This article is part of our On Target series.
The results from last week's column were pretty interesting to me, even if it becomes more clear each day that there are more predictive factors outside of just matchup that we need to consider. JuJu Smith-Schuster had a big day against the Bengals, Odell Beckham did get the best of Jalen Mills several times but the Giants offense was too inept to do anything about it, Mohamed Sanu scored in weak coverage, A.J. Green only got to 85 yards against Joe Haden and the Steelers, and Jarvis Landry was shut down by a combination of the Chargers, his own quarterback, and Todd Haley.
Now, onto the interesting spots in Week 7!
Demaryius Thomas vs. Patrick Peterson
This game is a very interesting one for the Denver wideouts. Peterson had been used as a shadow corner by previous regimes in Arizona, but the new coaching staff has given him 58 percent of his snaps on the left and 40 percent of his snaps on the right, basically never going into the slot. Emmanuel Sanders runs most of his routes out of the slot, which means that Thomas will see the most of Peterson. The Broncos should eventually regress to a league-average number of plays and that is a positive indicator for DT; however, if Peterson truly does cover him more than 70 percent of the time, this is going to be a long day at the office for Thomas, who has been a garbage time hero for fantasy owners so far.
The results from last week's column were pretty interesting to me, even if it becomes more clear each day that there are more predictive factors outside of just matchup that we need to consider. JuJu Smith-Schuster had a big day against the Bengals, Odell Beckham did get the best of Jalen Mills several times but the Giants offense was too inept to do anything about it, Mohamed Sanu scored in weak coverage, A.J. Green only got to 85 yards against Joe Haden and the Steelers, and Jarvis Landry was shut down by a combination of the Chargers, his own quarterback, and Todd Haley.
Now, onto the interesting spots in Week 7!
Demaryius Thomas vs. Patrick Peterson
This game is a very interesting one for the Denver wideouts. Peterson had been used as a shadow corner by previous regimes in Arizona, but the new coaching staff has given him 58 percent of his snaps on the left and 40 percent of his snaps on the right, basically never going into the slot. Emmanuel Sanders runs most of his routes out of the slot, which means that Thomas will see the most of Peterson. The Broncos should eventually regress to a league-average number of plays and that is a positive indicator for DT; however, if Peterson truly does cover him more than 70 percent of the time, this is going to be a long day at the office for Thomas, who has been a garbage time hero for fantasy owners so far.
Jarvis Landry vs. M.J. Stewart
Stewart is making another appearance in this column and this matchup should interest fantasy owners. Landry has been downright bad the last two weeks, but he is getting a prime chance to make good. Stewart is targeted 24 percent of the time when he drops back in coverage and Landry plays 74 percent of his snaps from the slot. Landry has received volume in every contest for the Browns but hasn't been able to turn those targets into real production consistently. A potential breakout week is here for the Browns' offense, and if they don't get it going this week, the panic sirens should start blaring.
Dede Westbrook vs. Kareem Jackson
Jackson has been one of the best slot corners in football through six weeks of the NFL season. While Westbrook has become the preferred fantasy wide receiver for the Jaguars, he could be in for tough sledding this week. Jackson allows the lowest catch percentage in coverage of all corners, and that is especially abnormal as slot corners normally allow a higher rate of targets to turn into catches given the sort of routes that they defend. Jackson has a 76.6 grade from PFF and Westbrook has not yet faced a matchup this tough. It will be interesting to see how many targets get funnelled to T.J. Yeldon and Niles Paul as a result of Westbrook's matchup.
Josh Reynolds vs. Richard Sherman
I am incredibly high on Reynolds this week. He should basically immediately step in as a starter for the Rams with Cooper Kupp out for at least this week and maybe more. The Rams run out of 11 personnel as their base set, which makes Reynolds a starter. Sherman, when he has been on the field, has been great this season though. He allows the fewest fantasy points per route run against in the NFL, and over 181 snaps he has allowed a 43 percent catch conversion rate. Reynolds has a speed edge on the older Sherman, but this matchup could leave the other Rams WRs running free.
T.Y. Hilton vs. Tre'Davious White
Hilton gets the unlucky distinction of running routes against the Bills' shutdown corner. Hilton is down to a 24 percent slot rate this year and White normally follows around the opposing team's best WR on the outside. White has a 66.2 PFF grade and is allowing only 0.2 fantasy points per route run against. I tend to think Hilton's 4.34 40-time will come into play here, but with Andrew Luck hesitant to push the ball down the field, this could be an inefficient day for for the Colts' No. 1 receiver.
