Tonight was supposed to be a coming out party of sorts for C.J. Spiller. Many in the fantasy community were expecting 30 carries for 500 yards, 20 touchdowns, a signed autograph from Justin Bieber (why, fantasy community, why?) and for him to save burning orphans from space aliens…give or take. Truthfully, I used to be a part of the Spiller fanclub and rooted for him harder than team Edward rooted for…crap, I’m not even going to pretend I know much about Twilight nor abuse google search for your pleasure to know what the ‘F’ I’m talking about in terms of Twi-Hardedness. Instead, I’m gonna break it down for you simply and gently. For as much as people rag on Fred Jackson and the Bills use of him, those two RBs serve a purpose to and for each other. They are both good RBs in their own right and splitting the carries makes the Bills a more dynamic offense than just giving 30 touches to either or. In many ways, having watched Spiller tonight, I was reminded of another running back: Jamaal Charles. You know him well, he’s the little speedster from KC that was used as the change of pace back for a long while in KC and then finally flourished in 2010 only to get felled by injury in 2011 and have a rocky 2012 so far. Why do I bring JC Superstar up when talking about CJ Superstar you ask? Well, for one, they can both turn a 5 yard loss into a 5 yard gain. They can also turn a 1 yard gain into a 5 yard loss. It’s hard as a coach to put in the guy who wants to run it outside when you’re on the 5. There’s not much room on the goal line people, it’s a common sense thing. Small backs with amazing speed in open space? Sure, sign me up. But if I’m a coach and it’s on the 5, I have in the back of my mind ‘is Cj gonna turn a 5 yard loss into a 5 yard gain…or a 1 yard gain into a 5 yard loss’. It makes you hesitate that close to the pylons and that’s the honest, no fantasy related truth of the matter. Enjoy what you have in CJ but don’t get bogged down by his lack of goal line involvement as an owner and if you are, trade him to me for Andre Brown…you know, the guy who has nearly double the touchdowns as CJ on the year. Granted, I’m no optometrist but I hope I improved your vision on CJ for the night. In other fantasy football news.
Ryan Fitzpatrick/Ryan Tannehill – I’m conjoining these Ryans and you’ll see me do that a lot on this post because really, none of these guys performed up to snuff in terms of the defenses they had to face. Fitz did a great job orchestrating game winning field goals. He must’ve been worried about an early 7-0 lead because that’s all he orchestrated on the night. Tannehill looked like a rookie, acted like a rookie and possibly smelled like a rookie but since I wasn’t out there and usually don’t taking to sniffing men I’m not familiar with, I can’t say either way on that. What I can say is there were a lot of encroachment penalties on the Bills. Personally think the Dolphins snap count got predictable because the Bills were always in the Miami backfield seemingly before the ball was in Tannehill’s hands. Well, whatever, I ranked them 12th and 14th among QBs this week because of the matchups and they peed on it like the rug that tied the Dude’s room together. I’ve now got to stop typing about these two or I’m going to suffer from unchecked aggression.
Reggie Bush/Daniel Thomas – I know a lot of people want to hate on Reggie. Fair enough, he went early enough in the draft for you to expect something better than 35 yards on 12 total touches but let’s put it in this perspective: DT only had 33 yards on 12 touches. Like I mentioned in the double Ryan blurb, there was something about the amount of encroachment penalties on the Bills tonight that makes me think they new the snap count of the Dolphins most of the night. I don’t care if you’re Adrian Peterson or any Michigan Wolverine RB ever drafted, there’s not much you can do when you’re being handed the ball and a defender is already in your face. Cold hard facts, Miami looked terrible tonight. If you’re down on Reggie, you should be down on DT too.
Davone Bess – Congrats 27% yahoo and 18% ESPN owned Bess owners. Hope you had him in your lineup tonight. Oh you didn’t? But how could you not? Tonight was supposed to be a fantasy feast! Had 6 receptions for 50 yards on 11 targets and the lone Dolphin touchdown not scored by special teams. Welcome to your fantasy hero of the night. Way to take out the Cobra Kai! You’re the Bess, around…
Brian Hartline/Stevie Johnson – Decent but not great. I think that about sums up what being the WR1 in a Dolphins or Bills offense is like. Hartline drew some PI and ended the night with 49 yards on 4 receptions while Johnson had a good fantasy night with 6 recs for 79 yards. Looking at these two just reminds me how much of a fantasy night was wasted. Seriously, if tonight’s game were a story problem in math class you’d be asked ‘if the 2nd worst and the 11th worst defense in terms of total yards were to face off on a Thursday night football game, how many fantasy football points would you expect to see at the end of the night?’. I’m not even going to give you the opportunity. Chances are, you were wrong, the guy you tried to cheat off was wrong and so is your teacher but it wasn’t his fault, he looked the answer up in the back of the book.
Donald Jones – Special shout out to my main bye week man, D. Jones. At first I thought ‘eh, he missed 1 touchdown chance in the 1st quarter but these defenses are terrible. There’ll be plenty more opportunities’. Two receptions and 11 yards later, there’s nothing more than a Rage Comic FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU! than I can share. Thanks for playing as bland as your name, D.J.
