Take a Pass on Thursdays

I love the fact that I get NFL Football on my television 3 different days a week.  The Thursday Night game is a nice addition to the full season schedule.  It seemingly makes the week move faster, doesn't it?  I do have one beef with Thursday Night games....they are KILLING my fantasy teams.  Week 1's pre-Sunday showdown (yes, I know it was Wednesday, but it gets grouped into this argument) was really the only "good" game of the bunch and everyone on both teams had all off-season to prepare for it.  But now that the season is in gear (and 1/4 of the way through after this week's games *sigh*), these Thursday games are proving problematic.  Here's my take on Thursday and how you should approach these games when it comes to managing your fantasy teams:

1) Thursday IS the only Primetime game that offers an injury report you can use.

At the very least, because it's the first game of the week, you get an injury report that actually helps you with your lineup.  All players were healthy for Week 1, but for Week 2, we knew in plenty of time that Greg Jennings wasn't going to play.  For Week 3, we had multiple days' notice that Hakeem Nicks and Ahmad Bradshaw weren't going to play and we knew Jonathan Stewart wasn't going to play more than 3 hours before game time.  So that's helpful.  The positive to this is that you're given an extra few days to find a great replacement so that your lineup is unaffected.  The negative to this is that the short turn-around doesn't allow these men to get the adequate amount of practice time or rest needed to play.  Reports were that "If the game had been Sunday", Nicks and Jennings would have played in their respective games.  That helps nobody.  Your benefit here is that you don't have to plan for last second Sunday or Monday night Inactives and you get the decision out of the way immediately.

2) You're starting your studs.....and that's it.

Tonight's game is Cleveland visiting Baltimore.  The only players in this matchup I can recommend starting are Ray Rice and Baltimore's defense.  Each of the 3 games thus far have been a fantasy wasteland.  Week 1's stars were Tony Romo (24.48 standard points), Miles Austin (13.3 standard points), DeMarco Murray (14.0 standard points) and Ahmad Bradshaw (15.3 standard points).  Kevin Ogletree screwed up the way everyone viewed the waiver wire for 2 weeks with a 23.4 pt performance.  Missing from fantasy super-stardom were Victor Cruz, Hakeem Nicks, Dez Bryant, Eli Manning, and Jason Witten, all dependable every week starts.  Green Bay-Chicago was an absolute fantasy debacle for everyone outside of Mason Crosby and Green Bay's defense.  Week 3 was the waiver wire power hour, starring Andre Brown and Ramses Barden.  The point is this....because this game occurs first, your strategy has to change....more on this in my next point:

3) Thursday Night is not the time to start sleepers and high upside players.

I look at Week 2 specifically for proof of this point.  With Greg Jennings out, the Green Bay receiving corp beyond Jordy Nelson all receiving abnormal amounts of pre-game hype.  Randall Cobb and James Jones were supposed to see extended action and be quality sleeper starts.  When the game was over, Nelson was the leading receiver for the Packers as expected (6 grabs for 84 yards), but Donald Driver was the leading fantasy scorer (8.6 standard points).  Cobb was worth 4.8 pts and Jones was worth a putrid -0.1 pts.  To make matters worse, the top Green Bay offensive performer was Cedric Benson with 11.6 pts.  Victor Cruz has played in 2 of these games thus far for the Giants and has a total of 10 fantasy points.  He managed to score 23.9 points in his one Sunday game.  The point is this: if you started Cobb or Jones in Week 2, you were forced to stare at a measly point total for 2 full days before the rest of your team got going on Sunday afternoon.  If you're going to start sleepers and high upside players, Sundays and Mondays are the best days to try it.  If you get that weak point total on a Sunday, you didn't have to stare at it for 2 additional days wondering what might have been and you don't have to strategize around it.  It was just a part of your day and that's it.  If at all possible, I like to hold off on sleepers until Monday Nights.  Going into Monday, you know where you stand in your matchup and you can at least have a reasonable expectation of what you need to catch up or you know that you've already won and any additional points are gravy at that point.  If you're going to try and look like a genius, you have to plan for all potential outcomes and the safest way to do this is to play your sleepers among your best scorers.  (Credit for backup on this point goes to NFL Network's Adam Rank (@adamrank on Twitter)....he's not only, in my opinion, the most credible analyst on the network, but he's also a life-guru....give him a follow on Twitter....you won't be disappointed.)

4) Minimize, where possible, what you actually have going on Thursday Night.

As I mentioned above, Ray Rice and Baltimore's Defense are the 2 safest plays going into tonight's game.  Rice gets his touches no matter what day of the week and is (in most leagues) a Top 2 fantasy commodity at this point.  Baltimore's Defense is an elite unit in an A+ matchup at home against a rookie QB in a divisional game.  Here's a primer for what players you should be starting without question for the remaining Thursday Night games (Thanksgiving Day is excluded because there are 3 games on that day):

Week 5: Arizona @ St. Louis (Start Larry Fitzgerald and Arizona's Defense)
Week 6: Pittsburgh @ Tennessee (Start Ben Roethlisberger, Mike Wallace and Anotnio Brown)
Week 7: Seattle @ San Francisco (Start SF's Defense, Seattle's Defense and Vernon Davis)
Week 8: Tampa Bay @ Minnesota (Start Adrian Peterson and Vincent Jackson)
Week 9: Kansas City @ San Diego (Start Jamaal Charles and Ryan Mathews)
Week 10: Indianapolis @ Jacksonville (Start Reggie Wayne and MJD)
Week 11: Miami @ Buffalo (Start Stevie Johnson, Reggie Bush and whatever Buffalo RB is healthy)
Week 12: Thanksgiving
Week 13: New Orleans @ Atlanta (Start all Saints and Falcons as you usually would)
Week 14: Denver @ Oakland (Start Peyton Manning, Demaryius Thomas, and Darren McFadden)
Week 15: Cincinnati @ Philadelphia (Start all Bengals and Eagles as you usually would)

You'll notice there are only 2 matchups in which I recommend starting all the usual suspects, and that is Weeks 13 & 15.  I have listed who I feel are the safest starts or players who you just can't bench.  Is there a chance that by the time these matchups roll around, a new fantasy stud will have emerged?  Of course.  My opinion remains strong, however, that if you minimize what you have going on Thursday, you can pick up the points you need from these games and have easier lineup decisions to make come Sunday.  It's extremely important to not get wrapped up in the schedule as a whole and to start the guys who have done right by you, but let's face it, Sunday is the biggest action day and with the bulk of your team going on that day, you want to maximize your ability to not have to come from behind.

Note: as far as tonight goes, I'm avoiding Trent Richardson, Torrey Smith, Anquan Boldin, & Joe Flacco.  If the game was Sunday, I'd comfortably find a way to get these guys in my lineup.  I just can't risk a flop tonight, and all of these players are candidates to completely screw up what you've got going for this week.  If you have better options, use them.

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