If you had told me before the season began that Kenny Pickett would have a handful of points more than Matthew Stafford this year, I’d have said, “Wow! He must have had an incredible rookie year!” Obviously, that hasn’t been the case because Stafford and the Rams fell off.
You can apply this a thousand different ways with disappointing 2022 quarterbacks who fell well short of expectations like Stafford, Matt Ryan and Tom Brady against the position's overachievers like Trevor Lawrence, Justin Fields, Daniel Jones, Jared Goff and Geno Smith. The middle of the quarterback rankings is a good place to shop for value. Parsing through each quarterback's value heading into 2023 is an evaluation process worth monitoring as we move to the conclusion of this season. In particular, there is a pair of quarterbacks, an underachiever and an overachiever out of the NFC West, that I feel exemplify this value dichotomy.
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QB Geno Smith, Seattle Seahawks
The crux of any dynasty conversation about Smith boils down to how the Seahawks will handle his contract situation. He will be an unrestricted free agent next year and it’s likely Seattle opts to hit him with a franchise tag, giving him a one-year deal in the $30 million range. It’s a hefty price tag, but would pale in comparison to the cost of a long-term deal. Seattle (7-7) is on the playoff bubble with three games left. Those matchups (at KC, vs. NYJ and vs. LAR) could result in a 1-2 finish, likely keeping the Seahawks out of the postseason. A long-term deal may not make sense even if Smith leads Seattle on a deeper run toward a Super Bowl.
With that in mind, I'd like to oversimplify this dynasty conundrum. In 1QB leagues, I'd be holding Smith. Generally, I prefer to use my backup quarterback spots in 1QB leagues to aim for ceiling instead of a high-floor backup like Smith. But considering he isn't that valuable or very unlikely to command much in return, it doesn't make sense to sell. In superflex, I'm more willing to roll the dice, bet on him to continue to succeed. You could certainly do a lot worse than Smith and he's an ideal QB2 given his relatively consistent play.
Ultimately, his trade demand is a bit depressed despite his incredible 2022 season. He's the QB7 so far in 2022. Yet on FantasyCalc, Smith is ranked as the QB15 in 1QB and superflex, just a touch higher than Pickett and Derek Carr. Smith is lower on KeepTradeCut (QB17 1QB and QB19 on superflex). That may be fair given we don't know how willing Seattle is to bring in an heir apparent to be the Trey Lance (or Brock Purdy) to Smith's Jimmy Garoppolo. With Smith, it's a buyer's market, so I'm likely to trot him out again in 2023 rather than taking the low offer I would get for him in the open market.
Price check (1QB): 2023 2nd
Superflex: 2023 mid 1st
Win-now: Hold
Rebuild: Hold
