Category: Uncategorized

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

The final NFL pre-season game for 2023 finished up on Sunday night. In case you weren’t paying attention, the Houston Texans defeated the New Orleans Saints by a score of 17-13 to cap the 24-day NFL pre-season. It started in Canton with the Hall of Fame Game between the Cleveland Browns and the New York Jets (the Browns won that game 21-16) and ended in New Orleans. The next game won’t be until Thursday, September 7th when the defending Super Bowl Champion Kansas City Chiefs host the Detroit Lions.

NFL teams have already started to cut their rosters down to 53 players and over the next week, there will be a lot of movement with trades, players getting released then added to the practice squad once they clear waivers, and players getting released by one team and added to another team’s active roster or practice squad. The Arizona Cardinals made three trades before their final pre-season game on Saturday and most everyone likely heard that former overall #3 draft pick Trey Lance ($8,526,319) was dealt from the 49ers to the Cowboys on Friday for a fourth round draft pick in 2024. All of those trades happened even before those teams’ final pre-season game and more trades went down since the pre-season finished up. I suspect that there will be even more by the time this article is published.

There will be frequent changes to salaries, teams and players becoming free agents over the next several days until the start of the season, so Dynasty Owners need to stay on top of their teams and their salary cap. However, while everyone is processing those transactions, we should take a step back and think about what just happened during the past month of training camps and pre-season games. This is not the time or the place to summarize all 49 pre-season games and 32 training camps. Instead, we need to hit the highlights and summarize what happened while keeping our Dynasty Owner eyes on the business of the NFL, including player movement, salaries and contracts

Therefore, let me present my NFL Training Camp and Pre-Season Heroes and Zeros. You’ll get to read about one Hero player at each position (even kickers!) who did a great job and gathered a lot of buzz during practices and pre-season games to elevate himself on his team’s depth chart and most importantly, increase his Dynasty Owner roster percentage and improve his startup draft Average Draft Position (ADP). You’ll also get to find out which players were Zeros, didn’t do so well, hurt their chances to play much (or at all) during the 2023 season and likely saw their Dynasty Owner roster percentage decline.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the morning of August 29th. 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/). Contracts and salaries are always subject to change and can potentially be increased. Check the Dynasty Owner Constitution for the ins and outs of when and how a contract change takes place.

Believe It or Not, These Players Were the Greatest NFL Heroes this August

Believe it or not, I’m walking on air. I never thought I could be so free.

That’s the beginning of the Theme from the Greatest American Hero (Believe It or Not), which is perhaps one of the best TV theme songs written by Mike Post with lyrics by Stephen Geyer, and sung by Joey Scarbury. Love the song and remember the TV show as well as the rendition on George Constanza’s answering machine in Seinfeld.

Every year, we have a Hero emerge before the season starts who was a late round NFL Draft pick, undrafted rookie free agent (UDFA) or veteran who came into training camp on a minimum salary contract just looking for a job and ended up as a Week 1 starter. Last year, the biggest Hero was probably 2022 fourth round draft pick, Ravens TE Isaiah Likely ($1,041,085) ended up with an ADP of 222.0 in Dynasty Owner startup drafts. Likely only played in two pre-season games and sat out the entire third game because of his solid training camp and pre-season game performance (12 receptions, 144 receiving yards, 1 TD). When he was drafted last year, it was expected that he’d fight it out for the third TE spot on the Ravens roster with Josh Oliver ($7,000,000) and fellow fourth round draft pick Charlie Kolar ($1,091,221). Likely had a solid minicamp and a strong start to training camp then caught 4 passes for 44 receiving yards in the first Ravens’ pre-season game then easily led the team in receiving (8 receptions for 100 receiving yards plus a TD) in the second pre-season game. Likely ended up the 2022 Dynasty Owner season as TE26 with 91.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 16 games played (5.71 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game) and just as many games with a Blutarsky (0.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) as double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point games (3 each).

Let’s find out who were the Isaiah Likely’s of the 2023 NFL training camp and pre-season:

Dorian Thompson-Robinson (QB – CLE) – 4 years/$1,045,568

You know that you’ve had a great training camp and pre-season when people start referring to you by your initials (DTR) and your NFL team trades away your primary competition. The Browns traded Joshua Dobbs ($2,000,000) to the Arizona Cardinals, which seemingly paves the way for Thompson-Robinson to be the backup to Deshaun Watson ($46,000,000). This is because Kellen Mond ($1,305,854) had been released by the Browns then pulled off the waiver wire when the team executed the Dobbs trade.

Thompson-Robinson didn’t lead the NFL in passing yards, completion percentage or QB passer rating during the pre-season, but he did complete 63.8% of his passes (37 out of 58) for 440 passing yards and 2 TDs plus 69 rushing yards in four pre-season games. He led the Browns on a pair of second half TD drives in the Hall of Fame game and didn’t stop after that performance.

For Dynasty Owners, the window of opportunity to get Thompson-Robinson off the Free Agent Auction has closed pretty rapidly. He had a mid-third round rookie draft ADP (30.5) but was only rostered in 29.08% of Dynasty Owner leagues prior to the Hall of Fame Game. Now, it’s 80.54% and likely to rise even further in the upcoming days after some backup QBs are cut from NFL rosters.

He likely won’t play much (if at all) in 2023 unless there is an injury to Watson, but he played well enough in the pre-season to make Dynasty Owner hustle to the Free Agent Auction to bid on him in case he gets a chance to play.

Jaleel McLaughlin (RB – DEN) – 3 years/$903,333

Unlike Dorian Thompson-Robinson, this is a Hero who you can likely still add to your Dynasty Owner roster as he is only rostered in 32.68% of Dynasty Owner leagues. That roster percentage is good for an UDFA who didn’t sign with the Broncos until two weeks after the NFL Draft was completed, and was likely not taken in your Dynasty Owner rookie draft.

Now, he’s considered either the number 3 or number 4 RB on the Broncos. Definitely behind Javonte Williams ($2,216,438) and Samaje Perine ($3,750,000) and in competition with Tyler Badie ($750,000) and Tony Jones ($940,000). McLaughlin is rostered in a higher percentage of Dynasty Owner leagues than both of those other RBs, while having a higher salary than Badie and only counting $36,667 less against the salary cap than Jones who is rostered in just 10.12% of Dynasty Owner leagues.

McLaughlin led the Broncos in rushing this pre-season with 113 rushing yards on 21 carries (5.4 yards per carry) and 3 rushing TDs, while adding in 7 receptions for 33 receiving yards and a receiving TD. That’s four pre-season TDs for a Broncos team that only had 29 TDs last year and averaged a league low 16.9 points per game. The Broncos need players who can score TDs and McLaughlin has shown that he can do that as a professional so far in the pre-season.

Despite being undrafted, McLaughlin finished his college career as college football’s all-time leading rusher (8,166 rushing yards) and 79 TDs. Admittedly, he played for Notre Dame College in South Euclid, Ohio (not the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana) and Youngstown State, but it’s not easy to be the all-time leader at anything so it’s clear that he’s pretty talented.

McLaughlin is not likely to be James Robinson ($1,010,000) circa 2020 when the UDFA was the Week 1 starter for Jacksonville and finished as RB7 in Dynasty Owner with 258.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. However, he could be a solid, very cheap practice squad stash for your current Dynasty Owner team or late round draft pick flyer if you’re tight against the salary cap at the end of your startup draft.

Tank Dell (WR – HOU) – 4 years/$1,244,382

His Week 1 highlight reel TD reception against New England vaulted the third round NFL draft pick into the consciousness of some fantasy football players but Dynasty Owners already knew about Tank. They had taken him in the middle of the third round on average (rookie draft ADP of 31.4) during rookie drafts well before training camp and pre-season games started. However, his “catch of the year” nominee reception came in the second NFL pre-season game of the year on a Thursday night, so it garnered a lot of attention. As a result, Dell’s stock skyrocketed and he has a Dynasty Owner startup ADP of 175.5, so he’s going in the middle of the 15th round on average.

As a way to contrast these ADPs, let’s look at another rookie WR with a similar NFL and Dynasty Owner rookie draft profile, but who didn’t make a highlight reel play in Week 1 of the pre-season and see how they compare.

Player	Team	NFL Draft Position	Dynasty Owner Rookie Draft ADP	Dynasty Owner Startup Draft ADP
Tank Dell	HOU	69th pick	31.4	175.5
Cedric Tillman	CLE	74th pick	30.5	203.0

After being drafted within five picks of one another in the NFL Draft and one pick in Dynasty Owner rookie drafts, Dell is being taken a full two rounds earlier (27.5 spots) than Cedric Tillman ($1,403,628) in Dynasty Owner startup drafts. I’m not saying it’s entirely because of one pre-season catch as Dell is projected for more Dynasty Owner fantasy points this season than Tillman (119.5 for Dell vs. 85.8 for Tillman) even though Tillman might be the WR2 for a better offensive team who doesn’t have a rookie QB. I am saying that Dell went from being drafted in roughly the same spot as Tillman in rookie drafts to in front of him in probably most startup drafts and both things have likely caused that movement.

Ironically, Tillman has outplayed Dell statistically in the pre-season with 7 receptions for 115 receiving yards. Dell had 5 receptions for 65 receiving yards and that one amazing receiving TD, but also didn’t play in the second pre-season game and was only targeted once in the Texans’ third pre-season game. Time will tell if Tillman or Dell is the better NFL receiver and fantasy player, but Dell was definitely the Training Camp and Pre-Season Hero.

Cole Turner (TE – WAS) – 4 years/$999,720

To be honest, I’m not really sure that there have been any true Heroes at the TE position this year so far. The top TE during the pre-season was Lucas Krull ($860,000) from New Orleans who had 10 receptions for 136 receiving yards in two pre-season games, including 7 receptions for 106 receiving yards on Sunday night. However, he is rostered in zero Dynasty Owner leagues and is likely to be released as the Saints already have veterans Juwan Johnson ($6,000,000), Foster Moreau ($4,078,000) and Jimmy Graham ($1,317,500) at the position.

Another player who made his mark in the third pre-season game was everybody’s favorite inexpensive TE from 2022 with a salary that computer programmers love, Albert Okwuegbunam ($1,011,011) of the Denver Broncos. Albert O had a slightly better final pre-season game than Krull with 7 receptions for 109 receiving yards and a TD. However, his stock has dropped dramatically after last season when he finished as TE68 with just 25.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points after being drafted in the first ten rounds of Dynasty Owner startup drafts (ADP 103.0). Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. That’s what Dynasty Owners should be telling themselves about Albert.

Instead, I’m going with Cole Turner who looks to be the Commanders starting TE right now as the TE1 on the depth chart, Logan Thomas ($8,021,667) hasn’t practiced with the team since August 3rd due to a calf strain, has missed 13 games over the past two seasons and could be on the trade block. I’m doubling up as I had Turner as my TE flyer in my Flyers, Dart Throws and Lottery Picks article a couple of weeks ago, but the buzz hasn’t died down yet and no other TE has stepped up to replace him on the Commanders’ roster or as a Training Camp and Pre-Season Hero. He’s still rostered in only 52.53% of Dynasty Owner leagues, which s up from 39.84% at the start of August. Turner also had 10 receptions for 75 receiving yards in the pre-season, which helps his case.

Joey Slye (K – WAS) – 1 year/$1,200,000

Since he’s a kicker and on the Commanders, I’ll be short about it. However, when you stop one of the most ridiculous records in all of sports (aka the Baltimore Ravens’ 24-game pre-season winning streak that had stretched back to the 2015 season) with a 49-yard game winning field goal that gets its own mention on Twitter/X and a rousing Kick Is Good call by Joe Buck on Monday Night Football, you get to be called a Pre-Season Hero and are worth mentioning.

Slye went from being rostered in 62.5% of Dynasty Owner leagues to 67.97% the day after that kick and it might be because Dynasty Owners realized that he was still around after finishing the 2022 season as the #26 ranked kicker in Dynasty Owner and his salary is just $1.2 million for the 2023 season.

The Commanders released Michael Badgley ($1,080,000) just two days before Slye’s kick and haven’t signed anybody since so it’s clear that Slye has won the job. He’s one of the few inexpensive kickers still available in more than a single Dynasty Owner league or two as his current Dynasty Owner roster percentage is 83.66%. If you need a third kicker for those bye weeks and the inevitable injury or poor performance that causes a kicker to be released, then go get Slye now before it’s too late and he’s 100% rostered.

The John Blutarskys of NFL Training Camp and Pre-Season

Zero. Point. Zero. That’s a Blutarsky for everyone who has read my weekly preview and recap articles here on Dynasty Owner. In case you don’t know, it’s called that because it’s the grade point average (GPA) for John “Bluto” Blutarsky in the movie classic Animal House.

No, these players didn’t have zero Dynasty Owner fantasy points during the pre-season. In fact, for several of them, it was just the opposite as they played quite a bit during the pre-season. It’s just that their performances were “not good”, so they ended up in this section. As of now, none of these players will start the 2023 regular season on the same team that they started training camp on.

Let’s hope that these Zeros can do better than Ronald Jones ($1,232,500) last season did for Kansas City after his poor 2022 training camp and pre-season performance. Jones started training camp with the potential to challenge Clyde Edwards-Helaire ($2,705,393) for the Chiefs’ starting RB position, but ended up not playing until Week 12 despite not being injured and scoring only 5.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points for the entire season.

Trey Lance (QB – DAL) – 2 years/$8,526,319

This was the most obvious choice for this entire article. I’m not going to rehash what’s happened to Lance so far this off-season, training camp and pre-season but when you go from being the overall #3 pick in the 2021 NFL Draft to being traded for a fourth round pick a little more than two years later, it’s safe to say that things have gone poorly.

The 49ers traded three first round picks to move up to the #3 spot so they could draft Lance. Dynasty Owners were not quite as enthusiastic as John Lynch and Kyle Shanahan, but Lance still had a Dynasty Owner rookie draft ADP of 7.3 in 2021, making him the third QB off the board on average behind only Trevor Lawrence ($9,198,372) and Justin Fields ($4,717,989). He was never taken with the first pick in a Dynasty Owner rookie draft, but was drafted in the first round in all but one rookie draft and taken twice with the 1.02 pick. His 2021 startup draft ADP was 56.6, so he was generally a mid-to-late fourth round pick. Dynasty Owners were more bullish on Lance in 2022 as his ADP was 43.7 before falling to 126.9 so far this season. That still means he has been a 10th or 11th round pick on average in Dynasty Owner startup drafts after seemingly being behind both Brock Purdy ($934,252) and Sam Darnold ($4,500,000) on the 49ers QB depth chart.

