914: 15 Transactions for Week 4

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Speaker 1: This is the Lab podcast with your host JJ zacher Retha j J zacher reefon what's up everyone. It's JJ zacharyesin in this episode nine and fourteen of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by Underdog Fantasy. Thanks for tuning in. Before we get into the transactions this week, I want to remind you to check out Underdog Fantasy. Underdog is a great place to play fantasy sports with so many different offerings that will definitely fit what you're looking for right now. If you sign up on Underdog, you'll get a nice deposit offer, a free pick that'll help you win some cash, and then also my rest of season rankings, and then on Tuesday, for what it's worth, there's a sight wide Patrick Mahomes free pick promo, so you can get that if you sign up. But those rest of season rankings they're updated every Tuesday through the end of the season. You get access to all of those updates, so make sure to take advantage of the offers. Just head to Underdog Fantasy and sign up, and when you do, use promo code Late Round. Let's get to these fifteen transactions, add Juwan Jennings, So keep in mind that with this fifteen transactions episode and with the write up that I do in the newsletter, I try to not repeat transactions week after week. I've talked about Bucky Irving for a couple of weeks. Now I'm not gonna bring him up on today's show because I want to try and stay one step ahead of the competition. I want to give you guys other recommendations, but sometimes things do need to be repeated. When you get a performance like what we saw at Jawan Jennings in week three, I've got to talk about it again because he scored forty six and a half freaking PPR points this past week. Now, I talked about Jennings last week as an ad I never thought that he was gonna do this. I never thought that he was going to see a forty percent target chair for the forty nine ers. Now, obviously, Deebo, Samuel and George Kittle being sidelined help Jennings cause Jennings and Brandon Ayuk combined for a seventy three point three percent target chair in week three. But at the moment, there's no telling when those guys might return. We might be able to get another usable week out of Jennings here in Week four, so he needs to be rostered everywhere by Brandon Aiyuk. So while Juan Jennings dominated for the forty nine ers this past week, Brandon Aiyuk not so much. Ayuk finished the game against the Rams with just nine point eight PPR points. He's now failed to hit a double digit PPR point total in each of his first three games. Anyone who used a top three round pick or a top four round pick on Brandon Ayuk is not very happy right now. But I'm willing to cut him a little bit of a break. He had a weird ramp up to the season because in that contract dispute, and even on Sunday, despite his poor performance, he had a thirty three point three percent target chair on the year. According to PFF's expected Fantasy Points model, Ayuk has played roughly four PPR points per game below x men xtation. Sometimes production just doesn't match the peripherals, and that's gonna especially be true when you get the ramp up like I said, like Brandon Ayuk had. Like at the end of the day, we have a lot of historical data that tells us that Brandon Ayuk is a good player. You might be able to buy his talent for a low price right now. Not only is he coming off this disappointing performance, but players like George Kittle and Deebo Samuel, they're not gonna be out forever. Their eventual return is gonna make Ayuk managers even more nervous. They're gonna be more afraid that Ayuk is not gonna see a high target share. But I'm willing to bet on the talent right now. So I'm willing to buy Brandon Ayuk for a lower price than we drafted him for. Add Braylan Allen. Braylan Allen's carving out a role in this Jets offense. He didn't see that much work in Week one he had a sub six percent running back rush are but over his last two games those rush shaars have been thirty three percent and thirty seven percent, And with the Jets playing in such a favorable script in Week three, that meant that the running backs saw a lot of work. He ended that game with eleven rush attempts. Now, Braylan Allen's not about to take Breesehall's job. As much as I like Allan, my ZAP model really liked Allen coming out, and he's definitely not a threat to take Breseehall's receiving work. Hall ran twenty five routes in Week three. Braylean Allen only had eight, but the Jets ran first right now in the NFL in running back target share, and Braylan Allen at worst is one of the best handcuffs in fantasy football. Keep in mind, among all running backs in this past year's draft class, Allen had the best breakout score. That's a metric that goes into the ZAP model. He should be rostered in way more than thirty six percent of Yahoo leagues sell Garrett Wilson. Now, I would imagine that Garrett Wilson's gonna be a popular by candidate this week, and I can't blame anyone who wants to go out and buy him. If you were to show me Garrett Wilson's current profile on a vacuum, his production, his peripherals, his talent, I'd almost definitely call him a bye. And you can actually still do that depending on where your team is sitting. Now, let me explain Wilson's definitely underperformed thus far. He's averaging twelve point two PPR points per game. Which is not special, but he's a target share above twenty eight percent. That's not far off from what we saw last year. And with Aaron Rodgers at quarterback, especially the Aaron Rodgers that we saw this past Thursday, why wouldn't we buy? The reason is the schedule. Over the Jets next four games, they get the Broncos, Vikings, Bills, and Steelers. According to my adjusted Fantasy Points allowed method, no team wide receivers have a tougher four game stretch in the Jets. Garrett Wilson has already faced some tough cornerbacks and there's some matchups over the next month that are going to be just as difficult. So this is one of those transactions that need some context. If you're sitting at three to zero and you've got Garrett Wills, or if you're in a league where the Wilson manager they're just over