Fantasy football strategy, rankings, and podcasts

The semifinals are here, congratulations to all of you that have made it past the first week of the playoffs and are looking towards this week's matchups as well as players to stow away for starts in the championship if you make it! Players to look for good performances in Week 15 include: Andrew Luck, Damien Williams, Kenny Golladay, and Adam Humphries. Pay attention to these rankings throughout the week, as they will continue to evolve based on the latest injury updates, news, and player/matchup analysis. Good luck in Week 15 and remember, you can tweet us @drinkfive with any of your lineup questions!

As we continue to take a look at trends and suffer through injuries, picking up valuable replacement/fill-in players to cover for bye weeks and long recovery times, it's important to strive for some consistency in fantasy scoring. Some of the guys I predict to have a successful week outside of the normal top group include: Andrew Luck, James White, Alfred Morris, John Brown, Corey Davis, Mike Williams, and Kyle Rudolph. Keep in mind also that Greg Olsen is coming back this week most likely. So scoop him up on your waiver wire if necessary. The Tight End position is very short on fantasy production this season. Good luck in Week 6 and remember, you can tweet us @drinkfive with any of your lineup questions!

Welcome to Statistically (in)Significant, the place to find great stats that probably only matter at the water cooler (or bar). Each week I'll dig through the stats of the week gone by and deliver you some choice conversation starters. All fantasy stats are standard Yahoo scoring, unless otherwise noted.

36 Fantasy Points, Week 10's Leader

This year's fantasy football juggernaut is perhaps as unexpected as anything in the NFL. Mitchell Trubisky (yes, he gets to be called by his full name) tops the Week 10 leader board with 36 points. For the sake of argument, let's assume that future HoF'er Nick Mullens keeps his total under 36 tonight. This is the second time this season that Trubisky is the highest points scorer in a week. He also achieved this back in week 4, when he set the high water mark for any player this season at 43.46 points. Trubisky is the only QB to lead the league in points in a given week twice this season. The QB group that led the league just once is Patrick Mahomes (Wk 7), Drew Brees (Wk 3), Ben Roethlisberger (Wk 2) and Ryan Fitzpatrick (Wk 1). That's pretty impressive company to beat, considering that a Bears quarterback and high fantasy ceiling have never been discussed together, ever. The only other player to lead the league in two different weeks in fantasy is James Conner, who did so in weeks 5 and 8.

249 Passing Yards

With just 249 passing yards on Sunday, Patrick Mahomes came one game short of tying Drew Brees' record for consecutive 300-yard passing games. Mahomes' streak ended at 8 games, but don't worry, he's still the league leader for passing yards and touchdowns and has a 9.0 touchdown percentage. His numbers were down this week against the Cardinals, but it didn't take a lot to beat them. His best stat from this game is that he did not throw an interception, which he had done in each of the last 5 weeks. Mahomes is still on track to throw over 5000 yards and could still get to 50 touchdowns at his current pace. This is perhaps the most impressive resume for MVP in a season with a few really top notch contenders. Mahomes will have a chance to separate himself if the Chiefs can beat the Rams this Monday in Mexico City - apparently the only good MNF matchup that we're allowed to have this season. I wonder how the crowd will react to the monstrosity that is the Booger-mobile. This is the last streak I was tracking in 2018, so let me know if there's something else out there I should be watching for.

501 Yards on Offense

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers accumulated a whopping 501 offensive yards against the Redskins on Sunday - a team that normally gives up just 324 yards per game. Given those stats, one would assume that Fitzmagic is back in full force - Ryan Fitzpatrick did have over 400 passing yards for the fourth time this year. Of course, we don't bring up stats like this because things went according to plan. The Bucs managed just 3 points, helped along the way by 4 turnovers (three of them to end long drives) and two missed field goals. Give credit, I guess, to the Washington Redskins, who are now 6-3 and are probably going to be hosting a playoff game. I don't even need to guess - just look at the remaining schedule for the Redskins, which features just two teams that have winning records. A final, weird note about the Redskins is that this team has not experienced a single lead change this year. They have either led all game or trailed after the first score, showing that this team is literally devoid of excitement.

21 TD in 6 Games

I'm willing to bet you haven't heard much about Andrew Luck's health since he attempted 121 passes in just 5 days back at the end of in weeks 4 and 5. There's a good reason, and it's that everything finally seems OK with @CaptAndrewLuck (that twitter feed is a must-follow). Andrew Luck has at least 3 TDs in the last 6 games and 21 total over that period of time. He's the 5th best QB over the last 4 weeks in fantasy and has the Colts on a 3-game winning streak. The Colts are just 4-5, but they have a good ground game, haven't given up a sack in the last 4 games and Luck is on track to throw for the most TDs in his career - all of them apparently going to tight ends. Also, nice game, Eric Ebron and your three TDs. Not a nice game, all of us who switched over to Jack Doyle once he returned from injury. The Colts could sneak into the AFC wildcard picture, or even the division picture, with two games against the Titans left to go.

