Week 2 Start/Sit: Don’t Overreact to Week 1

Week 2 is where fantasy managers start making mistakes. That is, unless they started Kyle Pitts or Colston Loveland last week. In which case that would be Week 1. Someone scores 31 points in Week 1 and suddenly he’s a league-winner. Someone else scores four points and he’s headed for the waiver wire.

Put down the panic button.

Our Week 2 Start/Sit recommendations focus on opportunity, matchup and expected workload—not one Sunday of football.

🟢 Start ‘Em

Baker Mayfield, QB, Buccaneers

Coming off a 216 yard performance with 0 TD’s and a career high 3 fumbles, one might hesitate to start him. But then one would look at his opponent: the Cleveland Browns. This revenge game is set up nicely for him as Cleveland allowed Trevor Lawrence to complete over 78% of his passes along with 4 TD’s. FanDuel Research has Mayfield projected for over 300 yards and 2 TD’s. Yes, please.

Jacory Croskey-Merrit, RB, Commanders

Croskey-Merrit looked solid against the Eagles last week, toting the ball 16 times for 63 rushing yards and a touchdown. He more than doubled the next closest Commander in rushing (Rachaad White’s seven carries). This week he gets a Cowboys defense that looked like a bunch of toddlers chasing a helium balloon on a windy day. They gave up 165 rushing yards with 7 missed tackles. Expect a whole lot of Bill this weekend.

Colston Loveland, TE, Bears

Don’t let Loveland’s two-target, zero catch nothing-burger make you shy away. Loveland surprisingly led the Bears in route’s run last week and he gets a Vikings defense that just gave up 5 catches for 115 yards to Green Bay’s TE’s. Ben Johnson’s out to break the scoring record and he’s not going to do that running in 6 TD’s every week. Loveland is the Bears leading returning receiver from last year and he gets back on track this week.

🔴 Sit ‘Em

Jacoby Brissett, QB, Cardinals

Brissett had a solid, highly efficient performance last week in their upset win over the Chargers. He ended the game with a 103.1 passer rating, throwing for 277 yards and a touchdown. However, this week he faces the Seattle defense which made Drake Maye look like, well, an early career Jacoby Brissett. Maye was limited to 178 yards passing and 3 INT’s. Don’t let the Week 1 performance blind you to what is coming in Week 2.

Quinshon Judkins, RB, Browns

While Judkins looked like the undisputed starter last week against the Jaguars, the Browns fell behind early, limiting Judkins to only 12 carries and 33 yards (2.8 YPC). The Browns offense is bad and the game script will almost certainly limit Judkins’ opportunities. They face a Buccaneers defense that performed fairly admirably last week against an offense in the Bengals that are light years ahead of the Browns. Look elsewhere.

Drake London, WR, Falcons

London had a dismal week, 4 targets – 2 catches – 29 yards, and things are not looking much better this week. While they do face a Panthers defense that gave up 269 yards passing and a 72.4% completion rate, he still has Cooper Rush throwing him the ball. Rush had a 51.9 passer rating, a 2.6 QBR, averaged 3.4 air yards per pass and threw more than half of his passes to Bijan Robinson. Unless Penix makes a miraculous recovery, London is a dice roll this week. And the die might be loaded against you.

The PigSkinFantasy rule: Don’t chase last week’s points. Don’t panic over last week’s duds. Look for the player whose Week 2 opportunity is better than his fantasy ranking suggests.

Want to see who was the most accurate fantasy rankings site Week 1?
Check out the Hog Race 🐷🏁
https://pigskinfantasy.com/accuracy-tracker/