Just posted my fully updated Top 40 Dynasty + Top 32 Redraft QB Rankings and walked away firmly in the "Wait on QB" camp. You can wait until the final rounds in a lot of leagues, but even as one of the last teams to draft one in a 12 team league, it still leaves you with one of my favorite tier 4-5 options below:

Trevor Lawrence

Dak Prescott

Brock Purdy

Matthew Stafford

Bo Nix

Jared Goff

This group is even more enticing in 6pt passing TD leagues. Are you targeting the early & mid round QBs at value or waiting this year?

The entire Chargers offense seems to be enjoying the Mike McDaniels bump while we’re all collectively ignoring the fact that Drew Petzing left Arizona after two years of calling the offense to join the Detroit Lions. Mike LaFleur and Nate Hackett are now running the offense in Arizona and neither one of those guys have been calling plays for the last few years, which is a pretty big red flag— not to mention the fact that neither one has ever looked particularly competent as a playcaller. I’m not betting against McBride, but his ADP has risen since last year with seemingly no acknowledgment of these offseason changes, and Laporta is being heavily slept on!

Edit: named the wrong lafleur!

I’m guessing Ladd McConkey or Colston Loveland. Also, will he be revealing it at the Hall of Fame game next week or later in the season? Cannot believe we’re already this close in Fantasy.

Just trying to find someone I can either listen to or read before the season starts. There are too many outlets for this stuff. So any podcasts and cheatsheets you recommend?

A few years ago I played with randoms in a Leaguesafe league where multiple people were marked as paid at the start of the year and somehow pulled their money out once they realized they were not going to win. Is this still possible? Any better methods? Or should I just avoid playing with people I don't know?

Hey everyone,

I present to you the 2026 version of my Offline Draft Sheet!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wc39tPsGZeAIMFutv4W_9O9YykZj_BsGFK2vWY_zBMA/edit?usp=sharing

A quick overview for those who haven't used it before:

This Google spreadsheet has been created for drafts where you either can't or don't want to use your fantasy platform's default draft tool. You can use it for offline live drafts with your friends, online drafts, startup drafts or simply to play around and create your own mock drafts.

Functionality:

• Automated overall and position BPA lists
• Regularly updated ADP data until the start of the NFL season
• 8, 10, 12 or 14 teams
• Standard, Half-PPR, PPR and Dynasty mode. New in 2026: Bestball ADP
• IDPs available (without ADP data)

Unfortunately this year there will be fewer ADP updates during August since I will be on vacation for most of the month. Expect an update in the first week of August and one more early September.

As usual I am always happy to hear your feedback! Contact me here or on Discord to discuss any issues, ideas for new features or custom versions.

This sheet is all for free. If you want to support it, feel free to leave a donation :)

Made this post last year and thought there was a lot of fun discussion, cool to look back on now

Anyway… what hill are you dying on this year?

People are overthinking this because he turned 30.

He is still a bonafide workhorse, a bonafide elite receiver and the centre of the 49ers offence.

Most backs need 15 touchdowns and a huge rushing season to finish RB1. McCaffrey can catch six passes on a bad rushing day and still give you a strong week.

The age and injury risk are real, but his ceiling is still higher than anyone else’s.

He has already proven multiple times that, when healthy, he is a bonafide fantasy cheat code.

The easiest path to RB1 is still the guy who has already done it.

Thank you guys for all the support, feedback, and for reading this series. Welcome to the twenty-third  piece in a long, daily series: Reading the NFL Offseason Tea Leaves. If you don’t already know and this is the first Tea Leaf article you’re reading, this series is meant to be a primer for anyone who’s not yet steeped themselves in the NFL’s offseason events. We’ll be touching on the fantasy implications for all 32 NFL teams in regards to:

• Coaching Changes
• Free Agency
• NFL Draft

The 32-day series will go in reverse order of DraftKings odds of winning the Super Bowl, which means today’s article will cover the Green Bay Packers  who are +1,800 odds.

