Week 6 Booms and Busts: Is Adam Thielen fantasy's best wideout?
Adam Thielen has made a life out of overachieving.
He wasn’t offered a big-time scholarship so he starred for Division 2 Minnesota State (and even then, it was after a redshirt year). He wasn’t invited to the 2013 draft combine, nor was he drafted later that spring.
Thielen got a look from the Vikings in the summer of 2013, was cut, and subsequently landed on the practice squad. He played sparsely in 2014 and 2015. And even after a 2016 and 2017 breakout, some thought Stefon Diggs (an underdog story of a different slant) might be Minnesota’s true No. 1 wideout.
Today? Thielen could be the best receiver in football.
The Vikings haven’t had a smooth liftoff in 2018. Their defense has collapsed and their offensive line has struggled. Tailback Dalvin Cook has been hurt most of the year. Buffalo shocked the world with a 27-6 shellacking of Minnesota back in Week 3.
But in a snow-globe league of constant weirdness, Thielen has been a rare pillar of consistency. He racked up 11 catches for 123 yards and a touchdown in Sunday’s 27-17 victory over Arizona, his sixth straight game with 100 yards or more (it’s happened just eight times since the merger, and the record, held by Calvin Johnson, is a gettable eight games).
Receivers are known as the variance position in fantasy, but Thielen’s floor is uncommonly high. He’s absorbed at least 10 targets in all six games. All six of his yardage totals fall between 102 and 135 yards. He’s scored a touchdown in four of his last five games. He runs everything in the route tree, has reliable hands, competitiveness, and toughness.
The only knock on Thielen entering this season was a lack of touchdown upside — even with breakout seasons in 2016 and 2017, he only spiked nine times in 32 games. That’s apparently over for good, as he’s been making beautiful music with Kirk Cousins. When you consider how shaky the Vikings are with their run-blocking (although Latavius Murray starred Sunday) and overall defense, Minnesota will probably live or die by its passing game going forward.
Thielen clearly belongs in the No. 1 tier at wideout now; it’s just a matter of how high. Has Antonio Brown come back to the pack, given JuJu Smith-Schuster’s emergence? DeAndre Hopkins has been a monster with DeShaun Watson, and he even produced without Watson last year. Julio Jones is a never-ending story, a yardage behemoth who can’t seem to score the requisite touchdowns. Michael Thomas is as unguardable as his twitter name suggests; he just has to share with some especially talented teammates.
Thomas had the day off, but everyone else on this list was heard from Sunday. Brown (5-105-1) sank the Bengals with a late 49-yard touchdown jaunt; Hopkins (5-63-1) barged into fantasy double-digits, even if it was a quiet game for him. Jones, well, you know the story — yardage for days (10-143-0), no touchdown.
If we were redrafting today, I’d consider Thielen anywhere from the middle of the first round and onward. I don’t see any wideout who is a clear preference to him going forward. There will be stylistic differences, sure — that’s why we have a game. This is a crowded tier of bankable studs. But Thielen is finally tied to a plus-quarterback and on a team that can’t stop people and can’t consistently run the ball. This is going to be a wonderful mix of volume and efficiency. He’s going to be a league-winner.
Additional Week 6 observations, Clipboard Style:
• Success has many fathers, and in the case of Baltimore’s 11-sack parade at Tennessee, failure has many parents, too. Be careful not to blame everything on the Titans offensive line. It should also be a major condemnation of Marcus Mariota and the coaching staff. No one has any problem running away from Derrick Henry and Dion Lewis — not to mention Mariota — but it crushes me to push Corey Davis down the list of fantasy priorities.
I know the cheapest advice in the world is “stash everybody” — you have limited roster space and need to make decisions — but I’d really try to hold Davis, if possible. If he does pop in the next few weeks, I guarantee someone will pay you a pretty penny for him. Maybe you can even trade him as a speculation play. But I also concede the other side of it, in that it’s hard to trust any wideout if you don’t trust the quarterback and the overarching context.
• If you knew on Sunday morning that Josh Gordon was headed for nine targets in a 43-40 game, you probably would have launched his name on 100 DFS rosters. Alas, Gordon managed a meager 5-42-0 line, and even though he did force a lengthy pass-interference flag, those don’t count in our games. The Patriots spread their 35 targets to eight different players and Sony Michel chewed up 24-106-2 on the ground. Gordon remains a variable WR3/flex going forward and his ultimate upside here might merely be a middle-ground WR2. He could be a useful player, but I don’t think a consistent, projectable explosion is likely to happen this year.
• It says something about Rob Gronkowski that he can have a quiet game and still find 97 yards by the end of the night. The Chiefs should have let Gronk score on his last long reception, of course; I wonder if Gronk would have had the awareness to surrender himself short of the goal line (I’m not going to blast any defender who gets this play wrong; the proper decision requires a quick calculation for an uncommon and unnatural situation).
