Transcription
Three weeks until the fantasy playoffs. You better be ready. And if you're not, I'm here to get you ready.
Now, our S tier running backs, it's the same as it's been for quite some time. You have Jonathan Taylor, you have McCaffrey. I would prefer JT averaging 27 and a half points per game in comparison to McCaffrey, who's currently at 25.8. But to put into context exactly how good these running backs have been this season, Saquon Barkley was the running back one in fantasy last year when he went out there, broke records, and he averaged 22 and a half points per game. Taylor is crushing what Barkley did last season. McCaffrey is crushing what Barkley did last season. Like, these two players give you such an edge in comparison to the rest of the field that it's almost impossible to beat a team that has both of them, which is what I'm going to be attempting to do in week 12 of the Flock League. Please pray for me.
Now, the A tier running backs, we're going to be let off with Bijan Robinson. In the live streams last week, we saw a thousand Bijan Robinson trades where y'all were able to pick them up on the cheap, and I applaud y'all for that. Taking the discount with the Tyler Allgeier vultured rushing touchdowns two weeks ago. Bijan Robinson finally gets that goal line usage. Has two rushing touchdowns himself this week. Big thing to monitor for Bijan is going to be the health of Michael Penix, because what we have seen is when Kirk Cousins is under center, this is going to be a much worse offense. But you're also not going to have Drake London for a little bit of time, or at least it seems. So realistically, we should expect that this team runs the ball over and over and over again.
Now, Jameer Gibbs just had a pretty tough game against the Philadelphia Eagles where the Detroit Lions weren't able to move the ball down the field, but he himself had over a 100 receiving yards and he looks so good. Like, I know this is going to be a hot take and it probably is a wrong take, but if we were just ranking running backs with how good they look with the ball in their hands, Gibbs may be the running back one in the NFL. Like, this dude is insane.
Devon Achane also incredible as well. Achane is actually averaging more points per game than Jameer Gibbs and Bijan Robinson this season. He's averaging six and a half targets per game. The only running back seeing more is McCaffrey. But keep in mind with Achane, he still has to go through the week 12 bye. And since you only have weeks 12, 13, 14 until the fantasy playoffs, if you have to deal with the by-week, you're going to be missing 33% of the remaining regular season games. For that reason, I would very clearly prefer Bijan or Jameer Gibbs.
Now, going down to B tier, we are going to have James Cook leading us off. With Cook, the rushing production wasn't exactly there as Josh Allen went nuclear this past week, but it didn't matter. He had the big long receiving touchdown, goes over 20 fantasy points. So far this season, is averaging almost 100 rushing yards per game, and is still averaging about 18 and a half fantasy points per contest.
Now, Rico Dowdle will be our next running back. So, they kind of abandoned the run against Atlanta and allowed Bryce Young to actually sling it. Um, but still, Rico Dowdle played 80 plus% of the snaps. If you look at the underlying usage, um, the only games he has started, he has scored 32, 34, 28, 15, and 15 fantasy points. So, this past week is the absolute floor that you've seen with Dowdle.
Now, keep in mind with Dowdle, you do have the week 14 bye. So, you are going to be missing him one week in comparison to some of the other running backs in this tier, such as Saquon Barkley. You better believe we're repping the Barkley jersey, the captain of my fantasy team, the guy that I took at the 106. And this past week against the Detroit Lions, he touches the ball a ton. I was pissed when they called back the touchdown because you knew immediately that Jalen Hurts was going to vulture it. Um, super frustrating that the big plays are still not there. And with the offensive line injuries and the fact that honestly Barkley just doesn't look nearly as good as he did last season, I'm afraid the big plays are never going to be there for Barkley.
Now, with Javonte Williams, obviously we haven't seen him playing since week nine. Um, but he's still averaging four targets a game coming into this. He's still averaging about 80 rushing yards per contest as well. 17 and a half fantasy points. If you go ahead and look at his current projections on Underdog Fantasy for tonight's game, he is currently sitting at higher or lower 92 and a half total yards against the Las Vegas Raiders. Now, of course, if you wanted to check out any of those projections, the link to Underdog Fantasy is always in the description as well as the comment section. If you use code FLOCK, you'll get a $100 added to your account after you play your first five. And on top of that, you'll be getting a Gimme CeeDee Lamb pick higher or lower half a total yard for that Monday night game and free questions that you can ask me in the live streams. So, we're live streaming every single day until Christmas.
