Top daily fantasy football quarterback plays for Week 9

Welcome to Week 9 of the Daily Fantasy season. Pricing has stabilized as trends have emerged, but there are still bargains to be found and even some higher-priced options that will go under-owned and can make a difference in your lineups. This article looks at some of the projected lesser-owned plays at quarterback who could provide huge boosts to your tournament lineups, as well as some trap plays to avoid.

The most popular pick in all of Daily Fantasy this weekend is Ezekiel Elliott, who should run all over the pitiful Browns defense from beginning to end. But the Browns’ defense is equal opportunity when it comes to getting roasted, allowing three touchdown passes virtually every week this season. Prescott is going to have all day to throw and should be able to freeze the Browns with play action. It all adds up to an avalanche of offense and with enough bargains elsewhere, a Prescott-Elliott stack makes great sense to capture all the Dallas TDs.

There’s no denying that Mariota has been one of the hottest quarterbacks in fantasy over the past four weeks, throwing for 10 touchdown passes against just one interception. Kendall Wright has really stepped up as an outside target to complement Delanie Walker over the middle and now Derrick Henry is emerging as a pass-catching back in relief of DeMarco Murray. The Chargers’ pass defense has improved with Joey Bosa in the fold, but it is still beatable and Mariota remains a low-owned option despite his great recent play.

Big Ben is back and he should be back big. The Steelers receiving corps is as healthy as its been all season and Ben should be throwing the ball all day in a highly competitive game. It wasn’t all that long ago that Roethlisberger burned the Ravens for six touchdown passes in a game, and while that might be off the table this week, there’s no reason to think a 300-yard, 3-TD game is beyond his reach. His injury designation should keep his ownership depressed, which makes him an ideal tournament play.

Garbage Time Production. It is real and it counts just as much on the scoreboard as a first-quarter score. Bortles was a GTP God last Thursday against the Titans, throwing for a pair of touchdowns in the final five minutes of a blowout to artificially inflate his point total. But guess what? If you played him, you happily took those points. You can be fairly confident the Jags will be playing most of Sunday’s game from behind, likely way behind, and that could open the door for a couple more “meaningless” touchdown drives that yield a nice haul of points. So bad, yet so good.

Did we mention the Chiefs will likely be way ahead in this game? Charcandrick West will account for some of it. The rest falls to Foles, who acquitted himself quite nicely last week against the Indianapolis Colts and now had a full week to prepare for a lousy Jags defense. At $6,800, Foles is a steal that no one will want to roster, making him about as perfect a tournament play as you will find.

This is not a knock on Carr, who has looked great lately and won people a lot of money last week with his blow-up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. But the Broncos are a whole other matter, and expecting Carr to repeat his recent success against the league’s best pass defense is probably not a great idea this time around.

Speaking of great defenses, the Vikings would like to remind everyone that they belong in the conversation after two weak efforts against the Philadelphia Eagles and Chicago Bears. Those were on the road. This game is at home and the Vikings are coming in wounded and angry. Not a great combination if you’re the opposing quarterback.