Summer is for family vacations, outdoor concerts, ice cream cones on a hot day and restless tinkering with our dynasty rosters while we wait for NFL training camps to open.
Here are some of my favorite trade and startup draft targets in dynasty leagues. (I’m sticking with veterans here and excluding the rookies.)
10 Must-Have Dynasty Players: Fitz’s Picks (2024 Fantasy Football)
Stop laughing. Yes, Fields has had the most calamitous offseason value loss of any player in fantasy football. That’s the bad news.
The good news: Fields is now really cheap in dynasty leagues.
Fields will get another chance to be an NFL starter. It’s a matter of when not if. Fields’ Waterloo is sack avoidance. He’s a sack magnet. A quarterback constantly getting thrown for big losses short-circuits an offense, hence the Bears’ willingness to jettison Fields and start over at QB with No. 1 draft pick Caleb Williams.
If he can overcome the sack problem, Fields can become an above-average NFL quarterback. His toolkit is first-rate. Fields has a big arm and surprising touch. His mobility is an attribute that can’t be taught.
In 2022, Fields averaged 20.5 fantasy points per game, ranking QB5 in that category. Acquire him cheaply now and wait patiently for Fields to earn another chance. He could get that chance this year, and I’ll be shocked if Fields isn’t someone’s projected 2025 starter a year from now.
It’s no longer a question of whether Achane will make it in the NFL; it’s now a question of whether Achane will be a star or merely a good running back. I’ll happily bet on stardom for Achane, so I’m trying to acquire him in leagues where his stakeholder has appraised Achane as merely good.
Yards per carry is a bad stat that shouldn’t be used to measure a running back’s body of work. But when an RB averages 7.8 yards per carry on more than 100 rushing attempts, it’s reasonable to conclude that he’s a special player. Achane has Olympic-caliber speed and extraordinary contact balance. He’s also dangerous as a pass catcher.
Achane’s usage was inconsistent in his rookie year, so not everyone is all in on him. At 188 pounds, Achane is never going to be a workhorse who gets 20 touches a game. But a running back with home-run speed and who contributes regularly as a pass catcher can do heavy damage on 10-15 touches a game. (Achane averaged 11.8 touches a game as a rookie, or 12.8 if you exclude a Week 11 game where Achane left with an injury after playing only three snaps.)
Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel is too smart to underutilize Achane’s rare talents. Buy now while ambiguity about Achane’s usage is muddying the waters.
Hockey legend Wayne Gretzky’s mantra was, “Skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it’s been.”
Chase Brown is where the puck is headed in Cincinnati.
The Bengals parted ways with Joe Mixon in the offseason and signed free agent Zack Moss, so Cincinnati is likely to use some combination of Moss and Brown in the backfield this year. The perception is that Moss is the favorite for early-down carries.
Moss was undeniably terrific for the Colts early last season while Jonathan Taylor was on IR. Moss had 322 yards from scrimmage and two touchdowns over a three-game stretch in Weeks 2-4, then had 167 rushing yards and two TDs against the Titans in Week 5 with the Colts opting to use Taylor lightly in his first game back. But Moss averaged 3.6 yards per carry from Week 6 on. He was widely considered a disappointment during the early part of his career in Buffalo, where he couldn’t carve out a major role with the Bills. Moss isn’t fast or explosive, and he isn’t a prolific pass catcher.
Brown is fast and explosive. (He clocked a 4.43 at the 2023 combine.) Brown was excellent as a pass catcher last year. (He averaged 10.4 yards per target as a rookie.) Brown could be a useful fantasy asset in a part-time role, and right now he’s being priced as a part-timer. But what if Brown proves far superior to Moss and ends up with a heavy-duty role similar to the one Mixon had with the Bengals in recent years? Brown showed in college that he could shoulder a heavy load, averaging 27.3 carries and 29.6 touches per game in his final season at Illinois.
Skate to where the puck is going to be; buy Chase Brown in dynasty.
It may already be too late to acquire McLaughlin at a discount. The second-year running back was reportedly a standout in the Broncos’ recent minicamp, and he’s impressed head coach Sean Payton. McLaughlin could push for an expanded role in 2024 after being effective as a part-timer last season.
As noted by my colleague Derek Brown, who’s banging the drum for McLaughlin like Keith Moon, McLaughlin ranked 14th in explosive run rate last year among qualifying RBs, fifth in missed tackles forced per attempt, fourth in yards after contact per attempt and fourth in yards per route run.
At 187 pounds, McLaughlin is probably destined to be a committee back, but if the sizzle he displayed last year is for real, he could still be quite valuable in that role. With a FantasyPros ECR of RB61 in dynasty, McLaughlin should be available at an affordable price, even with the buzz coming out of Denver’s minicamp.
If you expect your dynasty team to contend for a championship in 2024, Addison probably isn’t the sort of player you’d want to target for acquisition. There’s no denying that Addison is facing headwinds in 2024, but he’s a great trade target for rebuilding or retooling teams that don’t mind waiting 2-3 years for this tree to fully bear its fruit.
The obvious elephant in the room is Justin Jefferson, the undisputed alpha receiver in Minnesota. With the Vikings in a transitional period at quarterback and no longer reliably getting about 4,200 passing yards and 30 touchdown passes from Kirk Cousins every year, will the Minnesota passing game have enough juice to make Addison a valuable fantasy asset right now? Perhaps not. (Although with TE T.J. Hockenson trying to come back from a major late-season knee injury, Addison might not be especially target-deprived early in the season.)
