Week 7 Fantasy Football WR Rankings: Breakout Candidates & Risky Starts (Ep. 2282)

0:00 What's up, friends, and welcome into Fantasy Pro's The Week 7 Wide Receiver Ranks episode. I'm Chris Welsh. I've got Pat Fitzmorris and Andrew Erickson with me. We are going to be going through the top 36 wide receivers according to Fantasy Pro's ECR. We'll go in our three buckets of wide receiver ones, twos, and threes. We might have some deeper plays for you, and we will try to have some of the tough conversations around some of the players that might be difficult to start or some of the guys you're going to want to make sure you're in lineups. That's what we've got in store. If you guys would like to follow along with us, You can go to Fantasy Pros Ranks, fantasypros.com slash rankings. You can

0:33 find everything that we're talking about in half PPR. You can change the settings if you'd like into PPR standard. You can look at Dynasty, whatever it is. We've got lots of ranks for you. But for this, we will be going off of the half PPR, which will also be updating throughout the week. So just keep that in mind.

0:51 If some of the names and the numbers we tell you start to change a little bit, that's because more rankers are going to be submitting their ranks over on ECR. Gentlemen, we are going to jump into it. Let's look at the big board for the week. Top 12 wide receivers, and it starts with Pukunukua going up against Las Vegas.

1:09 We've got Jackson, Smith, and Jigba, Jamar Chase, Amonra St. Brown, CeeDee Lamb, and Christian Watson. Top six, seven through 12. We've got Drake London, Chris Olave, Matthew Golden, Malik Neighbors, Justin Jefferson, and Nico Collins. Let's take a little stop. for New York for a second, to have a caveat.

1:29 JJ McCarthy is starting this week. What does that do for both of you? I'm not even sure if your guys' ranks are relative to neighbors right now, but he comes in at 10. Erickson, we'll start with you. How concerned should we be about Malik neighbors with JJ McCarthy, if at all? And should any of that concern bump him out of being a wide receiver one?

1:51 I think he's on the fringe of the wide receiver one. I don't think there's a scenario where you could think about benching Malik neighbors. We did see at least some positive from JJ McCarthy in the second half of that game against the New Orleans Saints. Now the game script kind of lend itself to McCarthy, just like dropping bombs downfield and Malik neighbors, Isaiah, like they just making plays left and right. So that definitely helped fuel a lot of neighbors production in week six. The other caveat too is the Texans defense has played better the last couple of weeks, but the one bugaboo with them defensively is they've given up a lot of explosive plays. Like that has been the one issue with them in the back

2:27 end specifically. So it's been better since D'Amico Ryan's took over as the play caller. You have a really tough cornerback matchup with Derek Stingley, potentially matching up a lot with Malik neighbors. So there's a lot of risk, right? Because we saw McCarthy last year with Justin Jefferson and it was horrible. He totally nuked Jefferson week after week after week. And we kept saying, you got to play this guy's fantasy wide receiver one every single week. And then it just, it never panned out. So that's the risk with going with Malik neighbors as a fantasy wide receiver one. So I have an 11 right now. I could see an argument moving him down a couple spots, but I don't think he can fall outside my top 15.

3:04 I'm willing to at least give JJ McCarthy a shot with a full game plan built around him against this defense with Malik neighbors. I say likely he knows where to go with the football. And just a matter of these guys making plays, even if it's off target throws. So that's kind of my initial read on Malik neighbors.

3:19 And I'm very interested to see how it does play out because we're going to have a couple of weeks to really break it all down because the Giants are on a bye in week eight. And I'm sure that there'll be a lot of discussion about McCarthy's performance against the fierce Houston Texans defense.

3:32 All right, Fitzy, same thing. Neighbors. is there any type of downgrade that you feel you want to put from James Winston McCarthy? Is it all just kind of neutral? Like, what do you think this does to, uh, to blink neighbors value? I mean, we'll talk about, I think when tight ends, we'll get to like Isaiah likely, but where are you at on neighbors?

3:50 I'm going to feel nervous about it. No question.

3:53 And the, the memories of the, uh, JJ McCarthy, Justin Jefferson, disconnection of 2025 in my head for that. But, um, McCarthy did actually look really good last week. We should probably give him a little grace like young quarterbacks often struggle. Maybe he's learned something just kind of sitting and watching for a while. Maybe things are going to become a little easier to him this season. And man, Malik Nabors, three straight games over 100 yards, 11 and 12 catches the last two weeks, 35 targets the last two weeks.

