Fantasy Football Rankings: QB Strength of schedule
By Dylan Tice
Fantasy Football Rankings: QB Strength of schedule
Kirk Cousins (16) – Cousins and the Vikings start the 2019 season off with matchups against iffy defenses against the Falcons, Packers, and Raiders. A huge positive is that they play the Bears in week 17, which mean for fantasy purposes, they only play the Bears once and that’s week 4.
It’s promising that the Vikings invested there first 4 picks into offense, getting 2 offensive linemen, TE Irv Smith Jr, and RB Alexander Mattison. Once the Vikings got rid of John DeFilippo and promoted Kevin Stefanski, Cousins and the entire Vikings offense benefitted. Cousins finished as the QB13 overall. In the 3 games Cousins played under Stefanski, he had 2 QB1 finishes.
Tom Brady (17) – It shocked me when I pulled up the Patriots schedule to see Brady have the 17th SOS for QB’s. He does have a 4 game stretch going against the Ravens, Eagles, Cowboys, and the Texans, but the beginning of the season is where he should shine.
The first 7 weeks is nothing but spectacular matchups against the Steelers, Dolphins, Jets, Bills, Redskins, Giants, and the Jets. Brady and company should dominate the first half of the season because the only team that has a chance at beating them is the Steelers in my opinion.
For fantasy purposes though, the fantasy community isn’t that high on Brady as he’s currently going as the QB15. I’m thinking a lot of people are scared of Brady because Gronkowski retired, but we can’t sit here and act like Brady was only fantasy relevant because of Gronkowski.
Sam Darnold (18) – It’s been an offsetting offseason for New York Jets QB Sam Darnold. He got one of the best receiving backs in the game in Le’veon Bell, but Darnold’s happy offseason was left on halt thanks to the signing of new head coach Adam Gase, who is typically nothing but disappointment.
Honestly, when looking at the SOS for Darnold, I was expecting it to be higher due to the fact that the only time the Jets play back to back tough defenses is weeks 5-6 against the Eagles and Cowboys. It’s worth noting that the fantasy community loves the Jets offensive playmakers in Bell, Robby Anderson, and Christopher Herndon, but not Darnold, who’s ADP is QB24.
Ben Roethlisberger (19)– The Steelers schedule is low-key tough in 2019. Throughout the year, they will go toe-to-toe with the likes of the Seahawks, 49ers, Ravens X2, Rams, and the Colts. The real topic to discuss is how will Big Ben do with Antonio Brown no longer in Pittsburgh?
The likes of Juju Smith Schuster, 2nd-year James Washington, free agent signing Donte Moncrief, and hype beast Vance McDonald, will all have to chip in to fill the void of AB. After finishing as the QB3 last year, AB leaving killed his ADP, having him as the QB16.