Three Takes for the Rest of the Fantasy Football Season

Three Takes for the Rest of the Fantasy Football Season

GuyWhoLikesSport

With Week 6 having just wrapped up, we’re about a third of the way through a normal fantasy football season.

Despite the fact that my season is going as well as relations between your first-year arts uni student sister who voted yes and your uncle who voted no, I thought I would try and impart some wisdom in the form of three actionable takes for the rest of the fantasy football season.  

(1) First Round Rookie Wide Receivers are yet to have any serious impact this season. 

 Let’s be honest, no one in the fantasy community saw 5th Round rookie out of BYU Puka Nacua being a current top 10 wide receiver in fantasy.

Over the last 3 years in fantasy football, we have invariably had one or two rookie receivers taken early in the actual NFL Draft break out and be, at worst, legitimate WR2s in their first year.

This is, in all likelihood, based on a number of factors that range from the college-ification of NFL offences, coaches being willing to rely on younger talents, and a rare glut of star receiver talents.

It’s like every receiver that has entered the league these last couple of years was inspired by Ed Norton in Primal Fear. 

To that end, since 2020 we have had CeeDee Lamb, Justin Jefferson, Ja’Marr Chase, Jaylen Waddle, DeVonta Smith, Garrett Wilson, and Chris Olave all enter the league as first round picks and have first seasons that ranged between good and great.  

https://twitter.com/AddisonEra2/status/1713984532691427613?s=20

The numbers bear it out, per Jake Ciely, over the last 15 years there is a strong correlation between draft round and production for rookie receivers.

First-round rookies average 8.3 fantasy points per game, second-round rookies average 6.0 and the numbers keep dropping as draft round drops.

In addition to fantasy points dropping, so do the opportunity metrics like snap percentage, route percentage, and target percentage.  

All of this makes sense, teams want to prove themselves right with the player that they invested real capital in, so they give their guy a chance to succeed.

That’s how you get Tom Brady throwing uncaught fades to N’Keal Harry in 2019. 

Based on the fantasy player’s continuing trepidation with drafting rookies, rookie receivers especially in the first round continue to be undervalued.

For example, Ja’Marr Chase was drafted as the receiver 28 in his rookie year and finished as the receiver 5.

Chris Olave was drafted as the receiver 44 and finished as the receiver 25.  

Even receivers who don’t necessarily perform from a counting stats perspective have still outperformed their fantasy draft status.

Take Jahan Dotson for instance, who was drafted as the WR 59 and finished as the WR50. 

So what does this mean?

Try and trade for some rookie receivers, Zay Flowers might be the one to exceed expectations, but he is already playing well so might be hard to trade for.

I would look at the highly pedigreed receivers that are underperforming and bet on them to return to form: Jaxson Smith-Njigba, Quentin Johnston, maybe even Jordan Addison if his manager is frustrated with the dip.  

I also want to note that this year’s crop of receivers was not a bumper crop. It’s possible that the rookie pass-catcher breakout that I’m looking for is actually happening in Detroit and it’s a tight end doing the dominating.

Regardless, bet on the data and maybe a rookie receiver will be the cure to all of your woes.  

(2) The return of the late-round quarterback was overstated. 

The season started with everyone heralding the return of the late round quarterback.

In the early-mid 2010s late round QB was the rage, like Pharell Williams and pouring ice over your head as the lowest barrier to entry form of slactivism in history.  

All the smart analysts were asking why you’d spend a draft pick on Peyton Manning or Andrew Luck when you could get basically the same production from Big Ben or Matt Ryan 10 rounds later.  

With the rise of the running quarterback that has changed dramatically with 8 QBs going in the first 5 rounds this season by ADP in a 12-team league (Mahomes, Hurts, Allen, Jackson, Burrow, Herbert, Fields, Lawrence).  

All of those eight, however, had indifferent or worse starts to the year while Tagovailoa, Cousins, Goff, Purdy and even Russell Wilson – all drafted after pick 93 – started the year off scalding hot.

It looked like we were back! 

As it turned out, we were not back and investing in a quarterback was still the right thing to do.

Heading into Week 6, the top three quarterbacks by fantasy points are Allen, Hurts and Fields.

Mahomes is sixth and Herbert had an early bye but is second in average fantasy points per game.  

The misses – Jackson, Lawrence and Burrow – have shown signs of life and will almost certainly return to form soon.  

(3) The star waiver pickups are probably over. Time to spend on matchups if you still have money. 

 After a hot start to the year on waivers with De’Von Achane, Puka Nakua, Josh Reynolds, Zach Ertz, Jerome Ford, and Zack Moss among others, it seems like the star waiver pickup run is probably over (with the exception of Keaton Mitchell of the Ravens who was just activated off IR and could be the RB1 in Baltimore). 

If you kept your FAAB budget, now is the time to look for green matchups on defences and kickers, spend big on players who look set to perform in a given matchup, and overpay on dart throws that might work if 100 things go right.

It strikes as unlikely there’s another waiver sweepstakes like there was for Achane or Nakua early in the year.   

Bonus: Get rid of defences. You are a moron if you play with defences.  

I play with defences. Can’t pick them to save my life. You’re a moron if you do too.