Dynasty Analysis
As @DFF_Joemem mentioned in his rapid reaction article, we got the news that Michael Thomas underwent a second ankle surgery in June and likely won’t be ready to go to start the NFL season for the New Orleans Saints. This would be his second ankle surgery of the off-season as he already had surgery in January following the NFL season after sustaining a high-ankle sprain in Week 1 of the 2020 season. The above is what we know for certain. What we don’t know is what exactly transpired this off-season, what exact surgeries Thomas had, and why he waited so long to have his surgery, putting his 2021 season in serious doubt. But, we can begin to put together a rough outline given his injury timeline that can help fantasy owners decide what to do with Thomas for both redraft and dynasty.
SuperFlex (SF) formats have become more and more popular over the last couple of years. In the FFPC Dynasty world, 42% of all startups in 2021 have been SF. This was the going rate back in 2020 as well. Before 2020, SF only made up about 11% of the total number of dynasty leagues on their site. Now it is closer to 26% and rising. I fell in love with this format and hold 19 FFPC SF dynasty squads.
Welcome back to the “Fantasy Stock Up, Stock Down” series. We have just two divisions remaining, and this week’s coverage will focus on the AFC North. Check out the breakdowns for the: NFC West, AFC East, NFC East, AFC South, NFC South, and the AFC West divisions here at DFF as well, with the NFC North to follow soon. Keep in mind, there will be a player whose stock is up and a player whose stock is down from each team in this division.
It happens every year. Players get hyped during the offseason, and lofty expectations are set for them that coming season. Inevitably, several players will fail to meet those expectations and their value will fall, and leave a sour taste in your mouth. However, as a savvy fantasy player, you can use this to your advantage to identify undervalued players. Not every player who has failed to meet expectations will rebound, but if you put some thought into it, you can identify the ones that have a strong case for a bounce back.
Thomas injured his ankle twice during the regular season last year and was expected to undergo surgery on it as early as January of 2021. Unfortunately for his team, it looks like now he won’t be looking 100% until we hit the ⅓ mark of the season. The Saints schedule has a bye Week 6 before they head into a Monday Night Football matchup against the division-rival Seahawks in Week 7. Given the expected timeline, it’s hard for me to imagine the Saints rushing him back there for the week 5 game against WFT at about the 3 to 3.5-month mark given the uncertainty of when the surgery actually occurred in June. Expecting a push for a Week 7 return makes the most sense when projecting this early on.
Derrick Henry is the starting running back for the Tennessee Titans, and he may be the most polarizing single player in fantasy football right now. The 27-year-old, sixth-year back out of Alabama is currently being valued by some as an elite fantasy running back, but many others are selling now projecting his market value to plummet due to his age. The Titans have Henry under contract through the 2023 season for approximately $12M per year. However, the Titans do have a potential out following the 2021 season where they would take on only a $6M dead cap hit that they may prorate over two seasons. The Titans had considerable offensive gains when they A) enabled Arthur Smith to call plays for the offensive unit, B) named Ryan Tannehill as the starting quarterback, and C) drafted A.J. Brown to become the new Alpha wide receiver.
To get a general idea of who Corey Davis is, he was an Upside prospect out of Western Michigan. Coming into the league at 6 feet 2.8 inches, 209 pounds, and a 26.3 BMI, he qualified as an Alpha. Which is a solid start to a profile, a prospect with potential upside and Alpha size. Unfortunately for Davis, he was selected by a team that deployed a low passing volume. Which played a big part in consensus not being high on him after his rookie season where he posted 375 receiving yards on 65 targets. But the raw numbers don’t do him justice. He owned a 19.1% target share is quite impressive. To get an idea of what Corey Davis’s first season told us, here is the fellow Upside Alpha’s who posted a target share within 3% of Corey Davis’ 19.1%.
The NFL season is almost upon us with less than two weeks left until Training Camps. The time to pilfer the waiver wire for any free talent before they gain value from camp buzz is right now. Some known commodities might make a splash, but owners are hoping to cash in on the next James Robinson or Phillip Lindsay to win now or trade while their value is high. We’ll look at team depth charts and scouting reports to highlight six rookies that are either going undrafted in rookie drafts or can be bought during late rounds of startups.
With the injury bug attacking San Francisco as a team in recent seasons, the rookie RB could find opportunities sooner than later. Jeff Wilson has already been struck with bad luck this offseason with a torn meniscus. Raheem Mostert is penciled in as the team’s starter for now, and he has played in all 16 games once in his seven years in the league. San Francisco also brought in Wayne Gallman from free agency this offseason, an RB who has never played in all 16 games and only holds 14 career starts under his belt in four seasons.