Now, Kyren Williams will be our next running back. With Kyren, um, Blake Corum continues to see more and more involvement. Like, Kyren Williams' market share numbers over the past few weeks, they definitely have trended downwards in comparison to what we've historically seen for Kyren, but he still continues to score touchdowns at a crazy high rate. Blake Corum is not going to have anything here as a receiver. So, um, Kyren still a very safe option in a very good offense and he looks a lot better than Blake Corum as well.
And then Austin Ekeler at RB1, if the Raiders were a good team. Austin Ekeler honestly could be an A tier running back for us. He could be up there with Bijan, Gibbs, and Achane. The issue is you are stuck in a garbage offense behind a garbage offensive line. Well, maybe, uh, this week against the Dallas Cowboys, a defense that's garbage, Ekeler is going to project out extremely well. Like right now, on Underdog, he's higher or lower 83 and a half total yards for tonight's game. Most weeks going into the future, it's going to be tough, but his usage as a receiver has been trending in the right direction, which is extremely bullish for his future production.
Now, leading us off with C tier is going to be Josh Jacobs. Now, I am recording this extremely late Sunday night/Monday morning. So, it's very difficult for me to sit here and tell you how you should value Josh Jacobs. From what I'm reading, it sounds like he is not going to be out for an extended period of time. He's definitely not going to be out the rest of the season, but again, we have three weeks until the fantasy playoffs.
Now, for my own team, it looks like I'm hopefully going to be 9 and 2 after tonight's game. We'll see what happens with CeeDee Lamb and Dak Prescott. And for my own team, if I'm 9 and 2, it's like, okay, I'm still going to value Josh Jacobs highly because I can potentially get a round one bye and I really don't need him until the fantasy playoffs in weeks 16 and 17 if I have that round one bye. However, if you are looking like you're going to be five and six after this week and you have Josh Jacobs, you're in a different boat. You should look to sell Jacobs.
But similar story here with Bucky Irving. Bucky Irving finally back at practice last week. Maybe with how good Sean Tucker just looked, there is some reason to be concerned that with the Bucky injury, even if he does play this week and through the rest of the year, Sean Tucker is going to have a little bit of a role and take away from Bucky just some.
Now, Derrick Henry will be our next running back. Um, it's very frustrating to see Lamar Jackson just simply not get better. I mean, that's what I've been expecting to happen. I'm expecting some big Lamar blow up. Um, but with Henry, we just know exactly what you're going to get. You're going to get about 15 to 20 carries, no usage as a receiver. If the big rush is there, then cool, it's going to be a good day. If the touchdown's there, then cool, it's going to be a good day. And if the touchdown's not there, you are certifiably cooked. Um, but looking at the upcoming matchups, he gets to play Cincinnati in week 13 and he gets to play Cincinnati in week 15 as well.
Now, TreVeyon Henderson will be our next running back. Henderson is very difficult to rank because if you told me, "Hey, Rhamondre Stevenson's going to be out for the season." Um, TreVeyon Henderson would be up in the B tier for me, he would be much higher than this. My only hesitation is we saw Mike Vrabel for whatever reason just continuously look at Rhamondre over and over and over again early in the year where you can clearly tell by these rankings, I'm not expecting Rhamondre to come back and to be the starting running back in this backfield. But I do think that there's an outside chance for Rhamondre Stevenson comes back and it's just a thorn in the side of TreVeyon Henderson and frustrates us all. But if Rhamondre was nothing, Henderson would go a lot higher.
Then Chase Brown will be our next running back. With Chase Brown averaging over five targets a game officially now. I mean, ever since Flacco's taken over, he's been much, much better. 12 points against Pittsburgh. I guess Flacco actually took over against Green Bay where you go 9, 12, 25.2, and then 18.7 fantasy points this past week. And this offense can look to get even better when we get Joe Burrow back hopefully a few weeks from now. If he doesn't wise up and realize, hey, you probably shouldn't come back, Burrow.
Marlon Mack will be our next running back. Um, with Mack, we haven't seen him since week five. He's missed week six, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and then now he has the week 12 bye. So, the reports that we got back a couple weeks ago were, "Hey, uh, Marlon Mack shouldn't be back into this offense until at the very earliest after the week 12 bye." Well, now maybe he is back in week 13. We will see. If you gave me a guarantee that he was back in week 13, I think you can make an argument that he's at the top of this tier.
