Trades You Need To Make In Fantasy Football Before Week 3
Trade Targets For Fantasy Football Week 3
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 10.
More: Fantasy Notebook: All The Usage Data From Week 2
Buy George Kittle & Brandon Aiyuk
The injuries are stacking up in San Francisco. First it was Christian McCaffrey who missed Week 1, then was placed on IR. He’s now expected to be out until mid-to-late October. Then we get the news this week that Deebo Samuel is expected to miss multiple weeks with a calf injury. That takes an offense loaded with weapons and condenses it down to a more consolidated target share. The ball is going to three players: Jordan Mason, Brandon Aiyuk, and George Kittle.
For Aiyuk, he’s gotten off to a slow start but that was expected after missing all of training camp and preseason with his contract situation. He’s now had two weeks to get reacclimated and will be the primary target in the passing game.
And for Kittle, we often complain about his volatility, but when one or more of the other weapons in the offense are out, he’s consistently produced at a high level. In fact, when Deebo missed Weeks 7 and 8 last season, Kittle combined for 14 catches on 18 targets for 227 yards.
I’m trying to take advantage and buy both of these guys this week, especially with the upcoming matchup against the Rams who are giving up fantasy points in buckets right now.
Buy Trey McBride
Trey McBride is the TE6 in PPR scoring after two weeks. He’s had two underwhelming fantasy outings of 8.0 and 12.7 fantasy points. However, in both weeks, McBride has continued his elite role from a year ago. He’s played a ton of snaps, run a ton of routes, and has had target shares of 29.0% and 28.6%. He’s third among all tight ends in targets and second to only Hunter Henry in target share.
At a position that is so hard to find consistently reliable production, we want a guy who is going out and commanding that level of opportunity on a weekly basis. The fantasy points are absolutely coming. Quarterback Kyler Murray has played well, especially in Week 2, which should only enhance our confidence that McBride will start producing as the top-3 tight end we drafted him to be. My prediction: he will end the season as the TE1.
Buy Anthony Richardson
Anthony Richardson was awesome in Week 1 and face-planted in Week 2. But what he gave us in Week 1 was exactly why we were drafting him so much this summer. He threw multiple touchdowns, ran for another, and picked up 56 yards on the ground. He even showed off his rocket-launcher of an arm with three completions of more than 50 yards. Things came back down to earth in Week 2 on the road against an underrated Packers defense.
And while there was certainly some cause for concern, we have to remember that this was just the sixth career start for Anthony Richardson. He’s played in six games. He’s attempted fewer than 140 passes. It’s not crazy to think that he’s going to have some games where he looks like a rookie quarterback. If you’re okay living with that here and there, then I encourage you to go out and buy him from the manager in your league who might be a bit worried right now.
That’s because Anthony Richardson, while volatile, can win you weeks unlike any quarterback not named Lamar, Jalen, or Josh. He is an unbelievable rusher with Cam Newton-like skills at the goal line. We’ve already seen the arm talent and he has the weapons and one of the sharpest offensive coaching staffs in the NFL. Week 1 is going to be what we get more often than not. Accept the few duds here and there, and enjoy the league-winning upside.
Buy Jameson Williams
I may have been wrong about Jameson Williams. The bad vibes from his first two years are gone and it’s nothing but fun football and big plays out of the former Alabama superstar. But he’s not just running straight lines down the field. The Lions are utilizing his speed in a number of ways. In addition to the vertical stuff, they’re putting him on shallow crosses, deep crosses, corners, and posts to find multiple ways to get him open and utilize his elite speed. Through two weeks, Williams has 20 targets which ranks No. 5 among all NFL players. That has come on target shares of 32.1% and 20.8%. He accounted for a third of the team’s air yards in Week 2, while running the same number of routes as Amon-Ra St. Brown.
While we usually recommend buying low on players, it is absolutely okay to buy high. I’ve see enough through two weeks to confidently say Jameson Williams is worth every penny it will cost to acquire him.
Buy Zack Moss
The question all summer was which Bengals running back would be the one to roster in fantasy football? Would it be Chase Brown or Zack Moss. I was actually leaning Brown because he was projected to play more in the passing game and was the more explosive of the two. Unfortunately, I didn’t fully appreciate the difference between Moss and Brown in pass protection. I had hoped we’d see a step forward from Brown in that area and the coaches would trust him enough to put him out there in those situations. That has not been the case. In fact, this backfield hasn’t even been close through two weeks. So far, Moss has out-snapped Brown 84 to 30 while playing 80% of the snaps in Week 2. Moss has run 40 routes to Brown’s 13, and has a 72.2% opportunity share to Brown’s 27.8%.
Moss is the clear workhorse in an offense that is only going to get better from here. We’re not buying him expecting to get a top-12 running back in fantasy, but he can be a steady RB2 for the duration of the season.
