NFL Best Ball Upside Scenarios: Quarterbacks
In the NFL Best Ball version of fantasy football, the later rounds aren’t about finding decent sleeper value so much as finding those who can smash their smash spots for incredible value. Guys who can break weeks on multiple occasions.
The quarterback position isn’t one in which we’re overdrafting, so it’s unlikely that we end up with an elite QB1. We don’t need an elite QB1. We just need a couple of guys who can smash and smash enough. With not having elite quarterback play, though, comes volatility. Volatility that we embrace.
One response to this is to draft a decent middling QB2 who doesn’t make many mistakes. The approach we’re talking about here is one where we draft a QB2 who can give us huge upside on a number of weeks, going late in drafts.
This isn’t gonna be pretty because it isn’t supposed to be.
RYAN FITZPATRICK, WASHINGTON
Ryan Fitzpatrick isn’t a very good QB. He threw for a 4.2% INT rate in 2016 and a 4.9% rate in 2018, looking like throwing to the correct jerseys was gonna be an enhanced problem with his aging curve. But that rate was only 2.7% over the last two seasons, indicating that he can keep his team in possessions and himself on the field.
Fitzpatrick doesn’t have impressive per game or per dropback stats, his deep ball rates are about average, and his high frequency of terrible throws is why he grades poorly, but there’s something that cannot be denied: the dude has huge games for us in fantasy.
Since 2018, his age 35-36 season, he’s thrown for 25 or more pass attempts in 23 games. In 12, he threw for under 300 yards, but he threw for 400 five times and he threw for 9.0 or more intended air yards per attempt 11 times. With a threat at every depth of target like Terry McLaurin, Fitz should have huge weeks, knowing where his bread is buttered. Where we’re drafting McLaurin, Fitzpatrick makes a lot of sense to have in our back pocket because Taylor Heinicke damn sure isn’t getting us there with Terry.
Even if Fitz doesn’t air it out at a high volume. If. Then, he’s still peppering one of the best WRs in the game to get us that YAC.
Vegas putting the WFT as somewhere around a .500 team is great for us. They won’t be ahead too often; and when they are, it shouldn’t be by much. Chances are, they’re behind a bit and throwing late or in close games where pounding the run is self-castrating. We should never fall to the whims of the myth of rational coaching, and Ron Rivera isn’t the smartest coach in the world, but he has fearless streaks and has a history of heavily funneling the ball to his best offensive player. That player is a wide receiver. This is great for our hopes of the WFT throwing a lot.
CARSON WENTZ, COLTS
What if I told you that we could have the QB with the fifth-highest deep ball rate (13.7%) and third-highest ADOT (9.4) in 2020?
That guy is Carson Wentz.
The team should win a lot of games, but that’s not always a bad thing. After the deep ball, we have a team that threw 4.625 times in the red zone last season. By comparison, the Chargers threw 4.688 times in the red zone.
A QB who’ll sling it on a team that should give him some good red zone volume? The Colts aren’t gonna win double-digit games despite Wentz. They’re gonna do it in part because of him.
DANIEL JONES, GIANTS
Daniel Jones is probably not throwing for 4,800 yards because he isn’t that good, but his team is just bad enough to get kicked around and give us great garbage weeks.
Jones doesn’t throw deep often, but when he did in 2020, his 51.2% adjusted completion percentage was fourth among all QBs with more than 420 dropbacks. We can’t talk Jones without talking Kenny Golladay and we can’t talk Golladay without deep balls.
We also can’t talk Giants without talking about the later game bend-don’t-break defense the Giants will face when they’re down often.
Most importantly, we can’t talk up Jones without being optimistic about his rushing ability. Jones led all QBs with 6.5 yards per carry and we have him projected to be initiate for top-five rushing volume at the position.
Jones will likely not average 275 yards per game or accumulate 30 TD passes, but he’s in the situation to have polarizing weeks throughout the schedule where we can profit on the upside.