Free Agent Targets – Week 10

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners! We are back with another fun filled week of free agents! As I always do, let’s take a look at some of the notable events of the past week. C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811)!!! What a performance the former Ohio State product had this weekend and while I don’t want to get ahead of myself, I think Ohio State finally has a star quarterback in the NFL. Unless you want to count Joe Burrow ($9,047,534) that is. In Week 9, Stroud set the rookie record for passing yards in a single game, finishing the day with 470 yards passing and 5 touchdowns and 62.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (470 passing yards, 10 rushing yards, 5 TDs, 1 2-pt. conversion, 1 fumble). Oh, and a near perfect passer rating of 147.8. Stroud also now has the highest scoring week here on Dynasty Owner this season, second highest overall in Dynasty Owner history and highest ever by a QB. If you can’t tell I am excited about the start Stroud has had thus far. Enough on my love affair, let’s move on to the rest of the league.

If you want to see an unfamiliar site, go to Google and type 2023 AFC playoff picture. When you do, you will find that all four AFC North teams would be in the playoffs if the season were to end today. Will that happen? I highly doubt it, but it’s still really neat to see this far into the season.

I can’t explain how badly I wanted to come on here today and talk about how the Cowboys “Cowboyed it up” on national television and while they lost, I will admit they surprised me quite a bit. Games like Sunday night are games Dak Prescott ($40,000,000) usually plays average at best in but had Dak not played so well, this game would have been a complete blowout. While the Cowboys didn’t pick up a victory against the Eagles, they took a massive step in the right direction. If moral victories were a real thing the Cowboys may have won Sunday night despite losing on the scoreboard.

Finally, I would like to congratulate the Raiders’ fan base on the free win every team with an interim coach gets. Enjoy it now because it usually goes downhill quickly come Week 2! On the bright side, at least Josh McDaniels is gone and will never be an NFL head coach again. He needs to add Tom Brady’s kids to his will as McDaniels made boatloads of money off him even after Brady switched teams and retired twice.

If you are new to this series of articles, there is a small list of requirements, with the main one being that the player must be 80% rostered or below in Dynasty Owner. The only other requirement I have is that I would like the player to have a salary of $8,000,000 or less, but I will put a higher salary player on the list if I feel they are worth it. Free Agent Auction bids will process on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) for this upcoming week, so there’s still time to get your bids in for Week 10. The Bid listed below is my recommended amount to secure the player for your Dynasty Owner team in the Wednesday Free Agent Auction run in a typical Dynasty Owner league.

  1. Noah Brown (WR – HOU) – 1 year/$2,600,000 – 30.65% Rostered

I can’t remember, did I mention that C.J. Stroud had a big weekend? Well one of the biggest recipients of that big weekend was former Cowboy Noah Brown. Anyone want to take a guess on where Noah Brown went to school? Yea, that’s right, The Ohio State University. Unfortunately, the two did not cross paths in their time in Columbus, but nonetheless it’s always fun to watch guys from your favorite college team up and do well in the pros. In Week 9, Brown had the biggest game of his career, and it all came on just six targets! Brown finished the day with 6 catches for 153 receiving yards and a touchdown finishing with 27.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for the week. It has been a guessing game on which Texans’ receiver will have a good week but if, and it’s a big if, Brown and Stroud build on this past week, our Dynasty Owners who win Brown’s services in the Free Agent Auction will be extremely happy!

Bid – $5,000,000

2.Keaton Mitchell (RB – BAL) – 3 years/$904,333 – 78.16% Rostered

If you read reports from this game, you are going to see things like garbage time attached to Keaton Mitchell’s name, but I don’t think it is a fair statement at all. Yes, the Ravens were up a couple of touchdowns at the half but that is hardly garbage time and Mitchell finished the first half with just as much work as Gus Edwards ($4,500,000) and Justice Hill ($2,255,000) and more rushing yards than both of them combined. Mitchell also produced the two biggest plays for the Ravens all season long in Week 9, or at least it seems that way, and looks to be a perfect fit alongside Edwards moving forward. It may be a week or 2 before we figure out what Mitchell’s true role will be but if he continues to produce electric plays, the Ravens will happily use him to take some of the load off of Lamar Jackson ($52,000,000). The Ravens are a Super Bowl or bust team which should mean players like Mitchell will see the field more in an attempt to keep their stars fresh for a deep playoff run. I remember hearing a lot about an undrafted rookie free agent running back the Ravens signed in camp, and I think we all figured out why this past Sunday.

Bid – $7,000,000

3.Taysom Hill (TE – NO) – 3 years/$10,000,000 – 49.81% Rostered

I am not going to spend much time on Taysom Hill as he was in last week’s article and his pricey salary is not for everyone. All of that said I believe Hill should be rostered in just about all fantasy football leagues, including Dynasty Owner, at this point. The tight end position is horrible this season and Hill’s versatility is much too intriguing to pass on. It also helps that Dennis Allen and the Saints have figured out how to best utilize him. I mentioned last week how bad the Saints had been in the red zone and Hill has single-handedly changed that over the past 2 weeks of play. In Weeks 8 and 9, Hill played a part in four of the Saints’ eight touchdowns scored (2 rushing, 1 passing, 1 receiving) while the Saints won both games. Hill currently sits as the seventh ranked tight end in Dynasty Owner and was not featured in the game plan much until Week 6. If Hill is able to stay healthy, he has a realistic shot to finish as a top 3 tight end the rest of the season.

Bid – $2,000,000

4.Leonard Fournette (RB – BUF) – 1 year/$7,000,000 – 69.73% Rostered

I know Uncle Lenny is another repeat from last week, but I did not expect him to still be so widely available after a week on the open market. Fournette does come with a price tag of $7,000,000 currently, but that will be changed if he is signed to the Bills’ active roster, or should I say when. I think we should expect to see Fournette in a 50-50 split with James Cook ($1,458,014) by next week at the latest. If the season were to end today, the Bills would miss the playoffs and it seems as if they are missing something as a team. Judging by signing Fournette, the Bills’ front office must truly believe it’s a running game and balance on offense. If Fournette ends up taking over in the Bills’ backfield, he could easily become a league winner with how banged up the running back position is as a whole right now.

Bid – $3,000,000

I couldn’t come up with a great fifth player this week, so I am going to do something a little different and give everyone a couple of quick hitters as possible fifth options for this article.

5a. Royce Freeman (RB – LAR) – 1 year/$1,080,000 – 72.03% Rostered

Yea, Yea laugh away! I know Royce Freeman is not the most attractive selection but hear me out. Despite playing well, Darrell Henderson ($1,053,001) was signed off the street, has never finished a full season healthy and is already in a time share with Freeman as we speak. If anything happens to Henderson, Freeman will see the ugliest 20 touch game in the history of the NFL. 20 touches is 20 touches, right?

Bid – $2,000,000

5b. JuJu Smith-Schuster (WR – NE) – 3 years/$8,500,000 – 85.06% Rostered

Had JuJu been rostered in fewer Dynasty Owner leagues, he would have been the only fifth option, but I didn’t feel like cheating so here we are. JuJu should be the Patriots number 1 receiver the rest of the season with Kendrick Bourne ($5,000,000) now out. The only real competition JuJu has is rookie Demario Douglas ($993,333) who has been banged up already this season. JuJu may not be someone with a high ceiling these days, but he should be a great option for your Bench the rest of the way with a consistent floor.

Bid – $2,000,000

5c. Jack Stoll (TE – PHI) – 1 year/$815,833 – 1.15% Rostered

If I am being honest, I just couldn’t comfortably put a player that has been around three seasons and has scored less than 35.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on the list. Jack Stoll becomes the starting tight end by default in Philadelphia moving forward after the Dallas Goedert ($14,250,000) injury, but I am not expecting much from him in terms of fantasy production. If you are in desperate need of a tight end and enjoy gambling, Stoll is your guy. If not, I would find a way to pick up Taysom Hill.

Bid – $1,000,000

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming articles from me and Steve plus the weekly Dynasty Owner Livestream. Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

NFL Week 9 Preview

Injuries

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

Injuries are a big story every NFL and fantasy football season and this year is no different. You might ask “Why talk about them now, in Week 9, after the Dynasty Owner regular season is more than halfway over and the NFL regular season is close to the mid-season?” That’s a good question and so here goes with my “answer”.

The situation with the Bijan Robinson ($5,489,634) injury situation back in Week 7 when he only played 11 snaps and had one rushing attempt for three yards (0.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) in the Falcons’ game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers appeared to have led to some changes in how injuries were reported in Week 8. All of a sudden, the Chiefs let everyone know that Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000) was sick on Sunday morning, before the Chiefs-Broncos Week 8 game, but still going to start. It was the direct opposite of what the Falcons had done the prior week and with the NFL publicly questioning the Falcons injury reporting, is probably the reason why the Chiefs let it be known that Mahomes was sick. It’s far less likely that the Chiefs make that announcement if the Robinson situation hadn’t occurred the previous week.

It reminds me that the G.O.A.T. Tom Brady was listed on the Patriots’ injury report as “probable” or “questionable” pretty much every week during his entire career in New England. Don’t believe me? Think I’m exaggerating a lot? Then please check out this article and graphic from 2017 that shows Brady had been listed on the Patriots injury report 186 times in his 17 year career (at that point). That’s an average of nearly 11 times per season or somewhere between 60% and 70% of the time, depending on whether or not you are counting just regular season games or both regular season and playoff games. Either way, it seems the Patriots were overcautious in adding Brady to their injury report on a weekly basis.

It’s difficult to get a count on injuries during the season in order to compare. However, with fewer pre-season games now than in the past and the top players playing even less in those pre-season games, the injuries that used to occur during pre-season games now happen in the first couple of weeks of the NFL season and are reaching a crescendo now. So far, 24 out of 32 NFL teams, or three-quarters (75%), have had only one starting QB all season with just the Bears, Browns, Colts, Giants, Jets, Panthers, Raiders, and Titans starting more than one.

In addition, there were a number of significant season-ending injuries in Week 8 to players like Kendrick Bourne ($5,000,000) and Kirk Cousins ($35,000,000), plus injuries to a few other QBs, such as Kenny Pickett ($3,516,976), Matthew Stafford ($40,000,000), Tyrod Taylor ($5,500,000) that forced backup QBs to play in Week 8. Not to mention that there were already backup QBs starting in Week 8 for Justin Fields ($4,717,989), Daniel Jones ($40,000,000), Kyler Murray ($46,100,000), Anthony Richardson ($8,498,508), Aaron Rodgers ($37,500,000), Ryan Tannehill ($29,500,000), and Deshaun Watson ($46,000,000). If you’re counting at home, we had 10 backup QBs play at some point in Week 8 and eight teams will start Week 9 games with a different QB than the one who started for them in Week 1. That’s a lot of injuries to players at the most important position on the field and likely a significant part of the reason why it seems like injuries are more prominent now than at the beginning of the season. Along with the current rash of reporting illnesses now.

Speaking of injuries, that’s why this Week 9 preview article is later than usual. I had a medical procedure earlier in the week and while I’m on the mend now, I’m  working slower than usual. Hence the delay in getting out the preview article and weekly recommendations for a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who you should have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup. These won’t be the obvious choices. No recommendation to go ahead and start our new top scoring player in Dynasty Owner in Josh Allen ($43,005,667). Other players who have scored lots of Dynasty Owner fantasy points and are at the top of the overall rankings won’t be mentioned either. Instead, I’m going to recommend you Start players outside the top players at their position, players drafted to be on your Bench or Practice Squad, or players who aren’t on a roster in every Dynasty Owner league.

After that, I’ll name one player per position who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad. For these Bench recommendations, it’s just the opposite. I’ll suggest players doing well so far, drafted early in Dynasty Owner startup drafts to be Starters, and also in the top 12 (QBs and TEs) or top 36 (RBs and WRs) in scoring this year. This section is where you might see some surprising players appear. However, the recommended Bench players shouldn’t be in your Starting lineup for the week based on matchups, past performance against a team or something else.

All stats cited are based on the Standard Dynasty Owner scoring system as outlined in the Dynasty Owner Constitution. Standard Dynasty Owner scoring gives you .1 points for every yard rushing or receiving, .1 point for every 2 yards passing, 1 point per reception, 6 points for a rushing, receiving or passing touchdown and 2 points for a successful 2-point conversion (rushing, receiving, or passing). Interceptions or fumbles lost cost you 3 points, while a fumble that is recovered by the player’s team is a loss of only 1 point. Bonus points are available for 100-199 yards rushing (2 points), 200 yards rushing or receiving (6 points), 300-399 yards passing (1 point) and 400 yards passing (4 points). There is also a 3 point bonus for clutch scoring, which is a score that results in a lead change in the final two minutes of the 4th quarter or overtime. Kickoff and punt return touchdowns are worth 6 points for the player and kickoff and punt returns are worth 1 point for every 40 yards.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the afternoon of November 3rd. All 2023 contract information is currently what is listed on the Dynasty Owner platform (number of years and salaries) and has been taken from Spotrac (https://www.spotrac.com/).

Dynasty Owner Player of the Week

Before we get into Week 9, let’s look at Week 8 and announce the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week. After a one-week interruption in our first time winners streak, it’s back as we have another first-time Player of the Week. This one is surprising, but after this week, he’s ranked in the top 10 at his position for the entire season. It shows how one great week can catapult a player up in the season-long rankings. The Dynasty Owner Player of the Week for Week 9 was Sam Howell.

Do you know what’s more surprising than Sam Howell ($1,005,400) winning this award in a week in which all 32 NFL teams were playing? It might be the fact that he’s the first Washington Redskins/Football Team/Commanders player to win the Player of the Week award in Dynasty Owner history and no Washington player has won Value Player of the Week. See the Conclusion to find out the other teams that haven’t had a Player of the Week winner and which team is the only one to have won either yet.

For Howell, this was the best game of his short NFL career by a pretty wide margin. In Week 8, he had 41.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (397 passing yards, 11 rushing yards, 4 TDs, 1 INT, 1 fumble) which was the best week of his career by over 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. With just an extra 3 passing yards, he would have gotten an extra 3.0 bonus points for 400+ passing yards and scored 45.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Still, I’m sure his Dynasty Owners are extremely happy with the fact that he won Player of the Week and is now the QB9 for the entire 2023 season. In case you were wondering since I had mentioned how much better he was this week than any other week in his career, his previous high was 31.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on that much reviled Thursday Night Football game against the Bears back in Week 5.

Finally, not only was Sam Howell the Player of the Week, but he also had the lowest Cost per Point for Week 8 and would have also won the Value Player of the Week award (if allowed), just like De’Von Achane ($1,359,362) did in Week 3 before he got hurt and went on Injured Reserve. Congratulations to Sam on your first Player of the Week honor and being the first Washington football player (regardless of team nickname) to win.

Week 8 Points: 41.9

2023 Salary: $1,005,400

Cost per Point: $23,995

Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week

Because this is Dynasty Owner and we’re all looking for value from the players on our roster, we also have the Value Player of the Week. As mentioned above, Sam Howell was technically the winner, but since he received the Player of the Week award, this goes to the second best value of the week. The winner is a familiar face with his second Value Player of the Week win of the 2023 season. The Value Player of the Week is Rashid Shaheed.

Before Puka Nacua ($1,021,244) and Brock Purdy ($934,252) started taking over this space, we had Rashid Shaheed as the Value Player of the Week back in the first week of the season. In Week 1, Shaheed had 20.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, and he did even better in Week 8 with 25.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (3 receptions, 153 receiving yards, 1 TD, 46 return yards). Shaheed currently leads the NFL in yards per reception at 20.8 and is the only NFL player averaging over 20 yards per reception this season. After this week’s performance, Shaheed is the WR21 in Dynasty Owner for the 2023 season and has more Dynasty Owner fantasy points than both of his better known (and much better paid) fellow Saints WRs Chris Olave ($4,817,969) and Michael Thomas ($10,000,000). Congratulations to Rashid on his second Value Player of the Week honor and for definitely being in the running for Value Player of the Year. It may be a longshot, but with injuries piling up in 2023, he’ll be in the conversation if he stays healthy and other low salary, high performance players miss a game or two (or more).

Week 8 Points: 25.5

2023 Salary: $750,000

Cost per Point: $29,412

These Guys Should be Starters This Week

Before we get into the weekly recommendations, I always look at how my previous week’s recommendations did (Good, Bad or Just Ok) and give a recap. Let’s find out what happened last week.

QB: Derek Carr ($37,500,000) –  25.4 (Just Ok recommendation)

RB: Devin Singletary ($2,750,000) – 6.3 (Bad recommendation)

WR: Rashee Rice ($1,623,802) – 9.6 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Trey McBride ($1,574,916) – 25.5 (Good recommendation)

Starting off with the Good recommendation because it was so Good. Trey McBride was the top scoring TE in Dynasty Owner (and most fantasy football leagues) in Week 8 when he had 25.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (10 receptions, 95 receiving yards, 1 TD). I said Arizona was making the TEs a prominent part of their offense and 14 targets for McBride certainly confirmed it.

In the Just Ok category was Derek Carr who finished with 25.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (310 passing yards, -1 rushing yard, 2 TDs, 1 lost fumble). That’s good enough to be a Good recommendation in most weeks, but in Week 8, Carr was QB12 and so it was Just Ok. While neither Devin Singletary nor Rashee Rice was terrible, both should have been on Dynasty Owner Benches instead of in Starting lineups after scoring 6.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (30 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 13 receiving yards) and 9.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions for 56 receiving yards) respectively. Therefore, both of those recommendations were Bad.

My Starting lineup recommendations have been a model of consistency as I’ve had seven consecutive weeks with one Good recommendation. That’s not good enough and I need to step it up for the rest of the Dynasty Owner regular season and playoffs if I want to reach 50% Good recommendations, or even have more Good than Bad recommendations for the 2023 season. Here are the players who I think are worth having in your Week 9 Starting lineup.

Mac Jones (QB – NE): The Commanders just traded away their top two pass rushers in Montez Sweat and Chase Young. That’s probably not going to help maintain their pass rush that had been doing quite well at sacking the quarterback, even as their pass defense that has been allowing 256.8 passing yards per game to rank 29th in the NFL.

Even saying that, it seems like a stretch to recommend Mac Jones ($3,896,588) as a Starter as he is QB24 for the season and hasn’t even had his bye week. He’s averaging just 14.59 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. Jones had two awful, negative point games with -0.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 4 against Dallas and -3.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 5 against New Orleans. Not to mention, his poor Week 6 performance of just 6.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against Las Vegas. However, in the past two games, he has scored a respectable 46.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (433 passing yards, 9 rushing yards, 4 TDs, 1 INT). He also had 33.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 1 against Philadelphia.

His Week 1 performance plus his 29.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy point performance in Week 7 against Buffalo were his two best and both came at home. The Patriots play Washington at home this week and it’ll be Jones’ third Starting lineup worthy performance of the season. Get him in your Starting lineup in a week where five of the top 13 ranked QBs are either out injured or on bye.

Chuba Hubbard (RB – CAR): Even though Miles Sanders ($6,350,000) was back after missing Week 6 with an injury and the Panthers on bye in Week 7, Chuba Hubbard ($1,048,294) still had more snaps than him in Week 8 (45 snaps for Hubbard vs. 12 snaps for Sanders). I don’t anticipate that kind of split in favor of Hubbard this week and he didn’t really take advantage with just 7.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (28 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 26 receiving yards). However, the Houston rush defense who were the Panthers’ Week 8 opponent is better than the Colts’ rush defense and the Panthers get to play Indianapolis in Week 9.

The Colts have allowed RBs to score 12 TDs in 8 games, so 1.5 TDs per week. If Hubbard can get a TD, he’ll likely do as well as he did in Week 6 against Miami (with Sanders out) when he had his best game of the 2023 season with 16.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (88 rushing yards, 1 reception, 2 receiving yards, 1 TD). In each of the past three weeks, the Colts defense has allowed over 37 points and at least a pair of rushing TDs.

I like Hubbard to get at least one TD against the Colts defense that has been in decline for the past three weeks and will still be without run stuffing starting defensive tackle Grover Stewart who was suspended for six games for violating the NFL performance enhancing drugs policy. Get Hubbard into your Dynasty Owner starting lineup while the Colts are missing Stewart and likely to give up at least one rushing TD to the Panthers.

Tank Dell (WR – HOU): When Tank Dell ($1,244,382) plays, the Houston Texans actively try to get the ball into his hands. In the six games that he has played, he has gotten five or more touches in four of them. The only exceptions were Week 1 when he was targeted four times and Week 4 when he was targeted five times, but only had three touches. With fellow WR Robert Woods ($7,625,000) already ruled out for Week 9, Dell will be one of the Texans’ starting WRs and also their primary punt returner. While punt returning might not sound like much, Dell does have 75 punt return yards on the season and the Buccaneers have allowed 235 punt return yards in just 7 games (33.6 yards per game). An average game on punt returns might yield Dell an extra 0.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Remember where you read it if Tank breaks a punt return for big yardage this week.

On offense, Dell played 45 snaps without Woods last week, slightly more than both Nico Collins ($1,217,879) and Noah Brown ($2,600,000) who each played 42 snaps. The fact that Dell is playing as much as Collins and the Texans are actively trying to get him the ball are good signs. He has as many touches (29) in six games as any other Texans’ pass catcher besides Collins who has 33 touches in seven games.

Last week, three Buffalo WRs had Starting lineup worthy performances against Tampa Bay as Gabriel Davis ($998,595) had 23.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, Stefon Diggs ($24,000,000) had 16.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and Khalil Shakir ($1,001,787) had 15.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Not sure if three Texans’ WRs will do it this week, but I’m confident that Dell will and should be in your Starting lineup.

Cade Otton (TE – TB): While Cade Otton ($1,123,486) doesn’t have a game with more than 10.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points this season, he does have three games with more than 9.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and had 8.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions, 27 receiving yards and a 2-pt. conversion) last week. With four top 10 TEs out this week – Sam LaPorta ($2,366,498), Mark Andrews ($14,000,000) and Evan Engram ($13,750,000) are all on bye and Darren Waller ($17,000,000) is out with a hamstring injury – it stands to reason that fewer than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points might be enough to make someone a top 12 TE this week.

