Trade Targets + TNF Preview, Hungry For More! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 9/25

what in the world is going on with him. It's everybody. Jake Ferguson, meanwhile, his injury in week one looked like, uh-oh, this, he might be toast, like for the entire year. He's already back, already back to 11 targets. And yes, GameScript really helped him out of the Cowboys were trailing to the Baltimore Ravens. This was a full comeback effort. And Ferguson got a bunch of targets there at the end. But he was a red zone dominator last year. We love that for our tight ends. And it's, what is the identity of this Dallas Cowboys team? It's a team that they're either, like, either they can't run or they're just abandoning the run. Both. Yeah. Like maybe that. Definitely the first one. I mean, I brought up, Rico Dattle is a good stash right now as things play out. But for the time being, smelly, smelly stash. This, this team is going to throw the ball a ton. And.

Brandon Cooks, Jalen Tolbert, they'll fit in here every once in a while. But Jake Ferguson is the number two option for this team. And because of the injury situation, the team that has him may have had, maybe they have a different tight end that they picked up. And you can go do wheel and deal. I just, I think that Jake Ferguson rest of season. is going to be one of the most reliable tight ends that we have available. Going into last week, it seemed like all of my leagues I had, one of the injured tight ends, and I was so excited to grab Ferguson off of some waiver. And in all of our league, he was rostered, because I agree with you. I think Ferguson, his red zone utilization is as good as anyone in the league. I think he led tight ends last year in that. And so he didn't come down with as many touchdowns as he should have.

But the fact that he can go out and be a player that gets 11 targets in a game at the tight end position and then has Reds on work. And is proven. Yeah. He's not buying into just a couple weeks. You should have looked at League of Shadows, Jay, because I scooped them up off the waiver wire. Wait. Oh, shadows is the one place I got Mark Andrews. Don't worry. Didn't need them. Problem solved. I want to throw a little asterisk into Mike's trade four candidate. Okay. I do believe. And I might have to whisper it. So listen carefully. Okay. I do believe you should trade for Travis Kelsey right now. Oh, okay. Wow. I think Travis Kelsey is a trade four candidate. I don't think he's been in shape. And I think he's going to get into shape and they need him badly. He did have five targets last week. Why is it in shape? Is this a Taylor Swift problem? Not a swift, but just an offseason of. A little bit.

I mean, there's a lot of- Love. A lot of commercial. A lot of commercials. A lot of commercials to film. A lot of jet setting, a podcast, a famous girlfriend. He's living the best life, man. If you, if the older you get, the more you need the off-season, okay? The more you need that time to get it. And I just think, like, he's, he's amazing. His career's amazing. But I think it's, I think you're seeing it come along in season. This is his, he's going to work himself into shape and this team. I think it's going to come along for Travis Kelsey in the bottom of the barrel. So I'm just, I'm whispering it. Honestly, if you go think about her, if you went and tried to trade right now, who do you think you get cheaper? Travis Kelsey or Jake Ferguson? I mean, Ferguson, you'll get cheaper. I don't know. I don't know. But like you start to, I mean, if you went to, I don't know, if you went to the Dallas Goddard manager right now, I'm not, as the number one tied in and you offered him Travis Kelsey, they're not all saying yes.

by any stretch of imagination. You're saying that my League of Record team that has Dallas Goddard, I should go try to trade for Travis Kelsey because I'm pretty sure that'll get noeep, nope, it'll get shut down immediately. I think it's more the inverse where you don't have the experience of the emotional event. Like you spent what, like a third back in second, a third rounder on Travis Kelsey and he's been destroying you. He has 11 total points on the year. I'm pretty sure Goddard had 11 on that one play. Yeah. And the experience of Goddard trying to trade him at 10 for 170, after 10 and 170, I don't know if everybody's going to do that. Anyways, I didn't want to hijack your hundred or your trade four. I don't hate it. All right, I'll hop in with my trade four candidate. My trade four candidate is the wide receiver 49. You've been.

You've been setting this one up for a couple weeks. Yeah, and honestly, I thought it would be right now. I didn't know that this was going to be the episode we were doing the trade for candidates, but this was the exact week that I thought you should trade for him. Because on film, this guy has been everything that you two fellers hoped and thought he would be. I was out on this player. I was the lowest on the three of us on George Pickens, wide receiver for the Pittsburgh Steelers. I'm out on this production. Oh, this production has been terrible. Week one wasn't really that bad. He had 10.5 fantasy points and half PPR, six for 85. It was like, and he looked good. He had some plays called back. Week two was Patrick Sartan. And he had two plays in that where he was unbelievably dominant on Sartan, a deep play and a touchdown. Both called back due to holding that didn't really affect the play.

