 Week eight was another one of a lot of weird stuff going on across it for NFL DFS. We had backup quarterbacks leading, winning drives, leading wins across the board with Mike White, Trevor Simeon, Cooper Rush, all getting victories for their teams. We saw some flops for weird reasons, I guess, talking about that Eagles versus Lions game, a lot of stuff to digest specifically around quarterback injuries and more. We'll let you know the key injuries to know what it means going forward and some role changes to note for your NFL DFS lineups. Welcome on into the heat check fantasy podcast powered by Numberfire. That's right here on the fan dual podcast network in Numberfire.com. My name is Jim Sonnis. I am a senior writer and analyst for Numberfire.com joined here as always by branding a doula. He is the managing editor for Numberfire.com brand and first of all, happy Halloween ish pastor all saints day. I guess now happy past Halloween to you. How was your Halloween? Uh, pretty uneventful from a Halloween perspective. Um, just dress up Benny in June. No, you don't, you don't dress up either of those cats. Um, no, especially not June. Benny wouldn't, Benny would kind of let you do it, but he wouldn't really like it about it now. Also not a whole dress up your pets kind of guy. Um, but no, I mean, for, for the actual day of Halloween, uh, just it was Sunday. So watching a lot of football and, you know, we live on a state road. So we don't get any trick or treaters or anything either. Okay. Well, that matters too. I guess, uh, I only had, we only won trick or treat her. It was our dog, uh, who refused to take candy. Good because it's toxic, uh, and wanted only hot dogs. So she was dressed as a hot dog as a result of, of her request for just hot dogs. Uh, as far as the football goes, I think to me, this late was a good reminder of why I value mistake erasers because I made mistakes on Sunday. I had a lot of Jalen Hertz and it's, that wasn't a mistake. It just, you know, I think that one, the process is fine. It just didn't go in my favor. Deandre says probably the same thing. I had like 62% Deandre Swift. And when you have that with a lot of Jalen Hertz, Devonte Smith, and you can still find a way to like be okay. That, that to me says that like I had guys, I chose guys who had the ability to make up for the fact that I made mistakes elsewhere. So I think to me, it was a good reminder of why we value ceiling so much. I want guys who can bail me out basically when I, when I do dumb things or how stuff go against me. You know, I don't think the dumb, I don't think that, uh, the Deandre Swift or Jalen Hertz plays were dumb. They just kind of went against me. So I think that's me as a good reminder of the value of identifying upside in order to erase mistakes you make elsewhere. What about for you? What was the key takeaway for you? Um, I mean, so this, this is probably a little bit more kind of like you're saying in a way where it's maybe a little bit more personal, um, as opposed to like an overall slate takeaway, which will have plenty of like injury related and usage related takeaways. But for me, um, the, like the Michael Pittman, AJ Brown stacks, um, very, very exposed to those. And it just reminded me because for, for the most part this year so far has been forgettable. I won't say it's been like awful, but it definitely hasn't been like good for me. Um, but whenever you actually have those guys in a substantial amount of your lineups and they hit, it's even then it's still not always going to work out because you're going to have Deandre Swift in those lineups. So I've been trying to narrow my core and just be okay. Being more exposed to guys week after week, and it doesn't always work out, but it's just a good reminder that if your goal is to hit it big in a tournament, you can't just be shuffling around, you know, 10 to 15 percent exposure, um, for your guys, because you're just the odds that you hit on seven, eight, nine of the, of the players in your lineup, it just goes down so much. So I felt pretty kind of vindicated with going hard at certain players, um, being very, very heavy with my core offer this week. Right. And I think the, the good thing with them is they made a lot of sense from a process perspective. You know, we want to target tight games. That was a tight game, high total stuff like that. And it did play out that way. So I think that that was, yeah, like you said, vindication is probably a pretty good word for it. It illustrated that like we're doing the right things, we just need to make sure things break in our favor. They happen to at times on Sunday, which is good. So hopefully we can carry that into week number nine. Okay. Let's dive in here to the week eight headlines. And the headline for this week is the quarterback injuries because there were a lot of them. The first one was on Thursday night and this one hopefully is pretty minor, but Kyler Murray sprained his ankle in that Thursday night loss to the Packers. Jake Lazar's called it a one to three week issue and that wording doesn't make me feel great, not a given the Kyler will play this week against the 49ers Deandra Hopkins in and out of the lineup, uh, consistently on Thursday with his hamstring injury. He ran just a total routes. So the problem here, Brandon, is like if Hopkins are going to miss time, but it opened up usage. But if Murray misses time, I think it torpedoes everyone regardless. So what's your view of this Cardinals team based on where the injuries stand right now? Yeah. So, um, the one to three week thing is it's not like day to day. It's like week to week. And I also saw a quote, I don't remember where exactly this came from, but, uh, it was basically like if it doesn't swell up, he should be able to play, but one of the reasons we love Kyler is that he can run the ball. He actually hasn't been running the ball, like from a yardage standpoint very much over his past, I want to say four games might be three games, but hasn't quite been there. He hasn't really needed it because the passing efficiency has been a big step up from what it was last year. But then again, like the reason you want to play Kyler at a premium and you're okay, you know, rostering him at an extremely high salaries, because he can give you 40 rushing yards and a touchdown as well and just kind of break open the slate. So if he's not 100% healthy, which if it's a one to three week issue, he can't really can't be 100% healthy. Right. Um, I'm going to have a hard time, uh, with, you know, featuring him heavily. Um, but you're right with the DeAndre hot, like it's a, it's a great situation for this team where you take DeAndre Hopkins off the field and we talk about those all the time. That hurts the offense because he makes this team more efficient, but they still have other options that I would trust. So, um, you know, if we still get Kyler without Nuke for, uh, week nine, she's week nine already, um, you know, that ideally the salaries for the other guys will still be a little bit lower. So I'd probably be kind of lighter on Kyler, but take advantage of any value that we might get. Yeah. I think we just keep an eye on Kyler. Um, I think that Nuke's probably going to play through because he was in there late in the game. I did see that he like wasn't supposed to be playing. Oh yeah. Yeah. Cliff was like, he was like, he was mad or something like that. Yeah. I saw that too. Um, yeah. I think that could be a good thing is like if they kind of get the minibuy with the Thursday night stuff. So hopefully that gets Kyler healthy. Um, but we'll keep an eye on that one because I think that one's kind of up in the air for right now. If you were to remove Deandre Hopkins for a bit, it would obviously like, I think like you said, we do care about losing high usage players because it does tend to lower efficiency. But when they're so deep as they are, I think it matters a bit less there. So we'll see how things play out there. But if Kyler can't go, that is a that is a killer for that entire team and games, it would kill games for opposing teams too. Sam Darnold accidentally with concussion sounds like they think he'll be able to play this week, but he wasn't playing well before that. PJ Walker came in with 737 left through just one pass attempt. Walker struggled and relieved for Darnold last week. Darnold hasn't been good, but how would you view the panthers of Darnold were to miss time? And again, it sounds like he's probably not going to miss any time here based on what they seem to think. Yeah. So, um, I'm just down on them and like in general, I played some we're going to talk about mistake erasers. I don't know. It's the opposite of an eraser is maybe like a sharpie. A mistake, I think. Yeah. But I mean, like, we Robbie Anderson was like written in Sharpie is like a yeah, he's yeah. So that hurt me this week. But this this offense anyway for me is just DJ Moore and his salary has been really high, which is fair for the role. But if you account for the offense and the efficiency, like, I think what this is this whole injury situation is good to talk about is just like DJ Moore kind of being almost unplayable for me at like a unless his salary drops down into like the low seven thousands. Right. How would you view more if Darnold's good to go because this offense is in a very good spot on Sunday and they still struggle quite a bit. I think we can cross off Robbie, that one like I had him to but the good thing is the targets he was getting are now gone, which is I think a blessing. So Robbie's gone. Where are you going to DJ more if we assume Darnold's good to go? So again, I'd say I'd play him in at a salary of in the low seven thousands and since I already said that I feel like I kind of named my salary, but name a salary for DJ Moore. They host the Patriots next week. That's not a fun game. DJ Moore is probably the only playable asset in that entire game. Yeah, maybe Hunter Henry if the salary is low enough and tight ends bad enough. But OK, so let me pull up usages here. So it's an 11 game main slate for some context. So it's a DGM or is that 30 percent still? It's not bad. I'd say seventy one seventy two. He's seventy one. So OK, that's fair. I think we can go there, but literally only one offs because there's no other way to get exposure to the Catherine might be back this week. That's yeah, I hadn't even thought about that. So with with Donald playing the way he has and we've discussed McCaffrey's positive impact on this offense, do you think McCaffrey's return would be enough to feel better about like not because we're on play, Donald, right? Would make you feel better about DJ Moore at that salary because I feel like it has to. It wouldn't make me feel worse. I know that because like he was getting targets when McCaffrey was healthy. He had eight and eleven targets in the two games. McCaffrey played the full game. So I think that he'd still be. I think, honestly, it'd be a wash, maybe a slight decrease in target share, but a bump in efficiency for the offense. Yeah. OK, I think I think that would be that would make him worth it