AFC South Fantasy Preview

Let's take a quick look around the AFC South. We'll look at the quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers and tight ends of fantasy note. So in other words, if they're not here, don't draft them.

QUARTERBACKS

Here’s the thing with a Peyton Manning vs. Matt Schaub debate for the top QB spot in the division, HEALTH. Even though Schaub endured all of last year without a visit to the injury report, Schaub still hasn’t proven to anybody that he won’t follow the footsteps of a young Carson Palmer, A lock to consistently put up a nice 250 yds and 2 TD’s every week, but also an even safer bet to miss 4 – 5 games a year. On the other hand you have Manning, a guy who hasn’t missed a game in the current millennium, gets Anthony Gonzalez back, has a top 5 offensive line in front of him, and most importantly… well, he is Peyton Manning. Do you really see him having less than 3,700 yds and 30 TDs this year? With those receivers? The year after he lost the Super Bowl and has more to prove than ANY QB in the league? I just don’t. And talking about QBs with something to prove, let’s bring Vince Young to the conversation. Now, of any athlete in the NFL, with the possible exception of Favre, I think Young could throw any kind of season at us and I really wouldn’t be surprised at all. I mean, he is the ultimate home run guy. You are either going to be supremely happy to have him or just plain miserable. I know everybody has been saying it for the past three years, but this is really his make or break season. He has the receivers, the best RB in the league, the best offensive line outside of the Meadowlands, and maybe for the first time in his career, the maturity to handle the position. So it’s either blackjack or bust with him, but of all the Orton’s, Garrard’s or Leinart’s out there, I think he is the one with the potential to really push it to another level.

RUNNING BACKS

Chris Johnson and Maurice Jones Drew don’t need any explanation, at all. Numbers don’t lie. Without question, they are both first round pickes. Now, many people may be surprised by me having Joseph Addai, 3rd. Let me explain. Of all the RBs the Colts have at their disposal, nobody fits their system like Addai does. He is a superb receiver coming from the backfield and extremely dangerous once he gets to the second level. The only problem I have with him is that in goal line situations he’ll most likely take a back seat to Donald Brown, but still, I can definitely see him having another season like last year, something along the lines of a 1,200 all purpose yards and 8 TDs. I would avoid Houston’s RBs at all costs, however I think Arian Foster has an edge over Steve Slaton, simply because of the fumble issues the team went through last year with him. Finally, because of all the touches that go around in the Colts offense I just don’t see how Donald Brown impacts the game outside of the five yard line, where I think they’ll bring him in to punch in a couple of scores.

WIDE RECEIVERS

Here are some quick thoughts on the receivers in this division:

Andre Johnson: With Warner now out of Arizona, is this the year we finally move AJ as the most prolific WR of the league?
Reggie Wayne: Top target for the best QB in the division. The fact that the Colts pass 99.9 percent of the time doesn’t hurt either. Ok, not 99.9 percent, but a lot.
Pierre Garcon: Playing Robin to Wayne’s Batman, Garcon will put up more points than Larry Fitzgerald.
Justin Gage: A hunch more than anything else. First, I the think this is the year that the Titans become a little bit more of a passing team, and he is their best red zone target, and the most complete wide out in Nashville.
Austin Collie: I just don’t see Anthony Gonzalez taking the slot position from the Colts’s version of Wes Welker.
Mike Sims–Walker: Garrard has to throw to someone.
Kenny Britt: I would probably have him in Gage’s spot, but reviews of him out of training camp aren’t encouraging and he will lose touches to Nate Washington.
Kevin Walter: Reminds me a lot of Brandon Stokely back when he was in Indy.
Anthony Gonzalez: How soon till we officially label him a bust? I don’t get it. He has done nothing to warrant a 1st rounder and will probably warm the bench for Collie all year.

TIGHT ENDS

Dallas Clark is so good we should start listing him as a WR. He’s definitely the top tight end in the division. Owen Daniels is the second best pass catcher in a great passing game. However he is a huge injury risk coming off knee surgery. Buyer beware!!

So these are my thoughts on the AFC South. Good luck on your drafts and the upcoming season.