And then Travis Etienne is a very interesting running back in that it looked like he was actually losing his job to Tank Bigsby at the beginning of the game. Then Tank Bigsby gets banged up and now Travis Etienne looks 10,000 times better if you have no Tank Bigsby and you have no Tank Bigsby. It's just Etienne and JaMycal Hasty. But obviously we will have to just continue to monitor the updates that you get with Tank Bigsby.
Now our next name is going to be Breece Hall. This is my running back three on my team. I have Barkley, Jacobs, and Breece. And with Breece, obviously super frustrating seeing that game against the New England Patriots. Um, and I know you want to sit here and say like, "Oh, okay. Garbage offense, garbage running back, blah, blah, blah." I completely agree. This is a garbage offense. Y'all know I'm a massive New York Jets hater. I stand by the Jets, the Browns, teams like this that have been horrible forever and that just continue to abuse their fans year after year. They should have no fans. Their fans should abandon them. At least in my opinion. But again, I know that is blasphemy to a lot of football fans. Um, but if I'm going to be honest with Breece Hall, you still have receiving upside. He's still an incredible talent. You can just go back two weeks ago against the Cleveland Browns. He scored 19 and a half points. His third to last game, he scored 33 against the Cincinnati Bengals. He does get to play against the Miami Dolphins in week 14. He has a game against the Atlanta Falcons. He has a game against Jacksonville. He has a game against New Orleans. It's not all horrible. Like, the Jets may actually not be massive dogs against the New Orleans Saints.
Now, Quinshawn Judkins will be our next running back. If you are looking at Judkins, I'm going to have him right back to back with Breece Hall here for a reason. The reason is is they are both stuck in some of the worst offenses in the NFL. The only reason I'm going to give a slight nod to Breece Hall is Breece Hall specifically gives you a little more receiving usage for a full PPR format. But if you're a non-PPR league, then obviously we'd prefer Judkins.
Now, R.J. Harvey will be our next name. If you are going to be ranking Harvey, it's very difficult with Julius McGofficin all of a sudden getting involved. Like I really thought that R.J. Harvey was about to be on that TreVeyon Henderson trajectory that he was about to just go absolutely nuclear and turn into a must-start running back every single week. But with Julius McGofficin getting involved, it does become a little bit tougher for Harvey.
Now leading off our next tier, we are going to have Jaylen Warren. So Jaylen Warren gets banged up this past week against the Cincinnati Bengals. I'm going to assume honestly that Jaylen Warren is A-OK. Okay. I think a big reason they kept Kenneth Gainwell in that game is Gainwell was just outplaying Jaylen Warren. And I want to sit here as somebody who was putting Kenneth Gainwell on their bench as a stash and say like, "Oh, Gainwell now has proven with two separate weeks that he is better than Jaylen Warren. He should be the guy out there. He should be the lead back." But we had previously seen already Kenneth Gainwell just put up in week four a better week than anything Jaylen Warren's done in his entire NFL career. And the team went right back to Jaylen Warren. So, um, I think realistically more likely than not Jaylen Warren is the starting running back here whether I like it or not.
Um, DeAndre Swift will be our next back with DeAndre Swift. Um, difficulty is Kyle Manunga now is showing that this touchdown vulture role is kind of sticking. DeAndre Swift definitely has a nice role as a receiver. It's a decent offense given specific matchups. Um, but I'm just worried that Kyle Manunga is going to continue to expand his role.
Aaron Jones has very clearly proven that he is the starting running back for the Minnesota Vikings. Very similar to DeAndre Swift. They're both averaging about three and a half targets per game. I would say DeAndre Swift's probably the more talented running back between the two of them just based off their overall age and their career trajectory at this point. And on top of this, I do like the Chicago Bears offense more than the Vikings.
Then with Woody Marks, if he wasn't behind such a garbage offensive line, you could put him higher than this. Um, he's averaging nine and a half fantasy points per game so far this season, but honestly, that's not really a good mark because the usage has trended up very nicely since the bye. I mean, if we look at Woody Marks after the bye, he's had 15, 15, 13, 17, and now 19 opportunities. So, you're getting anywhere from essentially 15 to 19 opportunities every single week.