The crazy part about Lance now to me is that he is still rostered in 95.72% of Dynasty Owner leagues. Admittedly, he was only traded on Friday afternoon, but it’s been a couple of days for everyone to react and realize that he’s going to be Dak Prescott’s ($40,000,000) backup in Dallas and not play barring an injury. In contrast, the player taken right ahead of him in the 2021 NFL Draft who is also now the clear backup to a well-paid veteran QB, Zach Wilson ($8,787,670) is only rostered in 38.91% of Dynasty Owner leagues. For there to be such a difference in the roster percentage of these two colossal flops at QB is very surprising. I can’t imagine that all of the Dynasty Owners with Lance still on their roster think he has a chance to play and produce meaningful results over the next two seasons or that they don’t need just over $8.5 million in salary cap room. Yes, you’re getting nothing for him in a trade now and the drop fee is very high ($4,263,160 Dynasty Dollars). Because he was traded, his contract isn’t changing unless it gets totally restructured so you’re stuck paying a backup QB on a new team over $8.5 million. Time to bite the bullet and drop Lance.

James Robinson (RB – Free Agent) – $1,010,000

You know you’ve had a bad training camp and pre-season when you’ve been released by two different teams. Robinson signed a two-year/$4 million contract with New England back in March when NFL free agency opened. He was waived in June, less than three months later, after struggling to stay healthy for practices. About a month later, he signed a one-year veteran minimum salary contract with the New York Giants, but was released prior to the 53-man roster cutdown deadline. In the pre-season, he rushed for 74 yards on 20 carries for a fairly pedestrian 3.7 yards per carry.

Robinson is still only 25 years of age, but seems to still be suffering from the torn Achilles injury he suffered with Jacksonville back in December of 2021. Robinson is the patron saint of UDFAs and the reason everyone thinks the guy they pluck off the waiver wire or draft in the 24th or 25th round of their Dynasty Owner startup draft will lead them to win the Chase for the Ring. Our 2020 winner Viktor Kilgore drafted Robinson late in his startup draft and his 258.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and RB7 finish were a very important part of his Ring winning season.

Those days appear to be long gone and while Robinson is still rostered in over three-quarters (75.88%) of Dynasty Owner leagues currently, that percentage is likely to fall over the next couple of days unless he signs with a new team who needs him more than the Patriots and Giants.

Bryan Edwards (WR – Free Agent) – $1,010,000

Long gone are the days when Dynasty Owners were drafting Edwards in the middle rounds of Dynasty Owner startup drafts. It happened during his rookie year in 2020 when his ADP was 138.6 and continued into 2021 when he slipped slightly but still had an ADP of 162.9. Edwards was a third round pick by the Raiders in the 2020 NFL Draft and some analysts were calling him a “mid-round steal” in the NFL Draft before he was even taken and compared him to Michael Thomas ($10,000,000). That was a nice comparison as Thomas had just finished the 2019 Dynasty Owner season as the WR1 with 373.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points.

Sadly, for everyone in Dynasty Owner who bought into the hype, Edwards finished the 2020 season as WR135 (not a mistake) with just 36.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 12 games played. He followed that up with his best season in 2021, but was still only WR67 and had 108.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 16 games played. He finished his two-year Raiders career with an average of 5.16 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game in 28 games played and only six double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point games.

Edwards was traded to the Falcons in May of 2022 along with a 2023 seventh round draft pick for a 2023 fifth round pick and immediately declared as one of the team’s top three WRs. However, he was injured throughout much of training camp, only played in seven games and scored a measly 4.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (3 receptions for 15 receiving yards) as a Falcon. He was released in late November and signed with Kansas City, but never played for the Super Bowl Champions.

He re-emerged with New Orleans with the hopes of reuniting with his Raiders QB Derek Carr ($37,500,000) and even lead the team in snaps in their first pre-season game. However, he didn’t perform well and ended his Saints’ tenure by catching just three of nine targets for 37 yards before getting waived by the team. The final blow to his chances of making the Saints’ roster may have come in their second pre-season game against the Chargers when according to Rotowire he “committed two offensive pass interference penalties on one offensive series, thus nullifying two would-be touchdown passes from rookie quarterback Jake Haener”. Haener ($1,136,204) likely wasn’t too happy about that.

Edwards has been on more NFL rosters (4) than the number of years he has been in the league (3), which is not a great thing for a third round NFL Draft pick. His Dynasty Owner roster percentage has plummeted to just 12.84% now and should drop further unless he joins another team in need of a WR very soon.

O.J. Howard (TE – Free Agent) – $1,232,500

Same as with the TE Hero, it was difficult to pinpoint a Training Camp and Pre-Season TE Zero. There have been several top TEs with minor training camp injuries who have missed practices and pre-season games, such as Mark Andrews ($14,000,000), T.J. Hockenson ($9,392,000) and Mike Gesicki ($4,500,000) but all of them appear likely to be back in time for Week 1. Zach Ertz ($10,550,000) started training camp on the Physically Unable to Perform (PUP) list, but was able to come off it and practice, but not play in any pre-season games. While missing valuable practice time might be bad for some TEs, none of these guys should let an injury or some missed practices completely hinder their upcoming season.

Therefore, I had to reach way back and pick a player who was released barely into training camp and has yet to re-emerge with another team in former first round NFL Draft pick O.J. Howard. The Raiders signed him back at the start of free agency, but then signed Austin Hooper ($2,750,000) a couple of days later and drafted Michael Mayer ($2,328,412) with their second round NFL Draft selection. Veterans reported to Raiders training camp on July 25th and less than a week later, Howard was released. That’s not a good training camp and Howard has yet to sign with another team.

This is probably a complete cop-out, but because he didn’t even get to play a pre-season game for his new team. Howard is somehow still rostered in 17.12% of Dynasty Owner leagues, which seems like a lot for a player who hasn’t scored more than 40.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in a season since 2019.

Cade York (K – CLE) – 3 years/$1,097,410

It says Cleveland, but is probably Free Agent by the time this article is published as after an awful pre-season. The Browns traded for kicker Dustin Hopkins ($3,000,000) from the Chargers and are widely expected to release York. York was a fourth round NFL Draft pick just last year, but a series of high-profile misses in the pre-season including a 49-yard attempt during the Hall of Fame Game, two attempts to kick a game-winning field goal during their second pre-season game versus Philadelphia and a deflected 43-yard kick that would have put the Browns ahead in their final pre-season game against the Chiefs led to this spot. All total, he missed four out of eight FG attempts during the pre-season, all from between 40 and 49 yards. This doesn’t include the 47-yard miss against the Eagles that was called back due to a penalty.

It doesn’t help that three of these kicks were high-profile, late game FG attempts and that York missed eight FGs during the 2022 season and finished as the #24 ranked kicker in Dynasty Owner. Everyone with York on their Dynasty Owner roster hoped that he would be as good as Bengals kicker Evan McPherson ($955,928) was during his rookie season in 2021 when he finished as the #4 ranked kicker in Dynasty Owner.

Even after his poor 2022 season, Dynasty Owners had given York a boost in startup draft ADP from 249.3 in 2022 up to 176.9 this season. Those Dynasty Owners will need to reach into the Free Agent Auction and find a replacement for York unless they have three kickers and can afford to hold on until he gets another opportunity.

York may have had the worst pre-season of anybody in the NFL based on the number of memes I’ve seen on Twitter. The Airplane! one is my personal favorite. And it got so bad during the third pre-season game that a friend of mine who is a Browns fan and from the Cleveland area (but not involved with Dynasty Owner) created a Twitter/X account entitled Have The Browns Cut Cade York Yet. Only 8 followers, including me, and it may end now that York has been released, but its existence is proof that York had the worst NFL pre-season this year.

Conclusion

There were plenty of players who performed well during training camp and pre-season games this year and not all of them could be covered here. Frankly, some of them got their chance in the third pre-season game and aren’t likely to make a NFL roster out of training camp and are just hoping for a chance to latch on to a team’s practice squad. That’s true for both the heroes and the zeros.

There were plenty of other players who could have gotten a nomination as a Hero or a Zero. If you think there was someone more deserving of being named as a Training Camp or Pre-Season Hero or Zero than the players I listed, then speak up and let me and the entire Dynasty Owner community know. You can post about them in the comments section accompanying this article on either Facebook or Instagram or tweet/post on Twitter/X. Make sure that you tag both me (@SteveVT33) and Dynasty Owner (@Dynasty_Owner) if you use Twitter/X.

Now that the pre-season is over, it’s time to start drafting your next Dynasty Owner team. You can do it by going to your D.O. Store, click on New Team for 2023, and find a time when you can draft in the future. You can also Create A League for a specific day and time, then invite friends who you want to play with or just make it a public league. If any of those friends are new to Dynasty Owner, give them your affiliate code and get a $49 referral fee. Don’t forget to give everyone the most recent promo code (LETSGO) for $20 off a new team and use the code yourself as well.

While you’re waiting for your next startup draft, you need to listen to the Dynasty Owner podcast with me and Jay Pounds from last week. We were joined by our past two Chase for the Ring Champions – 2021 winner SKOL Vikings, aka Jeff Rachlin and 2022 winner Dynasty|Trade|School (D|T|S), aka Rudolph Valentine to talk all about startup Dynasty Owner drafting to help both new and existing Dynasty Owners with how to draft and put together a winning Dynasty Owner roster.

Dynasty Owner also has plenty of other content to help you out. Jay Pounds has his Free Agent Watch article about 10 players still available (and most widely available) in the Free Agent Auction. He’ll be back with another look at free agents before  Week 1 of the Dynasty Owner season and you won’t want to miss reading that article.

Finally, don’t forget about the weekly Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. Tim missed last week’s episode, but I was fortunate to have 2021 Chase for the Ring Champion Jeff Rachlin join me for some training camp and free agent discussion. If you missed it, then go watch it on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel. Finally, don’t forget to follow Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X.

Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners we are so close to having real NFL football back in our lives and I cannot wait! Come Sunday, September 10th, I will be glued to my couch and TV screen all day. Thank God for delivery drivers, am I right? Pizza, adult beverages and football are in the very near future folks, but before we get to enjoy all of that it is time to make sure your Dynasty Owner rosters are in order before kickoff of Thursday Night Football on September 7th.

In today’s article, I will take a look at some of the best remaining free agents who happen to be affordable and less than 76% rostered, though many of these players are well under the 76% threshold and are widely available. I am not expecting many of these players to be Day 1 starters on your Dynasty Owner team, but they can help out on your Bench and will make for great added depth.

Marvin Jones (WR – DET) – 1 year/$3,000,000 – 63.81% Rostered and Josh Reynolds (WR – DET) – 1 year/$3,000,000 – 31.13% Rostered

I had to lump both of these guys into one for now as I am unsure which will demand the greater target share until Jameson Williams ($4,365,448) gets back from his six game suspension. In all honesty, both will likely put-up respectable numbers, but I am expecting one to be clearly ahead of the other when footballs start to fly. It’s hard to picture Marvin Jones in a Lions uniform and not being the number 2 guy, but Josh Reynolds has a lot of experience with quarterback Jared Goff ($33,500,000) going back to their days with the Rams together. If I had to choose, I would put my money on Reynolds but it’s a close call. Who would you go with? Let me know on X (formerly known as Twitter).

Bid – $2,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Robert Tonyan (TE – CHI) – 1 year/$2,650,000 – 60.7% Rostered

I must admit this is not a player I currently love, but I am also not the biggest believer in Cole Kmet ($1,894,445) either. I am expecting Kmet to get more opportunities early due to the investment the team has in him, but would not be surprised if Tonyan ends up with more targets when all is said and done. Tonyan was not great in 2022 by any means finishing with 53 catches for 470 yards and 2 touchdowns (112.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), but he is an experienced veteran who has spent time with a Hall of Fame quarterback Aaron Rodgers ($37,500,000) and someone who young quarterback Justin Fields ($4,717,989) can lean on in tough times. The Bears also play in what is known as the Windy City, so expect to see a lot of two tight end sets with Kmet and Tonyan on the field at the same time in Chicago.

Bid – $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Darius Slayton (WR – NYG) – 2 years/$6,000,000 – 44.75% Rostered

I still can’t believe the disrespect Darius Slayton gets from the fantasy community as a whole. It’s not just in Dynasty Owner where you can blame the salary as I see this man on the free agent list much more often than not on many different platforms, yet he has done nothing but produce most of the time he has been on an NFL field. The only thing that seemed to slow Slayton down was Joe Judge and the amazing coaching decisions he made while head coach of the Giants. Throughout his career (aside from the second year of the Judge regime in 2021), Slayton has been a lock to hit the 700-yard mark. I am expecting that to increase in his second year in Brian Daboll’s system and believe we will see Slayton finally hit the 1-000 yard mark this year. If Slayton can increase his red zone production in 2023, it’s not crazy to think he can finish inside of the top 30 wide receivers.

Bid – $2,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Kene Nwangwu (RB – MIN) – 2 years/$1,058,200 – 64.98% Rostered

The NFL is a brutal place for running backs. Kene Nwangwu’s teammate Alexander Mattison ($3,500,000) is about to be put to the test in 2023 and because of that I want the guy directly behind him. We have never seen Nwangwu get much work outside of as a return man, but there is no doubt that he is electric with the ball in his hands and at worst will be fun to watch from the running back position. If Mattison happens to struggle, gets hurt, or just simply can’t handle being a workhorse back for an entire season, Nwangwu will end up seeing at least 8-12 touches a game in a high-powered offense. At worst, I am grabbing Nwangwu as a handcuff to Mattison but there is a real chance he will work his way into a role after the first couple of games. Nwangwu has a very low salary making him a low risk pick up with a ton of upside for at least 2023.

Bid – $2,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Ben Skowronek (WR – LAR) – 2 years/$891,131 – 50.58% Rostered

I know I know; Ben Skowronek doesn’t move the needle for any of us, but he is going to be on the field a ton in an offense that has Matthew Stafford ($40,000,000) at the quarterback position and Sean McVay as a head coach. If Skowronek’s teammate Van Jefferson ($1,402,784) fails to take a step forward, Skowronek is a lock for the number 2 role behind Cooper Kupp ($26,700,000) and may be the number 2 guy regardless. Should Kupp happen to miss time to an injury, I believe Skowronek would be a lock to play on the Bench for most Dynasty Owners at the minimum. My 2023 prediction for Skowronek is in the area of 50 catches for 600 yards and 2 touchdowns and when you pair that with a salary under $1,000,000 and multiple paths to a bigger role, Ben Skowronek should be rostered in more than 50% of Dynasty Owner leagues.

Bid – $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Jimmy Garoppolo (QB – LAV) – 3 years/$24,250,000 – 75.49% Rostered

I know Jimmy Garoppolo is an expensive option at quarterback, but he is the only one left under $30,000,000 who is a lock to start for his team in Week 1. In all honesty if I had to pick up Garoppolo, I would find a way to accumulate $9,250,000 more in cap space and pickup Jared Goff (if available as he is 84.44% rostered), but that isn’t what we are here for. Garoppolo has never been an intriguing fantasy option, but he is consistent and should be the same in 2023 despite switching teams. The biggest risk when picking up Garoppolo is his injury history, but that’s a risk some may have to take if they need a Bench quarterback for the season. If you are going to grab Jimmy G, I would highly recommend picking up, or trading for rookie Aidan O’Connell ($1,087,345) as well. If you don’t pick up/trade for O’Connell and Garoppolo happens to get injured be prepared to pony up at least $7,000,000 Dynasty Dollars in a Free Agent Auction bid or a second round rookie draft pick to acquire O’Connell.