NFC North Fantasy Preview

The NFC North boasts a ton of talent that you want to have on your roster. You want to grab these guys early and often in order to build a championship team. The division seems to have something at every position for the fantasy owner looking to find the right guy for their team.

QUARTERBACKS

Let’s start with my man crush, Aaron Rodgers. Rodgers has been the starter in Green Bay for two seasons and in each he has led most fantasy leagues in points. Rodgers is young, which means he’s getting better, and he is the head of what seems to be the newest high-flying offense in Green Bay. Rodgers is my top choice at quarterback and I would take him in the first round without thinking twice. He was the top scorer and is getting better. The next quarterback in this division is Brett Favre. Old Man Favre put together his best season at the age of 40 and he clearly makes the Vikings a better team. Last year was the only time in his career where he had single digit interceptions but without Sidney Rice playing wideout I feel a 25-td, 15 interception, season is right around the corner. I’d take Favre in the end of the 5th, early 6th round. The last quarterback that I like in the division is Matthew Stafford. I like Stafford, whom I would pick up in free agency, over Jay Cutler, whom I wouldn’t draft, because I feel the potential is there for a big season for Stafford. I expect the young Lion Cub QB to finish the year with more touchdowns than interceptions, something that I can not expect from Cutler. So forgo Cutler in your draft and keep an eye out for Matthew Stafford.

RUNNING BACK

The running back position starts with the #2 pick overall in my fantasy draft, Adrian Peterson. Peterson is a beast and he has rushed for over 1,300 yards and had double digit touchdowns each of his three seasons. Peterson is consistent and that makes him a safe pick at #2 overall. The next back that I would take off the board would be Ryan Grant. I like Grant because he is one of those rare workhorse backs. No one is threatening his carries so I expect him to get most of the touches in Green Bay and all the goal line carries. Good value for Grant is at the end of the second, beginning of the third round. The next two backs are neck and neck; they are Jahvid Best and Matt Forte. Both players have weaknesses, Best’s injury history and Forte’s sophomore slump. I think both players are worth the risk in the late stage of round 4 at the earliest, but I see them more as potential boom or bust players. The last back I would take a look at in the division is Chester Taylor. The Bears paid him a lot of money to come to Chicago and if Forte were to falter, Taylor would take that job and not look back. Currently I see Taylor not being drafted in leagues so he may be someone you want to keep an eye out for in free agency.

WIDE RECEIVERS

Who’s first? Calvin Johnson is first. Johnson is one of those freak wide receivers that have a balance of speed and height. I like Matt Stafford mostly because of this guy. He had a bad year last year but it doesn’t seem to be affecting his draft position as he is usually the third wide receiver off the board as early as late in the second round. If you had asked me who would have had a bad hip first, Brett Favre or Sidney Rice, I would’ve bet my car that it would be Favre. But the #2 receiver in the division is sidelined an estimated 6-8 weeks. According to reports he seems to be shooting to come back in game 7 so he still might be able to help your squad make a playoff push. Consider him in round 7 if you dare. The third receiver coming off the board is Greg Jennings. Jennings is a deep threat with the ability to take it deep on every play. He is currently going in the 4th round, which is a fair price to pay for this huge potential player. Jennings’ fellow wideout, Donald Driver, is going to get more looks than Jennings, but they’ll be for a shorter yardage. As part of the receiving duo in what I predict will be the best offense in the league, he is worth a look in round 6. However, I would move him up one round if I were drafting in a PPR league. The final receiver I would pick up from this division would be Devin Aromashodu. Aromashodu is Jay Cutler’s #2 option, right behind the opposing team’s cornerback. When Cutler isn’t throwing to the other team, he will be throwing to Aromashodu. He should be available in the 10th round.

