Ben Roethlisberger's Staggering Splits
In Week 1's narrow win over the Cleveland Browns, Big Ben completed 11-of-11 passes for 182 yards to Antonio Brown. To the rest of the Steelers' pass catchers, he completed just 13-of-25 passes for 81 yards with two scores and an interception. That's 3.2 yards per attempt and 6.2 yards per completion for a disastrous 68.9 quarterback rating.
Is Sam Bradford Good or?
The Vikings' starter absolutely dominated New Orleans defense to the tune of 27-of-32 passing for 346 yards with three touchdowns and zero interceptions in Week 1. More than that, he was near-perfect when throwing to his receivers. Including Adam Thielen and Stefan Diggs, Bradford completed 18-of-21 passes for 278 yards with two touchdowns to his wide receivers.
We can point to a historically bad Saints pass defense that's now yielded 73 touchdown compared to 16 interceptions since the start of the 2015 season. But Bradford was definitely looking to toss the rock down field more often in Week 1. That bodes well for his fantasy relevance moving forward.
Brady Struggling Without Recivers?
Danny Amendola will miss Sunday's game against a dreadful Saints pass defense with a concussion. It's noteworthy in that he caught 6-of-7 passes from Tom Brady for 100 yards in the Patriots' Week 1 loss to Kansas City. Brady completed just 4-of-12 passes for 96 yards to the rest of his Pats wide receivers in the loss. With that said, Brady and his squad should absolutely light up the scoreboard against New Orleans. Look for both Chris Hogan and former Saint Brandin Cooks to have huge games here.
The Rise of the Rookie Running Backs
Kareem Hunt, Tarik Cohen and Leonard Fournette finished as the top-three fantasy running backs in Week 1. All three are rookies and were playing their first regular season NFL games. Dalvin Cook also put up 127 yards in his NFL debut for the Minnesota Vikings on Monday night. He finished as a top-10 fantasy running back.
Moving forward, Hunt, Fournette and Cook all represented the highest upside as they'll be bell-cow backs moving froward on t he season. Though, Cohen is an intriguing prospect. With the Bears' lack of receivers following season-ending injuries to Cameron Meredith and Kevin White, he took on a huge receiving role in Week 1.
Cohen caught 8-of-12 passes thrown in his direction for 47 yards and a score. Talk about PPR stud. He also put up 66 yards on five rush attempts. That's an average of 1.95 fantasy points per touch. For his part, Hunt averaged 2.3 point per touch in his Week 1 game against the Patriots.
Still Connecting
Despite going up against an elite Seahawks pass defense last week, Aaron Rodgers was still able to find both Randall Cobb and Jordy Nelson at a tremendous clip. The two caught 16-of-24 targets for 164 yards against one of the best defenses in the NFL. That's most definitely a good sign moving forward, even against an improve Falcons defense in Week 2.