The Patch Work Report NFL Week 4
This weekly column will give a run through of all the previous weeks NFL games. All fantasy points discussed will be related to the Chalk Daily Fantasy Sports official NFL scoring system.
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Miami Dolphins @ Cincinnati Bengals
1.) This game was boring and frustrating for everyone, unless you owned A.J. Green. He was the game’s lone shining star, going off for 10 catches, 173 yards and 1 touchdown. The entire Bengal’s offense funneled through Green, who found himself on the other end of 40% of Andy Dalton’s pass attempts. The Dolphin’s secondary had no answer.
2.) In other Dolphin’s news — they are terrible.
3.) In what seemed to be a good matchup for Jeremy Hill to take advantage of, he disappointed. The Dolphins were allowing 129.8 rushing yards per game going into week 4, which ranked 29th out of 32 teams, but Hill only rewarded owners with 7.1 Chalk fantasy points (fpts).
Indianapolis Colts @ Jacksonville Jaguars (London)
1.) In a game that had plenty of scoring, there was no major fantasy production like we had hoped. Yards and touchdowns were very evenly distributed amongst 4–6 players on both teams, which lowered everyone’s ceiling.
2.) To no surprise, T.Y. Hilton and Allen Robinson lead their respective teams in target with 10 apiece.
3.) I feel bad asking it, especially because he seems like such a nice person, but is Andrew Luck overrated? I know he has an awful offensive line and has never had a significant run game to support him, but he makes some very poor decisions while on the field.
Carolina Panthers @ Atlanta Falcons
- ) All hail Julio! Julio Jones is an absolute freak. On Sunday, he pulled in 12 receptions for 300 yards and 1 TD. He had more receiving yards than all but 5 quarterbacks had for passing yards! That is insane! I know, I know… the Carolina secondary is in shambles, but no matter who you put out there to cover him, he is just bigger, faster and stronger. Even if Josh Norman was still on the team, Julio would have easily put up 200 yards, I don’t care what you say.
2.) In contrast, the Panthers offense was disappointing. Even before Cam Newton got knocked out of the game with a concussion, there was not much going for them. Greg Olsen was the only player to put up respectable numbers with 6 receptions for 76 yards and a spectacular one-handed TD.
3.) After a week with just 1 target, I expected Kelvin Benjamin to get force fed and have a monster game. He did not. He managed only 3 catches on 7 targets for 39 yards. He did salvage the outing with a TD, but it certainly didn’t seem like enough in what could have been a bounce back week.
4.) Matt Ryan is not an elite QB. In fact, more often than not, he is a bad QB. However, with the way Julio is playing, it is clear that Ryan has his confidence back. After a few inaccurate passes that Julio magically pulled in, Matty Ice started dropping dimes to all sorts of receivers that no one has ever heard of. As a result, the Ryan-Julio connection was by far the best stack of the week. (Note: The term “stack” refers to pairing a quarterback with one or more of his receivers)
Oakland Raiders @ Baltimore Ravens
1.) Did anyone see a Michael Crabtree 3 TD day coming….? No? Didn’t think so. So far this season, Amari Cooper has lead the team in targets each week, so it was reasonable to think he was in for a big day, but Derek Carr only had eyes for Crabtree. It will be interesting and most likely difficult to predict who leads the team on a week by week basis going forward.
2.) Steve Smith Sr. is a 37-year-old, 5 foot 9 inch (175 cm) wide receiver coming off of an Achilles tear… and just strung up 8 catches for 111 yards and a TD on the Raiders secondary. I am 27 years old and I am sore for a week after playing 5 v 5 football for 40 minutes. I do not get it.
Detroit Lions @ Chicago Bears
1.) What do you expect out of a wide receiver who last week had over 200 yards and 2 TDs and now has an even easier matchup? How about 250 yards or maybe 3 TDs….? WRONG! Marvin Jones went up against the Chicago Bears, whose secondary is about as good as the Chicago Cubs’ secondary (yup, that’s a baseball team) and managed only 12.4 Chalk fantasy points. People who rostered Marvin are pissed.
2.) Is Brian Hoyer better than Matthew Stafford? Eh, no. Is he better than Jay Cutler? You best damn believe it! Boy, I sure bet the Cleveland Browns wish they kept Hoyer at this point. Classic Browns.
Tennessee Titans @ Houston Texans
1.) This had to be DeAndre Hopkins’ worst game of his career, which is a shame considering he had one of the best matchups out of the elite WRs this week. I do not think this is anything anyone needs to worry about in the coming weeks.
2.) With an off week for Hopkins, it meant Will Fuller had a feast. He led the team in targets, which he turned into 7 catches for 81 yards a TD. If that wasn’t enough, he then rewarded owners with a nice punt return for a TD. I don’t know how predictable he will be week to week, but the sky is the limit for the rookie.
3.) Demarco Murray continues to be one of the most productive RBs in the league this season, which is shocking considering how awful the Titans offense is.
4.) Marcus Mariota is an absolute mess, but you know one of these weeks he will go off for 200 yards passing, 2 passing TDs, 100 yards rushing and 1 rushing TD, and no one will own him. Thanks Marcus.
Buffalo Bills @ New England Patriots
1.) Congratulations Rex Ryan! You beat a Patriot team that rolled out a 3rd string rookie QB who had an injured thumb on his throwing hand. You are truly a football mastermind.
2.) Bitterness aside (yes, Pats fan here) Tyrod Taylor got in a rhythm early against a very good defense and never looked back. That’s without Sammy Watkins. There will be some monstrous weeks in the future for Ty-God. He will definitely win some people some money in better matchups.
