Best Pick: Robbie Anderson (8)

Worst Pick: Daniel Jones (3)

 

Brad’s team is a perfect mix of bad draft decisions and bad luck. 

 

Don’t get me wrong; I love the structure of his draft. Start with the highest floor/upside players available (CMC and Burrow) and wait on WRs given the immense depth at the position. Unfortunately, Brad decided to follow up his strong start with Danny Dimes instead of taking a higher upside QB like Fitz/Darnold or high upside RB like Gibson, Sanders, or Carson. Pair that with the unfortunate Dobbins pick in the 4th and the somewhat unnecessary Cam Newton pick in the 6th and Brad doesn’t have anything to anchor his team.

 

In 14 games last season, Daniel Jones scored fewer fantasy points than Minshew (9 games), Trubisky (10 games), and Lock (13 games). If I’m Brad, I’m looking for a way to turn CMC into a an upgrade at QB over Dimes while still getting a solid RB in return. Being ranked 12th in WRs isn’t going to sink your team this year - hell, there are still several startable WR3s on the waiver wire - but the trade-off for having poor WRs should be having solid talent anchoring your other positions. Burrow and CMC are just not enough. 

 

If I’m wrong about anything when it comes to Brad’s team, it’ll be the WRs. I think 12th is a fair projection for what they’re expected to do, but at least there’s upside in guys like Robby Anderson and Jaylen Waddle. Robby has a history with Darnold and finished WR24 last season playing with a QB who generally avoids pushing the ball downfield. Waddle has 4.4 speed and has caught more passes from Tu’a than anyone else in the Dolphins organization. It’s not much to hope for, but at least it’s something.

 

A lot can happen between now and week 15, but unless Brad makes a few drastic un-Brad-like moves then he’s going to be sitting out of the playoffs for the first time since 2018.

​

Best Pick: Will Fuller V (17)

Worst Pick: DeAndre Swift (5)

 

I’ve ranked Danny’s team in the top 3 every year for the past 3 years, so this feels weird. His formula is usually pretty simple - grab at least one player that is Top 10 (or close to it) from every position, and from there just take the best player available. This year he went a different route, trading up to ensure he’d have two top 10 QBs and mortgaging a few early round picks to get there. 

 

Unless I’m grossly underestimating the combo of Lamar Jackson / Ryan Tannehill (who I ranked 4th among QB duos in the league), I’m not sure there’s a way to make the trade Danny made and end up with a top 5 team. It’s hard to argue against Mixon in the 4th, and while I absolutely hate the Swift pick in the 5th (before CeeDee, Kupp, OBJ, Mike Davis) there wasn’t really a route for Danny to take from the 5th round on that doesn’t leave him with a set of RBs and WRs that are well below average. 

 

Like Brad, Danny opted to wait on WRs. Unlike Brad, Danny didn’t take many WRs that had a lot of consistent upside (with the exception of Jamarr Chase, who he later traded to me for Mooney). Golladay is reliant on the arm of Daniel Jones who I’ve already given my opinion on, and while any one of Antonio Brown / Michael Pittman / Fuller V could go off for 20 points any given week, it’s going to be hard to bet on any of them putting up double digit points for consecutive weeks. Out of all of them, Fuller was by far the best value in the 17th round. If he stays healthy and Danny’s QBs play as they should, Fuller could end up single handedly winning him a week. 

 

I have no doubt Danny will make moves and trades to improve his team’s chances as the season progresses, but as of right now he’s got a lot of work to do. A Lamar resurgence to his 2019 production would do wonders for his team (especially given the stack with Andrews), but barring that or the Bengals offensive line dramatically improving and launching Mixon’s value into the stratosphere, I don’t see playoffs in this team’s future. Danny will be able to watch more of “his” guys this season - 4 players from his 2020 draft are also on the N.O.T.O.R.I.O.U.S. squad to start the season (Tannehill, Golladay, Pittman Jr., Budda Baker), so at least there’s some comfort in that.

Best Pick: Marques Calloway (17)

Worst Pick: Drew Lock, Deshaun Watson, Jacob Eason, Irv (10, 10, 13, 14)

 

There isn’t a single player on Huck’s roster that was drafted in the first two rounds. He initially had two 2nd rounders, a result of him masterminding multiple draft pick trades that would give him the ability to have a lot of roster depth at the expense of a top 15 QB or an elite first round caliber RB.

