Start or Sit LeSean McCoy in Fantasy Football Week Six?
Five weeks of the NFL season are in the books. This means that in most leagues, we have only eight weeks left of the fantasy football regular season. The bad news is that for some of us, the season is already over one-third gone. The good news is that we still have nearly two-thirds of the season left. Time to dig ourselves out of holes and make a serious run at the fantasy football playoffs. In order to help you with your fantasy football decisions, Football Absurdity keys in on some players every week on the fringes of startability and helps you decide what you should do with them. This week, we take a look at whether you should start or sit LeSean McCoy.
Things haven’t always been this way for Shady McCoy, the once consensus top-three pick in every fantasy football draft. However, Father Time is undefeated (though Frank Gore is doing his best) and McCoy seems to have become his latest victim. It’s not all his fault, though I’m sure his fantasy football owners aren’t too concerned with placing blame. I’ll say it bluntly: the Buffalo offense is a dumpster fire. It starts with the offensive line, which is a complete mess thanks to multiple departures. Josh Allen being a frenetic mess doesn’t help matters, either. Shady McCoy also has plenty of tread on the tires, which puts some blame at his feet.
Here’s the skinny: Shady McCoy had 24 carries on Sunday, which represents 53% of his season-long carries. He also chipped in half of his season receiving yards in one game last week. Prior to this, the Bills offense had been exceptionally dysfunctional against quality opponents (Baltimore, Chargers, and Green Bay). Here’s the other thing… Shady wasn’t even that good from a production standpoint. 108 yards on 27 touches is a stat-line out of a 1995 box score in a game that ended 17-10. So what, so what if Shady is inefficient? He’s the best weapon on this Bills roster and should be a touchdown machine. His zero scores disagree with you. Also, the team scoring a field goal or nothing as many times as they have scored multiple touchdowns also creates a problem for trusting McCoy.
This week, Shady gets the Houston Texans run defense. While they are middling overall (literally the #16 defense against running backs), they are one of six teams to allow a yards-per-carry below 3.5. They were chewed up and spit out against Nyheim Hines and Saquon Barkley, but they stymied Ezekiel Elliott, who needed 27 touches to get 84 yards against them. There’s nothing about this defense that screams “lean into starting opposing running backs against them.” To feast against the Texans, McCoy will need to get volume, and Zeke Elliott showed that even volume doesn’t guarantee production against Houston.
Given the Bills are not a functional offense right now, this doesn’t feel like a good game to use Shady this week. The offense is a mess, and Shady has one game with over thirteen touches this year. I do not own any Shady, but if I did, I would not be questioning if I should start or sit LeSean McCoy this week. For me, he would be a firm sit until I am convinced the Bills offense will turn it around.
If you have more fantasy football questions like “Start or Sit Mohamed Sanu?” then check out our other start/sits for the week:
Start or Sit Blake Bortles?
Start or Sit Jameis Winston?
Start or Sit Aaron Jones?
Start or Sit Mohamed Sanu?
Start or Sit Allen Robinson?
Start or Sit Austin Hooper?
Start or Sit Jared Cook?
