Kenny Moore, always excellent.
Welcome to Johny the Greek’s Cornerback Corner Week 9. Last week we streamed corner and did it well. I recommended 63 different corner streams from 15 different Week 8 matchups. The majority of them worked out extremely well. We sit at 72% accuracy for the season, 72% last week based on those calls matching or beating their projections (Yahoo), and will continue to track accuracy all season long just like last year. Transparency is something we take seriously here at IDPGuys.
If you’re new to this article series, the idea behind it is that in the IDP world cornerbacks are the red-headed stepchild. Not here. We love streaming corners and have for some time now, it’s a key component of playing big boy IDP.
This is not an article for the Sleeper IDP players of the world, the “DB” people, baby IDP if you will. Although, in deep enough leagues, a CB stream at DB is still a decent option. This is more for your true degenerates. Those "CB and DT required /a few points a week is going to make a difference" type of player.
While I do enjoy my Sleeper leagues and those kinds of leagues as well (variety is the spice of life), the vast majority of what I play in these days is those advanced, individual positions, best possible competition, need every edge you can get type leagues. That’s the audience here. If that’s not you or you’re not a fan of my approach the exit button is top right on PC, it looks like an X, close window on mobile.
I’ve been doing this long enough that I have my audience, I know my readers, we talk in and out of the season and I live a perfectly happy and fulfilling life beyond fantasy football, this is just a hobby for me. I am so far from interested in arguing about any of this that if that stuff were a star it would take the light from that star billions of years to reach me, save yourself the time on Twitter I’ll just block and move on.
Apologies to those of you that don’t need this disclaimer but this is the world we live in these days, just making things clear up front.
We’re going to be looking at things like the expected game script, opposing offensive tendencies, snap counts, teams that are more or less likely to target wide receivers, and historical production to inform our weekly decisions on what corners are an “ideal” streaming option.
By giving this entire thing more than two seconds thought we will have a distinct advantage over our opponents who are not doing this over the course of the season. We are going to put ourselves in the best position possible every week to score the most IDP points humanly possible from our cornerback slots.
Just a little background, I’ve been playing IDP for 18 years now and streaming corners for well over a decade of that time. In that time I have won clear of 25 titles in both redraft and dynasty traditional IDP leagues and many many more in best ball, DFS, and college fantasy football.
I am a true degenerate. Add an additional 50 plus second and third place finishes also in traditional IDP leagues, most of them with money prizes attached, and you’ll start to envision how deep my degenerate tendencies go. I am absolutely NOT an analyst, I’m just a guy who loves playing IDP fantasy football and has been pretty decent at it for a long time.
People throw that term around too much, this isn’t my job, this is just for fun. None of us are analysts unless your name is Matthew Berry etc.
Personally, I like to stream not only whatever the current week is but if my bench is big enough I’ll load up two more ideal streamers for the following week and by doing so I’ve already taken my pick of the litter a week before anyone else also streaming is even thinking about their corners for that week.
Corner is a naturally spotty position but by looking at all the factors I listed above we will have better outcomes than the majority of IDP owners who simply put in a “known” corner with a big name (Richard Sherman for example) into their corner slots and ride out the production whether or not that matchup makes sense each week.
Richard Sherman against last year's Falcons or Chiefs makes sense, while Richard Sherman against last year's Jets or Patriots does not.
It looks like we’ll have some pretty solid matchups this week and we’ll continue to target those for our ideal matchups but in today’s NFL, where passing is the name of the game, I’m sure we’ll find solid streaming options in just about every matchup so even those of us in the deepest of leagues have some options.
I always give last weeks results as well as an overall season-long accuracy because it’s important, to be honest, and upfront with stuff like this, if I’m in a slump and making bad decisions you’ll know it and can decide if you want to follow these streaming suggestions or not.
Last week I made 63 recommendations, of those 5 were declared inactive or injured during play, 42 were correct (met or exceeded projection) and 16 were incorrect (below projection).
We don’t count acts of God here (injuries) and I specifically ask people to check for inactives before each game so discounting those I was 72% correct last week, 72% accurate for the season overall.
Of those 42 correct calls last week 14 of them were “massive hits” (doubled or tripled projection). That is a 33% massive hit rate.
Weekly Accuracy:
- 75% Week 1 Massive Hit: 25%
- 64% Week 2 Massive Hit: 35%
- 67% Week 3 Massive Hit: 34%
- 77% Week 4 Massive Hit: 37%
- 77% Week 5 Massive Hit: 40%
- 71% Week 6 Massive Hit: 40%
- 73% Week 7 Massive Hit: 41%
- 72% Week 8 Massive Hit: 33%
Season accuracy to date: 72%
Season massive hit rate to date: 36%
You can read all previous Cornerback Corner articles on my IDP Guys author page.
