Week 7 is over, finito, and while we didn't have a head-scratching blowout loss like we did in Week 6 with Houston, we were treated instead to a delightful melange of Tom Brady close ups as he was one-upped by Geno Smith.
Yes, Geno Smith. And Jeremy Kerley. And enough sub-replacement level guys to fill up an af2 roster. Oh, Boston, you just want it all, don't you?
Well, Pats fans, while you focus on the 'Sox and the World Series, the rest of us will focus on Week 8 and the six must have waiver pickups for your team.
Jordan Reed
He's a fast, super-athletic TE out of Florida, a nightmare for LBs to cover. Remind you of anyone? (Here's a hint: he's currently wearing orange, and no, he doesn't play for the Bengals.)
Here's a few more hints, just because I love you so much: Jordan Reed would be downright killer for your team. He'll murder your opponents with his extremely high target-reception conversion rate. Get it yet? Good.
The bottom line with Reed is that he's an emerging superstar on a team that desperately needs someone, anyone to take some pressure off of Pierre Garcon. The matchup vs. Denver is a great one as well; not because the Broncos have a weak defense, but rather the Redskins do and thus Reed and friends will have to put up a lot of points to win. He's your #1 priority by lightyears, and in case you need more proof, his #1 comparable is Jason Witten, 2005.
Mike James
He's pretty much the unquestioned RB1 attack on his team right now, which is always worth paying attention to...even if the team itself is a total disaster with a walking dead coach and a mysterious infection running through the locker room.
Doug Martin looks to be out for quite some time - pretty much destroying the hopes of anyone who drafted him #2 - and now it's Mike James' turn to run the ball 20 times for 40 yards. Still, he's got some upside and again, sole RB1 options just don't exist on the waivers all that often so if you were too late on Zac Stacy, this may be a workable option for you.
The downside here is that he's got no real experience - and thus, his career path isn't projectable by math nerds like us - and his schedule is very difficult, facing two of the top power-ranked defenses by NEP (Seattle, #2 and Carolina, #4) in the next two weeks. Don't expect much, but again, he's the #1 option for his team and that just doesn't become available all that often.
Jarrett Boykin
One of the more callous aspects of fantasy football is that you have to deal with injuries. It begins to make you see human beings - the players - as fungible goods, commodities. You never think of an injury like what happened to Jermichael Finley on a human level; rather, you think of it as how it impacts your fantasy team.
Not that I blame you - it's a fact of life and another fact of life is that you're reading an article about fantasy football and the waiver wire. So with all of that said, go all in on Jarrett Boykin.
I'll have to admit that going into Week 7, I was selling him. Not that there was anything to sell - other than the hype - but I certainly did not expect the rapport he showed with Rodgers to congeal right out of the gate. It's difficult to draw many statistical comparables for him given the extremely small sample size, but we can certainly point to the efficiency of the Green Bay offense (#6 power-ranked, by NEP) and the fact that both Jones and FInley are likely out, giving precious targets to Boykin.
(Note: This was written under the logic that Darrius Heyward-Bey was likely unavailable in your league. With Reggie Wayne sidelined, DHB takes preference.)
Roy Helu
Disclaimer of disclaimers right here: he's not going to score three TDs in a game ever again. And I mean that. Ever.
That's the bad news. The good news is that he's clearly the passing down back on a team that is going to have to pass the ball like crazy to keep up with the Broncos in Week 8. Further, he was also on the field for more snaps in Week 7 than Alfred Morris, showing a bit of the ol' Shanahan RBBC creeping up as well.
Don't expect anything higher than a flex play in tight situations, but if that's what you need, then the 10-12 touches that Helu will get may be just what you need to skate by. His comparables indicate decent productivity if he can find the field (Pierre Thomas, Mike Alstott) and the matchups beyond this week at Denver look very promising; San Diego, Minnesota and Philly back-to-back-to-back.
Kendall Wright
Man, I've got deja vu. This is what I wrote last week:
Just above of Brandon Lafell, we'll play the targets game with Kendall Wright here as well. He's had three straight weeks of eight targets, and he's coming down with two-thirds of them with more than a few plays going for 20-plus yards. In a PPR friendly league, you'll take 10 points every week out of your WR4, and that's exactly what he'll give you. Unlike Dobson, he's got a much weaker QB and a much worse offense around him; he does, however, have the advantage of competing for targets alongside the likes of Nate Washington and Kenny Britt instead of Kenbrell Thompkins and Julian Edelman.
Why didn't you listen to me, you magnificent fool? If you want consistency, it's going to be hard to beat Kendall Wright off of the waivers. Peep this: 6-8-8-9-12. That's his targets the past five weeks.
Jake Locker is also back for the Titans, so even if Chris Johnson can't run the ball to save his life, Kendall Wright is clearly emerging as the #1 receiver in Honky Tonk country, which is an absolute steal to find on the waiver wires.
He's got the bye in Week 8 so you'll have to sit on him, but after that it couldn't possibly be better: St. Louis and then Jacksonville. Booyah.
Chris Ivory/Daniel Thomas
The two-headed hydra of RB mediocrity. Lamar Miller and Bilal Powell aren't cutting it, so let's see if these two have what it takes instead, shall we?
We've written about Daniel Thomas before and about why he does deserve carries in Miami, so I won't belabor that point by repeating it. As far as Ivory, what he did in Week 7 was what he was supposed to do all along; bring stability to a Jets offense that is floating adrift with a rookie QB and a makeshift receiving corps. Of course, whether he can keep it up is more than a little questionable..
...but I'm getting ahead of myself. If you're looking at either of these two, you're desperate and likely have missed the boat on Zac Stacy by a week. Pick one of these guys if you want to roll the dice a little; I'm going to lean Ivory because of the massive touch difference between him and Powell, and because his comparables amazingly include Terrell Davis.