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Fantasy Football Stock Report: Javonte Williams stays hot, Kenneth Walker III rebounds and rookie RBs play seesaw in Week 2

With all but two Week 2 games in the books (MNF doubleheader), we've learned a little bit more than we knew last week. Or, in some cases, thought we knew. Players impressed, players disappointed, players unfortunately got hurt and there is fantasy football fallout to unpack.

With that in mind, I've compiled the full weekly fantasy football stock report below. These are the most notable risers and fallers heading into Week 3. And in a high-scoring week with a lot of lessons starting to solidify, this week is heavy on quantity.

📈 Stock Up at RB

Jacory Croskey-Merritt, Commanders

With just four carries for 17 yards on Thursday Night Football, this would be a baffling "Stock Up" for Jacory "Bill" Croskey-Merritt, if not for Austin Ekeler's season-ending Achilles injury. While Washington will likely activate Chris Rodriguez Jr., involve Jeremy McNichols in the passing game and maybe even trade for a running back, there's no denying JCM will have the first crack at starter duties in this offense. Given how good he's looked on limited opportunities, the ceiling is incredibly high here — particularly if the rookie can lock down a bell-cow workload.

Quinshon Judkins, Browns

Shortly after signing with the team, Quinshon Judkins saw his first game action on Sunday and definitely delivered. The rookie rushed 10 times for 61 yards — including an impressive 30-yarder — and also caught all three of his targets, all on just 26.4% of the offensive snaps. Meanwhile, Jerome Ford and Dylan Sampson combined for just 37 yards on 10 carries. While Sampson will remain involved as a pass-catcher, Judkins' snap count is going to skyrocket in the coming weeks as he gets into game shape and takes over for Ford. There's still the looming cloud of a potential (short) suspension, but he's clearly Cleveland's RB1 from here on out and will be relevant in fantasy for as long as he's active.

Cam Skattebo, Giants

In an overtime barn-burner with the Cowboys, Cam Skattebo played 50.8% of the snaps (to Tyrone Tracy Jr.'s 41.5%) and handled 11 carries (to Tracy's five). He was more effective, looking like the wrecking ball he was in college, and had an excellent 24-yard run and a follow-up goal-line touchdown. Some of this might have been game script, but it feels like Skattebo is playing his way to the top of this depth chart sooner than expected. He should be rostered in every league (he's currently available in 41 of Yahoo leagues) and might be a startable asset in the very near future.

Javonte Williams, Cowboys

On the other side of that New York-Dallas fiesta, Javonte Williams looked, candidly, rather sensational. He had a 30-yard breakaway touchdown run to flash the explosiveness we'd missed last week, dominated the RB opportunities with Jaydon Blue still a healthy scratch and caught six of seven targets for 33 yards as a receiver. Through two weeks, there is exactly one running back with more fantasy points than Williams: James Cook. In fact, Williams is closer to Cook (three points back) than Saquon Barkley is to Williams (roughly nine points). The Cowboys RB1 is now up to a fantasy RB2 in the stock watch ... and might not be done ascending.

Kenneth Walker III, Seahawks

After a severely forgettable Week 1, Kenneth Walker III was brilliant on Sunday. He took 13 carries for a whopping 105 yards and a touchdown (8.1 per carry), while Week 2 riser Zach Charbonnet totaled just 10 yards ... on 15 carries. That's right. Walker's per carry average was roughly 1,057% better than Charbonnet's this week. Hopefully these two aren't planning to roller-coaster their way through the Stock Report every week, but for now Walker's on the way up and Charbonnet's dipping back down (see below).

Bhayshul Tuten, Jaguars

With Tank Bigsby out of the picture in Duval, Bhayshul Tuten had a breakout performance on Sunday. He took eight carries for 42 yards and added two catches for 32 yards and a touchdown. The explosive rookie looked every bit of his 7.4 yards per opportunity in this game and should have a meaningful role in the Jaguars offense. Time will tell whether that role is a "FLEX-able" RB1B behind Travis Etienne Jr., insurance in case of an Etienne injury or something else entirely.

📈 Stock Up at WR

Zay Flowers (again), Ravens

Zay Flowers headlined the "Stock Up" wide receivers last week, but we're going to keep highlighting him until he plateaus. Flowers followed up his seven-catch, 143-yard Week 1 with a seven-catch, 75-yard Week 2. Entering Monday, he is top six among wide receivers in receptions, receiving yards and fantasy points and is one of just four wideouts with 7+ catches and 75+ yards in both weeks. The others are CeeDee Lamb, Puka Nacua and Jaxon-Smith Njigba. Until another shoe drops, Flowers is looking like a strong WR2 with WR1 upside as Lamar Jackson's No. 1 option.

