RADIO
As any experienced fantasy football enthusiast knows, evaluating individual players is only part of the equation when it comes to building a roster. There are many instances in which the team a player plays for is just as important as his ability and talent. And in these cases, the determining factor is not always whether the team is good or bad in real life.
Teams that are good on the actual football field aren't always appealing from a fantasy standpoint. The San Francisco 49ers went 13-3 and represented the NFC in the Super Bowl last year. Among their skill position players, only George Kittle finished inside the top 25 at his position in ESPN standard fantasy scoring. Jimmy Garoppolo finished as QB14, rendering him a streaming option at best in standard-sized one-QB leagues.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers went 7-9 and missed the playoffs in 2019. Jameis Winston and Chris Godwin both finished top-five at their respective positions in ESPN standard fantasy scoring. Mike Evans finished 15th among wide receivers due to an injury that cost him the final three games of the season, but ranked fifth in fantasy points per game. Even running back Ronald Jones finished 25th at his position, making him a reasonable RB3 or flex option in some weeks. The point being: The criteria we use to gauge a team's fantasy appeal can certainly intersect with the qualities that make them a winning or losing team in real life, but there are also junctures where the two roads go their separate ways.
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How to Evaluate Fantasy Relevance
A few questions we can ask ourselves when evaluating a team from a fantasy perspective include the following: What kind of offensive philosophy does their coaching staff employ? Run-heavy? Pass-happy? A balanced attack? Is their quarterback any good? And if he isn't, are the skill players around him good enough to overcome his play? (The same can be asked of good quarterbacks with underwhelming supporting casts.)
Does their offensive line protect well enough to give plays a chance to develop, or is the quarterback constantly taking hits and running for his life? Does their defense keep them in games, or are they routinely forced to try to outscore their opponents? What does their schedule look like?
And then there is a pretty tricky one: If the team in question frequently distributes the ball around to multiple players, is that a detriment or an advantage in fantasy? In other words, some teams are appealing because they have multiple players to turn to, if they're adept enough offensively to sustain multiple fantasy contributors. Others can be unappealing for the exact same reason, such as a team that regularly utilizes multiple running backs because the head coach doesn't trust any of them enough to give one a full workload.
I'm certain there are other questions fantasy writers would choose to ask, but these are a solid foundation and most of them are pretty easily answered. With these criteria in mind, and with all of the NFL's major offseason events having concluded, I've compiled a ranking board for all 32 teams in terms of how fantasy-relevant they figure to be in 2020. We'll discuss each team's strengths (if they have any) and flaws, some in more detail than others, with the ultimate goal of providing ourselves a starting point for our spring and summer draft preparation. Without further delay, let's start with the bottom of the pack.
Note: All stats used in this article are courtesy of Pro Football Reference, unless otherwise noted.
32. Washington Redskins
For the other 31 teams in the league, you could probably bump each one up or down a few spots from where I have them based on your own personal preference. For the Washington Redskins, I think we can all universally agree this is the least exciting team in the NFL from a fantasy perspective (or any perspective, really). Terry McLaurin is their best skill position player, and the thing about wide receivers is they can't throw the ball to themselves. We'll allow for the possibility of a year-two improvement from quarterback Dwayne Haskins, but the bar for said improvement is pretty low after his performance as a rookie.
The shine on running back Derrius Guice's potential is wearing off in a hurry, as he's played just five games in two years. Here's hoping the aging Adrian Peterson continues to defy the laws of time as they pertain to NFL running backs, or that rookie Antonio Gibson finds a way to carve out a fantasy-relevant role for himself in year one, I guess. If I don't nab McLaurin as a mid-round WR3 or flex option on draft day, I won't be rostering any of Washington's players.
31. New York Jets
I remain a Sam Darnold believer, but until he proves me right it's going to be tough to put any faith in the Jets as a fantasy offense. Le'Veon Bell has fallen from grace as a backfield stud, and Darnold lacks any truly dangerous receiving options unless Denzel Mims goes off as a rookie (count me among those not diving headlong into the Breshad Perriman camp after a handful of good outings at the end of last year in Tampa Bay).
Perhaps tight end Chris Herndon can start to make amends with all the fantasy owners who patiently stashed him on their benches last year waiting for a day that never came, but he's a late-round flier. You like that the Jets prioritized upgrading the offensive line this offseason; that coupled with the expectation that Darnold won't get mono in 2020 are about the extent to which you could argue this unit has improved since last year from a fantasy standpoint.
