2021 Dynasty/Fantasy Game Analysis Week 13: Washington 17, Raiders 15
I don’t know how they did it, but the Raiders pulled out another win by the same exact score/luck the last two weeks, a pair of 17-15 wins and a 4-game win streak.
I don’t know why they do it, but the Raiders lose every big game they’re in later in the season and botch their playoff chances right around the last quarter of the season for the past three seasons…and here they are again.
These two teams tried to out-running back each other while hoping their QB didn’t screw up and their defenses out-hustled the other. Washington got the better RB play, QB play, and about even on defense in this game – but they got the late game field goal to pull it out in the end. There are two ‘C’ teams that can give any team a run and also lose to most any team. They clashed here, and Washington won this one…would be 50-50 if they played it 100 times.
Washington has pulled themselves up to .500 (6-6) and can really throw a grenade into the NFC East beating Dallas this week. I’ll take Dallas, however…and we expect Washington to finish with 8 wins (which I need to happen to ‘push’ my over/under preseason win total bet). Nine wins is not out of the question. In no way is Washington a better team, a better representative to have the NFC East title over Dallas…but anything is possible in the NFL. One injury to a team can change everything. We project Washington to 8 wins and out of the playoffs, and out of the playoffs even if they get to 9 wins.
Las Vegas blows a golden opportunity, at home to an opponent they should have taken down at this stage of the season. They fall to .500 (6-6) and the AFC West title daydream is dead, and now the playoff dream is slipping away. We see the Raiders finishing (8-9) and out of the playoffs, last place in the AFC West.
Fantasy Player Notes…
-- The biggest FF news from this game is all the issues with both teams' tight ends…
Logan Thomas (3-48-1/5) looked so good in his return, and had a sweet TD catch in this game…but later got his ACL/MCL clipped and he’s likely out for the season. A guy I put a lot of redraft teams together with as a key mid-round value pick at TE…and I lost him Week 4, for 7 games, and now I’ve lost him again.
This is Fantasy Football…constantly working around injuries. Just like the NFL teams have to.
Ricky Seals-Jones was working nicely as a Logan fill-in but then he got hurt. Since them rookie John Bates (3-42-0/4) has started establishing himself. My projection ahead would be: Bates and RSJ split themselves up into TE2s. But if RSJ can’t go this week, Bates is a TE1.5 with hopes of a TD to get to TE1.
Logan Thomas essentially played 5 games this season, his 16-game (I know it’s 17 now but I’m not mentally used to those tallies) projection off his 5 games:
55+ catches, 600+ yards, 9+ TDs. Would have been TE1 work.
Might have led all TEs in TDs this season…
Sad.
Darren Waller (DNP) is out with an injury and hopes to be back Week 14 for the KC game. I think that it is 60/40 he does NOT play, and Foster Moreau (1-34-0/3) gets another full start.
Moreau has been FF-good starting in place of Waller, but he gave up an FF-dud here. Not his fault. He was barely targeted as Las Vegas only runs plays to Josh Jacobs (13-52-1, 9-30-0/9) and Hunter Renfrow (9-102-0/10) now…and then randomly everyone else sees an errant opportunity.
If Moreau starts Week 14 with Waller out…he’s a TE1 threat again.
-- Hunter Renfrow is a secure WR1 now on volume…7.0 rec. on 8.2 targets per game the past 6 games with back-to-back 100+ yard games the past two weeks.
-- Josh Jacobs is an RB1 now…as suddenly he’s Vegas’s new Christian McCaffrey…5.3 rec. on 7.0 targets per game the past four games. Kenyan Drake out for the season in this game has only poured accelerant on Jacobs’ rise in the passing game.
-- Antonio Gibson is an RB1 in the same manner Jacobs is, the Football Team’s new Christian McCaffrey. 6.0 catches on 6.0 targets per game the past two weeks with J.D. McKissic hurt. And averaging 23.3 carries per game on a fractured shin.
All Gibson’s output per touch is very low, but he’s getting enough touches to make up for it for nice FF scoring…especially PPR. That PPR booster may change with McKissic back, but the carries won’t dip.
-- Terry McLaurin’s (3-22-0/5) last 5 games: 4.2 rec. (6.8 targets), 51.4 yards, 0.20 TDs per game…a WR3. The Taylor Heinicke effect.
-- Curtis Samuel (2-0-0, 1-0-0/1) is also getting dragged down by Heinicke. More carries than targets…I’m ‘done’ with him for 2021 if I see better bench/sit-on sleeper options in redraft.
-- Raiders IDP notes…
Rookie LB Divine Deablo (11 tackles), yes that’s his name, played a bunch of snaps because Cory Littleton got hurt. Deablo looked like you’d expect, if you were familiar with him from college – a college safety trying to play linebacker in the NFL (for the first time in-season). He was lost in coverage a few times and may have cost them the game in a low-key way…just too inexperienced but got thrown into the deep end of the pool to try to figure out how to swim here.
The Raiders signed veteran LB Tom Compton Monday…which tells me Littleton may be missing time-hurt.
Rookie DE Malcolm Koonce (1 tackle, 1.0 sacks) played his first 7 snaps of the season. I can tell you this from those 7 snaps – he’s one of the best pass rush prospects from this draft, possibly as good as ‘the best’ pass rusher.
When I first saw him prepping for the Senior Bowl, I was like ‘wow’. He had a mild injury to deal with to begin 2021, so he missed the Senior Bowl, and got lost in the no-Combine 2021 shuffle…but wound up a shock #79 pick by the Raiders. Mayock saw what I saw and didn’t wanna wait until day 3 to try and get him.
He will race up the Dynasty Stash next rankings update. All I needed to see were these 7 snaps…wow.
-- Is the Washington-DST FINALLY a legit DST play now? They’ve allowed 17-19-21-15-15 points in a game the past 5 games, so I’d say…yes.
Thanks a lot…only 7 weeks too late for me loving them in the preseason. So glad I ‘stumbled’ into Arizona after Weeks 1-2, where Washington was burning me.
I did not realize all they needed to have happen was Chase Young, Montez Sweat, and Landon Collins to go down and then they’d be good. My bad.
Snap Counts of Interest:
54 = Renfrow
51 = Zay J
40 = Bry Edwards
24 = DJax
55 = Ant Gibson
05 = Smallwood
04 = Patterson
