Oliver-Coleman trade update: Oliver gets 20 from Olave and zero from injured Mixon; Coleman gets 34 from Kyren, but the future second loses a little bit of value. The subtext of the trade is that Oliver spent his late keeper on Kyren when he could have spent it on Nico Collins, who has 55 FP through three weeks (top-5 WR status), while Olave has 36 (top-20, barely). Have to imagine Oliver would have held onto Collins and sent out a trade package of a 2nd and Aiyuk (who has 20 FP, which is like 50th among WRs, but post-draft Coleman the resident Friscan would have been interested). With this matchup in the books, it’s probably the last I mention this trade unless they meet in the playoffs.
Coleman had another huge game where he had enough firepower from his loaded draft to survive a poor showing from Jalen Hurts. With AJ Brown and DeVonta Smith banged up, it’s hard to start Hurts. The Eagles prefer to run Barkley in short-yardage situations, so you can wipe a solid ten TDs off the board from last year’s total for Hurts. It’s time to consider Aaron Rodgers. If that makes you want to puke, you’re in good company. But would you prefer Sam Darnold? Honestly, considering we might see Addison back soon, that’s a decent stack. And you know how I feel about stacks. It’s also kind of fine to start Hurts when the rest of your lineup is this filthy.
Oliver’s best player was his QB, who was sacked four times, turned the ball over three times, and still scored 21 FP. His second best player was Chris Olave, who we’ve covered already, and his third best player was… Robert Spillane. Oliver has to be feeling a little bit of pressure now with Mixon out and his WR plan falling apart. Without Mixon, he still has a respectable three-RB lineup with the Robinsons and Steele. To start three RBs (which I truly believe is the move), you have to bench one of Olave, Adams, and Aiyuk, which is a difficult decision, but understand: volume is king. RBs are risky draft picks because of injuries and hot hands. But if you know you have a true starting RB, you’re golden. If we had the certainty about Carson Steele going into Week 3 that we have coming out of it, Oliver would have had a few more points. A few more points next week could be the difference. Take it from me: the guy who started Chuba Hubbard solely because he’s the starter, and he’s the only reason I had any hope this week.
What Oliver can’t do is make a trade. He’s already burned a future 2nd, there’s no value in the injured old guys, and he still has a competitive starting lineup plus one start-worthy guy on the bench. He’s just gotta hold.
Coleman, if he wants, can try to trade for a QB. Evan’s got the Eagles’ WRs, would probably prefer Hurts to Baker or Love, you might even be able to trade Hurts for the pair. Sean won two championships with Hurts as his QB, so that’s a possibility, but the league doesn’t like it when we trade with Sean, so I wouldn’t recommend. That leaves Shelby, who probably doesn’t want Hurts but would probably sell low on Anthony Richardson this week. Because, you know, then you have two disappointing dual threats.
Corey and Cameron played the only matchup that was over and done without any need to play the two Monday night games. Kudos to Corey for benching Terry McLaurin because of how scary it would have been to go into this matchup needing Terry McLaurin to do something. Now what Corey needs to do is drop Zeke so that he’s never tempted to play him again. And then fill the empty spot on your bench. You’re desperate enough to start Zeke but not even go pick up Rico Dowdle for your empty bench spot? You could have been stashing Chuba Hubbard this whole time!
How brutal that Cameron was wavering whether to start Adam Thielen or Quentin Johnston, and if he had just started both (benching anyone but Achane, which he would never), he would have won. The dream team of Dak Prescott and Brandon Aubrey, who combined for 35 in Week 1, 36 in Week 2, and now 45 in Week 3. And CeeDee Lamb’s not a bad third wheel! I absolutely loved when Adam Thielen scored a vintage Thielen TD and then couldn’t play anymore. What a way to go out. (It’s a hamstring; he’ll be back in a month, but it would be way cooler to just retire with that as his last play). I also love the fat dump the rest of your team took after you hung 198 on me last week. The teeny man being your worst starter was the little baby cherry on top.
I must again pay some respect to Corey for notching his first win while handing an undefeated team its first L. Makes that whole Devin Singletary thing worth it. But you won’t have to lean on Singletary for long. With the 49ers dropping to 1-2 after a last-second loss to the Rams of all teams, Christian McCaffrey’s timeline will move up. With zero medical information, just vibes, I’d guess he returns in Week 7, just in time to face the Chiefs and Cowboys before a bye week. So you’ll have seven weeks of CMC before our regular season ends, which to me means you only need to scrape out one more win between now and then. You’re in good shape.
