Fantasy Football: Darkhorse candidates to finish as the overall WR1 in 2024

• Year 3 is typically a big year for wide receivers and two players stand out with a shot at a significant leap: Both Chris Olave and George Pickens are set to lead their teams in 2024 with little target competition to worry about.

• Jaylen Waddle has shown he can overcome sharing targets with Tyreek Hill: Waddle has everything else going for him as a potential WR1 but has to stay healthy to make the most of his opportunities.

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Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

Fantasy’s WR1s, similar to the running back position, are often already getting drafted within the first five players at their positional ADP. However, as evidenced by Cooper Kupp in 2021 and even CeeDee Lamb last year (WR6 in ADP), someone else can emerge, which is going to be the emphasis of this article as we look beyond the top-five, and even top-10, wide receivers drafted to find the true darkhorse WR1 candidates for 2024.

Understanding all that makes up a fantasy WR1 is going to be important, so let’s start by looking back at past seasons to determine the recipe for success that led them to fantasy glory.

• High-end consistency is king for the top overall fantasy wide receivers. Delivering over 20 PPR points per game while staying healthy for a full season allowed these WR1s to separate themselves.
• Only Davante Adams in 2020 missed games and still finished as the WR1, but he did so with unreal touchdown numbers (18) that season.
• DeAndre Hopkins is the last wide receiver to repeat as the overall WR1 (2017 and 2018).
• Kupp and Lamb were both drafted outside the top five at the position the year of their WR1 season, but that ADP changed to WR2 for Kupp in 2022 and WR1 for Lamb in 2024.

• The minimum requirement for receiving touchdowns is about 0.5 per game,. Only Adams and Kupp came close to or exceeded one per game.
• The more difficult threshold to reach will be the minimum of 115 total receptions, which only Lamb (135), Tyreek Hill (119) and Amon-Ra St. Brown (119) accomplished last season. This will be key, especially in PPR leagues.
• To get the receptions, the targets have to be there as well, and every one of these receivers averaged at least 10 targets per game.
• Each past WR1 also finished inside the top five in the league in receiving yards, most of the time leading the league.

• Over the last six seasons, each PPR WR1 finished inside the top 10 in PFF receiving grade versus man coverage, and only Justin Jefferson finished outside the top two in that regard during his WR1 season.
• Each player also hit a minimum threshold of 2.50 yards per route run on a target share of at least 25%.
• To hit that target rate, the competition for targets among the team’s other receiving options often needs to be minimal.
• Cooper Kupp in 2021 was the only past WR1 on this list to have a teammate with a higher ADP than him (Robert Woods) while each of the others didn’t have another wide receiver already on their team drafted inside the top-25 wide receivers that season.

• Another key data point these past WR1s shared was that they all came from an offense with a top-10-graded quarterback leading the way.
• Each of these team passers threw for over 4,000 yards as well – a mark that 10 quarterbacks hit in 2023.
• These offenses were all productive in scoring as well. Only 2023’s Minnesota Vikings finished outside the top five in the league in offensive scoring.
• One last important note to keep in mind is that the WR1 doesn’t necessarily have to come from a team that is passing the ball at an above-average rate. The main thing, as highlighted in the other points above, is that they are at least funneling the large majority of the targets in one receiver’s direction.

With all these criteria in mind, let’s take a look at which wide receivers going outside the top 10 in ADP at their position make the best case for 2023’s darkhorse WR1.

Best shot: Chris Olave, New Orleans Saints

• Sleeper ADP: WR12
• Underdog ADP: WR11
• ESPN ADP: WR10

Entering Year 3, Olave is in the perfect position to have his best fantasy season thus far. He’s the highest-drafted wide receiver on this darkhorse list but only goes top 10 on one platform (ESPN), which greatly helps his darkhorse status. Olave has finished as a top-24 PPR wide receiver in each of his first two NFL seasons, most recently as high as WR20 in 2023, but as a former top-12 pick in the NFL Draft, he’s arguably yet to reach his full potential heading into a crucial year of development where we often see wide receivers hit their stride in the NFL.

Olave has almost everything going for him that we’re looking for in a potential WR1, including a dominant target share with little concerning target competition on his team. He also has a history of high-end yards per route run, including 2.42 as a rookie (seventh). Olave even recently finished as a top-10 wide receiver versus man coverage, earning an 89.1 receiving grade (seventh), which checks another box for his WR1 potential. For his career, 2.23 yards per route run ranks 12th at his position while his 25.9% target rate ranks ninth (min. 500 routes). If he takes that Year 3 leap, he’ll be the best shot as the darkhorse WR1 from this list.

