Fire & Ice: Top starts, sits and sleepers in fantasy football for Week 1

• Mike Evans should kick off his 2024 season in style: The veteran wideout faces a Washington Commanders defense, albeit revamped, that surrendered the most explosive plays in the NFL last season.

• Keep Brock Bowers on the bench for now: Rookie tight ends notoriously underperform in Week 1, rarely eclipsing even nine fantasy points.

• Unlock your edge with a PFF+ subscription: Get full access to all of our in-season fantasy tools, including weekly rankings, WR/CB matchup charts, weekly projections, the Start-Sit Optimizer and more. Sign up now!

Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

Are you struggling to set your Week 1 fantasy football lineups?

Below, you can find my top fire (boom) and ice (bust) players at each position for Week 1. I also include my sleeper of the week at each position, in case you are in a deeper league or need a replacement for an ice player.

Don’t miss my “Fire & Ice” chart at the bottom of this page. There, I have listed out my fire, good, sleeper and ice plays for Week 1 of the 2024 fantasy football season.

Quarterbacks

Fire QB Start of the Week: Kyler Murray (at BUF)

Not only am I expecting Kyler Murray to have an elite fantasy season, but I believe he will start with a huge performance in Week 1 at Buffalo. The Bills' defense lost many key pieces this offseason and will also be without All-Pro linebacker Matt Milano, who tore his bicep in August. Buffalo lost its sack leader and both starting safeties in free agency, as well as Milano’s backup, Tyrel Dodson, who played admirably when Milano missed games last season. Dodson earned a team-high 89.5 PFF overall grade in 2023.

On the other side of the ball, the Bills should have zero issues putting up points against the Cardinals' weak defense, so this game could be the highest-scoring matchup of the week.

Sleeper QB of the Week: Baker Mayfield (vs. WAS)

Baker Mayfield is going to wake up feeling dangerous on Sunday morning. He gets one of the easiest matchups you can ask for in Week 1 against the Commanders, who allowed the most passing yards, touchdowns and fantasy points to the quarterback position in 2023. Despite Washington’s efforts to upgrade its secondary this offseason, the unit still ranks third worst in PFF's secondary rankings entering 2024.

Mayfield proved last season that he could be a solid spot starter in good matchups, especially toward the end of the season, when he scored 19.8-plus fantasy points in three of the last five weeks of the regular season. He then put up more than 300 pass yards and scored three touchdowns in the a wild-card win over the Eagles.

Ice QB Start of the Week: Dak Prescott (at CLE)

Location, location, location. The Cowboys' offense and Browns' defense had the biggest home-road splits in terms of points scored and points allowed among all NFL units in 2023. The Cowboys averaged just 23.3 points per game on the road (averaged a league-high 37.4 at home), while the Browns allowed a league-low 13.9 points per game at home (allowed a league-high 31.3 on the road).

Logically, Dak Prescott’s fantasy production also suffered on the road compared to at home, as he averaged just 16.0 points per game in away games in 2023. Meanwhile, the Browns' defense allowed only 9.9 fantasy points per game to opposing quarterbacks when playing at home.

Running Backs

Fire RB Start of the Week: James Cook (vs. ARI)

Once the Bills moved on from Ken Dorsey and promoted Joe Brady to offensive coordinator in November, the offense became extremely run-heavy. The Bills averaged a league-high 36.9 rushing attempts per game from Weeks 11-18 under Brady.

James Cook was also finally let loose with Brady as the play-caller. Cook averaged 19.6 touches and 104.3 scrimmage yards per game with Brady. Now, he gets to start the season with an excellent matchup against the Cardinals, who allowed the most rushing yards and fantasy points to running backs in 2023.

Sleeper RB of the Week: Jerome Ford (vs. DAL)

If you picked up Jerome Ford late in your fantasy draft, it was to play him for at least the first four weeks that Nick Chubb will be out. Last season, while splitting the backfield with Kareem Hunt, Ford finished as an RB2 or better (top-24 scorer at the position) in 11 weeks. Ford will likely see an even heavier workload while Chubb is out to begin the year, with only Pierre Strong Jr. and D’Onta Foreman behind him on the depth chart.

The Cowboys' defense on the road is not one to fear for your fantasy running backs. They allowed the 12th-most fantasy points per game and the third-most rushing touchdowns to running backs when playing on the road in 2023.

Ice RB Start of the Week: Chase Brown (vs. NE)

It is unclear how the Bengals will handle backfield snaps and touches between Chase Brown and Zack Moss. But for what it is worth, the team's Week 1 depth chart lists Moss as the starting running back and Brown as the backup and primary kick returner.