Otton has gotten six targets in three out of his four best scoring fantasy games and the Houston Texans, the Buccaneers’ opponent this week, have allowed 62 targets to TEs in 7 games played (8.86 targets per game). Those targets have yielded an average of 7 receptions and 64.9 receiving yards, which equals 13.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. An average week by Otton from QB Baker Mayfield ($4,000,000) who has always targeted his TEs a lot would be enough to make Otton a Starting TE this week. Therefore, go get Otton in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup.

These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week

Now it’s the time to look at how each of my Bench recommendations from Week 8 worked out (Good, Bad or Just Ok).

QB: Russell Wilson ($48,517,647) – 22.7 (Just Ok recommendation)

RB: Brian Robinson ($1,261,227) – 9.9 (Just Ok recommendation)

WR: Amari Cooper ($20,000,000) – 14.9 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Jonnu Smith ($12,500,000) – 2.3 (Good recommendation)

These Bench recommendations were similar to the Starting lineup recommendations with only one Good recommendation. They were a slight bit better as two recommendations were Just Ok and only one was Bad. Not great though and still needs improvement in the second half of the season.

Jonnu Smith only had one reception for 13 receiving yards (2.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) for an easy Good recommendation. Both Rusell Wilson and Brian Robinson had decent games and were the lowest of low-end Starters or highest of high-end Bench players in Week 8. Wilson had 22.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (114 passing yards, 30 rushing yards, 3 TDs, 2 fumbles – 1 lost) which put him just behind Derek Carr as QB13. Even though he was technically QB13, I can’t call it a Good recommendation, so it’ll be Just Ok. Same with Brian Robinson who had 9.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (59 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 20 receiving yards) and was right on the cusp of being worth having as one of your Starting RBs. Again, that’s Just Ok. Even though the Amari Cooper recommendation was Bad, it wasn’t terrible as he had 14.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (6 receptions for 89 receiving yards) and finished as a high-end FLEX option for the week. It was a Bad recommendation and the fourth Bad WR recommendation of the season for me, but the highest number of Dynasty Owner fantasy points for any of those Bad recommendations is 16.3 so all of them have been pretty close to being Just Ok.

Hopefully this week can have four Good Bench recommendations, like I did back in Week 1. These four players are the guys who I’m relying on to not play well enough to be worth having in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup.

Tua Tagovailoa (QB – MIA): Technically, I could pick Joshua Dobbs ($2,000,000) here as after subtracting injuries and QBs on bye weeks, he goes from being QB16 to QB11 overall, but since he was just traded and is just possibly going to play a “supportive” role (whatever that is), I’ll be fair and not include him. The top four QBs are all facing tough teams, but it’s tough to pick Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts ($1,506,293), or Patrick Mahomes here. However, the overall QB3 is Tua Tagovailoa ($7,568,859) and while the Dolphins have some amazing skill position players, Tua has a few weaknesses that make him my choice this week.

First, it’s a road game for the Dolphins and a big road game as they have to travel to Germany and play at 9:30 AM (Eastern). Don’t forget to set your lineup early Sunday morning or Saturday night if you sleep in late or live on the West Coast. Tua has averaged 26.16 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game (209.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in eight games) this season, but at home, his average is 30.88 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game and on the road, it’s 21.45 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. That road average includes his 41.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points versus the Chargers in Week 1 and obscures the fact that he has fewer than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in his other three road games this season.

Tua is also fairly turnover prone with 7 INTs and 7 fumbles this season. He’s tied for eighth most INTs and the Chiefs defense is averaging 1.5 turnovers per game, which is in the top third in the NFL. Chances are good that Tua will lose a few fantasy points due to turnovers and he doesn’t gain any yards rushing (26 rushing yards all season), so if the Chiefs can hold him under 300 yards passing and to just 1 TD, he’ll likely score fewer than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and be a high-end Bench QB this week. That’s my prediction so when you set your Dynasty Owner lineup early for this game, put Tua in your Bench QB spot.

Alexander Mattison (RB – MIN): The injury to starting Vikings QB Kirk Cousins is thrusting rookie fifth round draft pick Jaren Hall ($1,029,819) into the Vikings starting lineup against the Atlanta Falcons this week. With an untested rookie at QB, it stands to reason that the Vikings might try to run the ball more than usual. Unfortunately for the Vikings, they are facing a Falcons’ defense that is allowing only 83.5 rushing yards per game and 3.84 yards per carry to RBs and hasn’t given up a rushing TD to a RB this season. It would seem that a RB will need plenty of rushing attempts to get enough yards to offset not scoring a TD.

Alexander Mattison ($3,500,000) has been the Vikings starting RB this season and is the RB27 for the season. With injuries and players on bye leaving six RBs out this week, he’s a mid-range RB2 for Week 9 and likely a starter for many Dynasty Owners. However, Mattison has yet to run for over 100 yards in a single game despite games with 16, 17, 18 and 20 carries already and is averaging 3.7 yards per carry (390 rushing yards on 106 attempts). Last week against Green Bay was the low point as he had just 31 rushing yards on 16 attempts plus 1 reception for 2 yards (4.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). He had fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 2 (3.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), but just 8 rushing attempts.

It’s not a true timeshare with Cam Akers ($1,543,259) as Mattison has played more snaps every week since Akers joined the Vikings, but Akers has outscored him in two straight games and got the Vikings lone rushing TD of the season last week. Mattison does have two TDs on the season, but both were receiving TDs.

While it would seem like a good week to trust the Vikings’ leading rusher with a new QB under center, the signs are heading in the opposite direction for Mattison. With the Falcons’ likely to dare Hall to beat them through the air, it seems like a good idea for Dynasty Owners to put Mattison on their Bench this week.

DJ Moore (WR – CHI): Since DJ Moore’s ($20,628,000) breakout Player of the Week game back in Week 5, he’s been pretty average and scored a total of 33.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (11.0 points per game) with zero TDs. The targets have been there as he’s been targeted 23 times, mostly with rookie Tyson Bagent ($906,667) at QB, but it’s all receptions and receiving yards (17 receptions for 160 receiving yards).

Things aren’t likely to improve this week for Moore against New Orleans as he’s likely to be shadowed by Marshon Lattimore who has dominated the perimeter and helped the Saints hold perimeter WRs like Moore to the second fewest fantasy points allowed this season. Now, the Saints haven’t exactly been facing Hall of Fame QBs every week, but Bagent is an undrafted rookie free agent from a Division II college and might be the worst QB they have faced.

Average performances with a rookie QB plus good playing a good defense with a shutdown cornerback equals a week with likely less than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for DJ Moore. Sorry Tim, but I’m recommending that you (and everybody else with Moore on their Dynasty Owner team) put him on their Bench this week.

Logan Thomas (TE – WAS): Despite only having three weeks with double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points, Logan Thomas ($8,021,667) is your TE10 in Dynasty Owner. With the previously mentioned four TEs above him either on bye or injured and out in Week 9, he’s a top end TE this week. That shows the sorry state of the TE position in fantasy football.

Thomas has those three double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point scoring weeks and has needed a TD to reach that mark all three times. This week, the Commanders are facing the Patriots defense that has allowed only one TD by a TE all season and less than 5 receptions per game and only 44 receiving yards per game to TEs. They also held one of those TEs ahead of Thomas in scoring, Dallas Goedert ($14,250,000), to a Blutarsky (0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) in Week 1.

Yes, it is true that Thomas’ QB was the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week last week, but I’m Bill Belichick defenses are always difficult for rookie QBs to handle and while Howell isn’t technically a rookie, he’s never faced the Patriots before. Advantage Hoodie. Don’t dismiss this as “Steve being a Patriots homer”. Leave Thomas on your Dynasty Owner Bench this week when the Commanders face the Patriots.

Free Agent Auction Targets Update

Now it’s time to recap the players recommended in Jay’s weekly Free Agent Auction targets article and see how much their Dynasty Owner roster percentage has increased since the start of Week 9. This week was a little different than usual as one of Jay’s picks was just over the usual 80% rostered threshold and another had a salary of over the usual limit of $8 million. That’s ok though as injuries are making the pickings slimmer and slimmer as the 2023 season moves along.

There have been two Free Agent Auction runs already this week – Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) and Thursday at 5 AM (Eastern), so some Dynasty Owners have had two chances to go pick up these guys in the Free Agent Auction. Hope you bid enough if you wanted to get them!

PlayerPositionTeamSalaryWeek 8 Roster %Current Roster %Change
Jaren HallQBMIN$1,029,81910.73%71.26%60.53%
Darrell HendersonRBLAR$1,053,00181.99%90.42%8.43%
Leonard FournetteRBBUF$7,000,00060.54%66.67%6.13%
Demario DouglasWRNE$993,33363.60%84.29%20.69%
Taysom HillTENO$10,000,00034.48%45.21%10.73%

A solid week of pickups in the Free Agent Auction as all five players have seen an increase of at least six percentage points and two players (Darrell Henderson and Demario Douglas) won’t be on Jay’s Week 10 list since they are rostered in over 80% of Dynasty Owner leagues now. I know Jay cheated a little bit with Henderson this week, but Douglas is higher than Henderson after last week due to the season-ending injury to Jay’s favorite player  to have on his targets list this year (Kendrick Bourne) and won’t be back again.

Even Taysom Hill and his $10 million salary were added in a pretty significant number of leagues (10.73%) over the past couple of days and Leonard Fournette saw his roster percentage go up to two-thirds (66.67%) even though he just signed with the Bills on Monday and still carries a hefty salary of $7 million.

A word of warning to everyone who picked up Jaren Hall this week. First, his hold on the starting job in Minnesota appears to be very tenuous based on his coach saying that recent trade pickup Joshua Dobbs ($2,000,000) will be in potentially in a “supportive” role in Week 9 and Dobbs’ history of playing for a team just days after getting traded. He did it last year for Tennessee and earlier this year for Arizona, so why not do it again in Minnesota? Also, Tyson Bagent had an increase in roster percentage in Week 7 just as high has Hall has, but Bagent hasn’t exactly lit up the scoreboard since becoming the Bears starting QB. Bagent has scored 27.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (394 passing yards, 23 rushing yards, 2 TDs, 2 INTs, 1 fumble) in two games as the Bears’ starter. I agree with Jay’s rationale and finding a starting QB for around $1 million is Dynasty Owner gold. Dynasty Owners need to take a chance and see if those QBs might turn into the next Brock Purdy. However, I wouldn’t start writing your League Championship victory speech and spending the money you’ll win in a cash prize pool league just yet.

Happy bidding and hope everyone got who they wanted, including Hall or even guys not on Jay’s list, in the Free Agent Auction.

Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring Leaderboard

Are you missing the Dynasty Owner Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring standings that used to appear here? It has been back over on Twitter/X sporadically over the past few weeks and if you follow me there (@SteveVT33), you may have seen it. If you have a good match-up, send it to me ASAP as there’s time and I can make it the Week 9 Match-up of the Week.

The updated Chase for the Ring Leaderboard has also been sporadically posted on Twitter/X during the first half of the regular season. However, anyone can access it 24/7 at https://app.dynastyowner.com/chase-for-the-ring. Check it out now and see if things changed after the Thursday Night Football game between the Titans and Steelers. The leaderboard is live and can change at any time, so your team name could be in the top 100 now, or during the games on Sunday or even Monday night.

Slightly longer versions of the Match-up of the Week and the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard have also appeared on a hit or miss basis on the Dynasty Owner thread on Reddit, as well as Facebook and Instagram. The Chase for the Ring leaderboard Top 10 has been appearing regularly in a weekly newsletter sent out by Dynasty Owner.

Conclusion

After Sam Howell’s victory as Dynasty Owner Player of the Week, only five teams have now not had a Player of the Week award winner. They are (in alphabetical order): Atlanta Falcons, Arizona Cardinals, Carolina Panthers, Denver Broncos, and New England Patriots. Sadly, I must report that the only team left without a Dynasty Owner Player of the Week or Value Player of the Week award winner is the New England Patriots. Come on Rhamondre Stevenson ($1,057,264) or Demario Douglas! Let’s get it done this season for me and every other Patriots fan who is also a Dynasty Owner!

Both of them have a chance because of recent Patriots injuries and the Friday afternoon news that DeVante Parker ($7,625,000) has been ruled out of Week 9 with a concussion. Let’s hope that there aren’t many Week 9 injuries and that some of the players who have been on Injured Reserve, such as De’Von Achane, James Conner ($7,000,000), and Khalil Herbert ($902,677), for a couple of weeks return soon and can contribute to their NFL teams and for their Dynasty Owners. Injuries are part of football, but no fun and nothing that anybody wants for their players or anybody else’s players.

If you have injured players who are making it difficult for you to set your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup and fill out a full Bench, then let me (and your fellow Dynasty Owners) know about it by posting it on Twitter/X and tagging me and Dynasty Owner, or posting about it on Facebook, Instagram or Reddit. It would be great if you could please comment in all of those places when this article is published and let everyone know if you like, or dislike, my weekly recommendations, or think you can do better. You can even agree and like the article on any of those social media platforms as well. We appreciate the feedback from our fellow Dynasty Owners.

The Week 9 Free Agent Auction targets article was published on Tuesday and Jay Pounds will be back every Tuesday during the 2023 season with a list of at least five widely available players in Dynasty Owner to help everyone with their Free Agent Auction bids for the first Auction run of the week on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern). We will also be back next week with the weekly Livestream. If you missed seeing with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer this week, then come back and join us next week or watch an old episode on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel. Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter/X: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

Free Agent Targets – Week 9

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners. it is that time again! As crazy as it is, the fantasy football season is starting to wind down. As we head into Week 9 of the NFL season, most Dynasty Owners now know whether their team(s) will be contending for a League Championship or a high draft selection. I know no one wants to be in the conversation for a high draft pick, but injuries can destroy a roster in a hurry leaving you no choice but to turn to the Free Agent Auction or look to 2024.

Before we even start to think about the 2024 season, let’s take a look at some of the big news from Week 8. I am sure all of you have heard the news a thousand times but there was no bigger news in Week 8 than Captain Kirk, Kirk Cousins ($35,000,000) tearing his ACL. I don’t think this could have happened at a worse time for the veteran quarterback as he is in the final year of his current deal. Will Cousins be ready for the start of 2024? Will he sign another big contract? My bet is Cousins will sign a 1-year “prove it” deal in 2024 with hopes of earning a high end 2–3-year deal in 2025. Will the Vikings bring in a big name in their attempt to make the playoffs? Let me know what you think on Twitter/X.

What is wrong with Brock Purdy ($934,252)? Purdy started his career by reeling off 10 straight regular season wins, but now has lost his last three games. Quite the turn of events if you ask me! I do believe Purdy will get back to the quarterback we have seen at the end of 2022/beginning of 2023, but if he doesn’t what do the 49ers do? Turn to Sam Darnold ($4,500,000)? Maybe they gave up on Trey Lance ($8,526,319) a little too early and shouldn’t have traded him? Either way it’s going to be a lot of fun watching it play out.

The last topic I want to discuss is the Kansas City Chiefs offense. The Chiefs superstar tight end Travis Kelce ($14,312,500) has hidden many of the Chiefs flaws this season and I believe his health will be the key factor if the Chiefs want any shot at making a Super Bowl run. The Chiefs are extremely young at the receiver position and have time to figure it out but someone other than Travis Kelce needs to step up quickly!

If you are new to this series of articles, there is a small list of requirements, with the main one being that the player must be 80% rostered or below in Dynasty Owner. The only other requirement I have is that I would like the player to have a salary of $8,000,000 or less, but I will put a higher salary player on the list if I feel they are worth it. Free Agent Auction bids will process on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) for this upcoming week, so there’s still time to get your bids in for Week 9. The Bid listed below is my recommended amount to secure the player for your Dynasty Owner team in the Wednesday Free Agent Auction run in a typical Dynasty Owner league.

  1. Jaren Hall (QB – MIN) – 4 years/$1,029,819 – 10.73% Rostered

Do I really need to say it again? I am sure most of you know the next phrase before I say it. Cheap quarterbacks are gold here on Dynasty Owner and that is exactly what Jaren Hall is. Not only is Jaren Hall a quarterback with a cheap contract but he is a rookie quarterback with quite a bit of upside ahead of him, potentially of course. Yes, the Vikings are looking at their options at the quarterback position but what happens if Hall comes out Sunday and has a good game while leading his team to victory? If he can, would the Vikings really hand the keys over to a rookie when they have playoff aspirations? If I were the Vikings at this point, I would let Hall play the rest of the way, Keep Jefferson off the field and enter the Caleb Williams/Drake Maye sweepstakes. In relief of Kirk Cousins ($33,500,000) on Sunday, Hall didn’t look lost in his limited playing time finishing the day with 3 completions on 4 attempts for 23 yards and -1 rushing yard, though he did lose a fumble on a sack (-2.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). If Hall happens to hit this would be a massive win for anyone picking him up!

Bid – $6,000,000

2.Darrell Henderson (RB – LAR) – 1 year/$1,053,001 – 81.99% Rostered

Alright you caught me! I am cheating on this one, with Henderson so close to the roster percentage cut off I am going to give him one more week on the list. At this point it seems as though it doesn’t matter who lines up in the backfield for the Rams, they are going to succeed. Over the past two games after being signed off the street, Henderson has posted a total of 25.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, finishing with a stat line of 30 carries for 92 yards and a touchdown while also adding 4 catches for 59 yards. It appears as if Henderson will be the lead back for the foreseeable future for the Rams and should be 100% rostered come Thursday. Warning! If you missed out on Henderson last week, this is your last chance to acquire him for just Dynasty Dollars. The Rams also have Royce Freeman ($1,080,000) who is only 57.85% rostered and scored a touchdown on 44 yards rushing (10.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) in Week 8 and will likely jump above the 80% threshold as Henderson’s clear handcuff. Grab one of these guys before it’s too late!

Bid – $8,000,000

3.Leonard Fournette (RB – BUF) – 1 year/$7,000,000 – 60.54% Rostered

Uncle Lenny is back! In case you are living under a rock without Wi-Fi, Leonard Fournette has signed with the Buffalo Bills practice squad and his status will change from Free Agent on the Dynasty Owner platform on Thursday. His salary won’t change until he is officially signed to the Active roster though. I will warn Dynasty Owners to temper expectations for a few weeks while Fournette learns the playbook. Come playoff time, Fournette could be a huge help for the Dynasty Owners who pick him up now. Fournette is an excellent fit with the Bills and will likely be their lead back by the time the Dynasty Owner playoffs roll around. As many of you already know, Fournette has the skill set to be a fantasy stud while paired with Josh Allen ($43,005,667). Fournette gives Allen a veteran passing weapon out of the backfield and will be used in the red zone as soon as he hits the Active roster. Fournette may not have the efficiency he once had but he is still a talented back who can put up good fantasy numbers if he gets enough work, especially in a high-powered offense like the Bills. The last time Fournette had an elite quarterback, he finished with over 200 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Dynasty Owners will likely have one shot at picking up Fournette because when a big-name signs with an offense like Buffalo, Dynasty Owners tend to pounce on those players quickly.

Bid – $4,000,000

4.Demario Douglas (WR – NE) 4 years/$993,333 – 63.60% Rostered

Another week, another Patriots wide receiver on the list! Hopefully this at least makes editing these articles enjoyable for Steve Van Tassell! Demario Douglas has quietly been the second best Patriots wide receiver since he returned from injury in Week 7. Over the past two weeks, Douglas has produced a stat line of 9 receptions on 13 targets for 79 receiving yards plus 24 rushing yards and 25 return yards (19.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points(. I know these aren’t jaw dropping numbers but with a salary under the $1,000,000 mark, Douglas is a player that should be rostered in all leagues. He is showing that he can succeed as a Bench option on bye weeks already and will see more work now that Kendrick Bourne ($5,000,000) tore his right ACL on Sunday and will miss the rest of the 2023 season. Even if Douglas is a player, you don’t necessarily need, I highly recommend picking him up and holding him for the future, at worst you’re out a few Dynasty Dollars and minimal salary against the cap! As we all know, Bill Belichick is terrible at drafting high-end receivers, but we have seen him hit on guys like Demario Douglas in the past with the most recent player being Jakobi Meyers ($11,000,000) who now plays for the Raiders.

Bid – $3,000,000

5.Taysom Hill (TE – NO) – 3 years/$10,000,000 – 34.48% Rostered

Finally, we have the expensive option for the week. Typically, I avoid players like this but allow me to explain why Taysom Hill has finally made it. The Saints have been a terrible red zone team this season, but they had yet to deploy Taysom Hill in those situations, until this past weekend that is. In Week 8, Taysom Hill showed off his versatility and helped the Saints find success in the red zone for what feels like the first time this season. I know Hill is a tough player to roster due to his $10,000,000 salary, but if the Saints are going to continue to use him around the red zone more often he could easily be a top 12 tight end the rest of the way! When Hill is on the field, he offers a multitude of ways to produce fantasy points for your roster as he is a threat to throw, run, or catch the ball on each play. Should Hill find consistency the rest of the way, he will be over the roster threshold in just a couple weeks. Even with a $10,000,000 salary.

Bid – $1,000,000

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming articles from me and Steve plus the weekly Dynasty Owner Livestream. Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

NFL Week 8 Preview

Halfway Point

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

It’s seven weeks into the NFL season, which means that we are at the halfway point of the Dynasty Owner regular season. The season is going too fast as Tim says all the time on the Livestream. He’s right as I can’t believe that we are halfway through our regular season now. Hopefully that’s just the start for your Dynasty Owner team(s) and you’re sitting pretty near the top of the standings and looking good to extend your season at least a week (or two) by making the playoffs.

The first half of the Dynasty Owner regular season has been interesting, and every season is unique in its own special way. For example, we saw the Miami Dolphins put up 70 points in a single game, nearly breaking the NFL regular season record of 72 points set back in 1966 by the Washington Redskins (not Commanders as they were called the Redskins back then). The final score of that Dolphins-Broncos game was 70-20, which was a NFL Scorigami.