 

Then his whole plan went to shit. He drafted Winston, a solid QB with what should be a reasonable floor, but had to sell his first 2nd round pick (Kelce) for a QB2 (Darnold) when he realized going in to the preseason with a Winston/Lock QB duo would more or less end his season before it even started. 

 

What’s so funny about Huck’s terrible draft is that it wasn’t truly as awful as we all made it out to be. He got some tremendous value out of picks like Mike Davis (7) and Calloway, but also ended up trading away some of his best players (Kelce, Chubb, Hopkins) and using a lot of draft capital on high upside dart throws rather than established talent. If he could go back in time you’ve got to think Huck takes Baker Mayfield over Calvin Ridley in the 3rd, or Carson Wentz over Chase Claypool in the 7th, or Teddy 2Gs over Deshaun Watson in the 10th, or literally any other player over Younghoe Koo in the 12th. 

 

Huck’s biggest issue is that he has no blue chip trade assets. Brad could change his roster significantly with some clever planning and negotiating (which he’s known for, right?) using CMC as the ultimate trade chip, but who could Huck flip - Ekeler? Ridley? I genuinely like Huck’s RBs and WRs, but he needs a breakout season from Darnold or an unexpected return of the Poop Tickler for his current roster to be a top 8 team. Everyone who bet against this team making the playoffs is licking their chops right now, and for good reason. Huck has a few of the same pieces that led him to the playoffs last season (Ridley, Ekeler, solid defense) but won’t be able to lean on Mahomes this year. However, if Huck is as aggressive with trading players as he was trading picks this year, there’s no telling what his team will look like by midseason. I’d happily bet that this roster doesn’t make the playoffs but I’m not quite as willing to bet against Huck, who hasn’t missed the playoffs since his shameful 2-14 season in 2017.

Best Picks: Henry Ruggs (12)

Worst Pick: Stefon Diggs (1)

 

Drafting at the 14/15 turn the year after winning a championship is impossibly difficult for a few reasons. First, you’re lucky if a top ~10 QB falls to you. QB is the most scarce, valuable, and high-scoring position in our league format and you’re guaranteed to miss out on the first 9 or 10 guys that the rest of the league gets to build their team around. So what do you do - go counter-culture and draft 2 RBs? Take two solid-but-not-elite QBs and hope skill position talent falls to your 3rd and 4th round turn? Trade up? Trade back? You’re automatically put at a disadvantage that last year’s non-playoff teams don’t have to deal with and there’s no established strategy for beating those odds.

 

On top of that, you’re so much more confident than anyone else at the draft. You’re the champion! You outsmarted everyone last year and you’re still on top of your game! You’re at the draft location that YOU picked, all eyes are on YOU and what decisions you’ll make as the ultimate fantasy mind in the room! None of these mere knaves can aspire to your greatness! What does ‘knave’ even mean? Who cares; you’re the absolute greatest! 

 

Here are the ‘turn’ picks that we’ve seen over the past 3 years:

 

2020: Chase selects Saquon Barkley 14, Carson Wentz 15. 9th place finish.

2019: Huck trades back a few times, gets Lamar and JuJu. 5th place finish.

2018: Max selects David Johnson 14, Alex Smith 15. Inexplicable 4th place finish.

 

All of this is to say that I’m not at all surprised by Cameron taking Stefon Diggs 14, Dalvin Cook 15. Those were the horses that brought him to the championship last year! 

 

Here’s the problem - by the time his 3rd round pick came around, 21 QBs and 13 RBs were off the board. Not panicking, Cameron grabs another WR (!!!) and Ryan Fitzpatrick as his QB1. At the 5/6 turn he grabs Zach Wilson, a great value regardless of circumstances, and...Patrick Queen? Again, I understand wanting to pick your horses from last year. I think both Stefon Diggs, AJ Brown, and Patrick Queen will all finish top 10 at their respective positions this year. You just can’t afford a WR at pick 14 knowing how long you’ll have to wait until you can grab another QB/RB. You can’t afford second WR in the 3rd knowing how long you’ll have to wait to grab another QB. You definitely can’t afford a defensive player after going WR/RB/WR/QB/QB. Josh Jacobs marked the end of the “halfway decent” RB tier so I understand not jumping at Mostert or Etienne, but Julio Jones is still available! Lockett, Cooper, and Higgins were all still readily available to guarantee you have the best WR trio in the league. 

