Gearing Up for Week 5 Fantasy Football

Week 5 is approaching this week and which means fantasy football is shaping up a little more from it's usually unpredictable beginning. The good news about that is you are more ready for knowing what to expect, the bad news is if you feel helpless because you are expecting defeat. So what are the keys going into this week that can win you a possibly key game. Let's get into it:

(All percentages are based on ESPN and this of course is all speculation, you have been warned)

If he is a free agent do yourself a favor and pick him up: Rashard Mendenhall is only owned in 63.7% of leagues, which is a high amount for someone who will typically be found is this column. The thing is that in every league he is not owned, you are going to want to be the smart guy in the room that picks him up. He is going to play this week, and he is going to be the lead back. The Steelers don't run nearly as much as they use to, but he is still a good call for at least 60 yards and a good shot at getting a TD. That's 12 points, and I am sure you have room on you roster for someone who has a good shot of getting 12.

Also another favor you can do yourself: The guy who would lead this column in normal circumstances is definitely Brian Hartline. Had I been doing this two weeks ago I would of told you to pick up Hartline, but I wasn't there, so I am telling you now. He is available in 73.3 percent of the leagues, and I bet that is cut into at least one fourth of that after this waiver period. Hartline will be the hot pickup if available, so if you are at the bottom of the priority list you may want to go in a different direction. If he's there though and you have a real shot of grabbing him, get him you are not going to regret it.
     Another receiver that may be a good pick up is Andre Roberts, who has put up a couple solid weeks to start up the year. He is owned in 1.9 percent of leagues, and is also the number 8 receiver fantasy-wise on the season. He won't be ranked that high all year, but it is guaranteed everyone in your league has someone on their bench that is much worse than 8th best player at their position.

Buyer Beware: Look, this is not about to say don't pick him up, because if you can get him then go ahead. That being said, it is hard to see Brandon Bolden being a consistent fantasy producing player, even though he really looked like a stud on Sunday with 20 points. He is owned in only 0.3 percent, and there is sure to be one of the running back deprived players in the league who will pick Bolden up (and I am guaranteeing there is someone who will start him this week). Beware though as New England can get murky, Shane Vereen believers haven't seen any return on their investment, and there is as good of chance Bolden's name is barely brought up the rest of the year.

Because running backs are always in demand in 2012: The running back position use to be one of the most revered in fantasy football, and now it seems like there are players in every league throwing out someone who gets a score of 5 or less. There are some options that are safer than Bolden that can be picked up this week. Jackie Battle is owned in 9 percent of leagues and has averaged 14 points the last 3 weeks. There is a 5 point game in there, and that is most likely his production this week, but he is a pretty good guy to put on your bench if Matthews struggles. I personally am a big believer in Battle, he has played well every opportunity he has had. I personally think he is consistently better than some backs that start in this league. (Quick Edit: Battle has been named the starter this week over Ryan Matthews on Wednesday, hopefully you took the advice.)
       Another solid pickup at running back is Shaun Draughn, right now Jamaal Charles fairly has a vice grip on the carries in Kansas City. Draughn though has been rising up Kansas City's depth chart, and may be the back up even if Hillis returns. So right now Draughn has some value as a back up (averaging 5.5 points a game), and he has a long term value if Charles gets hurt too. Bilal Powell will start one day for the Jets and is owned in only 5.4 percent of leagues, so even if he hasn't shown a whole lot of explosion he is still a solid pickup. Kendall Hunter, Ronnie Hillman, and Jacquizz Rodgers are backups that also should not be ignored.

Sell High, Buy Low: Most fantasy columns don't have a list of who to trade for and who to trade, so here it is going to be attempted to incorporate a list of these players. It has gotten to that point where you are better off making your team better through trading. So here is the list of people you might want to buy low if you believe in them (think Wes Welker 2 weeks ago) or might want to sell high before you feel their value will go down (Michael Bush before Forte returned), always try to get a fair deal though.
Buy Lows:
Phillip Rivers, Tony Romo, Chris Johnson (if you believe), Ryan Matthews, Ryan Williams, Beanie Wells, Greg Jennings, Sidney Rice, Kenny Britt, and Antonio Gates
Sell Highs:
Ryan Fitzpatrick, Andy Dalton, Joe Flacco, Alfred Morris, Stevan Ridley, Chris Johnson (if you think that was his last hurrah), Miles Austin, Danny Amendola, Andrew Hawkins, Dennis Pitta, and Kyle Rudolph

One Last Note: Pro tip, if you have a bench player who collects dust every week and need some help not only now but in the future. Jahvid Best is only owned in 1.4 percent of leagues, and has better case to be a  better option than any of the aforementioned running backs. He comes back in Week 7, that is only 2 weeks from now. Do it now and avoid the rush for Best.

NFL Week 4 Sunday Quick Points

Week 4 in the NFL wasn't quite the spectacle that week 3 was in the NFL, but many fans probably enjoyed it more. What the NFL lost in unpredictable officiating, key injuries, and crazy finishes everywhere; they got back in just some really good football. Here are some quick points you should take from Sunday:

If You Root For An Expected Contender You Will Be Okay: Some of the things that were said last week around this time were "Oh no, the Patriots have a losing record for the first time since 2003" and "The 49ers just lost to the Vikings, maybe they aren't as good as we thought (we will talk about the Vikings later)." Look, this is a league that you don't have teams go undefeated over 99% of the time. On top of that these teams normally lose to one or two teams that they shouldn't lose to. So this whole worrying about some of these teams after the first three weeks was a little premature. In this league you can lose 6 games and still make the playoffs, so this week proved you should be fine if you're the Packers or Patriots. Also, a loss to the Vikings doesn't make the 49ers go from a popular best team in the NFL to maybe just a borderline contender.

