Fantasy Football Recap – Week 6

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If somebody had told me last week that Kirk Cousins would have outscored Aaron Rodgers by more than 20 fantasy points, even with the different match ups (Cousins vs. Atlanta and Rodgers vs. Tampa Bay), I would have thought they were crazy!

I am sure plenty of fantasy owners were not happy if they chose to play Rodgers over Cousins, especially a particular friend of mine who asked my advice (sorry buddy!).

There are still two games to be played on Monday night, but let’s look at the rest of the fantasy football recap from week 6!

Stock Up

Quarterbacks

Deshaun Watson – Houston Texans

Although it didn’t lead to a victory, Watson had his best fantasy performance of the season on Sunday against the Tennessee Titans. The Texans ended up losing in overtime, but Watson threw for 335 yards and 4 touchdowns.

In fact, in the 2 games since head coach Bill O’Brien was fired, Watson has thrown for 7 touchdowns and just shy of 700 yards in the two games. Hopefully for Watson and the Texans that results in some wins soon.

Matt Ryan – Atlanta Falcons

Maybe more teams need to fire their head coaches to get their teams to play better. In Ryan’s first game after Dan Quinn getting fired, he had his best fantasy game as well, throwing for 4 touchdowns and 371 yards passing.

This comes after 3 straight weeks with only 1 touchdown pass combined, and helped the Falcons get their first win of the season against the Minnesota Vikings.

Ryan Tannehill – Tennessee Titans

It might be a little unfair to put Tannehill in the same category as the previous two quarterbacks, considering he has a dominant force in Derrick Henry behind him to take off a lot of pressure.

That being said, Tannehill has definitely rejuvenated his career in Tennessee, as he had his second 4-touchdown game of the season and is starting to be mentioned in the MVP discussions.

Also Trending Up

Carson Wentz continues to put up good numbers even though the Eagles cannot seem to keep anybody healthy. This week they lost Zach Ertz and Miles Sanders. On the other side of the field Sunday, Lamar Jackson didn’t do much with his arm, throwing for only 186 yards and a touchdown, but killed the Eagles with his legs, rushing for 108 yards on 9 carries and another touchdown on the ground. We mentioned Kirk Cousins, but can’t give him too much credit, going against the Falcons, who had not won a game coming in, And although he did have his best statistical game of the year, throwing for over 300 yards for the first time of the season (343), he did throw for as many interceptions (3) as he did touchdowns (3).

Running Backs

Derrick Henry – Tennessee Titans

You may be asking, how can Henry’s stock go up anymore? Well when you rush for 212 yards including a 94-yard touchdown run in which he reached a top speed of 21.6 MPH, you are doing pretty good and deserve a little recognition.

Oh yeah, he also had 2 catches for another 52 yards, and finished the day with another touchdown to win the game in overtime. Pretty solid day for the big fella.

D’Andre Swift – Detroit Lions

The biggest gripe I heard from fantasy football players (besides playing Rodgers this week) was that they didn’t play Swift because he hasn’t done anything this year.

Sunday Swift broke out with 14 carries, which more than doubles any other game this season, and turned that into 116 yards and two touchdowns. He also added 3 catches for PPR leagues, though only gained 7 yards total from those.

Ronald Jones II – Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Jones hasn’t had a bad year so far, with his lowest fantasy game over 9 points in PPR leagues. In fact, Sunday was the third straight game which he has gone over 100 yards rushing.

Sunday he got into the end zone twice, however, giving him his highest fantasy point total of the year. And as long as Fournette is out (he was a late scratch Sunday), Jones will have ample opportunity as the Bucs focus on good defense and a running game and less reliance on Tom Brady in his 21st season in the league.

Keep an Eye on

James Conner has stayed healthy this season, which has been a problem for him the last two years. As long as he can stay on the field he has shown that he will put up consistent numbers, as he has scored a touchdown in 4 of 5 games this year and reached over 100 yards in 3 of them. Myles Gaskin continues his good not great season, rushing for 91 yards and catching all 4 targets for another 35 yards.

Wide Receivers

Justin Jefferson – Minnesota Vikings

Had a guy in my league who played CeeDee Lamb over Jefferson this week, mainly because of Jefferson’s poor performance a week ago against the Seattle Seahawks.

Turned out to be a bad decision, as Jefferson was targeted 11 times, catching 9 of them, for 166 yards and 2 touchdowns. He may give you the occasional egg like last week, but he has played himself into starting on your fantasy team every week, for fear of missing out on games like this.

Julio Jones – Atlanta Falcons

Jones finally looked healthy again, and it showed. Catching 8 of 10 targets for 137 yards and 2 touchdowns, he looked truly explosive.

Unless he gets injured again, Julio is back to being a top 3 wide receiver, with Detroit up next.

