Tee Higgins Injury Update: Will Higgins and Ja’Marr Chase Play in Week 1? Fantasy Impact and More

Injuries are easily the worst part of fantasy football. Unfortunately, even ahead of Week 1, not everyone is healthy. Both of the star Cincinnati Bengals receivers were listed on the injury report Thursday.

Should fantasy managers be concerned about the statuses of Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins this week?

Latest Injury Update on Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins

Let’s start with Chase because his limited status at practice is far less of a surprise and not injury-related.

Chase spent the entirety of training camp holding in. He attended Bengals practices — as not doing so would result in fines — but he did not participate because he wants a new contract.

Chase did not return to actually participating in practice until Wednesday of this week, the first official weekly practice ahead of Week 1.

Given that Chase was not practicing for the past month, the team did not want to immediately throw a full complement of reps at him. Opting to ease Chase back into the swing of things, the Bengals are being careful with their superstar wide receiver.

As for Higgins, he was limited with a hamstring injury. This is both new and unexpected, which is often concerning. You never want to see a player added to the injury report, especially with a hamstring.

With that said, Higgins did practice in some capacity. He also spoke to the media after practice and did not seem to be in any distress or discomfort. However, Higgins was not seen on the field Friday when the other receivers were going through warm-ups.

Higgins was listed as doubtful on the final injury report and is, therefore, not expected to play in Week 1.

Will Higgins and Chase Play This Week?

While it’s entirely possible that Chase doesn’t see his usual 90%+ of snaps, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported that Chase will be ready to go on Sunday. Even if he’s only out there for 60-70% of the snaps, Chase is still an easy must-start in fantasy.

Higgins’ hamstring issue is a far greater concern. However, he did not appear concerned that would be in any danger of missing this week’s game.

Tee Higgins (hamstring) and Ja'Marr Chase (rest) were both listed as "limited" in today's practice.

After practice, Tee put any concern to rest:

"I feel amazing."#Bengals @WCPO pic.twitter.com/I1MUZJXFMm

— Caleb Noe (@CalebNoeTV) September 5, 2024

Sometimes, players are overly optimistic regarding their health and recovery ability. In this instance, it seems that Higgins has done the same. He missed practice altogether on Friday and is now doubtful for Sunday. Very rarely do players listed as doubtful to suit up.

What Does This Mean for Joe Burrow and Andre Iosivas’ Fantasy Rankings?

This is great news for Joe Burrow, who had only a couple of games where he, Chase, and Higgins were all healthy last year.

It’s not good news for anyone who was planning to start Andrei Iosivas this week.

Now, to be fair, unless you’re in a very deep league, Iosivas should be nothing more than a bench stash this early in the season. But if you were hoping to start him in the event Chase couldn’t get up to speed, it’s probably not a good idea.