30. Chicago Bears
When one of your key training camp storylines is whether Mitch Trubisky can fend off Nick Foles to keep the starting QB job, you have some problems on offense. Whoever wins that battle won't be leading a team with a ton of weapons, either. Allen Robinson is the most exciting fantasy player in Chicago by way of putting up solid numbers despite poor QB play in 2019, and he may have to do that again to stay in the WR2 conversation in 2020.
Running back David Montgomery is interesting as a year-two-leap candidate, especially considering Chicago's defense is respectable enough to keep the Bears in games and minimize the need for airing the ball out a ton. Still, I don't feel great about Montgomery as anything more than a low-end flex option on draft day.
29. Miami Dolphins
A lot of where the Dolphins fall in as a fantasy unit in 2020 depends on how long the team keeps Tua Tagovailoa on the sideline to protect him from a needless injury in what is sure not to be a winning season. Assuming Ryan Fitzpatrick is the primary starting QB in Miami this year, he proved last season that you don't need to avoid the Dolphins like a plague in fantasy.
DeVante Parker finally had his coming-out party, albeit a couple years after many fantasy owners had given up on him. Preston Williams was carving out a sneaky PPR role for himself before a torn ACL ended his season in November. He could become a factor again in 2020 if he's able to get back on the field in a timely manner. Even tight end Mike Gesicki began to show signs of future promise in the second half of last season.
As far as the run game is concerned, new acquisitions Jordan Howard and Matt Breida are going to have a hard time getting anything going consistently behind Miami's offensive line, which was the worst in football last year by any measure. The Dolphins also allowed the most points per opposing offensive possession in the league in 2019.
These aren't flaws you can completely fix in one offseason, so expect Fitzpatrick to be forced to launch the ball around again this year, which should keep his pass-catching options functional as fantasy assets. Again, these positives are contingent on Fitzpatrick playing all or most of the season, as I worry Tagovailoa would spend half his time just trying not to get leveled with such poor protection in front of him.
28. New England Patriots
It might be surprising to see the Patriots ranked this low on any list, but what else am I supposed to think after watching this offense last year? Julian Edelman was New England's only consistently reliable fantasy player in 2019, and his value has always been directly tied to a years-long connection with Tom Brady.
I won't rule out the possibility that Jarrett Stidham develops chemistry with Edelman, but when an offense is a relative non-factor in fantasy with Brady at the helm, you can't fault me for having low expectations for the same unit with a completely unknown quantity at quarterback one year later.
I expect New England's on-field formula to rely heavily on its defense, which was one of the best in the league last year, while asking Stidham and the offense to play mistake-free football. That is not conducive to an abundance of fantasy output. I don't have to stretch my imagination very far to envision Edelman and James White coming in below their customary levels of production.
I see minimal upside and unexciting floors when I look at the rest of the Patriots roster from a fantasy perspective. Maybe a later-round gamble on N'Keal Harry pays off, but I won't be paying too much attention to the Patriots in the early stages of any 2020 draft. Disclaimer: I reserve the right to alter my outlook if New England shocks the world and signs Cam Newton.
27. Los Angeles Chargers
Say what you will about Philip Rivers. The Chargers were a pretty reliable source of fantasy production during the 14 years he was their starting quarterback. Now he's gone, and his replacement will either be the unexciting Tyrod Taylor or the potentially under-prepared rookie Justin Herbert.
Melvin Gordon is also no longer around, giving whoever plays quarterback one less weapon to turn to. We should feel fine about Austin Ekeler from both a talent and opportunity standpoint, but even he might come at too high a draft-day cost if his first-round RB ranking lasts through the summer.
Hunter Henry has yet to play a full season in four years, washing away some of his allure as a mid-tier fantasy tight end. No player's value takes a greater hit in this new-look offense than Keenan Allen, who I'd be comfortable drafting as a flex option, but will be avoiding at his customary low-end WR1 or high-end WR2 standing.
26. Jacksonville Jaguars
By not exercising his 2021 option, the Jaguars have essentially declared this will be Leonard Fournette's last year with the team. If they don't trade him, there isn't much incentive for the Jaguars not to pile a ton of extra mileage onto Fournette's body. Fournette trailed only Christian McCaffrey and Ezekiel Elliott in total touches in 2019, which should give us plenty of insight into the workload he's staring at as a lame duck running back in 2020.
