Matchups Start/Sit

Amari Cooper is this week’s Air Yards value play! Cooper has exceeded expectations this season finishing as a weekly WR1 almost 50-percent of the weeks in which he plays. He has seen 573 Air Yards through his past four games after seeing 245 Air Yards last week. While Deshaun Watson will be taking over for Jacoby Brissett as quarterback after returning from his suspension, Cooper’s stranglehold on the Browns’ receiving game should not be affected. Fire up Cooper without hesitation in DFS this week.

The Seahawks just allowed a whopping 303 total yards to Josh Jacobs. They have allowed over 100 yards rushing to opponents in each of their last three games, yielding 17 RB receptions in that span. Facing a porous run defense, Williams has the opportunity to become Los Angeles’ sole fantasy viable RB.

Only viable in superflex leagues, Matt Ryan has thrown 10 interceptions this season. With 14 total turnovers, Ryan has struggled to get the Colts offense going. While he entered Week 12 with an 8.1 (No. 7) Accuracy Rating, he also had 23 (No. 6) danger plays. A sturdy Dallas defense awaits in Week 13.

This is the Hitchhiker’s Guide to RB: Week 13! If you are new to the column, this is the place we talk all things running back streaming. Each week we discuss running back usage, matchups, and waiver opportunities to convert the least amount of capital into a playable running back position on your fantasy teams.

With Fournette ruled out in Week 12, it was Rachaad time. He earned 80-percent of Tampa’s RB carries and all their targets. Though not particularly efficient running, his 64 yards on 14 carries were buoyed by a 35-yard gain on his second carry, and his nine catches on nine targets for 45 yards helped him to 19.9 fantasy points. With this a second consecutive 100-yard performance, the Rachaad White genie is officially out of the bottle. Even when Fournette returns, White will get a good share of touches and may have taken a firm grasp of the receiving role.

Alec Pierce saw a team-high 47-percent Air Yard Share in Week 11 and now faces a Steelers secondary that has been repeatedly exposed over the top (No. 2 in explosive pass plays of 20+yards allowed). His Anytime Touchdown scoring prop is sitting at +290 on FanDuel Sportsbook.

Pat Friermuth has been a security target for Pickett. His 22-percent Target Share is No. 3 best at his position just behind Travis Kelce. Friermuth has posted two top-four TE performances in his last five games to boot. To the detriment of his wide receiver team-mates, Friermuth has cleared a 30+-percent Target Share in two straight games.

Rachaad White’s 3.6 true yards per carry is nothing to write home about, and that number is so low in part to how beat up the Bucs’ offensive line has been. But luckily, they get the Browns and the league’s worst run defense according to Football Outsiders’ run defense DVOA metric. White looks like an RB1 option this week if Fournette can’t go. Both would be RB2s in the event Fournette can go.

I sought a correlation between Bengals pass-catchers. My educated guess was Hayden Hurst would eat against a Steelers secondary that would primarily be focused on WR1 Tee Higgins. Instead, Higgins stomped all over the stat sheet in a 37-30 shootout with nine receptions on 13 targets for 148 yards. Hurst logged just two receptions on three targets for 28 yards. We paired this duo with a CeeDee Lamb alpha game, but the Cowboys ran all over the Vikings and didn’t need Lamb to take over to win 40-3. The third-year wideout finished with a season-low five targets, producing five receptions for 45 yards. Blah.

50-percent of Sleeper leagues are starting D.J. Moore with the Carolina Panthers getting ready to face the Denver Broncos and their tough secondary. Moore is top-10 in targets (82) and Air Yards (920), but his season has been hindered by the plethora of pernicious Panthers passers under center.

The Week 12 TNF Showdown features three matchups: Giants at Cowboys, Bills at Lions, and Patriots at Vikings. This year’s fantasy slate is chalk-full of talent. The Buffalo Bills high powered offense travels to Detroit to face a Lions defense giving up big plays at a high rate. The Dallas Cowboys face off against the New York Giants in a divisional matchup as Dak Prescott looks to continue his streak of top-10 performances. Finally, the night will be wrapped up with a sneaky shootout, where the New England Patriots and Minnesota Vikings both look to spark their offenses. This week I’ll be short and to-the-point, giving you the starts, sits, and picks for each of these matchups.

Potentially Tampa Bay’s new starter, Rachaad White has 33 touches over his last two games. He has at least three receptions in five games this season, with 6.8 (No. 22) yards per reception. Leonard Fournette left last game due to injury, but even before that, Fournette was ceding opportunities to White. Young and shifty with 84th-percentile or higher Speed and Burst Scores, White has the chance to boom this week.

With four top-10 TE finishes in his last five games, Juwan Johnson has become an established start option at TE. His production has been touchdown-dependent, however, with five touchdowns in his last five games. The 49ers limit TE touchdowns, so it will be harder for Johnson to hit paydirt this week.