Fantasy Football is Won on Tuesdays

HEAD COACHES

There wasn’t a lot of head coaching moves this year and the new kids in town are all on teams that don’t really look like they will make much of an impact this year. Teams with new head coaches include:

• Atlanta : Mike Smith
• Baltimore: John Harbaugh
• Miami: Tony Sparano
• Jim Zorn

I don’t see any of these coaches being able to right any of these ships for a playoff run this year. It’s also hard to see how the fantasy stars will be impacted by these new coaches with their offensive philosophies. Zorn bringing the west coast offense to Washington seems to have the biggest potential on paper but I’m not sold on Jason Campbell (QB Was).

QUARTERBACKS

Both Atlanta and Baltimore have traded off their veterans and journeymen to commit to rookies. Matt Ryan get the start for the Falcons and Joe Flacco in Baltimore. In San Francisco, they have brought in journeyman J.T. O’Sullivan who is has warmed benches in cities all over the league. My advice: Stay away from them all and be weary of their receivers.

Its not so much a move involving him that brings Aaron Rogers to the limelight in Green Bay but Brett Favre’s brief retirement and then move to the Jets. I’ve seen a lot of hype around this guy but I’m treating him like any other first year starting QB and staying the hell away. Yes, I may eat those words later but I look for a roller coaster year for him and that’s not what I want from my fantasy QB.

Speaking of Favre, with him leading the Jets, who knows what will happen in the big apple. I have learned the hard way not to bet against Favre but my gut says look for more pics than TD’s and more L’s than W’s. What I do see is a lot of fantasy potential for the New York wide receivers. Look for Jerricho Cotchery and Laveranues Coles to put up some of the best numbers of their careers.

Chad Pennington was part of a big QB shuffle in Miami and landed the starting job. Could this be his big chance to revive his career? I don’t think so. Look for him to be injured by mid season and then Josh McCown coming in to lead the Dolphins to yet another disappointing season.

I usually don’t talk about backup much but some interesting moves leave some potentially viable fantasy stars one knee injury away from starterdom including David Carr In New York (Giants that is), Mark Brunell in New Orleans and Trent Green in St. Louis. Green would be my pick for most likely to step up and put up numbers if given the chance.

Thats it for QB’s and Coaches

-Chris

We discussed QB’s in a separate post now on to the rest of the offense.

RB’s

Travis Henry to the Broncos. Watch out. I’m not exactly breaking news when I say he will put up big numbers. The Broncos have a proven system and it is made for a North/South runner (bye bye Tatum). Travis will do well

Reuben Droughns to the G-men. He will no doubt spell Jacobs to give the big man a breather but I just don’t see big enough numbers to make my team.

Thomas Jones to the Jets. Big year.

Tatum Bell to the Lions. Look to see where Tatum is in your league and see if you can get him on the cheap. He is going to have some time in the spotlight while they figure out what’s what with Jones’ foot. Meanwhile, Bell may end up being the starter for year on an explosive team.

TJ Ducket to the Lions. I don’t think he will get the same number of red zone touches that he got in Atlanta so I just don’t see him as Fantasy Viable (FV)

Sammy Morris to the Patriots…..Yawn.

Dominic Rhodes to the Raiders. Dominic, fire your agent.

Willis McGahee to the Ravens. This could be a solid year for MaGahee but I see no surprises.

Kevin Barlow to the Steelers. Willie is still the man

Ahman Green to the Texans. I like Green but if he were on my team I would dump him while he still has any value. People act like David Carr was what was wrong with the Texans. Domanick Davis put some good numbers here in the past but Ahman is a little long in the tooth and the Texans will be playing from behind.

Keyshawn Johnson Retired. Just give me the damn remote control.

Jamal Lewis to the Browns. Both the player and the franchise will become rejuvenated with Lewis leading the league in rushing and leading the Brown to a division title….ok, just kidding. Dump him

WRs

Ashley Lelie to the Niners. Look for Lelie to put up similar number to what he did in Denver. What that means to me is the week I start him he lays a goose egg while scoring 20 fantasy points from my bench the next

Joe Horn to the Falcons. Coulda Woulda Shoulda. He will still but up decent numbers as Harrington’s primary receiver. The problem is he’s going to see a lot of double teams until/unless a true non Tight End secondary receiving threat emerges.

