Week 1 Studs & Duds + Panic Players, Deep Breaths! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/8

Summary

Fantasy Footballers Podcast Summary

Episode: "Week 1 Studs & Duds + Panic Players, Deep Breaths!"

Date: September 8, 2025

Hosts: Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, Mike “The Fantasy Hitman” Wright

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Episode Overview

Week 1 is in the books, and the Fantasy Footballers are here to help you navigate the highs and lows of the NFL's chaotic return! In their signature mix of humor and insight, Andy, Jason, and Mike break down which players exceeded expectations ("studs"), who left fantasy managers frustrated ("duds"), and what to realistically take away from opening weekend. The trio cautions against overreactions while highlighting actionable trends in usage, injuries, and matchups. Injury news, market corrections, and plenty of player puns await in this jam-packed episode.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Opening Thoughts and Week 1 Mindset

• Andy opens the show with a reminder: “This is the weekend of reacting, not overreacting. And it's very, very possible that Green Bay has a top five defense...” (02:42)
• Jason reflects on how unpredictable Week 1 can be, even for Super Bowl predictions: “My Super Bowl pick was the Green Bay Packers... they beat the Detroit Lions, their NFC foes, so handedly... wait a minute. They lost.” (03:05)
• The group establishes the show's purpose: helping listeners process Week 1's mayhem—without jumping to rash decisions.

"Monday Punday": Highs, Lows, and Player Puns

(06:13–08:17)

• Plenty more “negative” puns than usual: “This week was so, so negative for the most part because expectations, when they're not met, that's how it goes.” – Andy (06:13)
• Some favorites:
  • Winners: “Mecca Booyah,” “Breeze Lightning,” “Cedric Thrillman,” “Justin Fields of Dreams.”
  • Duds: “Bo Picks,” “A.J. Brown Pants,” “Ken Moan Walker,” “Kelvin Diddly Squat.”

Week 1 NFL News & Injury Updates

(09:40–16:40)

Surprises and Moves

• Lions: 10 catches for 31 yards for Jameer Gibbs—"the fewest yards in NFL history on 10 catches." (09:47)
• Browns sign rookie RB Quinshon Judkins, possibly for immediate use. Jerome Ford looked slow: “Jerome Ford said, hey, Quintron Judkins, I got you. You're going to get a fully guaranteed deal. Watch this. I mean he was so bad.” — Jason (10:38)

Injury Rundown

• Xavier Worthy (Chiefs): Dislocated shoulder; likely out short-term but could play with a brace.
• George Kittle (49ers): Hamstring injury, back on injury report for the 19th time in his career, 6th for hamstring; misses some game but previously never missed more than one game for this injury. “We've asked players to do this for years. If you're going to get injured, get a touchdown first.” – Jason (12:27)
• Drake London (Falcons): Shoulder injury, possibly an AC joint sprain, status day-to-day. "His usage was great before that." — Jason (16:00)
• Puka Nacua, Chris Olave, Jalen Waddle: All left games briefly with injuries but returned.
• General notes: "It's not a joke anymore. It's just, we're like, oh, there it is. Yeah, he did it again." – Mike on Waddle's recurring injury-time drama (16:58)

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Studs: Top Performers & Key Trends

Quarterbacks

(21:16–28:20)

• Josh Allen: Week’s highest scorer, “by a lot.”
• Justin Fields: “He played outstanding. Mike, you deserve a ton of credit for believing in him.” – Andy (21:44)
• Daniel Jones: Shocks by being top 3, especially with rushing TDs.
• Lamar Jackson and Justin Herbert round out top 5; Herbert's usage and designed runs praised: "He had designed runs and he had quick scrambles. I loved it." – Jason (23:21)
• Baker Mayfield: Game-winning drive, but stats (167 yds, 3 TDs on 17/32) leave Jason skeptical of Bucs’ offense until more data.

Running Backs

(28:44–37:35)

• Derrick Henry: "Still good. Still good." (28:47)
• Bijan Robinson: Got it done through passing game.
• Christian McCaffrey: Massive usage. “32 opportunities, 10 targets. He was everything.” – Jason (30:50)
• Travis Etienne: Breakout game against Carolina (16-143); snap counts more important than box score.
• Breece Hall: “Most telling player this week for me…playing for a contract, he’s auditioning for free agency.” – Jason (34:10)
• Devon Achane: Only 10 touches, but still scored; Dolphins’ offense looking shaky, possible positive regression ahead.
• Kenneth Walker III: Big worry, 40% snaps. “It was a full-on timeshare… Extremely disappointing.” – Mike (56:03)

Wide Receivers

(37:35–45:44)

• Zay Flowers, Quentin Johnston, Ameka Egbuka: All explode into top 3.
• Keon Coleman: Heavy usage (94% route participation).
• J.S.N. (Jaxon Smith-Njigba): “53% target share of wide receivers…” – Jason (44:47)
• Garrett Wilson: 100% route participation, “should have had two touchdowns.” (42:41)
• Debo Samuel: "40 snaps in slot – double his previous career high..." (42:30)

Tight Ends

(46:52–48:45)

• Brock Bowers, Dalton Kincaid, Travis Kelsey (though Kelsey’s usage was a concern), Juwan Johnson, Tyler Warren.
• Harold Fannin: Surprise 9 targets; “That’s an incredible…really bad for Njoku.” – Jason (47:27)

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Duds: Big Letdowns & Players Causing Panic

Quarterbacks

(51:40–55:12)

• Joe Burrow: “Joe Burrow had 113 yards. The Browns looked really good.” – Jason (52:09)
• Bo Nix: “He had 78% of his attempts under 10 yards… couldn't get the ball down the field.” – Andy (53:10)
• Trevor Lawrence: Weak performance, lightning delay blamed; compared to Kyler Murray as ‘good not great.’
• Dak Prescott, Tua Tagovailoa, C.J. Stroud: Struggled; Stroud’s OL a big problem.

Running Backs

(55:52–62:31)

• Kenneth Walker III: 40% snap share, nearly equal with Charbonnet.
• David Montgomery: Only 37% snaps, “game script more Gibbs oriented.”
• Travion Henderson, Ramondre Stevenson, Amari and Hampton: Limited touches, “rookie slow starts common, don’t panic.”
• Cam Scataboo: 2 carries, -3 yards.
• Caleb Johnson: “Third on the depth chart…impossible path until he overtakes Gainwell.” – Jason (61:16)

Wide Receivers

(62:59–66:29)

• A.J. Brown, Jamar Chase, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Brian Thomas Jr.: Underperformed, but fantasy managers advised not to panic after Week 1.
• Nico Collins: Basement game due to Texans’ OL; “CJ Stroud did not deal with pressure well.” – Jason (65:53)
• Terry McLaurin: Concerns about how offense functions if big plays don’t connect.
• Mike Evans, George Pickens, Devonta Smith, T. Higgins: Share in Week 1 misery.

Tight Ends

• Mark Andrews: "He was awful. One target, one catch. Seems like good night." – Andy (66:29)

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “This is the weekend of reacting, not overreacting.” – Andy (02:42)
• “We've asked players to do this for years. If you're going to get injured, get a touchdown first. Is that too much to add?” – Jason (12:27)
• “32 opportunities, 10 targets. He was everything. He was…three-fourths of every play was in the hands of Christian McCaffrey." – Jason (30:50)
• “The most telling player this week for me, Breece Hall. Playing for a contract.” – Jason (34:10)
• “If they weren't facing Cam Warden as rookie first appearance, they could have easily lost that game.” – Andy on Bo Nix (53:39)
• “You can't have an offense with Russell Wilson in 2025.” – Mike (63:17)
• “If you want to call it and try to trade for (Garrett Wilson) now before he puts it together over and over…that's okay, but I would probably personally wait another week.” – Jason (44:02)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |------------------------|------------| | Main theme setup/open | 01:38–03:05| | Monday Punday (puns!) | 06:13–08:17| | News & injury updates | 09:40–16:40| | Studs (top performers) | 21:16–48:45| | Duds (disappointments) | 51:34–66:29|

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Takeaway Themes and Advice

• Don’t Overreact: One week does not make a season. Look for trends, not just box scores.
• Monitor Usage & Injuries: Snap counts and injury updates are more informative for future weeks than actual Week 1 output.
• Veterans Can Start Hot: Players like Debo Samuel, Derrick Henry, and Christian McCaffrey asserted their value early; rookies often ramp up.
• Key Worries:
  • Kenneth Walker’s share with Charbonnet.
  • Texans’ offensive line affecting Nico Collins, C.J. Stroud.
  • Recurring injuries to high-profile WRs.
• Encouraging signs:
  • Justin Fields’ improvement as a passer.
  • Rookie WRs (Flowers, Coleman, Johnston) earning significant roles.

