Week 5 Observations
What an ill-fated trip to Vegas that was. I got bounced from Circa Survivor Week 1, and after another 2-3 week ATS, I’ve yet to have a winning one through five weeks, am basically drawing dead in the Circa Millions and even for the second-quarter prize. And I can’t even complain about the bad beat with the Bengals +2.5 (even though that was a horrible beat) because my wins were the Cowboys +2.5 and the Jaguars -2.5, both of which were by a hair. My other losses were blow-outs — the Browns and the Raiders. When you’re picking well, you’re on the wrong side of coin flips and right side of the blowouts.
My Primetime team also got its first loss of the year, to a team missing its first three picks (AJ Brown, Davante Adams and Isaiah Pacheco)! He got 46 points from Lamar Jackson and had Chuba Hubbard, Isaiah Likely and the Texans kicker. My team was missing Jahmyr Gibbs, JK Dobbins and Dallas Goedert, and had Jordan Mason, Marvin Harrison and a bunch of mediocrities. It’s okay — just a down week, and, knock on wood, the team is still healthy and should bounce back.
Two of my three Beat Chris Liss teams are in first place now after massive weeks. One of them got 192 points despite little from Mason, Dalton Kincaid or Braelon Allen who I was forced to flex with DeVonta Smith on bye. That’s the Joe Burrow-Ja’Marr Chase team where I did something crazy and took a second QB (Burrow) in Round 10 because he was there, I had Chase, and I knew Anthony Richardson was low floor. It also has Drake London and a Younghoe.
The other one has 166 with Rashid Shaheed still to play, despite my benching Rhamondre Stevenson for Bucky Irving, Malik Nabers and Jaylen Waddle on the bench and Dobbins on bye.
The first BCL is in 12th place, and I’m enjoying it. Put all the bad picks (Christian McCaffrey, De’Von Achane, Sam LaPorta) on a sinking ship and let it go to the bottom of the ocean. It died so the others might live.
If the season ended today, I’d have three of four in the playoffs, have the most points in the Steak League and (pending Patrick Mahomes and Xavier Worthy) be in the top-3 in the RotoWire Dynasty League. Also in the Seslowsky Survivor pool, we took the Packers and faded the Seahawks this week, so we’re still alive. It’s only the Circa contests and that first BCL that are in shambles.
Justin Jefferson had a modest day because he kept drawing PI calls, some legit and some not so legit.
I had temporarily put in Dalton Schultz over Tyler Conklin in the Primetime earlier in the week, planning to consider changing it back, but I forgot about the early start, and it locked, costing me four points. It could have been a lot worse because Schultz had zero at the half. But I mention that just to say that my primary rooting interest in the game was for Conklin not to go crazy, and he almost did with a couple end zone targets.
I also wanted Braelon Allen to so something in my flex, but the Jets were snapping to shotgun (with Allen in the game) from 1st-and-goal from the 1!
The Jets lost the game on a Stephon Gilmore pick. Watching it live, I was like, “Why didn’t Mike Williams turn around?” And when I saw the replay, I was like, “Oh, because Gilmore was grabbing and shoving him the entire time.” After all the Jefferson largesse, that was a strange swallowing of the whistle.
Of course it did give Sam Darnold the revenge win, but he looked more like the old Darnold that game, as the Vikings got nothing done in the second half. The Aaron Jones injury hurt them too.
Garrett Wilson had a breakout of sorts, but it took him 22 targets to get 101 yards. The Jets only ran the ball 14 times all game.
Breece Hall is like Bijan Robinson — he’ll have his huge game at some point, but by then you’ll be out of contention.
I didn’t watch much of Bears-Panthers. It looks like Roschon Johnson is the goal-line back which hurts D’Andre Swift a little bit. And DJ Moore is the only startable receiver there.
Chuba Hubbard keeps producing. You have to wonder how much urgency there will be to get Jonathan Brooks involved when he comes back. It’s hard to see him displacing Hubbard entirely.
Andy Dalton might be better than Bryce Young, but he’s no Joe Flacco.
The Bengals-Ravens game was fun to watch but torture if you had the Bengals +2.5. The Bengals were up three, in field goal range with 2:23 left, and if they kick it, they go up six, locking in the cover even if the Ravens drive down for the game-winning score. But Burrow threw a pick! I was sure the Ravens would score a TD and beat me, but they settled for a FG to send it to overtime. In overtime, the Ravens got the ball, and I was positive they’re going to beat me with a TD, but Lamar Jackson fumbled the snap, and the Bengals have it in long FG range. But instead of trying to shorten the FG with a pass play from your QB who has 392 yards, five TDs and 10.1 YPA against a tired defense, they run it three times, settle for a 53-yarder and miss. They deserved to lose, and they deserved to lose the cover. And I deserve the Circa loss for betting on those nutless monkeys.
Ja’Marr Chase is so good. While Wilson is getting 101 yards on 22 targets, Chase has 195 on 12. Every time he touches the ball in space he’s got a chance to score. I have him in three leagues, a big reason why my fantasy teams are off to a good start.
Tee Higgins got his too, though in much more modest increments. He’s the perfect complement, a high-end No. 2.
