We’re now well into October, so welcome to this pumpkin-spice edition of the 10 most intriguing fantasy football players series.
For the record, I enjoy pumpkin beer and pumpkin pie, but you can miss me on pumpkin-spice everything else.
But enough of this fall foolishness. Let’s get started.
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Most Intriguing Fantasy Football Players of Week 6
1. Rico Dowdle (RB – CAR)
Pressed into starting duty because of Chuba Hubbard‘s calf injury, Rico Dowdle carried the ball 23 times for 206 yards and a touchdown against the Dolphins last week. It was the biggest rushing day by any NFL running back this season. Dowdle also had three catches for 28 yards.
On the heels of his epic day against the Dolphins, Dowdle gets to face his 2024 employer, the Dallas Cowboys. The Cowboys let Dowdle walk in free agency even though he gave them 1,079 rushing yards last year.
The revenge game angle is fun, but the fantasy angle is juicier.
Hubbard has been ruled out for Week 6. If Dowdle shines against his old team, might we see a changing of the guard in the Carolina backfield? Hubbard was terrific for the Panthers in 2024, rushing for 1,195 yards and 10 touchdowns. He’s been less effective in 2025, with 53-217-0 rushing in his first four games.
If Uncle Rico has another big day, he may supplant Hubbard as the starter, or at least turn the Panthers’ backfield into something close to a 50/50 timeshare.
2. Ja’Marr Chase (WR – CIN)
We could have listed Joe Flacco as one of the most intriguing players of Week 6 after a surprise trade sent Flacco from Cleveland to Cincinnati, where he’ll immediately replace the struggling Jake Browning as the Bengals’ starting quarterback.
But let’s face it: Flacco had become unplayable for fantasy as a member of the Browns, and he’s unlikely to become a valuable fantasy asset with the Bengals.
The real question is whether Flacco can reinvigorate Ja’Marr Chase, the near-unanimous WR1 in 2025 fantasy drafts. So, Chase makes it onto the most intriguing list for a second straight week.
In three games with Browning as the Bengals’ starting quarterback, Chase turned in stat lines of 5-50-0, 5-23-0 and 6-110-2. The big day against the Lions last week was encouraging, but Detroit was playing without starting cornerback D.J. Reed, and then lost starting cornerback Terrion Arnold to an in-game shoulder injury. Chase took advantage of a depleted Lions secondary.
In recent years, Flacco has been a rainmaker for his passcatchers. He averaged 262.5 passing yards in four starts with the Jets in 2022, 323.2 passing yards in five starts with the Browns in 2023 and 265.5 passing yards in six starts with the Colts in 2024.
But the 40-year-old Flacco was struggling with the Browns, averaging just 5.1 yards per pass attempt with two touchdown passes, six interceptions and an anemic passer rating of 60.3 before being benched after four starts.
The immobile Flacco was struggling to handle pressure thanks to a Browns offensive line that has allowed pressure on 25.6% of dropbacks, the seventh-highest pressure rate allowed in the league. The Bengals have allowed a 27.6% pressure rate, second-highest in the league behind only the Titans.
But back to Chase.
Fantasy managers should never bench Chase under any circumstances, and woe to those who rage-benched the star after his 23-yard game in Week 4, only to miss out on his two-touchdown game last week. Perhaps Flacco’s slow start in Cleveland was an aberration, and Chase will flourish with Flacco. Or maybe the move from Browning to Flacco is going from the frying pan to the fire, and Chase will continue to produce sporadically.
We’ll have a better idea of which way things are headed when the Bengals visit the Packers on Sunday. Flacco has already faced the Packers once this season, completing 21-of-36 passes for 142 yards with no touchdowns and one interception in Cleveland’s 13-10 upset of Green Bay in Week 3. The Browns’ most productive wide receiver in that game was Cedric Tillman, who had three catches for 26 yards.
3. Derrick Henry (RB – BAL)
The 2025 season started well enough for Derrick Henry. He was royally trampling the Bills in a high-profile Sunday night affair in Week 1.
