SDMB Fantasy Football DYNASTY League: Year Eight

The Game Room
361

It is hard to find additional cuts on your roster, but there’s at least one to be had at TE. Between Jordan Reed and Austin Seferian-Jenkins, you have an established young star and one of the better TE prospects. You’re totally set. So, I would cut at least one of Zach Miller and Martellus Bennett.

Well, Bennett actually isn’t a bad keep: I don’t think his role in NE as things stand will justify rostering him (Aaron Hernandez he’s not), but a Gronk injury would make him very valuable in the short term, and somehow he’s only 29 years old (feels like he’s been around forever).

Zach Miller, however, can safely be dumped. 31 years old, he’s never had a good season. The only thing he has going for him is that he’s now the starter in Chicago. But how much is that worth given that the Chicago starter last year (one Mr. Martellus Bennett, as it happens) had a crappy year? So, I’d rather have had a 4th Rounder than Miller.

362

Pre-draft, I wondered if my team could contend with the elite top-level talent I have, or if I was going to be a basement dweller since I don’t have the depth of startable players other teams have. On balance, 8th seems really fair. And outside of RGIII, I doubt I get a ton of 2016 production from my picks, so my assessment isn’t drastically changed by this draft. It’ll be interesting to see how quickly I can turn that around.

You may not be surprised to hear that I tried pretty hard to get one. I didn’t quite have the ammunition for it, so I decided to go in on this season and try to move up at key spots instead. Thanks for the review, and thanks Really Not All That Bright for yours as well. These contributions to making the league more immersive and readable are very appreciated.

363

My 2017 1st is available for a running back if anyone wants to get a jump on their rebuild.

364

Miller is basically just insurance for Seferian-Jenkins; there were rumors that his knuckleheadedness was going to get him cut during training camp, and he’s missed seven or more games due to injury in each of his two seasons. I’ve learned the hard way that two TEs is not enough depth for this format, especially when one of them is Jordan Reed. I’ll probably trade or cut Miller if ASJ starts Tampa’s first few games.

As for Bennett, he’s an oft-elite TE in an offense that can certainly support two. It’s certainly possible that he doesn’t catch enough passes in NE, but I wanted to see it first. In that sense, he’s also insurance since Miller might not pan out either for the reasons you pointed to.

365

It makes zero sense to cut Bennett and Miller for…a 4th and 5th rounder in the worst rookie draft in this league’s history?

366

We have a 3-team trade.
RNATB gets:
RB Doug Martin (from Varlos)
Varlos’ 2nd Round pick next year

Varlos gets:
RB LeSean McCoy (from Beef)
WR DeVante Parker (from Beef)
RNATB’s last pick next year

SenorBeef gets:
RB Lamar Miller (from RNATB)
*WR Pharoh Cooper (from Varlos)

  • –> I’m assuming Beef wants Cooper; that’s the way he was leaning. He still has the option to take WR Rashard Higgins instead when he wakes up.
    This will be our first three-team trade. I came very close to one a couple years ago with furt and Petey, trying to get Russel Wilson.
367

Yuck

368

Yuck at part, or yuck at the whole thing?

369

Yuck at my rivals making trades which help their teams.

370

To be honest, I’m not sure how this helps Varlos. McCoy is older than Martin, has carried the ball exactly twice as many times, and at this point in their careers, is not as good. Parker has upside, but couldn’t beat out Kenny Stills for a starting job in Miami. Beef keeps going on about how that doesn’t matter because they will run lots of three receiver sets, but that’s not really the point.

It’s kind of a wash for me; I value Martin and Miller similarly, but now I don’t have to worry about whether the Texans will score enough points for both my stars each week. I also got a second rounder, so that helps. Beef is probably the winner of this trade; he gets a potential rushing champion who is far younger and healthier than the potential rushing champion he gave up.

371

I’d certainly rather have Martin, but: (A) McCoy is only 6 months older, (B) I’m not too worried about mileage (carries) per se, (C) McCoy has been very healthy overall during his career, (D) on per game basis McCoy actually scored slightly more points than Martin last year, 13.56 to 13.49 (just looked it up; this one surprised me!), and (E) as awesome as Martin was last year and in 2012, we can’t just forget that 2013 and 2014 happened.

But yes, like I said, I’d rather have Martin by a decent margin. What the trade is about is my depleted WR corps and the hope that Parker is as good a prospect as most owners/analysts think he is. His ADP in inaugural dynasty drafts is kinda bonkers-high. I mean, he had a disappointing season last year and you can’t just pretend he wasn’t hurt, but once he got on the field the last 6 games he did very well, averaging 12.25 p/g, which over a whole season would be an excellent rookie year (it’s a bit less than Emmanuel Sanders’ 2015, say). So it’s not like we’re still waiting for him to show anything.

He’ll be glad to hear it; based on our conversations I suspect he feels the opposite, if anything.