I will not trust Brown in my fantasy lineups before seeing how he will be utilized in his second NFL season. Plus, the Patriots were very stingy against the run last season, earning the third-best PFF run-defense grade in the NFL (80.7) and allowing just 3.4 yards per carry to running backs (second fewest in the NFL) in 2023.

Wide Receivers

Fire WR Start of the Week: Mike Evans (vs. WAS)

Possibly the best touchdown scorer currently in the NFL gets to face the Commanders in Week 1, who allowed the most touchdowns to the wide receiver position last season. Mike Evans ranked tied for first in the NFL with Tyreek Hill in receiving touchdowns (13), with nine of them coming on explosive plays (15-plus yards). There will be explosive plays to be had in this matchup, as the Commanders allowed a league-high 113 of them in 2023. This feels like it could be one of those 140-yard, two-touchdown Mike Evans performances.

Sleeper WR Start of the Week: Jayden Reed (vs PHI)

There is a lot of hype surrounding Jordan Love and the Packers' offense entering the 2024 season — but somehow not around young wide receiver Jayden Reed, who led the team in receptions, receiving yards, scrimmage yards and touchdowns as a rookie in 2023.

Over the second half of his 2023 rookie season (Weeks 10-18), Reed averaged 17.4 fantasy points per game, which ranked 10th among all wide receivers during that span. He finished as a top-25 fantasy wideout in seven of his last eight weeks played last season, including three top-12 performances. Although the Eagles worked to fix their secondary this offseason, it is worth noting that they allowed the most fantasy points to wide receivers in 2023.

Ice WR Start of the Week: Brandon Aiyuk (vs. NYJ)

Aiyuk is just getting back to practice after holding out the entire summer while waiting for his big contract extension. The possibility of him being rusty or out of shape, plus the difficulty of the matchup, makes Aiyuk a strong “sit” candidate for Week 1 in fantasy football.

The Jets have PFF's top-ranked secondary entering the 2024 season for a good reason: They absolutely shut down wide receivers for the majority of the 2023 season. The Jets' defense allowed by far the fewest fantasy points to WRs in 2023 — 21.4, to be exact — while no other team allowed fewer than 27 points per game.

Tight Ends

Fire TE Start of the Week: Kyle Pitts (vs PIT)

With Steelers cornerback Joey Porter Jr. likely focusing on locking down Falcons wide receiver Drake London in Week 1, Kyle Pitts should have a much easier matchup. Pitts is often utilized as a slot receiver, meaning he could see a lot of undrafted rookie cornerback Beanie Bishop, who is expected to be the Steelers starting nickel back this year.

Pitts finally has a good quarterback to target him down the field accurately, and, hopefully, he has a better play-caller who will value his skill set. After a disappointing past two seasons, Pitts should be hungry to ball out in Week 1.

Sleeper TE of the Week: Greg Dulcich (at SEA)

There is not yet an answer to who will be the Broncos' No. 2 target for Bo Nix in his rookie year. It could be tight end Greg Dulcich, who got a lot of praise in training camp this season after missing nearly his entire sophomore season in 2023. As a rookie, he averaged 1.3 yards per route run, which ranked 14th among all tight ends with 300-plus routes run in the 2022 season.

This matchup is very enticing for Dulcich to have a breakout performance in Week 1. The Seahawks struggled to cover tight ends last year, allowing the seventh-most receiving yards to the position. Their middle-of-the-field coverage might look even worse this season, as their top three tacklers from the 2023 season are no longer on the roster (linebackers Bobby Wagner and Jordyn Brooks and safety Quandre Diggs).

Ice TE Start of the Week: Brock Bowers (at LAC)

Only two rookie tight ends have scored nine-plus fantasy points in Week 1 over the past 10 seasons: T.J. Hockenson and, oddly, Will Dissly. The great Sam LaPorta scored the third-most points by a rookie tight end in Week 1 during that span, with just 8.9 points in full-PPR leagues. Bowers will have to have an outlier performance to help you win your fantasy matchup in Week 1.

Fire and Ice Fantasy Football Plays

Here, I categorize every relevant fantasy player into five different buckets: 1) fire starts (best starts of the week); 2) thumbs up (good starts); (3) risky players with upside (sleepers); (4) ice starts (predicting a bad performance from a good player); (5) stop (must sits).

Note: If a player or defense is not listed, I am not considering starting them in Week 1. No Chiefs or Ravens players are included.