Five Biggest Questions
1. Is Kirk Cousins a top-16 QB?
2. Can Dalvin Cook be a reliable top-14 RB?
3. Is Alexander Mattison draftable?
4. Will Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs continue to be weekly fantasy starters?
5. Will Kyle Rudolph be a TE1?
These past few weeks I've hyped up five QBs with ADPs in the 20’s who are entirely capable of being QB1s this season. Coming in at a QB-19 ADP, Kirk Cousins has as much upside as any of them. How can a guy who finished 12th last season—and who was top 8 the prior three seasons—suddenly be undraftable? Yes, there are reports Minnesota will lean more on the run this year. And he was fourth in the NFL in attempted passes (suggesting a more run-oriented offense would impact his production).
But let’s look at some seemingly obvious indicators of continued success. Cousins is still in his prime (turning 31 years old in August). He hasn’t missed a game since becoming a permanent NFL starter (64 straight regular season contests). He still has two fantastic wideout targets. His primary RB is a solid pass catcher (four receptions per game last year). And Cousins’ “bad” 2018 campaign featured a fantastic 4,298/30/10 stat line. His baseline is around the 16-18 mark, and that’s if he somehow regresses into the 3,700/20/10 realm. You’d be well served grabbing Cousins and another painfully undervalued QB like Jimmy G. in the final two rounds and stream them all the way to the playoffs.
Can Dalvin Cook be the elite RB many of us thought he could become? His current RB-11 ADP places him in the second round of most drafts—a high price to pay for a guy who’s been limited to 15 games in two NFL seasons. Given their higher-than-normal injury risks and depth chart shifts, I draft only safe RBs in the early rounds: players with good shots at staying healthy, and who aren’t at serious risk of a demotion. Cook needs a near perfect season to crack the top 8. I wouldn’t roll those dice. Instead, rookie Alexander Mattison is absolutely worth drafting at his RB-55 ADP, if for no other reason than he’s playing behind an injury-prone back. And believe it or not, the formerly highly touted Ameer Abdullah (RB-103) could earn deep-league draftability with a strong August.
When the Vikes snagged Laquon Treadwell in the first round of the 2016 draft, he was eyed as a long-term #1 receiver. In fairness, 28 of the other 30 WRs selected that year haven’t panned out either. (The other two were second-rounder Michael Thomas and fifth-rounder Tyreek Hill). But Minnesota's been able to cover over this mistake thanks to former fifth-rounder Stefon Diggs and the undrafted Adam Thielen. Both guys finished in the top 30 in WR fantasy scoring in 2016, then top 20 in 2017, then top 10 last year. This summer they’re priced right at WR-13 and WR-10, respectively. Given the lack of significant talent playing behind them, they’re as safe a tandem as any in the league. Beyond them, Chad Beebe (WR-116), Treadwell (WR-143), Jordan Taylor (WR-145), and perhaps rookie Dillon Mitchell (WR-207) will compete for tertiary looks. Beebe is the best bet right now, though anything could change in August.
Interpreting stats in a vacuum is a waste of time. Kyle Rudolph’s 2016 breakout (#2 fantasy TE) was a fluke. His two biggest reception games—nine catches in Week 12 and 11 catches in Week 17—came when Diggs sat. And Sam Bradford’s short-pass approach didn’t hurt. He fell back to the lower-mid-range TE1 pack in 2017 and 2018: still good, but not weekly-starter good. And this offseason two strange things happened: Minnesota drafted TE Irv Smith in the second round, which is a steep price to pay for a backup tight end. Then about six weeks later, the team signed Rudolph to an extension that will keep him in town until 2024, and which makes him the NFL’s fourth highest-paid TE. So what can we make of this TE situation? For the first time in years, Rudolph might be undervalued. His TE-14 ADP assumes competition from Smith (TE-27). If there is no competition in August, Rudolph will start the season with strong top 8-12 TE potential.
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