Fantasy stock watch for week 8
Andy Behrens and Tank Williams take a look at the fantasy stock of a few players this week.
Video Transcript
ANDY BEHRENS: All right, time now for Fantasy Stock Watch, presented by E TRADE from Morgan Stanley, helping you invest with confidence. Let's take a look at who's trending and help you make some confident roster decisions. Matt, let's start with your stock up pick.
MATT HARMON: Oh, man it feels great to say with a full chest, Brandon Aiyuk, big time stock up in fantasy football. Obviously, we've got no Deebo Samuel this week. That's a big deal. That's going to just push more volume towards Brandon Aiyuk's way. But frankly, Brandon Aiyuk was trending up even prior to this Deebo Samuel injury. The guy's had 11 targets in back to back games after somewhat of a kind of shaky start in the box score.
And I know people are sick of hearing me say this, this guy has been balling out, not in the box score. I get it. This is your fantasy team's, blah, blah, blah, blah. But like this guy is getting open at all levels. He's running incredible routes. When he's asked to, he's making incredibly difficult catches. You know, I watched that game. I charted that game against the Rams earlier in the season. Guy was getting open, I mean routinely, just cooking every single defensive back.
You talk about big time scout, Dalton Del Don, Andy, was at that game and reported the same thing from the stands, a totally non-biased source. So Brandon Aiyuk is a huge stock up. I think he's a top 15 receiver this week with Deebo Samuel out, and a guy that I think has the most secure role away from Christian McCaffrey now that his kind of influence has been put into that offense as the non-gimmicky receiver there.
ANDY BEHRENS: Man, you should have led with Dalton Del Don recommendation. That's all I need to hear to go start a guy. I'm going to go with Tony Pollard here. And this is kind of a layup call, right? No Zeke Elliott this week. He's got the knee injury. Tony Pollard going to get as close to a full workload probably as we'll see all season from him. And he also gets the Bears defense, the Bears defense on the season, allowing over 4 and 1/2 yards per carry, allowing about 150 rushing yards per game.
Tony Pollard is just a big play machine. He's averaging 6.2 yards per touch, well over 5 yards per carry, and actually leads all running backs in yards after contact per attempt at 4.3. So he's been fantastic. And now he's just got a run funnel defense ahead of him. I expect well over 100 yards from Pollard in this one. I expect at least one touchdown. He is a very strong play here.
But, Matt, talk to us about somebody-- oh, man, this is a Harmon favorite you're going to tell us is on the stock down list.
MATT HARMON: Yes, unfortunately. You know I think Diontae Johnson, big stock down right now. And it's really not his fault. Like you can take the yards per target metrics and just shoot them into the sun. That is not a receiver metric. And it makes me want to pull out what little hair I have left when people talk about that as a receiver metric.
But let's stay focused here for a second, Andy, because the reality of this situation right now, you know, I had Frank Schwab and Scott Pianowski on the preview podcast this week. And unfortunately, they tried to play a little game of has Harmon seen it, when it comes to a classic movie like, I think it was "Rounders." This was-- I do watch-- I watch a lot of film. It just happens to be all 22 film, because I'm a dialed in professional.
And I'll tell you what if you want a horror movie right now for this time of the year, you go pop yourself on to Matt Cannon offense, the worst designed offense I think in the entire NFL. And it is bringing a guy like Diontae Johnson down. I just don't have any confidence in starting pretty much any Steelers player right now.
ANDY BEHRENS: Listen, if you're looking for hair, I might have a little extra for you. Talk to me at the end of the show. My stock down guy, it's going to be Tyler Allgeier. And I actually don't think he's a bad start this week of course. Atlanta facing Carolina, this isn't a stay away match-up by any means.
You look at him in recent games, he's playing about 2/3 of the snaps. That's fine. Hasn't been really extraordinary with the ball in his hands. But he's been productive enough, found the end zone a week ago. Here's the problem for Allgeier. Cordarrelle Patterson is posting workout videos of himself, OK? Like Cordarrelle Patterson is coming back very soon. Probably going to see him in the week ahead. So you've basically got one last chance to flex Allgeier. And then he goes back to a supporting role, a rotational role that you probably aren't going to mess around with in a fairly low yield offense.
All right remember E TRADE offers innovative, easy to use digital platforms and services that allow you to take an active role in Yahoo Finance's for more information or to get started head to etrade.com