Fantasy Buys and Sells: Week 7 💰

It says a lot about the pure luck that goes into fantasy football when I’m 5-1 in one league with the fewest points scored against me and 3-3 in another where I’m the top scoring team.

Moral of the story: don’t take losses too hard.

What’s in store:

• Anthony Richardson is out for the season 🤕. It’s Gardner Minshew SZN, and that might not be a terrible thing.

• Time to move off of Derrick Henry? Tennessee is doing some of the damage to his fantasy value themselves.

• The asking price for Brandon Aiyuk via trade may not be lower than it is now. Two straight down weeks make him a prime target going into Week 7.

• Alvin Kamara is doing Alvin Kamara things. He’s been a workload king through his first three weeks of 2023.

• Colts rookie QB Anthony Richardson expected to miss rest of 2023 season after mulling season-ending surgery

  • After speculation swirled about the possibility of Richardson going under the knife for season-ending surgery on his throwing shoulder, the generally sentiment appears to be that he’ll ultimately miss the majority of his rookie season. He looks every bit the part of the high-end QB1 fantasy managers drafted him to be, but fantasy football and NFL fans alike will be forced to wait until 2024 to see the dynamic dual-threat QB back in action. At this point, it’s likely that the Colts will ride out the 2023 season with Gardner Minshew at the controls. That’s not necessarily a death sentence at all for Colts playmakers, who just watched 55 passes come off the hand of Minshew in their loss to the Jaguars in Week 6. Richardson will likely qualify as one of the strongest and most popular options at the position in fantasy football for 2024.

• Eagles sign WR Julio Jones, Rams sign RB Darrell Henderson in back-to-back mid-Tuesday signings

  • It was a surprisingly busy afternoon yesterday on the cheap veteran market, with the Eagles and Rams making moves to sign Julio Jones and Darrell Henderson, respectively. Julio Jones likely wants another shot to ring chase before he finishes up his career, but any role he might have in the Eagles’ offense projects to be minimal with A.J. Brown and Devonta Smith leading the way in Philly’s WR room. There’s no reason to pursue him on waivers unless he gives us a reason to. Meanwhile on the west coast, Darrell Henderson is back with the Rams for the time being with Kyren Williams and Ronnie Rivers slated to miss Week 7. In a corresponding move, the Rams elevated Royce Freeman to the active roster. Neither running back projects to be a fantastic play in Week 7 against the Steelers, but there’s a chance this becomes a backfield by committee if the Rams aren’t prepared to hand the keys to the backfield over to Zach Evans right out of the gate.

• Jaguars QB Trevor Lawrence spotted with a knee brace in practice Tuesday, trying to be ready to play on Thursday vs. Saints

  • Recent reports indicate that Lawrence is ‘optimistic’ that he’ll be ready to go for tomorrow night’s matchup against the Saints, which is a very welcome development at this point in the week heading into TNF. Lawrence practiced yesterday after being listed as a DNP on Monday, and should have him on track to start barring any setbacks between now and game time. The Saints have been a tough defense to crack through six weeks for quarterbacks, so tempering expectations for Lawrence is important - but he’ll have is usual high-end QB2 upside he’s been notorious for so far in 2023. There’s still an off chance that he could miss, so hold onto your backup option at QB for the time being until we receive the most accurate reports through today and into tomorrow.

• SELL RB Derrick Henry, TEN

  • Derrick Henry might not have necessarily hit the age cliff just yet, but the Titans offense being a dumpster fire and Tyjae Spears coming out and splitting snaps with Henry is just fast-tracking his approach to it. Fantasy Life’s utilization reports says that Spears has a 50% snap share for the season through six weeks and is eating up a ton of valuable work in the passing game: 49% route participation against Henry’s 32%; 13% target share vs. Henry’s 7%; 90% of long down and distance snaps to Henry’s 3%; and 86% of 2-minute snaps vs Henry’s 14%. That’s made Henry, whether we want to or like to admit it or not, a touchdown-dependent RB2 this year - and the problem isn’t that Henry is hitting a cliff, which would be out of his control, but instead it’s something predictable like a backfield by committee that’s killing him.

