RB/WR Opportunity Breakdown For Week 6

Running Backs

The Breece Hall takeover is nearly complete. Even if Michael Carter vultured himself into a good fantasy day with two one-yard rushing touchdowns after Hall did the heavy lifting on 79-yard and 21-yard receptions, Hall still out-snapped Carter 41-24 and out-touched him 20-12. Look to trade Carter to anyone in your league that just peruses the box scores and assumes Carter’s 17-point week was indicative of anything other than luck. Hall scored 27 fantasy points on the day and it could have easily been a 40-point day. If Hall isn’t the RB1 overall in dynasty then he’s the RB2 at worst, and it’s not a bad time to test the market to see if you can trade him for a haul.  

It’s important to drill down into game data and not just rely on seasonal data when trying to determine what is happening in a backfield. James Robinson maintains a 51.6% to 46.9% snap share edge for the season over Travis Etienne, but things have changed over the past two weeks.  The Jaguars have slowly moved away from  Robinson in the bell-cow role over the past two weeks after he saw a season-high 63.4% snaps played in Week 3. Since then he’s had two sub-50 % games, including Sunday when he played on a season-low 40% of offensive snaps. Etienne has taken advantage of the decreased playing time for Robinson and played on a season-high 53% of snaps in Sunday’s loss to the Texans. As should be expected Etienne has out-targeted Robison 6-2 over the two weeks, but what comes as a surprise, and should concern anyone rostering Robinson is that Etienne has the same amount of rushing attempts (18) as Robinson in those two games. Acquire Etienne, now. 

Travis Etienne played a season-high 53.3% snaps on Sunday. Etienne has out-targeted James Robinson 6-2 over the past two weeks (not a shock), but he’s also matched Robinson with 18 rushing attempts. It’s coming.

— Shane says (@ShaneIsTheWorst) October 10, 2022

A couple of running backs returned from injury this week. One, after a one-week absence, and the other after missing the entire season thus far. Death, taxes, and David Montgomery taking back his full-time role after a backup produces in his absence. After leaving Week 3 early due to injury and then missing Week 4, Montgomery came back against the Vikings to a 72% share of the offensive snaps, and Khalil Herbert fell to a 28% share. Though neither back saw a target, Montgomery saw rushing attempts to Herbert’s four. You should feel secure starting Montgomery as your RB1, as his 13.9 points per game (excluding the game he left early due to injury) would be good enough to place him as the RB19 in points per game. Brian Robinson made his debut on Sunday after missing the first four weeks recovering from gunshot wounds suffered during an armed robbery, and immediately carved out a role in the Washington offense. His 28.6% snap share finished well behind J.D. McKissic (41.3%), but he played on just two fewer snaps than Antonio Gibson. Gibson’s 31.7% snap share was a season-low and the fourth consecutive week it decreased from the prior week. Robinson had nine rushing attempts to three for Gibson, though Gibson did see four targets to zero for Robinson. 

One of the more disappointing players of the 2022 season thus far is Joe Mixon, whose 13.3 fantasy points per game ranks 17th for running backs. Despite this relative lack of production Mixon’s peripherals are strong and his usage suggests he could be ready to break out in a big way. Despite concerns about Mixon’s snap share and usage, he ranks sixth at the running back position with a 73.8% snap share, and his opportunity share (rushing attempts + targets) of 80.4% is fourth highest for running backs. Mixon has averaged just 3.1 yards per carry this season and should be in line for regression to the 4.04 yards per carry he averaged entering the 2022 season. Not only is Mixon securing a high snap share and a large workload he’s also seeing a ton of work at the goal line and leads the league with 10 rushing attempts from inside the 5-yard-line, thus far Mixon has only been able to convert one of those attempts into a touchdown, which screams regression. With Mixon not scoring at an elite level now might be a good time to acquire and wait for positive regression to take hold.  

Receiving Options 

A.J. Brown is still the leading target-getter in Philadelphia, both by share and raw targets for the season, but he’s been out-targeted in two of the last three games by Devonta Smith. Not surprisingly Smith has been the Eagles most targeted player over the last three weeks with a 29.3% target share, compared to 26.1% for Brown (and Dallas Goedert is seeing a healthy 20.7% of targets in the same time span). Part of the reason for the target disparity is that Smith is on the field more than Brown, with Smith maintaining a 92.4% snap share compared to Brown’s 85.1%, with Smith seeing the field over Brown in 12 and 13 personnel sets. The Eagles wide receivers’ matchup’s over the next two games are juicy, facing a Dallas defense that surrenders the 14th most fantasy points to wide receivers in Week 6, and a Steelers defense that allows the most fantasy points per game to wider receivers in Week 8, with a bye in between. This is going to be a trend to keep an eye on to see if Brown can reassert himself as the WR1 in Philadelphia.

The Denver offense has been a disappointment through five weeks, but it has at least settled into a pattern for the wide receivers. Courtland Sutton is the clear WR1, Jerry Jeudy the WR2 and no one else is worth worrying about for fantasy purposes. The next most targeted player is Melvin Gordon, and his 8% target share is low even for a running back. Excluding Week 1 when both Sutton and Jeudy had seven targets, Sutton has out-targeted Jeudy in every game this season. Sutton controls an elite 28.2% target share while Jeudy has a mediocre 17.1% share on the season. Perhaps if Russell Wilson were more efficient Jeudy could be a fantasy option even with such a low target share, but with Wilson, in his current form, Jeudy is not startable with 9.9 fantasy points per game. Even with an inefficient Wilson, Sutton’s elite target share has allowed him to score 15.4 fantasy points per game, and check in as the WR15 through five weeks. If Wilson can improve at some point this season Sutton could be in line for a monster week or two.  

There are nine receivers who have five or more catches in the red zone, and of those nine receivers only one has been unable to convert even a single one of those receptions into a touchdown, JuJu Smith-Schuster. But wait it gets worse, among the 22 wide receivers with five or more targets inside the red zone Smith-Schuster is one of just two receivers, the other being Marquez Valdes-Scantling, that hasn’t been able to convert any of those targets into a touchdown. Despite being Kansas City’s highest-targeted wide receiver if Smith-Schuster can’t convert red zone receptions into touchdowns he’s going to have a hard time improving on his 9.1 fantasy points per game considering his 7.94 yards per target which ranks 55th overall for wide receivers. 

If you’re looking for a wide receiver waiver wire / buy low target, turn your attention to Jakobi Meyers. Meyers’s 3.78 yards per route run ranks first among wide receivers, while his 9.66 yards per target ranks 24th. Though he’s only played in three of five games his 19.7% raw target share still leads the team, and in each of the three games he’s played he’s been New Englands’ most targeted player. Considering that Meyers’s 17.6 fantasy points per game ranks 8th among wide receivers, and his peripherals are so strong he is a player I’d look to add to my rosters. 

Thank you for reading and good luck to you in Week 6. If there’s anything or any player you would like me to cover in future editions of this article feel free to let me know on Twitter @ShaneIsTheWorst.