The beginning of the season creates an opportunity for massive value changes in players. During the nine-month offseason, the market’s value on players becomes cemented. Then by mid-October, after five weeks of games, there can be a real panic in the marketplace if a player is not playing well.
Dealing With Missed Expectations
There are a couple of rules of thumb to follow when a player is not living up to expectations.
First, what has this player done in the past?
Players with strong historical profiles are the type of durable profiles that bounce back from stretches of poor fantasy scoring. These players typically make good buy lows, and you must be very careful to discard them.
Common durable profiles include quarterbacks and wide receivers with multiple top-12 seasonal finishes on their resumes and tight ends with top-three seasonal finishes.
On the other hand, buying low on unproven first- or second-year players can be a real trap. Their odds of producing are lower than the market appreciates, and baked into their cost is a youth premium that makes buying low difficult.
Second, why is the expectation not being met?
Good places to buy low include players who are hurt or have low efficiencies. Likewise, quarterbacks that have changed teams or systems are good bets to rebound.
Be careful in making too many excuses for the failure to meet expectations. If you have to take more than a couple of sentences to explain why they are not meeting expectations, be careful betting on a rebound.
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Buying Low on Dak Prescott
Elite players can make a huge difference in your dynasty team. Buying low on these profiles is a great way to turn your team around for the long term.
The one trend that has been most consistently true in the NFL this century is good quarterbacks stay good for a long time. This is usually much later than when the dynasty community writes them off.
Dak Prescott is a great example. He has struggled to date. He has a new offensive play-caller in the form of head coach Mike McCarthy, but Prescott's profile is durable. Prescott has multiple top-six seasonal finishes, is locked into a multiple-year contract, and is performing well below his touchdown expectation. Prescott has 10.4 expected touchdowns (3rd in the league) but only 5 actual touchdowns (17th in the league).
Dynasty fantasy football can be most profitable when you invest in good profiles at depressed cost, and Prescott is the type of player to be in on acquiring when they are buy-lows.
The price for Prescott has fallen from a top-20 startup pick in the offseason, all the way down outside the top 50 at FantasyCalc.com. Fortunately, the market has made Prescott very gettable in trades.
To get a sense of the market, here are some recent actual trades from MyFantasyLeague.com leagues. Every league is different of course, but these trades in existing real leagues can give you a pretty good feel for the cost and type of trade packages in the market.
In a Superflex league:
- Trade Away: Bailey Zappe and 2024 1st-round rookie pick
- Trade For: Dak Prescott
In a Superflex league:
- Trade Away: Bryce Young and a 2024 2nd-round rookie pick
- Trade For: Dak Prescott and Cooper Kupp
In a Superflex league:
- Trade Away: Jordan Love
- Trade For: Dak Prescott, Dalvin Cook, and a 2024 4th-round rookie pick
In addition, there are multiple trades of Dak Prescott for a single 2024 1st-round rookie pick.
Takeaways
Dak Prescott is a depressed price profile that can explained by highly variant touchdown performance. He is coming off a poor performance on a Sunday Night Football island game that should make him acquirable in the trade market in your dynasty league.