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Closing Notes

Week 1 is about adjusting expectations and making measured decisions, not gutting your roster. The Fantasy Footballers urge patience—with humor—while encouraging managers to monitor usage patterns and injury news. The hosts sign off with their trademark optimism, “Deep breaths, everybody. React appropriately. The season is not over. You also didn’t win the championship. It’s just begun.” (68:00)

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Transcript

[A]

What's up clan? You can't count on much these days, but you can always count on Sundays with the NFL on CBS and Paramount plus. That's right, football fans watch your local NFL game live every Sunday on CBS and Paramount plus all season long. This year's schedule is absolutely stacked with rivalries and revenge games, including the next chapter of the epic Bill's Chiefs saga. So stay connected to it all on any device at home or on the go. Visit paramountplus.com NFL to get started today and count on Sundays for another must see season of the NFL on CBS and Paramount plus.

[B]

This message is brought to you by Apple Pay. Forget your wallet. It's all good because with Apple Pay, you can pay with a simple tap of your iPhone. The wallet you never forget at millions of places worldwide, including websites, apps and anywhere you see the contactless symbol. Security is built in with face id so so you don't have to worry about your cards getting lost or stolen. And the best part is you still earn the card rewards, points and cash back you love. Say goodbye to the bifold, add your card to Apple Wallet and start paying the Apple way terms apply. The Fantasy Footballers Studio is sponsored by Walmart. Welcome to the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore and Mike Wright.

[A]

Welcome in.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, right.

[C]

No way, no how.

[A]

Exhale. Monday, September 8th the fantasy footballers Podcast. I'm excited to react to the weekend with each and every one of you. I'm Andy Holloway, joined as always by Mike the fantasy Hitman. Jason Moore is here.

[B]

Big breaths, people.

[A]

So here we are most of week one in the books. We still have a Monday Night Football game that I am very much looking forward to. Minnesota, Chicago, whatever's left of the Chicago secondary. Justin Jefferson, J.J. mcCarthy. We'll see what Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson. Because it looked like the Ben Johnson. The lack of Ben Johnson.

[C]

Yikes.

[A]

Might. Might yikes have hurt the Lions. But again, this is the weekend of reacting, not overreacting. And it's very, very possible that Green Bay has a top five defense and they're playing at home in Lambeau. And you're. You're definitely going to have some transitional pains, so we'll see where they go. I don't know if Detroit will look like that again.

[B]

My super bowl pick on whenever it was, the last episode or last week or whatever, I felt so amazing about it because my super bowl pick was the Green Bay packers getting to the super bowl and they beat the Detroit Lions, their NFC foes, so handedly and they were going to lose to the Baltimore Ravens. And I was like. And they beat the tarnation out of the Bills. And I was like, oh, man, this looks.

[C]

Wait a minute.

[B]

They lost. The game was awesome.

[A]

We had a morning and afternoon where I think there was like one game that hit the over and it was the jets and it was Jets Pittsburgh where Aaron Rodgers. I got a text from my son. My oldest son doesn't play a lot of fantasy. He was in a league this year, doesn't know a lot of the players and he's like, dad, you had me draft Bo Nicks and Aaron Rodgers dominated this weekend.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

And I was like always draft Rogers. I was like. I was like, yeah, yeah, that Bo Knicks didn't look good. I mean, Monday punday. Today there were a lot of inappropriate Bo Knicks puns coming into the winners.

[C]

I bet you could not guess it.

[A]

No, no, you couldn't. But. But it was like, yeah, why didn't you have me draft Aaron Rodgers? And that is a good summary of week one. Like that is. You know, we had big time wide receivers that struggled. We had a lot of surprises and we will get into all of it. We have studs and duds on the show today. We have news to catch you up on, including some injury news. We had a calf that held up Mike. We had a calf that.

[C]

Yeah, don't worry about it.

[A]

Oh, are you victory lapping?

[C]

No.

[B]

Oh, What?

[C]

Oh. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. You did. You do not get to ask me that question. After our slack when the injury came through and all of you were like, we were the only ones who believed he was going to get hurt. No, no, no, no, sir.

[B]

No. When you say all of you, you really mean all.

[A]

And Andy, I didn't mean it in a sense that inappropriate. I meant it as in a sense of you'd be tempting fate.

[C]

Oh.

[A]

Not in a sense that it's. You should celebrate his healthy calf.

[C]

Yes.

[A]

I just meant if you do it, watch out.

[C]

Yes.

[A]

But it was nice in my main character.

[C]

Yes. I will prevent that.

[A]

Somebody is living on the edge right now.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

He just said, but look, I was trying to celebrate you, but I got flame.

[C]

I am definitely not victory lapping. The. The health. I will victory lap the performance. McCaffrey is awesome and he will be the entire offense. I saw a tweet from Hayden Winks that he was. It was like the expected points for running backs and is like expected Fantasy points. Chris McCaffrey's like 12 ahead of second place. Like, he is just such a stud. Is he Going to stay healthy. We'll be well that every single.

[A]

I mean, look, it was great. It was great to see. We're back by popular demand Monday punday. All the responses from the weekend, which by the way, you know, sometimes you can take the temperature of how a weekend went by the proportion of good and I don't mean quality because none of them are quality.

[C]

Right.

[A]

But the good oriented things that were.

[B]

Successful players, players that hit and the.

[A]

Amount of puns that come in on those versus the negative. And this week was so, so negative for the most part because expectations when they're not met, that's how it goes. But we'll start with the good. Monday punday. Jason, go ahead.

[B]

Oh, well, let's talk about Mecha Booyah.

[C]

Mecca Bazooka.

[A]

I like that a lot. A Mecha Bazooka. We had Josh Alien last night. Josh Alien last night.

[B]

Zay Powers.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

How about Dalton can Kade.

[A]

Yes, he can. Jackson Smith win. Jigba. Huge performance.

[B]

And your guy, Tyler Soren.

[A]

Oh, it looked good. Samuel and Breeze Lightning, of course.

[B]

Very nice to Infinity and Keon.

[A]

He had a big game.

[C]

Justin Fields of dreams.

[A]

Travis et Win.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

And Cedric Thrill. Man.

[C]

Unfortunately Bo picks.

[A]

Yes. We're into the bad. And R.J. hardly.

[C]

Oh, he was hardly on the field, but he was okay.

[B]

And Tua turned the ball over.

[A]

Yes.

[C]

Oh, A.J. brown pants.

[A]

Yeah, we got to bring that back. Cam. Scatter Poo.

[B]

Oh, and Ken Moan Walker.

[C]

Yeah. Isaiah Poop checkup.

[B]

Sometimes it's easy.

[A]

Dude, where's my jamar?

[B]

Yeah, that's good. Kelvin Diddly squat.

[C]

Oh, don't bury him, but look out for Nico Coffins.

[A]

Oh, another one of those tough wide receivers. I recall, by the way, one year anniversary of his last 30 yard catch today.

[C]

No.

[B]

Lamerson Williams.

[C]

Terrible. McLaurin. Yes.

[A]

Stink Bigsby Stank Bigsby wrapping it up. We. We didn't know if Tank Bigsby got hurt.

[B]

That's because he didn't get a carry in the first quarter.

[A]

He couldn't find. We got it. Got a nice co starter.

[C]

Co farter. Right.

[B]

There was a starter.

[C]

There was.

[B]

He was. He looked great.

[A]

But again, got to be careful when you play Carolina. It looks really good against Carolina, I believe.

[B]

I turned to you guys and said whoever's starting against Carolina is my start.

[C]

Of the week next week.

[A]

Which you. You know. That'll be James Conner. Yeah. Carolina looks awesome. Carolina looked awful.

[C]

They looked so. It was.

[A]

I mean, you're playing Jacksonville. You had so many opportunities to do something in that game. It was.

