Case Keenum 2019 Outlook: Serving Notice in Washington
6 years agoAfter a season in which Case Keenum led the Vikings to within one game of the Super Bowl the signal caller moved on to Denver and by most accounts had a bad season. While the record was not good, the stats were very similar.
In his magical 2017 season in Minnesota, Keenum completed 67.6% of his passes for 3,547 yards, with 22 touchdowns and seven interceptions. In his disappointing 2018 season, his completion percentage dropped to 62.3, but that was partly due to a higher workload for the quarterback. He completed 40 more passes on 105 more attempts. The real key to his miserable season fantasy wise was the drop in his touchdown production from 22 to 18, combined with his increase in mistakes throwing 15 interceptions, up from the seven in 2017. With his increase in completions also came an increase in yardage moving up to 3,890 last seasons. Another key factor were his receiving weapons. In 2017 he had the likes of Stefan Diggs and Adam Thielen catching the ball. Not to mention a monster season from Kyle Rudolph. In Denver he had Demaryius Thomas and Emmanuel Sanders for half a season. Besides this, he had a mixture of rookies in Courtland Sutton, Daesean Hamilton, and Tim Patrick. That is not quite the same, and it had essentially led us to this point and Washington.
This season is not even a guarantee of a starting job for Keenum. The Redskins drafted Dwayne Haskins in the first-round and in all but very few cases a rookie QB with start sooner not later. If Keenum does win the job and keep it, he is still in for a heap of trouble.
Jamison Crowder and Maurice Harris are both gone from the team, leaving Trey Quinn and Paul Richardson as the veteran presence. Not a pretty situation. Running back Derrius Guice is hopefully making his return, but this does nothing for the passing game. Much like Adrian Peterson, Guice is a two-down back with not much to offer in the passing game. Chris Thompson is supposedly healthy, and this could be a good thing. But how long will he remain healthy? He is an elite pass catcher, but he is also constantly hurt and unreliable, which makes him hard to count on when it comes to projections of the team. Jordan Reed and Vernon Davis could provide some solid production at the tight end position between them, but a tight end alone does not make a fantasy viable quarterback.
Whether it be the Case Keenum show or Dwayne Haskins is the man, neither is a good option for redraft leagues. Haskins is, of course, a second-round pick in dynasty drafts but as for any other league format the Washington QB position should be ignored.