Fantasy Football Trades Week 13: Christian McCaffrey, Jonathan Taylor, Davante Adams, Deebo Samuel

We are getting close to the end of the fantasy football season, and some leagues may have already had their trade deadlines. If you’re reading this article, hopefully your league is still allowing trades as we enter Week 13 (although I used to read fantasy articles even after all my teams had been eliminated, so I won’t judge if you’re just here for the takes). Any fantasy football trades made now can have a huge impact on your team’s championship hopes, so it’s more important than ever to make sure you get good value.

That's where FantasySP's tools come in: We can use the FantasySP Fantasy Assistant to find players that have the most Expected Trade Interest (ETI) and then cross-reference with the Trade Value Chart to see how much those players are worth. Here are this week’s leaders in ETI:

The top of this week’s ETI chart features four fantasy superstars who are trending in the wrong direction: Christian McCaffrey, Jonathan Taylor, Davante Adams, and Deebo Samuel. Honestly, all four of these players are in shockingly similar situations. However, that doesn’t mean all four require the same approach in the fantasy trade market. Let’s break down what to do with these four (former?) studs.

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Best Fantasy Football Trades To Make Week 13

Buy Low On Christian McCaffrey

This article is going to have a theme, and that theme is “players who may not be quite as good as they once were but are still seeing elite volume.” CMC kicks off that theme in perfect fashion. Since returning from injury, the three-time Pro Bowler has not been his usual explosive self: He has zero explosive runs in 43 attempts and is averaging a career-low 3.5 yards per carry. The tracking data paints a similarly ugly picture for the 28-year-old RB dealing with double Achilles tendinitis. 

However, I do expect CMC’s fantasy output to trend upward, even if he is all out of juice. Through three weeks, he is averaging just 11.2 Half-PPR points per game. But his expected fantasy points per game is 15.8, as his incredible dual-threat workload is still firmly intact. CMC has averaged 14.3 carries per game to go with a massive 17% target share since his return. He has also been heavily utilized in the red zone but has yet to hit pay dirt. Even if his days as the undisputed RB1 overall are over, McCaffrey should still be a top-12 option going forward with this pristine usage. If you can find someone willing to give him up coming off an 8.3-point outing, make the move.

Hold Jonathan Taylor

Another former RB1 overall, JT’s situation isn’t that different from McCaffrey’s. Despite some undeniable issues, his overall profile still looks better than his recent production. Of course, the 25-year-old Taylor doesn’t have the same washed concerns as McCaffrey (I sure hope not, anyway). Instead, his issues are usage-based. With Anthony Richardson under center, Taylor has averaged just a 5.5% target share (1.5 targets per game). The sophomore QB has also been cutting into Taylor’s TD equity since his return from the bench, with two goal-line touchdowns over the last two games. 

Receiving and goal-line usage are the two most valuable parts of an RB’s workload, so this is obviously bad for Taylor’s value. However, his recent production is even worse than these issues would imply. Over the last four weeks, JT is averaging just 7.7 Half-PPR points per game, with four scores in the single digits. Given that he handled 69 of the Colts’ 71 RB rushes in that span (17.3 carries per game), I don’t expect this level of lackluster production to last. Like McCaffrey, Taylor may be more of a borderline RB1 than an elite RB1, but I wouldn’t panic despite the red flags that have popped up in recent weeks.

Buy Low On Davante Adams

What’s this? Another aging former fantasy superstar who has underperformed in recent weeks despite elite volume? Since joining the Jets, Adams has only one finish inside the top 30 weekly wide receivers. However, he is still averaging a massive 26% target share over that span — his expected fantasy points per game of 14.5 is much better than his actual 9.4. 

Of course, savvy fantasy managers will have noticed that Adams is seeing 8.4 targets per game. But I think there is still a buy-low window here, as the vibes around the Jets are currently at an all-time low. Rumors are flying about Aaron Rodgers’ 2025 plans, and there is speculation that some of the Jets’ veterans (including Rodgers or Adams himself) will shut it down for the season with their playoff hopes dead. In my experience, narratives like this are almost always pure conjecture. If anyone were to quit on their team with multiple weeks left to go, Rodgers would be a prime candidate, but that type of thing essentially never actually happens in the NFL.  

With that in mind, I like taking a flyer and trying to snag Adams from a disappointed manager. It might not always be pretty, but a guaranteed heavy dose of targets each week should mean he finishes the season stronger than his Jets tenure has gone so far. 

Sell Low On Deebo Samuel

Overall, this has been a fairly positive article, in which I find reasons to believe in highly drafted players who are struggling … that ends here. I may be biased as a frustrated 49ers fan and Samuel manager, but I see very little reason to expect a turnaround from him heading forward. 

The key difference between Samuel and these other players is that he simply hasn’t had elite usage. For the season, he has just an 18% target share in the 49ers’ offense. That number hasn’t gotten any better with Brandon Aiyuk sidelined, as Samuel's target share is at exactly 18% over the last three weeks as well.  Of course, a part of Deebo’s value has always also come from his work in the rushing game. He is averaging 2.7 carries per game but hasn’t found much success on the ground. His 2.9 yards per attempt is by far a career-low, and he has just one rushing TD on the season. 

To be fair, this volume isn’t that out of the ordinary for Deebo. He averaged just a 20.5% target share and actually slightly fewer carries per game in 2023. But he relied on truly elite efficiency (thanks in large part to the 49ers’ overall offensive dominance) to still put up quality fantasy numbers. Both of those aspects are now gone, as both Deebo himself and San Francisco’s offense as a whole have been much less effective in 2024. Where the other players on this list have elite volume and just need mediocre efficiency to be great assets, Samuel has mediocre volume and will need elite efficiency to return to form. I wouldn't bet on that happening, so it’s worth checking to see if you can get much of anything for him in the trade market. 

Ted Chmyz is a fantasy football contributor for FantasySP. Find him on Twitter @Tchmyz for more fantasy content or to ask questions.