697: 15 Transactions for Week 8

00:00:02
Speaker 1: This is the Late Podcast with with your host JJ Zachera, JJ Zacherison. What's up everyone, It's JJ zacharyesin in this episode six hundred and ninety seven of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel.

00:00:20
Speaker 2: Thanks for tuning in.

00:00:22
Speaker 1: Before getting to this week's transactions, I want to let you know that the Week eight NFL Sunday Million is officially live on FanDuel. Showcase your NFL knowledge and construct your best nine player roster while staying under the salary cap. Then follow along using FanDuel's live scoring feature to compete for your share of one point four million dollars in cash prizes, including a cool two hundred and fifty thousand dollars first place prize, all for just five dollars. Head to fandel and submit your lineups today. Eligibility restrictions apply. Go to fandle dot com or download the fandel app for more details. Hold or sell Gus Edward so chances are Gus edwards valuation is all over the place after week seven. So admittedly he's one of those players where it's just tough to give straight up advice, but I will say this, if you can get a huge return after that performance against Cleveland. I'm all for it, but I don't think he's just gonna go away either. It's more that if there was one way that I would lean, I would lean more sell than buy, because his peripherals really weren't that great Against the Browns. He saw forty eight and a half percent of the team's running back rushes and he had a six point three percent target share, and he also played just thirty six and a half percent of Baltimore's offensive snaps. Those are not good numbers, and the Ravens also face the Browns. The Browns have been pretty bad against the run. They currently rank as the third most advantageous matchup for running backs and adjusted fantasy points allowed this year. Now, maybe Edwards begins to see more work in that back dough because he is coming off an injury. I think we should expect that, to be honest, we should expect Gus Edwards to see a little bit more work. The problem is we know that Baltimore splits their backfield up. It's been a consistent theme, and there's still a chance that Dobbins returns later in the season and that would cap Edward's ceiling during the Fantasy playoffs. Now, judging by some of the rest of season rankings that I've seen from analysts, my inclination is that he's more of a hold than a cell, just given where I'm probably gonna rank him and where other people have him. But I would rather have a player like Devin Singletary than Gus Edwards rest of season, if that helps a little bit to give you some context, and obviously if Edwards is on your waiver wire. Adam by Chris Godwin. Chris Godwin has finished as a top thirty wide receiver in PPR leagues and four straight games. The problem is that he hasn't ranked higher than wide receiver twenty one, and it's strictly because he's not.

00:02:46
Speaker 2: Finding the end zone.

00:02:48
Speaker 1: He's seen elite target shairs of thirty two percent and twenty seven percent over his last two games, but he's yet to find the end zone this year, and that largely has to do with the Tampa Bay offense as a whole, because they've been kind of bad pre Monday Night Football. Only the Steelers and Broncos have been worse at converting touchdowns per drive this year than the Buccaneers, and hey, maybe that continues, But I have a lot more faith in Tom Brady turning his offense around than other quarterbacks turning their offenses around. Like look at some of the teams ahead of the Bucks when looking at converting touchdowns per drive. You got Carolina, Houston, Washington. I trust Tom Brady a lot more than the quarterbacks.

00:03:27
Speaker 2: And those offenses.