[C]

That was One of the, I mean many terrible things happened. You know what was the. The unders hit on basically all the. Essentially every game except for like two.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Bryce Young looking just like that again. That sucked.

[B]

Benjamin Quick and then take back. You know what I mean? Worked last time.

[A]

All right, you can follow the show over on Instagram at Fantasy Footballers, over on X at the FF Ballers. That's where we put out the thread for the Monday punday. A reminder, JoinTheFoot.com is the community. It's a great time to get over there. You get all the premium in season tools, including the ultimate dashboard, the lineup optimizer which has, you know, you also get access to the expanded start sit, a bonus episode of the show and it's where you want to hang out all season long. JoinTheFoot.com there's an app for all of the tools as well. Let's talk some news.

[B]

News and notes from around the league presented by Progressive Insurance.

[A]

Well, he didn't have a big week. Nobody really did. On the Lions. I actually read that the 10 catches for 31 yards for Jameer Gibbs is the fewest yards in the history of national football on 10 catches.

[C]

Wow.

[A]

From.

[C]

You did it.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. So the Lions didn't look good and neither did Jameson Williams. But before the game they signed him to a three year, $83 million extension, which was a bit of a gut punch to the Isaac to slaw. Oh my gosh. You didn't lower it. You didn't lower it.

[C]

Take that.

[A]

Quinshon Judkins signed by the Browns. Signed by the Browns. A fully guaranteed deal. There is a real possibility he plays in Week 2 against the Ravens. I thought Dylan Sampson looked good. I thought Jerome Ford looked slower than Dalton Schultz.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, Jerome Ford said, hey, Quintron Judkins, I got you. You're going to get a fully guaranteed deal. Watch this. I mean he was so bad. Dylan Sampson, though, he's got juice. I think he will retain the passing downs role. So this might be a backfield between the two rookies, but they need quinch on Judkins. They could not run against the incredible run defense of the Cincinnati Bengals.

[A]

Well, there was a surprise also. We found out that Chris Rodriguez was going to be a healthy and active. If you join Mike, which you should do on Sunday live. There was discussion about this and many different things that were going on right before games began. But Chris Rodriguez, who we thought would have a goal line opportunity, was inactive, healthy, inactive.

[B]

And Bill Crossy, he once won a staring contest with the sun.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Bill Cross.

[A]

Oh, you got another one, huh? No.

[B]

He made his teachers raise their hand to speak.

[A]

Okay. All right. He looked good. He looked really good. Injury updates. Xavier Worthy dislocated his shoulder right out of the gate.

[B]

Travis Kelsey injured Xavier Worthy Worthy shoulder right out of the gate.

[A]

So we'll find out more about Worthy's prognosis. He'll try to play this year. Normally when you have the dislocation, you need surgery at some point, but you can play with the brace after an amount of time sometimes. So we'll figure out that George Kittle. This one is a bummer. I did take.

[B]

I made you take George Brittle out of the puns Sunday puns.

[A]

Yeah, you did. But you can't do.

[C]

The man at least had the decency. Yes. To catch you a touchdown.

[B]

We've asked players to do this for years. If you're going to get injured, get a touchdown first. Is that too much to add?

[C]

It's the decent thing to do.

[A]

It's the decent thing to do. Well, he did that. He had four catches and then he left due to a hamstring injury. Did not return this morning. I was looking it up. He's been on injury reports 19 different times in his career. Five times for hamstring injuries. We are hoping.

[B]

That's terrible.

[A]

Yeah, we're hoping that that means that this will be a brief absence, if any at all from the four previous or five previous hamstring. I guess this would be the sixth because there were five previous. He had only missed a maximum of one game with a hamstring injury.

[B]

Now, does this game count as the miss? Has he missed the majority of this game?

[A]

No. This one is not count.

[B]

Darn. I do love that. As soon as it happened and he had already like you, it sucked because he would have been the tight end one on the week he was dominated. But it was nice that he didn't go back out to re aggravate. He knew and he stayed on the sideline. So hopefully if he misses time, it's short. I'm prepping for up to three weeks but we'll find out more when he gets the mri.

[A]

Well, yeah, the remainder of the game. I mean, you had Juwan Jennings who also got hurt in the game he's going to get. So he'll go with George to the MRI machine. You know, Jennings had a shoulder injury. We don't know how long he'll be out. And you ended up with the backup tight end who's never really played a name. Tonjas mc Basketball Tonjas ends up with the game winning touchdown.

[C]

So on an insane catch.

[A]

It was great. Oh, the pass was horrible. It would have been the third pick for Purdy.

[C]

It should not have happened. It should not have worked. And yet it did it actually.

[A]

You know, I wonder how San Francisco is going to play if they don't have Kittle. Like I really, I'm curious what it's going to look like because no Kittle, no Jennings.

[B]

I think they're rebranding. Rebranding to the Christian McCaffreys. I mean he touches the ball so much.

[A]

Yeah, it's weird because it's not the, it's not the best offense to just dump it to him all the time. But they got it done. They had the game winning drive. Evan Ingram left early. Calf injury for the Broncos. That sucks. Brock Bowers left with the knee injury. Tom Pelissero said that he talked to Brock Bowers and Brock Bowers said he's fine. If you. He took a hit on the knee. If you watch the play where it happened to me, it happened on the long run up the sideline on that 35, 40 yard run on the, when he was wide open, he took a hit to the knee going out of bounds and you know, he says there's no concerns, we'll monitor that.

[B]

It was so scary because when, when you watched live it looked like a non contact. He got injured. The play prior.

[A]

Correct.

[B]

And so then the play where you saw the injury and where he was limping around, he goes out, runs around, nothing happens and then he's limping. It's like, oh no.

[C]

What I had seen was he wanted to go back in but medical would not let him go back in.

[A]

Drake London left the Falcons game. I think people missed this at least when it was happening. He left in the fourth quarter, shoulder injury, didn't return. Considered day to day as of now, according to Ian Rapaport. I saw some replays of the injury. Not a doctor, but they're talking about AC joint sprain. He basically collapsed on his left shoulder in the end zone, went down really hard on it. We'll see if he will miss any time.

[B]

He probably will. It seems like it is going to be an AC spot sprain and I don't, you know, hopefully it's not anything majorly serious but you got to be prepared to be without Drake London. His usage was great before that.

[C]

Yeah, it didn't turn into a great line because he caught eight passes for 55 yards which is. But okay, I'll hit it but 15 targets.

[A]

Well, you're going to see. And if he misses time. Kyle Pitts ended up with seven catches in this game. That's right. Seven catches for Kyle Pitts. Still still has a hard time separating.

[C]

Get ready for Casey Washington. Like I said, Kyle Pitts, Casey Washington.

[A]

And then Puka Nakua left briefly with a concussion, came back or a concussion check. Sorry.

[B]

What looked like a bleeding eyeball.

[A]

Yeah. And then Chris Olave left with a chest injury but also returned.

[C]

He Olave and Jalen Waddle both fulfilled their quotas.

[A]

Waddle left again looking miserable pain and then came back out there. I don't, I don't know how we.

[B]

Can make the joke about how he does this every game as much as.

[A]

We do and still have it happen.

[B]

Yeah, and still have it happen.

[C]

It's not a joke anymore. It's just we're like, oh, there it is. Yeah, he did it again.

[A]

And man, did they look bad.

[C]

Oh, man, they look so bad.

[B]

Lave though, 13 targets in his previous game with Spencer Rattler had a ton of targets. And according to our data that I'm looking at on our website right now, played 156% of the snaps. So that's great.

[A]

Who did?

[B]

Olave.

[C]

That is 156%. That is an impressive amount.

[A]

Our data team is doing good work.

[B]

In week one, huh? Making a boo boo.

[A]

He played 100% of the snaps for the Saints and 56% of the Cardinal snaps.

[B]

Oh, I wish we could use them.

[A]

That was news and notes sponsored by Progressive Insurance. Quote [e-mail] Progressive Casualty Insurance Company affiliates and third party insurers not available in all states or situations. Coverage subject to policy terms, limits and conditions. I'm going to hit the button. Take a break and we'll come back with suds and duds.