Wan'Dale Robinson, Giants

Remember how Flowers was top six in catches, yards and fantasy points? What if I told you Wan'Dale Robinson was top eight in all three? That's right, the Giants No. 2 receiver has 18 targets, 14 catches and 197 yards through two weeks, and scored a monster 32-yard touchdown against the Cowboys. He was NFL history's quietest 93-catch player last year, thanks to a pitiful averaged depth of target from a carousel of QBs, but is now being used downfield by Russell Wilson and Brian Daboll. He'll always be second-fiddle to Malik Nabers, but right now that fiddle is playing quite the jaunty tune.

📈 Stock Up Elsewhere

TE Tucker Kraft, Tyler Warren & Juwan Johnson

Why have I grouped this trio together? Because, after two weeks, I'm willing to state something a little extreme: this trio might be the second tier of tight ends behind Brock Bowers, Trey McBride and eventually George Kittle in Tier 1. Craziest of all, it's hardly a stretch, as entering Monday, Kraft is the TE1, Johnson is the TE3 and Warren is the TE4 overall. But more importantly, all three look like the best pass-catchers on their teams, and each of them lead tight ends in one of the major categories: Johnson's 20 targets are the most at the position, Warren's 155 yards are tops in the league and Kraft is tied for the most touchdowns with two (one in each game). If you don't have one of the elite three, I'd put in some serious effort to get one of these three.

QB Daniel Jones, Colts

Goodness gracious. Roll the John Williams score, because "Indiana Jones" is here to stay. The artist formerly known as Danny Dimes had another excellent showing on Sunday, throwing for 316 yards and a score and adding another touchdown on the ground. Except this time, he did it against a talented Denver defense, lending real credence to his breakout. Perhaps, eventually, Jones will have a bad game and look more like the quarterback of seasons past. Or maybe he's just gone the Baker Mayfield route and been unlocked to franchise QB status. Either way, he's the No. 2 scorer in all of fantasy entering Monday, and should be started in fantasy until further notice.

Lions Offense

Apparently, Jared Goff, John Morton and the Lions offense took the "Stock Down" moniker from last week personally. They hung 52 points and 511 yards on the Bears on Sunday, with Goff throwing five touchdown passes, Amon-Ra St. Brown catching three of them, both running backs scoring, Jameson Williams cracking 100 yards and Isaac TeSlaa continuing to impersonate Odell Beckham Jr. every time he's targeted. We'll need another couple weeks to sort out how much of this was about the Bears defense, how much was about the Lions figuring something out post-Week 1 and how much was just a game of growing pains to start the year. But we can trust all the stars far more heading into Week 3 than we did heading into Week 2.

📉 Stock Down at RB

TreVeyon Henderson, Patriots

Two weeks down, two weeks without TreVeyon Henderson breaking six carries, 30 rushing yards or 10 half-PPR fantasy points. Instead, Rhamondre Stevenson racked up 142 scrimmage yards on 16 touches in a wild Week 2 win over Miami. Most concerning of all, Henderson only played 29.1% of the snaps, after playing 33.8% in Week 1. It's not an encouraging trend, and it may mean benching Henderson in fantasy until his usage improves.

Kaleb Johnson, Steelers

Oof. It's tough to think of a worse two-game span to start a career in recent fantasy-relevant-rookie history. After totaling -2 yards in the season opener, Kaleb Johnson got up into the positives — with exactly one total yard — in Week 2. Yay. Then he made arguably the worst mistake of the entire weekend — and one of the worst I can remember, period — when he mentally mishandled a kickoff, resulting directly in a Seahawks touchdown. Johnson isn't just benchable in fantasy, he's droppable.

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Zach Charbonnet, Seahawks

If you skipped or forgot the Kenneth Walker III section above, let me hit you with the Zach Charbonnet yards per carry number again: 0.7 or, spelled out, seven-tenths of a yard. Youch. His longest run went for six yards, which means his other 14 runs went for four ... total. As noted on Walker earlier, we might be locked into an unfortunate and unpredictable roller-coaster with this duo. Heading into Week 3 against the Saints, Charbonnet feels nigh unplayable, while Walker is a very risky but startable option.

James Conner, Cardinals

James Conner has scored a touchdown in each of the first two weeks — receiving in Week 1, rushing in Week 2 — so it might seem strange to have him as a faller. Here's the problem. The 30-year-old back has totaled just 73 yards on 23 carries through two weeks and the younger, more explosive Trey Benson has just looked better. In a game Conner should have ran all over the Carolina defense, he finished with just 34 rushing yards. Conner's not seeing enough volume to be this inefficient and still be great in fantasy ... and Benson might usurp him as the lead back if this continues. He's still playable, for now, but Conner needs a big game to restore some confidence in his stock.

