🙏 Don't Be Afraid To Start These 2 Players

Apparently not enough of you offered your ribs up to Justin Herbert...

In today’s Fantasy Life Newsletter presented by Reignmakers:

• Morning Download: Pete gets you caught up
• Will Justin Herbert play?
• Eliot's favorite stack: Eagles/Commanders
• SNF: Our Top Picks & Plays
  
• Player Matchups: Kyle Pitts & Carson Wentz
• It’s 9/25. Take it away, Peter Overzet…

One of the biggest edges remaining in fantasy, specifically in DFS, is not being afraid to start players returning from injury.

The field often wants a "prove it" week or a "wait-and-see" performance, but pushing the button on players like J.K. Dobbins and George Kittle in their 2022 debut can reap big dividends.

If you're on the fence, FantasyLife.com makes it easy for you to make the best possible decision with our free suite of tools:

• INACTIVES - updated at 11:30am ET for 1pm games
• RANKINGS - Full Week 3 rankings for multiple scoring settings from Dwain, Waz, and Hill.
• START/SIT TOOL - Debating who to start? Simply type in both players to this tool and we'll tell you the best option.

Read on for everyone who is and isn't expected to play today...

📁 Will Justin Herbert play?

The biggest domino of the weekend centers around Herbert's availability. He is officially listed as questionable and is still dealing with an injury he sustained to his ribs in last Thursday night's game against the Chiefs. The decision is expected to come down to the wire during pregame warm-ups and would involve a pain-killing injection. The line on this game moved from Chargers -7 to -3.5 and has settled there as of this morning, indicating that Herbert is unlikely to play. If you're rolling the dice on Herbert, make sure you have a backup option lined up (Marcus Mariota, Geno Smith, and Jimmy Garoppolo would all be decent insurance).

We're still awaiting news on Keenan Allen, as well. It's been quiet on that front.

📁 Keep tabs on Josh Jacobs. 

Jacobs (illness) is truly questionable for today's 1pm ET game against the Titans. He didn't practice the last two days, but did end up traveling with the team to Tennessee. If Jacobs were to miss, rookie Zamir White would get some burn while Brandon Bolden would likely lead the team in touches.

📁 J.K. Dobbins returns.

Dobbins, who tore his ACL, LCL, hamstring, and meniscus last year and who has publicly beefed with anyone questioning his ability to start the season healthy, is finally set to make his debut today against the Patriots. The Ravens have been a disaster on the ground to start the year, so Dobbins explosiveness will be a welcomed addition to the backfield. 

📁 James Conner up in the air.

Conner has been dealing with an ankle injury all week, but is "tracking to play" vs. the Rams today (assuming everything goes well in warmups). This is also a late game, so make sure you have some insurance on hand if you plan on starting him. Darrel Williams and Eno Benjamin would split the work if he were to miss.

📁 George Kittle and Jerry Jeudy good to go for SNF

Kittle is finally off the injury report and will make his 2022 debut tonight. Jeudy, who injured his chest/sternum at the beginning of last week's Broncos game vs. the Texans, is trending in the right direction as well. 

📁 Misc. files

Julio Jones is a true game-time decision. All of the other Bucs should play (Leonard Fournette, Russell Gage, Breshad Perriman, and Cole Beasley)...Christian Watson and Taysom Hill are not expected to play...Both D'Andre Swift and T.J. Hockenson are good to go.

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🚦 Should you start Kyle Pitts this week? Here's why you should ignore the warning signs.

☣️ The Titans are in trouble. Can Derrick Henry overcome this?

🚀 Everything points to this Eagles WR scoring today. One Week Season spills the secret.

🚑 The Rams place a WR on IR. He won't return until Week 7 at the earliest. The Packers had to as well.

📈 Things turning around in Denver? This is a step in the right direction.

😡 Tom Brady will break your tablet. Don't leave one out by him.

When playing DFS we want to correlate our lineups because it means we have to get fewer things right. Tournaments have such top-heavy payout structures that when you are right, you want to be right in a big way. That’s where stacking comes into play. Today, Eliot shares his favorite game to stack...

 🚀 Jalen Hurts > A.J. Brown (Bring back: Terry McLaurin)

Last week we targeted the Commanders game, and we are going right back to the well this weekend. Washington has a pass-happy offense, throwing the ball on 65% of plays, and a defense that is giving up big plays, ranking 26th in explosive pass rate against. That is a recipe for high play volume and a lot of points scored.