Bonus Buys:
Braelon Allen: Elite handcuff with a smidge of stand-alone value
Rachaad White: Elite receiving RB
Rashee Rice: Volume in the KC offense. Buy high.
Rhamondre Stevenson: The focal point of the offense and the receiving volume is back. The o-line is exceeding expectations.
Terry McLaurin: Still the WR1 in Washington. He has overcome quarterback play throughout his entire career. Things will get better, don’t give up yet.
Sell Kyren Williams
You can’t say I didn’t warn you. There was no one more adamant that you absolutely should not be drafting Kyren Williams in the second round. But for those of you who didn’t listen, the sell window is still open. Despite a complete lack of efficiency in the first two weeks, Williams has still managed to score 14.4 and 15.2 fantasy points thanks to a pair of goal line plunges. However, Williams has been about as bad as any running back in football between the twenties. He’s averaging just 2.5 yards per carry, has evaded one tackle on 37 total touches, and has yet to have a run reach 10 yards. His yards per touch and yards created per touch are both outside the top-40 running backs (PlayerProfiler.com).
Maybe you want to blame the offensive line for his struggles and that would be fair considering it is by far the most injury depleted unit in the NFL. However, things are not going to get much better on that front anytime soon so he will continue to have to run behind a struggling line.
Then we also have Blake Corum lingering in the shadows. After not seeing the field in Week 1, the rookie started Week 2 strong with a 41-yard kick return. He ended up taking eight carries for 28 yards on offense as well. If you followed anything I did in the summer, you already know I am all-in on Corum and consider him the best running back in Los Angeles.
I’ve never been more confident in that take than I am right now. We’re going to see Corum eased into the offense more and more over the course of the season, taking away the volume that Williams benefited so much from in 2023. Before that happens and before your league mates realize how truly terrible Williams has been so far, put him on the trade block and get your money back on this fantasy lemon.
Sell JK Dobbins
JK Dobbins has been about as impressive as anyone in fantasy football to begin 2024. It’s not because we underestimated his talent—he’s always been a good running back—it’s just nobody but the Chargers actually expected him to be able to perform at such a high level after a series of catastrophic leg injuries over the last few seasons. However, Dobbins is looking as good as ever and is currently the RB4 in PPR formats. He has scored more than 20 fantasy points in both games and is leading the NFL in rushing yards.
With that said, it is absolutely impossible for Dobbins to maintain this pace in his current role. That’s because while it feels like he is a bellcow in Los Angeles, Dobbins has yet to reach a 50% snap share in either game. In fact, he was actually out-snapped by Gus Edwards in Week 2 while playing just 46.4% of the snaps. He has taken just 45.8% of the running back rush attempts in the Chargers offense and has been targeted just four times. Of course, this could shift given how well he has played to begin the season, but for now, he’s looking like anything but a bellcow.
We also need to remember that the Chargers have played two of the easiest run defenses in football to begin the season. It was the Raiders in Week 1 and the Panthers in Week 2. Who knows how things will look when the going gets tougher. And speaking of the schedule tightening up, the Chargers have the Steelers and the Chiefs over the next two weeks.
While I certainly don’t expect Dobbins to go away, it’s hard to see this level of production being sustainable. I’m selling to anyone willing to pay an RB1 price tag.
Sell Tyreek Hill & Jaylen Waddle
Who knows if/when Tua Tagovailoa will be back under center in Miami. He will miss a minimum of four games after the team placed him on IR, but I suspect his absence will linger beyond that. That means it will be Skylar Thompson responsible for feeding Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle for the foreseeable future. I’m not sure how I feel about that. Going back to the last time we saw Thompson starting games, things got pretty ugly for both Hill and Waddle. In three full games together in 2022, Hill averaged 9 targets, 5.3 receptions, 46.3 receiving yards, and scored zero touchdowns.
It was even worse for Waddle who averaged 5.3 targets, 3.7 receptions, 37 receiving yards, and again no touchdowns (Jared Smola on Twitter). Of course, that was Thompson‘s rookie season and things could certainly be better this time around, but I’m not expecting anything close to what we’re used to. Hill is still a WR1, but closer to the WR8-10 range, while I am desperately trying to move on from Waddle wherever I can.
Sell Dontayvion Wicks
Every fantasy analyst on planet earth was touting Dontayvion Wicks as a late-round sleeper this summer. Unfortunately, it’s going to be difficult for him to make the dream a reality when he’s playing such a limited role. Despite scoring the touchdown in Week 2, Wicks still only managed 11.6 PPR points. That’s after putting up a goose egg in Week 1. Even with the touchdown, Wicks was only targeted four times and ran just 50% of the routes. He is not a main character in this offense.
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