Fantasy Stars Who Will Struggle in Week 16: Brock Purdy, Gus Edwards, Davante Adams and Dallas Goedert

We choose one player at each offensive fantasy position who is usually a weekly starter but has good reason to expect a slow Week 16.

Week 16 is fantasy semifinal time for most, the penultimate week of the fantasy season. The decisions between stars and matchups won’t get any easier, and I’m here to identify guys you usually count on who have reasons to expect a struggle.

Week 15 was a success in this endeavor, even if nobody truly tanked:

• Tua Tagovailoa didn’t have to do much as his team blew out the Jets 30-0, and he threw for just 224 yards and one touchdown. It was a middling day that left him outside the top 20.
• I’d love to call it a win choosing Joe Mixon, as he ran for only 47 yards, but his 13 touches produced 61 total yards, and he scored a touchdown. It wasn’t an exciting day, but Mixon had a good fantasy week.
• D.J. Moore caught four passes for a team-high 52 yards, a decent day, but a far cry from his top-10 yearly status. Moore is the go-to receiver for Justin Fields, and for good reason, but his ceiling is sometimes capped by the passing limitations of his quarterback.
• I chose Evan Engram for the second straight week and was rewarded after the tight end had his best game of the year in Week 14: Engram had just four catches for 28 yards against Baltimore.

Let’s go again in Week 16 and try to find guys you may want to second-guess when setting your lineup. One or more of them will likely have a good week, but it’s worth looking at all your options, even available free agents after the waiver period.

Fantasy points against positions are from Pro Football Reference and FantasySP. Passing yards per attempt and per game and rushing yards per attempt and per game are from Team Rankings.

 

Quarterback

Brock Purdy, San Francisco 49ers vs Baltimore Ravens

This is going to be one of the most telling games of the season. The 49ers have been rolling over essentially everyone, but they come face-to-face with possibly the best defense in the league (though San Francisco’s own D may argue with that).

I’m not jumping on the bandwagon of Purdy not being worthy of the MVP because of his team. San Fran has the most impressive collection of offensive talent we’ve seen in a long time, but Purdy is performing his duties as well as any player in the league.

Fantasy Pros has Purdy fourth among quarterbacks in total fantasy points and per game. He has been a top-11 QB nine times in 14 games and outside the top 16 in only three weeks. Purdy is as consistent as almost anyone in fantasy.

Baltimore has allowed the least passing yards per attempt and seventh-least passing yards per game. They are second best against quarterbacks in fantasy scoring. If anyone can step up and slow down this full-strength 49er team, it’s the Ravens.

I don’t love this pick, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the Ravens could at least slow down this offensive machine. If they can’t, health might be the only thing that can stop San Francisco from the Super Bowl.

 

Running Back

Gus Edwards, Baltimore Ravens @ San Francisco 49ers

Edwards himself isn’t a star (in real life or fantasy), but the Baltimore running game is intriguing every year. It starts with a hyped-up player, often JK Dobbins lately, who gets injured early in the season. Several other options cycle through (seemingly always including Edwards) who are effective but short-lived due to injury.

The man to trust in the end is whoever is healthy, and that’s Edwards right now after Keaton Mitchell was lost for the season with a Week 15 knee injury. The cycle goes on, and here’s to wishing Edwards the best of health.

His production is likely to be lacking in Week 16 against the 49ers. San Francisco has allowed the third-least rushing yards per game and the seventh-least fantasy points per game to running backs.

Arizona, admittedly, had a big game on the ground last week, with their top two backs racking up 150 rushing yards on San Fran, but that was following two weeks in which very good running games in Seattle and Philadelphia were essentially shut down by the 49ers.

I see this as a game where Lamar Jackson is the one making the plays for Baltimore. That will mean some passes, but more importantly it will include Jackson running the ball. I see him stealing valuable carries, especially in the red zone, in one of Baltimore’s biggest games of the year.

Edwards is a flex player with RB2 upside, but I don’t see a realistic finish where he reaches the RB1 heights he has hit several times this season.

 

Wide Receiver

Davante Adams, Las Vegas Raiders @ Kansas City Chiefs

These teams matched up in Week 12: Vegas went ahead 14-0 early but was outscored 31-3 by the Chiefs in the final 37 minutes of game time. After a promising start, the game ended just how we thought it would.

The Raiders now visit Kansas City, where the Chiefs are in good position but far from settled in the AFC playoff picture. Two teams are ahead of them in the conference, but a loss by Denver in Week 15 afforded KC a two-game cushion at the top of the division.

The defense has been Kansas City’s most consistent unit all season, and they’ve allowed the fourth-least passing yards per attempt, fifth-least passing yards per game, and eighth-least fantasy points per game to wide receivers. 

Adams had 101 yards and a touchdown last week against the hopeless Chargers, but it was only his second game this season over 90 yards and just his fifth receiving touchdown of the season after leading the league with 14 in 2022. He has been inconsistent on a weekly basis.

While Adams had five catches for 73 yards last time these teams matched up, that seems like the best-case scenario this time around. The game is in Kansas City, which is a notoriously tough place for visitors, and the Raiders are just playing out the string, even after a huge victory last week.

He will catch a few passes, but I see a quiet week for Adams outside the top 20 receivers.

 

Tight End

Dallas Goedert, Philadelphia Eagles vs New York Giants

As hapless as the Giants have seemed at times, they aren’t wildly underperforming given the circumstances: 5-9 isn’t a successful record, but this team hasn’t had its starting quarterback most of the season and has been starting an undrafted rookie, Tommy DeVito, for an extended stretch.

The Giants aren’t as far down as, say, the Commanders or Panthers. While they have been league average against the pass, New York has been very good against tight ends, allowing the eighth-least fantasy points per game and 11th-least receiving yards to the position.

Goedert returned in Week 14 from a fractured forearm and put up back-to-back four-catch, 30-yard games. He has only been a top-10 tight end twice in 11 games, in Weeks 5 and 7. Goedert is still treated like a star by name recognition, but he has been far from a top performer this season.

Fantasy owners counting on Goedert would be better served looking for a streamer; that looks like the case for the rest of the season, as Philly sees the Giants again in Week 18 and faces the Cardinals in Week 17, a team that has given up nearly the same fantasy points and receiving yards to tight ends as New York.

If you own Goedert, he’s a fairly safe player to drop if you don’t have a roster spot and/or want to stream the position. Someone will pick him up and probably play him, but that owner won’t have upside over the rest of the season.

#brock-purdy #gus-edwards #davante-adams #dallas-goedert