Here’s a decision between high upside excitement versus old, reliable, and boring for fantasy football managers to consider. Buffalo Bills deep threat WR Gabe Davis has scored a TD in three straight weeks, and a red-hot QB Josh Allen is throwing his way. Carolina Panthers WR Adam Thielen, on the other hand, currently sits as the WR10 for the season, being rookie QB Bryce Young’s security blanket.
If you are considering either of these WRs for your Flex or even your WR2 spot with bye weeks starting, should you start Gabe Davis or Adam Thielen in Week 5?
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Gabe Davis’s Fantasy Outlook This Week
Davis ranks as the WR39 in PFNs Consensus Rankings. He’s scored a TD in the last three games, with his latest against the Miami Dolphins, catching all three of his targets for 61 yards.
Being a part of the Bills’ offense, however, Davis is second fiddle to Stefon Diggs, who commands a lot of targets. With Davis being more of a boom/bust type, he’ll need to continue catching TDs to compensate for his lack of targets and yards, as he still hasn’t hit the century mark in a single game this year.
This week, Buffalo travels to London to face the Jacksonville Jaguars, who just won last week against the Atlanta Falcons across the pond.
Given Jacksonville’s very beatable secondary and an offense still looking to break out, this game could have shootout potential since Buffalo lost the team’s CB1, Tre’Davious White, for the season due to a torn Achilles suffered last week.
Adam Thielen’s Fantasy Outlook This Week
Thielen is the WR10 for the season but is ranked as the WR43 by PFN, partially due to much of his production coming in an explosive Week 3 in which he put up 145 yards and a TD off 11 catches. In that game, Panthers backup QB Andy Dalton was under center while starter Bryce Young sat out with an injury.
Young returned last week and continued to look Thielen’s way as his first read, targeting the veteran wideout eight times. Thielen caught seven of those targets for 76 yards.
An aging WR at 33, Thielen’s best years are behind him, as his total yardage has declined in each of the last three years. However, he is seeing over 90 percent of the offensive snaps for the Panthers and is the first person Young looks for when the rookie QB steps back to pass.
Carolina plays the Detroit Lions defense this week, so Young will be in for a long day with pass rusher Aidan Hutchinson chasing him around. Young will look Thielen’s way early and often to avoid being on his back all game.
Who Should You Start?
There are two different paths to choose from here. Davis offers a higher upside based on his big play ability and the Bills’ QB play, but his floor is absolutely zero. Thielen provides a safer floor because of his targets and snap count percentage but not as high upside.
Thielen’s big game with Dalton throwing him the ball was unique and isn’t likely to repeat with Young.
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A more realistic outlook can be drawn from the last two weeks with Young at QB — Week 2 and Week 4 — where Thielen was targeted seven times each game and finished with serviceable yardage marks of 54 and 76.
I lean more toward starting Davis, primarily because of the potential for a bigger game and better QB play, despite his not being the top target in the offense. Buffalo has an implied team total of 27 points against Jacksonville, and Davis is a big enough piece in that offense to be a significant contributor to that total.