Fantasy Football : Week Eight : The This and That of Fantasy Football

After exploding for 10 catches for 112 yards in the season opener, Andre Johnson slowed down tremendously with only 67 yards combined in his next two games. But, then the power turned on, and Johnson went off with 131 yards, 178 yards and 141 yards this past Sunday against the Lions. Johnson now has 629 yards receiving to go along with 45 catches. He only has two TDs, but hey all those yards make up for it. Matt Schaub had a great game in week four with 307 yards and three TDs. He missed week five against the Colts with an illness.After watching Sage Rosenfels almost engineer a victory over the Colts, Schaub returned in week six with 379 yards passing and a TD. Last week Schaub threw for 267 yards and two scores further justifying his pre-season hype. Rosenfels (15 TDs last season in relief of an injured Schaub) is a must pickup if Schaub is the best QB on your roster. Johnson and Schaub aren’t the only fantasy worthy players on the Texans. Kevin Walter actually leads the Texans’ in receiving TDs with three. Tight end Owen Daniels averages 62.3 yards receiving a game and has two TDs. Little Steve Slaton is a bad man an averaging 4.8 yards per carry and has a total of five TDs.

Kyle Orton a fantasy force??!!! You daaaaaaamn right! Orton is sixth in the NFL with 1,669 passing yards. He also has ten touchdowns and four interceptions. Orton is a reminder that you must pick up starting quarterbacks on your waiver wires. Orton only recently was picked up in many leagues. This can help you if you have an injury, quarterback that is not performing, or a guy like Orton having a favorable matchup. But, it’s actually more than that. By plucking starting quarterbacks off the waiver wires in your leagues, you keep them off other teams. I enjoyed watching one team in one of my leagues scramble for a quarterback, because he lost the only two quarterbacks on his roster in Romo and Kitna. He was forced to pick up Brad Johnson, who threw three picks last week, and he only got him because he had a high waiver pick. Meanwhile, I have Jay Cutler, Aaron Rodgers (who is so much better than I thought he was – 12 TDs), Matt Schaub and Jake Delhomme.

An example of playing matchups happened to me with one of my worst teams which features Ocho Stinko, Carson Palmer and LaDainian Tomlinson. With Palmer out, I have Trent Edwards, Gus Frerotte and J.T., “The Human Turnover,” on my roster. Frerotte played the Bears this past Sunday. Frerotte is averaging 257.2 passing yards a game. Against the Bears, Gus threw for 298 yards and two TDs. In the league I’m referring to, turnovers are not penalized so his four picks didn’t hurt me. The motto is do your homework. The Bears for example are ferocious against the run, only allowing 85.9 rushing yards a game. But, against the pass, they can be had – allowing 243.1 passing yards a game.

Statistical Surprises:

Give Clinton Portis some props. Everyone always sleeps on him. The talk among most owners in the preseason was that he gets hurt. He leads the league in rushing with 818 yards, so Clinton should say to all who doubted him and passed on drafting him, “How ya like me now!” Portis also has seven TDs.

Michael Turner is third in the league in rushing with 597 yards. He also has six TDs. Against tougher teams; he has struggled rushing for 42 yards against Tampa Bay, 56 against Carolina and 54 against Chicago. That doesn’t mean you should ever bench him. He steamrolled the sorry Lions in week one to the tune of 220 yards and two scores. Against the hapless Chiefs, he rushed for 104 yards and three scores.

Everyone runs on the Chiefs. I just mentioned what the Burner did against them. Last week Lendale White (149 rushing yards three TDs) and Chris Johnson (168 yards and a score) torched the Chiefs. White averaged 8.8 yards a carry and broke off an eighty-yard TD run. For those that don’t know, White is quite pudgy, the NFL version of Antoine Walker of the NBA. Johnson averaged 9.3 yards per carry. Prior to the Tennessee game, it was DeAngelo Williams turn to look like a Pro-Bowler against the Chiefs rushing for 123 yards with two rushing scores. Williams also added a 25-yard TD reception against the hapless Chiefs.

Guys like Kyle Orton (he of the aforementioned 1,669 yards), Aaron Rodgers (1,668), J.T. O’Sullivan (1,547) and Jake Delhomme (1,533) have all thrown for more yards than Peyton Manning, who has 1,531 passing yards. Jay Cutler, a mid-round pick in most drafts is second behind Brees (2,224) in passing yards with 1,862. Tom Brady as we all know is out for the season. The moral of the story is you can wait on a QB in your fantasy drafts.

Second-round pick, Matt Forte, is eighth in the league in rushing yards with 515. Julius Jones deserves a lot of credit for averaging 4.7 yards per carry on the horrible Seahawks, and he has 459 yards. Who would have thought that Warrick Dunn (423 rushing yards, 4.8 per carry) and Earnest Graham (456 yards and four TDs) would be such a productive tandem?

Greg Jennings leads the league in receiving yards with 685. I slid him down on my draft boards, because I didn’t think Rodgers could get him the ball. Again, I was very wrong. Jennings also has four TDs. Roddy White is fourth in the league with 566 receiving yards. I love Hines Ward as a player, and if you’re a football fan you should too. Ward has five TDs this season, and has been straight knocking people out with his blocking. He plays to win the game Herm!!!

Two to Target:

Donnie Avery, especially in a keeper league, is someone to pick up. The rookie WR starts opposite Torry Holt. Avery has been practicing TD dances since the preseason, and he should get more practices to dance on a real stage. He has 73 and 55 yards receiving in his last two games respectively, is a deep threat who had a 42-yard TD last week, and has a rushing TD. He is only going to get better.

The Patriots have solid RB depth just like your fantasy team needs to have. Laurence Maroney is out for the season with a shoulder injury. Sammy Morris, who pounded the Broncos last week for 138 yards on 16 carries, is potentially out for two-to-three weeks with a knee injury. LaMont Jordan has missed the last two games with a calf injury and probably won’t play this week. Kevin Faulk and BenJarvus Green-Ellis will carry the rushing load. Faulk is on some fantasy football rosters already, especially since he scored two TDs in week five. Go pick up the rookie Green-Ellis. In his second career game, Green-Ellis answered the call big-time rushing 13 times for 65 yards to go with a TD.

E-mail questions to pechacek2@comcast.net