[C]

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[A]

What's up, Vo clan? You can't count on much these days, but you can always count on Sundays with the NFL on CBS and Paramount. Plus, that's right, football fans. Watch your local NFL game live every Sunday on CBS and Paramount all season long. This year's schedule is absolutely stacked with rivalries and revenge games, including the next chapter of the epic Bill's Chiefs saga. So stay connected to it all on any device at home or on the go. Visit paramountplus.com NFL to get started today and count on Sundays for another must see season of the NFL on CBS and Paramount. Yeah, before. Before the break, Mike was. I could hear him laughing a little bit because Jason could not be more miserable with the Cardinals victory.

[B]

They sucked so much.

[C]

I am in complete agreement. That was.

[A]

There were a lot of embarrassing in their defense. There were a lot of good teams that looked bad in week one.

[B]

That's fair. And hopefully. And hopefully genuinely like the Broncos.

[A]

The Broncos were horrible.

[B]

Yeah, they looked.

[A]

They looked like the Cardinals.

[B]

They looked exactly. It was the same situation where you go in excited for a team. Like I haven't been excited for the Cardinal in, I don't know, half a decade.

[C]

Right.

[B]

And this year I was actually thinking, hey, I think they could be a playoff team. They could win this division. And you get a Spencer Rattler version of the Saints that you should just go in and smoke and nine seconds left. You basically were on the goal line. They were about to go to overtime and you couldn't do anything against them. My only hope. I know a lot of reports were coming out about Kyler being sick.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Being ill. Is that why you dress that way?

[B]

That might have been what caused it. Maybe the mirror check was like. But that's my hope. He did scramble a lot more. Kyler did and did nothing with it, which is rare. Usually when Kyler runs, it's a successful play.

[C]

He made like, bad decisions on window scramble.

[B]

I'm just so hopeful that he was horribly ill.

[C]

Okay.

[A]

Horribly ill. Jason was horribly ill watching him. So there you go. It was. It was a weird week for. For several quarterbacks. We'll get into all of it right now, but we'll start with the positives.

[B]

This week's fantasy stud muffins presented by Lowe's.

[A]

All right, we are into the studs. Top five quarterback scorers on the weekend. In four point passing it was Josh Allen.

[C]

Goodness, man, by a lot.

[A]

And then it was Justin Fields and Daniel Jones.

[C]

Yeah, hey, Justin Fields. The Daniel Jones one is pretty shocking, but the Justin Fields one is not surprising to me at all.

[A]

It should be, but it is not. But it's. Well, I mean, he has been statistically one of the worst passers when he's gotten opportunities. And I will say from watching the football game, he was outstanding on every level. His he had so much zip on the passes, hyper accurate, making plays, constantly getting outside the pocket and battling through a collapsing pocket. He played outstanding. Mike, you deserve a ton of credit for believing in him. And we'll see what continues. They ended up losing the game, which by the way, Pittsburgh was. We have the survivor pool. We're doing. Pittsburgh was two of my three entries. Oh, didn't realize how close I was on that one.

[C]

The. For Justin Fields we could. Because he's Justin Fields and we've seen it. Next week he could come out and he could fall on his face. That is, that is, that absolutely could happen. My hope for Justin Fields is he's on a team that wants him like Pittsburgh. You know, last year Justin Field started okay. Last year he was 4 and 2.

[A]

Chicago really wanted him, but Chicago had.

[C]

They had garbage around him.

[B]

That was also the early career, you know, rookie, second year type of player. Just.

[C]

I would hold out hope that this might be a year for Fields to just be a top five guy.

[A]

Lamar Jackson was number four, Justin Herbert number five.

[C]

So yeah, the Herbert one is, is one that is like if that pass rate sticks, then he will be. It's never been a question of can Justin Herbert do it. It's been there. They just restrain him all the time.

[B]

Not just the pass rate, but the rushing we saw. This is what I wanted last year with G Row because he has always used his quarterbacks in the running game. He is way more athletic than you think and he had designed runs and he had quick scrambles. I loved it.

[A]

Yeah. 318 passing yards, three passing touchdowns. You got to remember there's conflicting forces in Los Angeles. There is Harbaugh's loving to run the football mixed with Harbaugh's unadulterated man love for Justin Herbert and he believes in Herbert.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

And you know, last year in the second half of the season they made the switch and they continued it. So it's not like, you know, it wasn't a great week for Amari and Hampton, obviously, Najee was basically not involved.

[C]

The usage was.

[A]

We also knew that this was the number one rushing defense.

[B]

Very difficult match.

[A]

So let's all just see what a few weeks looks like. But moving on. Daniel Jones was 22 for 29 against the hapless Dolphins. 7 for 26 on the ground with two rushing touchdowns. He looked really good.

[C]

He did.

[A]

Now he'll play Denver, then Tennessee and Los Angeles. You know, this was a really impressive performance by the Colts all the way around. There are a lot of weapons and Tyler Warren, adding him to that offense, that connection was. That connection was awesome all game long. But Michael Pittman, you know.

[C]

Yeah. Like, hey, dude, I need to drop back on my board. Come on.

[A]

Do you need some help over there?

[B]

Yes. So good. This is so good.

[C]

I mean, let's not get over the skis. Hey, hey.

[B]

Some credit really, really needs to go to the Miami Dolphins. Yes, a lot of. A lot of credit. Next week they've got the Patriots and I think it is the perfect matchup to find out how bad they are. Who was true. You know what I mean?

[A]

Who has the Patriots.

[B]

The Dolphins and the Patriots play each other. So Drake May, who had some plays that looked amazing and some plays that were just outrageously bad. This will be a perfect test next week to be like, if he comes out and does a Daniel Jones impersonation in week one and is great, I think we can just chalk up the Dolphins to being one of the worst secondaries in the league.

[A]

Patrick Mahomes had 258 yards and touchdown, one rushing touchdown ran a ton. He is own one. And everyone else in the division, Raiders, Broncos, Chargers, all want to know in the AFC west, week one in the books, Aaron Rodgers, four passing touchdowns and looked amazing.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

According to my son should have been the number one pick in fantasy.

[C]

That game was so weird of, you know, I mean, look, you had the mirror match the flipped quarterbacks. You had the offenses, which are both you had before week one. You're like, yeah, they'll be okay. Ish. And their defenses are going to be the strong part of the team. And it was. They went into the upside down.

[B]

That was. That was a really surprising game. Surprising turn of events.

[C]

But it was really fun.

[B]

And the ancillary pieces, you know, it looked like it was like DK Metcalf and no.

[C]

1.

[B]

And you got Garrett Wilson and no. 1. And then, you know, other people got involved, especially on the pitch side.

[C]

Kenneth Gainwell.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

What?

[B]

Yeah, that was.

[C]

Arthur is the worst.

[A]

Yeah. But he is the worst. No, the history of. The history of Arthur is. He's right.

[C]

We'll see.

[B]

Is that just a John New Smith correct bit?

[A]

Yeah, I mean it's. But he's also. Yeah, it's John New Smith in lieu of Kyle Pitts. But we know that that was the right call.

[C]

So that one is, that one is so interesting.

[A]

But he had the most snaps. Yeah, that was a, that was a high school. That was one of the only over unders.

[C]

Yes.

[A]

So.

[B]

Well, they were all over unders but it was, that was one of the few overs.

[A]

Thank you. Jalen Hurts. Jalen Hurts. Had a couple of rushing touchdowns, didn't pass for a lot of yards. Hurt us with AJ Brown, Michael Pennix, you know, a lot of these sophomores. It was up and down to me it was, you know, unfortunately Jason is responsible for Bo Nix because Bo Nix was looking. And then Jason says wow, he's so good outside the pocket. And then he made some of the worst throws you've ever seen.

[B]

It was, I said it right before the first pick because he comes out in this game and he's looking on fire, just drilling perfect. You know, bread basket throws on a rope and. And then he's just awful. As soon as I said that the rest of the game. Yeah, you're, you're right. Michael Pennix, Bo Nixon, Drake May. We'll see Caleb tonight. But they, they all showed flashes of good and flashes of, you know, just real, real bad.

[A]

Baker led a game winning drive. Although that game should have gone to overtime. We wanted more of that game but young Waiku could not tie it up. Tied up.

[C]

I will week one but I mean a Buka was awesome But Baker was 17 for 32, 167. He had the three passing touchdowns. This is against the Falcons defense. So I, I'm going to be a little skeptical for the Tampa Bay or for the Bucks until we get a couple games under our belt.

[A]

Running backs, top five scores of the week. Derek Henry.

[C]

Oh my goodness.