Will Fuller V – Houston Texans

Fuller has had a good season, catching at least 4 passes in every game he has played this year. He had his best game Sunday, catching 6 of his 11 targets for 123 yards and a touchdown, which was his 4th straight game with a touchdown.

With the Texans playing much better the last two week, Fuller is trending towards WR1 territory.

Keep Catching Passes

A.J. Brown has had two good games since being out with a knee injury, catching 5 passes Sunday for 56 yards and 2 touchdowns. If Jonnu Smith misses times Brown will get even more looks. Brandon Cooks joins his teammate Fuller in having had 2 good games since the firing of O’Brien. He caught 9 passes for 68 yards and a touchdown Sunday. Travis Fulgham didn’t have quite as good of a game as last week, but getting 10 targets, and catching 6 of them, is a good sign. He finished with 75 yards and a touchdown, but as more skill players go down for Philadelphia, Wentz is going to have to throw to somebody.

Tight Ends

Anthony Firkser – Tennessee Titans

With Jonnu Smith leaving the game early with an ankle injury, Firkser took advantage by catching 8 of his 9 targets for 113 yards and a touchdown.

If Smith misses extended time due to the injury, Firkser has shown he can produce if given the opportunity.

Trey Burton – Indianapolis Colts

Burton was another tight end to take advantage of another player out with injury, with Mo Alie-Cox missing the game Sunday.

Burton caught 4 passes, from 5 targets, for 58 yards and a touchdown, plus ran in a 1-yard touchdown from the wildcat formation.

Darren Fells – Houston Texans

Fells took advantage of the high-scoring game against Tennessee, catching 6 passes for 85 yards and a touchdown. It also helped that Jordan Akins was out with an injury as well.

If Akins misses another game, Fells should be able to replicate his success next week as well, but if Akins comes back there will not be enough targets to play Fells.

Also Played Well

Rob Gronkowski had his first touchdown of the season, finishing with his patented Gronk spike. Adam Shaheen has had touchdowns in consecutive weeks, as he tries to reach the expectations he was unable to reach in Chicago. Hayden Hurst got his first touchdown since week 3, catching 4 passes for 57 yards.

Stock Down

Quarterbacks

Aaron Rodgers – Green Bay Packers

I mean we have to start with Rodgers, right? Not that this will affect his performance next week, but he had easily his worst game of the season.

To start with, this was his first game without a touchdown pass, and also his first game with an interception, as he threw 2 of them, and 1 of those returned for a touchdown.

The Houston Texans are up next, and I would expect a BIG game from Rodgers next week.

Baker Mayfield – Cleveland Browns

Technically, the entire Browns had a bad week, losing to the rival Pittsburgh Steelers 38-7 Sunday. But Mayfield is the quarterback, which means he gets too much credit when his team does good and too much blame when his team does bad.

Mayfield only threw for 119 yards, did have 1 touchdown pass but threw two interceptions as well. The Browns will try to get back in the win column against the Cincinnati Bengals next week.

Teddy Bridgewater – Carolina Panthers

It was probably a lot to ask of Bridgewater, going against Bears defense who hit Tom Brady so much a week ago that he forgot what down it was at the end of the game.

So only completing 16 of 29 passes for 216 yards is not too bad, but he did not throw a touchdown pass and had two interceptions. Up next is the New Orleans Saints in a big NFC South match up.

Other Rough Games

Matthew Stafford only had 223 yards passing, with 1 touchdown and 1 interception, but the Lions won against the Jacksonville Jaguars so I am sure they aren’t too concerned in Detroit. Jared Goff was off against the San Francisco 49ers Sunday night, completing 50% of his passes, 19-38, for 198 yards. While he had two touchdown passes, he also had an interception and the Rams lost and important division game. Daniel Jones is not quite living up to expectations in New York, almost having as many rushing yards (74) as passing yards (112) against the Washington Football Team. Who knows what they can do to get more production out of the quarterback position.

Running Backs

Alexander Mattison – Minnesota Vikings

With Dalvin Cook out, one would have expected Mattison to have a good game, especially against the lowly Atlanta Falcons.

Unfortunately that is not the way it worked out, as the Falcons rushed out to a big lead, and the Vikings were playing from behind the whole game.

Mattison finished with only 10 rushes for 26 yards, adding 1 catch for 4 receiving yards. Cook will be back after the bye, putting Mattison back on the bench in both reality and fantasy football.

Kareem Hunt – Cleveland Browns

As I said earlier, the entire Browns team struggled Sunday. Hunt rushed 13 times for only 40 yards, catching 2 passes for 17 more yards.

They were down early, making it tough to establish the run. Hopefully a game against Cincinnati will prove to be easier for Hunt and the Browns.

Todd Gurley II – Atlanta Falcons

The Falcons won their first game of the season, so I am sure Gurley is not too upset that he put up his lowest number of rushing yards in a game this season with 47 on 20 carries.

