Something I want to quickly express is what I’m aiming to do here with these targets. What I’m certainly NOT doing here is trying to just accumulate as many small wins as possible, because those don’t really matter much at all in fantasy football. Instead, the goal here is to hit on those season-defining, league-winning players in the earlier rounds, and the major ADP beaters in the middle-later rounds. Similarly, the goal is not a certain “hit rate” with the below players (obviously the more, the better), but rather trying to spot out true league-winning assets.

If you’ve been following along for long enough, you probably already knew that this was my mindset, but did just want to clarify.

With that said, let’s get into my top draft targets of 2026. These are going to be relatively quick breakdowns that aren’t as long as what you’d typically see from me. I’ll be linking plenty of past articles or posts on X referencing my bullishness for said players, rather than going through extended write-ups of each.

There are 6 RBs, 9 WRs, 3 QBs, and 3 TEs listed below, a total of 21 players. The ADP you will see below is based on FantasyPros real-time ADP for half PPR scoring. This ADP is constantly updated based on real-time drafts and is a lot sharper than your standard site ADPs, so it feels like the best to use from how I see it.

And one more note on the targets. I have excluded any 1st round ADPs from the discussion, as it seems somewhat pointless to put those players as “targets” (the case for them is obvious and they more depend on your draft slot rather than preference). I did add a “1st round targets” at the bottom here, alongside honorable mentions (guys who missed the cut but I like) and late-round hammers (my favorite late round/deep league selections).

Now, before we get into it, just a few notes on where you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Running Back

Kenneth Walker (RB9, 15.3 overall)

My Rank: RB5, 9th overall

Walker has been a major target for me all offseason. He’s one of the most explosive and talented backs in the NFL (4th among all RBs in explosive rate w/ 500+ att since ‘21), and is poised for major workload in a high-upside KC offense. All signs point towards him getting all of the high-value touches, including his big contract (7th highest GTD $$$ among RBs), offseason camp reports, and the lacking touch competition behind him.

Walker is a very capable receiver (1.4+ YPRR in 3/4 seasons, elite 9+ YAC/Rec), and KC/Mahomes loves throwing to the RB (particularly around the goal line, top FIVE in goal line RB receiving TDs for 6 of 9 years). With Mahomes hobbled off the ACL, more checkdowns than ever should be in play for the Chiefs’ backfield. And there’s zero threat to his goal line role, which should put him in position to crush his career high 9 rush TDs in this offense.

Contrary to the narrative on Walker, we’ve see him both operate as a workhorse (70%+ opportunities in 2023 and 2024) and stay relatively healthy overall (has missed an average of 2.5 games per year). He’s got RB1 overall upside from how I see it, one of the most talented RBs in the NFL in an elite role.

Jeremiyah Love (RB15, 33.7 overall)

My Rank: RB13, 29th overall

The concern around Love now pushing him to the 3-4 turn makes him an awesome bet in drafts this year. He may miss a week or so (also may not), but most reports are indicating that he’ll be back rather soon if he does even miss any time.

And getting this profile in the back of the 3rd is preposterous. This was the 3rd overall pick in the NFL draft, the highest drafted RB since Saquon Barkley. Recent highly drafted rookie RB disappointments were going in the 1st round of drafts (Bijan, Jeanty), but Love goes much cheaper than that. Many are acting as though they are similar rookie year bets, but that’s not the case at all given price differential.

He’s got all the tools to be an absolute stud right away, including the receiving skillset (84th percentile YPRR) and that he’s an awesome rusher (elite YACo/MTF/explosive numbers) with plenty of size and athleticism (96th percentile speed score). The environment isn’t the greatest, but Brissett has proven capable and they have a lot of talent on the offensive side of the ball, so it could be better than expected. The receiving upside in a competent offense that will be trailing a lot is extremely high for the hyper-talented Love, and I have minimal worries about him getting enough work despite career backup Tyler Allgeier’s presence. The Cardinals certainly did not draft an RB 3rd overall just to limit his impact on the offense.

I think we’re getting a major discount based on those recent early-drafted rookie RBs performance, but the pattern matching here is pointless given the different environments and prices (and just given every situation is different).

Read more

Today, we have another 8 WRs to go through. Those are:

• Christian Watson

• Parker Washington

• Marvin Harrison Jr.

• Brian Thomas Jr.

• Quentin Johnston

• Jayden Reed

• Josh Downs

• Matthew Golden

As a reminder or in case you didn’t get to the prior article, there’s four primary factors and/or changes to a players situation that we are looking for in our potential mid-round WR breakouts. Those factors are:

• Increased route volume - Playing time? New offense? - The average breakout WR ran 4 additional routes per game, nearly 70 per season.

• Higher target priority - Less competition? Bigger role expected? - The median target share increase in breakout WRs is a 4.8% jump.

• Undervalued TD equity - Offense improvement or new scheme? Poor variance thus far? - The median touchdown jump from these breakout WRs is 2, nearly half the breakout pool saw 3+ additional TDs.

• Improved QB play - New QB or QB from last year injured? - 75% of these WRs saw “improved” QB play by EPA/dropback

Like the prior article, I will be focusing on a handful of players who are popular breakout candidates, while also discussing their ability and 2026 outlooks at large. These are again intended to be unbiased views of the potential breakout factors, until we get to the bottom “Am I buying the breakout?” section of the write-ups.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Before we start, just a quick guide to understanding the emojis in the “Reviewing The Breakout Factors” section of each player write-up:

• ✅ - Firmly yes

• ✅⚠️ - Leaning yes, but with a caveat

• ⚠️ - Maybe? Up in the air/not clear

• ❌⚠️ - Leaning no, but with a caveat

• ❌ - Firmly no

Christian Watson

ADP: WR28, 64.9 Overall

Reviewing The Breakout Factors

• Increased route volume ✅

• Higher target priority ⚠️

• Undervalued TD equity ❌

• Improved QB play ❌⚠️

Analyzing The Breakout Factors

Watson exploded onto the scene midseason last year unexpectedly after a major injury in 2024, and he was extremely efficient in his return. He posted a wildly impressive 2.67 YPRR and 0.24 TPRR, on an 18.0 (!) aDOT. Watson has dealt with a lot of injuries over his career, and has never put it together for a full season, but the 2026 ADP suggests that this is the year he will do just that.

The route volume, as will be mentioned with the other two Packers WRs here, is almost assuredly going up. The Packers had five (5) WRs who earned real playing time in 2025, capping the routes of any individual WR on this team in 2025 (Watson himself was 2nd on the team at just a 68% route share). With both Romeo Doubs (72.8% route share) and Dontayvion Wicks (46.2% share) gone, and zero notable talent replacing them, Watson should get much closer to a “full time” route share (ideally 80%+). I also see a possibility that this typically run-heavy Packers unit could shift a bit more pass-heavy, with Jacobs aging and more prominently a weaker OL.

In terms of target priority, Watson was technically the leader on the team in 1st read target share, so I don’t know if we can say he’s moving up in priority. But, I think we likely see that target number consolidate with less WRs getting playing time (Watson was just 34th in NFL at 23.9%), so he could become more of a priority relative to himself last year in a now hopefully fully healthy season.

In terms of TD equity, Watson has actually scored at an extremely high rate throughout his career, scoring on 14.7% of his career touches. I don’t think you could make a great argument for him being undervalued in that regard, considering how TD heavy his production has been, but the reduction of the pass-catchers in the room again could be a benefit here. As for QB play, we’re likely getting the same solid output from Jordan Love. I put the caveat in that the QB play is solid and Love is still capable of taking a leap, but we should be expecting a similar level of play.

Watson has had trouble staying healthy, but his 2025 season was his best yet (WR15 in FP/G). The 2026 outlook leaves him set-up better than ever before, with the likely route volume to really smash if he maintains the efficiency (2.5+ YPRR in 3 of 4 seasons). The question will be in a room full of promising or pass-catchers (Reed, Golden, Kraft), will Watson be able to separate from the guys in this room?

Am I buying the breakout?: I think it makes a lot of sense in theory that Watson breaks out. He’s talented and has been extremely efficient, in a good offense, and the volume seems likely to be well above his career highs (on a season-long basis). He’s definitely the best bet to lead this Packers WR room in receiving production, but my one main concern is I don’t feel supremely confident that he’s notably more talented or capable of earning targets than the rest of these Packers pass-catchers (mainly Reed who has also been quite efficient, but Kraft will get his and Golden is round 1 WR getting tons of positive buzz). I don’t want to throw to much cold water on him here though, as he’s a strong bet to breakout at this cost and I definitely am willing to take the stab in this round 6 range, but it also feels good to arbitrage with a later Packers WR AND my preferred option is just below him on this list (and over half a round cheaper).

Parker Washington

ADP: WR30, 72.7 Overall

Reviewing The Breakout Factors

• Increased route volume ✅⚠️

• Higher target priority ✅⚠️

• Undervalued TD equity ✅⚠️

• Improved QB play ❌⚠️

Analyzing The Breakout Factors

P-Wash has been one of the buzziest players of the entire offseason, coming off a scorching hot end to 2025 (14.5 FP/G in final 9 overall games, 2.82 YPRR following the Jags bye) and getting endless positive reports in camp. The wide receiver room in Jacksonville is definitely a bit crowded with 4 highly capable options, so Washington will have to emerge from the pack (or at least well out-target 2 of the 3) to be a major hit.