and then for McCaffrey, if he goes. Depends on practice. OK, depends on practice. I need to see how far he's going. And I want to raise our national beat reporters thoughts on how hard he'll go. Yeah. But I mean, it does seem like whenever he does play, I think the one bad thing is that he's on I.R., which means they don't listen to practice supports. We're not going to know if he has a full practice Friday and that I do value that info. So that that's kind of a bummer for me. Let's move down to the Saints. Janice Winston got her in the second quarter and it sounds like it's probably going to be the full season. Trevor Simeon came in and put up 159 yards on 29 attempts, 0.05 passing net expected points per drop back with a 40 percent passing success rate, six yard eight dots. Diante Harris led with six targets from Simeon. Adam Tremont and Marquez Callaway had four. Alvin Camara had three. So I feel like we're going to plan around this offense with Simeon because Tayson Hill is still not back to practice in that concussion. James probably done for the year. I love touchdown Trevor because he went to Northwestern. I don't want to talk about his like efficiency. But like at least he's experienced. We've seen him be somewhat competent in the past. So what's your thoughts in the Saints offense? Basically just what's thoughts now of Camara under Trevor Simeon? Yeah, I was going to say it's just Camara. I will say that Fandall Sportsbook has these Saints. And like we know this knowledge now and I'm not saying the Falcons are a team to worry about, but they're still five and a half point home favorites against the Falcons next week. The total is forty three and a half, but that gives the Saints an implied team total of twenty four and a half. Yeah. So. That's not like complete cross off numbers for Camara in such a good spot. So I have I don't remember really if I. Has there been a week where we were really on Camara this season? I was on this week a little bit for like mostly. But like, yeah. But not like advertising him. I don't know. Yeah, because it feels like we haven't. I can't really remember a time where maybe like we had games like that team stinks for DFS. Yeah. But, you know, low total, tight ish spread. But, you know, definitely favored. They should be playing, you know, from ahead, have the more efficient offense. Is that enough where you think? So OK, let's talk specifically for this matchup next week. Home against the Falcons. Moderate home favorite. Name a salary for Alvin Camara that you think is appropriate. So he ran a couple fewer routes this week with Mark Ingram being there. I'm not saying it's a concern, but I got my attention. Like they could try to put in more in that like 20, 19 ish role, which is good. I mean, that's fine, because if he gets targets, I don't care. He's not really I don't like using for the carries using for the targets. He's still getting those. So I would say like eighty six hundred is fair for me. Yeah, I think he was eighty four this week. Yeah, I didn't really play him. So I'd say I wouldn't want to move it much. I'd stick at eighty four. Yeah, I think that that's probably about right. He is ninety four hundred dollars. Wow, OK. Didn't see that. That's pretty high for a backup quarterback. Again, all the respect to touchdown Trevor Longball, Simeon back in our collective conscience. But you know, that's pretty high. So he's he's scored. One, two, three straight games had two in one game. In games without touchdowns, which I know is like, but you always have to count for I want to know how many how many points they can get with no touchdowns. I do value that info. So yeah, 12 points against the Giants, 120 yards. That was when he got no targets. So in the game with Simeon and with Mark Angram, he had seventy six total yards that was with a really, really, really tough matchup. The Falcons are not that. So I would say if we're projecting yardage, he's probably going to wind up being in the hundred ish yard range, but I tend to want like one twenty to allocate ninety four hundred dollars or so. I can think of yardage in my like that's kind of what I am looking for up there is yardage. One twenty ish is kind of what I want for ninety four hundred dollars. And I don't think I quite get them there right now. I could probably with the matchup being. I think I'll use him. I just can't prioritize him. Yeah. And a week of prep. I would I would I'll say this. I would probably put him in the like core bucket like the the guys I would really consider if his salary was still eighty four hundred. Yeah. Ninety four hundred. Unless the main slate is a lot worse than I would think it is with eleven games. He's not going to be a priority. Like he's not he's not going to make it in the loves on Thursday show, most likely. And I think the the question is do you use him over like Devontae at nine thousand dollars? No. Like I'd rather Devontae against the cheese at nine thousand over Camara at ninety four. I think that's kind of the way I want to think about it there. So it's a downgrade. He's over salaried. But he's still a good good fantasy piece. But a bit over salaried for right now. Cooper Rush filled in for Deck Prescott last night looked pretty good through for three and twenty five yards and two touchdowns on 40 attempts. He had point one two passing that expected points per drop back, which is roughly a average. I'd expect that to start this upcoming week because sounds like he was pretty close, looked pretty good in warmups. They face Denver. But let's say apathetically, you know, they're like, OK, we'll be decently favored against Denver. Let's give that another week. How would you view this Cowboys offense under Cooper Rush? I mean, I liked what I saw overall. I wouldn't want to like forge ahead and say there's no downgrade, especially against the Denver defense that's solid. What's there? I didn't I didn't tend to log the bookmaker they're not doing that right now. Maybe they have a Codel up right now on Fandall Sportsbook, which makes sense, not knowing right or total or just play last night. They tend to post like the previous primetime games like mid like a mid afternoon or mid morning, plus with, you know, the uncertainty of quarterback. So, yeah, I mean, I would be curious as to know and we can find this out. But before I look like what the if we're going to get a potential Cooper Rush discount on CDLAM, Amari Cooper, Zeke, which I wouldn't expect that we get because of the probability that that plays. So it's going to be very dependent on this offense. I wouldn't like cross it off from a just a sheer offense standpoint, but given the match up, I wouldn't particularly love it. So I kind of need to see a decrease in salaries there. Would you feel the same? Yeah, if it were Rush. Yeah, I think so. I think like. It was encouraging, but like you don't project that going forward. It's not like the target or the targets here are hyper concert. I know that Amari had a really good usage last night, but like that's not the way they typically tend to play. So I wouldn't necessarily like expect that same concentration of usage to be in place once again in the next week. And I think that's kind of the key reason I would need a decrease to feel good about them there. And so and the lamb is seventy five hundred Amari salary sixty nine hundred, which are both very fair. Yeah, even with Cooper Rush, those are very fair numbers. Yeah, so. And I mean, well, we'll talk about the Broncos in more detail, but Gallup could be back this week. Is that good? Like we love Michael Gallup, but. A little bit. I have. I just have market share concerns with this team. So someone in the I'm changing the subject here because they have a new week week eight headliner. OK, Mr. Monte on YouTube said Derek Henry may have suffered a season ending injury and I pulled up NBC Sports Edge. Adam Schafer reports Derek Henry may have suffered a season ending foot injury in week eight against the Colts. He played throughout that game wasn't in an overtime that's wild that he may be done for the year. So let's talk about that now. Let's talk about the Titans here with no prep. Derek Henry, if we assume this is time, we talk about Christian McCaffrey, his impact on the offense. This offense is built around Derek Henry. The guys who will be filling in for him are Jeremy McNichols. Derek's the one on IRC is done for the year. So it'd be Jeremy McNichols, Kari Blossom game like their fullback might get some work and then whoever they decide to bring in as well. Trade deadlines Tuesday, so they may bring in someone else as well. But how would this impact Ryan Tannehill, A.J. Brown, if he's back Julio Jones, Derek Henry does wind up missing time. So lots of wrap my head around at 20 after nine in the morning because I you said he didn't play an overtime breath. I'm pretty sure he was out there at least what he did. He was out for the first snap. He came up in the second snap. Yeah. And got like stuffed on a carry, I think on the second play and overtime for them. I would probably have to say that and what we'll have to dig in to the efficiency numbers for sure and not just assume, but typically passing the balls more efficient, they're running the ball. The Titans are one of the teams where they still run the ball efficiently, but you just assume that the pass rate goes way up and that would just make A.J. Brown a very, very heavy core play until the salary gets exorbitant. Right. We would need Julio Jones to be healthier. I just this honestly feels like from a from a passing market share standpoint, this is going to make some sense, but it's going to feel like the the Packers where A.J. Brown just might get the thirty thirty five percent target share and nobody else really gets anything noteworthy. Again, the Packers have Aaron Jones and if the Titans don't have a Derek Henry, it would be a not the full comp. But from like a passing share standpoint, this team might just come down to like, can we stack Tana Hill and A.J. Brown this week? And if not, probably don't play them. I don't think I can use Ryan Tana Hill if Derek Henry is not in there, honestly, which may sound weird, but like so if you go to next gen stats, you can pull up on off stats. And these are fluky because like they don't account for situation. They don't account for the fact that, you know, Derek Henry may have been off the field in garbage time where the team wasn't trying to push. But if we look at these situations where Derek Henry is on the field this year, Ryan Tana Hill's completion percentage of our expectations is one point seven, but out of its minus one point zero, his EPA per dropback with Henry on his point one eight with him off its negative point one three. That is point three one difference with or without Derek Henry. The passing success rate is fifty five point two percent of them on forty one point eight percent with him off. So again, there are key context that's not included. There's key context that included in those numbers. But those numbers are terrifying and I feel like it's going to downgrade Tana Hill to the