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The media has criticized, praised, and lambasted Tim Tebow continuously. His time as an NFL starting quarterback has come and gone, yet the media will strangle their hold on his publicity until he is completely off an NFL roster. Truth be told, quarterbacks come and go by way of their play on the field daily, weekly, and yearly. You’re not guaranteed to be a starter no matter what round you’re picked in or the size of your contract.

Unfortunately over in Tennessee they’ve dragged on with Jake Locker a bit too long. Every characteristic that has been attributed to Tim Tebow can be categorized the same for Locker. In college he was boasted as a supreme athlete that could do-it-all and he did. The four year starter was predicted to be an easy lock as a top five or even the number one pick.

He did not declare as a junior, and therefore, so his stock overall decline as a senior. Locker was still expected to be a first round pick but no one believed he be a top five pick, in fact most had him as a mid to late first round pick. Draft day came and the Titans believed Locker was their guy to not pass on with the eighth selection.

Legs and an ability to produce on the run and broken down plays have cast a few years to many as starting quarterbacks in the league. Vince Young was able to do it successfully to as a Titan before Locker. Locker’s inefficiencies with his arm were there in college, and have haunted him in his young career thus far. In college Locker’s completion percentage was just around 54 percent. Guess what it has been in sixteen games in the NFL? ….55 percent

Locker is not dropping back and throwing it 40 to 50 times a game either. The only quarterbacks behind Locker in completion percentage a year ago were Mark Sanchez, Josh Freeman, Andrew Luck, and Chad Henne. All but Luck, who was a rookie, will likely be demoted after this season (Henne is a backup). Stats do not lie and the Titans will be faced with a tough decision soon on the amount of money they’ve invested in Locker.

He can probably be a solid backup or situational quarterback, but too succeed in the NFL you need to have a consistent arm. Those extra five to eight completions can be all the difference in winning a game.

I believe the Titans made a mistake by letting Matt Hasselbeck sign as a free agent with the Indianapolis Colts, as they’ll definitely need a different signal caller under center when Locker struggles. Hey Titans fans, does the name Ryan Fitzpatrick ring a bell?

Fitzpatrick is a quarterback that just finds himself in opportune situations time and time again, even though his skillset is not that of a starter. He has been on the Rams, Bengals, and Bills. With every team he was brought in as a backup and ended up starting games either due to injuries or poor quarterback play. There is no doubt he will start games for the Titans, his fourth team that he will do so. Frankly, I believe he gives the Titans a better chance to win on the field. The burden of a huge contract that the Bills mistakenly gave him is off his shoulders now.

By mid-October expect Fitzpatrick on the field and to actually play decent as he has notoriously done when called off the bench.

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There are certain teams in football that cannot stay away from the media dramatization in soap opera fashion. Chip Kelly is coming in with a revved up offense that the NFL has never seen before. Kelly is going to be testing just how much he can force the issue with play calls and wearing down opposing defenses. Wearing down a defense is one thing, but the speed advantage Chip Kelly had at Oregon is another. Speed is not an issue in the NFL. When you’re on that field it’s for the most part a sideline to sideline and end zone to end zone fierce athletic enclosed field.

All it’s going to take is for that one play to be called to quickly, and a missed block assignment for Mike Vick to end up right back where he is all too familiar with—on his back shaken and woozy. Mike Vick’s at the stage in his career where he can ill afford to consistently take hits. Do you really believe a new head coach in Chip Kelly is going to have the interest of Mike Vick’s health on his mind? He came in with a system in mind and he is going to run it.
The drafting of Matt Barkley and keeping Nick Foles in discussion for the starting quarterback job now is where his mindset sits. We all know that Foles will be sitting on the bench in favor of Vick once week one is here.

One area that should offset and protect Vick somewhat is the depth at running back with LeSean McCoy and Bryce Brown. Brown showed he can carry the load if he needs to in stints of starts with McCoy out in 2012. At Oregon, Kelly made it standard to run the football downhill with constant action.

My worries for that adaptation to the NFL is how Kelly calls that high pace action when the running game is not working or they’re losing? At Oregon they were in the lead the majority of the time and that made it a non-issue for 95 percent of Oregon’s games. Games they did lose like last year to Stanford were blueprints that NFL teams have used before in shutting down high octane offenses. Stanford milked the clock offensively and put all their might into winning the trenches on the defensive line.

It worked and it was a methodical low-scoring game that Oregon was unaccustomed too. The same thing has happened for run and shoot offenses in the 90’s with the Houston Oilers and Buffalo Bills. The Bills lost their first Super Bowl to the New York Giants because the Giants chose to sustain drives offensively and milk the clock as much as possible.