00:03:29
Speaker 1: And the other thing, too, is that we can look at this Bucks offense and see some regression coming. They rank a lot higher in scoring rate per drive that includes field goals. They just haven't been able to convert into touchdowns. Godwin seems back and healthy. I'm going to bank on this favorable regression and hope that he can start finding the end zone a little bit more. Hold, Isaiah Pacheco, you know, as I always say on the show, at the end of the day, running back usage comes down to a coaching decision. We can only do so much on the evaluationation front. We don't know exactly how a team is thinking about their backfield and how they want to deploy their running backs. If a coaching staff wants a committee, they can have a committee. It's a little bit different at wide receiver. This past Sunday morning, NFL Networks Ian Rappaport reported that the Chiefs were planning on starting Isaiah Pacheco, and it wasn't the situation of, oh cool, he's going to get the first touch of the game. I've seen that a lot out there people are saying that, Oh yeah, the report was that he was just going to start. No, that wasn't the report. There was more to it. Rappaport said the following on NFL dot Com before the main slate of Week seven games. He said, quote Isaiah Pachecko took the first team reps in practice this week and is expected to be the starter at running back in Sunday's game versus the forty nine Ers. Sources say Pachecko will replace former first rounder Clyde Edwards Dlaire, who will still have a key role in the offense. Kansas City often rotates backs, and both are expected to see significant snaps. The transformation has been swift for Kansas City, which began the year featuring Edwards, Laire and Jerck McKinnon with a splash of Pachecko. Now it'll likely be Pachecko and Edwards a Laire with a splash of McKinnon. Now look I'm not putting Rapaport on blast here. He's doing what he believes is best. He's doing the best that he can at his job. Not all reports are gonna come to fruition. But as fantasy managers, the media is how we learn more about these backfields. It's how we learn more about what could be going on in the heads of these coaching stafs across the league. And on Sunday, Pachecko started, but he still trailed Jerck McKinnon and Snaps played. If you dropped a decent bench player for Pachecko on Sunday morning, I think that's totally fine. I think that was rational. Even if you started Pachecko over a borderline flex play still kind of rational. That process was not wrong because you didn't make a decision about Pachecko solely based off of that Rapaport report. You recognize that not only did that report say that, but Pachecko's on field performance set it too. It's not like you're sitting there grabbing some terrible running back because a report.

00:06:04
Speaker 2: Told you to.

00:06:06
Speaker 1: You grabbed a dude who has run really well as a seventh round rookie, And honestly, that report wasn't totally wrong. According to Next Gen Stats, Pachecko played one more snap than Clyde Edwards a Laire this week. That's a huge deal. It was the first time all season where that's happened. Clyde Edwards a layer was third and snaps played a running back for Kansas City. Now, look, the most likely outcome in this backfield is that we get just this awful committee moving forward. That's the most likely outcome. That's always been the most likely outcome. But Pachecko's role was better in Week seven, and first year players they do see an uptick in production during the second half of their rookie seasons, and according to adjusted Fantasy points allowed to running backs, the Chiefs have one of the most favorable fantasy playoff schedules for running backs. They'll face the Texan Seahawks and Broncos in weeks fifteen through seventeen. You should not be dropping Isaiah Pachecko right now. Sure you might not be able to just plug and play him, but he's moving in the right direction, he's seeing more snaps. That's exactly what we want out of a seventh round rookie, and he's in an offense that's very, very good. If there's an injury, Pachecko becomes a lot more valuable. But even without an injury, he's starting to see more work. With that playoff schedule, I think that he's still worth a hold. Add Paris Campbell. So we had weeks of Paris Campbell just doing a lot of cardio on a football field. That's changed over his last two From weeks one through five, Campbell was averaging just four point four pper points per game. He had an eight percent target chair per game, but over his last two that points per game number it's almost twenty one. His target share per game is about twenty four and a half percent. Now, Campbell's snap rate has risen a bit over his last two. He's been at a one hundred percent and a ninety eight percent snapshare over his last two games. But just know that before that he was in that eighty to ninety percent range. So this is not a scenario where he went from like being on the bench to all of a sudden being a starter. He was always a starter. Though he is playing more snaps, but regardless, he should be scooped up this week, even though there's a quarterback change for the Colts. Indianapolis is an above average schedule for wide receivers. Moving forward, sell Ezekiel Elliott, so Dak Prescott returns and Ezekiel Elliott gives us his best fantasy performance of the season. Obviously, a lot of fantasy managers are gonna make that connection. They're gonna say that Zeke's Week seven success had to do with Dak Prescott returning, and while that definitely helps, it's definitely not everything either. There are still glaring issues with Zeke. He's averaging just one point one targets per game this year. His target share is just three point six percent per game. He's been below the three percent target share mark in each of his last three games. Just for a comparison, he averaged three point eight targets per game last year. Remember, he's at one point one this year. His target share per game nine point six percent again this year three point six percent. Dallas is also coming off a game against the Lions. The Lions have been horrible against running backs this year. It's not a huge surprise that both Ezekiel Elliott and Tony Pollard did well this past week, and speaking of their schedules, their short term one looks fine, but the playoff one, not so much. In weeks fifteen through seventeen, Elliott and the Cowboys get the Jags, the Eagles and the Titans. The Jacksonville game should be fine, but Philly and Tennessee have both been below average matchups for opposing running backs and adjustin fantasy points allowed this year. Can Zeke be an RB two from here on out? Maybe, but he likely needs a whole lot more work as a receiver to really hit a ceiling. Add Deontay Foreman and Chuba Hubbard. So I haven't done a fifteen transaction show since the Christian McCaffrey trade went down. If you want to break down on what I think is gonna happen with Christian McCaffrey, I did make a post over on Patreon about that trade over the weekend.