point where I can't use him because he was barely usable to begin with this year. Even if you bump up his his pass rate, like is it going to matter enough to nullify the loss and efficiency, which is why we use Ryan Tana to begin with. I agree that that AJ Brown would get a bump up, you know, that the efficiency may come down, but like the efficiency goes or the volume would go up because they probably passed more. And I think that that's that's going to make things really, really tough here. So I think to me it's a downgrade to everybody except for AJ Brown and it probably makes Ryan Tana Hill probably unusable. I think for DFS, which may sound weird, but I think that's that's the case. Yeah, I mean, if we consider Tana Hill and the usable bucket to begin with, I would say he's out of it, but he was only borderline anyway. I think this past week. Yeah. Yeah. And again, like this, it made sense. I guess a good question is let's say not knowing what happened this past week against the Colts, they play the Colts next week. Same exact game situation. Derek Henry's out. Are you considering Tana Hill? Probably not, no. OK. I would use it around a lot, but I wouldn't use Tana Hill, I don't think. I think it's I think of a downgrade for the for the offense, just with the way they operate. It definitely is. I know that, you know, like we're data driven people are supposed to like hate running backs, but like I can't like you watch him, you watch McCaffrey play like they make a difference and that's a downgrade for the offense. Now, let's talk about here about the backfield. You know, I think it's going to be tough to have a firm grasp on what to expect here. What I would expect is that Jeremy McNichols is probably going to play more snaps. And we've seen this year that they do covet McNichols from a from a passing game perspective. He played twenty three point five percent of the snaps in week number eight. He ran or played 16 total snaps McNichols as far as usage perspective didn't have any rush attempts from a passing perspective. He ran 10 routes, three targets, thirty three yards. He had a massive target game earlier on this year. So McNichols they're probably going to bring in someone else to be like the the passing game back. But we covet pass catchers in BFS. And I can tell you without a shadow of doubt that he will catch passes in this in this offense, the way it's currently constructed. He is if you go to player profiler, his best comp is Tevin Coleman, fast guy. Actually did get a lot of work at Boise State in college. So he's five nine two fourteen probably can handle early down work. So where are you at? I'm Jeremy McNichols based on what we know right now. So who did they play this week? The Rams, that game just came off. I was wondering about that game was locked. Yeah, I was pulling numbers. And I was like, I mean, Tannehill is not her. Why is that game locked? Yeah, that was why. Well, it's gone for me, which is why. Yeah, yeah. And I checked the bi-week list and they were on it. And I was very, very confused, but it makes sense. So that's what Sunday night. No, that's on the main slate. Pretty sure, isn't it? No, I think that's the Sunday night game. Oh, you're right. OK, so, I mean, again, I can still analyze it, but it's going to be different because this game's not on the main slate. We won't get like we'll get news by the time that that's the single game slate is posted. So we won't get McNichols at a screaming value. So I think maybe we just contextualize this into a main slate conversation where if that game was on the main slate and Jeremy McNichols was going to be Derek Henry's out. We don't necessarily know that McNichols is the starter, but we assume he is. The question becomes what kind of salary is fair for his role because you're usually a little bit more aggressive than I am whenever we get situations like this. So tell me what salary you would pay if this was on the main slate. So he hasn't gotten any. He's gotten no more than two Roger Thames the entire year. So I think we should, you know, maybe it's like a JD McKissick type role. And for that, it's like sixty three hundred dollars or so, I would say. Maybe I was going to say low sixes. But you were speaking pretty glowingly. And I feel like sometimes like a chubahubber for comes to mind, like you're a little bit more aggressive up in the seven plus. And I didn't know if that's where you would put him. So I think that's good context to have. No, I think early down work is up in the air. I think they're probably going to they might trade from Marlon Mack, honestly. Yeah, like, I don't know if they do an interdivision trade, but there's going to be a change there. But that sucks. That sucks to lose Derek Henry, like just as like a football fan. That is a massive bummer. Hopefully he wants to be OK, but that is a brutal one, for sure. Also, sucking is Calvin Ridley going to miss some time here. He's definitely from football for personal reasons. Just again, as a football fan, like that stinks as a human being. It stinks that that's the reason that he's taking time away because you hope that he's OK. Looking at the Falcons offense here in week eight without Ridley. Kyle Pitts led the team with 28 rounds run. Tajid Sharpe and Hayden Hearst ran 20. Cordero Patterson and Mike Davis ran 13. So they didn't look good with no Calvin Ridley. They talked to Kyle Pitts after the game and he said, yeah, I was seeing a lot of like double coverage effectively as a result. No, Calvin Ridley. We did see him go off in that London game when Ridley was out. So like it's not as if he can't interrupt. Patterson did the same thing because he used to be pretty concentrated. But how are you viewing this Titans offense if we assume that Ridley misses some time going forward? Yeah, down. Yeah. So I talked about Matt Ryan and his improvements against admittedly weak defenses, but he was on the ball downfield. Calvin Ridley is just one of the best downfield receivers in football, both from an efficiency and volume standpoint. They don't really have a whole lot who can replace him on that that field stretching component. Like, I know it's weird because he's their wide receiver one, but he's like a downfield guy, too. You take that off the field. This offense gets less efficient. They can't push the ball as easily. They don't really have anyone who can take attention away from Kyle Pitts. We saw Tajesh Sharp run a lot of routes. Like, I don't think Tajesh Sharp is really on the DFS like. Radar. Yeah. Just because we need guys who have that like either run after the catchability or the ability to get multiple downfield targets and convert on them. So. Maybe we see like Cordero Patterson get more and more involved like and stay just extremely involved as a past catcher. But I think this actually hurts Kyle Pitts from that from the standpoint that he was just talking about where like he's probably going to like he's really the only guy they got to take away from like a right because like immediate and downfield standpoint. Right. Because Russell Gage ran 20 routes, too, for this team. Didn't get any targets. He had a long touchdown, but like he's not a deep threat by any means. Almeday is a key. It's like can kind of run, I guess, but like I'm not really worried about him downfield. So it really is a situation where you should expect teams to game plan around Kyle Pitts. So if like if you're asking me what I rather have Kyle Pitts after what we saw last week with Calvin really being healthy or Calvin Ridley or Kyle Pitts without Calvin Ridley, I would prefer him with Calvin Ridley just because they saw he can get that good usage with Ridley there and get the freedom of coverage, too. So I would say it's a down group for the entire offense. What does this do for Patterson for you? Because we were warming to him. I used him a decent amount on Sunday. The his snap rate went down a bit again. But like he was still fine. So what would this do for you with no Ridley? So yeah, I have Patterson at 60 percent of the snaps for according to next chance stats and like Davis is 64 percent and I didn't see a lot of that game on Red Zone. So I'm sure they shared the field plenty if they both, you know, played over 60 percent of the snaps. I kind of liked whenever he was a little bit more guaranteed to get rushing work and an elite Red Zone role. But you take Calvin Ridley off the field, the Red Zone chances go down because they're not going to have as many drives to get them into the Red Zone, which is this is probably like, again, if you're still new to like NFL DFS, maybe you're transitioning from season long or you play like NBA and you're now getting back like you're trying NFL just in, you know, in the meantime, it's a perfect example of how injuries don't necessarily generate value. Right. Like injuries kind of only generate value at running back. Honestly, everything else is kind of a downgrade. Yeah, there are some times where it's wide receiver can help. But like it's pretty minimal because we don't always with a Calvin Ridley type guy, never like that doesn't help. That's not an upgrade. And I think that that's not the consensus view, I would say. I think that we tend to deviate in that sense, but worse games are worse. Like that's that's what I would say. So I think that's tough for him with Patterson. You know, he did have the lone Red Zone chance on Sunday, which goes to your point of they won't get there as often, because it only had one play. It was a target for Patterson. He scored. So I still feel like he'll play a lot in the Red Zone. He'll probably get some more targets, which is good. He's still running back eligible, getting wide receiver and running back users. So I still think that's valuable. I would keep his salary around 73. I think that's probably about where he should be. What about you? I'd say probably seven because we see we see some like some question marks emerge in the upper six. Is it running back? I feel like maybe that's a little bit more, okay, more appropriate. He's seven thousand on the button. So I think that's about right. Not a prime target, but also not a cross-off. So overall downgrade for this team with no, with no Ridley. What about pits where he put in for a solid perspective? Oh, that's got to go down to he was 68. He led this late in salary. He's not going to drop a lot lower than like 65, which we thought he was a little bit under salaried at 68. So I'd say probably 65, 66. He's 66. I think that's about right. I'd agree. Like Mike Kosicki was getting a lot of usage with not the best efficiency to think it's kind of what we should expect out of pits and he was 62. So I think that's, you know, 66 about right. I think that's because the difference there is pits is going to be their wide receiver one. That's actually Kosicki still dealing with two other. Well, it was one at the time. I was basically off of no Parker. Yeah. So James Robinson loves to that. Sorry, didn't mean to cut you off. Go ahead. No, I just mean like the Falcons implied team total next week is 19 points. Seems about right. Yeah, bad game. James Robinson