Welcome back, Tom! Your fantasy owners have missed you.
Fresh off a four-game suspension, Tom Brady had himself a monster fantasy day, as he victimized the Cleveland Browns' defense. Yet he wasn't the week's top scorer, as it was a week of big games by several quarterbacks, a breakthrough day for a rookie running back, pleasure and pain for owners of a Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver and -- gasp -- a kicker making headlines.
As we do each Sunday, we will recap the week's winners and losers from a fantasy perspective, complete with applicable game and historic data. Check back after the conclusion of the 1 and 4 p.m. ET (and, when applicable, Sunday Night Football) games for our picks of the week's best and worst.
Winners
Tom Brady, QB, New England Patriots: Brady was the top storyline, considering he was the most started quarterback in his 2016 debut, residing in lineups in 94.7 percent of ESPN leagues. Granted, it was a no-brainer for his owners to start him against a Browns team that had afforded a minimum of 16 fantasy points to a quartet of lower-profile passers than Brady, but his 29 fantasy points Sunday were one shy of the week's lead and represented his most in a game since 2015 Week 13 (30).
Brady also became the third-oldest NFL quarterback since 1950 to score at least that many fantasy points in a game, trailing only Doug Flutie (30; 2003 Week 10; age 41 years, 17 days) and Warren Moon (32; 1997 Week 9; age 40 years, 342 days). George Blanda (36; 1968 Week 10; age 41 years, 55 days) had a game in the AFL with that many fantasy points.
Martellus Bennett, TE, Patriots: With Rob Gronkowski drawing increased defensive attention despite playing a healthy number of snaps -- 66 of the Patriots' 77 plays, per Pro Football Focus' Nathan Jahnke -- Bennett dominated Sunday, despite being on the field less than his team's other tight end (54 snaps). Bennett scored a career-high 24 fantasy points -- not only the most by any tight end in Week 5 but also the most by any tight end in a game this season. Bennett, incidentally, hasn't scored more than six touchdowns in any season, but he scored three on Sunday alone, which is as many as any tight end in the league has all season. Bennett was started in only 58.4 percent of ESPN leagues, perhaps frustrating Rob Gronkowski's owners, who started him in 93.3 percent, but in Gronkowski's defense, he managed 10 fantasy points of his own on Sunday.
Marcus Mariota, QB, Tennessee Titans: At a time when his fantasy owners were seemingly beginning to give up on him -- his ESPN ownership percentage at kickoff time was a season-low 32.0 percent -- Mariota rewarded those who were patient with 30 fantasy points, tops among all players. It's the third time in Mariota's career that he has reached the 30-point threshold, and that ties him with Cam Newton and Robert Griffin for the most by any quarterback before his 23rd birthday (Mariota will turn 23 on Oct. 30).
Perhaps more importantly, though, the performance gave Mariota 271 fantasy points through his first 17 career games, which ranks ninth among quarterbacks through that many career games. The full top 10 is in the chart to the right.
Ezekiel Elliott, RB, Dallas Cowboys: For the fifth consecutive week, Elliott scored double-digit fantasy points, putting him in an exclusive club of only eight running backs to have done so in each of their first five NFL games (Alan Ameche, Derek Brown, Joe Cribbs, Robert Edwards, Chuck Foreman, Adrian Peterson and Ricky Watters are the other seven). In fact, Elliott's 28 fantasy points ranked second at the position for the week, and they also brought his career total to 87 through his first five games. That earned him a place in the top 10 running backs through that many career games, since 1950:
Adam Vinatieri, K, Indianapolis Colts: Kickers need love too! Vinatieri soared to an early position lead in fantasy points, culminating with a 23-point performance that captured the kickers' No. 1 weekly spot. That got Vinatieri within nine points of the single-game record of 29, set by Rob Bironas in 2007 Week 7, and it gave Vinatieri four double-digit efforts and 66 fantasy points through five games. That puts him on a staggering 211-point fantasy pace, which would easily shatter David Akers' single-season record of 182, set in 2011.
Through five games in 2011, incidentally, Akers had 48 fantasy points. Since 2001, only Robbie Gould (70, 2006), Neil Rackers (69, 2005), Jason Hanson (68, 2012), Jeff Wilkins (67, 2006) and Matt Prater (67, 2013) had more fantasy points than Vinatieri has through five games.
