NFL Prime Time Games: Week 3 Thursday Night Football (FREE)

NFL Prime Time Games – Week 3

Greetings Gamers!  Who is ready for a Thursday Night Defensive Battle Royale?!

We are going to be tweaking this article format to focus more on the single game aspect.

Feedback is always welcome and you can reach out to me in Awesemo.com Premium Slack, Twitter @EMacDFS and of course [email protected]

With most of the main sites offering “late swap” for the multi-day contests, the release schedule will be no later than:

Thursday Night Game: Wednesday night or Thursday morning

London game: Friday night or Saturday morning (kickoff is generally around 9am ET on Sunday for these games)

Sunday Night Game: Friday night or Saturday morning

Monday Night Game: Friday night or Saturday morning

Because these games are outside of the standard NFL Week cadence, information and injury reports may be a little behind, but all game write-ups will be posted by Saturday morning most weeks.

 

Week 2 Summary

Depending on your selections, the primetime games may have been exciting or gone along pretty much unnoticed.  My results were a mixed bag as I did not play anyone from the Thursday contest (missing out on the Dalton/Green goodness), but was very heavy with the Cowboys and Seahawks D/STs.

CIN 34 vs BAL 23 Yikes, if you rolled out A.J. Green and/or Andy Dalton clearly you were grinning from ear-to-ear, at least until kickoff on Sunday morning as this duo connected for a trio of touchdowns and Dalton added a fourth to Tyler Boyd on his way to 265 passing yards on 24 for 42. Joe Mixon had 82 yards, but suffered a knee injury for which he has already undergone arthroscopic surgery and he will be out for the better part of a month.  This should foist Giovanny Bernard into the lead role and you will want to grab him off waivers in your season long leagues if he wasn’t already stashed.

Baltimore was a mega-disappointment with their run game being shut down (22 attempts for 83 yards) and Flacco throwing for a relatively empty 376/2/2 with John Brown and Michael Crabtree each seeing 10 targets, Willie Snead 8 and Javorius “Buck” Allen 7.

DAL 20 vs NYG 10 in a boring affair, the Cowboys rode home field advantage to a victory.  The game was relatively dull outside of an exciting Dak Prescott to Tavon Austin 64 yard strike on the opening series that gave Dallas the lead for good.  Austin is now on our radar, but just know that he had 2 targets catching both for 79 yards and the aforementioned score and a carry for 15 rushing yards – but he had just one rush for a single solitary yard in Week 1.

Living up to their cover photo hype for this article, the Dallas Defense was outstanding allowing just 13 points on 265 combined yards and 6 sacks plus a fumble recovery courtesy of Eli Manning.

Speaking of the Giants, their rushing game was a complete disappointment with 17 carries for 35 yards and the lone semi-bright spot was rookie Saquon Barkley setting a franchise record with 14 receptions for 80 yards, though he tallied just 108 combined yards, he did his backers a solid on full-PPR sites.

CHI 24 vs SEA 17 the Bears D/ST was on a roll with six sacks, a fumble recovery, a Pick-6 and allowing just 10 points until the Hawks put in a late one with 14 seconds remaining in the game.  We should definitely look to target against the Seahawks as Russel Wilson will be vulnerable for a handful of sacks each game with the crummy offensive line and overall predictable offense.

Mitchell Trubisky once again looked great during the “scripted” early series but ended the night with a pair of touchdowns to go along with a pair of interceptions and just 200 passing yards. The one positive is that he did rush for 24 yards on five attempts and he has 56 yards and a score through the first two weeks.

 

 

Week 3

Thursday Night Football

PREGAME UPDATE CARLOS HYDE may be heading to the hospital for the birth of his child

New York Jets at Cleveland Browns -3.0 / 39.5

Hoooo boy, another thrilling Thursday Night tilt.  Clearly The League is burning this early pairing in the hopes that the “newness” of the NFL season will overcome the lackluster matchup.  Now this one is actually interesting as both defenses and both kickers will be in play, but it is going to be a hard one to watch and there really will not be a lot of love on the Thursday-Monday slate.

New York Jets

Quarterback – Sam Darnold has had two solid games to start off his career, particularly when we consider that he is still just 21 years-old.  The Jets have tallied 60 points on the season and Darnold is 41 for 64 for 532/3/3 and while he is not worth considering on the full slate, by no means is he a “fade” on the single game contests.