Bid – $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Deep Fliers

Tyler Badie (RB – DEN) – 1 year/$750,000 – 24.12% Rostered

Another year, another Tyler Badie pickup recommendation in the off-season. In all reality, it is a long shot that Badie sees significant playing time, but Broncos lead back Javonte Williams ($2,216,438) is coming off of a significant injury in 2022 and we all know how that can go. Should anything happen to Williams, Samaje Perine ($3,750,000) will be the lead back, but I would fully expect the Broncos to go with a running back by committee approach which would mean Badie would have a guaranteed role.

Bid – $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Joshua Dobbs (QB – ARI) – 1 year/$2,000,000 – 20.62% Rostered

At the end of last week, the Cardinals traded for Browns quarterback Joshua Dobbs, which tells me that they do not have a whole lot of faith in any of the quarterbacks they have on the roster. If this is the case, it’s a real possibility we will see Dobbs as the starter for the Cardinals until Kyler Murray ($46,100,000) gets back from injury. If this is true, you better get Dobbs now because as soon as the news breaks, he will be a minimum of $5,000,000 Dynasty Dollars to acquire in the Free Agent Auction.

Bid – $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Imhir Smith-Marsette (WR – KC) – 1 year/$940,000 – 1.95% Rostered

I don’t know if Smith-Marsette will even make the Chiefs roster but after the performance he had in the final week of the pre-season, he will likely get a chance somewhere. Smith-Marsette isn’t someone Dynasty Owners will be rushing to pick up, but he is someone we should keep an eye on for the time being. In the Chiefs final pre-season game against the Browns, Smith-Marsette finished with 4 catches for 101 yards and 1 touchdown.

Bid – $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming content from me, Matt and Steve plus the Dynasty Owner podcast and the Dynasty Owner Livestream to help with the last few weeks of startup drafts. Don’t forget I will be doing free agent articles and short YouTube videos to help Dynasty Owners with their in-season acquisitions. Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

The Goldilocks Principle of Dynasty Owner

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

The Goldilocks principle is named after the children’s story “Goldilocks and the Three Bears“. In case you’re not familiar and don’t want to click the link, I’ll summary the story for you. Goldilocks tastes three different bowls of porridge and finds she prefers porridge that is neither too hot nor too cold, but has just the right temperature. The phrase “too hot, too cold, just right” is often used to describe the Goldilocks principle and I’ll use it in this article in the following manner.

• Too Hot – being drafted too high and their Average Draft Position (ADP) is a lower number than it should be
• Too Cold – being drafted too low and their ADP is a higher number than it should be
• Just Right – being drafted pretty much on target of ADP

For Dynasty Owner, I’m going to look at the current Dynasty Owner startup ADPs and find a player at each position (QB, RB, WR, TE) who fits into each of the three categories. No kickers again in this article. You’re welcome to everyone who doesn’t like kickers or want them in Dynasty Owner.

Overall, I found the WRs to be the hardest players to judge as there are so many of them and the differences sometimes were very small in their ADPs, past production and projected Dynasty Owner fantasy points. It’s a solid mix of players with a couple of rookies included and a lot of players still on their rookie contract. There are also a few veterans who have gotten paid. It is possible for Dynasty Owners to be “too hot” on a good player on a rookie contract and for him to not be worth his current Dynasty Owner startup draft ADP, or drafting a veteran with a high salary not soon enough and being cold on him.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the morning of August 22nd. 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/). Contracts and salaries are always subject to change and can potentially be increased. Check the Dynasty Owner Constitution for the ins and outs of when and how a contract change takes place.

Without further ado and with apologies to the millions of people who have read the Goldilocks and the Three Bears fairy tale and the hundreds of very smart people in the developmental psychology, biology, economics, engineering fields and even the planetary astronomy field (such as Stephen Hawking) who have spent years developing the Goldilocks principle, here is the Dynasty Owner fantasy football version of the classic story. 

Players Who Dynasty Owners Are Too Hot to Trot For

There are plenty of players who are likely being drafted too high and won’t produce as many Dynasty Owner fantasy points as their draft position demands that they do to justify their ADP. They just aren’t a good “value”. In Dynasty Owner, “value” can mean both that they don’t score enough Dynasty Owner fantasy points at their ADP, but it can also mean that their salary is too expensive (or will be too expensive in the next year or two) compared to the number of Dynasty Owner fantasy points that they have produced in the past and are likely to produce this season.

These “too hot” players are a mix of both types. Two players who are very good and will likely be amongst the top scorers at their position, but are just too expensive in terms of salary to take as early as they are being drafted right now. The other two players are on rookie contracts, but they are being drafted well before they should be based on the amount of Dynasty Owner fantasy points they have scored in the past and are projected to score this year.

Patrick Mahomes (QB – KC) – 9 years/$45,000,000; ADP 7.4

Mahomes is the first QB off the board in Dynasty Owner startup drafts based on his ADP of 7.4 and unfortunately for everyone drafting him, that’s too high to be taking the two-time Super Bowl Champion. This has nothing to do with his performance on the field, off the field or his status as possibly the number 1 QB in fantasy football. Mahomes has finished as no lower than QB6 in Dynasty Owner since the 2019 season and was the overall top scoring player on the platform in 2022 with 534.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. He is also projected to score the most points overall in 2023 with 483.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. With the Dynasty Owner scoring system awarding six points for a passing TD (unlike many leagues that only give four points for a passing TD), the scoring system works in favor of taking a QB earlier.

Instead, it has everything to do with Dynasty Owner using real NFL salaries and contracts and Mahomes’ being the fifth most expensive player in Dynasty Owner right now. It is true that he will definitely fall to seventh place next season and maybe even further depending upon Joe Burrow’s ($9,047,534) contract negotiations.

The risk in using your first round pick on Mahomes is that if something happens and he misses even a game or two, it will be more difficult for Dynasty Owners in startup leagues to put together a winning team if they draft Mahomes in the first round than if they draft another player with a lower salary then pick Mahomes in the second round. I’d rather wait and see if Mahomes lasts to my second round pick and take Burrow or Josh Allen ($43,005,667). Because both Trevor Lawrence ($9,198,372) and Justin Fields ($4,717,989) have two years left on their rookie contracts, they can be just as good of a selection even if they score less. All of those players, except Allen, will allow you to construct a better supporting cast than drafting Mahomes with your first pick.

Saquon Barkley (RB – NYG) – 1 year/$10,091,000; ADP 23.0

Barkley is being drafted generally at the back end of the second round of Dynasty Owner startup drafts. He is the ninth RB off a typical Dynasty Owner draft board on average, but only Christian McCaffrey ($16,015,875) has a higher salary. His ADP makes sense if you look at the 2023 projections (279.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points), which would rank him third among RBs. If you believe those projected points, it does make sense to take him over both Tony Pollard ($10,091,000) and Josh Jacobs ($10,091,000) who are projected for 36.6 fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points (Pollard) and 37.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (Jacobs) with identical contracts and salaries. Both are being drafted about a full round later (34.8 ADP for Jacobs and 37.0 ADP for Pollard).

However, Barkley is still being drafted earlier than he has finished in the overall Dynasty Owner rankings in his entire career. Last year was the best season of his career and he was still the overall #26 player in terms of points. His next best season was 2019 when he was the overall #42 player. In both 2020 and 2021, he didn’t even finish as RB23, never mind the overall #23 player.

Having Barkley off the board when RBs with much lower salaries such as Rhamondre Stevenson ($1,057,264) at over $9 million less in salary have a similar ADP (25.2) seems to be a situation in which Dynasty Owners are drafting based on pedigree. Barkley was the overall #2 draft pick in the 2018 NFL Draft after all.

Drake London (WR – ATL) – 3 years/$5,383,617; ADP 29.2

What am I missing here? Why is Drake London being drafted in the middle of the third round of Dynasty Owner startup drafts, while Christian Watson ($2,310,528) who is nearly $3 million less in salary, has the same number of years left on his contract, and who finished with nearly as many Dynasty Owner fantasy points as Drake last year (165.0 for Watson versus 175.6 for London) is being taken at the start of the fifth round (ADP 51.0)?

With his ADP, Drake London is the eleventh WR off the board in a typical Dynasty Owner startup draft. He is effectively the WR1 for a Dynasty Owner team and in his only season, he finished as WR33 and is projected to be WR24 this season. That’s your WR2 or FLEX spot, not your WR1. London averaged just 10.33 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game on a team that ran the ball a lot in 2022. The Falcons ranked second in the NFL with 32.9 rushing attempts per game and next to last in passing attempts with 24.4 per game. They also drafted RB Bijan Robinson ($5,489,634) with their first round pick in the NFL Draft and return a 1,000 yard rusher from last year in Tyler Allgeier ($998,474). I can’t imagine that they plan to run the ball less in 2023, so how is London going to improve on his 2022 performance. He led the Falcons in targets with 117, nearly a 30% target share, as Kyle Pitts ($8,227,624) missed seven games. With Pitts healthy, London might get fewer targets if the Falcons continue to run as much as they did last season.

I can’t even think about drafting London in the third round of a Dynasty Owner startup draft. He’s not a WR1 for a contending Dynasty Owner team and should be going closer to where Dynasty Owners are drafting Christian Watson, one to two rounds later.

Cole Kmet (TE – CHI) – 1 year $1,894,445; ADP 107.5

Finally, I went with a player who isn’t being drafted in the first couple of rounds. It’s kind of easy to do players who are being drafted early, but more difficult to find one who is not being taken as one of the top five or top ten players at his position, or inside the top 50, but is still being drafted “too high”.

Bears TE Cole Kmet fits that profile though as he is a ninth round Dynasty Owner startup draft pick on average. Even though he’s the 11th TE being taken in Dynasty Owner startup drafts, it’s still too high for me for several reasons.

First, while he was the TE9 in 2022, he basically had two great games (Weeks 9 and 10) in which he scored almost one-third of his Dynasty Owner fantasy points for the season (45.4 out of 146.3 points, or 31%).

Second, he has only scored 10.0 or more Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 10 games in three seasons (50 games played) and in six of those games, he had a TD reception. With only nine career TD receptions, you aren’t getting a double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy point performance from Kmet unless he catches a TD, and he doesn’t do that very often.

Third, he had as many games with less than 5.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points as he did with 10.0 or more last season (5 each). Remember that last season was the best season of his career. He averaged only 8.61 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game in his best season.

Finally, he just received a 4 year/$50 million contract extension, so his Dynasty Owner salary will be $12.5 million per year starting in the 2024 season. If he doesn’t produce this season, it’ll be difficult to justify keeping him on your Dynasty Owner team at that salary, so you may just be getting him for one season, then releasing him next year when that new contract kicks in.

It is true that Kmet finished the season strong after a very slow start to the 2022 season and he did average 10.15 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game in the Bears’ final four games after the team’s bye week. He was also Justin Fields’ ($4,717,989) top target (69 targets) last season and the duo should only improve their chemistry.

Players Who Dynasty Owners Are Too Cold as Ice On

Vanilla Ice said it best “Ice, Ice baby. Too cold. Ice, Ice baby. Too cold. Too cold.” Here’s the video – you know that you want to watch it, so go ahead and do it.

Just the opposite of the first set of players, here are players who Dynasty Owners aren’t drafting high enough. They are “too cold” on them. If you’re in a Dynasty Owner startup draft and have the opportunity to get one of these guys before the rest of your league because everyone else doesn’t want to draft them “too early” based on ADP, do it and thank me later.

Justin Fields (QB – CHI) – 2 years/$4,717,989; ADP 21.7

I have made the argument that Justin Fields is a first round Dynasty Owner startup draft pick and if so, it means that if you’re picking him in the late second round at his current ADP, you’re getting two first round picks. Imagine grabbing Ja’Marr Chase ($7,704,910) with the #3 pick because his ADP is 2.9 and then getting Fields with the #22 pick in the second round. That’s two players with two years each left on their rookie contract, and you’ve spent less than $12.5 million of the $157.36 million salary cap. It makes me want the third pick in an upcoming Dynasty Owner startup draft to see if I can pull it off.

After a rough start to the 2022 season with just 38.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in his first four games, Fields ripped off 292.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in his final 11 games of the Dynasty Owner season, an average of 26.62 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. If he played 16 games at that pace, he would have been QB5 in 2022 instead of where he finished (QB12). I’m not a fan of those types of projections normally, but it shows Fields’ has the potential to be a top 5 QB in Dynasty Owner. Now that he has a true #1 WR in DJ Moore ($20,628,000) to catch his passes when he’s not taking off from the pocket and running for 6.7 yards per rushing attempt (his career average), the sky could be the limit for Fields.

Time will tell if this prediction is correct, but I’m willing to draft Fields with a first round pick, so you know that I think his ADP is far too low. We’ll see what happens in a couple of weeks.

Dameon Pierce (RB – HOU) – 3 years/$1,118,858; ADP 36.9

I was listening to Sirius XM Fantasy Sports radio on Monday and heard the hosts express some surprise that Devin Singletary ($2,750,000) isn’t challenging Pierce more for the top RB spot in Houston. It seems to be a common theme as they listed Pierce’s ADP on a bunch of other fantasy football platforms and all of them were higher numbers than his Dynasty Owner ADP. Obviously, Pierce is being drafted earlier in Dynasty Owner than on other fantasy football platforms that don’t utilize real NFL contracts and salaries. The Singletary factor combined with the Texans’ offensive futility last season must be the reasons why Dynasty Owners aren’t drafting Pierce until the end of the third round of Dynasty Owner startup drafts.

Pierce is currently the 15th RB off the board in a Dynasty Owner startup draft, which ranks him as a upper-end RB2 on your Dynasty Owner team. I realize that he finished his rookie season as the RB28 in Dynasty Owner, but he did miss the final four games and averaged 12.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game (166.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 13 games played). He only scored 5 TDs all season (4 rushing and 1 receiving) and the Houston rushing offense only had 7 TDs total. They should be able to improve on that number in 2023 and Pierce will be the primary beneficiary. Pierce may end up being a three-down back for the Texans with Singletary spelling him for a series or two during the course of the game versus last season when Rex Burkhead ($2,350,000) played for the Texans a lot on passing downs.

Rachaad White (RB – TB) – 3 years/$1,282,500; ADP 59.7

I had to pick two RBs here as Rachaad White being drafted almost two full rounds later than Pierce is incredible, especially since how Dynasty Owners are too cold on Pierce. In contrast, White is like Greenland in the winter (average temperature of -8 degrees Celsius/17.8 degrees Fahrenheit on the coast and -20 degrees Celsius/-4 degrees Fahrenheit inland) for Dynasty Owner with his 59.7 ADP and 21st RB taken ranking.

