Need a break from a narrow fantasy loss, a one-sided rout or all those injuries piling up on a weekly basis? This is the place for you!
Here are 30 of the most interesting facts from around the fantasy football world entering Week 5:
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1. How about that Robert Tonyan? Big Bob became an instant superstar with three receiving TDs in the Green Bay Packers’ impressive Monday Night Football win over Atlanta. Tonyan has five touchdown receptions on the season – the most among all tight ends, and the most in history for any player who has seen 15 or fewer targets over the first four weeks of the season. Keep expectations in check, as his TD rate is bound to drop precipitously.
2. Let’s head in the opposite direction and see if we can’t find some positive touchdown regression candidates. We start at running back, where three players have 45+ carries but zero rushing scores to date:
Frank Gore (55)
David Montgomery (51)
Myles Gaskin (48)
We’re ignoring Gore and Gaskin here, since Gore is about to lose the bulk of his carries to Le’Veon Bell and Gaskin remains criminally underused inside the five-yard line. But Montgomery has to start finding the end zone, no? He’s averaging a respectable 4.1 YPC, and the Bears have had just three rushing plays inside the 10-yard line all season, a number that is bound to grow. If you can pry Montgomery away from his current manager, do it.
3. Meanwhile, four players have seen 30+ targets and have failed to find paydirt through the first four weeks:
A.J. Green (33)
D.J. Moore (31)
Julian Edelman (30)
Evan Engram (30)
Green appears to be a lost cause, and should start ceding more and more targets to rookie Tee Higgins. Moore has been a frustrating fantasy option throughout his career, with just six TDs in 35 games. Edelman has better days ahead, but Cam Newton isn’t a 35-TD passer. I’m most optimistic about Engram, though it would help if he would see more than one target inside the 10-yard line (his total for the season).
4. We just can’t get enough of Jordan Howard, who is staking his claim to being the greatest vulture in NFL history. While he didn’t score in Week 4, he did put up a 2-2-0, 1-(-3)-0 rushing/receiving line, giving him a total of 11 yards from scrimmage on 15 touches – and three touchdowns. He’s on pace for 44 scrimmage yards and 12 touchdowns; no player has scored more than five TDs on fewer than 100 yards from scrimmage in a season.
5. Jacob Gibbs would like you to know that Higgins is definitely a thing:
Cincinnati’s WR over the past two weeks:
Routes run:
75 – Tee Higgins
75 – Tyler Boyd
73 – AJ GreenTargets:
21 – Boyd
17 – Higgins
11 – GreenAir Yards:
293 – Higgins
227 – Boyd
142 – GreenRed zone targets:
3 – Higgins
1 – Boyd
0 – Green– Jacob Gibbs (@jagibbs_23) October 5, 2020
If you were fortunate enough to nab Higgins either earlier in the season or on the Week 4 waiver wire, you’ve landed yourself a reliable WR2-3 with WR1 upside depending on the matchup – and that’s quite something when you consider how little buzz he received in the preseason.
6. He might not lead running backs in PPR formats at season’s end, but Dalvin Cook has as good a shot as anyone of finishing atop the rushing yards ledger. He leads the NFL with 424 yards through four weeks – 50 more than runner-up Aaron Jones – and his peripherals are eye-popping, as he ranks first in broken tackles (20) and positive yardage rate (94.7 percent) while sitting fifth in average yards after contact (2.6).
7. Who is the busiest receiver in the NFL? It’s hard to argue against Los Angeles Chargers wideout Keenan Allen, who is experiencing a career resurgence in terms of usage. Allen is the only player in the NFL with more than 35 percent of his team’s air yards and targets through the first four weeks, though he’s only parlayed all that action into a 32-327-1 line. As long as Allen continues hogging the action, the fantasy points will come eventually.
8. As tempting as it is to roster D.K. Metcalf in DFS, he’s one of those players who could easily score 30 points one week and three the next. And a major part of the problem: Drops. Lots of them. Metcalf has dropped a staggering 17.9 percent of the passes sent his way; the next-closest player among the top-10 in receiving yards, Stefon Diggs, is at 5.7 percent. Imagine how much gaudier Russell Wilson‘s stats would look if Metcalf could hold onto the ball.
9. Who stands to benefit from the Washington Football Team switching QBs? It’s hard to see much more improvement from wide receiver Terry McLaurin, who has 26 catches for 387 yards. But let’s consider tight end Logan Thomas, who ranks fourth in the NFL among TEs in routes run (137) and is tied for fifth in targets (28). If those trends continue under Kyle Allen, it could mean big things for a tight end still under-owned in most formats.
