Ask the Experts

August 14, 2014

Who impressed you most in Preseason Week 1?

ASK THE EXPERTS appears weekly from training camp through Super Bowl with answers to a new question being posted Thursday morning. How the guest experts responded when we asked them: Which player or players impressed or disappointed you most in the first week of the preseason?

MICHAEL NAZAREK

Giants running back Rashad Jennings has more speed than I thought, so even if he loses most of the goal-line carries in New York to rookie runner Andre Williams, he will still be an effective fantasy producer for owners in 2014.

Nazarek is the CEO of Fantasy Football Mastermind Inc. His company offers a preseason draft guide, customizable cheat sheets, a multi-use fantasy drafting program including auction values, weekly in-season fantasy newsletters, injury reports and free NFL news (updated daily) at its web site. He has been playing fantasy football since 1988 and is a four-peat champion of the SI.com Experts Fantasy League, a nationally published writer in several fantasy magazines and a former columnist for SI.com. For more info go to www.ffmastermind.com. Nazarek can be reached via email at miken@ffmastermind.com.

BRYAN HOUGH

It's hard to really give an answer after the first preseason game. You have to take it with a grain of salt. I'm really excited about Bishop Sankey; he didn't have a lot of yards, but had 13 carries and 3 catches. It seems the Titans want to get him going in this offense. As for a player I'm disappointed in, but not surprised is Chris Johnson. Granted he only had 4 carries for 2 yards. He should be better, but he won't be on any of my teams this year.

Fantasytitan101.com is in its first year. It is a fantasy football advice site ran by Bryan Hough, a High Stakes player, along with his technical guy Tony Lee. The site offers live draft results from High Stake drafts along with draft strategies, matchups and analysis, real-time cheat sheets, late breaking news, live injury updates, start'em/sit'em, sleepers, busts, breakouts, gut-check picks, best waiver wire options, player projections and rankings and much more!

SCOTT SACHS

I liked the Baltimore offense. Flacco looks reborn under OC Kubiak's savvy mentoring and cagey veteran Steve Smith looks pretty spry and had best not be overlooked. Ray Rice will channel his transgressions and put up big numbers after his 2 game hand slap. On the flipside, I'm certainly disappointed that the Browns receivers dropped 5 balls against Detroit's suspect secondary, including one in the endzone, one in the redzone and another one that killed a potential TD drive during Johnny Manziel's 2nd half appearance. Speaking of J-Football, his other almost TD drive had soon-to-be-released RB Dion Lewis fumble it away.

With 2 perfect seasons to his credit, Scott Sachs runs Perfect Season Fantasy Football, featuring LIVE Talk & Text consulting, advice, and opinions. Serving as one of the "Experts" for Fantasy Football Index, was 2011 wire-to-wire winner in Mock Auction Draft League. Also, was named winner of the 2012 Fantasy Football Index Expert's Poll! In 2013 Fantasy Index Leagues, finished No. 2 in Mock Auction, No. 3 in Draft.

IAN ALLAN

Cardinals, Dolphins and Saints. Those were the three offenses that caught my eye. With Arizona, I like the look of John Brown, their little rookie receiver. Not that he’s going to start, but he adds another explosive element to a team that was really good in the second half of last year. Arizona might have the chops to move past both Seattle and San Francisco, and I find myself getting more interested in Carson Palmer. With the Dolphins, I think their new offense is going to be an upgrade. I think they’ll be more effective running the ball, and that should open things up. Ryan Tannehill and Lamar Miller are moving up my board. And with the Saints, I think there’s some running ability on that team. They might average 20-30 more rushing yards per game than last year, potentially making Mark Ingram and Khiry Robinson underrated fantasy choices.

Allan is the senior writer for Fantasy Football Index. He's been in that role since 1987, generating most of the player rankings and analysis for that publication. His work can be seen in Fantasy Football Index magazine, and also at www.fantasyindex.com.

JAMES SELTZER

First, let me preface my answer by saying that I put very little stock in preseason performance. This is even more true in the first preseason game, where you tend to see the most vanilla offensive and defensive schemes of the preseason. So I am not that excited or disappointed about anyone's performance, but if I had to choose one, I'd go with Nick Foles. Foles looked very shaky in his limited amount of play in preseason game one against the Bears. Foles was 6-for-9 for 44 yards and two interceptions. As Twitter was quick to tell everyone, that's the same amount of INTs Foles threw all of last season. Furthermore, Foles just never looked comfortable. His two interceptions were both bad passes that were not the fault of a WR or the O-Line. Therefore, I guess I am a little disappointed in Foles' performance. But again, I put very little stock in any preseason week one performance, so don't go jumping off the Foles bandwagon just yet. Let's see how the potential breakout QB looks in preseason week two and three before labeling him a bust.

James Seltzer is a Writer of NFL content for Rotowire.com. Since 1997, RotoWire.com has been one of the leading fantasy sports resources on the web. Seltzer can be found on Twitter @JamesSeltzer975.

