Josh Jacobs does not care about your fantasy football teams. However, I do care and believe it’s important to look forward to Josh Jacobs’ Week 15 matchup against the Los Angeles Chargers. Coming off back-to-back disappointing weeks, will Jacobs be better in Week 15 for the next round of the playoffs?
Josh Jacobs trolled fantasy managers prior to Week 14
Why poke the bees nest? Is it for the clicks and analytics numbers on social media? Is it to be the topic of conversation and controversy while watching people panic? Maybe it is a combination of it all. Michael Caine said it the best, “Some men aren’t looking for anything logical…Some men just want to watch the world burn.”
Jacobs’ status going into the game was up in the air. The 22-year-old was listed as questionable all week after missing Week 13 against the Jets with an ankle sprain.
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With the 4:00 PM slate of games coming up, Jacobs took to Instagram and posted a cryptic message where he stated he “wasn’t playing.”
Adding to the confusion was a report from Raiders beat writer Vincent Bonsignore of the Las Vegas Review-Journal saying that Josh Jacobs was on the field and participating in warmups.
Jacobs apparently had enough time before the game to post one more Instagram story where he said there were “A lot of hot fantasy owners.”
Yeah. No kidding. I can’t even imagine why his feed was full of them.
There is a lesson to be learned in the madness
None of us who play the game or do it for a living expect athletes to treat fantasy football how we do. We are obsessed, probably a bit too much, but we love it. That’s why it is almost refreshing to see someone like Austin Ekeler going to Twitter to say he is coming back for those in fantasy who stuck by him. Weirdly, we were there with him, and it felt like he cared.
But then you have guys like Josh Jacobs who find the time and reasoning to make fun of it at our expense. Or in 2019, when the Arizona Cardinals posted about how we probably should have played one running back over the other, simply pouring salt in the wound.
Look, if I were a guy in the NFL who put my body and livelihood on the line, had a bad game, and then get on social media to see myself getting blasted by people saying I ruined their fantasy matchup and was getting death threats, I’d be a bit salty too.
We can all be better. The players could understand that we help give them relevancy outside their one team’s fan base. And as a community, we shouldn’t go online and trash players because of what they did to your fantasy team — they didn’t purposely fail.
It’s 2020; none of us need that karma following us.
Speaking of karma.
Josh Jacobs struggled on Sunday against the Indianapolis Colts
While not 100% healthy, Josh Jacobs found it difficult to find room against a solid Colts defensive front. Jacobs carried the ball 13 times for 49 yards. Adding three receptions on five targets for 25 yards helped to boost his output.
Maybe fantasy managers wished Jacobs would have sat out. His 8.9 fantasy points meant he finished as just the RB24 on the week.
Taking stock of Jacobs’ volatility
Josh Jacobs has been a bit unpredictable this season. In his 12 games this season, Jacobs has finished inside the top 12 RBs three times. However, he has been outside the RB2 range (top 24) five times, including games in which he’s left mid-game due to injury.
Even with some up and down performances, Josh Jacobs is still one of the better young RBs in fantasy. He currently sits as the RB8 with 168.1 points and is the RB11 in points per game (14).
The third-year pro out of Alabama has 831 rushing yards on 219 attempts, nine touchdowns and has caught 30 of 39 targets for 200 receiving yards this year.
Assuming Jacobs is healthy, he should have a bounce-back game on Sunday facing a subpar Chargers run defense.
Josh Jacobs could be a low-end RB1 for fantasy in Week 15 against the Chargers
In Week 15, Jacobs faces a Chargers defense that allows a massive 4.82 yards per carry to RBs. After not giving up a TD for their first five games, they’ve allowed seven rushing touchdowns in their last eight games.
The Chargers are 20th in fantasy points allowed to the running back position at 23.53, including their opening five-game stretch. The Chargers have also faced the fourth-most targets to RBs (98). However, they haven’t allowed much on those targets. Opposing teams have scored just three touchdowns through the air while allowing only 4.55 yards per target.
You will never start Josh Jacobs in fantasy for his pass-catching upside, but it is a nice bonus. Jacobs didn’t see much work last week and seemed to come out of it no worse for wear-and-tear. After another week of treatment, Josh Jacobs should see the lower-end of the RB1 conversation for fantasy in Week 15.
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