00:09:58
Speaker 2: Spoiler alert.

00:09:59
Speaker 1: I love Risia McCaffrey rest of season, but back to the Panthers backfield. We saw the Panthers without CMC for the first time this past Sunday, and I think that both Deontay Foreman and Shuba Hubbard should be added this week. It's not a great week for the waiver wire, but they should be added now. Foreman was the player who led that backfield and snaps against Tampa Bay, he had a fifty four percent snapshare. But Hubbard was also injured in that contest. But according to Adam Schefter, that Hubbard injury, it's just.

00:10:25
Speaker 2: A minor one.

00:10:25
Speaker 1: It's no big deal. He apparently could have come back in that game if they needed them. So we're looking at a backfield committee in a mediocre offense. That's not something that you really want to buy into. So if you want to add these pieces and trade them away, I'm all for it. I think Deontay Foreman is one who would be the more obvious sell because he had the better performance. But I do think it's really important to note he had a really bad success.

00:10:49
Speaker 2: Rate on Sunday.

00:10:51
Speaker 1: I know his numbers look fine, but according to number fires Expected Points model, it was just twenty seven percent and Hubbard's was at sixty seven percent. It's a small sample size. Probably still do like Foreman more than Hubbard, but it's something to note. So add them this week and I'm totally open to you trading them as well. Hold Rondeale more So. Week seven was a tough one for Rondeale more He had just one catch for thirty one yards and a six point nine percent target share in his three games prior to last Thursday, he had seen target shas this season of sixteen percent, twenty one percent, and twenty eight percent. So the question is what the heck happened? Well, I think the easy thing to look at first is DeAndre Hopkins. He's finally back, and Hopkins being back did impact Rondell More to some degree.

00:11:37
Speaker 2: Let me explain.

00:11:39
Speaker 1: In weeks five and six, when Moore saw twenty four point four percent target share per game, he played eighty four percent and seventy one percent of his snaps from the slot. In Week seven, Cliff Kingsbury thought it would be cute to put a five foot seven wide receiver on the perimeter on eighty six percent of his snaps. That resulted in by far, his worst target share of the season. And we sort of saw this back in Week four two, which was Rondel Moore's first game of the season. AJ Green was out in that game that forced Greg Dorts to play the slot. Moore played thirty nine percent of his snaps in that game in the slot. That resulted in his sixteen percent target chair. So to recap this in our four game sample, Rondel Moore has played the slot pretty heavily in two of them, and in those two games, his target chair per game has been above twenty four percent.

00:12:28
Speaker 2: In the games where he's played the.

