Fantasy Football: Does Carson Palmer Trade Affect Darren McFadden's Value?

Now that quarterback Carson Palmer has been traded to the Oakland Raiders, we wondered what kind of an impact the trade has on Raiders running back Darren McFadden's fantasy value?

Now that Week 6 is in the books, McFadden is currently ranked as the No. 3 running back in the ESPN Fantasy Football Scoring Leaders list. McFadden has 100 points right now on the year, while the leading running back Fred Jackson of the Buffalo Bills has 119 points and No. 2 running back LeSean McCoy of the Philadelphia Eagles has 112 points.

While playing with quarterback Jason Campbell for the first six weeks, McFadden has averaged 5.5 yards per rush, gaining 610 yards on 111 carries. As a pass receiver out of the backfield, McFadden averaged 8.4 yards per catch, catching 18 passes for 151 yards.

Looking at the last two years in Cincinnati, Palmer didn't exactly do much throwing to his running backs, but that might have been more of an issue as to how good the Bengals backs were at catching the ball. In 2010, Cedric Benson was the top running back receiver, catching only 28 passes for 178 yards. In 2009, the leading running back receiver was Brian Leonard, who caught 30 passes for 217 yards. McFadden has almost reached those totals already through six weeks.

How will opposing defenses respect the Raiders passing game now that Palmer is taking over for Campbell? So far this season, Campbell was averaging 195 passing yards per game. In 2010, Palmer was averaging 248 yards per game, throwing to the likes of Terrell Owens, Chad Ochocinco and Jermaine Gresham.

Clearly Owens and Ochocinco are past their primes, so there is the factor that the Raiders might see Palmer's production increase throwing to a younger, faster receiving corp in Darrius Heyward-Bey, Denarius Moore, Jacoby Ford and Chaz Schilens. If secondaries are trying to crowd the box to take away from McFadden's ability to run the ball, Palmer should be able to have the arm strength to reach the speedy Raiders receivers deep down the field.

Having said that, nobody has seen Palmer throw a pass since the 2010 season, so we don't know what kind of shape his arm is in. He will have to ramp up his arm to playing shape quickly, but most veterans experience a "dead arm phase" during training camp, similar to what baseball pitchers go through. When would that occur to Palmer? In Week 9, 10 or 11?

There will be some down time for Palmer to learn the offense, and to learn specifically how to throw to all of the receivers. He will also need to know where to throw the ball to McFadden and how he likes the ball to be passed to him on screens and sideline patterns. That takes time, so expecting overnight success may be somewhat wishful thinking.

My best educated guess is that the Raiders' opponents in the near term will be determined to slow down the Raiders running game and make Palmer beat them through the air. They will look to crowd the box and put eight men in there until they are convinced that Palmer has the ability to beat them long. Once he does that a couple times, defenses will start backing off and the higher rushing yards totals will pop back up again.

However, when teams crowd the box, the results can also go the other way. If you saw how Fred Jackson split the Giants' secondary last Sunday, an 80-yard scamper going untouched up the middle of the field can change fantasy fortunes very fast as well.

Would like to hear the opinion of what McFadden's fantasy owners think of what kind of impact  the Carson Palmer trade will have on the balance of the star running back's season.