The 49ers passing game, along with A.J. Green being out, and jumbled depth charts like Miami, Washington, and Arizona offer situations to exploit in Week 1. However, the variance is high with outcomes of usage and overall strength of these units. Are there any underrated plays for cash or GPP lineups among them?
Dan Hindery
Let’s start by taking Tyler Boyd out of this cohort of unknowns. He is one of the surest things on the slate. Pencil him in for 8-to-10 targets and feel great about his floor. Boyd averaged 16.4 PPG on DraftKings last year and looks like a rock-solid WR2 again in 2019. He isn’t at the top of my list for cash games but he is at least in the conversation. Nobody else from these offenses makes my list for cash game consideration.
Phil Alexander
Washington - The Eagles were consistently roasted by perimeter wide receivers last year and should force Washington to pass more than they would like to. If you're ever going to use Paul Richardson Jr as a GPP dart, now is the time to do it before he gets hurt.
Arizona - As Dan said, Kirk is the guy you want in tournaments. His price point will make him popular in Kyler Murray stacks, but judging by his dip in season-long ADP after a quiet preseason, he shouldn't be too high-owned on the whole. Kirk is the type of player who can pay off his middling salary on one play.
Justin Bonnema
Dan nailed it with Boyd and the Cardinals’ offense. But I’m going to be the contrarian here and throw some love on Albert Wilson. He appears to be healthy finally and with Kenny Stills gone, there’s a lot of targets that need to go somewhere. He has a tough matchup against the Ravens as Phil noted, but Ryan Fitzpatrick doesn’t care. Baltimore is going to turn up the pace in this one and force Miami into volume. Give me a few GPP shares of Wilson and his nearly site-minimum salary. If he and Fitzpatrick can connect a few deep shots (a big if), Wilson could swing tournaments.
BJ VanderWoude
Jason Wood
If you only play a handful of GPP lineups, I'm less interested in these situations because I'm not excited about the quarterback play.
JAMES BRIMACOMBE
Tyler Boyd is absolutely in play this week as his volume and price are both perfect along with his situation. I think for GPPs it is worth taking a Dalton, Mixon, and Boyd stack and possibly run it back with Tyler Lockett on the Seattle side. I won't be touching Miami or Washington players this week but I will be playing Baltimore and Philadelphia defenses against them. Arizona is an interesting team to target this week but I believe their ownership numbers will be inflated with all the talk of the Air Raid offense this offseason so if I was going to target them I might look at going with Kyler Murray and David Johnson stack to be different.
WILL GRANT
The thing that stops me going heavy on Boyd is the thing that had me cool off on Joe Mixon as the summer wore on - their offensive line. The Bengals have one of the worst offensive lines in the league, and while Boyd will be the #1 target, I don't know if Andy Dalton is going to have the time to throw to him. The Vegas projected line at just 17 points for Cinci this week, I'll have some of Boyd in a couple of GPPs but not a lot.
All the hype in Arizona has you thinking 'someone should go off' - but the question is who? Like others have said, I'd rather go with 'known' guys like Larry Fitzgerald or Christian Kirk and hope they score a couple of times rather than throwing a dart at Michael Crabtree or KeeSean Johnson. Consider those guys extremely low ownership plays rather than guys you expect to do well.