3.) LeSean McCoy had another big week against another very tough matchup. He, much like Demarco Murray, is not being talked about. These guys can win you weeks with Chalks PPR (point per reception) scoring format.
4.) I can’t wait for Tom Brady to come back.
Seattle Seahawks @ New York Jets
- ) The Jets are the ultimate funnel defense. You cannot run against them, but boy can you put up some big yards through the air. A hobbled and struggling Russel Wilson did just that, to the tune of 309 yards and 3 TDs. For DFS, you should look to stack against this defense each and every single week.
2.) Jimmy Graham put up another solid fantasy week while leading the Seahawks in all receiving categories (8 targets, 6 receptions, 111 yards). This is impressive considering he was putting up nowhere near these numbers when healthy last year and he is still recovering from a serious knee injury.
3.) Brandon Marshall was actually shadowed my Richard Sherman in this game, but that didn’t matter. The veteran ended with 18.9 Chalk fantasy points despite working against one of the best corners in the game.
4.) With Eric Decker potentially out for a long period of time, keep an eye on Quincy Enunwa. He is still flying under the radar due to the tough matchup against the Seahawks, but he has the tools to be a high upside sleeper in the future.
Cleveland Browns @ Washington
1.) Jordan Reed finally had the day we expect from him. After going on a tear on the second half of last season, he has had a very slow start. This is mainly due to being double and triple teamed in the red zone this season. Perfect thing to solve that problem is to play against the Browns. He rewarded those who decided to pay up for him again this week with 28.3 Chalk fantasy points.
2.) This game was really all about the RBs. Yeah… Matt Jones and Isaiah Crowell… seems dirty to say that. Both RBs totaled over 130 yards from scrimmage and found the endzone.
3.) The only other thing to note from this game is that Terrelle Pryor could have had another big day, but in the second half, once Josh Norman got in the zone, he was essentially shut down. If only they had Brian Hoyer instead of Cody Kessler.
Denver Broncos @ Tampa Bay Buccaneers
1.) Much like the Jets, the Bucs are a funnel defense. They are very good against the run, but awful against the pass. As a result, both Demaryius Thomas and Emmanuel Sanders had 80+ yards and a TD. With this matchup, I really hoped for more out of these two, but what can you expect when you have Trevor Siemian and Paxton Lynch behind center.
2.) The Denver defense shut down yet another offense. Not much else to say there.
Los Angeles Rams @ Arizona Cardinals
1.) Talk about the ultimate let down game! Carson Palmer was in the perfect position, at home, to have one of his classic 300 yard and 3 TD games we all love. However, with only 1 TD plus 1 INT, his game ended as a dud.
2.) The most fantasy relevant takeaway from this game was that John Brown got twice as many targets in this game alone than he did in the previous three weeks of the season combined. He turned that into 24.4 Chalk fpts.
New Orleans Saints @ San Diego Chargers
1.) This was Drew Brees’ first trip back to San Diego since he left in 2005, which is really hard to believe. Despite the revenge game narrative, he had a less than par outing by Drew Brees standards. He ended the game with 200 passing yards, 2 TDs and 2 INTs. He is just much better at home.
2.) John Kuhn had almost as many TDs in this game as he did rushing yards (3 vs. 5). He also drove every single person who rostered Mark Ingram absolutely insane, vulturing most of Ingram’s fantasy significance.
3.) At this point I have no idea who to roster in the San Diego passing game. One week its Travis Benjamin, the next its Tyrell Williams, and now its Dontrelle Inman. Good luck with that going forward.
Dallas Cowboys @ San Francisco 49ers
1.) Dak Prescott is finally getting the TDs to fall. After the first couple of weeks of the season averaging 250 yards passing and 0 TDs, he has 3 in the past 2 weeks. He is trending up week over week, but that will all come crashing down once Tony Romo returns in week 8.
2.) The other Cowboy who is trending up week over week is Ezekiel Elliot. Last week against the Bears he totaled 160 yards from scrimmage with 2 receptions, but all the goal line work was stolen by backups Alfred Morris and Lance Dunbar. This week he finally got in the end zone while putting up nearly identical yardage as the week before.
Kansas City @ Pittsburgh Steelers
1.) He’s baaaaack. Le’Veon Bell wasted no time coming off of suspension by tearing the Chiefs apart on the ground and through the air. He ended the night with 178 yards from scrimmage and 22.8 Chalk fpts. The only negative on the night was that he did not find the end zone.
2.) All three of the Killer Bees (Brown, Ben, Bell) were in form for the night game. Big Ben ended with 300 yards passing and 5 TDs and Antonio Brown had 4 receptions for 64 yards and 2 TDs. This offense should be putting up big numbers for the rest of the season.
3.) Jamaal Charles made his season debut in this game, but thanks to it being an early blow out, he didn’t get much game time. It will be interesting to see what the time split between he and Spencer Ware is going forward.
New York Giants @ Minnesota Vikings
1.) When Odell Beckham Jr. is playing at his best, he is one of the most exciting players to watch. However, this was the second week in a row where he looked more like a 4-year-old who refuses to go to bed. Adam Levitan’s tweet during the game says it the best, “Odell Beckham quickly joining Russ Wilson and JJ Watt as good NFL players I would not like to grab a beer with.”
2.) This game is proof that Eli Manning is not “elite”. I do not care what anyone says. He is a good quarterback. He is no better than Matt Ryan and you all know how I feel about him. Give Brian Hoyer the receivers that Eli Manning has and he would have superior numbers…. Ok that’s a stretch. The hate went a little too far.
3.) The Minnesota Viking Defense and Special Team is very good.
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