Besides the fumble Lamar Jackson played out of his mind. He’s got the pocket-passing touch now too, and he evaded about 10 sure sacks. The Bengals defense actually played pretty well and still gave up 41 points.
Zay Flowers had a big game, but he’s just a guy. Solid, good hands, quick and reliable, but nothing special.
Mark Andews finally showed up and made an impact, but Charlie Kolar and Isaiah Likely outscored him. Andrews could easily be the TE1 ROS, but his floor is also the floor.
Derrick Henry had a modest game until the big OT run. He’s game-flow dependent, and the Ravens were losing for much of this one. (The Bengals also sold out to stop the run.)
I didn’t watch any of the Dolphins-Pats, but I did bench Stevenson because he briefly lost his starting role.
Jonnu Smith is a good player, and should have value if/when Tua comes back.
Jaylen Wright might be this year’s Achane if Achane is out for any length of time, and Tua’s return makes it a functional offense.
I bet the Browns because it was so contrarian it had to be right, but it was dead wrong. Deshaun Watson sucks, and there’s no way to massage it. Sometimes the market is just stupid because the “sharps” are too caught up in the indicators to see one team emerging and the other imploding entirely. The Indigenous Peoples seem to open huge holes in the run game, but maybe that’s because defenses are trying to account for Jayden Daniels.
Alec Pierce is the AFC’s Rashid Shaheed. All he does is make huge downfield plays. Why do they only give him three targets per game?
The only athlete with a more bizarre career trajectory than Flacco is Barry Bonds, and we all know why that happened. How do you go from being a quasi-scrub at your peak to a superstar in your late-30s?
I considered shares of Travis Etienne by the end of draft season but luckily never pulled the trigger. Tank Bigsby is at least a co-starter, and he looks good too.
Trevor Lawrence finally played a decent game. Brian Thomas looks like a budding star. It’s amazing he, Nabers and Daniels were all on the same college team. All three will be vying for offensive rookie of the year.
I stacked Texans in the Primetime, and I’m not thrilled with their style of play. The pace is glacial, they run the ball way too much despite having scrubby backs, and the offensive line commits too many penalties (though they were better this week.) They also are cowardly with the go-for-it/punting decisions which ends drives and shortens games. CJ Stroud is great, but his production is being hamstrung by the game plan.
Speaking of hamstrung, Nico Collins left after catching a long TD in the first half and didn’t come back. I took Stefon Diggs over Collins in the Primetime which looks like a mistake in part because I trusted Diggs to stay healthy more than Collins who’s been banged up a bunch in his short career. Tank Dell, who I took in the fourth round (solely for the stack), hasn’t left my bench.
The Broncos defense might actually be good.
Bo Nix played a clean game, but he’s spreading it aroudn so much, you can’t start anyone except Javonte Williams on this team.
Gardner Minshew played so poorly he got benched. The Raiders offense is a shitshow, but at least Brock Bowers got the 12 targets he deserved.
I didn’t trust little Kyren Williams to hold up with 22 carries per game, but he has so far, and he’s a scoring machine.
The Rams are amazing in that they can get passing game production out of anyone.
Jayden Reed is the Packers best receiver by far, but since I should have drafted him and didn’t, it was nice to see him get only six targets. I don’t know if Tucker Kraft is a thing, or if it was just because Christian Watson and Romeo Doubs were out.
Daniel Jones played his best game of the year without his star receiver. Nabers’ absence was good for the team as it got Darius Slayton and Theo Johnson more involved.
Tyrone Tracy is my second biggest regret (to Reed) this draft season. I saw a couple runs in the preseason, and I could tell he had it. Devin Singletary is just a guy, and Tracy is explosive and can catch passes. He’ll have a big role going forward even when Singletary returns.
One of my Bold Predictions was the Giants would have a top-10 fantasy defense, and I drafted (and dropped) them everywhere. Right now they’re tied for eighth pending the Monday night game. I picked up Dexter Lawrence (two sacks) in the Steak League because I noticed in the Seahawks-Lions game the Seahawks can’t pass protect to save their lives.
The announcers in this game were morons. The Giants were up three with with 1:50 left on third and long, Seahawks had two timeouts and they were criticizing them for trying to throw for the first down. “They should have run and forced the Seahawks to use their second time out.” Bitch, if they do that, then they’re definitely punting it back to Seattle who only needs a FG with 1:50 and one TO instead of two, i.e., time is not a serious issue for them. Don’t you think it’s worth trying to get the first down and win the game?
I loved the blocked FG TD to seal it. The TD itself made no difference, but just a triumphant way to knock fools out of Survivor and secure the win. Brian Daboll showing some 11-D chess “going” for two and kneeling on it to keep it a two score game and not give Seattle the infinitesimal chance to return it for a two-point play of its own and make it a one-score game.
I only watched the highlights of Dallas-Pittsburgh because the 40-minute version wasn’t available when I woke up, and that’s on them. It looked like I didn’t miss much. Remember last year too CeeDee Lamb took a while to get going before setting the league on fire.
Justin Fields doesn’t need to do much to hold off the carcass of Russell Wilson, but 4.9 YPA against a Cowboys team missing Dexter Lawrence and Micah Parsons is walking the line.