Week 6 Waiver Wire Pickups: Sleepers Who May Still be Available

Fantasy football managers must always keep a watchful eye on the waiver wire.

Yes, even if things have gone swimmingly for you over the first five weeks of the 2023 NFL season.

The need for roster reinforcements can arrive at any time. You might need to cover for an injured player or swap in for someone on a bye week. Or maybe one of your regulars has a particularly daunting matchup that you'd simply prefer to avoid.

No matter the reason, you might need to snag a substitute off the waiver wire for Week 6, so we're spotlighting one sleeper—available in 30-plus percent of Yahoo leagues, per FantasyPros—at each of the three marquee positions.

Through the season's first five weeks, Stafford had tallied the fourth-most passing yards (1,451).

For that reason alone, you'd think his roster percentage would be higher, but a surprisingly (unsustainably?) low touchdown count is likely the reason it isn't. He has the same number of touchdown passes as games played—and as interceptions thrown (five apiece).

That trend feels highly unlikely to continue. Just two seasons back, he threw 41 touchdown passes, and that merely matched his career-high.

So, the scoring strikes will come. He's too talented for them not to, especially when he's firing off passes to what's quickly becoming one of the league's most dynamic pass-catching duos in Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua. It's quite possible Stafford corrects this trend as soon as Sunday, when he squares off against an Arizona Cardinals defense allowing the third-most fantasy points per game to quarterbacks, per Yahoo.

Foreman's first season in Chicago surely hasn't gone as he had planned. He was tasked with five carries and three targets in Week 1 and hasn't stepped foot on the gridiron since.

So, you might be wondering what on earth he's doing here. Well, fortunes can change an instant in this league, and that's exactly what has happened in the Windy City. With Khalil Herbert (ankle), Roschon Johnson (concussion) and Travis Homer (hamstring) all in jeopardy of losing this game to injuries, Foreman suddenly finds himself with a rather direct path to an RB1 gig.

He has a good chance to capitalize on this opportunity, too. Just last season, he was similarly rocketed up the depth chart when the Carolina Panthers traded away Christian McCaffrey, and Foreman immediately responded with back-to-back 100-yard performances. From the time of that trade (Week 7) to the end of the season, Foreman was the 14th-highest fantasy scorer at the running back position.

Unless he's simply unstoppable against the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday, he won't see nearly as much longevity in his expanded role, but for this week, he could be a legitimate difference-maker.

A third-round rookie out of North Carolina, Downs is quickly climbing the depth chart in Indianapolis.

He has 21 targets to show for the past three weeks and has only been targeted fewer than five times once all season. These opportunities haven't yielded a touchdown catch yet, but with volume like this, that should merely be a matter of time.

He is coming off his most efficient effort of the season, having corralled all six of his targets for a season-high 97 yards. He has averaged better than 16 yards per reception each of his last two times out. Big things are almost certainly in his future.

Oh, and that future could be right now, as his matchup against the Jacksonville Jaguars could be a great one.

"He will run about 87% of his routes against Tre Herndon (84.2% catch rate and 147.4 passer rating), who has been a turnstile in slot coverage," FantasyPros' Derek Brown noted. "Jacksonville has bled out the sixth-highest passer rating to slot wide receivers this season."