Q2, of course; Q1 was incredi | Forum
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Dec 8 '17
Its another challenging week with six teams on a bye again, plus some other notable injuries to contend with. Youth Cubs Jerseys . Your lineup may look far from ideal this week, but the same holds true for others in your league.If you deftly worked the waiver wire and are well informed, you should be set up well during Week 9. But if you are still struggling to roll out an adequate fantasy crew, well get you in position to win as every victory now becomes magnified in terms of determining playoff positioning.FILLING IN FOR PATSThe Patriots are on a bye, which means you have to fill in for Tom Brady, Rob Gronkowski and LeGarrette Blount. At quarterback, you can consider Colin Kaepernick, who faces the Saints 28th-ranked pass defense and can at least give you adequate production because of his rushing potential. A good statistical result would be if he throws more than one TD pass or runs in a score. He is one of the best running quarterbacks in the league and anything he can additionally provide you with in the passing game in a friendly matchup will be a welcome bonus. Dak Prescott takes on a Browns team that has allowed an NFL-high 19 TD passes and Ryan Tannehill opposes the Jets, who have the leagues lowest-ranked pass defense.TIGHT END REPLACEMENTSIn addition to finding a sub for Gronkowski this week, fantasy owners may also have to replace Jordan Reed, Tyler Eifert and others at tight end. St. Louis Lance Kendricks is a quality one week play (or streamer) against a Panthers defense that allows 12.2 fantasy points per game to the position according to FantasyPros.com, second-most among all teams. The Browns allow 11.7 FFPG to tight ends, third-most in the league, and while Jason Witten is not the fantasy producer he used to be, consider plugging him in as well.RUNNING BACK UNCERTAINTYBlount is possibly the most dependable TD producer in the game right now, and David Johnson is widely regarded as the best RB overall in fantasy. There is also uncertainty about whether LeSean McCoy and Spencer Ware has been declared out. Many fantasy owners are digging deep for help at the position. Consider Seattles C.J. Prosise in point-per-reception formats, as he has big-play potential and can also be a safety target for Russell Wilson, who is hindered by injury. Tim Hightower saw more work last week and faces the 49ers, who have the leagues worst run defense by far. If you picked up Hightower, dont hesitate to use him. Miami has been vulnerable to RBs this year, so you can use Bilal Powell in PPR formats.WIDEOUTSSome top wide receivers on a bye include A.J. Green and Larry Fitzgerald. Very deep options include Torrey Smith, who could get a downfield shot or two to make some significant statistical contributions against New Orleans, and Kenny Stills against a Jets secondary that is very prone to giving up big plays. Kenny Britt opposes the Panthers, who have the worst pass defense in the NFC, and Darrius Heyward-Bey moves into the starting lineup against a Ravens defense that has allowed 14 TD passes.BIG BEN RETURNSBen Roethlisberger (knee) is expected to return this week, and should boost the outlook of those involved in the Steelers passing game. Fantasy owners will not need to worry about the production of Antonio Brown, and Sammie Coates can be returned to lineups as a third starting wide receiver. Tight end Ladarius Green is not quite ready to come back from an ankle injury, though, so expect Brown, Coates and Heyward-Bey to be the main receiving producers for Pittsburgh.CHARGERS INJURIESThe San Diego WR corps continues to deal with injuries, as Travis Benjamin has a sprained PCL and Tyrell Williams has a knee issue, but is expected to play. Look for Dontrelle Inman, a unique combination of size and downfield potential, to possibly see a larger role in the offense beginning this week. He may still be a free agent in some leagues.PHILLY RUNNERSThe running back situation in Philadelphia appears to be unclear. Darren Sproles is too small to carry a full load, but Ryan Mathews has been dealing with fumbling issues. Keep using Sproles as a flex player in a PPR league, because his pass-catching skills always make him relevant, but keep Mathews benched for now if you are not dealing with bye or injury issues. This situation could remain fluent.CARR VS. DENVERDerek Carr threw for a Raiders record 513 yards and four TDs in Week 8. His reward? A date with the leagues best pass defense this week as he takes on the rival Broncos. Denver tends to be more vulnerable to the run, so the Raiders may lean some more on their ground game and this could be a lower-scoring affair between familiar divisional rivals. Carr totaled 425 passing yards and two TDs in the two games prior to his explosion last week, so dont assume he is surefire starter based on momentum. He may not be a top 10 fantasy QB this week and it would not be crazy to use Kaepernick over him.