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Rebuilding Owners Should Make These Kinds of Trades (Part 2)

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By: Jay Pounds (@JayPoundsNFL)

Is there a more boring time in the NFL than now? When the top news story of the day is about a 2nd year quarterback throwing interceptions in a pair of shorts, you know reporters are out looking for things to write about, regardless of how unimportant they are. With all of that said, I am here to spice things up a bit for you with some real-life Dynasty Owner trades that should help my team go from one of the bottom feeders of my league to a contender for many years to come. It will also give Dynasty Owners an idea of what to expect when trading for your personal teams.

Over the last year, I have been trying to understand the true trade value of players and contracts combined on this platform, and I come up with the same conclusion every time, which is all trades are going to be situational depending on who you are trading with. As you are reading this article pay close attention to trades #7 and #10 both involving pick 1.01 in different ways. I bring these two trades up because of how I handled the same asset with different values, but still got what I wanted out of the deal in the end. Over the years I’ve played fantasy football I’ve found most trades will depend on who you are trading with, but in those leagues, you can use a trade calculator to get a deal done. Here on Dynasty Owner, there are zero trade calculators and virtually nothing to reference trades aside from the knowledge you have and trades that were previously made in your league. In my opinion there are several factors that make Dynasty Owner the most enjoyable fantasy experience I have ever had, but the one that stands out the most is the tremendous differences I have seen in how different owners value different things.

I have mentioned numerous times in earlier articles that chatting with your league mates is the easiest and most efficient way to get a deal done. If you just start chatting and understand how different owners think and value things you will have a much easier time getting deals done. I don’t want to single anyone out but recently on Twitter I saw one of our owners annoyed at a trade offer he received. While I fully understand how that can get under someone’s skin, I truly feel in Dynasty Owner you will get these types of deals more often because of the way different owners value things when you add a price tag to it. When you factor in price, it can make for bad trades especially if one of the owners is up against the cap. I know I have made trades and felt I needed to add more but simply couldn’t because of the cost for the other owner. I personally feel the best way to attack these owners and get a deal done is to break the trade down in a message and show them why you need more to get a deal done, possibly by adding draft picks or swapping out a player that is cheaper with similar production. I have tried this four times thus far in my Dynasty Owner career and have made two deals I’m extremely happy with because of it. A quick example would be an offer of the 1.05 for the 1.01 which is obviously a horrible trade and will always be a No. I would message back explaining why there’s not enough value to accept and what I’d be willing to accept. If you don’t get a message back from the owner you can move on. If you do then you’re in business. I am not going to say who, but I was told a story about a very prominent individual in the fantasy football world who took over a team on Dynasty Owner and one of the first moves this person made was putting Russell Wilson on the trading block for a 1st round pick. Trading on Dynasty Owner will be interesting for quite a while to say the least.

(Before and after teams listed at the bottom)

Trade 7 – (4/17/2021)

Sent – 2021 1.05, 1.06, and 2.05

Received – 2021 1.01 and 3.12

At this point I knew I was going to be in the market for just about everything, but more specifically I knew I had to come away with one quarterback in the 2021 rookie draft. Leading up to the inaugural Dynasty Owner rookie draft, I truly had no idea how the draft was going to play out, which prompted me to make a move for the 1.01. As a rebuilding owner this was a tough trade to make because I hate giving up multiple young assets for one, but I love being able to somewhat control the draft at the same time. When thinking about it I looked at the 1.01 as a safer bet than the 1.05 and 1.06, with Trevor Lawrence being so highly valued among the NFL scouting community. Those types of players tend to work out more often than not. I also took into consideration that I would be able to get close to similar value, if not more back for the 1.01 if I decided I wanted to move it for more assets and ultimately pulled the trigger on making this deal. The other factor here was salary with picks 1.05, and 1.06 likely costing more than just Lawrence would by himself. As I’ve mentioned before young quarterbacks are gold in Dynasty Owner. Overall, I feel I may have overpaid a bit, but I did have a direction I wanted this team to go, and figured Lawrence would fit in well with my young roster. I also knew that my roster would look wildly different come draft day and loved the flexibility this trade offered in terms of the multiple ways I could go in the draft. The opposite owner in this trade was extremely happy with the deal as he probably got a little more overall value than me in this trade. I absolutely love making deals like this one where both owners leave smiling!