 

As it stands now, Cameron still has outstanding receivers. I love Henry Ruggs and hope that Cameron can see past my hatred of his draft strategy to trade him to me. Dalvin is great; his other RB options are not. Fitz/Wilson might both be viable QB2s, albeit low end ones. Higbee is talented, but last year was the first of Matthew Stafford’s career where he had a top 6 fantasy TE and he now has two of the best receivers he’s had to throw to since Megatron. To me all of this adds up to a perfectly adequate 6-8 or 7-7 season.

Best Pick: Chris Carson (5)

Worst Pick: Tyler Boyd (8)

 

All things considered, Chase did a very solid job playing the hand he had after the draft pick trades. Carson should never have fallen to the 5th round, and both Tee Higgins and DJ Moore are high floor WRs to pair with his high floor QBs.

 

Even after making solid picks in those rounds, Chase is still way below the Mendoza line as far as skill positions are concerned. Moore and Higgins each received over 100 targets and finished at WR19 and WR34, but relying on them and Carson (RB17 last year) is going to be difficult on the odd week Rodgers/Dak don’t put up 30 points apiece. That’s what this team was set up for though - Chase may have gotten screwed in the lottery, but he still ended up with two top 5 QBs before having to wait through the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th rounds with no picks. 

 

This team will obviously rely heavily on QB play and an above average defense, but there are a few potential upside picks on the roster as well. Mecole got slightly less than 10% of Mahomes targets last season (Kelce and Hill alone took 44%) - now that Watkins is gone, if he can increase his targets from 62 to 90+ while retaining his job as the team’s punt returner he could end up being as valuable as Shettig thought he’d be last season (5th round). I think Zack Moss turns into a fine RB2 if anything happens to Singletary. As of right now he’ll vulture enough TDs to make Singletary worthless but not enough to make him worth actually starting, so he’s in limbo. I don’t love the Jonnu Smith pick as I still think Henry ends up leading the Patriots in endzone targets, but neither he nor Jonnu were healthy enough to take any preseason snaps so I guess he’s a sort of wild card. For what it’s worth, Jonnu got a significantly larger contract than Henry with a ton of guaranteed money.

 

As it stands now, I don’t see Chase as having a playoff roster despite his elite QB tandem. If he can find a way to keep his QBs and pull in some unexpected talent off waivers of finagle some one-sided trades then his team could be a force. However, if I were in Chase’s shoes then I’d be waiting on the first QB injury domino to fall and taking advantage. If, for instance, Derek Carr got injured then I’d be willing to trade quite a bit with Tu’a to upgrade to Dak. Elite QBs are a hot trade commodity in our league, and with the current state of Chase’s roster he might need to treat them as such.

Best Pick: James Robinson (6)

Worst Pick: Devante Parker (10)

 

No other team in our league has had their power ranking placement move more than Scott’s has since our draft. 

 

Shetstradamus drafted James Robinson in the 6th in between Darrell Henderson and Myles Gaskin. Had we known that he wouldn’t be competing with Travis Etienne for touches, Robinson (who finished as RB7 last season) would likely have been drafted at least 2 rounds higher. Shet didn’t stop there - in the 9th, well after QBs like Cam Newton and Taysom Hill had already been drafted, he grabs Mac “Macorkle” Jones, the new Week 1 starting QB for the Patriots. 

 

That just about does it for things I like about Scott’s team. He shot himself in the foot with the Cousins/Robinson for Ben/Diontae trade. I get the thinking behind it - the Bears offense is not one you want to be too invested in on a weekly basis and he’s already got Montgomery, but Koz got better players on both ends of that deal. It’s not going to ruin his season and now he’s got a Steelers stack to root for, but prior to the trade I had this team ranked 7th. That says more about how closely I view teams 7-9 than about the trade, though.

 

The biggest difference between how I view this team versus how someone else does revolves around the RBs. Montgomery and Robinson finished as RB5 and RB7 respectively last year. I’d have to be a complete moron to rank his Team RBs out of the top 3 if they were guaranteed to repeat that. Here’s my thinking though - 6 out of the top 10 RBs drafted finished as top 10 QBs last year (7 out of the top 11 if you include Aaron Jones). The 4 that didn’t consist of 3 injured players (CMC, Saquon, Sanders) and 1 awful draft decision (CEH). RBs have been easy to predict over the past few seasons because of how tiered the production has been. The difference between a top 10 WR and a top 20 WR is nowhere close to the difference between a top 10 RB and a top 20 RB. With that in mind, there’s a reason Montgomery and Robinson both fell so low, and that’s their limited upside. Both were healthy for the majority of last season and had little to no competition for touches. On top of that, the Bears and Jags finished 28th and 32nd respectively in rushing attempts last season. I have little reason to believe that will change with Chicago’s unresolved offensive line issues and Jacksonville’s horrible defense forcing them to constantly play from behind.

