5 biggest Week 5 fantasy football sleepers: Jerry Jeudy, Caleb Williams and more

Week 5 of the NFL is here and it began with a bang on Thursday night as the Falcons beat the Buccaneers in overtime, winning on a walk-off 45-yard touchdown from KhaDarel Hodge.

I bring that game up because it’s a great example of how players who aren’t ranked high can still deliver big games. Hodge scored 14.7 PPR points but was the WR129 in the FantasyPros rankings. Darnell Mooney was the WR32 and posted nine catches for 105 yards and two touchdowns.

Wild stuff, right? You just never know when a QB is going to explode for 500 yards. It’s what makes the NFL beautiful, you know? On any given game day, literally anything can happen.

To count as a sleeper, quarterbacks and tight ends need to be ranked outside the top 15 at their position on FantasyPros’ weekly rankings, while running backs are ranked outside the top 20 and wide receivers are ranked outside the top 25.

Caleb Williams - QB - Carolina Panthers

Week 5 ranking: QB18

Chicago Bears rookie quarterback Caleb Williams has yet to have a top-10 fantasy finish through four games, but this week’s meeting with the Carolina Panthers should offer an opportunity for Williams to find some success.

While Carolina only allows the 15th-most passing yards per game, the team is allowing the second-most passing touchdowns per contest. Game script has limited how many passing opportunities opponents have had against Carolina, but the switch to Andy Dalton at QB instead of Bryce Young has helped Carolina keep games closer and thus has forced opponents to pass more.

In the two games that Young started, the Panthers allowed 199 and 130 passing yards. In the two that Dalton has started, that number has jumped to 276 and 232. This should work out in Williams’s favor here, giving him more opportunities to showcase what he can do.

Also: as much as I love stats, sometimes you have to think about narratives as well. This game features Williams against the team that could have potentially drafted him if they hadn’t traded their first-round pick to Chicago in the Young trade. The Bears have all the reason in the world to go out there and put points on the Panthers’s heads.

Trey Sermon - RB - Indianapolis Colts

Week 5 ranking: RB24

With Jonathan Taylor likely to be out for this game with an ankle injury, the Colts will turn to Trey Sermon at running back.

Sermon enters this game with just nine carries all season, but that’s largely because Taylor is one of the NFL’s best running backs and has dominated the running back touches. Per Add More Funds, Taylor has 88.89 percent of the positional attempts for the team. In other words, Sermon not getting opportunities says more about the team’s play calling than it says anything about Sermon.

Last season with Taylor missing time, Zack Moss reinvigorated his career, rushing for 794 yards and five touchdowns. Now, Sermon gets his opportunity to do the same thing. While he doesn’t have the same track record as Moss, who had shown in his time in Buffalo he could handle a larger role, Sermon is a talented back who should get a sizable amount of work based on how the Colts offense operates.

Antonio Gibson  - RB - New England Patriots

Week 5 ranking: RB34

There have been a lot of rumors that the Patriots are going to hand the bulk of the running back work over to Antonio Gibson, who is averaging 5.3 yards per carry to Rhamondre Stevenson’s 4.1 yards per attempt.

Right now, the fantasy rankings aren’t treating Gibson like he could supplant Stevenson in Week 5 against the Dolphins, as Stevenson is the RB19 and Gibson is the RB34.

But look, the Patriots head coach has acknowledged that Gibson could start this weekend. That’s not necessarily something a coach can just…say, you know? If you say “yeah, we might start X player,” there becomes a lot of pressure to actually start X player.

Considering how Gibson has been more efficient than Stevenson and also hasn’t had the same fumbling issues that Stevenson — who has fumbled in every game so far — has, Gibson should be valued as more than a low-end RB3.

Jerry Jeudy - WR - Cleveland Browns

Week 5 ranking: WR34

Any time a team plays the Washington Commanders, you should take an interest in that team’s passing attack. Even this week, when that attack is led by Deshaun Watson, who has been one of the league’s worst quarterbacks so far this season, with the Cleveland signal caller failing to reach 200 passing yards a single time through four weeks.

But again — this is Washington, a team that allows more passing touchdowns per game than any other team and has yet to intercept a pass. If there’s a week for Cleveland to figure out how to move the ball through the air, this is it.

Amari Cooper is the obvious beneficiary of this matchup as I wrote on Thursday, but Jerry Jeudy has a shot to have a big performance as well. Jeudy has been targeted at least six times in each game this season and has over 70 receiving yards twice. Factor in a touchdown in Week 1, and he’s delivered strong fantasy numbers in 75 percent of his games so far. Expect that to be 80 percent of games after Sunday.

Juwan Johnson - TE - New Orleans Saints

Week 5 ranking: TE24

The Kansas City Chiefs have struggled significantly against opposing tight ends this season, allowing 30 catches for 365 yards and a touchdown to the position. Only one other team — the Ravens — sits within 100 yards of the Chiefs.

At this point, it feels like if you play a tight end ranked worse than like … fifth? ... then you’re just entering a lottery, so why not buy a scratch-off ticket who plays against the defense that's the worst at defending against the position? Real scratch-off tickets usually have prize pools that vary based on ticket cost, but the tight end scratch-off at this point basically is that the $20 scratchers have the best payout, but the $10 ones and the $1 ones have almost the same odds of winning the same amount, so why not go with the $1 one? 

Johnson, for his part, caught a touchdown pass back in Week 1. His production has been down since then, but he’s in a solid position this weekend.