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Double Trey Triumphs: Week 4 Fantasy Football Recap

October 4, 2021 | Fantasy Football Strategy | 42 Comments

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Oh I am so glad as a NFC Northerner to see my dear Vikings get demolished by [checks notes] Baker Mayfield. Longtime readers of my articles (Hi Mrs. Donkey Teeth!) know that I am not a fan of Baker Mayfield on the gridiron, although I think his commercials are on par with the fairer works of Chris Tucker. Mayfield, you’re so magnetic, why can’t I learn to love you?! ENYWHEY. My team played some of the least interesting football I’ve seen in years and your teams probably fared slightly better. How much better? Let’s check the scores!

Kirk Cousins and the Minnesota Vikings: I mean, let’s lead off with some fantasy studs, right? Dalvin Cook, Justin Jefferson, Adam Thielen, and Kirk Cousins are all starting on teams like they’re Ocean’s 11 except they made Don Cheadle the straight man. Along with the much-hyped Tom Brady-goes-back-to-Foxboro narrative we saw in Week 4, the other big narrative was former Vikings’ coach-turned-Cleveland Browns’ head coach Kevin Stefanski playing his old team. Revenge narrative! Stefanski had been with the Vikes for a stunning 14 years — in this era of football, that’s an eternity — before taking the helm of the Browns’ rebuild. Now, loyal readers know I’ve ragged on the Vikings for losing to the much-maligned Bengals this year, and now the Vikes have lost to the Browns — the other team other than the Bengals that are recovering from a decade of mismanagement. Who’s old enough to remember when the Browns won 1 game in the span of two seasons from 2016-2017 and then started the head coach carousel? Kevin Stefanski brought his team to town — a team that he’s controlled for 2 years and already brought to the playoffs once and is currently in first place — to whoop his former team. Kirk Cousins underwhelmed with only 200 yards, 1 TD, and a pick — his first pick in 200 pass attempts — while the banged-up Dalvin Cook rushed 9 times for 34 yards. Cook came up limping in the second half again, and saw Alexander Mattison take the majority of the touches in the game. Justin Jefferson put up a fantasy-worthy game with 6 catches and 84 yards and the only Vikes’ TD, but for the fantasy capital that many managers invested in the Vikings, the last thing fantasy footballers want to see is this offense put up a lame 7 points on the week. Quick, who had Sam Darnold’s rushing TDs outscoring the entire Vikings’ team this week? Did anybody take that bet? You’re rich now! 

Daniel Jones: Remember back three days ago when I told you to start Daniel Jones? 400+ passing yards, 27 yards on the ground, and 2 TDs against the Saints. Saquon Barkley snagged 5 passes for 74 yards and a TD, so much like my Madden 2004 game where I just dumped the ball to LaDainian Tomlinson 60 times a game, we might see Barkley get the majority of his fantasy value via the pass this year. Kenny Golladay and Kadarius Toney got to work as well, each pulling down 6 catches for 120 and 60 yards, respectively. We can love the Giants from a stat perspective, but we all know that it’s going to be a better DFS situation than regular fantasy football situation, unless you have room for Sterling Shephard, Darius Slayton, Evan Engram, Saquon Barkley, Kenny Golladay, and Kadarius Toney all on your roster. If you do, please invite me to that 8 FLEX league. 

Justin Fields: Someone in the “NFL Head Coach Leadership Initiative and Competitive Baking” Facebook group finally told Matt Nagy that the way he managed Mitchell Trubisky and Nick Foles wasn’t going to pay off for Justin Fields’ development. Indeed, the Bears are awful and Fields won’t be too fantasy-relevant while the Chicago Offensive Line continues to shuffle their feet against the blitz. Fields garnered 200 yards on the ground with a single pick in his victory over the Lions and found a new best friend in Darnell Mooney, who snared 5 catches for 125 yards. The Bears’ relied more on David Montgomery, who ran 23 times for over a hundred yards and 2 TDs. Huh. The run game and the deep receiver. That’s a game plan that makes sense to protect against the blitz. I wonder if it will work against a DEF that’s not busy hunting kneecaps. 

Kalif Raymond: 3 catches, 46 yards, 2 TDs. Did you read Kirksey’s air yards report where he told you to pick up Raymond? He wrote it while drumming the solo from the movie Whiplash. 

Davis Mills: Let’s tell the story of the Texans’ drubbing from the point of view of the loser. Mills threw for less than 100 yards and garnered 4 picks along the way as the Bills won 40-0. At some point this season we’re gonna see Deshaun Watson treated as a cowboy hero riding in to save the day rather than the Texans paying for any of their troubles over the past decade. Brandon Cooks managed 5 catches but everybody else on the Texans basically ran back home to their beds where they would feel safe. 