Moss and Stallworth to the Pats. WOW. Are you kidding me? New England was a place of redemption for Cory Dillon. Will Moss take the opportunity? I say yes and I would be thrilled to have either of these gentleman on my roster this year.

And the rest…

Keep an eye on:

Marcus Robinson could shine in Detroit with all the ball they have flying around the motor city.

Drew Bennett could have a good season on the Rams where the average age of a wide receiver is 53.

Dennis Northcutt to the Jags. Time to figure out whether it Cleveland was holding Northcutt back from jumping into that next tier of receivers or whether what you see is what you get. The Jags certainly need the next Jimmy Smith to step up. I think Northcutt is worth a chance.

TEs

The are some opportunites at Tight End.

Daniel Graham to the Broncos. I say take a shot on him if you have a crappy TE and an open slot. He was at the top of his game when Ben Watson can into New England and made him the forgotten man.

Randy McMicheal to the Rams. Boy this one looks great on paper. We’ll see.

Until next time.

-Chris

Lets look at how QB changes in the offseason will effect our fantasy teams. First, a fond farewell to Drew Bledsoe as he concluded his fine career.

Qb’s acquired to help keep the bench from floating away include Patrick Ramsey in Denver, Jake Plummer in TB, Brad Johnson in Dallas, Anthony Wright for the Giants and Tim Rattay in Tennessee. Nothing against these guys but unless a major injury downs the starter, these guys aren’t worth a second thought and certainly not even the deepest of opening day benches.

Then there is Josh McCown. He may end up starting without an injury but frankly, who cares. Stay away from a QB in silver and black. Kelly Holcomb might not see the ball all year in Philly even when, oops, if McNabb goes down.

There is one other second stringer acquisition that may be worth a gamble if you have a slot and weak backup QB. David Carr may be worth that slot. Jake Delhomme has been inconsistent of late and if things were to get tough in Carolina, Carr could see some PT. Even if it is because of an injury, Jake may not be able to get his spot back. Carr has skills and may be able to showcase them if he is actually allowed to throw from the standing position instead of his back. Carr is my sleeper pick of the bench warmers.

Thats a good segue to Carr’s former team, the Texans. Matt Schaub, Micheal Vick’s old backup in Atlanta is getting the starting nod for Houston. To bad for him and all the Falcons fans out there that he didn’t stay where he was. He is a quality QB who deserves his shot. As for Fantasy Value, Schaub is a solid number 2 QB that if for some reason is not drafted, would be a good pickup.

Moving right along. Speaking of Atlanta. They picked up Joey Harrington to replace Shaub and now he is the starter there. I’ll be honest, I’m not a big Harrington fan so I am advising caution here. If I got stuck with him in an autodraft, I would hope he had an early good week and sell when the stock was high.

On to the last of the QB moves. Jeff Garcia has moved down to Tampa and up to starter. His stock has risen so you may not get a steal here but if you can, do it. He will at least be a fantastic number 2 QB and depending on who your other guy is could a part of QB match up rotation where you play the guy with the best match up for a given week. TB has not had this good of Quarterback in a while and this guy is a winner.

-Chris

Today we will complete the post started yesterday and look at the AFC offseason head coaching changes. Again as a reference point is a chart of the changes:

Lets start with the biggest news which may end up also being the least impact. San Diego made the move to go with Norv Turner over Marty Shottenheimer. Poor Marty, he only built this franchise up to have it taken from him when it seems to be on the verge. The thought process seems to be that Marty can get you to the edge but can’t close the deal.

So they decide to go with Norv who has proven consistently to be one of the best Offensive Coordinators the game has seen. He has also proven the Peter Principle on two other occasions, one with Washington and one with the Raiders. Maybe these were just poor teams or maybe Turner is best focusing only on offense and not the organization.

Whatever. This move baffles me but all the same, why would anyone rock the boat on a team that seems poised to win it all. If Rivers can perform this year as expected San Diego will certainly be a top contender. All that being said, for all intents and purposes, it will be hard to notice any change in Souther Cal.

Impact Level (1-10): 1

On to the Dolphins and Cam Cameron coming to town. It will be hard to weed out his impact with an actual quarterback now in town again. They used to have a decent QB in Miami several years back. I’m not sure what became of that fellow.