You had a really good game in real life ability and execution that in the box score and in fantasy production, it didn't work out. It was a very, very bad game. Then last week, you had a game that we knew going in. Like I said, you know, don't trade for him yet because this Steelers Chargers game is going to be who can throw the ball fewer times. Who is going to run the most? and throw the least. And that's what happened. This was a 20 to 10 total points scored in the game. Dominant Steeler victory. And I watched the film. And here's what I was so impressed with. The reason I never really believed in George Pickens coming into this season is because I wasn't sure he was a complete wide receiver. He's kind of been this deep field stretching jump ball specialist, you know, highlight real guy that's going to be very hot and cold.

The diversity in his routes is exactly what you want. There are plays where he's just running right across the line of scrimmage, just, you know, a little crosser trying to get him open where if they hit him in stride, he can take it to the house. Still running the nine routes down the sideline where he's coming down with those balls. Running across the zone, sitting down in a spot, like they are using him like an alpha wide receiver. He's the clear number one target in this offense, and he has... passed the eye test incredibly while scoring very few fantasy points and upsetting their fantasy managers. I think if you are the George Pickens manager and you get offered something of any kind of value for him, you'll be open to that. You're done with this. You don't want to start him next week if you haven't been watching these games. The talent is there. The opportunity is there. But you're saying don't do that. Well, no, I'm saying trade for George Pickens. But if you have him, you're saying don't do that. Yes. If you have them, hold on to him.

If you don't have him, go get him. Because I think he's going to be affordable, cheap, and really good going forward. He plays Indianapolis this week. I think it's a good get-right situation for him. And while the quarterback play is not great, you know, in Justin Fields, he hasn't been. He's doing what he's been asked. Yeah, yeah. He's been doing what he's been asked. And they did just lose a really important defensive asset this week. So I think George Pickens has much brighter days ahead. And when I watch him play, I'm like, I want that player on my team. Well, I will go with a player that is the wide receiver 64 through three weeks. I'm going to go with Brandon Ayuk of the San Francisco 49ers. It's impossible for his value to be lower than it is right now. You're all about these players who are going to work themselves into shape. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, Brandon Ayukuk just hasn't worked out yet. And yet this is a player that.

was offered $30 million a year. Like we know who Brandon Ayuk is. We know what he's done. We know what, you know, the history is and what the expectation is. And he's still getting targeted. This is more of a maybe it took a couple weeks to work into shape. And then last week, 10 targets, 5 for 48 is not the end of the world. And you're talking about a situation where you're pre-buying on the cheap. Like Amari Cooper, like Amari Cooper's cost right now is. Not what it was last week because he came down with a couple of touchdowns and had a big game. The target numbers are going to be there for Brandon Ayuk. We are just seeing the lowest possible value for him in this moment. So I've not been the biggest Brandon Eug fan my entire time on this show, but at this point in time, if you can go get a player that has top 15 potential and he's the wide receiver 64, that is why you trade for them. You have to have the

Fortitude to go and offer something of value, maybe a player that has been overperforming and go get Brandon IUke. I don't mind it. I wonder if I wonder if more of the Brandon Iuke managers will have the same thought process of like, well, he's been, you know, he didn't have the off season. He didn't have camp. I think that's been the mindset each week. But for some of them, I think it expires. Yeah, you wear you down. You know, man, can I want to take so much. Yeah. I mean, let's do the conversation justice here. I'm going to read you some wide receivers and you tell me whether you'd trade them for brand on any. Mike, would you trade Chris Godwin away? Who is the wide receiver three? Oh, man. Wow, you started with fire. Yeah. We're supposed to work our way up to these things. You want me to go that direction? No, no, no, no, no. You stick him right in them flames. What are Chris Godwin?

25 targets on the season, 21 receptions. Yeah, the receipts. 253 yards and three tuddies. The touchdowns, like Godwin will not score in every single game. But eight for 83, seven for one, 17, six for 53. Is that a yes or no? I'm trying to work through it of like, what do I actually think about Chris Godwin? Because Mike Evans will be back. Like, he's, I mean, he's not gone, but he was like he was gone this past week production wise. He will be more involved. Baker loves that dude. I think, oh gosh. It's a yes for me. I'll hop in for you. You'd trade Godwin away? I would trade Godwin away. I don't know. Godwin had two touchdowns all of last year. He has three so far this season. It's not really his normal thing through his career. But they're using him difference. No, I. Stefan Diggs. I would trade Diggs. So Diggs is the wider receiver 12. Yeah, I would trade him for a U. There is a subconscious impact of seeing the player rank on these platforms.