Despite the competition, Washington is all but certain to see an uptick in route volume from last year, where he posted just a 62.2% route share on the season. I put the caveat because he was at roughly a 75% route share from Week 9 on when he started really producing, which seems like a reasonable projection with Hunter working in as WR4. He could be above that, but ~75% seems fair.

In terms of target priority, it’s a similar trend to the routes. On the year, he was just 3rd on the team in 1st read target share (21.0%) but led the team following the Week 9 bye (27.7%). He seems likely to rise from the year-long number, closer to the post-bye mark. All reports seem to indicate the Washington is the best bet to lead JAX in receiving, as does his post-bye performance in 2025, so I think it’s fair to claim he’s moving up in priority.

Washington scored a career-high 5 TDs in his 3rd year in 2025, so there’s plenty of meat left on the bone for a bigger season there in what should be a very good offense. His 10 redzone targets from Week 9-18 were tied for 6th among all WRs. If the overall role maintains, despite a lot of touch/target competition, there’s no reason why Washington can’t set an easy career-high in TDs.

The QB play was really good for Washington last year, as Lawrence played the best football of his career, particularly in the back of half of the season. I’ll leave the light on for an improvement from Lawrence in year 2 of the Coen system, but it’ll be tough for him to play better than he did in the back of 2025.

This offense should be quite potent again, and Washington has gotten nothing but praise this offseason. He’s in the coveted slot role in this Coen system, and the 24-year-old showed massive upside in his first crack at a full-time role. Will Washington continue to stand out in this WR room, or is there too much talent for him to emerge again and be a big ADP winner?

Am I buying the breakout?: I’m completely buying in to the full-season breakout for Washington. The talent seemed pretty undeniable last year, and the offseason reports have done nothing but back it up. All signs point to this passing game being centered around Washington, with BTJ being the downfield X clearing out space and Hunter getting more outside reps when on offense. This seems like a great price to buy Washington, and the upside in this offense/role is extremely high (as we just saw last year) if he’s the guy I think he is.

Marvin Harrison Jr.

ADP: WR31, 74.2 Overall

Read more

For the 2nd year in a row now, I’m going to be trying to spot which potential breakout WRs will actually breakout/return massive value at cost versus which are going to blend in with the crowd. Check out last year’s article, which panned out pretty well overall while nailing the Pickens breakout.

This article is inspired by a series Pat Kerrane did last year, which led me to write on the topic both last year and now again in 2026.

Now, there are four major factors and/or changes to a players situation within past mid-round WR breakouts. Those factors are:

• Increased route volume - Playing time? New offense?

• Higher target priority - Less competition? Bigger role expected?

• Undervalued TD equity - Offense improvement or new scheme? Poor variance thus far?

• Improved QB play - New QB or QB from last year injured?

All of these factors, in theory, would of course improve a player’s outlook. In order to best predict these potential breakouts, we should be looking for players who we suspect have real/underrated talent AND are getting situational/volume improvements in one or more ways.

To provide some quick data points to these breakout factors, defining a “breakout” for this dataset is classified as a non-rookie but under 28-year-old wide receiver beating positional ADP by 60% (ie: WR20 ADP finishes as WR12 or better, WR40 ADP finishes as WR24 or better):

• Route Volume: The average breakout WR ran 4 additional routes per game, nearly 70 per season.

• Target Priority: The median target share increase in breakout WRs is a 4.8% jump.

• TD Equity: The median touchdown jump from these breakout WRs is 2, nearly half the breakout pool saw 3+ additional TDs.

• QB Play: 75% of these WRs saw “improved” QB play by EPA/dropback

Today (and in part 2 of this article), I will be focusing on a handful of players who are popular breakout candidates in round 4-10 of fantasy drafts, going through whether they meet the breakout factors and my thoughts on their 2026 outlooks' at large. I’ve tried to mostly remove any biases I have from these write-ups, at least until the “Am I buying the breakout?” section at the end of each player we talk through.

Players That Will be Discussed:

Today’s Article (Part 1)

• Jaylen Waddle

• Tetairoa McMillan

• Ladd McConkey

• Emeka Egbuka

• Luther Burden

• Rome Odunze

• Jameson Williams

Upcoming Article (Part 2)

• Christian Watson

• Parker Washington

• Marvin Harrison Jr.

• Brian Thomas Jr.

• Josh Downs

• Quentin Johnston

• Jayden Reed

• Matthew Golden

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Before we start, just a quick guide to understanding the emojis in the “Reviewing The Breakout Factors” section of each player write-up:

• ✅ - Firmly yes

• ✅⚠️ - Leaning yes, but with a caveat

• ⚠️ - Maybe? Up in the air/not clear

• ❌⚠️ - Leaning no, but with a caveat

• ❌ - Firmly no

Jaylen Waddle

ADP: WR17, 40.1 Overall

Reviewing The Breakout Factors

• Increased route volume ✅

• Higher target priority ✅

• Undervalued TD equity ✅

• Improved QB play ✅

Analyzing The Potential Breakout

Waddle has been one of the most consistently underrated WRs in the NFL over the last couple years, largely due to extenuating circumstances which I believe were out of his control. He’s remained one of the most efficient WRs in the NFL over the past 4 years despite up-and-down environmental factors (top 10 in 1D/RR, top 20 in TPRR, 2.4+ YPRR in 3 of last 4 years is elite), and he’s hit an extremely impressive ceiling in terms of both efficiency (2.93 YPRR, 0.30 TPRR) and production (1,356 yards in 2022, 75 YPG across 2022 -2023). He’s a do it all receiver, one the can separate with the best of them (per Reception Perception and Fantasy Points ASS) and create after the catch (6th among all WRs w/ 8+ yard aDOT in YAC/Rec since 2021).

Over the 2 years doing this article, Waddle will be the only WR to hit all four breakout factors without any sort of caveat. So let’s take a look at those.

The route volume is almost assuredly increasing, going from one of the lowest volume passing teams (Miami was bottom 5 in pass rate and PROE) to one of the most pass-happy teams in the league (top 12 in pass attempts each of last 2 years despite top-tier defense, 4th in 2025 specifically). Waddle is also a higher-priority target within his own team heading into 2026 too, compared to almost his entire Miami career (excluding rookie year and post-Tyreek injury in 2025). Going from playing with one of the best WRs in football and a top ~3 pass-catching RB, to a team where there’s no real target-commanding players will assuredly increase Waddle’s intra-team priority.

The offensive environment, in terms of both potential TD equity and QB play are massively improved as well. Bo Nix is probably nothing special, but he’s more than capable of running this Denver offense and is a major upgrade over the 2024-2025 version of Tua Tagovailoa. Furthermore, this offense in Denver has been more than sustainable for fantasy production, above average in scoring the last 2 years with Sean Payton giving this unit a high “floor” and minimal risk of breaking down.

Waddle has never topped 8 TDs in a given season, and has only crossed 6 of them once. This due to a mix of really bad environments (‘21, ‘24, ‘25) and several high-end playmakers when the offense was quite good (‘22, ‘23). In a much friendlier offensive environment this year, I think it’s very fair to expect Waddle to meet or exceed his career-high TD mark. Good WRs have the best chances of scoring TDs regardless of past variance, and Waddle is quite a good player.

Am I buying the breakout?: Yes, very much so. Waddle is pretty easily my favorite bet outside the first 3 rounds to be a league-winner at WR. He’s got all the makings of a legitimate fantasy WR1 (highly talented and efficient, big environment and volume upgrade), yet is priced in mid-WR2 range at best (notably lower ADP on certain sites).

Tetairoa McMillan

ADP: WR18, 42.0 Overall

Reviewing The Breakout Factors

• Increased route volume ❌

• Higher target priority ❌⚠️

• Undervalued TD equity ❌

• Improved QB play ❌

Analyzing The Potential Breakout

As much as I do think Tet is a talented WR, and how encouraging the rookie year was (1k yards and 7 TDs, solid 0.23 TPRR and impressive 10.5% 1D/RR rate), the 2026 environment makes a major breakout into fantasy stardom seem like a relatively thin bet at a WR18 price.

In terms of volume, both in routes run and and targets, the path is pretty murky to a higher volume of routes or priority in target share. If anything, the target competition is stiffer with a fully healthy Jalen Coker that legitimately challenged Tet down the stretch last year when healthy (last 8 weeks). Coker actually out-produced Tet in this time, with 58.6 to 49.6 YPG, 4 to 3 TDs, and just one fewer target. I did put the caveat about possibly being a higher target priority, which I left as a possibility just on the basis of a big year 2 leap also coincidingly raising his target share quite notably. So not necessarily “priority” rising, but a big leap is in the cards.

As for the offensive environment, the QB play is the same (likely poor again from Bryce Young based off his career thus far) and the TD equity in a bad offense is probably fairly valued at best. My confidence in Bryce is quite low, who has never crossed a 5.5 ANY/A and has been running one of the NFL’s worst passing offenses even excluding his disastrous rookie year (27th in EPA/DB). Tet put up 7 TDs last year, in an offense that easily outperformed expectations despite mostly poor play from Bryce. I don’t expect significantly stronger TD production than that in this offense.

Am I buying the breakout?: No, unfortunately. It’s mostly offensive environment issues, but I have a tough time seeing Tet end this year as a big ADP beater/league-winner in said environment. And while I think he’s quite talented, I don’t think year 1 showed us the type of talent that can overcome the poorer environment to the level you’d want out of a round 4 pick.

