Yahoo Sports Booms and Busts: Week 16 provides old-school path to fantasy title games with RBs leading the way
Are you advancing to the finals of your fantasy football league? If so, there's a good chance you did it the old-fashioned way — through the backfield.
When the early slate of games closed on Sunday, the top of the running back leaderboard was littered with signature performances. Jonathan Taylor made up for last week's regrettable gaffe, romping for 218 yards and three touchdowns for 39.8 fantasy points against the Titans. Chuba Hubbard (30.5 fantasy points) was right behind Taylor on the scoresheet, with 152 rushing yards and two scores, including the walk-off touchdown to defeat Arizona in overtime. Saquon Barkley (27 points), James Conner (24.6 points before getting hurt), Jahmyr Gibbs (23.4 points) and Bijan Robinson (23.3 points), those stars were in the highlights all day.
RB leaderboard with SNF and MNF left to play
The hit rate at the top of the Week 16 running back board has been absurdly high. When that early window was completed, nine of the top 11 running backs in play had exceeded their projected fantasy score (we'll squeeze in De'Von Achane and James Cook as major hits from the afternoon slate). Only Chase Brown (12.4 points) and Joe Mixon (7.6 points) came in under expectations.
Mind you, there's always room for some quibbling. Derrick Henry (19.9 points) hasn't scored a touchdown in a month. Conner suffered that knee injury, wrecking what could have been a monstrous game. Gibbs managers love the 27 touches and 154 total yards, but maybe they're a little greedy — they'd like more than one touchdown. The Lions were kind enough to steer a touchdown to all four of their plausible skill-position starters.
Even some of the sleeper and quasi-sleeper plays came home. Gus Edwards punched in two scores on Thursday, Jerome Ford (21.6 points) made splash plays at Cincinnati, Tyjae Spears had a couple of touchdowns. Tyrone Tracy Jr. didn't do much as a runner, but pass-catching work and one touchdown grab made for effective deodorant. He beat his projection, too.
We talk about this often in fantasy circles: running back workloads are fairly projectable week-over-week. The wide receivers and tight ends have to play the variance game. Most NFL teams have either a bell cow or a head-of-committee runner, and defined backs for the goal-line and third-down work. We pretty much know where the ball is going. Meanwhile, it's never that surprising when a No. 2 or No. 3 receiver outperforms a team's No. 1 in a given week. These are the rules of variance and we try to make peace with them.
Gibbs, Robinson and Barkley all took on extra responsibility in Week 16. Gibbs was working without David Montgomery (out indefinitely) and Barkley's importance immediately shot up when Jalen Hurts suffered a concussion on the 11th snap of the game. The Falcons didn't want to overload Michael Penix Jr. in his first start, allowing Robinson to get 22 carries for the third straight week. Gibbs easily set a new season high for touches, and the 29 Barkley carries were a new high, too.
It helps that a lot of these backs are on teams still fighting for playoff spots and positioning — we don't have to guess on team motivation. Conversely, it's now a concern for Conner managers that Arizona is eliminated from playoff contention — perhaps the Cardinals could rest Conner for a future game that doesn't matter to them. Most of the other players we mentioned are free from these concerns. Miami in particular is a club that stayed in playoff contention with its victory; good news for Team Achane.
QB roundup
Versatility was the watchword with the quarterback heroes in Week 16. Top scorer Jayden Daniels was amazing with five touchdown passes en route to 36.42 points in an inspired comeback win over Philadelphia, but he also ran for 81 yards. Bryce Young, of all people, put up 27.12 points, in part because of 68 scrambling yards and a touchdown. The second-best fantasy game of Patrick Mahomes' season was sparked by 33 rushing yards and a touchdown on Saturday. It's a shame Mahomes missed a couple of wide-open receivers for likely touchdowns; it could have been a pinball score.
And then there's the Lions, who are set up to make fantasy managers happy. Jared Goff did whatever he wanted in the 34-17 win at Chicago (336 passing yards, three touchdowns), but there's a leak at the bottom of the bucket — Caleb Williams threw for 334 yards and two scores against the injury-ravaged Detroit defense. It wasn't a surprise to see Keenan Allen gash the Lions again (9-141-1); he went from a start-sit seam call to the WR2 for Week 16 in a matter of hours.
