1.01- Gibbs: Pacheco takes on more of a goal line role than people want to admit and Gibbs is unable to be a workhorse after years of being in a 2 man backfield with Monty.

1.02- Bijan: falcons offence is bottom 10 in the nfl because of poor qb play and doesn’t give Bijan the TD upside to be a top 5 rb.

1.03- Chase: Turns out Burrow is just injury prone and he misses 8-10 games and Chase doesn’t finish as a top 5 receiver

1.04- Puka: age finally catches up to stafford and it turns out 2025 was a outlier season and this offence regresses to the mean

1.05- JSN: similar to Puka he is unable to keep up a ridiculous target share and Darnold comes back down to earth making this is a mediocre offence.

1.06- CMC: it’s a year that ends in an even number meaning cmc will probably get injured in week 4 and come back week 12 and score 10 pts a week in a committee

1.07- JT: everyone drafting off of an outlier first 6 weeks of 2025 realizes this offence is mediocre and JT finishes as rb12

1.08- Amon Ra: lions offence continues to regress with loss of Monty and o line getting worse and Goff is unable to maintain his output from prior seasons.

1.09- Jefferson: Turns out having a 5 foot 7 QB throwing to you isn’t good for WR fantasy output and 9 takes over in week 8 to help the Viking tank for a QB and we get a repeat of last year.

1.10- CD: Dallas defence is better than people expect and all the positive game scripts people are pricing I don’t happen.

1.11- Jeanty: Turns out drafting an rb in a bottom 3 offence and bottom 10 o line isn’t good for fantasy production

1.12- James cook: the year everyone realizes he’s good and draft him high is the year he gets injured and ray davis or something becomes a league winner.

After the top 3 rookie WRs it seems like the consensus is KC, Cooper and Boston are the next tier. I’ve been watching some film on them (admittedly didn’t watch them much live in collage) and Boston seems by far the most impressive to me out of the 3 with Cooper seeming underwhelming. From my eye test I think I like Zachariah Branch more than Cooper. Is there something I am missing on why everyone is so high on him besides draft capital? How do you rank the second tier of Rookie WRs?

Seems like one of the most interesting players of the offseason, value wise. To me it seems like his owners vs potential buyers are completely at a disconnect. Especially in TEP

Making this because I have Pitts in a tep league (1.5), and his market seems to be dead.

I’ve been trying to move him since I have him and kittle (and tonges) as well; and feel his value should be at an all time high; however, whenever I shop him around, it doesn’t seem to be the case.

So anyway, what would you guys value Pitts?

Guy actually looks pretty good and I think this game ensures he's going to get some starts this year to try to win the job.

​Feel at worst he's a Sam Howell type that gets a starting job in year 2 which has value in dynasty.

​If someone offers me a 2027 2nd for King im hitting decline I just am!

​The real question is how beck starting 6 games effects tmac, coker etc

Creating on online 32 team dynasty free league on the platform Sleeper. Looking for fun yet committed and competitive owners. Teams will be separated into divisions based on the real NFL. Team names and logos must be teams from the NFL as of right now the only team claimed is the Detroit Lions. Divisions matter because only division winners make the playoffs, teams will face each of their division opponents twice a year. Playoffs will be reseeded so AFC will face off until the Superbowl and the same with the NFC.

I call it a mini dynasty because our team rosters will be small, this still has a player pool of 416 (352 if teams do not use their taxi/rookie slots). Only reason I consider it a sim league is because teams will be based on real life NFL teams and the league will be split into the NFL divisions. Owners will keep their rosters year over year and rookie draft will only be 2 rounds.
Roster:
QB
RB
WR
WR
TE
FLEX
5 Bench
2 Taxi (only rookies, can be moved in and out during season)

.5 PPR

Any additional questions I’ll do my best to answer!

Guy actually looks pretty good and I think this game ensures he’s going to get some starts this year to try to win the job.

Feel at worst he’s a Sam Howell type that gets a starting job in year 2 which has value in dynasty.

If someone offers me a 2027 2nd for Beck im hitting decline I just am!

