On Angst and the Fantasy Football Waiver Wire
Tom Woldum
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This week I endured great angst. First, I entered the Colonoscopy Zone. Not to be confused with every fantasy football fan’s favorite zone, although this preventative procedure did indeed occur deep in my own personal end zone. But…the REAL angst—the angst that kept me up at night, and the angst that made me ponder, ponder again, and continually re-ponder my own feeble life decisions, was of course concerning who I should pick up on the fantasy football waiver wire.
[brid autoplay=”true” video=”1097522″ player=”26281″ title=”WATCH%205%20NFL%20rookies%20who%20showed%20out%20during%20Week%201″ duration=”93″ description=”As expected, NFL rookies who stepped up the most in Week 1 were primarily on the defensive side of the ball. In most cases, it’s a lesser transition than offense from college to the professional level.That included a defensive back getting a bit saucy in Jersey and the No. 1 pick in the 2022 NFL Draft making a huge statement despite his team’s loss. On offense, a certain wide receiver lived up to expectations in a big way for his team. Below, we provide you with five NFL rookies who showed out the most during the opening week of action.” uploaddate=”2022-09-14″ thumbnailurl=”https://cdn.brid.tv/live/partners/17660/snapshot/1097335_sd_1663171679.jpg” contentUrl=”https://cdn.brid.tv/live/partners/17660/streaming/1097335/1097335.m3u8″ width=”16″ height=”9″]
The Internal Warfare of Fantasy Football
If you’re engaged in fantasy football, you understand my plight. After one week we are all struggling with indecision. Give up immediately on the mid-ranked player with upside who laid an egg in Game One? Believe in the youngster who randomly put up ten fantasy points off of one touchdown and 40 receiving yards? What to do?
Have I Struck Gold or Am I a Fool?
After a 16-round fantasy draft, in theory, you are starting with the 193rd-best player available when looking to fix what ails your squad with the fantasy football waiver wire. All kinds of shiny objects have appeared in the murky water, but each time you pan for gold with a young could-be-something-special guy who happened to play well last Sunday, you have to throw something back in the water. In many cases, it’s another young could-be-something-special guy who happened to play poorly last Sunday. Or didn’t get many snaps. Or didn’t play at all.
So, it’s hard to tell – you could be snapping up gold from the waiver wire, or you could be throwing the gold right back in the water. Either way, there’s probably gold involved somewhere.
My own angst centered on my wide receiver corp. D.J. Moore, a well-regarded receiver, posted just 5 fantasy points as a starter last week. Do I banish him to the bench immediately, listening to my own questionable emotions instead of the statistical probability that he just had an off day? If so, who to elevate to starting status? —my backups didn’t fare much better. There were tantalizing shiny objects in that murky waiver stream.
I had my eye on several strong performers from week 1 who are widely available in most fantasy leagues and definitely in mine:
- DeAndre Carter, Los Angeles Chargers
- Dante Pettis, Chicago Bears
- Joshua Palmer, Los Angeles Chargers
To acquire one would mean I’d need to throw one of my own shiny objects back into the water. Treylon Burks (Tennessee Titans) and George Pickens (Pittsburgh Steelers) had each been subject to the rookie hype machine during the preseason.
Was I ready to give up on one of them? Was I sure that the young shiny objects I had identified would be an improvement, just because each had outperformed my own guys during week 1? Should I just stand pat and give one of them the start over D.J. Moore? Or was the premise flawed in the first place, is Moore going to be a strong starting option going forward? It all made my head hurt so much.
And so, I turned these questions over in my mind all day Tuesday, made my decision, and then changed it twice. Two questions kept running through my head as I tossed and turned into the night.
- In Justin Jefferson’s rookie season of 2020, he was on the bench for most of the first two games. He got his first start in game three, and promptly went off for eight catches, 175 receiving yards and a touchdown. How would I have felt if I had had him on my fantasy team and dumped him one week into that season?
- How pathetic is my fantasy football obsession that I’m feeling more angst about a waiver claim than I am about my upcoming colonoscopy and the possibility that they’ll find something life-threatening?
The answers seemed clear enough—I would have regretted cutting Jefferson immensely, and it is extremely pathetic that I prioritized my fantasy obsession over worrying about my own health. Right?
Or….is it healthy that I distracted myself from health worries that I’m unable to control? Could it be that all of us fantasy sports obsessors are doing exactly the right thing, and our lives will be forever enriched by this immense distraction?
OK maybe the answers weren’t all that clear. All I know is if DeAndre Carter wins the Rookie of the Year Award this year, I am going to start feeling the angst all over again.
