Week 2 Observations

Still annoyed

It didn’t have to be this way. I was set up for an epic week.

I had to choose between Marvin Harrison and Tank Dell at WR (I chose Harrison, thank God) and JK Dobbins and Brian Robinson at RB (I chose Dobbins), so my Primetime team was set up for a 200-point week with good days from Chris Godwin, the Chargers defense and enough from Jordan Mason and Jahmyr Gibbs. I just needed a good game from CJ Stroud and Stefon Diggs in the Sunday night game. Plus I was 1-2 ATS in the Circa contest, and I needed Houston to cover 6.5

Of course, Stroud had a modest game, Diggs did little and the Bears backdoored the 6.5 thanks to a roughing the passer penalty on 3rd-and-14 that kept the FG drive alive. What a dud of a game.

It’s not all bad, I still have 157.5 points with Dallas Goedert (sans AJ Brown) going. But it could have been so much better, and after two weeks, I’m almost drawing dead in Circa Millions (2-7), pending the Falcons tonight, as a result.

• It’s still early, but so far Garrett Wilson has not been worthy of a first-round pick. Everyone loved him with Aaron Rodgers, but a new QB and a player who had never put up first-round value before gave me pause. Obviously plenty of time to change this, but only six targets yesterday.

• I love that Braelon Allen vultured two TDs. Fantasy football is a zero-sum game, and if you don’t have Breece Hall, that’s a win. Of course, Hall did just fine, but it could have been a lot more.

• Tony Pollard was the alpha for the second straight game. Tyjae Spears got hurt, but Pollard had only three more snaps than in Week 1.

• The Giants loss was tragic. Not only did they lose three PATS after Graham Gano got hurt on the opening kickoff, but Malik Nabers dropped an easy fourth-down conversion that would have sealed the game.

• Nabers had 18 targets, and several were in the end zone. He played well overall, the game-losing drop notwithstanding. I know a bit of, “Otherwise, how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?” Watching him play reminds me (maybe in part because of the number?) of Ja’Marr Chase. Smooth and effortlessly explosive.

• Devin Singletary is the clear workhorse — he ran well, and the offensive line held up pretty well.

• Danny Dimes played okay too. No turnovers, only one sack, pretty good game management.

• Brian Robinson is a good, tough runner with a little wiggle for a big man. But Jayden Daniels gets his share of designed runs, and Austin Ekeler is in on passing downs and even gets some rushes.

• Daniels is slippery as a runner, a bit like Lamar Jackson. He’s still a work in progress as a passer though, maybe like rookie Lamar.

• I got a lot of bad information this preseason. You read something, you don’t know, so you believe it. For example, that the Saints had a terrible offensive line, and their offense would be bad rather than the most efficient by far in the NFL. (I was out on Alvin Kamara too, even felt a bit sorry for the dumb schmos drafting him in the third or fourth round!)

• The thing about Kamara is not just the monster start, but he passes the eye test too. He looks spry and fast out there.

• I wondered why Rashid Shaheed was getting drafted nine rounds after Chris Olave when they’re both about the same size and speed, and all Shaheed does is make huge plays. He did it again and even got three carries too.

• The Cowboys looked good in Cleveland, but got worked by the Saints. Ezekiel Elliott moved okay, but the production was poor. I still think Dalvin Cook could get a shot before long — he’s from the same class as Kamara, Joe Mixon and Aaron Jones.

• CeeDee Lamb produced early in the game, but was quiet in the second half. I remember he got off to a sluggish start last year too.

• Amon-Ra St. Brown got back into it with 19 targets, but left with a leg injury late in the game, and Jameson Williams saw 11. Sam LaPorta is getting almost no looks, not sure why.

• Godwin was the only Bucs player to do anything. Rachaad White was an inefficient runner last year, too, so maybe Bucky Irving gets more work.

• I have Anthony Richardson in two leagues — WTF was that? I was told this preseason Shane Steichen was a QB whisperer!

• Alec Pierce is a poor man’s Rashid Shaheed — makes more big plays than he should.

• The Packers receivers are unusable until Jordan Love comes back.

• Sam Darnold played great, zipping in a couple nice downfield throws in pressure spots. Of course, his numbers were inflated by a 97-yard TD pass to Justin Jefferson, but he put that on the money too, even if Jefferson made an amazing cut just after tracking down the ball to take it to the house. Jefferson had to leave the game with a bruised quad, but it doesn’t sound too serious.

• Ty Chandler outproduced Aaron Jones who fumbled on the goal line. Not sure there’s anything to make of that just yet.

• Jordan Mason is in an ideal situation, but he’s also a tough runner who gets extra yards. Odd that George Kittle left on a cart and then came back and played. If you leave on a cart you should be disqualified — have some dignity.

• I can’t believe people were *still* taking Christian McCaffrey 1.1 *after* he got hurt. I took him before it happened and should have known it was dumb, given his workload into the Super Bowl and age.

• Deebo Samuel made some awfully tough catches on high throws over the middle in traffic. Toughest receiver in the league.

• I lost on Seattle -3.5 vs at the Pats. Maybe I neglected to price in the travel distance and early body-clock game. Jacoby Brissett has gotten away with two weeks as mistake-free game manager, but it’s a hard way to win.

• I had Jaxon Smith-Njigba on my bench in the Primetime, but it was nice to see him go off. He had 16 targets, DK Metcalf 14 and Tyler Lockett only two.