Wide receiver 12, Stefan Diggs. What about D.K. McCaff? You hold on to Metcalf? Yes. Yeah, I would. What about Devante Smith? Wide receiver 11. If I could get Iyuk. For Devante Smith. If I could get Ayuk, I would do it. I would rather have Devante Smith. Devante Adams. Wide receiver 19. I think I'd hold Adams. Jameson Williams or Brandon and Iyuk. Brandon Ayuk. Iyuk. Drake London or Brandon Ayuk. Iyuk. So those are some names you could throw out there. London scored in two straight games. You're going to get that deal done. Like, I think the Drake London for Brandon Ayuk deal will get done in most of your leagues. Also, just quick point of reference for everybody. If you can extract more value, please do that. Right. You leverage. Say, hey, Drake London, look at these numbers. Even if you don't believe in them, it doesn't matter. You've got to sell the numbers and say, hey, give me Brandon Ayuk. Plus.

This. Jonathan Brooks and Brandon Ayuk for one of these guys. Something like that. Yeah. All right. What about trade away players? Players you're going to unload right now. These are spicy. You know, a live show back in 2018, I brought up the names hurt you. So sometimes you don't. Jason, you are, you are like exploding because your trade away candidate is the best one we've ever had. And I have him in one league and I was like, this is so smart. It's so smart and you have to do it. If you've got him in the league, you've got to go. You can get so much for him. Patrick. Patrick Mahomes. Patrick Mahomes. He's not that good for fantasy, man. He's an F, an F in our consistency rating over the last 17 games. Which accounts for 17 weeks of performance. He's the quarterback 13 in three weeks. And people hang on to names and keep playing names.

Because of history and hope. He's the best quarterback in the NFL. He is. He's the current active goat. Who used to be the best quarterback in the NFL? Tom Brady. Okay. Tom Brady was the goat. He played 23 seasons. How many times did he throw 30 touchdown passes? Well, he did. Tom Brady wasn't always great for fantasy. Sometimes he was. Okay. That's literally my point. Yeah. And it wasn't like all the years of 30 touchdowns came consecutively, by the way. And 30 is not the benchmark of 50, which he hit. No, it was a peppering. Nine of 23 years. Nine times Tom Brady threw for 30 touchdown passes. Okay. He had double digit interceptions, 12 different seasons. He only had eight seasons of over 4,500 passing yards for the goat. Like, you're going to have the best quarterbacks win ball games, how they need to be won. Right. In the NFL. In the NFL. And this Chief's team doesn't win ball games.

the way that the former chief's team needed to win ball games. This is why we love James Winston. Right. We don't need to win ball games. We need fantasy points. That man lost ball games the way we needed him to lose ballgame. But Tyree Kill leaving this team was a fundamental switch in the way that they executed the offense because Tyree Kill, we saw it when he got to Miami, is a unicorn. He's a one of one. He's a different player. The yards per attempt. The touchdown percentage. The fantasy points per game was without Tyree Kill, Mahomes, and we've got 35 games without Tyree Kill. It's five fantasy points fewer per game. So big names give you those big headlines. You're very happy when you go into the week and you go, oh my gosh, my quarterback. Have you seen him? It's Patrick Mahomes. But we now have a run of 17, 18, 19 games where this is a bottom.

of the quarterback starters. Right. Performing. Now, and you're going to start them every week. That doesn't mean you're going to not get, you know, a special game here, there from Patrick Mahomes, and you're going to listen to this show and then you're going to see him throw some 74-yard touchdown to Xavier Worthy one week and you're like, oh, you idiot. You should have kept him. Yeah, you're going to have that happen. Patrick Mahomes has not finished inside the top eight at the quarterback position since week seven of last year. And he only did it twice last year. So you're talking about even those outlier games are barely coming. 291 passing yards 151, 217, five total touchdowns in three weeks. That is not the normal recipe for old Patrick Mahal. Tell me, what is the Kansas City Chiefs record? Three and oh, they're fine. They're not, they don't need to change this. It's like the, oh, his average depth of target keeps going down. They're back to back champions. They're, they are doing NFL right.

