ASK THE EXPERTS appears weekly from training camp through the Super Bowl with answers to a new question being posted Thursday morning. How the guest experts responded when we asked them: Which top performer will cool off the rest of the way?
DAVID DOREY
The one player is hard to pick. The top-8 running backs contain James Robinson, Clyde Edwards-Helaire, D'Andre Swift, Cordarrelle Patterson, Jamaal Williams and Khalil Herbert. That's six guys that mostly have injury histories and that opened the year with good matchups. Of the group, I'd expect Edwards-Helaire to again get injured and drop because the offense is more about passing and he'll miss out his standard three to six games.
Dorey co-founded The Huddle.com in 1997. He's ranked every player and projected every game for the last 23 years and is the author of Fantasy Football: The Next Level. David has appeared on numerous radio, television, newspaper and magazines over the last two decades.
SCOTT PIANOWSKI
It's a good time to shop James Robinson. The comeback story is amazing and inspiring, though a lot of his production is tied to long runs. That's an unsustainable business model. Travis Etienne's skill set might better fit when the Jaguars trail in some games. Let's be clear, I don't think Robinson is going to collapse, or that you should trade him at any costs. But this could be a peak moment where you can fetch maximum return. Surely several of your opponents are struggling with their backfields.
Pianowski has been with Yahoo Sports since 2008, covering a variety of sports. On the rare occasions when the computer is turned off, he enjoys word games, poker, music, film, game theory, and a variety of condiments. He lives in suburban Detroit. Pianowski was inducted into the FSWA Hall of Fame in 2021.
SCOTT SACHS
Saquon Barkley still scares me. He finally looks healthier and fresher after prolonged injuries in recent seasons. As the RB1 in fantasy this year, he's already put up about 80 points. However, the New York Giants offense still looks overmatched. The receivers are injured, disgruntled, and unproductive. Daniel Jones seems to have improved a bit, thanks to Brian Daboll, but he's still inconsistent. Barkley is their only real offensive weapon and it is hard to imagine him lasting the season due to New York's current over-reliance on him, and the probable overuse to follow. After some early wins, the G-Men lost a very winnable division game at home with a packed stadium on Monday Night Football against a backup quarterback. Troubling.
With 2 perfect seasons and multiple league championships to his credit, Sachs runs Perfect Season Fantasy Football, featuring LIVE Talk & Text Advice. He is a 3-time Winner of the Fantasy Index Experts Auction League, as well as a previous Winner of the Fantasy Index Experts Poll.
IAN ALLAN
Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson are putting up insane numbers, but it doesn’t look sustainable, with their playing styles. They’re exposing themselves to a lot of unnecessary hits. That makes it unlikely, I think, that they’ll be able to make it through the 17-game season unscathed. There will be an untimely hit at some point, with those teams likely having to play some without their difference-making quarterbacks.
Allan co-founded Fantasy Football Index in 1987. He and fellow journalism student Bruce Taylor launched the first newsstand fantasy football magazine as a class project at the University of Washington. For more than three decades, Allan has written and edited most of the content published in the magazines, newsletters and at www.fantasyindex.com. An exhaustive researcher, he may be the only person in the country who has watched at least some of every preseason football game played since the early 1990s. Allan is a member of the FSTA Fantasy Sports Hall of Fame and the Fantasy Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame.
JASON WOOD
Greg Dortch, Zay Jones, and Mack Hollins are all top-24 receivers through three weeks, and none are likely to finish at these levels. Of the three, Dortch is the riskiest because his volume has come while both Rondale Moore and DeAndre Hopkins are out of the lineup.
Wood is Senior Editor at Footballguys.com and has been with the company since its start in 2000. For more than 20 years, Footballguys has provided rankings, projections, and analysis to help fantasy managers dominate their leagues.
ANDY RICHARDSON
There's been some surprising production thus far from the Washington Commanders, with Carson Wentz, Curtis Samuel and Antonio Gibson all putting up starter-type numbers to this point. It's not sustainable, and this week (at Dallas) should be the first rude awakening for these guys. Perhaps Samuel can continue to be a PPR asset with these short throws, but Gibson will fairly soon be losing work to Brian Robinson, and Wentz seems likely to inevitably either implode or get hurt (9 sacks last week is one indicator).
Richardson has been a contributing writer 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.