This content has been archived. It may no longer be relevant
By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)
I’m under .500 in several Dynasty Owner leagues as well as in my weekly Starting lineup and Bench recommendations. I’m optimistic that I can rectify this situation, but that’s where I’m at right now. It’s difficult to make these Starting lineup and Bench recommendations and I think they are more difficult than the way some others do their predictions. Totally my decision on how I do them and grade them. Nobody made me do it this way or is preventing me from changing. In a way, it fits with Dynasty Owner as playing against some of the best fantasy football players around and using a salary cap is more difficult. Dynasty Owner forces you to either release or trade away good players at times (just like NFL teams do) and makes Dynasty Owner more difficult. I just wish that I could get all of my Dynasty Owner teams and my recommendations at least to .500 by the end of the season.
My recommendations and all recommendations or predictions from any fantasy football analyst are just that, recommendations or predictions. Especially when they are like mine and free, but honestly I’m not sure that paid predictions are any better. None of us are Biff Tannen and have the Grays Sports Almanac at our disposal. If you’ve never seen Back to the Future, you won’t get that reference.
The other reason why they are recommendations or predictions is that nobody knows your Dynasty Owner team better than you do. While my recommendation last week was to Bench new Vikings TE T.J. Hockenson ($4,955,306), you can’t follow that recommendation if your only other TEs were Dalton Schultz ($10,931,000) and Donald Parham ($895,000) because Schultz was on bye last week and Parham was injured. Even if Hockenson had only scored 0.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, he would have been better than either Schultz or Parham for your team’s Starting lineup. He ended up with 16.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and should have been a Starter for your Dynasty Owner team unless you have Dallas Goedert ($14,250,000), Cole Kmet ($1,894,444), Cade Otton ($1,123,486) or Travis Kelce ($14,312,500). Those were the only four TEs who had more Dynasty Owner fantasy points last week than Hockenson.
Please take these recommendations in that spirit. Just so you know, I might not take my recommendations either at times. After all, I know my team best and won’t be following my QB recommendation in at least one league this week since I have Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000). I think the QB I’m recommending this week will do well and be a worthy Starting QB, but I don’t think he’s outperforming Mahomes.
The teams in the Match-up of the Week are both over .500 and you can go check my Week 10 preview article to find out which teams are featured. This weekly recommendations article will contain a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who you should have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup, but who isn’t an obvious choice and might usually be on your Bench or Practice Squad or even available in the Free Agent Auction. After that, I’ll name one player per position who is playing well and is normally in your Starting lineup, but who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad.
For the purposes of this article, ADP and Dynasty Owner roster percentage statistics were current as of the afternoon of Friday, November 11th.
These Guys Should be Starters This Week
First, we’ll check on how my Week 9 recommendations fared (Good, Bad or Just Ok). I predicted Dynasty Owner Starting lineup worthy performances from these four players in Week 9.
QB: Justin Fields (CHI – $4,717,989) – 51.9 (Good recommendation)
RB: Deon Jackson (IND – $825,000) – 5.6 (Bad recommendation)
WR: Demarcus Robinson (BAL – $1,035,000) – 2.2 (Bad recommendation)
TE: Will Dissly (SEA – $8,000,000) – 5.4 (Bad recommendation)
Looking at my overall recommendations record of 33% Good, 56% Bad and 8% Just Ok (plus one recommendation who didn’t play and was not applicable), you would think that my recommendations are this poor every week. That’s wrong as I haven’t had three Bad weekly recommendations since way back in Week 3. A truly terrible start to the season with recommendations has put me well below .500 and while I’ve improved in recent weeks, I’m still far behind with not a lot of time left to improve.
For this week, the Good recommendation was one of the best recommendations of the season as Justin Fields was nearly the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week. The rest were Bad as nobody else had even 6.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Deon Jackson and the entire Colts offense was stymied by the Patriots defense, Lamar Jackson ($23,016,000) only threw 22 passes for Baltimore with four targeted to Demarcus Robinson. Unfortunately, he only caught one of them for 12 yards. I went with Will Dissly thinking that Noah Fant’s ($3,147,680) hamstring injury would leave him not able to play or limited against Arizona. He ended up being Seattle’s leading receiver in Week 9 with 5 receptions for 96 receiving yards (14.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). If I had chosen him, it would have been a Good recommendation. Instead, I went with Dissly, and he had just 5.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (3 receptions for 24 receiving yards).
Even if I have four Good recommendations this week, I’m not moving above .500. I need several weeks in a row with three or four Good recommendations to get there. I’m going to try, so here are my Week 10 Starting lineup recommendations.
