Fantasy Football Outlook: Dalton Kincaid, Jake Ferguson, Dawson Knox, Hayden Hurst

What an interesting week this is setting up to be.

Fantasy football is the ultimate game of strategy because every season has a vast galaxy of variables. How we assess, interpret and act on those variables is critical to our success.

Boy oh boy, Week 5 is chock full o’ variables.

The bye weeks are back to challenge our roster depth and our managerial acumen. Can you win with one hand tied behind your back? Two hands? Two hands and one foot? If you went heavy on Chargers, Browns and Seahawks in your draft, you might be feeling like the Black Knight at the end of the sword fight in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”

But there are some positive variables, too. Week 5 could bring the return of a pair of stars who spent the first four weeks of the season on injured reserve: Cooper Kupp and Jonathan Taylor. Kupp reportedly practiced with the Rams without limitation on Wednesday. Taylor also practiced in full, though it’s unclear whether he and the Colts have resolved their differences over Taylor’s contractual status. Also back in Week 5 is Lions WR Jameson Williams, whose six game gambling suspension was shortened to four games after a change to the NFL’s gambling policy.

And of course, we have to sift through all of the other variables: matchups, injuries, shifting depth charts, etc.

Buckle up, friends. It’s going to be a wild week.

As always, feel free to use these tiered rankings as a tiebreaker for your difficult lineup decisions. Here are all of my fantasy football rankings, tiers, and player notes for Week 5. Below we dive into a few notable players.

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Fitz’s Fantasy Football Outlook

The 49ers gave up the second-fewest fantasy points to TEs in both 2020 and 2021, and the seventh-fewest fantasy points to TEs in 2022. San Francisco has given up the ninth-fewest fantasy points to TEs so far this year. Still, the Cowboys’ Jake Ferguson still looks like a decent play this week against the 49ers. Ferguson’s weekly reception totals so far: 2, 3, 5, 7. Things are trending in the right direction. Ferguson has a healthy 18.5% target share this season. And while the 49ers have been fairly tough against tight ends, they have seen 35 TE targets so far this season — the third-highest total in the league.

Dawson Knox had a season-low 50% snap share for the Bills in Week 4, which bodes ill for Knox but bodes well for rookie Dalton Kincaid. In the Bills’ convincing win over the Dolphins last week, Kincaid was targeted on five of Josh Allen‘s 25 pass attempts — a 20% target share. Kincaid has only 15-99-0 receiving so far this season, but his time is coming. Maybe it comes this week against a Jaguars defense that gave up 6-95-0 to Falcons TE Jonnu Smith last week.

Hayden Hurst could be a sneaky matchup play this week even though the Carolina passing game hasn’t exactly been firing on all cylinders. Hurst faces the Lions, who have given up 43 targets, 32 receptions and 303 receiving yards to tight ends — all of which are league highs.

-Pat Fitzmaurice