Let’s take a look at players our analysts consider on the fringe as you weigh your waiver wire additions for the week. And here is all of our fantasy football waiver wire advice for Week 5.

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Fantasy Football Waiver Wire Advice: Drop or Hold?

DROP RECOMMENDATIONS

Droppable

• Dalvin Cook
• A.J. Dillon
• Josh Reynolds

The Jets’ offense can’t seem to support one fantasy-viable running back, let alone two. Breece Hall is a star in the making, while Cook is clearly in the twilight of an outstanding career. You won’t have any regrets about dropping Cook.

The plodding A.J. Dillon wasn’t able to provide fantasy value even when Aaron Jones missed Weeks 2-3 with a hamstring injury. Dillon is averaging 2.7 yards per carry, and he’s had three receptions in four games. Now that Jones is healthy again, Dillon has virtually zero fantasy value and isn’t worth keeping on your roster.

Josh Reynolds worked his way into flex consideration over the first four weeks of the season, but now that Lions WR Jameson Williams is being allowed to make an early return from a gambling suspension, Reynolds’ fantasy value is diluted.

Droppable with a chance of regret

• Kendre Miller
• K.J. Osborn
• Samaje Perine

With Alvin Kamara back from suspension in Week 4, Kendre Miller played only five offensive snaps — fewer than Saints RBs Tony Jones and Adam Prentice. Jamaal Williams will eventually come off injured reserve and be the Saints’ designated between-the-tackles banger. Miller will eventually get a chance to make a meaningful contribution to an NFL backfield, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen in his rookie year.

K.J. Osborn is playing more snaps and running more routes than rookie first-rounder Jordan Addison, but Osborn isn’t doing anything with the opportunity. He’s caught a pair of TD passes, but he’s caught 8-of-15 targets for 117 yards and hasn’t had more than 36 yards in a game this season.

When Javonte Williams sustained a hip injury on Sunday, it was undrafted free agent rookie Jaleel McLaughlin, not Samaje Perine, who provided a spark from the RB position. If Williams misses more than a game or two, it’s possible Perine will split work 50/50 with McLaughlin or even get a majority of the RB touches. But it’s also possible that McLaughlin’s Week 5 mini-breakout is for real and he’s about to completely marginalize Perine. If byes have you in a pinch this week and you have to drop a player or two to make room for new additions, Perine can be thrown overboard.

Don’t drop yet

• Joe Burrow
• Kareem Hunt

Joe Burrow‘s career passer rating entering this season: 100.4. Joe Burrow‘s 2023 passer rating: 66.2. The guess here is that if you offered Bengals head coach Zac Taylor the chance to go back in time and reassess the handling of Burrow’s calf injury, Taylor would keep his quarterback sidelined for the first few weeks of the regular season and give that nagging calf injury a chance to heal. Burrow has been a shell of himself so far this season, but the calf-related malaise won’t last all season. Just as Justin Fields broke out of a three-week slumber with a big game in Week 4, Burrow will eventually snap out of it and go back to being one of the best quarterbacks in the game. Resist the urge to spite-drop him.

Kareem Hunt‘s surface stats from the Browns’ 28-3 loss to the Ravens in Week 5 look ugly: five carries for 12 yards, with zero targets. But the Browns’ offense was doomed from the start after QB Deshaun Watson (shoulder) was a surprise inactive, and there was actually a silver lining around Hunt’s usage. Hunt played only 15 snaps, but he either had a carry or ran a route on 13 of those 15 snaps. Jerome Ford is unquestionably the lead guy in the Cleveland backfield, but Hunt will have a role, and he’d become a valuable asset if Ford were to go down.