IDP Week 10 NFL Fantasy Football 2009 Waiver Wire Pick Ups

Last bye week: Texans, Giants

DBs (Defensive Backs)

Free Safety Sean Jones (PHI) gets San Diego and this will be a true shootout game and a very high action one to watch. I'm not sure if Quinten Mikell is on very many people's waiver wire, but he is a nice play in this one also.

S Bryan Scott (BUF) is back. And he was a stud before he got injured. He'll face Tennessee in his first game back and get plenty of tackle chances against Chris Johnson and INT opportunities vs. whichever mediocre Titan QB starts..

The Entire St. Louis Secondary vs. NO.  I know Atogwe & Ron Bartell on not on many people's waivers, but strong safety James Butler & CB Quincy Butler definitely are and might be worth a flyer if you're desperate for around 4 tackles and the potential of some pass deflection points. And any secondary facing Brees always has plenty of room for upside. I'm pretty happy about it since I'm an Atogwe owner.

SS Abram Elam (CLE) gets Baltimore on Monday Night Football week 10.  His biggest game of the year with 10 tackles was against Baltimore this year. Good player + good matchup = good opportunity.

CB J. Wilson (SEA) gets Kurt Warner week 10. All he did in week 9 was put up 5 solos, 2 pass deflectionss and a 61 yard interception return for a TD.  He'll get plenty of tackly opportuties vs. the Cardinals.

My DB PICKUP OF THE WEEK is NE safety Brandon McGowan vs. Indy. He keeps getting stronger every game and he has a strong chance of surpassing his 7 solos and 3 assists that the got against Miami last week in the week 10 Colts matchup.


LBs (Linebackers)  

LB D. Hawthorne(SEA) IS THE REAL DEAL.  9 solos & 2 INTs week 9 makes me a very happy Hawthorne owner! He's not my pick up of the week because I don't know what to think of him vs. Arizona week 10. They're not exactly a traditional run team. Yet linebackers continue to put up big numbers against them like in week 9 when Briggs put up 9 solos and even Hillenmeyer got 5 solos & 5 assists against them. The way Hawthorne is playing, you have to start him in this one. If it gives you any indication, I'll need to think long & hard whether to start Hawthorne vs. the Cards or Jerod Mayo vs. Indy week 10.

LB Calvin Pace (NYJ) gets Jacksonville week 10. I notice many people drop guys who are on bye and Pace might be available in your league. If you're league allows him to play as your DL guy, he's fantasy gold at that position, but he's still fantasy "silver" as an LB, especially when he's always a threat to put up 2 sacks in a game in addition to his 5 or more tackles that he puts up.

LB G. Hayes (TB) had a solid game week 9 with 7 tackles and he gets Miami week 10. That's a nice upside play and you get the feeling Miami will be ahead and there should be no need to abandon their running game.

LB AJ Hawk (GB) continues to look solid and could be a sneaky play vs. Dallas week 10. He's been adding sacks and INTs to his tackle #'s lately. I can't fully recommend him because he has let us all down in the past so that's why I call him a sneaky play. He's sorta like a Lawrence Maroney on the defensive side of the ball. He's easily glanced over on the wire, but just might be your best play in some cases. I know I wish I would have gone Maroney over Portis week 9 like I was thinking about doing.

MLB Dhani Jones (CIN) follows the same pattern as Hawk. And I like him even better than Hawk week 10 vs. Pittsburgh. Nice rivalry and Jones has had success against them in the past. Also keep in mind that Keith Rivers has a vendetta to pay back since it was Steelers Hines Ward who broke his jaw last year. So he gets a slight bump also based on his extra motivation, but I still feel Jones is the safer play than Rivers at this point in the season.

LB Keith Brooking (DAL) gets GB week 10 and I really like his chance for a sack in this one.  If not, he's known for his pass deflections and has been putting up the biggest tackle #'s out of all the other Dallas LBs this year.


My MLB PICK UP OF THE WEEK is ILB Kaluka Maiava (CLEV) vs. Baltimore on Monday Night Football. He now plays DQ's & Eric Barton's spot.  Hopefully, he doesn't follow in their footsteps and also get a season-ending injury, but the USC rookie finds himself in the perfect scheme and perfect position to put up big numbers. Now all he has to do is make it happen. That's the risky part of this move. Can he continue the 9 solos a week that the other guys were putting up? He certainly has the potential to do so. Naiava is a "true" waiver wire pickup, but if Hawthorne is also available, I'd grab him Hawthorne over Maiava.


DLs (Defensive Line)  

The ENTIRE Cowboys Line, specifically NT Ratliff & DE Marcus Spears(DAL) has GB week 10. Even Tampa Bay got 6 sacks against this line. That's insane!! There's simply no doubt that you must start any and all DLs against GB. The problem is predicting which guy. Obviously, if Demarcus Ware can't get at least 2 sacks in this next game, he needs to have his big contract taken away. If he's not a DL in your league, I'd take a flyer on Igor Olshansky in this one. If your Grandma was playing on the Dallas line, I'd recommend her too vs. GB.


DE's Kyle Vanden Bosch & William Hayes(TEN) are sneaky plays vs. Buffalo, who is the second highest sacked team behind Green Bay. Only if your desperate with your NYG linemen on bye in week 10.

C. Kelsay(BUF) vs. Tennessee is not a great matchup, but Kelsay is a good player and has the potential to do well despite the matchup.


