852: 15 Transactions for Week 16

JJ Zachariason (0:11)

What's up, everyone? It's JJ Zachariason in this episode 852 of The Late-Round Fantasy Football Podcast, sponsored by FanDuel. Thanks for tuning in. As I mentioned last week, this 15 Transactions show, it's a little bit different at the end of the fantasy season. Rather than giving you buy and sell transactions, I'm just focused on ads and drops. So every transaction that you hear is solely about the waiver wire. That's because trade deadlines have passed. With that being said, let's get to the first transaction of the week.

Add Ty Chandler. So a lot of the transactions that I talked about last week, they're still applicable to this week.

Whether it's adding Clyde Owards-Alaire or Zameer White. But he's a special case. I need to repeat this transaction because his week 15 was very, very impactful. He took over for Alexander Madison as Minnesota's lead back against Cincinnati. He saw a 96% running back rush share and a 12.5% target share in that game. He scored about 25 PPR points. Now, why it took this long for the Vikings to feature Ty Chandler? I have no idea. As someone who touted Chandler at the start of the season, yeah, it's kind of frustrating. I'm not going to lie. But it's pretty clear that his performance against Cincy, it should mean that he's going to see more work over the next couple of weeks, even if Madison is back and healthy in week 16

I don't know if that's going to be the case, though. According to Dr. Edwin Porras, Madison seems more likely to come back in week 17 than week 16 That would mean another week of Ty Chandler being this team's lead back.

Add Dontavian Wicks.

I've talked about Dontavian Wicks quite a bit over the last month and a half on this show. He's had a really, really underrated rookie season. He's leading that Packers team right now in yards per outrun. Without Christian Watson this past week against Tampa Bay, Wicks ran the second most routes at wide receiver for the Packers. He had a 19.4% target share. He caught six of seven balls for 97 yards. Now, something else happened in that game to help Wicks out, and that was a Jayden Reed injury that happened at the beginning of the fourth quarter. His status right now, totally up in the air. So is Christian Watson's.

But both of those injuries could mean a lot of Dontavian Wicks in Week 16 So I would add him just in case.

Add Tucker Kraft. So another Packers pass catcher who's benefiting from these injuries is Tucker Kraft. Kraft is basically just playing the Luke Musgrave role in this Packers offense. You could argue he's doing a better job at it. He's now seen target shares of 17%, 11% and 17% over his last three. He scored double-digit PPR points in each of his last two. So given the injury question marks around this Green Bay Packers passing attack, Kraft could walk into a 15% target share here in Week 16 pretty easily. That's enough to be usable in fantasy football at a tight end.

Add Curtis Samuel. Another player that I've talked about a lot this season on this show, Curtis Samuel, man. He's been getting it done for a lot of the season, and fantasy managers just don't seem to care. He's still out there in 63% of Yahoo! Leagues, despite a 25.5% target share per game rate over his last three. Now, the commanders have a tough couple of weeks coming up. They get the Jets and then the 49ers. But the Jets have allowed a top-five target share to the slot this season. Samuel could see six or seven targets in that matchup, and the commanders are likely to be a pass-heavy team and week 17 when they get the 49ers. So given how he's performed this season, I think he's definitely worth an ad.

Drop Sam Howell. Now, look, Sam Howell has had a great season from a value perspective. He was drafted as an afterthought in most fantasy drafts this year, and he's basically been a low-end QB1, high-end QB2 in points per game. He's been a nice value. But in a lot of formats right now, you can probably drop him. Howell was benched in week 15 It does sound like the commanders are going to go back to him in week 16, but him being benched, not a great sign. This week, Howell is going to get the Jets. New York has been the toughest matchup for quarterbacks this season by Adjusted Fantasy Points Allowed. Chances are you're not going to feel great about Sam Howell here in week 16 And chances are, from a probability standpoint, from a projection standpoint, Sam Howell is not going to have a great game against the Jets.