Fantasy Football Week 9: Weekly Fantasy Trends Report

Welcome to Week 9 of the NFL and fantasy football season—or as I like to call it, bye-pocalypse 2.0.

Yup, it's another week with six teams on bye: the Arizona Cardinals, Chicago Bears, Cincinnati Bengals, Houston Texans, New England Patriots and Washington Redskins.

This may actually be worse than Week 8; there are, like, no good tight ends this week!

As we do every week, we'll go over some of the most trendy transactions in fantasy football—examining Yahoo leagues in particular—and make sense of them.

There are actually a couple of adds in particular that I'm not too fond of, but rest assured that those waiver-wire adds will likely pay off since I'm bound to be wrong on all things I pound the desk for.

Well, anyway, here are the trends of the week. Good luck in Week 9.

Chiefs RB Charcandrick West Lead Add

Michael Conroy/Associated Press

Definite, 100 percent, no-brainer here.

In Yahoo leagues, Kansas City Chiefs running back Charcandrick West is the lead add as we approach Week 9.

With fellow running back Jamaal Charles placed on injured reserve and Spencer Ware dealing with a concussion, West has a chance to be the starting running back this week at home against the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Again, no-brainer.

The good news is there are still plenty of smart people in the world.

Falcons: Top D/ST Add

Stephen Brashear/Associated Press

This was actually somewhat surprising: The Atlanta Falcons are the top defensive add this week.

In Week 9, the Falcons will be playing on a short week and on the road against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

A few things are confusing here.

One, the Falcons defense is, well, not good and gives up the second-most fantasy points to opposing quarterbacks, the ninth-most fantasy points to opposing running backs and the sixth-most fantasy points to tight ends.

Second, they are owned more in Yahoo leagues (33 percent) than the Dallas Cowboys defense (30 percent) that will take on the Cleveland Browns this week.

Yeah, the Browns are actually a decent offense with quarterback Josh McCown at the helm, but the Falcons on a short week against Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston and wide receiver Mike Evans sounds incredibly risky.

Go with Dallas here.

49ers QB Colin Kaepernick Owned in Less Than 10 Percent of Leagues

Marcio Jose Sanchez/Associated Press

Don't look now, but San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick is the QB12 in his two starts this season.

Couple that with his juicy matchup at home in Week 9 hosting the New Orleans Saints, and we've got ourselves quite the nice streaming option here.

Yeah, guys like Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott or Tennessee Titans quarterback Marcus Mariota might be a bit safer, but at just over 10 percent owned, I'll take my chances with Kap.

The Saints are terrible, giving up an average of nearly 300 yards per game through the air. While that is already enticing, if you factor in Kaepernick's rushing ability (averaging 75 rushing yards per game in his two starts), he has quite a decent floor.

Now, I know—it's Kaepernick. He's not exactly the best quarterback in the league, but as we've all learned in fantasy football, it's not a matter of if you're a good football player, but rather the opportunity you get.

In a week with guys like Redskins quarterback Kirk Cousins, Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton and Patriots quarterback Tom Brady on a bye, Kaepernick is a plus streaming option.

Chiefs WR Tyreek Hill Worth a Spot Start

Michael Conroy/Associated Press

That awkward moment when you write this entire slide assuming Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith will play, but then he gets ruled out, thus changing the whole dynamic of your slide...Yeah. That happened to me.

Anyway, yeah—Chiefs wide receiver Tyreek Hill is now worth a spot start in Week 9 if you can get him, and he's only owned in 8 percent of Yahoo leagues.

This season, Hill has been targeted on balls traveling 20 yards or deeper five times, catching three of them. Two of those five targets, as well as two of those three catches, came when backup quarterback Nick Foles entered the game for the injured Smith in Week 8.

Oh yeah—according to Terez Paylor of the Kansas City Star, the Chiefs plan to start Foles in Week 9 against the Jaguars.

While Hill has played in just 30 percent of the team's snaps over the past three games, he makes for a decent bye-week fill-in given the caliber of receivers that are not available this week, coupled with Foles likely targeting him deep a time or two.

It's a boom-or-bust play, but it's a risk worth taking.

Saints RB Tim Hightower Sees Huge Increase in Ownership

Butch Dill/Associated Press

We all check out Rotoworld. I mean, who wouldn't? It's absolutely phenomenal for fantasy sports.

On Rotoworld, you'll find plenty of news blurbs that can radically change the course of a fantasy week. One of those blurbs seems to have made a shakeup to the waiver wire this week.

According to Mike Triplett of ESPN.com, Saints head coach Sean Payton stated that running back Tim Hightower will "definitely" get more carries in Week 9 against the San Francisco 49ers.

While that may be well and true, I'm not starting Hightower this week, and he's been added by more than 300,000 teams.

Since returning to the league in 2015, Hightower has carried the ball more than 15 times in a game on four occasions. In those games he's performed well, averaging nearly 94 yards and a touchdown.

However, when it comes to games with 15 carries or less? Not so good. In fact, Hightower has eight games with under 15 carries (12 games total since 2012), has reached 50 yards rushing just one time and has never scored.

So, yeah, while he may get "more" carries, fellow running back Mark Ingram is still going to play, making it hard for Hightower to amass enough carries to prove valuable in Week 9, minus Ingram being benched again.

Falcons TE Austin Hooper Great Streaming Option

David Richard/Associated Press

There are six notable tight ends on bye this week: Cincinnati's Tyler Eifert, Chicago's Zach Miller, Houston's C.J. Fiedorowicz, Washington's Jordan Reed and New England's Rob Gronkowski and Martellus Bennett.

Because of this, you probably need a tight end in Week 9.

And if you do, go get Atlanta Falcons tight end Austin Hooper.

According to Vaughn McClure of ESPN.com, fellow tight end Jacob Tamme has been ruled out for Week 9 on Thursday Night Football.

With Tamme out, Hooper will get his first NFL start, and he's in a good spot to perform well considering the Falcons-Buccaneers contest could turn into a shootout.

Owned in a measly 8 percent of Yahoo leagues, give Hooper a shot this week.

It's Time to Trade Texans WR DeAndre Hopkins

Eric Christian Smith/Associated Press

Coming into 2016, we were all excited about Houston Texans wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins finally having what we thought was a serviceable quarterback in Brock Osweiler.

Man, were we wrong.

Hopkins is a beast, no doubt. Unfortunately for him, his quarterback is arguably the worst in the league and it's hindering his production.

While Hopkins is eighth in the league in targets, he's just the WR24 in points-per-reception leagues and the WR30 in standard leagues. To put that in perspective, Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown has the exact same number of targets and is the WR8 in PPR leagues having played just seven games through eight weeks.

We all assumed that Osweiler would be able to get Hopkins the ball down the field.

Wrong again—Hopkins has caught just two of 11 targets on passes of 20 or more yards, with three being deemed catchable.

Deal Hopkins now before it's too late (second-most traded player in Yahoo leagues this week). It sucks because he's so great, but it's not getting better anytime soon. If Osweiler couldn't make it happen against the Darius Slay-less Detroit Lions, he can't do it against anyone.

Statistics courtesy of Pro Football Focus and ESPN.com.

Follow me on Twitter @RichardJanvrin.