00:12:29
Speaker 1: Perimeter a lot more, his target chair in his production has taken a huge hit, which isn't that surprising because he's not a perimeter wide receiver. Sorry for screaming, now, here's the thing. DeAndre Hopkins ended up playing forty six percent of his snaps from the slot in Week seven. Why wasn't rondel Moore there? I have no idea that could be some concern for more moving forward. I just don't think it's rational. I don't think it's rational to play DeAndre Hopkins in the slot more than rondel Moore. The big thing is that Arizona decided to be aj green this past week and Robby Anderson wasn't caught up and he only played eleven snaps. So what I think is gonna happen moving forward is that you get Robby Anderson playing the outside, DeAndre Hopkins playing opposite of him, and Rondell Moore in the slot. We're still going to see some rotation, though, DeAndre Hopkins is going to see some slot snaps, but it wouldn't make any sense just rationally for them to use Rondell Moore as they did in week seven, So I would just hold more for now, don't go dropping him because of his bad performance. And Khalif Raymond Detroit pass catchers, they're banged up. Jamison Williams, he's still not back. DJ Shark is on ir aman Ross Saint Brown suffered what we thought was a concussion, but it turns out it wasn't a concussion. He exhibited a taxia that's apparently poor muscle control that causes clumsy movements.

00:13:53
Speaker 2: So right now, aman Ross.

00:13:54
Speaker 1: Saint Brown is in concussion protocol, but he didn't suffer concussion, which is good news. The thing is, though Khaliff Raymond played the most snaps a wide receiver for Detroit in week seven, he had a twenty four percent target chair, but last time we saw him back in week five, he had almost a twenty two percent target chair. So even if amin Ros Saint Brown is back this week, I think that Raymond is worth a cheap look off the waiver wire given these recent performances by Corderol Patterson now, look, trading for injured players always risky. I talk about that all the time. But Patterson could realistically return in Week nine. That's when he's set to be removed from r Now. There's not a ton of information out there about his injury, but Patterson did tweet a video of himself sprinting last week and the caption of that tweet said almost that time, So we'll see. Like I said, this is a risky transaction. We've learned more about this Falcons offense since Patterson was injured in Week four, like how Arthur Smith will run the freaking football no matter the game circumstance. This past week was really all the evidence that we need. The Falcons saw an insane negative game script against the Bengals on Sunday. They ran ninety one percent of their offensive plays while trailing by ten or more points. In that game, Atlanta ran forty five plays. Only sixteen of those plays were dropbacks. Atlanta's pass rate and I'm going to define this by pass attempts divided by total pass and rush attempts, it's currently under forty percent. The Atlanta Falcons are pacing to have the most run heavy team that we've seen in at least a decade. And like I said, after this past week where we really saw this negative game script, I'm convinced this might not stop. And that's especially true when you consider their schedule. The Falcons get the Panthers twice, the Chargers, the Commanders, and the Steelers over their next five games. Their schedule is not tough from here on out, which means they could be playing in neutral and positive game scripts, which means more running and that should all benefit Cornerol Patterson. As long as he falls back into a similar role that he had pre injury. That may not happen. That's one other reason why this is a riskier transaction. But teams with Cornerial Patterson in your league, they might be struggling right now.

00:16:06
Speaker 2: They might need a win this week.

00:16:08
Speaker 1: So send them an offer and see if you can get Patterson for cheap. Add Wandale Robinson. Now, look, I talked about Robinson last week, I talked about him in the preseason. I love me some Wandel Robinson, but I have to talk about him one more time this week. Back in Week six, he saw four targets on just eleven routes run. That route's run number jumped to twenty four this past week. That was the second highest on the Giants, and he was targeted eight times. He caught six balls for fifty yards, and he played seventy four percent of his snaps from the slot. Wandell Robinson is the giants best receiver. He needs to be rostered. Add Daniel Jones and the guy throwing the ball to wandel Robinson he needs to be rostered too. Daniel Jones is coming off a monster twenty nine point performance. He ran for one hundred and seven yards on the ground. He's now averaging more yards per game on the ground than Jalen Hurts. But you want to hear something even crazier. Through seven games, Daniel Jones has more rushing yards than Najie Harris. He's essentially adding more than a passing touchdown worth of fantasy points via rushing yards each game. This is why I keep bringing him up on the Sleeper Show each week.