[A]

Still good. Still good.

[B]

Hate you.

[C]

It was fookland the Jason and I, we brought it up. We were matched up in the league of record. That one was kind of felt like it was over on Thursday after Dak and A.J. brown laid an egg for him. And then all of Sunday we were also matched up in our dynasty league, our main one and it looked easily like Jason would win. I have the burrow chase stack which fell completely flat.

[A]

It's very rare when Jason says I won.

[B]

Oh yeah, I don't like to jinx Myself, I think I was down at like the 1%, but it all worked out for me. My. My three running backs from yesteryear that were supposed to be great in Bijon and Breeze and Travis etn. So I was like, yeah, all right. We split.

[C]

Unfortunately, you did not have the king. The king. Henry here. Derek Henry. If you missed it, you should go back and watch all the highlights from the game. It. The insanity. I really needed Derek Henry. So, I mean, I had, I was glued. The third quarter of like Derek Henry barely touching the ball and then moving to Justice Hill a lot. Just in that particular quarter, it seemed very odd to me. It was a really strange decision by the Ravens when Derek Henry is just doing whatever he wants and they're like, eh. It was like something else.

[B]

It was literally like an adult playing with children. That's what it felt like. He was at that point in the game, I think he only had 13 or 14 carries. It wasn't like we got to give him a break or rest. He didn't. He couldn't have a lot of carries because he kept housing them. He kept ending drives with the 30 plus yard touchdown.

[C]

He's. He's the best.

[A]

Bijan was number two. He got it done in the passing game.

[C]

Yeah. We're lucky he had that huge reception.

[A]

Javante was number three. Yes. Javante Williams with the two touchdowns. James Cook at four and Christian McCaffrey at number five on the week with no touchdowns.

[B]

Yeah. 32 opportunities, 10 targets. He was everything. He was. You watched the Niners game and I know that look. They had a ton of injuries.

[C]

Right. There's.

[B]

There's no IUK that got rid of Debo. There's no Kittle for most of the game. Juwan Jennings goes down. So it's like, what do we do? And their answer was just. It was basically like, I would say three fourths of every play was in the hands of Christian McCaffrey.

[C]

32 opportunities. Just stay strong.

[B]

Stay strong.

[A]

We had Travis ETN 16 for 1, 43 against Carolina. Three targets, 61% of snaps. Bigsby saw 21%, Tutin 6%.

[B]

I will remind you.

[A]

Second highest rushing total of his entire career.

[B]

I will remind us that what we said going before the week, you got to remember what you thought before the week. We said, don't worry about production. Someone's going to have a monster game here.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

Worry about the snap counts and the breakdown of like, that's it. And so I'm not going to sit here and say Travis ETN is going to be great. Rest of season. 143 yards against Carolina seems easier.

[C]

There was a lot of inept tackling by Carolina.

[B]

61% of snaps.

[C]

Yep.

[B]

To Bigsby's 21, to Tootin's 6% and their other running back. Look, I want to say Laquin Allen. I don't remember his name off the top of my head. He was actually more involved early on than some of the others. But it was clear that Travis ETN was their primary starting running back.

[C]

Yep. And if you drafted him and like, you're like, he's on your bench, I think you should feel confident. Next week against the Cincinnati Bengals.

[A]

On the other side of the ball.

[B]

No, the Our Foot Clan hq. Our ultimate dashboard.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

I was looking at my teams on there and it said, hey, I think you set your lineup wrong. You should have Travis ETN over Adam Thielen. And I was like, okay. And I made that switch. So he was in my starting lineup, Mike.

[C]

Okay.

[A]

And you built that product.

[B]

I did, I did. That's true. I was part of it.

[C]

Don't. Victory lap that too.

[B]

That's true.

[C]

Thielen has not played well.

[B]

Oh, okay. Fair, Fair. That's right.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. It would be so great if we had three touchdowns in the other side of that game. You know, you look at the snap counts here. Even in a super negative game script, Juba Hubbard, 67% of the snaps, 16 for 57, also had a receiving touchdown. And you know, that's a good sign for those that believed in Chuba Hubbard. We were definitely believers. But in a negative game script, you didn't see him come off the field and a bunch of Rico dowdle or something. Saquon, 18 for 60 and a touchdown. Five targets. Breeze Hall. Let's talk about. Yeah, we had a show, baby. We had a show three, two, three weeks ago. And it was like, what's one player that would be most likely to flip the script on the narrative in the off season? And we brought up Breeze hall because we had been there before. We've been here where the off season, no one wants to believe in Breeze Hall. And then Braylon Allen gets all the offseason hype. And it was the same situation there with Michael Carter. You know, this was a really impressive performance. 19 for 107 on the ground. Now, he didn't get a bunch of pass catching. He only had two receptions, but they were went for 38 yards.

[B]

Well, he did get four targets, but that was 100% of the running back targets. So I was happy with that. And it was an eyeball test. Like he looked really fast where for some reason he just didn't look that way last year at all. He was, he was one of the most telling players this week. For me, where you want to talk about a changed opinion because I don't want to. You don't want to underreact from week one either. You know, we talk about don't overreact. But that was one where it was like, oh, okay, he looks like he is playing for a contract. He's auditioning for his free agency.

[C]

He looked very sleek and fast.

[A]

Devon HN7 for this was this one look. Seven carries, three catches. Now he scored. But I wonder your reaction to that because you look at 10 total touches for Devon HN. Ollie Gordon only saw three. They were throwing the whole game. But this could be a little bit of the Miami Dolphins season. It could go downhill quick.

[B]

Tua was so unbelievably bad. You talk about how much they threw the ball and they should have thrown it that much. DeVoni HN had four targets. I mean, Devon Anchin is, you know, he. He's usually in games with Tua. He's on like 100 target pace. And so it was so weird to me that they weren't involving him in the passing game. I don't expect that to stick. I don't understand what happened with the Dolphins. They were so bad I couldn't really make sense of it.

[A]

J.K. dobbins was the start of the week. He ends up getting into the end zone. 16 for 63. The split in the first half, it looked really 50, 50.

[C]

It's just.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Are you talking about 5050 with bidet?

[A]

Well, Bidet was out there a bunch, Sean Payton. But in the second half, when the game, when it got onto the line, I think that's when you need to pay attention. There was a lot of Dobbins in the second half win. It was the final drives to put the game away. 16 for 63 rushing, touchdown. Harvey was very good. He had a 50 yard run.

[B]

Harvey looked like he has juice and he will definitely get more involved as the season goes along. And I think it won't take long before he overtakes Bidet. And Bidet was more of the passing game. This is what was interesting to me. It was like looking to see who's got the passing game role. Does J.K. dobbins have that? And he didn't really have that role. That was Bidet. And so RJ Harvey looking as good as he did I could see him sneaking in, keeping J.K. dobbins in the role he clearly has right now and then having RJ Harvey just overtake Tyler.

[A]

Bidet, Jakori, Crosky, Merritt. 10 for 82 and a touchdown. He looks so good, you know, Eckler, solid veteran snap counts were in his favor. But the juice, the juice was Bill.

[B]

Yeah, Echler had a good game. He's got the same role he had last year, which was a role where he was very often in the top 24 weekly running max. This looks like it is Bill's. Bill Crosky is going to be the one of the one two punch here throughout the season.

[A]

Top five wide receiver scores on the week. Zay Flowers was number one, Quentin Johnson, number two, Ameca Buka, number three, Keon Coleman number four and D Ball Samuel. One of the reasons not to victory lap a season on Debo. We said a couple things. One, I thought he'd start strong like veterans start stronger at the top of the year. But two, it's the offense. Everything about Washington fits the pursuit of Debo Samuel because they do so many short area targets, screens into rounds, misdirection close to the line of scrimmage. It's really nice for Jaden Daniels to have somebody capable of doing that. But their offense looked pretty good. They didn't get it going until, I mean it was like 14 to 6 for a long time. But Keon Coleman, really nice to see the target count there. I think he was at 12, had the deflection touchdown that wasn't intended for him, but also had a couple of intentional, you know, targets in the end zone that didn't work out. He had one where he. I think he had two 2 point conversions that were targeted to him. One he ran out of the back of the end zone. The other one he ended up the ball wasn't really placed in the right spot.

