Week 2 Broke Your QB. Buy a Schedule, Not a Name.

Two starting quarterbacks left Week 2 on carts. Jayden Daniels dislocated his left elbow on the last play of the first half against Dallas, X-rays negative, Dan Quinn expecting him to miss time — and the last time he did this to the same joint, it cost about a month. Caleb Williams pulled up with a non-contact right hamstring injury scrambling in the fourth quarter against Minnesota, and Ben Johnson has since called him week-to-week. That is not a bye-week patch. That is a month of your season at the most concentrated position on the roster.

Which changes what you are shopping for. The instinct on Tuesday is to scan Week 3 projections and take the quarterback with the friendliest single game. The correct move is to buy the next three weeks in one purchase, because you will be starting this person in Week 3, Week 4 and probably Week 5. Under that rule the board reorders fast.

Tyler Shough is the cleanest add at 48% rostered: 410 yards and three touchdowns against Detroit in Week 1, then 27-of-34 for 252 and a rushing score in New Orleans' road upset of Baltimore, with Kellen Moore running the offense at a pace that manufactures snaps. He is home the next three weeks, and the Raiders and Falcons matchups in Weeks 3 and 4 are both playable. FantasyPros puts his true value at $3 of FAAB, $6 if you are desperate. Pay it.

Bryce Young is the more interesting bet at 32% rostered and roughly a dollar. Six passing touchdowns and one interception across two weeks, 8.9 yards per attempt, passer ratings of 110.3 and 116.3, on a Carolina offense averaging 35.5 points a game. You are not buying his Week 3 trip to Cleveland. You are buying Week 4 against a Lions defense playing without safeties Brian Branch and Kerby Joseph, neither expected back, which has already surrendered 658 passing yards and six touchdown passes in two games.

Geno Smith, at 5% rostered, is the same trade with the safety margin removed. One touchdown pass in two weeks is genuinely bad. He also draws Detroit in a dome, then Chicago's bottom-five defense, and Detroit's offense should keep the Jets throwing. Nobody is asking you to enjoy this.

Every schedule-first argument carries the same mortgage: it assumes the schedule holds. The defenses that make Young and Smith appealing are soft because of injuries, and the league's official Week 2 report is a reminder of how quickly those designations churn — Detroit listing D.J. Reed questionable with a foot, Baltimore ruling out Nnamdi Madubuike and T.J. Tampa while Ronnie Stanley and Trey Hendrickson sat in the questionable column, Green Bay cycling through concussions and knees. Safeties come back. Corners get healthy. A good matchup has a shelf life of about nine days.

Weather is the other leak. Young's Week 3 trip to Cleveland puts an ordinary arm into the wind off Lake Erie, against a pass defense that gave Baker Mayfield trouble in Week 2. Week 2 already showed what that does to a slate: rain soaked multiple games and scoring collapsed after a wide-open opening week.

So add for Weeks 4 and 5, and decide now which of those three starts you are prepared to write off. A streamer you have pre-forgiven is much easier to keep in the lineup than one you expected to be good.

Mariota has the Washington job indefinitely, and in seven starts for the injured Daniels last season he averaged 17.8 fantasy points a game — dull, functional, and exactly what a bench spot is for. Seattle in Week 3 is unappealing; Indianapolis and the Giants after that are not. He is rostered in 3% of leagues and costs a dollar, which is the correct price for insurance.