Every week, at least one player becomes my fascination of whether he’s worthy of a fantasy football start or bench. The decision can be a mental wrestling match, but for the purpose of brevity, only one player can be chosen as the fantasy football gamble of the week.
The best fantasy football gamble for Week 10
Tracking my predictions: 3-6-0
Win: Player produces ≥ 75% of projected fantasy points
Loss: Player produces >75% of projected fantasy points
Tie: Player is ejected or leaves with an injury
It wasn’t pretty, but last week’s recommendation of Jordan Love met the threshold by being 80.1 percent accurate. I projected 272 passing yards, 30 rushing yards, two TDs and an interception. He finished 258-1-1 with 20 yards on the ground, but every moment felt like a struggle.
This week, I’ve decided to stick with the quarterback position and roll the dice on a rookie who has not thrown for more than one TD pass since the season opener. He scored 5.1 fantasy points last week … it doesn’t get much riskier than that!
QB Trevor Lawrence, Jacksonville Jaguars at Indianapolis Colts
Fresh off a stunning 9-6 win over the Buffalo Bills, the Jaguars’ prized quarterback began his career with three touchdown strikes and 332 yards in a losing bid against the Houston Texans. Since, he has two games without a TD throw, including last week. Lawrence completed five games sandwiched in between with fewer than 240 yards and no more than a score. The only moderate improvement along the way was 273 yards, one TD, an interception and a rushing score against the Tennessee Titans in Week 5.
Jacksonville may have to start backup running back Carlos Hyde again, but James Robinson has a chance to play through his heel injury if it isn’t too painful. The Jaguars have an awful matchup on the ground vs. the Colts this week, which will direct attention toward capable tight end Dan Arnold and the short-area passing game to help act as an extension of the ground game. Lawrence will need to dink and dunk his way down the field more often than not as the Jaguars have no true vertical threat.
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WRs Marvin Jones, Laviska Shenault and Jamal Agnew aren’t world-beaters, but we’ve seen enough from them to suggest they are capable of doing enough damage against Indy’s laughably bad defense of the position to elevate Lawrence’s play. Twelve receivers have scored at least 10 PPR points against Indy in 2021, including the likes of such “stars” as Keelan Cole, Elijah Moore and DeVante Parker.
Indianapolis is likely to hang some points on the Jaguars, causing Jacksonville into a pass-heavy script. The New York Jets’ second- and third-string quarterbacks were able to obliterate this pass D last week as a ragtag group of wideouts had their way on Thursday Night Football. This defense has had the misfortune of facing some of the best quarterbacks in the league, which inflates the figures a bit, but it’s impossible to ignore what we witnessed as the Jets’ backups combined for 38.5 fantasy points.
Over the course of the year, the Colts have given up the second-most fantasy points per game (26.0) to the position. Since Week 4, this figure increased to 27.2, and the matchup is 25.4 percent better than the league average in that time.
So, what’s a reasonable expectation for a quarterback who has no more than 22.7 fantasy points in any single game this year? It all comes down to game script. This could go off the rails if the Jaguars play defense like we saw a week ago, but a season’s worth of games argues it is improbable.
The best-case scenario for Lawrence is Indy runs roughshod over them in the first half and the rookie has to throw 40-plus times. He has done that three times in eight outings, and a pair of them resulted in his two best fantasy showings. Considering he has scored twice on the ground in the last five games, there’s also a hint of added upside for a TD, especially if Robinson is out or has limitations.
My projection: 286 passing yards, 22 rushing yards, 2 TD passes, 1 INT (23.5 fantasy points)