NFL Week 4 Fantasy Football Recap: Los Angeles Rams vs. San Francisco 49ers

• The All-Pro wide receivers shine: Both Deebo Samuel and Cooper Kupp put up 100-yard performances, but Samuel had the best night of all.
• Familiar faces in the backfield: The San Francisco 49ers‘ Tevin Coleman and Los Angeles Rams‘ Malcolm Brown were elevated from the practice squad and played tonight. It was both players' season debuts and were homecomings after both players played in the AFC East last year.
• Tyler Higbee keeps grinding: Higbee gained over 60 receiving yards for the third straight game this season.
• For all fantasy football game recaps from Week 4, click here.

Los Angeles Rams @ San Francisco 49ers

• Deebo Samuel: 6 receptions, 115 yards, 1 touchdown, 2 carries, 2 rushing yards
• Cooper Kupp: 14 receptions, 122 yards

The Rams backfield becomes more complicated: The Rams activated Malcolm Brown from the practice squad, and he played the most snaps for a Rams third-string running back all season.

• Brown started with the Rams as an undrafted player in 2015.
• He worked his way up the depth chart, and in 2020, he led the Rams in offensive snaps with 459 while Darrell Henderson and Cam Akers both finished under 400 snaps that season.
• Brown spent 2021 with the Miami Dolphins and missed half the season before spending some of this past summer with the New Orleans Saints.
• It was already difficult to trust Henderson or Akers in fantasy football. Their performances tonight just added to that anxiety and made it more likely Brown carves out a larger role in the offense.

Start Tyler Higbee: Higbee caught 10 passes for 73 as the clear second option in the Rams' passing attack.

• Higbee was not only second tonight, but he has the second-most targets for the Rams this season, posting more than double the No. 3 receiver's targets.
• He joins Travis Kelce and Mark Andrews as the only tight ends with more than 20 receptions and 200 receiving yards this season.
• The 49ers allowed only five receptions for 23 yards to tight ends this season prior to this game.
• He was in less than half of starting lineups on ESPN this week.

The 49ers' new backup runningback: Tevin Coleman was the only other halfback outside of Jeff Wilson Jr. to play an offensive snap Monday night.

• Coleman was elevated from the practice squad prior to the game.
• He was the fifth halfback to play an offensive snap for San Francisco this season, but two are on injured reserve.
• Undrafted rookie Jordan Mason was the main backup last week with five offensive snaps. Mason was active tonight but didn’t play on offense.
• Wilson had a fine game rushing, gaining 74 yards from 18 carries and scoring a touchdown.
• Wilson typically doesn't play on third downs and is off the field at times for either Deebo Samuel or Kyle Juszczyk in the backfield, so the backup role doesn’t matter much unless Wilson also gets injured.

Table Notes

• Snaps include plays called back due to penalties, including offensive holding or defensive pass interference. The other three stats have these plays removed.
• Targets may differ from official NFL sources. The most likely discrepancy would be from a clear thrown-away pass, where the NFL may give the target to the nearest receiver, while this data will not.
• Carries are only on designed plays. Quarterback scrambles won’t count for the total number of carries in the game.