I got chopped yesterday. My first ever Guillotine League elimination, executed by my best friend. I needed a heroic effort from Rashid Shaheed and nearly got it! I thought maybe Shaheed had done enough to save me. And then I received the following text in the group chat:

Gideon is my brother; he was the first one out. If you're a longtime FFT Newsletter reader, you might remember me saying this at the outset of taking over as the new author:

"I invite you to consider approaching Fantasy football through a per-route lens. It's not just yards per route run; there's more! We have access to all sorts of awesome per-route data -- targets per route run, yards per route run, and even first downs per route run -- I believe that this information is the next wave of improving Fantasy football analysis, and it would be my honor and joy to help you learn more about how to apply it and accomplish all of your wildest Fantasy football dreams.

I have been using per-route data to make my Fantasy football dreams (basically just making sure that my little brother never finishes above me in the standings; he talks way too much trash for me to let that happen) come true for the past six years, and this information has helped me to consistently identify values in Fantasy football."

Sure, I went out with, by far, the most remaining FAAB. I blew it. I completely fumbled the bag. I got barely outbid on Justin Jefferson by my buddy Nate, even though I had more than double the remaining FAAB that he had, and that was the difference in getting chopped or not. I wasn't aggressive enough, and now I'm a dead man, and my friends are looting my pockets.

But I did finish ahead of Gideon in the standings. Again. Be better, brother! (He drafted CMC at the 1.01; this really isn't fair at all) No excuses, though!

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, consider checking out this podcast that Dan Schneier and I recorded with Matthew Berry! My first taste of Guillotine action has been super fun. Even though I was eliminated, it was a fun ride. And we can do it all over again! You can start a new league at any time!

Alrighty, let's look at this week's waiver wire. Maybe you aren't feeling quite as happy-go-lucky as I am about your Fantasy football endeavors after spending all of your hard-earned FAAB only to be rewarded with 4 PPR points from Dontayvion Wicks. Maybe you're in a super serious high-dollar buy-in league where you can't simply "start a new league." Does that change anything about your Week 6 waiver wire approach?

Whatever situation you find yourself in heading into Week 6, all that we can do is focus on what's in front of us. Learn from the past, sure. I had a feeling that I was being too conservative when I placed my bid on Justin Jefferson last week, and I would have been better served trusting that intuition. I can reflect on that and make an effort to learn from it. Dwelling on it does me no good, though. It's time to look forward. What can we do from here? How can we best use our remaining time and resources?

My brother and I have had an absolutely brutal run-out in a couple of our co-managed Dynasty leagues. After looking around the league and making note of how many competitive teams there were, we made the decision to pack up our bags and prepare for the long road ahead. We're rebuilding. I would really prefer not to bail on a season after just five weeks, but so much of the circumstances around those teams have been out of our control. Oh well. There's no use in being frustrated about it. With a clear new direction, we can maximize our resources and be ready for the next fight.

In another league, even though we've had a brutal 2-8 start (we're 2-2 against the league median and 0-4 in head-to-head matchups), we are still convinced that we can compete. We've evaluated our current circumstances and looked ahead and see a real outcome where we compete for a championship in 2024. And that's all that matters, the fact that we have just two wins and feel like hard-luck losers does not matter. The fact that I took a swing and miss on Bo Melton as a waiver wire fill-in does not matter. Curtis Samuel's disappointing Week 5 doesn't matter. What matters is that we still have most of our FAAB, we have a roster that is mostly healthy, and we have multiple future rookie draft picks that we can use to acquire more assets. What can we do from here?

For those of you who are Dontayvion Wicks investors, I watched all of his routes from Week 5. It could have been a much bigger Fantasy performance. And if he gets more starts in the future, I'd expect much bigger Fantasy performances. We don't know when Christian Watson will be back, so feel free to drop Wicks if you believe there's a player available who better helps your team. Personally, I want to hold Wicks if at all possible. Week 5 was a bottom-range of outcomes game for him. It happens. Bad games happen to literally every player, especially at the wide receiver position.

I created a thread detailing what I saw from Wicks in Week 5 if you wanna watch that.

So, which wide receivers are in the best matchups to target based on the coverage data? ... Join SportsLine here to see Jacob Gibbs' 2024 Week 6 matchups to exploit, all from an expert who has finished highly in accuracy rankings in recent years! ... You've unlocked our best deal! Get your first month of SportsLine for ONLY $1 with the promo code "LEAGUE"! Join here!