Fantasy Football Draft Season – Planting My Flag

Fantasy football draft season is close to swinging into full gear and you need to know who you’re targeting in every draft. These players are my boys wherever I’m drafting.

Invariably, every fantasy player is going to hit a point in their fantasy football draft where ADP(average draft position) ceases to matter and you just have to go get your guys. These are players that you believe in no matter what and you’re planting your flag on them. You just have to have them in every league. If they wind up failing, you right go down with the ship but you’re convinced this player will be a fantasy goldmine and I’m here to give you some of mine for this upcoming season.

The ADP data is being taken from fantasyfootballcalculator.com and is accurate as of Wednesday, July 18th. It’s also using 1/2 point per reception scoring and I’ll note if a player is more valuable to me in a different format. I’ll highlight one player out of the four major positions that I’m drafting anytime I can at a reasonable draft capital.

Jerick McKinnon, Running Back – San Francisco 49ers ADP 2.08

The new hotness in San Francisco has gotten plenty of hype this offseason and his ADP shows it. You might have a hard time finding anyone who is higher than McKinnon than I am because I think he’s going to be a top eight running back in any type of PPR format. That’s right, he’s going to be an RB1 for your fantasy squad this upcoming season and there’s a few reasons why.

The first and foremost to me is he’s an athletic freak, even by NFL standards. Back in 2015, Devonta Freeman took the fantasy world by storm en route to being the RB1 in half point formats. It just so happened that Kyle Shanahan was his offensive coordinator then. The same Kyle Shanahan that is coaching in San Francisco now, but more on that in a minute. Freeman is an exceptional running back. McKinnon actually has even better measurables in some categories than Freeman does.

That is a massive difference is a lot of areas. It would suggest that McKinnon is an even better athlete than Freeman. Not only is that in McKinnon’s favor, he’s actually the exact same size as Freeman. There’s plenty of folks claiming that he’s too small to handle a full workload but both running backs are 5’9″ and weigh about 210 pounds. McKinnon has the body type to handle running the ball in the NFL. That’s not why I’m extremely excited to take him though.

The reason I’m excited for McKinnon and willing to take him in the second round is his receiving ability in the Shanahan offense. He just missed 1,000 total yards on 201 touches last season but he also was behind Dalvin Cook until he tore his ACL. Then he split work with Latavius Murray and that was the system that worked for the Vikings. Now he finds himself on a team where he is the lead back and in a system that will accentuate his strengths.

Over the past 10 years, Shanahan has used the running backs in his passing game. The total running back targets since 2008 are 73, 100, 94, 97, 40, 63, 39, 108, 107 and finally last year’s 166. There’s some low numbers on that list but let’s provide context to that. The 40 and 63 target seasons came in Washington when the lead dog in the backfield was Alfred “Skillet Hands” Morris. That’s his real middle name, I checked. Shanahan is a smart offensive mind. He’s not going to waste a ton of targets on a player that can’t catch. The 39 target season came during his one year stint in Cleveland. With Brian Hoyer and Johnny Manziel at quarterback and the rotation of Terrance West, Isaiah Crowell and Ben Tate at running back. I’m not holding that season against him and you shouldn’t either. 166 is on the high-end and shouldn’t be expected either. Remember, C.J. Baethard started seven games and he was not ready for the NFL. It was check down city.

Another critique is McKinnon won’t have enough carries to return value at such a high pick. I would offer that Shanahan gave Freeman at least 227 carries in their time together in Atlanta. I think 200 is a fair estimate for McKinnon. Even if he’s not the traditional back, I’m actually happy about that. A reception is going to be worth more in the long run than a carry. He averaged 8.3 yards per catch last season compared to 3.8 yards per carry in 2017. You pretty easily want the receptions more than you want the carries, especially when he’s getting points just for catching the ball. Also, that 8.3 yards per reception was higher than James White, Tarik Cohen, Christian McCaffrey and Le’Veon Bell. His game by game points are a little unstable but that’s what happens when you’re in a major timeshare.

Get McKinnon out into space and let him take advantage of his athleticism instead of pounding him into the line of scrimmage constantly. Fellow running back Matt Breida will see some carries in this offense. That’s going to help keep McKinnon fresher and help more than hurt. The former Viking finished as the RB21 in a very split role last year. His role is going to increase this year and he’s going to see more targets than the 68 he saw last year. McKinnon is one of my favorite early round targets.

Players I’m drafting McKinnon ahead of – Christian McCaffrey, Devonta Freeman, A.J. Green

Fantasy Football Draft – Zach Ertz, Tight End – Philadelphia Eagles ADP 4.02

Depending on how the first few rounds go, there are times that I want to spend a high pick on a tight end. Having one of the top three gives you a significant advantage at the position on a points per game basis. Last season, Rob Gronkowski of the New England Patriots was good for 13.8 points per game, Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs scored 12.8 points per game and Ertz came in at 11.8. The next highest tight end was rookie Evan Engram at 9.4 points per game. Every other player at the position was under nine points per contest. You’re talking about being up on your opponent by 3-5 points on a weekly basis. So why do I want the third highest scorer from the position?

