Fantasy Points Allowed By Position-Analysis

Week 1, and along with it, fantasy football, is officially in the books and life seems to be about as normal as it has been for the entirety of 2020. Football is back which means the Browns and Jets look like abominations again, while the Chiefs and Ravens look like the class of the NFL. I would have like to have gotten this content out sooner, but it has been a busy week. Starting next week we will have content on the following days:

Tuesday-Waiver Wire Targets
Wednesday-Snap/Target Analysis
Thursday-Fantasy Points Against by Position

We missed on the first two this week, but we are coming in fucking hot in Week 2. We are also going to be dropping TWO podcast episodes per week starting after Week 2 so make sure to check those out wherever you listen to your pods.

Quarterbacks

*All fantasy points are according to FantasyPros.*

1	New England Patriots	8.44	17	Denver Broncos	19.36
2	Cincinnati Bengals	9.02	18	Las Vegas Raiders	19.4
3	Baltimore Ravens	10.86	19	Indianapolis Colts	20.82
4	Dallas Cowboys	11.5	20	New York Giants	22.06
5	Buffalo Bills	12.2	21	New Orleans Saints	22.46
6	Philadelphia Eagles	12.82	22	Green Bay Packers	22.76
7	Tennessee Titans	13.14	23	Kansas City Chiefs	22.82
8	Carolina Panthers	13.56	24	Detroit Lions	24.28
9	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	14.4	25	Seattle Seahawks	24.9
10	Washington Football Team	15	26	Miami Dolphins	25.7
11	Jacksonville Jaguars	16.82	27	Houston Texans	26.44
12	Chicago Bears	17.18	28	San Francisco 49ers	27.3
13	Los Angeles Chargers	17.32	29	Cleveland Browns	27.5
14	Los Angeles Rams	17.64	30	New York Jets	28.18
15	Arizona Cardinals	19.26	31	Minnesota Vikings	30.76
16	Pittsburgh Steelers	19.36	32	Atlanta Falcons	31.78

Fantasy Analysis

One of my biggest takeaways from this table is that Atlanta’s defense may be worse than any of us ever thought. Pete Carroll finally decided to let Russ cook and look what happened. He is your QB1 for Week 1. Any QB against the Falcons is going to be a very streamable every week option, if not a top 10 play every single week.

The Patriots and Ravens are right where I expected them to be, and that is where you will see them for most of the season. Bill still has some tricks up his sleeves, so watch out for that defense all season long.

Since the Ravens traded for Marcus Peters, they have been one of the best pass defenses in the league, especially for fantasy purposes. They get teams in negative game scripts and they still don’t allow any garbage time stats.

Start your QB expecting 25+ points against the Jets every single fucking week. Josh Allen would have been QB1 overall had it not been for his two fumbles. The Jets secondary is rough, the pass rush is non- existent and the linebackers are slow.

Anomalies

Minnesota’s secondary is bad, but the defense as a whole is not as bad as Aaron Rodgers made them look on Sunday. I don’t expect Minnesota to be top 10 against QBs, but don’t start your QB expecting 25+ points every week.

Dallas and Carolina are at the top of this list, but they will not stay there very long. In both games, they got dominated on the ground and the QBs were not asked to do much. You can confidently start your QB every week against both of these defenses.

Seattle gave up the 8th most points to their opposing QB in Week 1, but don’t expect that on a week to week basis. There may not be a better garbage time QB in the history of the NFL than Matt Ryan. About
2/3 of his yards and both of his touchdowns came with the Falcons trailing by 2+ scores.

Running Backs

Fantasy Points for RBs in Week 1 always need to be taken with a grain of salt. So that means, we need to take what defenses did against RBs with a grain of salt.