it, they're willing to trade him away for less than what he was drafted for, you actually could argue trading for him. I think we're going to see a lot of Garrett Wilson production during the second half of the season. This transaction, the cell transaction for Garrett Wilson is for the teams out there, which might be a lot of Garrett Wilson teams given how he's produced. But it's the teams out there who are zero and three or one and two who are struggling a lot, who maybe could use the information that's out there by analysts who are saying by Garrett Wilson to actually sell him at a reasonable price. As much as I want to say go buy him because the peripherals are there and he's a really great wide receiver, I still have to ground myself and realize that this schedule coming up is not very fun. If you can get past this schedule, he should be great, though. Add Clyde Edwards a layer. So in Week three Kansas City's running back deployment, it was pretty expected. Maybe Carson Steels saw a little bit more work than anticipated, but he was the early down bruiser. Samaj p Ryan was the pass catching back. It wasn't something crazy. It's not like we saw one of those two guys become a bellcow. Now Clyde Edwards Hilaire has been sidelined as he deals with PTSD. We don't know for sure if and when he's gonna return to this lineup, but Mike Tarico on Sunday Night. He mentioned that Cech could return to the team soon, possibly as early as Week five. He said, quote talking to the Chiefs tonight, they think they'll get Edwards Hilaire back, perhaps for Game five of the season when he's eligible to return, And shout out to Fantasy Alarm for that report. Now, the likely outcome for this backfield is that it's an absolute mess, just an absolute disaster. The chief signed Kareem Hunt last week. Keyanta Ingram's there. It's a mess, but plenty of you are in deeper formats and plenty of you need some help, So don't be afraid to add Ceh this week. Buy Romeo Dobbs. So Jordan Love seems really really close to finally getting back to that Packers lineup. That would obviously change the offenses dynamic completely. Over their last two games, Green May has had drop back over expected rates according to Fantasy Life of minus twenty five percent and minus twelve percent. They were plus three percent in week one because in week one they had Jordan Love. Now everyone is gonna be rightfully excited about Jaden Reid when Jordan Love returns. But don't sleep on Romeo Dobbs. Either he's led the Packers and routes run in all three games this year, and there's a chance that you could just get him off of someone's bench. Maybe they're not recognizing how good his peripherals have actually been, and it might not be that hard to get him because he hasn't had really great performances this year. I think Romeo Dobbs is honestly one of the best buys this week. Drop Ezekiel Elliott. Now, look, anytime I give advice about dropping a player, you've got to put your league into context. You've got to understand your own individual league. There are some formats where letting go of Ezekiel Elliott is a bad idea. In deeper formats, he should probably still be held. But in a ten team league, maybe even a twelve team league with a normal size bench, you could easily argue that that roster spot should be used for someone else. Elliott has seen his backfield share drop every single week this year. His fifty two percent running back rush share in week one was totally fine, but that's now falling to twenty three percent. His snap share has done the exact same thing, and when from fifty percent in week one, it was twenty percent in Week three. We might have some usability at times from Ezekiel Elliott this year, but as long as everyone's healthy in that backfield, why should we believe that Elliott's going to be the guy who emerges who becomes some warhorse. It's not like he's better off with a teammate injury than like ninety five percent of the backup running backs in the league. I would rather have a handcuff than Ezekiel Elliott. Like you might not get the same production out of Trey Benson, let's say, but there's a lot more upside for Benson than there is for Zeke Elliott, and he's still rostered in sixty seven percent of Yahoo leagues. I think that he can be safely dropped in most of those, and if Rico Dowdle's available, he's the back that you should want out of that Cowboys backfield. By the Chicago Bears passing attack, it really shouldn't take that much to get Kayleb Williams right now. He threw his first touchdown passing Week three. He's been below eight Fantasy points in two of his three games this year, and Shane Waldron, Chicago's offensive coordinator, has been horrible. But you have to just hope that adjustments are coming, and you have to hope that Kayleb Williams just simply develops as a passer. But there are some good things here. The first thing is that Caleb Williams actually ranks as a QB one right now in expected fantasy points. That's according to PFF's model, he should be closer to eighteen point one points per game. He's been about six points below that, And yeah, it's because he hasn't played that well, but he's also a rookie quarterback. He hypothetically should be able to develop as the season goes on. But here's the second reason I'm intrigued. Upcoming for Chicago are games against the Rams, Panthers, Jags, and Commanders. None of those teams are scaring us from a matchups perspective. It's arguably the best next four schedule of any team passing attack. So if you're struggling at quarterback, maybe you want some sort of platoon, you could look at Kayleb Williams. But then don't forget to get a feel for how the DJ Moore, the Roma Dunesday. Maybe even the Keenan Allen manager feels about those guys in your league because the pass catchers in Chicago, they should benefit from this upcoming schedule two ad Cole Kmet. So let's go to one of the pass catchers and the Bears in Cole Comet, because he had a big Week three performance. Yes it was helped because Keenan Allen was sidelined, but this coaching staff is using their tight ends differently. They've been a pretty irrational staff so far this year. But at least they're being semi rational with their tight ends because if