What a wild week three we had! Starting with Thursday night’s surprise thriller with the Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers blowing up the scoreboard, and continuing with the Jacksonville Jaguars annihilating the Baltimore Ravens, this week saw a lot of high scoring affairs, with plenty of fantasy football points to go around.
Week Four NFL Fantasy Football Watch List
As we close in on a quarter of the way of the season, consistent skill position producers will become clearer and clearer. Every week there will still be overreactions that will cause a trendy waiver wire pickup. Here however, we sort through all the one-week wonders, and instead of screaming out who to waste a valuable waiver wire claim on, we’ll just highlight a few players to pay attention to in the incoming weeks.
These are players who have not proven they can produce quite yet, but have the talent to breakout should the right situation present itself. Don’t add them yet, but put a star next to their name, and add them to your watch list.
Watch of the Week
This week we begin with another quarterback Deshaun Watson of the Houston Texans. Usually, rookie quarterbacks are not very good producers in fantasy football, but Watson could be an outlier due to his awesome rushing prowess.
In two games as the Texans starting quarterback, Watson has rushed for 108 yards and a touchdown. Rushing yards and touchdowns can give a lot of value to quarterbacks, because the point value is much higher, giving Watson a higher ceiling than most first-year signal callers.
What will hold him back is his passing. He hasn’t appeared to be the most accurate, and has three interceptions to match his three touchdowns. Still, he was able to throw for 300 yards against the New England Patriots, and almost won the game! Plus, he does have a pretty good wide receiver to throw to in DeAndre Hopkins.
Watson has some juicy matchups throughout the season, including two matchups in division against the Indianapolis Colts, and Tennessee Titans. The Colts have given up 283 yards per game, and the Titans give up 275 yards a game.
Watson is definitely worth a look as a streamer for bye weeks, and could even turn into more. Watch how he does this week against the Titans, and see if he continues to progress as a passer.
From a Rookie to a Veteran
Here is a very deep sleeper, but a familiar name. Jamaal Charles used to be a fantasy god, but a string of injuries have forced to take a backup job on a new team, the Denver Broncos.
C.J. Anderson is a very good running back, so the only way Charles becomes relevant is if Anderson goes down. On his career, Charles has a ridiculous 5.4 yards per carry average. He’s getting up there in age, but despite his limited opportunities this season, he’s still managing to keep his average up. His 5.1 this year is still phenomenal, and last week he actually outperformed Anderson, racking up 62 yards and a touchdown on just nine carries.
Charles is guy who is tempting to just pick up and stash on the bench. If Anderson goes down, Charles instantly becomes and all-star. He is only owned in 34% of Yahoo leagues, so if there is no room on your bench, be careful with your waiver claims so if he becomes a hot name, you can win that claim!
Someone In-Between
We’ve focused on a greenhorn rookie, as well as an established veteran. Now here’s someone who’s in-between. Sterling Shepard, wide receiver for the New York Giants is this week’s wide receiver to watch.
Shepard put up a huge stat line in last week’s game against the Philadelphia Eagles. With Brandon Marshall looking like he exchanged his hands for cement blocks this year, Shepard looks to play second fiddle to superstar Odell Beckham Jr.
As a rookie, Shepard shared targets with Beckham, and Victor Cruz, playing mostly out of the slot. He managed 683 yards and eight touchdowns. His fantasy outlook seemed bleak to begin the season, due to Marshall’s presence, as well as the Giants drafting tight end Evan Engram in this year’s draft.
Instead, he looks to be a growing part of this offense, and at this rate is on pace to go over 1,00 yards this season. Monitor Shepard’s games the next few weeks, and if he keeps putting up even similar numbers to his week three performance, he might have a spot on your squad.
Week Three Redux
Trending Down
Last week, veteran Chris Johnson was our running back to watch in week three. Well, there wasn’t much to watch. Johnson put up a stat line that will not put him on even the worst fantasy squads, only managing a paltry 17 yards on 12 carries.
The Arizona Cardinals played catch up most of the game, but kept it close the entire time, so it’s not like they abandoned the run game. It was only his first game as a starter, so there’s still hope, but Andre Ellington outperformed him. Ellington could see a bigger role going forward because he is a much better asset in the passing game.
Right now the Cardinals backfield is one to stay away from, but not one to stop watching completely. Ellington came out of the game with 10 touches split between rushing and receiving and 81 total yards. Let’s see if his role grows going forward.
Trending Up
Austin Seferian-Jenkins saw his first regular season action Sunday with the New York Jets. On the surface, his stat line was nothing spectacular, managing five catches for 31 yards. A little more of an in-depth look will show that he was tied for the most targets, and most catches in the game. Quarterback Josh McCown still likes his tight ends.
What is really significant about this though, is that it is a fresh start for the troubled tight end. As stated last week, we know the talent is there. It’s been overshadowed by his off the field incidents, mainly, his issues with DUIs. Some players have their NFL careers killed by these issues. Seferian-Jenkins seems to have woken up.
Since his last incident, he has decided to give up alcohol for good. As of Wednesday Sept. 26th, he is 230 days sober. Putting his focus in the right place will hopefully allow Seferian-Jenkins to finally realize his huge potential.
He’s a guy to definitely keep monitoring.
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