I just hope Chip has a backup plan in game situations that his play calling is not working. We all know Andy Reid’s was to have Vick drop back and take a mercilessly beating.

It does not bode well that before the Eagles first preseason game that Jeremy Maclin and Arrelious Benn are out for the season at receiver. The receiver that has to pick up the slack is none other than Riley Cooper. He has familiarity with the Eagles offense but there will obviously be a ton of pressure on him mentally each time he steps on the field and off the field. Will he be ready for that role?

That leaves Jason Avant who seems to have been on the team even before the pre-McNabb era. In actuality it’s only been eight years, but Avant is not the caliber of player that is going to be a threat in the three wide receiver sets. He is on the downside of his career and is just a serviceable receiver at this point of his career.

The rest of the Eagles receivers are unproven for the most part. Damaris Johnson from Tulsa had a decent finish to last season, but there is no possible way he can line up opposite DeSean Jackson. He is only 5’8 and 175 pounds, which would be opposite of Jackson who is just 5’10 and 175 pounds himself. The injuries may continue to mount at wide receiver—Jackson has not exactly proven to be able to avoid the injury bug.

We’ve seen college coaches race right back to the college ranks—Bobby Petrino, Nick Saban–. Chip Kelly may side step going back immediately because of the penalties facing him from Oregon, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see him do that down the road. It’s not for everyone and if his system fails in Philadelphia, he’ll go back to where he knows it’ll be successful.

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The New Orleans Saints may hate to admit it, but when they let Reggie Bush walk away a few years ago, a part of the Saints explosiveness disappeared. Darren Sproles had some sporadic games in which he was able to reappear in the form of Reggie Bush like a magic-trick, but injuries have hurt Sproles effectiveness.

New Orleans never really did use Bush in the way he would have liked. They used him more as a decoy, and with how fast the Saints were scoring, Bush’s role was never really questioned. Part of the issue that has transformed Bush was his ability to shake off the misperception that he could not run in –between the tackles. As a Saint, he truly couldn’t. That’s where the Saints would utilize one of their plethora of backs they had to carry the load.

Bush wanted to shake that label, and he did just that as a Dolphin. He proved to be much more than a PPR fantasy option, as he had several big games on the ground. Even though Miami had options of Daniel Thomas and Lamar Miller, Bush still put up viable numbers of nearly 1000 yards rushing.

Now the question is how will Miami and Detroit adjust with/without the Bush factor? Miami believed they needed to give their young running backfield a chance to break through. Miller and Thomas figure to platoon the carries. Both had their share of carries last year but I do not believe either put two feet down for the permanent lead role in 2013.

With both having injury concerns it will be imperative they make it through September and October healthy. Nothing lowers the chance of a young back to prove himself than getting hurt right out the gate. There are too many young talented backs that will get an opportunity if that happens. In the preseason game against Dallas on Sunday neither Miller nor Thomas had great outings, with Miller botching a handoff at the start of the game.

The preseason is not a time to over react, the Miami coaching staff believes they made the right decision with these two. I do not expect either to be a fantasy football juggernaut, because of their offensive line issues and the second year growth of Tannehill. They do deserve to be flex options and roster depth fillers.

In Detroit, Reggie Bush is going to get a slightly bigger role than what he had last year in Miami. Detroit is not going to go full throttle with him as they still have Mikel Leshoure and Joique Bell. The area where Bush will exceed his fantasy value over the past two years is out of the backfield. We all know the Lions have Megatron and a decent cast of receivers around him. They’re also a team that ranks near the top in pass attempts with Matthew Stafford and three to four spread receiver sets.

This is the area where Bush’s stats out of the backfield should shift back to where they were as a Saint. That should get him in the range of 450 (low end) to 600 (high end) receiving yards. There is no telling what he can do with the type of explosiveness he has and additional throws that will come his way.

He will be involved and not forgotten as what happened in New Orleans. You just have to hope that Bush does not get disgruntled throughout the season if the Lions lean to Bell or LeShoure in a given game. He didn’t in Miami, so I do not expect it to get to him now.

If you’re not focusing on running backs early, and plan to get your RB2 later, than Bush is a solid gamble to fill that role. That’s in standard fantasy formats. If it’s a PPR than you’ll be more than happy with Bush.

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Familiarity in all walks of life can lead you in directions you would not expect. Complacency in a career is something you never want to happen. In the sports world free agency keeps most athletes on their heels. In San Diego that has not been the case at quarterback.