Emeka Egbuka

ADP: WR19, 43.6 Overall

Read more

Like with the RBs, we are going to be using FantasyPros real-time ADP for half PPR formats. Also like the RB article, we are pretty heavily pushing the “turn” phrasing, as this really covers the back half of round 2 through the entirety of round 3.

See the 10 WRs being selected in this range:

• Drake London (WR7, 19.4 ADP)

• AJ Brown (WR8, 22.6 ADP)

• Nico Collins (WR9, 22.8 ADP)

• George Pickens (WR10, 23.2 ADP)

• Malik Nabers (WR11, 28.5 ADP)

• Devonta Smith (WR12, 30.1 ADP)

• Zay Flowers (WR13, 33.7 ADP)

• Tee Higgins (WR15, 34.1 ADP)

• Chris Olave (WR14, 34.6 ADP)

• Rashee Rice (WR16, 35.5 ADP)

What I’m going to do for each of these guys, again like with the RB write-up, is put together a (relatively) quick write-up on my thoughts on them and their outlooks for 2026. Then, there will be a “verdict” line at the bottom of said write-ups on how I’m handling these guys this year at their respective costs.

If you want a more specific view of how I’m ranking these players, head over to the rankings page on my website.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Drake London

WR7, 19.4 ADP

London is a great NFL WR, and I don’t want the words about to be written below here to be conflated as otherwise. That being said, I do have large concerns about this passing game with Tua seeming more and more likely to win the starting job. Over the past 2 years. Tua really struggled these past couple years in Miami, despite the strong structure of the McDaniel offense and multiple high-end playmakers. His mobility has been completely zapped over the years and really limits an offense, while he has to get the ball out quick and doesn’t allow for many plays downfield. London’s target share numbers since 2024 are also significantly higher with Penix on the field (35.2%), than with him off (26.8%).

If Tua is indeed as bad as I personally think he is, the upside of London is probably pretty limited as a 2nd round pick. TDs opportunities are important to a big possession WR like London, so the possibility of even less red zone opportunities in 2026 concerns me. If Penix can’t even beat Tua out for the job, the environment concerns remain if he ends up replacing him at some point.

As talented as London is, environment still matters for TD (and overall) upside. And he’s not a special YAC creator, which I like to cancel out the poorer environment and lacking redzone drives for big-play purposes. I do also suspect both Pitts and Bijan see higher target shares this year, as Pitts shined late last year in London’s absence and Tua has a knack to checkdown with his playstyle (Bijan range). There’s similar talent levels going after London in much friendlier environments.

VERDICT: I’m hard-fading London in the middle of round 2. Even though I’m a fan of the talent, a stable-to-strong environment is important to the upside of a WR, especially at this price. I’m wary the combo of Tua and Penix is capable of providing London with good enough QB play for a league-winning season.

AJ Brown

WR8, 22.6 ADP

AJB was a big riser following his predictable trade to New England, but I fear this firmly in round 2 price is too rich given his 2025 output. Simply put, AJ took a step back last year. It showed up in the numbers (5-year lows in YPRR, 1D/RR YPT, YAC/Rec), and in his Reception Perception profile (worst success rates of his career against man and zone). You can argue the potential motivation issues and the poorer offensive environment caused this decline, but as his price has creeped up into the 2nd round, I feel less inclined to rely on that being the case for the 29-year-old WR.

In terms of environment, I’m a big fan of Drake Maye, but we did see him struggle against much tougher competition in the playoffs. Last year’s schedule was a cakewalk, so it’s a tall task to expect league-best efficiency from this offense like in 2025.

AJ need to return to form for this price to make sense, and something I want to bet against in round 2.

VERDICT: AJB is a pretty easy fade for me inside the top 24 picks. I think he’s a lesser talent than most in this range at this point, and want to bet against that.

Nico Collins

WR9, 22.8 ADP

Read more

Before we go any further, I did want to note that unlike last year, these draft plans are on my actual website in the draft strategy section. The current versions of these plans are screenshotted below, but they will consistently updated on the site for the remainder of the offseason.

In these draft plans, the “targets” column will hold the priority target for that round, and then the “other targets” column will have varying amounts of backup options or alternatives depending on how you drafted to that point (ie: priority target was one of the elite TEs, “other” target would be a later TE in case you didn’t land that elite guy). Lastly on these plans, the “notes” column will give any additional context and info where necessary (strategy notes, selecting certain player if there).

These draft plans are based off FantasyPros real-time half PPR ADP, and are for 12-team leagues that start 1 QB, 2 RB, 2 WR, and 2 Flex. I used ESPN ADP last year for these, but I’ve found this real-time ADP is much sharper and probably more realistic for most of your guys’ leagues. I do also plan to add draft plans for 10 team leagues at some point in the next few days.

You will notice the round-by-round targets stop after round 11, and the remaining round 4, 5, or 6 rounds (depending on your league) are grouped together at the bottom of each plan (the same for all 3 draft plans). Here’s why:

• Remaining picks are very context-dependent on what you did earlier in the draft

• Players here vary greatly in terms range of where they are selected.

• While there are specific targets I have here, the player archetype we should be targeting here is more important (elite handcuff potential, punted QB/TE)

These draft plans, used alongside my Redraft Player Rankings, should give you guys pretty good understanding of guys I would target at their respective prices. They also are helpful examples of how I’d structure teams. I like using these plans as “cheat sheets” while drafting, along with my said rankings.

Before revealing the draft plans (scroll to bottom if you want to see them, or check them out directly on my website as mentioned above), I did just want to touch on some general strategy tips for your home leagues…

8 Home League Tips & Strategy

1. Have A Round-By-Round Plan: This is the whole basis of why I create these draft plans. Having an idea of what you want to do each round, with a backup plan if things go a bit sideways, is quite important to staying on track and making sure you’re strong enough at both WR and RB.

2. Use Best Ball ADP To Find Values: I always keep Underdog best ball ADP on hand in home league drafts. This ADP is much sharper than any redraft ADP you’ll use (money backed drafts by most in-tune/up-to-date drafters out there), and can be very useful in finding values (where UD ADP is much higher on certain players than redraft ADP). Don’t follow it blindly because you’ll likely end up with too many WRs and not enough RBs, but use it to spot major discrepancies in ADP and values that remain on the draft board later than they should.

3. Hammer RB Early: This was my general home-league thesis last year, and it’s even more applicable in 2026 from how I see it. RBs are priced way up across the board this year, reviving the “dead zone” and making most of the round 3, 4, and 5 guys worse bets than last year (and so on, to a lesser degree). I like getting a couple RBs early in rounds 1 and 2 when I can as the depth at the position dries up much quicker than WR, and lets me avoid selecting what I see as mostly poor bets at RB in round 3 and 4. There’s some high-upside guys at RB I like in the middle rounds (RD5-6 particularly) if I don’t double-up on RB early (or even if I do), but the WR position just feels like a much stronger bet in these middle rounds (projection wise and more importantly in terms of upside).

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• Jonathan Taylor (6.9)

• James Cook (9.1)

• Saquon Barkley (11.9)

• Ashton Jeanty (13.4)

• De’Von Achane (15.5)

• Omarion Hampton (15.6)

• Kenneth Walker (15.8)

• Chase Brown (16.0)

• Derrick Henry (18.7)

I’ve heard many say that getting these names right will be possibly the biggest decision in fantasy drafts this year, and while I think that point is a bit vague, it is inherently true that these decisions will make-or-break drafters slotted in the back half of the 1st round.

So, what I’m going to do for each of these guys is put together a (relatively) quick write-up on my thoughts on them and their outlook for 2026. Then I’ll close out with how I’m handling them this year at their respective costs with a “Verdict” line at the bottom of the write-up.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Jonathan Taylor

RB4, 6.9 ADP

Taylor is a really tough guy for me to get behind in 2026 at his much more expensive mid-round 1 price, as opposed to late round 2 ADP last year. Yes, he had an incredible 2025, but things broke perfectly for him and a lot of the same 2025 concerns still somewhat prevail in 2026. I actually already wrote a separate article on why I’m fading Taylor again in 2026, which you can check out here. But to give you the super short version of that, I’m of the opinion that 2025 was the perfect runout for him. The main driver of that runout was the offensive environment, which was expected to be near the bottom of the league (26th in implied PPG) but ended up being a top 2 unit for the majority of the year. Not only would that be a massive boost for any RB, but particularly for Taylor who is one of the most game script-dependent RB s in all of fantasy (led all RBs in FP differential in wins vs. losses).

In 2026, I have a lot more concerns about this offense dropping off substantially, with Jones’ achilles issue being the primary driver of that as well as a much declined receiver core (Pittman gone, Pierce hobbled). I also have concerns of Taylor’s chronic ankle issue flaring up (3 straight years of high ankle issue from 2022-2024) with another year and another 369 touches under his belt, although that may be a little more nitpicky. Not only do the concerns from pre-2025 still loom, but you have to pay a substantially greater price in 2026, as Taylor has jumped from a later round 2 to mid-round 1 pick.

VERDICT: He’s a hard fade in the middle of the 1st round, in all formats.

James Cook

RB5, 9.1 ADP

Cook’s ADP is a little pricier in redraft as opposed to best ball drafts, but I have hard time being actively bearish on Cook despite that. I understand the downside cases in terms of the lacking receiving volume for an RB going this early in drafts, as it theoretically limits him from true RB1 overall upside.