But then Henry lost a critical fumble late in that game, paving the way for a Bills comeback victory. And ever since, things haven’t been so swell for Henry.
Derrick Henry before his backbreaking fumble vs Bills:
16 carries
172 yards (10.8/att)
2 TD
3 forced missed tackles
4 runs of 15+ yardsDerrick Henry since his backbreaking fumble vs Bills:
47 carries
149 yards (3.2/att)
2 TD
1 forced missed tackle
1 run of 15+ yards
2 Fumbles— Pat Thorman (@Pat_Thorman) October 9, 2025
Can Henry get his mojo back this week against the Rams if Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson misses a second consecutive game with a hamstring injury?
The Ravens desperately need to get their running game going without Lamar, but if backup QB Cooper Rush doesn’t do his part for Baltimore, the Rams can load the box against Henry. And if Rush can’t keep the chains moving, it’s going to limit Henry’s touch volume.
Henry had 15 carries for 33 yards and a touchdown last week in a game where the Ravens ran only 39 offensive plays. It wasn’t a high-volume game by Henry’s standards, even though 38.5% of Baltimore’s offensive plays were Henry handoffs.
Maybe things get back to normal for the 31-year-old Henry after the Ravens’ Week 7 bye. But by that time, a lot of his investors might be in dire straits.
4. Jacory Croskey-Merritt (RB – WSH)
I enjoy the music of a band called Camper Van Beethoven, who have a song called “Where the Hell is Bill?”
A lot of Jacory Croskey-Merritt investors were asking that question a few weeks into the season, when Croskey-Merritt, aka “Bill,” was failing to live up to all the preseason hype. Croskey-Merritt had 10-82-1 rushing against the Giants in Week 1 but then had only 90 rushing yards over his next three games.
Then came a watershed performance in Week 5, with Croskey-Merritt trampling the Chargers for 111 yards and two touchdowns on 14 carries. He added two catches for 38 yards and finished as the RB5 in half-point PPR scoring on the week with 26 points.
Croskey-Merritt had been sharing work with Chris Rodriguez Jr. and Jeremy McNichols early in the season. But Croskey-Merritt had a season-high 47.5% snap share in Week 5, and you’d think the Commanders might ramp up his usage even more after his tour-de-force performance last week.
Croskey-Merritt leads the NFL in yards per carry (6.6) and rushing success rate (72.1%). Now he gets a mouth-watering matchup against the Bears, who have allowed the fifth-most rushing yards and fourth-most fantasy points to running backs.
5. Hassan Haskins (RB – LAC)
Chargers rookie Omarion Hampton sustained an ankle injury in Week 5 that landed him on injured reserve (IR). The Chargers had already lost veteran Najee Harris to a ruptured Achilles last month.
It’s hard to decipher how the Chargers will deploy their remaining backs in Week 6. Hassan Haskins is the only healthy running back who was on the Chargers’ opening day roster. Kimani Vidal is in the mix, too, and the Chargers signed Nyheim Hines and Amar Johnson this week.
Haskins seems like the safest bet for a fantasy-relevant role. He played for Chargers head coach Jim Harbaugh when Harbaugh was coaching at the University of Michigan, rushing for 1,327 yards and 20 touchdowns in his final college season.
Haskins doesn’t have good speed by the standards of NFL running backs, and he offers little pass-catching potential. But the 228-pound Haskins is a near-lock to be the Chargers’ goal-line back.
And if Haskins gets a substantial workload on Sunday, he has the potential to smash against a marshmallowy Dolphins run defense that ranks 29th in DVOA (defense-adjusted value over average) and has allowed a league-high 668 rushing yards to running backs.
6. Jaylen Waddle (WR – MIA)
With Tyreek Hill out for the year after sustaining a grotesque knee injury in Week 4, the Dolphins needed Jaylen Waddle to step up. He obliged in Week 5, with six catches for a season-high 110 yards and a touchdown.