Philip Rivers at one time looked like he could very well be worth the trade value of Eli Manning. Heck, there was a time San Diego fans were even okay with the fact that Drew Brees was allowed to walk away. Those times seem ancient especially over the last couple of seasons were there seemed to be a non-existent attention to detail for Rivers or the offensive playbook.

Tracing the offenses woes to a couple of key areas is easy. The Chargers did not have LT and were trying to go with a platoon of running backs due to Ryan Matthews constant injuries. The offensive line that used to be stable a few years ago regressed. Rivers has seen his sack-ratio rise from an average of the mid 20’s from 2006 to 2009, to in the high thirties the last three seasons—including a whopping 49 sacks a year ago.

There was also a time the Chargers had big play receivers at their disposal. Vincent Jackson was a top receiver in the league, but for some reason the Chargers did not want to pony up the dollars to re-sign him and keep him a Charger. Antonio Gates redefined the athletic tight end and became an example for other teams to emulate. The same injury bug tune that has hit Matthews has plagued Gates the last few years. Literally the Chargers have done almost next to nothing to protect their franchise quarterback and build a nucleus of talent around him the past few seasons.

It is amazing Rivers has remained unscathed to time off the field because of injury. He has taken a severe beating, and a just like a boxer, at some point you’re going to make mistakes if you’re getting targeted frequently. Norv could never figure that out and there were a few times a year ago that you could see the two clashing visibly on the sidelines.

With Norv gone the familiarity of a coach that Philip obviously did not get along with is erased. Rivers is only entering his 10th year at quarterback, and eighth as a starter. His quest to get back to an AFC championship is not going to happen this year, but he can begin to regain confidence in himself and his teammates. Honing in on getting back to the basics needs to be his first priority.

He knows the talent at wide receiver is not the great in San Diego. They did not sign any key free agents and spent a draft pick on Keenan Allen. News today that Danario Alexander tore his ACL will only decrease the wide receivers value on the Chargers roster. They do have serviceable receivers though in Vincent Brown, Malcolm Floyd, Robert Meachem, and Eddie Royal. All have had their moments in their careers on different teams.

A big key too is that all have been Chargers for at least a year. Rivers should already have timing down with them, and a connection in the pocket to find them.
I think the AFC West will surprise some people with the possible emergence of Kansas City and a newfound actual veteran in Philip Rivers. He has the intangibles to be an elite quarterback in this league again. He needs to realize that each down does not need to be a home run play, and that he can hold back on a series when it is not there.

Numbers do not lie, and a tell-all stat for Rivers trying to do too much is how many fumbles he has had the last two years. He has had 24 fumbles, but only 12 were recovered. Rivers is not a scrambler anymore either. So it’s not like he is getting drilled ten to twenty yards down the field and losing the ball. He is holding it far too long in the pocket.

If Rivers would have played the way he has the past two years for different coaches other than Norv, he likely would have found the bench.

Rivers will reawaken this season and I expect a strong rise in his yardage totals, and for him to calm down in the turnover department both with fumbles and interceptions. If you are the type of fantasy draft owner that likes to wait on a quarterback, and then get two semi-decent quarterbacks (E. Manning, Romo, Roethlisber, etc) and having your choice of who to start each week—I’d include Rivers in that conversation.

By the end of September and early October, Rivers will have that green upward arrow on him as he ascends from the low teens range he is at right now for fantasy quarterbacks.

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Bring back Ray Lewis from the studios of ESPN and on the field with a championship contender. Come on New England bring him on board to be the leader of the Patriots defense, and deliver Brady another quest for a shot at a title. No, no, no, this is not a Brett Favre early August rally to see Ray Lewis on the field for one more season.

It does have to do with Jacksonville Jaguars running back Maurice Jones-Drew. Is it his time to fall off the fantasy radar maps much like greats in the past did, LT, Shaun Alexander, Larry Johnson, etc? He is approaching that age that makes true franchises and fantasy owners get the jitters. All types of questions can surface but I’m not one to predict a complete downfall season unexpectedly. Typically you can see signs of wearing down from a running back to negate his fantasy value. Examples of the more recent would be all the backs listed a few sentences ago, and throw a back like Michael Turner in that mix as well.

Even though a running back may be regressing, in the right situation he is still going to get a fair amount of carries and a large chunk of the workload. As a Jacksonville Jaguar, MJD, will continue to reap the bulk of the Jaguars offensive categories in terms of carries and percentage of involvement in their offense. It’s a question if those carries will be as meaningful as in years past, and if MJD can avoid hitting the injury bug.