4:31 It's clear that the offense runs through him and Isaiah likely to a lesser extent, but Nabors is going to be prominently involved. Now he could get 14 targets and catch five of them if J.J. McCarthy does revert to his old form this week. But I think I'm willing to take the chance. Like, Even in an eight-team league, I can't imagine benching Malik Neighbors this week.

4:53 Yeah, and I don't think it's anything into necessarily bench or anything like that, but just as a little caveat, let's talk about a couple other wide receiver ones just in your guys' take. Matthew Golden, we've got two top nine Green Bay Packers wide receivers with Matthew Golden coming in up against Detroit. He's wide receiver nine. Erickson, you got him at 10, but Fitzy, you bumped him out of a wide receiver one. You've got him at 13, so hit us with some Matthew Golden, Fitzy. What's bringing, again, you're not starting him or anything like that, but there's a little bit more hesitation there. versus some optimism of early rankers?

5:25 I do hate being low man on Matthew Golan, and maybe I should have him ranked ahead of Malik Nabors, considering that Nabors is playing with McCarthy and Golan is playing with the red-hot Jordan Love. Golan has scored a touchdown in three of his last four games. He's gone over 100 yards in three of his last four games.

5:43 The Detroit pass defense has been really bad this season. But, you know, Christian Watson is really good, too. So is Tucker Kraft. I do think Watson is the number one receiver for Green Bay. That guy is just so good. But Golden is really good, too. He has opened eyes with his performance, and he's opened my eyes. I didn't like the Matthew Golden draft pick for the Green Bay Packers.

6:07 I freely admit that I was wrong about that. So, yeah, I like him this week, and it's with great reluctance I leave him out of wide receiver one range.

6:19 Great. I like how you said that. Erickson, same thing. Matthew Golden, you've got him at 10, so you're really close into that. What are Matthew Golden vibes for this week?

6:29 He leads the Packers in targets this season. He is number one on the team in terms of overall target share ahead of Christian Watson, 26%. His 42% air yard share ranks 12th among all wide receivers in the NFL. And I think he just got some positive touchdown regression coming his way, right? He caught a touchdown last week, should have caught three touchdowns because he was dropping the ball all over the place. So I think that Jordan Love and them are going to, especially with a guy like Golden, where that was one of his claims to fame, right?

6:54 Coming out of Texas was this dude never drops these like critical passes. So it was very un-Matthew Golden-like to have that many drops in a game. And against the Detroit, guys, this guy's, where's this game being played? Forward field? Yeah. There's going to be a ton of points in this game.

7:09 You said Coors? You said Coors Field?

7:11 Coors Field.

7:11 Coors Field, right?

7:12 Coors.

7:13 Coors Field, Ford Field, the NFL, going to be a shootout. You can't, the total can't be high enough. 54 and a half, 55 and a half, doesn't matter. You take the over every single time you see claims played at Ford Field. So- I think Matthew Golden bounces back after, again, a quote-unquote down game last week when he still had 104 yards and six catches and a touchdown, and he left production on the table. I mean, that's how consistent he has been last four weeks. He has at least 100 receiving yards and a touchdown, or his third game in his last four weeks with 100 yards and a touchdown.

7:46 He has four games, at least five catches and 95 receiving yards this season. So from a consistency standpoint, he has been more consistent week in and week out than Christian Watson has. So I know I talked about this on the running back show. If the Josh Jacobs factor does come into play here and the Packers are throwing significantly less, who would that hurt the most? Probably the receivers that are seeing less volume overall anyway, which could actually hurt Watson maybe a little bit more than Matthew Golden, who has been the target share leader to start the season.

8:13 So that's also why I'm a little bit spots, a couple spots down on Christian Watson versus the ECR because I have him at eight where ECR has him up at six.

8:23 The other name on this, you know, I'm going to say Fitzy, I think you put this name on here. So I'd be really curious what you want to talk about with him. And I think it does stand out because he's not a top 10 wide receiver and what we know of him. But Justin Jefferson comes in at ECR 11 going up against the Colts. Colts, bad defense.

8:38 So I think there's kind of this generalized, you know, like Colts are bad. Maybe why is Jefferson down? Is this about Kyler Murray? And you guys both kind of agree. You got him at, Fitzy's got him at 10. Erickson, you got him at 12. So Fitzy, you put Jefferson on here. So I got to imagine there was something you wanted to hit as far as talking about him and the wide receiver ones.

