What’s that old saying? You can’t win your league in the first round of a fantasy draft, but you can certainly lose it? If that’s the case, would the same be true of the last few rounds of a fantasy draft, where you can’t actually lose your league but can substantially increase your chances of winning?
The final 3-4 rounds of a fantasy football league are where the stakes are lower, and where the excitement of making a great pick kicks in. This is where most players pick their kicker and/or defense, and where darts are thrown without much pressure to hit the mark.
In these rounds, coming up with a player who proves useful at any point in the fantasy season – whether it be as a starter every week, trade bait, or even just a bye week fill-in – is a boon to one’s fantasy team and puts that team a step ahead of others.
Last week, I wrote an article that detailed some wide receiver sleepers to keep in mind in the seventh round and later in fantasy drafts.Now, we’ll take it a step further by going into detail about some of the wide receivers you can get off the waiver wire at the end of your draft or perhaps for free.
Below are four deep sleep patterns you can consider tracking with a device. FantasyPros.com Which takes the average ADP (average draft position) from three different platforms – Yahoo, Sleeper and Realtime Fantasy Sports – and compiles them into one list.
Each name in this exercise will rank outside the top 55 on Fantasy Pros’ compiled positional ADP list for wide receivers in a half-PPR format, and all will be available in the 13th round or later of a 12-team fantasy draft, on average. You can find the entire ADP list here.
Mike Williams – New York Jets
Positional ADP: 59th; Overall ADP: 159th
The common philosophy I like to follow when looking at sleepers is to “follow the money.” The idea is that if a player was given a hefty contract by a team in the offseason (or acquired for hefty trade compensation), that team will be more likely to utilize him and incorporate him into their offense, otherwise that money will be wasted. This certainly isn’t foolproof, as we’ve seen wasteful general managers in the past, but there is some logical basis to this idea.
Mike Williams was paid $10 million New York Jets this past offseason, including four voided years to reduce his 2024 cap hit, meaning he’ll be on their books in some form until 2028. Williams is recovering from a season-ending torn ACL suffered in Week 3 of 2023, but with reports that he’s already getting team reps in practice and the fact that he wasn’t placed on the “physically unable to perform” (PUP) list, expect him to be in football before too long in the regular season.
When healthy, Williams was a weapon for Justin Herbert. Los Angeles Chargers His best season came in 2021, when he scored 1,146 receiving yards and nine touchdowns before leading a Chargers team with 895 receiving yards in a 2022 campaign where they missed four games.
The thinking in New York is that the 6’4 Williams will be Aaron Rodgers’ number two receiving option, and his primary red zone weapon. Rodgers is recovering from his season-ending injury, but the last we remember him, he was always a prolific thrower of the football within the red zone. The four-time MVP ranked in the top 10 in touchdown passes from inside the 10-yard-line each of the past three seasons.
Williams won’t break the bank, and with this selection you’re getting a proven commodity along with a proven quarterback whose main concern (injuries) figures heavily into his ADP.
Jaelin Polk- New England Patriots
Positional ADP: 66th; Overall ADP: 176th
Considering his cost (practically free), Jaelin Polk is one of my favorite rookie wide receivers to target in fantasy drafts this season. After one season at the University of Washington, where he excelled with 1,159 receiving yards and nine touchdowns, Polk showed enough for the Patriots to select him with the fifth pick in the second round of the 2024 draft.
The biggest reason for my excitement behind Polk other than cost is his disappointing target competition in New England. The key players in the Patriots’ WR room are second-year player Demario Douglas, who had 561 receiving yards last year and was a 2023 6th round compensatory pick, KJ Osborne, who has never had more than 655 yards in a season, Javon Baker, who went two rounds after Polk in the same draft class, and Kendrick Bourne, who is recovering from a torn ACL that has put him on the PUP list.
Polk has the immediate draft pedigree to be considered a favorite for the WR1 job, and he’s expected to be the Week 1 starter. Another player expected to start in New England, if not immediately then eventually, is quarterback and second overall pick Drake Maye, with whom Polk played a lot in the preseason, running a route on 34 of Maye’s 38 dropbacks.
Polk has been working with the starters in practice often, and has linked up with Maye plenty of times in preseason action. If he wins the top wide receiver job, he’ll be the cheapest primary WR you can find in fantasy drafts.
Darnell Mooney – Atlanta Falcons
Positional ADP: 69th; Overall ADP: 200th
Last season, there were five teams whose two wide receivers were in the top 15 in the league in percentage of snaps played (when healthy) – Philadelphia Eagles, Las Vegas Raiders, Carolina Panthers, Indianapolis Colts And Los Angeles Rams,
The Rams’ Cooper Kupp was on the field 91% of the time (in games he wasn’t injured) and Puka Nacua played 87% of the time, and those numbers would have been higher if they hadn’t been ruled out early in Week 18 and if he hadn’t suffered an injury early in Week 13 that forced him out of the game.
Now, what does any of this have to do with Darnell Mooney? Well, Atlanta’s new offensive coordinator Zac Robinson recently came over from the Rams, where he worked under Sean McVay since 2019. He likely reflects many of McVay’s philosophies, one of which is that the two best wide receivers almost never leave the field. Behind Drake London, Mooney is arguably Atlanta’s WR2 and was paid accordingly this offseason, signing a three-year, $39 million ($26 million guaranteed) contract shortly after free agency opened (we’re following the money again).
Mooney’s best season came in 2021, when he Chicago Bears with 1,055 receiving yards and four receiving touchdowns. Since then he’s been beset by poor quarterback play and increasing competition, failing to reach 500 yards in each of the last two seasons. Yet the Falcons have trusted him with big money, and he’ll catch passes from the best quarterback of his career so far in Kirk Cousins.
While London will be the alpha wide receiver in Atlanta, Cousins’ track record of distribution is promising for Mooney’s prospects. In each of Cousins’ last three full seasons in Minnesota (this doesn’t count last season, when an Achilles tear ended his year prematurely), he targeted his number two wide receiver (Adam Thielen) at least 95 times, despite the presence of the great Justin Jefferson all three of those years. Thielen actually had triple-digit targets in two of those three seasons and the only reason he had 95 in 2021 was because he missed four games due to injury.
Mooney isn’t being drafted in most leagues, despite the fact that he’ll spend a lot of time on the field with a quarterback who historically involves his second wide receiver, hoping to create an explosive offense.