Waddle hasn’t been a leading man in the Miami passing game since Hill arrived in 2022, which was Waddle’s second NFL season. Is he capable of being an alpha receiver? Well, Waddle was the sixth overall pick of the 2021 NFL Draft, and he launched his NFL career with three consecutive 1,000-yard seasons.
Let’s see if Waddle can author a second straight big game this week against the Chargers.
7. Mason Taylor (TE – NYJ)
The Jets came into the season short on pass-catching firepower behind wideout Garrett Wilson. Mason Taylor, a second-round rookie out of LSU, seems to be establishing himself as a reliable No. 2 option for Jets quarterback Justin Fields.
Taylor, the son of former Dolphins sack artist and Pro Football Hall of Famer Jason Taylor, has 19 targets, 14 catches and 132 receiving yards over his last two games. His snap shares in those games were 81% and 84.1%. We’re talking premium usage here.
Taylor’s efficiency hasn’t been anything special. He’s averaging 6.3 yards per target and 8.8 yards per catch. But give the kid time.
It will be interesting to see what Taylor can do in a difficult matchup Sunday against a Broncos defense that has allowed the seventh-fewest receptions and eighth-fewest fantasy points to tight ends.
8. Jameson Williams (WR – DET)
Jameson Williams had his first 1,000-yard season in the NFL last year, and it seemed as if the escalator would continue to go up.
But Williams is off to a sluggish start in 2025. He has only 11 catches for 223 yards and one touchdown on 21 targets over the Lions’ first five games. He’s been held to 43 or fewer yards in four of Detroit’s first five contests.
Williams is a big-play receiver, so he doesn’t necessarily need a lot of targets to pay off. He’s averaging 20.3 yards per catch and 10.6 yards per target this season, and 17.2 yards per catch and 9.9 yards per target for his career. Williams’ average depth of target (aDOT) this season is an eye-popping 20.8 yards, according to Pro-Football-Reference.
The Lions might need Williams’ deep-ball artistry this week in a potential shootout against Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs. Williams’ fantasy investors are starving for more of the big plays that made Williams the WR19 in half-PPR scoring last season.
9. David Njoku (TE – CLE)
When Joe Flacco made five late-season starts for the Browns in 2023, David Njoku had 30 catches for 390 yards and four touchdowns over those five contests and was the TE1 in half-PPR fantasy scoring over that stretch. A Flacco-Njoku reunion in 2025 seemed to bode well for the veteran tight end.
But Flacco struggled, and Njoku’s drab numbers prompted many of his fantasy investors to seek other options at tight end. Njoku had 14 catches for 128 yards and zero touchdowns over his first four games to rank as the TE22 in half-PPR scoring.
The Browns’ switch to rookie quarterback Dillon Gabriel in Week 5 seemed to reinvigorate Njoku, who had six catches for 67 yards and a touchdown on nine targets against the Vikings. Gabriel leaned heavily on his tight ends, particularly Njoku. Cleveland tight ends combined for 13 targets last week, while Cleveland wide receivers combined for 10 targets.
Stakeholders might be hesitant to put Njoku back in their lineups until he proves that the big game with Gabriel last week wasn’t just a one-off. Njoku gets a promising Week 6 matchup against the Steelers, who have allowed the fourth-most fantasy points to tight ends.
10. Baker Mayfield (QB – TB)
The scrappy Baker Mayfield is on a heater. He’s thrown for 668 yards and four touchdowns over his last two games. Last week against the Seahawks, Mayfield completed 29-of-33 passes for 379 yards and two touchdowns. The Buccaneers had as many touchdowns in that game (four) as Mayfield had incompletions.
Mayfield is notoriously dangerous as an underdog, and the Buccaneers were underdogs in each of their last two games — road wins against the Eagles and Seahawks. But the Bucs are home favorites this week against the 49ers.
Can Mayfield keep up his torrid pace? Mike Evans remains out with a hamstring injury, but Chris Godwin has returned from the gruesome ankle injury he sustained last year, and rookie Emeka Egbuka is establishing himself as a star.
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