Making a trade in your Fantasy Football league can be a complicated process. You’ve gotta figure out what you’ve got and how to value them, and then you’ve gotta figure out what you need and are willing to give up to get it. Then, you’ve gotta find a trading partner who is willing to give you what you need while accepting what you’re giving up. If you do it right, both sides can walk away from the deal feeling good about their part in the process; if you do your job really well, you’ll feel even better about your part in the process.
There’s a lot that goes into that, obviously, and the Fantasy Football Today team is here to help you out when you’re looking to make a trade. In Wednesday’s FFT Newsletter, I wrote about five players I’m looking to buy and five I’m hoping I can sell right now, so that should give you some ideas when looking to build a trade. And Dave Richard’s Trade Values Chart can help you figure out whether you’re putting together a fair offer, or whether you’re about to get ripped off.
Sometimes, we even like to answer your questions directly, so I looked through my inbox — subscribe to the newsletter here and email me with the subject line #AskFFT at Chris.Towers@CBSi.com to get in contact — and sent out a call on Twitter asking for our reader’s trade questions. Here are the answers to some of the most interesting we received:
Brad: I can barely field a team with the amount of injuries I’ve suffered through the last few weeks. What are your thoughts on trading injured players? Do I look to trade A.J. Brown and Logan Thomas for players that I can actually use? I am 1-3 and scored very few points the last two weeks because I’ve had multiple players knocked out in my lineup.
It’s always tough to trade an injured player because you are almost always going to have to take a loss on them. But it’s also important to remember that a player can have very different values to different teams. If you’re 4-0, acquiring David Montgomery right now could make a lot of sense — if you go .500 the rest of the way, you’ll be 9-5 when the playoffs arrive and should be pretty much guaranteed a spot. If you get Montgomery back in Week 11 and have him as your RB2 for the playoffs, you’re going to be pretty thrilled.
However, at 1-3, you need to start to turn your season around, and hanging on to a player because they have upside for the playoffs doesn’t have much value to you. Obviously, that isn’t the scenario with Brown, who will likely return in the next two weeks from his hamstring injury. However, if you lose in Week 5 and fall to 1-4, having Brown back for Week 6 is going to be a small consolation. I would be looking to move Brown if I’m 1-3, but I wouldn’t be settling for a significant discount, because I think he’ll still be one of the 10 best WR in Fantasy when healthy. I would be looking for someone like Diontae Johnson plus another piece in exchange for him.
Ronald: Should I give up Justin Jefferson to get DeAndre Hopkins and Trey Sermon?
I can see the idea behind this deal, but Dave has this one as a loss for you based on the trade chart, and I tend to agree with that. I think Hopkins will be better than he has been moving forward, but the Cardinals are spreading the ball around a ton this season, and with four reliable wide receivers — up from maybe 1.5 last season — it makes sense that they would continue to do so. Hopkins has still been effective on a per-target basis, he’s just on pace for about 60% as many targets as he had last season. Meanwhile, Jefferson has been pretty much exactly as advertised so far. Obviously, it’s not just a one-for-one between Jefferson and Hopkins, but I’m not convinced Sermon’s role is secure as the 49ers lead back and his lack of usage in the passing game especially makes me think there just isn’t much upside here. I would rather have Jefferson.
Jacob: For an RB needy team, who would be fair compensation for either Dak Prescott or Jalen Hurts if I moved one of them?
Going by the trade chart, you’re looking at someone in the mid-to-low RB2 range. I would be aiming for Chase Edmonds, who is RB12 on the season in PPR leagues despite not having a touchdown yet. I think you could pull that off for either Prescott or Hurts, and I would ask for an additional piece, just to see — not many people are as bought in on Edmonds as I am.
On the one hand, Kamara has been a pretty sizable disappointment to date, which means you might just be selling him at the low point of his value. On the other hand, with his role in the passing game shrinking amid an overall drop in passing volume for the Saints, are we sure this is the nadir for Kamara’s value? It is worth keeping some perspective here: Kamara still ranks 14th at RB despite having no targets in Week 4 and having no rushing touchdowns despite 78 carries. He’s still a must-start RB even if what we’ve seen so far sustains, but there’s also plenty of room for him to be much better than that moving forward, obviously, if the Saints stop being so run-heavy and find him more opportunities near the goal line.
Ultimately when it comes to Kamara, I think you’re probably better off holding him unless someone values him as an elite PPR option. Selling low on Kamara is a greater risk than holding on to him still.