However, starting with that receiving work, there’s reason to be optimistic that Cook’s role in this area could get notably larger in 2026 (similar to his 2023 season with 54 tgts, 445 rec yds, and 4 rec TDs). New OC Pete Carmichael has a long history of heavily involving his RBs in the pass game, working with notoriously heavy RB-targeting coach Sean Payton in 19 of his last 20 seasons. There’s been tons of buzz in camp on the Bills RBs seeing more passing game work as a whole. And an ode to Ben Gretch’s piece on RB air yards, James Cook has finished top 15 among RBs in air yards in each of the last 3 years, finishing as 2nd among all RBs in 2023. Furthermore, as a collective, Allen has finished top 2 in targeted RB air yards in 2 of the last 3 seasons (top 12 in all 3). Point being, the receiving volume might not have to be quite as high as other RBs for Cook to smash there, if he gets some more targets and retains the more downfield role here in comparison to other RBs. Bigger plays downfield = less receptions needed for high-end receiving production.

On top of that, I think the raw rushing volume and upside for production in that regard in such a potent/explosive offense is probably still somewhat underrated. Even with a modest receiving role, Cook has finished inside the top 8 RBs by FP/G in each of the last 2 years. He won the rushing title in 2025, and has totaled 14 or more TDs in each of the last 2 seasons (18, than 14). He’s apart of this uniquely high-ceiling Bills offense as well. The Bills by far lead the NFL in % of games above 30 points in the last 2 years, at 61.8% of their total games while only one other team sits above 50%. They’re also, with the Lions, in a tier of their own in terms of just average PPG over this time (both 29+, next closest team sitting at 27.7 PPG). When an RB is a bit more reliant on the run game, it helps when they are very live to lead the NFL in both rushing/TDs AND naturally have high-end spike weeks on that rushing/TD production alone, which are aided both by Cook’s explosive run ability and even more so the offensive environment.

All the above considered, Cook is still a bit flimsier of a profile in round 1, likely without a high-end receiving role and a QB can eat up a bunch of rushing TDs. The offense likely has to remain top-of-NFL with outlier rushing production for Cook to be a big hit here. And ideally, receiving volume improves as well, but that’s another “if”.

That being said, any of these RBs outside the top 3 will require some outlier to occur to reach RB1 overall status. Cook’s path to returning a league-winning season at this cost very much exists, I think more so than the aforementioned Taylor and similarly so to anyone else in this range.

VERDICT: I think Cook is a solid pick in late round 1 and the conversation can start at 1.08 (all of the top 7 are clearly above for me, and I have one RB below here ahead of him in my ranks), but I’m not reaching any higher for him. Full PPR and/or 3 starting WR slots would likely have me taking Jefferson/Lamb over him as well.

Saquon Barkley

RB6, 11.9 ADP

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That all being said, and maybe only adjacent to today’s article, I wanted to take you guys through three players I’ve actively changed my mind on throughout the 2026 offseasons. Exercising that ability to adapt to new information, ADP changes, or even just ceding that I was missing the full picture on a player’s outlook

But before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Josh Allen

Allen has gradually shifted downward in ADP throughout drafting season. His price has dropped from the early/middle round 3 to the back of the round, and he’s pretty consistently available in the beginning of round 4 (have drafted him in the middle of round 4 as well). In this range, Allen feels like a much more enticing pick, as the opportunity cost of drafting a QB here as opposed to an early-mid R3 pick is much less discouraging.

As a fantasy asset, Allen has finished as the QB1 or QB2 in fantasy points in EACH of the last SIX years.

In 2026, I think one of the major concerns that are shying people away from Allen are passing volume concerns. However, Allen has already dealt with near league low pass rates in the past three years (bottom 6 in each of these years). And the fantasy production hasn’t faltered as seen with his fantasy finishes above. You can also see it in the fantasy scoring by year:

• 2020: 24.8 FP/G

• 2021: 24.8 FP/G

• 2022: 26.1 FP/G

• 2023: 24.3 FP/G

• 2024: 24.2 FP/G

• 2025: 23.6 FP/G

A very slight drop in scoring with the coinciding dip in passing volume, but still top-of-position performance which resulted in Allen being a solid-to-very strong pick at cost in these recent seasons. Even in his worst season of the last six in 2025, he was still a top 30 player by wins above replacement (WAR).

The passing volume concerns are fair given Allen’s far and away QB1 ADP, but they’re probably overblown. Even with a 31st-in-NFL pass rate last year, Allen was still 9th in passing TDs and 11th in passing yards. We also know there’s room for much more should the pass rate climb some, given the outlier-level rates and an OC change in 2026 along with just Allen’s raw ability as a passer.

The rushing floor is also just so strong, with the goal line role he has AND in such a potent offense. Allen is one of just two QBs that’s accounted for greater than 40% of his teams inside the 5 rush rate since 2021, with the rest of the QB crop not even close to this mark. He’s also top 2 in rushing TDs in this time (54 total), and top 5 in rush YPG among QBs. The rushing role around the goal line has actually improved in these last few years despite Allen getting a bit older (relatively speaking) (largely due to more overall production from the offense), as Allen has tallied 12+ rushing TDs in EACH of the last 3 seasons!

I think some are more averse to Allen because he’s in a tier of his own price wise (although only a bit over a round above Lamar now on Underdog), but he’s rightfully in a tier of his own in my opinion. He’s the only QB without any real question marks on hitting QB1 overall upside (Lamar rushing decline, Daniels passing upside, Maye top-tier rushing + schedule getting harder, Burrow no rushing, etc). That’s not to say I don’t draft those other guys, particularly Maye and more so Daniels who I like a lot, but Allen is a different level of profile from these guys. And on that note, his ability to produce league-winning spike weeks is second to none:

I rounded up the top 3 scoring weeks of ALL QB seasons since 2023, and averaged them. Here are the results (top 5):

1. Josh Allen (2024): 41.5

2. Josh Allen (2025): 39.8

3. Josh Allen (2023): 35.1

4. Joe Burrow (2024): 34.8

5. Lamar Jackson (2024): 34.7

To clarify, this means Allen holds ALL THREE of the top ceiling game averages (avg. 3 highest FP scoring outputs in a given season) over the last 3 years, in seasons where his overall output is actually slightly declined from the prior couple of years. No QB in any individual season has matched even his lowest top 3 game average over the past 3 years.

Allen also has 6 of the top 12 overall single-game fantasy performances of the last three years, and 7 of the top 15. No other QB has more than one single performance in this range.

The combined passing upside given Allen’s ability and the potency of this offense, along with the near certain rushing production, gives Allen an unmatched ceiling/likelihood of hitting said ceiling.

Into round 4, I’ll start grabbing a lot more shares of Allen, who we’ve seen be one of the most valuable players in fantasy multiple times over the past half decade (by WAR). The opportunity cost in this range becomes a lot less worrisome when you’re drafting him over the Tet, Javonte, or Kyren types as opposed to the Rashee, Olave, Devonta range, in my opinion.

And last thing to note, this is much more of a best ball take than a redraft one, as his late round 2 ADP in redraft is way too rich for me. If you can get him late round 3 in your redraft league, that’s a move I’m willing to make.

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Thinking through which players possess the greatest chance of rising in ADP by the end of the summer is a very useful thought exercise for finding current values and mis-priced players. We obviously want to acquire players when they are at their lowest costs, therefore building more valuable rosters and gaining closing line value (CLV) on these players. For those who are unfamiliar with the term “CLV”, it is essentially when your personal ADP of a player (the average pick at which you drafted them) to be lower than the players’ actual ADP at the end of draft season.

The players below are inherently good values at their current costs considering their increased chances of becoming more expensive, and will likely remain so if they do not rise notably in price.

You’ll see me reference/link Zain Dhanani’s posts here, who has been an awesome follow in regards to this type of info (injury news, camp news, depth chart outlooks, etc.). If you want to follow along with this stuff, I highly recommend giving him a follow.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Josh Jacobs (RB18, 40.4 ADP) seems like a pretty likely riser as the season approaches. Prior to the domestic abuse case concerns, Jacobs was going inside the top 30 picks in the beginning of the 3rd round. Since then, he’s dropped outside the top 40 in ADP, and has not recovered. To me, it seems pretty likely at this point that Jacobs will NOT be facing legal ramifications from this incident, at least in the 2026 season. While the investigation is still technically open, the charges were dropped and these things take quite a while to get figured out legally. With a month left in the offseason, I find it quite hard to believe that Jacobs will face any sort of suspension. And I think the market will come around to that. While I don’t think Jacobs sneaks back into the top 30, I do expect him to rise back to the back of the 3rd round and inside the top 36.

Rhamondre Stevenson (RB29, 76.3 ADP) seems like the type to assuredly rise as more casual drafters enter the mix in August (I am on board with these prices converging, as I think Rhamondre is somewhat underpriced and TreVeyon is heavily overpriced). Simply put, Rhamondre remains the theoretical RB1 in this offense, and the larger public perception is exactly that. That’s not to say the split between he and Henderson won’t be a lot closer than it was down the playoff stretch in 2025, but Rhamondre is the clear favorite to be 1A based off usage late last year (and reports thus far in 2026). And he was legitimately good last year, with really strong efficiency metrics and receiving usage (clear preferred pass pro back too). I expect that the more casual August drafter thinks these two should be flipped, where I think they should just be closer in price than the ~2 round gap that currently separates them. Nonetheless, I fully expect this gap to close to some degree, so I’m getting shares of Rhamondre while he’s cheaper in round 7.

