Advertisement

Julio Jones has uncharacteristic dud to land on Week 4's All-Bust Fantasy Team

This week in the All-Bust fantasy lineup, we have four representatives from the same game, three of which come from the same team. Both are season highs that seem unlikely to be broken.

However, if I’ve learned anything from being a Falcons fan, it’s that you can’t discount how much a single team can disappoint you. Atlanta was able to exact a bit of revenge on Sunday, sending Houston to a 1-3 record and Texans fans into a spiraling glass case of emotion.

Just remember, Texans fans, it could always be worse: Houston could be in a division that’s not the AFC South.

A reminder on the selection process for each week’s All-Bust team: I determine the difference between the projected Yahoo! point totals and the actual outputs of each player. The guys with the worst sums wind up here, with their substandard performances illustrated by PointAfter visualizations.

Notes: All projected point totals were pulled Sunday morning from Yahoo’s standard scoring system. Players who were injured on Sunday weren’t considered. The list will be updated following the Monday Night Game as necessary.

[Week 4’s perfect fantasy lineup: Top scorers at each position]

QB: Peyton Manning, Broncos

Projected points (position rank): 16.8 (5th)

Actual points (position rank): 10.3 (28th)

The Broncos are still undefeated despite the surprising struggles of their offense. Manning’s fantasy owners likely can’t say the same thing.

Manning has appeared in this column twice in the season’s first four weeks. The 39-year-old’s owners likely expected him to continue to age gracefully, but that hasn’t been the case. He’s had fewer passing yards per game (242.0) than he has in a decade, and after averaging 66 completions of 20-plus yards during his first three years in Denver, he has just nine such completions so far in 2015.

Manning’s struggles could be attributed to Denver’s injury-ridden offensive line. After the unit was a top-six group last year, according to Pro Football Focus, it was ranked 18th by PFF going into Week 4. Maybe Denver’s offense is missing Julius Thomas a little more than we expected it would.

Note: While Matthew Stafford scored 7.2 points less than he was projected to on Monday Night Football, he was only started in 24 percent of Yahoo leagues. So it’s hard to call the latest victim of Seattle’s defense a “bust” this week.

RB1: Arian Foster, Texans

Projected points: 13.2 (8th)

Actual points: 1.5 (60th)

The giddy folk who drafted, stashed and likely started Foster this week had to be disappointed with his return to the gridiron Sunday.

Foster only had eight rushing attempts for 10 yards against Atlanta, which came into the week allowing the most fantasy points to opposing running backs. Matters weren’t helped when one of Houston’s offensive linemen bumped into Foster in the backfield on a second-quarter carry, forcing a fumble that the Falcons returned for a touchdown.

Fortunately, this is likely the worst it’s going to get for Foster this season. Bill O’Brien probably didn’t feel comfortable pushing Foster to his limits Sunday – there wasn’t much point, as Houston was down 28-0 at halftime and 42-0 after three quarters. Alfred Blue didn’t exactly light it up will Foster was sidelined, and the latter should resume his regular workload in due time.

RB2: Carlos Hyde, 49ers

Projected points: 12.5 (10th)

Actual points: 2.2 (52nd)

After a monster season debut, Hyde somewhat disappointed with 6.6 fantasy points in successive weeks before fully crashing back to Earth on Sunday with just 20 yards on eight attempts.

The 49ers have scored just 28 total points in their last three games. Accordingly, Hyde hasn’t scored during that span, and just seven of his 64 carries this season have come in the red zone.

Until the Niners work through their offensive woes, Hyde’s ceiling is limited.

WR1: Julio Jones, Falcons

Projected points: 13.7 (1st)

Actual points: 3.8 (T-66th)

Houston didn’t do much right in its 48-21 loss to Atlanta, but at least it contained Julio Jones.

On the day the Falcons scored the most points in a game since their 56-14 laugher over Tampa Bay in Week 3 of last season, their best offensive weapon had just 38 receiving yards on four receptions.

Of course, Jones’ owners have no reason to worry. He still has the most receptions (38) in the NFL, is tied with Antonio Brown for the league lead in receiving yards (478), and is second to only DeAndre Hopkins in targets (52).

WR2: Randall Cobb, Packers

Projected points: 13.6 (2nd)

Actual points: 4.4 (T-58th)

Green Bay actually had more rushing attempts (33) than passes (32), a surprise given it employs the reigning MVP at quarterback. So even though Cobb led all Packers with eight targets, he was held out of the end zone while recording a pedestrian five catches on 44 yards.

Don’t expect that to happen too often going forward. Cobb has nine of Green Bay’s 20 red zone targets this season, six more than the next closest Packer. Even though the James Jones Reunion Tour has been a nice story, Cobb is the No. 1 wideout in the land of the Cheeseheads.

TE: Kyle Rudolph, Vikings

Projected points: 6.3 (10th)

Actual points: 0.7 (T-41st)

Rudolph had seen his receptions and yardage decrease through each of the first three weeks, so it’s no shock he was held in check against Denver’s top-ranked pass defense.

Still, Rudolph was started in 34 percent of Yahoo leagues this week (11th among tight ends), and those owners were undoubtedly expecting more than seven yards on two receptions.

FLEX: Latavius Murray, Raiders

Projected points: 14.3 (4th)

Actual points: 4.1 (44th)

It’s probably been a long time since any Raiders skill player was projected to be in the top five scorers among his position for any given week. And after Murray (and the entire Oakland offense) wasted a prime opportunity for a monster day against Chicago’s defense, it likely won’t happen to Murray again for a while.

Murray’s fantasy output (16 carries, 49 yards) worsened when he fumbled a pitch in the fourth quarter and was subsequently benched for the rest of the game. He should still be regarded as Oakland’s bellcow, but that moniker doesn’t carry as much promise as it did at this time last week.

D/ST: Houston Texans

Projected points: 6.8 (14th)

Actual points: -2.0 (29th)

The Texans actually didn’t have the worst fantasy output of the weekend. That dishonor goes to the Chiefs, who accounted for -4.0 points while not recording a single sack or turnover against Cincinnati.

But we have come to expect better from Houston’s defense than what we saw Sunday. The Falcons had one of the worst offensive lines in football last season, but most of that same cast absolutely manhandled Houston’s vaunted defensive front.

Atlanta scored four rushing touchdowns on the day – three from new fantasy superstar Devonta Freeman and one from someone named Terron Ward, an undrafted 23-year-old rookie who led Atlanta with 72 yards on the ground.

The Texans probably would have rather had Julio Jones just rip their defense apart. At least that’s a feeling most teams can sympathize with.

KICKER: Nick Novak, Texans

Projected points: 9.3 (1st)

Actual points: 3.0 (T-27th)

Welcome back to the NFL, Nick Novak, and welcome to the All-Bust team!

Novak made his season debut Sunday after taking over for Randy Bullock in Houston. While other kickers experienced weekends that had worse implications for their careers (cut to Josh Scobee sighing), no others underplayed their fantasy projections more than Novak. He only left the sidelines for three meaningless extra points, all of which came in the fourth quarter during the rout at the Georgia Dome.

Now wash all of this disappointment off your hands, and start looking forward to Week 5.

Will Laws is a writer for PointAfter, a sports data aggregation and visualization website that's part of the Graphiq network.