[B]

But if you look at his last several healthy games, his target share percentage is really, really good. They talked a lot about what a great camp he had, what a good off season he had. This is what you hope. You hope that there's a guy that can come in here and start demanding a 25% market share for Josh Allen. Now it won't always be the bill down by 15. You know that's going to be more rare than when you play the Ravens. But it does look like there's the potential chance for him to emerge as a clear number one wide receiver option.

[A]

What do you make of The Cuuge performance? Two touchdowns, five for 79. This was not, you know, one weird broken play. This was a good performance.

[C]

Yeah, I, he was clearly ahead on the depth chart. You know, Trey Harris was the second round pick, so it was, could he take over? And then you had like the weird off season where Lambert Smith was the one making some noise in training camp. On then all along, you know, it's, it's Keenan, it's Ladd and it's Johnston as the, the three primary starters. And if. So it's a, if you buy in to the pass rate and what Justin Herbert did in week one, then I think you should buy into Johnston. He's not going to do this every single week. But he was out there running a ton of routes and it really was divvied up. You're talking that the targets were divvied up between the three guys.

[B]

Here's a tweet from our own Kyle Borgignoni.

[C]

Okay.

[B]

22 plus fantasy games in full PPR since the beginning of last season. Since the beginning of 24. You have Justin Jefferson, C.D. lamb, Nico Collins, Tyree Kill, T. Higgins with three of them.

[C]

Nice.

[B]

You have Drake London, D.K. metcalf, Jalen Waddle, George Pickens with two of them. And then you have Cuge with four of them. More than any of those players, the most in fantasy football, explosive.

[A]

He's the player they're going to look to around the red zone, period. It's not going to be, you know, he, that's where he thrived last year at times. So I think if he keeps catching the football, that'd be good. Ameca Abuka. It was, it was a weird game because two big touchdowns. Jason, you said you felt a little disappointed in Abuka just from a target standpoint.

[B]

Yeah, I mean genuinely the way that they were playing the Buccaneers when they were down, needing to throw the ball at times and he wasn't a hyper targeted guy the way that Chris Godwin was hyper targeted last year before the injury. So I was, look, I'm not going to be disappointed on a two touchdown first NFL game. Awesome. Right? Mecca Igboya. But I was a little bit disappointed in the utilization throughout.

[A]

Well, you did have Mike, you know, you brought up Baker's performance. It was saved by touchdowns. Mike Evans was not good.

[C]

Right.

[A]

We'll see. I'm pretty excited.

[C]

It's just that they're, you know, one of the teams like the, the Lions, packers top tier defense. But that's the Lions first game without Ben Johnson. This is the Bucks. We, it's been Baker's M.O. to just keep getting new offensive coordinators, but Liam Cohen leaving will be something to be paid attention to.

[A]

Keon Coleman was 8 for 112 and a touchdown on 11 targets. He ran 94% of the team's routes. That's a good sign for those of us that believe Keon could break out and be their true number one. He looks like that guy to me. Debo, we Talked about it. 7 for 77. Had the rushing touchdown. He also had 40 snaps in the slot. That was double his previous career high in 2022.

[B]

Wonderful.

[A]

Very cool. Garrett Wilson. Yes. Nine targets, seven for 95 and a touchdown. Should have had two touchdowns. Yeah, should have had two. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he did. Don't know how he got tackled.

[C]

I think he slipped. If we go on, I need to watch it again.

[B]

No, I remember it really well. The defender came in, we thought he might have even face mask him and it wasn't. It was just an awesome tackle around the shoulders, but it still felt like just have a little bit of momentum and you should get in.

[C]

It's weird. What do you guys make of that of Garrett? 100% of the routes.

[A]

Well, that better be the case.

[C]

Well, I. That even, you know, elite wide receivers don't run every single route.

[B]

There was never a question of whether he was going to be on the field getting the most targets, getting a ton of targets. The only question was how catchable are these targets?

[C]

Right.

[B]

How good are the targets yesterday?

[C]

Seven of nine.

[B]

No. Yeah. I mean, that's because they were all catchable. Justin Fields was on fire. He was. He was doing everything he wanted to do and had a great game. We have seen a handful of really amazing looking Justin Field games in the past. So he needs to put it back to back. I am really, you know, it's a great, positive outlook for him. I'm more bullish on the potential that, you know, hey, Garrett Wilson can do enough with Justin Fields. I would be fine taking the shot. If you want to call it and try to trade for him now before he puts it together over and over and over. That's. That's okay. But I, I would probably personally wait another week. The problem is if you wait another week.

[C]

Yes.

[B]

You're not going to get him.

[A]

Yeah. All right. We had Keenan Allen, 10 targets. We had Marvin Harrison with a touchdown.

[C]

Five for 71 is not. I mean, from Harv. That's. That's great.

[B]

Five catches on six targets. I mean, the catch rate last year, the.

[A]

Not enough.

[B]

Not in sync.

[A]

Not enough. Not Enough targets.

[B]

I agree with that.

[A]

I'm still worried about it. Still not sure Marv is better than really good. Yeah, fair Cortland Sutton, nine targets, six for 61. So you know any other wide receivers? I mean JSN was.

[B]

Oh, JSN was unbelievable.

[A]

I mean he also played outside the most he's ever played in his career.

[B]

He had a 53% target share of wide receivers of the team. That is an outlandish number. If you get on the course of a season a 30% target share. If you finish the season at 30%, you're borderline guaranteed to be a top 12 wide receiver. That's just a super high number. He's starting the season with 53% of the targets. And the thing is is you know the bull case for him going into the season was look, he was that dude last year. Now you take away DK Metcalf and you take away Tyler Lockett. Obviously they drafted rookies and brought in Cooper cup, but those are downgrades and so Jackson, Smith and Jigba looked great. I've got fully in on js.

[C]

He's got Pittsburgh next week. We'll see if their defense is just falling apart and then Saints and then Arizona. So it's a pretty decent run. So speaking of target share, can I interest you in 42% of Patrick Mahomes targets because that's what Hollywood Brown received and it was 16 targets. We're probably not getting there but with with Worthy out, Rice out, he is going to be a hot topic of discussion for the week.

[B]

You know who I was super disappointed in in week one from the Chiefs was Travis Kelsey. I know he got the touchdown so everyone's going to be fine. You know, fantasy wise he didn't bust but it was like they needed him before the injuries without Rice and It wasn't that.

[C]

Four targets, 2 for 47 with the.

[B]

Score and then Xavier Worthy goes out. How many targets for Hollywood? No, no, no. For Kelsey, for Kelsey?

[C]

Four.

[B]

Yeah, four targets. When you had all the injuries to everyone else. I don't know man. I'm starting to. There's a couple of these elder statement vets where you go, oh, you know Mark Andrews, the Baltimore Ravens just scored 40 points, put it on him. And Mark Andrews had one target. 100% catch rate is just like, I don't know.

[A]

We had top 10 tight end or top five tight ends. Brock Bowers, Dalton Kincaid, Travis, Kelsey, Joanne Johnson, Tyler Warren, all really close in points somewhere between 12.8 and 11.4. Nice debut for Warren, you talked about the Kelsey touchdown. Kincaid with the long touchdown. Brock Bowers hopefully healthy. Outside of that, you know Harold Fannin was a story because Harold Fannin ended up with nine targets for the Browns which is a real problem for David Najoku who was a common theme in the duds notation there.

[B]

If you don't know who Harold Fannin is he's a rookie tight end who fell a little bit in the draft. No one knew where he was going to go because he kind of played for a small school and then he tested bad and he didn't do well at the combine but his production in college is pretty much the best production of all time. The fact that week one as a rookie he comes out and is this involved 67% of the routes a 21% target share which I don't know for a fact Kyle, please double check me on this but I think he led the team in target share. That that's, that's an incredible. That is really bad for Najoku. I've gotten a Joku in a lot of leagues and obviously it's wonderful to say like oh look how many passes went to the tight end from Flacco. That process worked but if you're splitting them between two guys you're going to need a lot more passes.

[C]

Yeah Judy had eight targets so it might have been fan and they're up at the top and then maybe one week wonder but I'm going to highlight Juwan Johnson who had 11 targets against Arizona the Saints for how you know how close the game was. They do project to be a team that will be losing and he ran around on 96% of their drop backs like he was. He was fully utilized as a pass catching weapon hot off of his contract.