Now, David Montgomery will be a running back that's difficult for us to come through and ever rank with standalone value just because he will be a touchdown or bust running back. He is currently sitting here averaging a whopping 1.9 targets per game, right? So, no role as a receiver. Jameer Gibbs definitely the better player, but I will always put David Montgomery a little bit higher in our rest of season rankings than what his regular points per game would be, just because if you were to get that injury to Jameer Gibbs, Montgomery probably turns into an A tier running back.
Now, Kenneth Walker will be our next play. If you're going to look at Kenneth Walker, the usage is definitely a lot better this past week, right? I mean, he comes through and he actually sees some involvement as well as a receiver, which is a big change in comparison to what we've had so far this season. So, looks like it's trending up on paper until you look at the underlying snap data and realize Zach Charbonnet still played half this game.
Then going over and looking at our next tier, we are going to have Zach Charbonnet. Um, I would never want to put him in our starting lineup normally, but if you were to get an injury to Kenneth Walker, then all of a sudden he turns into a must-start player that you can just absolutely jam in your lineup any given week.
Now, Trey Benson will be our next name with Benson. Um, every week that goes by, he's a little bit closer to returning, but he still hasn't really ever proven anything at the NFL level. And at the same time, it's a pretty bad offense.
Now, Alvin Kamara obviously in a garbage offense. Alvin Kamara has looked straight up washed, not getting involved as a receiver nearly as much. And he's averaging fewer than 10 points per game.
Kamaní Vidal um looks like he's now banged up. And at the same time, you have a week 12 bye. Marlon Mack's potentially coming back right after. Kenneth Gainwell again looks incredible when he gets the opportunities. The issue is he just very rarely gets enough opportunities for you to ever be able to actually put him in your starting lineup. So, um, I have Gainwell on my team. If you were to tell me, "Hey, Mason, Jaylen Warren's missing this next week," I would move him up my rankings dramatically, but we don't know.
Um, I have Emanuel Wilson on my bench as well. I'm going to give Emanuel Wilson a premium value over the other handcuff running backs considering the Josh Jacobs injury. Any game Jacobs were to miss, Emanuel Wilson turns into a must-start player just like um Kenneth Gainwell if Jaylen Warren were to miss.
And then Tyjae Spears will be our next running back. Um, with Spears, just impossible to put him in your starting lineup um considering the fact that he is split in the backfield with Derrick Henry 50/50 and it's a bad offense and at the same time neither running back is super talented.
Kyle Manunga will be our next running back. Very clearly the backup to DeAndre Swift, but he is getting more and more work here, so you want to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Sean Tucker comes through with a massive, massive performance, but Rashaad White's still on the field. And there's a real shot Bucky Irving is back this week. Um, Jordan Mason just straight up regulated a handcuff duties. Tyler Allgeier pretty much just a handcuff averaging eight points per game. But again, under the most desperate of circumstances, you could put him in and really hope that he scores a touchdown. And then if you are looking at the instance in which Bijan goes down, Tyler Allgeier turns into a league winner.
Then our last tier running backs, Blake Corum's a handcuff like everybody else here. But the reason Corum's going to be below some of these other players such as Tyler Allgeier, such as Emanuel Wilson in my handcuff rankings is one, Kyren's fully healthy. And also Blake Corum doesn't have receiving upside.
Kareem Hunt, not much receiving upside at this point either, but he is playing literally every single snap with no Pacheco. Rhamondre Stevenson, best case scenario is he comes back. He's um seeing 30% of this backfield and he's just a handcuff to TreVeyon.
Tony Pollard I have on my bench. I don't know why I would never consider putting this dude in my starting lineup, but I would say that if Spears were to go down, then I could consider it, I guess. And then it looks like Chris Rodriguez is probably the running back you'd prefer over Chuba Hubbard rest of season. But I really appreciate you. Hope I was able to help you out in some way with this. Of course, if you wanted to check out those Javonte or Austin Ekeler projections on Underdog, the link's always in the description. It's in the comment section. Code FLOCK will get you a $100 added to your account after you play your first five. And on top of that, you will get free questions that you can ask us in the live streams. And you're going to be able to get a Gimme CeeDee Lamb pick higher or lower half total yard for that Monday night game.