Fantasy Redraft Formula – Rookie WR Edition

Equation Construction

I wanted a way to come up with a “formula” to help differentiate between players and to help decide on how to find the best players for when I am drafting for Redraft leagues. That leads me to concentrate on a few areas for rookie evaluation for redraft leagues that, when combined, give me a solid chance at finding some players that will help me win some championships. These variables for the formula are Draft Capital, Opportunities, Supporting Cast, and Draft Profile.

Draft Capital – The higher team drafted the player in the NFL Draft; historically, that player has more opportunities to get a greater chance of success in the NFL. But, again, this goes for fantasy purposes; these players generally correlate to having the most success in fantasy football.

Opportunities – There are a limited number of given snaps in the NFL and even more limited options for opportunities (plays with the ball). All players that project to be healthy and have primary usage in their offenses get their calculation here.

Supporting Cast – This is purely subjective, but I feel that some positions (Wide Receivers and Quarterbacks) greatly benefit when they have an excellent supporting cast for rookies, specifically for fantasy. Running backs and tight ends generally aren’t swayed too much from their situations, but it is still good to include them for tiebreakers and one-of cases.

Draft Profile – Trust your process when you evaluate rookies. If you are high on a rookie but fell in the draft, still believe in their rookie profile. They are the same athlete they were before the draft, don’t let the draft capital completely change your opinion on the player.

2021 Rookie WR Review

One of the deepest wide receiver classes in recent memory, several of them came primed to take over in 2021 and future years for all the dynasty managers. Here is the list of some of the wide receivers from the class and how their ADP and Positional finishes lined up:

Truly the definition of a league winner; if there were people that ignored the training camp slump of Ja’Marr Chase, they certainly made playoffs and possibly won their championships because of it. Drafting a top 5 WR in the 7th round in drafts is the recipe to do just that. Waddle came up big as well, being drafted a couple of rounds later and finishing just outside of the WR1 category. Devonta ended about where his ADP was, and the big surprise was Amon-Ra St. Brown. He finished as a WR2 overall and had an excellent finish to the season that helped managers if they could add him off the waiver wire.

Draft Capital

With no first-round running backs, the draft capital is a little less weight for this draft class. Only Breece Hall, Kenneth Walker, and James Cook have the second-round investment from this draft class. Here is a quick table to illustrate the running backs in the 2022 NFL Draft class:

Very different than the rookie running backs, the wide receivers were heavily invested in the earlier rounds by teams that could look to use them right away. Based on their draft capital, all day one or two healthy wide receivers should be considered in your redraft leagues during the draft. There are even arguments for some players like Velus Jones and Jalen Tolbert to be considered. Romeo Doubs has gotten a lot of camp hype as well.

Opportunities

Targets will be king for all pass-catching players, especially for wide receivers. Breaking them up into three categories to help you understand how I would group them:

• Path to Lead Team in Targets
  • Drake London
  • Chris Olave
  • Treylon Burks
• Possible Contributors
  • Garrett Wilson
  • Jameson Williams (if activated off the NFI list)
  • Jahan Dotson
  • Christian Watson
  • Wan’Dale Robinson
  • Velus Jones Jr.
  • Jalen Tolbert
  • Alec Pierce
  • Skyy Moore
• Waiver Wire Candidates
  • George Pickens
  • Romeo Doubs
  • David Bell
  • Kyle Phillips

I am prioritizing the first group in all my drafts. These all can be great values since they all have more accessible paths where the outcome would be they lead their team in targets. That is a huge factor in evaluating their production for fantasy football. Draft Drake London at all costs!

For the possible contributors, these all have outcomes where they contribute to their team’s offenses enough to where they might have relevancy for flex play, maybe even elevating to a weekly starter. Of course, getting to that path might take an injury or suspension, but remember that they provide excellent value in the later rounds of your redraft leagues.

Waiver wire candidates are the guys I will be monitoring during the season to see how fluid their situations are. Especially with George Pickens, who has shown to be a huge steal in the NFL draft and making plays in camp and preseason games. However, he still has Diontae Johnson, Chase Claypool, Pat Freiermuth, and Najee Harris ahead of him for targets. The Steelers will lower their passing attempts with Kenny Picket or Mitchell Trubisky starting. I would rather wait on this one in Week 1 or 2 for waivers than draft and drop.

Supporting Cast

The key to understanding the supporting cast and using it in this formula is simple, do they have an elite quarterback throwing to them or not? Ok, maybe it’s not that simple; wide receivers can quickly produce with average to below-average QBs. I think it’s more of a tiebreaker when deciding which wide receivers to consider if you choose between them. There are also some historical data for some that seem to favor and target their primary target a heavy amount (i.e., Matthew Stafford). So, in short, trust your process on how you evaluate the quarterback position and use that as a metric on if this wide receiver will be good for redraft.

Draft Profile

As always, I will use the Undroppables Rookie Guide to evaluate and use their scores for my formula; you should also know to help you a leg up on the competition in your home league! All the first-round wide receivers are monsters regarding their profiles, expect them to have promising careers, and that’s a big bonus for dynasty managers. There are several players as well, like Skyy Moore and Alec Pierce, that will have great careers as well, based on their profiles. If you sign up for this guide, I promise you will have a leg up on your league mates when understanding the rookies this year.

Result

Time for our calculation! I love this wide receiver class, and I have prioritized them in my redrafts regarding mid-round to late-round picks. I will list them in order of how I see them drafted. Hopefully, it will help you win some of your leagues!

• Drake London
• Chris Olave
• Treylon Burks
• Skyy Moore
• Jahan Dotson
• Jalen Tolbert
• Garrett Wilson
• Wan’Dale Robinson
• Christian Watson
• Velus Jones Jr.
• Alec Pierce

Good luck with your drafts this year, and please follow me on Twitter for all Redraft advice and my weekly articles at The Undroppables!

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