Week 7 Fantasy Football Trades: Terry McLaurin, Chris Olave and De'Von Achane

Fantasy football trading is easy in theory, but very hard in practice. Plans to “Buy Low” or “Sell High” only work if there is someone on the other hand willing to do the buying high and selling low. Thankfully, this is where the Fantasy Assistant comes in.

The Assistant uses predictive analytics to generate an Expected Trade Interest (ETI) for each player. The ETI leaders in a given week are the players whom you are most likely to be able to trade for or away. Here are those players for this week:

At this stage of the season, we are starting to see a lot of repeat names. Cam Skattebo leads the way with a 20% ETI — I recommended you trade for him last week.

Players two (A.J. Brown) and four (Brian Thomas Jr.) are also both repeats. That means we will have to go further down the list to find the three players to feature in this week's article: Terry McLaurin, Chris Olave, and De'Von Achane. Without further ado, here are my recommendations for fantasy football trades featuring these three players. 

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Sell Terry McLaurin

Really, this one is simple. If you can find a manager in your league who thinks “Terry McLaurin has been injured, but he'll be back soon and should perform to preseason expectations,” you need to trade him to that person ASAP. Scary Terry's issues go far deeper than the quad injury that has caused him to miss the last few weeks.

For one, McLaurin was already obviously overvalued coming into this season. This narrative was beaten to death by fantasy analysts (myself included) during draft season, but here's the short version: McLaurin finished as the WR6 last season, but that was mostly thanks to his unsustainable 13 touchdowns, while his underlying numbers looked more like those of a WR2 or WR3. 

However, McLaurin was underperforming even my already low expectations to start this season prior to his quad injury. McLaurin's biggest red flag has always been a lack of elite target earning despite negligible competition, but it was assumed he would remain the Commanders' WR1 over 29-year-old Deebo Samuel Sr. 

Instead, McLaurin was clearly outperformed by Samuel in the duo's two healthy games together. He saw just an 18% target share, 6.5 targets per game, compared to 25% and 9.0 for the former 49er. Samuel also saw four designed targets to McLaurin's zero in those two games, claiming valuable YAC opportunities in Kliff Kingsbury's offense. 

McLaurin's usage in his two healthy games wasn't truly terrible. That 18% target share isn't too bad, and he saw a healthy 33% air yards share. But, combined with some underperformance of his expected stats, he averaged just 5.5 half-PPR points in those two games. That number is what is most concerning about McLaurin, not his quad injury, and it's why you should be selling him now as excitement builds for his potential Week 7 return. 

Hold Chris Olave

I'm very tempted to list Olave as a player to target in trades. He ticks all of the traditional boxes for being a classic buy-low: he's got the talent and is seeing elite usage, he's just underperforming in the production column, largely thanks to a lack of TDs. Olave ranks second in the league in total targets, but just 31st among WRs in half-PPR points per game. That absolutely screams positive regression incoming, trade for this player now.

However, I'm not so convinced. For one, Olave's massive volume isn't exactly flying under the radar. Unless his manager is really checked out, they know that he is seeing elite volume and should eventually start scoring more points. For two, we do have to consider that New Orleans' offense with Spencer Rattler under center is genuinely bad. Although some positive regression is likely coming, it shouldn't surprise anyone if Olave underperforms his baseline expected numbers all season.

With that in mind, I only recommend buying Olave if you can do so at or near his current production levels. But on the flipside, I 100% don't recommend giving up on the 25-year-old if he's already on your roster. As long as the targets keep coming, better days will too. Hold Olave and keep rolling him out as a solid WR2 option if you have him.

Buy De'Von Achane

Currently the overall RB4 and RB5 in points per game, Achane is not going to come cheap. But the fact that he is showing up near the top of the ETI charts means at least some managers might be willing to listen to offers. If that is indeed the case, you should do whatever is possible to get the third-year back on your roster.

At the end of the day, fantasy football championships are usually won and lost by a few elite players each year. So far, Achane is on track to be one of those players. He's got the usage to back up his production, ranking fourth among RBs in snaps and second in both targets and target share. His rushing volume is less impressive, but we know that targets are more valuable than carries even in standard leagues. 

Achane's already-elite receiving usage has actually leveled up with Tyreek Hill done for the season. Over the last two weeks, he has ranked second in Miami's offense to Jaylen Waddle with a 19% target share, good for 6.5 targets per game. He has also run the majority of his routes (54%) from either out wide or in the slot.

This is essentially unprecedented among running backs, and it has helped his ADOT move from -0.9 over the first four weeks up to 1.4 — he's still mostly seeing screens and underneath targets, but lining up outside comes with at least some downfield opportunities. 

Perhaps the non-traditional way in which he earns his points is why Achane may be more available for trade than most elite fantasy running backs. But points are points, and this usage, unique though it may be, should just keep leading to points for Miami's RB1. If you can get him without giving up another superstar fantasy option, do it.