Washington’s defense was once thought to be the strength of this team, but giving up the third most points per game and the third highest drive success against, those days are no more.

That is bad news when Jalen Hurts and the Philadelphia Eagles come to town. 

Hurts has been nothing short of masterful to start the season with two top 4 QB finishes in the first two weeks. No quarterback is averaging more yards per attempt (9.1), rushing yards per game (73.5), or rushing touchdowns (3) than Hurts.

Hurts has shown excellent early chemistry with his new weapon, A.J. Brown. Brown is seeing 56% of his team's air yards, the most in football. Brown also has 224 yards through two games, despite the fact that the Eagles have been up so big in their first 2 contests that his production hasn't been needed in the fourth quarter. He gets a juicy matchup against a Washington secondary that is allowing the 5th most points per game to WRs.

While Curtis Samuel leads the team with 20 targets, he has a minuscule aDot of just three yards. They are scheming ways to get him the ball, so he is a high floor play, but the ceiling play for Washington remains Terry McLaurin. While the matchup isn’t great, McLaurin remains the big play threat for the Commanders leading the team in both aDot (15) and air yard share (26%). With a projected rostership of just 2%, no one is going to be on F1 McLaurin this week.

Thanks to Kittle's return and Jeudy's positively trending status, SNF will feature a fair amount of star power. The Broncos (1-1) enter this game as 1.5 point home underdogs, though Vegas isn't expecting anything too nutty here with a 44 point over/under.

Here's everything we like tonight from a fantasy, DFS, and betting perspective:  All odds via BetMGM

Our research for these plays comes from, Run the Sims, Props.cash (Use promo code LIFE to save 20% on your subscription), PFF, OWS, and the Fantasy Life Rankings, Start/Sit tool, and Player Props tool.

Every Sunday we'll highlight two interesting matchups you should be aware of before setting your lineup. Take it away, Kevin...

🔥 Kyle Pitts @ SEA

I cannot wait to type the “The reports of Kyle Pitts’ death are greatly exaggerated” tweet once Pitts scores his first NFL touchdown on American soil in Week 3.

It’s coming.

Nobody in the NFL has underperformed compared to expectation as Pitts has through two weeks. He’s been targeted 10 times thus far, with seven coming in Week 1. Pitts’ route share and snap share have increased from Week 1 to Week 2. He also blocked on fewer pass snaps last week (8.5%) than in Week 1 (20%), so we’re making progress toward the end goal of more targets, more touchdowns, and more fantasy goodness from Pitts.

Pitts will have a decisive advantage over a Seahawks secondary minus Jamal Adams, and a juicy matchup is in store as the Seahawks are 24th in the NFL against TEs.

It could be MUCH worse for Pitts — he could be like Cole Kmet, who has the same amount of fantasy points this season as you or I! And no, Arthur Smith, it’s not fantasy football, but you’re not winning either.

☣️ Carson Wentz vs. PHI

To say that Carson Wentz has been great to start 2022 is an understatement. He’s been the QB4 so far, averaging just shy of 30 fantasy points per game against the Jaguars and Lions. He’s also been airing the ball out often with the second-most air yards (705) in the NFL through two weeks. 

However, I can’t help but feel like the other shoe is going to drop here with Wentz, and his toughest test this season comes this week against an Eagles team that had a bit of trouble with the Lions but dismantled the Vikings in Week 2.

The Eagles are easily the most talented team Wentz has played this season, and we saw the job Darius Slay did on Justin Jefferson, which doesn’t bode well for the Commanders WR1 Terry McLaurin this week. The Eagles’ defense also has more interceptions (four) than touchdowns allowed (three).

Consider this: The Commanders’ offense and fantasy scoring for the primary weapons in the offense (McLaurin, Jahan Dotson, Curtis Samuel, and Logan Thomas) has been buoyed heavily by the touchdown — accounting for almost 34% of their combined fantasy points output in 2022. A lot is stacking up against Wentz this week against the Eagles, and I don’t want to get caught holding the bag.

Editors note: We love it when our Fantasy Life contributors have different opinions; let us know who you think is going to be correct! Will Wentz be able to carry the Commanders offense for Eliot's stack? Or will Wentz struggle vs his toughest test of the season like Kevin predicts?

Dolphins Twitter is getting even more intense. 🤣

— Alfredo Brown (@ThePretendGM)
Sep 24, 2022