Trade 8 – (4/11/21)

Sent – Daniel Jones (2 years, $6,416,014), 2021 2.06

Received – 2021 1.07 and 3.07

I have slowly been learning that the owner that thinks more than a couple moves ahead will benefit greatly in Dynasty Owner. Heading into the offseason I had four starting quarterbacks and only one was someone I would consider borderline Top 10 in Ryan Tannehill. I knew the first day of the offseason all of my quarterbacks except for Sam Darnold would be gone rather quickly. The reason for this was because I knew in the next two years Daniel Jones, Jameis Winston, and Sam Darnold would all either receive big contract extensions or they would end up as a backup somewhere, just look at Mitch Trubisky in Buffalo. With all three of these quarterbacks set for new deals I knew the time to strike was now. As you had seen earlier, I had already dealt Winston to gain some receiver depth and next up was Daniel Jones. The owner had originally messaged about who would be easier to acquire between Darnold and Jones, with me telling him I’d much rather move Jones. I wanted to move Jones first because I am not all that sold on him, and I knew with Kenny Golladay signing with the Giants he would have a bit more value over Darnold. The deal didn’t take long to make as I felt the original offer was very fair. Overall, I’d say both owners left this trade happy, and both got what we wanted. As far as long-term value goes, I am thrilled to gain another asset for a player who will likely be expensive or benched soon. I’ll take four or five years of a rookie deal over a Daniel Jones extension any day of the week.

Trade 9 – (4/15/2021)

Sent – Sam Darnold (1 year, $7,561,929), Allen Lazard (1 year, $675,000), 2021 1.02, 3.06, 3.07, and 3.12 

Received- Tony Pollard (2 years, $796,945), Phillip Lindsay (1 year, $3,250,000), 2021 1.04 and 1.08

Do you remember what I said last week about the Jameis Winston trade? Capitalize on the news! Sam Darnold may very well be a talented kid, but it is not very often, that we see a player fail as miserably as Darnold did and come back and revive their career elsewhere. The one instance I can think to compare the Darnold situation to is Ryan Tannehill in Miami. The kicker for that is Tannehill and Darnold both played under the same coach, Adam Gase, during the worst part of their respective careers. When Darnold initially went to the Panthers, I had every intention of keeping him to see if we had another Tannehill situation on the horizon, but after thinking about it he would just be too expensive next season thus lowering his trade value significantly. Darnold is a very limited runner with the ball and that fact alone really caps his fantasy value, meaning in 2022 he will need to be phenomenal if you want him to return solid value while playing on his fifth year option, which will make him much more expensive than his 2021 salary (1 year, $7,561,929).

All in all, I had to move back 2 spots to the 1.04, picked up an extra 1st round pick in the 1.08, and got two solid young running backs in Tony Pollard and Phillip Lindsay for some much-needed bench depth at the position. The other owner approached me because he needed a quarterback and after a few messages back and forth we had a deal. The only things I would be worried about as the other owner is how much the Panthers will pay Darnold, and will he be able to turn into what we all hoped he’d be when he was drafted third overall by the Jets. I feel both owners left this trade happy with him getting his potential QB of the future for his team and myself getting an extra quality draft pick in a year with a very deep first round. I do want to mention that had this been a somewhat shallow class in terms of position players I may not have made this move, but I was certain there would be great value left at the 1.08.

Trade 10 – (5/07/2021)

Sent – Russell Gage (1 year, $654,049), A.J. Dillon (3 years, $1,321,458), 2021 1.01

