Dynasty Fantasy Football Trading Post: Tyreek Hill
“Age is just a number. Age is a state of mind. 40 is the new 30. It’s not your age, it’s how you feel.”
There are many lies out there to make us feel better about how many rotations around the sun we have survived on Earth. Do any of them actually make you feel any better? Nope. So when I am sitting here thinking about writing an article about a certain player who is turning 29 soon and having to call him “old”, I wish there were a few more of those lies that I could tell myself that would actually sink in.
Age does, however, play a large role in dynasty value. There are studies that say a wide receiver’s prime years for production are at ages 27-29, but there is so much more to a player when it comes to dynasty than just production. Contract length, years left in the league, years before talent/physical ability dropoff, are all other aspects around a player’s age that get put into their dynasty value. This has led to dynasty GMs trading their wide receivers away before they even hit their prime years because no one wants to be stuck “holding the bag” on a player once they have started to decline. “Better to get out a year early than a year late” is an easier way to put it.
First we wanted to get rid of our wide receivers before they hit 30 and started their decline. Then we wanted to get rid of our wide receivers before they hit 27 because we are too afraid to hold on for too long and start to lose value. This has escalated a step even further to where value already starts to decline at 27, so now we need to trade them away at 26 to make sure we get our max value returned in a trade. The agism knows no bounds.
The broken down, crotchety, old, veteran wide receiver I want to talk about today is…
Tyreek Hill, WR MIA
Hill ranked at WR7 and 11th player overall in one-quarterback January 2023 ADP and finished the last two seasons as WR6 and WR3 in points per game. Those are all very exciting numbers, especially for an old fogy getting ready to purchase his first walker. But as we all know, draft value is not the same as trade value. Time to pull up the DLF Trade Finder and Trade Analyzer to see if maybe we can get some high-end production at lower trade cost since Hill was just accepted into AARP.
Let’s say that Teddy Bridgewater and a fourth cancel each other out (sorry Teddy). That means this trade is Hill and a second for Travis Etienne. Hill has an earlier ADP, similar positional rank (Hill WR7, Etienne RB6), and a higher grade in the Trade Analyzer. So why are we paying up from our elderly wide receiver to get a strapping, young running back? Oh yeah, because one of them is elderly and the other one is young. Etienne is very good and will score a lot of fantasy points in the near future but is age enough of a reason to add draft picks to make the swap? I don’t think it is. I think the picks are on the wrong side.
Now here we have some respect for our cheeser (the thesaurus told me that was a synonym for old person and I love it). I love the thinking behind both of these trades. One team gets the senior citizen and the fantasy points that come along with him while the other team gets the shiny new toy wide receiver full of youth, energy, and hope. What you will notice in these two trades that you don’t see in the first one is that the values are practically even here. There is no senior discount when acquiring Hill.
I see this trade and I start yelling: “get off my lawn, ya whippersnappers!” This team had Hill ready for the casket and decided to get some pennies along the way. I have been a Jerry Jeudy fan ever since he came into the league and I am ready for him to take that next step with Denver and everything that is happening for that offense. I even like Sam Howell and will be crossing my fingers that he will even be in the conversation for a quarterback battle in training camp.
But why are we trading a top-ten wide receiver for some ifs and buts? Hill is no spring chicken but he also isn’t a dead and buried chicken either… or a chicken at all! He is a cheetah! His Twitter handle says so! Even if you wanted to set out on a rebuild for your dynasty team, this isn’t the way to do it. Yes, you want to get younger but you also want to get good value for your veterans.
We are heading straight into rookie fever season and if you don’t mind a little wisdom and experience being added to your team now is a great time to go out and try to trade for Hill. He is on a good team with a good offense and will keep putting up more than good fantasy points. If you are looking to age down and trying to trade away Hill, just make sure you are respecting your elders with the offers you are sending out. Get the value back that a geezer like Tyreek Hill deserves.
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