*All fantasy points are according to FantasyPros 0.5 PPR*

1	Washington Football Team	9.6	17	Philadelphia Eagles	20.7
2	Los Angeles Chargers	10.4	18	Cincinnati Bengals	21.6
3	Indianapolis Colts	11.1	19	Miami Dolphins	23.3
4	Pittsburgh Steelers	11.6	20	Houston Texans	24
5	New Orleans Saints	12.3	21	Chiacgo Bears	24.1
6	Detroit Lions	13.6	22	San Francisco 49ers	25.5
7	New York Giants	14.8	23	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	25.6
8	Denver Broncos	15.6	24	Las Vegas Raiders	27
9	Baltimore Ravens	15.7	25	Minnesota Vikings	28.1
10	Buffalo Bills	17.2	26	Dallas Cowboys	29.9
11	Cleveland Browns	17.7	27	Los Angeles Rams	30.4
12	Seattle Seahawks	17.8	28	Atlanta Falcons	31.2
13	New York Jets	18	29	Green Bay Packers	31.3
14	New England Patriots	19.4	30	Jacksonville Jaguars	42.3
15	Kansas City Chiefs	19.8	31	Carolina Panthers	42.6
16	Tennessee Titans	19.8	32	Arizona Cardinals	43.2

Fantasy Analysis

Washington’s defensive line is fucking legit. Look, I get that the Eagles didn’t have Miles Sanders, but that front 7 gets after it! Start RBs at your own risk against this team as they may not let too many holes open up.

The other teams that are at the top of this list that will probably stay there are: Chargers, Steelers, and Saints. All three of those teams pose threats to opposing RBs scoring a lot of fantasy points.

I fully expect the Patriots to move on up to the top 10 at some point. They only allowed 3.1 YPC to the RBs for the Dolphins and the TD scored by Howard skewed their points against this week. Regardless of what you see here, Bill has a plan, and that plan will most likely limit the fantasy success of your RBs.

The Rams played Zeke and they still have Aaron Donald, so don’t expect 30+ points from your RBs against LA week in and week out.

The Chiefs run defense is awful, but they almost always put teams in a negative game script so start your RBs with caution against them. This week in particular is a safe week to start Austin Ekeler. He is the primary rushing option, but also the primary passing down option as well. Even in a negative game script Ekeler should see at least a 65% snap share.

Be Wary

Alvin Kamara scored two TDs against the Bucs and is one of the best two way RBs in all of football. Tampa’s run defense is going to be great again, so don’t fire up your RBs expecting anything other than a TD dependent RB2 every week. Kamara and Latavius Murray averaged a godawful 2.4 YPC and Kamara’s day was saved by the 2 TDs.

The Eagles surrendered almost 21 fantasy points to the Washington RBs, but don’t be fooled. Ron Rivera started Peyton Barber on his fantasy team and made sure he got in the end zone twice. Gibson had some success, but for the most part, even a banged up Eagles front 7 showed that they will not be giving up huge games to RBs this year.

All the other teams had weird games or big plays make their scores lopsided, but for the most part everyone else will stay in roughly the same tier they were in this week.

Wide Receivers

Combining WR points allowed by a defense doesn’t always tell the whole story. When you have a team like the Raiders where a TE is their main target, it will seem like Carolina did a great job slowing down the LV WRs. That is usually not the case, so starting next week I will start breaking it down to WR1, WR2, and so on.

*All fantasy points are according to FantasyPros 0.5 PPR*

1	Arizona Cardinals	6.1	17	San Francisco 49ers	28
2	Miami Dolphins	14.9	18	Los Angeles Rams	28
3	Baltimore Ravens	15.4	19	New Orleans Saints	29.1
4	Tennessee Titans	16	20	Cleveland Browns	33.9
5	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	16.2	21	Houston Texans	35.4
6	Cincinnati Bengals	16.7	22	Pittsburgh Steelers	35.6
7	Washington Football Team	17.5	23	Las Vegas Raiders	37.7
8	New England Patriots	18.1	24	Atlanta Falcons	38.4
9	Philadelphia Eagles	18.2	25	Indianapolis Colts	38.4
10	Los Angeles Chargers	18.3	26	Kansas City Chiefs	38.6
11	Carolina Panthers	21.4	27	Green Bay Packers	38.7
12	Jacksonville Jaguars	23.1	28	Detroit Lions	40.9
13	Buffalo Bills	24.7	29	New York Jets	42.2
14	Dallas Cowboys	26.7	30	New York Giants	44.7
15	Chicago Bears	27	31	Seattle Seahawks	65.5
16	Denver Broncos	27.7	32	Minnesota Vikings	68.4

Fantasy Analysis

Like I already said, Week 1 games can be an anomaly. Absolutely start your WRs every single week with confidence against the Arizona Cardinals. San Francisco was without their top two WRs so naturally, their WRs did not have much fantasy success. I know, Patrick Peterson is usually a shadow CB, but this team is going to be in shootouts all year long and WRs should have plenty of success against them.