Cameron, like Turner has a sharp offensive mind so it will be interesting to see what he does with this group. He seems to have some talent to work with a hyped RB in Ronnie Brown, Good QB in Green who he has worked with before and a couple of decent receivers. They have a good defense so any improvement in offense will be felt.

Impact Level (1-10): 8

On to Pittsburgh. Its sad to see Cowher go and it seems that any replacement would be a lessor coach for the team or at least a lessor personality. Then again I vaguely remember feeling the same thing when Chuck Noll retired. The Steelers have had success in grabbing a young talented guy and sticking with him.

Tomlin will have to suffer through the comparisons for a while but he seems like the right guy for the job. He’s young and defensively minded. With Bruce Arians, last years wide receivers coach taking over as offensive coordinator there will be some continuity there. I would think that Willie Parker is the skill player that could be affected one way or another by this new coach

Impact Level (1-10): 3

On to Oakland. Let paint a picture. A young lad watched as Lester “the Molester”Hayes circled over the line of scrimmage to approach the Philadelphia Eagle Wide Out closely and then circle back to just over his own side of the ball. As Jaworski barked out signals Hayes dipped his body low with hands extended and seeming dripping with stickum…

I could go on with stories burned into my mind from The Snake, to Madden, to Ted Hendrix, to Marcus Allen , to Jack Tatum to Bo Jackson and on and on. A great franchise in ruins. Ok, back to the point of it all. It doesn’t matter who the coach is this year, they are going no where fast. They can’t even sign their number one pick. Good luck

The Raiders were always filled with characters and comeback stories and just plain rebels. You either loved the Raiders or you loved to hate them. They say indifference is the opposite of love, not hate and let me tell you I have a great indifference for the Raiders. Al Davis must of lost his mind some years back.

The Raiders have lost their identity, their talent, their hope and they suck. There, I said it. Good luck to you Mr. Lane Kiffin. Maybe Al will give this guy an actual shot to turn this team around, but I doubt it.

Impact Level (1-10): 2

-Chris

Let examine the offseason head coaching moves in the NFC and how this my affect team strategy and thus skill position performance in Fantasy Football. We will examine the AFC in the next segment. Lets begin by recapping who is out and who is in just in case you missed it.

Lets start in Arizona. Ken Whisenhunt should be good news for everyone at and in Arizona but at the skill positions its a mixed bag. I would expect a mored controlled game from Leinart and so less interceptions but probably less yardage if Whisenhunt brings more of a run focus. Boldin and Fitzgerald will still have good stats but less in the yardage column as well. The really good news is for Edgerrin James who will undoubtedly have a better year. Do I want him as my starter….No. Do I want him as my third back out of the gate…Hell Yes. He will be worthy of a starting spot by mid season and would be an excellent bye week replacement assuming a a decent match up for Arizona that week.

Impact Level (1-10): 8

On to the Cowboys. Full disclosure. I loved LT (Lawrence Taylor that is) growing up and so I came to love Bill Parcells as well. It pained me to see him in Dallas and I am glad it is over although it was also painful seeing him on set with with so much makeup he looked like an Oompa Loompa with a white outline. Wade Philips will undoubtedly continue to focus on defense. Hard to say whose numbers change though. The bigger story here is Romo and how he recovers from the end of last year. I don’t see Philips messing with much here

Impact Level (1-10): 2

If you could measure the level of happiness of head coaches the year after they were fired, Jim Mora would surely be near the top of that scale. Bobby Petrino’s ability to impact this team has been bitten in the back side. Offseason problems will dog Petrino all year long. I’d bet he…..OK I’ll stop now. For the record to calm the PETA crown, I love animals and have a whole houseful of them so get over yourself, its a freakin joke

Seriously, Petrino has been dumped in a no lose situation. If the Falcons suck, it will be Vick’s fault. If he can pull off a decent season he will be seen as a genius. The skill players will be affected by Vick and therefore Harrington, much more so than Petrino. He has a sharp Offensive mind and it will be/would have been interesting to see what he would have done with Vick.

Impact Level (1-10): 4

Overall, for Fantasy Football purposes, the NFC will be affected much more by player movement than by Coaching movement but the Cardinals may be a team to keep an eye on.

-Chris