8:56 Just maybe a test of how much we're sticking to our priors with Justin Jefferson. It has not been a great start for him. He's averaging 64.5 receiving yards per game, which is only about three yards better than what he averaged last year with J.J. McCarthy and friends at quarterback for the Vikings. Jefferson has one touchdown left. this year, and he's going up against the Colts defense. Yeah, the Colts have been bad defensively, but they've been pretty good against outside receivers and just getting destroyed by slot receivers because they've got Sauce Gardner, who's not fantastic this year, and Travarius Ward, but those guys are better than slot corner Justin Wally. It's not a great matchup, maybe, and

9:41 Jefferson hasn't been great, but I just have a hard time leaving Justin Jefferson out of the top 10 based on what we have seen from him over his career. I still have to put him there. Would not shock me if he had the big game that seems so overdue for him.

9:59 Erickson, you have him at 12. So are you starting to have some hesitation with Jefferson whatsoever?

10:04 I mean, it's hard to have an exact pinpoint of what this Vikings offense actually is, right? We have seen a total of nine snaps, according to the Athletics' Alec Lewis, when you've had Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison, Jordan Mason, and TJ Hawkinson on the field together this season. Nine snaps. Those are like the focal points of this offense. So it's hard for me to look at Minnesota and be like, oh, they're going to run the ball over a bad Colts run defense, or they're going to build up Kyler Murray's confidence, and they're going to sling it all over the yard because I don't know if it's... So that's Carter's point of playing in this game, right? So he's out. He has a calf. He re-injured his calf last week. So

10:42 I think that the Vikings can do whatever they want. It's just dependent on how they want to approach attacking this Colts defense that I think is weak all over the board. The one positive with Jefferson so far this year, even though the production has kind of been lackluster, can target on 27.6% of his routes. That's tying for his career high. He's also caught a career high 79.2% of his targets. So I thought Kyler Murray played better in the last game we saw him against the Saints back in week five. I think they tried to build up his confidence. And how do you do that? You just throw the ball to 18. especially against these defensive backs.

11:15 So moving the slot, moving to the outside, I don't think there's anyone on the Colts that can keep up with Jefferson, but it's just a matter of, do they take the pedal off the metal? How much are the Colts going to push the Minnesota Vikings to keep scoring offensively when Daniel Jones is not going to be able to do anything against this Brian Flores defense? So this Vikings game, I'm not, honestly, I'm not getting good read on what they're going to do offensively. I just know one of these guys is going to probably have a monster game unless it's just like so spread out. And I think that's obviously worth why you want to start as many Vikings as humanly possible.

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12:36 All right, wide receiver twos. We've got Zae Flowers coming in at 13 on the big board. Tedaroa McMillan at 14, followed by Garrett Wilson, Devonta Smith, George Pickens, Jalen Coker, Tee Higgins, DK Metcalf at 20, Luther Burden, AJ Brown, Michael Wilson, and Carnell Tate. A couple five-star matchups in here, interestingly enough. DK Metcalf and Carnell Tate. But let's take a stop at Luther Burden, ECR wide receiver 13. 21 going up against the New England Patriots, and you guys are a little bit split. Erickson, you're on ECR. Fitzy, you are down. Fitzy, 25. You do not have him as a wide receiver, too. Talk to us about Luther Burden with Caleb Williams back going up against New England.

13:17 I expected a bigger role for Luther Burden this year. He has played 60% of the Bears' offensive snaps. I did not expect him to be kind of a part-time player. And Burden did have eight catches for 95 yards against the Falcons last week, season highs. But it was, yeah, the first time all year that Burden had had more than 63 yards in a game. And yet Burden had a season low 39% snap share against the Falcons. And I think he only ran like 18 routes.

13:48 In that game.

13:50 So it just, I'm not sure what, Ben Johnson is doing there, making Burden sort of a part-time player. Now, maybe Burden is more involved this week because he is likely not going to draw any coverage from Christian Gonzalez. It'll be Romo Dunze wearing Christian Gonzalez like a well-tailored suit. So maybe that helps Luther Burden a lot this week, and I'm too low. But it could also be a Kalief Raymond week as far as Ben Johnson and his unpredictable game plans go.

14:21 So, Erickson, do you think that's the case? You haven't been 21, you got him at ECR. Do you think it's Roma Dunzay wearing the Christian Gonzalez jacket and Burden opens up a little bit? Or I mean, not that your rank is like super aggressive or anything like that. Where are you at?

14:36 I think that's probably what I would expect more coverage for Gonzalez on Roma Dunzay because they just move Luther Burden around the formation so much. I mean, this guy takes carries out of the backfield. So considering his deployment from the slot, considering if he's not a full-time player, well, then Gonzalez can't guard him when he's on the sideline.