Overall, White was just RB34 in Dynasty Owner last year with 147.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 17 games played (8.66 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game). However, starting in Week 10 when he received a career high 22 rushing attempts through Week 17, White scored 92.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. That’s an average of 13.17 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. He had to share touches with Leonard Fournette ($7,000,000) last season and Fournette isn’t in Tampa Bay anymore. His “replacements” are Chase Edmonds ($1,232,500) who flamed out in both Miami and Denver last year and Ke’Shawn Vaughn ($1,188,999) who hasn’t played much since being drafted in the third round of the 2020 NFL Draft by the Buccaneers.

Because of the downgrade at the position, I see White as the lead RB in Tampa with not a lot of competition for the spot. If White was good enough to take snaps and rushing attempts from Fournette last season when the Buccaneers were trying their best to get to the playoffs in the G.O.A.T. Tom Brady’s final season, he should play a lot for the Buccaneers this season.

Davante Adams (WR – LV) – 4 years/$28,000,000; ADP 43.7

It’s kind of amazing that a player who has finished as the WR4 in 2022, WR2 in 2021 and WR1 in 2020 is being drafted in the middle of the fourth round of Dynasty Owner startup drafts. It’s an overreaction in my mind to the fact that Adams is not playing with Aaron Rodgers ($37,500,000) or his college teammate Derek Carr ($37,500,000) for the first time in his NFL career. That got me to thinking about how well Adams has played when Rodgers has been hurt and after Carr got benched in favor of Jarrett Stidham ($5,000,000) last season.

The answer is very well. In nine games total between the two games last season and back in 2017 when Adams played in seven games without Rodgers, he has 53 receptions for 715 receiving yards and 6 receiving TDs. That equates to 160.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (not taking into account bonus points or points lost from fumbling, etc.) in nine games or an average of 17.83 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. That is lower than his averages from the past three seasons of 20.33 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game last year, 21.89 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game in 2021 and 25.53 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game in 2020, but not by a lot.

His current projections are WR6 with 292.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, which is right around his non-Rodgers/Carr Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game average if he plays in 16 or 17 games. If Adams and Jimmy Garoppolo ($24,250,000) can produce at that projected level for the 2023 season, he’ll be well worth being on your Dynasty Owner team. Even at $28 million in salary.

T.J. Hockenson (TE – MIN) – 1 year/$9,392,000; ADP 56.7

It’s difficult to argue with taking Travis Kelce ($14,312,500) and Mark Andrews ($14,000,000) ahead of Hockenson in Dynasty Owner startup drafts, but having Hockenson basically going at the same time as George Kittle ($15,000,000) and behind Kyle Pitts is puzzling. Hockenson is also going a full round later on average (13.8 draft spots) than Pitts while outproducing Pitts overall last season and on a per game basis in 2021. The extra contract year and $1 million in salary savings isn’t enough for me to take Pitts in front of Hockenson in a Dynasty Owner startup draft.

Compared to Kittle, maybe it’s that Dynasty Owners are “too hot” for Kittle, but I prefer to think that they are “too cold” on Hockenson instead. After all, Hockenson is younger than Kittle (26 years old vs. 29 years old), over $5.6 million less in salary this season and improving his game. Hockenson was TE2 last season and his Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game have gone up from 11.08 in 2020 to 11.94 in 2021 to 12.61 in 2022. In addition, Hockenson averaged even more (12.89 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game) after getting traded from the Lions to the Vikings during the 2022 season. He should only get better with a full off-season and training camp of work with Vikings QB and apparent Quarterback hottie (at least according to my friend Julie) Kirk Cousins ($35,000,000).

The downside for Hockenson is that you may be drafting him for one year only as it’s not clear what his salary will be for 2024 and beyond. However, the drop is free next year since it’ll be a contract change, while Kittle will cost Dynasty Owners an Amnesty Provision at the minimum. The 25% of Kittle’s total remaining salary drop fee will exceed $5 million (the price of an Amnesty Provision) if Dynasty Owners release him either this or next year. If Dynasty Owners find themselves in the fifth round or late in the fourth round and Hockenson is still available, they should happily draft him, make a good push for the League Championship in Year One and worry about 2024 after this season is over.

Players Who Dynasty Owners Are Getting Just Right

This is probably the most difficult set of players to evaluate using this principle. It’s a lot easier to look and say “He’s overrated” or “He’s not getting the recognition he deserves” than hit the middle ground of “He’s ok” correct. In theory, Dynasty Owners have to be selecting at a specific point in a startup draft to get the player “just right”. If someone has an ADP of 48.0, then he’s the final pick of the fourth round. If you have the fifth, sixth or seventh pick, then you need to take him a bit “early” if you get him at your spot in the fourth round (#41, #42 or #43) and if you wait until the fifth round, he’ll probably be gone. As always, Dynasty Owners should probably go “get their guy”, but keep their ADP in mind when going to get them. But there’s no reason to get your guy in Round 2 if no one else wants him until Round 5. Here’s are some players who I’m happy to take at their current ADP and who I think Dynasty Owners are getting just right.

Josh Allen (QB – BUF) – 6 years/$43,005,667; ADP 16.6

At first glance, it may seem odd that I have Patrick Mahomes as being drafted too early and Josh Allen as just right even though the gap between them is only 9.2 draft spots. While that is true, the difference is that Dynasty Owners who draft Mahomes in the first round are getting pretty much the exact same production from him with a virtually identical salary as the Dynasty Owners who draft Allen in the second round. I prefer the draft strategy of taking a low-salary, high-production player in the first round, followed by a high-salary, extremely high production player in the second round over doing it the opposite way around.

In the past three seasons, Allen has finished as QB1 (2020), QB2 (2021) and QB2 (2022). Those are also his overall finishing positions meaning that you are likely getting a top two player in the second round of a startup draft at his current ADP. Yes, he is going to count over one-quarter (27.33%) of this year’s salary cap, but you can’t save all of that money if you want to win. Also, he is almost $2 million less in salary than Mahomes and ranks as the sixth most expensive player in Dynasty Owner. Not a lot of salary, but you’ll want the extra when you’re in the last few rounds of your startup draft or wanting to bid on players to fill out your roster in the Free Agent Auction after the draft is over.

Allen hasn’t gotten his Dynasty Owners below 500.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points since the 2019 season and hasn’t missed a game since the 2018 season either. His average of 31.64 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game over the past three seasons is more points some QBs score in a single week for an entire season. The Dynasty Owner scoring system rewards the most important and most expensive players on the football field, aka the QB, more appropriately than “traditional” four points per passing TD scoring systems. If your goal is to mirror being an actual NFL GM, then getting your QB selection correct is the single most important decision you’re going to make and taking Josh Allen in the second round of a Dynasty Owner startup draft does it.

Kenneth Walker (RB – SEA) – 3 years/$2,110,395; ADP 19.7

I’m going to ignore the training camp groin injury since he’s reportedly been practicing since last week even if he didn’t play in the Seahawks’ pre-season game this week. Hopefully he’ll get a little pre-season action in the team’s final pre-season game on Saturday against Green Bay. Remember this is Dynasty Owner, not Redraft Owner, so even if Walker was out for a game or two at the start of this year or has a slow start because of his training camp injury, it’s ok.

As a mid-to-late second round Dynasty Owner startup draft pick and the seventh RB off the board, Walker should be a great performer for his Dynasty Owners. While he was just RB19 in Dynasty Owner last season, you have to remember that he didn’t do much in the first quarter (4 games). He had just 15 rushing attempts for 58 rushing yards and 6 receptions for 14 receiving yards (13.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) going into Week 5 last year. In the next 11 games during the Dynasty Owner season, Walker had 184.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (16.73 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game). It was a great performance for effectively three-quarters of the season and once he got rolling, he only had one game, Week 13 against the Rams when he got hurt in the first quarter and didn’t return, in which he didn’t have double-digit Dynasty Owner fantasy points.

I realize that many fantasy football analysts and Dynasty Owners are concerned that the Seahawks drafted Zach Charbonnet ($1,719,020) in the second round of the NFL Draft, but I’m not worried at all. Walker played well last season, is still on his rookie deal and NFL teams want more than one quality, starting lineup level RB on their rosters now. Seattle didn’t have another one of those at the end of last season and they struggled in Week 14 when Walker was out with only 10 carries for 28 rushing yards from their RBs. In Week 13 when Walker got hurt in the first quarter, his backup DeeJay Dallas ($947,350) also got hurt and the team was left with Tony Jones ($940,000) as the only healthy RB until he got hurt and Dallas returned to action. Seattle escaped with a 27-23 victory over a decimated 3-8 Rams’ team and I’m sure Pete Carroll doesn’t want that to happen again. When he’s healthy, Walker will produce and get the ball enough to justify using a second round Dynasty Owner startup draft pick on him.

Jaylen Waddle (WR – MIA) – 2 years/$6,771,498; ADP 17.2

In two NFL seasons, Waddle hasn’t missed a game and finished as a top 13 WR both times. He was the WR13 in his rookie season, but only finished 0.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points behind Mike Williams ($20,000,000) for the 12th spot and a WR1 finish. He has averaged 15.45 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game over those two seasons. He has eight games with 20.0 or more Dynasty Owner fantasy points, just two games with 5.0 or fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points and 11 games with 10.0 or fewer Dynasty Owner fantasy points. Basically, he’s as likely to get you a 20 point game as he is to get you less than double digits and that’s a good thing to have in your WR1. You can safely stick him in your Dynasty Owner Starting lineup and only take him out on his bye week (Week 10 in 2023 if you’re now planning on drafting him).

His rookie contract still has two more seasons left on it and he’s the 50th most expensive WR on the Dynasty Owner platform right now. The only WRs who scored more Dynasty Owner fantasy points than Waddle did last year for a lower salary were Justin Jefferson ($3,280,701), CeeDee Lamb ($3,502,503) and Amon-Ra St. Brown ($1,066,313). All three of those guys are being drafted before Waddle on average in Dynasty Owner startup drafts, which is why I think Waddle is being taken at just the right spot.

Some may say that it’s a bit too early as he’s projected to score “only” 249.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, since that would be fewer points than last year and barely more than his rookie season. With a second year under coach Mike McDaniel and with QB Tua Tagovailoa ($7,568,859) and likely backup QB Mike White ($4,000,000) for a couple of games, it’s hard to envision Waddle not improving at least a little bit on his WR9 ranking from last season. That would put him in very close proximity to his draft spot among WRs and with a rookie contract that has more than one year remaining, it’s ok if he’s just a “low-end” WR1 again. As a Patriots fan, I’m not happy having a Dolphins’ player here, but it’s the right move and he’s being drafted just right.

Michael Mayer (TE – LV) – 4 years/$2,328,412; ADP 92.4

Sam LaPorta (TE – DET) – 4 years/$2,366,498; ADP 93.6

I’m combining Mayer and LaPorta because they are pretty much joined at the hip so far in their NFL careers. LaPorta was taken by the Detroit Lions with the #34 overall pick, then Mayer was taken with the #35 pick by the Las Vegas Raiders. Both are expected to be instant contributors to their NFL team and get to play with veteran QBs in Jared Goff ($33,500,000) and Jimmy Garoppolo. Neither of their teams had an established player already at TE, unlike Dalton Kincaid ($3,356,756) who was drafted by the Bills who already had Dawson Knox ($13,000,000) on their roster. Finally, both of them are listed as second on their team’s current depth chart. Mayer is listed behind Austin Hooper ($2,750,000) on the Raiders depth chart, while LaPorta follows Brock Wright ($940,000) on the Lions depth chart. I wouldn’t take those at face value though.

The differences are slight which is why I’m ok with both of them having virtually the same ADP. Mayer had better college production overall and last season than LaPorta. However, LaPorta went to Iowa, which has produced several great NFL TEs in the past few seasons, such as George Kittle and T.J. Hockenson plus Noah Fant ($6,850,000) who was a first round NFL Draft selection, but hasn’t panned out as well as Kittle and Hockenson. LaPorta joined a team with a better offense and who’s QB has been in the offense for a couple of seasons. It remains to be seen if that matters, but a slight advantage to LaPorta on that metric.

I like that both of them are being drafted as low-end TE1 right now in the ninth and tenth spots among TEs in Dynasty Owner startup drafts. That shows me Dynasty Owners aren’t relying on them to produce instantly this season as it’s difficult for rookie TEs to do so. Hopefully the Dynasty Owners with Mayer and LaPorta are getting a solid veteran who maybe has a higher salary later on to pair with them. Regardless of whether you get LaPorta or Mayer, if they are your mid-to-late seventh or very early eighth round Dynasty Owner startup draft pick, it’s just right.

Conclusion

Who does everyone agree with on my Too Hot, Too Cold and Just Right lists? Is there anybody who I’m wrong about or got absolutely positively correct? Let me and the entire Dynasty Owner community know by tweeting/posting on Twitter/X and tagging me (@SteveVT33) and Dynasty Owner (@Dynasty_Owner). You can also comment on both Facebook or Instagram with what I got right or wrong.

You can also put in players who you think are being drafted too soon, too late or at just the right time based on their current ADP who aren’t listed here. There were a total of 14 players in this article and I’m sure I missed somebody who other Dynasty Owners think should have been included.

If reading this article makes you want to draft a Dynasty Owner startup draft, then  join one before the NFL season start. Go to your D.O. Store, click on New Team for 2023, and find a time when you can draft in the future. You can also Create A League for a specific day and time, then invite friends who you want to play in a Dynasty Owner league or just make it a public league. If any of those friends are new to Dynasty Owner, give them your affiliate code and get a $49 referral fee. Don’t forget to give everyone the most recent promo code (LETSGO) for $20 off a new team. Use that code yourself as well for $20 off your league fee.

While you’re waiting for your next startup draft, you need to listen to the Dynasty Owner podcast with me and Jay Pounds this week. We will be joined by our past two Chase for the Ring Champions – 2021 winner SKOL Vikings, aka Jeff Rachlin and 2022 winner Dynasty|Trade|School (D|T|S), aka Rudolph Valentine. They will be helping both new and existing Dynasty Owners with how to draft and put together a winning Dynasty Owner roster.

Dynasty Owner also has plenty of other content to help you out. Matt Morrison – The Jerk is on the Trade Time beat now and evaluating real Dynasty Owner trades by running them through the Trade Calculator to show Dynasty Owners how to use it to their advantage or just get trade discussions started. Jay will be starting up his weekly look at the best players available in the Free Agent Auction and producing new content for Facebook and Instagram to go with it starting Week 1 of the Dynasty Owner season. You don’t want to miss it!

Finally, don’t forget about the weekly Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. We’ve been off for a couple of weeks in August, but will be back this Friday. The Livestream is usually on at 11 AM, but check to make sure of the time, go back and watch previous episodes on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel. Finally, don’t forget to follow Dynasty Owner on Twitter/X. Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

By Matt Morrison (@dynastyjerk)

Hello Dynasty Owners. Thank you once again for joining me and for continuing to support this wonderful platform. Today, I will be continuing my Trade Time series. Last week I introduced this article series that I will be presenting through at least the end of this year. In this series, I will be highlighting the Trade Calculator that has been newly released by Dynasty Owner. All of the trades that I discuss will be looked at through the “eyes” of the Trade Calculator.

