Fantasy Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame member Bob Harris and Gary Davenport have well over 40 years of experience as fantasy football analysts, with three Football Writer of the Year Awards between them. They know their stuff—or at least that's what they tell themselves.
Each week during the 2025 season, Harris and Davenport are going to come together here at Footballguys to answer five of that week's biggest fantasy questions.
The calendar has turned to October, and already the 2025 campaign is terrifying to many fantasy managers whose seasons teeter on the brink. Harris has the lifeline to pull you to safety this week with the names you need to know in Week 5.
Davenport was distracted by something shiny and wandered off. Sadly, he'll be back.
Scrubbing Bubbles
The carnage at quarterback continues, with Lamar Jackson of the Baltimore Ravens the latest big name to go down under center.
With so many fantasy managers potentially looking for a spot-starter, which scrub signal-caller has the best chance at being a decent Week 5 fill-in? Which mid-range QB will take advantage of the vacuum at the top and be a star for a week?
Harris: If you're making me pick a scrub, what about the Saints signal caller Spencer Rattler?
Rattler has completed a respectable 67.1 percent of his throws so far for 765 yards with five touchdowns and only one interception. He has another 102 yards and nine first downs as a runner. But it's not all good. As USA Today notes, Rattler is at the bottom of the league with a lowly average of 5.6 yards per attempt and 7.8 yards per completion. Accuracy issues have kept him from making plays down the field -- even with a capable supporting cast that includes Chris Olave, Juwan Johnson, Brandin Cooks, and Rashid Shaheed.
All that said, if Rattler can't make plays against a Giants defense that ranks just 25th against the pass, he never will. If that's the case, Tyler Shough might be the scrub I'm rolling out in Week 6.
As for my mid-range play, let's officially welcome the guy on the other side of that matchup, Giants rookie Jaxson Dart, to the world of fantasy relevance.
As I noted in this week's Fantasy Notebooks, the passing numbers weren't great. He connected on 13-of-20 for 111 yards and a touchdown against a tough defense -- and without star wideout Malik Nabers, who was lost to a season-ending torn ACL early in the game. More importantly to me, Dart avoided turnovers and kept the Giants in positive situations, and clearly brought a sense of urgency to the offense.
Dart joined Daniel Jones as the only Giants rookies since at least 1950 with a passing touchdown and a rushing touchdown in his first career start. Dart is the first QB with a passing touchdown, rushing touchdown, and 50-plus rushing yards in his first career start since Tim Tebow. Dart also goes up against a Saints defense that has given up the third-most pass TDs and ranks in the top 11 in QB rush yards allowed.
Davenport: I can't help but feel like we have seen this movie with Dart, and that three years from now, he'll be starting in Pittsburgh after he gets run out of New York.
Is Bryce Young a scrub? That's a rhetorical question—we all know the answer, and it ain't, no.
Outside of one big game against Arizona in which most of Young's numbers came in tiempo de basura, the third-year pro has been mostly bad this season—less than 190 passing yards a game and just five passing touchdowns in four games. But if ever there was a week for Young to act like an actual NFL quarterback (man, did we whiff on that call), it's Sunday against a Miami Dolphins team that leads the AFC in fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks.
For a mid-range option, this idiot who liked Young as a late-round value in drafts this year will roll with C.J. Stroud of the Houston Texans, who sits one slot behind Dart in this week's quarterback rankings here at Footballguys. Stroud's 233 passing yards and two scores last week were depressingly his best passing performance of the season, but he's in a prime spot to better those numbers against a decimated Baltimore Ravens defense surrendering an AFC-high 265.8 yards per game through the air.
Chalk Talk
The running back position has been more chalk than any other in fantasy football, but there are backs who have struggled in a big way—Chase Brown of the Bengals has been invisible, and Baltimore's Derrick Henry ranks outside the top-40 running backs in PPR points since Week 2.
Which high-end running back are you most concerned is just cooked this season? And which option outside the top-25 in this week's RB rankings at Footballguys is the best bet to get fantasy managers through the week?
Harris: I don't think Henry is cooked, but I don't see how his situation gets better.
Last week, the veteran superstar only ran the ball eight times, his fewest carries in a game since 2018. Henry gained 42 yards on those eight carries, and he said afterward that, however many carries he gets, he needs to find a way to make plays when the ball does go to him.
That's true. But Henry is also averaging 5.8 yards per carry. And, according to Next Gen Stats, he had the 12th fastest speed of any player this season when he hit 21.07 mph against the Bills in Week 1.
But even if Henry isn't the problem, there clearly is one. It's a defense that can't stop anybody. They've given up a league-high 133 points.
Baltimore playing from behind is not ideal for Henry.
After his eight-carry outing last week, he has only had 49 carries. And, as we saw against the Chiefs, the more versatile Justice Hill is standing by for just these situations. Hill outsnapped Henry 32 to 21 in this one, and finished the game with 76 yards and a touchdown, while adding five receptions for 41 yards and a score on six targets.
Those numbers were good for 28.7 fantasy points and an RB4 finish; Henry was RB43 with 7.8 points.
The Ravens are 1-3, Lamar Jackson could miss two to three weeks with a hamstring injury, and the injuries keep mounting on the other side of the ball. Unless something changes drastically, it's hard to envision the Ravens providing Henry with the positive game scripts necessary to achieve the volume we expected when we drafted him this summer.
Although opportunity is knocking, Arizona's Michael Carter currently ranks as RB32.
With James Conner's season over and Trey Benson out at least four weeks after going on injured reserve this week, Carter was signed to the active roster earlier this week from the practice squad. He joins Emari Demercado and Bam Knight in the running back room. Asked if Demercado or Carter would take over as starter when the Cardinals take on the Titans, Gannon said, "We'll see how the week goes."
Last season, with Conner and Benson sidelined in the final two games, the Cardinals turned to Carter as their lead back -- although Demercado was also out during that stretch. Carter finished those two games with 30 total carries for 113 yards and a touchdown. He added six catches on six targets for 27 yards.
While it's possible Demercado could be asked to handle more than the third-down role he's excelled at, I'll take my chances that Carter was promoted to handle a role similar to what we saw during that two-game stretch last year.
If so, it's worth noting this week's opponent, the Titans, has allowed the fourth-most fantasy points to running backs this year.
Davenport: Speaking of being wrong, this moron also beat the drum all summer long for Brown as a potential league-winner.
It's barely October, and he's already cooked like a pumpkin pie.
Four games into the season, Brown has yet to amass even 50 rushing yards in a contest. He's averaging (and this is a real number) 2.3 yards per carry. The offensive line in Cincinnati is poubelle chaude. The quarterback play of Jake "Coming Soon to a UFL Team Near You" Browning has been kacke (That's three other languages so far). The light at the end of the tunnel with Brown?
It's a freight train coming your way.
I'm not entirely sure why I keep doing this to myself—Mike Vrabel has made it quite clear that the New England backfield is a RBBC in 2025. But Patriots back TreVeyon Henderson scored his first professional touchdown a week ago, and the second-round rookie is always one touch from six points. The Patriots would be wise to go hard at a soft Buffalo run defense Sunday night. Who's up for a coming-out party?