14:51 So it just makes more sense to me that they would be locking up with Roma Dunzey. And I guess I'm not as pessimistic about the role. Now, it was weird that he only played like less than 50% of the snaps, only ran 18 routes, but he got targeted on eight of them, right? Like getting a target on more than 50% of his routes run and he caught all eight of them for 95 yards. If I'm Ben Johnson, I don't go back and look at that and be like, you know what? We probably shouldn't play this guy more like when he was like 95 receiving yards in that game.

15:19 Because when you look at the holistic picture of the Bears so far this season, Burden, despite the three different quarterbacks and all the weird different game scripts they've had, he leads the Bears in targets. He's number one in yards per route run at 2.3. He has nine red zone targets, which also leads the team. He's seen volume as a rusher in almost every single game. And he has at least four catches in 47 yards in five of the six games played this season. So I think that the floor is still really high with Luther Byrne, given how much involvement he's had, even with a limited route share. And what if they decide, oh, well, this game, you're going to run 80% of the routes because he has been higher at points of the season. So I

15:52 think that in Caleb Williams' first game back, the fact that every time or every other time Luther Byrne was running a route, that's exactly where Caleb Williams was going. I think that suggests, hey, the targets are going to continue to keep going to Luther Bird, especially in a matchup where he's not going to draw the number one corner from the New England Patriots, in my opinion.

16:09 Big rank difference here is A.J. Brown.

16:12 A.J.

16:13 Brown comes in at ECR 22. That's not really the big rank change. It's against you guys. Fitzy, you've got him at 21, but Erickson, 14. So Erickson higher than Fitz, but higher than ECR by a lot. We did not see these. These didn't exist. These are hands that I'm showing right now for the podcast listeners from A.J. Brown last week. So Erickson, did he find his hands?

16:38 Yes, I think that he did find his hands. A guy was knocking off the rust, right? Like this happens all the time when guys come back from their injuries. Sometimes they ball out. Sometimes they play like crap, like A.J. Brown did on Sunday against the New York Jets. But it wasn't for a lack of opportunities. He had 10 targets in that game. That was the most by any Patriot this season. So to me, that signals... Joshua Daniels and Drake May got their alpha number one wide receiver back in the offense and they peppered him with targets.

17:01 Romeo Dobbs was placed on injured reserve. He's not even a factor in this offense anymore, specifically on Thursday night when you're going to see A.J. Brown matched up with Jalen Johnson for the majority of the routes. That's a matchup I want to take 10 times out of 10, including on Thursday. So for me, if A.J. Brown just catches that 60 yard touchdown pass, he's consensus top 15 wide receiver. And we're not even thinking twice about it.

17:24 But the fact that, you know, he just didn't squeeze the football, we're penalizing him or punishing him as a outside the top 20 when everything that we saw from a usage standpoint suggests he should be closer to a top 12 fantasy wide receiver in a great matchup against the Chicago Bears. So I am not wavering on AJB this week. I think that you have to start him more often than not as a top 15 play.

17:46 I do agree.

17:47 I just it felt very vintage Eagles, those bad, frustrating Eagles matchups where just nothing was going on. But you know, the targets were there, the volume was there. Fitzy, you know, when you put him at 21, again, they're still like starters, but when you get into the 20s, it's starting to become a question maybe for like, you know, like 10-man leagues that maybe he's not like a must-must starter. You know, do you share, maybe your rank doesn't share your optimism or do you think there's a little bit of question still like that from a performance standpoint, it might take him multiple weeks to get right?

18:18 I might have to come up on him. I could come up like, two to four spots on him. I was just so spooked by how it wasn't just the hands. While she was the ball tracking. Yeah. I was joking with Jake Sealy about this. Like his ball tracking looked like eight year old me and little league in the outfield trying to track fly balls. Like it was just the radar was broken for AJ Brown in his first game back.

18:46 And I get it. There's rusty.

18:48 I hadn't played since week one. Maybe that's completely fixed. And, and, this week against the bears and the matchup is great. I don't know what happened to Jalen Johnson. I thought he was like a top five cornerback, like two or three years ago. Like he is not good now. And I expect AJ Brown to win that matchup.

19:05 Our one more in this range, Michael Wilson. Uh, the thing that has been happening is Michael Wilson getting shut down, getting the, uh, the focus. Uh, that's why I like Hendrick Bourne a little bit, but he's been getting the defensive focus comes in at ECR 23, uh, He's going up against the Denver Broncos. You guys are a little bit split. Fitzy, you're at ECR and Michael Wilson. Can the Cardinals, can Michael Wilson break this defensive focus that ends up just, they're trying to shut down two players.

