Film + Analytics: 2024 NFL Week 10 Notes

Fantasy football is a game based on statistics, but statistics without context will tell lies. Great fantasy analysis should incorporate a blend of statistical and film analysis, which will be the goal of this column every week.

I will watch the condensed version of every game this season and highlight a handful of the most important developments from my game reviews each week for fantasy managers to consider moving forward.

Justin Herbert

There is a decent chance one of the league's best quarterbacks is on your waiver wire right now. This can happen when he enters a season with low expectations due to a run-oriented play-caller and a supporting cast many fantasy managers wrote off for various reasons.

Herbert has not torn up the NFL beginning the season with four straight sub-200 yard passing games, but he has taken advantage of a relatively soft spot of the Chargers' schedule to rank as the overall QB5 over the last three weeks. The 26-year-old has been able to accomplish that while ranking 19th over that time in pass attempts (77), 18th in completions (52), 10th in passing yards (725), and tied for 10th in passing touchdowns (five).

How is that possible?

One of the best parts of Herbert's game throughout the first four seasons of his career was his ability to take care of the ball. Despite operating in less-than-ideal circumstances from 2020-23, Herbert entered this season with a career 2.7 touchdown-to-interception ratio. His pre-2024 interception rate was a very palatable 1.7%. Those marks are a scintillating 11:1 and 0.4% in 2024, respectively. Among quarterbacks with at least 100 pass attempts, only Lamar Jackson (1.0%) has a lower turnover-worthy throw rate than Herbert (1.2) this season.

However, the 2020 Offensive Rookie of the Year is doing more than managing the game. His 12.9% deep-throw percentage ranks eighth in the league for the season. The biggest change recently has been what he has done as a runner (16-83-1 over his last three outings compared to 20-34-0 over his first nine games).

The most encouraging part of his usage last week was the Chargers' decision to call a designed run for him on fourth down late in the first half, which resulted in a touchdown. Not only would this call have been unthinkable early in the season as Herbert was overcoming a high-ankle sprain, but his nine rush attempts in Week 10 were also tied for the second-most of his career.

In this Greg Roman-led offense, it seems unlikely Herbert will ever be a player who is a regular part of his team's rushing attack in the same way Josh Allen is — even though the former might be a better overall athlete. Herbert's four rush attempts per game this season put him on track to set a career-high with 68 carries (which he will likely exceed, considering he was limited early with the ankle injury), but the difference between the two situations is Buffalo has rarely prioritized getting a second running back involved with Allen as its quarterback. Roman's offenses typically have.

While Herbert's rushing floor appears to be as high now as it has ever been, it seems unlikely the Chargers will ever ask him to do more than he is doing right now. He needs to make the throws that need to be made in a relatively low-volume passing attack and serve as an occasional change-of-pace in the running game when the running backs are struggling to move the chains or push the pile - the latter of which was the case on his TD run against the Titans.

The beauty of Herbert moving forward is a favorable upcoming schedule (the Chargers face the Bengals in Week 11 and Ravens in Week 12), especially during two of the three fantasy playoff weeks (Week 15 against the Bucs and Week 17 versus the Patriots). He should have mid-range QB1 upside in all four of those contests.

Audric Estime

To put it mildly, Estime's NFL career got off to an inauspicious start. The first carry of his professional career ended up being a 13-yard run that ended with a lost fumble. He did not receive another carry for a quarter before spending a month on injured reserve. He then lost another fumble in his third rush attempt back from IR in Week 7. In all, Estime did not play more than 10% of the team's offensive snaps through nine games.

While Week 9 was hardly a breakthrough performance against the Ravens in a blowout loss to the Ravens - all five of his carries (for 35 yards, 21 of which came on one carry) occurred in the final 5:17 of a 41-10 game - head coach Sean Payton hinted that his rookie running back would see more work moving forward. Payton delivered on that promise against a stingy Kansas City run defense, as Estime handled 14 of the 17 carries by Denver running backs.

Despite failing to break a run for more than 10 yards in Week 10, Payton doubled down on his belief in Estime after the game, suggesting the fifth-round pick "ran well" and "gave us some juice." While the amount of juice Estime actually provided is up for debate, perhaps what Payton was referring to was the rookie's first and third carries, which accounted for 34% of his 53 rushing yards on the day.

On the downside, Estime did not see his first action versus the Chiefs until the team's third series, as he watched Jaleel McLaughlin, Javonte Williams, and wide receiver Marvin Mims take backfield snaps ahead of him. However, after Mims (two) and McLaughlin (one) took some of the early rushing work, Estime handled 82.4% of the remaining non-quarterback carries thereafter.

Payton could also be taking more of a macro look at the backfield situation. The rookie is averaging a full yard after contact (3.07) more for the season than Williams (2.07) and McLaughlin (2.05), albeit in a much more limited sample size. (Williams has 103 carries, and McLaughlin has 55 versus Estime's 29.) The Notre Dame product finished with 31 yards after contact in Week 10, which is more than Williams has produced in all but two games this season, so Payton is onto something.