Sammie Coates, WR, Steelers: Although it'll go down in the history books as an outstanding fantasy day -- his 25 were most among wide receivers -- Coates' game was as frustrating as it was gratifying. The 25 fantasy points were two shy of his career total in 10 games entering the day, but he also committed three gaffes -- we'll soon know whether they're all credited as drops -- and that means he could've provided his owners much more. Coates, the week's second-most added wide receiver, might see his 40.1 percent ownership in ESPN leagues increase as a result of this effort, but don't be overzealous with your expectations, considering the depth of the Steelers' passing game and Coates' history of drops.
Ben Roethlisberger, QB, Steelers: Coates' success helped fuel a similarly big day for Roethlisberger -- or should that be vice versa -- as Roethlisberger scored 29 fantasy points to finish tied for second among quarterbacks. It's something you might not notice unless you've owned him for a good chunk of his career, but Roethlisberger certainly seems to be the kind of quarterback who hits hot streaks such as this one: He has 63 fantasy points in consecutive weeks (34 in Week 4, 29 in Week 5). It's the fourth time since the beginning of 2014 that he has scored at least 50 fantasy points in consecutive weeks -- 79 in 2014 Weeks 8-9, 54 in 2015 Weeks 12-13 and 53 in 2014 Weeks 13-14 -- but he also has six single-digit performances in that span.
Jordan Howard, RB, Chicago Bears: He's off to a solid start as the Bears' new starting running back, as he filled in for Jeremy Langford (ankle) with 21 fantasy points on Sunday after 13 in his first career NFL start in Week 4. The two most recent running backs who recorded more than Howard's 34 fantasy points in his first two career starts were Javorius Allen (35, 2015 Weeks 12-13) and Langford (38, 2015 Weeks 10-11).
Tevin Coleman and Devonta Freeman, RBs, Atlanta Falcons: For the second time in the past three weeks, both Coleman (22 fantasy points, third among running backs) and Freeman (17, sixth) finished among the top 10 scorers at their position. For the season, that gave Coleman 73 fantasy points and Freeman 67 through five games played, though strangely enough, Freeman (83.9 percent) was started in a significantly greater percentage of ESPN leagues than Coleman (17.7 percent), and neither ranked among the 10 most started running backs.
Coleman is now on pace for 234 fantasy points and Freeman 214, paces that would make the 2016 Falcons only the second team since 1950 to have two different running backs score at least 200 fantasy points. The other was the 1961 Green Bay Packers, and keep in mind that one of their two running backs, fullback Paul Hornung, amassed nearly half of his 211 fantasy points while also serving as the team's placekicker.
Hunter Henry, TE, San Diego Chargers: Though his 13 fantasy points fell shy of the position lead for Week 5, Henry warrants a lot of credit for his fill-in work these past three weeks. He scored five and 12 fantasy points as the Chargers' starter in pace of the injured Antonio Gates in Weeks 3-4, then set the bar even higher with Gates available (and absorbing five targets for seven fantasy points of his own) on Sunday. We always caution about the long learning curve rookie tight ends face, but this gives Henry two double-digit fantasy performances in his first five NFL games, something only 14 other NFL tight ends have done since 1960. In fact, he is the first to do it since Randy McMichael in 2002.
Adam Thielen, WR, Minnesota Vikings: Few fantasy owners were willing to chance this fill-in starter, as Thielen was active in only 0.35 percent of ESPN leagues for his 18-point fantasy effort on Sunday, which shattered his previous career best of 12 (2014 Week 17). Thielen got the call for what was his sixth NFL start to fill in for Stefon Diggs (groin), so if Diggs returns after the bye in Week 7, don't expect a repeat.
Losers
Julio Jones, WR, Atlanta Falcons: Jones' owners -- they started him in 99.2 percent of ESPN leagues, third-most among wide receivers -- certainly are not happy, not after he followed up his 36-point fantasy outburst of Week 4 with a two-point stinker on Sunday. Matt Ryan simply couldn't deliver him the football with accuracy in this one, and the team's early lead minimized the need to pass; Ryan's 28 pass attempts represented his fewest since 2015 Week 4 (27). Most frustrating is the fact that Jones has now sandwiched a great game with two awful performances, as he had only one fantasy point in Week 3. It's the first time that Jones has been held to two standard and four PPR fantasy points or fewer in two of three games since Weeks 10 and 12 of 2011, when he departed the former game with a hamstring injury.
