Gary Dickman’s special guest on today’s Rivals Fantasy Football Show was Heath Cummings, Senior Fantasy Sports Writer for CBS Sports. Cummings is also an analyst on “Fantasy Football Today.” Here are some of his expert observations and projections:

With Andrew Luck’s retirement, all Colts RBs and WRs have been downgraded. TY Hilton, for example, was considered a WR2. Now Cummings has him no better than a WR3. Says that, with Jacoby Brissett at QB, he doesn’t see Hilton catching more than 5 TDs. (He’s never had more than 7; hasn’t had more than 6 since 2014.)

Ezekiel Elliott is in his Top 15 players. Cummings projects Elliott to get about 16 touches and a TD this week against a poor Giants team.

With Melvin Gordon still holding out on the Chargers, Cummings says Austin Ekeler is a solid option for fantasy players. He does expect Gordon to eventually report to the team, but not until Week 9 or 10. No progress has been made at all between Gordon and the Chargers.

Cummings loves David Montgomery’s talent and sees him as his top rookie RB. (Note: Bears head coach Matt Nagy was today quoted as saying the coaching staff is “pinching ourselves” over Montgomery’s talent and attitude.

Jarvis Landry is on a downward slope. Last season, when Freddie Kitchens took over as offensive coordinator, Landry’s targets dropped to 6.6 per game. Expect the trend to continue with the addition of Odell Beckham, Jr.

Cummings has New England’s James White on his “bust” list. The receiver saw a lot of targets last year with the absence of Julian Edelman. With Edelman’s return and a bolstered receivers unit, expect White to have fewer opportunities.

He predicts QBs Matt Ryan and Drew Brees will be busts this year. Cummings suggests Brees’ gaudy numbers in 2018 were an outlier – 6.5% TD rate was his highest since 2011 and his 4 rushing TDs were a career high – and his fantasy production will disappoint when his numbers “normalize.” He also expects Ryan to have a down year compared to last season, when Atlanta’s defense was riddled with injuries and (as a result) Ryan’s pass attempts went way up (79 more than 2017).

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