The Cleveland passing game has come to life down the stretch, rewarding fantasy managers in the playoffs. (Photo by Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images)
If fantasy football is your true passion, the game is a 12-month assignment.
You watch every snap of the NFL playoffs. You carefully observe every free-agent move like a pre-op surgeon. You grind tape for the NFL Draft, even rewatch the mediocre Kevin Costner movie. You keep your ear to the ground for minicamp and summer camp news. You scout the preseason games, in case one of your players actually plays for 15 seconds.
You mock draft, and you best-ball draft. You learn the backups, and the backups of the backups.
You do everything to look for that key, that secret, that winning ingredient for playoff glory.
And then it winds up being Joe Flacco, journeyman off the couch.
Joe Flacco, the fourth Cleveland quarterback of the year (the fifth if you count summer camper Joshua Dobbs). Joe Flacco, a man who seemed retired for good, a man who went 1-8 in nine mediocre starts for the Jets over the last three years.
Roll the Sunday tape, Flacco throwing dimes to Amari Cooper and David Njoku. It’s a beautiful thing.
To be fair, Flacco’s glorious one-month run is more valuable to many fantasy leaguers as a conduit, as a way to unlock Cooper and Njoku. And what an amazing unlocking it’s been. Cooper went ballistic at Houston on Sunday (11-265-2), setting a team record and posting the best wide receiver game of the Yahoo fantasy season. It’s just the eighth time anyone has cracked 40 points this year; Cooper rang up 46 in default Yahoo scoring as the Browns handled Houston easily.
Flacco percolated to the top of his position for Week 16, too, chucking for 368 yards and three scores. He did throw two picks, which is par for the course. He’s had a turnover in all four of his starts. But he has the arm and the experience to push the ball downfield (and the confidence to throw some 50-50 balls), and it’s turned Cooper back into a star. We’ve…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/week-16-booms–busts-amari-coopers-historic-game-another-example-of-december-fantasy-football-surprises-003452484.html
Author : Yahoo Sports
Publish date : 2023-12-25 00:45:13
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