Fantasy Football; Free Agents
Hello Jet Nation!
Welcome to a new Fantasy Football season! As we did last year, I will list the best free agent pickups each week. For the preseason we will pass along some drafting tips as well. For this week we will list the players who are rising and dropping as your draft approached this weekend
Droppers
- Arian Foster- He has two things working against him; One is the hamstring and two is in the last 20 years, 25 RB’s have had similar points and only 6 stayed the same or went downhill. Stay Away.
- Roddy White-Always solid but used to being the only target, Jones and Douglass will take away a lot of targets.
- Peyton Manning- Still has not practiced fully, would not bet against him, but I would rather take my chances later in the draft with Ben or Stafford.
- Ryan Grant-He has looked very slow while Starks has young legs, best case is a job share, not what you are looking for in 3rd or 4th round.
- Matt Schaub-They are now a running team and with the defense improved can see him dropping production wise.
- Cedric Benson-Now in jail will be missing all practice time but also with a rookie QB and him only getting over 60 yards 7 times last year, he is falling off the edge.
- Javid Best-Another concussion, would be best used 8-10 times a game but with no RB1 he is forced into a role his body cannot hold up to.
- Marshawn Lynch-The OL is a disaster and he s the kind of RB that needs holes.
- Fred Jackson-It seems like they want Spiller to take the #1 job even though Jackson is better, way too cloudy to count on him as your 2nd running back.
- Austin Collie-Hurt again, not sure of Peyton starting, let someone else roll the dice in 6th round.
- Daniel Thomas-He is playing with 3rd stringers, Bush has been named RB1, also a terrible pass protector, and anything earlier than the 10th round is too much of a gamble.
- Matt Cassell-Had great stats until playoff time last year but closer inspection says he had 15 additional int’s that should have occurred and a lot of his success was lucky and now w/o Weis.
Risers
- Ray Rice-He had 12 goal line carries last year which will now increase, may be the safest RB pick
- Felix Jones-With Choice hurt and Murray not ready he may finally be ready to shoulder the load, tons of upside here.
- Mario Manningham-He put up WR2 stats toward the end of the year with and w/o Nicks.
- Tim Hightower-He has been named RB1 and with only Torain and Helu behind him, can see a prototypical Shanny RB season that he used to get at Denver.
- Big Ben-The days of the plodding/running Steelers are long gone and with the defense getting older, I can see a lot of shootouts.
- Kenny Britt-He moves up for not getting suspended, when playing he produces like a WR2.
- Kevin Kolb-I am alone on this island but with that Cards defense I see a lot of 4th quarter throwing and if int’s are not a killer in your league he can be huge.
- Reggie Bush-I do not think he can hold up as RB1 for a whole season but as a 6th or 7th rounder, not a bad chance to take.
- James Starks-As per above he is quicker than Grant and will provide that spark that Grant will not as he showed in the playoff run last year.
- Ryan Fitzpatrick-All he did was outscore Brees and Brady the last 6 weeks of last year, with them trailing again this year, you can sneak by with him in a job share.
- Ben Tate-Here is your Foster handcuff and could have the job with the injury very soon; he was a 2nd round pick while Foster was undrafted.
- Kendall Hunter- As all Frank Gore owners know he will miss 3-5 games and he is your starter, a great pick to stash.
Follow me on Twitter and feel free to ask any and all fantasy football questions -dvond
Good Luck this week!
Fantasy Mike
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