Will Fuller V, WRs, Houston Texans: Although DeAndre Hopkins rescued a seemingly lost game with a pair of final-drive, garbage-time receptions (one for a touchdown) that boosted his fantasy point total to 11, Fuller's Sunday didn't go quite so smoothly. The rookie, who managed double-digit fantasy point totals in three of his first four career games, was shut out on the fantasy scoresheet on six targets. Surely owners of either Texans wide receiver were disappointed, considering Hopkins was started in 89.8 percent and Fuller 52.7 percent of ESPN leagues, though they should've been aware of the treacherous matchup against a Minnesota Vikings defense that had afforded just 50 fantasy points to opposing wide receivers through four games, second-fewest behind the Denver Broncos (45 through four).
Lamar Miller, RB, Texans: Perhaps more frustrating than Fuller's day was Miller's, as he managed only two fantasy points for his owners, who started him in 92.3 percent of ESPN leagues. It was a performance that might remind them of Miller's Miami Dolphins days, as in his 32 games played for the Dolphins from 2014-15, he amassed double-digit touches nine times when his team trailed by at least one touchdown, and this was the second consecutive Texans game in which Miller played nearly the entirety of the game from behind (17 of his 22 touches in Week 4, all nine touches on Sunday). Incidentally, only three times did Miller score as few or fewer than two fantasy points for the Dolphins from 2014-15.
Isaiah Crowell, RB, Cleveland Browns: After he scored exactly 20 fantasy points in two out of three games, Crowell earned a decent share of his owners' trust, with his 58.6 percent start rate on Sunday representing a more than 7 percent increase. Unfortunately, he was able to muster only three fantasy points, tied for his second fewest in any game in which he had at least 10 rushing attempts. His owners can't even claim that the opposing Patriots captured an early lead they held for the majority of the game, taking the run out of the equation, as Crowell had 13 carries, his 12th-most in 37 career games played.
Kenneth Dixon, RB, Baltimore Ravens: He wasn't heavily started, but he was one of the week's more popular pickups, and he is now owned in 34.2 percent of ESPN leagues. Unfortunately, Dixon's four-touch, zero-point fantasy performance might cause him to shift to the "most-dropped" list come Week 6, though that'd be a mistake considering his anticipated role in his NFL debut on Sunday.
Matt Jones, RB, Washington Redskins: He was started in 57.5 percent of ESPN leagues on Sunday, despite facing a Ravens defense that had allowed only 44 fantasy points to opposing running backs through four games entering the day (fourth-fewest). Predictably, Jones struggled and totaled three fantasy points on 16 total touches.
Jerick McKinnon, RB, Minnesota Vikings: What an awful day to be a running back. McKinnon was yet another running back who let his fantasy owners down, as he scored only four fantasy points for those who started him in 66.1 percent of ESPN leagues. Worse yet, he managed only one reception, which gave him a terrible five-point PPR fantasy day. Bear in mind that he had 21 total touches in the contest, while backfield mate Matt Asiata managed 15 standard and 18 PPR fantasy points. It was McKinnon's second-worst PPR score in any of the 13 games in which he had double-digit touches.
Jeremy Hill, RB, Cincinnati Bengals: After he ran the football 21 times in Week 4, Hill was a popular start among fantasy owners despite the challenging matchup on Sunday, as he was active in 63.3 percent of ESPN leagues. Unfortunately, he was held to one fantasy point and only four carries, as the opposing Cowboys grabbed a big, early lead and never let go. It's the sixth time in his 37 career games that Hill has been limited to one fantasy point or fewer.
Jarvis Landry, WR, Dolphins: For only the sixth time in his 37 career NFL games, Landry was held to two standard and five PPR fantasy points -- he finished with exactly that many of each -- and keep in mind that four of his previous five such instances happened during his rookie year of 2014, when his role wasn't nearly as sizable as it is today. He was one of the 10 most started wide receivers of Week 5, active in 90.5 percent of ESPN leagues.
Kyle Rudolph, TE, Vikings: In what was another predictably poor matchup -- the opposing Texans entered having allowed only eight fantasy points to opposing tight ends through four weeks -- Rudolph delivered his first real stinker of 2016 to his fantasy owners. He scored only one standard and three PPR points.