Well Unless You Root For These Two: Well, maybe you should actually hit the panic button on the Saints. The aren't the same team after bounty gate, which came so surprising to some especially with an 0-4. Especially me, I was sitting there saying "They have DREW BREES, they will be okay", "So what about bounty gate, they still have a solid team without Sean Payton", and "Man, DREW BREES has done so much for New Orleans, he can get this done." As you can see, I believed in the Saints team (and that Drew Brees guy) overcoming this and making the playoffs. Four weeks in and anyone with that opinion couldn't feel more wrong, and all of the games have lacked key late game execution. Sean Payton is pretty much this years Peyton Manning, the more he is staying away from the Saints the more this guy looks like a genius. New Orleans could easily be 4-0, had they just put a drive together in the 4th quarter in each of the games. Which just makes it seem Drew Brees isn't so much a great coach on the field, as much as he seems to be a great quarterback who misses his great coach on the sidelines.
       Now for the 1-3 Lions, who aren't in nearly as bad of shape, but still there are some real issues here. They squeaked out a game against St. Louis, and then lost 3 straight to the 49ers, (expected) Titans, (really not expected) and Vikings (not as shocking). There are two fixable issues here that can turn the Lions ship around. First of all, they need to finish their drives off right. The Domininc Raiola play is such a symbol for this as the Lions seem to be able to gain the yards needed to put up points. Other than the Titans game, which they still lost, they have averaged 19.6 points a game. That isn't awful but it definitely doesn't meet the standards that such a highly respected offense requires. As for the second issue, its the return touchdowns, which can be pointed to bad preparation. The Lions are the only team that has let up a kick return touchdown up this year, and they have let up two. Add to that two punt return touchdowns the last two weeks, and that is 28 points the last two weeks that special teams gave up. This should be easily fixable, lets see if Jim Schwartz tries to fix the issue.

Is It Time To Hop On The Viking Ship?: Yes, it can be conceded the first two weeks were a little more ugly, but these last two were really solid for Minnesota. It is hard to be attributed to it really being a fluke either, since they beat two teams in the 49ers and Lions that are suppose to be pretty solid squads. The Vikings were not a trendy pick to win the NFC North by any means, especially when looking at the competition, but when you look at the roster it isn't all that crazy. The Vikings still had some real offensive talent, especially now that Kyle Rudolph seems to be emerging as another good young Tight End in the NFL. Really their only big differences last year to the 12-4 team was the fact that Donovan McNabb's ghost, and a Christian Ponder more unaware of the world than Bambi were the quarterbacks instead of Brett Farve. Christian Ponder has come out in the last two games and is improved greatly from the rookie who was vastly unprepared after the lockout. Ponder is in a great fit in Minnesota with the talent around him in Peterson, Rudolph, and Harvin. Game managing can be looked at as his best skill, and Ponder is on a team that just needs him to manage the game. Add that defensive line, and a secondary that is revamped by adding Chris Cook and Harrison Smith to the established Antoine Winfield. This seems like a great recipe to make Minnesota this years version of the team that goes from last in their division to first, something we have gotten every year.

Do We Believe In Chris Johnson Now?: Ehhhhhhh, no. As much as most of the NFL's fans want to see the electric Chris Johnson that we use to know, and as seductive as believing in this guy can be (you just want to believe!). One impressive performance isn't enough to remove the stink that was around the artist formerly known as CJ2K. Even if he can come out once every four weeks and have a game like this, he still is on pace for 744 yards on the year. There are articles everywhere after that game saying there is more of this to come, all of which are completely fair to say. It just seems to overlook how awful he was through 3 weeks of the year, 44 yards isn't something to just throw out. He was on pace until this game to have 6 more yards the whole year than Jamaal Charles had against the Saints. In my opinion he won't be that bad the rest of the year, but he isn't going to lead the NFL in rushing every week like he has so far this week. I feel like 70 yards is a good expectation going into the next couple weeks, with no surprise if he gets 60 less or 60 more.

The Mark Sanchez Question: Oh what do the Jets do? They brought in Tim Tebow to be the league's most notorious back up, and now Sanchez is playing like well... Sanchez. The issue that is circling around Sanchez is the fact that everyone is waiting for some kind of improvement that might never come. If you take a look at Mark Sanchez's last 32 starts and split them up into two groups of 16 you don't see much of a difference. Bill Barnwell of Grantland did so:

Split	Completions	Attempts	Comp %	Yards	Yards/Attempt	Touchdowns	Interceptions
Last 16 starts	290	519	55.9%	3,282	6.3	25	17
Previous 16 starts	313	575	54.4%	3,746	6.5	17	18

As you can see, Sanchez's improvement is minimal at best. These stats work for a guy who is a quarterback of a run oriented team that just needs the quarterback to make some plays, like Sanchez was at the beginning of his career. Now with a run game that is just deteriorating, and no improvement being made by Sanchez, this is just screaming trouble. As my good friend texted to me while watching the Jets game "if you are going to have a quarterback who can't throw, might as well be the one who can run." I don't know if it's time to bury Sanchez yet, but he really needs to get something going if the Jets are about to do anything.

Brian Hartline playing so good he surprised Brian Hartline: We have heard about Ryan Tannehill's chemistry with Brian Hartline through Hard Knocks. I don't think anyone expected 12 catches 253 yards and a TD though. Even Brian Hartline: https://twitter.com/BenVolinPBP/status/252557833374138369
Hartline hadn't gotten a 100 yard game even at Ohio State, and 4 games into 2012 he has already had a 111 yard game and now this 253 yard game. Expect a vastly improved year for the 4th year receiver from Canton.