Week 6 brought us lots of good times. We saw another shut out, we saw a stupid tie, tons of TD's from Joe Flacco and an impressive 4th quarter win by the Packers.
- The Bengals can win or lose with grace, but a tie? Sometimes kissing your sister is really going to piss you off. After a game the featured Vontaze Burfict apparently trying to injure Cam Newton after a tackle, CB Adam Jones (nee Pacman) called out his kicker for missing the game winning field goal at the end of OT. Yes, a 38 yard FG should be a sure thing for an NFL kicker, but mayyyybe you don't want to point fingers after you gave up 37 points to a team with no RB's and no WR's.
- Yes sir, those Cowboys look like they're for real this year. We'll see what the second half of the season has in store for them, but so far their ground game has pounded almost all comers into submission. The latest victim? None other than the reigning champs and their stellar defense. But do not worry, Demarco Murray has no fear. He tied Jim Brown's record of 6 games with 100 yards or more to start a season. Murray leads the league in almost every rushing stat and as we've said before, ride this wave as long as it will go! Keep giving Murray the ball, PLEASE!
- Jordan Reed has returned to the Redskins lineup. It's not always apparent who will succeed at TE in Washington (usually it's Reed), what is certain is that there's tons of production to be had at the tight end position in that offense. As long as one of them can stay healthy, they will be an excellent streaming or low end TE1 option the rest of the season.
- Victor Cruz is done for the season and this opens up the gates for Randle and Beckham Jr. to break out in a big way. The biggest issue with this is trying to figure out when the good Giants will show up. Maybe they just ran into a hot defense last night, but an offense that puts up exactly zero points is one to be wary of, for sure. Randle and Beckham Jr. should be a match-up dependent WR3 for the rest of the year (home games should be good, for example) with very high upside if one of them really develops quickly with Eli Manning.
- Kicking for Detroit has not been easy this season. The Lions are a measly 5 for 15 kicking field goals which includes an astonishing 2 for 12 from 40+ yards. Matt Prater may be the answer for their kicking woes, but he only went 1 for 3 outdoors in Minneapolis. Conditions will be optimum indoors in Detroit, of course, and the Lions are fully behind Prater as their guy. I'd view this game as nothing more than return jitters and he'll be a great fantasy option going forward.
- Joe Flacco went nuts in the first half of the game yesterday, throwing for 5 TD's in the first 16 minutes of the game. After that fifth touchdown pass, the Bucs win probability dropped to 0.0%. Flacco did not even attempt a pass in the 4th quarter. Now the 7th highest scoring QB, he's doing better than the likes of Matthew Stafford, Tony Romo and Cam Newton.
- Running backs continue to be one of the more volatile commodities. Only 19 RB's scored 10 or more points, among them such names as Theo Riddick, Antone Smith, Isaiah Crowell and Fozzy Whittaker. This just goes to show that maybe picking the big time WR's makes more sense, as they are much more likely to perform on a consistent basis. Just 7 of the top 25 RB's this week would have been considered high round picks this year.
- Wide Receivers are much more consistent, with 31 of them scoring in double digits. Only a few more, about 10 or so out of the top 25 are high draft picks. Maybe what all of this is showing is that while WR's might be more consistent, the best bet is to be playing the waiver wire as best you can. For example, a look at the top WR's in the drinkfive league shows that 10 of those WR's out of the top 25 are available on the waiver wire.
- Minnesota seems to be tipping in the favor of Jerick McKinnon already. This week, McKinnon had 17 touches and got 82 yards total. Matt Asiata, on the other hand, had had 2 carries for -5 yards and 1 rec for 18 yards. This is a huge departure from his 20 or so touches per game over the last 4 games. McKinnon is clearly the man going forward and it looks like his coaches are in agreement.
- Finally, a look at the Tight Ends. Only 7 TE's scored in the double digits, three of those being free agents in the drinkfive leage. At least one thing can be said about drafting TE's, 5 of the top 10 drafted TE's were in the top 10 this week (not including Jimmy Graham). Keep an eye out for Jordan Reed and Scott Chandler on the waiver wire going forward.