As I mentioned last week…this is just a tool. It should not be used as the only factor for making a trade. This tool should be combined with team needs and current team philosophy in order to help make the correct decision regarding a trade. Here is more info about the Trade Calculator since I was somewhat vague in describing it last week.

First off, the Trade Calculator is continuously updated. It takes info and data from several different websites and compiles it into one place. As a player’s stats and team conditions change, so will the player’s value. It might be difficult to see value fluctuations in the off-season, but things will ramp up once players start producing actual Dynasty Owner fantasy points. As I said last week, this Trade Calculator also takes contracts and salaries into account. Real-life NFL contracts and salaries are the most unique aspect of Dynasty Owner, and it is one of the biggest reasons that established dynasty fantasy football players are drawn to the platform. The Trade Calculator takes contract years left and salary into account when it analyzes each trade.

I hope this gives you a little more insight into how the program operates. For now, let’s break down some real life Dynasty Owner trades and see what the Trade Calculator thinks about them.

Real Trades

Austin Ekeler ($6,125,000)

For the first trade today, I’m going to look back at one of my favorite trades that I made this offseason in one of my Dynasty Owner leagues.

	Player	Position	Salary	Years Left on Contract	Age	Value
Team A	Miles Sanders	RB	$6,350,000	4	26	3876
	Quentin Johnston	WR	$3,547,195	4	21	4599
	2024 2nd Round	–	–	–	–	2250
						10,725
Team B	Austin Ekeler	RB	$6,125,000	1	28	4789
						4789
Results	124% In Favor Of Team A

In this trade, I am team B.  I traded Miles Sanders, 2023 1.07 rookie draft pick and a 2024 2nd rookie draft pick for Austin Ekeler. The 1.07 rookie draft pick this year that I traded away ended up exchanging hands again, and it eventually turned into Quentin Johnston. So which side would you rather have?  Clearly the Trade Calculator heavily favors Sanders’ side, and I have to say that I can’t disagree from a value standpoint. Team A is getting incredible youth compared to Team B. I think that on paper the clear choice is Team A.

However, I can understand the logic if you want to take the Team B side (as I did). I don’t think anyone would argue that Team B is getting the best player in the trade. While this isn’t always the case, more often than not I try to make sure that no matter what or who is involved in a trade, that I get the best player. In this case, I sold an established RB moving to a new team in Miles Sanders and two unproven players/picks for an elite RB. I think it goes without saying, but I’m going to state it anyway…I am in win-now mode with my team from League #30057 in which I made this trade. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to pair Ekeler with Josh Allen ($43,005,667), Jalen Hurts ($1,506,293), Derrick Henry ($12,500,000), Justin Jefferson ($3,280,701) and Dallas Goedert ($14,250,000). With Hurts’ salary increasing to $51 million next season and Justin Jefferson playing for at least a minimum of $19.743 million on his fifth year option, it’s clear that I’m not going to be able to keep this team intact in 2024 so making a push for a League Championship and maybe being the Chase for the Ring Champion is a great strategy.

Once again, it’s a great idea to use the Trade Calculator as a way to get the conversation started on a trade like this one with a potential trade partner.

Sam Howell ($1,005,400) and Brock Purdy ($934,252)

I love this trade because of its simplicity. Sometimes there’s nothing better than a one for one player trade.

	Player	Position	Salary	Years Left on Contract	Age	Value
Team A	Sam Howell	QB	$1,005,400	3	22	3287
Team B	Brock Purdy	QB	$934,252	3	23	3864
Results	18% In Favor Of Team B

This is a trade that took place less than four hours before I started writing this article and almost right after Howell was named as the starting QB for the Commanders.  It occurred in one of my Dynasty Owner BETA leagues, and it was accomplished by two seasoned Dynasty Owners.  So, what do we think about it?

I would say that for the most part it is a lateral move for either side. I don’t think anyone expects Howell or Purdy to become a QB1 for any Dynasty Owner team this year. This means that each Dynasty Owner is staking their flag on the opposite player and saying, “he will be better than the player I currently have.” I love the commitment to each player, and I love that this deal was able to get done. For what it’s worth, I agree with the Trade Calculator as I would rather have Purdy on my roster for the foreseeable future than Howell. I like the fact that the 49ers are a better offense and I see many more scoring opportunities for Purdy. I also see Purdy having a longer leash with the starting QB position when compared to Howell.

Conclusion

Regardless of what side you fall on for these trades, I hope I’ve shown that the Trade Calculator can be a valuable asset for every Dynasty Owner who is looking to make a trade. It is a fantastic tool to get the conversation started, and it should at least be peeked at before any trade is offered and/or accepted.

As always, thank you for reading. If anyone has any suggestions on real trades that were either accepted or rejected that they would like me to analyze, please let me know.  I would appreciate it if you followed @Dynasty_Owner on X/Twitter as well as subscribed to Dynasty Owner on YouTube. Thank you all. Take care and be safe.

TheJerk

By Matt Morrison (@dynastyjerk)

Hello Dynasty Owners and welcome to another start to the week. We are halfway through August which means that all of us here at Dynasty Owner (and elsewhere) are switching from off-season mode to pre-season mode. For some of you, the pre-season starts right after the NFL Draft. However, the most common event that gets everyone excited about real, meaningful football has to be the start of the pre-season games. Ah yes, the sound of children going back to school mixed with the increased frequency of our favorite podcasts…It’s a great time of year.

With that being said, I am also changing gears as I transition from the “Contract Spotlight” series over into a “Trade” series. Throughout the rest of the pre-season, and into the regular season, I will be delivering you all the info that you need to know about trading here on the Dynasty Owner platform. That includes values, trading away players and identifying which players you should be looking to trade for prior to their breakout. For all these trade articles, I will be utilizing a brand new tool released by Dynasty Owner…

The Trade Calculator

The Trade Calculator is something that I have heard numerous requests for from Dynasty Owners, and it has arrived just in time for the NFL pre-season. A trade calculator in itself is not a new invention, but when it comes to Dynasty Owner, it takes on a whole new meaning.  As we know, all of our projections here take into account several factors…

• Age
• Fantasy Production
• Projected Length of Career
• Salary

All of these are standard for “regular” dynasty leagues except for salary. Taking into account a player’s salary takes on a bigger meaning when you are considering trading away one of your Dynasty Owner assets (player, draft picks, Dynasty Dollars or an Amnesty Provision). As I mentioned in the opening, I will be using the Trade Calculator to identify value trades, players who you may want to trade away as well as one player who I would recommend trading for in each article.  Let’s jump into the first two trades for this series…

Trade Away

All of the trades that I discuss in this series will be subjective. Your willingness to pull the trigger on these trades will depend on your team’s roster construction and one to three year goals in Dynasty Owner. These shouldn’t be taken as gospel.  Rather they are examples of fair trades that both I and the Trade Calculator agree on.

	Player	Position	Salary	Left Years on Contract	Age	Value
Team A	DJ Moore	WR	$20,628,000	3	26	4397
	2024 2nd Round	–	–		–	2250
	2024 3rd Round	–	–		–	1000
						7647
Team B	A.J. Brown	WR	$25,000,000	4	26	6788
						6788
Results	11% In Favor Of Team A

There are a couple of reasons that I would be actively looking to trade away DJ Moore at this point in the pre-season.

The first reason is that I’m not fully convinced that Moore will take a giant fantasy leap this year.  Yes it’s possible that he is playing with the best quarterback he’s ever had. Yes, he should easily be the number one wide receiver in this new offense. However, with the rushing baseline for Justin Fields ($4,714,989), I don’t see a path for him to be a Top 12 WR at least this year. The Moore trade to the Bears will be a much bigger difference maker for Fields than it will be for Moore.

The second reason is that DJ Moore made a brilliant play in last Saturday’s pre-season game.  He took a bubble screen 62 yards for a touchdown. It was his only touch of the game, and it was blasted all over Twitter/X. There is no doubt in my mind that this one play will dramatically increase Moore’s ADP in startup drafts as well as his trade value in all leagues. If you can find someone who is overreacting to one pre-season play, then maybe this trade is possible. I, personally, would much rather have the A.J. Brown side and I don’t think it’s very close, even though the Trade Calculator favors the DJ Moore and the picks side. You can use the Trade Calculator as a way to start a conversation about players who you’d like to trade away from your Dynasty Owner team.

Trade For

Dynasty Owners can also use the Trade Calculator to figure out a fair offer for a player who they want to acquire from another Dynasty Owner. For example, this proposed trade that Trade Calculator grades as pretty close.

	Player	Position	Salary	Left Years on Contract	Age	Value
Team A	Joe Mixon	RB	$5,750,000	2	27	3539
Team B	D’Andre Swift	RB	$2,134,729	1	24	3814
Results	7% In Favor Of Team B

Without context you may be questioning which side of this trade I prefer. The truth is that I would much rather pay the more than $3,000,000 premium for Joe Mixon. Based on the Trade Calculator, this trade is very close in value, and I agree. However, I am not convinced that Swift is the starting running back for the Eagles yet. That, and I believe that Mixon is being undervalued this year following the fear that he was possibly going to be suspended. Mixon is likely to be a Top 10 running back this season, and he is making significantly less than previous years when his salary was $12,000,000.

These two hypothetical trades are just a couple of examples of trades that could be finalized in Dynasty Owner, and the Trade Calculator can be a valuable tool in order to help Dynasty Owners both find fair value, and hopefully convince your trading partner that the trade is fair.

As always, thank you for reading. If anyone has any suggestions on real trades that were either accepted or rejected that they would like me to analyze, please let me know. I would appreciate it if you followed @Dynasty_Owner on Twitter/X as well as subscribed to Dynasty Owner on YouTube. Thank you all. Take care and be safe.

TheJerk

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners! Welcome back and thank you for checking out another one of my articles. We finally have football again with the pre-season underway. With that said, let’s take a look at a few things that stood out to me in Weeks 1&2 of the NFL pre-season.

• C.J. Stroud ($9,069,811) struggles! Stroud had a rough debut against a Patriots’ defense that always gives rookie quarterbacks a hard time. I am nowhere near concerned as this was the toughest test any rookie quarterback could have been given on Day 1.
• On the other end of the spectrum, Texans rookie WR Tank Dell ($1,244,382) was on fire posting a stat line of 5 catches for 65 yards while adding a touchdown.  If you were able to snag Dell in the late 2nd or early 3rd round of your Dynasty Owner rookie draft (rookie ADP 31.4), you have to be thrilled after that debut.
• Next, we have Packers starting quarterback Jordan Love ($3,095,863) who looked solid against the Bengals finishing with 7 completions on just 10 attempts for 46 yards and a touchdown. My main worry here is that the stat line is a little skewed due to Love averaging just 4.6 yards per pass attempt. At worst, it’s a great way to build the youngster’s confidence.
• The last 2 players I want to talk about are Kenny Pickett ($3,516,976) and Baker Mayfield ($4,000,000). I have been critical of Pickett since being drafted by my Steelers and we all know how much love I have for Mayfield, but both of these guys came out on fire, and both left the field throwing as many touchdowns as they did incompletions! Only one of each!

In today’s article I will be covering players who I think can contribute heavily towards winning your Dynasty Owner League Championship and you won’t have to invest a ton of draft capital in. You will see a wide range in salaries so be sure you are planning for this come draft day! I don’t have any real requirements in this article outside of the player being drafted in the fifth round or later (ADP 60.0 or higher).

Quarterback

Geno Smith (QB – SEA) – 3 years/$25,000,000 – ADP 105.1

If you are looking for a mid-round quarterback, come draft day then Geno Smith is an excellent option in my opinion. Seattle had chances to draft his replacement and instead went and got the veteran more firepower on offense while spending premium draft capital to do so. If Geno is as good as the Seahawks believe he is, he will be a difference maker on your team this season. In 2022, Smith finished the year with over 4,000 yards passing with 29 touchdowns to just 9 interceptions (378.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) finishing as QB6 on the Dynasty Owner platform. If Smith can do it again in 2023, he will be a steal at his salary and draft position.

Jared Goff (QB – DET) – 2 years/$33,500,000 – ADP 164.5

Goff finished one spot below the man above him on this list, yet he is being drafted nearly five full rounds later than Geno Smith in Dynasty Owner startup draft, though Goff is $8,500,0000 more expensive. The biggest win for Goff and the reason I think I would choose him over Geno in a startup draft at their current ADP is because Goff’s offensive coordinator Ben Johnson is back in town for another season which should mean big things. Goff nearly hit 4,500 passing yards while throwing 29 touchdowns to just 7 interceptions last season. If Goff does the same in 2023, he will stay inside of the top 10 quarterbacks for the season.

Running Back

Cam Akers (RB – LAR) – 1 year/$1,543,259 – ADP 69.6

If you are looking for a running back in the sixth round or later, I believe Akers should be your number 1 target due to his strong finish in 2022 and the current makeup of the Rams roster. Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford ($40,000,000) and receiver Cooper Kupp ($26,700,000) were both banged up in 2022 and are not getting any younger. I am expecting the Rams to run the ball much more often this season to take some pressure off of Kupp and Stafford in order to keep their dynamic duo healthy. Akers was squarely in the doghouse to start the 2022 season as he failed to hit the 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy point mark until Week 13. From Week 13 and on, the Rams gave Akers the workload he should have been receiving all season long and he performed well while getting said opportunities. Should the Rams turn Akers loose this season, he could easily finish inside of the top 8 running backs for the season.

Jerick McKinnon (RB – KC) – 1 year/$1,317,500 – ADP 134.7

Had the Chiefs added a player like DeAndre Hopkins ($13,000,000) this off-season, Jerick McKinnon wouldn’t make this list, but they didn’t and because of that I believe McKinnon is in line for plenty of touches in the best offense in the NFL. If McKinnon is able to play at the level, he did from Week 13 all the way through the Super Bowl, he will be an absolute steal in the 12th round of Dynasty Owner startup drafts. If McKinnon is used regularly throughout the season, I see no reason he doesn’t finish with 1,000 all-purpose yards in 2023. McKinnon had back-to-back 30.0 plus Dynasty Owner fantasy point games in Weeks 14 and 15 while helping many Dynasty Owners make or win their League Championship. Can he do it again this season? I believe so!

Wide Receiver

Deebo Samuel (WR – SF) – 3 years/$23,850,000 – ADP 81.5

Deebo had a quite 2022 by his standards and still finished as WR40 in Dynasty Owner while missing four full games due to injury. When Deebo is healthy, he is no doubt a top 5 playmaker in the NFL and is a player who I would love to have on my Dynasty Owner team over the next couple of seasons. Samuel has been banged up throughout his career, but I fully believe the risk outweighs the reward when he is being drafted in the middle of the seventh round. I am sure the price tag will scare some people away but at $23,500,000, he is much more affordable than a player like Devante Adams ($28,000,000) with similar upside now that he is catching passes from Jimmy Garoppolo ($24,250,000). I don’t mean that to be a knock on Jimmy G, I just think he is a much better fit alongside a player like Samuel versus Adams.

