Week 7 Top Performers At Each Position

Now that all but the Monday night game has been played, it is time for a weekly look at the top performers from the games on Sunday, and on Thursday. After going over my thoughts, I will select a few other players who either performed above expectations, or maybe have you questioning whether you should continue starting him or not.

The goal of this article is to highlight those top guys, and if you can expect similar performances in the future. If you can’t though, what you should do with that player, and what expectations they will have going forward. Let’s get right into the top performers from week 7.

QB - Andrew Luck 353 Passing Yards, 3 TD’s, 17 Rushing Yards, 27 Fantasy Points

This is Luck’s third straight game of over 20 fantasy points. Because of how poor the Colts defense is, the Colts are having to constantly throw the football on offense. The volume of pass attempts is what is carrying Luck’s value right now. As it currently stands, Luck is fourth in fantasy points, but I would rank him behind the following: Brady, Brees, Newton, and Ryan, with him being in the same tier as Rodgers, and Stafford.

QB - Drew Brees 367 Passing Yards, 3 TD’s, 1 INT, 24 Fantasy Points

Take that home/road splits. A week after I go and write about how Brees has been poor on the road, he goes out and does this. Even with the great road performance, I can’t say I am fully confident the trend won’t continue in some capacity. You always have outliers that should be viewed as such. I am still going to slightly downgrade all Saints skill position players slightly on the road, but it may not be by as much now.

RB - Melvin Gordon 22 Carries for 68 Yards and 2 TD’s, 6 Receptions for 53 Yards and 1 TD, 29 Fantasy Points

Gordon has been one of the most consistent backs so far this season. While he didn’t have much in the way of rushing yards, he has been used so much in the redzone that it doesn’t matter. At somepoint there will be TD regression, but until that happens Gordon remains one of the top backs who is just outside the top 5.

RB - Jay Ajayi 28 Carries for 214 Yards and 1 TD, 1 Reception for 2 Yards, 27 Fantasy Points

Okay that is now two straight weeks where Ajayi has over 200 yards. I really don’t know what can be said other then it is about time Adam Gase. I said last week that I needed to see some consistency in the RB rotation before I can fully trust Ajayi. Well I think this week gave me the assurance that Ajayi should be viewed as a top 10 back going forward. As long as the Dolphins keep fully committing to Ajayi, he will keep producing.

RB - Matt Forte 30 Carries for 100 Yards and 1 TD, 4 Receptions for 54 Yards and 1 TD, 25 Fantasy Points

Oh hello Forte. I almost didn’t recognize you after the abysmal last 4 weeks you had. Guess what, this is not going to continue. His ypc has been awful this year, so he has to either get 25 plus touches or find the endzone to have value. I don’t see either of those things happening that often the rest of the season. If you can trade Forte for a top 15 back or receiver after this game, I would pull the trigger.

WR - Davante Adams 16 Targets, 13 Receptions for 132 Yards and 2 TD’s, 25 Fantasy Points

Which Packers receiver is the top fantasy option right now? After it looking like Jordy Nelson for most of this season, it appears we may now have a discussion. Over the past three games Nelson has only 10 receptions for 115 Yards and 1 TD. That would be a nice week, but three games? Randall Cobb on the other hand now has three consecutive weeks of 10 points or more, with a TD in two of those games. Then there is Davante Adams who just burst himself into contention with that game on Thursday night. Going forward who would you want to own? Well I would still have Adams third, Cobb second, and Nelson first, but really it is more of a 1A, 1B, and 2, as I see Adams as slightly below both Nelson and Cobb at this point. Oh and don’t forget Ty Montgomery is still heavily involved in both the pass and run game.

WR - A.J. Green 8 Targets, 8 Receptions for 169 Yards and 1 TD, 22 Fantasy Points

Is this who Green is now? Green either goes for 160 or more yards and a TD, or he goes for under 90 yards with no scores. Granted his TD in this game came on an end of half hail mary, but it still raises a question of whether he is going to be consistent going forward. Green feels like he has entered T.Y. Hilton territory as the top tier of boom or bust guys, which is surprising given the amount of looks each guy sees.

WR - Mike Evans 13 Targets, 8 Receptions for 96 Yards and 2 TD’s, 21 Fantasy Points

Another game another TD. Evans now has 6 TD’s through 6 games. The only game he didn’t score a TD in was against the tough Broncos secondary. Evans has become a top 5 receiver with Winston, and may be the guy you can trust the most after Julio Jones and Antonio Brown when Big Ben is healthy.

TE - Rob Gronkowski 4 Targets, 4 Receptions for 93 Yards and 1 TD, 15 Fantasy Points

Gronk plays. Gronk scores. Gronk top TE for the week. Is this anything new?

TE - Delanie Walker 8 Targets, 7 Receptions for 84 Yards and 1 TD, 14 Fantasy Points

Entering this week Walker had the 9th most fantasy points at the TE position. That was with him having a lot of down weeks. This goes to the state of the position, as there is a lot of bad options right now that can’t be trusted. Jordan Reed has another concussion, Hunter Henry and Antonio Gates are stealing from each other, Zach Miller just lost Brian Hoyer, and Jimmy Graham has a struggling Russell Wilson. At this point even if you can’t exactly trust Walker to be consistent, he is still a top 5 TE behind only Gronk, Greg Olsen, Martellus Bennett, barely behind Jimmy Graham.

TE - Jack Doyle 10 Targets, 9 Receptions for 78 Yards and 1 TD, 13 Fantasy Points

Once again, it appears as though you can only trust a Colts TE if one of them is out. Jack Doyle will be a top 10 guy for as long as Dwayne Allen is out, much like Coby Fleener was in the past. Doyle presents a nice option for Luck as an over the middle guy and redzone threat. When Allen is back we may see Doyle continue to have a larger role in the passing game, but I may need to see it happen once before seeing exactly if that will be true.

Now a look at a couple of other performances that stood out to me from Sunday’s games:

QB - Russell Wilson 225 Passing Yards, 9 Fantasy Points

I am getting worried again with Wilson. While it appeared after week 4 that he was fully healed and figured it out again, he has now had two straight games of 10 fantasy points or less. This now means he has had only one game out of six where he has gone for over 13 fantasy points. He has a great opportunity at a bounceback game against the Saints next week, but if things still don’t look great even in that matchup, I would start sounding the alarm.

RB - Spencer Ware 17 Carries for 77 Yards, 2 Receptions for 54 Yards and 1 TD, 18 Fantasy Points

Clearly Ware isn’t going anywhere. Even when Charles gets closer to being 100%, Ware will still have a big role in the offense. This has the looks of the same split we saw once before with Charles and Thomas Jones. Granted that will be once Charles is at 100%. Until then though, Ware is a top 10 guy, and reverts back to being a top 15 guy once Charles gets more involved.

WR - Alshon Jeffery 11 Targets, 3 Receptions for 33 Yards, 3 Fantasy Points

With the injury to Brian Hoyer on Thursday night, we will be seeing Jay Cutler once again suit up for the Bears. What this does is bring back the value that Jeffery once had. When Hoyer was QB, he was spreading the ball around more to Zach Miller and Cameron Meredith. Cutler on the other hand will be looking to force the ball to his top target that has worked out for him in the past. This makes Jeffery a top 15 guy again, and may have him creep into the top 12 if we can see him finally get in the endzone. This also may not happen next week against a tough Vikings defense, so if you are looking to trade for him, I would wait an extra week or two, as they also have a bye week right after facing the Vikings.