Fantasy Football: 3 Things We Learned From Week 15

Fire up Deandre Hopkins if Brock Osweiler Stays Benched

A few names come to mind when pondering the biggest fantasy football bust of 2016, and DeAndre Hopkins is certainly on that list. Hopkins had a prolific 2015 season -- his 143.89 Reception NEP ranked 4th among all receivers and his 95.5% Reception Success Rate ranked highest among all receivers with at least 100 targets.

Also, he produced mega-numbers with a combination of Brian Hoyer, Brandon Weeden, and T.J. Yates tossing him the rock. With that in mind fantasy drafters could have been forgiven for thinking Hopkins was quarterback-proof.

Unfortunately, he's not and a few factors have contributed to Hopkins' decline. First, the Houston Texans are a run-first team, and the addition of Lamar Miller doubled down on that strategy. Second, the addition of rookie Will Fuller and the emergence of C.J. Fiedorowicz have siphoned targets away from him. Last season, Hopkins held down a super-healthy 31.2% target share in the Texans' offense. This season it's down to 25.7%.

The most obvious contributing factor has been the extremely poor play of Brock Osweiler, who ranks dead last in the league with a -15.62 Passing NEP. Hopkins' fantasy football fortunes may have taken a turn for the better in Week 15, though, when Osweiler was finally benched for Tom Savage.

Savage didn't light the world on fire, but he put up a respectable 0.21 Passing NEP per pass upon entering the game mid-way through the second quarter.

Moreover, Savage managed to lead the Texans to a comeback victory against the lowly Jacksonville Jaguars, a narrative that will surely merit heavy consideration for Texans' coach Bill O’Brien when deciding who he'll start next week.

The reason that matters is because, if Savage starts, he's going to try and get Hopkins the ball, as evidenced by the 15 targets he directed his way in two-and-a-half quarters of play.

While Hopkins' 8 catches for 87 yards on 17 total targets wasn't the model of efficiency, that volume is impossible to ignore. If Savage is named the starter for Week 16, you can finally breathe easy when inserting Hopkins into your lineup.