Welcome to the Week 3 edition of The Inside Look for the 2022 NFL season. This will be a data-driven article and will go under the hood to see if the box scores tell the whole story about what transpired during the weekend. My goal here will be to either calm your nerves about a player that may have underperformed or cause you to rethink some of the spots you may have taken.
Let’s dig into the data!
Before we dig into individual player performances I wanted to take a moment to talk about why we focus so heavily on Targets. Targets equal opportunities and in fantasy opportunity more often than creates production. The more targets that a player gets the better chance there is that the player will return on value.
Hollywood! With Kyler Murray throwing the ball 55 times in Week 3, Marquise Brown was the biggest beneficiary. The Ravens cast-off was targeted a career-high 17 times this past weekend. Prior to this weekend, the most he had ever had in a game was 14. He somewhat made the most of it as he finished with 14 catches and 140 receiving yards. The 140 were the most he’s had in a game since his first career game back in 2019. The only thing that Brown didn’t do this weekend was find the endzone.
Thanks to the early exits of Michael Thomas and Jarvis Landry this weekend, it was the Chris Olave show. Olave had 13 targets for a second straight week. Unlike last week though, he was able to make the most of them as he caught 9 of the 13 for 147 yards. With 29 targets so far through 3 games, Olave is playing an important part in this offense. Up next for the Saints will be a matchup with the Vikings, a team that has given up the sixth most receiving yards to wide receivers so far this season.
DeVonta Smith, have yourself a day! With targets being spread out thanks to the acquisition of A.J. Brown we probably won’t see games like this often. But when they do, oh we’ll want to enjoy them. Smith had one of the most productive games of his young career thanks to the 12 targets. He was able to catch 8 of them for 169 yards and found the endzone once. The 169 yards receiving were the most he’s ever had in an NFL game.
This week was a little bit more back to normal for the running backs and targets. We had 2 guys surpass double digits, compared to just 1 last week. Jets running back Breece Hall was tied for the lead this weekend in running back targets with 11. The rookie running back has now had 2 games where he had at least 9 targets. He’s quickly become a focal point of this offense. With the return of Zach Wilson expected to be this week, it will be interesting to see if Hall continues to get a healthy amount of targets.
While Austin Ekeler’s ground game was MIA this weekend, his targets were not. He was targeted 8 times this weekend and is now up to 22 targets on the year. He hasn’t been able to get much going on the ground, but through the air is where continues to be more productive and more important to this Chargers team.
As someone that lives in Baltimore and is part of a family that is crazy for Ravens football, it’s been extremely fun to be able to watch Mark Andrews and Lamar Jackson grow together. This QB/TE tandem may be the best in the game. Andrews had a monster game on Sunday, finished with 8 catches on 13 targets and 2 TD. This weekend will be a much tougher task for him though as the Bills have been one of the best teams in the league at defending tight ends.
Marquise Brown wasn’t the only Cardinals player to get into the fun this weekend, well at least in terms of targets. Zach Ertz was the second most targeted tight end this weekend with 10. This was the second straight week with double-digit targets. It was also the second straight that Ertz did very little with the targets. He was able to catch just 6 of the targets this weekend for 45 yards. All in all a pretty disappointing weekend for him.
The Russell Wilson experiment in Denver is not off to a great start. Although the Broncos pulled out the victory in Week 3, Wilson had an awful game. He finished with just 184 passing yards on 33 throws. Of his 33 passes, he relieved heavily on his backs as they accounted for nearly 40% of his targets.
When you have 2 stud receivers in DeVonta Smith and A.J. Brown, there’s really no need to throw the ball to anyone but them. Of Jalen Hurts’ 34 pass attempts, 22 of them went to that duo and more than 70% of his passes in total went to receivers.
I said it earlier with the targets, but we saw a little bit of a return to normalcy with running backs in Week 3. A healthy Christian McCaffrey led all running backs with 25 rushes this past weekend. He was able to convert those rushes into 108 yards rushing. The 25 rushes were the most he’s had in a game since all the way back in Week 7 of 2019. The second consecutive week with over 100 yards rushing was also the first time he’s done that since 2019. A healthy McCaffrey is good for fantasy and also good for the NFL.