50% More Offensive Touchdowns

The Bills can use this tag line when advertising their team for the rest of the season. They went into Sunday with just 8 offensive touchdowns in 9 games, and increased that total by 50% with an additional 4 against the Jets. Heck, they even added a bonus defensive TD to make it a lucky 13 on the season. This was just the second game this season that the Bills did not have a turnover - the other was their Week 3 shellacking of the Vikings. The Bills also put up 451 yards of offense - their previous high water mark was just 333 - a 35% improvement! The new and improved Matt Barkley led Buffalo Bills (please, please do not give us any more Nathan Peterman) will have a bye this week before playing the Jags in week 12 and oh who cares, it's the Bills and they still stink. This is more of an indictment on the Jets, who have multiple turnovers in 8 of 10 games this year and somehow managed to lose the two games where they did not turn the ball over.

Welcome to Statistically (in)Significant, the place to find great stats that probably only matter at the water cooler (or bar). Each week I'll dig through the stats of the week gone by and deliver you some choice conversation starters. All fantasy stats are standard Yahoo scoring, unless otherwise noted.

4 of the top 8 QBs - Owned in 34% of Leagues or Less

Week 13 was a rough one for fantasy footballers. The end of the fantasy regular season brought a ton of chaos at the QB position. Only half of the top 8 QBs are likely to be owned in your league. Josh Allen (2nd - 5% owned), Derek Carr (4th - 18% owned), Nick Mullens (6th - 7% owned) and Marcus Mariota (8th - 34% owned) all put up at least 22.5 points in standard leagues. We also saw three regular starters finish outside of the top 25 QBs. Drew Brees and Matt Ryan both had terrible statistical games and were led by Jared Goff who at least won his game on the way to his 9.08 points. With all of this inconsistency at the position, we must give props to Patrick Mahomes, who once again led the way with 33 points and threw for 4 TDs for the 7th time this year (now up to 41 on the season). If the Chiefs can avoid off-field distractions and hold off the red-hot Chargers, then Mahomes is definitely in line to win the league MVP in his first year as a starter.

3 of the top 5 WRs - Owned in 3% of Leagues or Less

Whaaaaaaa? Who are these mystery men that dominated week 13's stat sheets? Well, Dante Pettis led the way with 24.70 points and is owned in just 3% of leagues. Pettis is actually a decent waiver pickup this week, with 20 targets in the last 3 weeks he is definitely trending up. Outside of the Sunday night game, where Keenan Allen and Antonio Brown put on a show, finishing 2nd and 3rd in points this week, we're right back to the guys that are not on any teams. Zay Jones (20.70 pts - 1% owned) and Jaron Brown (18.70 pts - 0% owned) both had 67 receiving yards and 2 TDs, with Jones adding a 2pt conversion. Ultimately, 13 of the top 30 WRs this week are owned in 30% of leagues or less.  In a week where points were at a premium, there were sure a lot of touchdowns that made you say "That helps nobody!".

23% More Fantasy Points Than 2nd Place

Saquon Barkley is having a hell of a season. He's nearly to 1000 rushing yards, he's got over 600 receiving yards and has found the end zone a dozen times, but he's in a distant second this year behind Todd Gurley's 282.90 points at the RB position. Gurley is dominating his position in a very Mahomes-esque fashion. He has nearly doubled up the RB10 and has more than doubled up the RB12. Gurley has paid off as the consensus #1 draft pick before the season started, something that usually does not wind up happening. So far, he's racked up 1649 yards from scrimmage along with 19 touchdowns. He's still got 3 weeks to go for fantasy players, so good luck if you've in the playoffs with him. Gurley has topped 20 points in 9 out of 12 games this season. He's got a couple of tough matchups in weeks 14 and 15, but his week 16 matchup is a juicy one in Arizona, so once again he will be delivering some fantasy championships for Christmas.

3+ TDs in 8 Straight Games

Andrew Luck had  a great streak of games going, throwing 27 TDs in 8 games, but that was broken on Sunday by the confusing and sometimes-decent Jacksonville Jaguars defense. The Jags blanked the Colts, 6-0 in Cody Kessler's first start for the Jaguars since the official benching of Blake Bortles. Kessler is clearly not the answer at QB, based on the 6 whole points that the Jags were able to muster. But back to the Colts for a moment - their last shutout was in week 7 of last year - also to the Jaguars. Before that, the Colts hadn't been shutout in the regular season since week 13 of the 1993 season - that's right, I had to go all the way back to the Jeff George era. The Jaguars, on the other hand, have a lot of rebuilding to do - with 4 weak opponents on the remaining schedule, they will still struggle to get another win.

135 Rush Yards

Josh Allen has been cut loose and is running free over his last two opponents. Week 13, he put up 135 rushing yards on only 9 attempts, giving him 234 yards on 22 attempts over two games, good for 10.6 yards per attempt. Allen is now third in rushing yards for QBs and has only played 8 games, compared to 12 games for the two guys above him. Extrapolated for a full season, he would have over 580 yards by now, on pace for 778 in 16 games. That's 75% of what Tom Brady has on his entire career, and yes, fine, congrats on getting to 1000 rushing yards, the most meaningless stat of your life. To wrap up on Josh Allen, his 30.74 points in week 13 were second best among all players. He's got 57 points in the last two weeks and has cupcake matchups against the Jets and Lions the next two weeks, so he could wind up as the best streaming option for the first couple of weeks of the playoffs.