The appeal is that Addison is an abundantly talented receiver who was a first-round draft pick in 2023 and proved worthy of first-round pedigree as a rookie, finishing with 70 catches for 911 yards and 10 touchdowns despite playing half the season with backup QBs. Addison had 1,593 receiving yards and 18 total touchdowns as a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of Pittsburgh. He’s a terrific young player.
Perhaps the ceiling for Addison over the next 2-3 years is that of a top No. 2 receiver. Jaylen Waddle and Tee Higgins have managed to turn out 1,000-yard seasons as sidekicks, and that could be Addison’s short-term destiny, too. Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell is a well-regarded offensive designer whom we should probably trust to keep Addison prominently involved.
However, the long-term ceiling for Addison is substantially higher. He probably isn’t going to be yoked to Jefferson for the entirety of his career. There’s a reasonable chance Addison eventually gets the chance to be a lead receiver somewhere.
Some dynasty managers are down on Watson because he’s had these persistent hamstring issues and because the Packers now have a bunch of talented young wide receivers and tight ends.
Watson saw a specialist about the hamstring issues in the offseason. He reportedly learned that he has leg strength asymmetry, with his right leg not as well-developed as his left leg. There’s optimism that training adjustments will alleviate the problem.
Watson’s target share should be less of a concern. In games last season where Watson and Green Bay WRs Jayden Reed and Romeo Doubs were all healthy, Watson had a 27% target share, Reed a 22% target share and Doubs an 18% target share. And Watson’s targets were high-value – his average depth of target in 2023 was 15.6 yards.
Watson is 6-foot-4, has sub-4.4 speed and scored eight touchdowns over a four-game span as a rookie. He also scored four touchdowns over a three-game span last year. There is exotic upside here for a player who’s already demonstrated serious big-play ability.
Williams’ dynasty investors are probably growing impatient.
This may be the right time to buy in.
The Lions drafted Williams 12th overall in 2022 even though he was coming off a torn ACL, and they understandably used him lightly in his rookie season. Williams played six games as a rookie and had his snap counts carefully managed. He finished with only one catch – which, by the way, was a 41-yard touchdown. Last year, Jameson Williams missed the first four games of the season with a hamstring injury, and his snap share was below 70% in all 12 of the games he played. He had 24 catches for 354 yards and two touchdowns.
Lions head coach Dan Campbell says Williams has been “a man on a mission” during the offseason. Yes, slot receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown and TE Sam LaPorta will command quite a few targets. But Williams is a home run hitter who doesn’t need 130 targets to pay dividends.
Williams also has sparse competition for targets on the outside, with Kalif Raymond and Donovan Peoples-Jones as his primary challengers. Williams has potential that those gentleman simply cannot match.
https://x.com/CoachspeakIndex/status/1793744284526448881
Let’s not forget that Williams had 1,500 receiving yards and 15 TD catches in his final season in Alabama. The Lions made a major investment in him, taking him in the top half of the first round two years ago, and have managed their investment with an abundance of caution. Well, the kid gloves are off. This is the time to go get Williams.
Shakir drew only 45 targets during the 2023 regular season, but he was efficient with those targets, averaging 15.7 yards per catch, 13.6 yards per target and 1.75 yards per route run. Late last season, Shakir started playing more snaps and drawing more targets. He had a touchdown catch in each of the Bills’ two playoff games, and he had a team-high nine targets and seven receptions in the divisional-round loss to the Chiefs.
Stefon Diggs and Gabe Davis combined for 241 targets last season. Both have left Buffalo. The Bills have brought in Curtis Samuel, who’s useful but not a high-volume receiver. (Samuel’s single-season high in targets is 105.) Buffalo drafted Keon Coleman, who’s certainly an intriguing prospect, but it’s probably unrealistic to expect an immediate splash from a player who finished with fewer than 800 receiving yards in each of his three college seasons.
It’s possible Shakir could lead the Bills in targets this season, and his spiffy 2023 efficiency suggests he could make quite a splash if he gets a major target bump.
Yes, I’m recommending another member of the Packers’ well-stocked WR corps. And, yes, it’s possible Wicks will be Green Bay’s No. 4 receiver behind Christian Watson, Jayden Reed and Romeo Doubs. So, why trade for Wicks?
Well, there’s reason to believe he’s good. Wicks’ head coach seems quite fond of the young receiver. And Wicks is affordable.
A fifth-round pick in 2023, Wicks finished his rookie year with 39 catches for 581 yards and four touchdowns. He was highly efficient, averaging an impressive 10.0 yards per target and 1.94 yards per route run.
Packers head coach Matt LaFleur says “the sky’s the limit” for Wicks and that the young receiver’s short-area quickness and ability to throw defenders off-balance is reminiscent of ex-Packer Davante Adams. That’s not faint praise.
Wicks has a dynasty ADP of WR63. He’s a growth stock worth adding to your portfolio.
Steelers beat writer Mark Kaboly of The Athletic listed Freiermuth as the team’s biggest winner in OTAs. Freiermuth is reportedly clicking with new Steelers QB Russell Wilson.
The departure of WR Diontae Johnson via trade has created a target void in Pittsburgh. WR George Pickens figures to be a centerpiece of the Steelers’ offense, but there’s not much proven WR talent on the roster behind Pickens. New offensive coordinator Arthur Smith is a former tight ends coach whose TEs combined for 174 targets, 114 receptions, 1,380 yards and seven touchdowns in Atlanta last season.
Injuries and QB incompetence made Freiermuth’s 2023 season a near-washout, but Freiermuth is a former second-round draft pick who scored seven touchdowns as a rookie in 2021 and had 63 catches for 732 yards in 2022.
The 25-year-old Freiermuth has a dynasty ADP of TE16. There’s a good chance his ADP will be in the TE1 range a year from now. Take advantage of the discount while you can.
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