NFL Target & Touches Report: Week 6

Volume and usage are two areas of Daily Fantasy Football that are key to successful lineup building. The correlation between rushing attempts or receiving targets greatly favor the amount of fantasy points a player receives at the end of the week. We are breaking down interesting player scenarios, trying to get a grip on future workloads in the NFL. We will be looking at crowded wide receiver cores on a week-to-week basis, as well as split backfields. Some will stay away from uncertainty in NFL, which gives an edge for those willing to take chances on teams with unclear usage. Injuries will also open the door for others, which can be found here.There is a lot of variance, which is what we will be covering. If there is a team or player situation that didn't get covered in the article, a comment below or finding me on Twitter (@JGuilbault11) will be the best way get it answered.

Elijah McGuire - RB - New York Jets

Matt Forte and Bilal Powell are both banged up right now, and Week 6 is in doubt for both of them. This puts rookie running back, Elijah McGuire, in play this week and as long as he is RB1 on the depth chart for New York. McGuire was a 1,000 yard rusher three out his four years in college, and caught 130 balls as well. He averaged 4.9 YPC in college, seeing 15% of the targets in the passing game. McGuire torched Jacksonville for 131 total yards and a touchdown, while last week had just 30 on 11 carries. He has evaded ten tackles over the last two weeks, and is an interesting guy to breakdown on playerprofiler.com.

Early reports are for McGuire to handle a heavy workload in a matchup against what has been a surprising bottom half defense this season. He is an RB2 in value consideration, as his work in the passing game can be a beneficiary if New England gets out ahead early.

Andre Ellington - RB - Arizona Cardinals

Arizona just cut Chris Johnson and traded for Adrian Peterson. Does this mean that Arizona is going to go from the heaviest passing team to a balanced offense? Likely not. They are airing it out more than any other team right now, which bodes well for a pass-catching back like Andre Ellington. He has seen 32 targets over the last three weeks, catching 23 of them, and 18 of them in the last two weeks alone. With a lack of consistency by guys like J.J. Nelson, Jaron Brown, and John Brown, Ellington has been basically a WR2 over the last few weeks in this pass heavy system. Ellington has scored 15.3, 19.4, and 13.1 DK points over the last three weeks without finding the end zone. Even with AP in town, the offensive line is bad, the Cardinals will still throw the ball an above average amount of times, so Ellington needs to remain in your process.

Lamar Miller - RB - Houston Texans

Houston's offense has looked good with Deshaun Watson under center, and they have a favorable schedule riding out the rest of the season. Miller has reasserted himself ahead of D'Onta Foreman, who struggled last week. Miller played 88% of the snaps last week, and has now topped 70 rushing yards in each of the last two games which were not favorable spots. Miller is hovering around 16.6 rushing attempts per game this season, which is not bad for an RB2 in a home spot against the Browns. Miller and this entire offense is trending upwards, and now that the passing game can move the ball, it opens things up for Miller a bit more. Miller should be a viable RB2 most weeks in good spots, and has the chance at 100+ all-purpose yards and a touchdown in terms of upside.

Roger Lewis - WR - New York Giants

With Odell Beckham Jr and Brandon Marshall out of the picture for the rest of the year, we are going to see Evan Engram and Sterling Shepard see a bulk of the targets. They are the obvious in this bunch, and Shane Vereen could see a tick up in usage as well. Roger Lewis could see WR 2-3 type volume down the road in his second year. He ran 29 routes last week, and ran 27 routes when OBJ missed Week 1. He finished with 4-45-0 that week, and 1-29-1 this past week. He is not in play against Denver, as I wouldn't really look at anyone from the Giants, but in the larger picture these guys get a bump with a massive amount of targets up for grabs. 36% of the Giants targets are now up for grabs.

Carlos Hyde - RB - San Francisco 49ers

Carlos Hyde was out-snapped in Week 5 against Indianapolis, by Matt Breida. I am not really in belief that Hyde is healthy right now, who struggled to finish Week 4, and saw Breida get 13 touches to his 9 in Week 5. Recent news has said Kyle Shanahan will keep a "hot hand" approach moving down the line, which is not what we want to hear in fantasy. Hyde has had injury issues in the past, and while the offense should be built through him, he might not be able to handle it. Hyde has been game script proof in his career, working well in the passing game when down, so the excuse of San Francisco being down early in Indy had nothing to do with it. However, his 11 rushing yards on eight carries might just be an overall sign of his health. It is going to be a tough time trusting this backfield moving forward.

Eric Ebron - TE - Detroit Lions

Time is starting to run out for Eric Ebron, who has a highly touted late-round tight end to pick up the red zone slack left by Anquan Boldin from last season. So far he has had one touchdown, and only two games over ten receiving yards. After a nice stretch of 12 targets over two weeks, Ebron has seen four in each of the last two weeks. Darren Fells has seen seven targets over the last two weeks, who has been a blocking tight end in his career. These are not promising numbers for Ebron, who has a matchup against the Saints in Week 6. While he could show some spark due to the matchup, I will not be getting too excited in this spot.

Fells isn't going to be a viable fantasy option, but continue to look for Golden Tate and Marvin Jones be the guys, but also a much heavier running attack has been shown in Detroit early on when they are leading. Ameer Abdullah and the various running backs will continue to see the workload. Ebron ranks fourth on the lions with 24 targets, and is only completing 50% of them.

Ty Montgomery - RB - Green Bay Packers

After missing Week 5, Ty Montgomery may have opened the door for a committee workload moving forward. Mike McCarthy had already talked about cutting back Montgomery's snaps, and after the injury that looks like it will be the case. Reports have come out today with McCarthy sating Aaron Jones has earned more snaps, as he saw 20 touches in Green Bay's Week 5 win over Dallas. He ended up with 125 yards on 19 rushing attempts for a touchdown. It is now the second straight week with a touchdown for Jones. While we still need to see if Montgomery plays in Week 6, but as of now we can look to limit his projected touches from where he was in the first few weeks.

If Montgomery misses time this week, we can peg Jones for around 17-20 touches, which is excellent for his price. Montgomery was trending up early on to be a heavy workload fantasy back, but things will likely swing elsewhere. Jones has 174 yards and two rushing touchdowns over the last two weeks, but hasn't shown any work in the receiving game, catching one ball for nine yards. Montgomery will likely have the edge there, but could at some point be someone they use as a partial early down back and more geared towards third downs.