Five Stats to Know: 2024 Week 3

Week 3 is (mostly) in the books! In case you aren’t an insane person like me who likes to spend his Sunday night digging through usage data, I’ve curated five stats that will help you make better decisions in all fantasy football formats for the coming weeks.

I’ll also do my best to provide buy, sell, and waiver recommendations for managed leagues where applicable based on my findings. For a broader (if slightly less detailed) overview of usage across the league, I recommend this Twitter thread.

Stat #1: Exactly How Bad Is Bryce Young?

Andy Dalton made the Panthers look like an NFL offense on Sunday.

Every part of the offense felt the positive effects. Diontae Johnson had a career-high 122 receiving yards on a 37.8% target share, the 2nd-highest of the week behind Jauan Jennings. Johnson had not exceeded 100 receiving yards in a game since Week 13 of 2021, when he was still catching passes from Ben Roethlisberger.

I argued tirelessly all offseason that Johnson is the league’s best separator and that he would only need passable QB play to go off — and that’s what he now has. This strikes me as a situation where I’d be okay buying high, especially considering Adam Thielen’s hamstring injury means Johnson has virtually no target competition in the short term (or even in the long term, given Thielen’s age and dramatic dropoff in the second half of last year).

Additionally, now that we’ve seen the Panthers in something other than an extreme negative game script, their backfield has become significantly more interesting. In Weeks 1-2, no Panthers RB exceeded a 60% snap share or 12.0 fantasy points. But in Week 3, Chuba Hubbard consolidated 75.8% of backfield opportunities, totaling 21.9 weighted opportunities and 27.9 fantasy points. In the immediate term, Hubbard could be usable in the Panthers’ Week 5 and Week 7 matchups with the Bears and Commanders…but most impactfully, this was a great week for Jonathon Brooks owners.

If you’ve been stashing Brooks since your draft, as Scott Barrett and I recommended all offseason, we now have evidence that this offense can support backfield fantasy production. And unlike Hubbard, Brooks should be usable in every matchup — HC Dave Canales raved about his versatility in the passing game the moment he was drafted. Brooks was an ultra-talented prospect who should have no trouble making everyone else in the backfield irrelevant once he’s up to full speed. He’s another sneakier buy-high I’d like to make now in redraft.

Finally, to answer the question posed in the title of this section: Bryce Young is incredibly bad, especially in hindsight. You’d have to go back to Jimmy Clausen to find a QB with a worse start to his career by adjusted net yards per attempt. Not even Canales could save him.

Stat #2: The Backfields That Will Drive Us Insane, Week 3

We have a new backfield featured in this section this week!

Marshawn Lloyd went on IR prior to Week 3, leaving Emanuel Wilson as the unquestioned RB2 in Green Bay for the time being. That distinction hadn’t mattered much through the first two weeks, with Josh Jacobs commanding 16.3 XFP/G (RB14) and a 76.2% backfield carry share. However, Wilson became more involved in Week 3:

• Jacobs: 64.7% backfield carry share, 7.1% target share

• Wilson: 35.3% backfield carry share, 14.3% target share

The above stats are as charitable to Jacobs as possible by removing the 4th quarter, as the Packers were ahead by multiple scores at the end of this game. Jacobs still received all three of the backfield’s carries inside the 10-yard line, but Wilson ultimately ended the game with nearly as many weighted opportunities (10.9 to 9.7).

Matt LaFleur told us throughout the offseason that he prefers to utilize a committee backfield, and we witnessed the first movement toward that today. If you can sell Jacobs at fringe top-12 RB value off the promise of Jordan Love returning to rejuvenate the offense, I would do so.

Stat #3: The Vikings Are Built To Score Fantasy Points Through The Air

Through three games, Sam Darnold leads the NFL in passing TDs (8). His four scores through the air in Week 3 were tied for the most of his career — he’s only ever done it one other time, back in Week 10 of 2019. Aside from all the short fields that have been provided by Brian Flores’ blitz and Kevin O’Connell’s clear schematic edge and penchant for getting the most out of average-at-best QB talent, there’s a clear reason why this is happening: the Vikings simply throw more than almost anyone else near the goal line.