[B]

You do have a couple years Kellen Moore with Dallas Goddard was over a 20% market share so there's, there's a little bit of signal there to say that Joanne Johnson could be the number two pass catcher for that team.

[A]

Okay we are going to take another break here and jump into some of the. Oh maybe we'll see if there's any panic in the streets. We'll find out.

[C]

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[A]

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[B]

Pooped in his big boy pan.

[A]

I'm very. I'm very frustrated. The Joe Burrow. The Joe Burrow performance. Well, look, they had seven yards in the second half of the game and they won seven.

[C]

They got dominated by the Cleveland Browns. Truly dominated.

[A]

I mean, the defensive line for. For Cleveland, the defense in general. I mean, Newsom against Chase. I mean, it was just the offense as well. Burrow had 113 yards.

[B]

Yeah, Burrow had 113 yards. The Browns looked really good. They looked like they should have won the team so easily. It wasn't like their defense was so good and they were let down by their offense. Their offense was very good. The issue and why they lost was because Joe Flacco had two perfect passes. One to Jerry Judy that was popped up and then turned into an interception. And then another really nice one to Cedric Tillman that was hit him in the hands and popped up and turned into an interception.

[C]

Also missed extra point and missed field goal.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

Believe. And then you lose by a point.

[B]

Crazy.

[A]

Yeah. They should have won the game.

[B]

The Browns definitely extra yardage too.

[A]

Yeah, no, they more than that. Yeah. Yeah. They were at like 340something. I think the Joe Burrow and that's a tough loss in the 140s.

[C]

I mean Eagles in week one.

[A]

That's why it was the almost upset which at least you know, it's just.

[C]

It's impossible.

[A]

All right. Bo nix 25 for 42 picks. Bo picks.

[B]

Those did not hit his wide receivers in the hand.

[A]

They hit the opposing team. And the other thing was that he had 78% of his attempts under 10 yards. I think his average depth of target was 4.3 yards. He couldn't get the ball down the field. He never like it was an asset. In the beginning of the game. You're like, oh cool, he can throw.

[B]

Moving.

[A]

Then it was like oh my gosh, please stop moving when you throw.

[C]

I think he just. Yeah, he was really sniffing those farts. Check out this cool Patrick Mahomes. Check out this cool throw I'm going to do. Yeah.

[A]

They're very lucky to have won the game. If they weren't facing Cam Warden as rookie first appearance, they could have easily lost that game.

[C]

Agreed.

[A]

Trevor Lawrence.

[C]

Really disappointing.

[A]

This is the same Trevor Lawrence. It was Carolina and he had 178 and one.

[C]

Now Trevor Lawrence. This game did have a super long lightning delay.

[B]

Yes.

[C]

Just like the. So I mean lightning delays are now two and oh. Against NFL offenses.

[A]

Yeah. Team.

[B]

You guys are really have a retractable roof.

[A]

You know, guys are really hammering the weather.

[C]

I just.

[A]

There's a solution.

[C]

I just said the game got shut down and then the offense is Trevor disappointing.

[A]

Trevor Law underground man.

[B]

Trevor Lawrence.

[A]

Where you like it, Mole Man.

[C]

Yeah, that'd be great. As long as the. As long as there's enough depth.

[B]

Yeah, for sure. If you. If you've got enough height on the ceiling underground simulated on a computer.

[A]

Why play?

[B]

You're not listening.

[C]

They didn't play.

[B]

Yeah, no, they did.

[A]

They came back and played because they're just impatient.

[B]

But T. Law is the most similar quarterback to me as Kyler Murray where he's not that dude. He's. He's good enough.

[C]

He's. You're never like it.

[B]

More and more every week you're going to.

[A]

But you did pay him like the dude. And you're stuck with him.

[B]

Yeah. And you're stuck with him. And if either one Kyler Murray or Trevor Lawrence hit the open market, half the league would go and pay him the highest. They're not bad quarterbacks.

[A]

Jay Cutler was highly in demand.

[B]

They're not terrible quarterbacks. They really aren't. They are above average quarterbacks, but they're not great and they will never be great. Send in the cars.

[C]

Yeah, send in the cars. Exactly.

[B]

I don't know, man. I think their car was better.

[A]

Dak had a tough week. One two was disgusting. And C.J. stroud, I thought he made a lot of good throws. But then you look at the stat line.

[C]

They got embarrassed.

[A]

Yeah. They got beat so they couldn't get it done.

[C]

That offensive line is going to be a big problem.

[B]

That offensive line. And they, and they. I think they lost an alignment during the game. Another one was kind of banged up during the game. They don't have depth and they don't have talent. So. The Texans are real. Their defense is awesome. But their offense could be a real issue this season.

[A]

Kenneth Walker, we need to have the conversation. 10 carries, 20 yards, that's not the problem. 40% of snaps, that's the problem.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

And yuck.

[C]

Yeah, it was a, it was a full on timeshare. I think he had one more touch or one more opportunity than Charbonnet. Charbs had looked much better in the production. This is, I don't. This is not a DEFCON one, but we're probably at about three.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

I don't terms of this. They're just going to split and maybe Charbs is just a better fit for the offense. It was extremely disappointing.

[B]

There is the outside chance and I do think it's an outside chance that this was managing the injury Kenneth Walker been dealing with. But even if that was the case, even if this was like we're going to limit Kenneth Walker in this game because in this early off season he was dealing with stuff. Charbonnet looked awesome.

[A]

He did number one in success rate in week one.

[B]

Charbonnet was great. I mean he was better for this system with, you know, this is a new system. Keep in mind with, with Kubes, with, with a fullback and Charbonnet was fantastic. Sharps has never had. He's basically averaged a 24% market share in games that he's played. With Kenneth Walker, he's only been a backup, and in this game, he was 48% of the snaps. So this is projecting to be a complete split. And Sharbs looked to fit the system better in week one.

[A]

There's not really something to be gained by Seattle banking too much on Ken Walker if Sharbs is productive. And, I mean, Walker's been hurt so much that if you bank on him and he goes out, then you're hurt, but if you have a committee and he goes out, you're fine.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

All right. We had David Montgomery 11 for 25 on the ground, only 30%, 37% of snaps. He averaged 42 last year. The game script was definitely more Jameer Gibbs oriented. So you, you know, pay attention to it. We expected a little bit more Gibbs this year. If it goes from 42% to 37, that won't surprise me. It also won't surprise me if this is more of their game script this year than it was last year. They were ahead of so many games last year, and we'll see. It's one week, but something to pay attention to.

[C]

It's. But the. The success of David Montgomery is the Lions offense has to run extremely hot, and they could bounce back after one week. But it. That's the thing, is the offense overall has to be nuclear for David Montgomery to be startable.

[B]

My opinion is that this was not a problem with the Lions.

[C]

Okay.

[B]

That this was not a problem with the offensive coordinator. That this was the Green Bay Packers. And the reason my. If I was in a court of law, if I would bring you a piece of evidence, it would be that Jameer Gibbs had 10 targets. He had 10 receptions. Jameer Gibbs, the fastest, most dangerous guy to have the ball in his hands. He had 31 yards. That defense was swarming and tackling and beating up the Lions. I saw it over and over where I was like, dude, you would get Gibbs a little throw out to the flat, and you're just waiting for him to just break it off. And then 12 packers were there, even.

[C]

Though they're playing 11 next week is against Chicago at home.

[B]

That's a great matchup for them running.

[C]

Say that you feel like as of right now, we're very early, but you'd be like, I'll put Montgomery back in my flex 100%.

[B]

Personally.

[A]

Yeah, it might be a decision based on some of the other guys that you want, right?

[B]

I mean, I'm not starting him over everybody, but I think he is. Next week is an absolute flex.

[A]

I play Dobbins over Monty.

[B]

What's the matchup?

[C]

I don't. I think he's saying it doesn't matter.

[A]

I mean, it's Indianapolis.

[B]

Oh, sure. Okay.

[A]

Travion Henderson, 5 for 27 on the ground, six targets, 6 for 24 through the air, 35% of snaps. Ramondre 7 for 15, 65% of snaps. And you'll see more Henderson sooner than later. But just wait.

[C]

Yeah, it. But it's. It's inevitable. It will happen. But how long will the curmudgeons hold out?

