Smashville Fantasy Football
Join Andrew Banta and Will Ott as they dive deep into the Smashville Fantasy Football League's 10th anniversary season. This weekly podcast offers a unique blend of league analysis, player insights, and friendly banter. Whether you're a league member or just a fantasy football enthusiast, you'll enjoy our hosts' distinct perspectives on roster management, player performance, and league-wide trends. From draft strategies to weekly matchups, we've got you covered with armchair analysis, historical comparisons, and plenty of laughs along the way.
Smashville Fantasy Football
Trade Deadline Spectactular
Smashville Fantasy Football Podcast: Trade Recap & Playoff Predictions
Join hosts Andrew Banta and Will Ott on the Smashville Fantasy Football Podcast as they return after a brief hiatus to discuss the results of their fantasy football election, key player performances, trade deadlines, and playoff predictions. With detailed analysis on notable trades, waiver wire pickups, and bench blunders, this episode is packed with insights to help maximize your fantasy football success. Tune in for friendly banter, expert advice, and strategies to keep your team competitive as the season progresses. Don't miss out on the hot takes and clever tips to elevate your fantasy game!
Welcome to the Smashville Fantasy Football Podcast! I'm your trade-addict host, Andrew Banta, joined by our analyst who swears he can predict the future, Will Ott. Get ready for armchair analysis, friendly banter, and a whole lot of fantasy fun!
Welcome back to smashville fantasy football. We've had a week hiatus here. Had a major election. So we're feeling all sorts of feelings about that.
It took me a long time to tally up the votes. there was a request for a recount. I know some of you have bad feelings about that, but I can't control that.
We extended our election for a couple of days. by now, if you didn't get it in, I'm sorry.
We are a pure democracy here though, unlike the United States. So don't have to worry about electoral college or anything like that. Only have to worry about wills counting skills.
I understand that about half of you are going to be somewhat upset and the other half are going to be happy with the results.
In third place, we had. Kicker, Brandon Aubrey.
I hate it when a third party skews the results like that.
I know, right? Like, it could've been, it could've, we could've
Stealing votes from more legitimate contenders here.
it might've been a game changer.
Number two was Lamar Jackson.
Okay, I can
see that. And then our winner. Derek Henry I'm happy about these election results. I wanted to make sure that I counted twice so that I could not be disappointed one more time.
Derek Henry, I think is a great choice.
I figured it was going to be a two person race with Lamar Jackson and Derek Henry. And it was, Brandon Aubrey was. The only other vote getter.
Aubrey's my kicker, but it wasn't me.
I think it was the person who drafted him.
Derek Henry just to recap, had 10 touchdowns versus one fumble and 946 rushing yards.
How did he actually perform this past week? He added another touchdown to his total. 68 yards. Does that put him over the thousand mark? And then
and then also the week before that
he had 106 yards, two touchdowns.
Oh, yeah, that's right. Okay. Yeah, so well over the thousand mark. he's rolling. He's doing great. Lamar Jackson is also rolling for his part to recap his couple of weeks here week nine, he had three touchdowns, zero interceptions, 280 passing yards, week 10, even better, four touchdowns, 290 passing yards, no interceptions and throw in a two point conversion there to boot 34.
9 fantasy points highest fantasy total for him.
We have another guy to talk about that really excels. He's my guy. And it was in that game, even that Ravens Bengals game was High scoring to Pharah, 35 to 34 Ravens won.
I love that Bengals team, too. They missed out on their two
point conversion to win.
Lots of high scoring affairs there. Who was that top scorer? And would that be top scorer of the entire fantasy year?
I would not be surprised but Jamar Chase.
Yeah, you can talk
about that in his performance while I'm
he had big time stats. For the game, he had 11 receptions off of 17 targets, 264 yards. Three touchdowns. So in our league that scores just over 50 points. Really big game.
you feel for the guy for having that kind of performance and having a loss, a show for it, basically discredits a lot of his effort That's not his fault. He did everything he could.
If that were quarterback stats for passing, that would be a very good game. And the fact that he was a wide receiver is insane.
I think he's had the most in our format as well. I know in full PPR, he's had the most fantasy points in the game. In our league, Alvin Camara was second with a 45 point week two.
Yeah.
Back when we thought the saints were actually good. In full PPR,
there's a surprise at number two. He's not number. to in our standard scoring but in PPR, can you even venture a guess which wide receiver might be second for most fantasy points scored?
I don't think I can guess it. It
was a real outlier,
Maybe D. K. Mekhef? Nope. He's not.
Jawan Jennings.
Not on my radar.
Versus San Francisco he had 46. 5 fantasy points in PPR leagues. Chase comes in at number one and number four score.
Yeah, and he's had a couple of real
blow up games there.
if we started the election process now Jomar Chase would enter the picture as a legitimate third party.
Yeah. he was shut out, which was maybe a bit of a surprise, but if we had it today, I don't think he'd be shut out.
he's really been a great scorer. He's just had a few Less than stellar weeks mixed in there.
Everyone does.
it's been a rough year for wide receivers. my wide receivers are killing me. I'm happy with my team makeup, but I'm not happy with their production.
I'd feel thrilled about these wide receivers. If I didn't see their horrible production this year, C. D. Lamb's been disappointing. Tyreek Hill, obviously disappointing. And now I'm sitting at eighth. I'm in danger of missing the playoffs I've been trying to collect wide receivers who I feel like have underperformed their potential and will do positive regression to the mean here. I got Tyreek Hill from Crunchy Leaves. I got Garrett Wilson from Worst Eater Around. I've held on to Debo Samuel because I thought he was gonna have some more positive regression, touchdown regression and all my wide receivers are disappointing.
my running backs, who I didn't even focus on, are doing great for me. But I can't seem to buy a good wide receiver at this point. So with the trade deadline looming on Saturday, I'll probably just roll with who I have and hope for the best.
I don't think I can gamble with improving the team from this point.
No, I agree with that. CD Lamb picked number 2 by you. Tyreek Hill picked number 3 by CrunchyLeaves. Garrett Wilson picked number 12 by WorstEater. And then you picked Deebo Samuel in the second round, number 11.