Jacoby Brissett (CLE – $4,650,000): So far this season, Brissett has passed for more than 200 yards and gotten a TD in seven out of eight games. He only threw for 147 yards in Week 1 against Carolina and failed to score a TD in Week 7 against Baltimore. This week, he gets to play against the Dolphins who have allowed the tenth most passing yards per game (245.9) and allowed the seventh most points per game (24.9). The Dolphins’ defense also doesn’t cause turnovers with just 7 (4 INTs and 3 fumbles) in nine games. They also allowed Justin Fields to score 51.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points last week. If you removed all of Fields’ rushing, he still would have put up 26.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (123 passing yards, 3 TDs, 1 2-pt conversion). Because of how well their offense is playing, their defensive struggles aren’t getting too much attention.
This recommendation is based more on the Dolphins’ defense than Brissett as he is QB20 in Dynasty Owner and averaging 16.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. He’s only had two games with more than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (24.1 in Week 3 versus Pittsburgh and in Week 8 versus Cincinnati). He did play very well in his last outing and had a season-high 278 passing yards before Cleveland’s bye last week. I’m confident that he can keep it up for another week and recommend getting Brissett into your Starting lineup.
Jaylen Warren (PIT – $857,333): Am I buying the Jaylen Warren hype? Yes, but not as much as people who are saying that Warren should start over Najee Harris ($3,261,862). I’m also not buying the Steelers’ claims that Warren hasn’t seen an increase in practice reps. The truth is somewhere in between. Warren has earned more playing time and will get it this week against the Saints. At the same time, Harris will get more work than Warren and continue to be the RB1 in Pittsburgh.
Both of those statements can be true. I wouldn’t sit Harris if I had him on my Dynasty Owner roster. I also would have tried to pick up Warren if he was available in any leagues (99.15% rostered) and not hesitate to put him in my Starting lineup if I had him on any of my Dynasty Owner teams.
In Week 8, Warren had 10.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (50 rushing yards, 3 receptions, 25 receiving yards). He has a total of 35.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on just 41 touches (29 rushing attempts and 12 receptions) without a TD. Harris had 12.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 8 (32 rushing yards, 6 receptions, 26 receiving yards, 4 passing yards). He hasn’t received fewer than a dozen touches in any game so far this season, but has only 86.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on 132 touches. Warren has been more efficient, while Harris has continued to get more work than him. Even in the two games that Warren received 9 touches, Harris still got 14 in both of them.
The Saints’ defense is allowing RBs to gain 95.3 yards per game rushing, 4 receptions for 26.4 yards per game and 8 TDs. If we give Harris and Warren combined those yards and receptions plus a TD, it’s 22.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. They allowed Kenyan Drake ($1,035,000) to get 24.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points last week (93 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 16 receiving yards, 2 TDs) and Eno Benjamin ($849,428) had 23.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 7 (92 rushing yards, 4 receptions, 21 receiving yards, 1 TD, 1 2-pt. conversion). Keaontay Ingram ($957,648) also had 11.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 7 (14 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 23 receiving yards, 1 TD). It’s very possible that both Steelers’ RBs will have enough Dynasty Owner fantasy points to be worth having in your Starting lineup so get Warren in there.
Tre’Quan Smith (NO – $3,000,000): Now that Michael Thomas ($19,250,000) is finally done for the 2022 NFL season for good, it’s time for another Saints WR to step up and play alongside rookie Chris Olave ($4,817,969). There are a lot of candidates as there are five other WRs on the Saints active roster and two on the practice squad. Based on production in the past two seasons, the best option to step up is Tre’Quan Smith.
Smith has played in 18 games over the past two seasons and scored 136.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (7.6 points per game) with seven games of more than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. He has the fifth most targets (25) on the team and the only WR with more is Marquez Callaway (29). However, Callaway has only caught 15 of those passes and his career catch rate is just 58.6% (82 out of 140). In contrast, Smith has caught 17 out of 25 targets this season (68%), a similar percentage to his entire career (66.5%).
The Saints play the Steelers this week and the Steelers’ defense has allowed the third most receiving yards to WRs this season (1,703), seventh most receptions (112) and the most receiving TDs (13). That bodes well for Olave and another Saints’ WR. That will be Smith and Dynasty Owners with him on their roster (25.96%) should put him in their Starting lineup this week.
Tyler Higbee (LAR – $7,250,000): Here’s my process for choosing a Starting TE.
- Question: Who’s playing Arizona?
- Answer: The Rams
- Question: Who is their Starting TE and is he in the top 12 TEs?
- Answer: Tyler Higbee and he’s TE17
Therefore, Tyler Higbee is the choice. He’s still outside of the top 12 if I remove the TEs on bye and out with an injury this week. There are four of them: TE2 Mark Andrews ($14,000,000), TE7 Tyler Conklin ($6,750,000), TE8 Hayden Hurst ($3,500,000) and TE9 David Njoku ($13,687,500). Higbee is TE13 without them and eligible for selection here.
