Fantasy Football: James Cook shining in Bills wins and 9 more stats that may go overlooked from Week 8

https://sports.yahoo.com/fantasy/article/fantasy-football-james-cook-shining-in-bills-wins-and-9-more-stats-that-may-go-overlooked-from-week-8-131125535.html

Each Monday, fantasy analyst Joel Smyth will go over 10 important stats that you may have overlooked from this week. Week 8 had plenty of noteworthy news. What keys to fantasy success do you need to know that your leaguemates may have missed?

50%

Breece Hall’s percent of the New York Jets’ RB Routes over the last month. Over 30 fantasy points on 20 touches in Week 8, but this topic is preaching caution. Cincinnati is a great spot for fantasy RBs to get right, but Sunday also proved that even without Braelon Allen, this is still a committee. Since Week 5, Hall and Isaiah Davis each have 71 routes run. Hall is part of a dangerous fantasy running back list that includes Kenneth Walker III, Chuba Hubbard, Tony Pollard and others; committee backs that do not receive enough valuable fantasy touches.

Hall’s three-touchdown day will likely be his peak of 2025. When the Jets star was the overall RB2 in 2023, 55% of his fantasy points came from receiving in PPR leagues. Not only is Davis taking 50% of the passing role, but Hall is getting next to no designed screens on top of Justin Fields’ checkdown percentage being nearly cut in half compared to 2024. Hall’s 20 touches also become less of a positive when you consider he still only had 60% of the RB touches on the day. The November schedule for New York does not look kind if he were to stay a Jet going forward, severely lowering my long-term confidence as a fantasy asset.

23.7

Half-PPR PPG for James Cook in Bills wins this season. A minor difference from his 6.8 PPG in losses. For many players, this would be a red flag, but going as your team goes works great when your team is the Buffalo Bills. Cook’s fantasy style is most similar to Saquon Barkley’s last season. Incredible rushing on a great offense with a strong offensive line, but with very little receiving. It doesn’t mean it’s bad; it just means it may come with some off weeks, especially in PPR.

Barkley had three single-digit performances last year, but also five games with 30+ fantasy points. Even with Josh Allen taking goal-line work like Jalen Hurts, there’s plenty to go around in the No. 2 scoring offense in the NFL. Cook’s RB carry percentage has increased by 20 percentage points compared to his 2024 usage, solidifying himself as a top fantasy RB. He’s become masterful in his vision and explosion, now only trailing Jonathan Taylor in points from explosive runs on the year. The targets will stay low, but Cook is much more of a buy-high than sell-high for me after his Week 8 bounce back.

23+

Fantasy points for Drake Maye in all three games with bottom-10 QB matchups. The definition of matchup proof. Maye has entered the fantasy weekly must-start category alongside Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes and not many more. Maye’s passing efficiency is incredible, even against defenses as tough as Cleveland’s, which entered as the third-best team versus QBs. The recipe to have more of the same going forward is there.

New England’s rushing attack is modest at best outside of Maye himself. The Patriots are seventh in scoring offense, but of the top seven, they have the highest percentage of their touchdowns through the air at 68%. Even with the lack of a stable rushing offense, Maye’s efficiency hasn’t been affected at all. Maye’s 9.0 yards per attempt is the second-best in the league, along with having the best completion percentage over expected, making the lack of passing volume much less important. And that’s just the passing, as the Patriots QB adds 4.6 PPG on the ground. Maye is putting the entire team on his back (sometimes only for three quarters), and it’s working.

80%

Of the RB2 touches for Tyrone Tracy Jr. in each of the last two weeks. With Cam Skattebo’s season-ending injury, Tracy goes back to his elite RB usage of 2024 with nearly all of the RB touches and routes after Skattebo left the game. After becoming the starter in Week 5 of last season, Tracy averaged 13.3 PPR PPG the rest of the way. Tracy’s biggest flaw last season wasn’t in his ability, but in the Giants consistently being blown out by their opponent, an issue they’ve had to deal with much less with Jaxson Dart (outside of Week 8).

With Dart under center, Giants RBs have averaged 27% more fantasy points compared to other New York QBs since 2024. Skattebo had the fourth-best fantasy RB volume since Week 3, a great sign for Tracy, who I expect to continue to get near 80% of the RB workload. For the rest of the season, and when facing the 49ers in Week 9, I’d expect Tracy to be a solid RB2 in fantasy as the New York bellcow.

Goal-line attempts for D’Andre Swift over the last two weeks. In 2022 with Ben Johnson, Swift had four goal-line attempts compared to Jamaal Williams’ league-leading 33. Everyone knows when Johnson gets down to the goal line, he wants to run the ball. Now that the Bears have a more proven sample size deep in the red zone, my confidence in Swift’s consistency and ceiling has taken a big jump. After two boom weeks, 14.1 fantasy points for Swift isn’t the most exciting, but without his three goal-line carries, it would be 7.6 points.

