Welcome to Week 6!

I can’t believe we’re almost 1/3 of the way through the regular season. Fantasy football can be a cruel game, and I’ve seen plenty of disappointing rosters shared on X. Injuries and general letdowns (have we lost all hope with Colston Loveland?) can derail what you thought was a good draft, which is why it’s important to keep living on the waiver wire, especially later in the week when Friday/Saturday injury reports come out. But if you’ve managed to get here unscathed, keep up the good work and march on!

Week 5 delivered some fun fantasy performances across the board: both New England and Detroit put up 45 points, featuring the #1 QB on the week (Drake Maye) and #1 RB on the week (Jahmyr Gibbs). We had a thriller of an OT game on Sunday Night Football, and we witnessed perhaps the most perplexing ending to a game we’ll see all season, and maybe for multiple seasons to come: Jayden Daniels and the Commanders bled out the clock in scoring range in OT, mistakenly forgoing the chance at a game-winning field goal. That game fittingly ended in a tie with both teams making critical errors down the stretch (Cam Skattebo coughed the ball up in field goal range in OT).

Week 6 is the first bye week where 4 teams take a breather, meaning streaming options become that much more important. The game of the week might be on Thursday Night when Seattle visits Denver, but if we’re talking fantasy, Dallas and Green Bay on Sunday Night Football features a clash of lackluster defenses and plenty of expected points for the elite wide receivers on both sides of the ball. I’m also incredibly interested to see how the Panthers / Eagles game shakes out — that game is in Philly with the Panthers at just +1 on the spread at the time of writing this. Imagine telling yourself that pre-season.

As always, if you need any trade advice or bespoke start/sit decisions, my full weekly rankings, rest-of-season rankings, and trade calculator are available on grankfantasyfootball.com.

P.S. — the below rankings in my newsletter are half-PPR by default. The website will always have my full PPR and standard scoring rankings as well.

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Week 6 Rankings

QB:

Favorite Plays: Unless you’re rostering the elite-of-the-elite, streaming QBs are all about matchups, and Jordan Love has one of the best possible, playing Dallas at home (the Cowboys just allowed Jalon Daniels to look like a great NFL QB). On the other side of the football, Dak Prescott should be forgiven for the Thursday Night Football debacle and slotted right back into lineups. I’m also playing Matthew Stafford with confidence, as even a mediocre offense facing the Cardinals is all but guaranteed to find the endzone a few times, and the Rams are better than mediocre on both sides of the ball.

Leave on the Bench: He might be your best option, but Patrick Mahomes is only rushing for 10 yards per contest on the season, and the game against the Chargers at home could get out of hand quickly, leading to a ton of Kenneth Walker. He’s not the worst option in the world but checks in at QB13 for me. I don’t know that I love playing Bryce Young on the road against Philadelphia either — the lack of rushing upside means you need a very strong game through the air, and I have a lingering feeling Philly gets right here.

Sleepers: Kirck Cousins against the defense allowing the 4th most fantasy points to opposing QBs (Buffalo) is certainly in play this week, as I think the Raiders have a chance to keep it relatively close against the Bills. I mentioned the Philly / Carolina game — don’t hate me for it, but I might consider starting Jaylen Hurts. There’s a chance he gets DeVonta Smith back, and having Dallas Goedert back as a reliable receiving threat should continue to provide Hurts with a safety valve.

RB:

Favorite Plays: I don’t have to state the obvious names. Rhamondre Stevenson and Jaylen Warren crack my top 12 this week though, and for the former, it’s having the backfield to himself, and for the latter, it’s the incredible rushing and receiving efficiency, even with Rico Dowdle likely to make his return. I’m also willing to forgive Cam Skattebo for last week’s dud + end-of-game fumble, because New Orleans is giving up the most points to fantasy running backs in 2026 by a pretty good margin.

Leave on the Bench: Anyone in the Denver backfield should probably sit this one out unless you’re particularly needy at the flex spot. Omarion Hampton is riding the bench for me just about every week now until he shows something, but a game against the Chiefs in Arrowhead is even more reason to look in a different direction.

Sleepers: Blake Corum could be a decent deep play against Arizona — he only played 27% of snaps against Buffalo but found the endzone and saw 4 targets. He tends to get more work when the Rams have a significant lead, and I expect that to be the case. Also, if you’re pretty desperate for a start, MarShawn Lloyd could still be sitting on waivers, and even though the efficiency hasn’t been there, the goal-line utilization (2 touchdowns against Chicago) and matchup against Dallas in week 6 put him in play.

