Tonight the Jaguars and Titans will battle on Thursday Night Football, in what can best be described as "a game that contractually must be played."
It's not that these are bad teams: the resurgent Titans' offense is one of the most surprising stories of 2019. Marcus Mariota's career was hanging by a thread only a couple weeks ago. Now he's #7 in QB rating with a 4/0 TD/INT line. For context, Tennessee averaged less than one passing TD per game the previous two seasons. Meanwhile, Derrick Henry is fourth in RB fantasy points, earning a healthy 18.5 touches per contest, just shy of the 19.2 he averaged last year.
And Jacksonville's offense arguably improved when Nick Foles was knocked out Week 1. The higher-upside Gardner Minshew owns the eighth highest QB rating while completing an insane 77.6% of his passes. And while Leonard Fournette has been a bit quieter than expected, he's netting 4.0 YPC and four catches on 18 touches per game. Their underappreciated defense kept Houston in check in a contest they could have / should have won, on a brilliant defensive play reminiscent of Mike Jones' famous last-season tackle of Kevin Dyson in Super Bowl XXXIV.
Although the stakes were clearly different.
So yeah, tonight's matchup could be entertaining. But let's be realistic: a relatively quick grind-it-out-game is more likely. A fair share of sacks and a large number of running plays will keep the clock moving. Derrick Henry and Leonard Fournette are volume plays, as both should earn 20+ touches. Neither back will exceed 80 yards on the ground. Neither QB will throw for more than 250 and one score.
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Yesterday Baker Mayfield was dropped in "A Division" of the Premier Fantasy Football League. This is the same Baker Mayfield who was the consensus 5th-ranked fantasy QB all summer (rising to 4th in early September). This is also the same Baker Mayfield I warned would be a bust. As subscribers know, he was 12th on my rankings.
That's not to say my QB rankings were anywhere close to spot-on. But I was loudest about two guys: the egregiously underrated Matthew Stafford and the shockingly overrated Mayfield.
David Njoku's injury exacerbates an already challenging situation for Cleveland's second-year franchise QB. Mayfield's averaging 3.07 seconds to throw, which is third longest in the league. Head coach Freddie Kitchens wants him to get rid of the ball quicker. Maybe he'll adjust. Maybe he can't, or rather maybe he needs time to figure it out. The offensive line isn't helping, but it's not the sole culprit.
Many young quarterbacks endure similar growing pains. He's already taken eight sacks after absorbing only 25 in 14 games last year. He needs to develop better instincts for getting rid of the bill if a play doesn't develop. Perhaps he needs to practice going through receiver progressions faster.
Here's what I saw this summer: a young QB with extraordinary potential coming off a deceptively mediocre rookie campaign. The fantasy universe saw a 3,725/27/14 line that, as some folks kept reminding me, was better than Peyton Manning's first year, better than Drew Brees', and so on. But they overlooked the fact that Mayfield's TD/INT line vs. Cincinnati and Atlanta was 10/0. Cincy owned the NFL's worst passing defense, while Atlanta was bottom-5.
This season one of his two Bengal games comes in Week 17, when most leagues are already finished. True, he'll get a beautiful home matchup against Miami in Week 12. But for a guy who struggled against even soft defenses last year (a combined 4/3 TD/INT line vs. the Chiefs and Raiders), there was no good reason to assume (from my perspective) that the addition of OBJ would transform him into a top-flight fantasy asset.
Don't get me wrong: I still view him as a top 11-14 QB. He'll enjoy some big games. But that's the point: Mayfield is still developing. Don't give up on him, and don't expect greatness. And circle weeks 12 and 14 on your fantasy calendar, when he'll probably rack up a combined 7+ TDs to compensate for an otherwise decent sophomore season.
It's not that these are bad teams: the resurgent Titans' offense is one of the most surprising stories of 2019. Marcus Mariota's career was hanging by a thread only a couple weeks ago. Now he's #7 in QB rating with a 4/0 TD/INT line. For context, Tennessee averaged less than one passing TD per game the previous two seasons. Meanwhile, Derrick Henry is fourth in RB fantasy points, earning a healthy 18.5 touches per contest, just shy of the 19.2 he averaged last year.
And Jacksonville's offense arguably improved when Nick Foles was knocked out Week 1. The higher-upside Gardner Minshew owns the eighth highest QB rating while completing an insane 77.6% of his passes. And while Leonard Fournette has been a bit quieter than expected, he's netting 4.0 YPC and four catches on 18 touches per game. Their underappreciated defense kept Houston in check in a contest they could have / should have won, on a brilliant defensive play reminiscent of Mike Jones' famous last-season tackle of Kevin Dyson in Super Bowl XXXIV.
Although the stakes were clearly different.
So yeah, tonight's matchup could be entertaining. But let's be realistic: a relatively quick grind-it-out-game is more likely. A fair share of sacks and a large number of running plays will keep the clock moving. Derrick Henry and Leonard Fournette are volume plays, as both should earn 20+ touches. Neither back will exceed 80 yards on the ground. Neither QB will throw for more than 250 and one score.
---
Yesterday Baker Mayfield was dropped in "A Division" of the Premier Fantasy Football League. This is the same Baker Mayfield who was the consensus 5th-ranked fantasy QB all summer (rising to 4th in early September). This is also the same Baker Mayfield I warned would be a bust. As subscribers know, he was 12th on my rankings.
That's not to say my QB rankings were anywhere close to spot-on. But I was loudest about two guys: the egregiously underrated Matthew Stafford and the shockingly overrated Mayfield.
David Njoku's injury exacerbates an already challenging situation for Cleveland's second-year franchise QB. Mayfield's averaging 3.07 seconds to throw, which is third longest in the league. Head coach Freddie Kitchens wants him to get rid of the ball quicker. Maybe he'll adjust. Maybe he can't, or rather maybe he needs time to figure it out. The offensive line isn't helping, but it's not the sole culprit.
Many young quarterbacks endure similar growing pains. He's already taken eight sacks after absorbing only 25 in 14 games last year. He needs to develop better instincts for getting rid of the bill if a play doesn't develop. Perhaps he needs to practice going through receiver progressions faster.
Here's what I saw this summer: a young QB with extraordinary potential coming off a deceptively mediocre rookie campaign. The fantasy universe saw a 3,725/27/14 line that, as some folks kept reminding me, was better than Peyton Manning's first year, better than Drew Brees', and so on. But they overlooked the fact that Mayfield's TD/INT line vs. Cincinnati and Atlanta was 10/0. Cincy owned the NFL's worst passing defense, while Atlanta was bottom-5.
This season one of his two Bengal games comes in Week 17, when most leagues are already finished. True, he'll get a beautiful home matchup against Miami in Week 12. But for a guy who struggled against even soft defenses last year (a combined 4/3 TD/INT line vs. the Chiefs and Raiders), there was no good reason to assume (from my perspective) that the addition of OBJ would transform him into a top-flight fantasy asset.
Don't get me wrong: I still view him as a top 11-14 QB. He'll enjoy some big games. But that's the point: Mayfield is still developing. Don't give up on him, and don't expect greatness. And circle weeks 12 and 14 on your fantasy calendar, when he'll probably rack up a combined 7+ TDs to compensate for an otherwise decent sophomore season.