🏈📈Week 8 Waiver Wire Report and A Trendy New Stat
aDOT is the hottest new stat overtaking fantasy football, but what is it?
QB
Kirk Cousins | MIN
Those of you who streamed Tua Tagovailoa last week were rewarded nicely but this week he faces the Buffalo Bills D and should have a far harder time. If you still need to stream a QB, Kirk Cousins is a nice option. He’s having a solid year and is coming off a bye week to face the Cowboys. The Dallas D is improved this year but still a favorable matchup, in part due to the lethal Dallas offense creating shootouts with tons of scoring. I’d start Cousins this week if Tua was your QB last week, assuming he’s available.
Tua Tagovailoa| MIA
I would still prefer not to play Tua this week but this is more of a stash play than anything. Tua’s next 3 games after this week come against Houston, Baltimore, and the Jets. 3 favorable matchups, with Baltimore being the toughest. Cousins is your guy in the short term, Tua is the one I prefer long term.
RB
Kenneth Gainwell and Boston Scott | PHI
Kenneth Gainwell is the easy answer after Miles Sanders went down with an ankle injury. His 51% snap count is a season high and will be higher this week with some snaps to go around however Boston Scott saw the field for only the second time this season and was out there about a third of the time. Believe it or not Scott actually had more carries than Gainwell did in the game (Gainwell did receiver more touches with his work in the passing game.) It’s hard to gauge just how much work Gainwell will get with Sanders out, especially because it was hard to gauge Sanders workload itself when he was healthy, but the RB market looks bare this week and Gainwell should be added first, with Scott added by those who missed out as a stash incase he gets more touches than expected.
WR
Kadarius Toney | NYG
Okay, I’m not sure what people expect when Kadarius Toney comes back eventually but I expect big things. Over 17% of ESPN Toney owners cut him last week, dropping him below the 50% line. If you aren’t in any trouble this week in terms of injuries or bye weeks Toney is someone you want to add for the long run. Toney was not only cooking when he went down with an ankle injury against the Rams 2 weeks ago but was the centerpiece of the Giants offense. Expect big things for him once he’s back. Even if he does return this week, with the game being on Monday night it will be hard to trust that he’ll play unless he participates in practice this week and even then like Sterling Sheperd he may be a late scratch. Consider it a stash play this week but one you do not want to pass up.
TE
Jared Cook | LAC
Jared Cook is available in exactly 50% of leagues so he barely qualifies for the list but he should be rostered in most all leagues. Cook has 2 games with only 3 targets in each (partly due to lower snap counts) but he also has 3 games with 7+ targets. The key is his aDOT (don’t worry we’ll get to that in a second). Cook’s aDOT is 5th in the league amongst all TEs, ahead of players such as Travis Kelce and TJ Hockenson. Should he see some consistency in his usage rate he may become a more reliable fantasy player which is hard to come by with the TE position.
aDOT. You might hear fantasy analysts drop this term every once in a while but what exactly does it mean? It stands for Average Depth Of Target and similar to target share and snap%, its an underlying stat that doesn’t always show up in the stat sheet but can give you a big advantage when deciding who to cut and who to hold onto a bit longer, or who to buy low on. What aDOT means is how many yards downfield a player is being targeted. Therefore this stat will mean a lot more to WRs and TEs than RBs. A great website for this stat is FTNFantasy. Amongst WRs who have at least 45 targets this year, it is Courtland Sutton who leads with just under 17 yards per target. Typically above 10 is a good indicator for a WR. Guys like AJ Brown would’ve made a great buy low candidate if you were confident the ball would find him more because his aDOT is 12.79 yards down the field. Keep in mind that this only accounts for the yards the ball is in the air and does not account for the YACs or Yards After Catch. So guys like Cooper Kupp (9.25) and Kadarius Toney (7.23) will still provide value despite their lower than ideal aDOT. It’s just lens to view information with as we get into the thick of the football season with bye weeks and injuries piling up on many of us. Who are some player’s who’s aDOT has you thinking they’ll have better second halves?