RADIO
We had some pretty interesting games this weekend. There were some serious duds being turned in on Thanksgiving (DeMarco Murray, Tony Romo, Dez Bryant Aaron Rodgers, Randall Cobb), leaving plenty of people to drown their sorrows of falling into an early hole with tons of food. Seriously, it could be worse.
Without further ado, let's check in on some players who saw their stocks fall with their Week 12 performance.
Week 13 Fantasy Football Fallers
Matt Ryan - QB, ATL
A lot of owners and experts came into the year with big things envisioned for the Falcons' passing attack. Julio Jones and Matt Ryan had one of the best schedules ahead of them as far as passing defenses go. I know, projections and "strength of schedule" type things from preseason are hardly foolproof, but Ryan has gone above and beyond merely not living up to the preseason hype. He is actively disappointing owners and putting himself in a situation where his head coach and front office are forced to answer questions about his performance.
Matt Ryan and the Falcons have lost four straight now, and five of their last six. While Ryan has still topped 20 fantasy points in four games out of that six game stretch, this latest affair against the Vikings was just butt ugly. Ryan is seen as a plus game manager type, but he's been making terrible and costly mistakes lately that drop him out of that tier. He's throwing picks in the red zone and just generally being careless with his throws.
Ryan has the Bucs next, an excellent opportunity to bounce back versus a beatable secondary. However, Ryan faces the Panthers in Weeks 14 and 16 with the Jaguars sandwiched in between. Keep that in mind for playoff purposes, but the bottom line is Ryan needs to get his act together and quick.
Lamar Miller – RB, MIA
I'm not sure who Lamar Miller pissed off these past few weeks, but it seems to have really come to a head with this last game against the Jets.
Yes, Miami fell behind early and the Jets front seven isn't your prototypical scenario . That said, wasn't Miller getting really involved in the passing game? Why'd that stop? Jay Ajayi was the one getting more usage there on Sunday. Miller finished the game with a pathetic two rushing yards (on five carries) and three catches for 11 yards. For context's sake, Ajayi had four catches for 52 yards on six targets and certainly looked better (though he only had six rushing yards himself).
This doesn't bode well for Miller moving forward, but it also is just a sharp decline after the amazing games he strung together after the Dolphins turned to Dan Campbell. Perhaps Bill Lazor leaving will change things a bit, but it seems that Ajayi's performance has forced much more of a split in the workload than any Miller owner wanted to see this year. Be aware.
DeMarco Murray – RB, PHI
DeMarco Murray kicked off the Thanksgiving festivities with 14 carries for 30 yards against a much improved Lions defense. Perhaps most surprising was how Murray didn't see a single target in the passing game. 30 scoreless yards is not good.
The Philadelphia Eagles are a hot mess right now and everyone is suffering. Murray is easily the most talented offensive player that the Eagles have, and as such he appears to be the most criminally misused. He isn't really a lateral runner, but the Eagles don't pound the ball and design for north-south runs. When you combine this with him not getting any looks in the passing game, you're going to have a bad box score for the guy.
Frustration has to be everywhere for Philadelphia, and we already saw Murray chirp earlier in the year about his usage, so there's no way spirits haven't just fallen further. Plus the defense has been in shambles after giving up back to back 45 point efforts to the Bucs and Lions and losing Nolan Carroll. How can you feel good about this guy moving forward? Or anyone on the Eagles for that matter? They get the Patriots next, then the Bills, Cardinals, Redskins, and Giants. Perhaps the divisional games will go well, but the next three games don't profile all that well for Murray. If you can bench him, it's a smart move.
Dez Bryant - WR, DAL
More NFC East Thanksgiving sadness. The Cowboys got stomped by the Panthers and Tony Romo is out for the season as he re-fractured his collarbone. But even before Romo left the game there were already some questions surrounding Dez.
He's clearly not 100% healthy out there and now has to deal with Matt Cassel being his quarterback again. He caught two balls on eight targets for 26 yards on Thursday, though he was in Josh Norman's shadow coverage. While he'll have better games than he did on Thanksgiving, he is absolutely out of the WR1 conversation this year, and perhaps even the high WR2 one.
Dallas faces the Redskins, Packers, Jets, Bills, and then Washington again to round out 2015. The Jets and Bills games might be rather difficult for him as they've done pretty well on the perimeter (assuming Bryant gets Revis). If you trust Cassel and a beat up Bryant in those matchups, well kudos to you, but I'll be looking elsewhere.
Eric Ebron - TE, DET
The Lions are trending up as a squad, but Ebron is not a part of it. Ebron went from having games of five, five, and eight targets, to only seeing three and two in the past two games. He appears to be getting phased out thanks to his unreliability. His past three games have seen him only catch six of his 13 targets. With an offense that is catching fire, there's no room for dead weight and people who aren't pulling their own. While they won't "give up" on Ebron, he's really out of the circle of trust and reliability as far as fantasy production goes. There are too many tight end fish in the sea for owners to choose from that have a much safer upside and floor. If you're still holding, you should really re-consider.
Other Fallers to Note: Drew Brees (QB, NO), Teddy Bridgewater (QB, MIN), LeGarrette Blount (RB, NE), Davante Adams (WR, GB), James Jones (WR, GB), Jason Witten (TE, DAL)
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