Top 10 Fantasy Football Takeaways Week 6: Can Drake Maye Save the Patriots?

by Ted Chmyz · Fantasy Football

We are now a third of the way through the NFL regular season. Derrick Henry is on pace to score roughly 100 rushing touchdowns. Let’s keep breaking down the top fantasy football takeaways from fantasy football Week 6!  

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Top 10 Fantasy Football Takeaways Week 6

1. Tank Bigsby Can Be Denied

Let’s start with a callback to last week’s article, in which I mentioned that Tank Bigsby‘s rushing efficiency was so elite that he was all-but-guaranteed to continue expanding his role. Unfortunately, we saw the limits of that role this week. 

Travis Etienne exited the Jaguars’ game early with a hamstring injury. In theory, this was the ideal situation for Bigsby’s usage. Instead, Tank finished with just a 26.7-percent snap share and seven touches. 

The problem is that the Jaguars clearly don’t view the sophomore RB as a passing-down back. In a game where they were behind big early, they turned to D’Ernest Johnson instead, who played 33 of their team’s offensive snaps. For the season, Bigbsy has just an 8.0-percent route participation rate and a grand total of one target. He also has just six pass-blocking snaps, only one of which came in a true pass set.

Bigsby’s explosiveness means he can still be a valuable fantasy asset, especially as long as Etienne is sidelined. But having essentially zero pass-game usage is a massive blow to both his weekly floor and weekly ceiling. Especially with the Jaguars looking destined for plenty of negative game scripts, this may be the time to move Bigbsy while his hype grows thanks to Etienne’s injury.

2. We Have A Mark Andrews Sighting

The former TE1 overall caught three of his four targets for 66 yards and a touchdown, good for 14.1 half-PPR fantasy points. That’s only 2.9 points fewer than he had scored in the previous five weeks combined. 

Of course, the question is whether this is the start of more consistent fantasy production going forward for Andrews. Unfortunately, for now, the answer is still no. Despite the big day, Andrews still finished with just a 53.3-percent route participation rate and a 15.4-percent target share. Those aren’t TE1 numbers, especially the route participation. Only two tight ends in the top 14 fantasy scores have participation rates below 60-percent: Cole Kmet, who is still being pulled down low numbers in the first two weeks (in which he didn’t score points) and Andrews’ teammate Isaiah Likely, who has his own very obvious consistency issues.

On the other hand, this was a step in the right direction. Over the previous three weeks, Andrews’ route participation rate was just 38.8-percent, while his target share was 9.2-percent. I wouldn’t plug him back into your lineups just yet, but Andrews is looking more worth stashing now than he did a week ago.

3. What Drake May(e) Mean For the Patriots

The third-overall pick made the first start of his career on Sunday, and it went relatively well. Yes, Maye threw two interceptions as New England lost by 20 points. But he also threw for three touchdowns and over 200 yards, both things Jacoby Brissett did not accomplish once in his four starts. The Patriots’ 21 points were also the most they have scored this season.

From a fantasy perspective, the most important question heading into Maye’s debut was how much rushing upside he would bring. His 11.1-percent college scramble rate was higher than many noted dual-threat quarterbacks, and he saw his fair share of designed runs as well. 

So far, that is carrying over. Maye scrambled five times on Sunday, bridging his scramble rate for the season to 13.0-percent. The only qualified quarterbacks with higher scramble rates are Jayden Daniels (14.6-percent) and Malik Willis (13.6-percent). No other qualified QB is at even 11-percent. He didn’t see any designed carries, but that scramble rate can give a real boost to his fantasy production even without designed rushes. 

Meanwhile, Maye’s rising tide should lift all boats for the Patriots’ offense. Unfortunately for my DFS lineups, those boats aren’t yet Ja’Lynn Polk. However, Kayshon Boutte (who led the team in routes), Demario Douglas, and Hunter Henry all had decent outings. If Maye continues providing increased volume and explosiveness for the Patriots’ passing offense, these players move closer to fantasy relevance. 

4. Is Rachaad White the Buccaneers’ RB3?

Rachaad White missed Tampa’s Week 6 game with a foot injury. Unfortunately for him, their running game exploded in his absence, as Bucky Irving and Sean Tucker combined for over 200 yards on the ground. The rookie and the sophomore each saw 14 attempts, and both averaged over 5.0 yards per carry and scored a rushing touchdown.

White has served as the team’s primary passing-down running back. With the veteran sidelined, that role went to Irving, who posted a new career-high 62.5-percent route participation rate, although he still saw one fewer target than Tucker (two to three). Both running backs caught all of their targets, with Tucker breaking one for a 36-yard TD. 

Going forward, it’s hard to predict how this backfield will shake out. Tucker could return to irrelevance when White is back healthy, or he could remain heavily involved. Fantasy managers will likely be clamoring for White to lose his role entirely, but at the very least, he will likely continue to lead the way in the receiving game. For fantasy purposes, it might actually be best if Tucker returns to the bench, otherwise this could become an ugly three-way committee.

