Fantasy Football

The worst part of our beloved game is the frequency of injuries. It’s an unfortunate byproduct of such a fast-paced, contact-heavy sport. It’s something that is important to remember as we approach the first full week of the preseason. Luckily for the NFL players, they have access to some of the best doctors in the world and can usually return to form at least by the next season. Unfortunately for us fantasy players, it’s not always easy to know when a player will get hurt. To another degree, sometimes your roster isn’t big enough to plan ahead for an injury. This series, the Infirmary Report, will give you advice on the injuries that have happened every week during the season. Without further ado, here are the injuries from the first week of regular season action.

The Broncos have been one quarterback away from competitiveness since Peyton Manning’s retirement.  They fill this much needed void with Russell Wilson.  Though his 2021 season was marred with injury, Wilson was still chucking the rock when healthy.  Wilson’s 5.5 Deep Ball Attempts Per Game (No. 1) and 10 Air Yards Per Attempt (No. 6) support this.

Football is back! It’s been a minute, but we finally made it through. Now, we all begin our journeys of winning our leagues, watching some good ball, and maybe winning a few bets along the way. That’s where I come in. Betting the spread in the NFL can be tough, but it is not impossible. Over the season, for PlayerProfiler EDGE, I’ll be making picks against the spread for each game of the NFL season. Last year, I was well above .500, so hopefully that continues in 2022. Let’s get off to a great start to the 2022 season. Welcome back football!

We made it! Football season is finally here and so is the ability to take advantage of overreactions reflected in player prop lines. The pain of seeing players designated as out, and the anticipation of them being questionable or active on Fridays is finally here to stay for a few months. In this article series, I’ll follow up Friday practices with Saturday morning selections of my favorite player props and pick ‘ems on the DFS pages of Underdog Fantasy and Sleeper.

A.J. Terrell finished 2021 ranked No. 1 in Coverage Rating, Catch Rate Allowed, Passer Rating Allowed, and Fantasy Points Allowed Per Target. Meanwhile, Michael Thomas has gone on to play in one game since their Week 13 matchup in 2020.

Amari Cooper had three top-10 scoring weeks last season. Two of those cornerbacks primarily tasked to guard him are out of the NFL. Outside of those games, Cooper had ZERO top-24 performances in 2021.

Josh Allen attempts to lead the Bills prolific offense to an opening night victory against the defending champs. He has at his disposal a duo of Stefon Diggs and Gabriel Davis who’ve compiled 31 touchdowns over the last two seasons. They patched arguably their only offensive hole this offseason with the drafting of James Cook, who will immediately see a fantasy relevant role.

The defending champs are undefeated on opening day under head coach Sean McVay. With Allen Robinson now in Matthew Stafford’s arsenal, this offense is not going to skip a beat from 2021. In fact, they’ll only be sharper. Cam Akers returns to the lineup fully recovered. With a rejuvenated offense and an undermanned Bills secondary, the Rams are in a great spot to keep the streak alive.

Sony Michel was cut before the season, giving Chase Edmonds more touches to handle at the head of the Miami backfield. Edmonds had over 40 receptions each of the last two seasons, and now joins Mike McDaniel’s RB-friendly offense. He projects to get most of the passing-down work and brings elusiveness, with a 29.6-percent (No. 12) Juke Rate and a 10.86 (96th-percentile) Agility Score.

Last season, the Bills allowed the lowest completion percentage in the league, snagging 19 interceptions to allowing 12 passing touchdowns. Tre’Davious White will be out, but rookie first-rounder Kaiir Elam comes in with Micah Hyde anchoring the secondary. With Von Miller coming off the edge, the Rams offense will have its hands full against a powerful Bills defense. Stafford does not have a favorable matchup this week.

The goal of this column is simple. Just as the hitchhiker attempts to achieve their destination without a consistent or known vehicle, we will reach your league championship relying on a mix of temporary solutions and unexpected revelations. I will attempt to stream the highest scoring season long RB2 slot we can, relying only on a finite pool of late round picks and the waiver wire. I will explain the parameters in detail at the end of the article.

Some fantasy players love to know what they have before they draft a player. “Have to see it first drafters” are organized and rule-based. They like to draft experienced players with large NFL sample sizes. “Look how they did last year! This is what I am expecting again this year!” The problem with this drafting style is that it rarely produces the sort of build that can truly dominate your opponents. Often this style of drafting leads to chasing old scores and drafting players who have already played their best seasons as a pro. This limits the unknown upside that lies with players who are on the verge of breaking out.  

Drafting is paramount in seasonal leagues. Leagues can be lost messing up the early portion of the draft, but they are definitely won finding the players later that outperform their draft prices. Here are players that I would consider ADP Smashers in 2022 according to their Underdog ADP’s.