TIGHT ENDS/DEFENSE

Last year Ravens Running Back Ray Rice was the hot name to skyrocket into fantasy stardom. This year, it’s Jermichael Finley. Finley has the ability and opportunity to be the number one tight end in fantasy. The only problem is that the tight end position is the deepest it has ever been. However, the potential for Finley to break out is there. I wouldn’t blame you for taking him at the end of the fourth, right after Dallas Clark and Antonio Gates. After Finley, the talent really gets watered down. I would head to Minnesota for my defense and tight end. I’d grab the Minnesota Defense in the 12 round and I’d grab Visanthe Shiancoe three rounds earlier. The defense is a top 10 defense, with potential to be in the top 5. Shiancoe will have a big impact early with Rice out, but I expect his numbers to fall when Rice returns.

This division is like Walmart, there is a little bit of everything for everybody. So when you are looking to fill out your roster on draft weekend, make sure you head north. You’re bound to find something to fit your team.

AFC North Fantasy Preview

The AFC North has some true beasts in it. When you consider that the perennial smash-mouth competitors Pittsburgh Steelers are the third best team in the division, it makes you ask the question of just how good the Bengals and the Ravens are shaping up to be. As for the Browns, well, let’s just say that Drew Carey is the only one who thinks that Cleveland Rocks.

This year’s Bengals and Ravens wide receiving corps look like they’re going to put up some amazing numbers. While it’s uncertain how much receivers on the same team help or hurt each other’s fantasy numbers, there’s no doubt that Carson Palmer and Joe Flacco are poised to have amazing seasons. In addition to having monster wide receiving corps, both quarterbacks have reliable, talented running backs that are coming off of career seasons. Big Ben makes us wonder as to what benefit he can bring to his owners having to serve a 4 game suspension, and the hapless Browns have only one bright spot in their brownout- Joshua Cribbs, and even then, many leagues don’t give points for the many talents of Mr. Cribbs.

AFC NORTH: Top 3 QBs

TO is in town! TO is in town! It might hurt or it might help Chad Ochocinco’s numbers, but it’s definitely going to help Carson Palmer. The Bengals potentially have the best receiving corps in the NFL with the addition of TO, and Chad Ochocinco is coming off of a very respectable 1,047 yard 9 TD season. Palmer is sure to benefit when one of the team’s receiver duo is left open while the other is being double-teamed. He also has Cedric Benson there to provide him with an outlet in case he should need it, and Benson’s running game is always nice to have to complement Palmer’s passing game. There’s nothing like a play-action fake combined with a defensive double team on the wrong receiver to set up nice big plays. Carson Palmer has had a healthy offseason, and his ship is coming in this year.

Joe Flacco either improved or didn’t worsen in every meaningful statistic his sophomore year. More significant than this is that he didn’t go through the dreaded sophomore slump that so many predicted for him. This guy’s a winner and he’s only getting better. His leadership and strong arm are huge assets and now he has Anquan Boldin in addition to Derrick Mason, Mark Clayton and Todd Heap. Similarly to Carson Palmer, he also has a solid running back in Ray Rice with which to have an outlet and setup the long ball. This other stellar corps of wide receivers makes the AFC North something to keep an eye on, especially when it comes to the QB’s benefiting from their many talents.

Pittsburgh Steelers- What good is a QB that can only give you 12 out of 16 games? Will he be in pro form or slow out of the gate? I think Ben Roethlisberger is the best QB in this division. His McNabbesque way of extending plays with his phone booth quick feet and powerful body make him an excellent clutch QB. But for fantasy purposes what good is a QB who’s going to miss at least 4 games of the season? And what about losing his most productive wideout in Santonio Holmes? The guy’s a winner on the field, but he has to be ON the field if he wants to make a difference. Hopefully his ban will be for only 4 games, and he’ll make an excellent high pick back up in your draft. It will be interesting to see how Big Ben will react after serving his suspension and missing wideout Santonio Holmes. Taking Big Ben as a back-up should pay dividends later in the season.The sad thing? A 4 game suspension for Roethlisberger isn’t enough to promote Delhomme to the third spot. The thought of putting stock in Jake Delhomme is bad enough, but when you consider that he might be sharing time with Seneca Wallace and the wildcat formation…on a terrible team…facing three very good defenses in his division… and the fact that he inspires about as much confidence as “Gimpy” the three-legged racehorse, makes leaving Delhomme at number 4 a great big no-brainer.

