Fantasy Football Cut-N-Go: Tyler Thigpen Makes Sense for Miami

Cut-N-Go is Fantasy Football FanHouse's weekday roundup of the NFL news with fantasy football impact.

When Chad Pennington went down Sunday with a season-ending shoulder injury, an injury that may end his NFL career as well, the Miami Dolphins felt they had to scramble a bit.

Backup quarterback Chad Henne will step up and take the reigns, but the Dolphins felt that Pat White wasn't ready to be the backup just yet. To remedy this issue Miami made a trade for Tyler Thigpen, who will come in and be Henne's backup. Armando Salguero of the Miami Herald feels that this move may make Pat White obsolete.

Thigpen is better at running the spread than White has shown to be. Thigpen can run. He can even catch passes. Just check out the video below.

What I'm telling you is once he learns the offense, expect him to compete with White to be the spread package QB. And given his experience and, frankly, better arm, expect Thigpen not White to be the guy running the spread if it continues.

None of these three quarterbacks should be on any fantasy football roster, not at this point in the season. But, with Henne running the show, there are a few other players whose fantasy values will change.

Miami will most assuredly move towards a run-heavy offense for the next few weeks. Both Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams will benefit from these extra carries. Brown is generally owned in just about every league imaginable, but Williams is likely available in many leagues. He could make a nice speculative waiver-wire selection.

Even though Henne will likely be handing the ball off a lot, Ted Ginn Jr. could also really enjoy this quarterback switch. Most people feel Ginn will show his true value with his ability to run the deep route -- a play that Pennington just couldn't handle with his limited arm strength. Arm strength isn't an issue for Henne as his arm is much stronger then Pennington's, which should lead to Ginn getting more opportunities to extend defensive secondaries.

Now Henne and Ginn must work to get on the same page and Ginn needs to fix his dropped-ball issues.

Other Fantasy Football Notes
• Matt Forte isn't making excuses for his less-than-stellar rushing numbers thus far. He says his hamstring isn't hurt and he's still running the same way he did last season. Forte also says that his running game will get back on track this week against Detroit. While that's probably likely, Vaughn McClure of the Chicago Tribune thinks that the Chicago running game won't improve until the offensive line improves.

• The Jets running game hasn't been as productive as many had hoped and the reason may be a new philosophy of using Thomas Jones and Leon Washington when they're running hot instead of focusing on their strong-suits within the running game.

• Brandon Jacobs and Ahmad Bradshaw have made a great 1-2 punch for the New York Giants at running back. Ralph Vacchiano of the New York Daily News says that he's not sure who's No. 1 anymore. Jacobs has 58 carries compared to 35 for Bradshaw but their yardage totals are almost identical -- 201 yards for Bradshaw and 196 for Jacobs.

• Willie Parker has turf toe and Rashard Mendenhall was benched from the offense due to lack of focus in practice for the Steelers. Ed Bouchette of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette speculates that Mewelde Moore could become more involved in the Pittsburgh offense this week.

• With only ten receptions for 62 yards Donnie Avery hasn't lit up fantasy scoreboards. Jim Thomas of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch thinks Avery was rusty entering the season due to his preseason foot injury and now he's pressing.

• Roy Cummings of The Tampa Tribune thinks that Michael Clayton took a step backwards as a receiver in Week 3 with two dropped passes and zero catches. Cummings also mentions that Clayton is best used as a downfield blocker.