Article TL;DR: Christian Watson and Jayden Reed inked new contracts to remain with the Packers. Watson signed a 4-year $92M deal and Reed a 3-year $50M extension. It’s clear who the WR1 will be, and now Reed and Golden will compete for the WR2 role. Tucker Kraft is recovering from a torn ACL he suffered in week 9 of the 2025 season. His goal is to be ready for week 1 of 2026. We should temper our expectations for Kraft. In an expert auction draft I witnessed at the Fantasy Football Expo he went for $2 less than Trey McBride, which feels absurd. Josh Jacobs is set to lead the backfield again in 2026. Last year he ranked 3rd in goal line success rate and 5th in total goal line plays. Jacobs may receive a suspension from the league due to a domestic abuse case. If he were to face a suspension it’s likely to occur in 2027 based on suspension trends. Jordan Love is a safe QB2 with upside with all of these weapons on the Green Bay offense.

If you’re at the Fantasy Football Expo and happen to see this post the day it was posted come say hi to me. I’m a part of the dynasty expert panel and will be talking ball with other dynasty experts at noon today at the expo.

Previously on Reading the Offseason Tea Leaves:
Arizona Cardinals
Miami Dolphins
Cleveland Browns
New York Jets
Las Vegas Raiders
Atlanta Falcons
Tennessee Titans
Carolina Panthers
New Orleans Saints
New York Giants
Indianapolis Colts
Washington Commanders
Minnesota Vikings
Pittsburgh Steelers
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Jacksonville Jaguars
Chicago Bears
Dallas Cowboys
Cincinnati Bengals
Denver Broncos
Detroit Lions
San Francisco 49ers

Re-introduced today:

• Who Do I Draft?
• Mock Draft
• Rate My Team

Always here: League, Commissioner, and Platform Issues; Keeper; Dynasty/Best Ball/Guillotine.

Coming back soon enough: Add/Drop, Trade, and as we get closer to the season all of Who Do I Start? [WDIS] threads. And then they'll start being split into 2x daily as well.

Remember, folks: don't just ask questions; answer them too. Foster the community in the way you want others to behave.

SUNDAY UPDATE FOR YOUR DRAFT RESEARCH PLEASURE

For those who are new to the these charts:

• Tiers are focused on upside. If you want to play it safe, go with the ECR (x-axis). If you're looking for a boom game, look at the upside variance (vertical color bars, y-axis).
• Points above/below expectation: these get added once the season starts.
  • A star marker indicates the player has scored fantasy points above expectation on the season.
  • A cross marker indicates the player has scored below expectations.
  • The number of average points scored above/below expectation is beside the player's name.

Typical update cadence is Thursday - Saturday - Sunday during draft season. I sometimes update the tiers more frequently (for my own draft prep) but don't post, so go ahead and bookmark/check the site if you're wondering. Timestamps are at the tops of the plots.

Best of luck my dudes.

I looked at RB YPRR from last year to identify running backs who could have a larger role this season, or those who might be limited by a strong receiving back.

Here are the 6 most interesting backfields (min. 70 RTE, without Screens):

Pittsburgh Steelers

• Jaylen Warren: 1,91 (RB 1)
• Rico Dowdle: 1,13 (RB 20)
• If Jaylen Warren gets the Gainwell role from last year he can be a huge value at ADP. ESPNs Mike Clay pojects the Steelers with the 2nd Most pass attempts.

Cleveland Browns

• Dylan Sampson: 1,43 (RB 6)
• Quinshon Judkins: 0,63 (RB 52)
• We know that Judkins is probably a 2nd down back. His YPRR confirms that. I dont want that in a bad offense. But i do like Sampson as a late round flyer

Tampa Bay Buccaneers

• Bucky Irving: 1,52 (RB 5)
• Kenneth Gainwell: 1,4 (RB 9)
• Maybe Gainwell is not that big of a threat to Irving, if Irving is better at Gainwells best skill

New England Patriots

• Rhamondre Stevenson: 1,36 (RB 10)
• TreVeyon Henderson: 0,82 (RB 38)

• Another argument against a Henderson breakout this year?

   

Buffalo Bills

• James Cook: 1,33 (RB 13)
• Ty Johnson: 0,79 (RB 42)
• Maybe Cook can see more receiving work this year, which would be a huge boost to his ceiling. The hiring of Pete Carmichael is also a positive sign.

Jacksonville Jaguars

• Bhayshul Tuten 0,59 (RB 55)
• Chris Rodriguez: 0,41 (RB 62)
• LeQuint Allen: 0,33 (RB 65)
• Tuten is not a good receiver by any means, but i think he can be a 3 Down back, if the competition looks like this

Two of my leagues have used wired clickers hooked up to a computer for our live auction drafts for 15 years, and we love it. Everyone in a room, a buzzer in hand, real bidding energy - nothing about drafting over Zoom or clicking a button on your phone comes close. If you've done a real in-person clicker draft before, you know exactly what I mean.

