Fantasy Football Recap Week 3: 23 Things You Need To Know

Week 3 of the 2024 NFL season might be remembered as the week of the backup quarterback for fantasy football. With four regular starters out, Marcus Mariota, Carson Wentz, Tyrod Taylor, and Jake Browning all drew starts in place of their team’s QB1. If you rolled with Mariota, Wentz, or Taylor, you got at least 15 fantasy points from your quarterback. If you went with Browning, well, I’m sorry. Things might get better soon.

There were also some backups that people were hoping would get into games based on the play of some quarterbacks like Joe Flacco, Russell Wilson, and Michael Penix Jr. It's been a rough start to the year for many quarterbacks, but things will improve in the weeks ahead. Before we get into the delicious Week 3 dessert of Monday Night Football featuring the Detroit Lions and Baltimore Ravens, let’s take a look at the good, the bad, and the injured from a wild Week 3 in the NFL.

Stud Players

Which players put up the best performances in Week 3?

Caleb Williams put on a Ben Johnson clinic against the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday. He threw for 298 passing yards and four passing touchdowns. He got all of his receivers and running backs involved in the game plan, including rookie Luther Burden, who burst out of his cold start to the season with 101 receiving yards and a touchdown. As good as Williams was in this game, the lesson from it was clear. Start any and all offensive players you have against the Dallas Cowboys. They have allowed 748 passing yards and seven touchdowns just in the last two weeks.

Jalen Hurts showed that the Philadelphia Eagles still can throw the ball when necessary. He finished Week 3 with 229 passing yards, three passing touchdowns, and his contractually obligated one-yard rushing score. If not for a fumble lost in this game against the LA Rams, he would have been the top overall scorer at the position on Sunday.

How dominant has Jonathan Taylor been this season? For starters, he has more than 50 more rushing yards than any other running back in football. On Sunday, he rushed for 103 yards, caught 16 yards, and had three rushing touchdowns. We always knew Taylor was a top-three pure runner in football, but now he has eight catches for 93 yards this season. For perspective, he had 18 catches for 136 yards all of 2024. If he has added a significant pass-catching role to his repertoire, this could be an overall RB1 season incoming.

Omarion Hampton took over after Najee Harris left with an injury (more on that below) and had his breakout game in the NFL. He rushed 19 times for 70 yards and caught six of seven targets for 59 yards, adding a rushing touchdown as well. He is in line for a big workload now, and if he can do this against a stout Denver defense, he should continue to rise in top 12 running back territory soon.

The Denver Broncos got Courtland Sutton involved early and often against the LA Chargers on Sunday. He finished the game with six catches for 118 yards and a score, which was a beautiful 52-yard touchdown throw on fourth down. He also narrowly missed a 60-yard touchdown from Bo Nix that would have given him an all-time performance.

I didn’t hear anything about A.J. Brown being the squeaky wheel this week, but he certainly got the grease with 10 targets, six receptions, 109 yards, and a touchdown in Philadelphia’s come-from-behind win. I do fear, however, that Brown is going to be boom or bust this year because the Eagles are going to need teams pushing them offensively to convert away from an overwhelming rushing attack.

Hunter Henry broke out in a big way in Week 3, leading all tight ends with 25 fantasy points, including eight receptions for 90 yards and two receiving touchdowns. Games like this one are unlikely to happen again, but this camaraderie between Henry and Drake May goes back to the second half of last season, and Henry should be a usable tight end on fantasy football rosters.

Jake Ferguson may not have had the touchdowns that Hunter Henry did, but he did lead all tight ends with 14 targets and 13 receptions. He also finished with 82 receiving yards, but couldn’t find the end zone as the Dallas Cowboys struggled in the red zone on Sunday.

Dud Players

Which players disappointed fantasy managers the most in Week 3?

While the offense might be a joke, we have to start taking this Cleveland Browns defense seriously because they shut down Jordan Love on Sunday. Love, even with Tucker Kraft healthy and playing, finished with 183 passing yards, one touchdown, one interception, and fewer fantasy points than Spencer Rattler and Cam Ward. As a result, not one Packers’ offensive player finished with more than 9.9 fantasy points in half-PPR formats.

Saquon Barkley is often on the wrong end of games where the Eagles are forced to go pass-heavy to stay in a game that’s a shootout. That, plus the Eagles digging themselves a big hole in Week 3, means Barley only had 55 combined, scoreless yards despite touching the ball 22 times. The LA Rams’ front seven were ferocious and had a game plan to bottle up Barkley. And it worked.