In comes the rookie out of Ohio State, Trey Sermon. He was drafted out of the third round in this year’s NFL Draft, and he may find a steady role in this offense. Although he isn’t known as an elite pass-catcher, it wouldn’t be surprising if he turned into one. Right now, there are the three other RBs that will battle with him for playing time, but if he could find a way to become a threat in the receiving game, there’s no doubt that he will take more snaps than both Gallman and Wilson.
Cam Akers suffered a torn Achilles while training, a headline first reported by the NFL Network’s Tom Pelisasero. Akers was trending up in all fantasy football formats, going as a late second to early third-round draft pick in Superflex start-up leagues. He also was going as early as the first round in Redraft formats. This is a crushing loss, and we hope for a safe recovery for this promising young man. With an injury of this magnitude, we cannot dwell in our sadness, we must look for opportunities that this has created for us to gain advantages in our fantasy leagues for 2021.
The Panthers have typically been a run-heavy team in years past. This is due to them having Cam Newton and a revolving door at QB. Now that they have a stable passer in Darnold I think they will throw more often. In 2020 they had a pass to rush play ratio of 1.35 which is exactly league average. For 2021 I have them bumping up to a 1.41 ratio. As for their rush-to-pass touchdown ratio they have had a very low one of .85 in 2019 and .84 in 2020. Typically this sort of thing regresses to the league mean of 1.82, and I find it unlikely that we will see this low of a ratio again. So, for 2021 I am giving them a ratio of 1.25. Now let us look at what these trends do to the individual players.
JuJu Smith-Schuster played college football at USC from 2014-2016. JuJu registered a breakout season as a true freshman with 54 receptions for 724 yards and five TDs, but he was truly dominant as a sophomore, racking up 1,454 yards and 10 TDs on 89 receptions. After a solid junior campaign, JuJu declared for the 2016 NFL Draft and was selected by the Pittsburgh Steelers with the 30th pick in the second round.
Building a league-winning roster involves being competent across many different criteria. The first box to check is having a high and consistent weekly floor. A weekly floor is important because inconsistent teams tend to not make the playoffs. It’s a long season, and your team getting cold for a couple of games here and there can be the difference between making a championship run and trying to not finish last. Now I understand that talking about players’ floors is not the sexiest topic in the world, but points win weeks. It’s as simple as that. This series will be written for those in normal PPR redraft leagues, starting 1QB, 2RBs, 2WRs, 1TE, and 1RB/WR/TE along with a Kicker and Defense. Follow these steps, and you will be on top of your league’s podium at the end of the season.
The Raiders hired veteran defensive mind Gus Bradley to coordinate their defense in 2021. Bradley has a long history of creating studs for IDP fantasy football. This track record, however, has delivered no shortage of teases to the game as well. For every Derwin James, there has been a Ronnie Harrison and a Kyzir White for each Telvin Smith. The 2021 Raiders are sure to have equal parts boom and bust among their defensive players.
The wide receiver group for Denver also has a lot of ambiguity in itself too. Jerry Jeudy operated as the team’s top pass catcher in 2020 but Courtland Sutton was the lead dog in 2019. Who should we expect to be the alpha in 2021? I did my projections under the assumption the Jeudy would perform more so as the slot guy that may garner more targets but have lower yards per reception and touchdowns. While Sutton will be utilized as the mid to deep WR threat on the outside of the field and looked at more in the red zone. This means he can see fewer targets but achieve a similar yardage output and more touchdowns. My projections relay this well, and they both average within .5 fantasy points per game of each other. I think they will both be weekly mid-tier to low-tier WR2s so Sutton having an ADP of WR32 feels good and Jeudy having an ADP of WR41 feels awesome. I like them both at their ADP, but I do not like drafting two wide receivers from the same team in a typical redraft league. Therefore my recommended plan of action would be to pass on Sutton and draft Jeudy later. Jeudy also has a higher upside because he has the potential to see way more targets and produce more points in a more consistent way.
In 2020, Justin Herbert became the first rookie QB to throw for over 4,000 yards and 25 TDs. He broke the NFL rookie record for TD passes and completions, in fact. As a result, Keenan Allen put together a more impressive season than any WR in our sample. Still, digging a little deeper, Allen did leave some meat on the bone. He finished as the WR7 in PPG despite seeing the second-most targets per game. He recorded a career-low of 9.9 yards per reception, as well. These minor inefficiencies can likely be chalked up to the growing pains of a rookie QB.
