Uh Oh: Darren Waller Could be Out for a While 😐

I don’t care how poorly Will Levis plays tonight against the Steelers - there is no scenario where the Titans should be going back to Ryan Tannehill. Sincerely, every football fan ever.

What’s in store:

• Tell me if you’ve heard this before: Darren Waller has a hamstring injury 😵‍💫. It’s looking like potential extended absence for the Giants TE.

• The Raiders are turning things upside down. That’s led to rookie QB Aidan O’Connell being named Las Vegas’ Week 9 starter.

• Time to move on from Addison? He’s scored five touchdowns in his last four games, but that efficiency could be coming to an end soon.

• Has D.K. Metcalf been underwhelming this season? Consistency is great, but there’s a scoring ceiling he hasn’t touched yet.

• Giants TE Darren Waller dealing with hamstring injury, likely to miss a few weeks

  • Even a broken clock is right two times a day, and even a healthy Darren Waller will deal with hamstring injuries on what feels like at least two separate occasions in a season. Things had been playing out all too well for the Giants tight end, who had amassed 20 catches on 26 targets for 227 yards and a touchdown over the past three weeks. Evidently, the fantasy gods felt they were too generous with allowing such satisfactory fantasy production from Waller, and have once again struck him down via his hamstring. Waller was just about the last legitimate weapon the Giants had in their passing attack, and bearing in mind his track record with hamstring injuries, fantasy managers should be prepared to be without Waller for at least a few weeks. If the Giants aren’t in a position to contend by the time he returns, Waller may slow-roll his recovery and miss even more time. With a wider target distribution, WRs Darius Slayton, Jalin Hyatt, and Wan’Dale Robinson could all see a few more targets per game - but nothing concentrated enough to make any of them a worthwhile start in lineups.

• Falcons WR Drake London misses practice Wednesday, status for Week 9 vs Minnesota up in the air

  • The Falcons’ top receiving option went down mid-game against the Titans and was unable to return, and a missed practice to open the week suggests that London could potentially be out for a game. There’s still plenty of time for London to log a limited practice or two, but fantasy managers should be prepared with their backup plans in the event he would be ruled out. London has found a groove these past few weeks after an up-and-down start to the season, totaling at least seven targets and 11 PPR points in each of his past five games. Without London in the lineup, fantasy managers can only cross their fingers and hope that any available targets would be distributed appropriately to TE Kyle Pitts and not the trick play tandem of Jonnu Smith and Mycole Pruitt. The hope is that London will be able to miss just one game, if any, and avoid any kind of prolonged absence with the injury.

• Raiders name rookie QB Aidan O’Connell starting quarterback for Week 9 and foreseeable future

  • With Jimmy Garoppolo headed to the bench after his disastrous performance against the Lions on Monday night, the rookie signal caller O’Connell will look to inject some life into the Raiders offense. While O’Connell will likely be a streaming option at best, the most important developments to monitor in the coming weeks will be how WRs Davante Adams, Jakobi Meyers, and RB Josh Jacobs are affected moving forward. O’Connell played serviceably in his lone start this season despite taking six sacks from Khalil Mack in week 4, so there should be optimism that things can get back on track in the coming weeks for the new-look Raiders. The only way to go for the Raiders offense is up with both Adams and Meyers handling just one catch apiece this past week. Adams should continue to be started as usual, while Meyers has the look of a WR3 in a solid matchup against the Giants in Week 9.

• Snaps were split evenly between Bijan Robinson and Tyler Allgeier through the course of the game, but Allgeier kind of played a closer role. First three quarters - Robinson was on the field for 79% of snaps. Allgeier also was the goal line back in this game - he ended up with 2 TDs on top of his 15 carries and a total of 18 touches.

• I don’t expect Allgeier to be the goal line guy all year long… we’re going to see a split there at the very least at some point. Both of these backs can be fantasy relevant - Bijan getting a 33% target share while running a route on 82% of dropbacks is elite, and he ran only two less routes than London and Pitts. Robinson is a must-start every week, and Allgeier is a sell high candidate. He’ll have his games, sure, because this is an effective run-heavy attack… but if you can get a real RB2 back, I’d do that. You can imagine the backfield shifting even more in Bijan’s favor, so this might be Allgeier peak to start the year.

• And when the run game is working, and the Falcons don’t have to throw it, they won’t. Drake London got 1 target, Kyle Pitts had 3. That’s embarrassing man. Get your playmakers involved. I know they won the game, but 1 target for your star WR is insane. For Mack Hollins to out-target London, that’s just irresponsible.

• Joe Burrow… wow. What a forgettable performance. 82 yards passing. The Browns came to play, and Burrow and Co. did not. That led to another guy missing on the stat sheet, and that was Tee Higgins. 9 targets for Ja’Marr Chase, who only finished with 5/39, and 8 targets for Tee Higgins, who finished with no catches. The Bengals lost a lot of people their fantasy matchups this week… but hey, this is the lowest this offense will be this year. They’ll bounce back next week - throw some offers out there for Tee Higgins because he’s a high-end WR2 - just go get that guy if you can. I’m not worried or anything moving forward. Just a really terrible Week 1. Don’t want to overreact.

• Joe Mixon still doesn’t have the third down role. Trayveon Williams was the guy behind him mostly, while Chris Evans also had opportunities. Joe Mixon is going to be dependent on TDs - good thing this will be a good offense.

• Without Kareem Hunt, Nick Chubb has the same role he had. Played on less than 50% of snaps, ran only 12 routes. Jerome Ford is in the Kareem Hunt role - 3rd down guy and increased role as a closer.

• Both Elijah Moore and Amari Cooper tied with 7 targets each - 24% target share from Deshaun Watson, and Moore also had 2 extra carries out of the backfield. This is very encouraging for Moore, but it’s also worth noting that Amari was banged up for a bit of this game and didn’t play a whole lot in the 4th quarter. More confidence in starting Elijah Moore going forward though.

This one is for all of the D.K. Metcalf managers out there: has it felt like he’s left a lot of meat on the bone in terms of his fantasy production over his past two games? If your answer is yes, you’re not alone – and based on expected fantasy points per game (which accounts for what a player’s usage would normally correlate to in terms of fantasy points scored), you would be justified in feeling like Metcalf has missed out on some serious opportunity.

Granted, Geno Smith hasn’t been playing at a level as high as he was last season - but Metcalf has had some serious trouble capitalizing in his past two starts. Since Week 6, Metcalf leads the leagues in fantasy points per game under expectation at -11.2. Yes, that’s right - his expected fantasy points per game since Week 6 is twice his actual fantasy points per game (11.3). The next-largest negative discrepancy between fantasy points per game and expected points per game belongs to Christian Watson of the Packers, who sits in 2nd at -8.6.

Part of the problem Metcalf has had capitalizing on his opportunity has been his inability to reel in the end zone targets he’s been delivered from Geno. Despite playing in just two games since Week 6, Metcalf is tied for 2nd among all WRs in that span for end zone targets with four, but has no touchdowns to show for them. He’s also posted just a 39.1% catch rate since Week 6, which has prevented the targets he’s earned from translating into production.

Based on his expected fantasy points, Metcalf could be averaging 22.5 fantasy points per game over his past two games, which would rank as the WR5 from Weeks 6-8. Instead, Metcalf has averaged just 11.3 points per game – placing him as the WR42 in that same span.