Many of his floor games from years past and going forward can be fixed. The receiving is dynamic, the offensive line is elite, and the offense itself is better than average. Not many running backs in the NFL have all that, and seven of the team’s nine goal-line attempts. I don’t think we see the Swift fall off this season as we’ve seen in years past, with so much going his way.

1.26

Fantasy points per snap for RJ Harvey this season, the second-best to Jonathan Taylor. I’d imagine it’s getting hard to keep Harvey off the field, but Sean Payton has been stubborn to date. There are two issues for Harvey managers. 1.) Dobbins is not close to playing himself off the field. Harvey may be incredible, but Dobbins is no slouch. Even with playing against eight-man boxes nearly 50% of the time, Dobbins is fifth among RBs in yards per carry and 12th in yards after contact per attempt. He limits mistakes and is a great veteran presence. 2.) Harvey’s role is to be Dobbins 2.0 and nothing else. Harvey doesn’t have a carved-out, passing-game role, red-zone role or anything to differentiate himself from Dobbins’ usage.

With all that being said… is Harvey not the best backup RB stash in fantasy? I’m beginning to rethink my top-10 rankings placing him behind Blake Corum for the rest of the season. The Cowboys defense is nothing impressive, but the Broncos are still an amazing situation for a fantasy RB. With Dobbins’ injury history, Harvey is a very valuable asset for his long term potential.

30.0%

Targets per route for Emeka Egbuka since returning from injury. A steep increase from 21% to start the season, now that he’s the lone surviving WR. This isn’t a panic spot for me. Baker Mayfield has led the Buccaneers to the second-most receiving fantasy points in the NFL since last year, trailing only the Cincinnati Bengals’ pass-friendly team. It hasn’t resulted in great production, but Egbuka is earning targets, and valuable ones at that.

Over the last two weeks, Egbuka is tied for first in end-zone targets and fourth in air yards among WRs. The difference between his air yards and actual yards is 181, compared to just 100 over the first six weeks. I believe in the larger sample size much more here. The lack of production has been a team-wide result, not a sole Egbuka issue from him coming off of injury. With his bye week upcoming, I think he’s a great buy-low from managers that desperately need available players in Week 9.

TE6

Harold Fannin Jr. with Dillon Gabriel starting at quarterback this season. A few reasons go into this, and why I believe he can stick as a top-10 TE. First is his average depth of target of 5.3. Gabriel has not been the greatest as a pure thrower, but with Fannin, the targets are so simple that his catch rate is at 78%. Second is the player he is after the catch. Although his YAC is not close to Tucker Kraft’s, his missed tackles forced are at the top of the position.

Fannin’s target share is the best on the team, becoming very valuable in the Browns’ usual pass-heavy game script. When taking out the blowout win versus Miami, Gabriel has dropped back 40 times per game, which would be the most in the NFL. It might not be pretty, but fantasy tight ends rarely are. Fannin is a talented player with real volume as a hybrid TE-WR that is benefiting from the QB change.

16.9%

Target share for Tee Higgins with Joe Flacco. The TD saved the afternoon, but after a two-target day, Higgins’ target share is now just 0.1% higher than it was with Jake Browning. For comparison, Higgins’ target share in 2024 was 25%.

Since joining Cincinnati, Flacco’s time to throw is the fastest in the NFL, resulting in the third-lowest depth of target. This favors Ja’Marr Chase’s play style much more than it favors Higgins’ downfield ability. Higgins has reached double-digit fantasy points in three straight games, but may find himself in a sell-high spot after back-to-back easy matchups. I can’t lie, Higgins having one reception against a Sauce-less Jets secondary, which entered the game 30th in EPA/dropback, scares me. The quarterback play and offense have improved, but I believe his 12.7 fantasy PPG with Flacco is at its peak.

Air yards for Matthew Golden in Christian Watson’s return. With all three Green Bay WRs running a similar number of routes, it will likely be more of the same barring another injury. Romeo Doubs isn’t going away anytime soon and since the beginning of last season, Watson ranks fifth among WRs in yards per route, tied with Chase. Now, there are many things separating him from Chase, but Watson also isn’t going to roll over anytime soon.

With Golden running 50% of his routes out of the slot, Doubs and Watson were given all seven targets of 10+ air yards. Keep in mind this is with no Jayden Reed, who is expected to return in the coming weeks. All three have a weekly ceiling for deep league flex plays, but in terms of consistency, I don’t expect Golden to be trustworthy in 2025.

https://sports.yahoo.com/fantasy/article/fantasy-football-james-cook-shining-in-bills-wins-and-9-more-stats-that-may-go-overlooked-from-week-8-131125535.html