 

Still, Scott’s got solid pieces on his team and trade chips to play with. Like I said before, the gap between 7th and 9th place on these rankings is minimal, so as it stands right now I think this is a team that can finish on the playoff bubble. 

 

French Connection Update - The enormous French Connection trade actually didn’t change either team’s total rank, although it moved Scott up in QBs and down in WRs. I think Clay “won” the deal, but like Huck said, I’m not sure it’s possible to get ripped in a trade where you get Mahomes.

Best Pick: Michael Thomas (8)

Worst Pick: Darnell Mooney (10)

 

Derek Carr is good, damnit. He may not be flashy, but the guy always finishes as a top 15 QB. In 2017 he was QB2 overall before getting hurt in week 10, and my expectation for him this season are somewhere in between QB2 and QB15 (realistically QB10/11). I have no idea what to expect from Tua this season, but I like the weapons he has at his disposal and I’ll take him as a QB2 if that’s what it costs to have Saquon/Chubb at RB.

 

I think I’ve made my point pretty clear about how I valued RBs in this year’s draft, so I won’t say much about my duo. If both stay healthy then they should be clear-cut top 10 RBs, and either one of them could finish in the top 5.

 

The biggest upside of my team, however, is with my WRs. Notice I’m saying “upside” and not immediate value - I planned on waiting at WR this season and ultimately I’m happy with the result despite ranking myself 11th in the league in WRs. Amari Cooper is a consistent albeit unexciting 1,000 yard machine. Corey Davis is the #1 receiver for a rookie QB, so that could go any number of ways. JuJu was seen as a potential top 5 WR two years ago, and only started to disappoint when he was the primary receiving option on the team...and now the Steelers have sophomore season Claypool + Pat Friermuth. Jamarr Chase and Michael Thomas are high upside dice rolls sitting on my bench - worst case scenario I’ve got 1 sure thing and 4 gambles; I just need 2 of them to work out!

 

My defense is horrendous. In my defense (ooo wordplay), I had initially drafted Darius Leonard before including him in the trade that netted me Travis Kelce. Truth be told I’d be willing to start defensive players exclusively from the waiver wire if it meant I got another year of Kelce to lean on - say what you will about the rest of my team, but my opponents will go in to every week fearing one player more than arguably any other individual player in the league. Ignoring the fact that he seems like he might be the biggest tool on the planet, Kelce is as consistent as they come and will anchor my roster through unpredictable Tua, Saquon, and WR performances throughout the season.

 

Rutherford B. Hayes (my team’s namesake for this season) was the first president ever elected who lost the popular vote. Despite having over 200,000 less votes than his opponent Sam Tilden, he won after a bipartisan committee investigated close vote counts in southern states whose electoral votes could potentially swing the election. Although Hayes had initially assumed he lost the election, the Electoral Commission found that he won electoral votes from all 3 states whose vote counts were being investigated, narrowly winning the presidential election 185-184.

 

I think that’s important to highlight because it could be a running theme with my roster all season long - I’m not ranking my team 8th out of modesty or with the hopes of some sort of reverse-jinx; I truly believe I have the 8th best roster in the league right now. I like my team but did not draft nearly as well as others. However, fantasy football isn’t always fair, and you don’t necessarily need the best team to win the championship. I’d happily take home my 2nd ship under those circumstances. It still wouldn’t be as shameful as an asterisk season. Speaking of which...

Best Pick: Jared Goff (4)

Worst Pick: Chase Edmonds (6)

 

This is another team that I’ve had anywhere between 6th and 12th since I started writing these rankings. Any time I moved them up or down I’d have to give the roster a second look and think (in a high pitched voice) “welllll…?”. Is there any roster in the league that has more “is ____ good?” players than John’s? We know Goff isn’t good, but for fantasy purposes...is Goff good? Is Chase Edmonds good? Laviska, Aiyuk, Courtland (Cam?) Sutton - good? Malcolm Butler retired; is it because he, like Andrew Luck, couldn’t stomach playing for the FUPA Slayer?

