Fantasy Football Trades You Need To Make Before Week 3
Week 3 Fantasy Football Trades: Top Buys & Sells
If you’re going to win a fantasy football championship, you have to be trying to find ways to make your team better week in and week out. One of the best ways to do that is to shop the trade market. Be active with making trade offers, updating your trade block, and engaging in conversation with your league mates. It’s also important that you make quality trades. The best way to make sure you don’t get taken advantage of by your league mates and that you are offering fair deals is to utilize our fully customizable redraft fantasy football trade calculator. Now here are a few buys and sells to consider building your trades around in Week 3.
More: Fantasy Notebook: Snaps, Targets, Air Yards, & Routes Data From Week 2
Buy: De’Von Achane
De’Von Achane missed Week 1 and then only played 10% of the snaps in Week 2. However, he is just a couple weeks away from a fantasy football explosion. Raheem Mostert has been carrying the load for the Dolphins through two weeks, but we know his injury history and he’s 31-years old. Either he is going to get injured again or the team is going to pull back on his workload in favor of their explosive rookie. Salvon Ahmed has also been getting a decent number of carries but he is now dealing with injuries of his own and is not a true difference maker.
Achane was drafted in the third round out of Texas A&M to be an explosive weapon out of the backfield. He has elite 4.32 speed with incredible elusiveness and change-of-direction ability. He is the perfect running back for the Mike McDaniel offense and Shanahan-style rushing scheme. Achane has the speed to get to the edge and the explosion to put his foot in the ground and take it up field. He is the type of running back who can rip off long touchdowns from anywhere on the field. That means, even if he is sharing the backfield with Mostert, he will still be a viable fantasy option.
But if he gets the opportunity to take on a significant portion of the backfield work, he will make a major impact for your fantasy team. It might be a slow ramp up to that point, but if you can be patient and wait for his moment, go get him now while he is cheap.
Buy: Michael Pittman
Fantasy drafters shied away from Michael Pittman this summer because of the unknown at quarterback. But with Anthony Richardson playing well to begin his rookie season and Pittman fully operating as the established alpha dog in the passing game, the fourth-year wide receiver is looking like a very intriguing trade target heading into Week 3. Pittman has had target shares of 28% and 36% to begin the season. His targets per route rate is 35% which is among the highest in the NFL. Pittman finished Week 1 with eight receptions on 11 targets for 97 yards and a touchdown and followed it up with another eight catches on 12 targets for 56 yards in Week 2. That’s 16 receptions through two weeks. Rookie Josh Downs is second on the team with seven.
Any concerns about Richardson as a passer went out the window in Week 1 when he completed 65% of his passes for over 220 yards. It doesn’t appear passing volume will be an issue either, as Richardson attempted 37 passes in his debut and attempted 10 in the first quarter of Week 2 before his concussion.
Pittman should continue to see targets at a high volume. He should also dominate the red zone looks and, based on the play of Richardson through five quarters, the Colts will earn more trips inside the 20-yard line than originally projected. Trade for Pittman now before he fully establishes himself as a top-12 fantasy producer.
Buy: Rachaad White
I loved Rachaad White all through draft season because he was locked into a bellcow role with one of the most complete skill sets of any running back in football. Through two weeks, the role has been exactly what we were hoping for. He has played over 70% of the snaps in both games and he’s dominating the passing game work with a 70% route participation rate in Week 2. White is top-10 in the NFL in rush attempts and his Week 2 target share (15%) was ninth among all running backs.
White’s Week 2 performance on the ground was far more efficient than Week 1, with 73 yards and a score on 17 carries. He now has 34 rush attempts on the year which is 21 more than the next closest Tampa running back. Despite fear of backfield competition from his detractors, White is fully locked in as the bellcow. Rookie Sean Tucker has struggled to get anything going with a 1.7 yards per carry average and Chase Edmonds is expected to miss significant time with a knee sprain.
Now is the perfect time to buy White because we know the role and he’s yet to breakout as a fantasy scorer so far. Yet, the usage and the surprising performance of the Bucs offense points to some big outings in his future. Buy now before it happens.
Buy: Darren Waller
The Giants offense is built around two players: Saquon Barkley and Darren Waller. With Barkley now set to miss multiple games with an ankle injury, the offense will run through Waller. The former Raider has gotten off to a good start to his Giants career. He followed up his five target outing in Week 1 with six catches on eight targets for 76 yards. Through two weeks, Waller is fourth among tight ends in targets, sixth in receptions, and no. 1 in receiving yards. He has yet to find the end zone so the fantasy production has been low enough to make him attainable in trade. The Giants offense came to life in the second half of Week 2 so if they can carry that into future weeks, it’s only a matter of time before Waller gets in the end zone and starts scoring like a top-5 tight end.
Heading into Thursday night’s game against the 49ers, Waller is as healthy as he’s been all season and is off the injury report. The emerging downfield threat of rookie Jalin Hyatt should only help open up the middle and intermediate areas of the field for a guy like Waller to take advantage of. He is on the verge of a monster performance. That could come anytime in the next couple weeks. I hope you trade for him before it happens.
Sell: Garrett Wilson
There was a lot of hope for a second-year breakout for Jets wide receiver Garrett Wilson. But that was when Aaron Rodgers was quarterbacking the team. With Rodgers out for the season and Zach Wilson looking no better than he did a year ago, those hopes seem to be dashed. In 10 games with Zach Wilson at quarterback in 2022, Garrett Wilson averaged 3.9 receptions, 48 receiving yards, and 8.6 fantasy points. With every other quarterback (Joe Flacco/Mike White), Wilson averaged 6 receptions, 82 receiving yards, and 17 fantasy points.
It’s a massive difference and speaks to the incompetence of Zach Wilson as a quarterback. Now, I do expect things will be better between the two this year—and they already have—but the projections vs what they were looking like when we thought Aaron Rodgers would be quarterback, need to be adjusted. The good news for those who drafted Garrett Wilson is your trade window is still open thanks to two touchdowns that saved his fantasy day in each game so far. We can’t count on that luck staying week-in-week out, though. Without the scores, both games would have been ugly with a five catch, 34-yard stat line in Week 1 and just two catches in Week 2. Luckily Wilson was able to make a play after the catch on a slant route in Week 2 that resulted in a 68-yard score.
With the next four games being against the Patriots, Chiefs, Broncos, and Eagles, now is the time to cash in on Garrett Wilson before it’s too late.
Bonus Buys
- Anthony Richardson
- Jaylen Waddle
- Josh Jacobs
- Jaxon Smith-Njigba
- Chris Olave
Bonus Sells
- James Conner
- Breece Hall
Do you have trade questions? Jump in our Discord and join the discussion!
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