AFC NORTH: Top 3 RBs

Ray Rice showed us last year how much of a stud he can be. He produced as a runner, he produced as a receiver, he was Mr. Productivity all around. This year with the bolstered offense, I’m excited to see what Rice can do with the ball. It’s common to see a good running back get the ball when a team is playing with the lead, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the M.O. for the Ravens this year.

As for number 2, I really like Steelers running back, Rashard Mendenhall. Not having Big Ben may hurt the Steelers early on, but it should serve to boost Mendenhall’s numbers. With the loss of productivity from Santonio Holmes, I can picture Mendenhall being the type of productive runner that would only matter to a Fantasy owner. Without Big Ben in the line-up, Mendenhall is going to be a great example of a productive running back in a losing effort. Handing the ball off to Mendenhall is going to pad his stats but simultaneously run the Steelers right into mediocrity. For Fantasy owners who don’t care what happens to the Steelers, Mendenhall is going to be productive. The Steelers are going to have to rely ever more on smash-mouth football to eke out a couple of wins without their starting QB.

Cedric Benson of the Cincinnati Bengals rounds out the top three. A very solid starting running back, Benson has increased his role as well as his overall productivity on the team. Last year was a break-out season for him, and he’s sure to play an important role this year to give the Bengals a well-balanced offense. The addition of new offensive weapons to his team, make him a good candidate to run the ball when the Bengals are sitting on an early lead. The time of possession battle is always fought by the running backs, and I don’t think Benson will be any different.

AFC NORTH: Top 5 WRs

Terrell Owens ball share with Chad Ochocinco might hurt him, and I’m not really convinced that he isn’t a cancer waiting to metastasize in the locker room. Still, he’s a talented wide receiver who put up decent numbers without a quarterback last year. We’ve seen what he can do with a talented quarterback, and we’ve seen what he can do on a good offense. A leopard can’t change its spots and this Tiger can’t change his stripes. I want TO in my locker about as much as I want three copies of Timecop from the Walmart discount DVD bin, but the guy is talented. Will he be hurt by the fact that he’s sharing the field with Chad Ochocinco? Time will have to tell. The key to TO’s productivity is to see how Carson Palmer will react to having TO as his new number one and if TO remembers how cold and out of the spotlight it can get in Buffalo.

I want to put Hines Ward higher than TO. God knows that I would much rather have him on my team than TO, but the fact is that even without Big Ben and age creeping up on him, Hines’ productivity may suffer a little. He may see a lot more action with the departure of Santonio Holmes; then again it may be another aspect that hurts his productivity. He’s never been a fast guy, a flashy guy or loud guy, but this guy does get it done. I’d hate to see Hines’s numbers suffer at attracting too much attention with Santonio gone, though, so I guess this is my way of saying “let’s see if a guy’s numbers improve or worsen when the other premier wideout leaves town.” The fact remains that Hines is the only premier wideout in the AFC North without other great wide receivers on his team taking his productivity away; something that isn’t the case for TO, Chad Ochocinco, Derrick Mason and Anquan Boldin. It might be a gamble to consider Hines number 2 in the AFC North with a backup QB throwing him the ball the first four games, so consider this a gamble… if you can really call 1167 yards with 6 TDs last year a really big downside.

Derrick Mason is a solid wide receiver who performs year after year. He’s historically had solid numbers, but Anquan Boldin is in town and we’ll have to see how that plays out for his productivity. He’s also getting older, but hey, so is Joe Flacco; in a good way. Derrick Mason has had plus 1,000 yards receiving in each of the last 3 seasons, and decent touchdown production. With Anquan Boldin joining the Ravens, he’s sure to have more opportunities to make a big play, but his production should be negatively affected.

Anquan Boldin is an extremely talented wide receiver, but I couldn’t put him higher than 4th on my list of the AFC North receivers. Getting traded to the most physical division in the NFL makes me question how many games Anquan is going to be around to play. Let’s pretend that his face was never smashed by a freight train type hit two seasons ago, and we still have to consider the little nagging injuries that Boldin has had to deal with. How many games is he going to play next season? And in how many of those games is he going to play 4 quarters?