If you rostered David Montgomery in Week3 in DFS, you were probably left disappointed and outside the cash line. The matchup was pristine and the end result for his replacement was simply amazing. Khalil Herbert stepped in after Montgomery’s injury and had himself a career game. He rushed 20 times for 157 and 2 TD. This was his second career 100-yard game. If he’s available in your season-long league, go snatch him up. Now.
The ‘Playbook’ as I like to call it shows a breakdown of the play splits that teams used this past weekend.
The Chicago Bears so far this season have just run, and run, and run. Justin Fields is nowhere close to a fantasy option as the Bears’ offense relies heavily on the run. This week they threw the ball less than 30% of the time, a trend now for 3 consecutive weeks.
With the run game completely ineffective this weekend, the Buccaneers went with a pass-heavy offense. Tom Brady threw the ball 42 times this weekend, the most he’s had in a game this season. The Bucs’ offense was a disaster as a whole as they only scored 12 points this weekend. That said, you can certainly use the excuse that they were missing some key weapons with Evans, Jones, and Godwin all out.
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Make sure you follow me on Twitter at @rangerzfan79 and be sure to sign up for an ALL ACCESS GOLD ACCOUNT here at Win Daily Sports. Gain access to our Projection Models and jump into our Discord where we will have our experts talking plays across every sport and slate!
Welcome to the Week 3 edition of The Inside Look for the 2022 NFL season. This will be a data-driven article and will go under the hood to see if the box scores tell the whole story about what transpired during the weekend. My goal here will be to either calm your nerves about a player that may have underperformed or cause you to rethink some of the spots you may have taken.
Let’s dig into the data!
Before we dig into individual player performances I wanted to take a moment to talk about why we focus so heavily on Targets. Targets equal opportunities and in fantasy opportunity more often than creates production. The more targets that a player gets the better chance there is that the player will return on value.
Hollywood! With Kyler Murray throwing the ball 55 times in Week 3, Marquise Brown was the biggest beneficiary. The Ravens cast-off was targeted a career-high 17 times this past weekend. Prior to this weekend, the most he had ever had in a game was 14. He somewhat made the most of it as he finished with 14 catches and 140 receiving yards. The 140 were the most he’s had in a game since his first career game back in 2019. The only thing that Brown didn’t do this weekend was find the endzone.
Thanks to the early exits of Michael Thomas and Jarvis Landry this weekend, it was the Chris Olave show. Olave had 13 targets for a second straight week. Unlike last week though, he was able to make the most of them as he caught 9 of the 13 for 147 yards. With 29 targets so far through 3 games, Olave is playing an important part in this offense. Up next for the Saints will be a matchup with the Vikings, a team that has given up the sixth most receiving yards to wide receivers so far this season.
DeVonta Smith, have yourself a day! With targets being spread out thanks to the acquisition of A.J. Brown we probably won’t see games like this often. But when they do, oh we’ll want to enjoy them. Smith had one of the most productive games of his young career thanks to the 12 targets. He was able to catch 8 of them for 169 yards and found the endzone once. The 169 yards receiving were the most he’s ever had in an NFL game.
This week was a little bit more back to normal for the running backs and targets. We had 2 guys surpass double digits, compared to just 1 last week. Jets running back Breece Hall was tied for the lead this weekend in running back targets with 11. The rookie running back has now had 2 games where he had at least 9 targets. He’s quickly become a focal point of this offense. With the return of Zach Wilson expected to be this week, it will be interesting to see if Hall continues to get a healthy amount of targets.
While Austin Ekeler’s ground game was MIA this weekend, his targets were not. He was targeted 8 times this weekend and is now up to 22 targets on the year. He hasn’t been able to get much going on the ground, but through the air is where continues to be more productive and more important to this Chargers team.
As someone that lives in Baltimore and is part of a family that is crazy for Ravens football, it’s been extremely fun to be able to watch Mark Andrews and Lamar Jackson grow together. This QB/TE tandem may be the best in the game. Andrews had a monster game on Sunday, finished with 8 catches on 13 targets and 2 TD. This weekend will be a much tougher task for him though as the Bills have been one of the best teams in the league at defending tight ends.
