There were a few outstanding performances by players in Week 8 and a couple were a little unexpected. You may have been handed a loss in your fantasy league if you played against one of their guys.
The Bengals’ Andy Dalton threw for 325 yards and five touchdowns in a win over the Jets on Sunday. Dalton has been tremendous as of late with three straight games of over 300 yards through the air and a total of 11 touchdowns to only two interceptions in the same span.
The more unexpected part of the game against New York was the fact that Dalton threw four touchdowns passes to Marvin Jones, who now has six in the past three games combined. Jones is in his second year in the league and was owned hardly at all before his four-score outburst, to now being the top waiver wire pickup of the week. The former California Bear is capable and worth a look in most formats, but don’t go thinking he’s going to continue to outshine fellow wideout A.J. Green. That’s almost like thinking Dez Bryant is a better wide receiver than Calvin Johnson.
Speaking of Megatron, the best pass-catcher in the entire galaxy notched 329 yards on 14 grabs with one touchdown in Week 8. There were only three quarterbacks to throw for more yards than Johnson had receiving and of course, one of them was the guy tossing him passes, Matthew Stafford, who had 488. The other two are named Peyton Manning (354) and Drew Brees (332). Brees also delivered five touchdown passes over the weekend, but we come to expect performances like that from him as he now has five or more touchdowns in eight career games, an NFL record.
Johnson’s owners were rewarded with 36 points in standard scoring leagues and those of us in points per reception (PPR) leagues did even better. His 329 yards receiving is the second most for a game in league history with Flipper Anderson holding the record with 336 in 1989 as a member of the Los Angeles Rams. If you own Johnson and still lost last week, then you have some other issues on your team and players who didn’t do their part.
Tom Brady and Robert Griffin III come to mind as both signal callers lacked production for their fantasy owners.
Brady threw a touchdown on Sunday, but had only 116 yards passing, his lowest total since Week 15 in 2009. New England’s gameplan was to run the ball against the Dolphins even though it was the first time all season that Danny Amendola and Rob Gronkowski were on the field healthy. The Pats ran it 37 times compared to 22 passing attempts. Fantasy owners can expect Brady to air it out more often going forward, but it has been a rough year so far statistically for the Super Bowl MVP.
Griffin completed half of his passes (15-for-30) for a whopping 132 yards to go along with a touchdown and two interceptions. He also lost a fumble and left the game late in the fourth quarter with an apparent knee injury as the Redskins were defeated by the Broncos. The former Baylor Bear and second overall pick in 2012 is slated to start this weekend against San Diego and has good matchups the next three weeks, so owners should start him if there is no better option.
Seahawks’ running back Marshawn Lynch also underwhelmed his owners with only 23 yards on the ground on eight carries. Seattle ran just 40 plays the entire game and Lynch’s production is a fluke. Skittles is still very valuable in all fantasy football leagues and should be started every week as the feature back on an extremely good team. His owners will ‘taste the endzone’ quite often the rest of the way.
Fantasy owners also saw Darren Sproles catch four passes for zero yards with no carries to boot. The speedy tailback is very useful in PPR leagues and should continue to get plenty of action in the Saints’ potent passing attack. Start him in knowing that Week 8’s output was a rare occurrence.
And where has Marques Colston been hiding? Over the past three games, the New Orleans’ wide receiver has a mere six catches for 44 yards and no scores. He has just one touchdown on the season and is on pace for less than 1,000 yards receiving for the first time since 2008 when a thumb injury saw him miss five games. Colston has been one of the more consistent players at his position since coming into the league in 2006, but he and Brees just haven’t been in sync lately.
If you own tight ends Julius Thomas, Jason Witten and/or Tony Gonzalez, you were graced with measly numbers on Sunday. Thomas and Witten will be fine while Gonzalez may see fewer targets because defenses will double-team him more often with Julio Jones and Roddy White sidelined with injuries.
As experienced fantasy owners, we tend to expect the unexpected over the course of a season. Follow me on Twitter @AndrewEggers and feel free to share your fantasy woes.
Marshawn Lynch and Marques Colston Photo Credits: Mark Runyon | Pro Football Schedules