 

I’ll start with Goff. My “best pick” spoiled it, but for fantasy purposes I think he’s good. In 2015, the Jaguars went 5-11 and allowed the 2nd most points per game (28!) in the league. Blake Bortles was not good. Despite getting sacked 51 (!!!) times, he still finished as QB7 in fantasy peppering rookie Allen Robinson and a bunch of young receivers who are no longer in the NFL with targets. That’s the kind of perfect storm Goff might be in for this year. Let me be clear - Goff is not good - but despite having a 22/16 TD/INT ratio in 2019, he finished as QB11 in 2019 after leading the NFL in passing attempts. There are no young QBs waiting to take his job (Bloughhh) and the Lions defense is arguably set to be the worst in the NFL this season. I’m not saying he’s a shoe-in to finish as a top 15 guy, but the 3 QBs that were drafted after him were Zach Wilson, Cam Newton, Taysom Hill. With that in mind, John got a great value in Goff.

 

After that, I’m not so sure. I initially ranked this team much lower because of how many question marks there are. After Tyreek John has Laviska, Aiyuk, Sutton, and Amon-Ra at WR. Between those four I am confident that there are two starting wide receivers...I’m just not sure which ones they are, and I doubt John does either. My money would be on Laviska and Amon-Ra to finish the season as his 2nd and 3rd most valuable receivers currently on the roster. Trevor Lawrence is going to need a safety valve that can get into open space, and now that Etienne is out for the year his options are more or less Laviska or Chris Manhertz (tight end). I expect him to get a lot more than the 79 targets he got last year, even with the addition of Marvin Jones Jr. As for Amon-Ra, who else is Goff going to throw to? What do the Lions have to benefit from giving Kalif Raymond or Quintez Cephus playing time ahead of him? It should be a foregone conclusion that Goff is going to throw the ball at least 600 times this season, and even if 200-250 of those targets go to RBs and TEs (not out of the question with Hockenson, Fells, Swift, and Jamaal Williams), who is going to soak up the remaining 350-400 targets? Tyrell Williams should get a fair amount of throws as the largest outside receiver on the team, but I’d expect Amon-Ra to get 80+ of them as the only other receiver that hasn’t already been confirmed as a below-average football player.

 

Wittle Kittle Ova Da Middle was a risky grab in the 4th round given the circumstances, but that pick pushed his team from being a fringe playoff contender to a top 8 team. I have him ranked 7th now, but if Jared Goff ends up Bortling his way into relevance and the duo of Taylor/Edmunds ends up being better than I have them ranked, John could easily ride a sneaky roster to a top 5 finish.

Best Pick: Darren Waller (4)

Worst Pick: Mike Williams (13)

 

It’s really hard to take the best player available at any given time. We all come in to the drafts with specific spreadsheets and/or magazines and highlight players we intend to draft based on where we think other players will be taken. Then we’re wrong. Over and over and over again, people do things we’d never expect them to like Michael taking Derrick Henry over CMC or Cameron going RB/WR at 14/15. What we’re left with are spreadsheets with glaring holes in them; a guy I had ranked above the QB I planned to take may be available but I’ve been operating under the assumption for weeks that I’d draft this specific guy! Then we make mistakes, compound those mistakes with unnecessarily bold trades (wait, am I just describing Huck?), and eventually one of us will be cooking breakfast for a bunch of hungover assholes in a maid’s outfit.

 

Given the way he drafts, I don’t expect Neil to be wearing that maid’s outfit anytime soon. It was hard to pick a “best” or “worst” pick from his draft because it seems like he consistently just grabbed the best guy available. In fact, I kind of like all of his first 8 picks. There are definitely players I would have taken at a few different spots - I like Darnold more than Lance for instance, but that’s less of a “bad” pick and more of an instance where I would have taken one of “my” guys.

 

Every year I’m pretty vocal about waiting to grab a TE. There’s a steep drop-off after the top tier of tight ends, so you either have to draft one in the top 4 or 5 rounds or you’ll end up with similar talent no matter which one you draft between rounds 8 and 19. I take 3 QBs every year, so it’s difficult to use an early pick on TEs for me. Given the roster he had going in to his first pick of the 4th round, Neil made the perfect move grabbing Waller. He knew he could grab a QB 3 picks later and one of Darnold, Goff, Lance, etc. would be available, which is not something he could be sure about with Waller, and I expect Waller to compete with Kelce for TE1 overall this season.

