FanHouse Devery Henderson

Every Tuesday night, we'll give you an update on our FanHouse fantasy football league. Who hit on their sleepers? Who made the shrewd pickups? Who's practicing what they preach? In 'House Check, you'll find out.

I hope all of you readers scored wins in your first week of fantasy football. I wasn't so lucky, as I squared off against Ryan Dembinsky, the top scorer in Week 1. Ryan rode a 38-point performance from the Eagles defense/special teams (five sacks, five interceptions, two fumbles, two TDs) to a resounding Week 1 victory and laid early claim to being the best team in the league. Big ups to Ryan.

Did the injury bug hit your fantasy football team like it was a car windshield moving at 100 MPH? If so, it may be time to do some Damage Control.

Quarterback

Donovan McNabb, Eagles - McNabb fractured a rib in Sunday's game against the Panthers and was originally thought to surely miss a game, maybe two. It appears now that McNabb can do no more damage to the rib by playing. Nobody is sure of his status for Week 2, but, if he can withstand the pain you'd better believe that he'll give it a try. You can't cut McNabb. If he decides that he cannot play, you're just going to have to run with your QB2 for the time being.

Sunday Evening Wrap checks out players who increased or decreased their value during the Sunday afternoon games.

We all know that every case is different, but value machine should generally be used by owners who enjoy making trades. If a player's stock is high, you shouldn't be trading for him. If a guy's stock is low, you should either trade for him or hold on to him. Obviously, every situation is unique, and that's why we'll discuss each guy.

Biggest : Cadillac Williams. Didn't you hear? He's back ... and apparently better than ever. Caddy's knees have gone through hell and high water, and Sunday he showed the same burst we saw at Auburn. The Cowboys run defense isn't bad, but Williams sliced through it for 97 yards and a score on just 13 carries. Expect another good game next week when the Bucs face the Bills.

With Fantasy Football season ready to kick in high gear, FanHouse is here to preview each and every team -- one per day until we've done them all.

Meet the...
League's highest scoring, most powerful offense. Who cares if they don't make the playoffs. As fantasy owners we couldn't care less if the Saints are 0-16 or 16-0. We want lots of positive yardage plays and lots of touchdowns. And those are things the Saints offer in droves. Drew Brees has replaced Tom Brady and Peyton Manning as the most prolific fantasy quarterback and head coach Sean Payton keeps the Saints high-powered offense burning away. Last season the team threw the ball 62% of the time. Don't expect that to change too much in 2009.

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Reggie Bush is a very unique individual when it comes to his impact on an offense. Even when Tom Brady went down, the Patriots were plugging in a backup to the same position. Obviously, Matt Cassel isn't near the QB Brady is, so the ripples felt through the team and league were significant. The point is, though, that the offense didn't change.

With Bush going down, the entire offensive complexion of the Saints is forced to change, because the dynamic Bush impacts the game on every play. Even when he doesn't touch the ball, the defense must pay attention to him. That element is now going to be missing from the Saints offense for at least the next two games.

So what does Sean Payton do? Does he try to plug Aaron Stecker -- the most comparable player left on the roster -- into the Bush-role? The defense doesn't exactly jump to Stecker the way they would Bush. The other option is to run a traditional offense until Bush gets back. Deuce McAllister would jump into the feature back role, with Pierre Thomas available to spell him, and Stecker picking up third and long duties.

Value Machine checks out the overall perceived value of fantasy players. If you want to commit a fantasy felony, you'll sell high on the up arrow guys and buy low on the down arrow guys.

Well, that sucked. I'm not one to hide my mistakes, so I'll link the post where I pleaded with fantasy owners to not bench Calvin Johnson. He awarded owners with less than three measly points. Hey, I stand by my reasons. The Bears had been awful against the pass, Nathan Vasher was going to sit, and Charles Tillman was even questionable. So what happened? The Bears defense just physically dominated the Lions offense. Maybe they were tired of giving up passing yards and stepped up their game. Maybe Jon Kitna was too teary-eyed after the departure of Matt Millen. Whatever the reason, Johnson's fantasy owners suffered along with Lions fans in Week 5.

If you stumble across an irrational Johnson owner, now is the time to strike. He's uber-talented and the Lions are always going to be playing from behind. You'll see many more 15-plus point weeks over what you saw last week. Go get him.

Drew Brees has had to deal with losing two of his best receiving options -- Jeremy Shockey and Marques Colston -- early on this season, but the stats are looking quite sparkling thus far. Will it continue? In a word, yes.

Brees carved up the Broncos for 421 yards through the air, with a wildly efficient 39 completions in 48 attempts. His most reliable option has been Reggie Bush out of the backfield, and the losses of Colston and Shockey aren't going to do anything to change that. The reason is that the Saints -- through the offensive scheme of Sean Payton and horizontal field-stretching ability of Bush -- can make a weapon out of nearly any receiver. You know Terrance Copper? Well, you wouldn't had he played for any other team.

Moving forward, you can expect Brees to remain an elite QB in fantasy and in reality. He's facing the Niners at home this week, so I'm calling for at least 300 yards and multiple TD passes.

Let's check out the impact on some other players:

Value Machine checks the current value of non-obvious names -- no Tony Romo or Brian Westbrook here -- for owners looking to scope out the trade market.

For the record, the most egregious thing about Ed Hochuli's snafu is being overlooked by everyone. I officiate high school -- I understand I'm far less qualified to complain than an NFL official, but this does make me more qualified than someone sitting at their computer claiming the "refs cheated" -- and the worst part about the call was the fact that the ball went backwards. Even if Hochuli thought, in real time, Jay Cutler's arm went forward, the ball still went backwards. A backwards pass is a loose ball. How the referee can't see that from even with the QB is beyond me. People keep talking about the whistle, but it's not acceptable to blow it there. I still respect him as an official, because human error is part of the game. Human error like this, though, shouldn't happen in such a high level game.

Even without the extra points, that he never should have accrued, Cutler had another big game. With two young, studly receiving speedsters and a reliable tight end, this isn't likely to change anytime soon. This time, the Broncos actually played a legitimate defense. You don't want to expect around 30 points a week, but it's very reasonable to start expecting 20. Jay Cutler is your top for week two.

When a receiver owned by nearly 98 percent of people goes down unexpectedly, it might not have the Tom Brady implications, but it sure can rattle your cage.

Saints Marques Colston will be out 4-6 weeks with a torn ligament in his thumb, which I heard isn't the greatest injury when your job is to actually catch the ball. With the Saints offense looking to rock like some predicted, this is a huge blow for most. So, while you wait a month before he gets back to Drew Brees' pattern boy, here are a few waiver heroes you should grab.

If you missed the Broncos Monday nighter against the Raiders, you probably have no clue who Eddie Royal is. The rookie receiver out of Virginia Tech looked to be Jay Cutler's guy, catching 9 balls for 146 yards and a touchdown, which equated to 22.5 fantasy points. He is probably the hottest waiver wire guy on the market right now, but is still only owned by 13 percent of fantasy teams on Fleaflicker. The only question will be the return of Brandon Marshall this week to the line-up. Marshall was suspended for the season opener but has proclaimed he will catch 9 or 10 balls a game, every game, this season. If that holds true (rolls eyes), then Royal will be second fiddle in Denver.