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There’s also another adjacent take that stems from this, one that I believe is just completely inaccurate: Players slightly outperforming ADP is a real “win”, or automatically a genuinely good pick at cost. Obviously this is not relevant to players drafted in the 1st round or so (pretty much impossible to really beat ADP), but getting into the late 2nd/early 3rd and onward, we want to start aiming to hit on big wins at ADP.

Depending on how closely you follow my posts on X, you may or may not have seen this post below.

In the replies, multiple people are vouching for Kyren’s rock-solid “floor” making him a great pick in the 3rd round, and similarly so that hitting what’s likely his ceiling of RB11 at an RB15 price tag makes him a “good” pick. This is also just the sentiment in Kyren by a lot of the fantasy community, that his “safe floor” makes him a solid pick.

At the end of the day, everyone is going to have their own opinions and thought processes in terms of drafting, but I could not disagree more with the concept of drafting for floor in the 3rd round (or in general) is a winning proposition. And a theoretical RB11 ceiling (obviously debatable, to be fair) at a 3rd round/RB15 price tag is mathematically (and logically) not a good selection.

We’ll get into the specifics on this below. But, before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

So, why is “floor” an invalid concept in fantasy drafts? Why is it nothing more than a fallacy that gets disguised as a legitimate strategy?

For the sake of explanation, we are going use the Kyren dilemma from above here as our concrete example. Rather than just spitting a bunch a words at you guys without using the context of an actual real-life example, I think this will be the easiest way to display the point I’m making.

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Despite getting burned, I’m putting my balls on the table and running this fade back in 2026. At a significantly more expensive cost than in 2025, I think a lot of Taylor’s concerns that had me out on him last year still linger this year. We’ll get more into this below, but he has a lot of red flags for me as a round 1 pick in fantasy. Check out my exposure on JT through 201 Underdog best ball drafts below, via my best ball exposure tool.

I’ll likely be a good bit lower than this 2.9% exposure, as I’ve grown less fond of JT throughout the offseason. I’m aiming to be closer to like ~1.5% by the time drafting season ends. Let’s get into why, but before we keep going:

Just a few notes about were you can find my other content, how to access my Discord, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

The 2025 Runout

So let’s start with what went wrong for us in 2025. Frankly, I boil the miss down to two (2) major points. First being, I certainly underestimated the raw talent of JT after a couple of down-in-production injury-ridden seasons. JT had shown an incredibly high ceiling in the past, both on a single-game and season-long basis (RB1 in 2021). He was a proven explosive and top-of-NFL talent whose poorer performance was pretty heavily correlated to when he was dealing with injury (same right ankle issue three years running). In every season he played in 12 or more games up until this point, he posted a minimum of a 5.5% explosive rate, 1,500+ scrimmage yards, and 12+ total TDs. To discount the possibility of returning to this elite form at just 26 years old was admittedly a miss.

To defend my thought process here though, I do think it was quite valid to assume that a player declining in production and efficiency for multiple years (regardless of injuries dealt with) while entering the back nine of his career is relatively unlikely to bounce back in such a major way. Overcoming not only a multi year dip in performance, going from 6.7% explosive rate and 5.3 YPC in 2020-2021 all the way down to a 4.5% explosive rate and 4.5 YPC in 2022-2024, but a previously poor receiving role and an expected poor offense (discussed just below here) seemed like a pretty massive uphill battle for a round 2 fantasy pick to climb.

The second and really the thing that ultimately burned us here, and this one was out of nowhere, was how strong this Colts offense was overall. Going into the season, the Colts were projected for the 26th most PPG based on implied points per game using preseason betting odds. They blew that projection out of the water while Jones was healthy (Wk1-13), leading the ENTIRE NFL in points per game… just shy of 30 PPG. They were also top 2 in both EPA/Play and success rate in this time, genuinely one of the best offenses in the NFL. As we know, environment is ever so important to RB production and scoring opportunities, especially for an RB we know isn’t going to turn in elite receiving production. The Colts environment allowed Taylor to flip this perceived negative into an overwhelming positive, easily leading the NFL with 17 TDs through just 12 games (13 weeks).

We saw what happened when the offense performed closer to expected late in 2025, as JT was just the RB25 in FP/G (12.1 half PPR FP/G) for the last 5 weeks of the season (small sampled, admittedly).

So, this may come off as cope, but I’m completely fine with my fade on JT in 2025. It was wrong in the end, but I think the process was more than sound. Taylor hit on several outlier outcomes last year, including returning to talent/play level we hadn’t seen in multiple years (since 2021) AND his offense massively outperforming expectation. On top of both of those, Taylore more than doubled his receiving role from the prior 2 seasons (19 then 18→46 REC, 153 then 136→378 rec yards), something we don’t often see occur for an already established RB. Three semi-correlated but ultimately separate outliers coming together at once for this type of season is something I’m willing to consistently bet against.

Why Am I Doubling Down In 2026?

So now the question arises: Why am I avoiding JT again in 2026?

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Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure viewing tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access my website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Let’s get right into it. Even with his price rising in best ball drafts on Underdog as of late (3.2 spots in ADP, a ~7% increase in price), I still think that this wide receiver is the stone best pick on the board as it stands right now.

So who is it?…

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This article is an exercise that I did last year as well, one that I enjoyed and thought was useful for best ball drafters. So, I decided to bring it back for the 2026 season.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Honorable Mention: Tank Bigsby

A guy I’m drafting plenty, he certainly would have been more than just an honorable mention had he not just snuck into the back of round 14 in ADP. Bigsby is the ideal handcuff/late RB pick from how I see it. He’s flashed high-end efficiency in back-to-back seasons (4.86 YPC, 5.6% explosive %, 0.20 MTF/Att), and he’s the clear RB2 in what should be a good offense (10th in implied PPG) that’s centered around the run game. Similar to B-Rob who we’ll discuss just below, I think he has a chance to carve out an ~8-10 touch role (with Saquon aging and Philly having a lot of rush attempts to go around), but the real value here is what Bigsby could do with an injury to Saquon. I feel very confident that he’d receive an high-end workload in this instance, with enough talent to do so and no notable RB talent behind him (maybe Shipley steals some passing downs?). He makes for a great pick as late as he goes in drafts.

Brian Robinson

ADP: 169.5, RB52

My Rank: 156, RB47

B-Rob feels like one of the best “handcuff” picks on the board from how I see it. For one, he could very well have somewhat of a standalone role as Allgeier did the last couple of years. He’s a not a world-beater, but he’s proven reliable and solid RB that’s been trusted with legitimate work in the past (200+ touches 1st 3 years, 100 behind CMC last year). His efficiency doesn’t jump off the page, but he’s averaged 4.3 YPC and nearly a 5% explosive rate in the last 2 seasons, while notably strong after contact (top 10 among RBs in YACo/Att in 2 of L3 years).

The main allure here is what he could do if Bijan goes down with an injury. From how I see it, B-Rob is certainly capable and probably likely to handle a top-tier workload in the event of a Bijan injury. As mentioned, he’s earned volume in the past, and the Falcons might have the thinnest RB3 candidates in the league (Tyler Goodson, Nathan Carter (?)). Combine that injury-contingent value with usable week potential a là the Allgeier role, and B-Rob makes for quite an interesting low-risk/high-reward option this late in drafts.

Fernando Mendoza

ADP: 172.6, QB27

My Rank: 154, QB26

Mendoza is 1 of 3 QBs that I’m north of 20% exposure on, sitting at 21.2% as I’m writing this. As a “free” pick and the 27th QB off the board, the risk of him (maybe) not starting the 1st handful of games is fully baked in, as he’ll certainly be playing in the most important weeks of the fantasy season (Wk15-17). On that note, we don’t even know for certain who the Week 1 starter is, so there’s a world where you’re getting a full 17 games of Mendoza. If he does get declared the starter, the price will likely be multiple rounds more expensive (I’d assume Ward/Stroud range). Regardless, as a QB3 on your roster, Mendoza missing the 1st few games is of very minimal impact to your advance rate. The early season depth chart should not be a reason to avoid him.

I also simply don’t think the upside of Mendoza, as the number 1 overall pick, is properly valued here. While he’s not a dynamic rusher and is lacking proven receiving talent outside of Bowers, he’s a very good prospect and should benefit from the Kubiak system (which we saw flourish in Seattle last year). The pure passing upside for Mendoza is way too high for him to be the 27th QB off the board in an upward trending offense, I’ll continue eating up shares as the QB3 on my rosters here.

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There’s for sure some varying definitions of where the dead zone is in drafts, or what exactly it even entails. For me, and I think at large amongst the FF community, the RB dead zone is best described as rounds 3-6 in fantasy drafts.

But what actually is the “dead zone”? The concept is rather simple. After the 1st two rounds of fantasy drafts (where we see relatively similar fantasy scoring between WR and RB), WR scoring has historically risen well above that of RBs in these rounds 3-6. A fairly simple concept at face value, but it’s definitely not as simple as just “fade all RBs in rounds 3-6”. And for that matter, the dead zone all but disappeared in the last few years from 2023-2025. And that’s where I want to open up this article, talking through how the dead zone has evolved over the years (since 2018).

Before doing so, I do want to note that all of this research here was done using redraft ADP from 2018-2025, courtesy of Fantasy Pros. So, this exact data will be more directly applicable to redraft leagues, but the overall trend is very similar in best ball drafts. The price of RBs as a whole will always be cheaper over on Underdog or DraftKings in best ball compared to a redraft format, so the “dead zone” might be a bit later (ie: rounds 4-7). But, I digress… the trend of RB pricing in this general range over the years is the same in both redraft and best ball, and the information below is therefore applicable to both formats.

