Fabiano’s Fantasy Focus: Week Eight, Vol. II – Bracing For The Trade Deadline

Every week during the NFL season, Sports Illustrated Senior Fantasy Analyst Michael Fabiano joins Sports360AZ’s Brad Cesmat to share his insight on building and developing your fantasy team for success.

In our most recent conversation with Michael (Oct. 26), we discussed how to deal with Tuesday’s trade deadline and which players could be changing addresses, as well as certain players returning from injured reserve. Here is what the Hall-of-Famer had to say:

Are You Concerned About James Robinson Potentially Getting Moved Before Tuesday’s Deadline?

“I haven’t heard anything about James Robinson potentially being dealt. Unless I’m missing something, he should be good to go against Seattle this Sunday. He’s coming off a bye, he’s been one of the top running backs in fantasy before, so I’m not sure what the concern is. They have Travis Etienne, I get it. I guess they’d have to be blown away by the offer but I don’t how much a team is going to give up for a running back. I know he’s good, but I don’t know that the Jags are going to get enough in return to make a deal. If they do, that may not be good news for Robinson. Assuming that does not happen, he is one of the ten to 12 best running backs in fantasy football.”

We’re At The Point In The Season Where We Have A Clear Idea Of Which Players Are And Aren’t Going To Be Viable Starting Options The Rest Of The Way. Who Are You Benching Right Now?

“Forget about the names. We are in week seven of the National Football League season in 2021. Julio Jones should not be in your starting lineup, Allen Robinson should not be in your starting lineup, Robby Anderson should not be in your starting lineup. Odell Beckham, Jr. should only be in your starting lineup if you’re really in trouble at the wide receiver position. Folks, these guys are not producing. Kalif Raymond is a better fantasy wide receiver than everyone I just named. Because we get stuck on names, we continue to play these guys because we’re so afraid that we’re going to sit the player and the one week we sit him he’s going to go off. It’s not happening.”

Michael Gallup Is Returning From Injured Reserve This Week. Should He Be Picked Up On Waivers?  

“If Gallup is active, I’d pick him up. You want to have parts of that offense. There’s a lot of mouths to feed, I get it, and we’re going to find out if the return of Gallup means that Dalton Schultz’s targets start to go down. Gallup is a talented guy and if he wasn’t on the Cowboys, he’d be a pretty regular flex starter on another team with a good quarterback. The matchup is also really good this week.”