• The Chargers are good. Unlike the Pats they can run and play defense with Justin Herbert able to make throws when he needs to. Not that he needed to against the 32nd-best team in the league.

• Dobbins had another big game, though Gus Edwards saw 18 carries to his 17. Dobbins’ ceiling hinges on getting more involved in the passing game, but gameflow has made that unecessary to date.

• Quentin Johnston caught two TDs and led the team in targets. Year 2 is when receivers break out, and while they usually need to show more than Johnston did as a rookie, the overall coaching is such a huge upgrade from the clueless, nerd-run prior regime.

• I don’t know what to say about the Panthers except avoid.

• I know the Browns have a good defense, but there’s something broken with the Jaguars. Maybe Trevor Lawrence is bad, maybe it’s the offensive line or the play calling. I’m not sure, but there’s no juice here and no consistency, and you’d expect there to be with Travis Etienne, Brian Thomas and Christian Kirk. (The late Evan Engram scratch probably didn’t help.)

• Deshaun Watson is basically Russell Wilson at this point give or take a massage.

• I was shocked to see they’re still (in fall of 2024!) running covid vaccine commercials during games. They have to know by now it’s unsafe, ineffective and that only the most credulous fools are still willing to poison themselves for no reason. I guess it’s like OJ finding the real killers in that if you really want to pretend you did nothing wrong you have to act like it works. The only person more ironically named than Andrew Luck is John Legend (the tool in the ads.)

• Part of why my ATS picks have been bad is I’ve been a nutless monkey about it. I liked Antonio Pierce as a coach and wanted to take the Raiders, but after his preposterous punt last week I started thinking maybe he was moron, and I had just imagined he was good because he wasn’t a stats nerd. But no, he can coach, and the Raiders typically show up.

• It’s crazy the biggest favorites in both Week 1 (Bengals) and 2 (Ravens) both lost. People will be splitting the Circa prize in Week 8.

• Speaking of which, it turns out the Mike Gesicki TD that was overturned in Week 1 was subsequently ruled a bad call by the NFL, i.e., it should have counted, and the next play where Tanner Hudson fumbled never should have happened. The Bengals lost 16-10, less than the margin of that TD, though to be fair they had many chances to come back in the second half anyway and still blew it. Just more salt in the wound — I won’t be petitioning for resurrection. (Nor will I make the joke that Aaron Hernandez could *resurrect* his career, or Henry Ruggs could have a breakout.)

• Brock Bowers is the TE1 now, correct?

• Isiah was unLikely to repeat Week 1, but three targets seems a bit light. Every offense seems like a slow-motion version of itself, no one (except the Saints and Cardinals) is really in sync.

• Marvin Harrison reminds me a bit of Randy Moss — super tall and lanky, looks like he’s not even moving because of his strides. He had two TDs early, but could have had a couple more, had Kyler Murray not missed him on some fades.

• James Conner will have a huge year if he stays reasonably healthy. He’s gashing defenses, and now the offense has a lot of weapons to set up light boxes and scoring opportunities.

• The Rams are cooked. Too many injuries. It’s funny because I was kicking myself last week for not taking Cooper Kupp over Harrison at 2.2, and now I’m awfully relieved I didn’t do that. Moreover, I would have taken Puka Nacua, but he went at 2.1. Now my big regret is taking Diggs over Nico Collins at 3.2, but I’ll probably have a different set of regrets next week.

• Justin Fields did just enough to keep the job. I’d like to see him against an offense that can score points, though.

• Jaylen Warren seems back to use usual role again, but the Steelers didn’t need to throw much.

• Courtland Sutton went from 12 targets to 4, and Jaleel McLaughin’s workload disappeared too. Bo Nix was just overmatched by the Steelers defense though.

• I still expect Ja’Marr Chase to go off despite the slow start. Joe Burrow is dink and dunking to scrubby tight ends, but at some point things will open up.

• Isiah Pacheco played well but now he’s apparently out indefinitely with a broken leg. Carson Steele and Samaje Perine are next in line, but I could see them trading for or signing someone too.

• Patrick Mahomes did just enough to get the win, but it wasn’t pretty. The only reason Travis Kelce is still startable with confidence is there are no other tight ends you could rely on anyway, so you might as well keep trotting his carcass out there. Xavier Worthy did very little in Week 2 also.

• Harrison Butker won the game on a 51-yard kick, but I was disappointed he didn’t get to attempt a 68-yarder at the end of the first half. The Chiefs were lining up for it, but with 24-seconds left they changed their minds and punted.

• The Chiefs could have punted on the final drive on 4th-and-16 with 48 seconds left and all three timeouts. They could have gotten the ball back with 25-odd seconds and only needed a FG to win it. But they elected to go for it and got the first down and into FG range on a PI penalty. Can’t commit the PI on that play no matter what.

• As disappointing as the offenses have been so far, the kicking has been insanely good. Everyone can drill a 55-yarder now. It’s like everyone’s Justin Tucker except Tucker.

• I don’t know how many of you watch the 40-minute version of games, but it’s annoying how many unimportant replays they fail to edit out of them. Like I don’t need to see a tackle for one-yard loss three times from every angle. The whole point of that version is to keep it moving. The other annoying thing is they always keep in the ref’s full penalty call. So someone jumps, announcer says “false start”, cut to ref making the circle motion with his arms, and that should be it, next play. No need to leave in the ref saying, “False start, number 62 offense, five yard penalty, still second down.”