Early Top 10 WR Rankings + Disappearing Acts

only had the five touchdowns. Generally, you can count on him for a lot more than that over the course of a full season. He was a double-digit touchdown guy three straight years before he got hurt last year. And if you think about, we've talked a lot about the Packers offense in relation to the unsustainability of Aaron Jones touchdown rate. Well.

Yeah, I mean, it's not that touchdowns are just going to go away and the Packers are going to be a bad team. It's it, oh, they might not all go to Aaron Jones next season. And so, yeah, I think Devante Adams, you know, I will certainly be statting him out for double-digit touchdowns again. All right, number four on our consensus wide receiver rankings is Tyreek Hill of the Kansas City Chiefs. Number one overall fantasy wide receiver in 2018 last year, injured, banged up.

disappeared at times, didn't get the 50 touchdown season for Patrick Mahomes. Mahomes was injured. You did get to see a little peak at that same Tyreek Hill in a five-week span from week six through 10, where he was the number one fantasy-wide receiver by way of points, number two, and points per game in that span. You know, he's 26 years old. He's on the best offense in football, and there's a level of consistency with Tyreek Hill being a part of the Andy Reed offense, then returning 10 of 11 starters.

I like that, and that's kind of why I have him statted where I do. I expect a great season from Tyreek Hill. I'm not sure exactly what to do with Tyreek Hill, because he can be an absolute game breaker. We've seen that he can dominate for fantasy football. The hard part for me with Tyreek Hill is that after he came back, he had the injury problem, and he exploded. He was having monster games.

But the Kansas City defense wasn't as good. And then the second half, that defense started to lock things down. And that's when Tyreek Hill was averaging basically 60 yards a game. And that continued all the way up until the Super Bowl is when you finally saw Hill have a game over 100 yards breaking out of that 60 to 70 range. So while I'm happy to have Tyreek as my number one wide receiver, he.

He won't be my first choice. I hope I'm making sense. Like when I have, if I've got Adams and Julio on the board, I'm not even considering taking. He doesn't fit the avatar for your wide receiver one that you prefer for your team. Is that what you're saying? Because he's less consistent than other receivers, he has big blow-up games, but he doesn't have the same target totals. Right. Yeah, I think you bring up a good point with their defense locking things down, them not necessarily needing to always score at.

Will. And, you know, some of the things we saw last year during that stretch, those final seven games were rough for Tyreek in fantasy. That was when he was healthy and back out there on the field. And during those final seven games, he was the wide receiver 41. But if I had to bet whether or not he's going to be, you know, game scripted out, because every now and then you just have, oh, okay, Sammy Watkins got a.

80-yard touchdown pass. Well, the drive's over. Nobody else gets fantasy points. Those things happen on the Chiefs. But if I had to bet whether or not Tyree Kill stays very inconsistent like he was this last year, big blow-up games, big disappearing acts, or...

is like he was the previous two seasons where, you know, I mean, over the, you know, those years, what was he, wide receiver four in 2017, wide receiver one in 2018, I'm going to take his upside. I would, I, I do agree. Yes. I do agree with Mike that he is, I think you said it well, like I would be super happy with Tyra Kills, my wide receiver one, but I'm not going to take him over the.

guys who are such the clear and only option on their team, the same way some of those guys we've talked. You know, Julio, the other three guys, they're the clear number one with a really distant number two. And here you've got Kelsey as a good option and plenty other speedsters who can just end a drive in a minute. Yeah, it's a fair discussion. You know, I haven't ranked it too because that's where I think he'll finish fantasy-wise. But from a preferential standpoint, if you want to go with one of the bigger target,

higher reception total guys. I get it. Tyreek had a very significant injury last year. And even though he came back from the injury, we all saw him go. Jason, you had him on your roster. We saw him go down multiple times where you thought, oh, no, he re-injured the same thing or limps. You know, he kind of gets carried off the field and you're like, oh, he's done. And then he's back. So the offseason should do him well in that regard. And that'll help get him out there to begin next year. Number five is DeAndre Hopkins of the era.

Zona Cardinals. We hope. Oh, get out of here. Hope. It's done. All you people, oh, the physical hasn't happened. Hopkins is on the Cardinals. Like, just let it happen. Yeah, he is. Let it wash over you. He's finished as the wide receiver one, wide receiver two, and wide receiver five over the last three years with 174, 163, and 150 targets.

I wanted to look at the passing volume of Houston and Arizona last year. They were both middle of the pack in terms of past attempts per game, and they were actually back to back. So very similar, you know, Cliff Kingsbury came in and increased what Arizona did on offense tremendously. But, you know, trying to find, you know, a way to predict what Hopkins is going to do, transitioning to Kyla Murray, where did you guys end up?

Yeah, for me, it was one of those things where initially you come over to the Arizona Cardinals. You assume he's not going to have the same target volume that he's had. And he's had that target volume, not just with Deshaun Watson, but with like 150 quarterbacks in his short career. Was Brandon Whedon part of that equation? Everybody was part of that equation. And it's low and behold, when a quarterback is there, they say,

That guy's good. I'm throwing him the ball. And if you really compare Christian Kirk and Larry Fitzgerald to the options at, you know, two and three that Houston had, it wasn't always healthy. But Will Fuller, I mean, who's the better wide receiver? Will Fuller, current Larry Fitzgerald, current Christian Kirk. There's a discussion to be had. Sure. I think Kirk and Fuller are probably not.