So of the first 24 picks, you have four wide receivers.
at one point I had Brandon Iyuk. I had to cut him because he went to injured reserve.
Yeah where did, Iyuk went fourth round, right?
somewhere up there though, higher round,
four in the top 24, that's like depressing to have that kind of team and be like, okay, I have a mediocre team based on results,
loading up on guys who were drafted highly, but underperformed throughout the year, maybe not a viable strategy.
After all, middle of the pack. I'm not, definitely not a lock for playoffs like I planned to be. I thought my plan at this point of the season, was to be pretty much locked for playoffs so I could start focusing on guys with playoff upside.
So then I could, if I wanted to do a last minute trade, maybe get someone who's injured right now, but would be back for the playoffs. Maybe I'd get someone who has a super easy schedule, in the playoffs, but has had a rougher one to this point. But now I'm just not confident enough Now I'm just like, okay, let's roll with who we got.
Hope we make the playoffs and see what happens. I can't afford to go after Pacheco. Who earlier I thought maybe I'd put out a trade for him from the mag. maybe we'll dive into this later. Uh, Look at some guys with easy schedules that could be interesting trade targets here at the very end.
But I'm probably not going to be trying that myself just because of the state of my team right now.
The quote unquote easy schedules are not really as prevalent in terms of there's no Oh, in 16 Detroit lions even the not so good teams are not going to be.
Oh, they're going to let up a bunch of points and be a disappointment. So therefore I'm going to try to find the teams that are going to be playing them twice in the last two months.
bottom teams in terms of wins are the Jaguars and the Giants.
they're not ones that I'm necessarily picking every one up off waivers to throw into my lineup just because they're facing those teams.
And then you have the Cleveland Browns two and seven Vegas Raiders two is seven. I think really when you're looking at teams like the easy schedule, you'd be looking at teams that are playing Las Vegas Raiders Carolina Panthers.
I'm looking at points against Carolina Panthers have let up 310 points through 10 games, the Raiders. 251. Jaguars have 264. Surprisingly, the Bengals have let up 262 points this year. even though they have four wins, you got to put up a bunch of points if you're going to let up 262 points.
That is also the second most on the year behind the Panthers.
wouldn't have guessed that I guess it's just a story of offense for Stephens Their defense is lacking. But yeah, I wouldn't have pegged the Bengals to be number two on that list.
Yeah. And the points against, so I don't really see there being a ton of easy walkover teams because everyone else is a little bit more closely packed in terms of points against. Maybe it might matter more if you're like, Hey, which defense do I need to pick up or drop That might now.
Be a little bit more of a reasonable thing to do
Since we have kind of two weeks to cover, we'll cover it briefly. You looked at teams and who won two, who lost two. What are the highlights?
Mixing it pretty good entering our last podcast was number one in the standings, but went, Oh, and two in the last two weeks.
So is now dripped down to number two.
the spirit of my early season prediction about her team, that she'd be within one win plus 4 of missing the playoffs, that has not gone my way. Her team's been great. But I will say, Technically, she is now within one loss, plus some points for, of missing the playoffs.
Only because all our teams are so close together. There's a lot of five and five teams there. Five and five could have you out of the playoffs and she's six and four. So in the spirit of the prediction, it's not there, but on a technicality, it is there at that point.
want you to clarify what you mean by with a couple of points.
Okay. It's not missing the playoffs.
The couple of points is going to be just over 200 points will need to be. A difference in order for
starters, puts a bench of no one up there, it could happen. I didn't we can say, I just said, we didn't one winner loss either way.
Okay.
I agree. It is not in the spirit of the prediction. It's on a technicality, but I'm surprised after her 1st the season's not over to 7 or so weeks. I am surprised as anyone that she's. At six and four at this point.
So that's really the biggest one. Simple Jack and our cohost here went, oh, and two.
That's maybe the second one. Especially last week how you were feeding, probably faded on Jaden last week.
Yeah, I mean it was not a great game. I think it was a new low completion for him or close to it I don't have too much to say about The game in specifics, but overall, it was a rough week for everyone who wasn't a running back on my team.
Yeah. And simple Jack also went, Oh, and two. that means we have three teams go to and out. Those teams were no no hard feelings, which I was kind of surprised seeing going to, Oh, with that team Mitchie Mitch went to, you know, and our new front runner in the standings.
Wu Tang Financial went 2 0. our final rundown of the actual current standings is Wu Tang Financial at 7 3, then we have Mixin It Pretty Good, No Hard Feelings, Myself, Chase Me If You Can, Volume 2, Crunchy Leaves, taking up 2 5 at 6 4. And then you have Mitchy Mitch, Worst Eater Around, No Fadin on Jaden, Mintberry Crunch at the 5 9 spots, sitting at 500, 5 5.
Then we have under the radar sitting at four and six kind of needs probably two wins in order to actually make the playoffs. They're simple Jack, mostly out of the playoffs. It looks like, uh, but still at three and seven.
And then we have the mag at two and eight. God, I do not, I can't really say that Mathematically, the Meg is eliminated, but practicality, she's eliminated.
Yeah.
She can finish the season, what? Six and eight. Ooh. Yeah, I don't know the full matchups.
I would have a hard time believing that she's not mathematically eliminated, but it's pretty close. And then we were going to also talk about some of the trade transactions since we were talking about this, the trade deadlines coming up, right?
We have four days until that's 16th. So, uh, We'll have this posted yet but basically we're going to be at the trade line. Once you're hearing about this or just before, so I don't know if we're going to see any more trades at this point, but I got my five in your hot take picking me to have five trades is done.
So I'm done. I just wanted to get the wind for you.
I believe it.
We've only had six trades. All grades involved us.
Yes.
I think last year we had more trades.
I think so too.
And I'm surprised these trades turned out.
So one thing I wanted to do is look through them and we can like, use our hindsight to say, off the cuff grade who did better. And I haven't. Pre thought this out. So we'll just, or even gut reaction.
So maybe should we do it from first to last? Yeah.
The first trade of the season,
Yeah. I had kicked off trades this season with my wife, the Meg. And I had sent her T Higgins, Tyler Algear and Tyler Bass.
in return for Chris Olave and Jake Elliott. I thought the kickers would be a slight boost for my end. I don't think it really worked out that way. Jake Elliott hasn't, hasn't had that many opportunities this season, comparatively.
