Every Week 1 Matchup to Exploit and Avoid | 2026 Fantasy Football

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Brian Drake (0:31)

Every gameday, you show up for your team. Now, it's your time.

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John Hansen (1:30)

Hey, what's up? Week one is here and so are we with the Fantasy Points Podcast. Brian Drake and I break down all the Sunday, Monday matchups. We have popped out for every game. One player slash matchup to exploit and one player slash matchup to avoid. We do touch on some other players, but that is the crux of it. Give you a quick look at some actionable data from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. Good luck with all your leagues and your plays in week one. Make sure you are continuing to subscribe. Throw us a bone with a favorable review or comment. We'd appreciate it and you're welcome.

Brian Drake (2:21)

All across the Fantasy Universe, welcome to week one of the 2026 NFL season. We're here to preview all the action on the Fantasy Points Podcast. Brian Drake alongside the guru, John Hansen, owner, publisher, the man at fantasypoints.com. John, I'm so excited. We've been talking for months, it seems, about who to pick up, how to draft, who to craft your lineup around. Now we've got those players. We're putting them into our lineups, and we can make some smart decisions based on the fantasypoints.com projections and your expert insight. You excited, my friend, for week one?

John Hansen (3:00)

Well, I was excited until Brock Bowers broke my heart about a week ago. But yeah, other than Brock Bowers, everyone's ready to rock and roll. But yeah, I am excited.

You know, I'm preparing for some serious ugliness. But, you know, thanks to Fantasy Points data, you know, we've got some some good information, even though we're obviously going off a lot of last year's stuff. But this year, by the way, I'm sure you're going to get into it. As opposed to going through every single game and talking about every single player, that's just I mean, that goes on and on and on. And by the way, it's I'm going to need through Friday to get a complete grip on it. But what we've decided to do is for every matchup, we're going to isolate one specific matchup to exploit and one to avoid. So I've done like the the first run, if you will, look through the matchups with some key players. So we've got some big names here that we'll talk about that we're not exactly feeling here in week number one. I hate to hate to say things like, you know, bench your drafted number two wide receiver in week one. But we might actually say that in a case or two.

Brian Drake (4:16)

And we want you to go over to fantasypoints.com, utilize promo code DS2. That stands for Data Suite 2, because we dropped Data Suite 2 and that will save you, let's call it 10%. Could be 15 I don't have the copy in front of me. We're going to wing it right now, but it's going to save you money on a subscription over at fantasypoints.com. Code DS2 at checkout. And then you can get John's full breakdown that will be up on Saturday. This podcast will record every Thursday. It will be up on Friday morning for you folks all throughout the fantasy season. We're going to lean heavily on Tom Brawley's Game Hub that he posts every week.

Ryan Heath provides us some insight for the podcast. And we're going to just whatever we can pull from all the super smart guys at fantasypoints.com to give you guys an edge. All right, John, well, let's dive in there. First game on the docket, Chicago Bears at the Carolina Panthers. Bears are three point favorites. The total line here is 46 and a half. And you're looking to exploit in this matchup Luther Burden, which is going to be music to the ears of people who are scooping him up in the fourth or fifth round all summer.