Week 8 was one of the worst injury weeks in recent memory. Even the return of Dez Bryant and Ben Roethlisberger couldn't soften the blow. Several big names went down in a set of noon games that seemed to have a new injury every 15 minutes. So, pardon my slight exaggeration as we get on with this week's casualty report.
Quarterbacks -
Josh McCown has been injured two weeks in a row. He hurt his shoulder week 7, and now his ribs in week 8. He left the game with a few minutes remaining, and now his status for week 9's Thursday night matchup with Cincinnati is up in the air. McCown has averaged 20 points/game over his last 6 games.
Ryan Fitzpatrick injured the thumb on his non-throwing hand and his status is currently day to day. Geno Smith inspired no confidence from the Jets, who were reportedly calling around for a QB before the game was even over. We'll know later on in the week if he'll be starting against the Jags Sunday.
Running Backs -
Le'Veon Bell has been placed on IR, and his torn MCL means that his season is done. He seemed to pick right up where he left off, so it's a shame that he goes down right as Big Ben comes back. He'll be back in full force next year, and for now, he makes Deangelo Williams the hottest waiver pick up this week.
Matt Forte exited Sunday's game against the Vikings, and of course, the Bears were very hush-hush about it. They did clue us in a little bit later on - Forte hurt his MCL, but doesn't need surgery and should only miss a couple weeks. Forte's absence makes Jeremy Langford possibly the second hottest waiver pickup this week.
Reggie Bush slipped on some concrete and tore his ACL, ending his season, and possibly his career. The 49ers are one of the biggest messes in recent memory, so whoever does wind up replacing Bush will have a really hard time being fantasy relevant. The only hope for fantasy value there is when Carlos Hyde returns.
Khiry Robinson wins the most painful injury of the week award - the worst award you can win on a weekly basis. A broken tibia will end his season, where from fantasy football's perspective, he was just vulturing TD's from Mark Ingram. The Saints will likely sign a third guy, but look for Ingram to monopolize the Saints backfield for now.
Wide Receivers -
Steve Smith Sr. is a guy who I've come to really admire as an NFL player. He's of the toughest players that I can remember watching, so seeing him be carried off the field with a towel covering his face was a little hard to watch. I don't want to see this be his last moment on an NFL field, and hope, like Jim Harbaugh, that he comes back next year. For the rest of 2015, Kamar Aiken will move up to the #1 WR spot in Baltimore. Aiken is still young, and won't be able to produce anywhere close to Smith's numbers.
Calvin Johnson suffered an ankle injury which was probably minor, but since it occurred in a blowout loss, he didn't return to the game. The Lions have the week off coming back from London, so we won't know a lot about Johnson until next week, but there's no reason to think he'll miss week 10.
Keenan Allen has an interesting injury track from the game Sunday. He left, reportedly with a shoulder injury, then it was called back spasms, but now the Chargers report that he is out indefinitely with a kidney injury. It's pretty safe to assume that he will miss week 9 and try to get back after the Chargers' week 10 bye.
Kendall Wright suffered a sprained MCL, which reportedly feels "horrible". Hey, it's nice to know that not everyone has a canned cliché response about an injury. Wright's absence from the lineup may finally lead the way to Dorial Green-Beckham getting some action week 9, when Marcus Mariota is expected to return.
John Brown is a savage, apparently. Go read his twitter if you're trying to figure that one out. Brown disappointed everyone who started him this week by pulling the rare move of being active, but not getting into the game. Clearly, his hamstrings are an issue, but he has a bye week to heal up and we'll know more about his week 10 status a week from now.
Tight Ends -
Larry Donnell was carted off the field in New Orleans, but his injury was just apparently a muscle spasm in his shoulder or neck, which is good news (relatively speaking). It's not clear if he'll be playing week 9 yet, we'll know more by Wednesday. Either way, he's not fantasy relevant for now.
Ladarius Green was in line to get a lot of work with a hobbled Antonio Gates, but then went down with his own injury in the first quarter. With Gates back on the field, the Chargers won't rush Green back, though they really are hurting with injuries this year. The Chargers play Monday night, which means we won't have an official injury report until Thursday night.
Garrett Celek left the game with a concussion, but is now the top tight end in San Francisco with Vernon Davis being traded to the Broncos. Celek won't be a TE-1, especially on this anemic offense.
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.
298 Yards from Scrimmage
Le'Veon Bell was the beast of all beasts this week, managing 298 yards from scrimmage and 3 TD's, putting up a ridiculous 47.80 points in standard leagues. This is particularly shocking in a week where only six players totaled over 20 fantasy points. Bell easily outscored the top two QB's and was just 5 points shy of beating the top THREE wide receivers. He had more yards from scrimmage that all but two QB's had passing yards. Hell, he had more yards than the entire team he was playing against. I could go on and on about Bell's big day.
27.14 Points per Game
Since I can, I will go on about Bell. He's now averaging over 27 points per game in his last 4 games, almost 5 points higher than second place - David Johnson. Johnson got his 13th game in a row of 100+ yards from scrimmage on Sunday in Miami. He ties Edgerrin James for the most consecutive games to start a season with at least 100 yards from scrimmage. Unfortunately for Johnson, it almost feels like his talents are wasted on a team that has been awful this season. No RB should have to suffer a QB that has -2.5 points late in the third quarter. That's not good for anyone.