DeAndre Hopkins (WR – TEN) – 2 years/$13,000,000 – ADP 129.0

Up next, we have the most quarterback proof player in NFL history, DeAndre Hopkins, which is why it’s mind boggling that he is a late 11th round pick in startup drafts. I am hoping this ADP is skewed by drafts earlier in the off-season, but even in round 7, I believe he will be a steal. Last season, Hopkins missed eight games in total, had a band of misfits throwing him the ball and still managed to finish the year with over 700 yards receiving while adding 3 scores (149.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). No matter how you spin it, Hopkins will get an upgrade at quarterback in Tennessee while being the unquestioned number 1 receiver. Oh, and barring injury, he won’t be missing the first six games of the season again this year. Hopkins is a lock to hit 1,000 yards receiving this season if he is on the field. After saying all of this, I would comfortably draft Hopkins in the fifth round of a Dynasty Owner startup draft.

Tight End

Darren Waller (TE – NYG) – 4 years/$17,000,000 – ADP 135.7

Last but not least, we have the new number 1 pass catcher for the Giants, Darren Waller. Waller was banged up in 2022, but should he stay healthy, I am expecting him to take on a huge role in Coach Brian Daboll’s offense. Just two seasons ago, Waller finished as the TE2 on Dynasty Owner with 282.6 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and I believe he can get back to that point again for his new team. Quarterback Daniel Jones ($40,000,000) took a huge step forward last season and now that he has a Bonafede number 1 option in Waller, we should see the Giants’ offense as a whole take a step forward. At $17,000,000, Waller will be pricey but if you draft accordingly and he is able to stay healthy you will have an advantage most weeks at the tight end position, and it will only cost you an 12th round pick to do so.

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming content from me, Matt and Steve plus the Dynasty Owner podcast and the Dynasty Owner Livestream to help with the last few weeks of startup drafts. Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

By: Jay Pounds (@jaypoundsnfl)

Dynasty Owners, it feels like it has been forever since my last article! In all reality, it has only been a little over a month, but I am more than happy to be back! Over the past month I purchased my first home and have been extremely busy getting settled in.

We are now just one month away from NFL football games that count and will soon be in full swing. If you have not joined a startup yet this year now is the time to do so. Don’t forget to use your promo codes (LETSGO for $20 off a new team), give your affiliate links to friends who aren’t Dynasty Owners and invite them to get $49 per referral and practice drafting using the mock draft feature here on the Dynasty Owner platform. Last thing before we get into the important stuff is that once the season starts, I will be doing a weekly Free Agent Auction article featuring the top 5 free agents each week. With that article will be a short video on each player to help make those tough in-season decisions a little bit easier. 

Is your roster ready for the 2023 season? If not, below are some players that should be able to help your Dynasty Owner team compete each week. I have put together a list of players with a wide range of salaries to ensure there is a player for everyone on this list. I believe each one of these players listed below has a clear path to being a productive Dynasty Owner player in 2023.

$1,000,000 and Under

Elliot Fry (K – DEN) – 1 year/$750,000 – 46.83% Rostered

I won’t spend a ton of time on this one as Fry is nowhere near a lock to be on the Broncos’ roster when the regular season starts. Fry has been in the league four years now and has scored a total of 12.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points. If Fry overcomes the odds and ends up as the Broncos starting kicker, he will be a huge value with such a low salary.

Peyton Hendershot (TE – DAL) – 2 years/$858,333 – 50.0% Rostered

Hendershot seems to be a long shot to start the season as the Cowboys’ starting tight end, but there is still a clear path to playing time and it does not require an injury. The Cowboys tight end room is wide open right now and a solid pre-season will earn Hendershot playing time and possibly a starting tight end spot. In 2022, Hendershot did not do much, but he proved he could hold his own and make an impact when called upon finishing with 11 catches for 103 yards and 2 touchdowns (39.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). Hendershot is a clear stash and see what happens but at the price of $1,000,000 Dynasty Dollars to bid on him if he’s available in the Free Agent Auction and likely win that bid, it’s a no brainer in my opinion.

$1,000,001 – $3,000,000

Latavius Murray (RB – BUF) – 1 year/$1,317,500 – 71.03% Rostered

Maybe I have just been too low on James Cook ($1,458,014) since his days with the Georgia Bulldawgs, but I just don’t see him being a bell cow running back, which could mean a steady role in a high-powered offense for journeyman Latavius Murray. Murray has played well in numerous offenses throughout his career, and I am expecting the same should he make the Bills final 53-man roster. In 2022 Murray bounced around a bit and still finished the season with 657 rushing yards and 5 touchdowns while adding in 26 receptions for 117 yards (140.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). Should Murray find himself as the lone starter at any point in the year for the Bills I believe he will be a must-start player with top 10 upside because of his pass catching abilities.

Josh Reynolds (WR – DET) – 2 years/$3,000,000 – 32.94% Rostered

I don’t know that Josh Reynolds will be a good option for the entire 2023 season but for the first half of the year I am fully expecting him to be a top 40 wide receiver. The Lions were one of the best teams in the NFL by the end of last season, their passing offense had a ton to do with it and I am expecting that to continue into 2023. Reynolds’ teammate Jameson Williams ($4,365,448) will be suspended for the first six games of the season, and I am expecting him to start slowly upon his return. Should this happen Reynolds production should last around eight games vs six games. Reynolds produced well in a limited role in 2022 posting a stat line of 38 receptions for 479 yards and 3 touchdowns (103.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). If Reynolds ends up taking over the number 2 role for the front half of the season, he could come close to those numbers in just eight games. My prediction would be 29 receptions, 306 yards and 3 touchdowns for him in those games.

$3,000,001 – $5,000,000

DJ Chark (WR – CAR) – 1 year/$5,000,000 – 87.70% Rostered

Chark is the highest rostered player on this list (and his roster percentage keeps going up) and for good reason. In 2022, Chark finished the year with 30 receptions for 502 yards and 3 touchdowns (98.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) despite scoring points in just nine games (10.91 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per each game scored in). If Chark is able to stay healthy for close to a full season, he could easily hit the 1,000-yard mark and at just $5,000,000 in salary, it’s a gamble I am willing to take 10 times out of 10. Chark is in a worse offense this season vs last season when he was on the Lions, but he is playing for a team I am expecting to throw the ball a ton while the youngster Bryce Young ($9,488,768) learns on the fly. If Young is able to pick up things quickly, Chark could find himself as a top 30 wide receiver this season.

$5,000,001 – $7,000,000

Leonard Fournette (RB – Free Agent) – $7,000,000 – 81.35% Rostered

I will try not to speculate much on this one as none of us have a clue where Uncle Lenny will play in 2023. Fournette struggled on the ground last year, but more than made up for it with his massive total of 73 receptions. Fournette finished with a stat line of 668 yards rushing and 3 touchdowns while adding in those 73 receptions for 523 yards and another 3 touchdowns (227.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). If Fournette finds himself with a quarterback that checks down a lot, he will be a productive fantasy player once again in 2023. If you have a Dynasty Owner team with $7,000,000 in available cap space and Fournette is available in the Free Agent Auction in that league, I highly recommend picking him up and holding him as he is a lock to see a pay cut whenever he signs with a new team.

Darius Slayton (WR – NYG) – 2 years/$6,000,000 – 45.63% Rostered

I am still shocked that Darius Slayton is under 50% rostered. Slayton has been an underrated player since he stepped on an NFL field, and he has done nothing but play well and produce since Day 1. In 2022, Slayton finished the year with 46 receptions for 724 yards while adding 2 touchdowns (126.4 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) in his first year with head coach Brian Daboll. The Giants’ new regime signing Slayton to a new deal tells me he will have a guaranteed role in an offense that should get better as the players continue to get more acclimated to the new coaching staff. If Slayton can step up as the Giants number 1 receiver, he will be 100% rostered in no time. Get him while you can!

$7,000,001 – $10,000,000

DeVante Parker (WR – NE) – 1 year/$7,625,000 – 36.11% Rostered

Earlier in the offseason the Patriots gave Parker a contract extension with a slight salary decrease (2 years/$5,400,000 per year), meaning he should be a critical part of their offense over the next couple of years. Parker’s main issue in the NFL has been his inability to stay healthy but when he is on the field he tends to play well. The Patriots will actually have a competent offensive coordinator in 2023 which should only improve Parker’s ability to produce when he is on the field. Parker finished the 2022 season with 31 receptions for 539 yards and 3 touchdowns (102.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points) while missing four games completely due to injury and being limited to only a handful of snaps in two other games. At a salary under $8,000,000, I am more than willing to take a chance on Parker staying healthy. Should he stay healthy, and the offense takes a step forward under Bill O’Brien, Parker could finish in the 900-1,000-yard range for the season.

$10,000,000 and Above

Odell Beckham Jr. (WR – BAL) – 1 year/$15,000,000 – 51.59% Rostered

It’s time for the expensive players! I thought long and hard about putting guys like Mike Williams ($20,000,000) and Courtland Sutton ($15,200,000) on this list, but Williams was over 80% rostered and Sutton is almost at that roster percentage, while Odell Beckham was sitting there just over 50% rostered. I am not sure how I feel about Beckham heading into the season, but I do know I love the Ravens change to Todd Monken as the offensive coordinator and am expecting to see much more passing from the Ravens than we have seen in the past. If Beckham is fully healthy and Lamar Jackson ($52,000,000) takes a step forward as a passer, Beckham could be in line for a solid 2023 season. All of that said it’s an expensive gamble that I probably will not take.

Aaron Rodgers (QB – NYJ) – 3 years/$37,500,000 – 16.67% Rostered

I have ragged on Rodgers plenty over the past season or two and now it’s time to give credit where its due. A week or two ago, Rodgers took the biggest pay cut in American sports history to allow the New York Jets flexibility to sign other players. I must admit I did not expect anything like this from Rodgers, but he seems to be embracing the team for the first time in his career. I could have finished this segment with one question, and I think I will.

Would you rather have Derek Carr or Aaron Rodgers at $37,500,000?

The answer is easily Rodgers which means there are numerous Dynasty Owners who need to use an Amnesty Provision on Carr and pick up Aaron Rodgers.

Thank you all for reading! Be sure to check out all of the upcoming content from me, Matt and Steve plus the Dynasty Owner podcast and the Dynasty Owner Livestream as we gear up for the new season. Stay safe out there and good luck on your 2023 Chase for the Ring!

By Steven Van Tassell (@SteveVT33)

With training camps in full swing, it’s the time of the year when fantasy football analysts overreact to every video posted on Twitter in which a QB either not wearing pads or facing a pass rush that can’t touch him throws a perfect pass to a receiver. The receiver is either wide open or makes a spectacular catch and everybody is ablaze with comments about how they need to be drafted, came into camp in the best shape of their career, and how they are going to take over as the WR1 for (INSERT TEAM NAME HERE). Yes, the (INSERT TEAM NAME HERE) was intentional. There are so many of them that it’s impossible to keep track.

In this article, I’m going to look at players who are likely not rostered in your Dynasty Owner league at this time, prior to the first pre-season game, and suggest that Dynasty Owners take a look at their Free Agent Auction and make a bid on them. They are going to be flyers, dart throws or lottery picks (whatever you like to call them) because they are widely not rostered and may not end up helping your Dynasty Owner team. Because nobody in a majority of Dynasty Owner leagues have these players on their roster a full month after rookie drafts finished and with training camps in session for at least a week for most teams, you’ll likely be able to make a $1 million Dynasty Dollar bid in the Free Agent Auction and have them on your roster. That’s also why they are flyers, dart throws or lottery picks.

All of these players are going to be cheap, so almost all Dynasty Owner teams can roster most of them. I’m talking $2 million per year or less with some under $1 million in salary. Some of them will be veterans, but likely veterans on minimum salary contracts, or close to that amount. No Brandin Cooks ($19,882,000) as even though he’s rostered in only 42.63% of Dynasty Owner leagues as he’s not a flyer or cheap. Most Dynasty Owners know Cooks, but few have him on their rosters because he is very expensive. A few started their NFL careers as undrafted rookie free agents (UDFAs), like James Robinson ($1,010,000) did back in 2020, which may be why they are playing under a really inexpensive contract. Finally, we’ll have those late round rookie draft picks who end up blossoming during their rookie season. Everybody’s favorite Mr. Irrelevant Brock Purdy ($934,252) is the most recent example, but there are plenty of others.

Last year, we had a couple of players with an ADP of 0 in 2022, meaning nobody drafted them in a startup draft, but are now rostered in over 90% of leagues. Besides Purdy, a couple of WRs, Rashid Shaheed ($750,000) and Greg Dortch ($1,010,000) spring to mind. I’m pretty sure that hardly any Dynasty Owners had Shaheed or Dortch on their roster in Week 1, but by the end of the season, they were finishing among the top 70 WRs in Dynasty Owner (WR61 for Dortch and WR67 for Shaheed). Now, they are being drafted, on average, in the 11th-13th round (Shaheed with an ADP of 153.1) or in the 20th-22nd round (Dortch with an ADP of 253.2). They aren’t winning you a League Championship, but you could have put Shaheed or Dortch on your practice squad early in the season last year for cheap, then used them in your lineup during the Dynasty Owner playoffs when they were putting up double-digit points.

The goal here is to identify some of these players well in advance of Week 1. That way when they have that great early season game and Jay Pounds writes about them in his weekly Free Agent Auction targets article, the other Dynasty Owners in your league won’t find them because they aren’t there. They are on your roster already!

For this article, I’m going to give you at least two players per position (no kickers though, you’re welcome). One will be the Flyer and rostered in less than 50% of Dynasty Owner leagues. The second one will be the Deep Flyer who is rostered in less than 15% of Dynasty Owner leagues. I’ll also add in a few bonus players because I like to write and can’t make up my mind sometimes. A few of the bonus players might be slightly over 50% rostered so they can’t be a Flyer, but still deserve to be mentioned. Just so you know, I’m using Flyer over Lottery Pick and Dart Throw because it’s the shortest phrase of the three.

Any salaries, ADPs and roster percentages listed were current as of the afternoon of August 2nd. 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/). Contracts and salaries are always subject to change and can potentially be increased. Check the Dynasty Owner Constitution for the ins and outs of when and how a contract change takes place.

Quarterbacks

Quarterback injuries are going to happen, and some teams are going to start their third string (or even fourth string) QB at some point in the season. It’s much rarer for a QB to take 100% of his team’s snaps during the course of the season. It actually happened last year by Seahawks QB Geno Smith ($25,000,000), while the other three teams in the NFC West were just the opposite and had four QBs play for them at some point.

