All offseason long, the PFF Fantasy team has been participating in mock drafts. PPR, standard, IDP, deep leagues, shallow leagues, we’ve tried to hit on the majority of playing styles at least once to show a little glimpse at strategy, at roster-building, and at how our evaluations of certain players change over the course of the offseason.
In that process, we also learned some things about our drafters’ preferences. A player taking a guy once doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme. Even twice, it can just be a coincidence that the draft fell a certain way. But a player taking the same guy three, four, five times? There’s something there. At some point, if you’re taking a guy over and over, you’re reaching for him more than the other people in a draft, and if you’re reaching for a guy, even a little, it means you have a reason to do that.
So below, several of our drafters opine on the players they took most often in our summer of mock drafts, to explain what it is about these guys that caught their eye.
Jeff Ratcliffe
Matthew Stafford, QB, Detroit Lions: With a middle-round and/or late-round quarterback approach in nearly every draft this year, I often found myself pair Stafford up with another late-round option. Stafford is volatile, but he has the upside to be a top-10 option.
Eddie Lacy, RB, Seattle Seahawks: Someone had to take him. But in all seriousness, Lacy hasn't looked particularly good so far in the preseason. However, he has shown the ability to produce RB2-plus numbers in the past. If he rounds into shape, Lacy could potentially be a fantasy surprise this year. That being said, he could also be found on waivers in about a month.
Odell Beckham Jr., WR, New York Giants: Stud. And no, I'm not worried about the ankle injury. I'm still taking him at No. 5 overall.
Brandin Cooks, WR, New England Patriots: The idea of Cooks in New England was enticing well before Julian Edelman‘s season-ending injury. Now, he looks even more appealing. There's very really WR1 potential with him.
Kelvin Benjamin, WR, Carolina Panthers: The drafting public continues to undervalue Benjamin. Sure, last season wasn't ideal, but he still finished as a WR2. One more year removed from the ACL injury and in an improved Panthers' offense, Benjamin was a solid value in this year's drafts.
DeVante Parker, WR, Miami Dolphins: Arguably the biggest breakout candidate at the wide receiver position, Parker looks like he's on the verge of big things after a strong preseason performance. This is one instance where the addition of Jay Cutler is actually a positive thing. Giddy up.
Scott Barrett
Dalvin Cook, RB, Minnesota Vikings: I hate the offensive line, but man, I love Cook. Coming out of college, I had the controversial take that he was a better overall prospect than Leonard Fournette. He's worked with the first-team offense throughout all of camp and is the likely Week 1 starter. I love the fit with Vikings OC Pat Shurmur, who has historically used his lead running backs in a bell-cow fashion. At the time I'm writing this, Cook currently leads all preseason running backs in targets per snap. Cook is a strong talent, likely to see an immense workload, and a good value in the early third round of your drafts.
Emmanuel Sanders, WR, Denver Broncos: Over the past three seasons, Sanders has ended the year as fantasy’s fifth-, 18th-, and 20th-highest-scoring wide receiver. Last season, Sanders ranked one spot behind Demaryius Thomas in fantasy points per game, and one spot behind Thomas in targets per game (13th). By current ADP, he's routinely being selected as the 33rd wide receiver off the board, which makes very little sense to me.
Kyle Rudolph, TE, Minnesota Vikings: Among tight ends, Rudolph ranked second in Actual Opportunity per game and second in targets per game last year. Among all players, in terms of target market share, he ranked first in end-zone targets, targets inside the 10-yard-line, and targets inside the 20-yard-line. Currently being drafted as the eighth tight end off the board, he's a steal in drafts.
Pierre Garcon, WR, San Francisco 49ers: I've written about Garcon a bunch this season, so I'm glad to see I've backed it up in drafts. San Francisco has the second-easiest strength of schedule this season for outside wide receivers. He's also re-joining Kyle Shanahan as the team's WR1. During Shanahan's play-calling career his top receiver has averaged 16.5 PPR fantasy points per game — which would have been good for ninth-most at the position. Last time the two played together, Garcon led the league in receptions.
Daniel Kelley
Willie Snead, WR, New Orleans Saints: Obviously I made these picks before news of Snead’s suspension came down. But even with that, Snead’s stock is surprisingly low. Yes, Ted Ginn is there now, but Snead had 96 targets (with 895 yards and 4 TDs) in 2016 even with Brandin Cooks around. Ginn might be playing over Snead in two-receiver sets, but there’s just no way he equals the 113 targets Cooks had a year ago. A chunk of them will go Snead’s way, making a thousand yards not a long shot at all.
Philip Rivers, QB, Los Angeles Chargers: I wrote about this over the summer, but even with Forrest Lamp’s season-ending injury, the team still has Russell Okung and Dan Feeney in the fold to improve an offensive line that made life hard for Rivers of late (his pressure percentage and fantasy performances have fallen closely in line over his career). Add in health for Keenan Allen, development for Hunter Henry, and the new arrival of Mike Williams, and Rivers has all kinds of chances to succeed.
Todd Gurley, RB, Los Angeles Rams: The yards a runner gets before contact aren’t really in his control; that’s what the offensive line does. Well, in 2015, the Rams line gave Gurley 1.96 yards before contact per rush. In 2016, that number fell to 1.00. In other words, Gurley lost 278 yards (his number of carries) last year entirely because of his line. Add even that number back in 2017 (with Andrew Whitworth in the fold to replace Greg Robinson), and Gurley’s numbers look way better. And with a better offense around him, I expect even more improvement.
