Tuesday Transactions: Week Three

Eric Hardter Posted On September 23, 2014

Dynasty football is undoubtedly a marathon, not a sprint. With that said, in-season roster management is still every bit as critical as in a standard re-draft format, and arguably even more so given the potential long-term ramifications. As such, this weekly piece is here to provide you with a dozen moves it might just behoove you to make.

Continuing, these transactions will be broken down into four categories: players you should buy low, sell high, buy high and sell low. The first two are self explanatory and follow the typical stock market analogy, which is that you should pounce when the market fluctuates in your favor – if you can get the most bang for your buck or scoop up the metaphorical penny stocks who have room to grow, it could be in your best interest to do so. Conversely, the latter two categories represent a contradictory stance, and some might even consider them “desperation” moves – however, it’s my belief that buying high beats buying higher, and selling low is preferable to selling even lower.

Before I dispense my advice though, I want to provide one final disclaimer – these opinions are my own. If you’re higher or lower on any of the players mentioned below you should absolutely stick to your guns. With that said, I believe there’s also enough of a sample size thus far in the season where we can begin to diverge from our off-season assessments.

In the interest of transparency, here were my week two suggestions:

Buy Low: Allen Robinson, Jason Witten and Torrey Smith

Sell High: Kirk Cousins, Delanie Walker and Knile Davis

Buy High: DeMarco Murray, Danny Woodhead, and Jordy Nelson

Sell Low: Cecil Shorts III, Kenny Britt and Denarius Moore

Robinson (7-79-0) is arguably Jacksonville’s biggest outside threat already, Witten (4-49-0) had his best (albeit still mediocre) game of the year and Smith (2-25) surprisingly continued his devolution, though the eight targets were encouraging. I may have been a week early on Cousins (427-3-1) and Davis (32-132-1), while Walker (4-54-0) predictably dropped off from his career-best 142 yards in week two. Murray (24-100-1, 4-31-0) continued his torrid pace (but needs to hold onto the ball), Woodhead was potentially severely injured and Nelson (5-59-0) led the way in an off week for the Packers. Shorts (5-35-1) collected a garbage time touchdown to stave off a total loss of a week, Britt (5-69) actually showed signs of life and Moore (3-23-0) let opportunity slip through his fingers, both literally and figuratively.

Onto the fallout from week three!

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Buy Low

1. Rod Streater, WR OAK – Along with Green Bay transplant James Jones, Streater was the only other functional part of the Oakland passing game. This shouldn’t have come as a surprise, as he finished the 2013 season as the PPR WR33 despite playing on a (stop me if you’ve heard this before re: Oakland) terrible offense. While his fractured foot negates any “real” football value, smart owners in deeper leagues should pounce now and reap the benefits come 2015.

2. Doug Martin, RB TB – Akin to a human pendulum, Martin’s value has been in a state of perpetual flux dating back to the NFL draft. The addition of fellow ball carrier Charles Sims was supposed to negate his passing game work, but then Sims got hurt and the coaching staff suddenly remembered Martin could catch. A poor week one concluded with an injury, as well as fill-in Bobby Rainey shredding the pathetic Rams defense, but Rainey seemingly fumbled his chance away in a week three massacre against Atlanta. Martin remains easily the most talented running back on the team, and now’s a good time to buy before his value swings back to the other direction again.

3. Marques Colston, WR NO – No, the last two weeks have not gone to script. With that said Colston is currently sporting the highest yards-per-catch statistic (19.3) of his career, as well as a sublime 10.4 yards-per-target. When (not if) the targets come again, expect Colston to make good on his preseason promise.

Sell High

1. Lamar Miller, RB MIA – I’ll give Miller his due in that he’s performed admirably when given a chance. But speaking to the latter part of that sentence, he really only received said opportunity due to an injury to starter Knowshon Moreno. His big week came against a poor Chiefs run defense (25^th in the league), and there’s just too much working against him to believe that type of output will become the norm.

