NFL Week 9 Recap: Instant fantasy football takeaways from Thursday’s game

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

PFF’s fantasy football overview focuses on player usage and statistics, providing all the essential information you need to achieve fantasy success in 2025.

baltimore ravens @ Miami Dolphins

Justice Hill sees a smaller role: Keaton Mitchell took shots away from Hill on early downs.

Last season, Hill played 39.6% of Baltimore’s offensive snaps. This included more than 80% of third downs and two-minute drills, along with 26.7% of early-down snaps. He ranked in the top-12 in receiving yards among running backs and finished as a top-40 running back in fantasy points. His role was even greater in the first four weeks of this year than last season. His role through the first six weeks of this year was very similar to last season. His third-down and two-minute drill snap rates were over 90%, and his early-down snaps were up slightly to 28%. This led to a snap rate of 45.4%. He was 32nd in PPR points during that stretch.

Mitchell averaged 8.4 yards per carry as a rookie but tore his ACL. He returned in 2024, but was not the same player. Mitchell was a healthy inactive for the first four weeks of this season, as the team opted to activate only three running backs. Rasheen Ali had the edge over Mitchell because of his role on special teams. The Ravens had so many injured players for Week 5 that they had room to make Mitchell active. Since then he has been active in every match. After the Ravens’ Week 7 bye, Mitchell played seven offensive snaps last week and finished with four carries for 43 yards. He and Hill shared the backup job on early downs.

This week, Mitchell was consistently the backup on early downs. Hill received his first carry late in the third quarter, after Mitchell had already run three times. Hill was held to one carry or less in three of the four games in which Mitchell was active. Hill can be dropped in all redraft leagues. Even if Derrick Henry were to get injured, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Mitchell would take over instead of Hill. It would likely take injuries to both Henry and Mitchell for Hill to have fantasy value this season.

The Ravens’ tight ends shine: Isaiah likely earned 60 receiving yards after gaining 24 yards in the past four games, while Mark Andrews scored twice and Charlie Kolar scored once.

This was the first game of the season with Lamar Jackson, fullback Patrick Ricard and all three tight ends. The Ravens’ tight rotation in this game was identical to last week’s, as well as last season’s when everyone was healthy. Andrews had a clear lead over Likely with 11 personnel, the two sharing the field with 12 personnel, while Kolar took over 21 personnel and Likely and Kolar shared 22 personnel.

There have been trade rumors surrounding Andrews, but there is no indication that the team is moving on from Andrews based on usage. They could easily have gone to Likely with 11 more men, but that was not the case. This should probably be a top target when it comes to the tight end even if Andrews isn’t traded. While this tight rotation can be a nightmare for fantasy purposes, the Ravens’ schedule is almost perfect for both tight ends to succeed as they did this week. Two of their next three matchups are similar to this week. From Weeks 13 through 17, all five games are against teams in the top five in allowing fantasy points to tight ends, including the team that has allowed the most points twice, the Cincinnati Bengals.

Monitor Ollie Gordon II‘s health: Gordon suffered an ankle injury and did not return.

Gordon has spent the entire season as De’Von Achane’s backup. Jaylen Wright has played just 20 offensive snaps this season and has been a healthy inactive more often than not, including before this game. Gordon played in 13 of 34 possible snaps over the first six drives, with more than half of his snaps occurring while Achane was also on the field. His playing time has increased since Tyreek Hill’s injury, thanks to more action with both running backs on the field.

After Gordon’s injury, Achane was the only active running back, so he started playing 100% of the snaps. If Gordon were to miss time, Wright would be active and be the primary backup. There would probably be fewer snaps with two halfbacks on the field. There may be a slight increase in Achane’s playing time, but not much. Wright would be worth picking up in deep leagues where all the handcuffs are on rosters, coincidentally Achane also picks up an injury before Gordon returns.

Various comments

• Lamar Jackson was back in the lineup after missing his third straight game due to a hamstring injury. He was a full participant in training all week. Cooper Rush was inactive as the third emergency quarterback.
• Baltimore wide receiver Devontez Walker was a healthy scratch, his third straight absence. He played 24 offensive snaps from Weeks 2 through 4 and had a 92.0 offensive rating in his minimum time, thanks to three receptions for 60 yards and two touchdowns on 14 routes. He was on the injury report from Weeks 5-8 due to an oblique injury, which made him inactive in Week 6. He was denied playing status in Week 8, but was still inactive. This week he was not on the injury report and was inactive again, suggesting he will remain inactive in the coming week.
• Tylan Wallace led a rotation with DeAndre Hopkins as the third wide receiver of 11 personnel through the first four weeks shooting 59.8% to 46.4%. Hopkins has clearly been the third player over the past four weeks, and the division was greater than ever this week. Wallace didn’t play his first offensive snap until the third quarter.
• Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa (illness, left thumb), wide receiver Malik Washington (knee) and fullback Alec Ingold (neck) were full participants in practice all week.
• Tahj Washington was active for the second time this season. He lost a fumble on his first NFL reception, but was subbed over and over again. The Dolphins used six wide receivers this week, which mainly led to a decrease in playing time for Nick Westbrook-Ikhine.
• Dolphins wide receiver Dee Eskridge did not practice on Monday, was limited on Tuesday and was upgraded to full on Wednesday. He was dealing with a shoulder injury and was initially listed as doubtful, but he was active.
• Miami tight end Julian Hill did not practice all week due to an ankle injury. He was ruled out on Wednesday. Hayden Rucci was activated from the practice squad to take his place on the roster.
• Last week, Greg Dulcich was the primary receiving tight end, while Tanner Conner played more in run situations. This week, Conner played a slight majority of the snaps in both situations.

Table notes

• Snaps include plays called back due to penalties, including offensive holding or defensive pass interference. These plays have been removed from the other three statistics.
• Objectives may differ from official NFL sources. The most likely discrepancy would be the result of an obviously thrown pass, where the NFL could give the target to the nearest receiver, while this data does not.
• Carries are only possible on designed plays. Quarterback scrambles do not count toward the total number of carries in the game.