By James Fotheringham (@NFLHypeTrain)
Welcome to the fantasy recap and what a week, week 2 was. This is a little late coming out as I’m still getting my breath back. We had monster scores, horrendous disappointments and crushing injury blows. A number of dynasty leagues will have seen their single week high score record beaten, were you one of them? Let us know who you had (for or against you). Maybe it was a few of these stars.
NB: Scores based on PPR leagues
Fantasy Stars:
Lamar Jackson (BAL) – 21cmp/318yds/3td + 9rsh/119yds/1td 42pts
Lamar Jackson will have done his contract credentials no harm with this performance. A stellar day both on the ground and in the air… and yet they still managed to lose the game. Astounding.
Amon-Ra St Brown (DET) – 9rec/116yds/2td + 2rsh/68yds 39pts
St Brown broke the record for the most consecutive games with at least 8 receptions. To add to his dominant air display he had 2 big rush plays and hit paydirt twice. Imagine Deebo Samuel but on a team where injuries are less frequent.
Nick Chubb (CLE) – 17rsh/87yds/3td + 3rec/26yds 32pts
Chubb became the first RB with 3tds in a day this season and again he had a dominant performance but ended up on the losing team, but that doesn’t matter for fantasy.
Surprise Packages:
The Dolphins (MIA) – See below
Tua Tagovailoa – 36cmp/469yds/6td + 1rsh/1yds 39pts
Tyreek Hill – 11rec/190yds/2td 42pts
Jaylen Waddle – 11rec/171yds/2td 40pts
Not only was the comeback victory the stuff of legend, but the fantasy scores were off the charts. If you need proof that you can support 2 superstar fantasy WRs on the same team, this was it.
Garret Wilson (NYJ) – 8rec/102yds/2td + 1rsh/-2yds 30pts
Wilson played a big part in the late game heroics for the Jets and had a monster day despite missing snaps due to being assessed for an injury before being cleared to return. Joe Flacco also deserves a mention here but I can’t be making a habit of claiming whole teams were surprises.
Jaguars DST (JAX) – 1ff/3int/5sck/41tkl 22pts (scoring may vary)
Every league has different scoring on defence but whatever league you are in, if you have DST the Jags are likely to have been a top 3 team as they demolished a previously fancied but already struggling Colts team. This shutout was the biggest shock of the week for me.
Disappointments:
Matt Ryan (IND) – 16cmp/195yds/3int 1pt
You would expect any game against the Jags to be a guarantee for fantasy points but the Colts clearly were lost without Michael Pittman and with other receivers also unavailable the wheels just fell off.
Rashaad Penny (SEA) – 6rsh/15yds 2pts
With the injury to Ken Walker people expected Penny to dominate the early weeks in Seattle. With Walker back for week 2 that was definitely not the case. A Penny for his thoughts?
Davante Adams – 2rec/12yds/1td 9pts
It’s odd to put a TD scorer in as a failure but Adams was up against a terrible Cardinals defence in a decent scoring game and yet only caught 2 of 7 passes. The narrative was there but the output wasn’t.
Waiver Wire pickups:
QB – Jimmy Garoppolo (SF) – With the horrible news of Trey Lance being out for the season, the 49ers thank their stars that they re-structured Jimmy Garoppolos contract and can use his experience and familiarity to keep their season on track. We know he can work with this offence and while he’s not as dynamic as Lance, he’s a more secure option in 2QB leagues.
Other QB Options – Jared Goff @MIN, Carson Wentz vsPHI, Daniel Jones vsDAL.
RB – J.D. McKissic (WAS) – Another impressive offence in these early weeks of the season has been the Washington Commanders and while they lost to the Lions they have a lot of fantasy relevant pieces. In a week where RB options are somewhat limited, McKissic may be a solid stand-in if required. Logan Thomas at TE could also be a good pickup.
WR – Sterling Shepard (NYG) – Kadarious Toney seems to be massively out of favour in New York and despite a late return from injury, Shepard has had strong start along with another surprise package Richie James. Both may be interesting pickups in deeper leagues.
DST Options – Saints @CAR, Browns vsPIT, Bears vsHOU, Texans vsCHI.