Buffalo Bills fantasy football preview, Week 13: an interesting match-up

When the Buffalo Bills host the New England Patriots on Sunday, they’ll do so with an opportunity to further their playoff hopes. The operative words in that sentence, of course, are “chances” and “hopes,” as it will take a phenomenal all-around performance to knock off the defending Super Bowl champions. After their defensive unit started off the season looking like an absolute disaster, they have come on strong in recent weeks. As a result, their fantasy football points against numbers are a bit skewed overall. Which Buffalo Bills are worth a look in what is probably the last week of your fantasy football regular season?

RB LeSean McCoy

Buffalo’s lead rusher was stifled last week against the Kansas City Chiefs, rushing 22 times for 49 yards on what was a frustrating afternoon. He has performed well in his career as a Bill against New England, rushing 54 times for 241 yards and a touchdown in three games; he also has 15 receptions for 106 yards and an additional touchdown over that time frame. If he’s on your team, he’s in your lineup, and even though the Patriots have limited opposing running backs fairly regularly this season (blowups to Kareem Hunt and Melvin Gordon notwithstanding), Shady should remain a fantasy starter for the week.

WR Zay Jones

Buffalo’s levitating rookie wide receiver has had a nice stretch of games over the past three. Jones has a solid matchup this week against a New England secondary that allows the 4th-most fantasy points to wide receivers in 2017. Even though the Patriots’ secondary has settled down since allowing 300-yard passers in each of the first six games, they still have allowed seven receivers to score double-digit fantasy points since week seven. With the focus sure to be on LeSean McCoy, the outsides may be open enough for Jones to continue his hot streak.

TE Charles Clay

The Bills’ dynamic tight end has been slowed by a knee injury suffered in Buffalo’s Week 5 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals, but he showed some signs of coming back last week. He caught a long pass to open the second half that very well could have been intercepted, and finished the day with four catches for 60 yards. The Patriots’ defense is league-average in fantasy points allowed to tight ends, sitting at 14th overall, but Clay is the kind of athlete that could give any team trouble. Without Kelvin Benjamin this week, expect Tyrod Taylor to target Clay early and often.

Miscellaneous

Even though the Bills’ defense rebounded nicely last week, I’d wait until the game against the Indianapolis Colts in Week 14 to play them... Stephen Hauschka is as a good a bet as any for the Bills to score some fantasy points. If you have him, or you’re looking for a kicker to stream, expect a good day... Even if Mike Tolbert is healthy, I’m hoping that the coaching staff continues to use Travaris Cadet to spell LeSean McCoy... Yahoo! projects Tyrod Taylor as QB13 on the week, and while the matchup looks good on paper, New England has been much tougher on opposing quarterbacks over the last six weeks. Hopefully, Taylor and the rest of Buffalo’s spare change combines for a few dollars on Sunday.