You might be asking yourself, “What’s a NFL Scorigami?” According to the NFL Scorigami website, it’s a final score that has never happened before in NFL history. Not surprising that 70-20 was a NFL Scorigami, but in fact, we had two of them in Week 3 as the Eagles 25-11 victory over the Buccaneers was also a NFL Scorigami.  There was also one in Week 1 this year as the Ravens defeated the Texans by a final score of 25-9. None since Week 3 though.

I can’t imagine trying to keep track of Dynasty Owner Scorigami as with Bench scoring and scores to two decimal places, it seems like every matchup is a Scorigami. In Dynasty Owner, we’ve seen The Road Warriors at the top of the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard for a couple of weeks, but their current score through seven weeks of 1245.7 points is actually behind the pace they set in 2021 when they had 1282.1 points and were in first place after seven weeks and also behind the number of points scored by our 2022 Chase for the Ring winner Dynasty|Trade|School and four other teams last season. The Road Warriors have definitely been the Dynasty Owner MVP through the halfway point of the Dynasty Owner regular season.

Since we are halfway through the Dynasty Owner regular season, let’s hand out a few mid-season awards. As some NFL teams have only played six games, I’ve made sure to check and compensate for that in some circumstances.

  • Dynasty Owner Player of the Year: This has to go to the player with the most Dynasty Owner fantasy points, so it’s Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000) who has 199.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points after seven weeks. He is trailed very closely by Josh Allen ($43,005,667) who has 196.7 and Tyreek Hill ($30,000,000) who has 195.6. The only top 10 player who’s been on bye is Justin Herbert ($6,644,689), but his 161.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points equals 26.9 points per game, below Mahomes’ per game average of 28.44 points.
  • Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Year: This was also close and not surprisingly came down to Brock Purdy ($934,252) against Puka Nacua ($1,021,244) who sit at #14 and #15 in Dynasty Owner scoring after seven weeks. This award is based on the lowest Cost per Point, so it goes to Purdy who has scored 151.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and has a $6,175 Cost per Point compared to $6,919 Cost per Point for Nacua who has scored 147.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points.
  • Rookie of the Year: There are two rookies in the top 20 in scoring at the halfway point. Even though Puka Nacua has more points than C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811). Nacua has played in seven games versus six games for Stroud. Stroud wins as he has scored 138.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, or 23.07 points per game. Nacua has scored 147.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for an average of 21.09 points per game.
  • Bust of the Year: This one is a little subjective, but the “winner” is Najee Harris ($3,261,862) who only has scored 48.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in six games played and is RB38 at the halfway point. It’s bad when your position ranking is a larger number than your startup draft ADP (32.7). That’s his largest ADP in three seasons, so nobody who drafted Najee has likely got what they wanted out of him this season so far.
  • Backups of the Year: This is a tiny bit subjective, but was designed to go to the player who started the 2023 season as a backup but has scored the most Dynasty Owner fantasy points at the halfway point. It’s a tie between Zack Moss ($1,153,079) and Kyren Williams ($992,601) who both have played six games and scored 114.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Neither one was the Week 1 starter and Moss was injured, so if Deon Jackson ($808,333) had played well, Moss likely wouldn’t have taken over in Week 2. Williams also took over as the Rams starter in Week 2, but is now on Injured Reserve.
  • Surprises of the Year: This is in lieu of a Comeback Player of the Year award that I originally planned to give out but then couldn’t really find a great winner. Instead, I wanted to give an award to the biggest surprise players of the year who are giving their Dynasty Owners a lot of production for not a lot of salary nor draft capital. Also, I wanted a way to acknowledge Puka Nacua. However, he has to split this award with Raheem Mostert ($2,800,000) who is only one spot behind him in Dynasty Owner mid-season scoring at #16 with 146.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points.

There you have it. The Dynasty Owner mid-season awards for 2023. Now, on to the usual preview article stuff.

Every week in this weekly preview article, I’ll present a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who you should have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup. These won’t be the obvious choices. No recommendations to go ahead and start any of the guys listed above, except Najee Harris, as all of them are having great seasons. Other players who have scored lots of Dynasty Owner fantasy points won’t be mentioned either. Instead, I’m going to recommend you Start players outside the top players at their position, players drafted to be on your Bench or Practice Squad, or players who aren’t on a roster in every Dynasty Owner league.

After that, I’ll name one player per position who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad. For these Bench recommendations, it’s just the opposite. I’ll suggest players doing well so far, drafted early in Dynasty Owner startup drafts to be Starters, and also projected in the top 12 (QBs and TEs) or top 36 (RBs and WRs) in scoring this year. This section is where you might see some surprising players appear. However, the recommended Bench players shouldn’t be in your Starting lineup for the week based on matchups, past performance against a team or something else.

All stats cited are based on the Standard Dynasty Owner scoring system as outlined in the Dynasty Owner Constitution. Standard Dynasty Owner scoring gives you .1 points for every yard rushing or receiving, .1 point for every 2 yards passing, 1 point per reception, 6 points for a rushing, receiving or passing touchdown and 2 points for a successful 2-point conversion (rushing, receiving, or passing). Interceptions or fumbles lost cost you 3 points, while a fumble that is recovered by the player’s team is a loss of only 1 point. Bonus points are available for 100-199 yards rushing (2 points), 200 yards rushing or receiving (6 points), 300-399 yards passing (1 point) and 400 yards passing (4 points). There is also a 3 point bonus for clutch scoring, which is a score that results in a lead change in the final two minutes of the 4th quarter or overtime. Kickoff and punt return touchdowns are worth 6 points for the player and kickoff and punt returns are worth 1 point for every 40 yards.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the morning of October 26th. All 2023 contract information is currently what is listed on the Dynasty Owner platform (number of years and salaries) and has been taken from Spotrac (https://www.spotrac.com/).

Dynasty Owner Player of the Week

Before we get into Week 8, let’s look at Week 7 and announce the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week. This week, we end the streak of first time winners, but still have someone who hadn’t won the Player of the Week award yet this season. However, he is the most decorated player in Dynasty Owner history, the only player to win a Player of the Week award in all five Dynasty Owner seasons, and the winner of the mid-season Player of the Year award. That’s right, the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week was Patrick Mahomes.

What more can I say about Mahomes that hasn’t already been said? This is his ninth Player of the Week award in four and a half seasons of Dynasty Owner. That’s four more awards than Josh Allen who has five. He’s the only player to win the award in all five Dynasty Owner seasons. He has the most Dynasty Owner fantasy points so far this season with 199.1 and the highest per game average (28.44). De’Von Achane ($1,359,362) with a per game average of 27.68 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game (110.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 4 games played) is close but not quite as good as Mahomes this year.

In Week 7, Mahomes had 49.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (424 passing yards, 29 rushing yards, 4 TDs, 1 INT). His 424 passing yards is the second highest of the season behind only the 466 yards by Tua Tagovailoa ($7,568,859) in Week 1. Both of them came against the Los Angeles Chargers by the way. By winning in Week 7, Mahomes was able to avoid having the latest Player of the Week award win of his career as he won his first (and only) Player of the Week award in Week 8 of the 2020 season. Congrats (again) to Patrick Mahomes on being the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week.

Week 7 Points: 49.1

2023 Salary: $45,000,000

Cost per Point: $916,497

Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week

Because this is Dynasty Owner and we’re all looking for value from the players on our roster, we also have the Value Player of the Week. It’s back to a familiar face as our winner this week. The competition was extremely fierce, and the winner didn’t have the most points among the contenders, but because his salary is about $350,000 lower than the highest-scoring low salary player, he had the lowest Cost per Point. For the third time this year, the Value Player of the Week is Puka Nacua.

Nacua had another solid game with 23.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (8 receptions for 154 receiving yards), which was just barely more than Amon-Ra St. Brown ($1,066,313) who had 23.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (13 receptions for 102 receiving yards) on a whopping 19 targets. St. Brown’s salary is just over $45,000 higher than Nacua, so he needed to score an additional 1.3 points to have a lower Cost per Point.

However, both of them had fewer points than Colts rookie WR Josh Downs ($1,380,115) who finished with 23.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions, 125 receiving yards, 1 TD). Downs has a higher salary than his fellow rookie WR because he was drafted in the middle of the third round (3.16) with the #79 pick in the 2023 NFL Draft. Nacua was the last pick of the fifth round (5.42) and taken with the #177 pick.

In addition, we had a trio of undrafted rookie free agents with excellent Week 7 games. All of them have salaries just above $900,000 and would have needed to score an additional 4.0-5.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to be the Value of the Week. Bears QB Tyson Bagent ($906,667) had the most with 16.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (162 passing yards, 24 rushing yards, 1 TD), followed by Seahawks WR Jake Bobo ($901,667) who had 16.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions, 61 receiving yards, 1 TD) and Emari Demercado ($903,333) who had more total yards than Bobo, but just 11.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (58 rushing yards, 4 receptions, 17 receiving yards).

Out of all of the great performances by these low salary players, the best was turned in by Nacua. His Cost per Point was the highest for a winner this season, but that’s ok. Congrats to Puka on his third Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week award of the 2023 season.

Week 7 Points: 23.4

2023 Salary: $1,021,244

Cost per Point: $43,643

These Guys Should be Starters This Week

Before we get into the weekly recommendations, I always look at how my previous week’s recommendations did (Good, Bad or Just Ok) and give a recap. It was more of the same in Week 7 as in the past five weeks with just one Good recommendation. Let’s find out who was Good and what the others did.

QB: Desmond Ridder ($1,340,740) – 13.3 (Bad recommendation)

RB: D’Onta Foreman ($2,000,000) – 33.0 (Good recommendation)

WR: Wan’Dale Robinson ($2,046,292) – 3.2 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Luke Musgrave ($2,118,933) – 7.0 (Bad recommendation)

At least the Good recommendation was really good. D’Onta Foreman had the most Dynasty Owner fantasy points by a RB in Week 7 with 33.0 (89 rushing yards, 3 receptions, 31 receiving yards, 3 TDs). Even though I picked Roschon Johnson ($1,152,172), I did give myself some wiggle room by saying it would be Foreman if Johnson didn’t play (which he didn’t). However, Foreman as a replacement for Johnson was the only Good recommendation and the other three were all Bad. Not even a Just Ok this week.

Out of the Bad recommendations, the worst was Wan’Dale Robinson who didn’t get the targets he needed. Robinson was only targeted twice, which was the fewest of the season for him. As a result, he had his lowest production with just 3.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 reception for 22 receiving yards). Desmond Ridder started off the Falcons’ game well by going 4 for 4 on his pass attempts for 46 yards and scoring on a 2-yard run on their first drive. He didn’t do much after that and finished as QB22 with just 13.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (250 passing yards, 38 rushing yards, 1 TD, 3 lost fumbles). It was the fumbles that cost Ridder the chance to be a Just Ok recommendation. Finally, we have Luke Musgrave who didn’t do badly as he scored 7.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions for 30 receiving yards). However, that only ranked him as a mid-range Bench TE this week. He may have done better if he hadn’t gotten injured early in the fourth quarter of the Packers’ game against the Broncos.  

I said it last week, but now I really mean it. It’s time to start having more than one Good weekly Starting lineup recommendation. Here are the players who I think will start off the second half of the Dynasty Owner regular season positively and be worth having in your Week 8 Starting lineup.

Derek Carr (QB – NO): Four games of around 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points plus three poor games during which he averaged only 7.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game has put Derek Carr ($37,500,000) as QB21 in his first season in New Orleans. He has only 6 TDs all season and just one 2 TD game (Week 5 against New England), but four games with over 200 yards passing. Things look like they might be joining together for this week’s Saints-Colts game in favor of Carr and the Saints’ passing offense though.

First, the Colts have allowed 37 and 39 points in their past two games. Most of the TDs have been on the ground (5) versus the air (2), but allowing 7 TDs and 7 FGs in the past two weeks is not the sign of a good defense. Second, Carr has played much better since Week 4 when he played through his AC joint injury and scored an average of 21.57 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game and scored between 21.0 and 22.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in each game.

Devin Singletary (RB – HOU): Another player who could have won the Bust of the Year award was Texans RB Dameon Pierce ($1,118,858) who hasn’t played very well so far. Pierce had a startup ADP of 35.7 but is RB32 at this point in the season with just 51.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in six games. His Dynasty Owners were expecting more.

His backup Devin Singletary ($2,750,000) might not be producing more than Pierce, but he’s been steadily given more opportunities to play and even had more snaps (34 to 21) than Pierce in Week 6. They both had 13 touches, but Singletary did a little more with his chances than Pierce and scored 7.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (58 rushing yards, 1 reception, 4 receiving yards, 18 return yards). In contrast, Pierce only had 34 rushing yards (3.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points).

I’m expecting Singletary to get more opportunities this week and with the Texans visiting the Carolina Panthers, it just gets better for him. The Panthers have given up 13 TDs and 978 yards of offense to RBs in just six games this season. That’s a lot of Dynasty Owner fantasy points and the main reason why Singletary should be in your Starting lineup this week.

Rashee Rice (WR – KC): Obviously Travis Kelce ($14,312,500) is the real WR1 in Kansas City, but it appears that the Chiefs may have found an actual WR to complement Kelce this season in their 2023 second round NFL Draft pick Rashee Rice ($1,623,802). Kelce is averaging nearly 10 targets (9.83) and eight receptions per game. He also leads the team in receiving yards (525) and receiving TDs (4). You know who’s second in all of those categories?

That’s right, it’s Rashee Rice. Rice has scored a total of 74.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points this season, but is still ranked as WR40. That makes him a top level Bench WR option, but not quite a FLEX Starter quite yet. That might change if he has another game like last week against the Chargers when he had 17.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions, 60 receiving yards, 1 TD). The Chargers pass defense is the only one in the NFL allowing over 300 yards passing per game (310.0), so it seems like assessing Rice based on how he did against the Chargers isn’t a great idea.

However, Rice has been targeted at least five times and scored double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points in five out of seven games this season. Double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points is usually enough to make a WR a low-end Starter in your FLEX position and he gets to face another below average defense against the pass this week in Miami. Good passing offense with the mid-season Player of the Year at QB facing a subpar defense should equal enough Dynasty Owner fantasy points to make Rashee Rice worth putting in your Starting lineup.

Trey McBride (TE – ARI): With Zach Ertz ($10,550,000) being placed on Injured Reserve, it’s time for Trey McBride ($1,574,916) to show everyone why he was the first TE taken in the 2022 NFL Draft. So far this season, the Arizona TE combination has been solid with a total of 83.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. If they were one player, he would be TE5 for the season between Sam LaPorta ($2,366,498) and Darren Waller ($17,000,000). It looks to be McBride mainly as the receiving TE with Geoff Swaim ($1,700,000) receiving plenty of snaps this season (160 snaps, which is 35% of Cardinals’ offensive snaps) but only four targets and 6.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (3 receptions for 30 receiving yards).

It’s not just that the Arizona TEs have been productive overall, they have been consistently producing nearly all season. Only once, in Week 3, did Ertz and McBride have fewer than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points combined. In three games, one of them has more than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Admittedly, those games with double-digit points have been only slightly over the mark (11.6, 11.3 and 10.2) and in no single game did Ertz and McBride combine for more than 16.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, but Dynasty Owners should be happy with double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points from their TE if they don’t have one named Travis Kelce, Mark Andrews ($14,000,000) or T.J. Hockenson ($9,392,000).

The matchup against Baltimore is tough, but Arizona is making their TEs a prominent part of the offense with 64 targets in 7 games (9.14 per game) and five games with 10 or more targets. With a similar number of targets and little competition from the other TEs on the roster, McBride should break double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points and be worthy of inclusion in your Week 8 Starting lineup.

These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week

Now it’s the time to look at how each of my Bench recommendations from Week 7 worked out (Good, Bad or Just Ok).

QB: Kirk Cousins ($35,000,000) – 28.8 (Bad recommendation)

RB: Rachaad White ($1,282,500) – 15.9 (Bad recommendation)

WR: George Pickens ($1,688,045) – 15.7 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Evan Engram ($13,750,000) – 9.5 (Just Ok recommendation)

This was my worst week of recommendations so far this season with no Good recommendations and only one Just Ok. My Good recommendation percentage fell under 50% for the first time and now sits at 46% (13 out of 28). About one in five (21%) recommendations on the season have been Just Ok and about one-third (32%) have been Bad.

The recommendation to Bench Evan Engram was Just Ok as he was TE12 for the week with 9.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions for 45 receiving yards) last Thursday night. Rachaad White was a low-end RB1 with his second best outing of the season, 15.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (34 rushing yards, 6 receptions, 65 receiving yards), while George Pickens had 15.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions for 107 receiving yards) and was a mid-range WR2 option for the week. I was wrong about the Steelers offense not being well equipped enough to support both Pickens and Diontae Johnson ($18,355,000) as worthy of being in your Starting lineup as Johnson had 12.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions for 79 receiving yards) in his first game off on Injured Reserve. Kirk Cousins had an inspired performance on Monday Night Football and scored 28.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (378 passing yards, -1 rushing yards, 2 TDs, 1 INT) to finish as QB6 for the week. Obviously, a Bad recommendation as were the White and Pickens recommendations.

It’s time to turn the page on Week 7 and start the second half of the Dynasty Owner regular season with some Good Week 8 Bench recommendations.

Russell Wilson (QB – DEN): Russell Wilson ($48,517,647) is the QB9 and eligible for this spot even though he is rostered in few than ten percent of Dynasty Owner leagues (9.96%). It’s the second time in three weeks that the Broncos will play the Chiefs and things didn’t go so well for Russ the last time. In that Week 6 game, he threw for just 95 yards, had 31 rushing yards, a TD pass and 2 interceptions (7.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). It was his worst game of the season.

On the other hand, this game will be at home, and he did fare well against the Chiefs in 2022 with two of his best three games statistically (33.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 14 and 25.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 17) coming against the Chiefs. The 33.0 point outing was also in Denver. Chiefs linebacker Nick Bolton is out, and Sean Payton is now the Broncos’ coach, not Nathaniel Hackett. Those are all real things that could derail this recommendation.

Still, I’m going to ride with Russ on this one and suggest to the small number of Dynasty Owners and apparent Wilson truthers that they don’t put him in their Starting lineup this week.

Brian Robinson (RB – WAS): My fellow Dynasty Owner writer Jay Pounds was the first to mention that Commanders coach Ron Rivera might be souring on Brian Robinson ($1,261,227) just as he did last year (and appears to be continuing to do this season) with Antonio Gibson ($1,233,159). After coming back from an illness in Week 6, third string RB Chris Rodriguez ($1,004,422) hasn’t been really cutting into playing time for Robinson and Gibson, but he has been touching the ball more in the few opportunities that he’s been getting to play. In the past two weeks, Rodriguez has played only 15 snaps on offense, but he’s touched the ball on 11 of them (all rushing attempts).

Meanwhile, Robinson saw the fewest number of touches he has all season in Week 7 with just eight rushing attempts and one target. He parlayed that into 8.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (23 rushing yards, 1 TD) which sounds ok, but wouldn’t have been without the TD.

It gets worse for all three Commanders RBs as they play Philadelphia this week and the Eagles held Raheem Mostert to just 6.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (45 rushing yards, 1 reception, 6 receiving yards) and have allowed only 343 yards rushing to RBs in seven games this season (49 yards per game).

I’d leave any and all Commanders RBs on my Dynasty Owner Bench (or Practice Squad if you’ve got room with everyone playing this week), including Robinson. Even though he’s RB12 for the season, this week’s matchup doesn’t look promising.

Amari Cooper (WR – CLE): It’s been one average game (13.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 6) and one poor game (4.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) for Amari Cooper ($20,000,000) with P.J. Walker ($2,075,000) under center for the Browns. That doesn’t bode well for Cooper this week, nor does the fact that the Browns are travelling to Seattle to play the Seahawks. I’ve written several times in the past about how Cooper has always been better at home than on the road during his NFL career. In addition, since the return of several members of their secondary in Week 3, Seattle has been doing a good job defending against WRs, particularly those who play primarily on the perimeter like Cooper. Admittedly, they got to face the Cardinals and Giants in two of those games. Bengals WRs Ja’Marr Chase ($7,704,910) and Tyler Boyd ($10,750,000) did have 14.0 and 16.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points respectively against them in Week 6. However, P.J. Walker isn’t Joe Burrow ($9,047,534) and that’s a big difference.

To recap, P.J. Walker at QB is strike one, playing on the road is strike two and facing the Seattle secondary is strike three. Three strikes and you’re out so Amari Cooper should be out of your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup and take a seat on your Bench.

Jonnu Smith (TE – ATL): Jonnu Smith ($12,500,000) is another expensive top 12 player (see Wilson, Russell) who isn’t on a lot of Dynasty Owner rosters (15.33%), but if he’s on yours, then you likely are playing him since he’s TE11 for the season and costing you $12.5 million in salary. I know it’s trendy to complain on Twitter/X about how Falcons coach Arthur Smith is using Smith vs. Kyle Pitts ($8,227,624), but if you go past all of the complaining and whining by people with Pitts on their fantasy rosters and actually look at some statistics, they’d see things aren’t so bad. They might even change their minds if their expectations for Pitts weren’t way too high and their grasp on reality and what’s actually happening in Atlanta (the Falcons are 4-3 and in first place in the NFC South) weren’t way too low.

In each of the past three weeks, Pitts has gotten more targets and Dynasty Owner fantasy points than Smith. In that time, it’s 21 targets and 37.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for Pitts versus 15 targets and 29.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for Smith. Of course, those doing the complaining think that Pitts should have gotten all 36 TE targets and that he would have scored 163.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (36 receptions, 559 receiving yards, 12 TDs) if he had gotten all of them.

That’s not going to happen. And I’m not even sure that Pitts will be worth having in your Starting lineup this week as Smith might run the ball 60 times if that’s what he thinks will win the game for the Falcons. He doesn’t care about your fantasy team! However, I do see Smith’s ceiling as lower than Pitts’ and that he likely won’t be able to sustain being the TE11 for the entire season. If you used him and got some quality production in either your Starting lineup or Bench, then kudos to you, but don’t count on Smith being worth filling the TE spot in your Starting lineup much anymore and not this week against the Titans.

Free Agent Auction Targets Update

Now it’s time to recap the players recommended in Jay’s weekly Free Agent Auction targets article and see how much their Dynasty Owner roster percentage has increased since the start of Week 8. It was another bonus week from Jay as he gave us six players, including two New England Patriots, instead of his usual five players.

There have been two Free Agent Auction runs already this week – Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) and Thursday at 5 AM (Eastern), so some Dynasty Owners have had two chances to go pick up these guys in the Free Agent Auction. Hope you bid enough if you wanted to get them!

PlayerPositionTeamSalaryWeek 7 Roster %Current Roster %Change
Darrell HendersonRBLAR$1,053,00138.70%75.86%37.16%
P.J. WalkerQBCLE$2,075,00031.03%36.02%4.99%
Kendrick BourneWRNE$5,000,00077.01%83.14%6.13%
Demario DouglasWRNE$993,33349.43%59.39%9.96%
Chris RodriguezRBWAS$1,004,42277.01%77.78%0.77%
Jauan JenningsWRSF$940,00056.32%57.09%0.77%

It took half a season, but Kendrick Bourne is finally rostered in over 80% of Dynasty Owner leagues. He crossed that threshold by getting picked up in an additional 6.13% of Dynasty Owner leagues at the start of Week 8 after two consecutive double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point weeks. He ranks as WR25 for the season. Darrell Henderson is close to 80% and might get there before his game on Sunday. His roster percentage nearly doubled from 38.7% to 75.86% now.

Demario Douglas “only” saw his roster percentage increase by just under ten percentage points, which is surprising considering that he surpassed DeVante Parker ($7,625,000) in snaps last week and also Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Both have played in the same number of games this season. Dynasty Owners must not be buying into the fact that P.J. Walker has won two games for the Browns this season and looking at his putrid stats of 8.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (370 passing yards, 4 rushing yards, 3 INTs, 1 fumble) in two games. That’s the only explanation for a potential starting NFL QB making barely over $2 million having his roster percentage increase by just under five percentage points.

Finally, few Dynasty Owners have picked up either Chris Rodriguez (again) or Jauan Jennings as their roster percentages have increased by less than one percentage point. That’s two weeks in a row with little movement for Rodriguez, while I can only assume Dynasty Owners don’t think Jennings will continue to do much upon the return of Deebo Samuel ($23,850,000) to the 49ers’ lineup.

Happy bidding and hope everyone got who they wanted, even guys not on Jay’s list, in the Free Agent Auction.

Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring Leaderboard

Are you missing the Dynasty Owner Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring standings that used to appear here? It has been back over on Twitter/X sporadically over the past few weeks and if you follow me there (@SteveVT33), you may have seen it. If you have a good match-up for the start of the second half of the Dynasty Owner regular season, send it to me so I can make it the Week 8 Match-up of the Week.

The updated Chase for the Ring Leaderboard has also been sporadically posted on Twitter/X during the first half of the regular season. However, anyone can access it 24/7 at https://app.dynastyowner.com/chase-for-the-ring. Check it out before things change during the Thursday Night Football game since the leaderboard is live and can change at any time. That means your team name could pop up in the top 100 during the game.

Slightly longer versions of the Match-up of the Week and the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard have also appeared on a hit or miss basis on the Dynasty Owner thread on Reddit, as well as Facebook and Instagram. The Chase for the Ring leaderboard Top 10 has been appearing regularly in a weekly newsletter sent out on Fridays by Dynasty Owner.

Conclusion

We’ve reached the halfway point of the 2023 Dynasty Owner season and once the Tampa Bay-Buffalo Thursday Night Football game starts, it’ll be past that point. We haven’t even reached Halloween yet!

Don’t worry, there’s still 10 or 11 regular season NFL games remaining and up to 10 weeks of Dynasty Owner for the season if your team can make it all the way to your League Championship game (or even to the third place game). Lots of time to get your team in shape to make the playoffs, start your run to a League Championship, make it on to the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard and for one person, win the Ring. Don’t let up now that half of the season has passed. Make those roster moves, don’t be afraid to use your Amnesty Provisions on unperforming and expensive veterans, looking at you Daniel Jones ($40,000,000), offer up those trades, bid on players you need in the Free Agent Auction and set your best Starting lineup and Bench to score as many points as you can every week.

Let me (and your fellow Dynasty Owners) know what roster moves you are making by reaching out to me or Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X, or posting those moves on Facebook, Instagram or Reddit. It would be great if you could please comment in all of those places when this article is published and let everyone know if you like, or dislike, my weekly recommendations, or think you can do better. You can even agree and like the article on any of those social media platforms as well. We appreciate the feedback from our fellow Dynasty Owners.

The Week 8 Free Agent Auction targets article was published on Tuesday and Jay Pounds will be back every Tuesday during the 2023 season with a list of at least five widely available players in Dynasty Owner to help everyone with their Free Agent Auction bids for the first Auction run of the week on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern). We also have the weekly Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. We’re going to go live on Friday morning at 11 AM (Eastern) this week. Please watch us live or catch us whenever you can by watching on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel. Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter/X: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

Free Agent Targets – Week 8

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners! It is time to dig through the virtual bargain bin, although surprisingly there are quite a few players available who can be great depth/Bench players for your upcoming playoff push. Typically, we see production on this list dwindling at this point in the season, but the past two weeks have been just the opposite!

Before jumping into this week’s free agents, let’s take a look at a few of my highlights from Week 7. The biggest surprise for me this week is none other than Steve Van Tassell’s Patriots earning a victory over the Buffalo Bills. As of now I have come up with two logical answers for the outcome of this game. The first being Bill Belichick was pissed off about the reports of Robert Kraft being open to firing him, leaving old Bill no choice but to bully his opponent like he was the biggest kid on the playground. The second option is that Josh Allen ($43,005,667) is constantly in his head due to struggles against the Patriots early in his career. I personally hope it is the second option that is true. Do I feel bad for Steve this year? Yes, I do…. just kidding, I hate the Patriots and am enjoying watching them struggle. Sorry Steve, it had to happen eventually!

In other news, P.J. Walker ($2,075,000) is undefeated this season! I know we can’t technically call him 2-0 with Deshaun Watson ($46,000,000) playing three seconds on Sunday but either way, Walker has helped the Browns stay in the playoff hunt. A funny tidbit about the Browns, they could have saved $228 million and had better quarterback play had they kept Joshua Dobbs ($2,000,000) and traded Watson instead.

The last game I want to touch on from Week 7 was yesterday’s game between the 49ers and Vikings. Once again, the 49ers struggled and are now surprisingly on a 2-game losing streak with sophomore sensation, Brock Purdy ($934,252) struggling in both games. Do teams finally have enough tape on Purdy to slow him down, or is he just going through a sophomore slump? Let me know what you think on Twitter/X! Regardless of your answer it is going to be a lot of fun to watch it play out.

If you are new to this series of articles, there is a small list of requirements, with the main one being that the player must be 80% rostered or below in Dynasty Owner. The only other requirement I have is that I would like the player to have a salary of $8,000,000 or less, but I will put a higher salary player on the list if I feel they are worth it. Free Agent Auction bids will process on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) for this upcoming week, so there’s still time to get your bids in for Week 8. The Bid listed below is my recommended amount to secure the player for your Dynasty Owner team in the Wednesday Free Agent Auction run in a typical Dynasty Owner league.

  1. Darrell Henderson (RB – LAR) – 1 year/$1,053,001 – 38.70% Rostered

Alright, to be honest did you see this coming? Talk about a blast from the past! The Rams brought Darrell Henderson back early last week in a move many thought was virtually emergency depth as the Rams had previously cut Henderson last year and let him walk for nothing. I am sure many of you, like myself, were hoping to see Zach Evans ($993,334) get a shot but it’s Sean McVay and I should have known better. I mean look at Cam Akers ($1,543,259). The good news about this situation is that Henderson is widely available for Dynasty Owners this week and we know he is going to see a bunch of touches over the coming weeks with Kyren Williams ($992,601) being placed on Injured Reserve. In Week 7, Henderson virtually came off the street and was able to rush for 61 yards on 18 carries plus a touchdown and reeled in a pass for 5 yards (13.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). I know those numbers won’t jump off of the page at you, but I am expecting them to get better as Henderson gets his legs back under him. I am sure you all know how thin the running back position is and I think you will see the results of that with the amount that Dynasty Owners are going to bid for Henderson tomorrow. One thing to keep an eye on is the fact the Rams moved Henderson back to the practice squad, but I am certain he will be active again come Sunday!

Bid – $9,000,000 – I know its high, but I believe this is what most will need to secure Henderson this week

2. P.J. Walker (QB – CLE) – 1 year/$2,075,000 – 31.03% Rostered

I am almost never one to knock a player for missing time because of injury but something fishy is happening between Deshaun Watson and head coach Kevin Stefanski. It may just be two guys with big egos, but it seems to be more than that. I have never witnessed a coach throw a star quarterback under the bus so openly before, which leads me to believe the Browns don’t believe Watson is as hurt as he says he is. It is starting to look like Watson got his huge payday and just doesn’t care as much anymore. Am I onto something here, or has Watson just been gone too long to get back to an elite level of play? All of that leads us to why we are here today and that is Watson’s backup, P.J. Walker. I know Walker has not looked good in the two games he has played in, but he is going to be a cheap starting quarterback and like I always say those are gold here on Dynasty Owner. Walker should also have the advantage of knowing he is going to play the entire week versus being thrown in at the last minute or even in the middle of a game. If Walker can come in and get 10-15 Dynasty Owner fantasy points each week he is the starter, he will be a great bye week option for your Bench. If you can’t tell I don’t think Watson will be back anytime soon.

Bid – $6,000,000

3. Kendrick Bourne (WR – NE) – 1 year/$5,000,000 – 77.01% Rostered; Demario Douglas (WR – NE) – 4 years/$993,333 – 49.43% Rostered

Alright, as much as I hate doing it, I had to combine these two players together this week. I have had Patriots occupying too many spots on this list in 2023, but I truly believe both of these guys deserve a spot and the youngster Demario Douglas is a player that needs to be 100% rostered immediately. Douglas is in his rookie season, has produced every time he has been on the field, and has one of the cheaper salaries on the Dynasty Owner platform. If Douglas is able to stay healthy the rest of the fantasy season, he is going to be a steal for whatever Dynasty Owners end up bidding enough to roster him. The second Patriot on this list is our free agent mainstay of the year, Kendrick Bourne. As sad as it is, I believe this will be the last time I am going to be able to write about Bourne as he won’t be eligible for the list next week as he should definitely finally pass the 80% roster threshold when Free Agent Auction bids run. It has been a fun two seasons trying to convince you folks to pick Bourne up and it finally worked. Jokes on you! I am kidding. If the Patriots’ offense can find some consistency, Bourne and Douglas will be solid options moving forward. In Week 7, Bourne finished the day with 7 catches for 63 yards and a touchdown plus a lost fumble (15.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), while Douglas finished the game with 4 receptions for 54 yards while also carrying the ball once for 20 yards and adding in a 25-yard punt return (12.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points).

Bid – $4,000,000 (Both)

4.Chris Rodriguez (RB – WAS) – 4 years/$1,004,422 – 77.01% Rostered

I am sure Chris Rodriguez making the list last week was a massive surprise to most of you, but nobody listened ,and his roster percentage actually went down slightly. I believe that if you read last week’s article and listened to yours truly, you would be a step ahead of some other Dynasty Owners and happy with Rodriguez by the season’s end. If you remember back a year or two ago, we had this exact situation play out in the Nation’s Capital with current starter Brian Robinson ($1,261,227) and Antonio Gibson ($1,233,159) who just about everyone in the fantasy community was high on. All I am trying to do here is remind everyone that Ron Rivera does not care about a name, he cares about who is most productive and with the Commanders on a losing skid right now it would not surprise me if we saw Rodriguez become the starting running back in the next couple of weeks. In Week 7, Rodriguez had one less carry than Robinson (7 for Rodriguez vs. 8 for Robinson) but gained more yards (31 yards for Rodriguez vs. 23 yards for Robinson) and looked to be the better back. The only worry I have with Rodriguez is the fact I have not seen him used in the passing game much just yet, but that should come with time. As I keep saying the running back position is brutal meaning you must take these types of chances!

Bid – $2,000,000

5.Jauan Jennings (WR – SF) – 1 year/$940,000 – 56.32% Rostered

At this point I don’t know a whole lot about the injury to Deebo Samuel ($23,850,000) but even if he is slated to return soon, I would not trust it. What happens when a star player misses time? Someone else must step up and that player is none other than Jauan Jennings. Jennings has been in the Bay Area for a few years now and seems to be a player who is trusted by his teammates, and it shows anytime he earns a big role. The latest example of this was W 7’s Monday night game between the 49ers and Vikings. In the loss, Jennings stepped up big time earning 9 targets, catching 5 of them for 54 yards (10.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). Should Samuel miss any more time, I am expecting Jennings to see numerous targets making him a solid option for a Bench player during bye weeks. As I hinted at earlier, you can likely get away with playing Jennings on your Bench even if Samuel is slated to return in the coming weeks.

Bid – $2,000,000

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming articles from me and Steve plus the Dynasty Owner Livestream, now every Thursday afternoon at 4:00 PM (Eastern). Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

NFL Week 7 Preview

– Where’s All the Scoring?

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

Even though I’m not doing a weekly recap article, I went with the title that likely would have been the title for a Week 6 recap article for this week’s preview article. It works for both as last week was very low scoring in the NFL and Dynasty Owner. Only two NFL teams scored 30 or more points in Week 6 (Dolphins and Jaguars) with 30 teams playing. In Week 5, there were seven teams with 30 or more points out of 28 teams playing. The fewest in the first four weeks was six teams with 30 or more points in Week 3, while 10 teams scored at least that many points in Week 2.

In Dynasty Owner, I didn’t see a team with over 200.0 points in Week 6. The highest I saw among the teams in the Chase for the Ring was 191.55 points and the most scored by a team in my personal Dynasty Owner leagues was 170.43 by Yorkshire Roses in beta league #3 (League #27483). Did anyone score over 200.0 points last week or see a team in one of their Dynasty Owner leagues with that many points? Take a screenshot of it and send it over to me on Twitter/X (@SteveVT33) so I can retweet it and share it with other Dynasty Owners.

Lower scoring is likely this week with six NFL teams on bye (Cincinnati, Carolina, Dallas, Houston, New York Jets, Tennessee). None of the top 10 players in Dynasty Owner scoring are on bye, but Christian McCaffrey ($16,015,875) is sixth and likely to miss Week 7 with an injury. The only top 25 players on bye are C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811), Adam Thielen ($8,333,333) and Ja’Marr Chase ($7,704,910). Adam Thielen is in the top 20 scorers in all of Dynasty Owner after six weeks, which is a crazy stat. However, plenty of Dynasty Owners will be missing players from their Starting lineup and have to use Bench players as Starters and Practice Squad players (if they have them) on their Bench this week. That should depress scoring a little bit more than usual.

Regardless, Week 6 was a low-scoring anomaly with only 551 points scored across 15 NFL games (36.7 points per game on average). In contrast, NFL teams scored 706 points back in Week 3 when Miami defeated Denver by a score of 70-20. That’s an average of 44.1 points per game. And that wasn’t even the highest scoring week. Week 2 had 796 points for an average of 49.75 points per game.

Individual players may score more or less than average, and this article is the place where you’ll find players who I predict will exceed or fall short of those scoring projections. Every week in this weekly preview article, I’ll present a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who you should have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup. These won’t be the obvious choices. No recommendations to go ahead and start Tyreek Hill ($30,000,000), Josh Allen ($43,005,667), or Tua Tagovailoa ($7,568,859) who are the top three scoring players in Dynasty Owner after six weeks and separated by just 4.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Other players who are rostered in 100% (or nearly 100%) of Dynasty Owner leagues with low ADPs and have scored lots of Dynasty Owner fantasy points won’t be mentioned either. Instead, I’m going to recommend you Start players outside the top players at their position, players drafted to be on your Bench or Practice Squad, or players who aren’t on a roster in every Dynasty Owner league.

After that, I’ll name one player per position who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad. For these Bench recommendations, it’s just the opposite. I’ll suggest players doing well so far, drafted early in Dynasty Owner startup drafts to be Starters, and also projected in the top 12 (QBs and TEs) or top 36 (RBs and WRs) in scoring this year. This section is where you might see some surprising players appear. However, the recommended Bench players shouldn’t be in your Starting lineup for the week based on matchups, past performance against a team or something else.

All stats cited are based on the Standard Dynasty Owner scoring system as outlined in the Dynasty Owner Constitution. Standard Dynasty Owner scoring gives you .1 points for every yard rushing or receiving, .1 point for every 2 yards passing, 1 point per reception, 6 points for a rushing, receiving or passing touchdown and 2 points for a successful 2-point conversion (rushing, receiving, or passing). Interceptions or fumbles lost cost you 3 points, while a fumble that is recovered by the player’s team is a loss of only 1 point. Bonus points are available for 100-199 yards rushing (2 points), 200 yards rushing or receiving (6 points), 300-399 yards passing (1 point) and 400 yards passing (4 points). There is also a 3 point bonus for clutch scoring, which is a score that results in a lead change in the final two minutes of the 4th quarter or overtime. Kickoff and punt return touchdowns are worth 6 points for the player and kickoff and punt returns are worth 1 point for every 40 yards.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the morning of October 19th. All 2023 contract information is currently what is listed on the Dynasty Owner platform (number of years and salaries) and has been taken from Spotrac (https://www.spotrac.com/).

Dynasty Owner Player of the Week

Before we get into Week 7, let’s look at Week 6 and announce the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week. For the fourth week in a row, we have a first-time winner. We also have the winner with the fewest number of Dynasty Owner fantasy points in history. It also marks the first time that teammates at the same position have been the Player of the Week in the same season and the first time that we’ve had three players on the same team win the award in one season. If you haven’t figured it out yet, the winner for Week 7 is Raheem Mostert.

Mostert won even though he “only” had 36.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (115 rushing yards, 3 receptions, 17 receiving yards, 3 TDs). That’s the lowest number of Dynasty Owner fantasy points for a Player of the Week, which is fitting for a low scoring week. Mostert is the second Miami Dolphins RB to win this award this season as De’Von Achane ($1,359,362) was the winner in Week 3. In addition, Dolphins WR Tyreek Hill won the Week 1 award. Now that Achane is injured and with the prolific nature of the Dolphins’ offense this season, it’s possible that we could see a fourth Dolphins player being the Player of the Week later on. After all, Tua Tagovailoa hasn’t won yet despite being the overall #3 player in Dynasty Owner so far this season, having won this award once before in 2022 and QBs having won the award more times than the other positions combined.

Week 6 Points: 36.2

2023 Salary: $2,800,000

Cost per Point: $77,348

Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week

Because this is Dynasty Owner and we’re all looking for value from the players on our roster, we also have the Value Player of the Week. While we have a new winner for this season, it’s a familiar name as we have someone who won this award three times last season. That’s right, our Value Player of the Week is Amon-Ra St. Brown.

This was the first week of the season in which neither Brock Purdy ($934,252) nor Puka Nacua ($1,021,244) had double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points, so it was time for someone else to finally win again. St. Brown stepped into the void with his best game of the season and the third best performance of the week with 30.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (12 receptions, 124 receiving yards, 1 TD).

St. Brown didn’t win his first Value Player of the Week award until last season even though he had four weeks with over 25.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and five weeks with over 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points back in his rookie season of 2021. Last year, he broke through with three Value Player of the Week wins and now he has his fourth one. That puts him in a tie with Aaron Jones ($12,000,000) who won it four times in the 2019 and 2020 seasons when his salary was just $650,484. With Purdy and Nacua having down weeks, Amon-Ra picked a good week for a great performance to win his fourth all-time Value Player of the Week award.

Week 6 Points: 30.4

2023 Salary: $1,066,313

Cost per Point: $35,076

These Guys Should be Starters This Week

Before we get into the weekly recommendations, I always look at how my previous week’s recommendations did (Good, Bad or Just Ok) and give a recap. Week 6 was a low scoring week and three out of my four recommendations fell in line and didn’t score many points. Let’s find out how each one of them did.

QB: Dak Prescott ($40,000,000) – 29.6 (Good recommendation)

RB: Kenneth Gainwell ($953,882) – 2.7 (Bad recommendation)

WR: Darnell Mooney ($894,263) – 6.8 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Cade Otton ($1,123,486) – 2.5 (Bad recommendation)

For the fifth week in a row, I only had exactly one Good recommendation. It took until Monday night, but Dak Prescott had 29.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (272 passing yards, 40 rushing yards, 2 TDs) to finish as QB3 for the week. The other three recommendations were Bad.

The best of the three Bad recommendations was Darnell Mooney who had 6.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (2 receptions for 48 receiving yards). I can’t blame Mooney’s performance on the injury suffered by Justin Fields ($4,717,989) as Mooney had just 1 reception for 39 receiving yards with Fields in the game for a little over a half. Both Kenneth Gainwell and Cade Otton had similar performances of under 3.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Gainwell had a season low three touches and only 2.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (13 rushing yards, 1 reception, 4 receiving yards). Cade Otton did slightly worse with just 2.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 reception for 15 receiving yards) on just two targets.

It’s time to start having more than one Good weekly Starting lineup recommendation. Here are the players who I think will be worth having in your Starting lineup in Week 7.

Desmond Ridder (QB – ATL): Look who’s improving after a poor start to the 2023 season. It’s Desmond Ridder ($1,340,740), that’s who. Ridder has thrown for over 300 yards in each of the past two weeks and scored 32.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (329 passing yards, 10 rushing yards, 2 TDs, 1 2-pt. conversion) versus the Texans and 21.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (307 passing yards, 18 rushing yards, 2 TDs, 3 INTs) versus the Commanders.

The Buccaneers aren’t allowing an average of 300 yards passing per game, but it’s close (265.0 yards passing per game) and they did just give up 353 passing yards and 30.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to Jared Goff ($33,500,000) last week. That yardage average is also a bit low because they faced Derek Carr ($37,500,000) a week after his AC joint injury, and he only threw for 127 yards against them.

Ridder probably won’t finish in the top 5, but all I need is a top 12 performance. That was only 19.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points last week and with six teams on bye is likely to be in the same range this week. Ridder is averaging nearly that many Dynasty Owner fantasy points per week (17.3). That combination of factors, plus the fact that several backup QBs are likely to be starting in Week 7, gives me confidence that Ridder is worth having in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup this week.

Roschon Johnson (RB – CHI): With so many starting RBs out with injuries, this should be a pretty easy pick. However, I’m not sure who will lead the Rams’ backfield against the Steelers, or if Jordan Mason ($856,667) or Elijah Mitchell ($915,892) will play the most for the 49ers against the Vikings. Out of all of them, I have the most confidence in Mason. Not enough to make him my RB recommendation this week though.

Instead, I’ll pick Roschon Johnson ($1,152,172) from the Bears and throw in a caveat that this pick becomes D’Onta Foreman ($2,000,000) if Johnson doesn’t make it out of the concussion protocol in time to play in Week 7. Johnson didn’t play last week, and Foreman had 6.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (65 rushing yards, 1 reception, 2 receiving yards, 1 fumble) would as the Bears’ starting RB in his place.

Johnson had a great Week 1 with 17.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (20 rushing yards, 6 receptions, 35 receiving yards, 1 TD) and then followed that performance up with just 17.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (102 rushing yards, 5 receptions, 23 receiving yards) in the next four games.

The Raiders have allowed an average of 12.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to their opponent’s starting RB this season. Regardless of who the Bears starting QB is in Week 7, I expect lots of checkdowns and running plays so whoever the Bears starter is at RB should get the ball in his hands a lot and score at least double-digit Dynasty owner fantasy points. That’s enough to make either Johnson (or Foreman) worth having in your Starting lineup.

Wan’Dale Robinson (WR – NYG): Follow the targets. That’s what I’m doing here. In the four games he’s played this season, Wan’Dale Robinson has been targeted 25 times by Giants’ QBs. It’s been a steady diet of targets in all four games with five being the fewest in Week 3 and eight being the most last week. The eight targets produced his first double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point week of the season with 14.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (8 receptions for 62 receiving yards).

With that many targets, you’d think Robinson would be ranked higher than WR70 for the season. He has only played in four games, but even if you take his per game average of 9.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game and pretend he’s played all six games, he’d still only be WR50 for the season.

Robinson’s health hasn’t been the greatest so far in his career as he’s only played 10 out of 23 NFL games in his 1+ seasons in the NFL and he didn’t practice on Wednesday so this recommendation could end up being N/A (Not Applicable) if he doesn’t suit up against the Commanders this week. However, I’m going to roll with it and hope that Robinson does play because he’ll likely play well and be worth having in your Week 7 Starting lineup.

Luke Musgrave (TE – GB): While Sam LaPorta ($2,366,498) has rightfully gotten a lot of attention for his TE2 start to the 2023 season, Luke Musgrave ($2,118,933) has quietly been a pretty large part of the Green Bay Packers’ offense. He’s third on the team in targets (23) and fourth in targets per game (4.6), which compensates for the fact that Christian Watson ($2,310,258) missed the first three games of the season. Musgrave has played almost twice as many snaps as any other TE on the Packers’ roster, despite suffering a concussion in Week 4 and being held to only 1.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 reception for 1 receiving yard) on a single target. In his place, Josiah Deguara ($1,136,942) had 7.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions for 34 receiving yards).

Musgrave has yet to score a TD, but he has put up three solid weeks with 10.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 3, 9.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 5, and 8.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 1. Now, Musgrave gets to face the Denver Broncos’ defense that is the only one to have allowed over 100.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to TEs this season and 27.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to another NFC North TE, Cole Kmet ($1,894,445) in Week 4. Yes, Denver’s defense has played better since giving up 70 points to the Dolphins, but they still got lit up by Travis Kelce ($14,312,500) to the tune of 21.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (9 receptions for 124 receiving yards). Musgrave isn’t likely to put up Kelce numbers in Week 7, but half of that would be 10.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and enough to make him a top 12 TE.

The final reason for getting Musgrave into your Dynasty Owner starting lineup comes from the team’s coaching staff. It’s a good thing when your offensive coordinator is saying “He’s one of those guys that we need to find ways to get more involved for sure.” I’m happy to have guys who the coaches are actively trying to get involved more in the offense in my Starting lineup and other Dynasty Owners should do the same thing.

These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week

Now it’s the time to look at how each of my Bench recommendations from Week 6 worked out (Good, Bad or Just Ok) and see if they were low-scoring enough to be Good recommendations.

QB: C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811) – 19.1 (Just Ok recommendation)

RB: Jerome Ford ($995,537) – 11.1 (Just Ok recommendation)

WR: DeVonta Smith ($5,035,348) – 9.4 (Good recommendation)

TE: Sam LaPorta ($2,366,498) – 7.6 (Good recommendation)

For the most part, they were as none scored 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, and none were Bad recommendations. I had two Just Ok and two Good recommendations for just the second week of the season, along with Week 1, with no Bad recommendations.

Both DeVonta Smith and Sam LaPorta fell short of 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on 11 targets and were Good recommendations. It took Smith a season-high in targets to even reach 9.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions for 44 receiving yards). That left him well outside the top 24 WRs and even outside of the top 36 WRs to be a FLEX starter. There were enough TEs with 10.0 or more Dynasty Owner fantasy points to make it the bar for a Starting lineup TE. LaPorta didn’t reach the bar with just 7.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on his 11 targets.

Both Stroud and Ford were Just Ok Bench recommendations as they finished as the lowest of low end Starters in Week 7. Stroud had 19.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (199 passing yards, 2 rushing yards, 2 TDs, 1 INT). In a low-scoring week with just four QBs having more than 25.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, you may have thought that 19.1 would be enough to make it a Bad recommendation, but there were quite a few QBs in the 20.0 to 25.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy point range to make Stroud finish as QB12 for the week. Finally, Jerome Ford had fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points with 11.1 (84 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 7 receiving yards) than his teammate Kareem Hunt ($1,350,000) who had 16.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (47 rushing yards, 3 receptions, 24 receiving yards, 1 TD). However, Browns fans don’t care that their team worked Hunt more into the offense at Ford’s expense and caused Ford to be a low-end RB2. They are just happy that the Browns won.

The split in Week 6 still leaves me with a majority (54%) of Good Bench recommendations. Hopefully I can keep it up with these recommendations of low-scoring players to leave on your Dynasty Owner Bench for Week 7.

Kirk Cousins (QB – MIN): The first week for Kirk Cousins ($35,000,000) and the Minnesota Vikings without Justin Jefferson ($3,280,701) didn’t go so great offensively. They only had 220 yards of total offense, 12 first downs and were 2 for 13 (15.4%) in third down efficiency. And that was against the Chicago Bears defense!

Cousins and the Vikings don’t catch a break in Week 7 as the 49ers arrive in Minnesota for Monday Night Football and are likely a bit upset at losing in Week 6 to the Browns. The 49ers’ defense is in the top half of the NFL in passing yards allowed per game (215.7) and has allowed less than a passing TD per game (5 passing TDs in 6 games played).

After a hot start to the 2023 season, Cousins has only averaged 16.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and 201.3 yards passing per game in his past three games. He seems unlikely to do much better than that against the 49ers, especially without his best offensive weapon. The 49ers also do a good job against opposing TEs and could limit T.J. Hockenson’s ($9,392,000) production and challenge one of the other skill position players on the Vikings to step it up.

Cousins will probably have another pedestrian performance in Week 7 and score around the same number of Dynasty Owner fantasy points that he’s been averaging over the past three games. That won’t be good enough for your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup, so get Kirk on your Bench if you have another healthy QB who’s not on bye (or usually a backup).

Rachaad White (RB – TB): So far this season, Rachaad White ($1,282,500) has had three games with fewer than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, one game with 10.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and his big Week 2 when he had 21.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. All total, he has 52.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and ranks as RB25 for the season. Taking injuries and bye weeks into account, he is a clear mid-range RB2 (RB17) in Week 7. It’s kind of a perfect display of the running back situation in 2023 that White is a mid-range RB2 with only one really good game so far.

The Buccaneers get to play Atlanta this week and during Arthur Smith’s tenure as Falcons head coach, no Buccaneers RB, including Leonard Fournette ($7,000,000) has run for more than 56 yards against them. Fournette had 35.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 5 last year, but that was built on 10 receptions for 83 receiving yards and 2 TDs, not his 56 rushing yards. Similarly, this year’s Falcons defense is allowing 3.7 yards per carry, hasn’t given up more than 80 yards to a single RB in a game and held Washington to 72 yards rushing last week.

White is going to need volume to get enough yards to be a Starting RB for your Dynasty Owner team and he only got seven carries last week against the Lions, while Ke’Shawn Vaughn ($1,188,999) also carried the ball six times. Does that mean more carries in the future for Vaughn, or was it a one-time only event? I’m not sure and with White not performing up to expectations this season (ADP 58.2), it’s fair to be worried about his usage and production against Atlanta given the Buccaneers’ recent history. Leave White on your Dynasty Owner Bench this week and hopefully you have a better option available.

George Pickens (WR – PIT): The potential return of Diontae Johnson ($18,355,000) plus a matchup against the Los Angeles Rams who are surprisingly stout against the passing game in general (upper half of NFL defenses in passing yards allowed) and WRs in particular, could equal a subpar Week 7 game for George Pickens ($1,688,045). The Rams have allowed just 64 receptions for 790 receiving yards and 1 TD against WRs this season, which ranks them in the top 5 best defenses against WRs.

Johnson had a full practice on Wednesday and seems ready to come back after spending four games on Injured Reserve. This is good news for the Steelers’ offense, but bad news for Dynasty Owners with Pickens. The Steelers aren’t really well equipped offensively (Blame Canada!) to support two fantasy relevant WRs as they are averaging less than 200 yards (187.8) passing and 20 completions (19.6) per game. Both are sixth worst in the NFL.

Pickens has been very good this season and ranks as WR23 despite having a bye last week. He has two games with over 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points with over 100 receiving yards and a TD. That’s unlikely to happen this week with the return of Johnson so temper your expectations and leave Pickens on your Dynasty Owner Bench.

Evan Engram (TE – JAC): Jaguars QB Trevor Lawrence ($9,198,372) is hurt. He might still play or C.J. Beathard ($2,250,000) might be under center tonight (Thursday) for Jacksonville against a good New Orleans defense. It’s ironic that the Jaguars are playing against the Saints as the Saints were in a similar situation with Derek Carr ($37,500,000) a couple of weeks ago. Carr ended up playing, but only giving his Dynasty Owner 3.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (127 passing yards, 1 rushing yard, 1 lost fumble) against Tampa Bay. The Saints should have started Jameis Winston ($4,000,000) instead.

What does this have to do with Evan Engram ($13,750,000) and why is Lawrence not listed above as your Bench QB? Good questions! Let’s start with Lawrence. He’s been average all year and honestly, will probably do what he’s been doing and score between 18.0 and 23.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, just like he’s done in five out of six games this season. Engram is a different story even though his play has been similar and pretty consistent.

Engram relies on getting 7-8 targets per week from Lawrence as he’s yet to score a TD this season. He’s turning those targets into an average of 6 receptions and 50 receiving yards per game, which is 11.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Even a slight decline in his targets could result in a reduction big enough to drop him into being a high-end Bench option. Tight ends are averaging just 5.2 targets, 3.2 receptions and 28.5 receiving yards per game against the Saints. Those averages equal about 6.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. If we even split the difference, it’s 8.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. Either way, Engram would likely be outside the top 12 TEs and should be on your Bench.

I’m more confident in Lawrence getting his average than Engram, so I’m recommending that you Bench Engram in Dynasty Owner. You can Bench Lawrence as well if you have a better option at QB. However, with six teams on bye and most of those starting QBs have a firm hold on their starting position, some Dynasty Owners may not have another option. They should at TE and use that player if they can.

Free Agent Auction Targets Update

Now it’s time to recap the players recommended in Jay’s weekly Free Agent Auction targets article and see how much their Dynasty Owner roster percentage has increased since the start of Week 7. Even after a low-scoring Week 6, Jay still found five players to recommend picking up, even though his top pick has a Week 7 bye.

There have been two Free Agent Auction runs already this week – Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) and Thursday at 5 AM (Eastern), so some Dynasty Owners have had two chances to go pick up these guys in the Free Agent Auction. Hope you bid enough if you wanted to get them!

PlayerPositionTeamSalaryWeek 6 Roster %Current Roster %Change
Malik WillisQBTEN$1,290,02579.69%80.84%1.15%
Tyson BagentQBCHI$906,6678.43%68.97%60.54%
Craig ReynoldsRBDET$1,080,00042.15%67.05%24.90%
Kendrick BourneWRNE$5,000,00065.90%70.88%4.98%
Chris RodriguezRBWAS$1,004,42277.39%77.01%-0.38%

We have the most picked up player off the Free Agent Auction so far this season and his name is Tyson Bagent. There’s no shame if you hadn’t heard his name before this week as he’s an undrafted rookie free agent QB who played Division II college football at Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Last year, he threw for 296 yards and 3 TDs (plus had a 1-yard rushing TD) in a 47-14 victory against West Chester (PA) on October 22nd. This year, on October 22nd, he’ll likely be the Bears starting QB versus the Las Vegas Raiders at Soldier Field. Good luck to Tyson and all of the Dynasty Owners who grabbed him off the Free Agent Auction and seemingly plan on using him at least on their Bench in Week 7 with only 26 starting QBs available. I was not that brave, or desperate depending on your opinion.

Dynasty Owners finally are warming up to Craig Reynolds who made his first appearance in Jay’s Week 6 article, but was only picked up in 6.13% of Dynasty Owner leagues for last week’s games. He was picked up in four times as many leagues over the past two days (24.90%) after this week’s appearance on Jay’s list.

Kendrick Bourne has steadily moved up in roster percentage and is finally now rostered in over 70% of Dynasty Owner leagues after his nearly five percentage point increase over the past two days. That’s what scoring 19.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (10 receptions, 89 receiving yards, 4 rushing yards) will do for you.

Lastly, few Dynasty Owner picked up Malik Willis, and Chris Rodriguez was dropped in more leagues than he was picked up in. For both, it’s likely because they were only available in barely over 20% of Dynasty Owner leagues. Willis is on bye in Week 7 and none of the RBs ahead of Rodriguez in Washington got hurt last week, so he might not be in line for more playing time quite yet. Both are affordable Practice Squad stashes if you have a roster spot and enough salary cap room to make it work. Happy bidding and hope everyone got who they wanted, even guys not on Jay’s list, in the Free Agent Auction.

Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring Leaderboard

Are you missing the Dynasty Owner Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring standings that used to appear here? It was back over on Twitter/X for Week 6 and if you follow me there (@SteveVT33), you may have seen it. I got one match-up for Week 6 and used it, but need another one for Week 7, even if it’s projected to be low scoring.

The updated Chase for the Ring Leaderboard will also be posted on Twitter/X as well even though anyone can access it at https://app.dynastyowner.com/chase-for-the-ring. Check it out before things change during the Thursday Night Football game since the leaderboard is live and can change at any time. That means your team name could pop up in the top 100 during the game.

Slightly longer versions of the Match-up of the Week and the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard will also appear on the Dynasty Owner thread on Reddit, as well as Facebook and Instagram on occasion. Plus, the Chase for the Ring leaderboard Top 10 will definitely appear in a weekly newsletter sent out on Fridays by Dynasty Owner.

Conclusion

I’m looking for some low scoring Dynasty Owner games this week because of the bye weeks. Not sure about the NFL games though. Dynasty Owners need to do their best to fill out a complete Starting lineup and Bench to maximize your points for the week. The Bench scoring might even secure you a victory if your weekly match-up is close, but your Bench has a better week than your opponent’s. That’s one of many things that makes Dynasty Owner unique among dynasty fantasy football leagues and platforms.

NFL and Dynasty Owner teams will be back to full strength, or as full as possible with injuries, in Week 8. No NFL teams are on bye. I’ve written this before and likely said it on the Livestream or on a podcast, but I don’t know why there are no Week 8 byes. I understand having no bye weeks for Thanksgiving as the NFL needs enough games to cover all day Sunday in addition to three games on Thanksgiving itself, the new Amazon Prime Friday afternoon game and Monday Night Football. Giving even two teams a bye that week would mean one less game. Why there are no teams on bye in Week 8 and two weeks (Week 6 and Week 14) with two teams on bye and two weeks (Week 7 and Week 14) with six teams on bye is something that I just don’t understand.

If you know why or just want to pass along a crazy theory you have, then feel free to reach out to me or Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X, or post on Facebook, Instagram or Reddit. You can also let your fellow Dynasty Owners know if your Dynasty Owner team is projected to score more points this week than normal or after the Week 7 games are over if you did. You can also mention if Bench scoring made a difference in any of your match-ups or anything else. Please comment in all of those places when this article is published and let everyone know if you like, or dislike, my weekly recommendations, or think you can do better. You can even agree, like the article and add your comments on any of those social media platforms. We appreciate the feedback from our fellow Dynasty Owners.

The Week 7 Free Agent Auction targets article was published on Tuesday and Jay Pounds will be back every Tuesday during the 2023 season with a list of at least five widely available players in Dynasty Owner to help everyone with their Free Agent Auction bids for the first Auction run of the week on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern). We also have the weekly Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. It’s back to being live this week on Thursday afternoon at 4:00 PM (Eastern). It was at Noon last Thursday and if you missed it or want to see a previous episode, then go watch on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter/X: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

Free Agent Targets – Week 7

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners, are you enjoying the year of being average in the NFL? You may be wondering what the heck I am talking about and of course I am going to fill you in. After six full weeks of regular season play the NFL currently has 13 teams with three wins and either a 3-3 or 3-2 record. There are only nine teams on top with four or more wins and 10 teams on the bottom with two or fewer wins. The NFL wants parity, and they sure have it! Before we cover the free agents of the week, let’s take a look at a few of my highlights from Week 6.

Undefeated no more! Well that pretty much furthers my point about almost every team being average in 2023. Week 7 hasn’t even started yet, and we have zero undefeated teams left. The 1972 Dolphins get to pop the champagne early this season. Outside of the Jets beating the Eagles on Sunday night and the 49ers losing to the Browns, Week 6 did not have any real upsets of note.

One team I do want to highlight that has surprised me this season is the Houston Texans. Heading into the season, the Texans were a team I wanted little part of, but they have proved to be competent on offense behind rookie C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811) and are currently one of the hotter teams in the NFL. What team has surprised you the most this season? Let me know on X!

Another question I have for everyone. If you were the Vikings GM, would you move on from Kirk Cousins ($35,000,000) regardless of how you have to go about it? My answer is Yes. The team has looked horrible and likely has no shot at making the playoffs. If I were wearing the purple and gold suit, pairing Justin Jefferson ($3,280,701) with Caleb Williams (USC) would be much too tempting at this point.

If you are new to this series of articles, there is a small list of requirements, with the main one being that the player must be 80% rostered or below in Dynasty Owner. The only other requirement I have is that I would like the player to have a salary of $8,000,000 or less, but I will put a higher salary player on the list if I feel they are worth it. Free Agent Auction bids will process on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) for this upcoming week, so there’s still time to get your bids in for Week 6. The Bid listed below is my recommended amount to secure the player for your Dynasty Owner team in the Wednesday Free Agent Auction run in a typical Dynasty Owner league.

  1. Malik Willis (QB – TEN) – 3 years/$1,290,025 – 79.69% Rostered

I must admit I am shocked Malik Willis has been dropped by so many Dynasty Owners so early in his career with such a cheap contract. I know things have been ugly up to this point, but he has too much upside to just kick him to the curb like that and now we are seeing why. Ryan Tannehill ($29,500,000) has regressed in each of the past few seasons, is getting older and it has been only a matter of time before one of the youngsters on the roster overtook him to become the Titans new QB1. In brief work this season, Malik Willis has shown all of us why some had him projected to go so early in the 2021 NFL Draft. In Week 6, Willis had the best performance of his young career finishing the day with 4 completions on 5 attempts for 74 yards while adding 17 yards rushing (5.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). If Willis can limit turnovers, he may just find himself entrenched as the starter heading into 2024. If you need a quarterback, Malik Willis is your guy but be prepared for a bidding war! I can’t recall a time in all of my years playing Dynasty Owner that I have seen a player with so much upside available in the Free Agent Auction, especially at the quarterback position.

Bid – $8,000,000

2.Tyson Bagent (QB – CHI) – 3 years/$906,667 – 8.43% Rostered

I hope this one is not needed come Sunday but early reports on Justin Fields ($4,717,989) do not look good and I am expecting Bagent to start at least one week. I am not sure Bagent will be any good, or even serviceable for that matter but he is a quarterback who will likely be starting during bye weeks. Oh yea, he’s also one of the cheaper QBs on the Dynasty Owner platform as well. I am sure there are a few Dynasty Owners out there who have no starting quarterbacks available for Week 7 and will need Bagent by default as injuries have taken a toll on the position thus far. In relief of Fields in Week 6, Bagent completed 10 out of his 14 pass attempts for 83 yards and an interception (4.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). He also fumbled after getting strip sacked which resulted in a touchdown for the Vikings in what turned out to be the changing moment of the game. If Bagent can find a way to take care of the football with a full week of practice, he should at least put-up Zach Wilson ($8,787,670) numbers.

Bid – $3,000,000

3.Craig Reynolds (RB – DET) – 1 year/$1,080,000 – 42.15% Rostered

After the Detroit Lions signed David Montgomery ($6,000,000) and drafted Jahmyr Gibbs ($4,461,283) in the first round of the NFL Draft, who would have imagined Craig Reynolds would be a hot pick up here on the Dynasty Owner platform. In all honesty, we all should have seen this coming. As I mentioned last week, the Lions have used multiple running backs since Dan Campbell’s arrival and I’m guessing it will stay that way until he is gone. Usually, a coach using multiple running backs would be a death sentence in fantasy, but most who have lined up behind Jared Goff ($33,500,000) in the Motor City have at least satisfied fantasy managers. Enter Craig Reynolds and I am expecting more of the same regardless of the name. I know Reynolds struggled in Week 6 against the Buccaneers with just 6.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, but so did the other four Detroit Lions who logged a carry in the game. The Lions running attack will be back in full force come Week 7 and Reynolds will be a beneficiary!

