The NFL season kicks off tomorrow night as the defending champion Philadelphia Eagles host the Atlanta Falcons. We had our fantasy drafts over the weekend and with Week 1 just day away I was hoping that I’d be more excited about football, but I’m just not. I was so uninterested that I didn’t even bother to ask the other hosts of the Sports Time Radio podcast to send me their season predictions until yesterday. If I get their predictions I’ll add them into the Saturday blog, but to be fair it’s difficult to get Mr. Fantasy to pick anything these days. I am going to go ahead and give you my picks for this NFL season now.
AFC East
- New England Patriots 2) Miami Dolphins 3) New York Jets 4) Buffalo Bills
AFC North
- Pittsburgh Steelers 2) Baltimore Ravens 3) Cincinnati Bengals 4) Cleveland Browns
AFC South
- Jacksonville Jaquars 2) Houston Texans 3) Tennessee Titans 4) Indianapolis Colts
AFC West
- Los Angeles Chargers 2) Kansas City Chiefs 3) Oakland Raiders 4) Denver Broncos
Wild Card teams
Texans and Ravens
Wild card round
Texans over Chargers and Steelers over Ravens
Conference semi’s
Patriots over Texans and Jaquars over Steelers
Conference Finals
Patriots over Jaquars
NFC East
- Philadelphia Eagles 2) Dallas Cowboys 3) Washington Redskins 4) New York Giants
NFC North
- Green Bay Packers 2) Minnesota Vikings 3) Chicago Bears 4) Detroit Lions
NFC South
- Carolina Panthers 2) New Orleans Saints 3) Atlanta Falcons 4) Tampa Bay Buccaneers
NFC West
- Los Angeles Rams 2) Seattle Seahawks 3) San Francisco 49ers 4) Arizona Cardinals
Wild Card teams
Vikings and Seahawks
Wild Card round
Vikings over Panthers and Packers over Seahawks
Conference semi’s
Vikings over Rams and Packers over Eagles.
Conference Finals
Vikings over Packers
Super Bowl
The Minnesota Vikings over The New England Patriots
Let’s see about the individual awards.
Offensive MVP: Aaron Rodgers (Green Bay Packers)
Defensive MVP: Luke Kuechly (Carolina Panthers)
Offensive Rookie of the Year: Sam Darnold (New York Jets)
Defensive rookie of the Year: Derwin James (Los Angeles Chargers)
Coach of the Year: Bill O’Brien (Houston Texans)
There you have it. This is what I’m going with for the upcoming 2018 NFL season. Please let me know if you agree or disagree and who you’re going with this season.
It appears as the biggest question heading into Week 1 of the NFL is season is; what is the status of Pittsburgh Steelers running back Le’Veon Bell.
Bell has yet to report to the Steelers and it’s being reported that he missed this morning 9:00 a.m. team meeting.
Pittsburgh start practice for their Week 1 game today and you have to wonder how much leeway head coach Mike Tomlin will give Bell. This is pretty much the same ting Tomlin had to deal with last season when Bell held out, but I believe he reported for practice before Week 1 of the 2017 season.
Obviously it’s a bigger concern for the Steelers, but there is also a whole bunch of fantasy owner that need to know what s going on with Bell. He was a Top pick in both of the standard drafts I did over the weekend. I believe he was the first player taken in one draft and the second player taken in the other draft. That’s a big investment for a fantasy owner to make in a player, but right now they’re going to have to wait and see what the Steelers do with Bell for Week 1.
Now if your in a big fantasy football league like mine; 20 teams you have to be able to find a sleeper or two to be successful. Now one of our 20 team leagues we start two tight ends which can be a nightmare if you’re not ready for it. It’s not too difficult to find two tight ends to start, but how do handle the bye weeks? Well this could be of some help.
The Dallas Cowboys are trying to find a replacement for one of the best tight ends in team history Jason Witten. After a 15 year NFL career Witten decided to retire and move into the television booth. So where do the Cowboys go at that position?
The Cowboys released their depth chart and Geoff Swaim was listed as the #1 tight end. Now Blake Jarwin did play more snaps in pre-season than Swaim, but it appears that the Cowboy will go with Swaim because he’s the better blocker. Even though he was arrested Friday night for marijuana possession the Cowboys held onto Rico Gathers. In the pre-season Gathers got the majority of the snaps at tight end on the red zone and if that continues into the regular season he could be the under the radar tight end in a big, big fantasy league. Of course after his arrest Gathers may face a suspension; so you’ll have to pay attention to that. The Cowboys are also carrying rookie Dalton Schultz on their roster, but that may be them just waiting to see if there’s some fall out from Gathers arrest.
Now it’s clear that you don’t want to go into your fantasy football season with one of these Cowboys tight ends as your first tight end, but if you’re in a big league or like our league where one have to stat two tight ends a week one of these names could become very useful for you; especially a tight end who could get red zone targets.
One of the other hot names coming into my drafts this weekend was Tampa Bay running back Ronald Jones. There was quite a bit of talk that Jones was going to be the starter for the Buccaneers, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to go that way.
The Buccaneers have also release their depth chart and there where a lot of fantasy owners that must’ve been disappointed when they saw Jones listed as the #3 running back. Peyton Barber is listed as Tampa Bay’s #1 running back with Jacquizz Rodgers listed as his back up.
Of course these depth charts can change from day to day, but as of right now Jones is starting out as the most over drafted player in my fantasy leagues.
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