Gronk is never really an option for me at such a high pick. It’s not that I’m scared off by his talent or his opportunity in the offense. I’m concerned with spending such a high pick on a player that almost always misses games. During his eight year career, Gronk has played more than 13 games five times. While that is the majority, the risk of him being injured again is too much risk for me to take on in a third round pick and a position that isn’t the easiest to fill reliably. Gronk has missed almost the equivalent of two full seasons and is 29 years old. He also openly talked about retirement and was reportedly almost traded this offseason. He may well be the most gifted and singularly dominant tight end we’ve seen when he’s right. Still, there’s enough alarms around him to make me shy away from the investment at the 2.10.

Travis Kelce is also a fine player. I was tempted to make him my TE1 on the season. My issue with putting him in that rarefied air is the amount of changes the offense has gone through this off-season. On the minor end, the Chiefs lost their offensive coordinator, Matt Nagy, to the Chicago Bears. That isn’t the biggest factor for me because head coach Andy Reid is still there and that is his offense. He’s called plays more often than not and likely still will this year. Kelce has finished as a top 10 tight end for the past four years and I don’t think that will change. I also think there is downside.

The bigger issues come from Kansas City needing to break in a new quarterback in Patrick Mahomes. It might seem gross, but Alex Smith was the QB4 last season. He threw for over 4,000 yards and 26 touchdowns to just five interceptions. You can be as excited as you want about Mahomes(I am too). To think he’s a huge upgrade over what Smith produced last season might be a stretch. He has one game under his belt. It was a solid game, as he threw for 284 yards in Denver against the Broncos. He also didn’t throw a touchdown. Kansas City also backed up the Brinks truck for receiver Sammy Watkins in free agency.

The top three in target share last year was Kelce at 122, receiver Tyreek Hill with 105 and Kareem Hunt with 63. The receiver that was second in targets was Albert Wilson with 62. The Chiefs didn’t pay Watkins $48 million over three seasons to throw him 62 targets a year. Those target have to come from somewhere. Even if Hill lose 10-15 a piece, that’s going to hurt Kelce a little bit. Watkins was also excellent in the red zone. He saw 11 targets with seven receptions for seven touchdowns. Kelce saw 21 targets last year and caught 11 of them for seven touchdowns. It’s not the best comparison between teams and quarterbacks, but you could argue that Watkins was the more efficient option when the field shrinks. The truth is we have no idea how the targets will be distributed or who Mahomes will favor when the pass rush is closing in. On a side note, I’m not going to feature Watkins but I love him this year. He’s going to outscore Tyreek Hill. Make sure to bookmark this and come yell at me on Twitter in January if I’m wrong.

Anyways, Ertz is the perfect combo of targets, consistency, health and upside. He’s seen over 105 targets the past three seasons(as have the other two), he’s caught at least 74 passes for at least 816 yards. He’s continued to score more touchdowns as he’s gone along and he’s a prime red zone target as well with 17 last season. Ertz has also only missed five games in his career, suiting up for 75 out of a possible 80. The Eagles offense is one of the best in the NFL and I’ll take the cheapest of the big three tight ends and the one I know exactly what I’m getting. If I don’t snag Ertz, I’m looking towards George Kittle of the San Francisco 49ers further on down the draft board. 

Players I’m drafting Ertz ahead of – Travis Kelce, Derrick Henry, Aaron Rodgers, Kenyan Drake

Fantasy Football Draft – Will Fuller, Wide Receiver – Houston Texans ADP 6.11

This may seem like it flies in the face of other things that I have written or said. Even in the piece that was linked above, I advocated not taking teammate DeAndre Hopkins but that was purely ADP driven and who he was going in front of. Fuller costs you significantly less and has the potential to be a top 20 wide receiver this year in all formats.

Fuller played just four games with quarterback Deshaun Watson. In those four games, he saw just 22 targets for 13 receptions, totaling 279 yards and a whopping seven touchdowns. Let’s discuss the elephant in the room first. The touchdowns are totally unsuitable at that rate. That should be obvious, unless you think Watson is in line for one of the best quarterback seasons we’ve ever seen –

I haven’t put it into writing yet, but I’m not touching Watson at his current ADP unless it’s something like a dynasty league. I did take him in the Scott Fish Bowl. That’s a different circumstance. In a normal one quarterback league, I’m not taking Watson as the second QB off the board. His touchdown rate was 9.3 percent. For context, the career marks for Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers and Drew Brees are 5.5, 6.4 and 5.3. I love Watson but he is not that far and away better than three of the most prolific quarterbacks we’ve ever seen in producing touchdowns.