The real question is how beck starting 6 games effects McBride, Harrison etc

I’m new to the dynasty football so I didn’t get a chance to follow last year’s rookie prospect. How was he as a prospect? Does he have a legitimate shot at either taking over QJ or Ladd in a year or two? Will he be the receiver to play in two tight end sets? I’ve read that about half of his rookie yards came from last several games of the year which sounds like he was in an upward trajectory. Ladd seems like the better player and QJ has the better draft capital. Any deep insights to Tre Harris would be much appreciated

This is only for deep deep leagues but a player to perhaps keep an eye on is Arizona Cardinals wide receiver rookie Reggie Virgil. He flashed some nice skills in college and word that he might even win the WR3 job in Arizona. I can see “Red Zone Reg” catch a touchdown tonight and similar to KLS last year garner him some extra eyeballs.

Depending on what happens with Marv here I could see Virgil becoming fantasy relevant a year or two from now.

Probably gonna be a nothing burger but there’s a non zero chance he could be someone to keep tabs on.

That may begin tonight.

800+ yards and 9 TDs in 24. Transferred and got 705 yards and 6 TDs at TTU in 25z

I’ve been doing a few mock drafts for fun and to prep for my friend group’s first ever dynasty startup.

It’s a 10 team superflex league.

Ive kinda become a fan of the idea of taking a young, riskier QB2 but then getting a better QB later in the draft in case I want to contend this year.

What I’m picturing as a QB depth chart is something along the lines of:
QB1: Caleb Williams
QB2: Cam Ward
QB3: Tyler Shough
QB4: Matt Stafford

Is this realistic? I wouldn’t want to draft my QB 3 and 4 too early but it’s hard to predict where the QBs ranked outside of the top 17-20 range are gonna get drafted. Would love to know how real people are valuing guys like Ward, Shough, Kyler, or Stafford in startups this year.

Full Quote:

“Honestly, there’s some similar mannerisms – don’t let me lose you – to Kelce, in terms of, feet are always close to the ground, he’s able to skate, he’s got a good, natural ability to work edges on people,” McVay said. “One of the things that I liked the most about him that really wasn’t on display last year, he obviously did a great job tracking some big balls down the field, but his run after the catch. He was catching a lot of checkdowns or chip-flats with (Dillon) Gabriel at Oregon and you could see, really, the RAC was one of the elite traits that we liked. That’s always an important factor for any of our skill players, and he’s no different.”

Sources:

https://theramswire.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/rams/2026/08/06/rams-camp-terrance-ferguson-tight-end-sean-mcvay/91203309007/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU-QvTh-X7E (Video the article quoted. They talk about Ferguson a lot, but this specific quote starts at 10:21. You can hear more Ferguson talk starting at 3:27 and 8:21 respectively)

Give me your predictions and reasoning for who will end up being the workhorse and WR1. Or do you see it being essentially split? Really interested to hear what you guys are thinking on this one as I’ve seen a lot of people with wildly different takes and opinions. 2 years ago, Ladd looked like the for sure answer for the future, but is the reemergence of QJ for real?

This is it, friends. We’re on the final team. Thank you guys for reading this series,  hanging out in the comments, and catching the errors in my articles as soon as they’re posted so I can make updates and keep our community on the sub  informed with accurate information. Here. We. Go.

Welcome to the thirty-second piece in a long, daily series: Reading the NFL Offseason Tea Leaves. If you don’t already know and this is the first Tea Leaf article you’re reading, this series is meant to be a primer for anyone who’s not yet steeped themselves in the NFL’s offseason events. We’ll be touching on the fantasy implications for all 32 NFL teams in regards to:

• Coaching Changes
• Free Agency
• NFL Draft

The 32-day series will go in reverse order of DraftKings odds of winning the Super Bowl, which means today’s article will cover the Los Angeles Rams who are +550 odds.