• Philip Rivers is crushing from an efficiency standpoint, but Melvin Gordon’s touchdown parade caps his upside. And the passing weapons for the Chargers are good, but not quite elite. It’s no shame to be inside the QB1 cutline most weeks, but Rivers will usually deserve a ranking in the 9-15 range, not in the penthouse tier. As well as Rivers played Sunday, he merely sits as the QB18.
• Twitter was popping after Ito Smith’s 14-yard touchdown run, and some pundits feel he’s been clearly superior to Tevin Coleman all year. Alas, Smith had 12 more touches against the giveaway Tampa Bay defense and they accounted for all of seven yards. Tevin Coleman has a slightly higher average on his rushes and receptions this year, and while neither player has gone pinball in the absence of Devonta Freeman, I’m not sure I see the argument that Smith has clearly been the superior back. Alas, the nebulous eye test can defend most arguments.
• Who is this version of Jordan Reed? He was one of the few Washington skill players free of the injury report, but he posted a useless 3-36-0 line on nine targets. Reed had a touchdown in Week 1; since then, he’s collected 177 yards and no scores. Usually, he’s a dynamic player who eventually gets hurt. This year, he’s a hale player who can’t seem to make any splash plays. He’s 28 on the roster but looks like a 30-something guy on the tape.
I still see Reed commonly ranked over players like David Njoku, Trey Burton, and Evan Engram. Maybe there isn’t a trade market for Reed, but he’s already had his bye and you might find a sympathizer. Quietly look around.
• The Raiders stunk in Mexico last year. They wet the bed in England on Sunday. America is sick of this traveling circus. What country could the Raiders play well in?
• We needed to see a second straight Tarik Cohen game. We saw it. Unless you’re overloaded with running-back riches, he’s probably a set-and-forget RB2 going forward. Matt Nagy is not putting that genie back in the bottle. Every offense needs some easy throws and simple paths to chunk plays, and Cohen’s providing a bunch of those.
• Kenyan Drake wore the goat horns after his goal-line fumble in overtime, but the Dolphins went right back to Drake on their next possession — the game-deciding one. It’s an ironic turn for Drake; a team that’s rarely shown extended confidence in him decided to play the opposite card right after his biggest career mistake.
But it also looks like Frank Gore is going to see 10-plus carries in perpetuity, so expectations on Drake must remain grounded, as frustrating as that is. Remember, Miami won this game, and when teams win, they tend to justify the game plan and usage employed. Losing teams are far more likely to dig up the infrastructure and try different things.
• Brock Osweiler jokes are the cheapest currency, but no one missed Ryan Tannehill, either. Miami’s 2019 quarterback will probably be Door No. 3.
• Andrew Luck had the Bortles game of the week, a QB7 garbage-time performance despite three interceptions, a modest 7.0 YPA, and a QB rating under 80. Luck employed a cast of thousands, using 10 targets in the passing game and throwing his three scores to three different receivers.
Eric Ebron overcame his multiple injuries to post a 4-71-1 line, though he also had one bad drop. Chester Rogers wasn’t efficient on 10 looks, but 4-55-1 is good enough for a low-expectations WR3. Marlon Mack (12-89-0 rushing, much of it in garbage time) could get some traction in the backfield if the Colts can actually keep games close. They also need to heal up on the shoddy offensive line.
• There’s not much new to say on the Bucs; they were as advertised. Jameis Winston made plenty of splash plays and a few “what was that?” throws. Both tight ends scored, along with Chris Godwin and Peyton Barber. Mike Evans was held in check, but he’s the last guy you’d worry about. Takeaways? Godwin moves ahead of DeSean Jackson going forward, and the Ronald Jones movement has to stop. It’s not that Barber is any sure thing, but he earned some leash after an early 28-yard run, and he’s at least the option this team has familiarity with.
• The Panthers didn’t do a lot right in their loss at Washington, but cheer up, Carolina — the Bucs come calling in Weeks 9 and 13. The NFC South remains the pinball game where fantasy owners rarely tilt.
• D’Onta Foreman is getting some preemptive pickup steam, but count me out. The Texans can’t run block at all, and that’s a difficult thing to mask (and almost impossible for any back to overcome). I also don’t trust Bill O’Brien at all, and Foreman doesn’t strike me as special enough to overcome a bad setup.
Deshaun Watson is also struggling with the line (seven sacks Sunday), though obviously some of that is on him, too. If I did own Foreman, I’d wait until he was in the 11th hour before liftoff, then try to find someone overly excited about his potential. Use the unveil endowment effect against your opponent; time spent waiting for something should not artificially inflate the value of the item.
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