I think Tyler Bass probably worked out a little better, but pretty much that's a wash. It's not a big deal. Really it comes down to the T. Higgins versus Chris Olave thing with it. Tyler Algier wasn't someone I was going to keep, but he was a handcuff for her B. John Robinson, so that was just to sweeten the pot for her.
how do you feel about that one? I think both parties have a right to be disappointed.
I
Injuries have been a problem.
Yeah, injuries were a problem and honestly I don't think T Higgins really shined the way I would have expected him to shine. knowing Jamar Chase is the number one and he's, number two on the depth chart, I would still expect him to be a decent performer.
And I looked at, he did not really, weren't having that much of an impact. He was injured or Is currently injured slightly on and off
injury when I traded them. And he's injured again for three weeks now. He's still day to day. He's only played five games.
Salave is with a concussion now and IR. So that's the only reason I'd give the edge to the Meg receiving Higgins cause at least there's hope for him. But neither guy has been doing well. There's been a lot of low single digit Fancy point games I think all of the games they've played, Higgins has outperformed Olave.
But there's been a lot of games missed. So it's hard to say there's any winner there. I think it was a wash of a trade on both sides,
but in terms of value,
the Meg got Tyler Algier, which is a valuable handcuff for BJ.
I feel like the value of the trade being even, I'd probably give it an, a minus Like a trade worth making.
And then how did it actually turn out in terms of did anyone really benefit or was it something that made or broke one person's season? I would say no. So I'd be like a C You could have not made the trade and probably been just as effective.
So it's not like it killed you. So it's not an F and it's also not an A because it didn't make your season or make Megan season.
And one thing I do when I'm scouting trades, I throw them into this website, fantasysp.com and it helps me keep an eye on if it's relatively balanced or not. one thing it does, is it doesn't really account for uneven numbers of players. So if I send three and receive two or vice versa it almost always considers the side giving three to have been the stronger side.
Cause it's just adding up individual player projected value. you can't look at that in a vacuum but it does say that the side receiving Higgins, Algier and Bass had a rating of 30 whereas the side receiving Olave and Elliott had a rating of 19. So it said this trade was imbalanced
But if you exclude one of the third players, it becomes a much more even trade. And in fact, it says it has crystal lave at, with a 13.15 value in t Higgins with 11.76. I don't even know if I agree with that in hindsight but that's what it has of that.
That's just one of many factors that I. Check when I'm trying to decide on whether to offer a trade or accept a trade. Another one is CBS's site has a fantasy trade value that it gives to each player. you can add those numbers up and see the total value of the package you're sending versus what you might receive.
So I use those in conjunction to see if I'm in the right ballpark on a trade. When you're trading, do you use any tools or is it just off of your own knowledge and feeling?
I do like typically the Yahoo evaluate this trade tool and that just gives me an idea of, Hey does this benefit them in a way where like it helps me see it in a different perspective of will this affect their starters?
Will this affect my starters? Because when it comes down to it. If you're trading away starters and getting backups for let's say you're getting rid of a starting wide receiver and getting a very good running back, but is a backup running back, that's not going to affect your. starting lineup.
So using the Yahoo evaluate this trade kind of just helps me verify that, without looking through the roster intently, this is something that they might want to take, or is it something I'm overlooking of my own roster that I should second guess that or say, no.
It's not really The end all be all. So if it's like Hey, you're going to lose two fancy points over the course of the remainder of the season. They're going to gain five. That doesn't really mean much because I have a different opinion in terms of what those players are going to do
it can't calculate the ease with which you could plug in.
Someone off the waiver wire to if you're trading away backup quarterback, it's going to say, Oh no, you've lost 17 points from your weekly projection, but it's no, I'll just pick someone up to fill in that week. It's okay. So I've done trades where I'm like, Oh, minus 20, minus 30, because I have reasons for thinking that's not a true reflection of the value.
Yep.
Another thing I try to do is find. Players on other teams at a stacked position. So find a guy's third or fourth running back that may be better than my third running back. He might start on my team, even though he's benched on their team.
So it's like unused, untapped value for another team, but maybe I've got a wide receiver that I can send them who could start for their team, but isn't starting for mine. So if at all possible, there's not many players out there. That would not start on someone's team, but be startable on another unless your team is in really rough shape.
If there are some, I try to find it. I know one guy out there that I have not traded for, but that I've kept an eye on to see if I ever wanted to do it was Tony Pollard. Whose team is that on? Mitchy Mitch. So Mitchie Mitch is pretty stacked at running back with Sequan Barkley, Jonathan Taylor, Aaron Jones, and then he is got Tony Pollard just chilling on the bench most of the season. But Pollard's been really good. Yeah, but I wouldn't necessarily start him over any of those guys except maybe in special circumstances.
So maybe he might be open to trading him, but I just haven't found the right deal for him Pollard could start on my team, in the third running back spot in the flex spot. So yeah, that's the sort of stuff I look for. At least I do that a lot of years. Haven't done it this year, but other years I've done it with quarterbacks.
Sometimes people draft high on their quarterbacks. they end up with two guys who are startable that's. Not value that you're using every week. So let's make a trade and I can start the guy moving on. The next trade was between both of us. And this one is one that I feel pretty good about.
I don't know how you feel, but I got Josh Jacobs from you and gave you Tank Bixby and Xavier Worthy.
I feel less good about it now that ETN is coming back and being healthy because now I don't know if I should be starting ETN or Bigsby. Bigsby also has a lingering, I think it was a hamstring injury It's not something that's going to prevent him from playing, but it might prevent the number of reps he gets, which affects then. Is fantasy value of actually starting him. He helped me get over the, mid part of the season and was a big part of my turnaround one and two to being where I'm at now because he has scored some big points right after our trade. So I feel good about that. Xavier Worthy has been so, so I figured he'd be a little bit more of an asset to me I don't feel great about it, but at the same time, I don't feel bad about it.
Okay. After those first two weeks post trade, I was like, Oh man, it didn't work out for me because Bigsby was blowing up more than I thought, but it's settled into what I was afraid of for Bigsby that he and ETN would just be a little bit of a timeshare, hard to decide who's going to be better in a certain week.
