Yahoo Sports’ Fantasy Football Live crew looks ahead to Sunday’s matchup between Detroit and Houston – and how Tank Dell, Joe Mixon and Amon-Ra St. Brown could impact fantasy managers.
Video Transcript
So let’s bring the whole group back together and turn our attention to Fantasy game changers for this week powered by Ram Trucks where we identify some of the most impactful players in one of the top Fantasy matchups on the schedule.
This week’s matchup.
We talked about it a little bit earlier.
We’ve got the Lions taking on the Texans and this is a big matchup.
Obviously for two great teams also big for everybody in Fantasy Football and NRG Stadium.
The Lions favored by 3.5 the over under on this 49.
So Andy Barns, when I say Fantasy game changer, you say, yeah, listen, if Houston has any shot whatsoever to keep pace with Detroit, they’re gonna need another big week from Tank Dell in recent weeks.
Uh As he gets further removed from last year’s injury, he’s looked a little bit more like his old self.
I think he is dealing with a back injury this week.
Sounds like he’s gonna be able to go.
Dell has either 100 yards or a touchdown in three of his last four games.
So he’s been at least moderately helpful lately coming off his biggest receiving output of the season was six catches 100 and 26 yards last week against the Jets.
This week, a much friendlier match up with the defense that’s actually allowing the third most fantasy points to opposing wide receivers.
Very good chance CJ Stroud will need to put the ball in the air 40 plus times on Sunday night.
And if that happens, there’s almost no way that tank Dell isn’t going to produce.
Last week was really the first time all season we saw a game from Dell that looked exactly like last year.
Right downfield opportunities high A 0.7 plus yards after the catch.
I think, I think the return of Nico Collins can actually only help Dell too because it, it obviously reshapes the field gives Detroit’s defense a huge problem to solve.
We got a question to chat on that.
I’ll hold you to, uh, I won’t try and say his name because I can’t pronounce it, but it says full P pr flex Del or Mooney.
What do you think?
Oh, man, I hate to, I hate to talk up Tank Dell and then pick the other guy, but I think I might pick the other guy here and go Mooney.
The, the volume has just been so locked in and the matchup this week of the Saints is just a, it’s just a gift.
All right, Tara, give me your fantasy game changer.
Andy is talking about that Texans passing game.
I want to talk about the run game, specifically Joe Mixon, he is absolutely thriving and that might even be an understatement here excluding the games where Mixon got hurt and played less than the single game where Mixon got hurt and played less than 50% of snaps.
He’s had over 100 yards in every game this season and scored at least one touchdown.
Last week’s performance was surprisingly low in fantasy points due to his receiving work, but that was an outlier still great on the ground.
And the matchup against Detroit’s run defense isn’t actually as daunting as you would think early this season.
Obviously, Detroit’s run defense was a complete no go.
But recently they’ve been giving up strong volume to backs like Josh Jacobs, Tony Pollard, Aaron Jones and talent just wins out against Detroit’s run defense.
Mixon has more than enough talent to keep on rolling here.
So Joe Mixon is my game changer.
All right, Matt Harmon, it feels like we’ve had a lot on one side.
Give me, give me your game changer.
Let’s see if we can get a little balance on this.
Yeah, and I mean, there’s a lot of options to go with on the Detroit Lions, but let’s talk about a on Ra Saint Brown as the game changer for Detroit here.
And I wanna kind of take a big picture.
Look at this too because there’s been some sort of worries about Saint Brown and the fact that he’s on pace for the lowest yards per game, uh figure since his rookie season, but if you look at the volume, it’s pretty identical target share.
It’s pretty identical air yard share.
It’s pretty identical air yards per target from this year to last year.
So there’s really no change in the usage.
Uh So what, what gives here?
Really?
It’s just that the lions are too good right now when the lions have to open up, we know that this ecosystem is still a pristine passing environment.
So the question here is, are they gonna have to do that against the Houston Texans?
The their offense is kind of trending down, maybe if they get Nico Collins, they’ll bring it back up.
So kind of we’ll see on that.
But regardless, I do think this is a really good matchup for Saint Brown.
The Texans play such tight perimeter man coverage.
They bring heat off the edge with their two star pass rushers.
Jared Goff’s is gonna need to get the ball out quick.
He’s gonna want to pick on the interior of that defense.
All of that sounds like I’m on Ras Saint Brown’s calling card to me and don’t forget that he probably could see even more space underneath with the return of field stretcher jam and Williams back off a two game suspension.
So I like Saint Brown to probably get it going here in this matchup against the Texans