10. That all said, Frank Stampfl has another player who could see a boost in value:
Kyle Allen’s target distribution in the 13 games he played in 2019:
D.J. Moore- 24% target share
Christian McCaffrey– 22%
Curtis Samuel– 17%
Greg Olsen 14%This could be massive for Antonio Gibson OR they can just continue to use J.D. McKissic as more of the pass catcher
– Frank Stampfl (@Roto_Frank) October 7, 2020
Don’t expect McKissic to see more work than Gibson, who racked up more than 100 total first-half yards in last week’s 31-17 loss to the Baltimore Ravens. Gibson has looked impressive for Washington, and the move to Allen could raise his profile even more. This is the time to buy him, or to roster him at a reasonable daily fantasy salary.
11. The Brandin Cooks bandwagon has become a ghost town – but is it premature? Cooks was completely erased last week vs. Minnesota despite playing 93.8 percent of the snaps; he has averaged better than 90 percent of the snaps over the Texans’ previous three games, the highest rate of any receiver on the team. Jacksonville has allowed the fourth-highest completion rate, so if Cooks sees this many snaps again, he could be in for a bounce-back.
12. It could be a big week for one of the most popular first-year players in fantasy football. Clyde Edwards-Helaire has seen the eighth-most touches of any rookie (85) through his first four games since 2000. And that workload could mean huge things this week, with the Chiefs facing a Raiders team that has allowed the most fantasy points to running backs (30.3 per game). It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if he’s the RB1 for Week 5.
13. One more reason to like CEH this week: Positive regression is on the way with regard to red-zone scoring. Only five other running backs have seen more carries inside the 5-yard line than Edwards-Helaire (six), but he has yet to find the end zone; the other five RBs have a combined 13 rushing touchdowns inside the 5. CEH is still the go-to guy for the Chiefs that close to the end zone, so it’s only a matter of time before he finds paydirt.
14. If you jumped on James Conner in Rounds 2/3 of your fantasy drafts, you’re going to like this next little nugget. Conner has been the Steelers’ no-doubt No. 1 option in the red zone, with 11 of the team’s 23 opportunities (six carries, five targets) over their past two games. If he’s healthy, Connor is the top offensive option on a team that heavily emphasizes running back involvement. He’s an RB1 that came with an RB2 price tag.
15. Ian Kenyon has a simple but impactful Dak Prescott stat to share:
Dak Prescott is on-pace to throw for 6,760 yards.
– Ian Kenyon (@IanKenyonNFL) October 6, 2020
How you view Dak and the Cowboys’ receiving corps moving forward depends at least partly on whether you think the Dallas defense will fare. The Cowboys have trailed for 85 percent of their first four games, which has forced Prescott to throw a LOT (he’s the only QB in history to rack up 450+ receiving yards in three straight games). But with the Giants, Cardinals, Football Club and Eagles coming up, Dallas shouldn’t trail nearly as often.
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16. Carson Wentz has done little to earn fantasy players’ sympathy in 2020 – but it hasn’t exactly been all his fault. Wentz has had 12 drops through the Philadelphia Eagles’ first four games, second only to Tom Brady. Of course, some of his problems are his fault: his 26.3-percent bad pass percentage ranks fourth-worst among QBs who have started multiple games. Whoever’s to blame, Wentz is not rosterable in standard one-QB formats.
17. Teams continue to put up a lot of points – and even the most subtle increases can have an impact on the average fantasy football scores. Case in point: Quarterbacks are averaging a league-record 264.6 passing yards per game, nearly 14 more yards than they averaged last season. And QB rushing yards are also up – from an average of 15.0 in 2019 to 18.4 this season. However you slice it, quarterbacks are far superior fantasy options in 2020.
18. Running back stats are also up, both in terms of rushing yards and receiving gains. Team running backs are posting an average of 94.8 yards per contest in 2020, the highest rate since 2012 (97.9). And the 41.4 receiving yards-per-game average is the highest in three seasons. The attrition rate has been unbelievable through the first four weeks, but the running backs who have managed to stay on the field have been mostly productive.
19. So who hasn’t benefited much from the league’s unexpected offensive explosion? Tight ends (of course). Team TEs are averaging 4.8 total receptions per game (in line with the average over the past five years) for just 51.1 yards (the lowest total since 2017). Here’s a look at where the top 10 TEs slot in on the wide receiver leaderboard in terms of total fantasy points (1/2 PPR):
Robert Tonyan: WR10
Travis Kelce: WR15
Mark Andrews: WR18
Jonnu Smith: WR23
Noah Fant: WR24
Tyler Higbee: WR24
T.J. Hockenson: WR28
Dalton Schultz: WR28
Jimmy Graham: WR30
Mo Alie-Cox: WR31
As expected, tight end has been a bit of a wasteland, with only three options as mid-range WR2s or better (although George Kittle is in the WR2 slot in terms of average points per game).