In fact, more teams had three or more QBs start a game for them during the 2022 regular season (13) than only had one QB start every game (10). Just like NFL teams need plenty of QBs since they are likely to need to start at least two of them during the season, Dynasty Owners need QB depth because of injuries, players getting benched, bye weeks and the need to have two active QBs every week because of Bench scoring.

Good luck predicting which teams are going to be needing more than one QB this year now. In reality, that’s not 100% true as there are teams more likely than others to be playing multiple QBs and end up with someone who was rostered in a very small percentage of Dynasty Owner leagues at some point in the season. Here are my top candidates to be one of those QBs and therefore someone who Dynasty Owners should be keeping an eye on and thinking about rostering now before an injury occurs and everyone wants him.

Flyer: Aidan O’Connell (QB – LV) – 4 years/$1,087,345; 49.40% rostered

Raiders rookie QB Aiden O’Connell isn’t my choice for the rookie backup QB most likely to play in 2023. That’s Arizona rookie QB Clayton Tune ($1,047,655), but Tune is rostered in 81.27% of Dynasty Owner leagues so I had to pivot.

O’Connell is my selection because the depth chart in Las Vegas after starter Jimmy Garoppolo ($24,250,000) shouldn’t be calming the nerves of any Raiders’ fans who are worried about Jimmy’s foot injury. Yes, I know Jimmy passed his physical and I love his talent and that he just wins baby (career regular season record of 40-17 as a starting QB). However, since being traded from New England to San Francisco and making his first start for the 49ers back in December of 2017, he played in less than two-thirds (55 out of 87) of the 49ers’ regular season games. His last full season was back in 2019, when he was 13-3 as a starter and the 49ers went to the Super Bowl.

Let’s be honest here. At 31 years of age and with his injury history, Jimmy is unlikely to start all 17 games for the Raiders in 2023. Add in the fact that the team is likely to be out of the playoff hunt late in the season when your Dynasty Owner team might need a QB the most. We could see O’Connell under center for the Silver and Black during the Dynasty Owner playoffs and if you’re relying on Jimmy to be your Bench QB, then you might want to grab O’Connell just in case.

Deep Flyer: Joshua Dobbs (QB – CLE) – 1 year/$2,000,000; 2.79% rostered

Joshua Dobbs was the choice for Tennessee coach Mike Vrabel at the end of last season over Malik Willis ($1,290,025) as the Titans were desperately trying to hold on to a playoff spot. He wasn’t great with just 22.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in those two games, but that was better than what Willis produced, or Nick Foles ($3,100,000) did when he was thrust into action by Indianapolis. Foles had been on the Colts all season, while Dobbs joined the Titans on December 21st and was starting at QB barely a week later, on December 29th.

If something happens to Deshaun Watson ($46,000,000 and the Browns are still in the playoff chase, don’t be surprised if Dobbs gets the call over rookie Dorian Thompson-Robinson ($1,045,568). Of course, Dobbs will have to beat out Kellen Mond ($1,305,854) for a roster spot during training camp so I wouldn’t go hit the Free Agent Auction for Dobbs until that happens.

Another QB to Consider: Skylar Thompson (QB – MIA) – 3 years/$935,554; 39.44% rostered

As I say all of the time on the Dynasty Owner podcast and Livestream, Tua Tagovailoa ($7,568,859) hasn’t played a full season of football since 2018 and he had multiple concussions last year. While Mike White ($4,000,000) should be the backup QB, he doesn’t qualify for this spot as his salary is too high and he’s rostered in 70.52% of Dynasty Owner leagues. If you have Tua as your Starting QB, but don’t have White on your roster, you may need to go get Thompson before the inevitable Tua injury. Yes, Thompson was terrible when pressed into action last year (19.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in seven games played, including two starts), but he’s cheap, available in a majority of Dynasty Owner leagues and hopefully better if pressed into action this season.

Running Backs

The same thing is true at running back. Injuries are going to happen. NFL teams usually have more RBs on their roster than QBs plus extra RBs on their practice squads who they can call up. Because of Running Back by Committee, load management and other factors, inexpensive RBs who might have a role for their NFL team are hard to find. Because of the salary cap and need for RBs, Dynasty Owners have gobbled up almost all of the inexpensive ones already with 75 RBs being rostered in over 95% of Dynasty Owner leagues.

However, it’s still possible to find RBs who might have a role during the 2023 season. If this article was published last week, not many people would have wondered who the Colts third string RB is, but now everybody is looking at Deon Jackson ($825,000) and wondering if he’s going to be the next Devonta Freeman ($1,075,000) or Latavius Murray ($1,317,500) in 2021 for the Ravens, or the next Ty’Son Williams ($825,000).

Here are some potential 2021 Devonta Freemans for your Dynasty Owner team.

Flyer: Melvin Gordon (RB – BAL) – 1 year/$1,165,000; 29.08% rostered

If you’re discussing RB injuries, then you have to start with the Ravens. At 30 years old, Melvin Gordon is not exactly a perfect player to pick up in a dynasty league. He also ended the 2022 season as a member of the Kansas City Chiefs, but didn’t play any games for the Super Bowl Champions after getting released by the Denver Broncos and picked up by the Chiefs. It wasn’t a great year for Gordon as he was supposed to lead the Broncos backfield after the injury to Javonte Williams ($2,216,438) in Week 4, but ended up getting dropped from the roster. He was RB56 with 82.1 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 10 games played. He also ended up averaging 3.5 yards per carry, tied for his lowest since with his 2015 rookie season with the San Diego Chargers.

Gordon was far better in his two previous seasons in Denver as he finished in the top 20 RBs both years (RB19 in 2021 and RB14 in 2020). By joining the Ravens, he is joining the team with arguably the most injury prone RBs in the NFL. Both J.K. Dobbins ($1,432,359) and Gus Edwards ($4,500,000) missed all of the 2021 season and half of the 2022 regular season combined (Dobbins missed nine games and Edwards missed eight). None of the last three RBs to have over 100 carries in a season for the Ravens are still in Baltimore, so if Dobbins or Edwards misses significant time, Gordon would likely end up as the primary backup at RB. While QB Lamar Jackson ($52,000,000) will likely lead the team in rushing, it wouldn’t be terrible to have Gordon there and hope he picks up a couple of TDs and a few rushing attempts and yards per game.

To be honest, I had Sony Michel ($1,080,000) as my flyer initially and only changed after his retirement was announced. Michel was rostered in only about one-third of Dynasty Owner leagues at that point. It’s difficult to make a choice like this without losing your top pick at the spot, but I think Gordon is a fine replacement.

Deep Flyer: Ty Montgomery (RB – NE) – 1 year/$1,800,000; 13.15% rostered

With Montgomery missing all but one game last season and suffering an injury in practice last Thursday, this may not be a great choice, but as I said above, there aren’t a lot of players to choose from here. However, Patriots coach Bill Belichick is reportedly not concerned so I won’t be either.

Last year, Montgomery had 11.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in his one game (Week 1 versus Miami when he had -2 rushing yards, 3 receptions, 15 receiving yards, 28 return yards, 1 TD). He played 21 out of 57 snaps on offense in that one game, which is a pretty healthy snap share. Of course, that was then, and this is now as new Patriots Offensive Coordinator Bill O’Brien will (hopefully) have a better offensive philosophy for the team than Matt Patricia. That might not include a big role for Montgomery. There’s also the possibility of the Patriots signing Ezekiel Elliott ($15,000,000) and Montgomery having a more reduced role.

However, Belichick values versatility and Montgomery was a WR before being moved to RB plus has the ability to return kicks. That versatility should help Montgomery make the roster if he’s healthy, even if Elliott is added to the team. At this point with a deep RB flyer, all I’m thinking about is making the roster and having a chance to carve out playing time which is why Montgomery is my choice here.

Another RB to Consider: Ke’Shawn Vaughn (RB – TB) – 1 year/$1,188,999; 54.58% rostered

While it’s true that Vaughn is rostered in more than half of Dynasty Owner leagues, he was rostered in just under that many (47.39%) as recently as just before the Buccaneers started training camp. That was before the news about him entering camp as the primary backup to Rachaad White ($1,282,500) broke. Since then, Dynasty Owners in a few leagues have decided that Vaughn might be worth picking up.

For an early third round pick, Vaughn really hasn’t been given many opportunities in Tampa Bay, but that could change now that the G.O.A.T. Tom Brady isn’t at QB and Leonard Fournette ($7,000,000) isn’t on the roster either. Vaughn has always been the third RB on the Buccaneers’ roster and in three years, he only has 79 carries in 37 games. In 20 of those 37 games, he failed to register a rushing attempt or a target.

When he has gotten the chance, he hasn’t performed badly. Overall, he has a career average of 4.3 yards per carry (342 yards on 79 carries) and in the seven games in which he has carried the ball more than five times in a game, he is averaging 4.9 yards per carry (287 yards on 58 carries). It’s possible that Vaughn just needs a chance and that he might get it in the final year of his rookie contract as long as he can beat out Chase Edmonds ($1,232,500), Patrick Laird ($895,000) and undrafted rookie free agent Sean Tucker ($898,333). Tucker is one of the RBs rostered in over 95% of Dynasty Owner leagues. If Vaughn beats Tucker out to be White’s backup, Vaughn should merit consideration as a RB to pick up unless you do it earlier than everybody else and get him now.

Another RB to Consider: Raheem Blackshear (RB – CAR) – 1 year/$750,000; 51.0% rostered

I really like Blackshear and picked him up in a couple of Dynasty Owner leagues last year after he had a good game in Week 9 and was the Value Player of the Week. In case you aren’t familiar, the Value Player of the Week is the player who has the lowest Dynasty Dollar per Point (DD/PT) value for a week. Normally, only players under $1 million win the award because it’s difficult to have that low of a DD/PT value at much more because one low salary player is likely to get 20.0 or so Dynasty Owner fantasy points in a given week. Blackshear had 17.5 Dynasty Owner fantasy points the week he won it.

Blackshear only had a total of 55.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 13 games played (4.28 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game), but he had two games with more than 10.0 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and another with 9.9 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, so he would have helped on your Bench three times as an undrafted rookie.

Obviously, Blackshear isn’t going to be the Panthers’ starting RB. That’s Miles Sanders’ ($6,350,000) job. However, with only 5 RBs on the Panthers’ roster, Blackshear has the opportunity to carve out a role as a third down pass catcher out of the backfield and late-game garbage time ball carrier. He led the team in kickoff returns in 2022 and if he maintains that role, he’ll have an opportunity with the ball in his hands every week. There are more than 50 RBs who make the NFL league minimum of $750,000 and Blackshear is one of the best positioned of those players to log meaningful snaps during the season and the least rostered of the players who might get those chances.

Wide Receivers

There are 683 WRs currently listed on the Dynasty Owner platform and plenty to choose from who fit the flyer criteria outlined earlier. With teams like the Giants having 13 WRs on their roster, down from 15 earlier in the off-season, it’s difficult to even figure out who among the inexpensive and low-rostered players might make the team, never mind who is going to this season’s Rashid Shaheed or Greg Dortch. However, that’s the task at hand, so let’s give it a try.

Flyer: Trent Sherfield (WR – BUF) – 1 year/$1,770,000; 27.09% rostered

After being the clear WR3 on the Dolphins last year behind Tyreek Hill ($30,000,000) and Jaylen Waddle ($6,771,498) and performing well by finishing the season as WR88 with 83.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points, it was surprising to see the Dolphins let Sherfield go in free agency. When the Bills picked Sherfield up shortly after releasing Isaiah McKenzie ($1,232,500), he seemed to be McKenzie’s most likely replacement as the Bills’ slot receiver. Not a bad spot to be in as McKenzie was WR51 in 2022, scored 127.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points and was targeted 65 times.

Personally, I expected Sherfield to be a popular off-season pickup after signing with a team that passes the ball nearly 60% of the time. The Bills do still have Stefon Diggs ($24,000,000) and Gabriel Davis ($998,595), but Davis didn’t perform nearly as well as anticipated in 2022 and the possibility exists that another WR could vault ahead of him this season. Based on roster percentage, Dynasty Owners are clearly favoring Khalil Shakir ($1,001,787) as that guy since he is rostered in almost every Dynasty Owner league (99.2% rostered). However, it’s not inconceivable that it could be Sherfield who emerges instead of Shakir.

I have Sherfield in five out of my six Dynasty Owner leagues and he’s on the Free Agent Auction in the sixth league, but my roster is already at the 30-man limit in that league. That should tell you how I feel about Sherfield and it’s heartening to see stories in the Buffalo press backing up my good feelings.

Deep Flyer: Justin Watson (WR – KC) – 2 years/$1,700,000; 3.98% rostered

Watson has a $1.38 million guaranteed salary for 2023 between his signing bonus and 2023 salary, which is a pretty good sign that the Chiefs like him and want him to make the roster. He has received praise recently from Head Coach Andy Reid who used words like “smart”, “talented”, “detailed” and “very important” to describe Watson. That’s another good sign for Watson’s chances of making the team and contributing in the place of departed WRs JuJu Smith-Schuster ($8,500,000) and Mecole Hardman ($4,500,000) who had 135 targets combined last year.

I remember seeing Watson on the field during the Super Bowl when Smith-Schuster was out with an injury, and he had two receptions for 18 yards and two first downs in the game. He ended up playing 33 snaps on offense, which was 60% of the team’s offensive snaps, and third among Kansas City WRs. While it’s usually not good to read too much into one game, I’m going to do just that because the one game was the Super Bowl! The fact that the Chiefs had enough confidence in Watson to use him on a majority of the offensive snaps in the team’s biggest game of the season says a lot to me.

His regular season stats weren’t gaudy at all in 2022 with just 51.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 16 games, or 3.24 Dynasty Owner fantasy points per game. He also only caught 15 passes while being targeted 34 times, a poor 44% catch rate. That’s why he’s only rostered in a handful of Dynasty Owner leagues. However, if Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000) needs a WR to throw to who he trusts early in the season, don’t be surprised if Watson is that receiver.

Rookie to Watch: Tyler Scott (WR – CHI) – 4 years/$1,125,863; 42.23% rostered

The fourth round rookie from Cincinnati is a deep threat and could be the type of player who could help Bears QB Justin Fields ($4,717,989) stretch the field and benefit from likely double coverage on fellow WR DJ Moore ($20,628,000). Scott has been receiving praise from Bears Offensive Coordinator Luke Getsy early in training camp, which is good news for Bears fans. If neither Darnell Mooney ($894,263) nor Chase Claypool ($1,654,156) live up to expectations in the final year of their rookie contracts after injuries curtailed their 2022 seasons, the Bears might look to Scott as the WR of the future opposite Moore.

Tight Ends

Let’s be honest here. Nobody is finding an inexpensive TE in the Free Agent Auction who isn’t on too many Dynasty Owner rosters and can be plugged into your Starting lineup. Basically, you’re hoping for a guy who can be fill-in on your Bench for a bye week or two or maybe performs well enough early in the year to be a viable Bench replacement at the end of the year. If you need more than that, then you should have drafted a TE in your rookie draft as there were a lot of them to take and most were available after the first round. Dalton Kincaid ($3,356,756) was the exception, and his rookie draft ADP was still 10.1.