This year, the Vikings’ 20 pass attempts inside the 10-yard line rank 2nd-most. In 2023, they threw on 69.7% of their plays inside the 10 (2nd-most). That remained the case from Week 9 onward after Cousins was lost for the season. O’Connell has ranked no lower than 2nd in red zone pass rate in the two full seasons he’s been head coach.

For those wondering why A.S.S. god Jalen Nailor can’t seem to stop scoring touchdowns (he now has 3 on the year, and had a 4th called back Sunday as well), this is why. O’Connell’s pass-heavy spin on the Shanahan offense has been a joy to watch.

Stat #4: The “Tush Push” Is No More

Scott Barrett and I mentioned this in last week’s Everything Report, but in light of Saquon Barkley receiving 100% of backfield opportunities in Week 3 en route to 33.6 fantasy points (led the position), I think it’s worth revisiting.

With Jason Kelce at center last year, Jalen Hurts converted on 93% of his 3rd-and-1 or 4th-and-1 rush attempts. The “Tush Push” at the goal line made Hurts the overall fantasy QB2 in a season where he struggled a bit through the air, averaging just 226.9 passing YPG (ranking between Derek Carr and Easton Stick). It ensured that every Eagles RB was near-worthless for fantasy, preventing any of them from amassing more than a 41% share of inside-the-10 carries in any season from 2021-2023.

But now, with Jason Kelce retired? This massive part of the Eagles’ offense and Hurts’ fantasy scoring seems to be disappearing. So far this year, Hurts has only converted on 60% of his 3rd/4th-and-1 attempts, including a fumble on one of those carries. They didn’t even try it on Sunday — Barkley received the only carry with one yard to go (out of the Tush Push formation).

The sample size (three games) is still small, but if the Eagles have lost confidence in the effectiveness of this play, Barkley could challenge for RB1 overall status this year. In fact, he’s already the RB1 by weighted opportunities and FPG, not least of which because he has the 3rd-most red zone carries — subverting the exact reason every Zero/Hero RB snob (myself included) foolishly faded him this year.

Stat #5: The Consolidation Of Volume On The Chargers

Beginning with the obvious, Justin Herbert reaggravated his high ankle sprain in Week 3. Per Fantasy Points injury expert Edwin Porras, Herbert usually tries to play through injuries like this, but the Chargers could be smart to hold him out for a week or two to reduce his reinjury risk.

Whenever Herbert does return to the field, I’m incredibly excited about both J.K. Dobbins and Ladd McConkey as redraft assets. It may be harder to buy the former, given his hefty Week 1 and Week 2 fantasy scores, but Dobbins’ usage in Week 3 has intrigued me the most of anything we’ve seen so far.

Dobbins’ percentage of backfield opportunities (carries + targets) has gone from 52.0% in Week 1, to 46.2% in Week 2, to 85.7% in Week 3. That included a 15.0% target share as well this week (6th-best). Unsurprisingly, Gus Edwards seems to have been largely phased out of the offense, given his 2.94 YPC (3rd-worst of 34 qualifying RBs). Dobbins’ 7.38 YPC ranks 1st, while his missed tackles forced/attempt (a much better and more stable efficiency stat) also ranked 1st at the position entering the week. Greg Roman and Jim Harbaugh have mercifully decided to start giving the ball to their best RB.

As for what this means going forward? I genuinely think Dobbins has top-12 upside for the rest of the season, so long as he stays healthy. He didn’t produce like that in Week 3 because the Chargers ran only 45 plays (compared to 65 a week ago), but that’s why it’s useful to think about backfield utilization in terms of percentages. As soon as the play volume normalizes, Dobbins will be a much more obvious bell-cow RB to the fantasy community at large.

As for Ladd McConkey, the argument is a lot simpler. Even though Quentin Johnston scored again this week (on a busted coverage), McConkey commanded a 30% target share, double that of any other Chargers player. He now easily leads the team in target share over the full season. That’s pretty impressive for a rookie who missed almost all of training camp, and when we remember McConkey (according to Scott Barrett) was a terrific prospect with massive PPR cheat-code upside, and that rookie WRs outperform ADP expectation at a massively high rate while often peaking in the second half of the season, it makes all the sense in the world to buy McConkey right now. I’m certainly not worried about Josh Palmer.