00:17:24
Speaker 2: Now.

00:17:24
Speaker 1: Up until this point, the Giants have faced the third toughest schedule for quarterbacks according to adjusted Fantasy points allowed. Over the next four weeks, they have the fifth easiest schedule, and during the Fantasy playoffs, their schedule.

00:17:35
Speaker 2: Is eighth easiest.

00:17:37
Speaker 1: Stop sleeping on Danny Dimes. He has a legitimate chance to be far more plug and play than a lot of people realize. Sell Aaron Jones. So like the Buccaneers offense, the Packers offense is also struggling. They're averaging just two touchdowns per game offensively, when they were over three last year, and their yards per drive figure ranks in the bottom half of the league for the past attack. It's not going to get that much better in the short term. The Packers, according to ad Justin Fantasy points Allowed to quarterbacks, have a top five toughest schedule in the league over their next four games because they're facing the Bills and the Cowboys, and things aren't any better at running back either. So enter Aaron Jones. He's coming off a huge game against Washington and in that game he had his highest snapshare of the season at seventy four percent. So you might be thinking, why would I trade Jones away when he just had a seventy four percent snap share, And it's because we can't bank on that maintaining. And it's the same deal with his target share. His target share was thirty percent this past week. His previous season high was a little over fourteen percent. What's more likely this was just an anomaly, that this was just an outlier type game in terms of usage, or that this is what Aaron Jones is going to be moving forward. Jones does have a more favorable stretch during the Fantasy Football playoffs in terms of matchups, so keep that in mind if you're looking to trade them away. But if you need wins as soon as possible, I think that he's a good sell candidate. Ad Mike Gasiki. So there have been rumors that Mike Kasiki could be traded by the deadline. That's one of the reasons that you might think about adding him this week. But he's also playing more. He's seen his top two games in terms of route participation over the last two weeks. He went from about a fifty three percent rate across his first five games to a seventy seven percent role participation rate over his last two. There was a chance of this Week six usage was because Durham Smythe was out, but it held week over week, and that increase in routes run per dropback that's translated into Gasiki's two largest target share games of the season.

00:19:38
Speaker 2: So we have some outs here with Gasiki. He could be dealt.

00:19:41
Speaker 1: If a team trades for Gasiki, they're probably gonna use him, or this could be the start of him having a larger role in that Miami offense. He's still out there in about sixty percent of Yahoo leagues, so he should be added this week.

00:19:55
Speaker 2: Ad IRV. Smith.

00:19:56
Speaker 1: Another tight end who is rostered in about forty percent of Yahoo leagues is Smith. He's seen really consistent target shairs all season long. He hasn't fallen below eleven percent or he hasn't gotten above eighteen percent since Week one. In Week eight, though Minnesota gets Arizona, the Cardinals are the second best matchup and adjusted fantasy points allowed to tight ends this year. We saw Juwan Johnson did to them last week, so IRV Smith is a good streaming choice. Add the Indianapolis Colts defense, the culture out there in sixty five percent of Yahoo leagues, and they get Taylor Heineke and the Commanders in Week eight. Washington's been the sixth best opponent for oposing defenses this year and adjusted fantasy points allowed. Indies at home. They're two and a half point favorites and the over under in this game according to Fandles Sportsbook just forty and a half points. This is a game with backup quarterbacks and it looks like it could get ugly. That's it for today's show, though thanks to all of you for listening. If you had subscribed to Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and don't for it to follow me on Twitter at late Round QB. Remember check out lateround dot com for everything I'm offering. Otherwise, I appreciate you listening. I'll talk to you tomorrow with the weekly ten Trend Show