Week 5 Preview: Key Matchups and Their Fantasy Relevance

Vikings at Jets

The Headline trade made yesterday morning to send Randy Moss back to the Vikings as they make their last ditch effort to regain their offensive firepower they had last season.  With Favre only in town for one year and the passing offense being pretty bad, Randy Moss is sure to provide a spark.  Every time Moss has changed teams he has used the fresh start to its maximum potential.  Sidney Rice will be returning from injury and the Vikings will likely have the best receiving corp in the NFL.  For now, they have to face the best defense in the league and Moss has to lineup against his ex-division rival Darelle Revis.  Expect this to be a low scoring game given the caliber of defense on each team.  Players like Moss, Keller and Peterson have to be started anyways, but if you have viable options instead of LT, Favre, Holmes and Greene you should use them.  I like the home team to squeak out a win with a healthy Revis shutting down Moss and the Vikings looking like they did before the bye for just one more game.

Chiefs at Colts

The Colts are pissed, they must be sick of hearing them mentioned along with the phrase “Super Bowl Hangover” and after losing to the third longest field goal in NFL history you can expect them to try and put on a show.  The Chiefs are the last undefeated team left in the league after their early bye week.  Even with the extra time to prepare, the challenge is the Colts at home and I don’t see them managing an upset.  The abysmal Colts run defense will allow Jamaal Charles and, to a lesser extent, Thomas Jones to have plenty of value to their fantasy owners in a losing effort.  Despite the Chiefs success thus far, Matt Cassell is not a quality QB and they will not be able to hold the division lead for too long.  Pierre Garcon participated fully in practice on Wednesday and with him back in the lineup Austin Collie will need to have a big day in order to keep the attention of Peyton Manning and hopefully the number 2 spot on the depth chart.

Titans at Cowboys

Both of these teams are at the bottom of competitive divisions.  The Cowboys are part of a wide-opening competition where every win is crucial and the Titans have to compete with the Colts and the newly-dominant Texans. Whichever team loses this game will probably go into crisis-mode and do something in an effort to shake things up.  Last season a mid-season shake up at QB led to a huge win streak to come back from an 0-6 start to be a part of the playoff hunt at the end of the season for Vince Young and the Titans.  Both teams are playoff contenders and this just may be the best game of the week.  I like the Cowboys to win a high-scoring game given their home field advantage as well as the match up of Miles Austin against the Titans secondary.  The Titans have allowed two straight 300 yard passers and Romo will also have a great game.  Don’t take a chance on a Cowboys RB or Titans WR unless you have no other choice, but Chris Johnson and Vince Young should do just fine if you are counting on them.