Marvin Harrison Jr. now has two consecutive weeks of dud games under his belt. This one, however, hurts worse and is potentially a problem for the future. Harrison caught three passes for 44 yards, but he had two egregious drops on balls that could have been touchdown passes. It’s hard to determine whether Harrison or Kyler Murray is more at fault for them being out of sync overall, but today is squarely on Harrison’s shoulders.

Travis Hunter deserves a mention here because things are not looking good for the second-overall pick and dual-threat rookie. Hunter has played more defensive snaps and fewer offensive snaps each of the last three weeks and finished Sunday with one catch for 21 yards. This is the kind of thing we should have known would happen, because any injuries in the secondary (as the Jaguars have) would force Hunter to play there more. And he hasn’t done anything to separate from the pack at wide receiver yet.

Tucker Kraft was brought down by the combination of a terrible Jordan Love performance and a knee injury he suffered in practice on Thursday. As a result, Kraft caught just three passes for 29 yards and was outscored by backup tight end John FitzPatrick.

Thud Players

Which players can we shove off our fantasy rosters after Week 3?

Michael Penix Jr. couldn’t lead the Atlanta Falcons to a single point against a historically bad Carolina Panthers defense. He now has two straight games with fewer than 175 passing yards and no touchdowns. Penix has just one passing score this entire season, and Week 3 was especially bad because of his two interceptions. Next up are the Washington Commanders, and I would have no problem moving on to another quarterback to fill out your roster.

Rhamondre Stevenson fumbled the ball twice on Sunday against the Pittsburgh Steelers and only managed 18 rushing yards. He has always struggled with fumbling issues, but TreVeyeon Henderson came in after these lost fumbles and looked good. Add in another fumble by Antonio Gibson, and this could be a phase out of the other running backs beginning to happen. After more than 18 fantasy points in Week 2, Stevenson finished with -0.90 in Week 3.

Marvin Mims Jr. is back to playing very irregular, part-time snaps. For comparison, he played on half the number of snaps that Courtland Sutton and Troy Franklin did on Sunday and ran just two-thirds of the routes. As a result, he finished with just one catch for four yards after just five catches combined in Weeks 1-2. Mims is safe to drop from your rosters.

Pat Freiermuth is now completely phased out of this offense, while Aaron Rodgers prefers to target Jaylen Warren, D.K. Metcalf, and Jonnu Smith. Freiermuth has just 10 targets in three games and caught one ball for six yards in Week 3. Five different Steelers on offense played more snaps than Freiermuth on Sunday.

Bad Blood Players

Which players’ injuries are worth monitoring after Week 3?

CeeDee Lamb left Sunday’s game against the Chicago Bears two different times with an ankle injury. He was eventually ruled out before scoring any fantasy points, and now the question turns to whether he will play in Week 4 in the massively hyped showdown with the Green Bay Packers. Lamb said Sunday afternoon that he “absolutely” would be able to play in that game, but we will have to wait and see how he responds and what the diagnosis is early in the week.

James Conner suffered what appears to be a season-ending ankle injury during a short run in the second half of the Arizona Cardinals’ game against the San Francisco 49ers. Adam Schefter confirmed the diagnosis on Sunday night, and it appears surgery is in his future. Trey Benson will take over for Conner and become a very attractive RB2 option moving forward, especially considering the workload he is about to assume.

Similarly, Najee Harris appears to have suffered a torn Achilles on Sunday and, if confirmed, will miss the rest of the 2025 season. There will surely be questions about whether or not the Chargers rushed him back after his July 4th eve injury, but for now, the takeaway is that Omarion Hampton is about to become a workhorse running back.

Terry McLaurin caught three passes for 74 yards on Sunday, and his last one was a 56-yard catch where he was tackled just shy of the end zone. After that catch, McLaurin exited with a quadriceps injury. He didn’t appear to be too hurt in the game, so hopefully this is a situation where he was held out because of the score of the game, and it is not a long-term issue, especially with Jayden Daniels hopefully coming back soon.

Mike Evans is the latest Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver to go down with an injury. After catching a touchdown earlier in the game, Evans was forced to leave the game with a hamstring injury and did not look happy AT ALL when the team took him into the locker room in the fourth quarter of a close game with the New York Jets. With the Buccaneers already missing Chris Godwin and Jalen McMillan, this would become the Emeka Egbuka show if Evans had to miss time.

Tyrone Tracy departed Sunday Night Football with a shoulder injury and did not return. That paved the way for rookie Cam Skattebo to be the one bright spot in the game for the New York Giants, as he led them in rush attempts, rushing yards, targets, receptions, and receiving yards. Tracy was already conceding work to Skattebo, and if this injury lingers for him, his time as the starter might be over.