---This column was provided to The Associated Press by the Fantasy Sports Network, http://FNTSY.com ;Cubs Jerseys From China . The Court of Arbitration for Sport ruling "puts an end to my dreams of being a top player," the 27-year-old Troicki said in a statement. "I worked my entire life for it, and it has been taken away from me in one afternoon by a doctor I didnt know," said Troicki, whose ranking peaked at No. Cheap Cubs Jerseys . Numbers Game looks into the Canadiens securing the services of Thomas Vanek in a trade with the New York Islanders. The Canadiens Get: LW Thomas Vanek and a conditional fifth-round pick. http://www.cheapcubsjerseyschina.com/ . "I was fortunate to play many years at this level with a great organization and unbelievable teammates," said Hejduk in a statement. ESPN rounds up all the reaction from up and down the Spa-Francorchamps paddock following qualifying for the 2016 Belgian Grand Prix.MercedesNico Rosberg (1st):?We had a difficult weekend until Qualifying. Especially, this morning we were thinking that we were off the pace a bit. So I was really happy to grab pole today. The Red Bulls were quickest on the long runs on Friday, so we need to be at our best to beat them. The tyres are a big challenge in the heat here this weekend. The degradation is very high. My disadvantage at the start is that I have a harder tyre with lower grip, so Max should get off the line quicker on the Supersoft. I reckon that, with some luck and a maybe a Safety Car, Lewis can climb up to the top very quickly, so he cant be ruled out either. In any case, Im pleased with my qualifying and looking forward to tomorrow. It will be an exciting and intense race.Lewis Hamilton (22nd):?Firstly, the team have done an incredible job -- the guys and girls back at Brixworth building the engines and then everyone here whove been kitting and fitting them -- so a huge thank you to them. To bring a new engine here, take it out after FP1, put another new one in for FP2, then do the same again before FP3 was just an unbelievable job. I have a massive 55 place grid penalty today -- but I also now have three new engines in the pool for the season, which is positive. In terms of today, it was definitely a weird qualifying session for me. There was no point in showing my pace. It was all about race preparation.The key for me is making sure I come out of tomorrow having lost the fewest points possible -- and that meant having as many fresh sets of tyres available as possible and making sure the car was set up well. I cant say right now what the plan is - the team will know already whats best and well discuss that later. Were not easily the quickest here. Were all going to have massive degradation and looking after the tyres will be a struggle for everyone. Its going to be far from an easy, breezy day but where I can just pick people off. There will be lots of pit stops and who knows what else. Im going to have to battle my way through the traffic -- but Ill give it my best as always and see where I end up.Toto Wolff, Head of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport:?We had completely opposite outcomes from todays session with Nico taking a great pole but Lewis doing the minimum he needed to do in order to be able to start the race from last place after his engine penalty. For Nico, it wasnt an easy job. We have struggled with the balance of the car this weekend but he managed to secure the strategic advantage of making it through Q2 on the soft tyre In Q3, we were overheating the super soft compound a lot but Nico managed to do enough to squeeze out the performance ahead of Verstappen. So a perfect job from his side. Lewis did the perfect job as well in totally different circumstances. He has taken a very positive approach to the challenge this weekend and has been very clear about focusing all his practice work on the race.He did the minimum today but this leaves him fresh tyres and the most strategic options for the race, which was the right choice. Finally, I must pay tribute to the fantastic work from the team in Brixworth and the team in the garage to implement our strategy of stockpiling the power units. So far, they have delivered an enormous workload without mistakes and in a perfect way. They are working under a lot of pressure but it shows the quality of our team that we have been able to deliver a smooth weekend so far. But the most important bit is now ahead of us. The tyres will be difficult to manage in the high temperatures tomorrow and I think we can expect a lot of action on the track and in the pits. Its now up to us to make the most of our opportunities to score the best possible result.Paddy Lowe, Executive Director (Technical):?Not quite the normal qualifying routine with Lewis grid penalties to consider. We decided to do a single short run with him during Q1 to get him safely within the 107% limit and then park the car to save the maximum number of tyre sets for tomorrow, giving him plenty of strategic options for the race. That left our bid for pole down to Nico. We could see from practice that it was going to be very tight between ourselves, Red Bull, Ferrari and Force India.We also had the challenge of getting through Q2 on the soft tyre, as we dont consider the SuperSoft to be a good race tyre here this weekend. Nico produced a fantastic lap in Q2 to go fastest on the Soft and, although Q3 was tighter than we had hoped after the Q2 times with Nico only finding a tenth and a half between the compounds, he delivered a strong lap to take pole. Tomorrow is going to be a very tough race -- particularly managing the endurance of the tyres -- so we can expect an exciting afternoon once again at this spectacular circuit.FerrariKimi Raikkonen (3rd): So far it has been a decent weekend, the car was behaving well today and we had the speed. My first run in Q3 was very good, but I went sideways and off track. The second attempt was even better, but in the last chicane I had some slight understeer and lost a few tenths compared to my Q2 sector. Today I felt we had the chance to get pole position, so Im a bit disappointed, my laptime was not good enough. On a positive side, we are very close compared to the last couple of races. We decided to start the race with Soft tires, if you can make them work it will make a massive difference, well see how the race will pan out but I think our plan will be fine. Well do our best, of course the hot conditions wont be easy for the tires, but its the same for everybody. Hopefully well be up there fighting also tomorrow.Sebastian Vettel (4th):?Im sure we made a step forward from yesterday! If you look at the gaps between the cars, they are very close, so tomorrow it should be a good race. Obviously you always want a little bit more, the exit of the last corner in particular wasnt very strong, so I cant be happy with that. The rest of the lap was ok, we had a much better balance than on Friday, but its important to be fast in all three sectors to be up there. We decided to start the race on the Soft tires, we believe that this is the best strategy, well see tomorrow. Anything can happen, there could even be some rain, in Spa you never know.WilliamsValtteri Bottas (8th):?Obviously it was a bit of a problematic qualifying session for us. Considering the software issues we had, I think we performed like we should have. Its a shame that we had the issues because it meant we couldnt get a top six position. At the end of the day, the race is tomorrow and thats what counts. The car felt better today than yesterday so weve already made progress. Our long runs in practice looked good in terms of the race pace, so I think we can have a strong race tomorrow, even though we didnt get the perfect result out of today.Felipe Massa (10th):?I had a software issue in Q1 which caused a misfire so I couldnt put a lap together. That really didnt help my qualifying, because I only had one set of supersofts left for Q3. I gave it everything on my final lap, but I locked the front into turn one and lost a lot of time, so Im not happy with that. If I had two sets of tyres in Q3 it would have helped me a lot, but that didnt happen so we lost a few places. We will see what we can do tomorrow though. I was happy with the car, the balance and the laptimes in qualifying.Rob Smedley, Head of Performance Engineering:?Qualifying was disappointing for us. We had a software issue with the power unit which meant that we werent able to run qualifying mode, so we lost lap time there. Without that we would have been around fifth position. It unfortunately put us on the back foot in Q1, after we discovered it on our first run and had to react accordingly. Most of our efforts were then focused on trying to resolve the issue rather than making our car go quicker, so its somewhat ruined our qualifying.Apart from that, the cars were reasonably well balanced. Going into the session we knew it was going to be tight with Force India, but we had a little bit of a margin on them so its a shame not to be ahead. Weve all got to pick ourselves up now, accept that these things are part of motor racing, and look forward to tomorrow. The long runs we were doing both yesterday and this morning were very encouraging. We just need to make sure we get everything right tomorrow and outscore those around us in the championship.Red BullMax Verstappen (2nd):?Its a great feeling. As soon as I crossed the line in Q3 on my fastest lap, I could see the fans going really wild so I knew it was a good lap. Its been already an amazing weekend. To see so many fans around the track and feel their support is incredible and Ive been enjoying the whole week a lot, so to be second on the grid is fantastic. It would have been very difficult to get pole position. The chance is always there if you are that close and in sector