Lastly, before we keep going, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool), and my 2026 draft guide, click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

The Dead Zone Is Disappearing As Of Late

So, what exactly does the dead zone disappeared in recent years actually mean? Well, pretty much exactly that. From 2018-2022, in both half PPR and full PPR formats, there was a clear gap in scoring between the RBs and WRs that were drafted in rounds 3-6 (WRs comfortably outscored RB, aka the dead zone). However, in 2023 and onward, that gap in scoring between WR and RB almost completely disappeared.

I have two charts below to show the difference in fantasy scoring between these season ranges. These are for half PPR, while the gap is even more drastic for full PPR (as one could obviously assume, since WRs score more there):

As you can see, the dead zone was alive and well in 2018-2022. There’s a clear delta that forms almost perfectly aligned with the start of round 3, where average WR scoring (purple) clearly outperforms that of RBs (green). In 2023-2025, the opposite occurs, RB was actually significantly higher scoring all the way through the middle of round 4. From there, the scoring gets closer, but no trend of WR outscoring RB forms by any means.

So you’re probably thinking, why did this flip? Why did the RB dead zone suddenly disappear? Well, I’ve got it boiled down to two major factors…

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With the draft guide now officially live, I’ll be writing a lot more frequently for the rest of the offseason than I have been over the last month plus. I’ve got a couple more write-ups that I’m planning to drop in the next week or so as well on player values I’m into.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookies), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool and draft assistant), and my draft guide, click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Ceedee Lamb

ADP: 9.5, WR5

My Rank: 11, WR6

Although this may seem like a minor fade rankings wise, it will leave me with VERY minimal Ceedee exposure this year as it stands now. Ceedee is a great player, but I don’t think this 2026 price is properly factoring in just how much George Pickens presence affected him. Granted he was dealing with a high ankle sprain recovery, but Ceedee posted by far his lowest target share (21.7%) and 1st read target share (27.8%) since 2021, and he even dipped under 10% 1st downs per route run for the 1st time since his rookie year. This naturally led to his worst fantasy performance since his rookie year.

Pickens himself is an absolute alpha, and I think he capped Ceedee’s ceiling far more than many were expecting in 2026 (whether Ceedee was fully healthy or not). In 2026, I have hard time buying into Ceedee at cost with that in mind, and I don’t think a WR1 overall outcome is really in the cards (which is what we should be shooting for with a round 1 WR). I think he’s a rung down from these top 5 WRs, yet not priced as such.

Omarion Hampton

ADP: 15.7, RB9

My Rank: 22, RB12

Hampton is priced near the top of the 2nd round after a pretty disappointing rookie year. He of course dealt with injury, but he was pretty underwhelming when out there both pre and post-injury. His efficiency numbers were meh, and they were quite poor if you take out his sole game against the Giants league-worst defense (outside top 30 RBs in YPC, YACo/Att, and success rate, outside top 20 in explosive %). I don’t typically love removing games from already relatively small samples, but this feels like an appropriate time to do so with his only really impressive play coming in that game.

This may be anecdotal, but I think Keaton Mitchell and Kimani Vidal could combine to take enough work to be a legitimate hindrance to Hampton’s outlook too. Mitchell could take away a lot of valuable outside runs and designed touches out of the backfield, while Vidal was trusted over Hampton in pass pro down the stretch of last year (and therefore could be in line for an LDD role). I don’t trust the role or the talent enough here at the top of round 2, and think Hampton’s price is bolstered way too much by expected environment. So, I’m comfortable fading here.

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HERE is the link to the 2026 Draft Guide: https://ffdataroma.com/draft-guide

My intention with this draft guide was to make it highly useful and actionable for all fantasy formats, including redraft, best ball, and dynasty. I believe I’ve done that with this guide, with 44 total sections that will help you guys draft in said formats.

The guide is broken down into three primary sections, see below:

• Player Rankings - There are 4 different sets of rankings currently in the guide/on the website. Those include best ball, redraft, dynasty, and rookie rankings.

• Season Outlook Tools - This section is made up of 19 total sub-sections. It includes more forward-looking info like landing spot reviews and impacts (rookie/FA/trade), strength of schedule info, playoff schedule/SOS data, ADP values, RB2 and backield projections, a fantasy point prediction model, and much more.

• Prior Season Data - This third section is made up of 21 total sub-sections, focusing on and researching past data to evaluate player/team performance and understand trends in fantasy football. This includes but is not limited to offensive line and defense rankings, offensive system scores, backfield opportunity scores, pace of play data, isolated WR data, and several research pages on specific questions that are prevalent in the fantasy football space.

This may seems like a lot of info and difficult to navigate, but that’s not the case. You can simply search the guide for any tool you’re looking for and that page will pop up. See the screen recording below to get a look at the Draft Guide home page and how simple it is to search for any page/info:

I’m of course biased, but I do think this guide will be quite a helpful resource for both drafting this offseason, understanding the 2026 FF landscape, and for better understanding the game of fantasy football at large (for all formats).

This guide is for my paid Subsack subscribers only, you can subscribe here if interested. Even if you are not a paid sub, you can hop on to the website and explore all the tools/content included in the guide, to get a feel for whether or not you’re interested in it.

Here is the link again: https://ffdataroma.com/draft-guide

Really believe you guys will enjoy this guide and find it quite useful. Any and all feedback is welcomed too, I’m happy to make improvements to it as the offseason progresses.

It’s been a few weeks since I last put anything out here on Substack (since landing spot review articles), but that’s not for a lack of grinding. I’ve been hard at work putting together my 2026 Draft Guide, which considering the website usability improvements and just the actual content in there, I think absolutely blows the 2025 guide out of the water.

The Draft Guide is basically finished and mostly live now on the website, but will be officially “out” early next week. It contains 35 individual sections of content, broken into 3 main subsets (rankings, season outlook tools, and prior season data) as it stands now. I’ll likely add some more sections in there as new ideas are likely to pop into my head as the summer progresses. I’m of course biased (naturally), but I think this guide is an extremely comprehensive/useful tool for drafters of all fantasy formats, and it should be a top-tier draft guide within the fantasy space. It of course contains rankings for all major formats, and has draft strategy for those said formats. It also has several sections to help you understand team/player situations, navigate landing spots and coaching changes, contains models for predicting fantasy success, has a bunch of deeper data dives for you data sickos, and much much more.

If you want to check all that out in advance of the official release, most of it is live on the website now.

For today’s article, with Underdog ADPs now having had a few weeks to settle in, I want to go through some of my favorite values on the board in drafts. This is the first of several post-NFL Draft best ball ADP “reviews” I’ll do, and I’ll put out a “fades” version of this in the coming days. If you want to specifically check out my full list of ADP values (and fades), that is also within the aforementioned Draft Guide here.

Before we hop into it, just a few notes about were you can find my other content, Discord access, and where the data I’m pulling is coming from…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, dynasty, and rookies currently), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator, team analyzer, and more), best ball tools (exposure tool and draft assistant), and my draft guide, click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

Data: You will see several basic and advanced stats throughout this article, most of which have been pulled from the Fantasy Points Data Suite. You can check out their comprehensive data suite by clicking that link.

Ashton Jeanty

ADP: 12.0, RB6

My Rank: 9, RB5

Year 1 was a bit disappointing for Jeanty from an efficiency (3.7 YPC, 1.9% explosive rate both bottom of barrel) and fantasy scoring (RB14 in FP/G) standpoint, but I’m all the way back in for his 2nd year. Everything is lining up for an explosion from how I see it. For starters, he obviously has the talent/prospect profile, #1 RB per my model that dates back to 2017. Even though the efficiency didn’t look great as a rookie, it’s hard to overstate just how bad this offensive line and environment was (2nd worst by EPA/Play since 2017). When given room to run (1+ yards before contact), he led the NFL in yards after contact (3.36), was 6th best in stuffed run rate, and jumps from bottom of the league to above average in YPC (18th/45 RBs).

As for the environment upgrading, new coach Klint Kubiak was really incredible in Seattle. He turned that offense, expected to be one of the worst in the league, into a well above average unit. They had a “bad” OL preseason, but were able to pull together a top 8 run game by EPA/Rush in the back half of the season.

On top of all this, Jeanty already proved to be able to earn targets as a rookie (1 of 7 RBs to cross 70+ targets). As for the committee talks, I think those are way overblown with zero real threatening talent behind him. Pattern matching to Seattle where they had two fully capable and starting-caliber RBs seems unwise. With all the improvements in Las Vegas (coaching, QB, OL), it’s hard to me find any negatives with Jeanty. RB1 overall seems firmly in his range of outcomes, and I would not be at all surprised if he, Bijan, and Gibbs are the big three of RBs come 2027 draft time.

Jeremiyah Love

ADP: 22.3, RB13

My Rank: 16, RB10

The 3rd overall pick in the NFL Draft, I think drafters are a bit scared of facing a similar situation to the aforementioned Jeanty’s year 1 (early pick RB goes to bad offense and struggles efficiency wise). But, how many times have we seen pattern matching different uncorrelated situations prove to be futile (countless). Love is give or take a top 10 RB prospect over the past decade, and he obviously has a versatile skill-set that landed him up at third overall to the Cardinals. Even if the TD equity isn’t crazy strong, Love has the opportunity to be a top 5 RB in receiving right out the gate.