Isiah Pacheco, Chiefs

Unlike Conner, Isiah Pacheco has not scored the touchdowns to compensate for his ineffectiveness elsewhere, and it's resulted in two weeks with fewer than four fantasy points apiece. The Chiefs back was particularly bad in Week 2, where he managed just 22 yards on 10 carries, and is somehow losing his scoring opportunities to Patrick Mahomes. Like Conner, he'll need a big game (and ideally a touchdown) to get us excited for fantasy, but unlike Conner, you can actually bench Pacheco until we see that game.

📉 Stock Down at WR

Terry McLaurin, Commanders

The freshly-paid $97 million man in Washington has been a pretty major dud through two weeks of action. Terry McLaurin has just seven catches for 75 yards in total, has not scored (after doing so 13 times in 2024) and has been somewhat usurped by Deebo Samuel Sr. as the Commanders' most effective wideout. I expect things to turn around to some degree for McLaurin, Jayden Daniels and the entire offense moving forward, but I was already concerned about regression for McLaurin coming into this season. He's hard to trust, but equally hard to bench.

Brian Thomas Jr., Jaguars

What is going on for Brian Thomas Jr.? Through two weeks, he's caught an absolutely abysmal five of 19 targets and totaled just 60 receiving yards. For perspective, BTJ's 26.5% catch rate is literally the worst in the history of targets (and therefore catch rate) among qualified receivers — the worst ever recorded over a full season was Louis Murphy's 35.4% in 2009. Clearly, Trevor Lawrence has been wildly inaccurate targeting Thomas, and things mathematically must get better in the future. But until that happens, Lawrence's play has sparked some serious concerns for the second-year receiver, given where he was drafted in fantasy.

Courtland Sutton, Broncos

I didn't have Troy Franklin in the "Stock Up" section above, because he'd hardly registered on the market at all before this week and is more of a waiver-wire feature. However, his breakout Week 2 — in which he handled a 30% target share and 38% air yards share — has created a major threat to Courtland Sutton. Sutton had just one catch for six yards on four targets on Sunday, and his stock is plummeting with the arrival of another legitimate option in the passing game. Sutton managed fantasy relevance in 2024 on the back of 135 targets, but if he returns to his typical 100-target range amid a Franklin breakout, he could fall from solid WR2 to touchdown-dependent WR3 (or WR4) very quickly.

📉 Stock Down Elsewhere

Bengals Offense

Unfortunately, Joe Burrow suffered a turf toe injury on Sunday that is set to sideline him for at least three months, if not more. That means Jake Browning will take over as the distributor for Ja'Marr Chase, Tee Higgins, Chase Brown and the rest of the Bengals offense. And while there are worse backups than Browning, this cannot be viewed as a positive for the offense, and particularly for Chase and Higgins. Both are still startable while we evaluate Browning's play — and Brown might actually see a little bump if Cincy turns to him in Burrow's absence — but the upside for everyone is likely lowered a couple notches for the foreseeable future.

Jets Offense

After a revelation in Week 1 against the Steelers, Week 2 brought an atrocious start and then a concussion for Justin Fields. Amid his early-game struggles and late-game absence, the entire offense stalled, with Garrett Wilson's 7.0 fantasy points setting the high-water mark in a 30-10 loss to the Bills. Fields should be back soon, and will hopefully return to his Week 1 brilliance, but the confidence he inspired in that performance has all but fizzled now. This offense will be highly volatile until proven otherwise.

Eagles Passing Game

Entering Monday, just two teams have thrown for fewer yards than the Eagles ... and they play each other in the 7 p.m. ET game. Unless Tampa Bay or Houston comes up short of 90 passing yards in Week 2, Philly will rank dead last in the metric. Worst of all, it's worked out just fine for the team, as their defense and run game has still produced a 2-0 start to the season. Regardless, there are major question marks around A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith right now, and even Jalen Hurts has a reduced ceiling until this air attack gets off the ground.

Vikings Air Attack

As amazing as his Week 1 fourth quarter might have been, J.J. McCarthy has been statistically terrible through his first two career starts. The "second-year rookie" has totaled 301 passing yards, with two touchdowns and three interceptions, resulting in a 67.2 passer rating — dead last among qualified passers. And while Justin Jefferson saved his Week 1 with a touchdown and his Week 2 with a 50-yard "garbage time" play at the end of the first half, he's been highly inconsistent otherwise and has just seven catches on the year. You're still starting Jefferson every week, but we'll need to see major improvement from McCarthy to consider any other option in Minnesota's passing game.

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