7 Fantasy Football Sleepers for Week 9

Sleeper is an ambiguous term. I'm defining anyone on less than half of Yahoo! rosters as a sleeper in the interest of providing clarity. Typically, I'll aim to feature players on fewer than 40 percent of rosters. However, this provides me some wiggle room.

Don't worry, deep-league gamers, this piece is intended to help folks in leagues of all sizes. With that in mind, I'm following my predecessor's lead, including honorable mentions. If the featured players are already rostered in your league, the honorable mentions should provide you with players to consider filling in for an injured starter or player on bye on your roster -- or for whatever other reason you're diving into the free-agent pool for a sleeper.

While it should go without saying, the featured players at each position are my favorite sleepers for the given week. The honorable mentions are listed in descending order of the percentage of rosters they're on.

Quarterbacks

Tua Tagovailoa (36%) - Tagovailoa has started three games in a row since his return from injury. According to Sharp Football Stats, when the offensive scoring margin was between trailing by seven points and leading by seven points in Week 6 through Week 8, the Miami Dolphins passed at the eighth-highest rate (63 percent versus the 59 percent league average).

The above-average passing rate is a boon for Tagovailoa's fantasy value. Last week, he was rough around the edges in a challenging matchup against the Buffalo Bills. Still, I'll give Tagovailoa a pass since the Bills rank as the best pass defense in our power rankings. When he faced the second-worst (Jacksonville Jaguars) and sixth-worst (Atlanta Falcons) pass defenses in Week 6 and Week 7, he piled up 620 passing yards, 6 touchdown passes, 3 interceptions, and 51 rushing yards.

This week, he combats with the seventh-worst pass defense sported by the Houston Texans. So, this is a rebound spot for Tagovailoa, and he projects accordingly. Our projections peg him as QB10 in Week 9, making him an excellent streamer.

Honorable Mentions: Tyrod Taylor (6%) and Taysom Hill (3%)

Running Backs

Jeremy McNichols (10%) - As you've undoubtedly heard by now, Derrick Henry required foot surgery, potentially ending his season. The Tennessee Titans have since signed a veteran two-down banger who I'll discuss shortly. However, McNichols has served as the team's backup and pass-catching back to this point.

According to Pro Football Focus, McNichols has run 101 routes, netting a target on a stellar 23.8 percent of his routes. He's parlayed his route-running usage into 2.6 receptions and 25.4 receiving yards per game and a touchdown reception, per Pro Football Reference.

Unfortunately, he has rushed the ball only 7 times for 38 yards. Nevertheless, his passing-game usage is more appealing than toting the rock on early downs. Further, he might soak up some of the early-down work as part of a committee.

The journeyman fifth-year pro has only 89 touches on offense to his credit in his pro career. However, I'm intrigued by his athletic profile which you can see on Player Profiler. McNichols' workout metrics and size provide me some optimism about his ability to snag some carries in addition to his receiving workload. Finally, our projections tab him as RB33 using FanDuel's half-PPR format, making him an adequate dice role for RB-needy gamers in Week 9.

Adrian Peterson (6%) - Peterson's the back I teased in McNichols' write-up. In the linked piece to Henry's injury prognosis, ESPN's Adam Schefter relayed from his sources that Peterson was signed to Tennessee's practice squad with the intention to promote him.

Obviously, there's a risk Peterson's promotion to the active roster won't happen this week if it takes him time to get up to speed with the playbook. Still, I prioritize adding him with the potential to pivot to one of the honorable mentions later in the week and things trend toward Peterson missing this game.

Simply, Peterson offers more long-term potential than the honorable mentions. Peterson has never offered much in the receiving game, so he'll likely be used chiefly to tote the rock rather than reel it in through the passing attack.

Thankfully, he'll run behind a roughly average or better offensive line, depending on your source. Football Outsiders ranks the Titans just 18th in adjusted line yards. However, Pro Football Focus grades the Titans as the sixth-best run blocking team.

If he suits up this week, Peterson will be greeted by a middling run defense. The Los Angeles Rams rank as the 13th-worst run defense in our power rankings. Our projections are optimistic, pegging him as RB20 this week.

While I'm more bearish on his Week 9 outlook, Peterson offers a desirable blend of fill-in utility this week and potential long-term helper, too.