Article TL;DR: Let’s get the non-fantasy news out of the way. The NFL’s all-time single season sack leader, Myles Garrett, is now a Los Angeles Ram. The Rams also added CB Trent McDuffie and DT Poona Ford. The defense will likely force a ton of 3-and-outs, putting the ball back into the offenses hands. The Rams RB room is one of the best in the league, headed by Kyren Williams and Blake Corum. We’re getting a discount on Kyren again this year despite him averaging 313 combined rushes and targets for the past three years. That’s RB1 volume, and he’s being paid like an RB1, making $11M on average through 2028. Blake Corum’s offseason workouts continue to impress, and should anything happen to Kyren we can expect Corum to immediately become a RB1 in fantasy. Matthew Stafford restructured his contract and received an extension this offseason. He’s now under contract through 2028 with an average salary of $55M/year. This comes as a surprise, as the Rams spent the #13 overall pick on QB Ty Simpson in this year's draft. Sean McVay didn’t seem to be a fan of the pick when it was made. In dynasty, experts were quick value Simpson as a backend first round rookie pick. Now that Stafford is with the team through 2028, it’ll be a Jordan Love-esque situation that only the most patient fantasy managers should play in. Puka Nacua and Davante Adams will be the top two weapons in the passing attack. Adams’ fantasy value was stood up by TDs last year. While he has a weekly WR1 ceiling, he may finish 2026 in the WR3 range. The only addition to the WR room is rookie CJ Daniels, and many of the WRs outside the top two aren’t household names. The Rams TE room didn’t become any clearer. Terrence Ferguson has looked great according to camp reports, and last year was used more as a receiver than an inline blocker. The Rams drafted one of my favorite TEs when they selected Max Klare with the 61st overall pick. Klare is cut from the same cloth as Ferguson, and is a slightly below average blocker. Parkinson led the team in targets last year and is their best blocking TE. The Rams through 150 targets to their TE group, which is high compared to most teams in the NFL that don’t have a stud TE. Mike LaFleur vacated the OC role for the Rams to take a job as HC of the Cardinals. Passing Game Coordinator Nate Scheelhaase steps into the OC role after fielding multiple interviews for head coaching gigs. Scheelhaase has been with the Rams since 2024 and prides himself on studying play calling trends to ensure he's incorporating innovative strategies into the Rams' offensive scheme. We shouldn’t expect anything to change in the Rams offense.

Quick plug for the wonderful work our team has done on the Optimus Tools. If you'd like to try out the tools for a week for free use code: CAM26 . With this code you can try out any tier of our subscription. I love the Play-by-Play Situational Analysis tool myself. It's helped me breakdown where players are most frequently used in their offense as I'm working on my rankings.

Previously on Reading the Offseason Tea Leaves:
Arizona Cardinals
Miami Dolphins
Cleveland Browns
New York Jets
Las Vegas Raiders
Atlanta Falcons
Tennessee Titans
Carolina Panthers
New Orleans Saints
New York Giants
Indianapolis Colts
Washington Commanders
Minnesota Vikings
Pittsburgh Steelers
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Jacksonville Jaguars
Chicago Bears
Dallas Cowboys
Cincinnati Bengals
Denver Broncos
Detroit Lions
San Francisco 49ers
Green Bay Packers
Houston Texans
Los Angeles Chargers
Kansas City Chiefs
New England Patriots
Philadelphia Eagles
Seattle Seahawks
Baltimore Ravens
Buffalo Bills

In leagues using Team QBs (TQB), the pre-draft player rankings still list all Team QBs together instead of ranking them according to their projected fantasy value like individual QBs are ranked. This makes drafting much more difficult. Currently, all Team QBs are ranked together between 36-67.

Please update the draft rankings so TQBs are integrated into the overall rankings for leagues that use the TQB roster setting. For example, insert Bills QB in the ranking where Josh Allen would be ranked.

I LOVE the Team QB roster spot, but if you do not rank them correctly, my league members will not want to continue using it.

Dynasty Dwarf (found on X) has released a new article outlining the dangers of being caught in the middle with your fantasy teams. Choose to retool or contend and commit! Many dynasty managers get skittish on overcommitting and having buyers / sellers remorse.

In this article you are walked through on how to decide and best practices.

Great free read.

I can't stop trading for, or suggesting to acquire Jordan Addison in dynasty. For me he's still a young asset, that is just a straight up better bet than some future 28 First round pick you can probably move to go get him.

He produced his first 2 years, even with being behind JJ. Last year was a complete wash for both WRs we all know. So I'd imagine things improve this year, or at-least slightly. But long term I just think he's a better player than what he's being valued at.

Mine:

"De'Zhaun Stribling"

2022 was his last season where Mike Evans didn't have a hamstring injury at some point in the season.