I have heard it said that the acquisition of pass-catcher extraordinaire Chris Thompson and the hiring of new offensive coordinator Jay Gruden (Thompson's old head coach) will adversely impact Fournette's fantasy value. To that, I say Thompson has missed at least five games in each of his last three seasons. A healthy Thompson will undoubtedly cut into Fournette's volume some, but from where I stand this is hardly a situation in which we should worry about Fournette dropping off the map as a fantasy asset.
My main concern about the rest of the offense is how little opportunity will be left over after Fournette gets his shares. D.J. Chark leads an exciting young receiving corps that will welcome rookie Laviska Shenault into its ranks, but the former fizzled out down the stretch in 2019. Assuming Chark remains the number-one receiver, I worry that Shenault, Dede Westbrook, and Chris Conley will consistently cut into each other's chances further down the depth chart.
Factor in the entertaining-yet-imperfect Gardner Minshew at quarterback behind a suspect offensive line, and I can see the Jags being a headache for fantasy owners beyond their top two threats. And if I'm wrong about Fournette's workload, this whole team could be a flat-out migraine.
25. Cincinnati Bengals
The Bengals represent one of the widest ranges of potential outcomes as a fantasy offense in 2020. Joe Burrow wasn't the first overall pick in this year's draft for no reason; if he picks up in the NFL where he left off in college this is going to be an incredibly fun team to watch. Offensive tackle Jonah Williams, Cincinnati's first pick in the 2019 draft who missed all of the 2019 season due to injury, is in line to return and strengthen what was a disastrous offensive line last year.
His presence can only help Burrow, and an improved offensive front undoubtedly benefits Joe Mixon, who averaged a lowly 1.8 yards before first contact per rush attempt in 2019. Factor in the assumption that A.J. Green will actually play this year, joining Tyler Boyd and rookie Tee Higgins to form a dangerous triumvirate of wideouts for Burrow to chuck it to, and the Bengals have all the makings of 2020's most pleasant fantasy football surprise.
Viewed in a different light, that optimism hinges a lot on whether three players who've never played an NFL game (Williams, Burrow, Higgins) can make an immediate impact. We also have to entertain the idea that Green is no longer the game-changing receiver he used to be. And a preseason that is bound to have some COVID-19 wrenches thrown in its spokes in terms of preparation and training will naturally hurt the Bengals more than it'll hurt teams with more well-established infrastructures. I'm in on all of the Bengals' skill players at the right price on draft day, but I'd advise caution on getting too excited over the best-case scenario here.
24. New York Giants
The Giants are the first team on this list for whom I feel compelled to bring up schedule strength. The Steelers, 49ers, and Bears all ranked top-six in points allowed per opposing offensive possession in 2019, and the Giants will face all three to begin 2020.
Pittsburgh and San Francisco were also the league's two best teams in terms of creating pressure on opposing quarterbacks. The Steelers forced turnovers at the highest rate of any defense in the league and the 49ers ranked sixth. Other matchups worth pointing out on the Giants' schedule include Week 4 at the Rams, Week 8 at home against the Buccaneers (2019's best run defense), and Week 16 at the Ravens.
What this all tells me is I could be in for some choppy waters right out of the gate if I spend the second overall pick on Saquon Barkley, and there are some pretty poorly-timed bad draws sprinkled throughout the rest of his schedule. Daniel Jones was also extremely prone to turning the ball over last season, so taking on a couple of ball-hawking defenses to begin the year doesn't paint the prettiest picture for New York's offense as a whole early on.
Evan Engram is the real deal and I'd be thrilled to have him if I knew he'd play the whole year, but he's missed 13 of a possible 32 games the last two seasons and I'm not crazy about having to draft a backup plan for a mid-round TE. The Giants' WR group doesn't have me jumping for joy, though I suppose I could live with the floors of Sterling Shepard and Golden Tate. I ultimately don't see very high ceilings from anyone other than Barkley or a healthy Engram, and you need at least some upside to crack my top 20.
23. Pittsburgh Steelers
By simply standing on the field in full pads, a healthy Ben Roethlisberger automatically elevates the Steelers' offense above whatever you call last year. That said, I view this offense much differently after how lost it looked without him in 2019. I know what you're thinking: Are we really going to hold 2019 against the Steelers when they lost a future HOF quarterback and replaced him with Mason Rudolph and Devlin Hodges?
