Evan Habeeb-USA TODAY Sports
We have seen it time and time again in our fantasy football days. A player goes down, and suddenly that handcuff a few forward thinking owners stashed becomes a key player for a chunk of the season. It happened with Mike James when Doug Martin went down, then Bobby Rainey when James dropped. It happened with Harry Douglas while Roddy White and Julio Jones struggled with injuries.
A few prognosticators recently have jumped off the Cincinnati Bengals D/ST bandwagon due to several injuries to key players like Ray Maualuga, Leon Hall and Geno Atkins. Instead of packing it in, the Bengals defense has taken it in stride and continued to dominate games. One of the players who has stepped up recently and is still off the radar of many fantasy owners is linebacker Vincent Rey (owned in seven percent of Yahoo! leagues).
After seeing limited snaps during the first eight weeks of the season and registering only eight and a half fantasy points, Rey played a decent game in week nine, registering five solo tackles and earning more snaps. In week 10, Rey went beast mode, recording 10 solo tackles, assisting on five more, three sacks, three passes defended and an interception en route to almost 35 fantasy points. In week 11, he combined on 12 tackles, and defended another pass while scoring 11.5 fantasy points.
This week the Bengals are on bye and Maualuga is expected to be ready to roll in week 13. Despite the threat of a split snap situation, Rey has shown that he deserves an increased role. In week 13, the Bengals travel to take on the San Diego Chargers. Currently the Chargers are allowing the eighth most fantasy points per game to linebackers. With the Bengals on bye, not many owners will be targeting Rey, so he should be available without having to burn a waiver wire pick. While he has only been on a tear for two games, he has shown the potential to be an every down IDP linebacker.
As always, I welcome your comments. If you think I’m wrong, I’m willing to listen. Just back it up with some facts and solid evidence. Thanks for reading and good luck this season.
Dustin Manko is an author at Rant Sports.com. Follow him on Twitter @DustinManko, ”Like” him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google
Read more from Dustin here.
