Dynasty, in Theory: Do Managers Overreact?

Long-time readers know I'm not super keen on practical, actionable insight—the running gag is that the column is called "Dynasty, in Theory" because, in theory, it's about dynasty. Long-time readers also know that my one big exception every year is my post-rookie production model. (This year's edition coming in January!)

Calling it a "model" perhaps oversells it. It only consists of a measure of efficiency (touchdown-adjusted yards per route run) and a quick-and-dirty measure of role (routes per game divided by team pass attempts per game), with both normalized and combined. If it were any simpler, I legally couldn't call it a model ("models" with just one variable are more properly known as "statistics"). But the goal of modeling is to make things as simple as they need to be, but no simpler, and the model works shockingly well for what it is.

The Model Cautions Patience

The first rookie class to test it against after it was developed was 2022, and the model scored Chris Olave in the "likely future superstar" tier and ranked Drake London, Christian Watson, and Garrett Wilson (in that order) in the "strong fantasy starters" category. Today, by consensus trade value, Olave is the #7 receiver, London is #8, Wilson is #10, and Watson is #19.

Maybe that all seems inevitable in hindsight, but it was very much not viewed as a foregone conclusion along the way. Drake London "only" had 866 yards and 4 touchdowns in his rookie campaign, and after a 0-catch performance to open his sophomore season, many managers were panic-selling for anything they could get.

(An aside: the model was especially impressed by those 866 yards as a rookie because they came on a team that only attempted 415 total passes, 2nd-fewest in the league. Garrett Wilson won Rookie of the Year because he had 27% more yards than London, but he played on a team that threw 51% more passes. The deck was stacked in his favor.)

In September 2023, after arguing with many on Twitter against panicking on London, I did a podcast episode with Matt Waldman, our resident film guru, on how much of a mistake it was to abandon London.

Chris Olave's sophomore season went better than London's, but injuries and underperformance brought him down in Year 3. In November 2024, Waldman and I once again discussed a receiver who had fallen out of favor, this time calling him the biggest buy-low in dynasty.

How Valuable Was That Patience?

With the benefit of hindsight, both stances were tremendously valuable. London's market value bottomed out at around WR22 in October of 2023. Olave was around WR23 in November 2024 and slid all the way to WR34 over the subsequent offseason before beginning his rebound. Per Footballguys' dynasty trade values, they are now the 14th and 15th most valuable players, regardless of position, in PPR, non-superflex leagues. They could have been acquired for a fraction of their current cost.

But more than that, they also provided production in the meantime. If we assume that the replacement level at wide receiver is around 7 points per game (even in my deepest dynasty leagues, I can find someone like Kendrick Bourne on the waiver wire who is projected to score around 7 points in any given week), then Drake London has added 364 points over a replacement receiver since the beginning of 2023 (7.6 per game over 48 games). Chris Olave has added 205 points over replacement since the start of 2025 (10.8 per game over 19 games).

If you've read a lot of dynasty advice columns, you know what comes next. This is the part of the article where I pivot from smug self-congratulation to castigating the average dynasty manager for their overreactions or lamenting their impatience. And sure, maybe that second criticism is a little fair; we had enough evidence available that London and Olave were good players going through a bad stretch, if we only knew where to look for it. A bit more patience was certainly warranted.

But despite what you might read in dozens of early-season thinkpieces, I don't think dynasty managers are especially prone to overreacting. Because, you see, there's a third character in this morality play we haven't yet been introduced to.

What That Patience Cost Us