Welcome back to Lucid Streams. Our goal here is to help you find emergency help that’s potentially available on the waiver wire or on the back of your bench when you’re scrambling for options due to injuries or plain old poor drafting at wide receiver and tight end. We also want to equip you with the tools to go out on your own and find the best fantasy football sleepers yourself in case the options listed here each week aren’t available to you. Our goal is to find WRs who have at least a reasonable chance to contribute 10+ PPR points to your lineup this week and TEs who can chip in at least seven points in PPR.
Last week, we were at 50% on our WR recommendations. We rode the Jameis Winston Fantasy Express with good results from both Cedric Tillman and Elijah Moore, while Josh Palmer got close to topping our 10-point threshold but fell just short. At TE, we got it right on three of five, with Will Dissly, Jonnu Smith, and Grant Calcaterra all hitting.
The Process
What we are looking for each week is to find the players most likely to pop for one of several reasons. They may have an increased role in their offense due to the misfortune of a player ahead of them on the depth chart, or they may be facing a defense that will have trouble defending them due to a positional mismatch. Maybe that’s a chronic problem of the defense, or maybe it’s due to injuries in the coverage units, which will allow a unique opportunity for success by our streamer. At the intersection of high opportunity and low ownership is where we want to pan for gold in the stream. Remember, these are recommendations for those who are really in a bind for a starter and should not be played over anyone you’d normally start.
We’ll use a variety of tools to help us, including schedule-adjusted fantasy points allowed to the WR and TE positions. If you’re not familiar with this metric, it removes the variance that can skew fantasy points allowed by a defense due to the quality of the passing attacks they’ve faced. For example, if Defense A has faced four top-tier passing offenses in the first four weeks while Defense B has faced only weak passing offenses over that same period, it could appear that Defense B is better at defending WRs than Defense A, when in reality, Defense A might be the tougher matchup. The further we get into the season, the more relevance this analysis has.
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Streaming Wide Receivers Week 9
Elijah Moore, Cleveland Browns
We got rewarded with 12 targets, eight receptions, and 85 yards for taking a chance on Moore last week, good for WR21 on the week. He probably is getting picked up in many leagues, but there are enough fantasy managers who have sworn him off for life that you may still be able to get him. Forgiving others is a healthy life skill. Start by forgiving Moore for being stuck with a nearly endless string of poor QB play, and go get him if you can.
Xavier Legette, Cleveland Browns
Diontae Johnson packed his bags for Baltimore, leaving plenty of opportunity in Carolina for their first-round draft pick to pick up more targets. After whiffing on Jonathan Mingo, the Panthers need to find out what they have in Legette this year in order to accurately assess their team needs in the offseason.
Jalen Coker, Carolina Panthers
Another Panthers WR? Call me crazy, but the opportunity is there, especially if Adam Thielen doesn’t play this week. The undrafted WR from Holy Cross looks like a real find for the Panthers. Just like Legette, it’s in the best interest of the Panthers to find out exactly how good Coker is before they face another offseason.
Darius Slayton, New York Giants
It’s hard to back any player catching passes from Daniel Jones, but he does take several deep shots a game and Slayton has become a viable part of this passing attack. Dial him up if you’re in a jam at WR.
Honorable Mentions
- Adam Thielen: If he plays this week, he’s instantly the #1 WR in Carolina. While that’s a low bar to clear, it’s still a valuable role.
- Demarcus Robinson: If Jordan Whittington is out, Robinson is the WR3 for the Rams. As we saw last Thursday, he can get lost in the sauce when defenses focus on Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua. I can’t predict two TDs this week but he’s a reasonable desperation option.
Streaming Tight Ends Week 9
Brenton Strange, Jacksonville Jaguars
As John Lennon once sung, “Nobody told me there’d be days like these; Strange days indeed.” The Jaguars’ WR room was decimated last week. They lost Christian Kirk for the season and potentially will be missing Brian Thomas Jr. and Gabriel Davis for this week as well. Parker Washington is Jacksonville’s replacement slot receiver, but during the game last week the Jaguars responded to losing Kirk by playing 12 personnel (two WRs and two TEs) for most of the second half. I think they’ll substantially increase their usage of this package for at least this week and possibly longer. The big beneficiary of all this is Strange.
Mike Gesicki, Cincinnati Bengals
If Tee Higgins is out for the Bengals, run to your waiver wire and pick up Mike Gesicki. His stat lines in the two games Higgins has missed? Seven catches for 91 yards on nine targets and seven catches for 73 yards on eight targets. If Higgins plays, though, Gesicki is nearly worthless for fantasy, averaging less than 4.0 points per game.
Juwan Johnson, New Orleans Saints
The Saints are likely to have Derek Carr back under center on Sunday. This should give a boost to their entire passing attack. Even better, the Saints will go up against the putrid Carolina Panthers defense. Carolina is particularly bad at defending TEs, ranking 32nd in schedule-adjusted fantasy points allowed to TEs.
Jonnu Smith, Miami Dolphins
Jonnu continues to be low-owned and he continues to come through for those of us who are struggling at the TE position, so we are going to continue to plug him in as needed. With eight, seven, and six targets in his last three games, Jonnu is getting the volume we need.
Honorable Mention
- Colby Parkinson: This week’s opponent, Seattle, ranks 29th in schedule-adjusted points allowed at TE. Parkinson is worth a shot if all of the other options are off the table.
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