Finding the little wins at TE
No one on the tight end page is going to break the Week 16 slate. Chig Okonkwo clicked with new starter Mason Rudolph, using a 9-81-1 line (and a 2-point conversion) as a path to a top-five TE finish. Still, he merely scored 14.6 points. I doubt many fantasy managers had faith in Dalton Schultz (5-45-1) or Isaiah Likely (3-29-1, which snuck him to TE8). Maybe Jake Ferguson or Tucker Kraft will flash in a later game. Travis Kelce is just another guy these days.
Streaming success
At least the defensive streaming model came through with two obvious plays. The Falcons scored two defensive touchdowns against Drew Lock and the overmatched Giants offense, racing to the top of the D/ST board. The Bengals didn't get the touchdown luck but they collected five sacks and three turnovers against Dorian Thompson-Robinson and the sluggish Cleveland offense. DTR's mediocre play wrecked the bottom line for Jerry Jeudy; after a dynamic five-week run, Jeudy crashed with a 2-20-0 dud on three targets. Hopefully, you had a reasonable pivot and were able to proactively bench Jeudy.
The Colts and Dolphins don't have great defenses, but given that they visit the Giants and Browns, respectfully, perhaps they'll be in the streamer conversation for Week 17.
Speed Round
• Joe Burrow would be squarely in the MVP discussion if the Bengals were going anywhere. He's giving us upside and floor every week. Every one of his indexed metrics is above league average, most of them well above. Even with just 30 pass attempts against the Browns — Cleveland's offense did not punch back — Burrow found three touchdown passes, the seventh straight week he's had three or more. And this has all come even with Chase Brown performing like a league-winner in the backfield.
• After five straight weeks of nothing, the 49ers finally unlocked Deebo Samuel (the five carries were window dressing; the 7-96-1 in the pass game is what sings). Of course he was reasonably benched by a lot of managers after the extended period without any production. Maybe the Bengals and 49ers can play some sort of exhibition game after the season — all the fun players, nothing to do in January. Of course Cincinnati still has an outside chance to qualify, but I wouldn't bet on it.
• The Brian Thomas setup down the stretch was too good to be true. Look at that target column; 10, 12, 14, 13. And look at those weekly finishes: WR13, WR23, WR4, WR3. The last few weeks have been with Mac Jones, who nobody has a high opinion of. Thomas is too big to fail. A shame we can't say that about some of the other first-round wideouts.
• As for Brenton Strange, I stand behind the process but the players have to play well, too. Strange lost a fumble and had a drop and appeared to get benched in the fourth quarter. Jones continued to target no-name tight ends over the middle, so Strange could have easily met or exceeded his projection. But most coaches are quick to react to mistakes — unless it's a star player in consideration.
• Most of the talk about the Jets centers around Aaron Rodgers, but what's up with Breece Hall? He's in the bottom half of running success rate, after finishing second to last in 2023. His receiving has been mediocre as well, and his per-touch stats have dropped two straight seasons. He's going to drop in ADP next fall, and I'm probably not interested in the bait.
• I give credit for Kyler Murray running aggressively in Week 16, with Arizona's playoff chances in the balance. But he's one of those players who's just good enough to lose with. Trey McBride having zero touchdowns and Marvin Harrison Jr. meandering through a disappointing rookie year, that's red ink on the Murray page. Arizona was the NFC West favorite in mid-November and somehow they ultimately were eliminated with two weeks to go. Murray is now 35-44-1 as a starter, by the way. Quarterback wins are a noisy stat, but it's not completely irrelevant.
• The Lions don't need the trick plays to score on everyone — they have all the pieces on offense. It's still a blast. though, when Ben Johnson sorts through the back of the playbook. The old school Cowboys used to be like this — they took more pleasure out of tricking you then beating you straight up. The key, of course, is being able to accomplish both.