Too different. Right. And Kenny Stills there. So I do think that Hopkins will retain his large market share in a good offense with a quarterback who was already, I believe the quarterback eight in fantasy this last season as a rookie will certainly go up in the touchdown category. I've got him a little lower than you two have him, but I still think he's a top half wide receiver one. Mike, 150 targets over under this year for.

Hopkins. That's what he had last year in 15 games. It's also the number he's never, he hasn't seen fewer than 150 targets since 2015. And you saw in Arizona, Larry was over 100, Kirk was over 100. I don't think that Hopkins can get to the 150 target area. He will be the alpha of the wide receivers for Arizona. And I'm betting on the talents.

And I think that some efficiency things can happen between Kyler, who's very accurate in Hopkins. But he won't be seeing 150 targets. If you set the threshold, let's say over under 130, I think that's more in the line of it would be tough to make that call. There have been, you know, we talked a lot about wide receiver switching teams, free agency versus trades. One name that did.

Pop into my head when you look at upper, upper echelon performances changing teams was what Brandon Marshall did a handful of times. Marshall went from Denver to Miami, followed up 154 targets with 146. He was obviously the alpha. When he went from Miami to Chicago, he jumped up 50 targets from 141 to 192. He jumped up from Chicago to New York from 106 to 173. I think we all...

agree in a very unbiased fashion with every fantasy owner out there. We acknowledge that Hopkins is a target hog. He's going to demand the ball. 140, 150 targets, I think is what you can expect from him. He finishes the wide receiver. You have him up there? 140 to 150. Yeah, I think he'd get close to it. But last year he finished at wide receiver 5 with seven touchdowns on 150 targets in 15 games. So putting him at the 5, 6, 7 range feels like a...

very safe, conservative ranking, considering this was the wide receiver one and the wide receiver two in back-to-back years with higher target totals. Yeah, that was on the back of double-digit touchdowns as well. I don't think he'll have that in Arizona year one with Kyler Murray. So I think where we've got him here in that five to seven range is perfect. Chris Godwin comes in at number six. Godwin last year, the first six weeks.

Best fantasy wide receiver out there, finished the year as the wide receiver two overall. It would be easy to kind of glance at his consistency and say, well, his second half wasn't quite as good as his first half, but his second half was still really great. His first half was just unconscious. His first half was good enough that he still finished as the wide receiver two. His big games were that big.

24.2 fantasy points per game through the first six weeks. And 115 reception pace. It dropped down to an 86 reception pace over the second half of the year, and he was like 16-something points per game. But he was obviously dominant. Now, it's rare, though, to have a brand new quarterback coming in to the system. And you look at what Tampa Bay did last year. They threw the ball almost 40 times a game. That was fourth most in football. Do we really expect?

Tampa to throw the ball that much again this year. And do you expect Godwin to deliver the same type of season? No, I think they're going to throw the ball less. I believe that they will have fewer passing yards total than they had with James. They're going to be a better team, though, and maybe a few more goal line opportunities. So to me, you know, obviously none of us have them up as the wide receiver too. But he is in that...

slot role that was so coveted, you know, going into last year, it was all this hype of the Bruce Aryan system and how he utilized that slot wide receiver. Well, guess what? That came true.

Guess what else? Tom Brady loves him, you know, a Julian Edelman, Wes Welker type, who's a great route runner can just catch every ball that he puts on the money. And so I think Chris Godwin's going to be an excellent wide receiver next year. If the touchdowns could go up a little while the yardage comes down a little, maybe he will finish about the same. I, you know, I took him down a few rungs here, but I would be happy with him as my wide receiver one. What if, I mean, we agree that Tom Brady will not have.

infinite playing days, right? He'll be 43 when this season starts. I don't think I can agree to that. I don't know what deals with the devil this man has made. He had his worst statistical season in a while last year. Yes, he did. So is there the possibility, and I don't want to put the fear of God into all Buccaneers fans with those new uniforms? I know they're expecting big things. But one of these years...

the wheels are going to fall off, the Tom Brady Mobile. And that variability does it factor into how you look at their past catching options or do you just you bank on the past when you look at a 43-year-old Tom Brady? Yeah, and that's the challenge. We know one person who wanted off the, or I should say didn't necessarily want off the mobile, but didn't really try to keep his ticket.

which is Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots. I mean, I know that Tom Brady's like, well, you know, I'm moving on. I don't care about legacy, blah, blah, blah. But if Belichick believed that Tom Brady was 100% the answer, Tom Brady would be on the Patriots, that's what I believe. So maybe we buy into that. I think Brady has enough left. And it's such a good offense that Bruce Ariens crafts for.

for fantasy players that I'm with Jason, that Chris Godwin, I would be very happy to have him as my number one wide receiver. Do you get, do you still remember noodle armed Peyton Manning's final final season? Oh, Peyton Manning. Yeah, it was painful, man. After a 39 touchdown season puts up nine touchdowns in 2015. He is the poster child for when it ends, it ends. He was so.