Analyze Setffon Diggs's matchup for week 9
Diggs has been steady (39-456, 22 % target share) but draws the league’s stingiest pass D—Atlanta allows a league-low 149 air yards a game and zero 100-yard receivers—so even 7-target floor doesn’t offset a capped ceiling; bench him if you have any viable alternative.
Atlanta’s defense is the ultimate fantasy WR graveyard, yielding just 149.1 passing yards per contest and keeping every opposing receiver under 100 yards this season. They’ve surrendered only ten WR touchdowns through eight games and have yet to let a quarterback hit 300 yards. Stefon Diggs, meanwhile, is New England’s clear volume leader (22 % target share, 88 % catch rate) but is still working back from last year’s ACL tear and has averaged a modest 8.4 PPR points over his last five. The matchup projects to neutralize his recently improving yards-after-catch and red-zone usage, leaving him dependent on short-area PPR volume for fantasy relevance.
Diggs has climbed back to form post-ACL, posting 29-358-1 over the last five weeks and earning 7+ targets in every healthy game, but his 5.7 PPR/game the past three shows his ceiling remains modest.
The underlying numbers paint a bleak ceiling picture for Diggs in Week 9. Atlanta plays man coverage at the sixth-highest rate and funnels action underneath—opposing WRs have managed just 10.4 yards per catch, the NFL’s lowest mark—directly sapping Diggs’ primary value, which is winning at the intermediate level and creating after the catch. New England’s pass-protect metrics are middling (22nd in pressure rate allowed), and rookie QB Drake Maye’s 6.4 YPA would rank 28th if qualified, so the offense lacks the vertical efficiency to stress the Falcons’ Cover-3 looks. Even with a 22 % target share, Diggs’ air-yards share sits at only 24 %, indicating most of his looks are schemed short; against a defense allowing the fewest 15-plus-yard completions, that usage caps his standard-league value. Finally, game-script risk looms—New England is a 7.5-point underdog—yet if the Patriots fall behind, the Falcons can still sit in two-high shells, forcing Maye into check-downs to backs and tight ends rather than Diggs. Historical comps underscore the futility: in Atlanta’s last 12 games, only one WR (A.J. Brown, Week 17 last year) has posted 20-plus PPR points, and he needed two short touchdowns to get there. All told, Diggs’ safe-catch floor keeps him in the low-end FLEX conversation in 12-team PPR leagues, but anything shallower or any alternative with a neutral matchup profiles as a superior play. Bench him, preserve the roster spot for a higher-upside option, and revisit Diggs next week when the schedule softens.