left an ankle injury after just eight snaps. So Carlos Hyde popped up and played 66 percent of the snaps. He had nine of 11 running back carries. He also had eight targets, which is, you know, pretty interesting. So that's interesting. How are you viewing Carlos Hyde if James Robinson is this time? And what does this do for your view of the rest of the Jaguars? So there's always like a team, like a bad team that I target in DFS. I thought this was going to be the team for me this year, where it's like, well, they'll they'll just try to let like Trevor Lawrence do some stuff. And they have Marvin Jones and like DJ Chark at the time and LaVisca. But I don't feel confident in any of these Jaguars. I will note, and this is something I'm going to talk to about later, but they've been thrown the ball at a higher rate. They're they've been top five the past two games. In non garbage time, pass rate, which was up from like a mid season at this point, like mid season, they were just basically right on the ball. So I kind of want to get there, but I really can't. And I'm definitely not going to play Carlos Hyde in DFS. So they face the Bills next week. So definitely not, but that's really rough from a select. They're throwing more, but they're throwing it to weird dudes. Like they threw 12 times to Jamal Agnew. Dan Arnold had 10 targets. Agnew turned his 12 targets into, I think, like 38 yards. Dan Arnold's not getting a lot of yardage. You know, I think the biggest takeaway for me is like, I have no incentive to use Livis Kishinal, they're Marvin Jones. I'm not really inclined to chase Jamal Agnew or Dan Arnold. What about you? Maybe Arnold, I guess he's a tight end, but. Yeah, that's the that's the thing is like, OK, so they they're playing the Bills, they're at home, they're still 14 point underdogs. I mean, so what I have that as the implied team totals are thirty one point two five to seventeen point two five there. The Jaguars are easily the lowest implied team total on the main slate for next week. So what I meant by there's always a team that I kind of go to. I was I was hoping that like, hey, 14 points. They're going to have to throw. They've been throwing. It's Marvin Jones week, like just he's going to see 12 targets. And we know Marvin Jones, they're not doing that with Marvin Jones. They're doing it with Jamal Agnew. And they're not doing it with Livis Kishinal. They're doing with Dan Arnold. So like you can't touch a running back as a 14 point underdogs. So like, no, there's nothing here. No, it's bad. Just just avoid the Jags outside of maybe Daniel, but not against the Bills. Another sad one, just a sad podcast. Robert Tonion Tours ACL on Thursday night. We saw a lot of absence from the Packers passcatchers on Thursday. So it's hard to get firm takeaways because Devonte might be back. Alan Lazard should be and it's hard to get a firm read on this. But they're facing the Chiefs next week. So how was Robert Tonion's injury impacting your view of the Packers? If we assume that Devonte and Marquez Valdez scantling are back. Yeah, I mean, this I mentioned it with the Titans, like this team is just Devonte and then there's not enough else for DFS relevance on a main slate. Now, the caveat is that they play the Chiefs next week. I'm going to take more chances on someone like a Vada scantling for sure. But I'm probably not going to get to the point where I play like heavy Randall Cobb, even in this game. So I think it's probably just a downgrade. Robert Tonion hasn't been like doing a ton or a ton. I should buy this. But I mean, like maybe I'm too low on the on the secondary guys, but it really doesn't feel like this. It doesn't matter what happens with this team. Nobody's really guaranteed for anything above 15% aside from Devonte. Right. So I think that like it's kind of a neutral move. Like it may give some additional targets to like Cobb, but like it's not enough to make him relevant. So I'd agree with that one there. Probably not using Mercedes Lewis or side to Guara. So I think I'd agree. Damian Williams left early for the Chicago Bears with a knee injury. Khalil Herbert also left, but came back pretty quickly. He 23 carries for 72 yards, two targets on 21 routes. He played 84% of the snaps. Like Herbert, we had questions about whether or not he'd be like the guy until the Montgomery got back as Williams in his time due to being in the Covid list. So it seems like now we're just getting confirmation that Khalil Herbert is going to be, like I said, the guy. They're not the main slate next week. They're facing the Pittsburgh Steelers on Monday night. So no bears in the main slate. But so this kind of locks in Herbert's the way we had viewed him heading into last week, correct? Yeah, 27 adjusted opportunities, which is carries plus double your targets. That's a really good role. I kind of make like the cutoff 25 where I consider like that's a really, really strong role and like something that I would be willing to bank on four red zone carries to 80% there. You know, Justin Fields did start to run a lot. Like he looks phenomenal running the ball. So like that's a bit of a concern, but I never get that worried about rushing quarterbacks until I see them just take every goal on chance. Yeah, I think there are no concerns there. I still will talk about the offense in general later on. I think there are lingering concerns there, but, you know, it's encouraging if you played well. I think that Herbert we should project and to be just kind of like the guy in figure what that's worth given the offense and its expectations. What? So they play Monday night. Seventeen point implied total. Forty and a half point total. That's we get some like, can we have Ben and field switch teams and give Ben to like chase or give Justin Fields, like Chase Claypool and Deontay Johnson and Najee Harris? Can we just have him swap? Do we want like, OK, maybe. He's better than Ben. Don't know. Yes. OK. But is Justin Fields helping his. Like, is Justin Fields not I'm not sure if it's a Justin Fields problem or if it's an offensive being too conservative problem, which could be because of him, like maybe they don't trust him. We know it's chicken to the egg. Well, that or like the past catchers alone is. Would Justin Fields support fantasy relevant receivers? If they let him throw as much as they let Ben throw. That's why I want the body swap. Let's just do the body swap. Don't tell them they body swaps like don't like them. Hey, it's still Ben, still this veteran, but then also. Oh, wow, he's got a rocket. I don't think I can pinpoint two quarterback rushes that stand out more to me from yesterday of Ben trying to run in a two point conversion and Justin Fields with his like a miraculous rushing touchdown. That's why I want the body. I don't just don't tell anyone like let's not tell anybody. Just see how I imagine Ben notice. Imagine current day Ben making that Justin Fields play. I can. It'd be very easy. I think it's realistic. I'm not sure why this is a talking boy. It seems it seems very realistic to me. Jalen Rager left with an ankle injury for the Eagles. We didn't get to see how this would play out because the Eagles didn't have to throw because they just throttled the Lions. Rager was getting a couple targets per game. And I think that's like narrowing the targetry any here. You know, you got the Zacher, it's trade. You've got the Rager injury. That's probably a positive for Dallas Goddard and Devonte Smith because when they get ahead, they want to run and we know that for sure. So I feel like to me like if I can feel better about Goddard and Devonte, I'll take it, but it's so hard to feel super secure about this offense given the way they the multiple paths of failure they have now. What do you think it is with this Eagles team here? Yeah, I mean, it helps. This is one that I noticed this injury and I was like, is it even like is it relevant enough to discuss? But I think the real takeaway is taking anyone off the field here at least helps because we want to play Dallas Goddard or at least I do. I want to play Devonte Smith. Yeah. So reducing even two to four targets can go a long way from like a market share standpoint. Goddard had seven targets. He's had a good role without Zacher. It's I feel strong there. But this this is kind of a three player team. And it's really like two if you give, well, Goddard's more than a half, I think, at tight end, because tight ends pretty rough. So I think it's about a two and a half player team with Hertz, Goddard and Smith. What? Why is there implied total 24 points against the Chargers? What should it be? Twenty two, twenty one, twenty one and a half. We put up like a thousand points against the against the lines. Lions, yes. That's weird. Let's actually just loop the running backs into here, too, since we're talking about the Eagles, if we must. So with Miles Sanders out, the Eagles used a full on committee. Boston Scott got mostly early work before that game got out of hand. He had a 44 percent snap rate, 12 carries, one target. You have three red zone carries. Kenneth Gainwell played almost exclusively garbage time. You had 12 carries, seven red zone carries. It didn't matter. He he was an afterthought. Jordan Howard got seven red zone carries with a 24 percent snap rate. So I think it's really Scott and Howard for right now. I don't think Gainwell is even in the picture at this point. But I feel like I don't want to target either of them anyway. What about you? Yeah, I think you said game on seven red zone carries. You meant. Oh, yeah, I mean, yeah, he had two. Yeah, which Howard had seven. Yeah, I think the only thing standing in the way of Kenneth Gainwell from being like super fancy relevant is having Miles Sanders back on there. We're getting Nick Siriani, Thanos snapped. I think that's the other potential route like that could be a thing. I don't know if there's like a, you know, a Thanos event happening at any point in the near future, but like that might help him too. I don't know. So yeah. So you here are some things I think we can say with confidence. You and I both loved this game as like a secondary option behind Colts Titans. It wound up being almost a primary for me. Yeah, it was pretty close. So we like this game a lot, but even with Gainwell ostensibly taking over a much bigger role. We weren't quite there with him from a value standpoint. We liked a few others more than him, specifically Eli Mitchell. Yeah, this isn't like a victory lap thing, but it's always important to remember that you're not guaranteed that a running back in a situation where there is an opening will take that role or a bigger role. You don't always know how it's going to work. And so unless a team is literally telling us that they're going to do it or has shown us that this guy like, hey, he's been playing 40, 45 percent of the snaps consistently. It only makes like if Aaron Jones were to get hurt, we pretty much know that A.J. Dillon was going to take over a huge role. Right. You don't. You got to like be a little bit cautious sometimes with these situations. So we talked