The Cincinnati Bengals will travel to take on the New York Giants on Sunday Night Football in Week 6. Here’s fantasy football start-sit advice for every Bengals skill player who has the potential to make an impact during the game.
Joe Burrow, QB
Joe Burrow’s health was in question entering the season and now the only question we have surrounding Cincinnati’s centerpiece is if his back will get sore from carrying this much of a workload.
The Bengals’ defense has required Burrow to be near perfect to remain competitive – that’s a tough break for this franchise, but it’s gold for fantasy managers. Burrow has completed over 20 passes in every game this season and has a 40+ yard play in each of his past four. I like him to extend both of those streaks with the Giants allowing the fifth most yards per attempt on deep attempts (16.4) this season.
Burrow has a chance to be the first QB to have five multi-pass TD efforts this season and shouldn’t have an issue returning top-10 value for the fourth time this season. He’s my QB5 and has as good a shot at leading the position in scoring this week as anyone not named Lamar Jackson (vs. Commanders).
Chase Brown, RB
Chase Brown has 32 touches and three scores over the past two weeks in an effort to earn more work (Weeks 1-3: 19 touches). Like Moss, he’s shown viable levels of versatility with multiple catches in four of five games, but the Bengals refuse to put two backs on the field at once.
That means Brown was on the field for just 32.3% of snaps last week and in a pass-centric attack, that’s not enough playing time to earn a starting grade. You should keep him rostered because he has made his presence known but don’t jump the gun and insert him into lineups just yet.
Ja’Marr Chase, WR
Bengals fans are allowed to be disappointed with one win through five weeks, but Ja’Marr Chase owners can’t complain even a little bit. My WR1 for dynasty purposes has racked up 19 catches for 396 yards and five scores over his last three games, breaking coverage for a 40+ yard grab in each of those contests.
All of Chase’s efficiency metrics are on a career pace, helping mask a target rate that is actually underwhelming based on his track record. There are two ways of looking at that – either his target rate ticks up and he gains even further value or his per route production trends closer to his career rates and what we’ve seen through five weeks is the peak of his powers.
Regardless of where you stand on that statistical conundrum, Chase’s spot among the top-producing Flex players in our game is safe due to Cincinnati’s need to light up the scoreboard to remain competitive.
Mike Gesicki, TE
After consecutive top-10 finishes, Mike Geiscki hasn’t been a top-25 tight end in back-to-back weeks and serves as a great reminder that if you’re streaming the TE position, you need to fully commit.
I get it. It’s easy to fall in love with any taste of production from your tight end slot. In life, commitment issues are prohibitive, but if you’re rolling the dice weekly with this spot in your starting lineup, I think it’s actually a positive.
In those two recent down weeks, Burrow has thrown for 624 yards and seven scores – it’s not as if there aren’t yards being gained through the air in Cincinnati. With Erick All Jr. (fourth-round pick out of Iowa) soaking up some usage and this offense trending back to the hyper-concentration plan of years past, you can do better.
That’s not to say you can’t circle back to Gesicki with time. That’s the point. If you’re streaming tight ends, you owe it to yourself to reevaluate the spot every week, regardless of the production that took place the week before.
Tee Higgins, WR
It’s been a weird season by every measure for Tee Higgins. He missed the first two weeks of the season, but it didn’t require much of a warm-up period (ala Brandon Aiyuk) as he’s earned 30 targets in his three games.
But what about the big plays? Higgins has 18 catches and yet, none of them have gained more than 17 yards (he averaged 15.6 yards per grab a season ago). His target share has spiked while his average depth of target sat at a career low, a trade-off that PPR fantasy managers should be happy with as it elevates his production floor.
Ceiling games like what we saw last weekend (14 targets and two touchdowns) aren’t going to happen often, but given the state of this defense and the comfort of Burrow, Higgins deserves to be locked into your lineup and always on your DFS radar.
Zack Moss, RB
Zack Moss has at least three catches in three straight games and has a 12+ yard rush in all five weeks. The role in the passing game is likely to stick if for no other reason than this team seems resigned to their fate as a need-to-score-in-bunches-to-keep-up team (third in pass rate over expectation).
There is the potential for the game script to work in the favor of Moss and that is what could elevate him from ordinary Flex to extraordinary RB2 as the Giants allow the most yards per carry after contact to running backs this season
Chase Brown is nipping at his heels, but Moss was on the field for 67.7% of snaps last weekend and that role should be enough to justify starting him in all formats in this spot.