The fantasy experts at Sports Illustrated have weighed in on who to start and who to sit this week with your fantasy football team. They are high on the Los Angeles Chargers wide receivers, especially Mike Williams, in their Week 2 matchup with the Tennessee Titans, who had issues in the secondary in their Week 1 loss to the New Orleans Saints
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00:00 Week one was a wild one, but luckily we have Michael Fabiano, SI's Senior Fantasy Analyst,
00:05 here to help us make the best start decisions as we head into week two.
00:10 Okay Fabiano, who are we starting this weekend at the quarterback position?
00:13 I'm going to start off with Trevor Lawrence. I know it's a little bit of low-hanging fruit,
00:18 but there are players out there who might have a couple of quarterbacks that they can play the
00:22 matchups with, and Lawrence has got a great matchup this week against Kansas City. Their
00:26 defense has allowed the sixth most fantasy points to quarterbacks since the start of last year,
00:30 and this should be a high-scoring game. The over-under right now is 51 in Vegas, and then
00:35 Jared Goff. He's at home, which means you start him. On the road, you sit him. I mean,
00:39 this is easy, right? It's easy money too if you're playing props for touchdown passes.
00:44 23 touchdowns and only three interceptions at home last year, and Seattle just gave up
00:49 334 passing yards to Matthew Stafford, so Goff is a very good play.
00:55 You mentioned the highest game total in Vegas this weekend and at SI Sportsbook this weekend,
01:00 but what about some of the games with the lowest game totals? Are there quarterbacks you would sit
01:04 from those matchups? I'm sitting Dak Prescott, and this shows you that I am not unbiased because,
01:09 hey, I know I'm a big-time Cowboys hawk, but that Jets defense is good. I mean,
01:14 they just held Josh Allen to nine points, and they turned him over four times, and sorry,
01:19 but Josh Allen is a lot better than Dak Prescott from a fantasy perspective. I'm keeping Dak on
01:23 the bench, and this one might surprise you. It's more of a beware than a true sit, but Anthony
01:29 Richardson, I get it. He had a really good game last week. I understand he's a little quarterback.
01:33 That's a big help, but did you know, Jen, that the Texans defense has allowed the fewest fantasy
01:38 points to quarterbacks since the start of last year, and they just held Lamar Jackson to 6.6
01:44 points, so the Texans defense, at least against quarterbacks, is pretty tough, so I would not be
01:50 surprised if Richardson maybe took a statistical step back this weekend. I like that, Colin.
01:56 Speaking of the Jets defense being good, just Dallas defense is pretty good, too, but that's
02:01 neither here nor there. Let's go on to the running back position. Who are we firing up in our lineup
02:06 this weekend? I like David Montgomery, who led Detroit's backfield in snaps and touches and
02:12 fantasy points last week. He's got a really good matchup, too, against the Seahawks, who have been
02:17 really bad against the run. This is a defense that gave up three touchdowns to the Rams' backs
02:22 last week, so David Montgomery and Jameer Gibbs should both be in your lineup, and then Rashad
02:28 White. Now, I get it. Last week, the numbers weren't great, but the snaps were there. He played
02:33 54 snaps. The volume was there. He had 19 touches, and the Bears, well, they've allowed 25 touchdowns
02:39 and the second-most fantasy points to running back since last year, so I think Rashad White
02:43 bounces back. I like that, and speaking of those Rams running backs, you say don't trust K-Makers.
02:51 He burned us all last week. Actually, we shot McVay. He just hates our fantasy teams, and I
02:57 guess he doesn't like K-Makers very much. Even though Akers started and he got a boatload of
03:02 carries, a lot of those carries came in the fourth quarter, and it was really Kyron Williams. He had
03:07 53 snaps. Akers only played 28 snaps and niners, by the way. This is the toughest matchup for any
03:14 running back on the week, so sit Akers and beware Kyron Williams as well. I'm also going to fade
03:20 Javante Williams or I guess flex him at best. This is not a good matchup against the Commanders.
03:25 Their defense has allowed the second-fewest PPR points to running back since the start of last
03:29 year, and Javante Williams basically split the snaps and the touches pretty closely with Samaje
03:34 Pirine last week. At the wideout position, who gets the nod this weekend? Let's start off with
03:42 Tyler Lockett. Now, he did have a concussion, so make sure you check his status going into week
03:47 two, but if he plays, I'm going to start him, even though he had a massive stink bomb last week,
03:52 but that's kind of Tyler Lockett. One week good, one week bad. He's got the Lions this week.