I’m buying in on both because it’s not like we’re dealing with just the sample size of this season with either. As I pointed out in my Week 4 RB rankings, Johnson has played 16 games with at least a 50% snap share since the start of 2019, and here are his numbers: 185 targets, 117 catches, 1,235 yards, and nine touchdowns. The Steelers offense is dysfunctional, and Johnon’s role is a product of that dysfunction, but he’s also been the only way they can consistently move the ball since the start of last season, so why should we worry he’ll suddenly be used differently? It just isn’t a concern for me, even if Ben Roethlisberger gets benched. He should be in the top-12 discussion all season long.
And if you go back to Week 12 of the 2020 season with Brown, here’s what his 16-game pace looks like: 75 catches, 1,146 yards, and 12 touchdowns. To a certain extent, that is an arbitrary endpoint, but it’s worth remembering that Week 11 was the low point of Brown’s 2020 season, as he had just three targets and zero catches. They’ve made a point to get him more involved since, and he and Lamar Jackson have shown a great connection on deep balls. His downfield-oriented role is going to lead to some inconsistency, but I’m viewing Brown as a borderline WR2 the rest of the way.
Now, of course, that doesn’t mean you can’t trade either if you get the right value. But I think there’s enough skepticism around both that it probably won’t be worth it. With Johnson, there’s a perception that his production is a gimmick that can’t sustain, but unless the Steelers can figure out how to protect Roethlisberger and get him to be more accurate on downfield throws, Johnson is going to remain the focal point. And with Brown, the Ravens have the looming return of first-rounder Rashod Bateman to worry about, and his three-drop game in Week 3 surely sticks in some folk’s brains — as does the (incorrect, mind you) perception that Jackson just isn’t a good passer. I just don’t think you can get enough for either to consider moving them.
I love this trade. Sure, you’re giving up two starting running backs and getting just one back, which is always a bit worrisome given the state of the position. However, outside of bye weeks or injuries, I don’t think there’s much risk that you’ll end up missing Latavius Murray. Chubb is, obviously, awesome, but I would still take Dalvin Cook over him moving forward, even with concerns about his ankle. Acquiring Mark Andrews when you already have Travis Kelce isn’t the most efficient use of a roster spot, but I think he’ll be much better than Murray going forward, so the value is too obvious to pass up. I do worry that the general perception of Andrews is a little lower than it should be, so trading him right now may not be the best option, but I also think things will get better for him. See if you can trade him for someone like Edmonds or Antonio Gibson, and if not, stick him in your flex spot and keep shopping him until you get what you want.
I think the Calvin Ridley/Darrell Henderson side might be getting the better of both parts of this deal. As I said earlier, I’m betting on Hopkins being better than he has so far, but I’m even more confident in Ridley getting there, because Ridley is already getting the usage. He’s on pace for a whopping 179 targets and his catch rate is actually up from last season, so he’s averaging a career-best 6.8 yards per target. Some of that is obviously influenced by a drop in his average depth of target from 14.3 to 10.8, but he also saw a handful of deep targets in Week 4 and had a chance to make a play on three of them that ended up incomplete. He’ll hit on those moving forward, and I really don’t have any concerns about him.
Kareem Hunt vs. Darrell Henderson is a closer call, in my eyes, just because Hunt is such a good bet for touchdowns in this Browns offense, having 14 of them in his last 20 games. He won’t routinely get the kind of workload that makes him productive even if he doesn’t find the end zone, however, while Henderson looks pretty much locked into a huge workload every week — that’s how the Rams have used him in the 2-plus games he’s been healthy for. The question is whether he’ll be able to hold up to that kind of usage, but as long as he’s healthy, I’ll probably have him ranked ahead of Hunt. This is a big win for the side getting Ridley and Henderson.
Not really a great time to be trying to trade the likes of Julio Jones, Allen Robinson, and Tee Higgins, obviously, with two of them being hurt and Robinson off to a dreadful start. Which means your best option is to probably just hang on to them and hope one of them lives up to their potential. Jones and Robinson still have top-12 upside, and Higgins’ ceiling is probably similar even with the rapid ascension of Ja’Marr Chase. I’d say your chances of one of those guys ending up as a top-15 WR the rest of the way is a lot higher than your chances of any combination of the three of them netting you one. Sometimes, it’s about the trades you don’t make.