But isn’t that a question amongst all NFL players? Yes it is. A year ago MJD s contract issues held his fantasy value low in a lot of drafts, and he did not end up signing his contract until September 3rd. His value for where he ended up getting drafted was far better than the rounds he landed. At least up until he got injured after six games on the field. His production was still near five yards a carry, and being on a team such as Jacksonville worries of him rushing back from an injury were not even thought of.

He has not played tackle football since mid-October and we are only talking about a foot injury here. As long as it has healed properly, you can expect Jones-Drew to regain some of his fantasy football consistency as a top fantasy back.

Time away from the field in fantasy football means you can fall off the fantasy radar blip just a little bit. Just ask Adrian Peterson. His value has re-risen like a company that had a poor earnings quarter and blew past projections three quarters later. He is right back on top.

While the CJ Spiller’s, Trent Richardson’s, and Doug Martin’s come into this season with a higher rating, do not rule out MJD from sneaking back up past them. Jones-Drew has had a few off the field issues this offseason but none that have been tagged as serious offenses.

Going into your fantasy drafts you should realize that Jones-Drew can be there easily for you as a running back second option. Depending on how running backs fly off your draft boards he should be there anywhere from the mid second to early third round. I say if you can get him as your second running back than do it. He’ll be right there with your RB1 statistically, and will for sure have a half of a season’s worth of games in which he’ll outdo your RB1 fantasy points wise.

MJD is not going to fade just yet. I say give him one more season to prove his fantasy relevance or demise. We all saw how Jamaal Charles and AP bounced back from serious injuries in just one season. MJD will be just fine even on that same pathetic anemic Jacksonville Jaguars offense.

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You could see the writing on the wall for Andy Reid’s grand finale and official exit as a Philadelphia Eagles head coach. He had a long run in Philadelphia but it just seemed that change was needed on both sides. Still a heck of a coach it was no surprise that Reid was a top candidate for the many vacancies left open in the coaching ranks in the offseason of 2013.

He landed in Kansas City were the team has had offensive woes that ranked near the bottom of the league for a passing attack. The money spent on Matt Cassel was right up there for the money the Arizona Cardinals over spent on landing Kevin Kolb. If there is one thing about Andy Reid he knows how to run offenses.

The supporting cast in Philadelphia was always around for Reid to do so. In his first year in Kansas City how will he manage Alex Smith and have the Chiefs competitive in year one?

The answer to that question is to change his rather unique philosophies on game planning offensively. In Philadelphia it was no secret that Reid’s penchant was to throw the football. This year in Kansas City I expect Reid to tone it down quite a bit and ride the backfield starting with Jamaal Charles.

That’s the burning question for fantasy owners. Can they bank on Jamaal Charles even if Andy Reid is back up to his old tricks. Do the names of Duce Staley, Brian Westbrook, Correll Buckhalter and LeSean McCoy ring a bell? They should. Buckhalter’s name was brought in the mix to showcase that Reid has had success with a complimentary back having fantasy value. The rest were top tier running backs in their heydays, which McCoy is still in.

Jamaal Charles has that game speed shiftiness intangible that Reid has thrived with backs such as Brian Westbrook and LeSean McCoy. They do not necessarily have to carry the load with 300 carries in a season to be a top fantasy back. Reid ensures his stars are involved in the offense from a running back standpoint, but he mixes it up differently than most coaches do.

He’ll wear down defenses with the quick screen or just stretching the field overall with a simple dump pass route to the running back. One of his patented red zone moves with Donovan McNabb at quarterback was the inside the ten yard line quick shuffle pass to the running back from the shotgun formation. With all the presnap focus and confusing formations set on linebackers, it will continue to work in Kansas City.

Charles is an obvious first round fantasy running back candidate. The worries of Reid’s offense should be halted, as it is inflated conversation with actual results produced by his running backs. If Kansas City throws the football 58 to 60 percent of the time who cares as long as Charles is trending as a top back.

If Charles was a 1500 dominating back on a team that had little to offer a year ago, imagine what he will do with a consistent capable team on the field now?

I rate him right in the range of a first round pick between the 5th and 10th pick. That’s dependent on how quick the running backs fly off the board. If you end up getting him toward the later part of the first round you’ll end up smiling after week one, week two, week three, week four—hell the whole season.

Reid’s history with running backs speaks for itself. The talent of Charles will only spring that chemistry upward and give the Chiefs a chance to catapult as a playoff contender.