We've reached the end of the first quarter of the 2020 season — plenty of time to better understand which players to trust in fantasy football and which teams are using our guys in fantasy-friendly ways.
While preparing my fantasy football rankings each week, I come across statistics and trends worth monitoring. The following are 32 interesting stats — one for each NFL team — that helped inform my Week 5 rankings. Several can be found in premium stats as well as the PFF fantasy stats. (These numbers do not account for the Thursday night Buccaneers-Bears game.)
Arizona Cardinals – Last season, Arizona attempted 125 screen passes — that was 35 more than any other team. They’ve kept up their high screen pass rate this season with 30. That again leads the league.
Atlanta Falcons – Calvin Ridley already has eight end-zone targets. That both leads the league for wide receivers and is a mark that no Falcons receiver topped in all of 2019.
Baltimore Ravens – Gus Edwards is the only running back this season to get a first down or touchdown on over 40% of his carries.
Buffalo Bills – Devin Singletary has avoided eight tackles on his 16 catches. He’s already topped his rookie season total when he had six on 29 catches.
Carolina Panthers – Mike Davis has the second-most red-zone targets for a running back at seven. He’s caught five of those, but only one led to a touchdown. Teammate Christian McCaffrey didn’t have any red-zone targets before getting injured this season. Last season, McCaffrey had the second-most among running backs at 18.
Chicago Bears – Nick Foles has the fastest time to throw this season at 2.3 seconds. The man he replaced, Mitchell Trubisky, had the sixth-slowest at 3.0.
Cincinnati Bengals – A.J. Green has the second-most contested catches this season at six. That is already half way to his 2018 total of 12.
Cleveland Browns – Nearly 22% of Browns rushing attempts have led to explosive plays. That is over 3 percentage points more than the next-best team despite Browns facing eight defenders in the box on 86 run plays — 20 more than the next-closest team.
Dallas Cowboys – Ezekiel Elliott has been much more involved in the pass game this year. His nine first downs on receptions are the second-most for running backs. He’s run 33 more routes than any other back.
Denver Broncos – Among all of Drew Lock‘s passing yards, 44.1% have come from air yards rather than yards after the catch. That’s the fourth-lowest rate in the league. His replacements while injured, Brett Rypien and Jeff Driskel, have had the second- and fifth-highest rates at 72.9% and 69.0%, respectively.
Detroit Lions – When healthy, Kenny Golladay has been very consistent since the end of last season. He’s had at least three first-down catches in seven-straight games and a touchdown in five of those seven.
Green Bay Packers – Robert Tonyan leads tight ends in end zone touchdown catches with four. Last season, the Packers had just three end zone touchdowns from tight ends, all coming from different tight ends.
Houston Texans – Will Fuller has the fourth-best yards per route run for a wide receiver in the last calendar year at 2.53.
Indianapolis Colts – Jordan Wilkins has a higher PFF grade at 76.4 than both Jonathan Taylor (69.0) and Nyheim Hines (61.6). Wilkins has avoided 11 tackles on his carries — equaling the total of the rest of the Colts running backs put together, despite Taylor having more than double the number of carries.
Jacksonville Jaguars – Last week, D.J. Chark Jr. had six first downs and two touchdowns — those were both the second-highest marks of his career. One of his best skills last season was his ability to avoid tackles, something he did 11 times in 2019. He has yet to avoid a tackle this season.
Kansas City Chiefs – Mecole Hardman has had more offensive snaps than Demarcus Robinson five times over the last two seasons, including this past week. Hardman has never had more snaps than Robinson in back-to-back weeks.
Las Vegas Raiders – Josh Jacobs avoided three or more tackles on his rushing attempts in all but one of his games last year. He avoided just one tackle on his carries last week and two the week before.
Los Angeles Chargers – Hunter Henry has 837 receiving yards over the last calendar year. That is fourth-most for all tight ends.
Los Angeles Rams – Darrell Henderson has the second-best rate of rushing for first downs or touchdowns on his carries at 39.5%. Teammate Malcolm Brown is not far behind at third with 35.6%.
Miami Dolphins – Myles Gaskin has avoided 0.31 tackles per rushing attempt, first among all running backs with more than 30 carries.
Minnesota Vikings – Dalvin Cook has rushed for 25 first downs. That’s six more than any other player.
New England Patriots – Patriots running backs are averaging 2.3 yards before contact per attempt, the second-highest mark in the league. Last season they were below average at 1.2.
New Orleans Saints – Alvin Kamara‘s 3.45 yards per route run ranks second-best among all players with 50 or more routes — regardless of position.
New York Giants – Darius Slayton is tied for the second-most receiving touchdowns over the past calendar year with 10.
New York Jets – The Jets have run only three goal-line plays all season. Every other team has at least double that amount, and the league average is 13.
Philadelphia Eagles – Carson Wentz is the only quarterback with 10 or more carries and a first down or touchdown on over half of them — he’s at 63.2%. His five avoided tackles on his carries are third-most.
Pittsburgh Steelers – Diontae Johnson has the second-most avoided tackles for a wide receiver in the last calendar year with 18.
San Francisco 49ers – George Kittle has 319 yards after contact on his catches in the last calendar year. No other tight end has more than 300, and only two have more than 200.
Seattle Seahawks – Russell Wilson has thrown a league leading 11 touchdown passes where the receiver was in the end zone at the catch. That is already more than half of all quarterbacks had in the entire 2019 season. His 20 TD passes are tied for the lead league.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers – Tom Brady has the most deep passing yards for quarterbacks at 458. He has finished outside of the top 15 in deep passing yards each of the last two seasons.
Tennessee Titans – A.J. Brown has 3.01 yards per route run over the last eight regular season weeks — the most among wide receivers.
Washington Football Team – Terry McLaurin only lines up in the slot for 27.4% of his pass routes, but when he does he’s been very effective. His 3.77 yards per route run in the slot are third-best for wide receivers with more than 30 routes in the slot.
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