19:34 It's McBride and him. And that has taken away all of the excitement we had when we were like, oh, he's just going to be a volume monster. Can this cycle kind of break this week? You've got him at ECR.

19:46 Another instance, as with AJ Brown, where I'm sort of looking and at uh Erickson's ranking like maybe maybe that's the way to go here um like so much of the boy and it's still like a low end RB or low end wide receiver two ranking but so much of where I have Wilson is just volume based He's averaging just under 10 targets a game this season, 23.7% target share.

20:10 That's all well and good.

20:12 But he's averaging 9.7 yards per catch, 5.5 yards per target, and 1.43 yards per outrun.

20:19 The efficiency numbers, yuck.

20:22 It feels like a number three receiver is being thrust into a wide receiver one role for his team. And with the quarterback, Jacoby Brissett, you've probably got a backup quarterback who's being thrust into a starter's role. So it's kind of a bad combination. It's kind of been empty volume lately. So, yeah, I mean, based on volume, that's why I have him ranked here. But I don't feel great about it.

20:49 It's really interesting, too, because like they can't go throw Jalen Brooks out there to do the Marvin Harrison decoy role. And it like they look so exposed right now and like, oh, you guys clearly needed this decoy wide receiver to run routes. And then you that opens up your other guys. And now that they don't have a decoy wide receiver that teams are scared of because Kendrick Bourne doesn't run that.

21:13 They just seem kind of lost in that space. And it's just how they're going to bounce back. That envious rank that Erickson has is 28. So you've got him as a mid wide receiver three Erickson. So talk to us about Michael Wilson, quite a bit lower than ECR for you.

21:24 1.4 yards per route run, 56 among 74 qualifying wide receivers, 49th in catch rate over expectations, 67th in EPA per target. That is Michael Wilson. 57% catch rate, 5.5 yards per target each rank in the bottom five of all players with at least 35 targets. He's the only player in football with at least 50 targets, no drops, and a negative catch rate over expectation. He had a 30% target share weeks one through four when we still had Marv Jr.

21:52 running out the routes and taking away coverage. which ranked fifth in the league last two weeks without Marvin Harrison Jr., 17.5%. That's third on his team. So to your point, right, it's more Trey McBride. It's more Kendrick Warren. And is that going to change? I don't know because Michael Wilson's not making the most of his opportunities to suggest that, oh yeah, we should keep featuring and funneling him the ball when he has not been delivering. His area of chairs also dipped dramatically, 43% down to 29.5%. So yeah, Patrick Sertan's probably still not going to play in this game.

22:23 So there is an opportunity where it's still a decent matchup for him. But just having faith in this Cardinals offense to do the right thing. Do they ever do the right thing on offense? I don't think so. I think it's just whenever they throw the ball to Trey McBride, and that's about it. Because everything else is just like more Bam Knight touches. Like, come on, man. Like, let's get it loaded in Roddick Dole.

22:42 So.

22:43 Yeah, that's why I'm a Michael Wilson fringe for me.

22:46 I'll tell you, they do whenever I'm invested against them. Whenever I say they're going to lose every game, they win the first game. Whenever I pick the Rams for Survivor, they win. So yeah, that's the two times they've done something right is against me negatively. All right, let's talk about some wide receiver threes, some big names that are going to be floating out there that people are going to be asking about. But before we do, if you're not sure who you should be starting, like some of the wide receivers we're going to be talking about, And maybe we don't cover your exact scenario or you wake up late at night. You're like, oh, I got to have this answered right now. Well, guess what? Get fast

23:19 and free starter set device with Fantasy Pros Who Should I Start tool. Compare your players and get instant recommendations powered by more than 150 fantasy experts. Set your best lineup at fantasypros.com slash start. That's fantasypros.com slash start. A wide receiver you're probably going to be asking about this week, which we're going to talk about in a second. Jeremy Bernard comes in as wide receiver 25. We've got Jamison Williams, Emeka Egbuka, 27. Denzel Boston, Jalen Waddell, Trey Tucker. By the way, Jalen Waddell, LOL at him still being a top 30 wide receiver ranked is just laughable. Trey Tucker at 30. Xavier Worthy, Omar Cooper, Keenan Allen, Devon Vele, Josh Downs, and Roma Dunze. This is not on the sheet.

23:57 Just real quick. Erickson, where do you have Jalen Waddell this week?