you remember, in Week one, Gerald Everett ran more routes than Comet. Comet was basically a drop candidate at that point, but things have shifted. Thankfully, they're using the young talented pass catcher. Comet saw a season high seventy one percent rout participation in Week three, Gerald Everett twenty one percent. That resulted in a season high twenty four percent target share for Comet. Now that likely is not going to continue when Keenan Allen is back that type of target share. But right now, the tight end position it's really weak, and Comet is still out there in sixty percent of Yahoo leagues, so he definitely should be added. Add Roshan Johnson, So I'll go with one more Chicago Bear before we move on. DeAndre Swift has been really bad this year. According to next Gen Stats, he's dead last and rushing your overexpected per rush and he's dead last with an eighteen point nine percent success rate, and Chicago seems to be noticing. In Week three, his running back rush share fell to fifty two percent, that was a season low. His row participation also fell to a season low fifty percent, and that led to another game with a sub ten percent target share. That's the second time that's happened this year for Swift. That's his bread and butter. If DeAndre Swift is going to be a viable fantasy asset, he needs to catch passes out of the backfield, but that's not happening right now, and he's been really bad on the ground. And then you look at Roshan Johnson. He played thirty eight percent of Chicago's snaps and he ran a route on thirty eight percent of Chicago's dropbacks. Khalil Herbert had a ten percent snap share in Week three. Now, Herbert's always been really good on the ground, but he's also had a lot of question marks as a receiver. That's the main reason he hasn't been an amazing fantasy asset. Rochan Johnson at least has a three down skill said, that's why I'm giving him some love on today's list. There's a chance that this was the start for a major shift in the Bear's backfield by Mike Evans. So this Buccaneers offense so far this year has been the Chris Godwin show. Godwins scored in every game and he has ten more targets than teammate Mike Evans. Evans has now had back to back bad games. He had seven point two p Piero points in Week two and he caught just two passes for seventeen yards in Week three, But now is not the time to panic. Evans still had a thirty two percent target chair in week two. In Week three, he saw shutdown corner Patrick Sirtan. Evans lined up against Sir Tan on twenty four of thirty two coverage snaps. Sir Tan is one of the best corners in the league. Now, Godwin's a legit asset to have this season, but we should expect these two wide receivers to meet in the middle a little bit more moving forward, add Darnell Mooney. Look, it's clear at this point that Darnell Mooney has a real role in this Falcons offense, and it's not that surprising because they don't have that much depth of pass catcher. But Mooney has had a really solid last couple of weeks. He had target sharers of twenty four percent and thirty percent over those two games. Atlanta's tried their best to establish the run. They've had a pass rate over expected below zero in each of their first three games, but even still a twenty four percent target share a thirty percent target share for a relatively talented player that shouldn't be sitting on the waiver wire by Rashid Shahed. So after such a good start to the season, Rashid Shaheed fell back to earth in Week three. He scored zero Fantasy points and a lot of people who are already pointed to the fact that this is just what Rashid Shaheed is. He's a deep threat. He either connects with a deep bomb or he doesn't, and when he doesn't, he is absolute toast in fantasy football. Now that's true to some extent, but this is not the same Rashid Shahed as what we saw in twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three. Despite the game that he had in Week three, he still hit a twenty one point seven percent target share. He's now been over a twenty percent target share in every game this year. He hit that mark just twice last season, and his fifty one percent air yard share this past week that was actually a season high. He just couldn't convert. Only twenty percent of his targets were catchable. That's according to PFF. Now the Saints don't have the easiest short term schedule according to adjustin Fantasy Points allowed, but from now through the end of the year, they have a top five schedule for wide receivers. So see if you can trade for Rashid Shahed because his role is a lot bigger than it was last year in the year before that. Ad Sam Donald. Sam Donald is the only quarterback in the NFL this year to have multiple touchdowns in every game played. This week, he gets Green Bay. It's not a great matchup on pay, but there could be more of a back and forth game with Jordan Love potentially back Now, Darnald does have some touchdown regression coming. His touchdown rate is currently ten point three percent, but he's in a good system. He's got an Alpha wide receiver. And keep in mind Darnald's doing all this without TJ. Hockinson and without Jordan Addison, so he's not a bad play this week, but he also has long term value. And if you need another quarterback streamer, if he's out there, look at Gino Smith. He's in a good spot this week against the Lions. Add the Las Vegas Raiders defense. So far this year, Cleveland's been the second most advantageous matchup for defenses according to adjusted Fantasy points allowed. They've given up the fourth highest pressure rate in the entire league, and they've been fourth worst in EPA per play. They get the Raiders this week, and it's in a game that has the second lowest game total on the slate. Cleveland's got offensive line issues. This is the right opponent for Vegas to get back on track. That's it for today's show, though thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribe to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are restating for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found in Follow me on Twitter at late Round QB. Thanks for listening everyone, I'll be back tomorrow with the weekly ten Trends episode. I'll talk to you then,