Jacksonville Jaguars WR Gabe Davis finally broke through last week — all it took was a trip to London to get the highly volatile receiver on track. After the two touchdown performance against the Chicago Bears, however, a knee injury cropped up and has resulted in limited practice participation to open the week.
Can you count on Davis to play this week, and if so, should he be penciled into Week 7 fantasy football lineups?
The Latest on Gabe Davis’ Injury
Davis has been a reasonably healthy receiver since being drafted. And after participating in a limited fashion during the first two practices of the week, Davis was upgraded to a full participant on Friday and carries no injury designation entering Week 7.
#Jaguars status report vs. Patriots lists Travis Etienne (hamstring) and Tyson Campbell (hamstring) as questionable.
No other players listed. pic.twitter.com/1c3POFHecX
— Demetrius Harvey (@Demetrius82) October 18, 2024
During his career with the Buffalo Bills, Davis missed just three games and appeared in every game last season. He played 71.7% of the offensive snaps a week ago and sits at 82.2% on the year. The production has been spotty, but Davis’ role appears to be safe.
Is that enough to land him in the Flex conversation, though?
Fantasy Outlook for Jacksonville’s Passing Game
A pair of drops last week prevented a truly slate-breaking performance from Davis, though his 5-45-2 stat line was enough to land him as the seventh-most productive receiver.
There were some positive beneath-the-surface numbers to back the big day, as it was Davis’ first game this season posting an on-field target share over 20%, and it was the fourth time in five games he saw at least a handful of targets.
Trevor steps up in the pocket and finds Gabe Davis in the end zone 🔥
📺: #JAXvsCHI on NFL Network
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus pic.twitter.com/LogTwgV3FG— NFL (@NFL) October 13, 2024
In terms of stability, Davis’ career-low 13.4 average depth of target is a positive sign. It’s still plenty deep but not as reckless as his role was during his time in Buffalo.
The Patriots own the fifth-highest opponent average depth of throw this season, which provides a path to high-upside looks for Davis.
Be careful.
Very careful.
Davis’ top-10 finish last week came on the heels of three straight weeks outside of the top 45 receivers. You don’t have to look back too far for evidence that his production one week doesn’t impact the next — he had four top 10s last season and nine outside of the top 45.
Davis saw the Patriots twice a year during his time in the AFC East, and in seven career contests against New England, he has exactly zero games of 40+ receiving yards. There might be a few more strong Davis performances this season, but I’m not counting on it in this spot at less than full strength.
Even with Davis active, Brian Thomas Jr. and Christian Kirk are both safely inside of my top 35 wide receivers and are worthy of being considered for starting lineups in Week 7. We saw Evan Engram vacuum in 10 targets in his return to action last week, and that sort of potential is beyond rare at the tight end position.
Relative to position, Engram (my TE3 this week) is my favorite Jaguars player against the Patriots, followed by Thomas and Kirk.
Davis isn’t be ranked inside of my top 50 at the position. And while I’m optimistic that Trevor Lawrence will be better moving forward than he has been through six weeks, he doesn’t deserve to be on radars in one-QB leagues.
