Week 9 Fantasy Football Trades: Jaylen Waddle, Jordan Mason and Josh Jacobs

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:

This week's ETI results are a little surprising. Normally, the top players in trade interest tend to be those going through some sort of change in circumstances and value. This week, only one of the top options, Jordan Mason, fits that bill.

The other two players in the top three, Jaylen Waddle and Josh Jacobs, are in relatively stable situations. That may make it trickier to decide how to approach them on the fantasy football trade market, but it doesn't mean we can't try. Let's get started.

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Buy Jaylen Waddle

Tyreek Hill's season ended in Week 4. Since then, Waddle has averaged 13.3 half-PPR points per game on a 21% target share and a 51% air yards share.

For the season, those numbers would rank ninth, 26th, and first (!!) among wide receivers with at least four games played. Without Hill, Waddle — who also ranks eighth among qualified WRs in PFF Grade for the season, by the way —  is a genuine WR1, or at worst a high-end WR2. 

Despite his impressive numbers, Waddle simply isn't being valued as an elite option. I checked multiple consensus trade value rankings, and he was outside the top-20 receivers everywhere I looked.

Likely, managers have been turned off by the Dolphins' well-publicized struggles, including multiple truly horrendous outings from Tua Tagovailoa. But, at least so far, the Dolphins' offense has remained competent and concentrated enough to support their top fantasy assets. It's a little risky, but buying Waddle is likely the easiest way to add a borderline WR1 to your lineup.  

Hold Jordan Mason

I would recommend selling Mason, but is anyone really buying? The former 49er looked like a straight-up backup with Aaron Jones Sr. back from injury last week. He played just 34% of the Vikings' offensive snaps, handled four carries, and saw one target on six routes.

No one who's paying any attention wants to trade for Mason now. (The time to sell was a month ago, when I recommended it on multiple occasions.)

Last Thursday was terrible, but better days are likely on the horizon for Mason. Thursday saw the Vikings in a massively negative game script, which favored Jones as the better pass catcher of the backfield. Even still, Mason saw just one fewer carry than Jones.

In Week 1, the only previous game in which Mason and Jones were both fully available, he led the backfield with 15 carries to Jones' eight. Mason has also played 100% of the Vikings' snaps inside the five in Jones' two full games. That stat is a lot less impressive once you realize the sample is literally one snap, but it does stand to reason that Mason, the larger of the two RBs, would be the preferred goal-line option. 

This is why I have Mason as a hold — last week was terrible, but there's a real chance he will have more productive outings in the future. We also should acknowledge the reality that it wouldn't be at all shocking if Jones, a 30-year-old with a long injury history, misses more time at some point this season.

Unless someone is truly asleep at the wheel and still paying RB3 prices for Mason, I recommend simply holding and hoping things improve. (Technically, you could also try to buy him at a discount, but I don't recommend trading for low-ceiling assets in most league formats.)

Buy Josh Jacobs

If I had to guess, Jacobs is appearing on the ETI list because managers are worried that he saw only two more carries than Emanuel Wilson last week, 13-11. Jacobs' 54% snap share was also his lowest of the season — he has been below 60% in each of the last two weeks after averaging a 74% snap share through Week 6. But you shouldn't be worried about Jacobs' workload, so if his current manager is, now is the time to buy.

For one, that 13-11 split in Week 8 is a bit deceiving. Eight of Wilson's 11 carries came in the fourth quarter, and two more came on the team's final drive of the third. Given that Jacobs came into the game nursing a calf injury, it seems more likely that this change in usage was injury-related rather than the Packers' coaches simply wanting to give Wilson touches at Jacobs' expense.

Jacobs also dealt with that calf injury in Week 7, as well as an illness that had him as a legit game-time decision. 

More importantly, Jacobs is a straight-up stud. Even including his last two weeks of reduced usage, he ranks fifth among all RBs with 18.2 points per game. He ranks sixth in total carries, 15th in target share, and fifth in his share of his team's expected fantasy points.

Given that the Packers' offense ranks second in the league in EPA per play, that last stat is particularly mouthwatering. Elite RBs are worth their weight in gold, and then some. If Jacobs is available in your league, don't be afraid to pay up to get him.