Fantasy Football Best Ball WR: How To Navigate The Wide Receiver Position
For a long time in this community, Zero RB was viewed as a gimmick. As not a viable strategy. Well, guess what folks? It’s here to stay. And that’s especially true in Best Ball, where the winner of Best Ball Mania IV deployed a Zero RB strategy to win $2 million last year. And you could too this season with a little help from this article (and by using Underdog Fantasy promo code ALARM to sign up and get a 50% deposit match up to $250 and more).
Zero and Hero RB are both legitimate strategies but there are still some issues with the correct way to deploy these strategies. We talked about that a bit in our article on How To Navigate The Running Back Position already. Today, we need to address some topics on the other side of the coin – the wide receiver side. Armed with this article and our 2024 Best Ball Cheat Sheet, you should feel pretty good about how to dominate the wide receiver rankings in best ball this year!
Balance
This is the key mistake I see: teams with massive balance issues. Both at the team level and at the position group level. Let me explain. Part of the reason folks gravitate towards Zero RB is that you “can’t go wrong” with the wide receivers at the top. The hit rates are better, the injury rates are lower. And that makes a lot of sense. We aren’t going to spend this argument arguing about whether to take Tyreek Hill or Ja’Marr Chase.
The problem folks run into is when to stop. If you load up at high-end wide receivers in the beginning, you have to choose a pivot point. Our friends at 4For4 have done some good work on advance rates and have shown that starting your draft with more than six straight wide receivers crushes your build.
We also know that the advance rates plummet after you draft eight wide receivers. I know we all have our mid-round and late-round fantasy sleepers but, if you keep adding them to the point of 9-10 guys, your entry is toast. As for the individual position, you also need to A. make sure you have enough, and B. make sure you have enough to actually fill a lineup.
Too many wide receivers on the same bye week and you could lose crucial points. Too many upside plays with no floor whatsoever and you could have a hard time. If you are only doing a build with 5 or 5 wide receivers, you could run into trouble taking ONLY high-risk, high-reward guys. Yes, rookies are fun; sure, you can get discounts on injured guys or free agents or pending suspensions; but you have to balance those.
Correlations
This is a warning as much as it is encouragement. Correlations are great but, when not used properly, you can bleed value. Or even mess up your team. The two most popular ones, especially in tournaments, are stacking teammates and stacking playoff week matchups. And it makes a lot of sense given how many other people you need to beat.
Pairing a QB with a WR can multiply points. And, if you get two WRs that are facing off against each other in a shootout championship week, that can lead to MASSIVE totals to beat the field. Just don’t reach TOO far to get it down. Especially early on, reaching even a round can bleed and negate any value you get from your stacks.
If you are someone like me that plans to draft a lot of teams, the true way to get value and win is to simply recognize the correlations and use them as tiebreakers. If they fall to you at a good value, great – now you are truly maximizing your potential. If you reach two rounds to draft Derek Carr because you have Chris Olave, that’s probably hurting your team more than it is helping it.
Upside
There are four historical paths to upside that have been the most successful in fantasy at wide receiver. Unfortunately, one of them is injuries to other players and that’s difficult to predict, so we’ll leave that out. The others are role changes, environment changes and rookies.
Role changes are classic ones. That’s what often gives us the “year three breakout”. Like Chris Godwin getting a full-time gig in year three when DeSean Jackson and Adam Humphries left the Bucs. Or CeeDee Lamb going from a pure slot guy early on to a guy who plays slot in three-WR sets and flanker for two-WR sets. Think about what players out there could see a bigger role in 2024.
Environment changes are also key. Evan Engram is a great example of this. On the Giants, he suffered from bad QB play and poor play calling. He then goes to the Jaguars where Doug Pederson loves calling tight end screens for his buddy Trevor Lawrence to deliver. Look for team changes, QB changes and coaching changes, as well as target competition leaving. This can help us dodge bullets as well.
And finally, we have rookies. The mystery box. It’s easy in hindsight to say that we knew Jalen Reagor was going to be bad and Justin Jefferson was going to be awesome, but the reality is Reagor was drafted before Jefferson, and they were being drafted at a similar spot in fantasy. Look for players you like and also look for opportunity. It just so happened that Stefon Diggs was traded, and Jefferson took that spot. Puka Nacua did not have a lot of target competition. There is upside out there.
How To Guage Value
You might say “Coop, you talked a lot about bleeding value, but how do I know what a good value is?” Well, I have a pretty simple answer for that. Our 2024 Best Ball Cheat Sheet has all of my rankings WITH tiers that give you an idea of what rounds these guys should be drafted in! Armed with this knowledge and that cheat sheet, you’ll know who you should be drafting and when. That way you can collect value, build your perfect roster and win the big bucks!
Player News
Dolphins signed No. 13 overall pick DT Kenneth Grant to a four-year contract.
ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler reports that Grant will sign his contract today. The former Michigan defensive tackle is expected to fill a major void left by Christian Wilkins, who left for the Raiders in the 2024 offseason. Grant totaled 32 tackles, three sacks, and seven TFLs in his final season at Michigan and excelled at stopping the run while also generating 27 pressures in his final season, per PFF.
Beat reporter John Hendrix reports that free agent WR Donovan Peoples-Jones is among the 16 players that the Saints will host for their rookie minicamp.
Peoples-Jones last played regular season snaps with the Lions back in 2023, when he caught 13-of-24 targets for 155 yards. He is highly unlikely to return to fantasy relevance at this point but could perhaps sign on as a special teams contributor.
Titans signed fourth-round pick WR Elic Ayomanor to a four-year contract.
Ayomanor will now begin learning behind Calvin Ridley. Although Ayomanor is unlikely to find a meaningful role in year one, dynasty managers should note his status as training camp gets underway this summer. The former Stanford receiver flashed big-play ability in his two college seasons.
Buccaneers signed seventh-round pick WR Tez Johnson to a four-year contract.
Johnson will serve as a rotational deep-threat option for Baker Mayfield. His thin frame (5'10/154) simply does not lend itself to the repeated hits one incurs in a full-time role. Johnson did earn 100-plus targets in his two seasons at Oregon, though. His big-play style make him a better fit in best ball for now, pending any major on-field breakthroughs.
Giants waived DT Casey Rogers.
Rogers was a 2024 undrafted free agent and logged 33 defensive snaps for the Giants in his rookie season. He is credited with zero tackles and/or sacks. He may find his way onto another roster as a practice squad option.
Vikings signed third-round pick WR Tai Felton to a four-year contract.
Felton is quietly in play to challenge Vikings No. 3 WR Jalen Nailor in training camp. Nailor (5'11/190) caught 28-of-42 targets for 414 yards and six touchdowns in his first season as a starter last year, with the latter category buoying his fantasy productivity. Felton (6'1/183), meanwhile, caught 96-of-143 targets for 1,119 yards and nine touchdowns while averaging 2.32 yards per route run in his final college season. Fantasy managers should monitor Felton’s training camp reports this summer, as he could have a matchup-based WR5 role if everything falls into place.