5. J.K. Dobbins is a Workhorse

This may be a sign that I am too deep into fantasy football Twitter, but I actually saw very little hype for J.K. Dobbins yesterday. Instead, fantasy die-hards are excited about Kimani Vidal, a popular rookie sleeper who was active for the first time with Gus Edwards on IR. To be fair, Vidal looked good in his NFL debut, catching a 38-yard receiving TD on his very first play from scrimmage. 

However, Dobbins was the main beneficiary of the Gus Bus’s absence. He played a new season-high 73.3-percent of the Chargers’ offensive snaps and handled 25 rushing attempts. Vidal did see a nearly equal amount of receiving work, as he ran just one fewer route and saw the same two targets. But Dobbins is clearly set to carry the load on the ground for arguably the most run-happy offense in the league. He’s a high-end RB2, at least, going forward.

6. Injured Tight Ends Are Back

The two leaders (pending MNF) in tight end target share so far this week are David Njoku and Evan Engram, both of whom played their first fully healthy games of the season on Sunday. For Njoku, an elite 30.4-percent target share didn’t turn into much, as he caught just five of seven targets for 31 yards. That target share is obviously very encouraging, but he may be yet another victim of the football disaster known as the Browns’ offense.

Engram, however, had a big day. He caught all 10 of his targets for 102 yards, finishing with 13.2 half-PPR points despite a lost fumble. So far, any worries that Engram would be the odd man out with Brian Thomas Jr. emerging in the Jaguars’ offense and Chrisitan Kirk back healthy seem unfounded. (If anything, Kirk and his 14.3-percent target share over the last two weeks is the Jaguar to be worried about.)

7. Bijan Robinson’s Problems Aren’t Going Away

I hate to be a hater, but I’m still worried about Bijan Robinson, even after his 24-point outing against the Panthers this week. The issue is that Robinson still saw three fewer carries than Tyler Allgeier, who also handled three of the team’s four goal-line attempts. It’s fine to split work against the Panthers, but we’ve seen in previous weeks that reduced volume can lead to some ugly fantasy outings for Bijan.

Robinson also isn’t seeing the elite receiving work fantasy managers were hoping for. For the season, he ranks just No. 19 among running backs with a 10.6-percent target share (this is slightly helped by the fact that the Falcons are No. 9 in pass rate). His route participation rate of 54.8-percent is better (No. 5 among RBs), and he also ranks No. 2 with 10 designed targets through six weeks. The issue is that Kirk Cousins is slinging it and not often looking Robinson’s way for checkdowns. That combined with Allgeier claiming groundwork (and doing well with it) means Robinson will likely continue to have down outings in tougher matchups.  

8. Caleb Williams is Cooking

Over the first three games of his NFL career, Caleb Williams averaged 210 passing yards on a 59.3-percent completion percentage (3.8-percent below expected), with four interceptions to two touchdowns. Over the last three games, he has averaged 229 yards on a 74.1-percent completion percentage (6.7-percent above expected), plus seven touchdowns and just one interception. We have to acknowledge that this was against arguably the three softest matchups in the league (the Rams, Panthers, and Jaguars), but it’s still impressive.

Importantly for fantasy, Caleb is also averaging 28.2 rushing yards per game. He’s not a true Konami code QB, but those extra three points per game can go a long way. The first-overall pick could push his way into the QB1 conversation if he can stay hot. His improvement is a big boost to the rest of the Bears’ skill position players, too.

9. DeAndre Hopkins Finally Played a Full Snap Share

Coming into this week, Hopkins had just a 40.7-percent route participation rate for the season. He had appeared in every one of the Titans’ games but was clearly having his usage limited thanks to a preseason knee injury. On Sunday, the veteran posted a 63.3-percent participation rate. His snap share was 71-percent, a full 25-percent above his previous season high. 

Of course, this still isn’t an ideal fantasy role. Hopkins caught four of six targets (22.2-percent share) for 54 yards this week. He actually leads Tennessee in receiving yards, but the fact that he does that with just 35 yards per game points to how terrible the Titans’ passing attack has been. This week’s usage uptick takes the former All-Pro from a waiver piece to a potential stash, but he’s still not a weekly starter until we see more improvement from either his role or the entire Titans’ offense.

10. Jameson Williams Can’t Keep Getting Away With It

After the first two weeks of the season, it looked as though Jameson Williams would be one of the best picks of the fantasy football season. The 2022 12th-overall pick racked up 20 targets over the first two weeks, good for a 23.8-percent target share, and a 47.2-percent air yards share in the Lions’ offense. 

Over the Lions’ last three games, Williams has just nine targets, a 13-percent share. His massive 17.6 ADOT means he still has a 30.2-percent air yards share, but that’s simply not a lot of volume. With that said, Williams has scored at least 15 half-PPR points in each of the last two weeks. 

However, unsurprisingly, his production was almost entirely thanks to two big touchdowns, a 70-yarder in Week 4 and a 37-yarder on Sunday. In Week 3, when he didn’t hit on a big play, Williams finished with just one catch for nine yards, adding negative seven rushing yards to finish with 0.7 fantasy points. There are a lot of mouths to feed on this Detroit offense, and the potential from the first two weeks that Jameson would be near the top of the pecking order seems to have faded. He’s still a valuable fantasy asset, but Williams profiles more like a highly volatile WR3 or WR4 than the WR2 his raw fantasy number would imply.  

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