Donovan Peoples-Jones

The Cleveland Browns have traded away Donovan Peoples-Jones to the Detroit Lions at the trade deadline. The Detroit Lions sent a 2025 6th round pick to the Browns to aquire DPJ. The move makes sense for both teams as DPJ has underwhelmed in Clevland, and with Marvin Jones stepping away from football DPJ could slot right into Marvin Jones role.

The former number 1 overall high school WR who had shown flashes as a big play threat last year has failed to show the same flashes this year. Many hoped DPJ could continue the success he had late last year with Deshaun Watson, but the injuries to Watson and the addition of Elijah Moore has limited DPJs usage this year. The Detroit Lions on the other hand are happy to add to their receiving core with Jameson Williams taking longer to get it going than the Lions were hoping for. The move shows the Lions mean business, and they see themselves as real contenders.

DPJ is now thrust into a relatively crowded Lions receiving room. He may be a direct replacement for Marvin Jones Jr but that’s not saying much considering Jones only got 10 targets in his 6 active games. The target competition extends past just the WRs in Detroit as well, rookie TE Sam Laporta is not going anywhere, and Rookie RB Jahmyr Gibbs will also continue to command targets in Detroit. That along with the WR core of Amon-Ra St Brown, Josh Reynolds, Khalif Raymond, and Jameson Williams makes DPJ carving out a significant role for fantasy highly improbable. The biggest impact it will have for fantasy is tanking the little value Jameson Williams had left. DPJ proved he can be a reliable deep threat last year, which is more than Jameson Williams has done in his short career. DPJ will take opportunities away from Jameson as he gets ingratiated in the offense, and he’s just flat out better than Jameson is at this point in their careers.

The Cleveland Browns receiving core has struggled without Watson, and with Watson at different points of the year. The DPJ trade helps in the area of consolidating the target share on the team, but as long as Watson is out that won’t matter much. Marquise Goodwin stands to benefit the most as a designated deep threat but DPJ was only averaging 2.5 targets per game, so his departure doesn’t help much, especially considering the poor passing efficiency of this Browns passing attack. Fantasy managers, be weary of Browns pass catchers, let them prove something before throwing one of them in your lineup. And Jameson Williams managers…tough luck, there’s always next year.