The Arizona defense is the worst against TEs and it’s not particularly close. They have given up the most receptions (66), receiving yards (694) and are tied with New England for most TDs (7). The best part for Higbee’s Dynasty Owners is that there is no other TE on their active roster with a reception so far this season. Kendall Blanton ($837,500) was released by the team on Tuesday and updated on Dynasty Owner as a free agent. He was signed to the Rams’ practice squad on Thursday and will be updated again before Sunday’s games. Even then, he only scored 5.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (2 receptions for 35 receiving yards).
It’s pretty much Higbee who will most likely catch passes from whoever starts at QB for the Rams. I’m going to make this recommendation and stick with it, even if John Wolford ($895,000) is the Rams’ QB against Arizona. Get Higbee into your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup.
These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week
Now it’s time to look at how my Bench recommendations from Week 9 worked out (Good, Bad or Just Ok). The Good recommendations were just under .500 through Week 8 with 15 out of 32 Bench recommendations being graded as Good. I’ve still had more Good than Bad recommendations (15 Good vs. 14 Bad) and let’s see if I kept that up with my Week 9 recommendations.
QB: Tom Brady (TB – $15,000,000) – 23.0 (Bad recommendation)
RB: Michael Carter (NYJ – $1,071,842) – 15.6 (Bad recommendation)
WR: D.J. Moore (CAR – $20,628,000) – 4.4 (Good recommendation)
TE: T.J. Hockenson (MIN – $4,955,306) – 16.0 (Bad recommendation)
Unfortunately, that didn’t happen and now I’ve had fewer Good than Bad recommendations for the first time all season. The only Good recommendation was D.J. Moore who had just 4.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Everybody else had more than 15.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and finished in the top 12 at their position for Week 9. My Good recommendations will be exactly at .500 if all four of my Week 10 Bench recommendations are Good. Here are the four players who are going to hopefully get me there.
Geno Smith (SEA – $3,500,000): The party has to end one day for Geno Smith and facing the Tampa Bay defense in Munich, Germany seems like as good a place as any for it to happen. Besides having to face the Tampa Bay defense, the Seahawks had to travel from either Phoenix (where they played last week) or Seattle to Munich. That’s either 5,283 miles from Seattle or 5,823 miles from Phoenix. It’s either a ten and a half or eleven and a half hour flight. That’s a lot of travel, then to have to play a football game. Yes, I know the Tampa Bay defense had to travel pretty far too, but not as far as Seattle’s offense. Chances are good that both teams will struggle to move the ball in an unfamiliar stadium.
It’s hard to pick Smith to play badly as he really only has one subpar game this season and that was back in Week 2 when he had only 7.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against San Francisco. He’s averaging 23.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game with more than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in six out of nine games. Smith and the Seahawks have been a nice story all season long and while I picked Seattle to win, I think it’ll be a low-scoring 13-10 game with few players getting a lot of Dynasty Owner fantasy points. That includes Smith, so leave him on your Dynasty Owner Bench this week.
Raheem Mostert (MIA – $2,125,000): I could have also picked Jeff Wilson ($1,085,000) here since the Dolphins split the RB workload almost evenly last week against the Bears. Wilson played 28 snaps and Mostert played 27 snaps. Both of them had TDs in that game and with Tyreek Hill ($18,000,000) and Jaylen Waddle ($6,771,498) that seems unlikely to happen in the future. Both of them will not keep up their current production (10.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game for Mostert and 10.0 for Wilson) sharing the backfield for the Dolphins.
Overall, Wilson had more touches (12 vs. 9 for Mostert). However, Mostert got more red zone work (4 touches vs. 1 for Wilson), likely because it was Wilson’s first week in South Florida. The end zone work is a lean in Mostert’s favor, but Wilson’s only red zone touch resulted in a 10-yard TD reception. Mostert also had a red zone TD with a 1-yard run. Again, that’s not going to keep happening.
So why did I pick Mostert who is RB24 in Dynasty Owner here instead of Wilson who is RB26. First, I’m only making one Bench recommendation per week. Second, I think the fact that they split carries in Wilson’s first game in Miami bodes well for Wilson in future games once he has practiced more. Again, I don’t know this for sure, but it’s my gut feeling. I would leave Mostert on your Dynasty Owner Bench this week.