two we were very strong, but we were missing some top speed. Tomorrow will be very interesting with the different strategies between us, Mercedes and Ferrari so I think itll be a good fight. Hopefully the supersofts will give me a bit more grip in the first few laps and then for sure I will drop off a bit but thats my strategy. I will probably have to pit a bit earlier but we have to wait and see how the race goes. Big thanks to the team for such a quick turnaround and working so hard on getting me out on time in Qualifying.Daniel Ricciardo (5th):?In Q3 I would have loved to have got a bit more out of it, but Im not too disappointed looking at the race tomorrow. Im really pleased I got through on the softs in Q2, that was our objective, whether it works tomorrow or not lets see, but thats what I wanted to get out of it. Id be less happy with P5 on some tracks, but Im not disappointed for two reasons: you can overtake here and with the tyres weve got this weekend, you can do a lot during the race tomorrow. If you can have a faster car or if you can be a bit more intelligent, then it can pay off. In Q2 my objective was to start on the softs. It was a nervous few minutes but we did it. Im happy; its close enough to the front and Im on the softs, sure a few cars in front have them too, but its going to be a good race. Two years ago I started in P5 and won! Max did really well to get on the front row -- but we have a split strategy for tomorrow, we talked about it before qualifying and he wanted to start the race on supersofts and I wanted to start on softs, so well see what happens tomorrow.Christian Horner, Team Principal: A fantastic performance by Max, in what is theoretically his home race, to qualify on the front row here within 15 hundredths of Mercedes, and with Daniel in fifth place on the grid at a track where you can overtake, its going to be a fascinating race. That together with the different strategies the two cars will be running tomorrow, starting on different tyres, it should prove to be an exciting grand prix. Its all going to be about tyre degradation and managing the tyres particularly in these unusually hot conditions at Spa.Force IndiaSergio Perez (6th):?I think we are in a really strong position for the race and I am really looking forward to tomorrow. We got as much as we could out of the session: I made a small mistake at the end of my lap and I could have been about a tenth faster, but thats all we lost. Some of the cars ahead of me are starting on the soft tyre compound, which should be a big advantage for them, but we are still in good shape to get a strong result. There will be a variety of strategies at play and I hope we can move forward, enjoy the battles and bring home some points. The hot weather is making it really difficult for everyone -- you reach a point where you cant go any further with thee tyres. Wholesale Cubs Jerseys. Strategy and making the right calls at the right time will be very important: you dont want to be on the wrong tyres at the start of such a long lap because its going to cost you.Nico Hulkenberg (7th):?Im reasonably satisfied with our performance today. Q1 and Q2 went to plan, but I had an issue with the power unit during Q3 and that cost me some time down the straights and proved quite costly. Weve got to start the race on the supersoft tyres, but I think we made the right decision to use them in Q2 because it would have been difficult to make Q3 on the softs. Its certainly going to be a challenging race if the weather stays this warm because Spa is already a demanding track on tyres in cool conditions. We need to explore our options tonight and make the right decisions tomorrow.Robert Fernley, Deputy Team Principal:?It was satisfying to see our strong form in free practice carried into qualifying with both Sergio and Nico delivering some excellent laps. Nico had a sensor issue, which cost him a few tenths on his runs in Q3, but overall we cant be disappointed with sixth and seventh on the grid. Tomorrows race will be dictated by tyre strategy so we need to wait and see if the high temperatures continue for the race. Weve shown that we are competitive and we are well placed to pick up some good points tomorrow.RenaultKevin Magnussen (12th):?Today we found a lot more pace than expected and thats a nice surprise, obviously. My lap wasnt even perfect; I really locked up in Turn 1 and lost a lot of time. I thought it was over, but pushed for the rest of the lap and got a decent time in. Even though we are P12, I think there was a little bit more in it and thats encouraging for the race tomorrow.Jolyon Palmer (14th):?I am pretty happy with that performance. Its the second race running that Ive been in Q2, but we can be especially pleased with this one as yesterday was tough and we turned it around. Having two in a row shows that Hockenheim wasnt a one-off and we are making genuine progress. There are a lot of unknowns for