Week 10 Rankings

I thought Week 5 was a tough pill to swallow, but the fantasy football gods showed up against me once more in Week 9.

I could write a 10 page essay about my Week 9 debacle, but I won't.  What I will say is that I put up the second most points of anyone in the league, but the most points were put up by the guy I was playing.  Of course almost half of his points came from Doug Martin: God of Destruction.

To add to that misfortune, I could have won this week (easily most likely) if I had known the trade rules.  From Yahoo help:

Trades

• If a player is used in an active roster spot and is involved in a trade, the trade will get pushed back and it will process for the upcoming week. In order to have the trade processed for the current week, the team that owned the player who was involved with the early week game would need to bench that player. It is not possible for a manager to actively use a player and then trade that same player before the week has been completed.

I was not aware of such a rule, and so I can really only blame myself for the loss this week.  Even still, as I've said, it's a tough pill to swallow.  Had I sat Dwayne Bowe for the Thursday night game, my trade would have gone through on Sunday morning (which is what I was preparing for but didn't happen).  I would have been able to play Megatron and Vick (instead of Bowe and Fitzpatrick).  My fantasy football world would be a different place today, but it is not.  Maybe this isn't my year to win it all.  But maybe it is.  Maybe now with this trade, my team will gain some momentum and turn things around (if only a fantasy team could do such a thing).  I'm firmly in "must win" territory now, and I feel like I need to win out to have a shot at the playoffs.  Luckily in my league, 7-6 should be in the top half of the league, but that means I need to start with a W right now.  We'll see if Week 10 is the start of something special or if it's the start of playing to "not be last" and have the league name my team in 2013.  It'll mean that for either me or my opponent, as we're both sitting at 3-6 right now.  Enough complaining on my end.  Let's get to the rankings!

QBs

1.Tom Brady

2.Matt Ryan

3.Drew Brees

4.Peyton Manning

5.Matthew Stafford

6.Andrew Luck

7.Ben Roethlisberger

8.Michael Vick 9.Eli Manning 10.Cam Newton 11.Philip Rivers 12.Ryan Fitzpatrick 13.Joe Flacco

14.Tony Romo 15.Andy Dalton 16.Josh Freeman 17.Carson Palmer 18.Alex Smith 19.Matt Hasselbeck 20.Russell Wilson 21.Jay Cutler 22.Matt Schaub 23.Ryan Tannehill 24.Christian Ponder Last week I ranked Vick pretty highly on Monday night against that horrible Saints defense, and although he did enough to give me a victory had I been smarter with my trade, he finished 10th for the week.  Not terrible, but not as well as I thought he'd do.  Hopefully he can get his act together at home against a division rival.  I'm going to need him.  I also had my opponent's bye week fill-in Josh Freeman near the top-10, and he finished 9th.  I said he would easily break the 20 fantasy point mark against that Raider D, and he ended up with 20.43 points in our league.  This week, I feel like my rankings are pretty standard.  Not a lot of surprises up there.  I'm getting these out a day early this week, so I don't have the expert rankings to really compare against, but I think I'll probably have Luck and Rivers higher than most.  I think Luck will continue to roll, especially against the Jags secondary.  In a shortened week, I just get the feeling that they won't be able to prepare as much for him, and it's going to favor the deep ball.  I look for Luck to have over 300 yards and a pair of touchdowns Thursday night.  As for Rivers, he's going up against a porous Tampa Bay pass defense.  He hasn't been great on the road lately, but I just have a feeling that he'll do some damage on my bench this week.

RBs

1.Ray Rice

2.Marshawn Lynch 3.LeSean McCoy 4.Arian Foster

5.Adrian Peterson 6.Stevan Ridley 7.Matt Forte 8.Chris Johnson 9.Michael Turner 10.Willis McGahee 11.Reggie Bush 12.Doug Martin 13.Frank Gore 14.Ahmad Bradshaw 15.Mikel LeShoure 16.Ryan Mathews 17.Jamaal Charles 18.CJ Spiller 19.Benjarvis Green-Ellis 20.Rashad Jennings 21.Isaac Redman 22.Pierre Thomas 23.Felix Jones 24.Marcel Reece 25.Shonn Greene 26.Vick Ballard 27.Steven Jackson 28.Joique Bell 29.Daniel Thomas 30.Fred Jackson 31.Jonathan Stewart 32.Ronnie Brown 33.Andre Brown 34.Jacquizz Rodgers 35.Kendall Hunter 36.Michael Bush 37.Peyton Hillis 38.Philip Tanner 39.LaGarrette Blount 40.Taiwan Jones Chris Johnson didn't cool off much against the Bears.  He got well over 100 yards and a TD against that defense, so consider me shocked.  And consider him matchup-proof from here on out.  I was hoping for a big game out of Mathews against KC, and I had him ranked much higher than the experts last week.  Unfortunately, he was the only one of my three running backs who didn't go off in Week 10.  I think this week will be a tough go for him against Tampa's rush D, so I'm lowering him a bit.  San Diego does pretty well against the run themselves, so I'm not going crazy and moving Doug Martin up too much just yet.  I am going to bump up LeShoure this week though, and I'm really high on Steven Ridley this week.  He's going up against a Bills defense that is giving up almost 2 rushing TDs/game on average, and New England is coming off their bye week.  I think he's primed for a big day.  Fred Jackson continues to fall down my list.  I think Spiller is going to continue to get more and more of the workload, as long as he's healthy.  Marcel Reece seems to be the safe play to replace the injured McFadden this week against Baltimore.  If anything, he should get a TD if they get close to the goal line.  I wouldn't trust Taiwan Jones to get too many carries, nor do much with them, until he shows me something. WRs