Disclaimer Time! I’m not going to get all of these correct. Cornerback especially is a wildly inconsistent position for production in IDP fantasy football. That’s why most people hate it with a passion. My whole thing is to put yourself in the best position to succeed by looking at all the variables and making the absolute best streaming call possible.
After that, you pray. Your team is your responsibility and yours alone, you set the lineup, not me.
Take ownership if things go south, these are only suggestions. I will do my absolute best to make sure that these recommendations are the best possible and will base these on factual information and statistics from places like NFLGsis.com, PFF, and other fantasy and NFL data and statistics sites.
Also, I will use the force, sometimes a gut feeling is all I have to go on in an unknown situation but if it comes down to that just know this isn’t my first rodeo.
I don’t work for the NFL. Nor do I get to sit in on defensive team meetings for all 32 teams. Meaning I don’t get inside information. If a player has been producing all season and has been playing a ton of snaps and they get yanked right before a game obviously I had nothing to do with it. I don’t work for any team, so no one told me. (See Vernon Hargreaves 2019 and 2021).
If someone goes down with an ACL, it’s not because I made a voodoo doll of them and stuck it with pins. These decisions are the same ones I’m making for my teams. If things go bad for you they go bad for me as well. I’m just here to help, don’t kill the messenger.
Article Key:
Outlook: This will be a brief overview of the two offenses and how that will affect the outlook for each team's cornerbacks corps. I look at offensive ranks for passing, expected game scripts, time of possession, competency of the quarterbacks, and their WR corps. This will help us guess how the game should go.
This will help us identify if this is a matchup we want to target for streaming corners or not. After last season’s issues with the weather causing problems with passing, we’ll try and look at that as well. (Raiders/Browns 2020 ring a bell?). First, we identify the matchups we want to stream from then we identify the best options in those matchups.
Ideal Matchup: This is the best possible matchup for this team's cornerbacks, streaming corners from this team, especially guys that are talented and play all the snaps gives you the best chances at excellent production from those corners.
Solid Matchup: This isn’t a perfect matchup to stream corner but it’s still pretty good, if you’re in a deeper league and have fewer options to stream from, this matchup is still a better option than most.
Avoid: This matchup will likely be terrible to stream corner from, due to anything from a god awful opposing quarterback who can’t complete passes to a banged-up wide receiver corps or even a run-first offense like the 2019 Ravens were, there’s something that makes this a bad matchup to stream corners from, avoid if possible.
However, there may be specific corners who get a “solid” in an otherwise “avoid” matchup simply due to their talent and ability to make plays in all aspects of the defense (see Marlon Humphrey, he always starts, doesn’t matter who’s in town).
Perfect Stream: This is one of the best matchups this week. I will be streaming from these matchups in my own leagues almost exclusively.
Poop stream: This is one of the worst matchups this week. I will very likely have zero corners from this matchup streaming anywhere.
***There will be games where I don’t recommend streaming from one team or another but still have someone listed as solid despite that, in those situations, it’s talent over matchup. Tre’Davious White (CB) might be up against the leagues worst passing attack but at the end of the day he’s still Tre’Davious White (CB) so I’d start him if I didn’t have any better options***
***For any "Deeper league only" suggestions, I'm talking a minimum of 16 teams, multiple cornerbacks started weekly (minimum 3x a week or more), and far fewer options available each week for waivers. These calls are for you truest of the true degenerates.
In regards to calling these calls correct or incorrect, I'll be calling them correct if they're close to their projection. If we're like a tackle off on a guy that only plays 70% of snaps a week and you wouldn't even be looking at except in the deepest and darkest of leagues, I'm going to take that as a win.
I also do the opposite with things like Quandre Diggs (CB/S) in week seven where he had five solo tackles and I still called that a miss, in the vast majority of leagues where you're actually playing Quandre Diggs (CB/S) you're going to be beyond happy with five solo tackles out of him, so it goes both ways with the weekly transparency thread***
Cornerback Corner Week 9
Browns @ Bengals
Outlook: One half of a good matchup but with this being division and the injuries to the Browns RB corps there could be more passing from Cleveland this week so I like the (singular honestly) Bengals option as well. Without OBJ, we've seen the Browns passing attack get better in the past. That dude is a locker room cancer. As for the reverse, if they have a pulse we start them. This Bengals passing attack is awesome in all respects. Really nice matchup but not perfect.