While the projected environment is poor, when looking at Jeanty’s situation for comparison, it’s hard to imagine the environment is worse than those 2025 Raiders. They were the 2nd worst offense by EPA/Play over the past decade. An offense with Love, Trey McBride, and two more than capable receivers should not fall into this range. And, despite a different staff and uniquely high play volume, we saw an even lesser 2025 Cardinals unit produce plenty of fantasy goodness in the back half of the season. I’m more than willing to bet on the talent/upside of Love in the middle of round 2, despite his ADP being towards the end of that round.

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Similar to the first part of this article from yesterday, these are my thoughts on players’ fits with their new teams, along with their rookie year/best ball and longer-term dynasty outlooks. We’ll again not only look at how these landing spots affect the players’ themselves, but also the guys around them.

If you want more official rankings for both dynasty purposes (rookie specific and overall dynasty) and best ball/rookie year only rather than only these overarching thoughts, check out the rankings on my website here.

If you want more in-detail takes on several of these prospects solely based off their profiles, and their chances of hitting putting landing spot aside, you can check those out linked below:

• RB Profiles

• WR Profiles (Part 1)

• WR Profiles (Part 2)

• TE Profiles

And lastly, just a couple notes about were you can find my other content and access my free Discord.

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, dynasty, and rookies currently), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator, team analyzer, and rookie pick tool), best ball tools (exposure tool and draft assistant), and my draft guide (coming soon), click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

4.105: WR Brenen Thompson → Los Angeles Chargers

Thompson kicked off the day 3 skill players, going to a spot with the Chargers where he’s almost certainly WR4 to start his career, behind Ladd, QJ, and Tre Harris. A plus for him is how enthused new OC Mike McDaniel seemed to be to have Thompson here, maybe signaling some real plans for him. The jury is still out on whether Harris, and even QJ really, are good NFL WRs. So, there could be some opportunity here longer term. Thompson could step in as field stretching Z receiver, with the separation chops to develop into more.

I don’t expect Thompson’s presence will be much of an impact on these Chargers WRs in year 1, as he should be a rotational WR more than anything else. However, I do think this raises the odds of a QJ not getting re-signed long term a bit, if Thompson ends up looking like a capable NFL WR.

4.108: RB Jonah Coleman → Denver Broncos

The Coleman spot has been one of the more polarizing of the draft from what I’ve seen. At first, I was pretty bearish, but I have come around a bit. The obvious drawback is that he’s a day 3 RB that probably opens his career as the third RB in Denver. You’d hope for a more clear chance at year 1 production for a guy like Coleman, as the window for him to get a chance in general is relatively small as a day 3 guy. Conversely, Coleman does have double injury contingency with Dobbins and Harvey, in a strong offensive environment that’s particularly friendly to RBs. With relatively minimal investment in Dobbins and his lengthy injury history, Coleman could be the successor to Dobbins in year 2 if he shows enough as a rookie. I’ve moved him down a bit in rookie drafts (2.01), but he climbed for me in these past couple days after thinking it through. In best ball, I’ll be waiting for his price to tank as it likely will, with the injury contingency and outs to contributing regardless of injuries.

I do think Coleman’s arrival adds a good bit more uncertainty to both Dobbins and Harvey in 2026 and beyond. That’s because Coleman is a versatile RB that can both be the early-down grinder and third down/pass pro back. That threatens both of these guys roles to some degree, especially if they’re underperforming. There’s a real possibility we have a 3-headed committee in year 1 for Denver too, and possibly beyond that.

4.108: QB Cade Klubnik → New York Jets

Klubnik goes a good bit ahead of where he was expected to in NY, more of a late day 3 projection and multiple QBs ranked ahead of him still on the board. We talked somewhat about the Jets environment in the day 1/2 write-up, but to summarize, they’ve built what’s seemingly a pretty strong pass-catching group and OL. Offensive system questions aside, if this team is out of playoff contention early, we could see Klubnik get an extended look later in year 1. I’m not big on the player and he’s a real longshot as a day 3 QB, but the capital is as strong as could be for him in specific, and the chance to play in year 1 is legit. He’s worthy of a stab in the last round of rookie drafts, although I’ll probably look elsewhere.

This obviously doesn’t hurt Geno much as the clear starter, but could slightly increase his bench risk late season. I’m just a bit more wary of taking him in best ball contests now.

4.115: WR Elijah Sarratt → Baltimore Ravens

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This article specifically will be going through every round 1 through 3 player drafted at the QB, RB, WR and TE positions. I’ll follow this up shortly with a day 3 article, focusing on the landing spots of fantasy relevant players only from rounds 4 through 7.

If you want more official rankings for both dynasty purposes (rookie specific and overall dynasty) and best ball/rookie year only rather than only these overarching thoughts, check out the rankings on my website here.

If you want more in-detail takes on several of these prospects solely based off their profiles, and their chances of hitting putting landing spot aside, you can check those out linked below:

• RB Profiles

• WR Profiles (Part 1)

• WR Profiles (Part 2)

• TE Profiles

Now, just a couple of notes about were you can find my other content and access to the free Discord…

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, dynasty, and rookies currently), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator, team analyzer, and rookie draft pick tool), best ball tools (exposure tool and draft assistant), and my draft guide (coming soon), click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

Day 1

1.03: RB Jeremiyah Love → Arizona Cardinals

Love to Arizona was a bit of a surprise, but it doesn’t change how I view him all that much considering I was expecting Tennessee as a landing spot. For what Arizona lacks in potential QB ability and upside, they make up for in playmakers and potential play volume. Neither landing spot would’ve been all that fun, at least heading into 2026, but we could get a ton of receiving volume in trailing game-scripts for Love in year 1. It's not the highest upside spot right now, but a top QB from the 2027 class could quickly change that. And Love has the talent/fantasy profile to ascend a mediocre environment anyways, à la Bijan Robinson. Love is obviously the 1.01 in rookie drafts, and his opening Underdog ADP of 31 is way too cheap to pass up on.

This also nukes all of Tyler Allgeier, James Conner, and Trey Benson at once, although one of those latter two are likely to get cut and could land in a much better situation.

1.04: WR Carnell Tate → Tennessee Titans

Tate falls to the spot where we thought Love would go, but I think this pairing makes a ton of sense. Not only are they getting their 2025 1st overall pick a weapon, but Tate himself should step right in as the far and away best receiver on this offense. Furthermore, while Ward was very inconsistent in year 1, there’s room to improve and he flashed the ability to make some spectacular throws on the perimeter and in tight windows. This fits well with Tate, who's a man beating X receiver that’s elite in contested situations. I like this pairing as Ward develops and for Tate’s skillset. While Tate may never be a top-tier target earner due to role (ie: Tee Higgins, George Pickens), he profiles to be a premier deep threat in the league that makes up for lower target totals. He remains my WR1 in rookie drafts, 1.02 overall, and a target of mine in best ball drafts.

Outside of Tate, there were several pass-catchers that people had hopes for in this offense, including Wan’Dale, Ridley, Ayomanor, and Dike. While Wan’Dale and Tate have near opposite roles, Tate’s presence should greatly affect all three of the other guys here. I assume Ridley will get the first crack at being in 3WR sets alongside these other two (if he’s not cut), but I don’t think the role for any of these three (Ridley, Ayomanor, Dike) is going to be strong and they’re all big “stock down” guys.

1.08: WR Jordyn Tyson → New Orleans Saints

Considering some of the teams in the top 10, and when factoring in offensive systems, Tyson going to the Saints was probably nearly as good as it was going to get. Kellen Moore is a pretty forward thinking offensive mind, one that has his WRs move around the formation a ton and gets them into free release situations. Obviously we have Olave here as well, but this high-volume (6th in pass att last year) offense should allow plenty of opportunity for both of these guys to eat up targets. This is an ascending environment from how I see it. I’ll be buying any dip if there is one in best ball, and the ever-so-smooth Tyson has moved to my 1.03 in rookie drafts.

I wasn’t that into Olave in pre-draft contests, but I would welcome a price drop here as well. We’ve seen two good-to-elite WRs co-exist and thrive in offenses plenty of times, even in average offenses. Elite talents always eat first.

1.13: Ty Simpson → Los Angeles Rams

Simpson, in a shocking twist, lands with the Rams at 13th overall. This is a much different situation than we were expecting, but it’s definitely a plus. We were expecting maybe a shot at playing time in year 1 or if not in year 2, with a likely less friendly offensive environment. Instead, we get Simpson in LA behind Stafford, obviously with no chance to play in his 1st year without injury, and almost certainly again in year 2 unless Stafford retires. But, this system and offensive environment is as good as they come. As long as McVay is around, we should feel confident in his QBs producing. And the Rams have plenty of weapons to boot, including arguably the league’s best WR in Puka Nacua. It’s obviously a long-term investment if you draft him and one meant for specific types of dynasty rosters (rebuild heavy or abundance of assets), but the upside is much higher in LA than anywhere else we could’ve anticipated.

1.16: TE Kenyon Sadiq → New York Jets

I’m not sure the Jets are quite as bad of an offense as many make them out to be at this point, but they’re still not a particularly exciting landing spot. Geno Smith has a ton to prove after his year in Las Vegas, and the infrastructure of this offense with Frank Reich and Aaron Glenn behind it is another question mark. On top of this, Sadiq has competition on multiple fronts. Garrett Wilson will obviously be the alpha, and fellow round 1 rookie Omar Cooper will likely be a big player in this offense as well. You’d want Sadiq to be the best YAC threat in this offense to get more of the designed touches, but Cooper is arguably the best YAC threat in the class, and Breece will likely get a bunch of targets around the line of scrimmage too.