And lately, neither of them have been doing that great. And then Worthy has really underperformed my expectations. I thought he would be. The better player long term and he hasn't been, but Josh Jacobs has been a very fine starter for me. So I feel good about that one. I'll give myself an A on it.
I think you have to be very happy with it for me.
I'd probably give myself a B or B minus. Because it still benefited my roster when I needed to get wins or to be able to keep myself in contention for playoffs and not fall too far behind. But throughout the remainder of the season, I might give myself a C because Xavier worthy is still capable of putting up points.
And I'm not sure if big B's going to return to that more prominent role over ETN longterm. So that's where. I think C is a reasonable grade, I would see myself at the end of the season. But, up to this point, I'd probably give myself a B or maybe even a B.
Okay. Next one Was between you and, uh, Crunchy
Leaves.
Disaster for me. It was a great one. We'll never know what could have been. I traded D'Andre Swift and Chris Boswell for Brandon Iyuck and Brandon Aubrey. let's exclude the kickers, Now there's some question marks with Brandon Aubrey.
with Dak Prescott being out the rest of the year, season ending surgery. So I don't know about that, but let's focus on DeAndre Swift for Brandon Iyuck. my prediction for Swift is coming to pass. I thought he had a few continued boom weeks left. His schedule was really appealing in that block.
And that's why I wanted to trade him high. Maybe I should have sat on him two more weeks to really eek out some more value. But, for the most part, he performed well when I thought he'd perform well, and now his production's come back down as the schedule's been a little less favorable. That's been fine.
It's about what I expected. Brandon Iyuk it was an ACL tear, right?
It's either AC or MCL. It's one of the ligaments in the knee.
So he was out for this season immediately. So there's zero value for me there. And that's just a hard knock.
Didn't even make it a full
Didn't even make it a full week.
But we'll never know if I would have returned to good production if he had just underperformed for a while or not.
I think for what we know that's going to happen for the rest of the season, you probably get an F and I think crunchy leaves is probably going to get a C because getting the Andrew Swift and Chris Boswell is not really a.
Yay! For giving up Brandon Iuck.
When he should perform well,
Yeah I would be pissed if I were you, I'd be not that happy if I were, Chris. I was surprised to see that trade go down and I was like, oh man, that's a weird one. I don't really understand it, but, getting people to vote no or vote against it is gonna be impossible in this league. So I didn't really, did you state
it for.
I feel like crunchy leaves gave up way too much for that, so.
Oh, did you think he gave
up too much? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Didn't that way at all.
Yeah. I'm just like, you know what that's your guys' thing. I'm just gonna let it, Can't really get to veto it.
Debo, Samuel has not taken advantage of IAC being gone. So I don't know if I would just look like Debo now, in which case it wouldn't have been a win either.
I think it would have
been injured on and off a little bit, but even then it's not great.
That's, I would say F for you, C for crunchy leaves or maybe even C minus for crunchy leaves because DeAndre Swift, I don't think is going to be really anything super happy to write about.
So I think being a C may be too generous. I'd probably go with C minus.
Okay.
is this your trade
next?
Yeah I came up with it while we were actually recording our podcast that week. And I was like on paper, this looks good.
This looks fair to me.
I wasn't sure if I was giving up way too much with the fact that Nick Chubb and Rico Dotal two known running backs are going to be running back one, going to be good. And then I'd be getting back Tyrone Tracy who is unsure if he's going to take Devin Singletary's spot as running back one for the New York Giants.
So there was some discussion that this was going to maybe happen. Sam Darnold being a backup quarterback, but I'm like Jordan Love's already been injured once this year. They also hadn't had their buy yet.
So I'm going to need someone for that spot. And I would like for it to be someone decent he was the backup for worst eater around. So that was, I feel like a reasonable idea. But at the same time, would it be worth giving up that much for Sam Darnold to be a backup quarterback? And then it kind of worked out because Jordan Love got injured again, but it was only for the rest of that game and then came back and didn't really look himself.
So I ended up starting Sam Darnold that week over Jordan Love. So it worked out really well for me, Pukanukuwa has been okay he's only, played two games? He had one good game and one not very good game, which, it's really too small of a sample size to really judge on that one,
Did you receive him before week eight?
I had him for his first game back.
Okay. he's had three games then. I
did not start him his first week back.
Gotcha.
Because I figured he was going to be limited on reps. It's not uncommon for players with injuries to sometimes get limited reps or give limited snaps. The fact that he had the questionable tag going into that weekend prompted me to say, I'm going to go ahead and pass on him.
So for him actually starting for me, he got one reception for 11 yards in one game, then nine receptions for 98 yards the next game. So a mixed bag on that one, which is fine. But at the same time, I picked up tanked out off of waivers. I picked up Rico Dodo of waivers.
Nick Chubb was just coming back from IR When I traded him, so they weren't sure if he was going to get full reps or partial reps? Derek Carr was my backup who had gotten injured, but was recovering, I think had just recovered from injury and not really shown anything interesting.
So For me, there questions I think on both sides of, is Tyrone Tracy going to be worth it? Is Nick Chubb going to be okay? Is Rico Dottle actually going to get the carriers for Dallas? that time Stefan Diggs had already gone down for the rest of the year. Collins, Tank Dell are going to be one and two in terms of wide receivers in Houston.
I feel like we're seeded around probably. I'd probably say he got a B plus and I might've gotten like a C plus, but now with the hindsight involved, I would give myself probably more of an A minus, and he probably got a B plus. I can maintain that B plus.
It's hard for me to judge this one. There hasn't been anyone that's like a every week contributor in here yet. So it's two B grades for me. I think I'd give you both B's on it, but it's hard to pick a flat out winner for me.
Yeah. after the trade was accepted, part of me was like, Oh no, what did I just do?
Because now I'm down to three startable running backs down to
underperformed what you expected because you were kind of eye on him. At least you were pitching them as really having good production when he comes back, most likely.
And he hasn't really been there yet.
Yeah, no, but at the same time I had JK Dobbins Travis ETN tank Bixby who are on the same team. And so one. Etn got back from injury. Now I have to split. And then Tyrone Tracy Jr. So those are my four running backs. really two of them are starting running backs.