03:57 They have been awful against wide receivers. Third-most points allowed to the receivers
04:01 since last year, including the most points to slot receivers. If Lockett can't go,
04:06 D.K. Metcalf obviously, and Jackson Smith and Jigbo would become very good plays,
04:11 and also Mike Williams. And Mike Williams did not have a great line last week, I get it,
04:15 even though it was a high-scoring game, but the Titans' defense is terrible. I mean,
04:19 they have given up 16 touchdowns and the second-most points to perimeter receivers
04:23 since last year, and overall, no team has a lot more fantasy points than wide receivers,
04:28 so as good as Tennessee is against the run, they're really bad against the pass.
04:31 I like that call. I like it a lot. Okay, wide receivers,
04:36 someone who was actually on your start list last week, but there are a lot of questions
04:40 about how they're going to use these talented players they have in Atlanta,
04:44 and I imagine that's what you're going to say about Drake London.
04:46 Boy, I mean, was I left with egg on my face with Drake London. I mean, nothing. Zero.
04:52 Bupkis. The same amount of points as you and I scored last week, and now I'm a little bit worried
04:57 because they ran the ball so much. I mean, they threw it 18 times, and now they've got the Packers,
05:02 which means that Jair Alexander is going to get a lot of Drake London, and that's not good for Drake.
05:08 This week, we hate the Drake. Let's hope he does not put up a good stat line because a lot of
05:13 people will be benching him, and then Terry McLaurin, who last week actually played a full
05:17 complement of snaps. He had 63 offensive snaps, so that toe injury seems to be a thing of the past,
05:23 but he did not put up a good stat line, and he's got a bad matchup against the Broncos this week,
05:27 they've allowed just six touchdowns and the fourth fewest points to perimeter receivers
05:31 since the start of last year. If you do start McLaurin, he's a flex and temper your expectations.
05:36 Certainly feels like the tight end position. If you'd paid up and drafted one early,
05:43 so far, it's only been one week, but that hasn't really paid off. You've got some guys on your
05:47 start list that may even still be on a waiver wire, so who you got? Tight end is impossible
05:53 to predict. I mean, unless you have Travis Kelsey or one of the high-end guys, and even those guys
05:57 didn't produce this past week, but I'm going with David Njoku. He's playing on Monday night
06:01 against the Steelers, and he has had success against Pittsburgh in his last three games.
06:06 He has scored at least 12.8 points in every single game. This has nothing to do with the matchup,
06:12 it's just a trend of Njoku finding success against Pittsburgh, because tight end is a
06:16 mess right now. And then I'm going Zach Ertz. You know Zach Ertz led all tight ends in a league in
06:20 targets last week with 10? Like, that's a lot for a tight end coming off of a knee injury,
06:25 so it seems like he's good to go. He's got the Giants this week. Did you know that in his last
06:31 nine games against New York, Ertz has averaged almost 18 points per game, and he's a security
06:37 blanket of sorts for Joshua Dobbs. So if you need a tight end this week, you could maybe pick up
06:41 Ertz and start him against the G-Men. I love that call. Not only that, but Ertz averaged more than
06:48 11 fantasy points per game last season when he played, and he's sitting right there on the waiver
06:52 wire. So I back that call. Go pick him up. But who are we sitting? I think we're sitting somebody
06:57 that he was picked up last week on the waiver wire. Yeah, we're going to start off with Kyle
07:02 Pitts though. He's going to live in the sit-ums until he wakes up, and I don't know that he will,
07:07 and it's not his fault. It's the offense. Like, I wish he got drafted by the Chargers,
07:10 somebody who actually had a good quarterback that threw the ball effectively. But Pitts led the
07:15 Falcons in receiving yards last year with 44, uh, last week, excuse me. And he had two catches.
07:21 That's it. And like I said, Desmond Ritter, 18 pass attempts. That's it. All they do is run the
07:26 ball. The Packers are tough on tight ends. I just don't see a light at the end of the tunnel for
07:31 Kyle Pitts. And then you got Tyler Higby, and I loved Higby last week, and he had a great matchup,
07:36 and hello, Puka Nakua and Tutu Atwell. You win some, you lose some. This week, he's got the
07:42 Niners. Now here's the trend on Higby with the Niners. He has scored fewer than nine fantasy
07:46 points in all but four of 14 career games against them. So he does not have success against San
07:52 Francisco. Uh, let's just say that he has not been fantasy gold against the Niners.
07:56 So I'm fading Tyler Higby this week. I know it's a bad dad joke.
07:59 There we go, guys. There are the starts. It's for week two. We wish you tons of luck in your
08:07 fantasy football leagues, and don't forget to follow us at sdi.com/fantasy. We'll be back next