Brian Orakpo(WAS) now has 7.5 sacks on the year and is only getting stronger. He plays OLB, but is counted as a DL in many peoples leagues. Obviously, you want to go with a Calvin Pace over him as a DL, but he's becoming more and more tempting.

MY DL Pick Up of the Week Stylez G. White(TB) who gets Miami week 10. Not only did he come through against Green Bay week 9 1.5 sacks, but it's the third game in a row that he got a sack.  Miami gives up a decent amount of sacks and runs enough off the edge to make White a busy man.

2008 Fantasy Footbally Week 10 IDP Waiver Pickups Injuries to DJ Williams, Whitner, David Harris, Shaun Rogers and Rankings

Week 10 IDP Waiver Pickups

Starting with Sneaky DB pickups:
Go Ko this week! That's right K0 Simpson. Wait a minute, who??? If you don't recognize that name, how about Bethea, Atogwe or Renaldo Hill?? What do all of these guys have in common? These are all basically no name free safeties who all put up monster numbers when playing the New England Patriots. And guess who the starting free safety is this week against NE. You got it, Go Ko! Need some #s R. Hill put up 7 tackles, Atogwe 7 tackles 1 INT & Colts FS Bethea who put up 2 solos the week prior put up 10 solos week 9 against the Pats. My only small concern is that Buffalo could change up their package vs. the Pats and Bryan Scott who's filling the spot of injured Whitner would become the bread winner. This only happened one other time vs. the Pats this year when the Jets did this and the two SS led the team in tackles that week.

Don't want to take quite so big of a risk? Staying with that same game and same philosophy, go with an oldy, but goody Terrence McGee who yahoo projects at 14.5 points this week.

Following the DeAngelo Hall Recipe: SF DB Walt Harris is a sneaky play vs. Arizona this week. He should be Larry Fitzgerald's doormat all day and doormats get stepped on a lot in heavy traffic. Translation in Fantasy Football - stepped on = many tackles and opportunities. Let's face it, Kurt Warner is great just as Bret Farve is great (or was and kind of is now). And apparently great QBs through quite a few interceptions. Hey, I didn't label them great, I'm just repeating what I hear. The stats don't lie though, Kurt will through an INT or 2 and why not Walt Harris. He's going to have a lot of balls thrown his way.

FS Madieu Williams vs GB: What a start last week with 22 fantasy points. 10 total tackles and an INT. Free Safeties are hard to predict, but I didn't think Williams would do as well as he did last week so I'd say he's as safe a bet as any FS out there this week.


Sneaky Linebacker Pickups for Week 10:
MLB Pat Thomas vs SD should see plenty of tackle opportunities. LT is almost 100% and will easily get his 100 yards and then some. Heck, I'm going to guess Sproles gets his 100 yard game that he always seems to sneak in once or twice a year. KC will be on Defense a lot and Pat Thomas is the starting middle linebacker. He should get at least 5 tackles just standing still and allowing a guy to trip over his face mask.

WLB Omar Gaither vs Giants: The Giants run a lot. And the Eagles Blitz a lot. The best defense agains the Blitz is draws, screens and short slants. Omar Gaither will get at least 6 tackles. Solid FF stats.

NYJ Linebacker Bowens vs STL: Filling in for injured LB David Harris, Bowens has done well for himself with 1 sack in each of his games (that's 2 total). He has also averaged 4 solos a game. I don't feel that St. Louis will run often or even have their offense on the field often in this game. So my recommendation here is banking on Bowens getting a couple sacks in this game. He will not have very many tackling opportunities, however, due to St. Louis being decimated at RB.

Det MLB Paris Lenon vs. Jacksonville: This will be an average, but solid FF game for Lenon. Jordan Dizon, continues to be injured so Lenon owners don't have to look over his shoulder this week. Jacksonville is a running team and the Detroit D should be on the field a lot. The way things work in the NFL, as you may have noticed, is that when a team is utterly embarrassed like the Jaquers were last week by allowing the Bengals to get their first win over a super soft Jaqs effort is they will come out very hard to erase the terrible fan and press fallout that they received all week leading up to Week 10. Ironically, they play the next team in the league that has not won a game yet. Expect Jacksonville to lay it all on the line this week.

Vikings Napoleon Harris MLB vs GB: This is more of a warm body than anything else, but he is a starting MLB in the National Football League, but he only gets the scraps that the vicious front 4 allow him to have. For some reason, Ryan Grant has always been able to run agains this very good run stopping unit. So Harris could be good for double digit fantasy points this week. Division rivalries are always wacky.

Don't try to pick up a Denver replacement for DJ Williams or Boss Bailey. It's way to muddled between 3 guys right now.

Not much of a DT guy:
However, when researching how free safeties do against the Pats, I continually noticed that DTs do very well against them. Those would be Marcus Stroud & Kyle Williams this week. Each very even with Stroud at 22 tackles and 2 sacks and K. Williams at 24 tackles and 1 sack.

DE Dewayne White for Detroit continues his red hot FF streak picking up an INT of all things this last week. Jacksonville's O line has been terrible and plagued with injuries all year. So. he should be able to continue his FF streak

Speaking of red hot, keep an eye on Cleveland DT Shaun Rogers for week 10. It's a short week with them playing this Thursday and his ribs are really hurting.