Our own Pat Fitzmaurice has been among the most accurate fantasy football experts in the industry over the last several years. Fitz was THE most accurate in-season ranker in 2020. What better way to prepare for your fantasy football start/sit lineup decisions than by reviewing his rankings? You can do just that below.
You can also find our expert consensus fantasy football rankings for the week here. And you can sync your fantasy football league for free using our My Playbook tool for custom advice, rankings, and analysis.
Fantasy Football Rankings
Fitz’s Fantasy Football Takes
Since Week 2, Dak Prescott has averaged 249 passing yards per game, with at least one TD pass in each of those contests. He’s completed 73.1% of his passes over that stretch, averaging 7.6 yards per attempt. There were concerns that with Brian Schottenheimer replacing Kellen Moore as the Cowboys’ offensive coordinator, the Dallas offense might become overly conservative. The good news for Prescott investors is that the Cowboys haven’t been especially good at running the ball, with Tony Pollard averaging 3.9 yards per carry and posting a 48.1% success rate. Prescott has an enticing Week 9 matchup against the Eagles, whose pass defense has gone to seed. Philadelphia can still rush the passer effectively, but their defensive backs have struggled in coverage. The Eagles have allowed the sixth-fewest fantasy points per game to quarterbacks in 2022. So far this year, the Eagles are allowing the fourth-most fantasy points to QBs and have the league’s eighth-worst opponent passer rating.
Christian McCaffrey, Travis Etienne, Jahmyr Gibbs and Javonte Williams are on bye this week, making for a challenging RB landscape. How rough are things at the position this week? Well, Gus Edwards is RB17 in the FantasyPros Expert Consensus Rankings. The enthusiasm among rankers is no doubt being pumped up by Edwards’ three-TD performance against the Cardinals last week. Gus Bus is only RB29 in PPR points per game, and after demolishing the Cardinals’ marshmallow-soft run defense last week, Edwards gets a much tougher Week 9 matchup against a Seattle defense that ranks eighth in DVOA against the run and is yielding 3.1 yards per carry to RBs. But Edwards has gotten double-digit carries in seven straight games and has averaged 15.2 carries per game since the start of October. Edwards’ ECR may indeed be inflated, but I’m not far behind in ranking him RB20.
Christian Watson is averaging 44 receiving yards per game, has scored only one touchdown and has caught only 11 of his 24 targets. He’s produced 33 or fewer receiving yards in three of his four games. Granted, Watson’s numbers have been discouraging, and so has the recent play of Packers QB Jordan Love. Still, I’m sticking with my initial read on Watson and continuing to start him in most circumstances. I’m not anxious to give up on a 6-4 receiver with sub-4.4 speed who scored eight touchdowns over a four-game stretch as a rookie.
Trey McBride was a smash play in Week 8, with 10-95-1 on 14 targets — good for a TE2 finish in 0.5 PPR fantasy scoring. He managed to do it against the Ravens, who had been extremely stingy to opposing TEs all season. With Zach Ertz out, McBride played a season-high 63 snaps last week, and his increased usage puts him squarely in the TE1 class. That said, McBride is a dicey proposition this week. He’ll be playing with fifth-round rookie QB Clayton Tune, who’ll be making his first NFL start, and McBride will be facing a Browns defense that has given up the fewest fantasy points to tight ends.
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