With the game projected to see five total touchdowns, we are going to want to corral those in the single game contests and that means that the quarterbacks have the best chance to be involved and in turn, they will also project as the most popular plays.

Darnold is not the most exciting option in a game devoid of exciting options, however, even though he is a bottom five projected signal-caller on the week – there is nothing that says he can’t be the top scoring QB on Thursday.  On the season, the Browns are allowing the 11th most passing yards per game at 263.0 and they have allowed three aerial scores against three interceptions.

Running Back – Both Bilal Powell and Isaiah Crowell have been used somewhat interchangeably and while I prefer the former, so will most gamers and that means the latter is definitely in play on the single game slates at likely half of the popularity.  Through two games, Cleveland is allowing 110.5 yards per game, 3.8 yards per carry and two rushing scores and they have been middle-of-the-pack with 6.5 targets, 6.0 receptions and 57 receiving yards per game to opposing running backs.

Wide Receiver – Quincy Enunwa has been outstanding as a PPR option with 21 targets over his first two outings for 13/155/1 and as we mentioned the last time the Jets were on the Prime Time slate, it was going to be hard for Robby Anderson to maintain the efficient success he enjoyed last season now that he has a rookie signal caller.  He did see 5 targets catching 3 for 27 yards, but that was not enough to make his backers happy (don’t forget in Week 1 he had one target, but it went for 41 yards and a score).

Terrell Pryor may actually be someone worth watching as he made some noise on Sunday with 8 targets for 4/84/0 after catching all three of his Week 1 targets for 49 yards.  He is reasonably priced and could be worth a GPP dart throw if you want to recall that the Browns are one of his former teams and where he successfully made the switch from quarterback to wide receiver.

Former University of Washington star Jermaine Kearse saw his first action of the season after receiving medical clearance, but he saw just two targets for one catch totaling negative one yards on 20 total snaps.

Tight EndNeal Sterling is in the concussion protocol so that leaves us with rookie Chris Herndon who tallied 4 targets for 2 receptions and 30 yards after nary a look in Week 1 and second year man Eric Tomlinson who has averaged 33 snaps and 1.5 targets for one catch and 15.5 yards per reception this season.  Jordan Leggett played on 15 snaps in Week 1 but was inactive Week 2.

Defense/Special Teams – Cleveland has allowed 10 sacks so far this season, but we do want to remember that seven of them came in the weather-impacted Week 1 rainfest.  The Jets have managed five sacks of their own and in this likely defensive struggle, it would not be a shock for them to get a couple more on Thursday.

 

Cleveland Browns

Quarterback – Tyrod Taylor has 103 rushing yards and a score on a dozen attempts through the first two games of the season.  The passing numbers have been mediocre at best as he has gone 37 for 70 with only 443 yards and a pair of picks and scores.  In a game that will likely see both teams trying to control the clock, at least we know that Taylor will be touching the ball on nearly every play and he isn’t afraid to call is own number.  He is in play on the single game slate as well as the Monday-Thursday (Yahoo!) slate that is wrapping up.  We will be counting on some rushing stats as Josh Gordon is of course now with the New England Patriots and Jarvis Landry has been limited in practice with a knee injury and he is currently questionable.

Running Back – Carlos Hyde has just not been getting the target volume we would like to see as the Browns have been running some conservative game plans and allowing their defense to do a lot of the heavy lifting through their first two contests.  This is highlighted when we see Hyde’s two game totals of 38/105/2 rushing and 3 targets for 2/10/0 receiving – if not for the pair of touchdowns, he would barely have cracked double digit fantasy points on the season.  He is in play for the single game contests only and will likely be popular.

Wide Receiver – Jarvis Landry is the clear leader in the Browns receiving corps HOWEVER and it is a big however (not just because I capitalized it) he is dealing with a knee injury and will likely be a game time decision with the short turnaround between games.  If he is a go, then he will be the top fantasy option from the Browns.

Last week he was joined by Rashard Higgins, Antonio Calloway and tight end David Njoku, however, we know that Tyrod Taylor is not going to be a prolific passer and the Jets defense has been pretty solid.

My preference is former Colorado State University stalwart Rashard Higgins because he has more experience than rookie Antonio Calloway who got a little lucky on that 47 yard score with 1:16 left in the final frame last week.  Hopefully the “game log watchers” head his way, but on the single game slates, the herd will be strong pretty much everywhere.