Baker Mayfield had a bit of a sophomore slump in 2019, but we got to see him bounce back with a good 2020 season where he threw for 3500 yards and 26 touchdowns. I have him projected to expand on this in 2021 and collect almost 4200 passing yards along with 29 touchdowns. Seems pretty reasonable to me. A small increase in throws per game and adding a 17th game certainly make up for that increase in pass yards. This leaves Baker averaging 20.9 fantasy points per game, resulting in a low QB2 ranking. Baker’s current redraft ADP is QB16, this is a tad high for me. I would feel much better about getting him at the QB20-24 range, I am fading him at his ADP and so should you. However, if he happens to fall a few spots I would gladly take him in that previously mentioned 20-24 range.
If you’re in the business of winning, then you should be in the boomin’ AB business in 2021. He is the definition of a potential league winner. After almost 18 months away from football for well-publicized off-the-field issues, he joined Tampa Bay Week 9 and was quickly back to vintage form. He finished in the 88th percentile against man coverage (Reception Perception) and third in fantasy points per snap (PFF). This led to him finishing tied as the WR21 on a point per game basis in Weeks 9 through 17. Considering AB was available in the late rounds of dynasty start-up drafts, and on the waiver wire in redraft leagues, the low-end WR2 production he posted was money in the bank for those fantasy players who took the risk on AB.
Rookie drafts are wrapping up and startups are the only thing getting dynasty owners through the off-season. If you’re a true dynasty degenerate, at least set yourself up for success from the draft. We’re not going to just set ourselves up for success now, but build a sustainable roster for the future to create a true “dynasty.” You don’t have to go all-in on big-name vets, nor do you need to only draft players under 26. Mix a little of both strategically.
I specialize in the FFPC dynasty format, where there is a somewhat unique constraint that drives market action. You have to cut down to 16 players by the end of March, carrying just 20 in-season including a K and a DEF. That means that after the Super Bowl there is only about a month and a half to get deals done to get your roster trimmed down. Or you can risk cutting guys that have a lot of value. Most owners try to avoid that. This makes that particular trading period an absolute boon of market activity. There are lots of “one man’s junk is another man’s treasure” kind of deals. And there are lots of premiums paid for studs and there are lots of “cashing out dollars for three quarters” type of deals.
The most expensive option on this list but a clear example of the dynasty community’s “what have you done for me lately” mindset. Sutton is a player that can be bought for a late first or early second who has already produced multiple fantasy-relevant seasons, including a 72/1,112/6 season in 2019. Going into his age 26 season this year, he is a player that offers a much safer floor than others going in that ADP range having already proven he can do it with a rookie QB in Drew Lock. Sutton offers genuine WR1 upside. It would be remiss to not mention the fact that this offense has more targets than it did in 2019 now boasting Noah Fant, Jerry Jeudy, & Javonte Williams, but for a QB like Lock that is fighting for his job, he will be looking to a guy like Sutton who has performed for him before.
Since the last four games of the regular season and playoffs, the Cam Akers hype train has started to gain velocity. That train is now going too fast, it has exceeded the speed limit, and he will soon be charged for speeding. Akers is now being drafted as the 19th pick in Dynasty Startups (RB8) according to Sleeper’s ADP and FantasyPros consensus, ahead of guys like Davante Adams, Travis Kelce, Ezekiel Elliott, Antonio Gibson, and D’Andre Swift, among others. I’m not thrashing Cam Akers but this price is definitely a market overreaction.
When one rookie receiver climbs in value, one is usually falling in value. But is the rising value worth the price? Is the falling value worth the lessened price? Is the higher valued receiver even the better receiver? Cue: Jaylen Waddle versus Rashod Bateman.
Justin Herbert’s rookie season was a veritable perfect storm for the rookie QB. Everything fell into place, and it allowed him the opportunity to break the rookie passing touchdown record. Coming off the incredible season, Herbert currently has an average draft position (ADP) of 6.6 in Superflex dynasty leagues. Only four QBs are coming off the board before him. Even if you’re a Justin Herbert truther, I think now is the time to trade him, as his value could never be higher. Let’s explore what happened last year, and hypothesize how “Big Herbs” could be looking at a different situation moving forward.
Welcome back to the “Fantasy Stock Up, Stock Down” series. This week’s coverage will focus on the AFC West. You can find breakdowns on the AFC East, the NFC East, the AFC South, and the NFC South divisions here at DFF as well. Keep in mind, there will be a player whose stock is up and a player whose stock is down from each team in this division. Let’s get started.