Takeaways from Week 1 as told by the tweets of the Fantasy Stronghold.
Surprise indeed. Earlier in the day, Matt Harmon lamented that Ameer Abdullah might have become an unfortunate fantasy redundancy in the Lions offense if Theo Riddick was going to play like he did early in the game. It was a valid comment considering the two players are nearly carbon copies of one another. How could there be enough in that offense for two of them to eat? Well we found out Sunday that when Ol' JBC's offense is humming at its best, there's plenty to be had. The Lions won't have the benefit of playing the awful Colts defense every week, but there's reason to be hopeful that both Abdullah and Riddick could prosper.
Corollary: Sam Bradford where are you?
If you didn't have a little fear of Shaun Hill, then you're not human. But plenty of us hoped that Adrian Peterson would do what he always did -- blow through opponents with sheer force of will. That didn't happen on Sunday. Some of that is owed to the general lack-of-threat that is Shaun Hill. Hill was neither great nor awful. He just was. And that wasn't enough. The Titans did everything in their power to silence Peterson and dare the Vikings to win through the air. That wasn't going to happen. This is where Bradford comes in. If he can replicate what Minnesota believed it had with Teddy Bridgewater then all will be right in the purple world.
Life comes at you fast moment of the week: That summer-long nightmare we had about Tevin Coleman eating into Devonta Freeman's production became shockingly real on Sunday. We may have witnessed the birth of a new running back committee. I feel like someone at Hallmark should start making cards for this sort of occasion. So for anyone that spent a later-round pick on Tevin Coleman ... surprise! You might have gotten a bargain option for your flex spot. To those who spent an early-round pick on Devonta Freeman ... surprise! You might have gotten a really expensive flex.
And then Jack Doyle outproduced Dwayne Allen. Fantasy football doesn't make sense. The tight end position was, well ... just look at these numbers. Heading into Sunday night, Austin Seferian-Jenkins was the TE5 on the strength of one catch. It's worth noting that Rob Gronkowski didn't play this week and as of this writing Jordan Reed hasn't played but there was a lot about the position that didn't make sense. Some encouraging notes were productive days by Julius Thomas (the revival!) and Eric Ebron (the happening?!) so maybe we'll have even more overall depth at the position.
Oh, and Jared Cook this week? crickets
Now we've gotten the touchdown thing out of the way for Melvin Gordon, but the Chargers run game was surprisingly spry against that Chiefs defense. The problem is that Gordon's fantasy fate might end up tied to the heartbreaking knee injury to Keenan Allen. With the main pass-catcher now out of the offense, we could see more of Woodhead on the field reprising his role as the team's target leader from last season. It doesn't mean Gordon will be erased -- especially if he continues to run the way he did today -- but his snaps could be diminished from what they might have been.
Wait...what?"
- Alex Smith threw for 363 yards. I know, right? The crazy part is ... that's not a career high. Smith dropped 386 yards in a loss to the Bengals last October.
- Willie Snead's 172 kinda came out of nowhere. He gobbled up yards late in the game as the Saints were playing catch-up. This could be a frequent scenario with a defense as bad as the Saints.
- Well hello there, Jalen Richard. Certainly didn't expect to see you mucking up our plans for the Raiders backfield.
And one for the road...
Marcas Grant is a fantasy editor for NFL.com. His snapchat (marcasg9) is a mixture of fantasy football and shenanigans. He's currently binging on sesame sticks that are drying out his mouth yet he's too lazy to get up and get more water. If you read all of that, congrats. Follow him on Twitter too.
