Week 4’s biggest surprise was no doubt Mitch Trubisky demolishing the Buccaneers for 354 yards and six touchdowns on his way to 43.5 fantasy points, after averaging just 11.3 points over the prior three games. Among other things, the week also brought us the re-emergence of Marcus Mariota (30.4 points), while the exciting but brief Ryan Fitzpatrick era came to an abrupt close (3.0 points) after FitzMagic was benched at halftime in a blowout loss to the Bears.
Fantasy player value can often change at a moment’s notice, so you never know when the next surprise will come, for better or for worse. That isn’t to say Trubisky and Mariota are suddenly 2018 fantasy saviors, but they’re looking a whole lot more interesting than they did a week ago, while Fitzpatrick’s value is toast with Jameis Winston already named the Bucs’ Week 6 starter. But the key is for us to know when to pounce, hold, or move on as things change through this crazy weekly game we play.
As always, let’s take a look at some other surprises, stats, and trends entering Week 5, and how they might affect your fantasy football teams moving forward.
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Julio Jones still hasn’t scored, while Calvin Ridley leads the league with six receiving touchdowns
We’re already through the first month of the season, and Julio Jones has as many NFL touchdowns as, well, my lazy cat. The cat did catch a mouse last week, though, so he probably has Jones beat in that category.
At any rate, instead it’s Calvin Ridley who’s hauled in six scores, not only leading the league, but already doubling Jones’ total from last season.
This appears to have led to some insane recency bias in the Twitterverse, but we have to remember that touchdowns continue to be the hardest thing to predict in football, especially in the case of wide receivers. Jones may not have all the glory, but he’s still far and away the top dog on this offense, leading the team with a 33% target market share (compared to Ridley’s 15%), along with a league-best 502 receiving yards and 713 air yards.
Now, if there’s anything to be a little worried about, it’s that Jones hasn’t seen any red zone targets since Week 1, remaining stuck on three ever since. But while that trails both Ridley (five) and Austin Hooper (four), we’re not talking about a massive discrepancy through four games, and in spite of Jones’ touchdown woes last year, it’s easy to forget he led the team with 19 red zone targets in 2017.
Yes, it’s frustrating, but don’t panic over this Jones and Ridley touchdown difference. Jones has still performed as a top-10 receiver in PPR leagues, and trust that those scores will come. I promise you he’ll have more touchdowns than my cat by season’s end.
Odell Beckham also has zero touchdowns through four weeks
While there’s been a lot of lamenting about Jones’ lack of touchdowns, outside of perhaps Giants fans, it doesn’t feel like there’s been quite as much talk about Odell Beckham, who also remains scoreless.
What makes his case slightly more concerning, though, is the play of Eli Manning. In Jones’ case, Matt Ryan is averaging the sixth-most passing yards per game (329) and has already tallied 10 passing touchdowns. On the other hand, Manning is averaging just the 18th-most yards per game (263.8) and only has four scores on his ledger. Manning has also taken the fourth-most sacks thus far (15), due at least in part to a shaky offensive line, and isn’t throwing deep to Beckham as often this season. It hasn’t just been the matchups, either, as last week Manning failed to do anything significant against a Saints team that’s been torched for the third-most passing yards and ranks dead-last against the pass in DVOA.
Of course, this being Beckham, he still leads the Giants with a strong 30% target market share and 44% air yards market share. Based on the volume and talent alone, he should eventually see his share of scores, but we’re going to need to see some improvement from Manning and this offense to feel confident about his ceiling. Stay the course, but the outlook is slightly less rosy than where we began the year.
Chris Hogan and Josh Gordon combine for just three targets and 57 yards in New England’s 38-7 win over Miami
In typical Patriots fashion, after looking like a dumpster fire against the Lions just a week earlier, they manhandled the Dolphins in a convincing “we’re back” 38-7 win at home in Week 4. Tom Brady looked more like himself, doling out 274 yards and a trio of touchdowns passes to James White, Phillip Dorsett, and Cordarrelle Patterson.
However, two guys who were noticeably absent from the festivities were Chris Hogan (again) and Josh Gordon. Hogan, arguably one of the biggest busts through four weeks, caught his lone target for 25 yards, while Gordon grabbed 2-of-2 for 32 yards.
In Hogan’s case, this may very well be the last straw for fantasy owners who have held on this long. With his 15 targets ranking just fourth on the team and Julian Edelman returning this week, it’s hard to see Hogan becoming a reliable fantasy factor again any time soon.
Gordon could eventually push Hogan further out of the fantasy picture, although this past week showed he’s still very much a work in progress. In addition to seeing just two targets, Gordon only played 6.8% of the snaps, so he clearly shouldn’t be in any lineups just yet. That said, he remains an enticing deep league lottery ticket if he can carve out a bigger role later in the year.
Mike Davis gets 25 touches and the Seahawks’ running game is a mess again
Chris Carson appeared to have the Seattle backfield locked down after logging 32 rushes in Week 3, but naturally, a hip injury held him out last week, promptly swinging the door back open.
While the obvious choice to walk through that door would be first-round draft pick, Rashaad Penny, he was once again passed up, with the bulk of the work going to Mike Davis instead. Davis, who logged 15-plus carries in three of his six games last year, would lead the way in Week 4 with 21 carries for 101 yards and two scores, while also catching 4-of-4 targets for 23 yards.
A performance like that certainly puts Davis on the radar, but with Carson expected back this week, a dreaded running back “rotation” has already been mentioned by Pete Carroll, which threatens to turn this entire situation into a fantasy wasteland again. Carson and Davis should both be on rosters to see how this all unfolds, but we’ve seen this charade from the Seahawks before, so you might not want to get your hopes up over the long haul. To make matters worse, the Seahawks are also home underdogs in a rough matchup against the Rams in Week 5.
Corey Davis achieves personal bests in targets (15), receptions (nine), and yards (161) in Week 4
Although Corey Davis was seeing reasonable volume over the first three weeks — with target totals of 13, seven, and four — 13 receptions for 151 scoreless yards was all he had to show for it.
But all that changed in Week 4, as Davis was without question the biggest beneficiary of Mariota’s strong performance, busting out for 161 yards and his first NFL touchdown off 9-of-15 targets — by far the best game of his young career.
Hopefully this is a sign of things to come, and Davis’ high usage in the passing game also remains encouraging. His 32% target market share and 42% air yards market share not only lead all Titans pass-catchers by a wide margin, but they’re elite marks overall. While the volume wasn’t resulting in fantasy production on a previously dormant offense, perhaps a now healthy Mariota can continue to tap into the potential of 2017’s fifth overall draft pick.
The Titans are road favorites over the hapless Bills in Week 5, which is a promising spot for this offense to keep the momentum going.
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Kenyatta Storin is a featured writer with FantasyPros. For more from Kenyatta, check out his archive and follow him @kenyattastorin.