about that on Monday, too. Like, hey, Jordan Howard's probably going to get called up and probably get go line carries. And he did. So yeah, they're a cross off. Rob Gronkowski left earlier back spasms. In week eight, we saw only Chris Godwin and Mike Evans run at least six pit of the team's routes. They were at 93 percent or higher. Cameron Bright ran 57 percent. He had four targets and a red zone targets. Tyler Johnson and 59 percent of the team's routes had six targets there. Antonio Brown was on crutches last week. So seems like he's probably going to miss at least week number nine as well. Let's say we get the Buccaneers without Gronk without Antonio Brown once again for what would effectively be the third game this year. They are on by. So I was going to set up the match up. They don't have a match up. But, you know, what's your view of this offense? If we go down the target tree a bit? Yeah, I mean, the I think the thing is, like, we know Evans and Godwin are in play. It's are we with are we high enough on Breit and Johnson that they would be playable? I don't Tyler Johnson yesterday because he was four nine hundred dollars in access to a game I liked. And there are no value receivers. Did I feel like that was good process? No, it was fine, but it wasn't good process. Like the results were OK, but it was not good process. Yeah, so probably still just the, you know, Evans and Godwin. Also, I didn't look at because I ended up not playing a whole lot of Leonard Fournette. He had a. Caustic, I guess, near fumble that got overturned. Yeah, he was back in the next drive. I was looking for that, too, because I was kind of worried, because I love homecoming Lenny was his name this past week. He's still in a fine role, so I have no concerns yet. 60 percent snap rate, 48 percent route rate, five targets. Same role. Yeah. So no change for you at all? No. OK, good to go. They think they trust him. So I think we're all set there. Let's talk about some role changes here. Talk about Michael Carter taking over the Jets backfield. He played a 71 percent of the snaps, even Ty Johnson being healthy for this game. I was skeptical about buying into Carter because his big usage came when Johnson was being checked for a concussion last week. This week, Johnson was there. Carter in 15 carries and 14 targets because Mike White loves him a check down. So where are we at with Michael Carter right now? Assuming he will be like the the lead back for this Jets team. So I run simulations and Michael Carter kept popping up as like and kind of like the best value back. And I was like, no, I'm not doing it. And I'm kicking myself a little bit, but I think that was OK. Yeah, I do, too. Now, I'll jump ahead to a note that I have in philosophy changes. The Jets were the eighth fastest team so far in week eight. If you exclude garbage time, which I consider plays where your pre-sap win probability was below 20 percent or above 80 percent. Since they're by, we have two games there. They've been 10th and eighth prior to that. They hadn't been top 20 in pace. So this could be a little bit of a thing to monitor because the Jets, while not a team stacked with options, they could help games be a little bit more fantasy viable. And I was looking for like the Jaguars this season is like maybe a potential. Run back situation. If we can get a sort of a value running back with the potential to get I'll say potential to get double digit targets, but more realistically, six, seven, eight targets and play a majority of the snaps, even in a bad offense that can be enough to bring it back sometimes. So I think with the pace increase and with the role being what it is, even considering they're always going to have low offensive expectations, I'm like, not I'm definitely not low on Michael Carter. I think I'm not low either, but I wouldn't be shocked if I'm lower than others because people love Michael Carter and it's hard for me to get super jazzed about someone on a team like that. So I think that's that's kind of the hang up that I have is I think people are going to like him a lot and because he's a value back, et cetera, et cetera. He's not the main slate this week, but I think that an appropriate salary for him, if he were on the main slate, it'd be like sixty seven or so. I don't know, that might be too high, honestly, but no, I think that's. It's realistic because it's such a good, such a good role that you can't really explain away too much of it. So, yeah. So they they're what, the Thursday game? Yeah, against the Colts. That'll be a fun one to break down. Also, they did post the Rams Titans line. It is seven and a half points in favor of the Rams. If I put in a downgrade for Derek Henry in my numbers, I've got a nine point two in favor of the Rams. So that's not enough where I'm like leaping to bed it because there's a lot of variance in like putting in that number and trying to guess what their efficiency will be without him. But like, I think seven and a half might be light in terms of the spread for that game with no Henry. So that kind of illustrates the downgrade I'm seeing with no Derek Henry. Antonio Gibson didn't officially suffer an injury, but weird usage. He actually practiced more this week than he did previously, but his role was awful. Jared Patterson actually carried him 11 to eight. And it wasn't like a late game thing because Patterson actually led in first half carries six to five. Antonio Gibson, I'm sorry, Jamie McKesson still had the third down roll. So we can just cross off this backfield and never consider Antonio Gibson again until things change. Correct? Yeah. OK. Dolphins, Devante Parker came back in he and Jalen Waddle. Absolutely dominated the targets for this team. Waddle had 12 targets, Parker at 11. Mike Gasicki had just four. Waddle had two deep targets while Parker and Gasicki had one each. Waddle also had three red zone targets. So Waddle had a lot of targets and a lot of high leverage targets. He didn't do a lot with it, though. They think he had 38 total yards, didn't do much with it. Whereas Parker was productive. He had a really bad drop, which made me shout things at my TV. But I think that, like, we can feel good about Parker and Waddle in this offense, given the target shares that I'd expect them to get. So where are you at on Devante Parker, Jalen Waddle and Mike Gasicki right now? You know, Waddle had 29 yards and 12 targets. Not great. Not great. Whereas Parker at 85. Yeah, if you weight the targets, which I do, for downfield work and red zone work, I have Waddle getting the equivalent of 15.3 targets in terms of expected fantasy points. Parker at 11.8, Gasicki at 5.4. I am totally fine having Waddle as the sort of the one, the one A from a workload standpoint. But you do want to make sure that that production is there. So I would probably have a lot of coin flip situations. I do have Parker, though, despite the discrepancy in weighted targets. My expected fantasy points model includes things like catchable targets. So maybe that had something to do with Waddle's inefficiency, too. I have Parker rating out a little bit better there. So either way, one A, one B situation, probably going to be a spot where if I like both, I will kind of have to hope that their salaries are similar and duplicate lineups and just play the same lineup with the other guy. Yeah. So what kind of salaries are you thinking for these receivers right now? I would say 63 is for both, probably. OK, so I feel better about Parker at 63 than Waddle at 63 personally. Waddle 61. Parker 62. So, yeah, I think it's totally viable, especially against the Texans. If we get Rod Taylor back, that's not that's not a terrible game. And Cook 68, man, that's a lot. I was going to say, if we get like the double low, six thousand, like Cook's Parker, Cook's Waddle, like many stacks, that that would open up so much. But unfortunately, we don't get that. Go Dolphins, baby. What about Kosiki? Oh, he's in the salary for Kosiki. I saw it. I saw it, too. He's 65. That's that's high. Even the tight end. That's high. That's what I'd say. Yeah, like I if I were to stack that game, I'd include him in the game stacks, but like my realistic in the stack that game, probably not. So, you know, and just, you know, and just while we're here, Miles Gaskin, 60 percent snap rate, 20 adjusted opportunities. I want to like it, but I don't think there's quite enough there. I think the issue is that in that game against Houston, we could like they could run more, which would mean more Siobhan Ahmed, because he's more of like the early down guy. He's not like the early down guy, but like that's where he's going to eat into Gaskin's workload more versus the passing game. So I'd have trouble being super high on Gaskin. I'd expect him to probably catch some popularity this week. I don't know if that's necessarily the wisest thing. He'll probably be adored by the the like per dollar optimizers. Yeah, I will say this, though. I wouldn't cross him off yet. No, I wouldn't cross him off. But so the salary scroll will be really telling. I think you're running back. I agree. Zach Moss ran twenty two routes compared to Devon Singletary's eight in that same game. Moss had seven targets. A single Terry had one entering the week. They were about even in routes run and games. They both played, but Moss separating there. Moss actually has four targets and now three straight games. And like we saw this in the playoff game last year, too, before he broke his leg. He was getting a lot of passing game work. And I think that if you want a back in this backfield to become DFS relevant, that's what you want. You know, you get that passing game work and Zach Moss. I think this is entering the game, but he had played 75 percent of the team snaps inside the red zone over the previous four games. So Moss potentially pulling away a bit as the 1A. He set a season high and just opportunities with 22, which is not a good number. But like in this offense, it carries a bit more weight. He gets red zone work. He had four out of ten chances inside the red zone this past week. Name that side for Zach Moss against the Jaguars. This is really tough because I'm going to have a lot of prior biases against Zach Moss, and I got to adjust for the off. So it's like a it's like a fine role, but in a great offense. So it almost feels like I was trying to value like Clyde Edwards, you layer where there are Edwards, you layer like historically, not this year would be Dara Williams, but the receiving at least is a little bit. This one could range, but I would probably say like 67. I think I would think it's 65, honestly. We're about on the same page. He's 6,000 though, like so passing game role in that red zone role. I might write down Zach Moss. Yeah, we do. We can't get we can't forget that they're 14 point. Favorites, yeah, which. For a lot of people, it's like the checklist of a running back. Yeah, but they're so going to throw the ball a ton. Right. But I think that's that's I trust this team more in a positive script than most, I think the bucks and the bills of the two teams that trust the most in a