While this move nukes any potential fantasy value from Mason Taylor, it is worth noting that with his presence, Sadiq will probably play of that move/F-TE role (at least early on in his career). We could see him limited in terms of routes due to this. He’s a guy I’ll likely won’t have much of in rookie drafts, and based off his starting best ball ADP, I don’t think I’ll have many shares there either (unless he gets a bit cheaper).

1.20: WR Makai Lemon → Philadelphia Eagles

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A few points I want to make here about how TE differs from both RB and WR. For one, athletic ability is a lot more important to a TE profile than these other positions, and actual production a good bit less important. You’ll see some guys with very minimal production or spotty production profiles drafted on day 2 of the NFL Draft, for this very reason. Raw athleticism is much more translatable to the skills needed to be an NFL TE, compared to a WR or even RB.

With the note on production, we also see that early career numbers are not quite as important for TE as the other positions. Breakout age for TE specifically has a notably lower R-squared (correlation) to year 1-3 fantasy points per game than the WR position (0.25 vs. 0.19). These guys take longer to develop at both the college and NFL level typically, so this makes sense.

Lastly, you’ll see me mention the “F” and “Y” TE archetypes a good bit here. An F-TE is more of your glorified slot receiver and passing down only TE, while the traditional Y-TE is the capable inline blocker that stays on the field all 3 downs typically. We care about this because more snaps → more routes → more scoring, so ideally these guys develop into Y-TE’s at the NFL level (or are good enough receivers to be full time route runners from the F-TE role like a Brock Bowers). I wrote quite in depth on this whole concept about a month ago, if you want a deeper understanding. You can check that out here.

If you’re interested in reading my other positional profiles and rankings for the rookie class prior to the NFL Draft tonight, I’ll link those here:

• Running Backs

• Wide Receivers (Part 1)

• Wide Receivers (Part 2)

And last thing before we hop in to it, just a couple of notes about were you can find my other content and how to access the free Discord.

Website: If you want to access my player rankings (best ball, dynasty, and rookies currently), my models (for rookies, year 2, and upcoming season fantasy points), dynasty tools (trade calculator and team analyzer), best ball tools (exposure tool and draft assistant), and my draft guide (coming soon), click HERE to access the website which has all of that.

Discord: If you want a place to talk fantasy with myself and others, get updates on articles and X posts, to get answers to questions you may have and more, join the subscribers Discord HERE.

Tier 1

Tier Value: 2027 late 1st

1. Kenyon Sadiq

Predictor Model Score (Pre-draft): #1 TE in class, #8 TE of 146 since 2017, 95th percentile score, Likely TE1 tier

Projected Draft Capital: #17 overall, mid round 1

Model Projection: Sadiq comes in as the 8th best TE prospect of the past decade, on the higher end of the “Likely TE1” tier. He’s a 95th percentile prospect per the model, with a ton of upside.

Production Profile: Sadiq definitely does not have the most gaudy production for a round 1 prospect, and it’s actually quite poor given the capital. However, I do think this leads to his overall profile getting a little too scrutinized. We also have the caveat of Sadiq being an early declare and playing with tough target competition at Oregon, which hurts the overall production as he did not get his senior season to boost his numbers. Sadiq’s career 0.67 YPTPA is the worst among all round 1 TE prospects since 2017, but it lands in the 54th percentile among all prospects. In terms of early career production, Sadiq lands in the 56th percentile in year 1 YPTPA, and 69th percentile in year 2 YPTPA. Not great, but also solid (and better than some of the other round 1 TE prospects since 2017). An immediate contributor in one of the most competitive offenses in the country is always a good sign.

Efficiency: The efficiency is another disputed topic in Sadiq discussions. His career YPRR of 1.72 is solid but not 1st round level (2nd lowest among all R1 TE prospects), in the 69th percentile overall. And he doesn’t earn targets at an elite clip either, with a 0.20 TPRR that’s in the 63rd percentile. His year 1-2 combined YPRR of 1.91 tells a much better story in relation to other prospects, and we again have to recognize that he didn’t get the 4th year to boost his efficiency. When targeted, Sadiq was reliable and consistently made plays, with a passer rating when targeted in the 97th percentile (139.7).

Traits: Sadiq is poised to be an awesome YAC threat by all accounts at the next level. He’s one of the best athletes we’ve ever seen at the TE position, with a 4.39 40 at 241 pounds, holding a 100th percentile (!) speed and burst score. That alone is a huge positive indicator of NFL, as athleticism at the TE position is particularly correlated to NFL success. The YAC production was quite strong in college too, as Sadiq’s 0.25 MTF/Rec is in the 90th percentile and his 6.6 YAC/Rec is in the 72nd. His “best season” YAC/Rec of 10.1 as a true sophomore is in the 94th percentile of all prospects.

As a route runner, Sadiq does not have the fluidity and change-of-direction ability of some of these other recent round 1 TEs (Bowers, Loveland, Warren). That’s fine, but probably caps his upside as a true matchup nightmare out of the slot.

As a blocker, Sadiq is a bit undersized, but he’s actually quite solid and willing to do the dirty work. This is a good sign for Sadiq being able to earn a 3-down role at the next level. He’ll never be an elite blocker due to size, but seems to have a pretty strong path to being “good enough” to stay out there on early downs.

Additional Notes: Sadiq is probably not a guy I’d want to draft as an NFL team in round 1. But, he’ll end up a round 1 pick nonetheless and should be a somewhat featured piece of an NFL passing offense pretty early on. I do think the truly elite upside is capped despite the athletic ability due to just raw ability as a separator and production profile concerns, but the YAC prowess and that athleticism make for a potentially best-in-NFL YAC threat. And if he develops as a blocker, he’s got mid TE1 dynasty value written all over him.

Fantasy Thoughts: Sadiq is my 1.07 in rookie drafts right now, behind the top 5 in ADP and then KC Concepcion. This is more of a nod to my bullishness on KC than bearishness on Sadiq, as I think he’s a fine swing in mid-round 1. Although, he’s not a smash for me there just due to the limitations and underwhelming round 1 profile. I’ll therefore be behind market.

Tier 2

Tier Value: 2027 early-to-mid 2nd

2. Eli Stowers

Predictor Model Score (Pre-draft): #2 TE in class, #14 TE of 146 since 2017, 91st percentile score, Likely TE1 tier

Projected Draft Capital: #48 overall, mid round 2

Model Projection: Stowers is the #2 TE in this class per the model, with a 90th percentile score that lands him as the 15th highest-graded TE since 2017. He’s a high-risk but high-reward profile.

Production Profile: The production is interesting for Stowers, that being because he’s a converted QB to TE that didn’t start playing the position until year 3 (of 5) in college. That leads to no early-career production at the position of course, a concern in itself that the production did not begin until he was 21 years old. However, Stowers was an elite producer once he started playing the position. His career yards per team pass attempt of 1.65 is in the 96th percentile for TE prospects. He crossed an impressive 50 receptions and 645 yards in both Vanderbilt seasons, again keeping in mind that this was his age 22 and 23. However, unlike most guys this age, he was pretty new to the position. You could argue that there’s a ton of development left to be had due to this.

Efficiency: The efficiency was similarly very strong for Stowers. His 2.34 YPRR is in the 94th percentile, and he was an elite target-earner at 0.27 TPRR (98th percentile). When targeted, Stowers efficiency was fine, in the ~50th percentile in both passer rating when targeted and EPA/Play.

Traits: Stowers has some really polarizing traits, starting with the incredible athleticism. His 4.51 40-time led to a 95th percentile speed score, and his record-breaking jumps led to a 100th percentile burst score. The YAC numbers were unsurprisingly strong, although not on Sadiq level, hovering around the 70th percentile in both MTF/Rec (0.18) and YAC/Rec (6.5). He’s not as powerful of a runner as Sadiq with the ball in his hands.

Stowers, unlike Sadiq, does have that fluidity to make him a potentially high-level route runner at the next level. When looking at the differences these two showed here at the collegiate level, it’s not all that surprising that Stowers was the more efficient college player.

The major hole for Stowers is blocking ability. As high as the upside is at receiver, there’s virtually no chance Stowers is able to be a NFL-level inline blocker. So what that means is Stowers will really have to hit his near top-tier upside as a receiver (or get injury/team-target comp luck), or he’ll likely be thrusted into a part-time role which will cap his upside. He is live to be better than NFL team’s slot WR, but it’s tougher for these big guys to be quick and savvy enough as route-runners to outperform an NFL-caliber slot WR.

Additional Notes: Stowers is rightfully a polarizing prospect, with a large range of outcomes. He’s got the efficiency and overall production that is among the top-tier of TE prospects, but he’s also an older prospect with no early career production to speak of as a former QB. Stowers has the receiving potential to really outperform ADP and ascend to an elite asset, but the severely lacking blocking ability will make that upside much harder to realize than a Sadiq type.

Fantasy Thoughts: I am pretty much right in line with Stowers at ADP. In a weaker class towards the end of round 1 in rookie drafts, taking a crack on the tantalizing upside of Stowers makes sense to me. I’m not a major fan of this archetype typically, but think he’s a fine value at ADP given the weaker late round 1 of rookie drafts this year.

Tier 3

Tier Value: 2027 early-to-mid 3rd

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