I may not be buying Watson at his ADP but that doesn’t mean I don’t think he’s a dynamite player. The reason I love Fuller is that he sees highly valuable targets. He’s never going to see an insanely high volume playing beside Hopkins. If you can’t bank on volume week to week, you need to be able to rely on the big play. The Watson to Fuller connection might prove to be one of the best deep ball connections in football this season. Breaking down the four games these two played together, the lowest yardage came in their first game with just 35 yards. He still salvaged his day with two touchdowns, but you don’t want to rely on 35 yards a week and hope for a TD. The other three games they played together, Fuller averaged just a hair over 80 yards per contest. A big part of that is because Fuller finished fourth in the NFL in targeted air yards. Those type of targets are massively valuable because it only takes one or two receptions to make things work for fantasy.

Fuller should be viewed like DeSean Jackson in his prime. He’s one of the premier deep threats in football, attached to a mobile quarterback who can make moves in the pocket and buy extra time to make a play. The longer the play goes, the harder it is to cover Fuller. Let’s do some math and say Fuller can average 65 yards a game with Watson at the helm. That seems fairly reasonable seeing as he would only need to four of five receptions at his aDOT to achieve that number. If he catches 60 passes(that’s only about four receptions a game) for 1,000 or so yards and catches eight touchdowns total, that would put him at roughly 180-185 points in half point per reception formats. With additional chemistry with Watson, clearing 200 points shouldn’t be out of reach. The 180ish points would have landed him between WR13-WR16 in 2017, while 200 would have broken into the top 10. Fuller is the WR31 off the board right now. If you want a piece of the Houston offense, this is the player to take that shot with. You’ll have to live with a couple lean weeks but Fuller is going to win you weeks multiple times this season.

Players that I’m drafting Fuller ahead of – Julian Edelman, Jarvis Landry, Chris Hogan and Corey Davis

Fantasy Football Draft – Andrew Luck, Quarterback – Indianapolis Colts ADP 10.01

I’m a huge proponent of waiting as long as possible on a quarterback. However, one quarterback that I want as much as I can get is Andrew Luck because you’re never going to get him this cheap again if he winds up being healthy. That is the reason that Luck is going so late because he just missed an entire season of football. No, I don’t know any better than any other fantasy analyst if he will be on the field in Week 1. If he is, his ceiling is unmatched at this range in the draft.

More from FanSided

• Cardinals Rumors: Surprise extension, Dylan Carlson-Yankees link, Rays trade idea
• USWNT vs. Vietnam: Key takeaways before they take on the Dutch
• NFL rumors: 49ers trending toward contract drama with defensive star
• Steelers avoid any camp drama with latest roster move
• MLB Rumors: Potential Braves reunion, Lance Lynn no-trade clause and Orioles deadline intentions

Since he broke into the league, Luck has played 15 games in four of five seasons. In those four seasons, he’s finished as the QB9, QB4, QB2 and the QB4. He’s currently the 12th quarterback off the board and aside from his rookie season of the QB9 finish, his track record suggests that he will vastly outperform his draft pick status. It’s hard to project exactly what luck is going to look like this fall if he’s playing from the kickoff of the season. Will he still run? That was a nice bonus to his game, as he ran for at least 255 yards in his four good seasons. That might not happen that often when he gets back as the Colts are going to do everything humanly possible to protect him.

For a moment, let’s just assume that Luck is healthy. I know, it’s pie in the sky dreaming but let’s just hope for the best right now. The Colts offense has weapons. Receiver T.Y. Hilton is still there, even though he just destroyed your fantasy team last year. Luck helped Hilton rack up at least 1,083 yards in four straight seasons so his number one option is ready to roll. The Colts have added three running backs since we last saw Luck in Marlon Mack, Jordan Wilkins and Nyheim Hines. They all have their strengths and will help Luck find fantasy glory again.

Eric Ebron and Jack Doyle are a solid 1-2 punch at the tight end position and Indy spent the sixth and 37th picks on guards Quenton Nelson and Braden Smith in this past draft. There were some folks who though Nelson was the best player overall in the draft. General manager Chris Ballard has really tried to beef this offense up in just his second offseason in that post. In addition to everything they did on the field, Indy also was spurned by New England offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels for the head coaching position. That sounds bad but they hired offensive minded coach Frank Reich, formerly offensive coordinator for the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. Luck has a good bit of talent around him to guide this season. The defense also still isn’t up to snuff, so the offense is going to have to put points on the board. I love all of these ingredients coming together for Luck this year.

The downside is Luck isn’t ready to go and maybe doesn’t play much, if at all. There is not much risk to you if you draft Luck because if you take him, you simply take a second quarterback shortly after Luck. Like I said, quarterback is criminally deep this season. Ben Roethlisberger, Alex Smith, Marcus Mariota, Dak Prescott and even Eli Manning are all going after Luck by at least one full round. Take the upside of Luck and take the safety of a secondary quarterback. It mitigates all the risk so you can enjoy all the reward. Luck will be fighting for a top five spot at his position if he’s on the field this fall. That’s one of the best gambles you can take in the 9th-10th round this draft season.

Players I’m drafting Luck ahead of – Matt Ryan

Next: Fantasy Football Players to Target and Avoid in your Draft

Stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest fantasy football news and analysis all NFl season long!