And the other ones, are splitting time. So now do I end up having to start a wide receiver in the wide receiver tight end running back slot? This is where I'm frustrated with having one less running back option.
Especially now that this week going into this next week, New York giants have a buy.
So now I have to start Travis CTN or tank Bigsby, and I don't really know which one to start.
That's a tough call.
that's my only drawback. I think really to my situation is that I've really limited myself in my options on running back. I feel like beyond this next week, Tyrone Tracy Jr.
is going to be the starting running back RB1 in New York. I think he's cemented that and Pukunukuwa is going to be back to his old self. He's had two good games, not good game. And that's okay.
Then we have the next trade was between you and our commissioner.
Yeah, he sent me this one out of the blue. I was so surprised by it, and I was thrilled to receive it. I smashed the accept button on it, so to speak. Hasn't worked out as well as I'd hoped, but it still worked out better for me than it has for him.
I received Tyree Kill he received Amari Cooper. this was fresh off Amari Cooper being traded. I think it was one game removed from Amari Cooper being traded to the Bills. he had a good first game at the Bills, so there was some confidence there for Crunchyleaves to want him.
And Tyreek Hill had been languishing without Tua Tagovailoa in the lineup Since Amari Cooper has done nothing He got 0. 3 fantasy points two targets one reception for three yards and he's been injured the other two weeks so we'll see if he Comes back and provides some more value for him.
Whereas tyree kill has been unimpressive but startable better than amari cooper 7. 2 points, 8 points, 8. 7 points. I'm not thrilled, but, I can at least use him, which is more than I could say for a Mari Cooper the past three weeks. Or most of the season, really. Mari Cooper's had two boom games this season and the rest has been horrible.
Yeah, those are two more guys that are just underperforming wide receivers. I don't know what's up with Tyree Kill now. It's like you've got Tua back throwing to you. What's going on? Like you're not the leading wide receiver on your team now. I don't have it in front of me on the targets, but he's not the leading target getter on his team at all.
I would assume Jalen Waddell's ahead of him.
And
I think someone else's too, but I can't think who off the top of my head. I just don't know what's up with Tyree Kill there. It may be getting too late for me to expect some positive touchdown regression. Maybe he only gets one touchdown every five games.
I don't know. But it's pretty sad. Yeah, that'd be real sad. He got a touchdown last game. His second of the year. And he got 8. 7 fantasy points. You would think you'd get more, but he only got 16 yards that game. Yeah, it was rough, but I'm happy with the trade.
I'm just not As over the moon as I thought I'd be
yeah, I feel like going into the trade I would probably give you an A for that. Probably give Chris maybe a D plus in terms of going into it
And his explanation was I'm just so overhill.
Tilting is not a good idea. I will say probably like post trade. I probably say give you like a B on terms of value received, like the actual value that you've gotten from him. And maybe even an F for Chris.
Yeah, thank you, Chris, for balancing out the horrible trade I got from you previously by giving me a little consolation prize there.
it's funny because we did give Chris a bunch of flack for, I believe he dropped Tink Dell earlier in the season.
you were able to take advantage of it.
And I picked him up and then we criticized him. So this is the second quote unquote podcast blunder.
Yeah.
I thought it was funny.
And then the final trade we've had thus far in the season. I traded with Worst Eater Around.
I was able to get Garrett Wilson, Derek Carr, and the Pittsburgh defense for Chris Olave, Tuta Tagovailoa, and Kansas City defense. I viewed the Steelers as the top defense in the league, so I was targeting them.
Kansas City had been on a good run, so that made them look appealing. The past two weeks, they haven't been as compelling of a defense. Pittsburgh's continued to be very solid on defense, so I feel good about that aspect. Derek Carr was just an unimportant piece for me. I've since dropped him when he didn't show much.
And he was injured too. So really it mostly comes down to Chris Alave and Garrett Wilson Olave's uninjured reserve after being disappointed most of the season I feel like I won that one by a little bit. Garrett Wilson's a little tough to predict, but he's had, enough boom weeks in there that I'm starting him.
He's got some busts as well, but overall I'm happy to have got him in that trade. B plus on that one for me.
I think the biggest difference is going to just be the Pittsburgh versus Kansas city. Do you think that's the biggest difference?
Yeah. Chris
has provided nothing.
Maybe it's just because I believe Alave and with Derek Carr being injured, it affected his performance.
Yeah,
maybe I'm a little bit biased on that, but that's what my brain initially goes to is the value of having Derek Carr healthy and Crystal Lave healthy.
Means he can actually generate points. I would give you the edge. I don't really know how to grade that though, because I don't feel like there's a significant gain to where I can give it like an a or a B plus or something So maybe I might say B or B minus for you.
And then for we're seated around maybe a C because you're,
yeah,
he has the ability of. producing points when he's healthy and Eric are healthy. Okay, cool. Like now that they can become a thing. But you're hoping on a lot of different things.
I've been unable to find a blockbuster trade as far as actual results go, I'm just.
Left swinging and missing on getting someone who's going to be a game changer for me, but through five trades I've at least got some usable pieces that are upgrades over what I sent But yeah, nothing that i'm like, oh, yeah, this is gonna Win the season for me,
as they said in Brandon brothers, one Fox hole as good as the next.
So trying to guess who's going to be injured or who's not going to be injured. one player is going to be just as good as another. So try not to think about it too hard.
Yeah. So that's our trades. If anyone else wants to get another one, get them sent out ASAP because closing in on the deadline,
or if you think we missed like you didn't like our grade and you wanted to say a grade should have been different on some of these traits. Let us know. We'll mention it next week.
one thing. I will do. Let me just bring it up here. This is with a fantasy pros, they have a trade finder feature. And honestly, I don't get too much use out of this because I feel like it weights the tight end position way too much and it just wants me to trade for all the tight ends,
especially in this, cause it's probably set up for more of a standard league or assessment and then our league doesn't require a tight end specific,
but I do like checking out the easy schedules recommendations so I can pull it up and see players that have easier schedules.
it'll give me players around the same rank, and I can say plus or minus five spots from that player. If I put in Jayden Daniels find players with easier schedules than him I see Baker Mayfield's schedule is just To die for here.
