Start em or sit em? Fantasy football start or sit decisions can be excruciating. While it feels great to make the right call and cruise to fantasy glory, it hurts just as much when you have someone erupt while on your bench. You can use our Who Should I Start? tool to gauge advice from fantasy football experts as you make your lineup decisions. And you can also sync your fantasy football league for free using our My Playbook tool for custom advice, rankings and analysis.
Let’s take a look at a few polarizing players and what fantasy football expert Derek Brown advises. And you can find all of DBro’s fantasy football outlook in this week’s fantasy football primer.
- Waiver Wire Picks
- Weekly Fantasy Football Expert Rankings
- Fantasy Football Start/Sit Advice
- Fantasy Football Trade Tools
Fantasy Football Start’em, Sit’em Lineup Advice
Calvin Austin hasn’t been a strong fantasy producer all season, but he does have three top-36 finishes in weekly scoring this season among wide receivers (WR16, WR31, WR35). Austin has a 16.5% target share with 33.9 receiving yards per game, 1.37 yards per route run, and a 21.5% first-read share. Austin has three red zone targets and seven deep targets this season. Austin missed the last meeting with the Bengals with a shoulder issue. With DJ Turner following D.K. Metcalf, Austin should see Cam Taylor-Britt (66.7% catch rate and 133.9 passer rating allowed) and Dax Hill (77.8% catch rate and 113.3 passer rating allowed) all day, which should lead to a fruitful stat line. Austin is a strong flex play this week.
Jayden Higgins is the only other Houston wide receiver (outside of Nico Collins) who has any type of fringe flex viability. Last week, Xavier Hutchinson had a 51% route share and didn’t draw a single target. Christian Kirk and Jaylin Noel logged 44.9% and 32.7% route shares. In Week 10, Higgins had a 49% route share, which isn’t great and was fourth on the team, but he had a 15.6% target share, a 22% air-yard share, finishing with a 29% target per route run rate, 42 receiving yards, 1.75 yards per route run, and a 16.7% first-read share. Higgins also had two red zone targets and a deep target. I hate Houston’s deployment of their wide receivers so much this season. It makes me furious. Higgins is a risky flex play that could pay off this week. Since Week 6, the Titans have allowed the fifth-most receiving yards per game and the second-most PPR points per target to perimeter wide receivers.
Last week, Tyler Lockett ranked third on the team with a 65.7% route share but he led the way with a 22.2% target share while having 44 receiving yards, 1.91 yards per route run, and a 21.1% first-read share. He immediately stepped up as the number two option in the passing attack behind Brock Bowers which is quite telling about Tre Tucker if Lockett could hop him in the target pecking order so quickly. Lockett is a surprisingly strong flex play this week against a Dallas secondary that since Week 6 has allowed the second-most PPR points per target and the second-highest passer rating when targeted to slot receivers.
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If you want to dive deeper into fantasy football, check out our award-winning slate of Fantasy Football Tools as you navigate your season. From our Start/Sit Assistant – which provides your optimal lineup based on accurate consensus projections – to our Waiver Wire Assistant, which allows you to quickly see which available players will improve your team and how much – we’ve got you covered this fantasy football season.