  • In games where Henry doesn’t score a touchdown, he’s averaging 8.4 points per game. The Titans are also 26th in scoring offense in the NFL, and that’s been with Ryan Tanehill at QB. Now he’s out with a high ankle sprain, and Tennessee is going to be relying on Malik Willis to command the offense. I’m all for a little optimism and giving the guy a chance, but the offense is not going to be good enough to make Henry a consistent fantasy producer (unless they completely bail on the passing game and return Derrick Henry to his 25 carry a game workload of 2022). That’s not going to happen, and Henry’s next two weeks include a bye this week and a tough matchup against a Falcons defense that’s allowing the fourth-fewest fantasy points to the position through six weeks.

  • If I can package up Henry and move him for a guy like Kenneth Walker, I’d take that deal all day long.

  SELL QB Dak Prescott, DAL

  • We knew the matchup coming into the game was good, and Dak delivered with an overall QB1 finish that really doesn’t feel all that groundbreaking - 25 fantasy points feels a bit watered down to be the top scoring player at the position, don’t you think?

  • Anyway, there are a few things working against Dak here, and number one is the way he scored his points. He had 40 yards on the ground and a touchdown, which counts for 9 points of his 25 on the night. Dak has scored just one rushing touchdown in each of the past three seasons, and he’s rushed for 40 or more yards just twice in that same time span, so there’s reason to expect that rushing upside not to be there moving forward.

  • Then, there’s the fact that he’s only thrown for more than one touchdown in just one game this season – and there’s been no in between for Dallas in terms of how they’re playing. If they’re winning, they’re winning by a lot, and Dallas doesn’t have to throw (see: blowouts against the Giants and Patriots). But if they’re losing, it’s because the offense is getting dominated and his scoring upside remains low (see: 11 fantasy points per game combined against Arizona and San Francisco). And if you watched the game Monday night, Mike McCarthy is not a good playcaller right now. Dallas’ offense is still super inconsistent in the red zone where points are scored, and that’s going to hurt his ceiling moving forward.

  • There are some good matchups coming up, but they’re against quality competition, and Dallas hasn’t unleashed Dak Prescott yet this season. Sell on this performance and move for a guy like Brock Purdy.

  BUY WR Brandon Aiyuk

  • He’s been pretty quiet these past two weeks - he’s averaging 11 points per game and has caught just four passes in each game. Granted, that’s come against two really good defenses in Dallas and Cleveland, but Aiyuk only had a quiet game against Dallas because the 49ers were in a ridiculously positive game script and the 49ers didn’t have to pass. That, plus the underwhelming effort even with Deebo off the field for part of the game this past week, could be enough to make his fantasy managers open to moving off of him.

  • Aiyuk has been everything you wanted him to be coming into the season and more as a target earner - 31% target share and 53% air yards share in his five games played is hilarious utilization - and he’s never had less than a 25% target share in a game this season. He’s also averaging 18 yards per reception courtesy of the Kyle Shanahan system, and he’s got a fantastic matchup this week against a Vikings squad allowing the 3rd most points to receivers.

  • Are you going to be able to get him cheap? Probably not. But the price is as low as it’s going to be this season, and picking him up after a loss is going to be a hell of a lot easier than after a matchup with Minnesota, because that 12.5 point per game average in his past four games is going to fly up on Monday night.

Remember the days when the Saints backfield looked like it was going to be extremely crowded in 2023? The Saints had added last year’s scrimmage touchdowns leader in Jamaal Williams and drafted the dynamic (and Faraz-approved) Kendre Miller out of TCU - and that was before the Saints knew they would be without Kamara for the first three games. But when Jamaal Williams went down with his hamstring injury and Kendre Miller was unable to stay healthy enough to turn momentum into an established role for himself in the Saints’ backfield, Alvin Kamara was already ready to retake his post as the lead back in New Orleans. And boy, has he been a massive value so far.

Since making his 2023 season debut in Week 4, Kamara has profiled as a true bell cow running back. His 52 rush attempts over a three-game span are sixth in the NFL among all RBs, and he’s earned the most targets (25) and registered the highest target share (21.6%) of any running back in that span, as well. He’s also run the third-most routes of any player at the position, as well.

That incredible utilization translates to a fantastic 22.5 expected points per game for the veteran RB, a number that he’s got room to grow into if he continues to see this type of workload. He’s currently the RB8 in true fantasy points per game (19.2), which indicates that he could still be slightly underperforming on the volume he’s received. Regardless, if you picked him up in drafts this past summer at a discount, you’re reaping the rewards with back to back to back RB1 performances.