WR:

Favorite Plays: Christian Watson against Dallas may be my favorite play this week after watching him explode for 143 yards and 2 scores against the Bears’ secondary. It goes without saying that he’s in your lineup this week. Same with Parker Washington who found the endzone twice against Philadelphia and has a Houston defense that’s surprisingly giving up the 3rd most fantasy points to WRs this year. DeVaughn Vele can be a hit-or-miss option at WR, but he’s in my lineups this week, as New York allowed the Commanders to go for nearly 400 total yards last weekend. There’s also a chance A.J. Brown (who practiced in a limited capacity Wednesday) returns to action on Sunday.

Leave on the Bench: I wouldn’t want to play anyone on the Chargers to begin with, but against the Chiefs, it’s an even scarier proposition. You can leave Ladd McConkey out of your lineup, even if he’s set to make a return. I feel similarly about Emeka Egbuka who, despite finding the endzone and posting 14 fantasy points against Dallas, faces Pittsburgh this week and still has backup QB Jalon Daniels running the show. No one on the Broncos is a confident start right now, and I would love to leave Jaylen Waddle on the bench — that said, I understand the start if you don’t have better options.

Sleepers: Denzel Boston is hardly a sleeper at this point, but in a game where the Browns are likely to be trailing and needing to air it out, he should be a confident WR2/flex start (Boston has 4/5 games with double-digit half-PPR performances this year). Tre Tucker against the aforementioned Buffalo defense shouldn’t be forgotten about either. Tucker has had at least 4 targets in every game this year and only one outing with fewer than 4 catches, so he feels like a safe floor play with some upside given the matchup.

TE:

Favorite Plays: There’s no reason to keep George Kittle out of your lineup this week, especially with Deebo Samuel slated to miss time. He could be in line for 7+ targets a game with the 49ers thin on receiving options (what’s new). Isaiah Likely is leading Tight Ends not named Brock Bowers in target share this year and is an every-week start until further notice. Tucker Kraft should be an automatic start this week as well.

Leave on the Bench: Even with Caleb Williams potentially returning this week, I need one good game out of Colston Loveland before he instills any level of trust from me. I’m starting to feel shaky about Dalton Kincaid who is still my TE11 this week, but if you were able to snag Brenton Strange or Pat Freiermuth off the waiver wire, I wouldn’t blame you for making that pivot.

Sleepers: I mentioned Brenton Strange and Pat Freiermuth and think they’re both in play this week. In particular, I like Freiermuth’s opportunity with both Michael Pittman Jr. and Roman Wilson slated to miss time, as the Pittsburgh target distribution was the only thing holding Freiermuth back from emerging as a weekly play. If you need to dig pretty deep this week, Michael Mayer has been inconsistent but gets a leaky Buffalo defense.

G-RANK Game of the Week for Fantasy

I hinted at it in the intro, and it has to be the pick this week: the Green Bay Packers at the Dallas Cowboys has a chance to be an elite game for fantasy football. Let me give you a sense of what we’re looking at. Dallas is allowing the 4th most fantasy points to the QB position this year, Green Bay is allowing the 2nd most fantasy points to the RB position (Dallas 7th), and Dallas is allowing the 8th most fantasy points to the WR position. So basically, start your skill position players in this one. The 52.5-point O/U indicates Vegas feels similarly about this game, and while they looked terrible at home against Tampa Bay last week, I actually think the Cowboys get it done on the road.

G-RANK Weekly Sleeper Pick

As a guy who posted borderline WR2/3 numbers, we’re going to narrowly take the win with the Malik Washington pick, as he probably did his job for you as a spot start if you were in dire need. Moving on to week 6, we’re going with Germie Bernard on the Pittsburgh Steelers. He was the hot waiver wire pickup of the week, and if you combine the target volume when on the field for >75% of snaps (8 and 9 targets) with the way the Steelers have been moving the football through the air, he feels like a good bet to put a flex-worthy performance against Tampa Bay. If you picked him up, I think he’s worth starting this week, especially if your normal options are on bye.

Thanks for reading this week! G-RANK has you covered for full top 200 rankings (half-PPR, full-PPR, standard) for this week and the rest-of-season. Be sure to also leverage the start / sit tool, trade calculator, and more for decisions specific to your league!