Fantasy Football Week 5 Heroes and Zeroes
Fantasy Football Week 5 is officially in the books. By now you have an idea of who is for real or who was a one-week wonder. Fantasy Football players this week were treated to several zeroes and heroes due to a variety of reasons. There were plenty of heroes who overachieved as well as zeroes who decided to take the day off. I present to you this week’s Fantasy Football Heroes and Zeroes.
Fantasy Football Heroes –
Matt Schaub – Schaub can be a very frustrating quarterback at times, as can be the coaching of Gary Kubiak. Schaub is one of those kinds of quarterbacks that like to throw in clunkers from time to time to remind you that you don’t own Drew Brees. The great thing about Schaub is that those clunkers rarely come two weeks in a row.
Schuab and the Texans struggled early against the Arizona Cardinals. Being down 0-21 was good news in one aspect for Schaub owners. You knew that the Texans were coming out passing. The negative was how terrible Schaub looked at halftime. However, Schaub turned it around and dominated the second half of the game. After a disappointing half, Schaub completed the game with 317 yards and two touchdowns. That makes three out of five weeks with over 20-point games from Schaub.
Roddy White - White has been a frustrating wide receiver for fantasy football owners this season. The problem with White is that he was an early pick or even a keeper. White sat out of camp due to a contract issue and was never able to get into a groove since rejoining the team. All of the Atlanta newspapers reported that Atlanta planned to work on running the ball during the bye week. Apparently Roddy White never got that memo.
White was a monster yesterday. Even more impressive was that White did this against a very good San Francisco defense. White wound up with over 200 yards on 8 receptions with two touchdowns. This is the Roddy White you thought you were drafting. It still boggles my mind how he can put up 33 fantasy points against the 49ers and 3 against Miami. Nonetheless, White has a great matchup next week against the Bears. Whether this was a one-week wonder or a return to prominence will be answered next Sunday.
Ray Rice - Meet your number-one running back on the Baltimore Ravens. The Ravens love to talk about a multi-back system, but make no mistake that Rice is the man in Baltimore. What makes Rice so dangerous is that Flacco loves him in the flats. Rice put up 19 fantasy points in my league without a touchdown. Rice was a huge overachiever this past weekend, after averaging less than 4 yards a carry against the Bengals twice last season.
Miles Austin - I don’t know if this is good news or bad news for Jerry Jones. The good news is that he may have himself a heck of a receiver here. The bad news is that Austin isn’t one of the receivers that Jones threw away millions of dollars and draft picks on in the last two seasons. It is hard to tell whether fantasy owners should drop a player and grab Austin off of waivers or not. See Mohamed Massaquoi for one-week wonders.
Cedric Benson - I hate to break it to you Bears fans, but Benson is having a much better season than Matt Forte is. Benson racked up over 130 yards of total offense, with 120 on the ground against a very good rushing defense. Benson has only had one week with less than double-digit fantasy points out of five games, some against very good teams. Benson was ranked the 24th running back in Week 5 on one respectable fantasy football website. This guy is either going to kill you or hurt you if he keeps getting overlooked. Cedric Benson is the real deal.
Fantasy Football Zeroes -
Steve Slaton - I am done with this guy. Like many, he has killed me every week but one. I should have went with my instincts and never took him knowing the goal-line situation, but I did and you did too if you own him. The Texans defense is terrible which makes just about every game a come-from-behind situation, nullifying the run. Slaton shows so much potential when he does catch the ball, but it seems as if Schaub has lost a lot of confidence in him. Trent Edwards had more rushing yards than Steve Slaton in Week 5! I have been patient with Slaton, but it is time to for all of us scorned Slaton owners to move on.
Derek Anderson - I have to admit it, I bought the hype after last week and had flashes of 2007. Anderson completed two passes after a tremendous week against a very good Bengals defense. Normally I would give him some slack for the bad wind, but he plays in Cleveland for goodness sakes! He had a quarterback rating of 15.1 which was worse than what JaMarcus Russell had in a blowout. Anderson plays the Steelers in Week 6 with a possible returning Troy Polamalu. I don’t expect much better from Anderson.
David Garrard - I can’t say that I am surprised. I was surprised after his game against the Titans but it is obvious that passing against the Titans is nothing impressive in 2009. Garrard went 18 for 31 with 188 yards and no touchdowns against the Seattle Seahawks. The Seahawks aren’t the Steelers and there is really no excuse for this. Garrard was ranked on one reputable website as the #8 quarterback in terms of expectations for Week 5. He finished behind Kyle Boller and Shaun Hill.
Carnell Williams - The Cadillac stalled in Philadelphia. In terms of what the expectations were for Carnell, he was expected to produce some good fantasy points against the Eagles. He averaged less than one yard per carry in Philadelphia. Williams put up a big goose egg. On a day where the Bucs quarterback put up 40 rushing yards himself, Williams should be embarrassed with his effort against the Eagles.
Chris Cooley - Cooley has quietly turned into one of the top tight ends in fantasy this year. Cooley owners salivated over a matchup against the Carolina Panthers. Unfortunately, Cooley-owners had no idea that their diamond in the ruff would wind up back in the ruff. Cooley registered his first NFL game without even one catch since 2004. Cooley was used to block and taken completely out of the offensive game thanks to an early injury. In the end, Cooley gave your team as many fantasy points as I would have if you started me yesterday.
DeSean Jackson - As a big Eagles fan with a man-crush on D-Jax, this one hurts me to write. However, Jackson was ranked as high as the number two wide receiver, by some experts in terms of expectations for the Buccaneers game. However, none of these experts took into account the emergence of Jeremy Maclin. Maclin had a breakout game which set records as an Eagles receiver. In all fairness, Jackson had a big catch in the first quarter which was called back due to a questionable penalty at best. Yet in the end, after over 100 receiving yards in each of his last two games, zero receptions makes him a zero.
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Hello fantasy football fans! Well we are 4 weeks into this 2009 season and as you all know its one quarter of the way finished. So what do we do when things are a quarter over? Well we grade them. Yes here it is, all 32 teams starting position guys and some extra players who get bulk work and how they have faired so far. This is thee must have measuring stick for your fantasy team. If you have A-Grade players you should be moving along nicely. However if you have F-Graded players, perhaps its time to view your bench or the waiver wire. So read up, enjoy, and scold those who come home with a bad report card!
