James Morris hails from Rio Rancho, NM and has been playing fantasy sports for just over 15 years. Not only does he write the Bengals fantasy section, but he also does the Miami Dolphins fantasy section. Crossing over, Morris writes the fantasy sections for the Minnesota Timberwolves in the NBA. Just send him an email and he will reply back the same day with your answer. Or, find him on Twitter (Fantasyguy23) and get all your NFL news before it hits the national media. *
This was a wild fantasy football weekend. Chad Henne and Matt Schaub put on a show in one of the best games I've seen in years. Then to wrap it all up, the 49ers made the Bears look absolutely foolish with Jason Campbell at the helm.
What really made this weekend horrible for fantasy owners is that running backs were largely ineffective and lost more games than they won. The few RBs that did produce were borderline roster guys that were most likely sitting on benches.
To give you all the heads-up on the injury front: X-rays showed that Rob Gronkowski has a broken forearm and it will cost him 4-6 weeks, if not longer.
Chad Henne – QB, Jaguars: Blaine who? Henne took over for Gabbert and amassed an impressive 354 yards passing and 4 TDs. Dolphins fans know exactly who and what Henne is, so take this game with a Bering Sea-sized grain of salt. Let someone else run to the waiver wire and deal with the Jaguars offense going forward.
Matt Schaub – QB, Texans: We all knew the Texans were going to beat the Jaguars, but I didn't expect Schaub to throw for 527 yards and 5 TDs while doing it. He did throw 2 INTs, but I will take the 42 fantasy points he put up in NFL.com leagues any day of the week.
Marcel Reece – RB, Raiders: Reece makes the winners list because he put up 193 total yards (103 rushing, 90 receiving) on Sunday. While he didn't score, the 4 catches and 193 yards made him a worthwhile play in a week where fantasy RBs came up lame across the league. This is just proof that touchdowns, or the lack thereof, can be deceiving when looking at fantasy value.
LaRod Stephens-Howling – RB, Cardinals: The Hyphen put together 127 yards rushing and a TD, which oddly enough was good enough for No. 1 in RB scoring for Week 11. These numbers would be RB1 stats most weeks, but not typically make him the leader of the pack. Not to take anything away from him as I would take those stats each and every week from my RBs and be just fine with them.
Bilal Powell – RB, Jets: Wasn't Bilal the character Martin Lawrence played in House Party 1? Even though Powell ran for just 42 yards and caught just two passes for 18 yards, he scored 2 rushing TDs on the day. And, we all know that TDs are king in fantasy football. The guy is owned in just 0.3 percent of all NFL.com leagues, which means he is owned in only the deepest of leagues. And, it should remain that way going forward.
Andre Johnson – WR, Texans: Johnson is already a stud, but he went straight up Beast Mode on the Jaguars as he hauled in 14 passes for 273 yards and a TD. Johnson is an every-week starter already, and I normally don't put someone of his stature on the Winners list because he is supposed to do well. But, stats like these deserve to be recognized.
Justin Blackmon – WR, Jaguars: Blackmon went toe-to-toe with Johnson on Sunday and finished with an impressive 7 catches for 236 yards and a TD. Blackmon was highly touted by many of the big-box websites heading into the season, and now they can finally brag about their pick … 11 weeks later.
Garrett Graham – TE, Texans: In a weekend where we all expected the Texans passing attack to shine, Graham sure wasn't someone that I was remotely considering mentioning. But, he ended up as the No. 2 fantasy TE with his 8 catches for 82 yards and 2 TDs on Sunday. This was a fluke and he is not someone you should be looking at as a waiver wire possibility next week.
Washington Redskins Defense: The Redskins held the Eagles to just 6 points on Sunday, and racked up 4 sacks, 2 INTs and a recovered fumble. All totaled they finished with 17.00 FP and a No. 4 ranking for fantasy defenses for the 6.6 percent of people that were brave enough to own them in NFL.com fantasy leagues.
Matt Ryan – QB, Falcons: This is one of the rare cases where a QB can throw for over 300 yards (301), but put up just 2 points in NFL.com standard scoring leagues. How is that possible you ask? Matty Ice was red hot when it came to hitting Cardinals players as he was intercepted 5 times on the day. The Cardinals did a great job at getting pressure on Ryan and he was off his game from the get-go. Chalk it up as a bad game and move on.
Nick Foles – QB, Eagles: The guy that many Eagles fans are hoping is the answer to Michael Vick didn't look good on Sunday as he threw for just 204 yards with 2 INTs. Look, the Eagles have more problems that even Vick can overcome, and Foles isn't going to make this team perform any better than Vick did. I would go ahead and cut Foles loose and return to whomever you had before him.
DeAngelo Williams – RB, Panthers: The risk in owning a guy like Williams is that he is no longer the focus of the running game, so his fantasy stats will be solely reliant on scoring each week. This week he managed to run for just 18 yards and no end zone visits, which means he ranks out in the No. 50 range for RBs despite being owned in 70.3 percent of NFL.com leagues still. The ONLY way Williams will have fantasy value is if Jonathan Stewart gets hurt.
Rashad Jennings – RB, Jaguars: One would hope that in a game where 80 points were scored, that Jennings would have gotten a little piece of that pie. But, that is not what happened as Jennings ran for an impressive minus-1 yard on 3 carries this week. He lost the starting job to Jalen Parmelee and that means fantasy owners will want to cut bait RIGHT NOW, like I told them to do weeks ago. And, Parmelee is only a fantasy option in deeper leagues where you need a flex play for one week.
Larry Fitzgerald – WR, Cardinals: There was a reason why I marked Fitzgerald as a sell candidate weeks ago when I traded him for Falcons TE Tony Gonzalez. Fitzgerald hauled in just one pass (on 7 targets) for 11 yards on Sunday, which remarkably enough isn't even a season low (1 catch for 4 yards in Week 2). You are stuck with the rollercoaster ride that is the Cardinals offense for the rest of the season if you didn't sell him like I did.
DeSean Jackson – WR, Eagles: And one of the most overrated fantasy WRs in the entire NFL is … DeSean Jackson. He managed to reel in just 2 passes for 5 yards in Week 11, stats certainly not worth the WR1 some owners drafted him as. It doesn't help that LeSean McCoy sustained a concussion on Sunday, which means now the Eagles are down to a rookie QB and a rookie RB (Bryce Brown) if McCoy can't get cleared in time for the Week 12 matchup with the Panthers.
Antonio Gates – TE, Chargers: Gates embodies everything that a fantasy TE is, boom or bust. This week he was a bust as he finished with just 17 yards on 2 receptions, good enough for 3.70 FP in NFL.com PPR scoring formats.
Houston Texans Defense: The Texans are ranked No. 2 overall for fantasy defenses right now in NFL.com scoring, but in Week 11 they managed to break even (0.00 FP) after giving up 37 points and getting just 2 sacks and 1 recovered fumble. It doesn't help that CB Jonathan Joseph pulled his hamstring, and that could be a big problem with Calvin Johnson next up next. The Texans are no longer a must-start defense heading into Week 12.