Michael Pittman (IND – $2,153,212): This selection shouldn’t be very surprising after how Colts QB Sam Ehlinger ($902,677) has played in his first two NFL starts. The Colts offense had a respectable 324 total yards and scored 16 points against the Commanders in his first start, but only 121 total yards and 3 points in his second start against New England. Start number 3 for Ehlinger comes with a new head coach and new offensive play caller. In his first start, Frank Reich was the coach and play caller, while Marcus Brady was the offensive coordinator. In his second start, it was Reich calling the plays and presumably was offensive coordinator as Brady had been fired. Now, new interim coach Jeff Saturday is in charge and Parks Frazier is calling the plays. It’s hard enough to come in mid-season and perform well, but basically having no continuity in his coaching makes it worse.
Amidst all of this turmoil, Pittman has done ok. He has scored 17.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (10 receptions for 75 receiving yards). That’s actually more than Ehlinger who only has 14.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in his two starts. However, Pittman hasn’t been the leading receiver in either game as Alec Pierce ($1,650,336) has gotten more yards in both games. Pittman’s yards per catch was 10.8 with Matt Ryan ($30,000,000) at QB, but has dropped to 7.5 yards per catch with Ehlinger. To be worthy of your Dynasty Owner starting lineup, Pittman will likely need at least 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, so he’ll need 6 receptions for 45 yards (10.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) at his current yards per catch. Six receptions seems like a lot when Ehlinger is averaging only 16 completions per game. That’s 37.5% and Pittman is already catching 31.25% (10 receptions out of 32 completions) of Ehlinger’s passes.
This doesn’t seem likely with a new head coach and play caller, both with no experience at their new jobs. I would have as many of my Colts’ players on the Bench as possible, including Pittman.
Robert Tonyan (GB – $3,750,000): In a sign of how bad the TE position is nowadays, Tonyan is TE11 overall for the season, but has only two games with double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points (19.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against the Jets in Week 6 and 10.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against the Patriots in Week 4). However, he only has one game with over 40 receiving yards (90 against the Jets) and only one TD (against the Patriots). Tonyan has scored 75.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in nine games played (8.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game), but just 6.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game in the six games against non-AFC East opponents. He had 8.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 8 against Buffalo. The Packers play against the Dallas Cowboys this week.
Since every TE on a NFL roster can be a Dynasty Owner Starter with pretty much a TD (that’s not completely accurate but close) as a 1-yard TD reception is worth 7.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Tonyan is more TD-dependent than most top TEs as he has scored double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 13 games since 2020, but only twice without a TD. In contrast, TE10 Gerald Everett ($6,000,000) has 13 double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point games since 2020 and in seven of them, he didn’t have a TD. TE12 Evan Engram ($9,000,000) has 15 double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point games since 2020 and in 10 of them, he didn’t have a TD.
If the Cowboys can keep Tonyan out of the end zone, he’s almost a lock to not get double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points and should be on your Bench. They have only allowed one TE to score a TD this season. That was Cole Kmet ($1,894,444) and ironically, he only had 9.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points that week (2 receptions, 11 receiving yards, 1 TD). Tonyan won’t have a TD and won’t score double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy so leave him on your Bench.
Conclusion
While a .500 record doesn’t seem great, there are only 14 NFL teams with a winning record right now and one team (San Francisco 49ers) at .500 with a 4-4 record. One division (AFC East) has all four teams with winning records. All of the teams in the NFC South are under .500 and only if Tampa Bay wins this week will there be one with a .500 record (5-5).
In terms of recommendations, I’ll be happy if I can finish the season with a .500 record. There are 8 weeks left in the Dynasty Owner season (5 regular season and 3 playoff weeks). I’ll need to hit on nearly 70% of my Starting lineup recommendations and a majority (56%) of my Bench recommendations to get there. The Bench recommendations are obviously more likely because I need a lower percentage and there are plenty more players who finish as Bench or Practice Squad players than Starters. Hopefully I can do it and also get all of my Dynasty Owner teams to at least .500 (7-7) and make the playoffs in every league.
If you’re still trying to make the playoffs, then please read all of the articles from myself, Jay Pounds and Matt Morrison – The Jerk to give you an edge. If you’re looking forward to the 2023 Dynasty Owner rookie draft, then we have a series of 2023 Rookie Draft articles from Nate Christian to help you. If you’re tanking or sandbagging, then nothing is going to help you.
Everyone can listen to the Dynasty Owner podcast with me and Jay as well as the Champions podcast featuring our three Chase for the Ring Champions. This week’s Dynasty Owner podcast episode was released on Thursday.
Watch the Dynasty Owner Livestream as it happens on Wednesdays as we will answer trade questions and talk about Dynasty Owner and fantasy football in general. You can also catch it afterwards if you can’t watch us live. Finally, don’t forget to follow Dynasty Owner on Twitter as well. Thanks, and have a great day!
Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner
Follow us on Twitter: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner