San Francisco 49ersOur read
Written Sun 12:01 am Central, for week 6
Kirk sits on injured reserve on Sunday's report, so he does not play Monday night against Washington and there is no waiting on a kickoff check. The 49ers draw a soft matchup anyway, a 29.8 point expected score against a Washington defense allowing 41 PPR points a game to receivers, but none of it reaches a receiver listed seventh on their depth chart. He has not played since week 1 of 2026, with every week through week 5 passed without him. Use an IR spot on him if your league gives one and cover the lineup slot with a fill-in this week.
Written Oct 19, from his facts through last season
Kirk has been on IR since before week 3 of 2026, and weeks 1 through 5 of 2026 all went by without him taking a snap. The board ranks him below every available receiver while he sits there, so there is no game to wait for and no week to stash him toward. Our preseason number gave him 12 points for the whole season on just 3 expected games, and the season has already burned five weeks of that. Even if he comes back, the middle range ran 2 to 22 points, and he starts from nearly nothing.
The football reasons to pass were there before the injury. San Francisco fed McCaffrey 23% and Kittle 22% of the 2025 targets between them, and Kirk is listed seventh among the SF receivers, behind Mike Evans and two names ahead of him you would not start anyway. Players who changed into rooms like this one dropped about 0.9 points a game the next season on average. His own line slid too, from 8.86 points a game in 2024 to 5.26 in 2025, with the target share cut from 19.5% to 12.4% and yards per target down from 8.1 to 4.6. At nearly 30 and in his ninth year, that reads as a decline.
Even when he played in 2025, it was thin: 11 games, one week over 15 points, six red-zone touches all season, and a 7.0-yard average depth of target that ranked near the bottom of qualifying receivers. There is no version of this that earns a roster spot in week 6 of 2026. Drop him if you have been carrying him, and if a league mate stashes him, let them.