Chasing Ships and Flipping Pieces: Part 3

The season is almost upon us! In FFPC leagues, there are barely two weeks left before we have to cut our rosters down to 20, including a kicker and a defense. On some of my dynasty squads, I am facing some steep cuts and difficult choices. How do I go about deciding which players to cut? Can I make some two-for-one trades that clear roster spots for me, or players for picks? Am I going to be fielding a competitive team that can contend for the title? Will there be a couple of impact players available on the first waiver run, and if so, will I have room to roster them? What about some later-round rookie picks that flashed during the preseason and I want to develop them? 

Those Are A Lot Of Factors To Be Weighed 

Maybe you are thinking why not keep this simple and keep the players you think are better? Even I would have to admit that if you slice all the fantasy football (FF) analysis out there down to the most basic actionable truth, you will have better results in the short and the long term if you draft better players than your opponents. It is kind of like hitting a hole-in-one. As strategies go, it isn’t a bad one.

Ok, so maybe I have picked a bunch of good players. But I can’t keep them all. So now what? Well, one small point is that although I hate injuries and I never wish (or plan) for them, it is often nice that we can stash up to three players on Injured Reserve (IR) in-season, without counting against the 20 player limit. I will undoubtedly be helped out in my roster crunch challenge by virtue of somebody getting hurt and moved to IR. It is only delaying the inevitable, of course, but it may allow me that extra flexibility that I need.

In Parts 1 and 2 of this series, I talked about the concepts of franchise values, of player values, of paying premiums to acquire studs (or premium draft picks), of being willing to sell for quarters on the dollar in the name of flexibility. I have written about the value of a roster spot, of the links between activity and success, of how you can play small ball at QB in SuperFlex, and I have written of the value of later picks in rookie drafts. The goal for me is to tie all this together when making these last decisions. 

What If I Might Have Potential Roster Cloggers But I Don’t Know If I’m Competitive Yet?

And that is really the rub. The truth is I have prepared myself for this moment throughout the offseason, and out of my 29 FFPC dynasty squads, there are only two where I feel I am facing steep cuts and have tough decisions. But I have already made some moves there and am on my way. The hard part will be waivers when I see so many other darlings that got cut. But that doesn’t answer the competitiveness question, and the only way to answer that is to compete and get a few weeks into the season.

The First Three-Five Weeks Of The NFL Season Reveal The Most Info

You may have some great squads that have been unlucky with a couple of early-season matchups, but they are still in strong shape to make a run. Or maybe you have an overachieving team that you don’t really believe in but it is putting up victories. By this time you should have a pretty good idea of where you stand, how the NFL landscape is looking, and you will want to be hitting the trade options hard if you decide you don’t think you can get there. 

Consolidating vs Liquidating

If your team is in the rebuilding category and not going to win the ship, this is a great time to be moving aging but productive assets. The following chart is a great visual breakdown of the typical trading value cycle throughout the calendar year. Right now we are entering the prime time to move players for future picks.

Tyler Lockett, Mike Evans, Leonard Fournette, guys that can help other teams win now. I would be aggressively willing to sell these types of one-dollar players for three quarters, or five quarters, or the best deal I could get, to obtain as much future and younger talent as possible. This is a liquidation path. And that doesn’t preclude you from consolidating assets either, but those deals will be more dependent on obtaining good value.

Unless you are contending to win, in which case you will be wanting to consolidate, and not necessarily based on obtaining value! This is where you pay the premium to obtain the stud. 

And, as before, you can always liquidate when you are contending as well. But it should probably take the form of getting draft picks back, so you can clear a roster spot, which I have determined should be worth something between five and 10 franchise value points.

Here are a couple of examples of consolidation and liquidation trades that I have made in SuperFlex leagues this offseason:

A gentle reminder that FFPC leagues are TE premium (1.5 PPR)

Although I am taking on an extra player in the Cooper/Mayfield exchange, I do not anticipate keeping Andy Dalton (QB – CHI) for more than a few weeks into the season, as I also hold Justin Fields (QB – CHI) in that league. I consider this a consolidation trade because I believe Baker Mayfield (QB – CLE) should be considered the biggest asset in this deal and I fundamentally made my team better in the SuperFlex format because of this trade. I have strong WR depth and can afford to move Cooper.

Liquidation trades, on the other hand, aren’t really designed to make your starting lineup better so much as to yield draft capital and roster flexibility or to obtain comparable value in aggregate. The Joe Mixon (RB – CIN) trade above is a liquidation trade fundamentally because I cleared a roster spot, but that team is a contender and I only did it because I felt the value was compelling enough. Not because I think Joe Mixon is a roster clogger.

Earlier in the offseason, I unloaded several players I consider to be roster cloggers, in deals that added up in aggregate but didn’t appear sexy on Twitter. In March some of these trades were blasted, but now a trade of player X for player Y and 2.02 has turned out to be in my favor as everyone seems to have the player I picked at 2.02 as being worth more than either player X or Y. Even though at the time I got blasted for player Y not being in the same tier as player X. Even though Terrace Marshall Jr. (WR – CAR) at 2.02 is likely already worth more than both. That is only one example.

Pay Attention To Who Is Actually Starting For You

As we move forward into the first few weeks of the 2021 season, I strongly encourage you to take a hard and honest look at your roster and think about whether you may have a player or two that could be roster cloggers. Can they be packaged as an ice-cold and shiny Coke in a can for someone that believes? Maybe that roster spot will be the one you fill with the next James Robinson (RB – JAX). I picked Tyreek Hill (WR – KC) off waivers in FFPC his rookie year. The team that dropped him probably didn’t have the roster flexibility to hold him. That is a shame.

I hope these articles and ideas have helped you think about meta-strategy approaches to your dynasty teams. I will be writing a weekly FFPC themed article to give pointers on free agent auction blind bidding (FAAB), reading of the NFL tea leaves, and a snapshot of the week’s results for one of my project auction teams that I bought from dynastydepot.com as well as some FFPC redraft and BestBall action. Maybe we can all get to Wally World together!

Thanks for reading! Feel free to reach out to me to chat about fantasy football on Twitter @Ship_Chaser and follow along with me on my journey as I chase six-figure paydays! Look for my new articles soon!

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