Tight End – David Njoku will be touchdown dependent like most tight ends, but we do have some comfort knowing that Tyrod Tayler has been good at utilizing that position throughout his career.  Weeks 1 and 2 have yielded twin 7 target games for Njoku and though he has just 7 receptions for 33 yards, he should see some additional opportunities if Landry limited or out of commission.

Defense/Special Teams – This is another less than enthralling play for the full-slate contests, though the price is definitely right on DraftKings/FantasyDraft.  For the single game contests, we can expect the Browns to be a popular option as the home team and with gamers hoping that rookie Sam Darnold feels the pressure (though remember this will already be his second prime time game).

 

Single Game Ranking (taking into account projected production and popularity)

  1. Tyrod Taylor (will likely be the most popular option)
  2. Quincy Enunwa (nice choice for the Captain designee DraftKings)
  3. Sam Darnold (intriguing swerve as the MVP designee FanDuel)
  4. Jarvis Landry (move to #1 if completely healthy)
  5. Bilal Powell (my favorite RB on both sites)
  6. Browns D/ST
  7. Carlos Hyde (loses carries to his QB, not fellow RBs Duke Johnson Jr. and Nick Chubb)
  8. Jets D/ST
  9. David Njoku (gets a boost if Landry is out or limited)
  10. Terrell Pryor Sr. (all about the big play)
  11. Isaiah Crowell (direct leverage against Bilal Powell)
  12. Rashard Higgins (one of many receiving dart throws)
  13. Robby Anderson (through two weeks Enunwa has dramatically curbed his opportunity volume)
  14. Duke Johnson Jr. (better on DraftKings with full-PPR)
  15. Jason Myers (gamers are learning quickly that kickers are viable in a slugfest)
  16. Greg Joseph (gamers are learning quickly that kickers are viable in a slugfest – keep in mind he is an undrafted rookie signed to replace the abysmal 7th round pick Zane Gonzalez)
  17. Chris Herndon (preferred on DraftKings where he is just $1,800, the FanDuel floor of $6,000 is not as useful)
  18. Antonio Calloway (not sure if the rookie will get enough looks in a slow paced game)
  19. Eric Tomlinson (TD hunting with a non-descript TE)
  20. Jermaine Kearse (missed part of camp and Week 1 after abdominal surgery)

Sunday Night and Monday Night Football will be posted no later than Saturday morning.

Good Luck Gamers! ~ EMac

Eric "EMac" MacPherson won the 2007 Fantasy Baseball grand prize (trip for two to the MLB All-Star game) in the Roto format on ESPN. He won again in 2008, this time in the H2H format. As one of the early adopters of daily fantasy sports, EMac has been providing content for baseball and basketball as well as both professional and college football since 2012 for a variety of websites including DraftKings Playbook, FanVice, RotoWorld, Daily Fantasy Bootcamp, and RotoGrinders. He is well into his third decade of fantasy sports and has a wealth of knowledge and experience. Follow him on Twitter @EMacDFS or contact EMac by emailing [email protected].

Stokastic +

Premium Data and Tools
PREMIUM TOOLS
Lineup Generator
Stokastic Sims MLB
PREMIUM DATA
Projections
Top Stack %s
MLB Data Central
FREE DATA
SoRare MLB Rankings
DraftKings Night Owl
FANTASY CRUNCHER (ADD-ON)
MLB Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
MLB Discord Server
PREMIUM DATA
Projections
Ownership Projections
PREMIUM TOOLS
Fantasy Cruncher (ADD-ON)
NHL Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
NHL Discord Server
PREMIUM TOOLS
Lineup Generator
Stokastic Sims PGA
PREMIUM DATA
Ownership Projections
Top Golfers Tool
PGA Tournament Models
FANTASY CRUNCHER (ADD-ON)
PGA Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
PGA Discord Server
Ownership Projections
Top Drivers Tool
NASCAR Discord Server
NASCAR Fantasy Cruncher
USFL Projections
USFL Discord Server
Ownership Projections
Top Fighters Tool
MMA Discord Server
MMA Fantasy Cruncher
NFL Betting Tools
Stokastic Discord Server
Best Ball
Best Ball Rankings
Best Ball Stat Projections
Stokastic Discord Server
Season Long Fantasy (Coming Soon)

DFS Winners from the Stokastic Community

Subscribe to the Stokastic newsletter

DFS advice, exciting promos, and the best bets straight to your inbox

Stokastic.com - Daily Fantasy Sports and Sports Betting Data, Tools, & Analytics

Please play responsibly. Only customers 21 and over are permitted to play. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-GAMBLER.