The one area where he doesn’t check the potential necessary box is at quarterback, as Derek Carr has not earned a top-10 passing grade since 2020. The positive part is that Carr at least has a history of doing so, though it’s been a while since he’s hit that mark. The other positive is that the New Orleans Saints still ranked top 10 in offensive scoring plays last regular season (71), which is encouraging that they can put up points despite Carr ranking 16th in passing grade (77.0). With everything else Olave has going for him, Carr should be targeting him heavily this season, helping fulfill that darkhorse WR1 potential.

Medium shot: Jaylen Waddle, Miami Dolphins

• Sleeper ADP: WR18
• Underdog ADP: WR15
• ESPN ADP: WR20

Waddle is entering the fourth year of his NFL career, coming off a relatively down season in terms of his fantasy production in 2023 where he missed time due to injuries. He finished the year as the overall PPR WR29 despite finishing as WR8 in 2022, and WR12 as a rookie in 2021. Playing time played a big part in this as he missed three games, and set a new career-low in routes run (385), which was about 140 routes short of his previous career-low. Even for a player as efficient as Waddle, dropping to a new career-low in offensive snap percentage (68%) when he was on the field, which can mostly be attributed to his injuries, played a significant part in his opportunity to produce WR1 numbers. The hope is that he’s healthy this season and gets back closer to his 78.5% snap share from his previous two years combined, which will play a big part in delivering on this WR1 potential.

One of Waddle's biggest obstacles is that he has to compete for targets with a top-three wide receiver, Tyreek Hill. Luckily, there’s evidence that Waddle can still command an elite target share and put up WR1 numbers with Hill in the lineup, evidenced last year when Waddle earned a 27.0% target rate, ranking sixth among all wide receivers. His 2.63 yards per route run also tied for sixth at his position and gives him two huge advantages in delivering potential WR1 production. Even Waddle’s 2.61 yards per route run since 2022 is the third-best mark among all wide receivers over that span, behind only Hill (3.49) and Justin Jefferson (2.72). His 24.0% target rate over that span ranks 17th and is right on the cusp of that necessary 25% that we’re looking to pair with the 2.50 yards per route run threshold — both of which Waddle hit in 2023.

The Dolphins offense with Tua Tagovailoa under center last season ranked tied for third in offensive scoring while Tagovailoa earned the best passing grade (90.2) on the year, lending to the quality of targets that can help Waddle flourish. Waddle essentially checks every other box that we’re looking for in a potential fantasy WR1, where if he can continue to overcome Tyreek Hill’s 30%-plus target share, he’ll have a decent shot to greatly outperform the ADP that puts him outside the top-15 at his position this offseason.

Long shot: George Pickens, Pittsburgh Steelers

• Sleeper ADP: WR28
• Underdog ADP: WR27
• ESPN ADP: WR29

Our long shot for 2024 darkhorse WR1, Pickens, is also entering his Year 3 season, like Olave, and primed to deliver his best year yet. Despite finishing as the PPR WR23 last offseason with worse quarterback play and tougher target competition than he has heading into this year, Pickens qualifies as both a value at his current cost and the longshot to finish as the darkhorse WR1.

The Pittsburgh Steelers offense figures to look very different this season without Diontae Johnson – the team’s top target earner for each of the past five seasons – leading the charge for the receiving corps. Instead, Pickens is the clear favorite to take up that mantle. Despite not having cracked a 20% target rate in either of his two seasons in the league, he come closer to that 25% mark we’re looking for this year. Helping that will be a potential upgrade at quarterback, whether it’s Russell Wilson or Justin Fields, both of whom were more accurate than Kenny Pickett in 2023. And even for Fields, who ranked 24th in adjusted completion rate (74.4%) compared to Wilson’s 78.8% (third), he was at least able to support the overall WR6 in 2023, DJ Moore.

Pickens is coming off a very encouraging season where he earned an 88.3 receiving grade versus man coverage (eighth) and his 2.11 yards per route run ranked 17th among wide receivers. Pickens also scored incredibly well in his Year 2 personnel-adjusted yards per route run (explained here), leading all second-year wide receivers in YPRR over expectations (0.70) and finishing among the top 75th percentile among historic second-year wide receivers in that regard, which correlates strongly to an improvement in fantasy points per game in Year 3. When adding the improved quarterback situation combined with lesser target competition, we could be looking at a huge jump in fantasy production for Pickens in Year 3, even if finishing as the actual WR1 is a long shot.