Honorable Mentions: Mark Ingram (37%), Boston Scott (20%), Carlos Hyde (7%), JaMycal Hasty (2%), Derrick Gore (2%), and Rex Burkhead (0%)

Wide Receivers

Hunter Renfrow (42%) - We have two data points with Rich Bisaccia as the head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders, and they're relatively promising for Renfrow. In Week 6 and Week 7, Renfrow ranked third on the Raiders in routes (49) and receiving yards (94) and first in targets (11) and receptions (10).

In addition, the Raiders deployed a pass-happy offense in those games, passing at the seventh-highest rate (66 percent) with the offensive scoring margin ranging from trailing by seven points to leading by seven points.

Renfrow's enjoying a rock-solid season on the whole, too. He's caught five or more passes in six of seven games, reaching at least 45 receiving yards in six games. Unfortunately, his season-lows for targets (5), receptions (3), and receiving yards (36) did come in one of the two games with Bisaccia as the head coach. So, that's less than ideal.

Nonetheless, we project him as WR41 this week. Thus, he's in the WR3/flex mix.

DeVante Parker (36%) - Parker is my favorite sleeper at any position this week. First, he'll benefit from the same pass-happy situation I detailed in Tua's write-up above.

Second, he's been on the same page as his second-year quarterback in the two full contests the duo has played together. In Week 1, Parker secured 4 of 7 targets for 81 yards. Last week, he snared 8 of 11 targets for 85 yards. In those two games, Parker accounts for a robust 27.3 percent target share, leading the Dolphins in receptions, receiving yards, and air yards (181).

The matchup is good for Parker this week. According to Pro Football Reference, the Texans are permitting 14.44 yards per reception to receivers. Predictably, the Texans struggle with explosive passes. According to Sharp Football Stats, they've yielded the fifth-highest average explosive pass rate (12 percent) this year.

Parker is on too few rosters. Additionally, our projections love him, ranking him as WR19 this week. So, go get him if he's available in your league.

Van Jefferson (13%) - Jefferson is jostling for third in the passing-game hierarchy with Tyler Higbee behind Cooper Kupp and Robert Woods. Thankfully, Matthew Stafford is leading a high-scoring offense capable of supporting ancillary options like Jefferson. To those points, the Los Angeles Rams rank fifth in scoring offense (30.6 points per game) and fourth in passing yards per game (301.8).

Meanwhile, Jefferson is fourth on the team in routes (234) and receptions per game (3.0), and he's third in targets (39) and receiving yards per game (49.0). The second-year receiver shines in one efficiency metric, as he's tied for 23rd out of 152 qualified pass-catchers with 10.1 yards per target. In addition, he ranks a solid-if-unspectacular 45th out of 73 receivers with at least 20 targets with 1.68 yards per route run, per Pro Football Focus.

Jefferson is attached to the second-highest implied total (30.50 points) this week, according to our heat map. He also has a good matchup this week. According to Pro Football Reference, the Titans have allowed the most targets (206), receptions (132), and receiving yards (1,728) to wideouts, tying for the second-most touchdown receptions (12) coughed up to them to boot.

We project Jefferson in the WR3 range this week as WR35, and he's my second-favorite sleeper receiver for Week 9.

Honorable Mentions: Rashod Bateman (31%), Deonte Harris (8%), Jamal Agnew (2%), Gabriel Davis (2%), and Nico Collins (1%)

Tight Ends

Dan Arnold (5%) - Arnold culminates the sleepers for this week. He's my favorite tight end who I highlighted in the 3 Fantasy Football Tight End Streaming Options for Week 9 I penned already this week.

Still, I've added one fresh face to this section, highlighting Jordan Akins for readers who are in extremely deep leagues and scraping the bottom of the barrel. Akins ranks fourth on the Texans in routes (40) and targets (7), third in receiving yards (66), and second in receptions (7) in their previous two games, and the offense projects to get a lift at quarterback with Tyrod Taylor seemingly trending toward a return.

However, Arnold, Tyler Conklin, and Pat Freiermuth are in a tier of fringe starters at tight end that's well ahead of Akins in the sleeper pecking order. And I rank my favorite sleepers at the position in that precise order.

Our projections rank Arnold as TE12 this week.

Honorable Mentions: Tyler Conklin (25%), Pat Freiermuth (11%), and Jordan Akins (0%)

Joshua Shepardson is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Joshua Shepardson also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username bchad50. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.