1053 Rushing Yards
Le'Veon Bell is now 4th on the season for total rushing yards, despite having played only 10 games compared to everyone else's 12 or 13. He trails only Ezekiel Elliott in average yardage, who is at 107.1 yards per game. Elliott was exactly at his season average last night, but no more, continuing a mostly down fantasy week. He was also absent from the field for large parts of the 4th quarter, in favor of Lance Dunbar who managed a weak 3 receptions on 5 targets for 12 yards. The image of Romo and Elliott standing next to each other on the sideline during the final drive(s) will resonate in the heads of radio callers all week in Dallas, I suspect.
6.7 Receptions Per Game
If you have Le'Veon Bell in a PPR league (yes, yes more about Bell), then you are very smart indeed. Bell leads all RB's in catches per game, and leads all but three WR's at 6.7 catches per game. He has more receptions than all but one of the Detroit Lions (OK, so I'm reaching a bit for a transition), who managed another comeback victory. Matthew Stafford now has tied Manning (Eli, not Peyton) and Jake Delhomme for the most GWD's in one season. With three games left and the Lions completely unable to hold a lead in the fourth quarter, I'd wager that Stafford breaks this record.
38 Rushing Attempts
Rounding out this week's Le'Veon Bell stats is the ridiculous volume that he has in basically every game. his 42 total touches last week tied him for 17th all time in a single game (the record is 48, held by fellow fantasy god LaDainian Tomlinson). Speaking of former Chargers, tip of the hat to Nick Novak, who went 5/5 on FG's and scored 19 points, which would have been good for 7th among all offensive players. What does this have to do with Le'Veon Bell? Nothing, I just couldn't finish this article without a mention of a kicker.
Hello everyone! The playoffs are upon us and that doesn't mean that fantasy football has to end! Please see our rankings below for the entirety of the playoffs (rest of season). Antonio Brown and Le'Veon Bell top the overall rankings here, which only begs the question: how far will the Steelers get in the postseason? Interestingly enough, the next pair on the board is Julio Jones and Devonta Freeman, from the Atlanta Falcons.
Obviously, we here at drinkfive.com think highly of both Atlanta and Pittsburgh going into the Wild Card week. Tom Brady and the New England Defense sit on top of their respective categories, however - as you can never discount Bill Belichick and the Patriots. Although we don't rank any of the Dallas Cowboys as #1 at their position, it will be hard to beat the regular season darlings at home and we wouldn't shy away from using any of their superstar players in DFS or fantasy playoff leagues next week. Good luck!
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.
27 Fantasy Points
Greg Zuerlein was an offensive force to be reckoned with on Sunday. He's personally responsible for 23 of his team's 35 points after making 7 field goals and another 2 extra points. His 27 fantasy points make him the 8th highest scorer for the week. It was a hell of a week for kickers, with 7 of them scoring 15 or more points - all of them in the top 42 players of the week. Of these 7 kickers, only Stephen Gostkowski is owned in a significant number of leagues. Young GZ is next, owned in 38% of Yahoo leagues. Looks like there will be a lot of kicker swaps coming up this week.
5 Touchdowns
DeShaun Watson, the rookie QB who apparently couldn't start over Tom Savage week 1, tied a rookie record with 5 touchdowns. Four passing and one rushing TD from Watson lead the way for the Texans, as they scored a franchise record 57 points. Watson has had growing pains, throwing 3 INT's in the last 2 games, however he is clearly getting better with each game. Can we finally put to bed the thought that a bad veteran QB is a better option than putting a rookie or otherwise still-developing QB out there? Indy has figured this out, and it seems like Chicago might join the party this week and start Mitch Trubisky.
39 Touches
Le'Veon Bell looks like he's back to his old self, which is fitting since in the past couple of years he hasn't played until Week 4 anyways. Anyways, that's no way to talk about a guy who won me a couple of fantasy matches this week. Let's get back to the old tradition of gushing about him, shall we? Bell's 35 carries were the second highest in his career, as were the 39 touches. The 144 rush yards are tied for 6th highest total in his career in the regular season. His 30.6 total fantasy points are easily his highest total since we celebrated Le'Veon Bell Week last year.
1 Out of the Top 20
There is only one WR in the top 20 players, Jordy Nelson, and he didn't even play on Sunday. By contrast, there were 7 RB's in the top 20, and yes, we're counting Greg Zuerlein in the top players. Didn't you hear me earlier? This was a good week for RB's, but really it was a down week for higher end WR's. None of them reached 20 points this week in standard scoring, and a couple of the top 5 WR's, Devin Funchess and Will Fuller, both are owned in less than 32% of Yahoo leagues. That's definitely a waiver wire tip for you guys.
146.0 Passer Rating
Andy Dalton's week 4 quarterback rating lead the league, as he went 25 for 30 for 286 yards and 4 touchdowns, 0 interceptions. Since the Bengals got a new OC, Dalton's completion percentage is way up, his touchdowns are way up (from 0 to 6) and his INT's are way down (from 4 to 0). It's been a large swing for the Bengals this season, who can finally feel good after getting a very convincing win last week. In comparison, the team that intercepted Dalton on the way to getting a shutout in week 1, the Ravens - yes, the very same Ravens - have yet to recover from getting pantsed by the Jaguars in London just a week ago. The Ravens looked awful again against a Steelers team that has looked very good, but also lost to Mike Glennon, a guy who is about to get benched. Maybe the only consistent thing we can find in the AFC north is that the Browns are still 0-4. The Browns losing is like comfort food to unstable Ravens, Steelers and Bengals fans.