It wasn’t long ago that mobile quarterbacks were fantasy football’s best-kept secret, but the cat is out of the bag. No one is sleeping on quarterbacks who add points as runners. Furthermore, pocket passers aren’t as valuable with an uptick in dual-threat quarterbacks.
Not every team in fantasy leagues can have a dual-threat quarterback, but avoiding overpaying for a pocket passer is critical and the reason why the first featured quarterback should be avoided at his average draft position (ADP). The second highlighted quarterback is a rookie entering a stellar environment. Still, the mystery quarterback is overvalued when looking at recent performances by first-round rookie signal-callers.
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Fantasy Football Quarterbacks To Avoid at ADP
C.J. Stroud (HOU – QB): 52.3 ADP/QB6
C.J. Stroud made a borderline seamless transition from the collegiate ranks to the pros. According to Pro-Football-Reference, Stroud was first among qualified quarterbacks in passing yards per game (273.9), tied for 13th in passing touchdowns (23), third in adjusted net yards per attempt (7.47 ANY/A), sixth in Quarterback Rating (100.8) and 16th in QBR (57.5) last season.
Nevertheless, despite a superb rookie season, Stroud was the QB9 in points per game (18.7) among quarterbacks who played at least eight games in 2023. Stroud isn’t unathletic, but he’s essentially a pocket passer, averaging only 11.1 rushing yards per game as a rookie.
The Texans traded the Bills a second-round pick in the 2025 NFL Draft to add Stefon Diggs to an already talented pass-catching corps. The arrow is pointed upward for Stroud. Yet, the Texans aren’t a lock to join the league’s most pass-happy offenses in 2024. According to RotoViz’s pace app, the Texans were tied for the 12th-highest situation-neutral pass rate (57%) last year. Comparatively, the Bengals had the second-highest situation-neutral pass rate (63%), and the Cowboys were tied for the fourth-highest mark (61%).
Joe Burrow‘s 2023 was ruined by injuries, starting with a calf issue that plagued him early in the year and a wrist injury that required season-ending surgery. In 2022, Burrow averaged 21.7 points per game, three more points per game than Stroud tallied in his excellent rookie season. Additionally, Dak Prescott was the QB5 in points per game (20.7) in 2023. Burrow has an ADP of 72.0, and Prescott’s is 69.7. The gap between Stroud’s ADP and Burrow’s and Prescott’s is too large, saying nothing of other intriguing quarterbacks, namely Kyler Murray (71.7 ADP) and Jordan Love (73.0). It’s not unreasonable to be ambitious about Stroud’s trajectory and rank him ahead of some of those quarterbacks, but the opportunity cost at running back, wide receiver and tight end for picking Stroud 17 or more picks ahead of them isn’t worth the reach.
Caleb Williams (CHI – QB): 103.0 ADP/QB13
The future might be bright for Caleb Williams. The Bears have wisely invested resources in the offense to ease his transition to the pros. Chicago traded for talented veteran wideout Keenan Allen and picked wide receiver Rome Odunze with the ninth pick in this year’s NFL Draft. DJ Moore, Allen and Odunze are an exciting receiving trio, and D’Andre Swift, Cole Kmet and Gerald Everett aren’t duds, either.
Regardless, the track record of rookie quarterbacks performing as fantasy QB1s isn’t ideal for Williams’s 2024 outlook. The following table shows all 22 quarterbacks picked in the first round of the NFL Draft since 2014, who also started eight games as rookies.
Only three of the 22 quarterbacks in the sample were QB13 -- Williams's present ADP -- or better. Justin Herbert's QB7 finish was the top showing from that group, and Stroud (18.7 PPG) and Murray (18.6) were the only others to exceed 18.0 PPG and finish as QB1s.
Deshaun Watson had 24.1 points per game as a rookie in 2017. Yet, he had a season-ending injury, limiting him to seven games. Watson's eruption was an outlier, and he was a more accomplished runner in college than Williams. Per Pro Football Focus (PFF), Watson ran for 1,174 yards and 12 touchdowns in 2015 and 708 and nine in 2016. Meanwhile, Williams ran for 559 yards and six touchdowns in 2021, 624 and 10 in 2022 and 356 and 11 in 2023. The 22-QB sample from the last decade says picking Williams as the QB13 at a fringe top-100 pick is a high-risk, medium-reward move. The juice isn't worth the squeeze with Williams.
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Josh Shepardson is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Josh, check out his archive and follow him @BChad50.