hyper positive script. Yes, but you still want they can throw the targets. You want a closer game. Yeah, you're right. You're right. So it took me a couple of we're right. I still like it, though. I like it, but I will say this whenever you told me that I wasn't my first instinct wasn't like, let's lock them in and yours wasn't. You said you might write them down. So like, I think for a lot of people, hope like people don't like Zach Moss. They don't like to use him. I don't think that's my people do seem to like devil. No, people like he's in the bills, the bills backfield at all. Like it's like, oh, they don't run. Who cares? And I'm like, I don't care if they run. They can pass the entire game if they want. Um, so yeah, I'll say this, though. If we took out that bias of people don't really like this backfield, I feel like they'll still catch them popular like Moss will catch the popularity. Potentially. Yeah, I think that's OK. They're paths of failure, definite paths of failure. I mean, didn't do much this week, even. But do we have any like written down? I did write down Moss's name, but it's not in pen. It's it's in digital ink, but like, so even with all these injuries, like, no, maybe it's just because I haven't written like. I mean, there's a lot of uncertainty still. That's probably why I guess. Yeah, and a lot of the injuries are not the main slate. Like the McNichols one's not in the main slate. Herbert's not in the main slate. So I think that's probably the main catalyst here in the quarterback injury has hurt everyone. So let's move now to the 49ers. Brandon Ayuk, maybe like peeking out of the doghouse. He actually led the team and routes run at 26. He had seven targets for 45 yards. He had a downfield target and a red zone target in the three games since his role improved and George Kittle has missed. He has a 78 percent route rate, 15 percent target share. So like it's it's like getting better. The problem is Kittle is probably back now. It's sound I think that he's due to be back this week. This upcoming week, I believe I could be wrong on that. But where are you at? And Brandon Ayuk for right now? Oh, that's AKA Debo Samuel's little brother. Yeah, we can talk to you, so I think Kittle is eligible to be back this week. Yeah, I hope so. I love Kittle. Hey, Coach, Kyle Shanahan said Wednesday that he expects Kittle to return for week nine against the Cardinals. OK, so I was even going to say, regardless of this, I'm it's not enough for me to go to Ayuk because it seems like he's on he's on the razor's edge of relevance and just going back to being being completely not relevant. So I'm not there with with Ayuk. I think we could probably talk. We could probably talk Mitchell, Debo and Kittle. Yeah, I think Mitchell is exactly what we thought he was, which is good. I mean, I thought that he was he was fine. He again, wasn't getting a lot of work in the passing game, but he got all the early downwork. And like in this offense, it's pretty valuable because like, I don't know, you can tell what a team wants to do when they can. And it seems like they want to run the ball with Elijah, with Eli Mitchell. I think that's pretty valuable. So I would say with status quo for him, I would say sixty five hundred dollars in appropriate salary for Mitchell. Debo is the best receiver on the planet. He's breaking Jerry Rice's team records. He's at one hundred and fifty yard three times this year, which is weird, isn't getting downfield work. So it's weird how he can get that far. This whole thing originated from my saying that even with the downfield work, he gets a lot of like those bunny targets and it makes his a dot not as good as it could be. So it makes his ceiling really hard to project because I use total air yards as a range of outcome. That's part of my range of outcome simulations. So while Debo gets downfield work, he got three downfield targets and his a dot was shy of ten yards this week. Both of those can be he can get downfield work and he can get a lot of targets that we typically don't value a ton. Now, Debo is he showed us he's capable of taking a negative four air yards target eighty three yards almost to the house. I get that he can do that, but it just feels a little bit weird that we like those targets for him, but not a lot of other players. Well, it's different because if they're only getting those targets, it's one thing if they're getting those targets as supplements to other work, I'll take it. Yes, that's the difference. And I agree with you with Debo, but all I'm saying is like he's a nightmare to project from a ceiling standpoint. That's fine. Yeah, which is that's the. Yeah, anyway, I think the LSU guy right now like, OK. OK, forgot. Yeah. There was like this clip of LSU like radio hosts like yelling at each other. They kind of agree to each other. Yeah. Anyway, name that side of Eli Mitchell. I mean, he's still got so they play the Cardinals, right? Yeah. I mean, let's they're two and a half point underdogs. Yeah, they're at home, which helps. So we know that they'll probably still run the ball plenty, even if they're trailing a bit. But if that game gets a little bit out of hand, then we got to worry because Mitchell know targets the past two games, despite, I guess, twenty seven total routes over the game this week. Yeah. Yeah, 13 this week, 14 last week, 18 carries both games. They're a positive failure there if that game gets out of hand. So I need to keep that in mind. I would probably say like I couldn't go much higher than sixty five. That's what I think, too. But I think sixty five is right and he is seventy one hundred dollars. Ah, how dare you? Like I get like I get it. I do, too. I simultaneously don't think that's a bad salary. And but also probably will be light on him for next week. So last week I was talking about how, OK, Eli Mitchell is Damian Harris, if he were favored and on a if he were favored and at a lower salary. But now Eli Mitchell is at the higher salary and an underdog, whereas Damian Harris is. Are they favored? Yeah, they're three point favorites that flipped real fast. So do I now have to like Damian Harris and hate Eli Mitchell? Do I have to betray my son, who was so good to me this past week? Do I have to like, you know, in the back like this? I don't think you have to hate him if we like this game to stack because he's still going to be part of if that game is going to score points, like he's going to be relevant to some degree. The only way that he's not relevant is if you say the Cardinals are going to floor them from the get go. And Eli Mitchell is going to run his 12, 13 routes and not see a target. Kiddles back to so probably makes it even harder for him to increase his efficiency. Sure, but not that he's getting targets anyway, but you'd think he gets even fewer. Would you rather Damian Harris against the Panthers or Eli Mitchell against the Cardinals? Assuming Kyler plays. Well, what's Harris's salary? Sixty six. Well, let's just say no salary. No, OK, he's straight up. Boy, that's tough. Yeah, because I don't like Damian Harris from a DFS standpoint, but he just jogs out there in the red zone. And I feel terrified that he's just going to walk in a touchdown. So I'd probably lean Harris by like a tinge. I would do. And I'm also not a Harris guy. His red zone role this week is actually the best that's been all year. He had nine out of 17 opportunities there, whereas he had not been above 50 percent the entire year previously set 100 plus yards, three separate times. You know, I think it's Harris over Mitchell in a vacuum, but you give him to me at $500 discount. I'll take it for sure. I just I might get there either. But I think that like it illustrates to me that Eli Mitchell's over salary now. He is. I just I don't like to play any running backs who play 50 percent of snaps, which is what Harris gets. Yeah. And is not a receiving back. It just feels like the wrong process. Yeah. So we'll see. But I think I prefer more Mitchell right now. Nick Chubb played 55 percent of the brown snaps in their first game with no with no cream hunt with Chubb, which says that like it's still going to be a split backfield. Chubb had 16 carries and a target Baker Mayfield wasn't great. I think he's fine if you just amount of curve for the matchup in the shoulder injury. But like, you know, that doesn't really matter for DFS. We can't really grade him on a curve. We had to do it straight up. Negative point to passing that expected points per drop back. The lone bright spot here was a Jarvis Landry had 10 targets. Three of those were downfield. That was the first game with Jarvis O'Dell and Baker all playing. So Jarvis had good usage. Name that sign for Nick Chubb right now. And are you willing to use Jarvis Landry? So Nick Chubb, I mean, you and I, I would say, always are. Under what is actual size, Nick Chubb or Eli Mitchell? Give me one. I mean, 50. So Harris played 53 percent of the snaps, Chubb played 55 percent. Like they each get one or zero targets per game. Like Chubb is and I know people like who watch film say this, but I also kind of know enough like I watch enough football to say like, Nick Chubb seems like he's one of the three best running backs in football. But yeah, he's awesome. He's a great runner. So like that part's different with Harris. Roll wise, not a whole lot is different. Offense wise, like I think Baker is at times a very capable quarterback, but also at times not. So a salary for Nick Chubb. So they are underdogs to the Bengals next week. I feel like he'll still be like 76, but I would put him in like the 71 bucket. I would agree. We put him there as well. He's 76. So, you know, whatever. Like they'll just never make Nick Chubb like 71, I don't think. I mean, like I get why, but like, yeah, I still have to use them. Jerry Judy returned, played a full complement of snaps. Super spread out targets here, though. So nobody had fewer than three targets and nobody had more than four. There were seven guys all got even three or four targets. That's stupid. So this passing offense is not good right now. They're spreading out targets. I like Jerry Judy and Coral and Sutton from a talent perspective. The environment they're in right now ain't great. Where are you feeling about this? Denver Brog is passing offense right now. I liked Judy this week. He was one of my loves. Did not work out. I love Coral and Sutton as a player. Did not work out. I was actually going to say, hey, they're playing the cow because we were talking about the Cowboys and TV lamb and a Mario Cooper and I accidentally pulled up just that game and looked at receivers. So I saw Coral and Sutton and Jerry Judy. I saw Judy's fifty eight hundred. Sutton's salary is sixty seven hundred. So like. So if we get DAC, that puts them in a negative script. They're indoors. They're against an aggressive defense that can make mistakes. Trayvon Diggs, we have banged up at the end of the game last night, too. So like, I think I could use Judy at fifty eight, but I would I like write him down and feel great about it? No. Like, and I should like they should. Like he