the race tomorrow as the temperatures are sky-high and tyre degradation is worse than expected, but we have some advantages. Everyone in the top ten is starting on used tyres whereas we have a new set in hand. Im now really looking forward to the race and trying to crack into the top ten if we can.Toro RossoCarlos Sainz (15th):?Its being a very tough weekend for us, maybe even a bit more than expected, and its disappointing not to be able to fight to get into Q3. On one side Im happy because I know Ive extracted the maximum out of the car today, but on the other side Im sad to see us sitting in P15, a second off Q3. Its not good enough. Theres a lot of analysis going on right now inside the team to see where we are losing so much performance -- we know the reason for half of it, its due to the 2015 power unit, but we need to understand why we are not performing as expected in Sector 2. Weve been slow all weekend so tomorrows race will be difficult. Im confident that a right strategy will get us close to the top ten, but it wont be easy to finish in the points. Having said that, we will give it our all and fight hard to finish as high up as possible.Daniil Kvyat (19th):?Even if we are not where we would like to be, I think it wasnt a bad qualifying session for me and Im happy with my laps and my progress from Friday to today. My lap was pretty much the maximum of what I couldve done today. We must accept that the car is where it is right now and, of course, its difficult for us but we just have to work with what weve got and try to move forward. I think that for the rest of the season this is what its going to be like and we will have to keep fighting, theres no other choice. Tomorrow we will do our race and see where we end up - I dont want to do any predictions, all I know is that it will be tricky but we will do our best with a package that isnt competitive at this track.James Key, Technical Director: We had the feeling qualifying would be a difficult session for us, weve been struggling a bit this weekend. Somethings not working very well for us right now and we need to look into that further in a lot of detail. We know that straight-line performance is important here and this is becoming quite a big weakness for us now -- we knew this would happen, but nonetheless theres more to it than that I think. We need to understand the situation a bit better going into the next races, we introduced a lot of new parts on the car throughout July and, although we have not seen any obvious problems with any of them, we have had two unexpectedly difficult races on a row now. Sadly, Daniil didnt get through to Q2 as he lost a bit of time in the last corner -- its a shame, as he was actually up on his teammate at that point, so that was a bit unfortunate.But thats life and we have to move on. Regarding Carlos, his Q2 lap wasnt so easy, as he got disrupted by another car a little bit and didnt quite get the Sector 2 together... So, all in all, it was a tough session for the team and the drivers. The thing to do now is understand why we seem to be struggling a bit at the moment, find out if its something on the car, the high track temperatures weve had recently or something else, because clearly we are feeling a bit out of position at the moment and we need to come back from that. Shorter term, we need to focus on tomorrows race and see what we can do. We think theres still opportunities here and even if we knew that Spa and Monza wouldnt be strong events for us, we still have to do our best and thats what we will do tomorrow.SauberFelipe Nasr (17th):?I was close to making it into Q2. I put in a decent lap at the end of Q1, but I just missed some lap time in sector three, as I struggled with the grip, especially on the rear, in the last corner. On the first try my lap time was deleted because I went on the inside kerb exceeding the track limits in Turn 4. On my second and last try I was able to improve, but it was not enough for Q2. It will be a long race tomorrow; there is lot that can happen.Marcus Ericsson (20th):?It was a disappointing qualifying for me. We already had issues with the power unit in the morning. We managed to fix it for the end of FP3, so I was at least able to go out for a couple of laps. Then in qualifying I had a lack of power again, and, therefore, I lost lap time, especially on the straights. We need to investigate and sort these issues out for tomorrow.McLarenTo followManorPascal Wehrlein (16th):?Im very happy that we made it through to Q2, of course; Q1 was incredible for us with P9. But unfortunately we had no new Supersoft tyres for Q2, so its a bit of shame, and I had to do my lap on used tyres. Q1 felt so good with new tyres, so you can see what was possible today; that last run was not our true pace. So it was a bit of a shame, but that decision has to be made much earlier in the year. Were actually in a v
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