Commanders vs. Seahawks Fantasy Football Worksheet, Week 9

The Worksheet, a comprehensive fantasy football preview by Rich Hribar, breaks down everything you need to know about the Week 9 matchup between the Commanders and Seahawks on Sunday Night Football.

Find a breakdown of every Week 9 NFL game in our Worksheet Hub.

Trust = spike production for that player

Quarterback

Jayden Daniels: We are expecting Daniels back this week after missing Week 8 with a hamstring injury.

If we are tracking that Daniels will miss another game and Marcus Mariota starts again, we will adjust.

It has been a bumpy ride for Daniels this season as he has been in and out of the lineup along with his pass catchers.

Daniels has one week higher than QB13 over his four full games.

The floor is still high.

He has at least 17 standard points in all five appearances this season.

We are just under the draft investment, which is enhanced by all of the missed time since his ADP also carried significant opportunity cost.

Negative plays have been an issue for him over his small sample this year.

19.2% of his dropbacks have lost -1.0 EPA or worse, which ranks 27th in the league.

He has had a league-high 8.2% of his passes dropped, up from 4.4% last season.

This is a spot where it is hard to push for ceiling runout, leaving Daniels as a floor-based option on the QB1 line.

If Daniels plays, it will be after a hamstring injury, which could compromise his mobility.

We also do not know if he will have Laremy Tunsil (hamstring) or Terry McLaurin (quad) this week.

On top of that, he is facing a Seattle defense healthier out of their bye, which is allowing 6.4 yards per pass attempt (6th) and a 3.9% touchdown rate (10th).

Seattle is eighth in passing points allowed per attempt (0.373).

Devon Witherspoon has played just two games, Julian Love has played three, and Nick Emmanwori has played just three.

All of those players are expected to play out of the bye.

Sam Darnold (TRUST): Darnold has an overlap matchup for his strengths out of the bye.

He leads the league in yards per pass attempt (9.1) and yards per completion (13.4).

Washington is allowing a league-high 8.4 yards per attempt and a league-high 12.8 yards per completion.

Darnold is eighth in play-action rate (27.1%).

On his play action dropbacks, Darnold is averaging a league-high 13.7 yards per attempt and a hilarious 20.9 yards per completion.

Against play action, Washington is allowing 8.5 Y/A (23rd) and an 8.3% touchdown rate (25th).

Seattle has used pre-snap motion on 58.8% of Darnold’s dropbacks (7th).

On dropbacks with motion, Washington is allowing 8.8 Y/A (31st) and 12.4 yards per completion (31st).

In bulk, Washington is allowing 17.2 passing points per game (28th) and is 31st in passing points allowed per attempt (0.552).

Darnold is fifth in passing points per attempt (0.574).

With Seattle, you are always somewhat concerned that they limit the passing volume if Washington does not push back here, but Darnold has taken advantage of the spots he should have as a streamer this season.

He has QB1 scoring weeks against the Saints, an injured Tampa Bay defense, and Jacksonville.

Running Back

Seattle RBs: It will be interesting to see if Seattle makes any changes to this backfield or if things remain where they left off.

Over the front half of the year, this has been a clear split.

In games with both backs available, Zach Charbonnet has played 54.1% of the offensive snaps with 78 touches.

Kenneth Walker has played 41.4% of the snaps with 86 touches.

Walker has been the between-the-twenties back, with Charbonnet playing on passing downs and in short yardage.

Walker has been stuck as an RB3/FLEX.

He has two RB2 or better scoring weeks, both of which have come with touchdowns.

Darnold has thrown to running backs on a league-low 8.9% of his attempts, leaving Walker with no path to fantasy-upside touches.

Charbonnet is a touchdown-or-bust FLEX.

In their games played together, Charbonnet has out-touched Walker 12-3 inside the 10-yard line and 9-0 inside the five-yard line.

49.9% of Charbonnet’s fantasy points have come from touchdowns, the highest rate in the league.

Washington is allowing 4.2 yards per carry to running backs (16th), allowing 0.96 yards before contact per rush (9th), and a first down or touchdown on 20.3% of those runs (8th).

Jacory Croskey-Merritt: Just when it appeared that Croskey-Merritt was going to take off, things have cratered.

After 150 yards and 2 touchdowns in Week 5, Croskey-Merritt has 125 total yards over the past three weeks.

He has closed those weeks as the RB38, RB44, and RB51.

The rushing efficiency has flatlined.

He has rushed 39 times for 119 yards (3.1 YPC) with a run of 10 or more yards on 2.6% of his attempts during that stretch.

His usage has dipped alongside the output.

After his breakout game, he handled 78.3% of the backfield touches but has accounted for 66.7% and 56.3% the two games after.

With no passing game role (7 catches for 60 yards on the season), Croskey-Merritt is stuck as a FLEX option that has to live on rushing efficiency or touchdown opportunities.

This is a tough matchup to bet on the efficiency bouncing back.

Seattle is allowing a league-low 3.0 YPC to running backs, allowing 57.4 rushing yards per game to backfields (2nd).

After Christian McCaffrey rushed for 69 yards against them in Week 1, Seattle has not allowed more than 48 yards on the ground to a running back, while they have allowed 2 rushing touchdowns to backs this season.