Bid – $2,000,000

4.Kendrick Bourne (WR – NE) 2 years/$5,000,000 – 65.90% Rostered

Another week another Kendrick Bourne appearance in the top Free Agent Auction targets. Bourne has now appeared in several of these articles, and I am I firm believer that he would be 100% rostered if the Patriots ever found even a little bit of consistency on offense. Bourne leads the Patriots in targets this season by a wide margin. Bourne has racked up a total of 44 targets while the next closest Patriot, Hunter Henry ($12,500,000) sits at just 28 targets. All of the fantasy experts I have listened to or talked with throughout the years always say the same thing about receivers, which is to follow the targets. What this means is if a player is consistently seeing several targets in a game, it is going to turn into production at some point. If Mac Jones ($3,896,588) remembers how to play quarterback this season, Dynasty Owners are going to be thrilled with the addition of Kendrick Bourne to their roster. In Week 6, Bourne racked up 11 targets catching 10 of them for 89 yards plus one carry for four yards (19.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). If Bourne continues to see this type of target share he is going to have a massive game sometime in the coming weeks.

Bid – $2,000,000

5.Chris Rodriguez (RB – WAS) – 4 years/$1.004,422 – 77.39% Rostered

In the final spot, we have a developmental type of player who has the ability to offer immediate upside, Chris Rodriguez. It appears that Rodriguez has surpassed Antonio Gibson ($1,233,159) on the Commanders’ depth chart and would likely shoulder the load if anything were to happen to Brian Robinson ($1,261,227) this season. Rodriguez had missed the previous two games due to an illness but was back on Sunday and it quickly became clear the Commanders see potential in him. In Week 6, Rodriguez finished the game with 4 carries for 23 yards and did not catch a pass (2.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). I may look silly when all is said and done, but I firmly believe these are the types of running backs Dynasty Owners should target now versus when someone gets hurt, and everyone is bidding on them.

Bid – $2,000,000

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming articles from me and Steve plus the Dynasty Owner Livestream, now every Thursday afternoon at 4:00 PM (Eastern). Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

2023 NFL Week 6 Preview

Looking Forward

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

Most fantasy football players react to what happened last week instead of looking forward to what might happen next week. Ideally when bidding on players in the Free Agent Auction, Dynasty Owners would look more at what you think those players will do in Week 6 (and further) and less at what they did in Week 5. Unless someone has a fantasy football league in which you retroactively get points for players who you pick up later on, it doesn’t matter how many points a player scored last week.  It’s true that there is some “past is present” and if a player played well in Week 5, it stands to reason that he might play well again in Week 6. Or circumstances might have led him to play well in Week 5 that have nothing to do with what’s going to happen in Week 6. Sometimes it works and the player does well again and sometimes it doesn’t.

We all know which team in every league will bid the most for whoever played the best last week. In my long-time redraft league, it’s a friend of mine who gets to the waiver wire at 8 AM every Tuesday when everyone not on a roster is available to grab for $5. He spends a lot of $5 bills every week and still hasn’t won the league because he focuses on what they did last week and not what they might do in the upcoming week.

It can be a little different in dynasty leagues and especially in Dynasty Owner because of the salary cap. A team can’t outbid every other team using Dynasty Dollars every week without dropping players or cutting salary. They can’t go get an expensive player like Russell Wilson ($48,517,647) who’s playing well to replace Mac Jones ($3,896,588) who isn’t unless that team has over $44.6 million in salary cap room. It’s one thing that makes Dynasty Owner unique and more difficult than other fantasy football leagues. It’s much harder for Dynasty Owners to pick up “streamers” every week to put in their Starting lineup or even on their Bench and replace them the next week with a different “streamer”.

However, this week and next week are a little bit different. This week, only two teams (Green Bay and Pittsburgh) are on bye while next week, we have six teams on bye (Carolina, Cincinnati, Dallas, Houston, New York Jets, Tennessee). Most Dynasty Owners won’t have a roster crunch and potentially have players on bye or who aren’t playing at all on their Bench this week, but they might be in that situation next week.

That’s why I’m advocating for Dynasty Owners to look forward to Week 7 sometime this week. Maybe not on Thursday or Friday, but do it on Saturday. Take a look at the Free Agent Auction and find available players who might have a role in Week 7. If you need a TE, see who’s playing against a team that’s bad against TEs and check to see if you can fit him on your Practice Squad. He might be your Bench TE (or even a Starting TE if you have multiple TEs on bye) in Week 7, but by acquiring him this week, you’ll beat the Free Agent Auction rush next Tuesday. Don’t worry, Jay Pounds will still have a Free Agent Auction targets article for you to read and enjoy, but when the Dynasty Owners in your league go hunting in the Free Agent Auction, they’ll all be saying “Wow! (TEAM NAME) already has (PLAYER NAME)” and have to move on to Plan B.

You might ask “Why is this important?” or “Does it matter if my team has a third string TE who might get 2.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on my Bench?” The answer – Yes, it does!

For example, my team in League #30326 was winning against Barbee Kilgore by 1.11 points going into Monday Night Football. If Viktor had a Bench RB on bye, I would have won the match-up. Instead, he had A.J. Dillon ($1,321,458) who was averaging 4.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game through four weeks. Viktor got lucky when Aaron Jones ($12,000,000) was declared inactive by Green Bay and Dillon started and scored 13.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. I ended up losing by 2.29 points as Dillon being on Viktor’s Bench gave him an additional 3.4 points.

This is not a perfect example as Viktor already had Dillon on his roster, but if he didn’t and didn’t pick anyone up during the week, he would have lost. Your Dynasty Owner team might be in a similar situation in Week 7. If you look forward to Week 7 before the final Free Agent Auction run of Week 6 on Sunday at 5 AM (Eastern), you are less likely to find yourself in jeopardy of losing a close match-up with a player putting up a Blutarsky (0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) on your Bench.

Speaking of looking forward, I hope that you are looking forward to reading the rest of my weekly preview article. This is the place where every week, I’ll present a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who you should have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup. These won’t be the obvious choices. No recommendations to go ahead and start Josh Allen ($43,005,667) who is the overall top scoring player in Dynasty Owner after five weeks and looks good moving forward since he’s playing the Giants in Week 6 and Patriots in Week 7. Other players who are rostered in 100% (or nearly 100%) of Dynasty Owner leagues with low ADPs and have scored lots of Dynasty Owner fantasy points won’t be mentioned either. Instead, I’m going to recommend you Start players outside the top players at their position, players drafted to be on your Bench or Practice Squad, or players who aren’t on a roster in every Dynasty Owner league.

After that, I’ll name one player per position who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad. For these Bench recommendations, it’s just the opposite. I’ll suggest players doing well so far, drafted early in Dynasty Owner startup drafts to be Starters, and also projected in the top 12 (QBs and TEs) or top 36 (RBs and WRs) in scoring this year. This section is where you might see some surprising players appear. However, the recommended Bench players shouldn’t be in your Starting lineup for the week based on matchups, past performance against a team or something else.

All stats cited are based on the Standard Dynasty Owner scoring system as outlined in the Dynasty Owner Constitution. Standard Dynasty Owner scoring gives you .1 points for every yard rushing or receiving, .1 point for every 2 yards passing, 1 point per reception, 6 points for a rushing, receiving or passing touchdown and 2 points for a successful 2-point conversion (rushing, receiving, or passing). Interceptions or fumbles lost cost you 3 points, while a fumble that is recovered by the player’s team is a loss of only 1 point. Bonus points are available for 100-199 yards rushing (2 points), 200 yards rushing or receiving (6 points), 300-399 yards passing (1 point) and 400 yards passing (4 points). There is also a 3 point bonus for clutch scoring, which is a score that results in a lead change in the final two minutes of the 4th quarter or overtime. Kickoff and punt return touchdowns are worth 6 points for the player and kickoff and punt returns are worth 1 point for every 40 yards.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the morning of October 12th. All 2023 contract information is currently what is listed on the Dynasty Owner platform (number of years and salaries) and has been taken from Spotrac (https://www.spotrac.com/).

Dynasty Owner Player of the Week

Before we get into Week 6, let’s look at Week 5 and announce the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week. This is a historic event as we have another first-time Player of the Week for the third consecutive week. However, that’s not the reason why this is a historic announcement. The reason why it’s so amazing for Dynasty Owner is that the Week 5 Dynasty Owner Player of the Week is the favorite player of our CEO Tim Peffer. That’s right, the winner is DJ Moore.

Depending on when you are reading this preview article, it’s been nearly a week or more since DJ Moore ($20,628,000) put up 55.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (8 receptions, 230 receiving yards, 3 TD) on the Washington Commanders. Moore held on to this award for the entire week and barely held off Ja’Marr Chase ($7,704,910) who had 52.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (15 receptions, 192 receiving yards, 3 TDs) on Sunday afternoon. The reason why Moore was the winner over Chase was the 6.0 point bonus that Dynasty Owner awards for 200+ receiving yards. After this week’s performance, Moore is now the WR4 for the 2023 season and his 5 TDs are more than he had in four of his five seasons in Carolina. Congratulations to DJ for being Tim’s favorite player and on his first Dynasty Owner Player of the Week award.

Week 5 Points: 55.0

2023 Salary: $20,628,000

Cost per Point: $375,055

Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week

Because this is Dynasty Owner and we’re all looking for value from the players on our roster, we also have the Value Player of the Week. It’s getting a little boring with the Value Player of the Week as we’ve only had three winners in five weeks. After Puka Nacua ($1,021,244) won his second award in three weeks, we have another player winning his second award in three weeks. If you remember who won back in Week 3, you’ll know that our Value Player of the Week is Brock Purdy.

Not only did Brock Purdy ($934,252) win the Value Player of the Week award but he had the most Dynasty Owner fantasy points (36.6) for a winner this year and the best cost per point ($25,526) as well. He barely had more points than Indianapolis RB Zack Moss ($1,153,079) who had 35.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (165 rushing yards, 2 receptions, 30 receiving yards, 2 TDs). Moss’s higher salary left his well behind Purdy in terms of value this week. Purdy is also the leader in the Value Player of the Year competition over Nacua, Moss and a host of other players with salaries in the $1 million range who are playing well so far. We’ll see if Nacua can reclaim this award in Week 6 or if Purdy wins his second in a row, third of the season and fourth overall. Only Aaron Jones has won the Value of the Week award four times, back when he made just $650,484 in the 2019 and 2020 seasons and one more win will put Purdy in a tie. Good luck to Brock on trying to become the most decorated value player in Dynasty Owner history!

Week 5 Points: 36.6

2023 Salary: $934,252

Cost per Point: $25,526

These Guys Should be Starters This Week

Before we get into the weekly recommendations, I always look at how my previous week’s recommendations did (Good, Bad or Just Ok) and give a recap. Looking back, not forward, goes against this week’s article theme but I’m not going to break tradition so let’s see how I did in Week 5.

QB: Joshua Dobbs ($2,000,000) – 11.4 (Bad recommendation)

RB: Jaylen Warren ($857,333) – 10.9 (Just Ok recommendation)

WR: Josh Downs ($1,380,115) – 15.7 (Good recommendation)

TE: Tyler Conklin ($6,750,000) – 10.7 (Just Ok recommendation)

Everyone had double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points, which would seem to be a positive. However, when looking closer, it turned out that there was only one Good recommendation, two Just Ok recommendations and one Bad recommendation.

Not surprisingly, Joshua Dobbs getting only 11.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (166 passing yards, 1 rushing yard, 2 TDs, 2 INTs, 1 lost fumble) at the QB position was Bad as he was tied with Ryan Tannehill ($29,500,000) as QB19 in Week 5. On the other hand, the other Josh who I picked last week (Josh Downs) had 15.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (6 receptions for 97 receiving yards) to rank as WR18 and end up as a Good recommendation.

The non-Josh recommendations were both Just Ok. Jaylen Warren was a very low end RB2 for the week with 10.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (40 rushing yards, 3 receptions, 39 receiving yards) and Tyler Conklin was a low-end TE1 with 10.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions for 67 receiving yards). Even though both were low-end Starters, these recommendations were Just Ok since they would have been high-end Bench options if they scored just one fewer point. Not going to take a victory lap with such a small margin of “victory” so both of those recommendations were Just Ok.

That’s four weeks in a row with a single Good Starting lineup recommendation and while that’s better than none, I’m looking forward to having a week when all four of my Starting lineup recommendations are Good. Here are the players who I hope can get me that perfect record in Week 6.

Dak Prescott (QB – DAL): After last week’s 4.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy point performance (153 passing yards, 2 rushing yards, 1 TD, 3 INTs), Dak Prescott ($40,000,000) could use a game against a bad defense. He gets exactly what he needs in Week 6 as Dallas goes to Los Angeles to face the Chargers on Monday Night Football.

The Chargers are unquestionably one of the worst defenses in the NFL as they are allowing the most passing yards per game (299.8) and 26.0 points per game to their opponents. Even though they have played one fewer game than most teams, they have given up the eighth most passing yards to QBs on the season. They have allowed an average of 27.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points to opposing QBs and that includes Week 4 when they got to face Raiders rookie QB Aidan O’Connell ($1,087,345) in his NFL debut. O’Connell had just 8.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points but did throw for 238 yards. He was just undone by an interception and three fumbles (two lost).

Dak has two bad games this season so far, two average ones and just one when he scored 26.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 2 against the Jets when he was worth being in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup. He’ll make it two Starting lineup worthy games this week and you’ll want him in your Starting lineup for it.

Kenneth Gainwell (RB – PHI): I should really pick a Kansas City RB as the Broncos have been just awful against RBs this season, but I don’t have faith in either Jerick McKinnon ($1,317,500) or Clyde Edwards-Helaire ($2,705,393) to put them here. I will say that CEH might get some garbage time runs like he did against Chicago and had 12.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (55 rushing yards, 1 reception, 2 receiving yards, 1 TD) to be worth a Bench play. Not going to do recommend starting him though.

Instead, I’ll take Kenneth Gainwell ($953,882) who was the Eagles’ lead RB in Week 1, but got hurt and lost his job to D’Andre Swift ($2,134,729). In Week 1, Gainwell played a majority (62%) of the team’s offensive snaps, but after missing Week 2 with an injury, it’s been Swift in the lead role and Gainwell playing about two-fifths of the snaps. Gainwell has scored some points in each of the past three weeks, it’s just not been many (14.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points combined) and his average yards per touch is pretty awful at just 3.55 yards per touch (47 touches for 167 yards). That includes a measly 4.9 yards per reception (8 receptions for 39 receiving yards) and 3.3 yards per rushing attempt (39 attempts for 128 rushing yards).

The Jets’ defense isn’t great against RBs as they have allowed them to run for 534 yards in five games and average 4.2 yards per carry. Their overall yards per carry average is 4.5 which ranks 25th overall. They have also allowed 31 RB receptions, which is tied for second most behind Green Bay. Gainwell has been playing enough and got 6 touches in Week 4 and 8 touches in Week 5. He just needs to break one of those touches for some yardage and I think it’ll happen this week. Get him into your Starting lineup so your Dynasty Owner team gets the full benefit.

Darnell Mooney (WR – CHI): The list of potential weapons for Bears QB Justin Fields ($4,717,989) got smaller last week after their Thursday Night Football victory over the Washington Commanders as the team traded WR Chase Claypool ($1,654,156) to the Dolphins and announced that RB Khalil Herbert ($902,677) is doubtful with a high ankle sprain. That provides an opportunity for Darnell Mooney ($894,263) to jumpstart his season.

Mooney has been playing a lot as the only week he played less than 70% of the team’s offensive snaps was back in Week 2 so he’ll be on the field. The Vikings have allowed the most receptions and receiving yards to opposing WRs this season (90 receptions for 1,048 receiving yards). That’s an average of 18 receptions for 209.6 receiving yards. D.J. Moore isn’t going to get all of those receptions and receiving yards so some will fall Mooney’s way. The Vikings’ slot cornerback is also being targeted one-third (34%) of the time when aligned against a receiver this season and Mooney is the Bears’ primary slot receiver. Mooney should have the opportunity to do well this week and as long as he avoids getting shut out again like he did in Week 5 when he was targeted four times but still put up a Blutarsky, he’ll be worth using as a Starting WR for your Dynasty Owner team.

Cade Otton (TE – TB): It’s been an up and down season so far for Cade Otton ($1,123,486). He had two games with very little production – Week 1 versus Minnesota with just 3.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (2 receptions for 19 receiving yards) and Week 3 versus Philadelphia with 2.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 reception for 16 receiving yards). He’s also had two games with just over 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points – Week 2 versus Chicago with 6 receptions for 41 receiving yards (10.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and Week 4 versus New Orleans with 3 receptions for 13 receiving yards and a TD (10.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). That adds up to a total of 26.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and a ranking of TE25 for the season.

Of course, that ranking is low because Tampa Bay had their bye week already, but he’d barely be in the top 20 on a per game average basis. However, Tampa Bay is playing Detroit this week and the Lions have allowed the second most receiving yards to TEs this season (353 yards) while not playing against a single top 12 TE. They did play Kansas City in Week 1, but Travis Kelce ($14,312,500) was injured and didn’t play. The Lions still allowed his backups, Noah Gray ($948,444) and Blake Bell ($1,165,000) to combine for 15.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions, 43 receiving yards, 1 TD).

Speaking of backup TEs, none of Otton’s backups in Tampa Bay have scored a single Dynasty Owner fantasy point this season. David Wells ($870,000) does have two receptions, but for -10 receiving yards and a fumble so he’s stuck at zero. It’s very likely that all of the Buccaneers’ TE production in Week 6 comes from Otton and with Detroit’s less than stellar defense against TEs so far in 2023, Otton seems like a solid bet for double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points. That’s worth a spot in your Starting lineup.

These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week

Now it’s the time to look at how each of my Bench recommendations from Week 5 worked out (Good, Bad or Just Ok).

QB: Russell Wilson ($48,517,647) – 22.7 (Just Ok recommendation)

RB: Kyren Williams ($992,601) – 7.7 (Good recommendation)

WR: Courtland Sutton ($15,200,000) – 2.3 (Good recommendation)

TE: Cole Kmet ($1,894,445) – 14.2 (Bad recommendation)

As usual, I’m doing better with my Bench recommendations than Starting lineup recommendations for the season and also this week. It was a solid week of TE play and the 14.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions, 42 receiving yards, 1 TD, 1 fumble) that Cole Kmet put up only had him as TE9 for the week. That was still enough points to make that a Bad recommendation. On the flip side, Kyren Williams did not have a TD as predicted, but did average 4.1 yards per carry (13 carries for 53 yards) which was above his 3.8 yards per carry average for the season. I split on those, but he only came up with 2 receptions for 4 yards plus the 53 rushing yards to give him a total of 7.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Not enough so he should have been on your Bench and therefore, my recommendation was Good.

It was a mixed bag on the two Broncos as Russell Wilson was perfectly average with 22.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (196 passing yards, 49 rushing yards, 2 TDs, 2 fumbles – 1 lost) while Courtland Sutton only caught 1 out of 3 targets for 13 receiving yards and 2.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Wilson was QB14 for the week as ten QBs had over 25.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. I’m calling that recommendation Just Ok as he was on the low-end Starter/high-end Bench cusp for the week. Recommending Sutton for the Bench was Good obviously as 2.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points doesn’t cut it for a guy with a $15.2 million salary.

I’m looking at just Week 6 with these Bench recommendations. Not ahead despite the title of the article.

C.J. Stroud (QB – HOU): Chalk this pick up to two things. First, he’s due for a bad game as a rookie QB and second, I couldn’t really find anyone else in the top 12 QBs to recommend as a Bench pick this week. Therefore, C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811) is my Bench recommendation.

I’ll start by telling you how good Stroud has been this year. He’s QB11 in Dynasty Owner with 119.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, over 240 yards passing in all five games, no interceptions, and passing TDs in each of his past four games. The only game that he didn’t have a passing TD was Week 1 against the Ravens and he also had a season-low of 242 passing yards that week as well.

Speaking of good, the New Orleans defense has been good this season. They have given up the fourth fewest passing yards per game (183.0 yards per game) and are tied for third in most interceptions with 7. Last week, they held Mac Jones to 110 passing yards, picked him off twice and forced a fumble (and recovered the fumble) for a total of -3.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Admittedly, Jones and the Patriots offense have been awful for the past two weeks, but a shutout is a shutout, and the Saints defense deserves some credit for it.

Under normal circumstances, I probably wouldn’t have taken Stroud, but none of the other top QBs are likely to do worse than him and I have to pick someone this week. Therefore, I’m recommending that Dynasty Owners leave Stroud on their Bench this week.

Jerome Ford (RB – CLE): The Browns’ schedule hasn’t done any favors to Jerome Ford ($995,537) ever since the season ending injury to Nick Chubb ($12,200,000). He’s had to play Tennessee, a top 10 defense against the run this year and the best in 2022, Baltimore without Deshaun Watson ($46,000,000) at QB so the Ravens could focus on stopping him and the running game, then a bye week and now the 49ers who have the second best run defense this year and finished second to Tennessee last year. And he might have to do it with P.J. Walker ($2,075,000) at QB. Yikes!

It’s difficult to run against the 49ers because their defense is good, and their offense has scored 30 or more points in every game this season and have been ahead by double digits by the early fourth quarter in every game. As a result, RBs have only attempted 59 rushes for 217 yards (3.7 yards per carry). It’s been better through the air as RBs have caught 30 passes for 170 yards. The 49ers defense has also given up 3 TDs to RBs so far this season, but two were to Kyren Williams back in Week 2 and Williams only had 52 rushing yards. Including that big performance from Williams (28.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), the 49ers have only given up an average of 16.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game to RBs.

