Advice To Peyton Hillis Fantasy Football Owners
Alex Dunlap, Rosterwatch.com

Should you drop him? You can’t trade him. His value is garbage right now and you would be selling at his lowest point.

A relatively-low risk move that some employed, including myself in two fantasy drafts, was taking Chiefs RB Peyton Hillis in the 8th or 9th round as a value flex play with tremendous upside. The reasons?

1) Jamaal Charles was coming back from injury.
2) He looked fantastic in the preseason, was consistently involved, and was re-united with OC Brian Daboll who coached him to a Madden cover just two years ago.
3) He was finally healthy and looking like the beast he was in 2010 in both training camp, and on the field during preseason action.

Here has what has occurred after three weeks regarding these statements:

1) Jamaal Charles is clearly not injured, and still has the ability to go absolutely freaking bananas. (He does look a tiny, tiny bit slower, though.)
2) Hillis has been involved in an inconsistent manner, to put things lightly, in every game except in Week 2 when he put up a relatively serviceable flex game, filling in when Charles went out with knee soreness.
3) Now he’s injured again.

Hillis injured his ankle in the third quarter of the Saints game, and I honestly don’t even remember seeing him play in the game until he left it, throwing his helmet.

Once again acting like a diva. Displaying troubling signs that you might have bought 2011 Peyton Hillis. Not the 2010 version you thought you were getting a great deal on after the test drive. As you know, the 2010 model was followed by an absolute lemon.

oh and…

4) There also now seems to be a rather unexpected addition to the committee that many did not foresee: Shaun Draughn from UNC apparently plays for the Chiefs now, and apparently he looks kinda good.

Hopefully the rest of your roster is strong enough to get you through this period, until a point at which you will comfortably start Hillis. You should not be starting Hillis at this point, though, unless you are in serious desperation.

If you followed our draft methodologies, you aren’t. Don’t freak out, and don’t drop Hillis yet. If you do, there will be an advantageous winning owner willing to take on what has now become a low-risk, high reward asset that you have paid for. That hurts you in two ways.

I would look at the Rashard Mendenhall owner and see if there were any deals I could make, packaging bench/weaker flex players at one of my positions of strength for Mendenhall.

If we have seen one thing this year it is that these ACL surgeries are getting better, and players seem to be coming off injury much less effected. You know that all too well as a Hillis owner seeing what Charles did Sunday. Mendenhall, at nearly nine months post-knee-reconstruction, by all reports has looked nothing short of amazing at practice for nearly three weeks now, and the Pittsburgh run game is awful.

To say the Steelers would not utilize Mendenhall currently is crazy. He may not be the best fantasy weapon, but he is only one year removed from a 1400 yard, 13 touchdown season.

A week 5 return seems likely, and he could serve as the option you hoped Hillis might be down the stretch if things don’t pan out, and can likely be had for peanuts or perhaps picked up off waivers in some leagues.

Now would be the time to make a move for Mendenhall. Before anything official is announced about his return, and the hype machine starts. Fred Jackson costs you a lot more today than he did yesterday, because it is now being reported he might play next week.