 

You’ll notice I haven’t had anything bad to say about Neil’s team yet. I don’t love the Mike Williams pick in the 13th round, but that’s not saying much considering there are multiple teams in the league who have dropped players that they drafted in the top 10 rounds and we haven’t seen a single down of football yet. I really like Neil’s team, and I’d really like to trade with Neil’s team. Here’s the problem - it’s really hard for me to rank teams that trade down in the draft much higher than this. In fact, I only ranked 1 other team that didn’t have a first round pick in the top 6 (more on that later). In order for Neil’s team to finish in the top 5 he’ll need one of his players to play much better than expected, and while he has some great candidates to do so with Kamara, Gibson, Stafford, and Trey Lance, it’s a difficult thing to project before the season starts. Assuming health, I think Neil’s team finishes somewhere between 5th and 8th this season, a much narrower range of outcomes than I’d project for most teams in the league.

Best Pick: Davante Adams (3)

Worst Pick: Matt Ryan (1)

 

There isn’t a single team in the league that has less of “my guys” on it than Scott’s. Aside from maybe the Davante Adams pick, at no point did he take a player that made me go “ah damn, I was hoping he’d fall to me”. I obviously don’t think it’s a bad team given where he’s ranked, but I wouldn’t be surprised if other people considered this the best roster in the league. 

 

Am I wrong about Matt Ryan? He finished as QB13 last year and no longer has Julio to occasionally throw to. That being said he now has rookie freak receiver Kyle Pitts, solid receiving RBs in Mike Davis and CordPat, and a defense that should guarantee the Falcons are playing from behind for much of the year, so maybe he was the right choice with Scott’s second 1st round pick. I personally would have preferred Kamara, Burrow, or Stafford, but I may just be nitpicking because it’s hard to find any truly awful picks on this roster.

 

There’s no questioning Kyler Murray’s upside. He led the Cardinals to an 8-8 record with average passing stats but finished as QB3 due to his 819 yards rushing and 11 rushing TDs. He’s not going to stop running, and this season he’s got an improved O-Line and new weapons in Rondale Moore and AJ Green (only half kidding). He’s got QB1 potential even if the chances of it are slim. Scott did a great job of pairing high floor guys with his high upside QBs too - Adams, Lockett, and Jacobs are all tentpoles of their respective offenses. Regardless of yardage or TD production, they’re going to get consistent touches every game. I don’t love Henderson or Gallup, but with the prices Scott paid for QBs, WRs, and defense he had to give something up.

 

I don’t usually recommend add/drops in the rankings and don’t think I’ve ever done so for a team ranked in the top 5, but Hedemann is in the unique position of having a great starting roster and an almost criminally terrible bench (which as of right now only has 3 players on it). Add Rondale Moore and a dart throw at a Jets RB and I think this may be a top 3 team. Bench spots are of even more strategic value than ever for the early weeks of the season this year. With bye weeks not starting until week 6 instead of week 4, there’s room on everyone’s bench for high upside dart throws. It’s why I feel comfortable with Jamarr Chase and Jamaal Williams being on my bench - we have more time to wait and see if a player we gambled on is going to be worth rostering through byes or not. As of right now Scott has RonJon, Latavius Murray (currently unemployed), and Christian Kirk (not very good at football) as a bench instead of taking a flier on a RB like Michael Carter or a WR like Jalen Reagor or even a TE like Noah Fant. What was the point of dropping Cole Beasley, who admittedly is hard to root for with his vaccine theatrics but still has netted 100+ targets for each of the past two seasons, if you’re not going to fill his slot? 

 

I get that that’s an unusually long tangent to spend on someone’s bench, but it’s hard to say much about a good team with a bad bench. Luckily I won’t have that problem with the next team on the list.

Best Pick: Javonte Williams (12)

Worst Pick: Derrick Henry (1)

 

I like the way Michael drafted. As I said before, there’s a huge difference between a top 10 RB and a top 20 RB this season. By drafting Henry and Elliott, he’s ensured that not only will he get consistent production out of the most scarce position in fantasy, but he’s also got outstanding trade flexibility should his season take a wrong turn. If Michael floated Henry or Zeke in the group text he’d immediately get offers for both players, and if Javonte Williams ends up being the primary ball carrier for the Broncos later in the season (which I think he will) then Michael might end up having some interesting trade options.