My counterpoint is that I think we all universally agreed Pittsburgh was a strong offensive team for the last few years leading up to 2019. If that were definitively the case, shouldn't the Steelers have been able to at least look respectable without Roethlisberger? Several teams found ways to tread water as fantasy banks last year without their Week 1 starters at quarterback (Jaguars, Lions, Panthers, Broncos, for example), and the Steelers were not one of them.
As far as I'm concerned, JuJu Smith-Schuster still needs to prove he can succeed as a fantasy player independent of the situation around him and/or without Antonio Brown on the field to draw defenders away from him. The weekly game of Will James Conner Be Active On Sunday? just isn't worth the trouble for me.
I'm perfectly fine missing out on a bounce-back season from Conner unless I can grab him at a serious discount on draft day. I'm intrigued as to whether Diontae Johnson can take a step forward with a real quarterback throwing him the ball, and he should be a fine mid-to-late round gamble as long as his stock stays where it is through the summer.
22. Detroit Lions
Much like with Roethlisberger and the Steelers, Matthew Stafford can significantly improve the Lions both in real life and fantasy just by being active. The difference is Detroit's best skill player found ways to produce without his number-one quarterback in 2019. Stafford missed eight games last year, exactly half the season. Here are Kenny Golladay's 2019 numbers extrapolated over a 16-game sample both with and without Stafford on the field, courtesy of the RotoViz Game Splits App:
- With Stafford - 70 receptions, 124 targets, 1,280 yards, 14 touchdowns
- Without Stafford - 60 receptions, 108 targets, 1,100 yards, eight touchdowns
We would naturally prefer Golladay's with-Stafford line, but his without-Stafford line isn't exactly killing our fantasy roster. Marvin Jones' numbers don't hold up nearly as well, as he averaged 1.25 fewer receptions and nearly 20 fewer receiving yards per game without Stafford, but his volume (7.12 targets per game with Stafford, seven targets per game without) remained steady all year. These types of splits aren't the end-all, be-all of deciding between a couple of players at the draft, but they're worth taking into account. Injuries happen, and it's nice to know you can still count on your players if they lose a key teammate.
As for the rest of Detroit's offense, I'd need to have a notarized letter of intent from head coach Matt Patricia stating that D'Andre Swift will be the primary running back before I drafted him as a fantasy starter. There is too much potential for a maddening timeshare between Swift and Kerryon Johnson early in the year, even if we can all agree that Johnson has been unimpressive and hampered by injuries during his first two seasons. Maybe T.J. Hockenson comes back from wherever it is he disappeared to after Week 1 of 2019, giving him late-round-flier appeal.
21. San Francisco 49ers
The 49ers can be a polarizing team when evaluating their fantasy appeal. They have arguably the best tight end in the NFL and if you believe Deebo Samuel is poised to establish himself as a top-flight wide receiver, this ranking is borderline sacrilege. Moreover, you might be of the mind that San Francisco's multi-pronged rushing attack is more beneficial than harmful to its stable of running backs.
But here's where I stand on the defending NFC champions. In 2019, San Francisco attempted the second-most rushes in the league and the fourth-fewest passes. Of the 49ers' 478 pass attempts last season, 107, or 22.3%, went to George Kittle, who missed two games. Samuel ranked second on the team with 81 targets and played in all but one game. No running back saw more than 30 targets. Tevin Coleman, Raheem Mostert, and Matt Breida all attempted at least 123 rushes. Breida is gone, which admittedly frees up a ton of work for Coleman and Mostert to share.
But here's what we can glean from these numbers: the 49ers are a low-tempo offense who rarely throw the ball, and when they do, a large majority of those opportunities go to one guy. A minimal fraction of those opportunities go to running backs, which takes Coleman and Mostert off the board as PPR threats. So if you draft either Coleman or Mostert, you're essentially hoping that this remains a near-even backfield split (which is admittedly more palatable in San Francisco than it would be in most places), or that you have grabbed the guy who is going to take over as the workhorse.
Either way, you have a chance of being totally burned by this situation in any given week. Samuel's intrigue stems from the idea that he's set to inherit all or most of the 5.3 targets per game left behind by Emmanuel Sanders. But with Kittle not going anywhere and the 49ers having spent a first-round draft pick on wideout Brandon Aiyuk, is that something you're willing to bet a WR2 roster slot on?
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