Good morning.

Hope you enjoyed the first round of waivers for the season. Unless you’re like me and woke up realizing you sold the farm for Kayshon freakin’ Boutte, then you might be regretting it… But that’s ok, we’re here to win. Not to mess around.

Today we take a deep look at all the underlying metrics from Week 1 to see which priors were confirmed and which expectations we might need to adjust. Let’s get after it…

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MARKET TRENDS 🧐

As we go through this week’s trends, keep in mind that it’s critical not to overreact to one week. After last year’s opening slate of games, Amon-Ra St. Brown scored only 4.3 points and Allen Lazard dropped 26.9. So let’s not get too wild thinking someone like Daniel Jones is gonna be a league winner.

Running Back

🚀 Christian McCaffrey is still HIM. CMC led all players in Week 1 with 30.1 expected fantasy points, per Fantasy Points’ Scott Barrett. He got there by leading all RBs in carries (22), a team-high 28.0% target share, and getting all four backfield touches inside the 10-yard line. Surprisingly, he’s one of the only healthy guys left in San Fran (for now), so expect him to get peppered with touches.

💰 Buy Bucky Irving:

✋ Hold Jaydon Blue (in deeper leagues). In your average 10-team work league, feel free to drop him. After all, he was a healthy scratch in Week 1 and could be again this weekend. But anyone who watched that game last Thursday night knows neither Javonte Williams nor Miles Sanders looked too impressive. Sanders could be especially replaceable, given the fact he fumbled late in the game and got caught from behind on what could’ve been a long TD run.

• In general with rookies, like Omarion Hampton, TreVeyon Henderson and R.J. Harvey, too, it’s best to hold and be patient.

📈 Stock up: Travis Etienne and Bhayshul Tuten. Following the trade of Tank Bigsby to Philly, Etienne instantly becomes a set-in-stone RB2 with RB1 upside, while Tuten gets one step closer to being this year’s Bucky Irving. Etienne handled 19 of the team's 29 RB touches, and totalled 156 scrimmage yards. While 71 of those yards came on a single breakaway run, he still averaged 4.8 yards on his other 15 carries. He’s a must-start going forward.

Meanwhile, Tuten is a high-upside handcuff who’s likely to fill the Bigsby role (12 snaps, five carries in Week 1). He brings game-breaking speed (4.32) and might provide enough juice to this offense to earn a significant role down the road.

📉 Sell high on Breece Hall. His talent is unquestionable, and that was on full display last week. But how sustainable was his performance? Hall only ran 8 total routes all game and was targeted on half of them, while also receiving just one of the team’s four goal-line rush attempts, per Griffin Missant of The Sporting News. He’ll have the odd blow up like he did against Pittsburgh, but consistency might not be his calling card with those underlying metrics.

👀 Monitor the Seahawks’ backfield. If their Week 1 usage is a sign of things to come, this looks like a true 50/50 split. Barring injury, both Walker and Charbonnet might just be RB3/FLEX options for now.

💩 Drop Jerome Ford. He was out-touched 20-7 by Dylan Sampson, which included eight targets to Ford’s one, per 4for4’s Jennifer Eakins. Plus, Quinshon Judkins could enter the fold as soon as this week. Without the expected passing game work many hoped for, Ford’s value is minimal.

Wide Receiver