Week 11 NFL Moneyline Underdogs
Mike Randle
Coming off the loss of starting quarterback Kirk Cousins to a torn Achilles Sunday, the Vikings made a last-minute pivot ahead of Tuesday’s trade deadline, trading for former Cardinals QB Joshua Dobbs, per NFL.com’s Ian Rapoport.
The 28-year-old Dobbs was a fourth-round pick of the Pittsburgh Steelers back in 2017. He’s bounced around the league, going from Pittsburgh to Jacksonville to Pittsburgh again to Cleveland to Detroit to Tennessee and back to Cleveland before a training camp trade this year landed him in Arizona. He had never started a game (and had only 17 career pass attempts) before Week 17 of last year, but he’s now started 10 straight games. His teams (Tennessee and Arizona) have gone 1-9 in his starts, but he’s put together 10 touchdowns against 7 interceptions, and he has 3 rushing touchdowns and 258 yards on the ground this season. So far in 2023, he’s QB12, with three top-seven weekly finishes.
Joshua Dobbs to Minnesota, Fantasy Impact
The Vikings were thrown into desperation mode Sunday after Cousins tore his Achilles. He was playing lights out on the season, but that injury obviously ends his 2023. The team had only Jaren Hall on the roster behind Cousins, with Sean Mannion on the practice squad and Nick Mullens on IR. There’s not a name in that sentence who was likely to (a) keep the Vikings’ strong momentum lately going or (b) support the offensive weapons (Jordan Addison, T.J. Hockenson and when-he-returns Justin Jefferson) as fantasy options, so the team had to look elsewhere.
Enter Dobbs, who has a shocking amount of recent history of showing up with little notice and at least not being a disaster — he was picked up by the Titans in Weeks 17 and 18 last year with only days’ notice and played well enough, then he was traded to the Cardinals only days before the season this year to do the same.
Dobbs isn’t likely to continue to perform as a borderline QB1, but then that was true no matter where he was. He’s not a fantasy factor in single-QB leagues by himself, but he is good enough to support Addison, Hockenson and Jefferson if and when he’s up to speed and they are on the field. Their ceilings all take a hit compared to where they were with Cousins, but Dobbs is a better option than Hall, Mannion or Mullens. (It is worth noting that the short turnaround for Week 9 means Dobbs might not be ready to start right away, but expect him to get the job no later than Week 10.)
Meanwhile, Dobbs had already lost his gig in Arizona, with the Cardinals announcing Monday that Clayton Tune or, if he’s ready, Kyler Murray would be the Week 9 starter. And now we know why. Dobbs was never going to be a blockade on Murray’s path when the veteran was ready to return, and now that’s even more clear.