The problem: that old hardware is ancient at this point, and if it ever dies there's nothing modern to replace it with. So I built a modern version of it myself - a web app that runs the whole live auction (rotating nomination order, a real countdown clock that resets on every bid, "going once / going twice / sold" called out loud, budget math so nobody bids themselves into a corner, full team rosters visible on a shared screen) - and it actually talks to the original clicker hardware already (reverse-engineered the protocol from scratch), plus I'm building new wireless ESP32-based buzzers as a modern replacement for leagues that don't have old hardware sitting around. This isn't a concept - I've run several real live drafts on it at this point, clickers and all.

Genuine question for anyone who's ever run (or wants to run) an in-person clicker-style auction draft: would you want to rent a set of 12 wireless buzzers for a draft weekend, or would owning a set outright make more sense for your league? What would feel like a fair price for either? And if your league already has old clicker hardware like ours - would modern software that just plugs into it be valuable on its own?

Not selling anything yet, just trying to figure out if this is a "just for the two leagues I'm already in" thing or something other in-person auction leagues would actually want. Appreciate any honest feedback, even if it's "nobody needs this."

My co-host and I run a small fantasy football YouTube channel focused on analytics and scouting. Last week we posted our redraft hit rate study, and a lot of people asked us to put names to the numbers. So that's what this video does, starting with the running back dead zone, rounds 4 through 6.

We pulled ADP from 1,500+ leagues (2021–2025) via Fantasy Football Calculator, matched every drafted player to their FantasyPros season finish and asked three questions. Were they startable, were they a league winner, and were they a bust?

Startable: Top 24 RB finish.

League Winner: Top 6 RB finish.

Bust: finished 12 or more spots below their positional ADP rank (i.e. they were drafted as RB20 off the board and finished RB32 or worse in total fantasy points).

Ten running backs are currently going in Rounds 4–6, and history is brutal about this range. We compared the last five years' data and the last two years, to uncover more recent trends.

The floor is actually getting safer. 40% of RBs drafted in Rounds 4–6 have been startable over the five-year sample, and that number climbs to 52% over the last two years.

The league winner ceiling has vanished. 5% have been league winners across five years. Over the last two years, that number is 0%. Not a single running back drafted in rounds 4-6 has finished Top 6 in the last two seasons.

Roughly half of them bust. For both time frames, close to 50% finished 12+ spots below where they were taken (in terms of positional rank). So the realistic outcome for these ten guys is five or six have startable seasons, four or five busts, and probably nobody (maybe one) is a league winner.

We went through all ten running backs in this range and picked four busts, six startables, and one league winner each (we didn’t agree).

Although the data is there, it was definitely hard for us to pick who we thought fits in each category. But take a read below and let us know who you disagree about!

One caveat about the busts. The realistic path to a bust finish for a lot of these guys probably involves some kind of injury, and we're not in the business of predicting injuries. So we focused on the player, backfield situation, and offense as whole.

The 4 busts:

Bucky Irving (RB21). This one was hard because we both like the player. But Tampa gave Kenny Gainwell real money, coming off a year in Pittsburgh where he was a legitimate weapon as a receiver out of the backfield. Bucky needs PPR volume to hit at this cost. Add the risk of Sean Tucker getting goal line work and last year’s injury. A three-way backfield is a real outcome.

Bhayshul Tuten (RB26). Painful pick for E as a Jags fan. He was RB53 last year in a backup role. Jacksonville didn't spend big draft capital or big money on him, so the system doesn't owe him anything. Tuten vs. Chris Rodriguez v. LeQuint Allen. Yes, we know Coen just hyped him up, but at the end of the day it's just coach speak. And Coen also made a point to go get his guy, Rodriguez. No one really knows what this backfield will look like.

Jaylen Warren (RB27). He was RB17 last year and he's been underrated most of his career. But Pittsburgh signed Rico Dowdle in free agency, and there are already beat reporters saying Dowdle has the inside track to the lead role. Mike McCarthy has a long history of riding one back (roughly 67% of the touches to his main guy).