Received – D.J. Moore (2 years, $2,792,829), 2021 1.02 and 2.12

In all fantasy football there are trades that just seem harder to make than others for us owners and this happened to be one of those trades. The other owner approached me about the 1.01 and asked who I had planned to take, which was initially Trevor Lawrence or Najee Harris. I looked at the other owner’s team and knew for certain he was after Harris as he had a solid team but needed running back help pretty bad. I responded telling him the two players I was thinking and that I was unsure of a deal. I knew in the back of my head it wasn’t likely I would take Harris at this point, but I couldn’t let him know that and shortly after I ended up swinging a deal to move the 1.01. After some back and forth we finally agreed on the trade above which gave me the rights to D.J. Moore, and I only had to move back to the 1.02 to get him in this deal. In the past, I have mentioned that knowing the other owners teams’ in your league will benefit you greatly, this is exactly what I mean by that. If I hadn’t looked at his team, I would have probably told him, I was leaning toward Lawrence and lost every bit of leverage I had in the deal. As a rebuilding owner sometimes less is more and if you can move back one pick while picking up a talent like Moore you have to do it every time. As far as the future outlook of my team after this trade, it may end up putting me in a bind having A.J. Brown, Dionte Johnson, and D.J. Moore getting new deals at the same time, but I do have players like Brandin Cooks, and Dak Prescott with solid backups if I really needed to clear out space a year or two down the road. The owner I made the deal with seemed to be happy with the deal as well after getting the player/pick he set out to get. The other owner got a bit of an added bonus in the deal a few weeks after with Russell Gage now having a clear path to targets after Julio Jones was moved to Tennessee.

Trade 11 – (6/04/2021)

Sent – 2021 1.02 (Kyle Pitts – 4 years, $8,227,623), O.J. Howard (1 year $6,013,000)

Received – Travis Kelce (5 years, $14,312,500), 2021 3.08

When you are a rebuilding owner you will run into a moment like this and in that moment, you will need to decide to continue rebuilding another year or pulling the trigger and becoming an instant contender. Overall, I feel that this trade sent me from a 3rd or 4th seed in my league to clearly one of the best two teams in the league, especially if we are talking about a few years window. I may still be a year out from winning it all, but if some of my younger guys make a jump, I can easily make a run at my league’s title. The trade I’m talking about is essentially a swap of Kyle Pitts and O.J. Howard, for Travis Kelce. Any rebuilding owner would gladly take Pitts but when I looked at my team, I knew I had about a 2–3-year window to stay as deep as I am and still have a potentially dominant starting lineup, because we have to factor in salary caps. If I would have stayed put and took Pitts, I would have likely had to wait a couple years for him to truly start dominating like we expect with the tight end position being so tough for rookies to learn and at that point I may be cutting a guy or two due to contract extensions or new deals for my players. Dynasty Owner is all about capitalizing when your roster has a good combination of talent and value. Once contract extensions start kicking in for multiple players things can become suspect rather quickly. The future of my team may have been a little brighter with Pitts over Kelce but the next three to four years have now become the time to win. The owner I made the deal with seemed elated to get Pitts and start building towards the future at the tight end position and I’d have to say both owners left this deal more than satisfied.

Trade 12 – (6/08/2021)

Sent – Anthony Firkser (1 year, $3,000,000), 2023 3rd

Received – 2023 2nd

About a month back Tim, Steve and I were doing a livestream and Tim asked what I preferred to do with guys I couldn’t keep because of price, my answer was and always will be to try and trade them for anything you can get instead of dropping them for nothing. I have a very solid roster and a very good tight end room with Travis Kelce, Dallas Goedert, and Adam Trautman, which made Anthony Firkser available to move. I love the thought of Firkser being the top tight end in Nashville, but the addition of Julio Jones and the lack of cap space on my roster meant someone had to go before the season started. I knew I wasn’t going to get rid of any of my top tier players for cap space and I also didn’t want to just cut a young player with potential, so I ended up making a lower-level veteran available. I knew Firkser wouldn’t fetch much in a trade, but I also knew he was too good to just release so I started sending out offers to send Firkser away for a 2023 2nd. I chose to make the pick in 2023 rather than 2022 because most owners place a little extra value on the draft picks, they will make the soonest. I ended up getting some interest and turned a player I needed to move on from into a future 2nd round pick, though I did send him my 2023 3rd in return. The future of my team did not change much after the trade, but I do have an extra pick I can use to help get a future deal done. I am guessing the other owner is happy with the deal as well with him getting a solid backup tight end in an up-and-coming offense. At the end of the day, Firkser is a great player to roster as a competing owner, but I needed to have some type of flexibility for free agents heading into the season and tight end was a position I felt comfortable doing just that.

