Fantasy Football

The dreaded Tight End Wasteland is a term that has become all too familiar in fantasy football. It’s a place you never want to be, but also a place that can be hard to avoid. We can’t all be lucky enough to land a set-and-forget tight end. Even in eight-team leagues, chances are there’s at least a couple teams disappointed in their tight end week-to-week. So let’s take a look at some prime candidates for a solid season to help us avoid the tight end wasteland next year.  Let’s go ahead and start with the studs that you’ll have to draft a little earlier, but for good reason.

Mark Andrews was as consistent as it gets, and when he hit his ceiling, he won your week. Expect more of the same this season as well. Andrews led the Ravens, and the entire position, with a 26.6-percent Target Share last year. He’s the alpha receiver on the Ravens offense. With a healthy Lamar Jackson, there’s no telling how much higher Andrews’ ceiling can go. Two years younger than George Kittle and four years younger than Travis Kelce, Andrews has firmly set himself up to be a valuable fantasy tight end for years, and is PlayerProfiler’s TE1 in all fantasy formats.

In this edition of Thinking About Thinking (Ranges of Outcomes), I continue my series addressing probabilistic fantasy football strategy. Each article I will unpack ways our brains work in irrational ways that create value in your fantasy football leagues. Last week I discussed analytical prospect models, and the importance of humility when evaluating rookies. If you haven’t yet, make sure to check that out to get a feel for this series!

In a ceiling scenario, Tua Tagovailoa is a top-12 quarterback this year with his new weapons, entrenching himself as Miami’s franchise quarterback. On the other hand, he could fail to meet expectations and carry precarious job security into 2023. Schrodinger’s Tua is both alive and dead, but his cost resides in purgatory. His market value is a compromise position between two plausible outcomes which attempts to balance them appropriately.

Fantasy football is obsessed with “alpha” receivers who look dominant and can make monster contested catches. However, this provides an opportunity to find cheaper alternatives that will outperform ADP and ultimately help win leagues. Targets score fantasy points. And these receivers have “alpha” production, while coming at “beta” price points. 

Brandin Cooks is consistently overlooked in the fantasy football community, and size is a big reason. 2021 was quietly a career year for Cooks, in which he posted highs in targets and receptions. Davis Mills also flashed in his rookie season, and will pay dividends for both the Texans offense and Cooks if his development continues in 2022. It also helps that Cooks is an elite-athlete who has 4.33 (98th-percentile) speed and a 98th-percentile Agility Score. 

Welcome to the latest and greatest arena where fantasy football takes thrive or die. A place where fantasy football propositions can gain validity or be thrown by the wayside. This is the second installment of the Fantasy Football Shark Tank.

Christian Watson has exceeded all expectations so far this draft season. He put himself on the map by killing the Senior Bowl. The wide receiver further elevated his stock value with his excellent performance at the NFL Combine. If the NFL continues the current trend of taking five or six wide receivers in round one, Watson could very well end up being one of them. 

In each of the last three years N’Keal Harry, Jalen Reagor and Rondale Moore have had underwhelming starts to their career despite excellent analytical prospect profiles. Each year the consensus has bequeathed different reasons why their lack of success was foreseeable. Harry could not separate. Reagor played in the Big 12 conference. Rondale Moore is too short. So should we now avoid every short player, non-separator or big 12 player?

Some may say we should simply view each player in their own context to determine what rules to apply. I would argue these players most likely failed because sometimes good prospects bust, and often the reasons don’t reveal themselves until after the fact, if at all.

Breece Hall’s resume is as sparkling as one a college running back could create. His tape and production already made him a nearly indestructible running back. But him blowing up the Combine was the last piece to make him a bulletproof prospect. To make matters even better, won’t turn 21 until May 31st, more than a month after he hears his name called. He should be the first running back to hear his name called among his class both in the NFL Draft and in upcoming fantasy drafts.

Whoa! Well, hello there Christian Watson! He may not have lit the college football landscape on fire the way Breece Hall did. But, he did manage to accumulate a robust College Dominator Rating/College YPR combo. Watson blew up the Senior Bowl with his dynamic skillset and then did the same at the Combine with his otherworldly athleticism. Doing so solidified him as a likely Day 2 draft pick at the minimum and possibly a first-round pick in late April. When it comes to winners of the Combine and the draft season, perhaps no player did so as emphatically.

Snoop Conner is a big dude at around 5-10 and 220-pounds. But he did not play a big role as a college football player. His career best Dominator Rating was the 17.9-percent he posted last season. Only a 32nd-percentile mark among third-year college runners who would go on to be drafted since 2007.

Again we see Miles Sanders popping up in the comps list of a total JAG running back (he shows up a lot because he’s average and therefore is relatively comparable to lots of players in the meaty portion of the bad-to-good bell curve). Nick Chubb is the best player here and Conner is the busted ass version of him. He’s bad and you should feel bad if you like him. Turn the film off and touch some grass.

Welcome to the latest and greatest arena where fantasy football takes thrive or die. A place where fantasy football propositions can gain validity or be thrown by the wayside. This is the first installment of the Fantasy Football Shark Tank.

Despite Tony Pollard’s fantastic efficiency metrics and Clyde Edwards-Helaire’s lackluster production, the two backs’ fantasy values have yet to fully flip. D.J. Moore is a stud. He is a wildly talented wide receiver that is as close to QB proof as there is. Just like Pollard, Moore needs his situation to improve to fully reach his potential. But unlike Pollard, he is a stable dynasty asset regardless of his team making any improvements.

It’s not a good look that it took D’Vonte Price four years to break out at Florida International. When it did happen though, it was emphatic. His senior season 40.2-percent Dominator Rating is a 90th-percentile mark for fourth-year college runners. Albeit in a five game season on a team that went winless in Conference USA.

D’Vonte Price is neither a good receiver nor runner, and he also wasn’t an impressive college producer. There just isn’t much indication that he’ll be a quality NFL player. I’m not interested in dynasty rookie drafts.

After one full year of waiting, fantasy football’s greatest mock drafting rivalry has been renewed. It’s UNDERWORLD VS ROSTERWATCH 2 (Electric Boogaloo?) The best from both sites partake in a fierce, ongoing, totally-serious-with-no-room-for-cheeky-shenanigans series of fantasy football rookie mocks.

The only two players from Round 1 not ranked among PlayerProfiler’s top 12 rookies are David Bell and Jahan Dotson, taking the places of Jerome Ford and Brian Robinson, respectively. Though this sentiment technically goes against our rankings, it shows that you want to take your 2022 WRs early. An easy assessment from our end given the main pre-Combine focus of the Underworld admittedly being on the RB position. Noah Hills’ extensive research shows us that the 2022 NFL Draft is starved for backs with complete skillsets. It’s up to us to find players that represent the oasis in the middle of this proverbial desert.