Okay so it’s not the QB that mattered so much as it was that each of Shelby’s guys showed up for, like, one play each. But when you invest that much in QB, starting the wrong QB every week isn’t bad luck. It’s bad process. And scoring so few points outside the QB position isn’t bad luck either, since you spent your 3rd round pick on a bench player. You have to have a great QB to win a championship, yes, but you can get to the playoffs without one. You need a good team first, then a good QB. Unless you have Josh Allen.
Now, look, it is a bit of bad luck to have Tua go down when you drafted Waddle in the 2nd. It is unfortunate that Bucky Irving is the truth, while Rachaad White has pulled off his mask to reveal a Charles Sims clone. The Winfield injury, Ricky Pearsall getting shot, the list goes on and on. But you could’ve mitigated risk by spending a lot less on your backup QB, especially when you had the Chase-Burrow stack established right away. All right, I’m in no position to give anyone a talking-to. This is inappropriate. I spent my first five picks on a bucket of steam. My team was one Chuba Hubbard prayer-add away from scoring fewer points than you this week. I, too, don’t know who my QB is. BUT I DO KNOW that if I had extra 2nd and 3rd picks, I would have drafted Lamar Jackson and Mark Andr—okay, back to me not giving advice.
I really think Shelby’s team is fine. I think it’s important who she starts at QB because her QB schedules align nicely, and this week was a flat-out wrong pick. The Bears have a great defense, especially for exposing Richardson’s limitations. The Commanders are dogshit on defense. Let’s take a minute to do the whole-season breakdown:
Week 4: Burrow @CAR; Richardson v.PIT
Week 5: JB v.BAL; AR @JAX
Week 6: JB @NYG; AR @TEN (can’t go wrong)
Week 7: JB @CLE; AR v.MIA
Week 8: JB v.PHI; AR @HOU
Week 9: JB v.LV; AR @MIN
Week 10: JB @BAL; AR v.BUF
Week 11: JB @LAC; AR @NYJ
Week 12: JB bye; AR v.DET
Week 13: JB v. PIT; AR @NE (oof)
Week 14: JB @DAL; AR bye
Week 15: JB @TEN; AR @DEN
Week 16: JB v.CLE; AR v.TEN
Week 17: JB v. DEN; AR @NYG (can’t go wrong)
Okay, honestly it’s pretty terrible once you get to Week 13, but for the next nine weeks, it aligns nicely, and Week 14 against the Cowboys is a solid spot for Burrow. The playoffs (or pick ladder) will suck, and you should probably pivot off one of these guys at the deadline if they have value. Everyone will have forgotten this note by then. You’re good.
But yeah Spencer kind of got the free square this week, and they needed it. Garrett Wilson and Tank Dell aren’t going to blow us away this year. Dell is stuck behind Collins and Diggs, and Wilson… that’s a whole thing: basically Rodgers sees the game a specific way, and if you also see it his way, you’re going to be wide open on like 75% of plays, but if you don’t, the ball is going nowhere near you, either because Rodgers threw it to where you’re supposed to be, five yards away from where you are, or he gave up on you and threw it to someone else. Rodgers is kind of the QB-version of Steve Smith in that Steve Smith didn’t really run proper routes, but he read the defense well and found open space. When the QB saw what Smith saw, it was a wide-open bomb. Rodgers doesn’t want receivers running their routes. He wants them breaking off their routes where the defense is leaving open space, then boom. Allen Lazard gets this. He sucks at running routes, yet he gets wide open for Rodgers. (Allow a bit of generalizing here; I, too, have access to Lazard’s game log.) The point is: Spencer doesn’t need Garrett Wilson AND Tank Dell. They need some combination of Wilson, Dell, and Ekeler to fill in the gaps behind Nabers, Odunze, Etienne, Dobbins. Again, starting RBs belong in your starting lineup, and the inverse of that is Spencer can safely drop Javonte Williams. In fact, everyone can drop all of the Broncos RBs since they have no true starter and will probably never have a true starter without multiple injuries. To circle back to Oliver for a second, now is the time to add Bo Nix. When Caleb Williams is on bye in Week 7, you can stack Nix and Sutton against New Orleans because you just know Sean Payton is saving some special shit for the game.