Conclusion

As we inch closer to the start of the 2021 NFL season, I am starting to get extremely antsy and I’m sure most of you are too. With the new season quickly approaching the time to get yourself and some friends into a Dynasty Owner start-up drafts is now. Start-up drafts have already started and will continue running up until close to kickoff for the regular season opener. If you are an owner who is having a lot of fun with Dynasty Owner, I want to challenge you to invite a few of your buddies over to check out the site and do a few mock drafts so they can truly see how much different this platform is, as well as the strategy they will need to consider going forward as well.

Over the next few weeks, I would like to try to set up a startup mock draft day each week on the same day at the same time (example Fridays from 5pm-7pm) to give those who are new to the platform a true learning experience as well as something the rest of us can use to sharpen our skills. If we get enough users for this to really get going it could become a great learning tool for everyone. I truly believe once people start to figure out what this platform is and how it works that we will see floods of new users joining in each off-season. Also, those of you that know people that will enjoy Dynasty Owner but don’t have the time to help them get going please send them to one of us here at Dynasty Owner and we will be more than happy to help. Thank you all for reading and playing Dynasty Owner! Good luck on your 2021 Chase for the Ring!

Original Team (all player contracts listed are current)

Quarterback

  • Daniel Jones (2 years, $6,416,014),
  • Sam Darnold (1 year, $7,561,929)
  • Jameis Winston (1 year, $5,500,000)

Running back

  • Christian McCaffrey (5 years $16,015,875)
  • Joe Mixon (4 years, $12,000,000)
  • Kareem Hunt (2 years, $6,000,000)
  • Leonard Fournette (1 year, $3,250,000)
  • A.J. Dillon (3 years, $1,321,458)
  • Latavius Murray (2 years, $3,600,000)
  • Justin Jackson (1 year, $570,000)
  • Ryquell Armstead (2 years, $716,439)

Wide Receiver

  • Julio Jones (3 years, $22,000,000)
  • DeVante Parker (3 years, $7,625,000),
  • Michael Pittman (3 years, $2,153,212)
  • Anthony Miller (1 year, $1,338,425)
  • Sammy Watkins (1 year, $5,000,000)
  • Russell Gage (1 year, $654,049)
  • Quintez Cephus (3 years, $899,822)
  • Malcom Perry (3 years, $842,622)


Tight End

  • Dallas Goedert (1 year, $1,406,068)
  • Will Dissly (1 year, $777,569)
  • Jared Cook (1 year, $4,500,000)

Kicker

  • Greg Joseph (1 year, $78,000)
  • Brett Maher (free agent)
  • Matt Prater (2 years, $3,250,000)

Current Team

Quarterback

  • Dak Prescott (4 years, $40,000,000)
  • Justin Fields (4 years, $4,717,988)

Running back

  • J.K. Dobbins (3 years, $1,432,359)
  • Antonio Gibson (3 years, $1,233,159)
  • Tony Pollard (2 years, $796,945)
  • Javonte Williams (4 years, $2,216,438)
  • Kalen Ballage (1 year, $920,000)
  • Jaret Patterson (3 years, $808,333)
  • Phillip Lindsay (1 year, $3,250,000)

Wide receiver

  • Dionte Johnson (2 years, $1,070,241)
  • A.J. Brown (2 years, $1,413,092)
  • D.J. Moore (2 years, $2,792,829)
  • Brandin Cooks (2 years, $16,200,000)
  • Ja’Marr Chase (4 years, $7,547,410)
  • Michael Pittman (3 years, $2,153,212)
  • Anthony Miller (1 year, $1,338,425)
  • Quintez Cephus (3 years, $899,822)
  • Nico Collins (4 years, $1,217,879)
  • Tutu Atwell (4 years, $1,477,175)
  • Josh Palmer (4 years, $1,258,365)

Tight end

  • Travis Kelce (5 years, $14,312,500)
  • Dallas Goedert (1 year, $1,406,068)
  • Adam Trautman (3 years, $1,124,850)

Kicker

  • Matt Prater (2 years, $3,250,000)
  • Cody Parkey (1 year, $1,212,500)
  • Graham Gano (3 years, $4,666,667)
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