XFL Week 3: What We Learned

Week 3 of XFL football is behind us, and it was a week with some strange things. The Wildcats being up 27-0 at one point against the Defenders? Tampa having a shot against Houston? The New York Guardians scoring just nine points?

Wait, nevermind, that last one was something we probably all expected based on how this league has gone.

Every week, I'll be bringing you some thoughts on how the previous weekend's games went, plus a few fantasy risers and fallers. Let's get going.

Houston Roughnecks 34 - Tampa Bay Vipers 27

The P.J. Walker/Cam Phillips connection is on fire

Walker -- who'd probably earn my vote for XFL MVP through three weeks if I was asked to vote on that -- is the big story in Houston, but maybe the real story should be how dominant wide receiver Cam Phillips has been.

In Week 1, Phillips hinted at what he'd become, catching four of his eight targets for 67 yards and a touchdown, but Week 2 was his real breakout, as the former Virginia Tech star caught eight passes for 63 yards and three touchdowns.

Well, if Week 2 was the breakout, Week 3 was the moment that Phillips planted his flag and screamed "I'M THE LEAGUE'S BEST RECEIVER."

The numbers: eight catches. 194 yards. Three touchdowns. Phillips just seemed to constantly be where the football was and the Tampa Bay defense just couldn't stop him. His touchdowns came on plays of 84, 24, and 17 yards, as Phillips showed off his big play ability. The touchdowns should drop off just based on math and all of that, but his role in this pass-happy offense shouldn't fall off.

This Tampa Bay quarterback battle is weird

That's a good way of saying it.

With Aaron Murray (foot) missing a second consecutive game, the Vipers turned to Taylor Cornelius as the starter once again. And after he was extremely uneven in Week 2 -- 16-for-27 for 154 yards and two interceptions -- many wondered by the team wasn't turning to Quinton Flowers, the former South Florida quarterback who's mainly been used as a gadget player for the Vipers.

Cornelius got off to another poor start and Flowers came in, leading Tampa to a second quarterback touchdown drive that was capped off by him rushing for a seven-yard score. Flowers finished the day with 29 rushing yards while going 4-for-6 for 51 yards as a passer.

The low attempt number should clue you into something else that transpired: Cornelius came back in and ended up taking the vast majority of snaps at QB. He was 16-for-31 for 193 yards and a touchdown while also adding six carries for 33 yards and a score, but Cornelius also ended his team's day with an interception.

In season-long fantasy leagues where you can just own the entire "Tampa Bay QB" room as a single player, Saturday's game was encouraging, as both guys showed promise at times. But for DFS players who don't have that luxury, it's hard to make sense of this. Flowers looks better most of the time, but Cornelius is getting chances, and Murray could return soon, and...well, it's tough to make sense of what happens next. Could that interception lead to more snaps for Flowers? Will Murray come back and take full control of the position, turning Flowers into a Wildcat QB? The short answer to that: I don't know, and that's why I'd steer clear of this team's passers in your DFS lineups.

Dallas Renegades 24 - Seattle Dragons 12

More slow starts for Dallas

The Renegades offense is better now that Landry Jones is the quarterback, but it continues to get off to incredibly slow starts before picking things up in the second half.

I think the "why" of this is easy to figure out. A new offense takes time to get going, and Jones has to settle into a rhythm and figure out defenses that he's never seen before. Offenses are at a disadvantage early in a new football league, and the team's that have had the best sustained success have been teams whose passers are more dynamic than Jones and can get outside the pocket and alter the defense. They've got the kind of gravity that Jones doesn't have, which means Dallas needs Jones to be more perfect as a pure passer than other teams need their QBs to be. It takes time to get things right.

That said, the second half performances by this team have been strong, and it's fair to extrapolate from that and say this team should start to get off to better openings as well. We also haven't seen Jeff Badet's game-breaking speed yet, so this offense still has a lot of room to grow.

Seattle starts passing more

In Week 2, Seattle's three running backs combined for 31 carries. This week, that number dropped to 22. Now, playing from behind in the second half factored into that, but it also seems like Seattle might be realizing that running the ball isn't going to be their path to success.

Which is...a problem for a team that was built to run the ball. They don't have the pass-game personnel that other teams have, with Austin Proehl and Keenan Reynolds being the only guys you'd consider "threats" at receiver, and Brandon Silvers targeted running backs in the passing game 10 times, so it's not like the team is going to abandon trying to get those players involved.

That said, we can probably fade these three backs at this point. The committee approach has hurt Ja'Quan Gardner more than the other two, but as a whole this is becoming a backfield that's impossible to predict because the opportunities in that backfield seem to be trending down.