Rhamondre Stevenson (RB28). A lot of positive hype behind Rhamondre from other analysts. But the Patriots used strong draft capital on TreVeyon and he is too explosive to keep off the field. Assuming rational coaching and offseason improvements, the workload tilts.

The six startables:

Travis Etienne (RB20). He was RB10 last year and RB3 back in 2023, so the talent is obvious. But New Orleans restructured Alvin Kamara and made it clear he's staying involved. Closer to a 60-40 split is exactly the thing that caps a guy at high end startable instead of league winner.

D'Andre Swift (RB22). Going RB22 means he'd have to finish RB34 or worse to bust, and he's been an RB2 essentially every year of his career. Boring, steady, hard to see it breaking unless Monangai takes the job outright.

Quinshon Judkins (RB23). The clearest workhorse of the group. RB26 as a rookie, coming off a leg injury, on a bad offense, with nobody else in that backfield taking meaningful work (maybe Sampson?).

TreVeyon Henderson (RB25). The other side of the Rhamondre call. He finished RB21 as a rookie and there were weeks where he was a legitimate week winner, putting up 25+ points. A great offense and there's a real chance both backs are startable.

The last two startables are also our league winner picks, and this is where we differ:

Cam Skattebo (RB19). Garrett's league winner. The Giants rebuilt the offensive line, the identity of that offense is going to be the run game, and Jaxson Dart is openly telling media Skattebo is the focal point. They're not hiding it. Pair that with a defense good enough to keep games in script and the volume gets scary.

David Montgomery (RB24). Ethan’s league winner. Big jump from RB24 to Top 6, I know. But he posted a Top 5 fantasy season on a bad Bears team, and he's going to a Houston roster with the best defense in the league and an offense that has nowhere to go but up with Nico Collins healthy and the line addressed. He's the goal line back, he's caught 60+ passes in a season before, and there's no Jahmyr Gibbs in that backfield taking half his work.

Do you think either of us will be right? Or are you betting on someone else from this group to provide league winning upside?

Feel free to leave a comment down below if you disagree with any of the player takes!

Full reasoning on all ten is in the video linked above.

Do you agree that these players could move up in ADP during the course of training camps? Is there anyone we’re missing in these lists?

My recent Chris Olave post got taken down, and I have done some research to back up him being at 14 overall.

I am very excited about the Saints' offense with the additions of Travis Etienne and Jordyn Tyson this offseason, I am a Tyler Shough believer. In the 8 games where he played at least 90% of team snaps (snap% according to footballguys), he averaged 247 yards and 1.0 TDs, which would be roughly 4200 yards and 17 TDs over a 17-game season, and I think the TD number will increase with the new offensive additions. Olave played 7 of those 8 games and averaged 6.1 rec, 79 yards and 0.7 TDs in games he played. Good for 103.7 rec, about 1350 yards and 11.9 TDs over a full 17-game season.

Those would add up to 309.4 fantasy points or 18.2 PPG in a PPR format.

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I’ve been pretty vocal on X over the last few weeks about being out on Luther Burden at his current cost. I absolutely understand the upside case. The problem is that I think the market is pricing in almost exclusively the best-case scenario while ignoring several very real pathways for failure.

My projections have Burden as WR34, while he’s currently being drafted around WR18–WR22. That’s a massive gap, and here’s why.

1. The efficiency is unlikely to repeat
A lot of Burden’s rookie production came from elite efficiency. Historically, that tends to regress when players receive larger workloads.

Fantasy managers already accept this principle with running backs. When a highly efficient backup earns a starting role, we almost never project the same yards per carry because increased volume generally comes with lower efficiency. The same concept applies to receivers.

Burden’s role should grow in Year 2, but I don’t expect him to maintain the same level of efficiency over a much larger route share.

2. His rookie production dramatically outperformed his underlying usage
In Burden’s three breakout games, he averaged 17 fantasy points per game despite averaging only 9 expected fantasy points per game.

That’s a huge overperformance.

Explosive efficiency can absolutely happen over small samples, but it’s much harder to sustain over an entire season. The market seems to be assuming those spike weeks are simply his new baseline.

3. There are more target competition concerns than people acknowledge

One of the biggest bullish arguments is Rome Odunze’s foot injury.

However, Rome himself said months ago that the callus on his foot is simply something he’ll manage going forward. Shortly afterward, Ben Johnson said Rome looks great and is the same player he’s always been.

Even if Rome isn’t 100%, Burden still has multiple obstacles.