But for fantasy, I mean, you could trade Patrick Mahomes for a Jaden Daniels plus a lot probably. Well, you're not getting. Well, after last week, you reached too high. Yeah, that was strong. Okay. You came strong. Joe Burrow plus a lot. If you, if you've got. Maybe. No, you could do that. I think you could do that. I think you're looking at your team and you've got Higgins or you've got Jamar Chase or you've got DAC and you want to flip. you know, for your stack. You want to take Mahomes and go get Dak or go get Burrow or something like that to make your team have more correlation. And then you might be able to get an extra piece on because he's Patrick freaking Mahomes, but he's not that good for Phoenix. His A-DOT right now would be tied for the lowest of any qualifying quarterback since 2006. So you've got almost a 20-year stretch where he is throwing the ball that close to the line of scrimmage. And look at the roster. You don't have it. You don't have those players. You have Rashi Rice, who is the...

Far and away alpha of this team. Yes, he is. But he's also the leader in yards after catch. So he's getting some cheap yards for Patrick Mahomes, but his average depth of target is shallow. And then Xavier Worthy is very, very, like right now he might as well be called Nicole Hartman. Like I don't want to say that, but that's a truth. Like Xavier Worthy's route tree and utilization is not any sort of Malik neighbors, Marvin Harrison, Brian Thomas Jr., any of those players. No, it certainly is not. I will say that the utilization was a little bit better this last week as far as route type and stuff. It didn't work out. He wasn't targeted, but just behind the scenes to be aware of. No, I think he had. I didn't know where he was two for 17. Yeah. Ah.

All right. So no target. Two weeks in a row. Two for 17. I'm going to throw out the next trade away. Interesting. Target. Mike is shaking his head. I disagree on this. Okay. You disagree. And that's the point. Like it's hard to find trade away. You have to trade away someone who has value. Like right? Trade away, you know, Van Jefferson. He's not good. Like, okay. Okay. Lay it out. So right now, running backs are king. They are dominating in fantasy football. They're beaten up on the wide receiver position. I think as the season goes along, it'll even out a little bit more. This Aaron Jones has been a revelation for the Minnesota Vikings. I was the highest on Aaron Jones coming into this season. I watched this film last year. You didn't lose. Now you abandoned him. No, now I'm capitalizing on him. Aaron Jones hasn't lost a step. He's really, really, really good. He was great last season. He got injured.

came back, was great at the end of last year, goes to the division rivals, and has been great. And the Minnesota Vikings team is 3-0, and they're surprising people, and they're looking like a great offense. And Sam Darnal is great. So far, he's averaging six yards per touch. Only J.K. Dobbins is better with running backs with 30 or more touches. He's never really been a battle cow. The reason I'm willing to trade Aaron Jones is twofold. One, I think you can get a lot for him. This is a top 10 running back. who has spent his career being a top running back, who's looking great. Like people will want Aaron Jones. They will pay up for Aaron Jones. This is a matter of flags. This is a matter of yellow flags. He's a 30-year-old running, almost 30-year-old running back. That's a flag, not in his case. The Sam Darnold thing, look, they've been great. The coaching staff deserves all the credit in the world. It's still hard for me to, if I had to take my house and say, Sam Darnold finishes this year.

as a great quarterback or finishes this year as, you know, average to below average quarterback, if I had to put my house on, I would still go the other way based on just the amount of historical data versus the three weeks we've seen in Minnesota. I think teams will start to figure some things out. When you've got a back who is in a committee, who is super efficient right now, who is older, whose team has ways it could go wrong, I just don't think that what you're going to see the entirety of the season is utter domination from the Minnesota Vikings and from Aaron Jones. I am not saying unload him. He's a ticking time bomb. I just think there are so many ways that I could see it go wrong, whether it's Donald, whether it's injury with his age, whether it's the timeshare that we saw in week two where he wasn't that good because he was splitting reps.

because there are a handful of ways it could go wrong, I would rather capitalize on what has gone right right now and try to find more value, probably at the wide receiver position, some of these other guys that we've been talking about that have been maybe underperforming plus something. That's the method I want to take here is trying to find a guy who you just think is like, I don't think it's going to last as good as it's been for the first three weeks for the next 14. All right, Mike, who's your tradeaway candidate? So this one, he does not have production value, but I think he still has name value, and is DJ Moore. And I am very nervous about what's going on here with the Chicago Bears. It's a rookie quarterback. This one is sketchy because it's a rookie quarterback who the schedule is great right now. We kind of rattled that off the other day for the Bears. The upcoming schedule is so good. And Caleb should get better.

over the second half of the year as he becomes more of a vet and less of a rookie. But it is not happening for DJ Moore, 5 for 36, 6 for 53. And the reason why I think he is a trade, because you look at the box right now, you go 8 for 78. That's not too bad. We got 11 points. 44 of those yards were in absolute garbage, Hail Mary at the end of a half. That was just, that was a gift from the fantasy gods. if you play DJ Moore. That saved your day. The targets have still been there, but Roma Dunesay, somehow he survived his injury. He's back. Maybe he's breaking out. Once Keenan Allen comes back, I think that this is just, it's even messier. Keenan Allen was super involved in that week. Maybe make the argument, Keenan's not going to be able to come back from the heel injury, but if he does, getting out of DJ Moore right now, I think that's the way to go of.

