Fantasy Football Week 1 Hot Takes: Sammy Watkins already a bust?

Chris Towers checks the biggest storylines of the weekend in his first round of hot takes

The NFL lends itself to overreactions.

Because the season is so short and the sample sizes so small, there isn't nearly as much room for reasonable, measured takes.

That doesn't mean you should run around like a chicken with your head cut off, panicking over everything that doesn't go your way every week. However, with only one game in the books (for 28 of the 32 NFL teams, at least), 6.3 percent of the season is now behind us.

From a Fantasy perspective, it's more extreme: 1/13 of the Fantasy regular season is in the books.

Fantasy Football might be a space where overreacting has value. In baseball or basketball, I wouldn't even think about the results of the first week, but I'm going to have multiple waiver wire offers out in every football league this week.

Of course, not every reaction after one week is right. You have to find a balance between overreacting on the one hand --"Tom Brady is finished!" -- and identifying the start of a trend --"Peyton Manning is actually finished!" If you can separate the signal from the noise, you can get an early edge.

With that in mind, let's look at some of the overreactions that might be going around the Fantasy world right now, and figure out whether they might not be.

"Sammy Watkins is already a bust"

If Watkins had just had the bad game Sunday, you could write it off. You don't want to see one of your top wide receivers held to 43 yards on four catches, but I don't expect anyone is freaking out about Brandon Marshall right now either. However, Watkins' poor performance came on the heels of a report his surgically repaired foot is not 100 percent healthy, and was then followed up by Monday's bombshell report that he might need to be shut down for several weeks because of ongoing discomfort. Watkins already was a risk coming into the season, given how often we see players suffer setbacks with foot injuries, but it's a bad sign that he couldn't make it through one game without the issue flaring up. Even if Watkins can manage the pain and play through this injury, it feels like only a matter of time until he goes down. Watkins looks like one of the biggest risks these days, and someone who might not go in the top-25 at the position if we were drafting right now.

"Andrew Luck and Aaron Rodgers are back!"

The top two quarterbacks in Fantasy scoring in 2014 struggled through rough 2015 seasons for different reasons. Rodgers lacked weapons in the passing game and Luck couldn't stay healthy -- in part thanks to the porous protection the Colts provided him. Based on talent, these two are easily in the top four at their position, and Week 1 was a nice reminder of what they can do with some help. Rodgers finished seventh at the position in Fantasy scoring with Jordy Nelson back -- even in a somewhat limited form -- and Luck finished second, racking up 385 yards and four touchdowns on 47 passes. I'm a bit more concerned about Luck than Rodgers, if only because it is a lot to ask Luck to stay healthy while throwing as much as he is going to have to on this team. Still, both looked a lot like their best-case scenarios in Week 1, and you should feel very good about having drafted either early.

"Jameis Winston is an elite quarterback"

In terms of talent, there's no question Winston could be elite before long. And we got a glimpse of that Sunday, as he surgically dismantled the Falcons. He was pressured on only 10 of his 34 dropbacks against a subpar pass rush, completing six, including one of his four touchdowns. He was 3 for 5 on deep passes for 102 yards and two touchdowns, including an absolutely gorgeous strike to Austin Seferian-Jenkins on this 30-yard touchdown:

Perfect throw from @jaboowins.
CRAZY @aesj88 catch.@tbbuccaneers TD! #TBvsATLhttps://t.co/GmTK0qWUH0

— NFL (@NFL) September 11, 2016

Even if it wasn't the toughest matchup for Winston, he didn't exactly dominate the Falcons last season -- he went 34 for 56 with 404 yards, two touchdowns and one interception in two games. He was arguably the most impressive passer in the league in Week 1. The biggest obstacle for Winston might be his schedule, as he faces the Cardinals, Rams, Broncos and Panthers the next four weeks. Winston's got the talent to be a top-5 Fantasy quarterback, but he might not show it consistently until the second half of the season.

"Tevin Coleman is the RB to own in Atlanta"

Coleman and Devonta Freeman actually kind of switched roles Sunday, with Coleman as the much more impressive Falcons back in the passing game, after making little impact there. The question is, was this just the Falcons taking advantage of the Bucs' scouting for Freeman in the passing game, or an actual example of their game plan moving forward? At the very least, Coleman showed enough in Week 1 to be worth owning in all Fantasy leagues.

"A.J. Green is this year's DeAndre Hopkins"

That is to say Green will be force fed targets the way Hopkins was last season (111 catches, 1,521 yards). The only problem is, this may be underselling Green. He might get close to the target volume Hopkins did last season, but he will be getting them from a much better quarterback, something Andy Dalton proved Sunday in dominating the Jets' pass defense. Green caught 12 of 13 passes thrown his way for 180 yards, and should continue to see a healthy number of targets as the leader of a thin receiving corps. He might challenge his 2013 career-high in targets of 178, and he finished as the No. 4 wide receiver that season in both standard and PPR formats. Green can get a bit forgotten when discussing the NFL's best wide receivers, but don't be surprised if he storms the party again this season.

"Adrian Peterson is this year's Marshawn Lynch"

The question isn't whether Peterson will run out of steam, but how long he will be able to hold it off. Peterson once again led the league in rushing yards and touchdowns last season as a 30-year-old, but he also needed 327 carries to do so, the third-most of his career. Running backs rarely age gracefully, and Lynch was a fine example of that; he led the NFL in rushing touchdowns in 2013 and 2014, while averaging 4.4 yards per attempt and 80.1 yards per game over those two seasons, but he struggled through a miserable, injury-riddled season that saw him average just 3.8 yards per carry last season. Peterson has earned the benefit of the doubt after one game, especially since he had only 31 yards in last season's opener before racking up 160 the next two games. I would still bet on Peterson as a top-five running back, but at 31 years old, it wouldn't be a huge surprise if he hits the wall; that's why you drafted Jerick McKinnon, right?

"Coby Fleener is already a bust"

From 2011 through 2015, the Saints had a tight end post at least 825 yards in each season; Ben Watson did it last season, preceded by four straight seasons of elite production by Jimmy Graham. Fleener falls somewhere between Graham and a 35-year-old Watson on the talent spectrum, and he was a popular breakout pick in an offense that has dedicated 8.4 targets per game to its primary tight end over the past five seasons. However, Fleener was nearly shut out in the opener, catching only one of the four passes Drew Brees threw his way for only 6 yards. If you take away six passes Brees either threw away or spiked to stop the clock, he attempted 36 passes Sunday, and completed 28. That means three of his eight incomplete passes were thrown Fleener's way. That isn't a great sign. No, Fleener isn't a bust after one week. But, on a day when seemingly everything was going right for Brees and the passing game, the fact Fleener couldn't get going isn't super promising.