Waiver Wire Watch: Week 15
Editor’s Note: We’re happy that 4for4 Contributor Pat Fitzmaurice (formerly of Pro Football Weekly) is back on the Waiver Wire Watch this year. He will continue to work in conjunction with Senior Editor John Paulsen to compile this list of the top pickups each week.
Here is a look at the top waiver wire pickups for Week 15. To be eligible for discussion, the player must be owned in 50% or fewer Yahoo leagues, though we’ll stretch the rules a bit for the RB position, which is usually very thin. We’ll also include suggested bid prices (with a $100 budget) for those leagues that use Free Agent Acquisition Budgets. Of course, player value depends on league characteristics and team needs. Players are listed by position in order of importance. For extremely shallow or extremely deep leagues, be sure to review our Rest-of-Season Rankings (updated every Tuesday) to get an idea of how to value players not on this list.
* Players with an asterisk next to their name were mentioned in last week’s Waiver Wire Watch.
Browns QB Johnny Manziel* ($12)
Mike Pettine’s decision last week to stick with Brian Hoyer as his starting quarterback was an affront to common sense. Hoyer rewarded his head coach’s trust by completing 45.2% of his passes for 140 yards, with zero TDs and two INTs, in a loss to the Colts that devastated the Browns’ playoff hopes. Pettine might be committed to a mental-health facility if he sticks with the chronically mediocre Hoyer as his starter for another game, so it’s a pretty good bet that Johnny Football will get his first professional start this week against the Bengals. It’s neither a great nor prohibitive matchup for Manziel. As mentioned in this space last week (when we were certain Manziel would be starting against the Colts), it’s hard to guess what sort of passing numbers the rookie will produce in a fairly conservative offense. But it’s a pretty good bet that he’s going to add some helpful rushing numbers to his fantasy point count. Manziel has a good matchup coming up against the Panthers in Week 16, so he actually might factor into some fantasy championship games as the choice of QB streamers who made it deep into the fantasy postseason. He’s worth a healthy bid from any fantasy owner who doesn’t have any attractive QB options this week or next.
Next up: Bengals, Panthers, Ravens
Buccaneers QB Josh McCown ($5)
McCown has completed just over 50% of his passes over the last three weeks, but he’s had some good games this season against bad pass defenses – 301 passing yards and two TDs vs. Atlanta; 288 yards and two TDs vs. Washington – and this week he’ll be up against a fairly beatable Carolina pass D that figures to have trouble with WRs Mike Evans and Vincent Jackson. McCown is a reasonable Week 15 streaming option.
Next up: Panthers, Packers, Saints
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