911: 10 Trends for Week 3

JJ Zachariason (0:11)

What's up, everyone? It's JJ Zachariason. In this episode, 911 of The Late-Round Fantasy Football Podcast, sponsored by Underdog Fantasy. Thanks for tuning in. Before getting to this week's 10 Trends, I want to remind you to check out Underdog Fantasy. Underdog is the best and easiest place to play fantasy sports. And right now, if you sign up with promo code LATEROUND, you get three things. You get a deposit bonus, which is always a plus, you get a free pick, and you get a copy of my rest of season rankings. Those rankings and tiers, they're emailed to you after you sign up and they're updated every Tuesday. You get those updates every single week with that link. All you have to do is head to underdogfantasy.com and use promo code LATEROUND when you sign up. Once you make a deposit, you'll get the offers. Again, that's promo code LATEROUND. Now let's get to these trends. I almost had Chris Godwin as a cell candidate in the 50 Transaction Show this week, but I'm glad that I didn't, because it looks like that I'm higher on him than other analysts right now. But if someone's valuing him like a top 10 wide receiver rest of season, something along those lines, I do think there's reason to treat him like I said to treat JK Dobbins this week, to aim high with a trade offer. Godwin has about a 33% target share. He scored over 20 PPR points in each of his first two games. He did that once last year. Now, I've talked about how he'd play more in the slot in 2024 That was widely reported. And this is an offense that can help that slot roll. He's run 58% of his routes from the slot this year. That rate was 78% in week two. Now, with all that being said, we can recognize he's going to outpace his ADP while also recognizing that what he's currently doing is unsustainable. He's been above a two yards per route run rate once in his entire career. Right now, his yards per route run, 3.92. And we have to recognize in these small sample sizes, I'm going to talk about this more on this show, but in these small two game samples, we have to look at opponent too. He faced Washington in week one. Washington is arguably the worst secondary in football. He faced Detroit in week two. Detroit's been really bad against slot guys so far this year. Detroit is another secondary that you can beat. According to PFF's Expected Fantasy Points Formula, Godwin has scored 9.4 PPR points per game above expectation thus far. So expect some regression, but I do think he's looking like a top 20 wide receiver from here on out. Let's just hope that he can stay healthy. Mike is sick, he got a lot of work in week two. He had a 26.5% target share, he scored 16 PPR points. The problem though is that his route participation was pretty low. It was just 51%. He ranks outside the top 30 league-wide in tight end route participation right now. And then all the while, rookie tight end Eric All, he started to get more run. He had a 12% target share in week two, he saw his route participation go from 9% in week one to 37% in week two. So keep an eye on Eric All in deeper formats. James Cook had a blow up game on Thursday Night Football, and there's some really intriguing peripherals to go along with it. He scored a pair of rushing touchdowns. He's now matched his rushing touchdown total from last year. And last year, he only had five goal line rushes all season. The other backs in that offense were preferred in that area of the field. This season, he's seen two goal line rushes, and he's accounted for all of the running back rushes at the goal line. If that continues, even with Josh Allen stealing work at the goal line, it could be a really favorable year for James Cook. We've got this switch happening in Carolina with Andy Dalton starting. That could be big for Chuba Hubbard in particular. obviously, the pass catchers get a bump, but don't forget about Hubbard. At least until Jonathan Brooks gets healthy. In week one, Hubbard had a 40% running back rush share and a 0% target share. In week two, his running back rush share increased by 19% points. His target share went from 0% to 19%. Now, that target share is a little bit inflated because his route participation only increased by 6% points week over week. But Hubbard once again has been better than Miles Sanders in basically every rushing metric thus far. Don't sleep on him with this quarterback switch. We just need Andy Dalton to be competent.