Marquise Brown wasn’t the only Cardinals player to get into the fun this weekend, well at least in terms of targets. Zach Ertz was the second most targeted tight end this weekend with 10. This was the second straight week with double-digit targets. It was also the second straight that Ertz did very little with the targets. He was able to catch just 6 of the targets this weekend for 45 yards. All in all a pretty disappointing weekend for him.
The Russell Wilson experiment in Denver is not off to a great start. Although the Broncos pulled out the victory in Week 3, Wilson had an awful game. He finished with just 184 passing yards on 33 throws. Of his 33 passes, he relieved heavily on his backs as they accounted for nearly 40% of his targets.
When you have 2 stud receivers in DeVonta Smith and A.J. Brown, there’s really no need to throw the ball to anyone but them. Of Jalen Hurts’ 34 pass attempts, 22 of them went to that duo and more than 70% of his passes in total went to receivers.
I said it earlier with the targets, but we saw a little bit of a return to normalcy with running backs in Week 3. A healthy Christian McCaffrey led all running backs with 25 rushes this past weekend. He was able to convert those rushes into 108 yards rushing. The 25 rushes were the most he’s had in a game since all the way back in Week 7 of 2019. The second consecutive week with over 100 yards rushing was also the first time he’s done that since 2019. A healthy McCaffrey is good for fantasy and also good for the NFL.
If you rostered David Montgomery in Week3 in DFS, you were probably left disappointed and outside the cash line. The matchup was pristine and the end result for his replacement was simply amazing. Khalil Herbert stepped in after Montgomery’s injury and had himself a career game. He rushed 20 times for 157 and 2 TD. This was his second career 100-yard game. If he’s available in your season-long league, go snatch him up. Now.
The ‘Playbook’ as I like to call it shows a breakdown of the play splits that teams used this past weekend.
The Chicago Bears so far this season have just run, and run, and run. Justin Fields is nowhere close to a fantasy option as the Bears’ offense relies heavily on the run. This week they threw the ball less than 30% of the time, a trend now for 3 consecutive weeks.
With the run game completely ineffective this weekend, the Buccaneers went with a pass-heavy offense. Tom Brady threw the ball 42 times this weekend, the most he’s had in a game this season. The Bucs’ offense was a disaster as a whole as they only scored 12 points this weekend. That said, you can certainly use the excuse that they were missing some key weapons with Evans, Jones, and Godwin all out.
Make sure to check out our new PrizePicks model.
Make sure you follow me on Twitter at @rangerzfan79 and be sure to sign up for an ALL ACCESS GOLD ACCOUNT here at Win Daily Sports. Gain access to our Projection Models and jump into our Discord where we will have our experts talking plays across every sport and slate!
Welcome to the Week 2 edition of The Inside Look for the 2022 NFL season. This will be a data driven article and will go under the hood to see if the box scores tell the whole story about what transpired during the weekend. My goal here will be to either calm your nerves about a player that may have underperformed or cause you to rethink some of the spots you may have taken.
With Week 2 now complete one thing is very clear, Ravens fans are not happy!
Let’s dig in to the data!
Before we dig in to individual player performances I wanted to take a moment to talk about why we focus so heavily on Targets. Targets equal opportunities and in fantasy opportunity more often than creates production. The more targets that a player gets the better chance there is that the player will return on value.
Thanks to trailing by 21 heading into the fourth quarter on Sunday, Tua Tagovailoa was forced to throw often. That led to monster games from both Jaylen Waddle and Tyreek Hill. The 19 targets were by far the most that Waddle has ever had in a game, as were the 171 yards receiving. Waddle now has touchdowns in 2 consecutive games to start to the season.
Waddle’s teammate Tyreek Hill also had himself a monster game, finishing with 11 catches and 190 receiving yards on 13 targes. Like Waddle, he found the endzone twice. There are going to be games where Hill gets you almost no fantasy points. That said, there’s no receiver that has the pure upside that he has due to his breakaway speed and ability to get past any secondary in the league. Next weekend will be a much tougher task for the Dolphins as they’ll face off against a Bills defense that has given up only 363 passing yards on the year.