Jeremy McNichols: While not a sexy play, McNichols has some appeal as a floor-based FLEX in full-PPR formats.

He has been an RB3 or better in each of the past three games, taking advantage of his role as the passing-game back.

Over the past three weeks, McNichols has 15.3% of the targets, fourth among running backs.

That has been the one area of weakness for Seattle against backs.

Running backs have 26.1% of the receptions against Seattle (third highest), while they are allowing a league-high 13.6 receiving points per game to backfields.

Wide Receiver

Jaxon Smith-Njigba (TRUST): Smith-Njigba comes out of the bye week still leading the NFL in receiving yards (819) by 99 more yards than the next closest player.

He leads all players in target share (38.3%) and share of air yards (51.9%).

Under Klint Kubiak, Smith-Njigba is getting all the cheat-code opportunities to combat the current defensive meta.

He leads the NFL with 332 receiving yards on play-action passes, averaging 6.64 yards per route run on those plays (not a typo, I checked again).

Smith-Njigba is sixth in the league in targets using pre-snap motion (40), averaging 3.95 yards per route on those plays.

Even removing all plays with motion or play action, Smith-Njigba is posting 4.71 yards per route while the base rate for all wideouts with 100-plus routes on those targets is 1.39 yards per route.

The next closest receiver on those targets is Justin Jefferson at 2.88 yards per route run.

We have already highlighted that Washington has had issues defending the play-action pass.

Top-down, they have had issues slowing wide receivers altogether, allowing 9.0 yards per target (28th) and a 5.5% touchdown rate (21st) to receivers.

Deebo Samuel: Monday night was not kind to Samuel.

He opened the game with a drop on a wide receiver screen that went directly to a defender for an interception, which set the tone for the night.

When the game was over, he ended up with 3 catches for 11 yards.

Samuel was still not fully recovered from his foot injury, based on usage.

He was on the field for only 74.3% of the dropbacks.

Over the past two games, Samuel has played 72.3% and 73.6% of the offensive snaps.

His injury and the state of this offense and matchup make it hard to trust Samuel as more than a volatile WR3.

Seattle is coming out of the bye with a healthier secondary, while they are already sixth in points allowed per target (1.50) to receivers.

They have allowed only 6.7 yards per target to receivers, third in the league.

If Samuel is healthier and picks up more snaps in Week 9, he could have an added lift should Terry McLaurin miss.

McLaurin aggravated his injury on Monday night, leaving his status for Sunday night in the air.

With McLaurin off the field, Samuel has averaged 1.90 yards per route compared to 1.30 yards per route with him on the field.

Cooper Kupp: Kupp is averaging career lows in receptions (3.4) and receiving yards (41.9) per game.

Playing second fiddle to Smith-Njigba in a low-volume passing offense has limited his opportunities.

Kupp is averaging 8.9 yards per target (his highest since 2021), but he is averaging 4.7 targets per game (WR62).

If searching for a carrot for Kupp as a WR4/FLEX, we have run down the spot for Darnold as a positive.

Two of Kupp’s three games this season as a WR3 or better have come in those streaming QB1 weeks for Darnold.

Kupp also plays a team-high 43.8% of his snaps in the slot, where Washington has allowed a league-high 10.7 yards per target.

Washington WRs: If McLaurin misses another game, we are back to the ancillary wideouts getting more playing time.

Chris Moore has been the direct replacement for McLaurin, running a route on 75.4% of the dropbacks.

He has only been targeted on 12.4% of those routes, however.

Jaylin Lane has been on the field for 54.4% of those dropbacks but has the highest target rate (18.3% of his routes) outside of Samuel without McLaurin.

Luke McCaffrey has turned in the most splash plays but is last in route participation (50.3%) and target share (10.6%) on those snaps.

All of the wideouts are only dart throws for single-game DFS in a poor matchup on paper for this passing game.

Tory Horton: Horton does not have a reception in either of his past two games played, but he is a touchdown-or-bust swing in single-game DFS or a deeper-end FLEX based on the matchup.

Tight End

Zach Ertz: Ertz grabbed 4 of 6 targets for 16 yards on Monday night.

He has two TE1 scoring weeks this season, both of which came with a touchdown.

Ertz is averaging 30.6 yards per game.

If chasing a touchdown, Ertz is second on the team in red zone targets (21.1%), a rate that jumps to 27.3% when  Daniels plays.

Seattle has allowed 6.7 receptions per game to tight ends (29th), offering some matchup-based FLEX appeal for those in need.

A.J. Barner: All of Barner’s streaming weeks have been tied to his ability to catch a pass in the end zone, but he plays a role in the red zone.

Barner has 22.7% of the Seattle targets in the red zone (TE10) and has run a route on 76.9% of the red zone dropbacks (TE17).

Outside of the red zone, all bets are off.

Barner has 10.6% of the targets (TE27) with a 62.6% route rate (TE22) outside of the red zone.

We will be watching to see if Elijah Arroyo has an added playing time out of the bye, but Barner is the Seattle Foster Moreau here.

If chasing a touchdown, Washington has allowed a 9.6% touchdown rate to tight ends (28th).

If taking a flyer on Arroyo getting extra snaps and playing the matchup, Washington has allowed a league-high 9.4 yards per target to tight ends.

More Week 9 Fantasy Breakdowns From The Worksheet: