The San Diego Chargers have Branden Oliver as the best fantasy football free agent for Donald Brown owners, as he came down with a head injury last week and now into Week 6 both Brown and Ryan Mathews will be out, leaving Oliver to start again and he has a great matchup coming with the Oakland Raiders on the schedule.
Oliver comes into the game this week against the Raiders as a string start option in all leagues, as he has a good matchup and will be the lead back for the Chargers. According to Pro Football Talk, Oliver is expected to get a heavy load in the game against the Raiders, as Ryan Mathews is still out and should be out for another few weeks and Donald Brown is dealing with a head injury suffered in the game last week. Brown is day to day with his injury and that makes Oliver a great option this week.
The Raiders have been terrible this season and they were mostly gashed in the running game over their 0-4 start and now Oliver has the chance to do it as well. Oliver has played in three games for the Chargers and he had his best performance last week with 114 yards rushing and 68 yards receiving. If Oliver can get into the receiving game he will be a strong option until Brown and Mathews return and in the past two weeks he already has eight catches for over 100 yards.
Oliver is a speedy back and Antonio Gates has compared him to Darren Sproles, which is as good of a compliment as an RB can get that is the size of Oliver. In college Oliver was very strong while playing for Buffalo and he went for 15 touchdowns and over 1500 yards and was an all-team conference player. Oliver is the best starter option for the Chargers at RB this week with Brown and Mathews out and he could be a good option for the rest of the season depending on how things shake out over the next few weeks.
The Chargers offense has been humming this season and Philip Rivers has continued his comeback from last season with four straight games of a QB rating of over 120. No one has done that before and the addition of Mike McCoy as head coach has really turned Rivers around after he struggled the previous season before he was hired. Oliver benefits from how the Chargers are playing on that side of the ball and he should put up some solid numbers this week with the terrible Raiders on the schedule.
The Chargers dominated against the Jets and the team has two divisional games coming up that are very big with the Raiders and the Chiefs. Oliver likely will be starting those games and he wants to help the Chargers get things going, as they are ranked 27th in rushing yards per game with all their injuries. The team has three of the next four games on the road and three of those are divisional games. Oliver will be key if Brown can't return soon and there is a chance that Mathews will be coming back before the bye week.