24:00 Wide receiver 29.

24:01 Wrong, wrong. Fitzy, where do you have him?

24:05 Because Erickson has promised that Bo Nix is going to look like vintage John Elway this week, I've got him also wide receiver 29.

24:11 Let's go.

24:12 Okay.

24:13 All right. Well, if he does, good on that. It only took one of the worst teams in the NFL to get him right. Just all the other weeks it didn't. But just wanted to check where we're at with that. Jeremy Bernard is going to be vastly asked over the next three or four days. That's going to be a big one. He's got New Orleans. It's a five-star graded matchup according to Fantasy Pros. It's now two weeks. That was a big thing. People were asking, like, oh, he's got to.

24:34 Do it again.

24:35 He kind of continues to roll. He's ECR 25. You two are both lower, but only by a notch. You're at 26. Fitzy, why don't you kick us off here? Jeremy Bernard, wide receiver three. I think that's pretty good. High and wide receiver three. What level of confidence do you have in starting him this week? I mean, top 26 again is solid, but where are you at on him?

24:53 Reasonably confident. And last week was great.

24:55 11 catches, 87 yards and a touchdown on 12 targets.

24:59 But it was also kind of volume based.

25:01 The Steelers were unexpectedly playing from behind against the Buccaneers. Aaron Rodgers threw a season high 49 passes. I like Bernard just fine this week. I'm just not expecting 11 catches.

25:13 Erickson, are you expecting 11 catches? Are you expecting the volume to continue? Do you have an optimism that's not representative of your rank, or are you just kind of like, eh, about Jeremy Bernard?

25:24 I think you just ride the wave, right? He's been heavily involved the last two games. I know that last week the Steelers obviously dropped back to throw a ton of times, but that actually helped DK Metcalf more than helped Jeremy Bernard. In the first half, he had six catches, way more than DK Metcalf did. So I think that Bernard and his role in this offense that doesn't have Roman Wilson, that doesn't have Michael Pittman, the Steelers are top three in overall pass rate this season and pass rate over expectation. So they are looking to throw the ball more than run the ball. That could change against the Saints, who have definitely been more of a run funnel defense, but just a defense overall that you can

25:56 kind of attack in any way that your offense decides. So He has Aaron Rodgers' trust. He caught the overtime touchdown. Quarterbacks remember that stuff, right? Clutch time, he went to Bernard and the rookie has been delivering more often than not. So he has 17 catches in the last two games. Again, that's up there with players like Malik Neighbors and Puka Nakua, right?

26:15 Who each have 23 catches. So again, being in that conversation with those guys, again, it looks and feels like an outlier, but it suggests, hey, Bernard's doing something well. And the fact that the concentration between Metcalf and Bernard has been so strong with you know, the tight ends kind of dabbling as well. I think that he continues to be a strong wide receiver three play.

26:35 Who has not been a strong wide receiver play this year has been a mech egg book, unfortunately, very much due to like Jalen Daniels out there, but why does he were 27 Erickson? You are higher though at 23 optimistic and wide and wide receiver to territory fits. You got him at 28 Erickson. Are we going to win?

26:52 Is the seal going to break for Emeka Egbuka? I mean, he's not Jalen Waddell or anything like that, but it just it hasn't lived up to the expectation. You are bumping up to a wide receiver to this week.

27:02 He had 16 targets last week.

27:04 Yeah.

27:04 Right.

27:05 Like you can't just like wipe that away. He has the volume on his side and that's not me. Jalen Waddell has. I mean, I don't know. Does anyone have 16 targets on the season?

27:14 Doesn't have 16 catches. I don't think it's like you got to.

27:16 Double check to be like, wait, does he? So at least that's working in Ibuka's favor that with Jalen Daniels, it's very concentrated on him being the number one target in the offense. Now you want more than 48 yards of receiving when you get 16 targets, but still in a full PPR, seven catches for 48 yards. He'll take that.

27:33 He did score last week. He actually should have scored two touchdowns last week. Jalen Daniels missed him, which is going to happen when you have a rookie quarterback as your starter. but I'm just chasing the targets, right? With Egbuka, excuse me, in the three full games with Daniels, Egbuka has seen 29 targets, which ranks top five. He's only caught 15 of them, which is the issue. 51.7% catch rate, not good, but sometimes you got to chase the volume.

27:58 It's the Carolina Panthers, right? And match up that in division. I expect it to be kind of back and forth. I don't think either team is going to run away with the game. So You're expecting at least some decent pass volume from the Buccaneers, and Egbuka's the guy, and I'm not afraid of a matchup against the Panthers. So that's why I have him at wide receiver 23.

