Strength in Numbers: Actionable Week 5 Stats

We’re going to get a lot of stuff wrong, but sifting through usage metrics can help us work through what matters and what doesn’t. That’s the goal of this article: to break down the most actionable takeaways from each week in a concise, numbers-filled format and work through what’s important. Let’s get right to it:

1. Blake Corum dropped a pitch early and was severely punished for it, playing just six snaps compared to Kyren Williams‘ 62 (season-low 9% snaps for Corum). Corum got a season-high 41% of the Rams’ designed carries in Week 4 and was seemingly forcing a real committee with Williams, but Sean McVay‘s Kyren love is well-documented, and he took the first opportunity he got to shift back to workhorse Kyren. We’ll see what happens in Week 6 against a banged-up Ravens defense, but the fumble seems to have cost Corum the momentum he was building.

2. We finally got to see the Rams in real negative game script, and Tutu Atwell out-snapped Jordan Whittington 45-27 and out-routed him 36-15. Whittington played a season-high 80% of snaps in Week 4, but the LAR WR3 battle seems script-dependent, which makes sense given Atwell’s electric downfield ability juxtaposed with his diminutive size.

3. Davis Allen out-snapped Colby Parkinson 41-25 with Tyler Higbee out. Rams TEs combined for four targets on 47 team pass attempts.

4. With both Ricky Pearsall and Jauan Jennings out, Demarcus Robinson (85% snaps) and Kendrick Bourne (81%) led the way for San Francisco WRs. Bourne dominated with 10 catches on 11 targets for 142 yards, while Jake Tonges also had a season-high 80% route rate and matched Bourne with 11 targets. Marquez Valdes-Scantling was the WR3 with 27 routes on 50 dropbacks, followed by Skyy Moore and finally Malik Taylor. Expect a similar rotation if Pearsall and Jennings are out in Week 6.

5. With Cedric Tillman out, the Browns turned to Isaiah Bond as their WR2. Bond ran 31 routes on 36 dropbacks and finished second on Cleveland with seven targets, but he only caught two of those targets, and he only played 57% of snaps. Harold Fannin Jr.‘s snap rate fell from last week, but he still played 79% of snaps, easily the second-highest mark of the season for him. However, he only ran 18 routes on 36 dropbacks. Bond has proven himself as a solid target earner so far, but that hasn’t translated into fantasy production yet. The snap increase for Fannin bodes well, but you’d like to see more routes from him. We’ve noted here before that most teams so far have played their backup TEs more than usual against Minnesota and kept them in to block.