Cleveland Browns
Denzel Ward (CB) Solid (If healthy)
Greedy Williams (CB) Solid/Ideal (If Ward or Newsome inactive, otherwise avoid/sit)
Greg Newsome (CB) Solid
Troy Hill (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Cincinnati Bengals
Chidobe Awuzie (CB) Solid
Eli Apple (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Mike Hilton (CB) Avoid (Playing time)
Broncos @ Cowboys
Outlook: We start our Broncos options comfortably against an excellent Cowboys passing attack. As for the reverse we always start Trevon Diggs (CB) and in most cases Anthony Brown (CB) but I would try and go deeper leagues only for Brown this week against an often ineffective Denver passing "attack". One half of a good matchup.
Denver Broncos
Patrick Surtain (CB) Solid
Ronald Darby (CB) Solid
Bryce Callahan (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Dallas Cowboys
Trevon Diggs (CB) Solid
Anthony Brown (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Jourdan Lewis (CB) Avoid
Texans @ Dolphins
Outlook: These two defenses are bad enough that there could be some points here just like with the Falcons/Dolphins game, start the obvious guys on both teams and leave the rest. Nothing special about this one but there should be some production.
Houston Texans
Terrence Mitchell (CB) Solid
Lonnie Johnson (CB) Solid
Vernon Hargreaves (CB) or Desmond King (CB) Avoid (Fluctuation between the two) Update, Hargreaves released and claimed by Bengals. King could play this week but I wouldn’t trust it.
Tavierre Thomas (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Miami Dolphins
Byron Jones (CB) Avoid
Xavien Howard (CB) Solid
Nik Needham (CB) Avoid (Playing time)
Falcons @ Saints
Outlook: We can start our Saints even against a Calvin Ridley-less Falcons passing attack but as for the reverse, I'm probably all set. AJ Terrell (CB) has had a down year regardless. Whatever backup quarterback (and real talk, Taysom Hill should be a backup) the Saints march out this week is just going to hand the ball off or throw short passes to Kamara.
Deion Jones (LB) or Foye Oluokun (LB) will get the tackle on those passes afterward, not the Falcons corners this week it looks like.
Atlanta Falcons
AJ Terrell (CB) Avoid
Fabian Moreau (CB) Avoid
No significant third option
New Orleans Saints
Paulson Adebo (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Marshon Lattimore (CB) Solid
CJ Gardner Johnson (CB/S) Solid
No other significant options
Raiders @ Giants
Outlook: We'll start our Giants options against a usually pretty good Raiders passing attack, it does see a downgrade without Ruggs going forward but there are enough pieces there that they'll still pass effectively.
As for the reverse, I'm all set. We've had trouble even establishing who the Raiders corners are week to week here. We don't need to figure that out for a terrible Giants passing attack this week, just skip it entirely.
Las Vegas Raiders
Brandon Facyson (CB) Avoid
Nate Hobbs (CB) Avoid
Casey Hayward (CB) Avoid
New York Giants
Julian Love (CB/S) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Logan Ryan (CB/S) Solid
James Bradberry (CB) Solid
Adoree Jackson (CB) Solid
Patriots @ Panthers
Outlook: PJ Walker (QB), Sam Darnold (QB) or Mac Jones (QB) with a bunch of bargain barrel wide receivers, there's nothing good about this one at all. Skip it entirely. We can't start any Pats against a passing attack in Carolina that's been God awful recently and may be rolling out a backup quarterback. As for the reverse we've got four corners fighting for three spots and it means they're all losing snaps.
This is Mac Jones (QB) and a terrible wide receiver corps, not the 99 Rams in the building. Pass completely here. The Panthers LB and strong safety corps will have the great game here stopping the run. That's the IDP play here for them this week.
New England Patriots
JC Jackson (CB) Avoid
Jalen Mills (CB) Avoid
Myles Bryant (CB) Avoid
Carolina Panthers
Donte Jackson (CB) Avoid
Stephon Gilmore (CB) Avoid
Keith Taylor (CB) Avoid
AJ Bouye (CB) Avoid
Bills @ Jaguars
Outlook: We can start the Jags options pretty comfortably. As for the Bills, if it's not Taron Johnson (CB), I'm probably going to skip it this week. The Jags passing attack just doesn't have enough juice to feed all three IDP relevant corner options for the Bills this week.
Plus, they'll probably spend the vast majority of this game on offense anyways so opportunities for the Bills corners will be few and far between. One half of a good matchup.