Devin Singletary and Zack Moss: Split carries (14/14) while each putting up about 70-ish yards and a TD for Moss. Somewhere, a botanist is cheering for Moss appearing in the endzone. 

Dawson Knox: 2 TDs on the day, 4 TDs on the year. We all forgot about Knox after he burned us in 2020 for a total of 24 catches on the year. I suppose I should make a locksmith joke or a Dawson’s Creek crossover joke…The Joey Wright, help me out here? 

Ezekiel Elliott: 20 rushes, 143 yards, 1 TD. Remember when you wanted to sit Zeke for Tony Pollard 2 weeks ago? Seasons are long, and often running back lines look like the stock chart for $DOGE: either the game script favors the RB and it’s a billion yards, or the running game is abandoned and Najee Harris gets 20 targets. Just like your tricky crypto investment, you can’t really predict when to sell or when to hold or when to buy, so the most you can do is ride the wave and make sure your WR are in place for good games. 

Dalton Schultz: After getting the lede last week, Schultz led the Cowboys receivers with 6 catches for 58 yards and a TD. I put in a measly $1 bid on him in RazzBowl and lost to a $2 bid. On the flipside, I received a consolation Jared Goff, so now I feel exactly like the Lions. 

Cordarelle Patterson: Can I write about former Vikings? I mean, what are we doing here with CPat? 3 TDs, 80+ yards receiving…it’s not like Patterson is an unknown equation. He’s been in the league since 2013. The Vikings — who made Stefon Diggs and Adam Thielen and Justin Jefferson — didn’t know what to do with the man. Bill Belichick didn’t figure out CP. Matt Nagy — who for all his faults has still featured the likes of Allen Robinson, Darnell Mooney, and the scatback Tarik Cohen — didn’t have a role for CP. And now that Patterson is with his 5th team, he’s outplaying Calvin Ridley, Kyle Pitts, and Russell Gage? Sure. Cool. Feel-good story of the year. Variance can be huge for small stretches, and I’d be fine with you adding CP. But…Bill freaking Belichick couldn’t make Patterson useful. Is this Arthur Smith’s magnum opus? Stay tuned for another 14 weeks to find out! 

DJ Moore: 8 catches, 113 yards, 2 TDs. Donald John Moore reminds you that 4 score and 7 years ago, football players wore Happy Meal boxes on their heads. 

Jonathan Taylor: 16 carries, 103 yards, 1 TD, 3 catches for 11 yards. Did Frank Reich read my post last week when I yelled at him for letting Chubba Hubbard out-rush JT? He must have, and then he must have chewed up the newspaper and eaten it to impress his TikTok followers, because Marlon Mack got 10 carries. In the middle of the week, the Colts were talking about trading Mack away because he could be starting for another team. Instead, they gave him a 40% carry load, taking away from that stunning 6.4 yard per carry rate that Taylor is sporting. What gives? 

Latavius Murray and Le’Veon Bell: After the Ty’Son Williams experiment ran for 3 weeks, Le’Veon Bell gets his turn as the RB3 on the Ravens. Murray carried 18 times for 59 yards and a Teddy, but the 3.3 yards per rush average with an 11 yard long rush doesn’t…you know…crack the RB1 that is Lamar Jackson. Fortunately for Murray, Lamar aired it out for 316 yards and nobody noticed the rushing game was absent. 

Najee Harris: At this rate, the “LaDanian Tomlinson Reunion Tour” will feature Najee Harris, after he received another 7 targets (6 catches) and pushed forward for 62 yards. Pundits thought that Harris would get a ton of touches this year, but I don’t think anybody expected Harris to have 26 catches after week 4. 

Trey Lance: Yeah, let’s bury the true lede way down here. Jimmy Garoppolo left at the half with a calf injury, and Trey Lance replaced him to go for 157 yards and 2 TDs and a 117 QB rating while also adding 41 yards on the ground. Many pundits thought Jimmy G had until the 49ers’ bye week to prove himself, and Trey Lance had to come in two times in the first three games to remind JG that [*knock knock*] there was some competition in town. Now, like Tony Soprano emerging from a therapy session to do some business, Trey Lance emerged to put let the world know where his businesses were. Also, a bunch of those yards came on broken coverage: 

Trey Sermon: Hey, I said in the comments on Sunday that I don’t believe in Sermon. Sure, I’m not exactly thrilled with the messaging coming from the coaches, even though Sermon went for 89 yards on 19 carries on Sunday. Also, Kyle Juszczyk got 4 targets to Sermon’s 0. The 49ers are still a mess and the consensus thinking on Sermon is really uneven. I don’t like the messaging. Could Sermon break out? Sure. Could Jeff Wilson step in as the RB1 when he’s back? Probably. 

What did you think about the games in week 4? Drop me a note down in the comments and have an awesome week! 

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