Worried about? Sammy edition...

[dazza]

Traded a late first for him in one league preseason, and DThom in another. Felt great about both.

A week later he was on the Rams, and I was sad.

Then the Rams offense blows up. Goff looks like an actual NFL talent. I think, 'Man, when they build chemistry, this is even better!'. Happy again.

Week 3 happens... HERE WE GO!!!!!

Week 4... TWO !*@&#^$#! TARGETS???

Week 5-11... &#^$ Goff. #&#@ McVay. #*@% the Rams

Here we are in week 12, and its taken a Robert Woods injury to give me any hope for targets/chemistry development this year. ROBERT @*#&$%$ WOODS!!!

Still a big believer in the talent, but if he doesn't get more targets he needs sign somewhere else next year. And for the record, if he signed with GB and got to play with Rodgers I would wet myself with excitement

[lukkynumber13]

Really nice to see him get featured today. Goff looked for him a TON downfield and in the red zone. Would've liked to see him be able to snag that one that became an INT, but it was a terrible throw. A good pass would've been a TD.

[lukkynumber13]

I THINK we could see a big game from Sammy this week. Woods is out. Lattimore, the Saints' shutdown CB, is supposedly out. Watkins has been incredibly efficient with any targets he's gotten, so if he gets 6+ targets (which he really almost has to get if Woods misses the game), I don't see him NOT catching 4+ balls for 50+ yards and maybe he catches 7 for 100 and a touch??

You would think so, but they're probably going to use him as a decoy and feed Kupp and the other not-as-good WR or TE that fills Woods role.

Good luck beating the Saints by feeding Kupp and Josh Reynolds, or Kupp and Higbee. If they want to move the ball, they will have to give Sammy some work.

And as it turns out, all 4 got some nice work!

[Servo]

Life does come at you fast!

[dipANDglide]

It's amazing what happens when Sammy gets more than 5 targets

[ColdZealDonkeyStrike]

Nice game, and even better for real football if you add in his 60+ yards of DPI.

[kmbryant09]

I don't know about anyone else, but to me, Sammy doesn't look like he's running right. The INT was the perfect example of this - granted it was a bad throw by Goff - but Sammy had time to quickly plant his left (upfield) foot in the grass to completely stop his momentum and come back for what likely would have been an easy catch. But instead, he just slowed down gingerly and lazily reached back for the pass, leading to the bad bounce INT. To me, either his foot / ankle is not the same and he knows he can't cut on a dime, or he's playing not to get hurt.

He's still pretty talented, but it looks like he's running with weights around his ankles - anyone else notice that?

[skip]

Really nice to see him get featured today. Goff looked for him a TON downfield and in the red zone. Would've liked to see him be able to snag that one that became an INT, but it was a terrible throw. A good pass would've been a TD.

This has been the primary problem with regards to Sammy. He's got an elite skill set. Anyone not seeing it...well, I'm not sure who they are watching out there. But Goff just doesn't have an accurate deep ball. It's why he is relying so much on Kupp. For the long term, I am hopeful that either a) Sammy leaves or b) the 2018 off season Goff spends all his time on his deep ball accuracy.

[StableOfRBs]

Really nice to see him get featured today. Goff looked for him a TON downfield and in the red zone. Would've liked to see him be able to snag that one that became an INT, but it was a terrible throw. A good pass would've been a TD.

This has been the primary problem with regards to Sammy. He's got an elite skill set. Anyone not seeing it...well, I'm not sure who they are watching out there. But Goff just doesn't have an accurate deep ball. It's why he is relying so much on Kupp. For the long term, I am hopeful that either a) Sammy leaves or b) the 2018 off season Goff spends all his time on his deep ball accuracy.

It's not just the deep balls, Cian Fahey (he does a ton of QB charting) was going over his throws from the game yesterday and he finished with 25 accurate throws and 15 inaccurate throws. I couldn't watch the entire game but there was one pass to Kupp on an out route just past the 1st down marker and he threw it way high and behind Kupp even though it shouldve been an easy 1st down since Kupp got inside the DB. Kupp still got it and got the 1st down but that was only because he contorted himself around and backwards to make the grab, was a horrendous throw by Goff.