And to circle back to Spencer one more time, they did what we should all do: spend decent draft capital on a couple bonafide IDPs in Roquan and Derwin. You don’t want to spend too much on IDP, but if the right guys are there, a 5th and a 7th get you pretty consistent double-digits, when that’s all you’re really getting from offensive players in that range anyway. Yes, there are cheaper IDPs who get it done, but we don’t typically know who they are until a few weeks go by. With Derwin and Roquan, we know. We knew, and we know.
And Max missed, and now he gets to bleed out on the street corner. You fucked us, man. You fucked us. Not only did you let Sean win on a down week, you deprived us of an undefeated matchup between you and Coleman where the narrative was going to be the team that has never traded for draft picks versus the team with the most stacked draft deck in Mortydome history. You could’ve gotten the league on your side. Now we’re all going to be rooting for Coleman, so Coleman’s undefeated season will inevitably come to an end prematurely and Sean will get to choose our Week 13 rivalries and it’ll be all your fault. And this is why we don’t draft people who abuse women and children! A plague on your team!
I understand why Max started the lineup he did. I’m not sure I would’ve played it any differently. Jordan Mason alone should have had the extra TD to put you over the top. It’s just Sean’s year. I haven’t even tried to deny it. But the rest of you are giving off vibes like you think he’s beatable. No. He’s going undefeated, and he’s transforming into the villain from DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp. Merlock. His name is Merlock. And Max is fucking Dijon. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, I don’t know, maybe get some culture.
Yes, I spent a solid 20 minutes Monday evening staring down Logan Wilson and Bobby Wagner on alternating possessions. Yes, I could have avoided this by having a life or by just starting Sam Darnold like I thought I would when Oliver dropped him on Friday. Yes, I could have avoided this by just starting Chuba Hubbard and my WRs again, by having a shred of conviction in my preseason priors. When the Jags game ended and I knew it was down to Logan Wilson versus Bobby Time, I was sure I was cooked. Writing this before Wednesday’s stat corrections, I’m still convinced I’m cooked. But I’m also convinced that Chuba Hubbard was such a savvy add that I deserve salvation, if just for one week. In fact, my top three scorers were dudes I added this week. Hard to miss that mark when none of my other starters scored double-digits, but still. Without those adds, I would’ve scored like 75 FP this week. That’s my whole strategy is finding these weekly adds with massive upside and scamming a few wins or hopefully even a legit starter. Oh, even better that Kennedy was the one who originally drafted Chuba, only to give up on him immediately. Should I mention that starting Romeo Doubs over Rhamondre would have won Kennedy this matchup?
Brian doesn’t like having Falcons, Panthers, or Saints in fantasy. Especially hates the Saints. But even when he inexplicably has the best WRs for the Falcons and Panthers, he can’t bring himself to play them. It almost screwed him. It’s not reflected in the final score, but that’s because Jayden Daniels and Tyler Bass saved his ass on Monday night. Also Evan’s team had another bad week. I guess you can only say that so many times before you have to admit it’s a bad team, but it’s really not a bad team. It’s the best 0-3 team in Mortydome. Evan’s just gotta get those IDPs sorted. And these Eagles’ receivers need to stay on the field. And Liam Coen needs to run the ball when the opposing pass-rush is pinning their ears back every play. Despite all of that, Evan was fourth in scoring this week. He outscored three teams that ended up eating Ws. It’s not a fair game.
Wow, that game sucked. The defense was always going to be pretty screwed. We started the game without Vea, Kancey, or Winfield. We needed the offense to protect the ball and extend drives, and it didn’t even kind of happen. At one point, whoever was rushing Justin Skule just started running around him, didn’t use any pass-rush moves, just ran a wide loop around him and put pressure on Baker over and over again, and Coen and Baker just didn’t see the opportunity that presented to run right through a wide-open lane. It didn’t even have to be a handoff. Baker could have just taken the snap and blasted outside the right guard for an easy five yards, force the linebacker to stay inside, create more time to throw, etc. But it didn’t happen, and hopefully Goedeke is back next week anyway so we don’t even have to worry about it. But it would be cool if our OC or QB could see stuff like that and take advantage in real time.
Since I scammed a win and continue to be at the bottom of the waiver order, I’ll close here with a top-10 waiver adds list:
1. Sam Darnold
2. Jauan Jennings
3. Cole Kmet
4. Roschon Johnson
5. DeAndre Hopkins
6. Andrei Iosivas
7. Tutu Atwell
8. Chris Boswell
9. Tyrel Dodson
10. Jameis Winston
And later this week I’ll have the Week 4 Preview.