I don't think that the production is going to get to the point where, like, we're back to old DJ Moore, where he didn't have, where he wasn't just the one guy. It's for with a quarterback who's okay. It's back to DJ Moore's such a good wide receiver and he deserves better than this. He's a really tough one because I'll just spoiler alert here. Don't know why I said it like that. All right. He's my start of the week this week. It straight them after this week? Well, and right now... It should work. DJ Moore is tied for number four in the NFL in Target, which, by the way, can you name the top target leaders right now? Give me number one. Who's getting... It's number one by four targets. Number one by four targets. Malik Neighbors? Malik Neighbors. Oh, yes, of course. Number two.

Amunrah St. Brown. Yeah. That's crazy because he had the down week. Number three is a tie between Rashi Rice and Amari Cooper. Okay. And then number four, a tie between Devante Smith, Nico Collins, and DJ Moore. So yeah, the DJ Moore one, look, you make a good point for the future of DJ Moore beyond this week. Like I don't expect Keenan Allen back. I think a lot of people are bending towards Roma Dunesay this week, but DJ Moore's targets are there, so I'm going to, he's the start of the week for me this week. But the long-term murkiness called Kamet's emergence, which came up on yesterday's waiver show, Komet, Allen, Adunze, and DJ Moore for a rookie quarterback who has not looked like Jaden Daniels. What do you guys think the chances are that Caleb Williams gets hot and figures it out this year? This year.

Not in the future. This season, by the end of the year, you're saying he's like a weekly starter. 50. I would say lower than that. Because it's not just Caleb. That offensive line is how do you fix that in the middle of the season? I don't fire Shane Waldron. I don't think you can fix it right now. All right. DJ Moore, the tradeaway candidate there. Jason, Aaron Jones, I went with. Patrick Mahomes will take a break. And if you trade these players, these are not dump players. Right. These are players that we think could have perceived. Well, Aaron Jones has great value. But Mahomes is a name. DJ Moore is a name. Don't dump these players. Upgrade your team. Utilize the name or the production through these three weeks to get a great deal. All right. Let's take a quick break. All right. We get a Thursday night football game.

this week and uh it's kind of interesting thursday night breakdown the dallas cowboys one and two taking on the new york giants who are also one and two on thursday night football in new york the drafting sports book line dallas minus five and a half the overrunners 45 who doesn't want to watch cd lamb and malik neighbors playing thursday night football Yeah, this is fun. It's in division. You've got a team coming off of a good performance in the Giants, who is the underdog going against a reeling Cowboys. The Giants are at home as well, which makes this more interesting. That being said, this rivalry has not really been much of a rivalry in recent, in recent memory. Last year, Dallas won 40 to nothing and 49 to 17. They have had the Cowboys.

The Cowboys have had the Giants number, like, brutally so. Yeah, and Dak is 12 and 2 against him in his career. Now, Dallas has played. Terrible football. Bad defense. Pooh-pooh. Pooh-pooh football. For two straight weeks. Like, I would say to the point where Jason doesn't like any of their balls. No. They are not crisp. And yet they get a five and a half point, you know, they got five and a half points here. On the road? On the road. Okay. And so, you know, does their defense show up? Do we get a, you know, 45 points is a pretty good over under here, implied point total of 25 for Dallas, 20 for the Giants. It puts Devin Singletary in play against one of the worst run defenses in the, I don't know, last 20 years. It's really, really hard to imagine not putting Devin Singletary in your lineup. The process, you know, I think the Cowboys will.

fix some things over the course of the season and not just be historically bad at stopping the run. But right now, after three weeks, they can't stop the run. And Devin Singletary, in his own right, has been pretty good. He's been a top 20 running back the last two weeks. He was top 10 last week against Cleveland. Looked good. And so, yeah, Devin Singletary is, I would say, is going to be 90% of the leagues that have Devin Singletary should be starting him. As a reminder, since he is a flex type of player, make sure you put him in the running back slot, not in the flex slot.