Market share update for Week 3

Each week during the season, we’ll take a look at the changing landscape of usage in the NFL and fantasy football. Whether you’re looking for a waiver wire pickup, deciding on a tough start/sit decision or looking for a DFS play, understanding how players are being used is vital to success during the season. 

The running back touches we want

I talked about the necessity to have valuable touches at the running back position last week. As we head into Week 3, I wanted to take a look at the running backs who saw valuable opportunities. A valuable opportunity, in this context can be either of the following:

• Rush inside the 10
• Target (wnywhere)

Note: This is filtered out to 15-plus touches per game for clarity purposes. The backs with red circles had a lower overall opportunity share than the backs with green circles.

We’re starting to see some separation at the top. Christian McCaffrey and Derrick Henry are pulling away from the field. It’s no surprise to see CMC there, but Henry hasn’t popped in this type of analysis much in his career because of his lack of usage in the passing game. Through two weeks, that seems to be changing. I’m not fully buying that he’s going to turn into a target hog but any help for his floor is a welcome development for people with him on their squad. Henry’s ceiling is indisputable, but he’s completely disappeared from the game plan in the past. If that goes away, then he’ll be even more dominant than he has in the past. 

Mark Ingram is getting dangerously close to putting himself in the weekly fantasy conversation. The issue there, in theory, is that he’s on such a woeful team. But, if they’re going to continue to give him opportunity after opportunity, he’s going to be impossible to ignore. 

One of the fallers of the week is Alvin Kamara. He could be fine in the long run, but last week was exactly why I had some trepidation with him. Structurally, they should be flowing the offense through him. If they aren’t going to make that commitment to Kamara, then it could get ugly for those that drafted him. Damien Harris is another name worth watching. If he’s going to account for one-third of the offensive opportunities in New England, we need to start holding him in higher regard. 

Wide receiver and tight end targets

If targets are good, red-zone targets are better. Let’s see which WRs and TEs are being utilized in that part of the field through the first two weeks.

The Chargers are using their wide receivers in the red zone early and often. With 10 total red zone targets between Keenan Allen and Mike Williams, that’s the top tandem in the league within this category. 

The Chargers have been one of the more pass-heavy teams in the red zone. The Eagles are also high on that list. With Zach Ertz on the Reserve/COVID-19 List and at risk of missing Week 3, Dallas Goedert should see an increased workload in that regard.                

Here’s the target leaderboard after the first two weeks. I’ve filtered it down to 16-plus targets for clarity. Brandin Cooks stands out, along with Deebo Samuel and Cooper Kupp. Not only is that trio getting a low of raw looks, they’re also seeing a high target share of their team’s offense. That means that when we get a higher-volume passing game from their team, they could really make a splash.