MICAH JAMES

Two quarterbacks really opened my eyes in the weekend games. I loved how Jay Cutler looked. He was in command of the offense, made good decisions and threw the ball with force and accuracy. Alshon Jeffery and Brandon Marshall should pick right up as fantasy WR1 options, and Cutler could near the Top 5 if he can manage to last over a 16-game season. I mentioned Carson Palmer on the radio last week, and as I watched the Arizona offense my thoughts were confirmed - Palmer is a breakout QB1 candidate this season. After struggling with the new offense for the beginning of 2013, Palmer and the Cards put things together the second half of the season. Expect that to continue in 2014 with the advantage of an improved offensive line and rushing attack. Securing Palmer as your QB2 will mean great things for your fantasy squad.

James, the Fantasy Football MagicMan, currently hosts the weekly FFToolbox Fantasy Football Radio Show. In 2012, the FFMagicMan won the Fantasy Sports Trade Association’s Preseason Accuracy Rankings Challenge, and followed that performance with a Runner-Up finish in 2013. James posts his in-season rankings on the FantasyPros Experts’ rankings every week, and you can find his latest musings at ffmagicman.com. Follow him on Twitter at @FFMagicMan.

SAM HENDRICKS

One impressed and one depressed. Put Travis Kelce (KC) on your cheat sheets as a TE2 to draft with the last pick in a 12 team league. The 6’ 5” player from Cincinnati missed all of his rookie season last year with a knee injury. I like his size and red zone potential on a team with few receiving weapons. He showed his speed against the Bengals with a 69 yard TD. On the other side, Eli Manning has not impressed me. I expected a bounce back year with his new OC and the West Coast Scheme they plan to run, but two games from Eli and the Giants have left me depressed about the QB2 I drafted late in a ton of leagues early this year. Granted it is still early, but if I do not see something in week 3 Eli drops even further down my rankings despite an easy starting schedule.

Hendricks is the author of Fantasy Football Guidebook, Fantasy Football Tips and Fantasy Football Basics, all available at ExtraPointPress.com, at all major bookstores, and at Amazon and BN.com. He is a 20-plus year fantasy football veteran who regularly participates in the National Fantasy Football Championship (NFFC) and finished 7th and 16th overall (out of 228 competitors) in the 2008 and 2009 Fantasy Football Players Championship (FFPC). Follow him at his web site, www.ffguidebook.com.

ALAN SATTERLEE

Mark Ingram jumped out for sure in Week 1 preseason, with 83 yards on 22 carries. I will be honest, I have been a sucker for Ingram pretty much every season and I am holding firm, but perhaps even more so in my dynasty leagues. I still believe Ingram is going to be an elite RB some day. Ingram is still just 24 years and itching to get a full workload (with just 356 attempts in three seasons), and in a contract season. Both of the New York Giants’ running backs are looking impressive (Rashad Jennings, who I have moved up my board a fair bit, and Andre Williams, who I was very high on in my rookie rankings). Did you see that Kelvin Benjamin catch?! In the Fantasy Index Experts rankings in the magazine submitted in April/May, I listed Benjamin as the No. 20 WR. That’s breaking out the crystal ball in my opinion. I think he is really going to surprise in 2014.

Satterlee is Co-Owner and Chief Editor/COO of FantasyFootballWarehouse.com. FFW features comprehensive profiles for all the major 2013 skill-position rookies, its Trading Spaces series, the team Deep Dives, the Speed Bump competition plus draft strategies, rankings, projections and more. FFW runs in tandem with its dynasty site DynastyFootballWarehouse.com.

DAVID DOREY

The first week of preseason rarely holds anything of real note but my favorite sleeper of Brandin Cooks looked great going 5-55 and scoring one touchdown against the St. Louis Rams. Granted it was in the third quarter against the second team but I’d rather Cooks keep it more under wraps so he can remain a bigger value in drafts.

Dorey is the co-founder and lead NFL analyst for The Huddle and author of Fantasy Football: The Next Level. He has projected and predicted every NFL game and player performance since 1997 and has appeared in numerous magazines, newspapers, radio and television.

ANDY RICHARDSON

I'll go with Jay Cutler and his top two receivers, who looked in midseason form already out there, putting up good numbers even with a 40-yard bomb to Alshon Jeffery being wiped out by a penalty away from the ball. That also had me more interested in Matt Forte, who will benefit from how dangerous that passing game is. And since everyone knows about those guys, I have to mention Chargers rookie running back Branden Oliver, who jumped off the screen at me when he got into the game. Oliver is more of a down the road type guy, but who knows. If Ryan Mathews gets injured, maybe Oliver sneaks past Donald Brown as the main running back in San Diego.

Richardson has been a contributor and editor to the Fantasy Football Index magazine and www.fantasyindex.com since 2002. His responsibilities include team defense and IDP projections and various site features, and he has run the magazine's annual experts draft and auction leagues since their inception. He previews all the NFL games on Saturdays and writes a wrap-up column on Mondays during the NFL season.

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