Week 10 Fantasy Football Defensive Matchup Exploitation: RB

Last week we saw some outlier efforts as Alfred Morris and Darrel Young scorched the tough Chargers defense and Fred Jackson and C.J. Spiller combined for a big effort against the typically stingy Chiefs D. The Ravens and Jets still shut down their opposing running backs and, more often than not, the better defense will prevail.

Before allowing the big running game to Washington, the Chargers had limited Arian Foster, Chris Johnson, DeMarco Murray, Maurice Jones-Drew, and all of Oakland’s running backs to 9.2 points or fewer. The Chiefs had shut down most of the same running backs as well.

This week, it’s Knowshon Moreno, Gio Bernard, Arian Foster (or Ben Tate, depending on Foster’s health), Ray Rice, Steven Jackson, Le’Veon Bell, and Rashad Jennings that have very tough matchups that are bound to limit their value.

Zac Stacy remains startable against the Colts who have given up big rushing games to Denver, San Diego, Seattle, San Francisco, Oakland, and Miami. LeSean McCoy is always startable, no matter the matchup though the Eagles have been running a lot less with Nick Foles at the helm. Frank Gore faces a Carolina defense that has been hit and miss. They have completely stopped guys like Steven Jackson, Adrian Peterson, and Marshawn Lynch in their tracks while giving up big rushing games to Buffalo, Arizona, and St. Louis. It’s not an optimal matchup. On the other hand, the Eagles haven’t seen many good running backs and Eddie Lacy leads the league in rushing over the last five weeks so he’s definitely startable.

The most favorable matchups belong to guys you were likely going to start anyway: Adrian Peterson, Chris Johnson, Alfred Morris, Reggie Bush, and Danny Woodhead. Mike James looks like a strong start against the Dolphins who have been giving up a ton of running back points. I don’t trust Trent Richardson but St. Louis just gave up nearly 250 yards and three touchdowns to Chris Johnson and Shonn Greene last week. Maurice Jones-Drew, despite a low fantasy ceiling, has had enough touches to remain a flex or bye week option in most leagues, especially against a Titans defense that has given up over 50 points to Zac Stacy and Frank Gore over the last two weeks. C.J. Spiller looks like a good option, if healthy, against a struggling Steelers defense and Pierre Thomas looks good against a Cowboys defense that has allowed 40 points to opposing running backs over the last two weeks.

Let’s take a look at all of the running back matchups in Week 10.

Browse Matchups by Position: QB – RB – WR – TE

Highly Unfavorable, Unfavorable, Neutral, Slightly Favorable, Favorable

*Values based on Yahoo standard scoring.

Browse Matchups by Position: QB – RB – WR – TE

Igor Derysh

Igor Derysh is Editor-at-Large at XN Sports and has been featured in The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Boston Herald, Baltimore Sun, Orlando Sun-Sentinel, and FantasyPros. He has previously covered sports for COED Magazine, Fantasy Alarm, and Manwall.com. Follow @IgorDerysh !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');

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