should have a better. We should get more targets than than what he got, you think? But I don't know. Long run, he will, but like it's still not a guarantee. So I'll say this. I don't feel good about Coral and Sutton to play him at sixty seven hundred in those stacks. I would play Jerry Judy in those stacks, though, at least. Where do you rank Judy at fifty eight relative to other receivers in the five thousand ranges past weeks? I feel like he'd be better than all those options that we had this past week in the five thousand range. He would. That's why he would see six thousand. That's why I just named him as a love. Right. But yeah, like the the Robbie Anderson's not in this is any hindsight bias. I didn't like him enough to to like make him a love. Van Jefferson was down there. I can't remember. Is it kind of a blackout of memory week at value receiver? So I would still say Judy number one. And if if. Yeah, so if if this week is anything like receiver value, which we'll find out in a second, Judy is going to still stand out there. I'd agree. So let's go to situations to monitor. What else stood out to you from a user's perspective this week? I don't have a ton. A lot of what I would have noted was a little bit more significant. And I have some pace numbers. But Pat Fremuth, because we're always looking for tight ends, led the Steelers with seven targets without Eric Ibron. Tommy Sweeney, 29 routes for targets for the bills. So still kind of relevant there. I want to keep an eye on the jets because of the some of the things you talked about and Denzel Mims led the team with 40 routes, had just three targets for 30 yards, but I like him as a prospect a lot. So I want to keep an eye there. He also dropped a touchdown. So like could have been solid and you give me a lead receiver at least on a team that is going to they're always going to have to throw. And if they're throwing the ball now, that's kind of I feel like he's I'm just I feel like once Corey Davis is back, he's done, though. Sure, like he doesn't play special teams. They don't make him active. And I think that'd be tough. Is Davis going to be back? I don't know, maybe, maybe not. So that's a situation to monitor. And thankfully they play Thursday and not on the main slate. And then Rondo Moore, 71 percent of the Cardinals routes with D hop banged up. So probably the most noteworthy of the sort of minor thing about you. Yeah, I think that the Hopkins or the the more one is interesting if we get no Hopkins this week. I think it's nowhere that Jonathan Taylor snapper was a season high, 78 percent. He has set a new season high in snap rate in three straight games. The yardage upside is always high. His red zone role is disgusting. The one question that we've had historically has been snappering, whether he stays out there in the negative script. The negative script one is still there. That's still an unknown because I don't know where he'd be there. It may be Nike behinds, but the snap rate not as much of a question. So I do want to ask you about this and where you had a Jonathan Taylor with a snap rate increasing higher. Taylor is one of the few backs who is like historically a bane of mine just because doesn't quite fit the process and you're almost banking on the team to get into the red zone, which they're going to do like every team gets virtually every team gets into the red zone. And we know that once they're there, they're going to use Taylor. But you're kind of banking on some bigger plays from a guy who doesn't play a whole bunch of snaps doesn't necessarily factor in always as a as a receiving threat, but who can take a few targets and take them to the house. So I'm a lot higher on Jonathan Taylor. And I kind of want to make that context clear because historically I've been a little bit low on Taylor. Yeah, I feel like he's got one of the best workloads in football now. So I've really changed my perception on him. Agreed. The Rams. We've got three games now with either little or no to Sean Jackson. And in those games, Cooper Cup has 32 percent of the overall targets, 36 percent deep and 35 percent in the red zone. He's stupid. But the other guys are more know where they are. Robert Woods at 23 percent in those games, Van Jefferson, 15 percent. Tyler Higby, 13 percent. So that could make you say, hey, it's just it's just Robert Woods. But Jefferson actually is tied with Cup for the team lead in deep targets in those games. He's at 36 percent. So we're going to rank Robert Woods above Van Jefferson. But I think that the deep work combined with Matthew Stafford's efficiency and with how good this team is right now makes Van Jefferson very, very, very, very, very playable in DFS, even on larger slates. Do you agree with that sentiment? Yeah, I had some sprinkles of him this week. There was enough there. This was encouraging. He did get a little bit dinged up. Yeah, he still ran almost every route. Yeah, yeah, I have to monitor like his health. But, you know, if he's good to go, absolutely. They're on the main slate, so I don't have salaries. But I would still rank Woods above Jefferson, but assuming a similar salary gap as to what they have. I'd put Jefferson over Woods like at salary. Let's use the good player. Tyler Lockett finally got work with Geno Smith. He had 13 targets out of 22 targeted throws. We look at the three games of Geno starting. Lockett is a 7.7 targets per game with 2.3 deep. DK Metcalf is at six targets per game with one deep. I don't want to analyze this one too much. I almost said analysis. That's not a word. I don't want to analyze it too much because it's not like Russ is back next week. But just worth noting that Lockett's getting more targets. We can talk more about that if if Geno winds up starting once again. X there and Y. So it doesn't matter. That's nice. Let's talk about philosophical changes here. I had one I want to note that was the Bears. Thought of change. It's noteworthy that it was a lack of a change because Justin Fields made that sick of a play on Sunday, but the offense is still crazy conservative. They had nine passes and only down to the first half compared to 18 rushes. So it was encouraging for Fields to see him play well. But I would not view this passing offense as being desirable yet just because they're still very run heavy. So not going there yet. What did you take note of here? Some some pace stuff. The 49ers ranked third this week in non garbage time seconds per play. This is their first top 10 week of the season. It's up from an average of 25th or the past three games. So if they would if they were to play faster, that would be very, very appealing to me. Again, you know, it's one week and I don't really think one week is enough. But space, especially if you adjust for things generally pretty stable week to week, you don't see a whole lot of like huge shifts. So it was at least noteworthy that they played so fast this week. The Jets, I talked about this already. The eighth fastest team so far through week eight games. And in two post buy games, they've been top 10 in pace and were really slow before that. They also were the most past heavy team in non garbage time situations this week. Not a whole lot of downfield work or any. I think you said he didn't my quite didn't have a single downfield target. We threw it 14 times Michael Carter in like eight to tie Johnson. Yeah, so. But, you know, if they're going to play faster, this might be a team that we can at least look to for some weird bringbacks. And the Panthers ranked ninth in pace. It was their second straight top 10 week after ranking 27th on average from weeks two through six. So, you know, these teams that are not. Primarily noteworthy if they're going to play faster, that helps the games be better. So I at least want to target the Jets and Panthers and keep like monitor their pace over the next week or so. Yeah, that can boost under it can boost. You know, guys who might otherwise be underwhelming to be viable for sure. And so, yeah, the Panthers are going to play the Patriots who just they play fast and they throw the ball a ton. That game is going to rate out pretty well for me. And I'm probably going to like overlook it like I kind of overlook the Chargers and Patriots because the Patriots just don't have a whole lot there. So it's probably going to be a good game. But I don't know if there's enough like concentration and usage for that game, for that to matter. Damian Chubb, let's go to the Salary scroll here and start off a quarterback shout out with anything that you see. Again, what we do here is we go to the salaries, go position by position, scroll and then shout out things that we see. I see Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jaxon 85 and 82 or 83. Those are really good numbers for guys that good. Yeah, so Mahomes that good. Sorry. Yeah, Mahomes, I guess short week against the Packers who will have a extra prep time, which you don't love. Yeah, that's the kind of thing I'll notice on a Monday and then forget about by Sunday or Thursday. And then Lamar playing the Vikings coming off of a buy for Lamar. So I like that. I would say Kyler at 82 if he's like kind of full and it's not that bad of an injury. Yeah, that would be super relevant. Yeah. Justin Herbert has had two bad games. They came against the Ravens and the Patriots, two of the best like defensive scheme teams in the league. Philadelphia Eagles will not be accused of having a great defensive scheme. I could see a situation where Herbert really resurges in a hurry in that game. In a herbie. It's bad. It's real bad. Jason Hill, 7000, if he's able to get cleared and comes back. Not a whole lot. Jumping out touchdown Trevor, 7000. What happened here? That's a mistake, right? I mean, what did that happen? It's rough whenever Baker Mayfield is at 6600. And lower than touchdown Trevor. Yeah, I think the standouts to me are Lamar, Mahomes and Herbert. Those are the ones that got my attention. Yeah, because that's it's Vikings, Ravens for Lamar and Packers chiefs for Mahomes. Both those really good games for stacking. Yeah, Gardner, Menchu's got like a mullet going on in his fandal photo. So do you think Aaron Rodgers at 8100? He's playable. I'll stack that game a lot. So, yeah, for sure. OK, so my takeaway from quarterback is we're probably going to have to allocate salary this week. Correct, because to Tyreek, to Kelsey, maybe. Well, allocate salary to quarterback because, you know, we have Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson, potentially Kyler Murray, Aaron Rodgers, Jalen Hertz, Justin Herbert. Odds are some of those guys are going to go off. So, yeah, building around a value quarterback is banking on a lot of those players just busting, which tough, something I would have done years ago, but probably not now. Tough bet. Let's go to running back again. Camara really high at 94. I think that's I also think Echler is kind of high at 9000. His role is better this past week, though. But Aaron Jones, I think. 