Giants @ Raiders Week 9 Game Preview
Jonathan Fuller breaks down the Week 9 matchup between the New York Giants and Las Vegas Raiders from a fantasy football and betting perspective.
New York Giants @ Las Vegas Raiders
The Las Vegas Raiders will look like a new team when they take the field against the Giants on Sunday.
The Raiders cleaned house this week, firing HC Josh McDaniels, GM Dave Ziegler, and OC Mick Lombardi. The team also announced that Aidan O’Connell will be starting at QB for this game and likely for the rest of the season.
The Raiders desperately need to turn things around after losing by double digits to the Bears and Lions in their last two games. and this attempt to shake things up can’t really make things worse, as the Raiders offense ranks among the worst in the NFL for both run and pass game efficiency.
This is a good week to make the change against a Giants team that hasn’t scored more than 16 points since Week 2.
The sample size is as small as it gets, but the target shares with O’Connell under center do paint an interesting picture that could point to bounceback weeks for Davante Adams and Josh Jacobs.
Both players are top-10 options at their position in the Fantasy Life consensus ranks. If you’re out on them for the rest of the season, this may be your opportunity to cash in via a trade if they have a big game on Sunday.
Michael Mayer is an okay dart throw at the TE position, but after a down week in Week 8, I would like to see him show some rapport with O’Connell before trusting him in a lineup.
For the Giants, the main stories are injury-related, as the team is expected to get Daniel Jones back but will be without Darren Waller, who re-injured his hamstring last week.
The good news for the Giants' offense is that they have a good matchup against a Raiders defense that has given up boatloads of points to the RB positions, something the Giants should be able to exploit.
Saquon Barkley is one of the top RB plays of the week after he had 39 touches last week in a loss to the Jets. He’s the only player from New York that you can really be excited to start on Sunday.
No one has stood out among the Giants WRs this season, with the highest target share sitting at just 14%. Rookie Jalin Hyatt has shown some brief flashes of his big play ability but has not commanded enough targets to give him any kind of floor for fantasy purposes.
Hope is fading quickly for the Giants season, and a loss to the Raiders would probably be the final nail in the coffin. The Raiders are 1.5-point home favorites, so this game is close to a toss-up, tough scenes for a Giants team that had high hopes coming into 2023.
With a game total of 37 and two teams that will want to lean on their run game, this game is unlikely to deliver much excitement. If you’ve got Saquon, Josh Jacobs, or Davante Adams, I would recommend just putting them in your lineup and checking the box score after the game is over.