Not sure Ford is going to find running room this week and his chance to get some receptions and receiving yards is significantly decreased if Walker is the Browns’ QB. Especially if the Browns start working Kareem Hunt ($1,350,000) into the offense more. So many things working against Ford this week so I’m recommending that you leave him on your Dynasty Owner Bench.

DeVonta Smith (WR – PHI): With the Eagles playing the Jets and their pair of top cornerbacks, it stands to reason that one (or both) of the Eagles top WRs will struggle. Since both of them are Starting WRs in Dynasty Owner, I get to pick DeVonta Smith ($5,035,348) instead of A.J. Brown ($25,000,000) as the one to leave on your Dynasty Owner Bench this week.

Both of them are mainly perimeter receivers which are the receivers that the Jets defense excels at stopping. Smith has two games in which he’s been better as a Bench WR including just 1.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 reception for 6 receiving yards) last week against the Rams. Brown’s worst game came in Week 2 when the Vikings held him to just 6.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions for 29 receiving yards). In addition, Brown has far more targets this season than Smith (51 for Brown versus 34 for Smith). I know I’m saying to look forward, but since both of them are playing against the same team and cornerbacks, it’s useful to see which WR Jalen Hurts ($1,506,293) favors and it’s clearly Brown.

Brown is WR8 and Smith is WR26 for the 2023 season so far. Both are usually in your Starting lineup, but I’d put Smith on my Dynasty Owner Bench this week and would temper my expectations for Brown as well.

Sam LaPorta (TE – DET): Using the same theory as above with C.J. Stroud in that it’s going to be hard for Sam LaPorta ($2,366,498) to remain the TE1 for all season and at some point, he’s going to have a bad game. Looking ahead, it might come next week versus Baltimore, but it’ll also come this week against Tampa Bay.

I’m not predicting a Blutarsky for LaPorta, but think he’ll have a tough time finding the end zone against the Buccaneers who have let to allow a TE to score a TD this season. They have played three of the top 8 TEs so far as well with T.J. Hockenson ($9,392,000) putting up 11.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, Cole Kmet ($1,894,445) only scoring 7.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and Dallas Goedert ($14,250,000) getting 9.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points against them. Overall, they are allowing an average of 7.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per week to TEs and if LaPorta hits that mark, he’ll fall short of being a Starting TE. If he does, it may end up being Just Ok as he may be a high-end Bench option.

If you have LaPorta paired with a high salary, high performance TE1 already, then congratulations for drafting well as you probably got LaPorta in the second round of your rookie draft (16.6 rookie draft ADP). If so, then you might think about using LaPorta as your FLEX this week and keeping that TE1 in your lineup, especially if it’s Kelce, Hockenson or Mark Andrews ($14,000,000). Don’t do it! Take the safe route and leave LaPorta on your Bench this week.

Free Agent Auction Targets Update

Now it’s time to recap the players recommended in Jay’s weekly Free Agent Auction targets article and see how much their Dynasty Owner roster percentage has increased since the start of Week 6. Jay gave us his usual five players this week and unlike last week when he recommended picking up Deven Thompkins ($787,500) even though he was on bye in Week 5, there are no players on a Week 6 bye who appeared on his list.

There have been two Free Agent Auction runs already this week – Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) and Thursday at 5 AM (Eastern), so some Dynasty Owners have had two chances to go pick up these guys in the Free Agent Auction. Hope you bid enough if you wanted to get them!

PlayerPositionTeamSalaryWeek 5 Roster %Current Roster %Change
Logan ThomasTEWAS$8,021,66722.22%48.66%26.44%
Tyler ConklinTENYJ$6,750,00047.51%49.04%1.53%
Nelson AgholorWRBAL$3,250,00015.33%14.56%-0.77%
Trenton IrwinWRCIN$825,0004.21%6.90%2.69%
Craig ReynoldsRBDET$1,080,00036.02%37.93%1.91%

It appears that not many Dynasty Owners wanted anybody on Jay’s list except Logan Thomas. Thomas saw his roster percentage shoot up over 25 percentage points, while nobody else had an increase of even three percentage points. In a historic first, Nelson Agholor was actually dropped in more leagues than he was picked up in and his roster percentage dropped slightly. Both Odell Beckham Jr. ($15,000,000) and Rashod Bateman ($3,149,853) returned to the Ravens’ lineup in Week 5, but both played fewer snaps than Agholor and combined for fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5.1 for Beckham and Bateman vs. 9.4 for Agholor). Jay thinks he was looking forward to Week 6 with his target players, but Dynasty Owners apparently don’t agree with him on four out of five players.

Both Trenton Irwin and Craig Reynolds could still be picked up by more Dynasty Owners and should be if the playing status of both Tee Higgins ($2,171,696) and Jahmyr Gibbs ($4,461,283) doesn’t improve significantly before Sunday. Neither Higgins nor Gibbs played last week, which led to the Week 5 performances of Irwin and Reynolds that landed both of them on Jay’s target list.

Even though Logan Thomas is nearly $1.3 million more in salary than Tyler Conklin and has scored 8.2 more Dynasty Owner fantasy points despite missing Week 3 against Buffalo, I was still surprised to see Thomas picked up in so many more Dynasty Owner leagues than Conklin. Conklin is four years younger and has missed only one game in his 5+ years in the NFL. Thomas has already missed a game this season and 14 games over the past two seasons. Dynasty Owners may have given more weight to the fact that Thomas outscored Conklin by 9.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points last week (19.7 for Thomas vs. 10.7 for Conklin). We’ll find out who is better in Week 6 and beyond soon enough.

Since all five players on Jay’s target list are still rostered in less than 50% of Dynasty Owner leagues, there’s still time to look at their Week 6 and 7 match-ups to see if you should put in a late week bid to secure the services of any of these players. Happy bidding and hope everyone got who they wanted, even guys not on Jay’s list, in the Free Agent Auction.

Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring Leaderboard

Are you missing the Dynasty Owner Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring standings that used to appear here? Did you notice that neither one was published for Week 5? If you want to see them again, then head over and follow me on Twitter/X (@SteveVT33) and also send over one of your match-ups to be featured for Week 6. I’ll post the best one I get for Week 6 or will be forced to find a good match-up in one of my Dynasty Owner leagues.

The updated Chase for the Ring Leaderboard will also be posted on Twitter/X as well even though anyone can access it at https://app.dynastyowner.com/chase-for-the-ring. Check it out before things change during the Thursday Night Football game since the leaderboard is live and can change at any time. That means your team name could pop up in the top 100 during the game.

Slightly longer versions of the Match-up of the Week and the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard will also appear on the Dynasty Owner thread on Reddit, as well as Facebook and Instagram on occasion. Plus, the Chase for the Ring leaderboard Top 10 will definitely appear in a weekly newsletter sent out on Fridays by Dynasty Owner.

Conclusion

While it might be difficult to look forward to Week 7 before Week 6 has even started, or even if you’re reading this after the Thursday night game is finished, Dynasty Owners would be well served by doing so. It may provide them with the advantage that they need to win their Week 7 match-up when probably everyone’s Dynasty Owner team will be hobbled with multiple players on bye. The same scenario will play out again later this season in Week 13 when six more teams are on bye (Baltimore, Buffalo, Chicago, Las Vegas, Minnesota, New York Giants). You could argue that better teams are on bye with more prominent fantasy players than Week 7 and with the stakes possibly magnified at the end of the season, it might be even more important to look forward during Week 12 than now. It might also be more difficult as Week 12 is Thanksgiving week with three games on Thanksgiving plus the Amazon Friday afternoon game. If Dynasty Owners wait until Saturday of Week 12 to look ahead, eight teams will have already played.

Talk about “looking forward”. I’m already mentioning Week 12 and Week 13 when it’s just Week 6 and in the famous words of Jim Mora, some Dynasty Owners are just hoping to win a game. Hopefully all of my teams (and your teams as well) will be in playoff contention at that point of the season, won’t have thrown away any games and it’ll matter if they can win. Feel free to reach out to me or Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X, or post on Facebook, Instagram or Reddit and let your fellow Dynasty Owners know if you’re looking forward to Week 7 or just staying focused on Week 6. You can also comment in all of those places when this article is published and let everyone know if you like, or dislike, my weekly recommendations, think you can do better and have players who you’re planning on bidding on in the Free Agent Auction in anticipation of Week 7. You can even agree, like the article and add your comments on any of those social media platforms. We appreciate the feedback from our fellow Dynasty Owners.

The Week 6 Free Agent Auction targets article was published on Tuesday and Jay Pounds will be back every Tuesday during the 2023 season with a list of at least five widely available players in Dynasty Owner to help everyone with their Free Agent Auction bids for the first Auction run of the week on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern). We also have the weekly Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. Usually, it’s on Thursday afternoons at 4:00 PM (Eastern), but we had to move it up to Noon this week. Hopefully you can watch live, or maybe you’re reading this and watching it at the same time or watched live if you are reading this after it aired. If you missed this week’s episode or want to see previous ones, then go watch on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter/X: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

Free Agent Targets – Week 6

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners, it is that time of the week again! Usually during my introductions, I give you my takeaways from the previous week, but I am going to do it a little different today and look at my major player surprises with the first quarter of the season officially in the books.

At the quarterback position we have none other than “Mr. Dangeruss” Russell Wilson ($48,517,647) who heads into Week 6 sporting a 1-4 record despite slotting in as the sixth ranked quarterback here on Dynasty Owner. I knew Wilson would play better with Sean Payton in town, but I wasn’t expecting him to be just 0.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points behind Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000) after the first two minutes of the first game let alone after five full games!

Up next, we have something I don’t think I have ever seen before in fantasy. At the running back position, we have a pair of teammates, Devon Achane ($1,359,362) and Raheem Mostert ($2,800,000), who are both inside of the top 3 in Dynasty Owner scoring at their position. I don’t think it will end up that way when all is said and done, but it’s still an amazing accomplishment for a team that also has the number 1 scoring wide receiver, Tyreek Hill ($30,000,000) five games through the season. The Dolphins have established themselves as clear contenders and have been a ton of fun to watch.

In the wasteland (tight end position), we have another unbelievable feat as a rookie sits atop the rankings. The rookie is none other Detroit Lions tight end Sam LaPorta ($2,366,498). LaPorta has been an absolute beast this season and has been by far the most consistent tight end on the platform. LaPorta has not scored less than 8.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in a single game all season long and has a high game of 22.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. I don’t mean to brag, but I drafted Sam LaPorta two years ago, late in my first ever devy league!

As for the honorable mentions, we have Kyren Williams ($992,601) and D’Andre Swift ($2,134,729) at the running back position ranking fifth and ninth, Nico Collins ($1,217,879) at the receiver position ranking 11th, and Cole Kmet ($1,894,445) at the tight end spot who is ranked fourth. I know I left kickers out. I am sorry. Let me know on X if you are mad at me!

If you are new to this series of articles, there is a small list of requirements, with the main one being that the player must be 80% rostered or below in Dynasty Owner. The only other requirement I have is that I would like the player to have a salary of $8,000,000 or less, but I will put a higher salary player on the list if I feel they are worth it. Free Agent Auction bids will process on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) for this upcoming week, so there’s still time to get your bids in for Week 6. The Bid listed below is my recommended amount to secure the player for your Dynasty Owner team in the Wednesday Free Agent Auction run in a typical Dynasty Owner league.

  1. Logan Thomas (TE – WAS) – 2 years/$8,021,667 – 22.22% Rostered

Sound the alarms, Logan Thomas is officially a TE1 after a quarter of the season. I know this sounds horrible, but keep reading and you may become intrigued. Had Thomas not missed the Week 3 contest against Buffalo, he may have found himself inside of the top 7 or 8 tight ends through five weeks of the season. Thomas has shown himself to be a safety net for young quarterback Sam Howell ($1,005,400). I know these numbers won’t blow you away but remember what the rest of the position looks like while reading this, 18 catches for 183 receiving yards and 2 touchdowns (44.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). Yea that’s what a TE1 looks like in 2023. If Thomas can stay healthy the rest of the way, he should easily finish inside of the top 12 tight ends making his rather large $8,021,667 contract and blah outlook seem feasible. At this point, what are your other options? If you really want to know, see below.

Bid – $2,000,000

2. Tyler Conklin (TE – NYJ) – 2 years/$6,750,000 – 47.51% Rostered

What! Two tight ends on the free agent list in 2023! Again, this is not an attractive free agent pickup at all, but it is what it is with just about everyone not named Sam LaPorta  at the tight end position struggling to post consistent fantasy numbers. Tyler Conklin has now hit 9.8 points or better in three of the Jets’ five games this season with his best performance coming in Week 5 when he posted a stat line of 4 catches for 67 yards which was good enough to score 10.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. While you should be prepared for some 4–6-Dynasty Owner fantasy point weeks from Conklin, he is a solid option for your Bench during bye weeks and even a every week Bench player for some rosters. I am also expecting the Jets to make a change at quarterback when Trevor Siemian ($1,317,500) is acclimated which should mean better numbers for all of the Jets’ pass catchers. I think it’s clear at this point that Zach Wilson ($8,787,670) is a bona fide third string quarterback on a few rosters in the NFL!

Bid – $1,000,000

3. Nelson Agholor (WR – BAL) – 1 year/$3,250,000 – 15.33% Rostered

We may just rename this week’s article to blah as that’s how I feel telling you to pick up these players. I am sure you have heard the old saying “20 bucks is 20 bucks” well I’m changing it a little and declaring this year’s fantasy football motto “production is production”. Yea, it’s been that kind of year. I’m sure this will hurt the Rashod Bateman ($3,149,853) truthers feelings, but Nelson Agholor has quietly been the second best receiver for the Ravens this season and he seems to have a firm grasp on the spot. I know that last statement doesn’t carry much weight with the way the Ravens have looked on offense this season, but I’ll say it again “production is production”. Speaking of production, Agholor finished Week 5 with 5 targets securing 4 of them for 64 yards and a fumble, good enough for 9.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. The great thing about picking up Agholor is the fact he is on a cheap one-year deal and won’t be hard to move on from should he struggle the rest of the season. Either way, bye weeks are coming up and it is time to secure some depth for your rosters.

Bid – $2,000,000

4. Trenton Irwin (WR – CIN) – 1 year/$825,000 – 4.21% Rostered

Up in the 4 spot we have little known receiver Trenton Irwin. Many experts (including myself) were expecting veteran Tyler Boyd ($10,750,000) to see most of the work as the secondary option to Ja’Marr Chase ($7,704,910) with Tee Higgins ($2,171,696) out in Week 5. Instead, it was Irwin who shined brightest behind Chase. In Week 5, Irwin had an impressive stat line of 8 catches for 60 yards on a whopping 10 targets, scoring 14.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. I know some will be worried that Irwin’s teammate, Tee Higgins will be back from injury come Week 6 but with the Bengals having a bye during Week 7, I am expecting Higgins to sit out for one more week. If this is the case, I see no reason Irwin won’t see a ton of work again this week. I know picking up a one-week rental is tough here on the Dynasty Owner platform, but I believe Irwin is well worth it should quarterback Joe Burrow ($9,047,534) play well on Sunday. With a price tag of less than $1,000,000, I see no reason Irwin is not worth the small risk of a pickup.

Bid – $2,000,000

5. Craig Reynolds (RB – DET) – 1 year/$1,080,000 – 36.02% Rostered

Alright tread carefully with this one! I am uncertain if Reynolds’ teammate, Jahmyr Gibbs ($4,461,283) will be back for the Lions’ Week 6 contest but with the way Reynolds played in relief I would expect them to hold the youngster out another week or two. I know this is going to sound crazy to hear but the Lions are playing for bigger things than a playoff spot this year in a wide open NFC and should be thinking big picture with every decision they face. In Week 5, Reynolds dazzled in a backup role to David Montgomery ($6,000,000) finishing the day with 7 carries for 52 yards averaging a massive 7.4 yards per carry, oh and he was able to find the end zone for 11.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. I know some Dynasty Owners may pause because of the presence of Montgomery, but the Lions have used multiple running backs since Dan Campbell showed up in the Motor City and I don’t see it changing anytime soon. The guy enjoys biting off people’s kneecaps, of course he is going to pound the rock. Should we just call Dan Campbell the modern-day Bill Cowher?

Bid – $2,000,000

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming articles from me and Steve plus the Dynasty Owner Livestream, now every Thursday afternoon at 4:00 PM (Eastern). Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

2023 NFL Week 5 Preview

Projections and Expectations

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

Fantasy football is a game of projections and expectations. The winners every week likely exceed those projections, while the losers fall short of them. The losers could also exceed projections, but not by as much as the winner exceeds theirs, or maybe both of them meet the projections, it’s just that one team was projected to be better and hit their higher projection while the other team hit theirs, but it wasn’t enough to win. Individual weekly player projections are even more subject to fluctuation than those for a whole team.

Expectations are different as everyone likely has a different expectation of how their NFL, Dynasty Owner, other fantasy football team, and individual players are going to do on a weekly basis. My weekly recommendations are a set of players who I have either high (Players to Start) or low (Players to Bench) hopes for in a given week. It doesn’t mean that I don’t like the player for the season or want them on my team. It just means that I think they are going to have a better or worse than expected weekly performance.

So far, there is really just one NFL team that is exceeding everyone’s expectations for them. Not even the most rabid Tampa Bay Buccaneers fan likely had their team at 3-1 with Baker Mayfield ($4,000,000) at QB in first year of the post-Tom Brady era. On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have three playoff teams from last year (Cincinnati Bengals, Minnesota Vikings, New York Giants) who are struggling at 1-3 on the season. Some people even had the highest of expectations for the Bengals and the Vikings as their pre-season predictions had those teams meeting in the Super Bowl. It’s still possible that both of them (and the Giants) rally to make the playoffs, but the possibility is dimming with each loss.

Certain players are clearly exceeding expectations for the season so far as well. You’d be hard pressed to find someone who predicted that both Jordan Love ($3,095,863) and Russell Wilson ($48,517,647) would be among the top 10 scorers in Dynasty Owner with bye weeks approaching and ahead of both Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000) and Jalen Hurts ($1,506,293). Same thing goes with Puka Nacua ($1,021,244). Plenty of Dynasty Owners drafted him (rookie draft ADP of 33.2 and startup draft ADP of 235.3) but nobody projected him to have the kind of start to his NFL career that he’s had with 98.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, leading the NFL in targets and receptions and in second place in receiving yards. If you made any of those predictions, everyone is going to need to see proof before we believe you.

Finally, and maybe most importantly, it’s four weeks into the Dynasty Owner regular season and all Dynasty Owners should have a pretty good handle on how their team is doing compared to its projections and expectations. Hopefully they are exceeding both of them and if you have a Dynasty Owner team in that situation, then let me know by reaching out on Twitter/X (@SteveVT33) or sending it to Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X. You can also offer up that team to be featured as the Week 5 Match-up of the Week.

Thanks for reading my weekly preview article and for being a Dynasty Owner. Hopefully this article at least meet your expectations or even exceeds them by offering up four Good Starting lineup and Bench recommendations for Week 5.

Every week of the 14-game Dynasty Owner regular season and three game playoffs, I’ll present a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who you should have as a Starter in your Dynasty Owner lineup. These won’t be the obvious choices. No recommendations to go ahead and start Christian McCaffrey ($16,015,875) who may have been projected as the top RB in Dynasty Owner, but was not projected to be the overall top scoring player in Dynasty Owner after four weeks of the season. He’s cemented in your Starting lineup unless something bad happens, or the 49ers are on bye. Other players who are rostered in 100% (or nearly 100%) of Dynasty Owner leagues with low ADPs who have scored lots of Dynasty Owner fantasy points, as projected and expected, won’t be mentioned either. Instead, I’m going to recommend you Start players outside the top players at their position, players drafted to be on your Bench or Practice Squad, or players who aren’t on a roster in every Dynasty Owner league.

After that, I’ll name one player per position who should be on your Bench or Practice Squad. For these Bench recommendations, it’s just the opposite. I’ll suggest players doing well so far and drafted early in Dynasty Owner startup drafts to be Starters, and also projected in the top 12 (QBs and TEs) or top 36 (RBs and WRs) in scoring this year. This section is where you might see some surprising players appear. However, the recommended Bench players shouldn’t be in your Starting lineup for the week based on matchups, past performance against a team or something else.

All stats cited are based on the Standard Dynasty Owner scoring system as outlined in the Dynasty Owner Constitution. Standard Dynasty Owner scoring gives you .1 points for every yard rushing or receiving, .1 point for every 2 yards passing, 1 point per reception, 6 points for a rushing, receiving or passing touchdown and 2 points for a successful 2-point conversion (rushing, receiving, or passing). Interceptions or fumbles lost cost you 3 points, while a fumble that is recovered by the player’s team is a loss of only 1 point. Bonus points are available for 100-199 yards rushing (2 points), 200 yards rushing or receiving (6 points), 300-399 yards passing (1 point) and 400 yards passing (4 points). There is also a 3 point bonus for clutch scoring, which is a score that results in a lead change in the final two minutes of the 4th quarter or overtime. Kickoff and punt return touchdowns are worth 6 points for the player and kickoff and punt returns are worth 1 point for every 40 yards.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the morning of October 5th. All 2023 contract information is currently what is listed on the Dynasty Owner platform (number of years and salaries) and has been taken from Spotrac (https://www.spotrac.com/).

Dynasty Owner Player of the Week

Before we get into Week 5, let’s look at Week 4 and announce the Dynasty Owner Player of the Week. We have a first-time Player of the Week for the second week in a row. This player also plays the same position as last week’s Player of the Week De’Von Achane ($1,359,362) who is apparently spelling his name differently this week after correcting everyone last week about how to pronounce his name. No problems with our Week 4 Dynasty Owner Player of the Week as everyone knows him and is probably shocked to learn this is his first Player of the Week award. Our Week 4 winner is none other than Christian McCaffrey.

You read correctly. This is the first Player of the Week award for CMC who is the highest paid RB in Dynasty Owner and was the RB1 and overall #2 player back in 2019, but never had a week with 4 TDs and over 50.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 46 career games in Dynasty Owner history until now. McCaffrey exceeded his projections and the wildest expectations of even his biggest fans with 50.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (106 rushing yards, 7 receptions, 71 receiving yards, 4 TDs) to secure his first Player of the Week award. Congratulations CMC on being the current NFL leading rusher and winning this award for the first time.