Week 11 I guess, bye. Week 12, giants, panthers, raiders, chargers, cowboys, panthers.
great schedule.
I don't think there's any trade. I can get done there because Mayfield is on mixing it pretty good. And I think she's good enough. She's not looking to trade anyone.
Probably C. J. Stroud also with a pretty good schedule here versus cowboys, titans, jaguars dolphins, but then you get a hard 1 with the chiefs and ravens to end the year.
is that during playoffs?
Yeah, through week 14 is regular season, and then you'd have 15,
because we have eight teams.
through week 14
make it to the championship game.
I wouldn't love Stroud in the playoffs, but I love him the rest of the regular season. Then looking at some other schedules at running back Jameer Gibbs has a pretty favorable schedule.
Going up against the Jaguars, the Colts, the Bears, got the Packers in there, Bills, Bears again, then 49ers. You think that's a favorable schedule, or is that according to them?
It says it's a favorable schedule. I guess I am not as sold on it.
It's not, it only has a plus one on it. So it's not a huge gain at all.
I'm surprised it classifies the bears as being an easy team.
They don't have ones that are just nightmare matchups, so maybe it's just the total average of them helps A couple other guys, according to this, at least with somewhat favorable schedules are Brie Hall and David Montgomery Kyron Williams as well.
those are guys that maybe someone wants to target last minute in our league, if they're looking at schedules towards the end of the season.
you do think David Montgomery is underrated.
he always seems underrated
I was surprised that the bears let him go,
At wide receiver. The list would change based on which wide receiver I chose. I'm choosing the ones higher ranked on my team. If I chose guys more toward the middle rank, it'd give me a different list of players to compare them to. Cause it's giving me players that it thinks are somewhat of a fair trade.
But if I look here, I don't know why this seems wrong to me. I put in CD lamb, maybe his ranking Prescott's gone down. But it says I could look at Calvin Ridley. His rank is. A lot lower, I would think, but he's had a couple really good games in there. he has a pretty favorable schedule coming up.
You got the Vikings, which isn't easy, but then you got Texans, Commanders, Jaguars, Bengals, Colts, Jaguars. So the couple of Jaguars in there help for sure. Malik Neighbors is also on this list as well as George Pickens. Pickens has a couple tough games. For playoffs though. I would not want that playoff run with Pickens.
You're looking at the Eagles, the Ravens and the Chiefs. No, I'd avoid that.
And speaking of neighbors that's a name that I'm going to be looking for next year is just keeping the back of my mind neighbors. He's had one or maybe two concussions this year, but when he has played from what I remember he's been a candidate to definitely be an impact player.
So yeah, that's the only other thing that I think is interesting to keep in mind. It's the time where you really may want to figure out what players are going to be active for you during playoff time if you're going to make the playoffs.
Which is an open question for me.
You feeling good about playoffs?
I feel like I'm going to make playoffs. I'm six and four. I've got a good amount of points and a decent roster. I play crunchy leaves next week. It's probably going to end up being a close one in terms of projections.
then I play you again. Which I think is going to be maybe a little bit more tough. And then I played Mint Bear Crunch and Wu Tang Financial. My schedule is not super tough, but I do have over a game to spare because I have advantage on points amongst most of the people below me.
The only person I don't have a points against advantage of is against Mitchie Mitch. Also, when looking at the Yahoo projections, it has me finishing fourth at eight and six. according to the current projections, it has me at eight and six sitting in fourth place.
I think that's reasonable. I think there's going to be a lot of people sitting at eight and six. It does have. the same eight people making the playoffs as there are currently, So there's no changes of who's participating, going into the postseason, but it does change who is positioned where.
I don't know if I really agree with who's going to be positioned where, but I feel confident that I'm going to make it.
I think it's going to come down to points for me. I think I'd be, Good to get two more wins out of the next four games. I might be in the stretch of going Oh, and four here, these next two games, I'm up against Sarah, mixing it pretty good.
And then I could easily lose both of those. then I need to win out to have a chance and go seven and seven this season and hope that I have enough points to beat out another team. without knowing who's facing who in the full matrix of matchups I could see a 7 7 team making the playoffs, but also missing the playoffs So I need to make sure that I'm scoring enough to slip in
you don't have good matchups for most of the season.
It's gonna be tough there's a chance that you're gonna be playing to make the playoffs.
Yeah, for sure. Like
it'd be like, loser goes home
i'm not feeling too great right now. It's gone downhill for me
to be fair, MintBerryCrunch, who's currently sitting in 9th, is playing NoHeartTheAliens, myself and then for week 14, WorstEaterAround.
That's a hard matchup.
Those are all hard matchups. but then under the radar, I'm trying to see where they stack up worst year around simple Jack. So that's a probably going to be easier when you're going to have crunchy leaves and Mitchie Mitch.
So that's a middle of the road schedule because most of us are separated mostly just by winning points. One win in points.
Sounds like I need to do a little mild collusion with SimpleJack here to get him a win over under the radar.
it's hard to do that because if you trade away something, you're not going to get it back.
I just meant him to make sure he starts his guys. he's had a couple of weeks of starting guys who are injured, so I think he's not entirely on top of it. Chris, message me if I'm wrong. But I feel like you're not checking it enough.
You got Brian Robinson Jr. Sitting on your lineup and he's been injured. I need him to show up and get a win for the most part, the top eight are solidly ahead in points four simple. Jack actually does have a decent number of points, just with 1044 points to my 1078.
He's the only one out of the playoffs right now that has broken a thousand points this season sitting at three and seven. So he is a couple wins back. That's gonna be hard to make up.
Yeah, we'll see. I guess I'm on the edge of, yeah, I'll make the playoffs, but it's definitely not a sure thing at this point. Oh, what else do we want to talk about tonight? I feel like we probably don't have time to really get into the games. We've talked so much of trade now,
and especially covering two weeks of games.
did you do any research for like with waiver? Was it like your awards? I
it's going to be pretty quick because there weren't many that stood out. And that goes for both of these weeks. So back in week nine um, you picked up Xavier LeJet.
Legate.