372

Alright, so according to fantasy consensus, I’m losing that trade. Not because of McCoy, but because of Parker. Parker goes in the late 2nd / early 3rd round of startup dynasty drafts. He’s the most valuable piece in that deal besides Miller, and some people have him higher than that. I asked for some advice from other dynasty players and they told me I was selling too low on Parker.

The fantasy world seems to be convinced Parker is AJ Green.

Is it merited? I’m not sure. He’s got the physical talent. And he hasn’t fucked up or anything - last year was derailed by a foot injury that kept him out of camp and a surprisingly productive year from scrub Dolphin WRs. He played in the last 6 games and put up some good stats but more importantly I’m told (I didn’t watch the games) that he flashed that jumps out of the screen talent.

But by conventional fantasy wisdom and pure value, I’m losing this trade and Varlos is winning. RNATB is probably losing by less than me.

Now, from my perspective, I’ve been trying to acquire one of the good young RBs with upside. I’ve failed to trade for Zeke, Bell, Gurley (with two owners!) and a few other guys. There aren’t that many bellcow RBs in this league, and it seems like a lot of them are older than they usually are. Since I haven’t drafted higher than 9th in 7 years (well, excluding the Trent Richardson thing, but I haven’t finished lower than 4th) it’s been very tough for me to acquire a top RB prospect. I’ve been trying to trade WRs for one for a while but nothing has worked.

So I like it here. Miller has always been a talented, underused guy and he’s going to a place where he’ll be used. He’s my best shot at getting a good young RB. I think his upside is about as high as I’ll be able to obtain.

I was hesitant to trade away Parker because while I don’t value him as highly as the consensus seems to, but the fact that everyone else did made me wonder if I wasn’t trading away a top guy for a decade. But then I thought - even if I do, even if Parker is everything he’s cracked up to be, could I live with that? Even if Parker blows up, my WR corps is still stacked, and I still have a problem with my future at RB. Even if Parker becomes great, and Miller is just very good, I benefit from the team composition change. I’ll be probably the top guy at WR in this league even if I just gave up a great one. If I didn’t have a replacement in a couple of years for McCoy and Mathews, wtf could I do?

As for McCoy - he’s been around longer, but he’s only 6 months older than Doug Martin. Age correlates with RB decline more than workload more than you think. It doesn’t seem to matter how much you work them, they’re going to hit a wall come 30-31. And McCoy has been great his whole career - Martin has good years and surprisingly bad ones. In my estimation it’s a wash between him and Martin.

As far as RNATB - I don’t think he needs to get out of the Houston offense, I think even a bad offense can support a talented WR1 and RB1, but if he was determined to get out of it, this seems like the best offer he’s had. Martin is good - he’s got a few top seasons left in him - and at least that 2nd rounder is in the 2017 draft where you might actually acquire a good player for it.

All in all, this is a mutually beneficial 3 way that meets everyone’s needs. Varlos needs a young WR with upside more than I do, RNATB wanted diversity in teams, and I needed to find some way to land a youngish top RB prospect. Everyone got what they wanted while giving away what they could afford.

373

That’s a hell of a trade. I always figure that if you get the best player in the trade, you can’t have lost it. So as far as I’m concerned, Beef won the trade. It seems pretty fair top to bottom, which is interesting. Well done.

374

I think it’s a good deal for everyone except I think RNATB may be too high on Martin because he’s being a bit of a homer, but everyone got what they wanted and thought they needed, so in that way it’s a remarkably good 3 way trade, which are kind of hard to pull off. I’m banking on Miller being a star, and my only chance at a youngish star RB.

375

Eh, wasn’t really a homer thing. I get to watch a lot of Martin and he made a lot happen despite shoddy blocking last year. 2013-14 don’t really bother me because he was injured and mostly facing loaded boxes. Winston’s deep ball means that won’t happen now. And as happy as I was to see Miller go to a run heavy team, he’s never actually seen a heavy workload. He could easily be Marion Barber redux. So from my pov I got an equally good player plus a second rounder in a loaded draft, and got the diversity I wanted (the possibility that Osweiler will be awful and sink all Texans production has also crossed my mind).

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376

Varlos didn’t process the trade yet but I’m sure it’ll be done by morning. Make sure you update your roster RNATB.

In the event that something keeps me from updating my roster after the trade is processed I want Miller starting in place of McCoy at RB. Cooper is on the bench.

377

Pryor over the obvious Sproles is my first risky play of the year.

378

Was not expecting CJ Spiller to be inactive. The Saints must really not like the guy if Tim Hightower is starting and Spiller inactive.

379

I don’t think it’s going to make much of a difference. I crush you.

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380

If Keenan Allen has a torn ACL and is out for the season after a 6 catch 63 yard first half, I 'm going to be a tad bit perturbed at this fucking league.