Ride Derrick Mason into the playoffs!

[biju]

Ok, hear me out.

Mason has the most catches in the league with 59 (at least at this point in time; TO could tie with 10 catches tonight). Normally I would consider that this trend would NOT continue and he would eventually start getting fewer and fewer looks as defenses crowd around him. Then I took a look at his remaining schedule:

@ Jacksonville (19)
@ Houston (28)
@ Indianapolis (31)
Kansas City (26)
@ Oakland (24)
Denver (2)
Detroit (23)

the numbers next to the team is their overall pass defense ranking. Given this, I believe he is a player of "higher" value than you might expect (unless maybe you're a Titan fan) and gives good reason to try and trade for him.

Three HUGE monkey wrenches:

1. The QB situation. Volek appears to be erratic at times, and there's no reason to believe that will change. One thing to note is that Mason got nearly the same amount of catches/yards over the last four weeks which is in between good and bad games, as well as QBs.

2. The lack of TDs. That's a problem, but for you staticians there must be some type of return to the mean, meaning he'll come up with his TDs against the weaker (upcoming) teams. His 3 year average (for what it's worth) is 7 TDs, and this includes him missing 3 games. This one is a little more suspect, because there is obviously no real correlation.

3. The Denver game on week 16. I guess the only thing to say here is that if I care how the week 16 game is playing out my Mason plan has worked.

Does anyone have any thoughts about this? Please, I particularly want to hear people tell me this idea sucks as I'm about to mortgage away my future (it's an odd keeper league where you can't keep anyone before round 5) for a run this year.

thanks,
Matt

[biju]

come on, someone has something to say!

Maybe I should change the title to something more outrageous like "Derrick Mason: Best WR option from here on out". That would bring out the critics, right?

[1crzydmnd]

I think Mason is a good play for the rest of the year. From what I have seen he is one of the most consistent receivers out there. He doesn't get many TD's, but he gets plenty of yards. The QB situation doesn't seem to have an effect on his numbers. The Denver game is a "play your stud" game IMO. I think Mason has to be considered a stud. It helps that the Denver game is at Tennessee.

Who else do you have the opportunity to keep at WR?

[Rusman]

Well, I have Mason on my team and he always starts. I expect to get about 7-9 points (yards only), if he gets more, I'm happy. Pretty sad considering he was picked as my number one WR in the draft. I got lucky by getting Walker next.

Anyway, Mason has always been a sort of disappointment. He does decently well, he just hasn't been playing up to the hype. I'm not sure why this is, maybe due to Brown, or defenses keying on him, or simply that McNair doesn't like him. I have noticed that he's been doing better with Volek, but not sure how much credit Volek should get.

I guess your plan is ok, he definitely has favorable matchups, but what are you squandering to get him? That's the real crux of your theory.

[gatorman1122]

I guess your plan is ok, he definitely has favorable matchups, but what are you squandering to get him? That's the real crux of your theory.

This is the trade that I'm thinking of doing.
ME: Dillon, Blaylock, J. Smith
HIM: McCallister, Mason

good or bad?[/quote]

[biju]

I guess your plan is ok, he definitely has favorable matchups, but what are you squandering to get him? That's the real crux of your theory.

You're right. I would be giving up Anquan Boldin as an 8th round pick next year. I know it could sound extreme in that sense being that Boldin could be a top 10 WR if healthy a whole year but there's no guarantee on that and my current top receiver is...Johnnie Morton. I had two extremely unfortunate picks for WRs that didn't come close to panning out while focusing on RBs in the early rounds.

I really ended up screwing myself.

But the plus side is that I currently have at least 5 legitimate "keepers" for next year so if I'm not going to get much value out of them this year they should be shipped off for good talent now, right?

Well, at least you see my problem. Maybe I'm not looking at this in a clear light...

[biju]

I guess your plan is ok, he definitely has favorable matchups, but what are you squandering to get him? That's the real crux of your theory.

This is the trade that I'm thinking of doing.
ME: Dillon, Blaylock, J. Smith
HIM: McCallister, Mason

good or bad?

So you'd be receiving Deuce and Derrick? If I were you, unless Dillon/Blaylock are your #3 and #4 RBs, I wouldn't do this trade. Of course, this highly depends on how long you think Holmes' injury will keep him out of service. There's talk of him missing anywhere from one more game to about 4 more. And with his talk of retirement early in the year I would assume there's a very, very, very slight possibility that he's done for the year.

If you think Holmes will come back in week 12 your trade essentially is Dillon for Deuce, and this makes great sense. However, while Holmes is out Deuce and Blaylock have (in my opinion) similar value so the longer Holmes is out the worse this trade would be for you.