20. JJ Zachariason has a stat that pours a big ol’ bucket of cold water on the Jonathan Taylor Fan Club:
Jonathan Taylor’s percentage of team running back rushes and target share marks over the last three weeks:
Week 2: 74.3%, 8.0%
Week 3: 44.8%, 4.0%
Week 4: 48.6%, 3.6%– JJ Zachariason (@LateRoundQB) October 5, 2020
It certainly isn’t time to panic on Taylor, but this does make me wonder if reining in the expectations might be the best course of action here. The absence of Marlon Mack clearly hasn’t changed the Colts’ offensive plan, which was always to use employ multiple running backs. Taylor is a strong fantasy option, but he’s ideally your RB2 moving forward.
21. If I were handing out a trophy for the worst fantasy rushing situation of all-time, the 2020 New York Giants are definitely contenders. Through the first four weeks of the season, Giants RBs have a total of 169 rushing yards on 60 attempts – good for a 2.82 yards-per-carry average. And just how frustrating has the touch distribution been? Saquon Barkley (who has been on IR since Week 2) still leads the team in rush attempts.
22. After picking on Metcalf a little earlier, let’s praise a guy who has been able to catch just about anything thrown his way. Jacksonville Jaguars wideout D.J. Chark is a star in the making, with 204 receiving yards and three touchdowns through his first three games of 2020. And not only has he gone without a drop so far, he has hauled in 15 of his 16 targets, the highest success rate (93.8 percent) of any receiver that has seen 15+ targets.
23. Derek Carr might finish this season as one the most under-appreciated fantasy QBs – at least, if he keeps up his current pace. Not only has Carr thrown for 1,095 yards and eight touchdowns without an interception, he has been one of the top decision-makers of any QB in the league. His 11.8-percent Bad Pass rate is the second-best of any quarterback with 100+ attempts. He has also been aided by the fact that his receivers have dropped just two balls.
24. So it turns out that Houston Texans running back David Johnson is not back in prime form. It was hoped that Johnson would have a career resurgence after being dealt from Arizona, but the metrics are not on his side: His three broken tackles and 5.6-percent broken tackle rate are the lowest of any player with 50+ carries, and he has gained just 41.1 percent of his total yards after contact (also the lowest among players in this category).
25. Our friends at PFF give you one more reason to love Josh Allen:
Josh Allen through Wk 4:
🔹 87.8 PFF Grade (5th)
🔹 6 TDs under pressure (1st)
🔹 673 YDS off play-action (1st) pic.twitter.com/HTTNo1ofQa— PFF (@PFF) October 8, 2020
Allen’s season certainly feels an awful lot like Lamar Jackson’s 2019 campaign – and we all know how that turned out. But while it’s exciting to see him emerge as one of the top young passing quarterbacks in football, that progress has come at the expense of his rushing (11 carries for 26 yards the past three weeks).
26. Let’s have some “on pace” fun while we’re here, since we have enough empirical data to create the impression that these things might actually happen. At running back, we’re on pace to see seven running backs finish with 1,200+ yards on the ground; that would be the highest number of 1,200-yard rushers since 2016.
27. Things are even more interesting on the receiver side, with a whopping 12 wideouts on pace to surpass the 1,200-yard mark in 2020 (Diggs, Metcalf, Cooper, Hopkins, McLaurin, Anderson, Ridley, Jefferson, Robinson, Allen, Boyd, Lamb). How does that compare with recent seasons? Here are the 1,200-yard receivers since 2015:
2016: 6 (Hilton, Jones, Beckham, Evans, Brown, Nelson)
2017: 6 (Brown, Jones, Allen, Hopkins, Thielen, Thomas)
2018: 12 (Jones, Hopkins, Evans, Hill, Smith-Schuster, Thomas, Adams, Thielen, Brown, Hilton, Woods, Cooks)
2019: 4 (Thomas, Jones, Godwin, Parker)
28. Quarterbacks time! How many are on pace to surpass the coveted 5,000-yard barrier? Perhaps surprisingly, only three: Dak Prescott, Josh Allen and Russell Wilson (though Matt Ryan is just off the pace with 1,246 passing yards through four weeks). And five quarterbacks (Wilson, Aaron Rodgers, Allen, Patrick Mahomes, Tom Brady) are on pace to throw for 40+ touchdowns, which would obviously be a league record.
29. Finally, let’s see how QB rushing yards measure up to recent seasons. Eight quarterbacks are on pace to surpass 400 rushing yards in 2020, which would compare favorably to the previous four seasons:
2016: 2 (Taylor, Kaepernick)
2017: 4 (Newton, Wilson, Taylor, Kizer)
2018: 5 (Jackson, Allen, Watson, Newton, Trubisky)
2019: 4 (Jackson, Murray, Allen, Watson)
30. Let’s have Mike Tagliere take us home:
Todd Gurley in 2017 (15 games): 788 receiving yards and six touchdowns.
Todd Gurley in 2018-2020 (33 games): 796 receiving yards and six touchdowns.
— Mike Tagliere (@MikeTagliereNFL) October 7, 2020
Gurley clearly isn’t the player he once was, and it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility to see him lose more touches to Brian Hill in the coming weeks.
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