Now on to non-Dolphins receivers! With no Gabe Davis last night, it was the Stefon Diggs show for the Buffalo Bills. And oh what a show it was! Diggs finished with 12 catches on 14 targets and 148 receiving yards and 3 TD. The 148 yards were the most he’s had in a game since Week 10 against the Jets last season.
What a start to the year for Amon-Ra St. Brown! The second year receiver for the Detroit Lions had one of the finest games of his young career this past weekend. He was targeted a team leading 12 times (second straight week with 12 targets) and caught 9 of them for 116 yards and 2 touchdowns. Up next week for St. Brown and the Lions will be the Vikings, a team that has given up close to 600 passing yards on the year.
As you’ll see when we get to the Running Back Touches section, this was a weird week for running backs. Only Austin Ekeler was over 7 targets this weeks as he finished his game with 10 targets. If we compare that to least week, there were 6 running backs that had more than 7 targets. Ekeler was able to catch 9 of his 10 targets for 55 yards.
The first 2 names on this chart are names we often see on this list. Both Zach Ertz and Mark Andrews are favorites of their respective QB’s as both have strong abilities to catch balls thrown their way. Ertz led all Tight Ends this week with 11 targets, finishing with 8 catches and 75 yards. The only negative was that he failed to find the end zone.
Mark Andrews had his first 100-yard game of the young season. He is, by far, Lamar Jackson’s favorite target. In Week 2, Andrews was able to catch 9 of the 11 balls thrown his way for 104 yards and 1 TD. Up next will be a tough matchup with the Patriots, a team that has only given up 37 yards to Tight Ends so far this season through the first 2 weeks.
Justin Herbert threw the ball 46 times this week past week. Nearly a third of those passes were thrown to his backs. While Austin Ekeler saw the bulk of the 15 targets to his backs, both Zander Horvath and Josh Kelly saw action too with 2 targets each. Should Keenan Allen return in Week 3 for the Chargers, I’m sure we’ll see a swing back to more target share to his receivers.
Of Lamar Jackson’s 29 passes this weekend, more than half of them went to his Tight Ends. The combo of Andrews and Isaiah Likely combined for 16 targets this weekend. Likely’s 5 targets were the third most of anyone on the Ravens this weekend.
If you missed what happened in Baltimore this weekend with Tua Tagovailoa, it’s time to put down the book or whatever you were doing and search for some highlights. The Dolphins trailed throughout in this one and it caused Tua to throw often. Tua threw the ball 50 times on Sunday, with more than 70% of those passes going to his receivers. Hill and Waddle accounted for 32 of the 50 targets.
I said it earlier and I’ll say it again, this was a weird weekend for running backs. Out of all the running backs with more than 15 touches this weekend, none finished with more than 90 yards rushing. Nick Chubb was the “best “ of the bunch as he finished with 87 yards on 17 carries. His 5.1 yards per carry were the most of anyone in the top tier of running backs and carries. Not what you want to see in season-long fantasy and DFS.
That said, there were a handful of running backs that did have solid games. They didn’t finish in the top of carries, but Aaron Jones, David Montgomery, and Christian McCaffrey all finished with over 100 yards rushing on 15 carries. Again, rough week for Running Backs.
The ‘Playbook’ as I like to call it shows a breakdown of the play splits that teams used this past weekend.
For the second consecutive week, Chicago went with a run heavy offense. The only difference this week was they did not play in a monsoon. Justin Fields threw the ball just 11 times this weekend against the Packers. I don’t need to state the obvious, but he’s not really an option for fantasy at this point.
On the other end of the spectrum, the Vikings threw the ball 80% of the time last night vs. the Eagles. Trailing from the moment of the coin flip and the run game of Dalvin Cook non-existent, the Vikings were forced to throw often. Of the 56 plays for the Vikings last night, 45 were passes.
Before setting your weekly lineups, make sure to check out our Optimizer.
Make sure you follow me on Twitter at @rangerzfan79 and be sure to sign up for an ALL ACCESS GOLD ACCOUNT here at Win Daily Sports. Gain access to our Projection Models and jump into our Discord where we will have our experts talking plays across every sport and slate!
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