2. Andrew Hawkins, WR CLE – I like Hawkins as a player, but his numbers (21-244-0) scream regression to me. The Cleveland offense is only 22^nd in the league in terms of passing attempts, with “Baby Hawk” sequestering 34.4% of the team’s targets. I don’t expect that to remain the case when Jordan Cameron is fully healthy and Josh Gordon returns.

3. Knile Davis, RB KC – I was never a huge fan of Cincy receiver Marvin Jones and always felt his coronation as the offense’s second receiver was a bit premature. During Jones’ absence Sanu has taken over the job and run with it (12-164-1), while also showing remarkable versatility through passing the ball (2/2, 68-1). This turn of events has certainly been both interesting and promising, but when Jones returns following the bye I expect him to dig into Sanu’s market share.

Buy High

1. Emmanuel Sanders, WR DEN – Following my completion of the 2013 Pass Catchers Portfolio I lobbied hard for Sanders as a “buy.” The rationale was simple – Denver, under the guidance of all-world quarterback Peyton Manning, is an offensive juggernaut that easily provided the most available points to its pass catchers last season. Say what you will about his ability to score, Sanders has taken over the “Eric Decker” role and retooled it to the tune of 25 receptions (on 33 targets) for 334 yards, or 37.3% and 45.1% of the way to his previous career highs – through three games. Whether or not you believe he’s better than Decker (I’m of the opinion he’s a bit overrated), Sanders is arguably a better fit for the offense, and I doubt he’s going away anytime soon.

2. Victor Cruz, WR NYG – This likely remains relative to his previous stature as the Giants were prematurely left for dead, and he could very well still represent a bargain. With that said, it’s possible that frustrated owners were provided with the showing they needed to fortify their prior beliefs, and the price has undoubtedly risen since last week. Even given that, I’d attempt to buy – Cruz is simply better than the other Giants receivers, and there’s a good chance he’s back on track.

3. Lorenzo Taliaferro, RB BAL – Ray Rice is gone, and neither Bernard Pierce nor Justin Forsett has seized control of his job. With Pierce out in week three, fourth round rookie Taliaferro churned out 91 yards on just 18 carries, to go along with a third quarter score. He has the requisite size, speed and one-cut ability the Baltimore offense needs, and it’s likely we’ll hear more from him as the season drags on.

Sell Low

1. Bobby Rainey, RB TB – As physics has shown us, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. By virtue of my promotion of Martin above, it stands to reason I’m equally as down on Rainey, and for good reason. He’s shown a propensity to follow up big games (generally versus bad defenses) with multiple duds, and he has a remarkable four fumbles on just 214 career touches. As long as Martin remains healthy, Rainey’s upside could (and should) be limited to that of a change-of-pace back.

2. Rueben Randle, WR NYG – Randle’s numbers are nearly unfathomably bad – 67 yards on 20 targets, “good” for a pathetic 3.4 yards-per-target. He’s supplemented this with just one score, which was supposedly going to be his niche on the size-strapped Giants. He was never an efficient pass catcher to begin with (53.8%), and clearly doesn’t have quarterback Eli Manning’s trust. For the price, I’d much rather roster cheaper options like Larry Donnell and Corey Washington.

3. Dexter McCluster, RB TEN – Though there was promise due to McCluster’s preseason depth chart situation, he’s once again failed to back it up in games that count. Gradually losing touches in every game, it’s fair to wonder if he’s now been passed for good by second round rookie Bishop Sankey. Selling (or rostering in general) McCluster is likely only relevant to those in deeper formats (I told you this category was the toughest to do!), but to those who have an opportunity to unload him for anything at all, now’s the time.

Follow me on Twitter @EDH_27

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Eric Hardter

Contributor at Dynasty League Football

Eric is a Boston College chemistry grad school survivor with a minor in dynasty football. He prefers to utilize both statistics and sarcasm whenever possible, believes in process over results and thinks "Hot Takes" are the scourge of the fantasy landscape.