Ian Allan answers your fantasy football questions. In this edition: Scrambling for running backs in Week 12. Why is Rachaad White ranked so high? Najee Harris' outlook. And is Sterling Shepard the sneaky Payback Player of the Week?
Question 1
I noticed you put Pacheco ahead of J. Williams (I have both). Usually in situations like these you qualifying it with:, “If playing” but don’t do so here. I have to play one of the two (and they play at different times). Are you saying one should play Pacheco ahead of Williams regardless?
Earl Weinmann (Northfield, MN)
We had a big windstorm on Tuesday night. I got knocked out of action for about a day. (I just got back fully on line about an hour ago.) So we were scrambling around on Wednesday morning, and there wasn’t the usual luxury of tagging guy with conditional grades. The ranking you see for Pacheco is where he would rank if fully healthy and in his usual role. (Really, it might be closer to where he would rank if playing against Carolina again next week, with a game under his belt.) Let’s see how practice goes this week, and we’ll dial it in more for the Friday supplement. (If his status is up in the air, I will include conditional grades for the Friday product.)
Question 2
Looking at the Redrafter rankings for this week. Rachaad White is 22nd in PPR scoring for RBs this year, and you have him ranked 6th in OVERALL rankings. You must be related to him, right?
Daniel Ford (Rochester, NY)
That does seem high. Keep in mind that it’s an overall points grade. That is, it’s based on the total amount of production the player will generate for the duration. The Bucs have had their bye, so they’ve got seven games left. A lot of the running backs have only six games left. So White is picking up an extra 17 percent. (Really more like 20 percent, since many of the backs carry an injury component and are listed at about 5.6 games – I’ve got White at 7 because while he could be injury, he could also benefit by the other back there getting hurt.) If we’re looking at just per-game production, White becomes the 11th back rather than No. 5 in that scoring system. That might also seem high, with him sharing time with Bucky Irving. But White right now is a big part of their passing game; he’s caught 23 passes and 4 TDs in his last four games. For this duration of the season, I’m projecting White to average 48 rushing yards and 4.7 catches for 38 receiving yards, with just under a fifth (18 percent) of the team’s touchdown catches and a third (33 percent) of the team’s rushing touchdowns. The Bucs play the easiest schedule in the league for the duration. On this Redrafter production late in the year, I’m just trying to dial in all of the numbers properly for each guy and then going off what those tell us – unlike in August, there’s no step where I then go over the numbers, adjusting them to move Player A above Player B).
Question 3
What are your thoughts on Najee Harris going forward this year and in the future? I am thinking of trading a future #1 draft pick in my dynasty league to shore up a possible run for this year and maybe the next year or two.
Damon Duhon (Baton Rouge, LA)
They’ve got that running game dialed in right now. The Ravens were ranked No. 1 against the run, and Pittsburgh ran for 122 yards against them. They ran for 140-plus in each of their four previous games. They’ve got Arthur Smith as their offensive coordinator, which makes it look likely they’ll be a top-10 rushing team in general – for this year and in future seasons. Now, he’s not a dynamic talent. He’s kind of a poor man’s version of Derrick Henry. And I notice that they’ve started using Jaylen Warren more (Warren has 9-14 carries four games in a row). Also note that remaining schedule this year isn’t great. Weeks 15-17, they’re playing against Philly, Baltimore and KC, who might have the league’s three best run defense. Pittsburgh is at Cleveland tonight, and I’m not sure they’re doing much in that one, either. The Browns have had lousy season, but this is a divisional game, increasing the likelihood of the offense coming in below expectations. Seems like Pittsburgh at Cleveland is a low-scoring game every year.
Question 4
I have Chase Brown, Breece Hall and James Cook on bye. I need to win this week. What are some good one-week rentals at running back that could put up decent numbers (I have great WRs so I just need some sense of RB production)? My options are Estime, Javonte Williams, Ford, Justice Hill, and Cam Akers. I need to pick up/start 2. Thank you.
Tom Fini (Manhasset, NY)
I would be inclined to start the two Denver guys. Estime was their main back two weeks ago, looking like he might take over that backfield. They went back to Javonte Williams last week. Sean Payton says they’ll be using different guys based on matchups. I would think the team production might be pretty good this week against the Raiders. I will take that over starting Justice Hill with the hope of him catching 4-5 passes.
Question 5
Playing for playoff berth this weekend in FFPC. How do you feel about using Sterling Shepard against his old team?
Martin Kaufman (Paoli, PA)
I hadn’t thought of it. Makes some sense. He spent eight years there. He knows his way around the stadium, and he knows a lot of people in that organization. I would think he’ll be bringing a little something extra to the table this week, with increased potential they maybe get him a short touchdown. This was not worked into the player ratings that went out yesterday. On the revised version that goes out Friday afternoon, I will increase Shepard’s grade some.
Question 6
Where can I find the defenses against TE? Which teams give up the most to this position?
Ken Freeman (Green Bay, WI)
Pro-Football-Reference.comhas good numbers on this. Go their home page, find “seasons” on the main gray toolbar. Pull down to “Team Defense”. On the team defensive page, select the “Defensive Stats” option on the toolbar and drag down to “Defense vs. Pos”. According to their totals, there’s no clear worst defense against the position. The Ravens, Colts and Kansas City have allowed the most catches, while the Bengals, Raiders and Panthers have allowed the most touchdowns (7 each). (Their Cleveland totals show 2 TDs, so apparently PFR isn’t scoring Taysom Hill as a tight end).
Question 7
Hey Ian, I've noticed that more & more leagues are awarding individual points for return yards & return TDs. Any thought given to including these stats for players in the future? My dynasty leagues use these stats and these players can be surprisingly productive in lineups.
Scott Anderson (Las Vegas, NV)
We have kick return grades for players, but we’re looking only at touchdowns, making note of guys who look like they have a good chance of busting one for a touchdown at some point – KaVontae Turpin, Derius Davis, etc. If a player looks like he’ll be scoring on a return about once every 20 games, he gets an extra “.04” of a touchdown on his grade. But we haven’t done anything with grades. I imagine I’d be looking primarily at which players are returning the most kicks, rather than who is the best at returning kicks. Some teams, I suppose are more willing to return kicks out of the end zone. (And some teams are probably banging kickoffs out of the end zone, while others want to make opponents return them.) Those factors would be more important, I think, than whether a player averaged 23, 25 or 27 yards per return.
Question 8
Hello, Is there a way to see the start percentages of the players for any particular week of the Blackout 2024 contest? Thanks, it is always a blast!
Steve Lantvit (Lisle, IL)
Ben Prator is running the Blackout competition. I will pass along this request to him. Agreed that it would be interesting to see which players are being picked.