Chad Ochocinco had the best numbers last year out of this year’s AFC North Top Five selection. I question what having TO on his team means for him as a fantasy producer, though. The fact that Cedric Benson is coming off of his best year also makes me think that his role on the team is more diminished than ever. Reading Chad Ochocinco’s face as he was interviewed by the NFL Network has me very unconvinced that he will willingly accept the role of the number two receiver on the team. There are too many variables circling Chad with the arrival of TO, and I’m not sure what it means for Ochocinco. It seems that the one definitely winning out is Palmer.

AFC North: Top 3 Defenses

The Cleveland Browns…are not my first pick. Picking the Cleveland Browns number one in this division would be like taking public speaking lessons from Miss Teen South Carolina 2007. I just wanted to mention them somewhere because they don’t have the best anything in this division. If it’s brown flush it down; which fortunately for the Baltimore Ravens is not the case for the AFC North’s top defense. It wasn’t an easy choice, but Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, Terrell Suggs and company are going to dominate opposing offenses this year. Sure, Ray Lewis is no spring chicken anymore, but I’ve been hearing that he’s too old for years and the guy keeps coming back as a solid leader and anchor to his team. The fact that the Ravens are going to have a solid offense and most likely scoring some points earlier in the games, also leads me to believe that the talented young running back that the Ravens are showcasing is going to let old Ray rest his feet. I like the time of possession favoring the Ravens, and I look forward to a couple of Defensive touchdowns. The Ravens are just as smash mouth as the Steelers except they fair better against the long ball and have less problems to deal with in the locker room.

Cincinnati Bengals- Yes that’s right, if Cincinnati is second then that means the “Shittsburgh” Steelers, as Bengals fans call them, are number three. Last year the Bengals showed more than just promise, and this year they’ve only gotten stronger on that side of the ball. Mike Zimmer has turned this defensive unit around since he arrived after the 2007 season, and there’s no reason to suspect that anything will change for the worse this year. Since 2007 the Bengals have jumped from 14th to 6th in 2008 to 3rd in 2009 in total Defense in the AFC. I should mention that the Steelers were 4th in 2009, and for all practical purposes that makes them about tied. However, the Bengals are on their way up and the Steelers don’t have me convinced that they’re not slightly on their way down. It isn’t only the year of the Tiger in China, it’s also happening in the NFL. Helping me make my pick is the fact that Cincinnati will be playing against a Roesthlisberger-less team for one game in addition to the two “bonus games” against the Browns that every other team in the AFC North enjoys. They also don’t have to play two games against their own TO-infused offense.

I’m a big fan of Troy Polamalu and what the Pittsburgh Defense means year in and year out against the run, but I have to put them at number three. The other side of the ball makes me question the efficacy with which the Steelers Defense will be able to manage the clock, and the pass happy NFL, including 4 games in their own division against some of the best wide receiving corps the NFL has to offer, makes me question Pittsburgh. Sure there are a couple of divisions in which the Steelers Defense would rank number one, but in this division smash mouth football isn’t going to cut it against two very solid and well-balanced offenses. 2009 showed us some weaknesses that the Steelers have, in particular, “What happens if Polamalu gets injured?” It scares me to think what if when one player has such an important role on the defensive side of the ball.

Well we’ve taken a look at the AFC North, and a couple of things stand out. Carson Palmer and Joe Flacco have all the pieces in place, and it’s just a matter of making the engine go. These guys have a bunch of weapons and are deep at the wide receiver positions. In addition to the players previously featured, Palmer has Antonio Bryant and Andre Caldwell; and Joe Flacco has Mark Clayton and Todd Heap. However, I’d like to point out that while the Bengals and the Ravens have what look to be two of the best receiving corps in the league, it seems that the great receivers might cancel each other’s productivity out. Considering that Hines Ward is the only great wide receiver without someone really hogging his productivity, it seems that he should have a great season but then there’s his QB issue. So in a division with so many great wideouts, I’m left feeling rather unmotivated to actively search out any one of these great wideouts in my early picks. They look good, but none of their situations look great. And as for Cleveland, well, at least you still have Lebr…oh wait.