Love and Hate Lists for Week 9

Love

Eli Manning, QB, NYG – After starting the season playing very mediocre football, Manning has really stepped it up in recent weeks and helped the Giants hold on to a 2 game lead on the NFC East despite injuries and mistakes. There might not be a team in the league that relies more on their QB to be successful and against a VERY soft Patriots secondary this week, the stats are almost sure to be there for Manning. The Pats have allowed an average of 19 fantasy points per game to opposing QB’s which is third worst in the NFL.

A.J. Green, WR, CIN – Andy Dalton and the Bengals have won 4 straight and look to continue their winning ways against the Titans this week. Each team is just half a game behind the division leader and will be fighting hard to not give up any more ground. Green has been phenomenal this season as there has been just one game where he has not either scored or been over 100 yards. He earned his spot in the top 10 of my WR rankings this week.

Fred Jackson, RB, NYJ – The Jets have struggled to stop the run this year.  They haven’t allowed a lot of big plays, but opposing teams have had little issue grinding out yards with an interior running game.  There is not a back in the NFL that is hotter than Jackson is and with Revis and company likely to limit opportunities down the field for Fitzmagic, Buffalo will need to rely heavily on Jackson.

Victor Cruz, WR, NYG – I talked about the soft match-up in the Eli section and would not be surprised to see Cruz as the top receiver for the Giants this week.  Cruz is just going to keep getting better with each passing week and his big-play ability is impossible to deny at this point.

Shonn Greene, RB, NYJ – Buffalo is averaging over 30 points per game on offense and has been better at defending against the run this year thanks in large part to Dareus. Rex Ryan and the Jets will NEED to run effectively against the Bills to keep their offense on the sideline. I am confident that Greene will put up some good numbers off the heels of his first 100 yard game since week 7 of his rookie season (2009).

Carson Palmer, QB, OAK – Let’s keep my “Love” of Palmer in perspective. You are not starting him in a standard league unless you are really hurting because of Cam Newton or Matthew Stafford being on bye week.  He isn’t likely to have a huge game here since he is still not in the best of shape and getting acclimated to his new team and offensive scheme. But if you are in a 2 QB league then you can do a LOT worse this week.  Palmer might have McFadden back, which would take a lot of pressure off him and the Broncos are the worst in the NFL at fantasy points allowed to QBs.

Hate

Steve Johnson, WR, BUF – This isn’t all because of Revis Island.  Fitzpatrick WILL look to Johnson when he is in man-coverage with Revis and I could see another game very similar to his past two weeks.  The problem is, he hasn’t been producing lately. He hasn’t hit double digit fantasy points in any of his past 4 games.

Joe Flacco, QB, PIT – The Ravens have really been VERY sloppy recently and the Steelers defense seems to have things turned around. Do you trust Flacco against the team that just shut down Tom Brady from start to finish? I don’t. Not when he was pretty bad against the Cardinals last week.

Ryan Torain, RB, WAS – With Tashard Choice joining the Redskins this week off of waivers, I am staying FAR away from Torain.  Helu is the guy I would play if I had to, but I would do anything you can to just leave all your Redskins on the bench. Apart from Fred Davis.

Antonio Brown, WR, PIT – I am pretty well sold on Brown at this point.  He is a play maker and a good deep threat. My issue with him is only for this week against the Ravens.  I think Ben will have a very tough time staying upright in this game and I don’t see Brown able to get too much done. He remains a very viable flex play in my rankings though as he has been targeted more than Steve Johnson, AJ Green, Greg Jennings, Mike Wallace, Jeremy Maclin and Vincent Jackson this season.