Fantasy Football News, Notes and More BlogReports out of Oakland continue to indicate that Darren McFadden will be used in a variety formats and several plays are designed specifically to get McFadden the ball.
We’ve been inching McFadden up our cheat sheets all summer long – this guy is an amazing talent and it appears the Raiders are ready to take advantage of it.
Bills head coach Dick Jauron has said that he’d like Fred Jackson to get more carries as he’s earned them with solid play over the past few years.
This could mean a few less carries for Lynch, but not too many would make sense. We’ve seen Marshawn be much more effective with 20+ carries a game so although Jackson might be a nice back to spell Lynch he’s not a great fantasy play behind a guy like Lynch.
It was always unlikely that Turner would again see over 370 carries, but certainly would exceed 300 and be one of the top producers in the league at running back – a great option on any fantasy team.
However, the Falcons are indicating they’d like to see Turner carry the ball more like 275 times in 2009.
FantasyDraftEdge.com Take
That’s easy to say in July but when it comes time to win games and Jerious Norwood is hurt again they’ll give the ball to Turner. Yes, the Falcons have more weapons on offense but we expect Matt Ryan to regress a bit this season and the run game despite best intentions for balance will still be the primary focus of the Falcons offense.
Get the ball to Tony Gonzalez. Not exactly ground breaking strategy to have your young QB find the best TE to ever play the game. Still this is a good indication that Tony G will continue to put up top fantasy TE numbers and this is reflected on our cheat sheets. Also reflected in our player rankings on our cheat sheets is the reality that Roddy White simply won’t see as many balls this season.
Reports coming out of Detroit indicate that the Lions are confident that Matthew Stafford will win the starting QB job and be ready to go week 1 of the season.
FantasyDraftEdge.com Take
This is more about a lack of competition than a glowing endorsement of Stafford. If the #1 overall draft pick can’t beat out Dante Culpepper and Drew Stanton for the job you didn’t draft very well. We’ve expected all along that this is Stafford’s job to lose.
