There's a classic football saying, “you can't make the club from the tub”. Well, in fantasy football it's hard to win the strap if your players aren't getting the snaps. Each Wednesday, I'll be taking a look at the snap counts from the previous week of action and how things are also trending over the course of the season. Obviously, Week 1 gives us just a single sample to review. So for this week I'll present the early answers to some of the backfield questions that were on a lot of minds coming out of drafts and heading into the season. But first, I want to examine the interesting Week 1 snap counts from of the two elite passing offenses: the Green Bay Packers and the New Orleans Saints.
Green Bay Packers
WR | Snaps (60) |
| TE | Snaps (60) |
58 |
| 37 | ||
55 |
| Andrew Quarless | 24 | |
54 |
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Ty Montgomery | 1 |
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Jeff Janis | 1 |
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In the wake of Jordy Nelson's season ender, the shuffling that happened at wide receiver thrust Adams predictably into a starting role. He led the GB receivers by playing 58 of the 60 offensive snaps and was targeted a team-high eight times, three more than Cobb. However, it was Jones that got the headlines with a pair of red zone touchdowns. After spending 2014 with the Oakland Raiders, Jones was let by the New York Giants right before the season started. He ended up playing 55 of 60 snaps, one more than Cobb. The trio limited Montgomery and Janis to just a single offensive snap. Quarless was not targeted at all in the passing game, while Rodgers caught all three of his opportunities. Toss out Montgomery and Janis as Cobb, Adams, and Jones will continue to dominate the amount of available playing time. Rodgers remains a streaming option at tight end.
New Orleans Saints
WR | Snaps (74) |
| TE | Snaps (74) |
73 |
| 68 | ||
58 |
| 18 | ||
46 |
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18 |
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Owners of Cooks shouldn't panic after a somewhat lackluster four catches for 49 yards in the opener. Colston owners should be, though. He's 32 years old and looks it very much. Wait for a decent game or two and sell, sell, sell. The trendy sleeper, Coleman has paid off early with four grabs for 41 yards and a score. More importantly, he played a dozen more snaps than Colston. Snead was a distant fourth with 18 snaps, catching a single pass for 63 yards. Unlikely to ever be worth a bench spot, Snead is minimum salary DFS long-shot consideration in a crazy GPP sorta way.
Backfields of note
Atlanta Falcons (77 offensive snaps)
In his pro debut, Coleman saw his fantasy value hold serve with a decent showing behind a crummy offensive line. As expected, Freeman was the preferred option in passing situations while getting half the carries.
Cincinnati Bengals (68 offensive snaps)
Jeremy Hill 36
Hill scored twice, but Gio had just as many rushing yards on half the carries. He was also third on the team in passing targets, catching all six balls sent in his direction allowing him to flirt with nearly 90 yards of offense. Seek out a buy-low opportunity in PPR formats before Gio breaks off a big touchdown or exceeds last week's long run of 28 yards.
Cleveland Browns (71 offensive snaps)
Duke Johnson 31
Quarterbacks Johnny Manziel and Josh McCown combined for 58 rushing yards on eight attempts, while Johnson and Crowell managed just 42 yards on 19 tries facing a stout New York Jets defense. Thankfully, Cleveland plays host to the Tennessee Titans and the Oakland Raiders over the next two weeks. As the opposition weakens, we hope to see whether or not either of these backs can perform behind an offensive line that has elite blockers at center and left tackle positions. In other words, don't dump your Browns backfield stock yet.
Dallas Cowboys (71 offensive snaps)
Lance Dunbar 33
Dunbar didn't carry the ball once, yet led the Cowboys with 70 receiving yards. The real eye opener is the fact he was on the field more often than Randle. While Randle caught all three of his targets, Dunbar was a perfect 8 for 8 and looks really interesting in full-point PPR, particularly if the Cowboys defense leaves them playing from behind frequently. Randle owners enjoyed seeing him exceed the century mark in total yardage, but can't like seeing how the playing time was divided up. Clearly, this is a situation that will have a lot of eyes on it going forward.
Houston Texans (77 offensive snaps)
Alfred Blue 22
Chris Polk 14
Unless you are waiting for Arian Foster, investing in the Texans backfield is an ugly proposition. However, should Foster remain sidelined into October, there was some decent opponents on the horizon.
Minnesota Vikings (56 offensive snaps)
Matt Asiata 12
Peterson's usage was very odd, but the Vikings never got into any rhythm on offense with just 56 snaps. Don't panic yet, the once vaunted San Francisco 49ers defense was mistakenly left for dead, and that's clearly not the case.
Philadelphia Eagles (74 offensive snaps)
Ryan Mathews 15
Sproles had a lot of usage last year in the opener before the team eventually backed off the aging scat back in favor of his return duties. In this one, Sproles was the only back capable of sparking a big play and likely the reason he was inserted into the offense after a sluggish first half. Mathews saved his flex value by finding the end zone. His investors will hope he can be more effective and keep Sproles on a sidelines.
San Diego Chargers (79 offensive snaps)
No one that owns Gordon will want to hear this, but Woodhead isn't going away. San Diego prefers him in the passing game and in the red zone. Gordon will continue to be the starter and will likely exceed Woodhead in playing time, even though that wasn't the case in Week 1. However, Gordon's scoring chances will be impacted and his PPR value is rapidly shrinking.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (74 offensive snaps)
Charles Sims 32
Doug Martin 29
Bobby Rainey 13
The score got out of a hand in a hurry, so we'll revisit the Bucs when there is a more competitive situation to evaluate. Hopefully there is a more competitive situation to evaluate soon.