Mitchy Mitch picked up TJ Hawkinson, No Hard Feelings streamed the Tennessee defense. I picked up Zach Charbonnet just to complete my set of handcuffs for all the rainbacks. No one stood out to me enough, so I didn't even want to give a waiver wired wizard award then.
And looking at Week 10, it's more of the same. Crunchy Leaves added Demarcus Robinson after two monster games. But he underperformed. Didn't do much for his team I added Jalen Warren because I had to fill in a running back. I Only had Chuba Hubbard available. I was gonna have John Finbrooks, but then they held him out for yet another week
I
had no running backs to start so I threw in Jalen Warren and hey, he got me 10 points.
So it worked out.
I think that's your way for wire wizard right there,
And I think it is, because there wasn't much else to compare it to. Yeah, I guess I'll say it just barely a waiver wire wizard award in week 10. But I'm not even sure if I'm hanging on to him at this point.
does he bring you the value that you're looking for? I think that's enough to give you the word for that. Yay!
Chalking up. As far as bench blunders it was also nothing, I mean, SimpleJack keeps leaving inactives in. So I don't want to beat a dead horse there and just give it to him every week.
Brian Robinson Jr., both of those weeks, wasn't active. Other ones in week nine, Crunchy Leaves, didn't check at the last moment to see that Mari Cooper was going to be inactive. It was a, I think a game time decision or close to it.
So he could have subbed in someone like Ray McLeod or Alec Pearson done better. So maybe that could be a blunder, but it was a tough call. Like it was right there at the end. And then other than that, it was just a little bit of coin flips for me. You had a tough one week nine Xavier Worthy gave you negative points, but I can't fault the start there, given your guys, I would have started him too.
Yeah. So week nine, nothing too crazy for me. Yeah. with crunchy leaves
the game was separated by just over five points.
Playing McCloud would have given him an additional 11. 6 points, but Interior Pierce would have left him just short of that mark.
It was like a 50 50, but I think you could still give it to him, even if you would have started Interior Pierce, just from the fact that would have been an extremely close game.
Alec Pierce, yeah.
Alec Pierce not intending,
yeah. I'll give him the bench blunder. it was a tough one being that it's so late.
But given that it did make all the difference in the result, we'll give it to him. As for week 10 let's see NoHardTinklings decided to stream the Giants against a bad Panthersteam, which can sometimes work out. But I feel like she had a compelling start already in the bills against the Colts, because the Colts are not a scary team this year.
I would have just rolled with the bills and they would have gotten you about 25 points this time and the Giants only 10. then she had a rough go with Nico Collins being somewhat surprised and active there on short notice. there were no other options to drop someone
for clarification on my other fancy team, I have Nico Collins and I was like, is he going to play? Is he not going to play? It's a late game. I'm going to go ahead and just sit them on the bench.
I had a mirror situation.
With Tyreek Hill this week, where it was game time decision, playing late Monday night. I would be screwed if he didn't play, but didn't make the difference for me, but it easily could have if he had scored another touchdown it was more the defense.
Crunchy Leaves this week. Left Alec Pierce on the bench, and he got 14 points. He's been so boom and bust that it's hard to make a consistent call. Worst eater around chose to start Cole Comet instead of Sam Laporta. Tight ends are tough this year, but I, in general, want to see Laporta over Comet.
it was not game changing I won by almost 40 points.
Yeah, and then Under the Radar continues to struggle with the call of do I start Aaron Rodgers or do I start Kirk Cousins? This past week, both of them did poorly. Rodgers looks washed up.
I think, didn't I say something about that? Yeah, yeah. During the draft.
Maybe the one that stood out to me most, and I think I will do the bench blunder award for this Mitberry Crunch left Bucky Irving on the bench for 15 fancy points instead of Javante Williams, 0.
7 points. I think I'd start Bucky Irving in general over Javante Williams, Would you
I'm not super familiar with either one, so it'd be hard for me to make that call,
yeah, this is me looking at their production rather than being an avid watcher of their body of work.
I'm just compared to past points and everything and I'm like, yeah, I haven't seen enough from Javante Williams.
That's where I'd probably end up going and seeing that one has given me more consistent double digit points versus the other, I think starting Bucky would be the best, way to go.
Williams, there's a lot of single and even low single digit point games in there. whereas, you know, Bucky Irving. Not as many, at least. Yeah. More double digit games this year. as you've said, I don't know if the matchup was a concern possibly. Irving against San Francisco can be a little intimidating.
Francisco has been a little off. I would have probably thought that I was a little bit more favorable than going against Kansas City. my idea would be that Denver's likely to be behind Kansas City's likely to be head. So therefore you're not going to see as many touches from Williams, whereas Tampa Bay and San Francisco, I think is a little bit more of a heads up matchup, especially with Christian McCaffrey maybe being limited.
therefore it'd be a little bit more of, we can have a good steady mix of running the ball, passing the ball.
Do you know what happened? Game script wise or play with Javante Williams this week?
He's at least gotten carries like the past four weeks. He had 14 carries, 17 carries, 12 carries. And then this week one carry. What happened there?
That's a good question.
I don't know why he had such reduced volume. And I don't see anything from the news about him. It was just a very quiet day.
It doesn't even seem like the game got away from them. The final score was a loss. 14 to 16.
I think they were winning a good chunk of the game.
Yeah.
Don't quote me on that. Yeah.
Yeah, so I don't know. Maybe it's just he's losing workload to other guys. The Chiefs though, squeaking out another win.
Has there been a less intimidating, undefeated 9 0 team? They're clearly a good team. I'm not saying they're bad. I'm just surprised they're 9 0. I saw something on ESPN today. The Chiefs plus 58 point differential for the whole season is the lowest in NFL history among 32 teams to start 9 0.
just
barely outscoring the teams they're beating.
a lot of close games.
How long can
they keep
it up?
They're facing the bills. The bills also haven't really looked super convincing Kansas city. Didn't look super convincing.
And I feel like both of those things are true this year. The only difference is Kansas city has scored 58 more points than their opponents.
more.
yeah. And last year I believe Kansas city, I was shocked that Kansas city looked so bad, not to say that their record super bad, but at the same time it's Kansas city.