1.AJ Green 2.Brandon Marshall 3.Calvin Johnson 4.Julio Jones 5.Victor Cruz 6.Wes Welker 7.Reggie Wayne 8.Demaryius Thomas 9.Mike Wallace 10.Roddie White 11.Andre Johnson 12.Eric Decker 13.Marques Colston 14.Denarius Moore  15.Steve Johnson 16.Steve Smith 17.Miles Austin 18.Brandon Lloyd 19.Vincent Jackson 20.Dez Bryant 21.Torrey Smith  22.Hakeem Nicks 23.DeShaun Jackson 24.Malcom Floyd 25.Dwayne Bowe 26.Jeremy Maclin 27.Lance Moore 28.Antonio Brown 29.Mike Williams 30.Brian Hartline 31.Danny Amendola 32.Michael Crabtree 33.Donnie Avery 34.Sidney Rice 35.Nate Washington 36.Anquan Boldin 37.Darius Heyward-Bey 38.Cecil Shorts 39.Titus Young 40.Kenny Britt 41.Jeremy Kerley 42.Golden Tate I went out on a tiny limb and ranked Calvin Johnson as the #1 fantasy wide receiver for Week 9, but he finished outside the top-10.  I'm going to play it safe and put AJ back at the top spot this week.  I did have Vincent Jackson as a top-10 WR, and he lived up to that expectation.  But I'm ranking him back down a little lower where I think he belongs for Week 10.  I'm big on Reggie Wayne and Wes Welker this week, as I think I have them higher than they've been on this list all season.  I also am predicting a big game for Steve Johnson this week.  Go figure.  I'm not ranking Percy Harvin due to his injury, but if he gives it a go, I think I'd still put him outside the top-10. TEs

1.Rob Gronkowski

2.Jimmy Graham 3.Jason Witten 4.Aaron Hernandez 5.Tony Gonzalez  6.Heath Miller 7.Antonio Gates 8.Vernon Davis 9.Owen Daniels 10.Dustin Keller 11.Brent Celek 12.Martellus Bennett 13.Brandon Pettigrew 14.Greg Olsen 15.Brandon Myers 16.Jermaine Gresham 17.Jared Cook 18.Dwayne Allen Gronk and Hernandez are both in the top 5 this week, and I think both will pull in a TD.  Dustin Keller stays in my top 10, as I think Sanchez won't have much option than to give him about 8-10 targets a game.  Dennis Pitta and Kyle Rudolph, two guys in the top ten earlier in the year, are now nowhere to be found on this list.  I hope no one traded too much to get either of those guys.  Oh yeah.  They were probably both waiver wire pickups anyway.  And that's where they probably are now.

DEF 1.49ers

2.Steelers 3.Patriots 4.Seahawks 5.Dolphins 6.Bears 7.Texans 8.Ravens 9.Broncos 10.Bucs 11.Giants

12.Colts 13.Lions 14.Cowboys The Bears were back on top last week, and my streaming defense was San Diego at home against the Chiefs.  That worked out pretty well for me, as they were the #2 overall defense, scoring two defensive TDs on Thursday night.  This week I have San Fran on top with, you guessed it, the Steelers at the #2 spot playing at home against the Chiefs.  I'm starting to see a pattern here.  If you're paying attention and playing at home, you might want to pick up Cincy for Week 11.  Believe me, I've thought about doing just that.  As for this week, I like the Patriots a lot at home against a struggling Bills team (and again, New England is coming off their bye).  I also like the Dolphins as another defense that might be available on the waiver wire.  Tennessee at home is not a bad matchup.  If they can stop CJOK, they should be able to do enough to get a few fantasy points on the day. Enjoy the early rankings! Cheers, Bart