Fantasy Football Player Notes

The last news that we have on Cooper was that he's missed practices or been limited in them recently. That doesn't exactly instill confidence in starting someone that you drafted early on and need to rely on. With that being said, Cooper also has to deal with the fact that he's most likely going to be shadowed by newly PAID Jalen Ramsey. With the other options on this team, it wouldn't surprise me at all to see Dak look Michael Gallup, CeeDee Lamb, and Blake Jarwin's way more than Cooper this week. Cooper's not a "must sit" player by any means, but expectations need to be managed going into Sunday Night Football.

We don't know if Amari Cooper will be shadowed by Jalen Ramsey, but if he's not, Gallup will see plenty of the shutdown cornerback. That's because we typically don't see Ramsey move into the slot, and it's a similar story with Gallup, as he was in the slot just 11 percent of the time last year. It appears that it'll be Ramsey and Troy Hill on the perimeter, which is less-than-ideal for Gallup. Hill played very well when promoted into a full-time role last year, allowing just 23 catches for 304 yards and a touchdown on 51 targets in his coverage. Was it a flash in the pan? He'd been extremely below average in his prior four years in the league. There are a lot of changes to the Rams, including their defensive scheme, so it's difficult to take much away from last year when they allowed just 11.97 yards per reception, which was the sixth lowest in the league. Until we know the pecking order in the Cowboys offense, Gallup should be looked at as a mid-to-low-end WR3, though it does help that Cooper may be dealing with some sort of ailment that could lessen his involvement in the gameplan.

I'm playing it safe with rookies in their first game, as they've still yet to play against an NFL team other than their own. There's going to be a transition that must occur. Think about someone like A.J. Brown last year who took a solid 6-8 games before he was used in a full-time role. That's not going to be the case with Lamb, but it's more about the learning curve. It does help that the Cowboys are supposedly going to play him in the slot (we have no concrete proof, but it makes sense), as that's a much easier transition than going to line up on the perimeter against Jalen Ramsey in his first game. The Rams moved on from slot cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman this offseason and appear to be moving forward with Darious Williams, a third-year former undrafted free agent. He's played just 225 snaps in his NFL career and has seen just 16 targets in coverage, so we don't have much to go off, though he did have two pass breakups and two interceptions on those 16 targets. Still, he's 5-foot-9 and 187 pounds, so we could see Lamb (6-foot-2 and 198 pounds) take advantage of his size. Again, exercise caution with rookies in their first NFL game, but Lamb may have the best matchup of the Cowboys receivers. He's a risk/reward WR4.