All of the top TEs are rostered in over 95% of Dynasty Owner leagues with many 100% rostered. A lot of low salary TEs are widely rostered, as are six rookie TEs. Not a lot of players to pick up, but here are a few who you can put a bid on and see how well they perform in training camp.

Flyer: Cole Turner (TE – WAS) – 3 years/$999,720; 39.84% rostered

Last year, I thought Commanders TE John Bates ($1,050,604) could help out Dynasty Owners and he didn’t do much with just 29.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points in 16 games. With new offensive coordinator Eric (Sleeping with) Bieniemy (one of my favorite Chris Berman nicknames out there) in Washington for his first season, the potential is there for someone on the Commanders to become the next Travis Kelce ($14,312,500). While Logan Thomas ($8,021,667) is the starter, his salary makes him ineligible for this spot. He is also 32 years old; two years separated from his 2020 breakout season and has missed 13 games over the past two seasons.

Turner could step into the TE void in Washington. Commanders head coach Ron Rivera was reportedly excited about Turner last season, but then an Achilles injury followed by a concussion robbed him of several games and he barely played in the 10 games that he suited up and had just 4.3 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (2 receptions for 23 yards). Well, that was then, and this is now and with the addition of Bieniemy, the Commanders not drafting a TE in the NFL Draft or adding any via free agency and Thomas’ age, it could be time for a new top TE to emerge and catch passes from Sam Howell ($1,005,400). Turner is available in just under three-fifths of Dynasty Owner leagues and a bargain at just $280 less than $1 million.

Deep Flyer: Will Mallory (TE – IND) – 4 years/$1,032,648; 5.18% rostered

It’s All About the U, isn’t it? Enjoy the video for a minute, then come back and read the rest of the article. Great video and introduction to a great 30 for 30 episode. Mallory played for Miami about 35 years too late and is even a dozen years younger than new Saints TE Jimmy Graham ($1,317,500). Mallory improved his pass catching stats every year for the Hurricanes and finished the 2022 season with 42 receptions for 538 receiving yards and 3 TDs, which ranked him inside the top 15 college TEs in receptions and receiving yards. He finished his college career off against Pitt by catching 9 passes for 103 yards and a TD.

There is a long tradition of quality Hurricanes TEs in the NFL and Will Mallory could be the next one. He’s probably fourth on the Colts depth chart at the position and started training camp off on the Physically Unable to Perform (PUP) list due to a right foot/ankle injury. All that means is the other Dynasty Owners in your league won’t think about grabbing him now. Combined, the three Colts’ TEs had 75 receptions for 803 receiving yards and 6 TDs last year, but none of them separated themselves as the top guy. Mallory could develop a connection with fellow rookie Anthony Richardson ($8,498,508) in a new Colts offense and if you have roster space, a little over $1 million in salary cap space and time to be patient with him, Mallory might be your guy. Remember, there is a TE taken in the third round or later of the NFL Draft who breaks out every year. Mallory was drafted in the fifth round this year and could be the one.

Another TE to Consider: Elijah Higgins (TE – MIA) – 4 years/$1,003,971; 27.09% rostered

Higgins was a WR at Stanford, but is being converted to TE. Miami is a good landing spot for him as the Dolphins’ top TE in 2022, Mike Gesicki ($4,500,000), was not re-signed and went to New England. Gesicki wasn’t great with just 98.2 Dynasty Owner fantasy points (32 receptions, 362 receiving yards, 5 TDs) to finish as TE22. The three veteran TEs on the team now, Durham Smythe ($3,500,000), Eric Saubert ($1,685,000) and Tyler Kroft ($1,290,000), combined for similar numbers with 86.7 Dynasty Owner fantasy points on 34 receptions, 334 receiving yards and 2 TDs in 2022, so none of them are great either.

While the approach of replacing Gesicki with the combination of Smythe, who was on the Dolphins last year, Saubert and Kroft might work for Billy Beane and the Oakland A’s in baseball, it’s probably not what the Dolphins plan to do. Admittedly, whoever the TE is in Miami will be the fourth option at best, but with Higgins being a rookie and learning a new position, I’m ok with it. Higgins might not help your Dynasty Owner team until late in the year, or even next year, but he was Stanford’s top receiver in each of the past two seasons with a total of 104 receptions for 1,204 receiving yards so he knows how to catch passes. Those pass catching skills could translate to the NFL and the other stuff can come later as he learns his new position.

Another TE to Consider: Jeremy Ruckert (TE – NYJ) – 3 years/$1,261,227; 35.06% rostered

Ruckert barely played for the Jets in 2022 as he was only on the field for 46 offensive snaps and had just 1 reception for 8 yards (1.8 Dynasty Owner fantasy points). He was expected to do more after being drafted in the third round of the NFL Draft out of Ohio State in 2022, but the Jets also signed free agent TEs Tyler Conklin ($6,750,000) and C.J. Uzomah ($8,000,000) and both of them played a lot.  Conklin didn’t miss a game last year and Uzomah missed just two.

With a new QB in town in Aaron Rodgers ($37,500,000), it could be wide open for Ruckert to come in and play a little bit this season. With Uzomah having a very high salary and a poor 2022 season, it’s possible that the Jets move on and give the backup spot to Ruckert. Fortunately, the Jets haven’t brought on any former Green Bay Packers TEs to compete for playing time. Not yet, but it’s still early.

The Jets invested a pretty high draft pick in Ruckert and while they drafted Zack Kuntz ($989,190) in the seventh round this year, Ruckert still has more draft capital and a year of experience which should give him getting the opportunity to play ahead of Kuntz. If you drafted Ruckert last season or picked him up off the Free Agent Auction and kept him for the entire 2022 season, then now is not the time to bail on him. And if he’s available in your league, as he is about two-thirds of Dynasty Owner leagues, then he could be worth grabbing and seeing how he meshes with Rodgers.

Conclusion

What does everyone think of these dart throws? Anybody spending a dollar (aka $1 million Dynasty Dollars) on these lottery tickets? If there is anyone who you are 100% sure that I’m completely wrong about, let me and everyone know on Twitter. Make sure to tag me (@SteveVT33) and Dynasty Owner (@Dynasty_Owner) in your tweet and pile on the likes from the rest of the Dynasty Owner community. And be sure to check back at the end of the 2023 season so we can all count how many of these guys I got wrong.

Out of all 14 flyers listed, I feel most confident in Trent Sherfield who I had on a non-Dynasty Owner league dynasty roster last year and felt was underappreciated in Miami. If he continues with how he’s played so far in training camp, he could be the WR2 in Buffalo behind Stefon Diggs.

The biggest reach out of this group is probably Joshua Dobbs. As I said earlier, if Deshaun Watson goes out, it might be Dorian Thompson-Robinson, since he is only rostered in 29.08% of Dynasty Owner leagues and who I considered for the Aidan O’Connell spot, who replaces Watson. Dobbs could also get cut during training camp. It’s happened to him before by the Browns. However, I think Jimmy G is more likely to get hurt than Watson, so I went with O’Connell, then Dobbs.

Because I’m a Patriots fan, you might think that I want the Ty Montgomery prediction to come true the most, but you would be wrong. That would mean the 30-year old Montgomery is playing meaningful snaps for New England in 2023. Instead, it’s Raheem Blackshear as I grabbed him last year in a couple of leagues after our 2023 Chase for the Ring Champion Dynasty|Trade|School (D|T|S) Rudolph Valentine (@DynastyTradeU) flagged him as the potential best pickup in Carolina after the Panthers traded Christian McCaffrey ($16,015,875).

If reading this article makes you want to draft a Dynasty Owner startup draft, then  join a startup drafts this all summer before the start of the NFL season. Go to your D.O. Store, click on New Team for 2023, and find a time when you can draft this weekend, or a weekend in the future. You can also Create A League for a specific day and write and invite friends who you want to play in a Dynasty Owner league. If anyone of those friends are new to Dynasty Owner, give them your affiliate code and get a $49 referral fee. Don’t forget to give everyone you know the most recent promo code (STARTUP) for $10 off a new team.

While you’re waiting to draft one of these flyers in your next startup draft, or just looking at your current teams to see who’s available, Dynasty Owner has plenty of other content to help you out. Matt Morrison – The Jerk started looking at players with updated 2023 contracts for this season in his Contract Spotlight series. The most recent one is about Terry McLaurin. The last article from Jay Pounds was about some of the top Free Agents available. It’s a full list of different players so go check it out if you haven’t read it already.

Jay and I also do a weekly Dynasty Owner podcast and we also have a weekly Friday Livestream with me and Dynasty Owner CEO Tim Peffer. The Livestream is usually on at 11 AM on Friday, but check every week to make sure of the time and go back and watch previous episodes on the Dynasty Owner YouTube channel. There are a few episodes with live mock drafts from earlier in the off-season that were a lot of fun. Finally, don’t forget to follow Dynasty Owner on Twitter. Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Steven Van Tassell is the Head of Content for Dynasty Owner

Follow us on Twitter: @SteveVT33 and @Dynasty_Owner

By Matt Morrison (@dynastyjerk)

The month of July has concluded which means there is only one full month left before September. That’s right…real NFL games are almost a month away. Given this milestone (and the fact that I haven’t talked about it much) today I’m going to bring back the news segment for this article. This will not be every bit of news from the off-season, but it will be the major highlights from the past couple of months.

The News

Let’s start with the oldest news and work our way forward.

Dalvin Cook ($12,600,000)

Cook was released by the Vikings in early June to clear up cap space. He remains unsigned (as of submission of this article for publication), but I am very confident he will be picked up by a team either this off-season or shortly after the NFL season starts.

Evan Engram ($13,750,000)

Engram signed a contract extension with the Jaguars. He will be locked in with them for the next three years. In my opinion, this should make him a Top 12 tight end for the entire three year period.

Denzel Mims ($1,358,425)

Not really major news here, but I felt it was worth noting since we don’t see many late July trades in the NFL. Denzel Mims was traded from the Jets to the Lions. Trade compensation for the Jets was about as minimal as it gets. The trade was…

• Mims and a 2025 7th round draft pick for a 2025 conditional 6th round draft pick

The condition is that if Mims doesn’t make the Lions’ 53-man roster in 2023, then the Jets receive no compensation. At best, the Jets move up a single round two drafts from now. It appears the market for the former second round wide receiver is as low as it gets.

DeAndre Hopkins ($13,000,000)

Hopkins has signed a two year contract with the Tennessee Titans. The contract is worth $13,000,000 per year, and that is now reflected in his salary on Dynasty Owner.  If you took a chance on rostering Hopkins through his free agency, then you have been handsomely rewarded. I wouldn’t say this is the greatest landing spot for him (Kansas City comes to mind as a better spot), but it is also not the worst. He will immediately slide in as the best wide receiver on the team, and I am projecting a Top 24 finish this year.

The other side of the coin is talking about Treylon Burks ($3,592,398). This certainly isn’t a “death sentence” for Burks, but I struggled to make a case for this being good for him either.  Burks will no longer be “the only receiving option” for Tennessee, and he will likely no longer receive the highest target share on the team. This is fairly bad news for a player on a low volume passing team already. We already know that the Titans’ offense runs through Derrick Henry ($12,500,000), and it is a good assumption that this year will be much of the same. I dropped Burks more than 10 spots in my 2023 rankings, but didn’t see that much movement in my overall Dynasty Owner rankings.

Jimmy Garoppolo ($24,250,000)

Garoppolo broke his foot in Week 13 and did not return for the rest of the 2022 season. He had corrective surgery in March and signed with the Raiders (with an injury waiver addendum added to his contract) right before the surgery. Raiders’ coach Josh McDaniels stated last week that Garoppolo is healing and has no restrictions as he enters training camp. That’s not to say that they won’t ease him back into action, but he appears to be on the fast track to a healthy pre-season. It goes without saying that this is great news for Davante Adams ($28,000,000) who will look to improve on a WR4 finish last year.

Saquon Barkley ($10,091,000)

Barkley has officially signed his contract with the New York Giants. The number that he signed for is exactly the franchise tag plus $909,000 in possible incentives ($11,000,000 in total). I’m sure this isn’t exactly what Saquon wanted, but it’s what he received, and it guarantees that he will not be holding out this year. It’s surprising that this is all that it took to get a one year deal done. Regardless, Dynasty Owners with Barkley on their rosters can sleep well knowing that their Top 5 projected running back will be playing in an all-important contract year.

Justin Herbert ($6,644,689)

On July 25th, Herbert agreed to a brand new contract extension. Initial reports say the extension is worth 262.5 million dollars over 5 years. This equates to $52,500,000 per year, and it makes him the highest paid player in the NFL and Dynasty Owner next year. 

***Keep in mind that per the Dynasty Owner Constitution this extension will not come into play for Dynasty Owners until the 2024 season***

Judging by how Patrick Mahomes ($45,000,000) and Lamar Jackson ($52,000,000) are both over 90 percent rostered in Dynasty Owner, it’s safe to say that Herbert will not be dropped in many leagues.

As I said at the top, this obviously isn’t the entirety of the news this off-season, but it’s a few highlights over the last couple of months.

Contract Spotlight

Terry McLaurin ($22,788,000)

As always, let’s start with the facts before we get into my opinions. Terry McLaurin finished the 2022 season as the WR20. While WR20 isn’t a league winner ranking, he was an amazing value given his 2022 salary of $961,918. In fact, McLaurin was one of the best wide receiver values in Dynasty Owner in 2022. Terry is projected as the WR21 coming into the 2023 season.  He received a contract extension which is worth $22,788,000 per year.

It remains to be seen if his quarterback situation will be more favorable this season when compared to last. I can’t imagine that it will be worse. Instead of some combination of Taylor Heineke ($7,000,000), Carson Wentz ($32,000,000) and Sam Howell ($1,005,400), the Commanders will have some combination of Sam Howell and Jacoby Brissett ($8,000,000). So, what is the outlook for McLaurin?

I think a Top 24 finish is likely for Terry, but I also think a Top 12 is unlikely. He is sandwiched safely in the WR2 zone. This may seem like a lot of money to spend on a low upside receiver (and it is), but if you can afford him, it will be a production benefit.  Even as a Bench wide receiver, he will outperform most of your opponents’ Bench receivers. As I have said with almost every player in this year’s New Contract Spotlight series, they will never be the value that they once were, but that doesn’t mean they have no value either. This is also true of McLaurin. I have him on my roster in a handful of Dynasty Owner leagues, and I get a warm, comfortable feeling when I see him in my FLEX position. He’s a high floor, low ceiling player that isn’t the sexiest pick, but he will perform.

As always, thank you for reading. I would appreciate it if you followed @Dynasty_Owner on Twitter as well as subscribed to Dynasty Owner on YouTube. Thank you all. Take care and be safe.

TheJerk