Week 1 was a bad week for passing and quarterback Fantasy production. Only 10 QBs scored 20 Fantasy points, and only 12 scored 18. Patrick Mahomes, Kyler Murray, Joe Burrow, Dak Prescott, and Jared Goff all finished outside of the top 12 QBs. All five are still ranked inside of my top 12 for Week 2. We are not going to overreact to one week of football, especially when it comes to some of the best quarterbacks in the game. But we aren't going to completely ignore Week 1 either.
Trevor Lawrence was a top 12 QB for me last week and is not a top 12 option this week. Caleb Williams was a top 15 QB for me last week, he's barely inside my top 24 in Week 2. Part of the reason why is the matchup. Lawrence plays the Browns and Williams is on the road against the Texans. While these defenses weren't great in Week 1, we expect them to be very good. It seems Vegas agrees, because the Bears have an implied total below 20 and the Cleveland-Jacksonville game has a total of 41.5.
The other part of the equation is what these two did in Week 1, particularly Williams. The rookie completed just 48% of his passes despite averaging just 6.3 air yards per attempt. Even for a debut, that's pretty awful. Even in a one-quarterback league, I don't want to drop Williams, but he is going to have to show me something before I will consider starting him.
Let's get to the rest of the preview:
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27.3% -- 27.3% of Jayden Daniels' passes were off target in Week 1. It's a good thing he was so good as a runner, but the accuracy must improve.
16 -- Lamar Jackson tied Daniels with 16 rush attempts, the most for a QB in Week 1. The arrival of Derrick Henry did not appear to impact his rush volume.
23.1% -- Nearly a fourth of Kirk Cousins' passes were graded as turnover worthy, the worst mark in the league.
40% -- Jalen Hurts was pressured on 40% of his dropbacks. We'll find out this week if this was an Eagles stat or a Packers stat.
18 -- Baker Mayfield has thrown 18 touchdown passes in his last seven starts, including last year's playoffs.
6.9 -- Joe Burrow has averaged just 6.9 yards per pass attempt since the start of the 2022 season.
16.4 -- Anthony Richardson averaged 16.4 air yards per pass attempt in Week 1. That is an insane outlier, watch to see if he comes close to that in Week 2.
If you missed Baker Mayfield, Justin Fields is now the top streaming option available. He should be better with a full week of practice with the first team and the Broncos defense is nothing to fear. I would start Fields over Justin Herbert, Caleb Williams, Deshaun Watson, and others.
Darnold looked above average in Week 1, but it's hard to judge his performance because the Giants secondary is one of the worst in the league. If he looks competent in Week 2 against the 49ers, then we will have to at least consider the possibility that he's going to be a borderline starter in Fantasy this season.
Prescott's fantasy numbers didn't show it, but he and his offensive line were very impressive in their Week 1 win against the Browns. In Week 2 they face an easier task against the New Orleans Saints. I don't think they'll be able to run the ball successfully, which should mean a high-volume game from Prescott with Fantasy production to match the volume. He's my fourth-highest projected QB on the main slate.
Burrow is coming off a bad performance, probably doesn't have Tee Higgins, and has to go into Arrowhead against a very good Chiefs defense. There's plenty of reasons he won't have a high roster rate, but none of those reasons change the fact that he and Ja'Marr Chase have huge upside every week. Finding uber-talented, high-upside players and a lot roster rate is exactly how you win GPPs. Just don't consider him in cash games.
QB Preview
Heath's projections
My full set of Week 2 Fantasy football projections for every position are now available on SportsLine. You'll find them here. Find out which of my favorite plays are projected to score higher than consensus rankings and which don't live up to their draft hype, at least in Week 2. Projected stats for all starting quarterbacks are available, so be sure to check out the full set of projections at SportsLine.
