Week 4 Waiver Wire Pickups

Week 3 was another injury week. Two backfields lost their lead back in the same 24 hours (Miami and the Jets), and a Jets tight end scored 20 points and is still priced under $8 on the Exchange.

Top claims: Sadiq, Ollie Gordon, Braelon Allen.

Points are half-PPR. Share prices are after Tuesday's settlement. Claims run Wednesday morning. If a name went in the first eight or nine rounds, assume he's rostered.

Last week's book

Five ranked adds: 0 hits, 2 pushes, 3 misses. That's a bad week for the ranked list, and it wasn't just us. Jonah Coleman was the wire's most popular claim across the board last week, and he landed on IR before he played a single snap for anyone. High ankle sprain, out until at least Week 7. We had him too. Own it.

How we count: a hit is when the points arrived (roughly 12 or more in half-PPR), a push is when the role held but the points didn't, and a miss is neither.

Off the ranked list, it was a much better week. The Drake London trade call (buy him before Thursday, because Penix returns) paid off exactly as described: 23.9 points, 194 yards, 10 targets. Terry McLaurin scored 16.7 on 9 targets and George Pickens 11.7 on 11. Jordan Love, our hold against the drop lists, scored 19.5. Chase, the buy-low from two weeks back, is at 20.3. Jonathon Brooks, the drop call from two weeks ago, is on IR now. The one honest miss: we held Mark Andrews against the drop-list consensus and he was quiet again, 3.9 points. That's looking more like the consensus was right than we were.

The detail on the ranked five's other four: Boston played 89% of the snaps but saw only 4 targets (down from 7) for 7.1 points. Push. Bateman held 88% of the snaps for 4.7 points. Push. Adonai Mitchell didn't play (finger). Miss. Tank Bigsby barely played (16% of the snaps, -1.0 points) because Barkley did play, which is exactly what our conditional bid was built for. We said $3 unless the MRI news changed. It didn't, and the conditional protected anyone who followed it instead of bidding the $8 ceiling blind.

The six secondary names were quieter, not disastrous: 0 hits, 3 pushes, 3 misses. Tucker and Kamara held modest roles (6.3 and 4.6 points). Waller drew 8 targets for 7.6, the best of the six. Wilson, Keon Coleman and Gadsden all went quiet. Combined with the ranked five, that's 0 hits, 5 pushes, 6 misses across all eleven names.

Buy: ranked claims ($100 FAAB)

1. Kenyon Sadiq, TE, NYJ. FAAB $10. Exchange $7.54.
7 catches on 8 targets, 105 yards, a touchdown, 58% of the snaps, 20.0 points. That was the fourth-best tight end week of the weekend, and the share only moved from $6.15 to $7.54. He did it with both Mason Taylor and Adonai Mitchell out (thumb, finger). If either practices Wednesday, the target log gets split again, so this is a real opportunity, not a permanent one. Jets are at Chicago.

2. Ollie Gordon, RB, MIA. FAAB $18. Exchange $6.14.
84% of the snaps, 17 carries, a touchdown, 3 catches, 13.0 points. Achane's ACL tear is season-ending (he's on IR), so the lead job is genuinely open, and the share still prices Gordon like a change-of-pace back. He costs more than Sadiq because the job is bigger. Sadiq ranks first because good tight ends are scarcer than good backs, and Gordon's role has a Jaylen Wright return hanging over it: Miami's own coach says both backs "are going to have their roles," so treat this as the right claim for right now, not a season-long hold. Miami is at Minnesota, so claim for the role and don't assume the box score follows immediately. One housekeeping note: our board still shows Gordon as Questionable from Sunday's cramping scare. He finished the game.

3. Braelon Allen, RB, NYJ. FAAB $15. Exchange $7.21.
52% of the snaps, 4 carries, 3 targets, 14 rushing yards, 3.2 points, but that's a whole-game number from a game Allen split with Hall until early in the fourth quarter, when Hall left and Allen took the rest. It blends a normal change-of-pace role with one quarter of feature work, so it understates what a full workload looks like. Hall's quad strain is week-to-week. The MRI came back better than feared, but he's unlikely to play Sunday. The share fell from $7.77 to $7.21, so the market hasn't priced the expanded role yet. Isaiah Davis shares this backfield too. See the secondary list below if you want the cheaper, deeper piece of the same story.

4. Keenan Allen, WR, IND. FAAB $6. Exchange $6.31.
73% of the snaps, 9 targets, a touchdown, 15.3 points. Alec Pierce is on IR (heel), not a one-week absence but an actual roster move, and with Josh Downs and Tyler Warren also drawing real volume, Allen is the one of the three most likely to still be sitting on your wire. The Colts are at Washington in the 9:30am ET window Sunday, so set him early.