Miami may actually not be a joke this year. A healthy Xavien Howard was joined by Byron Jones to create probably the most underrated CB duo in the league. The Pats only threw 19 passes, so start your WRs against the Dolphins, but temper expectations until we learn otherwise.

The Washington Football team faced a decimated Eagles team and held their injured WRs in check. Alshon didn’t play, Jalen Reagor was at less than 100% and we’re still not sure what happened to DeSean Jackson. Start your WRs confidently against Washington.

San Francisco surrendered 28 points to Arizona WRs this week, but DeAndre Hopkins accounted for almost 80% of those points. This is where my breakdowns next week will come in handy. They silenced Christian Kirk who had 0.5 points, and even with two of their top CBs going down this week, this is a solid secondary who will occasionally lock up opposing WRs.

Must Starts

Start WRs 1 and 2 every week against the Jets, Vikings, Lions (until Okudah comes back), and Packers. Of these teams, Green Bay has a “shutdown” corner in Jaire Alexander, but he can be had as Adam Thielen found out this week.

Tight Ends

Tight Ends are tricky when considering what teams give up to them. Some teams do not use their TEs while other teams have a TE as their number 1 target. This position will be easier to get a gauge on when we get to weeks 4 or 5.

*All fantasy points are according to FantasyPros 0.5 PPR*

1	Minnesota Vikings	1.7	17	Jacksonville Jaguars	9.4
2	Indianpolis Colts	1.8	18	Arizona Cardinals	9.5
3	Miami Dolphins	3	19	Detroit Lions	10
4	San Francisco 49ers	3.1	20	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	10.5
5	New York Giants	3.1	21	Cincinnati Bengals	11.3
6	Los Angeles Rams	3.3	22	Philadelphia Eagles	11.7
7	Las Vegas Raiders	3.5	23	Atlanta Falcons	13.6
8	New York Jets	3.6	24	New Orleans Saints	13.7
9	New England Patriots	4.5	25	Houston Texans	13.8
10	Buffalo Bills	4.7	26	Kansas City Chiefs	14
11	Seattle Seahawks	5.3	27	Chicago Bears	14.1
12	Green Bay Packers	5.4	28	Baltimore Ravens	16
13	Pittsburgh Steelers	6.4	29	Tennessee Titans	17
14	Dallas Cowboys	6.7	30	Denver Broncos	19.7
15	Los Angeles Chargers	7.7	31	Cleveland Browns	21.6
16	Carolina Panthers	8.2	32	Washington Football Team	29.4

Fantasy Analysis

The Minnesota Vikings are the king of stopping TEs after week 1. It won’t last much longer. Green Bay did not work their TEs into the game plan pretty much at all after accounting for only 3 targets. Rodgers was too busy throwing darts at Davante Adams.

The Colts have a solid group of LBs and Safeties that can help contain TEs so I do not believe that this is an anomaly. Be cautious starting your TE against this Indy defense.

Arizona went from DEAD last in 2019 to the middle of the pack in Week 1. A mirage. George Kittle got hurt on an ugly play and I have no doubt that he would have put up another crazy stat line had he stayed healthy. Again, dial up your TE every week until Arizona proves me wrong.

Don’t Get Cute

Washington got absolutely roasted by the two TEs for the Eagles. Goedert and Ertz both found paydirt, and this will be a theme going forward for the Football Team. They will probably not creep up to higher than 20th on this list all season. Start your TEs against the Football Team.

Like I said, TEs are really the toughest position to gauge when it comes to fantasy points allowed. More in-depth analysis of this position will start to come as trends start to occur.

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