Pat Fitzmaurice shares his weekly tiers and rankings to help you set your fantasy football lineups. Here is the full article including all positions. Below, Fitz dives into the wide receiver position for the week.
Fitz’s Fantasy Football Week 2 Tiers & Rankings
WIDE RECEIVERS
Tier 1
Tier 2
Pat Fitzmaurice shares his weekly tiers and rankings to help you set your fantasy football lineups. Here is the full article including all positions. Below, Fitz dives into the wide receiver position for the week.
Fitz’s Fantasy Football Week 2 Tiers & Rankings
WIDE RECEIVERS
Tier 1
Tier 2
Tier 3
Tier 4
Tier 5
Tier 6
Tier 7
Welcome to must-start status, Brandon Aiyuk. More than one 49ers beat writer noted that Aiyuk was the standout performer in San Francisco’s training camp on either side of the ball. Aiyuk topped 1,000 yards for the first time last season, and he looked ready to take another big step forward with his 8-129-2 performance in the Niners’ Week 1 thrashing of the Steelers.
It’s too early to mash the panic button on D.J. Moore, even though the Bears’ passing game was thoroughly disjointed in an unsightly Week 1 loss to the Packers. I thought the Packers would use a lot of zone coverage against the Bears, because zone allows defenders to face the line of scrimmage and react more quickly to a quarterback who likes to run, as Justin Fields does. But no, the Packers played a lot of man and had Jaire Alexander cover D.J. Moore on a lot of Moore’s snaps. Alexander is one of the best cover men in the game, so I’m inclined to give Moore a mulligan for his Week 1 disappearance. The Fields-to-Moore connection was reportedly clicking throughout training camp, and we saw that connection work well in the preseason. This is not the time to bail out on Moore.
Sorry, Garrett Wilson investors. There’s no other way to spin it: Aaron Rodgers‘ tearing of his Achilles severely damages Wilson’s value. Wilson should still be in your lineup in most cases — perhaps not if you’re in an eight-team league – but his ceiling is far lower with Zach Wilson quarterbacking the Jets. Wilson still managed to generate more than 1,100 receiving yards last year while catching passes from Wilson, Mike White and Joe Flacco. But a 100-catch, 1,300-yard season is off the table, and it would be a shock if Wilson sniffed double-digit touchdowns, even though he had a terrific TD catch in Week 1. I have Wilson ranked WR20 in a tough matchup against the Cowboys this week, and even that modest ranking feels overly optimistic.
As noted in the QB section, the absence of Seahawks offensive tackles Charles Cross and Abraham Lucas could be a major problem for the Seattle offense against Detroit on Sunday. You’re most likely starting D.K. Metcalf no matter what, but tread lightly with any lineup decisions involving Tyler Lockett or Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
It will be interesting to see how George Pickens fares against the Browns this week with Diontae Johnson out due to a hamstring injury. Pickens is outrageously talented but has been operating as sort of a clear-out receiver, running mostly deeper routes while Johnson operates in the short and intermediate areas. Johnson’s absence might funnel a small handful of extra targets Pickens’ way, but I’m reluctant to give Pickens a huge bump in the rankings just because he’s now Pittsburgh’s de facto WR1.
It was a good idea to leave Gabe Davis on your bench last week in a bad matchup against the Jets. Feel free to fire him up this week in a much more alluring matchup
No player has generated more discussion in the run-up to Week 2 than Puka Nacua. Nacua’s 15 targets against the Seahawks were the most for a rookie receiver making his NFL debut since the NFL began keeping track of targets. Could it be a fluke? I mean, Kenbrell Thompkins had 14 targets in his debut with the New England Patriots in 2013 and never became a useful fantasy asset, aside from a decent first month in the league. I tend to think Puka’s Week 1 performance was legit. Thompkins only turned his 14 targets into 4-42-0 back in Week 1 of 2013. Puka had 10-119-0 against a non-terrible Seahawks pass defense and passed the eye test with flying colors. The guess here is that Cooper Kupp won’t be back as good as new when he’s eligible to come off the IR in Week 5. He wouldn’t have been sent halfway across the country to a specialist in Minnesota if this were a run-of-the-mill hamstring injury. Puka isn’t always going to look as good or draw as many targets as he did in Week 1, but at the very least he should be regarded as a fantasy WR3 going forward.
Even a pass catcher as good as Drake London is at risk of an occasional disappearing act in Falcons head coach Arthur Smith’s ultra-run-heavy offense. London will bounce back … but possibly not this week against a Green Bay defense that’s much better against the pass than it is against the run.
What we saw in the Jaguars’ preseason games continued into the regular season: It was Zay Jones, not Christian Kirk, playing with Calvin Ridley in two-receiver sets. That generally bodes ill for Kirk’s fantasy value, although I rank him as a low-end WR3 in a potential shootout against the Chiefs. As for Jones, he’s a viable weekly WR3 or flex option.