5. Keaton Mitchell, RB, LAC. FAAB $5. Exchange $4.86.
38% of the snaps, 8 carries, 3 catches, a short touchdown, 12.2 points. The receiving line is ugly (3 catches for -5 yards) and the score was a pop pass, so the points overstate the week. Hampton still leads carries 15-8 in a real three-way committee. This is the cheap, explosive piece, not the lead back. Chargers at Seattle.

If those five are gone, in this order. All of them are Wednesday-morning claims.

• Ted Hurst, WR, TB. FAAB $3. Exchange $6.68. 75% of the snaps but only 3 targets, 1 catch. A 40-yard touchdown made the box score look better than the role currently is. Jalen McMillan's knee (PCL) is the trigger; if he's out again, the targets should follow the snap share.
• Malik Washington, WR, MIA. FAAB $3. Exchange $6.05. 86% of the snaps, a team-high 10 targets, 8.6 points, and he was Miami's emergency third running back when Achane went down. Chris Bell (71% snap, 4 catches for 67 yards) is the cheaper alternate in the same offense if Washington's gone; you don't need both.
• Isaiah Davis, RB, NYJ. FAAB $2. Exchange $3.88. He's not hurt; the price is low because his role has been small. He's the other back in the mix if Hall sits alongside Allen. Deeper-league stash, not a start.

2QB / Superflex only, Wednesday claims: Sam Darnold threw for 379 yards and 4 touchdowns, Deshaun Watson has back-to-back QB1 weeks (20.3 points, 45 rushing yards), and Jacoby Brissett scored 25.6 in a low-scoring week for every other quarterback. All three are 1QB-league bench names, 2QB-league streamers.

Trade for / buy the dip

• Don't panic-sell Omarion Hampton. Exchange $10.21, down from $12.37. The excitement is all Mitchell right now, but Hampton played 42% of the snaps to Mitchell's 38% and still led 15 carries to 8. It's Week 3 of a genuine three-man committee. That settles slower than one big Mitchell box score makes it feel, and the share already reflects the panic. It's the actual buy-low here, not Mitchell.
• Don't cut Justin Jefferson over one ankle tweak. Exchange $8.69, down from $10.71. The share is showing as locked, which just means it isn't tradeable right now. His coach called the imaging "very encouraging" and said he avoided anything long-term. Wednesday's practice report will tell you more than we can right now. If he's limited or full, that's your answer.

Sell / Drop

• Jonathon Brooks, RB, CAR. We said drop him two weeks ago. He's on injured reserve now (abdomen). Nothing left to decide.
• MarShawn Lloyd, RB, GB. 23% of the snaps, 2.8 points. Same fade as last week, still shallow-league-only if you're holding on.
• Quentin Johnston, WR, LAC. 87% of the snaps but only 3 catches for 40 yards. Volume is our signal all through this email, and this is where it doesn't hold: two years of it with nothing behind it, not one bad week.
• Drake Maye, QB, NE. Three turnovers Sunday, three straight finishes outside the top-20 quarterbacks. The share fell from $15.59 to $12.30. The market's already moved on.
• Kyle Pitts and Hunter Henry, TE. Both drew 2 targets, both scored 1.0 point, both remain streamer-tier. If you're churning the position, churn past these two.

Where we differ

• Omarion Hampton. Most of the chatter is about Mitchell. We wouldn't sell Hampton (see above): he still leads the backfield in carries, and a back rarely loses a real job over one quiet game.
• Isaac TeSlaa. The read elsewhere is that his role is growing off one 3-for-3, 66-yard game. Our own snap count has him at 48%, flat versus two weeks ago, not growing. We'd wait for an actual increase in playing time before spending FAAB, not one clean catch rate.

On the Exchange

https://waiverwire.com/exchange

Settlement already ran this morning. Gordon at $6.14 and Allen at $7.21 are still priced like backups, not like backs who just inherited a lead job. Sadiq at $7.54 is still cheap for a 20-point week. If you're trading rather than claiming, those three are where we see the gap.

Paste this in the group chat: Achane's done for the year. Gordon has the job for now. The price still says $6.

Earnings Season: Week 4

Ten questions. Estimates lock Sunday at 1pm ET. The slate covers Sunday afternoon and evening games plus Monday night, so nothing from Thursday or the 9:30am kickoff is on it.

https://waiverwire.com/earnings-season

Open Field

Week 4 challenges are open.

https://waiverwire.com/open-field