[WhatWouldDitkaDo]

Watkins looked good/still has potential, but important to note that NO was without their two starting CBs against LAR.

[lukkynumber13]

Watkins looked good/still has potential, but important to note that NO was without their two starting CBs against LAR.

For sure, and that's why I was so high on him this week - but it's very encouraging to know that he did what we want a stud to do. He took advantage of targets and a good matchup.

I still absolutely stick to what I've been saying all season. What we are seeing from Watkins this year is an anomaly in the NFL. He is playing very well, and with great efficiency. Players that good don't stay unused forever. We just get caught up in recency bias because football (by nature) deals in extremely small sample sizes. Remember when Fitzgerald was absolutely unplayable for like 2 full seasons? And then he's been on a tear of WR1/2 seasons again for the past 3 years.

[stoneghost28]

Anybody listen to the Hansen podcast with Greg Cosell? They brought up Watkins, and Cosell said it's not Watkins, it's Goff not being comfortable yet with his backside reads (I kinda get what the point, I think, just trying to paraphrase what was said, not speak as an authority on these technical concepts), something a lot of young QB's struggle with early on. Cosell said that Goff is basically working in an offense where Woods, Kupp etc line up opposite Watkins who consistently runs backside routes, and that Goff isn't looking in that direction much at all because he's just not comfortable yet doing that. Said it's common w/young QB's. Said that looking at the tape, Watkins is pretty much always open, even against the absurd CB's he's had to line up against this year (apparently really tough CB schedule for him).

This makes me feel better. I already owned Watkins on a pair of teams, and traded for him in another league this past offseason and was feeling quite frustrated. While maybe this is just tape talk, it makes me feel more comfortable with Watkins being in St. Louis. Don't have a major issue with him leaving if he does via FA as long as it's to a good situation, but if Cosell is right, I get the sense Watkins would probably start producing at some point in '19 more consistently as Goff gets more comfortable going through his progressions.

[Cameron Giles]

I don't know about anyone else, but to me, Sammy doesn't look like he's running right. The INT was the perfect example of this - granted it was a bad throw by Goff - but Sammy had time to quickly plant his left (upfield) foot in the grass to completely stop his momentum and come back for what likely would have been an easy catch. But instead, he just slowed down gingerly and lazily reached back for the pass, leading to the bad bounce INT. To me, either his foot / ankle is not the same and he knows he can't cut on a dime, or he's playing not to get hurt.

He's still pretty talented, but it looks like he's running with weights around his ankles - anyone else notice that?

There was no way Watkins could have caught that ball. He had Williams beat, but Goff underthrew by a lot. Watkins was basically trying to slow down to come back to the ball while running at top speed, which is impossible to do. His mistake wasn't not catching the ball, it was trying to make a play on the ball. Williams wouldn't have caught it if Watkins didn't try to make a play with one hand. The most Watkins could have done was a half effort because of the underthrow.

Watkins looked good otherwise. I haven't seen any problems with his feet or ankles. He's made some great cuts in his routes this year, but hasn't had the volume for people to see it.

[Kurt G.O.A.T.]

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haha, you guys are hilarious. goff is making great throws. so one or two are off, he's a second year qb.

these nerds going over tape will see the same things about every qb. all of them make bad throws during a game. anybody watch brees yesterday? they're not throwing against air, there are players on the other side running towards them and trying to crush them with dbs shadowing the wrs.

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[StableOfRBs]

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haha, you guys are hilarious. goff is making great throws. so one or two are off, he's a second year qb.

these nerds going over tape will see the same things about every qb. all of them make bad throws during a game. anybody watch brees yesterday? they're not throwing against air, there are players on the other side running towards them and trying to crush them with dbs shadowing the wrs.

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Uh actually in that last game (the one where the opposing team's top two DBs were out) 15 out of his 40 throws were inaccurate, so there's that. Not saying he isn't playing well but don't act like he's not making his fair share of mistakes.

Also did you really just come onto a fantasy football forum to call someone else a nerd?