 

Before I go any further, I’ve got to address Michael’s boldest pick - Derrick Henry. The “is he good?” conversation ended a few years back; there’s no doubt he’s an elite and consistent RB. He was the best RB in fantasy last season, running for 2,027 yards and 17 TDs while scoring 9 more fantasy points than Kamara. Here’s the kicker - Kamara only ran for 932 yards. He also caught 83 passes for 756 yards, which almost made him match Henry’s points due to Henry only catching 19 receptions for 114 yards. Assuming Henry matches his production from last season (which is a lot), there’s very little chance he outscores McCaffrey if he stays healthy. McCaffrey outscored all players aside from Lamar and Dak in 2019 - he outscored Russell Wilson by 50 and Mahomes by 60 - and should have never made it past the 7th overall pick. Henry may have seemed like the safer choice, but I think McCaffrey was the right one.

 

This year’s Michael Special™ (drafting both Bears QBs) is much better than the 2017 version. Fields has a high ceiling and this team will be much better when he takes over for Dalton. Despite having to spend his season chasing the dream of a successful Bears QB, it’s Michael’s other QB that has the potential to make or break his team. The Mayfield/OBJ stack is definitely an interesting one - Mayfield was QB15 and OBJ was WR15 in 2018, and neither has finished in the top 15 for their respective positions since. However, Baker is working with the best O-Line he’s ever had in his entire career and Beckham is still the team’s best deep threat despite not having a single 100-yard game last season. If it doesn’t happen for the two of them this year it’s probably never going to happen.

 

The rest of Michael’s team is pretty underwhelming. Thielen finished as a top 10 receiver last year thanks to his 14 TDs and despite being 32nd in the NFL in targets (less than Claypool, Tyler Boyd, and Russell Gage for context), which will not be an easy thing to repeat. Pair that with Devonta Smith and Goedert (which is more investment into the Philadelphia offense than recommended), and Michael’s going to be pretty reliant on elite RB play this year. Luckily he’s got the RBs capable of carrying a team.

Best Pick: Carson Wentz (9)

Worst Pick: Jalen Hurts (3)

 

Trevor had 4 of the first 31 picks. It turns out that when you’re able to draft that much early round talent, you end up with a pretty solid team. It also doesn’t hurt when you’re able to grab a QB with a no-doubt week 1 starting job in the 9th round. Here’s a breakout by position of all the players taken before Wentz was - 36 WRs, 30 other QBs (including Taysom), 14 defensive players, and a kicker. That’s just bonkers to me.

 

Let’s get the negative stuff out of the way first: I don’t think Jalen Hurts is good. In the 4 games he started for the Eagles last year he had a pedestrian 52% completion rate and a QBR of 41. For reference, that’s sandwiched in between Nick Foles (43.3) and Sam Darnold (40.1). In fact, his QBR was worse than 6 active QBs that no longer have starting jobs (and Philip Rivers). Of players who had over 100 passing attempts, only Jake Luton had a worse “Bad Pass %” - 26.7% of his passes were deemed uncatchable. I could go on, but you get the picture. The allure of Hurts comes from his rushing, and I expect him to do that early and often so that he doesn’t have to throw the ball.

 

Aside from Hurts, I love Trevor’s team. It’s well-balanced and is loaded with players whose situations have improved over the offseason. Robert Woods finished as a top 15 receiver last year and now has Matt Stafford throwing him the ball instead of Jared Goff. Terry McLaurin finished as a top 25 receiver last year and now has Fitzmagic throwing him the ball instead of Alex Smith or Dwayne Haskins. CEH is running behind a completely rebuilt offensive line that now features multiple Pro Bowlers starting in the place of what was a sneaky-terrible run blocking offensive line last year. The Lions jettisoned all relevant players from their offense aside from TJ Hockenson, who now has the benefit of catching passes from a QB who has so much guaranteed money that he won’t care how many INTs he throws for a team that will be constantly playing from behind.

 

Pair that with a generational rookie QB playing with solid weapons, a workhorse rookie RB playing for a team with an offensive line that at times made James Conner look at times like a good running back, Gus “I’m a starting RB now!” Edwards, and Brandin “Who the hell else are they gonna throw it to; Amendola?” Cooks and Trevor’s got an immensely deep team that should be expected to put up 170+ every week. In fact, with all the trade ammo he’s got, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Trevor make a trade or two with teams who get off to a slow start before bye weeks even kick in.

