The June trade season did something it usually doesn’t: it created real, actionable value before camps even open. A.J. Brown to New England and DJ Moore to Buffalo aren’t just headlines, they’re depth-chart shifts that ripple two and three players deep. A lot of the rankings going up right now treat these as name moves. They’re roles, and roles are what you draft.
Start in Jacksonville, because Bhayshul Tuten is the one I keep circling back to. Etienne is in New Orleans, and the Jaguars used all ten of their draft picks without spending a single one on a running back. That’s about as clear a signal as a front office gives that the job is Tuten‘s to lose. He flashed it as a rookie: 386 yards and 7 touchdowns on a backup’s workload, and he scored in all four games he got at least nine touches. The piece I love most is the passing-down vacancy. The other back in that room, Rodríguez, has seven career targets across three seasons, so the receiving work flows to Tuten by default, and this playcaller has thrown more running back screens than anyone since taking over in 2024. The risk is that Jacksonville signs a veteran in August or rides a fuzzy committee, which would cap him in touchdown-dependent RB4 territory. But the price pays for that. I’m comfortable taking him at RB30 and I’ll get aggressive down at RB36. If he’s going inside RB24, I let someone else dream.
Buffalo finally fixed the one thing DJ Moore needed. People look at Moore‘s Chicago tenure and see a former WR1 who stalled out. I look at the trade and see a guy walking back into the exact conditions that made him good. He reunites with Joe Brady, the coordinator who handed him the sixth-highest target share in the league when they were together in Carolina, and now he’s catching passes from a top-tier quarterback instead of fighting through a crowded, dysfunctional room. That Buffalo WR1 slot is not a mystery. It produced 100-plus catches, 8-plus touchdowns, and double-digit fantasy points per game for Diggs in all four of his seasons there. The Bills’ receiver depth is thin enough that the targets have to land somewhere, and Moore is the most accomplished name in the building. If Buffalo leans run-heavy and feeds backs and tight ends, that’s the version where he’s a touchdown-variance WR3, but I’m betting against that given who’s throwing him the ball. He’s a back-end WR2 on price and I’ll buy through WR24, push to WR28 in PPR, and pass north of WR18.
Now flip that trade over. Moore leaving Chicago vacates the targets he led that team in last year, and Rome Odunze is the natural heir. He’s the perimeter alpha, he’s entering the part of the curve where first-round receivers tend to jump, and the quarterback situation is finally trending up. The clutter is real, Luther Burden III and Colston Loveland both want pieces of that pie, and there’s a realistic version where the volume fragments and Odunze settles in as a boom-bust WR4. I keep trying to talk myself down to that outcome and the talent won’t let me. At a WR3/4 cost this is a clean best-ball and redraft target: comfortable at WR40, aggressive at WR45, and I’m out past WR32.
A quick one on Kenneth Gainwell, because he’s barely on the radar and that’s the appeal. The model that called Daniel Jones‘ big season tagged him as a sleeper in Tampa, and his pass-catching profile from Philadelphia gives him a defined satellite role behind Bucky Irving. That’s mostly a contingency stash, one injury away from standalone RB2 value, and I’m not paying anything real for it. Late-round dart in best ball and zero-RB builds, 2 to 4 percent FAAB if he wins passing downs, otherwise he sits on waivers and that’s fine.
A.J. Brown is the one where I’m only halfway in, and I’ll say it plainly. If the move to New England holds, he’s the unquestioned No. 1 on a thin depth chart, and raw volume can carry a receiver even when the surrounding context isn’t great. A target count north of 150 and a return to WR1 numbers is on the table. The catch is that this looks like a lower-volume passing attack, the kind that can turn a great receiver into a frustrating WR3 with bad scoring luck. I’ll take him at WR18, stretch to WR22, and not a pick before WR12.
If I’m ranking who I actually want, it’s Tuten and Moore at the top, Odunze as the value I can’t quit, Brown as a measured WR2 bet, and Gainwell as the free lottery ticket at the very end.