Fantasy Football Player Notes

Going from Kirk Cousins to Josh Allen isn't going to be a highlight of Diggs' career, as Cousins has continually been one of the better deep-ball passers, while Allen was among the worst in 2019. Diggs actually led the league in yardage on passes that traveled over 20 yards in the air last year. The Bills are still a run-first team that has a top-tier defense, so it's hard to expect a big jump in pass attempts. They targeted their wide receivers 310 times last year, which was a lot for a team that threw the ball just 513 times. The 60.4 percent target share was the fourth-highest mark in the league. So, again, it's tough to say there will be more to go around. Knowing that John Brown was fantastic last year (115 targets), as was Cole Beasley (104 targets), it's tough to take targets away from them, but we have to start taking them from someone because you don't trade for someone like Diggs and not target him. Still, giving him even 115 targets might be too generous, as it'd completely crush the value of Brown, who already has experience with the quarterback/offense. Realistically, I have Diggs down for 111 targets in my projections. When tied to Allen's inconsistencies, that is a WR3 in fantasy who can get into WR2 territory at year's end, similarly to the way Brown did last year. Diggs is probably a top-eight wide receiver in the league, but you need to targets to move up the boards in fantasy football. I'd be happy landing him as my WR3, but that's about it.

The addition of Stefon Diggs likely crushed the appeal that Brown had in fantasy football. The Bills gave up a first, fourth, fifth, and sixth-round pick for Diggs (and a seventh rounder). That's a lot. The fact that there will be no preseason certainly helps Brown, as he has experience and chemistry with Josh Allen, as well as knowing the offense. Here's the crazy part about Brown last year: He hit WR3 or better numbers in 73.3 percent of his games, which ranked 11th in the league. He only hit WR2 or better numbers in 26.7 percent of his games, which ranked 51st in the league. Now start removing targets to get Diggs his, and we suddenly lose some of that WR3 floor that he had. He is a good football player who just won't get enough targets to start on a consistent basis. Now, if Diggs were to miss any time, we could go back to playing him as a low-end WR2/high-end WR3. Until then, Brown is in the WR4 range for me.

It's odd, but the trade for Stefon Diggs doesn't really affect Beasley's role at all. He's the slot receiver in the offense when they go three-wide, and he's the safety valve for Josh Allen. With that being said, many more plays will be designed to the perimeter in order to get the ball into Digg's hands. That will cap the number of targets Beasley sees, which was at a tremendous 104 last year. Even without Diggs on the roster last year, Beasley produced just two games with more than 14.3 half PPR points, so it's not like you were winning weeks because of him. He was a fine streamer during bye weeks as someone who wouldn't crush your lineup. Lowering expectations to around 80-85 targets, Beasley's floor has been lowered and there will be better options to choose during bye weeks in 2020.