28:15 Fitz, you got him at wide receiver 28, but you got Jeremy Bernard ahead of him. So where are you at on Emeka Egbuka?

28:22 Yeah, he's also scored a touchdown each of his last two games and did have the 16 targets last week. But man, in Jalen Daniels' three starts, Egbuka's averaged 6.6 yards per catch.

28:35 In 3.4 yards per target.

28:37 So again, I talked about this with Bucky Irving on the running back show. The Buccaneers offense just feels very constricted with Jalen Daniels at quarterback, and that's kind of an issue for Ibuka too. The pass volume has been great, the target volume, but he's just not turning that into a lot of yardage.

28:57 Next wide receiver up here, wide receiver 32. Got 32 on here going up against Miami. Fun one, you know, his return back, Solid performance. Omar Cooper, we talked about him in the waiver show, Fitzy, Sealy and I, and where he ended up going. It was usually right after Trey Tucker, if Trey Tucker was available. Omar Cooper, though, was one of the top wide receivers to pick up this week. Doesn't have like a vastly insane rank, but he comes in as a wide receiver three. He's at 32.

29:24 You guys are both relatively optimistic about him. Fitzy, you've got him at 32. So talk to us about Omar Cooper this week. You're right at ECR. He is a startable piece that maybe there's going to be some guys that other people are going to have uh, worthwhile, but still like wide receiver three starter this week.

29:40 Kind of an eyeopening performance from Omar Cooper in week six after, uh, barely playing in week one only played like, I think what half a dozen snaps or so ran one route and had a 30 yard catch in week one before he got hurt. Um, This guy is just– I'm not surprised that he would make a quick adjustment to the NFL because he was so well-rounded and just such a gamer for Indiana last year. And I remember Erickson talking about him as– I think Erickson bet the under on wherever he was going to be drafted this year because there was so much buzz about Omar Cooper.

30:21 Just tough inside-outside versatility, can play in the slot, can play outside– Really tough after the catch.

30:29 Hard to tackle. Makes acrobatic catches.

30:32 I mean, beat Penn State for Indiana last second last year with one of the best catches you'll ever see. Just like a quarterback-friendly wide receiver. And I don't think he's going to leapfrog Garrett Wilson as the number one receiver for the Jets anytime soon, but they still don't have Adnai Mitchell with that finger injury. And I like the matchup against Miami, which probably has one of the worst secondaries in the league.

30:57 Erickson, you got him at 30. You're talking him up. Are you going to talk him up this week?

31:01 Yes, because he's facing the Miami Dolphins. So you want to start as many guys as you can against these really bad defenses. Miami, I would put in the same territory as the Colts in that capacity. And Omar Cooper should have had two touchdowns last week. Had not been for a Tim Patrick offensive pass interference call. So he could have had an even bigger game still. You're going to take six catches for 103 yards on seven targets.

31:23 I agree with Fitz. I don't think he's going to take over as the wide receiver one on this team. I think that when you catch coverage from Christian Gonzalez, it opens up opportunities for some of those other guys. But Storm Duck, is he coming back to save the Miami Dolphins secondary? I know he's always catching strays, but again, no offense to Storm Duck, but this Dolphins secondary is not good. So Omar Cooper, especially all the ways he can be used, especially after the catch. I know I comped him to Debo Samuel coming out, discount Debo, mini Debo, et cetera. And the fact that he came back, totally dusted Isaiah Williams as the number two guy. played all the snaps, 82% snap share. That's really, really good for

31:57 a receiver coming back in basically his first game since week one. So all he has done is make plays. And I see no reason why we expect anything different in a juicy matchup at home against the Miami Dolphins.

32:07 And by the way, I'm mad all over again.

32:10 That was such a bogus OPI call on Tim Patrick in that game.

32:14 It should have been two touchdowns for Omar Cooper.

32:17 Really interesting jump that's happened this week. And you guys have a big difference on the guy we're going to talk about. But Keenan Allen, Keenan Allen at 33 has jumped Josh Downs, who comes in at 25. You guys are split. Erickson, you have pushed Keenan Allen outside of a top wide receiver three, so not really a startable piece.

32:36 So the question is, is should Keenan Allen jump Josh Downs? And what are you maybe not so into? Because you are lower than ECR as a flex option, I guess, of Keenan Allen this week.