Best Pick: Damien Harris (12)

Worst Pick: N/A

 

Now that the season is about to start, I wonder if there’s anything Koz wishes he would have done differently in the draft. Brady still looks like a solid high floor pick in the first (although I would have taken McCaffrey), and considering he was able to flip Big Ben and Johnson for Cousins/Robinson and then CeeDee for Hopkins, I can’t imagine his draft having gone much better than it did. 

 

Nobody’s WRs can outscore Koz’s. Hopkins has been WR5 overall for the past two seasons in a row despite completely disappearing at times last season, Robinson has been a top 15 WR for the past two seasons despite awful QB play in Chicago, and Justin Jefferson just put up one of the best rookie seasons for a WR we’ve seen in years. I would rate Koz’s QBs and RBs as firmly above average, especially given the flexibility he has in playing matchups between Kareem Hunt and Damien Harris, but his WRs are going to be a tremendous pain in the ass every single week.

 

Something especially notable about Koz’s team is his bench - that’s right, I’m gonna talk about benches again. As I mentioned before, byes don’t start until week 6. Theoretically that should make it easier for us to use less moves early in the season. I personally loaded my bench with high upside guys who are getting immediate playing time - I want to see how many touches guys like Fournette, Williams, and Chase get before committing to them. Koz is going another way, stashing Russell Gage (a startable WR3 on any other team) and 3 of the most valuable RB handcuffs in fantasy. I guess Hunt doesn’t really count as a “handcuff”, but if anything happened to Chubb he’d immediately be a top 10 RB every week. The same goes for Pollard and AJ Dillon, the latter being Koz’s insurance policy for Aaron Jones. These players won’t be startable anytime soon but with a roster as strong as this one it doesn’t hurt to use available bench spots for lottery tickets. Worst case scenario these players are dropped by week 6 or 7 but serve as an excuse to save moves until then, best case (for Koz, at least) one of them turns into an elite RB and his team gets a whole lot scarier.

 

This team’s relatively week defense isn’t enough to prevent them from making the playoffs. Koz is going to coast to 9+ wins this season, although that probably won’t start until week 2 because he has the rotten luck of facing my #1 ranked team to start the season.

Best Pick: Raheem Mostert (7)

Worst Pick: Taysom Hill (7)

 

I haven’t referred to it yet in these rankings, but I still use RBR to give me a general outline for the rankings. As always I don’t follow the ranks I get from the system exactly because it’s an imperfect system. The difference between the best QBs and the worst QBs isn’t always equal to the difference between best and worst RBs or WRs. Ranking them this way only gives me each roster’s strength relative to the next best team in each position category - it’s all relative. I change the calculations every season so it’s hard to say whether someone has had the “best team ever” to start a season, but I can guarantee that since I started using RBR (which was in the 2013 power rankings) there has never been a team so far removed from the rest of the pack as Clay’s is. The average RBR for the league this season was 64 - that’s the rating my team has, with Shettig’s team being slightly worse and John’s team being slightly better. Koz, who drafted a hell of a team this year, has a 77.5 RBR this season, which is only slightly higher than both Michael and Trevor. Clay has an 89.5 RBR.

 

Clay and I made a very simple pick trade, and he won it. The trade more or less ended up being me giving Justin Herbert, Chris Godwin, and Taysom Hill for Derek Carr, Austin Ekeler, and Darius Leonard. Even with me being able to swap Ekeler for Chubb and Leonard in the Kelce trade, that’s a tremendous win for Clay and will hopefully discourage me from trading away my first round pick again in the future.

 

That trade isn’t the only reason this roster is as strong as it is - Miles Sanders (RB17), Mostert (RB26), and Deebo (WR36) should not have fallen as far as they did. It’d be one thing for Clay to have the best QBs in the league and a bunch of borderline players filling in at RB and WR, but by getting good RB values while still having Keenan and Godwin at WR Clay has built a juggernaut. I don’t love the Taysom Hill pick given that six week 1 starting QBs (4 of whom should actually keep their jobs) were taken after him, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that Clay has an extreme advantage over the rest of the teams in the league going in to the season. 

 

French Connection Update - Hell of a trade for Clay. Downgrading from Mahomes to Wilson drops him from 1st to 2nd in QBs, but the upgrade from Deebo to Metcalf is more than worth it. The rich got richer. We’re in danger.

 

Let the bitching begin!