It’s Week 3 of the NFL preseason, featuring so-called “dress
rehearsal” games. As such, the once-cloudy picture of who
we ought to be targeting in fantasy drafts starts to come into focus.
If you’re worried about some of the big names underperforming
this year…well, you should be. They always do. The best way
to ensure you’re prepared for this inevitability, however,
is to make sure you grab some guys who could end up being next summer’s
big names. Following are the list of guys I believe we’ll
all be talking about a year from now.
Note: All rankings are based on FFToday’s default standard
scoring.
A quick reminder of the Top 10 fantasy QBs from last season...
Ben
Roethlisberger, PIT: We already know Tom Terrific’s taking
somebody’s Top 10 spot this coming season, so it seems like a waste
of ink to talk about why. I’d rather talk about a guy who could
easily have achieved Brady-esque success had he managed to stay
just a little bit healthier in his 13 professional seasons. Big
Ben came into the league in 2004, the same year Philip
Rivers did. While he’s been significantly more successful than
Rivers (two Super Bowl rings), he’s missed exactly 17 more starts
since the start of the 2006 season. Making matters worse, those
DNPs have been spread out over a lot of years, meaning he rarely
plays a full 16-game slate. Naturally, this makes Roethlisberger
difficult to trust.
If we can set that fragility aside, however (which sounds ridiculous
to say about a 6’5”, 241-pound man), it’s hard
not to see him as anything other than an attractive, possibly even
undervalued, option at the position. For starters, he’s been
a Top 10 option before and as recently as 2014 (No.5). Additionally,
he’s been a Top 10 performer on a per-game basis in every
season since 2013. Yes, you’ve gotta play enough games to
actually be a Top 10 performer, but you get the idea: The upside
is obviously there. While we’re on the subject of upside….
Name me one quarterback in the league who has a more lethal assortment
of pass catchers to target than Pittsburgh’s super-sized triggerman.
Antonio
Brown is an All-Pro. Le’Veon
Bell is the best receiving running back in the league. Martavis
Bryant (provided he gets reinstated for good) is possibly even
more explosive than either of them. Only another nagging injury
is keeping Big Ben out of the top 10 in 2017, folks, so find a way
to land him.
Eli dropped from the top 10 last season
but an improved receiving corps could make him a reliable
QB1.
Eli
Manning, NYG: Turns out that 2004 class of quarterbacks
was pretty solid, huh? Manning, the third (and last) great QB from
that year’s draft, has managed to combine Rivers’ durability (no
missed starts since Day 1) with Roethlisberger’s on-field success
(two Super Bowl rings). What has eluded him, however, is year-over-year
consistency, especially from a fantasy perspective. While Rivers
and Roethlisberger have averaged more than 20 points per game eight
times each as professionals, Peyton’s kid bro has only done so four
times. Last year, in fact, he was just the 20th-ranked player at
the position, barely worth starting in larger two-QB leagues.
So, why assume the 20th-ranked player can make a huge leap into
the ranks of the elite signal callers? Well, like Roethlisberger,
he’s been there and done that. Like, recently. Manning was
No.7 and No.8 at the position in 2015 and 2014, respectively. Though
his first year in Ben McAdoo’s offense was certainly marred
by poor line play and too many turnovers, he still managed to post
4,000+ yards and 26 TDs, solid numbers that would have looked a
lot more solid next to a couple hundred rushing yards and some rushing
TDs. Problem was, Manning rushed for the fewest yards of any QB
in 2016 (a career-worst -9) and zero scores. Yikes!
We probably can’t expect huge gains in ground-based production as
he’s just not that mobile. Even a slight uptick there, however,
and several more passing TDs would put Manning in contention for
a return to the Top 10. I think the additions of Brandon
Marshall and Evan
Engram, two huge, talented red-zone targets, should be worth
at least 8-10 more scoring strikes. He’s already playing with the
best receiver on the planet and a sophomore stud (Sterling
Shepard), so…get back on the Eli bandwagon.
Marcus
Mariota, TEN: Seems almost everyone’s jumping on the
Marcus Mariota bandwagon these days. The former Heisman winner showed
lots of promise as a rookie in a bad offense, notching 21.2 points
per game. Then, he showed vast improvement in his sophomore season,
scoring the most fantasy points at the position from Weeks 5 through
12. If there’s one thing that’s held him back thus far, it’s an
inability to avoid injury. He missed four games in 2015 and another
last year. Just one more game of 20+ points in 2016 (he averaged
21.7) would have guaranteed him a spot in the Top 10 and made this
conversation moot.
Oddly, the one thing that could endanger Mariota again come 2017
is the one thing he needs to do, IMHO, to vault into the quarterbacking
stratosphere: run the ball more. I never thought I’d say that
about a guy who ruined collegiate defenses with uncommon quicks
and terrific top-end speed, but the fact is he hasn’t been
the elite dual-threat we envisioned when Tennessee made him the
second pick in the 2015 draft. Marcus seemed to realize this after
last season’s injury, making a conscious decision to drop
weight and get faster this season, defying the advice of the Titans’
shot callers. His logic? Nimbler, more elusive QBs don’t get
hit as much. I think it pays off to the tune of 500 rushing yards
and two more running TDs this season.
Not that Mariota and Tennessee can’t be successful employing last
year’s formula, tweaked to account for a significantly upgraded
receiving corps. Eric
Decker brings great size, great hands, and great experience
to the position while Corey
Davis, Taywan
Taylor, and Jonnu
Smith inject youth and athleticism. By ground or by air, Marcus
becomes a Top 10 option this year.