Mike Gillislee, RB, New England Patriots: We’re too obsessed with the “Bill Belichick hates your fantasy team” narrative. Since LeGarrette Blount became relevant in the team’s offense, he was active for 33 regular-season games, and led the team’s RBs in rushing yards and/or fantasy points 30 times. Before that, Stevan Ridley had similar usage over his run. The team used a different back to catch passes, but the primary ball-carrier was fairly locked in place. And considering the Patriots pursued Gillislee after they had Rex Burkhead in the fold, he’s the one they want.
Tyler Loechner
Paul Richardson, WR, Seattle Seahawks: Richardson is without a doubt my favorite late-round flier at wideout this season. He's not the only worthy flier, but he's definitely my favorite. He displayed strong rapport with Russell Wilson down the stretch last year and was often targeted in the red zone. Plus, the No. 2 wideout spot in Seattle is there for the taking.
Cam Newton, QB, Carolina Panthers: Newton is a potential league-winner. He's being drafted as (roughly) the QB10 in most leagues, but since entering the league in 2011, Newton has more top-three fantasy finishes than not. He's being drafted at his floor, but his ceiling is what I like.
Derrick Henry, RB, Tennessee Titans: Henry is stuck behind DeMarco Murray, who is poised to be a workhorse for the Titans again in 2017. But Henry still averaged over 10 carries per game in the final seven games he played last season, and he scored five touchdowns in that span. He becomes an instant elite RB1 if anything happens to Murray, and he has standalone value as a flex option.
Tyler Buecher
Doug Baldwin, WR, Seattle Seahawks: I'm not that surprised that Baldwin leads my list here. He's been inside my top-10 wide receivers all offseason and I'm generally content targeting the receiver position early and often. Baldwin posted the seventh-highest WR Rating among all wideouts last year and finished top-25 in yards per route run. Only six wide receivers had more top-12 weeks than Baldwin last year, and it wouldn't be shocking to see him improve on his 2016 numbers with more touchdowns from a healthy Russell Wilson back in the mix.
Jeremy Maclin, WR, Baltimore Ravens: Maclin is another player that I seem to be higher on than consensus. In fact, I've got him ranked above all of our other staff rankers at WR32. He's going to an offense that has a ton of targets up for grabs and he could easily carve out a role as the Ravens' top wideout. Maclin was in fantasy purgatory with the timid Alex Smith throwing the ball to him. I'm expecting Joe Flacco to unleash Maclin's return to fantasy relevance on a team that led the league in pass play percentage last season.
Tyler Eifert, TE, Cincinnati Bengals: Last but not least, Eifert is another player I just can't seem to stop drafting. Eifert leads all tight ends in touchdowns over the last two seasons with 18, and that's really all I'm searching for at the position — touchdown potential. Eifert caps off the end of that mid-range tier of tight ends for me, largely due to his hefty 10.9 percent touchdown rate over his career. If he can stay healthy, a top-five fantasy finish isn't out of the question.
Mike Castiglione
Marlon Mack, RB, Indianapolis Colts: Sure, I could point to Mack’s crazy 217.8 elusive rating or summarize all the reasons for my biggest offseason man crush. But really, the eye test just says it all. He’s going to be hard to keep off the field.
C.J. Prosise, RB, Seattle Seahawks: Eddie Lacy has failed to impress and Thomas Rawls averaged 3.2 yards on 109 carries last year. Prosise, a converted receiver, carries standalone PPR value after catching 17-of-19 targets for 208 yards last season to go with 5.7 YPC. He’s just been criminally underdrafted as the RB48.
DeVante Parker, WR, Miami Dolphins: Jay Cutler has been locked in on his new No. 1 target, Parker, who averaged 3.00 yards per route run in the preseason and appears poised for that third-year breakout. It’s been tough to pass up that kind of upside in the middle rounds of our mocks.
Ameer Abdullah, RB, Detroit Lions: Another mid-round value, Abdullah has drawn rave reviews since OTAs and then averaged 3.2 yards after contact behind Detroit’s revamped O-line this preseason. He forced the third-most missed tackles of the 2014 RB draft class and was one of the league’s most elusive runners before going down last season.
Martavis Bryant, WR, Pittsburgh Steelers: Bryant has averaged 0.67 TDs per game for his career and finished No. 1 in fantasy points per snap in 2014 and No. 3 in 2015. Even knocking 25 percent off his career TD rate, Bryant’s per-16 average would still have placed him as a WR1 in any format last season.
Walton Spurlin
Russell Wilson, QB, Seattle Seahawks: During the PFF mock drafts I landed Wilson four times mainly due to draft strategy. My preference is to avoid the quarterback position until at least the fourth round (the earliest I selected Wilson in any mocks) and come out of the first three rounds with either two running backs/wide receivers or vice versa. Once he got healthy last year, Wilson was the second-highest-scoring QB in Weeks 9-16, scoring 16 total touchdowns and rushing for 211-yards in that time. I love the rushing threat Wilson brings and that I was able to land him in the sixth round twice.
Pat Thorman
Kirk Cousins, QB, Washington: Cousins’ combination of affordability, demonstrated production, and unrealized upside is exactly what we look for. He was the sixth-highest-scoring quarterback on a per-game basis, saddled with questionable red-zone weapons. His touchdown rate should return to 2015 levels. Cousins returns ADP equity with a repeat of 2016, and he crushes it with reasonable regression.
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