This was also only the second game of the season in which he didn’t score a touchdown, but I am sure that there will be plenty of opportunities going forward for the veteran running backs.

Didn’t Do Well

Devonta Freeman struggled to get going against the Washington Football Team, rushing 18 times for only 61 yards. His only reception was for a loss of 4 yards. Jerick Mckinnon filled in for Raheem Mostert when he left the game with an ankle injury, but only rushed 6 times for 18 yards, and only saw 3 targets, catching 2 of them for 10 yards. Damien Harris showed why you typically stay away from New England running backs. After rushing for 100 yards on 17 carries in the team’s last game, he only had 6 carries for 19 yards against the Broncos on Sunday.

Wide Receivers

Odell Beckham Jr – Cleveland Browns

I could do an entire stock down segment of the Cleveland Browns game against the Steelers. The fact that Beckham was only targeted 4 times tells you a lot about the way the game went Sunday.

Beckham finished with 2 catches for 25 yards, which no doubt is upsetting to the All Pro receiver.

Cooper Kupp – Los Angeles Rams

Kupp was targeted 9 times, but only caught 3 of them. There were a couple opportunities for a touchdown for Kupp, but he dropped both of them.

The good news is the 9 targets was second behind Robert woods. The bad news is the Rams face the Chicago Bears defense next week.

T.Y. Hilton – Indianapolis Colts

At this point it looks as though Hilton will not be returning to his former glory, as this was his worst game of an already bad year by his standards.

Only catching 1 of 5 targets for 11 yards, it is obvious that he and Philip Rivers are not on the same page, and Hilton is not really relevant in fantasy football anymore.

Throw Him the Ball

JuJu Smith-Schuster may not be the top receiver in Pittsburgh anymore. He only had 4 targets Sunday, catching 2 of them, for only 6 yards in a game that saw James Washington catch 4 passes for 68 yards and a touchdowns and rookie Chase Claypool catch 4 passes for 74 yards. Mike Evans had a tough game as well, only catching one pass for 10 yards. Laviska Shenault’s usage went down when DJ Chark ended up playing. He finished with 2 catches and only 10 yards on the game.

Tight Ends

Mark Andrews – Baltimore Ravens

Andrews has reverted to a touchdown dependent tight end, as was seen in Sunday’s game against the Philadelphia Eagles. He only caught 2 of his 4 targets for a measly 21 yards, and no touchdowns.

For context, in the 3 games he has scored at least one touchdown, Andrews has gotten at least 15 points in PPR leagues. In the 3 games without a touchdown, he has scored 3.9, 5.2, and 4.1 in those games.

Eric Ebron – Pittsburgh Steelers

Ebron hasn’t had the season many expected, only having one game over 10 fantasy points so far this season. Sunday’s game against Cleveland was the second game, and the first since the opening game of the year, he has been held under 3 points.

Robert Tonyan – Green Bay Packers

Not many expected Tonyan to replicate his explosive output from the Packer’s last game, against the Atlanta Falcons in week 4.

Tonyan caught all 6 of his targets that game, for 98 yards and 3 touchdowns. This week against Tampa Bay, Tonyan caught 3 catches for 25 yards, battling an injury that forced him out of the game in the second quarter, though he did return in the second half.

The entire Packers offense struggled though, so Tonyan should be able to do better than 25 yards next week against Houston.

Other Tight End News

Jimmy Graham was second on the Bears in targets, behind Allen Robinson, but only caught 5 passes for 34 yards Sunday. Still, a fringe TE1 due to the volume he is seeing on a weekly basis. Zach Ertz and Jonnu Smith both left their respective games with injuries, Ertz is expected to miss 3-4 weeks, Smith might only miss next week.

Conclusion

Fantasy football can be crazy sometimes. How is your fantasy season going? Did you play Rodgers or somebody similar this week, costing you a win in your league this week? Tell me about it in the comments below!

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6 Comments

  1. I was one of those that played Rodgers, I knew that he had a tough match up but he’s been playing lights out so you have to play him. Hopefully next week they get it right

  2. Fantasy football is. Avery interest thing and I have not been very actively following up with the activities because I have some little work to do and feel bad for missing some of the good games. Getting to see a recap here and it makes every thing fun all over again. I hope to make the most of this week and watch all the games .

    • I definitely understand, sometimes life gets busy and there is no time for much else! I will be here to give you updates when you need them!

  3. Hello there! Thank you very much for sharing this article on fantasy football recap week 6. My brother talks about fantasy football all the time and it’s like he’s addicted to it or something. He was among the people that played Rodgers last week. I had no idea it was this interesting, I should have joined him. Now that I know of I’ll definitely join him this week. Thank you for showing me how exciting it is. 

    • It can be very addicting! I have 6 leagues myself, my wife makes fun of me! Sorry to hear your brother played Rodgers, tell him to play him next week though, I think Rodgers will have a big week!

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