Buffalo Bills
Taron Johnson (CB) Solid
Levi Wallace (CB) Avoid
Tre'Davious White (CB) Avoid
Jacksonville Jaguars
Shaq Griffin (CB) Solid
Tyson Campbell (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Tre Herndon (CB) Avoid (Playing time)
Vikings @ Ravens
Outlook: We can start our two solid Ravens options pretty comfortably this week but as for the reverse I'm probably all set against the run first, second and last Ravens in this one. In deeper leagues, if you need a risky play, but I'd go Humphrey, Averett, or nothing with this one.
Minnesota Vikings
Bashaud Breeland (CB) Avoid
Cameron Dantzler (CB) Avoid
Mackenzie Alexander (CB) Avoid
Baltimore Ravens
Marlon Humphrey (CB) Solid
Anthony Averett (CB) Solid
Tavon Young (CB) Avoid (Playing time)
Chargers @ Eagles
Outlook: We can start the obvious guys here in deeper leagues and leave the rest, this one should be enough of a back and forth affair to give us acceptable production for both cornerback units but I would only trust it in deeper leagues.
If the Chargers were still as hot as they were early season I'd call the Eagles options a slam dunk but they aren't so I'll be siding with caution in this one. UPDATE The Chargers cornerback corps appears to have some injury and or fluctuation going on beyond Harris Jr, I'd just avoid it this week, not worth the risk against a mediocre passing Eagles team anyways.
Los Angeles Chargers
Chris Harris Jr (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Te'Vaughn Campbell (CB) Avoid
Asante Samuel Jr (CB) Avoid
Philadelphia Eagles
Darius Slay (CB) Solid
Steven Nelson (CB) Solid
Avonte Maddox (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Packers @ Chiefs
Outlook: What was once a perfect stream on both sides is now a one sided affair. The news about Rodgers being out due to Covid destroyed this one for everyone. Start the Packers options comfortably, ignore the Chiefs options and keep it moving.
Green Bay Packers
Eric Stokes (CB) Solid/Ideal
Rasul Douglas (CB) Solid (Only if Kevin King inactive, otherwise avoid/sit)
Kevin King (CB) Solid (If healthy)
Chandon Sullivan (CB) Solid
Kansas City Chiefs
L'Jarius Sneed (CB/S) Avoid
Chavarious Ward (CB) Avoid
Rashad Fenton (CB) Avoid
Cardinals @ 49ers
Outlook: We can start the obvious guys on both sides in medium to deeper leagues now that Jimmy Beautiful is back at the helm and they sat the overhyped and ineffective rookie. This is a division battle, which should be close. Hopefully, it give us more offense than the first iteration where the Niners couldn't complete a pass to save their lives.
Arizona Cardinals
Byron Murphy (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Marco Wilson (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Robert Alford (CB) Avoid (Playing time)
San Francisco 49ers
Josh Norman (CB) Solid
Emmanuel Moseley (CB) Solid
K'Wuan Williams (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Titans @ Rams
Outlook: Without King Henry the Titans will undoubtedly pass to AJ Brown (WR) and Julio Jones (WR) early and often in this one in an effort to keep up with the excellent Rams passing attack. Start the obvious guys on both sides in what looks to be a perfect stream this week. This one is blessed by the maker.
Tennessee Titans
Janoris Jenkins (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Elijah Molden (CB) Solid
Greg Mabin (CB) Avoid (Not set in stone that he's a starting CB)
Los Angeles Rams
Jalen Ramsey (CB) Solid/Ideal
David Long (CB) Solid
Donte Deayon (CB) Avoid (Not set in stone that he's the third CB)
Bears @ Steelers
Outlook: We can start our Bears options in deeper leagues and that's it. Avoid the Steelers options against this Bears passing attack that can't pass. And full disclosure Jaylon Johnson (CB) and Kindle Vildor (CB) may play enough each week but those two aren't super productive to begin with, I'd probably just skip this entirely if it were my team.
Chicago Bears
Kindle Vildor (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Jaylon Johnson (CB) Solid (Deeper leagues)
Duke Shelley (CB) Avoid
Pittsburgh Steelers
Joe Haden (CB) Avoid
All others (CB) Avoid
Closing thoughts
Remember to check inactives before kickoff to avoid any surprise zeroes! The information here is usually only accurate up until Thursday evening each week, then it gets published and I won’t be editing and updating with any injury news that occurs after that point, it’s your responsibility to track injuries for your own team. Good luck this week!
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