32:48 Well, all the Colts receiver rankings depend on whether Tyler Warren plays or not. I think that they would all fall pretty dramatically if he misses another game. They're also playing the Minnesota Vikings, right? So I don't see any reason where I feel the need or urge to start any of these Colts receivers. So I get that Keenan Allen led the team in targets last week, as he tends to typically do. All this underneath stuff not really being used much after the catch, given his age. But I still think that Josh Jones is the better player.

33:15 And if you ask me to rank these guys in the next 10 games, who's going to outscore who, I think it'd probably be Josh Downs more often than Keenan Allen. Josh Downs had a bad game, right? He almost scored a touchdown on the end around. He got like, I don't know how he didn't score, honestly. Like he looked like he was going right into the end zone and then just like he just got hit a wall at the one yard line and he didn't end up scoring.

33:34 He also had a couple of drops in that game. So I think obviously Downs has been disappointing. I'm just not willing to chase these 12, 11 targets with Keenan Allen against the Minnesota Vikings defense, which is an absolute gauntlet. That's why I have both guys right as like fringe fantasy wide receiver threes. And I would just, I think there's way other upside plays you can look for.

33:53 But to you are higher on Keenan Allen than ECR. And I'm going to guess the battle of Keenan Allen versus Josh Downs. You are in favor of Keenan Allen.

34:04 I have Keenan Allen, I think, one spot ahead of Josh Downs.

34:08 No, two spots ahead of Josh Downs.

34:10 And I'm not totally convinced that Josh Downs is a better player than Keenan Allen, even at Keenan Allen's advanced age. What?

34:18 You think Keenan Allen's better than Josh Downs?

34:21 Is Josh Downs playing well this year? I mean, he's he's being thrust into this elevated role and he's like, you know, Kevin in the office with the pot of chili with this role. I mean, it's just he has not been good this year.

34:35 I'm sorry. I wanted to believe it, too.

34:37 And I feel kind of I feel kind of silly for ranking Josh Downs as high as I did in my draft rankings. But he's not having a good year by any measure, I don't think. And yeah, like Keenan Allen, there's a reason he's gotten twenty nine.

34:51 Targets over the last three weeks.

34:53 Like that dude can get open in his sleep even at, you know, in his late 30s here. So, yeah, this is based on Tyler Warren probably not playing or playing but not being himself. And if we hear Tyler Warren's good to go, I'll probably drop both of the Colts receivers.

35:13 A little bit. Would they be outside the top like 36? Yeah, right around there.

35:18 Okay.

35:20 All right, deep plays. What do you guys got for us on deep plays? Erickson, why don't you kick us off here? Deep play wide receiver, you know, like a non-top 36-ish type of wide receiver.

35:28 Who do you got?

35:29 Ryan Flournoy, wide receiver for the Dallas Cowboys. He's been the top 24 wide receiver in back-to-back games, coming off a game where he had nine targets, caught seven for 40 yards, had a fourth quarter touchdown, but he played 87% of the snaps, seven catches, like I mentioned, and he plays more than half of his snaps from the slot.

35:48 And that is what we've been targeting when teams have faced the Eagles defense all year long. So I think that Florentine coming off a season high in snaps, targets, catches, and route participation at 93%. I think that he's an interesting play here against the Eagles on Monday night.

36:02 Fitzy, you got a deep play. I'm a little bit of a homer, but I was kind of locked into this just because of injuries as well. This actually might be sneaky. Your sneaky play is a San Francisco 49ers wide receiver.

36:12 Brandon Cooks, who hard to believe he's a thing in 2026, but he might be the number one wide receiver for the 49ers against the Falcons, who have been the biggest pass funnel defense in the league this year.

36:25 Fitz, if Christian Kirk is active, do you still prefer Cooks?

36:30 In general, Christian Kirk's first game back, yes, I would have Cooks ranked ahead of Kirk, though it wouldn't surprise me if Kirk was more the go-to guy.

36:39 All right, well, who do you guys like? And hopefully there's some deep plays out there for you. Those are 36 wide receivers. at least in ECR. It will adjust throughout the week, so make sure you keep tuning back to the webpage. We also can help you out with the Who Do I Start tool if you guys have some big specific questions. And of course, we've got a bunch of live streams to help you guys out, so make sure you're locked into the YouTube channel. That is going to do it for us on the Wide Receiver Ranks episode. For Andrew Erickson and Pat Fitzmaurice, I'm Chris Welsh.

37:06 Thank you guys so much for hanging out with us. Good luck in Week 7, and we'll talk to you next time right here on Fantasy Pros.

37:11 Thanks for listening to the Fantasy Pros Fantasy Football Podcast.

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