[A]

I mean, he is just playing a little bit smaller. I mean, he's just not like when it's. When it's going to be fourth downs, maybe some goal line like I don't think you're going to see. I think you're going to see a lot of Ramon Dre in those situations, unfortunately. But the targets you're looking for, the high value opportunities and touches and hopefully Trayvon, you know, Miami next week, that went pretty well for the Colts.

[C]

I mean, like listed, you know, these are the ways, but it's like Travion Henderson's listed at 510 202. Jameer Gibbs is 59 202. Like they are almost sized identically.

[A]

Gibbs. Yeah, yeah. But watching him, he's not. No, he just.

[C]

He was just bouncing around in different uniforms.

[A]

He was bouncing around though. I mean, when he was getting hit, he was getting hit hard. I'm not saying anything like we want him to catch the football and get into space. I don't think he's ever going to be. Well, we'll see. We'll see what happens. Marion Hampton, 15 for 48 against Kansas City's running interior.

[B]

Not worried.

[C]

Nope. I'm not worried either.

[A]

Caleb Johnson did.

[B]

Oh, no, didn't play.

[A]

Oh, no.

[B]

He had one play, negative two yards. Although I give him positive 13 because he drew a flag. You know What I mean? 15 yards. I got to do it. No, I mean, Caleb Johnson is sold.

[C]

Out to help the team.

[B]

Thank you. Caleb Johnson is third on the depth chart and until he overtakes Kenneth Gainwell, impossible. But Kenneth Gainwell wasn't good in his own right. So I do think. You think Kenneth Gainwell was good.

[A]

I did. I thought he looked fast and they won the game. So I don't know.

[B]

I mean, I'd have to go back and watch.

[A]

It's hard to compare to the numbers.

[B]

I don't think Gainwell was. I mean, one carry from Caleb, but I think Gainwell did not reach 3.

[C]

Yards of carry the production.

[A]

Well, how many carries did he even get?

[C]

He was seven for 19. So that's 2.7. And he caught the ball three times for four yards. Production was due to. This is what I'm saying. What is Arthur doing? It's. It's so bizarre to give Jalen Warren that extension right before opening weekend and then you're like, hey, this guy we picked up, that's going to be the guy.

[A]

There's a lot more to the running backs in Pittsburgh when you have Aaron Rodgers. It's about picking up the blitz, picking up pass protection, chipping guys. It's the ones that he feels like has experience. I mean, there were numerous beat writers in Pittsburgh that said that that was the point of emphasis for Caleb Johnson to work on in this off season was that there were struggles at times this offseason. It's his focus. Caleb came out and said it. If he earns the trust in those situations, even when he's not touching the football, he will get out on the field more because Gainwell's made to be a backup.

[B]

Yeah. History has shown that rookies often take time. Don't look at. Look at this list. We're talking about Travion Henderson, Amari and Hampton. Caleb Johnson, Cam Scatter Boot like they're all in the duds. This is week one. This is. I don't pull a red alarm on rookies getting off to a slow start.

[A]

Cam Scatter Boo was two for negative three. They could not run the football. Tyrone Chasey was not good and Washington just shut it all down.

[C]

Russ. Russ sucks it.

[A]

If it'll be Jackson dart very soon.

[C]

It needs to be this week.

[A]

It might be.

[C]

I think it's.

[A]

It might legitimately be Jackson dart.

[B]

Russ get 100 passing yards. I don't think he achieved 100 passing yards.

[A]

He.

[B]

You can't have an offense with Russell Wilson in 20.

[C]

He did. He threw the ball 37 times and he ended up with 168 yards. Four and a half yards an attempt. Get him out of here.

[B]

There are running. What is Derek Henry's Baltimore career rushing yards per attempt.

[C]

Like get it. How is Russ keep getting these jobs? How does that happen?

[B]

It's a resume thing. Sometimes you hire someone. Sometimes people come and they show you the resume and they. You go, whoa, you work for that company?

[C]

Yeah, that does happen.

[B]

And you go, okay.

[A]

All right. Wide receiver duds. Let's say some big names. A.J. brown, Jamar Chase, Amon Ross, St. Brown. Brian Thomas Jr. Had one catch.

[B]

He had a lot of targets.

[A]

One catch. Nico Collins 3 for 25. Terry McClaurin, 2 for 27. Mike Evans 5 for 51. George Pickens, 3, 3 for 30. A lot of players with a lot of expectations. But it's one week and wide receivers are all going to have some down weeks. You know, it was super disappointing. I have a team with the Jamar Chase and Burrow Stack. They didn't win, they didn't even come close. That's the stack. You still got 15 points between them. That was bad. But you know, T. Higgins also didn't get it done. Devonte Smith didn't get it done. So you had tandems like it wasn't like one guy did well. So it is.

[B]

Who are you concerned with?

[A]

Like you look, I'm concerned with Tyreek Hill.

[B]

Yes, that was the name that I'm probably.

[A]

I'm concerned. I'm a little bit concerned with Brian Thomas because I don't, you know, Travis Hunter, the news came out before full time offensive player. He was a full time offensive player. He out targeted Brian Thomas Jr. So yes, I'm a little bit. This is, this is one of the reasons Brian Thomas's stats didn't bear out as high in my rankings as other people is I was just a little bit worried about the Lawrence with actual other weapons. Like they, they didn't really have anybody else at the end of the year and all of his success came with Mac Jones like his major world beating success. So I was a little bit concerned that Thomas might be good, not great. So I'm a little worried there. I'm a little worried about Terry McClaurin because Debo, the way the offense functions, if you don't hit the big play, I don't think you're going to be happy.

[B]

If you look at recent history of wide receivers who have held out of training camp waiting for that new contract and then they come in and then they, you know, Brandon, I. You did it and he just sucked. He came back and wasn't good until he got injured. So that one's concerning. I'm not overly concerned on this guy, but a sneeze just.

[C]

Okay, do you need to whisper it?

[B]

Just little Nico Collins worry because of the overall offense. Just that offensive line was so bad and to be honest, CJ Stroud did not deal with pressure well. He kept running backwards and kind of trying to like he had opportunity after opportunity step up in the pocket when these, when the Offensive line was going around him and instead he tried to do like the old school Russell Wilson, turn and run away, but he's not that type of an athlete. And so he just gets this deep sack. Hopefully he corrects that. But that offensive line was real bad.

[A]

We talked about Mark Andrews. He was awful. One target, one catch. Seems like good night.

[B]

Pick up Isaiah likely.

[C]

Yeah, maybe.

[A]

We have Tucker Craft, four targets. He caught a touchdown. That's not a. That's not a dud.

[C]

Jordan Love threw the ball 22 times.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Kraft had four targets, which look like that's.

[A]

That is something to be aware of. If the packers defense is what we saw on Sunday, you're going to get. I mean, you're going to get a lot of Josh Jacobs. Like, I thought Jordan Love looked really good. He can make plays when you need to make them, but he might not have to make as many because you're going to have games. It's kind of like the better get in the first half situation of Philadelphia. Yep, it could be the situation. Josh Jacobs looked good to me, even against a tougher run defense.

[C]

It took him a while.

[B]

Matthew golden, only two targets. You know that because of that. Same thing. Two of the 22, but I don't. Again, these rookies, don't move away from them yet.

[A]

That was Studs and Duds presented by Lowe's. Lowe's knows Sundays are for NFL football. Earn your Sunday with Lowe's, official partner of the NFL. We've got another game tonight. We got waiver wire tomorrow on the show. Our first waiver wire of the year on Wednesday. Backup options, TNF preview, mailbag. We got starts of the week coming at the back of the week. And yeah, here we go. One more game to get through. Deep breaths, everybody. React appropriately. The season is not over. You also didn't win the championship.

[C]

It's just begun.

[A]

Goodbye.

[C]

Goodbye, everybody.

[B]

Thank you for listening to another episode of the Fantasy Footballers Podcast. Join our fantasy football community on JoinTheFoot.com and follow us on Twitter the FFballers.

[A]

The fight for our future starts with belief in our nation and its promise in our future and its potential. Together, we answer America's call to win. We are Marines. We were mates for this. Are you ready to get spicy? These Doritos Golden Sriracha aren't that spicy.

[B]

Maybe it's time to turn up the.

[A]

Heat or turn it down. It's time for something that's not too spicy. Try Doritos Golden Sriracha.

[B]

Spicy but not too spicy.