I was expecting more out of them, and then this year, I didn't expect that much out of them, and they're dying to know, and they've somehow been disappointing.
In a way. I don't know how that works, but whatever.
I was looking up the odds on them, and despite the fact the Chiefs are unbeaten, the Bills are favored in that game by two and a half points. I'm not Over the moon about the Chiefs, but I'm not about the bills either, so I'll go against the odds and say The Chiefs go 10 and 0 and beat the Bills this week. It's not a super hot take, but I've lost my swagger on hot takes having lost a couple of them.
it's gotten harder to take a hot take as the season's gone on.
Yeah.
I feel like in the early part is easier. Through week nine, last year, Kansas city was seven and two, so they were not that bad, but they did fall off later in the season and ended up 11 and six losing four of their last however many games.
that is what stuck into my brain was the fact that we lost a lot after their bi week making it feel like they were underperforming. Man, hot take. can, I just double down on my current playoff picture.
It's already in the books, so
I can double down, right? I don't know if it counts
as a separate
one,
I'm looking at the AFC playoffs in trying to pick the wildcard teams. if it all shakes out with the division leaders we have a few that are looking to be wildcard potentials. We got Broncos at five and five, the Broncos are third in the AFC West right now, but they have a legitimate shot.
You got the Bengals at four and six.
I'm kind of rooting for them just
based on. Yeah, I think the
Bengals should, should, should make the playoffs. Yeah. I didn't see their I didn't see
the cults that have a chance too, but I'm less confident about their odds. How many wild cards teams do we get now?
There are a total of seven teams, so three wild card spots. Three wild cards. Okay, so there are actually spots for all of them. I don't feel like the cults are going to make it, but Let me pull up the standings. Yeah, the Bengals
play Pittsburgh twice, play the Chargers once, play Tennessee, Dallas, Cleveland, Denver.
The
Ravens are going to be a lock for a wildcard if they don't play Tennessee You got Steelers and Ravens both in the North, so one of them is a wildcard. Do you want to pick two of the next three teams?
So yeah, I'll say the Bengals, the Chargers.
Chargers look pretty good for it too.
I have a hard time saying the Broncos.
You have a hard time saying them.
but at the same time
Ravens,
Ravens for sure. Ravens or Steelers.
Okay. You got Ravens
Does that mean it's Bengals?
Ravens, Chargers, Bengals. this is my wild card.
I like it. Okay, I'll put you down for that one. it's interesting. I think Raven's chargers look good. Maybe Steelers will even end up being the wild card, who knows. for me it's between Bengals and the Broncos.
On the opposite side of the
Broncos because I don't see the Colts doing it.
Now,
the Bengals have to make up a win here. the Broncos are five and five. I do think they're the better team.
their schedule is not super easy with the sealers twice, but it does get easier because you also play the Cowboys who I think are overrated have not figured out how they want to play football.
And also now with no longer having Dak Proscott for the rest of the season. Tennessee Titans, who have struggled all year. And you also have the Cleveland Browns, who just have not looked good whatsoever. So you have, I would almost say three wins, a maybe win against the Broncos. So four wins, and then you have to figure out, are you going to win a game against Steelers and Chargers?
So I think I'm hopeful for the Bengals.
Yeah. I'd like to see that. And the Broncos don't excite me as much.
Yeah. And the NFC man, I can't believe the Cardinals are six and four. They don't feel like a six on 14.
No, they don't.
But the big thing is that they're the leader of the division by San Francisco is only one game back.
without looking it up, I would have thought San Francisco was The NFC West.
I knew the San Francisco 49ers had a tough start the season because they had no Christian McCaffrey.
Yeah. he's back. I think the wildcard teams are going to be Vikings, Packers.
I'm probably going to say commanders if the Vikings end up passing the lions, then the lions being like basically three NFC North teams. between Lions Vikings and Packers, and then commanders.
So who gets left out Cardinals or 49 ERs?
Wins. I thought we just talking about wild card teams.
I thought we were just talking about wild card teams.
One of them's not a wild card. That means one of them's left out.
I think
four nine ERs passed the Cardinals.
I hope they do.
because Christian McCafferys back now.
Yeah.
You have Seahawks, which I think is not as hard of the game. The Seahawks do a good job of battling, but with Christian McCaffrey back, I can't see that being a loss.
Packers is going to be probably a close game. Bills is probably going to be a close game. The Bears are probably going to destroy the Rams. just depending on what the Dolphins do. I'm not 100 percent sure on that. Probably going to get destroyed by the Lions.
And I think they're going to beat the Cardinals. Cardinals They have Seahawks, which they're going to win Vikings. I think they're going to lose Seahawks again. They're going to win Patriots. They're going to win Oh, that's going to be down to the wire because they play the Panthers Rams 49ers.
that is a close one. but I still think the 49ers are going to win it. they have a better chance of upsetting someone versus being upset. Whereas I think Arizona Cardinals have a higher chance of being upset than upsetting a team they're not supposed to win against.
is your hot take just for AFC or NFC?
We'll make two hot takes. Separate them.
What's your NFC wildcards again?
three of the four NFC North teams are going to get in there. So whether the lions are the NFC North winner, or the Vikings are going to be NFC North winner, regardless, three of those four teams are going to make it the commanders are going to be the other team. Wait, the 49ers probably being the winner of the NFC West.
I didn't even realize the Packers were also in third in their division, like the Broncos.
They're right now sitting in playoff spot by themselves at six and three.
Only three losses they've had there by already.
But yeah, they just had there by, so yeah, they're looking pretty good. I think those are some solid hot takes.
We have the trade deadline looming. Are you looking for any more trades?
I would like to make one trade, but I don't see how it's going to work out. So I think I'm going to end up being done. I have my final roster.
Yep. I think my roster is what it is at this point. I can only close my eyes, hold my nose, hope for the best for the rest of the season. See how it goes.
May the force be with you.
That's it for this episode of the Smashville fantasy football podcast, as always, we have aspirations of adequacy. So come back and we'll try to do a bit better next time.
Who knows? We may even reveal that one sneaky trick guaranteed to win your fantasy league, but until then keep those trades rolling and get your lineup set before kickoff.
See you next week.
