Ed Dickson is your new fantasy football obsession
After a big first half on Sunday, Carolina Panthers tight end Ed Dickson is sure to be your new fantasy football obsession.
In the weeks since Carolina Panthers tight end Greg Olsen went down with a foot injury, his fantasy football owners have surely struggled to replace him. Someone made an immediate list of five possible fantasy replacements for Olsen, including new Panthers’ No. 1 tight end Ed Dickson.
Over almost two complete games with Olsen out of the mix (Week 2 and Week 3), Dickson totaled just three catches for 34 yards on four targets. He showed a little life in Week 4 against the New England Patriots, with three catches for a pretty robust 62 yards. But that’s nothing compared to what Dickson has done so far on Sunday against the Detroit Lions.
In the first half of Sunday’s game, Dickson had four receptions for 152 yards. FOX sideline reporter Pam Oliver passed along comments from Lions head coach Jim Caldwell about finding an answer for Dickson coming out of halftime, but he almost immediately had a 23-yard reception to start the second half.
To show just how out of nowhere Dickson’s performance has been, let’s take a look at Twitter.
Ed Dickson ... more receiving yards in the first half today than he had in ALL of 2016. Or 2015. Or 2014. Started in 5.9% of lgs.
— Matthew Berry (@MatthewBerryTMR) October 8, 2017
Just like we all expected... PPR leaders:
— ESPN Fantasy Sports (@ESPNFantasy) October 8, 2017
A.J. Green - 23.2
Carson Wentz - 17.1
Ed Dickson - 16.9
Torrey Smith - 14.2
Orleans Darkwa - 13.1
Ed Dickson is the first Panthers TE not named Greg Olsen with 100+ receiving yards in a game since Wesley Walls in Week 6, 2000 vs Seahawks
— NFL Research (@NFLResearch) October 8, 2017
First half yardage
— Bill Voth (@PanthersBill) October 8, 2017
Ed Dickson - 152
Lions - 109
Other Panthers - 91
Dickson’s emergence has seemed to coincide with Cam Newton playing better over the last two games, as he gets further removed from offseason shoulder surgery. Dickson is clearly not as good a player as Olsen, but he has stepped into a role that yielded a top-10 fantasy tight end every year from 2012-2016 and a top-five fantasy tight end in each of the final three years of that timeframe.
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Dickson has not been on the fantasy radar at all since 2011 with the Baltimore Ravens, when had 54 receptions for 528 yards and five touchdowns. So he’s widely available in Yahoo! (four percent owned) and ESPN leagues (8.6 percent owned), and now is time for tight end-hungry fantasy owners to make Dickson a priority waiver wire addition for the coming week.