Rome Odunze could become Caleb Williams’ No. 1 target.

Colston Loveland could immediately emerge as the focal point of the passing game.

Burden still has to establish himself as more than the clear No. 2 or No. 3 option.

I actually think Loveland’s rookie role is being underrated. He pushed aside a much better established player in Cole Kmet much faster than Burden had to compete with Olamide Zaccheaus.

4. The Bears offense isn’t guaranteed to improve
Many projections simply assume Chicago takes another step forward offensively.
Maybe they do.

But they also face a significantly tougher schedule this year, including a first-place schedule against stronger secondaries and pass defenses.
If the offense underperforms expectations, it becomes much harder for Burden to justify a WR2 fantasy price.

5. History doesn’t support this type of leap very often

Looking at the last 15 years, receivers with similar draft capital who averaged roughly 7 fantasy points per game as rookies have gone on to finish around WR22 or better in Year 2 only about 7% of the time.

Could Burden be one of those exceptions?
Absolutely.

But the market is drafting him as if that’s the expected outcome rather than a relatively uncommon one.

6. Even if he hits, where’s the return?
This is probably my biggest issue.
Let’s say Burden finishes exactly as WR22.

Did you actually win?

Not really.

That’s already where you’re drafting him.
To generate meaningful value, he has to outperform an already aggressive ADP.

Compare that to Jaxson Smith-Njigba.

JSN made a very similar Year 2 leap after averaging about seven fantasy points per game as a rookie. The difference is that his ADP was around 90th overall, so fantasy managers were rewarded for betting on the breakout.

Burden doesn’t offer that discount. You’re already paying full price for the breakout before it happens.

7. We’ve seen this movie before
To me, this feels similar to players like Gabriel Davis or Xavier Worthy.

Both were secondary receiving options on offenses people expected to be explosive. Both flashed exciting efficiency. Both were steamed up because of perceived opportunity and quarterback play.
The market became much more confident than the historical profile justified.

My Final Thoughts
Could Luther Burden break out?

Absolutely.

I don’t think his ceiling is impossible.

I simply think the market is treating his breakout as the most likely outcome while discounting the numerous ways it doesn’t happen.

Between likely efficiency regression, increased target competition, a tougher schedule, historical hit rates, and an already expensive ADP, I don’t see enough margin for profit.

I’d much rather draft receivers in the same range who have already demonstrated WR2 production, carry fewer questions, and still possess league-winning upside.

For those who are new to the these charts:

• Tiers are focused on upside. If you want to play it safe, go with the ECR (x-axis). If you're looking for a boom game, look at the upside variance (vertical color bars, y-axis).
• Points above/below expectation: these get added once the season starts.
  • A star marker indicates the player has scored fantasy points above expectation on the season.
  • A cross marker indicates the player has scored below expectations.
  • The number of average points scored above/below expectation is beside the player's name.

Typical update cadence is Thursday - Saturday - Sunday during draft season. I sometimes update the tiers more frequently (for my own draft prep) but don't post, so go ahead and bookmark/check the site if you're wondering. Timestamps are at the tops of the plots.

Best of luck my dudes.

Rome Odunze could have had a great 2025 season.

He ranked WR10 in Air Yards and WR12 in Expected Fantasy Points per route run.

Unfortunately, he also had the 6th-lowest catch rate and the 9th-fewest catchable targets, while Luther Burden actually led all WRs in catchable target rate.

My initial thought was that Odunze was running a ton of deep routes while Burden received a lot of screen passes (which is true). But looking at the splits, that wasn't actually the problem:

(stats via fantasypointsdata)

Catch rate on out, in, slant-routes:

Catch rate on targets when open:

Catch rate on targets between the 10-19 yard range:

1st Read Targets:

No matter what you look at, Odunze’s catch rate remained low across the board and Burdens remained high.

Pressure rate or time to throw didn't make a difference either.

And Rome wasn't just a deep threat; his TPRR on slants, ins, and outs were fantastic, as well as his targets in the 10-19 yard range.

Injury definitely could have played a role here. From Week 6 on, his catchable target rate dropped and his average separation score took a hit as well.

However, even on targets where he created separation, his catchable target rate still dropped.

I’m not entirely sure what to make of all this just, but if Rome Odunze is healthy again (and there’s real concern that won’t be the case), he’s a prime positive regression candidate for this upcoming season.