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
Troy Franklin is the WR38 in fantasy points per game with four top-36 wide receiver finishes in weekly scoring (WR1, WR26, WR36, WR7). Franklin remains a high-leverage usage machine, ranking fourth in red zone targets and fourth in deep targets among wide receivers. Franklin has a 19.3% target share, 42.8 receiving yards per game, 1.50 yards per route run, and a 22.2% first-read share. This week, he faces a Raiders’ secondary that has utilized single high with 56.1-69.6% of their defensive snaps in five of their last seven games. Against single high, Franklin has seen his target share increase to 20.6% with 1.83 yards per route run and a 22.5% first-read share. He’s a strong flex again this week with top 24 upside. Since Week 5, Las Vegas has allowed the 14th-most PPR points per target and the ninth-most receiving yards per game to perimeter wide receivers.
Last week, RJ Harvey had his highest snap rate since Week 4 (31.1%) and his highest route share (41%) and target share (13.5%) of the season. Sean Payton…don’t give me hope. Are you really going to increase his workload, or am I just going to be even more frustrated after Week 10 when I realize I got rugpulled again? It still only amounted to seven touches (five targets) and 56 total yards (one score) for R.J. Harvey. With the passing game usage and insane touchdown runout over the last two weeks, Harvey has been the RB7 in fantasy points per game. Since Week 4, he has been the RB21 in fantasy points per game. The usage has been volatile but profitable. Since Week 4, he has averaged 8.5 touches and 45.6 total yards per game. Among 62 qualifying backs, he ranks 27th in explosive run rate and 26th in missed tackles forced per attempt. This isn’t a good matchup for Harvey through the air, but he could get it done on the ground. The Raiders have allowed the tenth-fewest receiving yards per game and the fourth-lowest yards per reception to running backs. Since Week 5, they haven’t given up a ton of huge plays to rushing attacks, but they have allowed the 13th-highest success rate, the eighth-highest missed tackle rate, and the 12th-highest yards after contact per attempt. Harvey remains flex viable weekly with his passing game role and his touchdown equity.
Geno Smith just logged his second QB1 outing of the season (QB6) with his WR1 returning to full health, and I wish I could tell you that better things are incoming this week, but it isn’t so. Smith will have a tough time this week. Among 41 qualifying quarterbacks, Smith ranks 20th in yards per attempt, 16th in highly accurate throw rate, 38th in hero throw rate, and 30th in fantasy points per dropback. Even without Patrick Surtain, Denver still stood strong as a pass defense last week, limiting Houston to 191 yards, 5.4 yards per attempt, zero passing touchdowns, and a 72.5 passer rating. Since Week 5, they have allowed the ninth-fewest yards per game, the fifth-fewest yards per attempt, and the second-lowest success rate per dropback. Sit Smith.
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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.