Week 4 Points: 50.7

2023 Salary: $16,015,875

Cost per Point: $315,895

Dynasty Owner Value Player of the Week

Because this is Dynasty Owner and we’re all looking for value from the players on our roster, we also have the Value Player of the Week. While CMC was winning his first ever Player of the Week award, the Value Player of the Week was racking up his second award of the 2023 season in just his fourth career NFL game. Once again, our Value Player of the Week is Puka Nacua.

If you thought Nacua was on his way back down to earth after “only” scoring 12.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (5 receptions for 72 receiving yards) or that he wasn’t going to score a TD because he had 30 receptions on 42 targets through three games without a tuddy, you were sorely mistaken. This week, Nacua set a career high in receiving yards with 163, scored his first career TD and caught 9 out of 10 targets, his best reception percentage so far. It added up to 34.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (9 receptions, 163 receiving yards, 1 TD) including the 3.0 point bonus because his 22-yard TD reception happened in overtime and was therefore a clutch scoring event. That reception was worth 12.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and put him over the top for this week’s Value Player of the Week award. Congratulations Puka on being the eighth player to earn multiple Value Player of the Week awards in the same season and the first player to do it in his rookie season. His $29,774 cost per point this week is the best of the 2023 season so far.

Week 4 Points: 34.3

2023 Salary: $1,021,244

Cost per Point: $29,774

These Guys Should be Starters This Week

Before we get into the weekly recommendations, I’ll always take a look at how my recommendations from the previous week fared (Good, Bad or Just Ok) and give a recap. The hope is that they meet my lofty expectations and exceed their weekly projections in order to have Dynasty Owner Starting lineup worthy performances in Week 4.

QB: Jameis Winston ($4,000,000) – -3.0 (Bad recommendation)

RB: Khalil Herbert ($902,677) – 24.2 (Good recommendation)

WR: Darius Slayton ($6,000,000) – 4.3 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Cole Turner ($999,720) – 0.0 (Bad recommendation)

Let’s start with the one Good recommendation who exceeded his projections. Khalil Herbert took advantage of his opportunity to shine against the Denver Broncos’ defense and produced 24.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (103 rushing yards, 4 receptions, 19 receiving yards, 1 TD). Other than Herbert, the rest of the recommendations were Bad and didn’t even come close to meeting their meager projections for the week.

Darius Slayton was largely a non-factor in the limited Giants offense on Monday night against Seattle. He was only targeted three times and caught two of those targets for 23 receiving yards (4.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). Slayton did the best out of the three Bad recommendations and from there, it’s a close call on which recommendation was worse. On one hand, you have Jameis Winston who didn’t start and only got in for one play in a week in which it seemed possible that he’d be the Saints’ starting QB. Instead, he threw one long pass late in the game that was intercepted so he had -3.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (1 INT). On the other hand, the Blutarsky (0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) ushered by Cole Turner was equally or more terrible as he played a mere six snaps in the Commanders’ loss to the Eagles with no targets. The return of Logan Thomas ($8,021,667) to the team’s lineup meant there was little room for Turner, as it was mostly third TE John Bates ($1,050,604) on the field in two tight end sets. Obviously, neither Winston nor Turner met my lofty expectations, and both also fell short of their meager projections for the week as well.

After four weeks, my Starting lineup recommendations are definitely not hitting expectations as I’ve only had five Good recommendations overall and just one per week for each of the past three weeks. There have been eight Bad recommendations with three Bad QB recommendations in a row. Let’s hope that I can do better in Week 5 and find four players who will greatly exceed their projected point totals for the week.

Joshua Dobbs (QB – ARI): Barring an injury in practice, I’m confident that this week’s recommended QB selection Joshua Dobbs ($2,000,000) will at least be under center for more plays than Jameis Winston was last week. Dobbs is ranked as QB16 in Dynasty Owner so far this season, but he does have three consecutive games with 20.0 or more Dynasty Owner fantasy points after starting off with -0.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 1.

The Cardinals have a matchup in Week 5 against the Bengals who are a middle of the road defensive team and only allowed 207.3 passing yards per game. Arizona has scored either 16 or 28 in all four of their games so far, so they have put up some points every week. Dobbs has been given the opportunity to throw a lot (123 pass attempts) and use his legs to scramble and run with the ball (24 rushing attempts).

Dobbs is averaging nearly 5.9 yards per carry (24 carries for 141 rushing yards), while the Bengals are allowing 5.1 yards per carry overall and just under 4.9 yards per carry to opposing QBs. Except for Lamar Jackson ($52,000,000), none of the other three QBs are particularly skilled running the ball and none of the three of the other QBs rank higher than QB18. Dobbs could run enough to give himself a decent floor of points and build on it from there with the passing. All in all, the signs are pointing to Dobbs exceeding his projections and being a top 12 weekly QB. It’s easier to get there than the first four weeks of the season with four teams out of bye this week.

Jaylen Warren (RB – PIT): I’m not ready to give up on Najee Harris ($3,261,862) after a few mediocre games this season, but I am ready to say that Jaylen Warren ($857,333) has earned his playing time and additional touches on offense with better performances than Harris so far this year. Harris is RB38 with 28.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (210 rushing yards, 4 receptions, 34 receiving yards), while Warren is RB27 with 38.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (84 rushing yards, 18 receptions, 127 receiving yards, 1 fumble). Warren is essentially splitting time with Harris now as both played 29 snaps (49%) in Week 4.

Warren’s touches have increased every week as well starting with eight in Week 1 and progressing up to 14 touches in Week 4. The number of touches both have been getting have been very similar in all but Week 3 when Harris had 19 touches (all rushing attempts) to 11 touches (8 rushing attempts and 3 receptions) for Warren. Warren has far more receptions (18 vs. 4 for Harris), so getting a full point for each reception is really benefitting Warren and part of the reason why he’s the pick over Harris here.

The fact that Warren was chosen over 100 picks after Harris in 2023 Dynasty Owner startup drafts (32.7 ADP for Harris vs. 151.8 ADP for Warren) and was an undrafted free agent compared to being a first round draft pick are two additional reasons for having Warren in this spot. In addition, Pittsburgh could run the ball a significant amount against the Baltimore Ravens with Kenny Pickett ($3,516,976) being questionable due to an injury suffered in Week 4 and his backup Mitchell Trubisky ($7,142,500) being generally a less than skilled QB.

Josh Downs (WR – IND): I struggled with choosing a WR for this spot and went with Josh Downs ($1,380,115) over a list of other contenders who have scored a similar number of Dynasty Owner fantasy points so far this season, including Rashee Rice ($1,623,802), Jahan Dotson ($3,762,090) and Tyler Boyd ($10,750,000). Downs has more targets than both Rice and Dotson and is tied with Boyd, who might get more targets this week with Tee Higgins ($2,171,696) questionable. However, with Boyd not guaranteed to get more targets because it’s Thursday and Higgins has three more days to get healthy enough to practice and play, I’m going to go with Downs and his anticipated volume.

Downs has 27 targets through four weeks, but was only targeted three times in Week 4 against the Rams. The Titans’ rush defense is so good that opposing QBs have to throw more and WRs have been targeted 97 times in four games against Tennessee this season with 71 receptions for 825 receiving yards and 4 TDs. Not all of those targets are going to Downs with Michael Pittman ($2,153,213) and Alec Pierce ($1,650,336) in the Colts’ lineup. Pittman is WR16 so he’s not eligible here and Pierce is WR88 with only 18.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on 14 targets. That’s barely over half as many as Downs, so I’ll pick Downs over Pierce as the Colts’ WR2 this week.

Being the Colts’ WR2 this week should be good enough for Downs to score the Dynasty Owner fantasy points needed to be a top 24 WR for the week. Especially with four teams on bye and at least half a dozen Starting lineup options not available to Dynasty Owners this week. Take a chance on Josh Downs as a replacement if you have one of those WRs from the Browns, Buccaneers, Chargers, or Seahawks usually in a Starting WR spot on your Dynasty Owner team.

Tyler Conklin (TE – NYJ): In contrast to last week in which I called for Dynasty Owners to Bench a top Jets WR (we’ll get to how that recommendation worked out very soon), this week I’m taking the opposite position and saying Tyler Conklin ($6,750,000) needs to get into your Starting lineup. He’s been trending upward since Week 1 against Buffalo and has been targeted at least five times in each of the past three games with performances of 10.0 and 9.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Weeks 2 and 4 respectively.

Conklin has finished as TE16 in both 2021 and 2022 and is currently TE17, so he’s basically playing like he has in the past. He wasn’t reliant on Aaron Rodgers ($37,500,000) for his value and actually may be more valuable for his Dynasty Owners with Zach Wilson ($8,787,670) at QB for the Jets. This isn’t really based on last year as Conklin and Wilson only connected for 57.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in nine games for an average of 6.4 points per game. That average is severely inflated by Conklin’s 2 TD performance against New England in Week 8 when he scored 25.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Otherwise, Conklin had eight games with less than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and no TDs with Wilson at QB.

Instead, it’s based on his performance this year and the poor performances by Denver’s defense against opposing TEs. Last week, they allowed Bears TE Cole Kmet to score 27.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (7 receptions, 85 receiving yards, 1 rushing yard, 2 TDs). In Week 2, they allowed the Commanders’ TE trio to score 21.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (7 receptions, 89 receiving yards, 1 TD). They were good against the Raiders’ TEs who have done almost nothing this season (combined 12.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) and in Week 3 against the Dolphins who basically had everybody, but TE Durham Smythe ($3,500,000), run roughshod over them.

With a bunch of the TEs in the same range on bye, Conklin is just outside of the top 12 TEs and likely paired with one (or more) of those similar TEs. If that’s the case, then take Conklin off your Dynasty Owner Bench and get him into your Starting lineup this week.

These Guys Should Be on the Bench (or Practice Squad) This Week

Now it’s the time to look at how each of my Bench recommendations from Week 4 worked out (Good, Bad or Just Ok).

QB: Lamar Jackson ($52,000,000) – 32.0 (Bad recommendation)

RB: Joe Mixon ($5,750,000) – 8.6 (Good recommendation)

WR: Garrett Wilson ($5,138,502) – 15.0 (Bad recommendation)

TE: Hunter Henry ($12,500,000) – 9.1 (Just Ok recommendation)

Let’s start with the recommendation that was easiest to rate. Lamar Jackson had 32.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (186 passing yards, 27 rushing yards, 4 TDs, 2 fumbles – 1 lost). Clearly Jackson was a starting QB last week, so the recommendation was Bad. The rest were close calls as the players got pretty close to their projections, even as I was down on them for the week.

There was one of each type of recommendation. Joe Mixon ended up outside of the top 24 RBs, but only by less than 1.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Still with an ADP of 61.2 and being drafted as a Dynasty Owner team’s RB2 on average, he should be getting double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points, so the recommendation to Bench Mixon was Good. Especially with 15 touches for the day. Hunter Henry is continuing his slide down the season-long and weekly TE rankings after starting off as TE1 in Week 1 and continuing as TE2 in Week 2. He’s down to overall TE6 after 9.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (4 receptions for 51 receiving yards) in Week 4. It was good enough to be TE18 and only 1.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points away from a starting lineup-worthy performance. That’s Just Ok.

Finally, it’s time to declare that while Garrett Wilson isn’t going to be worth his ADP of 9.1 in 2023 Dynasty Owner startup drafts, he’s also not someone who should be sitting on your bench either. He was a very low-end WR2 this week and is ranked as WR25 for the season. Wilson will likely score between 9.0 and 17.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game, as he has done every week so far in 2023 and be worth the WR2 or FLEX spot in your starting lineup. This past week, he got 15.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (9 receptions for 60 receiving yards) on 14 targets and did basically what he was projected to do. I had him doing worse, so that recommendation was Bad. I’m declaring that I’m not putting Garrett Wilson here again this year. Instead of Wilson, let’s find out who I am putting as my bench recommendations for Week 5.

Russell Wilson (QB – DEN): It’s a different Wilson! If before the start of the 2022 NFL season you told anyone that this pick would be controversial because Russell Wilson shouldn’t be a Dynasty Owner Starting QB, then you were ahead of your time. While Wilson is rostered in only 9.2% of Dynasty Owner leagues right now, he is technically QB6 for the 2023 season. To those Dynasty Owners with Russell on their roster, I applaud you for sticking with him, but urge you to get out from under that contract as soon as things go south for him. An Amnesty Provision is only $5 million Dynasty Dollars if you don’t have one already.

My expectation is that the decline starts this week with the Broncos hosting the New York Jets. The Jets defense is legit and held Patrick Mahomes to only 14.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (203 passing yards, 51 rushing yards, 1 TD, 2 INTs, 1 fumble) in Week 4. They also held Josh Allen ($43,005,667) to just 8.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in Week 1. Only Dak Prescott ($40,000,000) has thrown for over 250 yards against their defense and scored more than 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points.

While Wilson has been good so far this season, he hasn’t played a defense as good as the Jets and this will be the week that he shows himself to be no more than a Bench QB for your Dynasty Owner team. It’s difficult to put a player who takes up over 30% of your Dynasty Owner salary cap on the Bench, but that’s exactly what I’m saying to do. Actually, I’m telling you to drop him entirely and save over $48.5 million in salary, but having him on your Bench is the next best option if you want to keep him on your roster.

Kyren Williams (RB – LAR): Dynasty Owners with Kyren Williams ($992,601) should be grateful for what he’s done for them so far this season. He’s the RB4 for the Dynasty Owner season with 88.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points scored when he was projected to be the backup to Cam Akers ($1,543,259) at the start of the season. Akers has been traded to Minnesota and there’s really nobody pushing Williams for the starting job with the Rams right now.

Not bad for a player who you likely got with a draft pick in the 15th round or later based on his ADP of 188.3 in 2022 and 190.7 this year. Williams played in 10 games for the Rams last year, but only had 30.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points despite 44 touches (35 rushing attempts and 9 receptions).

The Rams run into the Eagles defense this week and are likely going to have to attack their depleted secondary, not run the ball 20-25 times, to have a chance to win. Williams has been great for his Dynasty Owners, but a closer look shows that volume has been his greatest ally this season. He has rushed the ball 64 times so far and is averaging a mere 3.8 yards per carry. Opposing RBs have also run the ball 64 times against the Eagles defense, but for just 185 yards, which is 2.9 yards per carry.

Williams is likely going to need a TD to be worth having in your Starting lineup and so far, he has six of them on the season so it’s definitely not outside the realm of possibility. However, I think it’s more likely that he doesn’t get as many carries as usual, is held below his yards per carry average for the season and doesn’t get a TD. That adds up to a player who should be on your Dynasty Owner Bench and not in your Starting lineup.

Courtland Sutton (WR – DEN): If I think Russell Wilson is going to have problems with the Jets defense, then doubling down on that and picking his leading receiver Courtland Sutton ($15,200,000) makes a lot of sense. Sutton is WR26 on the season but with three WRs ahead of him on bye, he sneaks into the top 24 WRs and is likely the WR2 or FLEX choice for many of his Dynasty Owners this week.

Even though Sutton has scored double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points in all four games so far this season, his projections have him falling short of that mark with 8.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. I’m going to agree with the projections and actually go a step further and predict that he’ll score fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points than that against Sauce Gardner and D.J. Reed, the Jets’ outside starting cornerbacks. Fewer than 8.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points is a bench WR, so that’s where his Dynasty Owners should be putting Courtland Sutton this week.

Some will argue that both Stefon Diggs ($24,000,000) and CeeDee Lamb ($3,502,503) were able to produce great games against the Jets with 26.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (Diggs) and 24.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (Lamb). My counterpoint is that Courtland Sutton isn’t Diggs or Lamb, but more of the caliber of the plethora of lesser WRs that populate the Patriots and Chiefs rosters and have been held in check by the Jets.

Cole Kmet (TE – CHI): Last year, Cole Kmet ($1,894,445) had back-to-back 2 TD/over 20.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy point performances, so I’m taking a risk by listing him here the week following his 27.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy point performance (7 receptions, 85 receiving yards, 1 rushing yard, 2 TDs). However, nobody has allowed fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points to TEs this season, with just 21.3 (13 receptions for 83 receiving yards) than the Commanders. The best game for a TE against them through four weeks is the 8.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy point performance (6 receptions for 21 receiving yards) by Arizona TE Zach Ertz ($10,550,000) in Week 1. They have played a couple of projected top 12 TEs in Dalton Kincaid ($3,356,756) and Dallas Goedert ($14,250,000) in addition to Ertz so while they haven’t faced the best TEs, it hasn’t been a collection of scrubs either or four bad QBs under center.

The projections for Kmet this week say he’ll get 7.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, and I have him coming up a little short of that on what is projected to be the best Thursday Night Football game of the season. That’s sarcasm. Nobody is expecting much from the Commanders and Bears game and it wouldn’t surprise me if Amazon gave Al Michaels the night off because of the terrible matchup for “announcer load management”. That way, he can rest up for October Prime Day when he has to pull a double shift in one of the company’s warehouses. Regardless of what happens with Al, Dynasty Owners should get Kmet on their Bench in advance of Thursday night.

Free Agent Auction Targets Update

Now it’s time to  recap the players recommended in Jay’s weekly Free Agent Auction targets article and see how much their Dynasty Owner roster percentage has increased since the start of Week 5. Jay gave us his usual five players this week and met expectations with the number of choices. Not sure yet about the quality of them. That will be determined soon.

There have been two Free Agent Auction runs already this week – Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern) and Thursday at 5 AM (Eastern), so some Dynasty Owners have had two chances to go pick up these guys in the Free Agent Auction. Hope you bid enough if you wanted to get them!

PlayerPositionTeamSalaryWeek 4 Roster %Current Roster %Change
Mitchell TrubiskyQBPIT$7,142,50011.11%19.54%8.43%
Jaleel McLaughlinRBDEN$903,33374.33%92.34%18.01%
Nick Westbrook-IkhineWRTEN$1,260,00063.60%69.73%6.13%
Deven ThompkinsWRTB$787,5000.38%4.98%4.60%
Ronnie RiversRBLAR$750,00014.56%40.23%25.67%

Similar to last week, only two of the players featured had a significant number of Dynasty Owners grabbing them off the Free Agent Auction. Not surprisingly, it was both of the RBs listed, as the Free Agent Auction well is running dry of RBs in general so anybody with a pulse and chance to have a couple of carries in a given week is heavily rostered at this point. Even guys who aren’t playing much (if at all) who are inexpensive are still rostered in too many leagues (over 80%) to get mentioned by Jay.

With a Week 5 bye looming, the low roster percentage increase for Deven Thompkins isn’t surprising. If Mike Evans ($16,500,000) has more than the “tweaked hamstring” being reported, Thompkins’ roster percentage should jump up the day after that news breaks. Thompkins is still available in just over 95% of Dynasty Owner leagues right now, so nearly everyone still has a chance to go get him and plenty of other players in the Free Agent Auction. Happy bidding and hope everyone got who they wanted, even guys not on Jay’s list, in the Free Agent Auction.

Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring Leaderboard

Are you missing the Dynasty Owner Match-Up of the Week and Chase for the Ring standings that used to appear here? Then head over and follow me on Twitter/X (@SteveVT33) to see what happened in Week 4 when a pair of 0-3 teams (Bull Dawgs and Coach Prime) had a match-up that would ensure at least one of them got a victory. Both teams ended up not meeting their weekly projections, but one team still got the win.

The updated Chase for the Ring Leaderboard will also be posted on Twitter/X as well even though anyone can access it at https://app.dynastyowner.com/chase-for-the-ring. If you recall the top two teams from last week were separated by only 0.1 points. However, one team exceeded their expectations and weekly projections while the other one fell far short of theirs. Both are still on the live leaderboard, and everyone can check out where both teams currently stand. Since the Chase for the Ring leaderboard is now live, your team name could pop up in the top 100 at any time.

Slightly longer versions of the Match-up of the Week and the Chase for the Ring Leaderboard will also appear on the Dynasty Owner thread on Reddit, as well as Facebook and Instagram on occasion. Plus, the Chase for the Ring leaderboard Top 10 will definitely appear in a weekly newsletter sent out on Fridays by Dynasty Owner.

Conclusion

How is your Dynasty Owner team, or Dynasty Owner teams (if you have more than one), doing so far this season? Exceeding, meeting, or falling short of projections and your expectations? If you had a team with Chase for the Ring aspirations, then hopefully they are exceeding those expectations as there can only be one winner of the Ring and your team needs to exceed those projections and expectations all season-long in order to have a chance to win.

We have the first set of NFL bye weeks coming up in Week 5 with Cleveland, the Los Angeles Chargers, Seattle and Tampa Bay all taking a rest. If you have any of the top players on those teams, don’t forget to get them out of your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup and off the Bench too if you have players on your Practice Squad who can fill in and at least provide a minimal amount of Dynasty Owner fantasy points. There are three consecutive weeks with teams on bye until everyone returns to play in Week 8.

Why are there no teams on bye in Week 8? That’s a great question that I have no idea on the answer. Feel free to reach out to me or Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X, or post on Facebook, Instagram or Reddit and let your fellow Dynasty Owners know the answer. You can also comment in all of those places when this article is published and let everyone know if you like, or dislike, my weekly recommendations, think you can do better and have players that you think will exceed or fall short of expectations this week. You can even agree, like the article and add your comments on any of those social media platforms. We appreciate the feedback from our fellow Dynasty Owners and I’m just happy that you took time to read my content and maybe even comment on it.

The Week 5 Free Agent Auction targets article was published on Tuesday and Jay Pounds will be back every Tuesday during the 2023 season with a list of at least five widely available players in Dynasty Owner to help everyone with their Free Agent Auction bids for the first auction run of the week on Wednesday at 5 AM (Eastern). We also have the weekly Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. We went live on Thursday afternoon at 4:00 PM (Eastern) last week with a special guest and will be back at the same time this week and likely for the rest of the 2023 season. Hopefully you can watch live or watched live if you are reading this after it aired. If you missed this week’s episode or want to see previous ones, then go watch on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter/X: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner