What We Saw: Week 6 2018

Ravens vs. Titans

Ravens

Joe Flacco was…..meh

Joe Flacco wasn’t great this week, but he wasn’t terrible either. He finished the game with 238 yards (his second-lowest total of the year, behind Week 1’s 236 yards), one touchdown, and one interception. Honestly, he just kinda looked like Joe Flacco all night. He made some decent throws, but there were plenty that he just messed up on. There were a number of overthrows that had me saying to myself, “You know, a better quarterback makes that throw easily.” In the end, Flacco’s mediocrity didn’t really matter because of the Ravens’ elite defense, but I don’t know how you can trust him in fantasy. I know the Titans weren’t exactly a cakewalk of a matchup, but still, he just doesn’t look like a particularly inspiring quarterback.

John Brown is quiet, but Michael Crabtree is not

In my game preview, I had expected both John Brown and Michael Crabtree could struggle, as they both projected to have tough matchups in the secondary. Brown did, though he wasn’t even targeted all that much (just three times). But Crabtree was excellent, coming down with some really tough catches and proving himself as a solid possession receiver. He ended the game with six catches for 93 yards and a touchdown. I don’t know if you’re ever going to be able to consistently trust him week-in and week-out as a WR2, but given the right matchup, he certainly has the ability to produce like one. Willie Snead is also worth a mention—I had said in my preview that I thought Snead could potentially have a nice game, as he’d likely match up with Logan Ryan, which I thought could be the easiest matchup of the three Ravens receivers. Snead ended up having a nice game, with seven catches for 60 yards on 10 targets. Unfortunately for fantasy, Flacco is spreading the ball out a lot, and whether Brown, Crabtree, or Snead gets a sizable target share each week will fluctuate. But all three are talented receivers, and at least Brown and Crabtree warrant starts in good matchups, with Snead as a deep league flex player.

Finally we see a nice game from Alex Collins

At long last, Alex Collins had the game we’ve all known he was capable of having. Hey Ravens, guess what? When you give the ball to Alex Collins a lot, he makes it work. In this game, Collins saw 19 carries and took it for 54 yards and two touchdowns. Like I’ve been saying, he’s a talented back, and if the Ravens are going to be successful this year, they need to balance their run game with their passing game. That happened and worked this week. Hopefully we’ll see more sizable workloads from Collins going forward. It is worth noting that Javorius Allen saw just one carry and three targets in the passing game (he caught all three for 18 yards), which is interesting. Even more interesting is the involvement of recent addition to the roster Gus Edwards. Edwards joined the team as the third-string running back after De’Lance Turner was placed on the IR. Edwards is someone worth keeping on your radar. Why? Because he’s talented, he flashed that a lot in the preseason:

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If Collins goes down and Edwards sees a significantly increased workload (which isn’t a given), he’s worth paying attention to based on his talent.

Still no clarity at the tight end position

Mark Andrews saw four targets, as did Nick Boyle, and Hayden Hurst saw just one target, and none of th ethree of them did much with what they were given. Your guess is as good as mine here.

The Ravens defense is awesome

The real tale of this game was the Ravens’ defense. They were killer, tying a franchise record with 11 sacks on the night and limiting Marcus Mariota to a really poor game. Not only that, but Dion Lewis ended up with just nine yards rushing and Derrick Henry had just 21. Part of the Titans’ awful offensive performance was time of possession, the Ravens had the ball for 37:34 while the Titans had it for just 22:26. This defense will be in your fantasy lineup just about every week, they’re fantastic.

-Ben Palmer

Titans

I’ve poked fun at the Titans offense for a few weeks now, but this was a whole new level. They had 51 net passing yards (passing yards minus sack yards) and 55 rushing yards on the game. The leading receiver was Tajae Sharpe with 33 yards. Marcus Mariota completed 10 passes but was sacked 11 times. The Ravens’ 11 sacks were enough to tie or beat the season tally for 11 different teams right now.

Needless to say, this was an ugly game. Sure, the defense played hard again. They gave up only 21 points despite being on the field for nearly 38 minutes. However, it doesn’t matter when your QB is getting hit every time he steps back with the ball. I am confident this is the floor, but it is a dreadful floor to see. The once promising Titans are now 3-3 and staring down a matchup against the suddenly-hot Chargers in London. If the Chargers can put up 21+ points, it’s probably game over. To finish up, let’s look at the fantasy stock of the Titans key weapons right now:

• Marcus Mariota: unstartable
• Derrick Henry: bye week fill-in (low end flex option)
• Dion Lewis: flex option (much better in PPR)
• Corey Davis: WR3/ flex option
• Taywan Taylor: flex option (BYE week)

-Matt Cava