St. Louis Battlehawks 29 - New York Guardians 9

Christine Michael finally gets going

Through the first two weeks, it would have been fair to call Christine Michael the most disappointing non-quarterback in the XFL. In Week 1, he had zero yards on seven attempts. A week later, his 15 carries resulted in 38 yards, which is not very good.

His per play yardage numbers didn't really improve too much in Week 3, especially if you take his 14-yard touchdown out of the mix, but overall Michael finally looked like a competent rusher, finishing with 44 yards and a score on 13 carries. That touchdown was a fun one:

Look, Michael's running style isn't ideal for this league, but after looking as bad as he did at times over the first two weeks, it's good to see him make some things happen this week, even if he's still not living up to the preseason hype that made some take him very early in fantasy drafts. (Hi, it's me, a person who took Michael at 1.01.)

New York used three different quarterbacks

You know that old saying about a picture being worth 1000 words?

Yeah, here's my commentary on the Guardians:

Uhh, Perez did well!

Los Angeles Wildcats 39 - D.C. Defenders 9

Oh, THIS is what Josh Johnson can do

Los Angeles came into this game at 0-2, but they utterly dominated the 2-0 D.C. Defenders. The defense should get a lot of the credit for that, but since we're focusing on offense here, let's talk Josh Johnson.

After missing Week 1, Johnson made his XFL debut last week and looked rusty, going 18-for-34 for 185 yards, though he did throw a pair of touchdowns.

Johnson built on that performance this week, going 18-for-25 for 278 yards and tossing three touchdowns. He found a strong rapport with Tre McBride in McBride's XFL debut, got Martez Carter involved, and helped L.A. control the pace of the game. This offense is apparently capable of fireworks, though McBride left the game after taking a big hit, so we'll have to see if he's good to go.

Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

So, the Defenders scored one touchdown -- a run by Nick Brossette -- and Cardale Jones threw four interceptions and had head coach Pep Hamilton feeling...not great about things:

Nothing went right. Jones seemed to be off target with all of his throws, which makes it a surprise that he completed half of them. The running game put up some good numbers in terms of yards per carry, but when you allow 39 points, running doesn't help you win games. Khari Lee was the leading receiver for the Defenders with three catches for 38 yards.

Did the league figure out D.C., or was this just a fluke? It's a good question. Hamilton knows how to coach. Jones has the talent to make this offense soar. But you can't not be worried after watching this performance, so I'd probably add a good bit of volatility into your projections for D.C. players in Week 4.

XFL Risers and Fallers

RISER: Jalen Tolliver (WR, Tampa Bay Vipers)

Tampa's passing game is finally coming to life, and on Saturday we saw Tolliver take a pretty big step forward. He caught eight of his 13 targets for 104 yards, and had more targets and catches in Week 3 than he had in Week 1 and Week 2 combined. Part of that was improved play from Taylor Cornelius, but another part might simply be that Tolliver -- who led Division II in touchdown catches as a Senior at Arkansas-Monticello -- is a very good wide receiver. I'm a little worried the impending addition of S.J. Green -- a dominant CFL receiver -- might impact Tolliver, but we also don't really know what Tolliver's role will end up being, so for now I'd still consider Tolliver a rising fantasy option.

RISER: Tre McBride (WR, Los Angeles Wildcats)

McBride's XFL debut saw him catch five passes for 109 yards and a pair of scores, and his six targets led the team. Now, McBride did leave the game in the second half after taking a hard hit and I don't believe he returned -- he at least wasn't targeted the rest of the game -- so that could play a factor going forward. But if healthy, McBride is a talented receiver who arguably should have earned a roster spot in Jacksonville this past season, and with Nelson Spruce drawing coverage, McBride has the room to continue growing into the 1B to Spruce's 1A role.

FALLER: Jeff Badet (WR, Dallas Renegades)

As mentioned above, Badet's speed was supposed to make him a major threat in the Hal Mumme-coached offense for the Renegades, but that just hasn't been the case. Through three games, Badet has 11 catches for 72 yards, with 53 of those yards coming in Week 2. This week, he caught two of his four targets, finishing with 13 yards. He's going to break off a big play eventually, but the picture we've got of him through three games suggests that his floor is extremely low and his ceiling is still a hypothetical thing.

FALLER: Mekale McKay (WR, New York Guardians)

One of the receivers I was most excited about coming into this season, the Guardians's mess of a quarterback room as really hurt McKay. His yardage has dropped each week, from 58 to 30 to this week's one-catch, 17-yard outing in which he was targeted just twice. Maybe Luis Perez takes over at quarterback and is able to get things on track, but I'm not sure that's something I'd be comfortable betting on.

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