85, we're going to love that game. It's coming off 11 targets, but that's a bit inflated with all their absences. So I'm going to have some nightmares about Aaron Jones FOMO. Depending on Saquon's practice status, he's $7500 facing the Raiders. I would need to get a full practice by Friday and to feel good about him. But like, you know, that's noteworthy, I think. Yeah, I would say that, too. Damian Harris is a lot better player than a lot of guys in his salary range. OK, so this past week, we talked a lot about backs in the 7000 range. This week, we probably won't. We have one nobody above 76. Like, so, no, in between 76 and 79. So we have one, two, three, four, five, six. Seven backs even in that range, which is not that many. And I don't know anyone other than Saquon, I would love. Yeah. Devonte Booker, 63 is Saquon, can't go, but he's such a jag. So we're kind of looking so far at needing salary at quarterback and potentially at running back. I do think Damian Harris plays as a value option, which I don't typically say. I think that Zach Moss works at 6000. Oh, this is like, I think Miles Gaskin at this point gets bumped up because not a whole lot. What's his salary? 61. OK, that's a little high. It is. But I mean, we're not going to love a lot of 7000 backs. Yeah. Who in the 6000 range? Aside from Harris, do you see yourself playing? Zach Moss is 6000. I'll play him. So I meant, like. So we got two guys there. Yeah. And one's the very, very low end of that. So I think by default, Gaskin's going to get some eyes for me. Yeah. OK, that's fair. Not in on either the Arizona guys. So out of there, not in on Jordan Howard. Boston Scott is 63. I don't see enough there to get super jazzed about him. Yeah, I think it's it's pretty tough. Running back is kind of bad. It's kind of bad, indeed. Khmer is over salaried. Echler is a little bit over salaried. Downs fine. But all's fine matchup. Aaron Jones is over salaried, I think, to me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's tough. It's tough one for sure. Nixon at 74 can be OK. Yeah, I saw that one. I can live with that. He might end up being like a love for me this week. Would not be shocked. Let's go to wide receiver. What do you see in there? OK, so the best wide receiver in 49ers franchise history is 8000. Yeah, we got three. We got three guys above eight at or above 8000 debos, 8000 Tyreek Hill, 8500 and Davante, 9000. So assuming Davante is good to go. The Davante Tyreek stack is going to be really hard to get to. But boy, it should probably be pretty different targets. It should. And it should like your prep. Most people are going to get to one of them. Yeah, I want both. I think both of the pretty sick. So like that increases the allure of Gaskin. It increases the allure of Harris. It increases the allure of Zach Moss. Yeah, I think the I would say the highest average receiver, specifically those two, Tyreek and Davante are a higher priority for me than the highest average running backs as of right now. Do you agree? I do. And we'll have to look a little bit more wide receiver now. But it's possible to receive a reflex week. Yep, I agree. I think that's very on the table. OK, scrolling down a bit more here. Big Mike Williams is 73. Not bad for his usage in the fact that again, he's facing a weird defense that. It's kind of strange. I do I do it. Yeah, I like to DJ more salaries down. Yeah. Bring a cook spot. Oh, that's that's the ghost revenge game, though. Same genre against Belichick defense. So hard to avoid actually might be PJ Walker, who knows? OK, Manny's still 65. Yeah, he didn't catch any balls, but like Josh Allen overthrew him on one where he got open behind the defense. Floating that out there. We'll let that center a little bit. Davante is 62 again. I think that's fine. I think Parker and Waddle in the 6,000 range are relevant. But other than that, like I could talk myself into Jarvis Landry 59, given the volume. Can we just stick in the 6,000 range again real quick? Sure. It's Parker Waddle at the very low end of that, and nobody else seems like they would be someone I would like build around, aside from maybe Amari. Yeah, I think I'd put Amari in the bucket too. So we're looking at a week where it like not a whole lot in the 6,000 stars and scrubs that receiver, I think is what it'll be. But are there are there going to be any, you know, scrubs? We'll find out here in the 5,000. The market share band at Jerry Judy is $5,800. Jarvis, so Jarvis and Judy. Judy. Kaderious Tony 57, depending on. I'm a right to Al and Al. Oh, no. What? Oh, no. No, OK, I talk myself out of it. I'm not going to say it. I talk myself out of it. Pretend it never happened. Pretend it never happened. Was it Kendrick Bourne? Nope, absolutely not. Absolutely not. Is your guy. He's not. It was it was very much not my guy who I considered mentioning in the salary scroll and did not. I almost mentioned Hunter Renfrow 56. I decided against it. I thought it might have been him. OBJ is 55, and that's like not even. Yeah, I'm not tempted. Miko Harvins, 54. Rashad Bateman, 54. Oh, we found one. We found one. We found one. Yay. Wait, wait, wait. Are you like not as high on Kaderious Tony? I know we got to see him play tonight, but. Oh, yeah, I'm fine with him. What is he? 57. Oh, that's fine. Yeah, I think he. Assuming like they basically came out and said like, yeah, once you got hurt, like we didn't have to do because he was like, he's going to be our offense. OK, so Kaderious Tony and Rashad Bateman. I think Rashad Bateman. Rhonda Moore, 53. So if Hopkins were. Yeah, to miss. Marquez Valdescan is 53, which makes the game stacks easier because you can offset the Mahomes Tyreek salaries a bit. I'd rather get to Devante, obviously, but like that helps. Oh, 12 targets from all Agnes. It's. Yeah, like Zacchaeus is not going to tempt me. Nope. The two games. No, really, he has 20 and 12 yards. Michael Gallup is 5,000 if he were to come back and play. Dang. Hmm. Hmm. He was at practice this week. So that's good. I mean, we do get a lot of value with the with the Packers receivers. They're they're salaried as if everyone's coming back. Yeah. So like Equinomy of St. Brown, 49, Joanne Winfrey. I think it's just Marquez Valdescan link. But I'm saying like, yeah, they're they're down there in case like someone can't return. Yeah, no, you're right. You're right. I think that the two right downs for me were Tony and Bateman. Tony Bateman and then conditionals on Rondale and V.S. and Gallup, I would say, agreed. Titan, you ready? Yeah. OK. So we get all the big guys back. The big boys. And Darren Waller, too. Rude, rude. Seeing those guys being back and seeing pits against New Orleans, I think that's enough for how I'm OK. Missing on a pitch this week. Yeah, probably crossoff pits. Crossoff, Kosiki, for sure. Kosiki. Goddard would still be in play. Six thousand. He comes. Yeah. He's not like I thought they were by this week. No, they're not. OK. No, never. I don't know. I keep forgetting his up by. Zachary, it's 55. He has five and four targets his first two games, but good yardage upside, which is weird for Zachary. I don't hate that. I think I've seen I've made worse plays. Yeah, CJ, Travis, Kelsey, Uzama, 54. I have a Conklin's 52. He's had 71 and 57 yards the past two games. That's pretty good for a tight end for fifty two hundred dollars and a good game. Dan Arnold's there. Fifty one. I know. So we actually have a lot of tight end. Potential value. Potential. Well, more. We have guys with cases to be made. Yeah. And we need salary. For quarterback, probably for running back because we're going to have to overpay for some guys, I think, if we want to play them. Yeah. So it might be a week where, yeah, it's like I'm going to be a little bit underweight on Travis Kelsey, which feels scary. But I if not, I'm underweight on like the stock quarterbacks or like Tyreek and and Devontae, assuming he's good. So like. Yeah. Decisions to be made at tight end, but it seems pretty deep at first glance. Yeah, it does a little bit. Josiah DeGuarres, fifty four. Again, I'm probably not chasing that for the cream bay guys, but it's worth noting that he's down there. Forty four. OK. Adam Trout, Adam Troutboy is forty four two dollars. He's not Troutman yet. He can get there eventually. But Troutboy is forty four. Tommy Sweeney's forty seven. Tommy, make the defense trembles forty five hundred dollars. He's his role is is getting better, but it's not high enough where I would actually use him yet. I keep my eye on him, but I haven't seen enough yet. I think that the standout down there, the guy like most in the low salary range is Conklin at fifty two. I'd probably say the same. Erts is interesting at fifty five, though. Yeah, within that game. Well, that's that's dependent on Kyler, too. If Kyler comes into this week like really banged up, I would be correct. Not very high on. I would not use. I would not use. Because there's accurate, said. Yeah, yeah. So we'll see how that shakes out. OK, note to future me, Brandon, after looking through the week nine salaries of checking out injuries and usage, what is standing out to you as of right now? What do you want to keep in mind for Thursday? Probably ranking the importance of the studs like really go through and think about what my lineups look like because we build around running backs, you and I both, almost always. Think about how I'm going to feel at like 10 after one when lineups lock. And I'm like, well, I played a lot of like Austin Eckler, but it came at the expense of Devonte Adams and Tyree Kill. Yep. Even though I don't love a lot of the value running backs, like that's going to be scary. So I think that that's my note to future me is consider a receiver in the flex this week, because if you're looking at the five thousand range flex players, I'd rank both Kaderi's Tony and Rashad Bateman above any running back in that range. Yeah. And if it means I have to use both of them in order to get to a Tyreek Devonte stack happily. So I think this week running back or wide receiver in the flex is the most tempting it's been the entire year so far to me, at least. Most likely, yeah, so I agree there. So we'll see how things shake out and we'll get you set for that on Thursday. You can get that by subscribing to the Number Fire Daily Fantasy podcast feed. Wherever you get your podcast, we, of course, have NBA and NHL podcast via Tom Vecchio, UFC via Austin Swain. We've got PGA coming up tomorrow for the Mayakoba, I believe, correct? Yep. All righty. The worldwide two words, technology. So we're going to talk about wide technology. Wide technology at Mayakoba. That'll be tomorrow 10 a.m. on the Fandal YouTube page up on the Number Fire Daily Fantasy podcast feed. After that, Brandon, if people have questions for you on Twitter, where can they find you there? I'm Matt Goodell, 13, G-D-U-L-A-1-3. And I'm Matt Jim Sonnis, J-I-M-S-A-N-N-E-S. You can also follow the Fandal Podcast Network at Fandal Podcast. Big thank you to everyone for tuning in for today. Good luck to you with your Monday night lineups. We'll talk to you once again on Thursday to get you set for week number nine. This has been the He Check Fantasy podcast powered by Number Fire.