Fantasy football fails and wins: week two

The first few weeks of the NFL regular season have been a roller coaster ride. With some players, you expect that it’ll be a high risk/high reward situation, but as always, there are always some unexpected fails and wins. Here are the top five wins and fails for week two in fantasy football.

Wins:

Sutton’s performance was surprising. I should know as I had him on my bench after week one’s results: one catch on three targets and 14 yards. To go from that to nine out of twelve targets and 159 yards? How were we to know? He didn’t make it into the end zone, but still had a great week against the Jaguars.

Patterson saw his first scores as a Falcon. A case could be made that he should be your starter instead of Mike Davis, who had an ugly start to the season with only 24 carries, 13 targets, and 135 total yards. Patterson has been more efficient on carries and targets and has two TDs to show for himself. At the moment, Patterson is the better start, but that could change as the season goes on. Next week, the Falcons will be up against the Giants, which should be favorable for Patterson.

And here we have another surprisingly good game from a player I sat on my bench. (Don’t worry - I still won, but now I know!) If you have Ezekiel Elliott, I wouldn’t be concerned that Pollard is going to replace him or anything. Zeke still had a great game, too. He led in carries, and Pollard led in rushing yards this week. However, coming into the season, we expected to see Elliott carry the load in both, so the split was unexpected. I would start Pollard in the coming weeks, even with Elliott healthy and starting.

Not just a one-week wonder! Samuel was again Garoppolo’s favorite target in week two. Brandon Aiyuk, once again, disappointed, and Deebo, once again, impressed. Samuel leads the team in air yards and is a must-start receiver at the moment. The Niners will take on the Packers next week.

Hooray! A winner I actually did start! And thank goodness for that. Jones had an amazing night, and saw his second four-touchdown display on Monday against the Lions. Week one was a rough start for the Packers, but Jones looked unstoppable in week two. He will have a tough matchup in week three against the Niners, but he is a must-start as such a dynamic player.

Fails:

You may be feeling like you wasted a preeeeetty high draft pick on this one right about now. Zero touchdowns two weeks in a row and a whopping 95 yards between the two weeks isn’t exactly what we had in mind for Kittle. It’s possible he’ll improve of course, but he seems like a risky start at this point. I wouldn’t give up on him just yet, but I’d pay attention to how he’s used in week three against the Packers.

Cooper tends to do this thing where he has an incredible game one week, and then disappears the next. In Sunday’s win against the Chargers, though, Cooper suffered a bruised rib and left the field. The Cowboys won’t play again until Monday night, so that gives him an extra day to get healthy, but his status as of now is questionable. And even if he plays, you never know when he’ll have a breakout game. If he doesn’t play, however, look for CeeDee Lamb to be the top target for Dak Prescott against the Eagles.

After an impressive week one with two TDs, this was a big ‘ol disappointment for fantasy owners. The Jets offense struggled against the Patriots defense, who held Davis to only 8 yards on two catches and saw Zach Wilson throw 4 interceptions. Davis was targeted less than both Braxton Berrios and Elijah Moore in week two, so it looks like he may be a risky start, sharing the role with those two and being a high-risk/high-reward type player with his high highs and low lows.

Ingram had a better week one, to say the least. Though he’s the lead back on Houston’s offense, there’s really not much else to say. You can see it in the stats. He barely had a role in the passing game in week two. I wouldn’t rule him out completely, but I wouldn’t say he’s a top starting RB either.

Fantasy managers continue to be disappointed by Taylor, as he split his carries with Marlon Mack and Nyheim Hines. He ran the ball 15 times, but only had one target in passing after playing a huge role in the passing game in week one. Nyheim Hines didn’t see much action in the passing game either, so it will be hard to know what to do with any of these Colts running backs in the coming weeks. They take on the Titans in week three.