Waiver Wire Week 11: Reviewing Top Pickups and Drops Likely Available

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Want to know how important roster management is for fantasy football success? Just check the production from waiver-wire players in Week 10 of the 2021 NFL season.

Maybe you sniffed out a gem from Mac Jones and were rewarded with his three passing touchdowns. Perhaps your league is shallow enough that AJ Dillon was still up for grabs, and you snagged him in time for his two-score performance. You might have even had a hunch Kendrick Bourne was due to break out, then savored his 141 scrimmage yards and receiving score.

The waiver wire offers a plethora of production if you know where to find it—and know which players you can drop to free up space for those pickups.

It’s a delicate science (or an educated guessing game), but we’re here to help tackle it with a few adds (available in 50-plus percent of Yahoo leagues) and drops to consider ahead of Week 11.

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While one week’s waiver-wire breakouts aren’t guaranteed to deliver their next time out, Patriots rookie rusher Rhamondre Stevenson could be an exception to that rule.

For starters, the 23-year-old has impressed in back-to-back weeks, so you’re not chasing a single-game statistical outburst. This week’s numbers look better because they included two touchdowns, but he only had eight more scrimmage yards (114) than the game prior. And considering he exited that first contest early with a head injury, maybe he would’ve found the end zone if he stayed on the field.

Either way, the Oklahoma product is building trust from this team, and that could be critical with Damien Harris (concussion) again uncertain heading into Thursday night’s collision with the Atlanta Falcons.

Stevenson could remain fantasy-relevant even if Harris returns, but the rookie has RB1 upside if he is again the focal point of this backfield.

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What are the chances Adrian Peterson finds the end zone this week? If your answer is anything other than 100 percent, you can probably move on in all but the deepest fantasy leagues.

While it’s encouraging Tennessee has kept the 36-year-old involved with its Derrick Henry-less rushing plans, he isn’t doing enough with his opportunities to keep that going. His 18 carries in two games sound good, but they are a lot less exciting when they’ve yielded just 42 yards. He also has two catches on two targets, but they produced a combined four receiving yards.

The Titans will give him red-zone work, and maybe he can find the end zone. He has once already. But with Tennessee giving more chances to D’Onta Foreman (13 touches to Peterson’s nine in Week 10) and keeping Jeremy McNichols somewhat involved (four rushes, one reception on three targets), the veteran is a touchdown-or-bust option at this stage of his career.

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Was Marcus Johnson anywhere to be found on your fantasy radar before Sunday? His rostership says almost certainly not.

That doesn’t matter. It might increase the temptation to write off the 27-year-old’s five-catch, 100-yard effort as entirely fluky, but don’t fall into that trap. The Titans put Julio Jones on injured reserve before the contest, so Johnson’s emergence didn’t come out of thin air.

The New Orleans Saints blanketed A.J. Brown in coverage, freeing Johnson to snag five of the six balls thrown his way.

That involvement could stick. the Texas product has played three games without Jones this season, and he was targeted at least five times in every one.

Johnson could see the same kind of workload this week and do something with it against a Houston Texans defense that has allowed five receivers to score in its last three outings.

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Fantasy managers in deep leagues can continue holding out hope that Marvin Jones Jr. recaptures the production that powered him to a quick start in Jacksonville. But all other managers can probably turn the page on the veteran pass-catcher.

The 31-year-old is playing with a rookie quarterback, and it’s torpedoing his numbers. While he has at least five targets in each of his last five games, he has only topped 35 receiving yards once in that stretch. He also has a single touchdown since Week 2.

Jacksonville’s offense is collectively stuck in the mud. The Jags have topped 20 points in just three of their nine games and rank 31st on the season with 16.6 points per game. Outside of running back James Robinson, this unit should be avoided at all costs.

                 

Fantasy statistics used courtesy of FantasyPros.