The downside to Estime, from a fantasy perspective, is that he has not earned any kind of trust in the passing game. Across his first six career games, he has been on the field for 15 pass plays. He has served as a blocker three times and run five routes. By comparison, Williams is averaging 16 routes per game, even after seeing limited usage in Week 10.

Whatever fantasy upside Estime possesses for the rest of this season lies almost entirely on his ability to do damage as a runner. He is highly unlikely to handle any regular work in the passing game, making him a limited-upside flex option in any week Denver is likely to be working in a negative game script.

John Metchie

If only we had access to this information beforehand (you know, when Nico Collins was somewhat surprisingly ruled out before Sunday Night Football) … but I digress.

One key takeaway from what head coach DeMeco Ryans said in the clip above was "(Metchie) beating man coverage (during practice) with his feet … and he took it to the field." It was an interesting statement on multiple levels, not the least of which because Metchie routinely burned man coverage during his college career.

Why does what he did almost three years ago or more matter now? Because, in some ways, Metchie is still very much a rookie.

For those who may not be familiar with his story, Metchie missed his entire rookie season after he was diagnosed with acute promyelocytic leukemia in the summer of 2022. That diagnosis came months after he suffered a torn ACL in his last college game on Dec. 4, 2021. It routinely takes athletes two full years to recover physically and psychologically from a torn ACL, so we can only imagine how much his 2023 season was the result of Metchie still working his way back from both setbacks.

We have seen glimpses of Metchie's upside before Week 10. He flashed a bit with three catches for 44 yards during the Texans' rout of the Browns in the AFC Wild Card game last season. He flashed again with a 6-68-1 showing in Week 2 of the preseason this summer. However, the addition of Stefon Diggs this offseason blocked Metchie from logging any real playing time before the former was lost for the season in Week 8.

The Texans played on a Thursday night the following week, further delaying a potential breakout for Metchie until Week 10. Against Detroit's man-heavy defense, Metchie finished with a Separation Win Rate of 16.7% versus that coverage, which was good for 18th among receivers who ran at least 10 routes against man.

However, it was Metchie's work against zone coverage versus the Lions that was the most encouraging. His Average Separation Score of 0.111 was good for 21st among receivers who ran at least nine routes against zone in Week 10, while his Separation Win Rate of 22.2% was good for eighth using the same benchmark.

His best play against zone was unquestionably his first career touchdown catch late in the second quarter, as he widened his post route just enough to create separation from Terrion Arnold and leave himself just enough room to catch the ball before safety Brian Branch could do anything about it.

The degree to which Metchie is usable in fantasy moving forward depends heavily on whether Houston is committed to using him in the slot as often as Diggs. Metchie's 54% slot rate in Week 10 is almost identical to Diggs' usage there through eight games. If Metchie is on his way to earning the Diggs' role in this offense — and that is a possibility with Tank Dell still struggling to rediscover his rookie-year form — then Metchie has a chance to become a fantasy starter down the stretch. The odds are against it happening, however, as Collins' return will likely minimize whatever impact he could have had.

Ja’Tavion Sanders

Sanders has played at least 70% of his team's offensive snaps in six of his team's first 10 games. For the first month of the season, it just did not seem like it, as Andy Dalton was primarily focused on feeding Diontae Johnson. Beginning with Johnson's last game as a Panther (and subsequently Dalton's last game as a starting quarterback) in Week 7, Sanders has started to show why so many considered him the second-best tight end prospect in the 2024 NFL Draft.

Sanders is not necessarily included in this week’s article for what he did in Week 10, as most of his fantasy impact in Week 10 came on a short touchdown catch that any decent college tight end could have executed. Some of his most impressive work came in Week 9 when he flashed the speed and athleticism he often showed during his time at the University of Texas.

The rookie showed off his versatility three plays later, lining up in the slot and displaying his run-after-catch skills again on a 21-yard grab to set up the Panthers' first second-half touchdown. He capped off his impressive day by drawing a 22-yard pass interference call on Saints linebacker Demario Davis, who is still one of the best at his position despite being 35 years old. That play led to Chuba Hubbard scoring the game-winning touchdown on the next play.

It is probably not a coincidence that Bryce Young has looked much more composed since Sanders became a more regular part of the offense. To that end, Sanders' 2.30 yards per route run over the last four weeks ranks sixth among tight ends who have run at least 50 routes in that time.

While it is hard to imagine any Carolina pass-catcher maintaining fantasy value for the rest of this season, tight end is the one area where it could happen because very few players at the position are guaranteed volume. Thus, an athletic player with some run-after-catch skills like Sanders has a chance, especially if he only needs to be a complementary player while he is still figuring things out at the pro level.

With Adam Thielen expected back soon and Jalen Coker and Xavier Legette emerging as viable threats, Sanders has a path to fantasy relevancy in deeper leagues.