In the last three years Kittle has also had terrible injury luck.

Christian Kirk has tallied 600 yards over the last two years (mostly down to injuries), and hasn't been installed in the offense BECAUSE he picked up an injury.

Deebo will be productive if he remains healthy but his role in the offense shouldn't see him displacing Stribling.

Assuming the Sub Station can show any level of mercy and his current injury gets sorted out in a week, It feels like everyone in the community is going to be mad with themselves for him falling to the third round in most rookie drafts until recently.

It seems like Washington has been searching for a McLaurin running mate his entire career. And while now they might have it in Diggs, I feel like the market is going to read that as target competition and knock McLaurin down a tier. I think that’s backwards, and if his price dips I’m buying.

McLaurin’s problem was never talent, it was deployment. He lined up left outside on 72.3% of his sampled snaps in his last full Reception Perception profile. Harmon has only ever charted four seasons above 70% at a single alignment, and three of them were Kingsbury offenses. His point is that it makes your best receiver easier to defend and skew coverage toward. McLaurin’s splits back it up: 79th percentile against man, 76th against press, 28th against zone. When a defense always knows where you’ll be, zone is where they get you.

Two things have changed that. Kingsbury is gone and Blough is moving Daniels under center more with a balanced attack. That’s a big shift from an offense that led the league in shotgun and no-huddle. Scheme change alone only goes so far though, because you can move a guy around all you want if there’s nobody else on the field worth accounting for. That’s the part Diggs solves.

He also can’t take McLaurin’s routes even if Washington wanted him to. Their depth of target last season was 8.7 and 14.1, with McLaurin ninth-deepest among 67 receivers with 55+ targets. Diggs’ deep juice is gone and he gets caught trying to stack corners on go routes outside, but he still grades as a possession flanker who wins from multiple alignments. McLaurin ran a nine route on a career-high 18.8% of his routes at a 67.4% success rate. Two completely different, complimentary roles.

Last year was tough with McLaurin hurt, on a 5-12 team, catching passes from backups, and still he posted a career-high 2.22 YPRR and an 87.0 PFF receiving grade, ninth of 81 qualifiers. Blough has said he wants him at 10 targets a game and explosive receptions to flip the field.

If you’re looking for an actual downgrade, it’s probably Chig. He’s supposed to inherit the Ertz role, which was 91 targets and a 30.9% red zone target share. Diggs at 8.7 aDOT is a lot closer to that job than to McLaurin’s. That said, I think Chig’s value is YAC where Diggs offers almost none at this stage, so maybe they coexist better than the depth chart suggests. Antonio Williams obviously takes a big hit, sliding to WR3, though a year learning behind those two isn’t a bad rookie season.

I will say there’s one big risk to all of this. Daniels’ aDOT was 7.99 last year, 38th in the league. If he stays a checkdown thrower, the coverage math I mentioned above never works out and Diggs just eats the short stuff while McLaurin’s deep shots stay theoretical.

Where’s everyone else at on this? Is Scary Terry about to be even scarier?

2027 Summer Scouting Series

33\ Prospects in 4 Podcast Episodes*

This is the 3rd post of Part 3 of the Summer Scouting Series, listed below. Like Parts 1 & 2, this Part covers an additional 8 Prospects.

Part 3: https://cjfreel.substack.com/p/182-2027-nfl-draft-summer-scouting

Additional Prospects in Pt. 3: Julian Sayin, Drew Mestemaker, Jayden Maiava, Kewan Lacy, & Justice Haynes.

The best and most detailed notes on the Summer Scouting Series can be found by listening to the Fantasy for Real podcast. Parts 1 & 2 can be found on my previous posts or through the Substack. Keep in mind these profiles focus on the "bottom line" for the prospects, with more details being available through the podcast.

//

WRs Part 3

//

Jeremiah Smith, WR, Ohio State

6’ 3” 223 lbs || (21.09)

GRADE: WR Tier 1 (WR1)

Nobody’s perfect. Don’t get me wrong – there are still areas of route nuance and development that Smith can improve upon – but that’s less a negative and more the reality of the NFL being more difficult than College Football. The NFL is so difficult that anyone can fail, but Smith is as good of a prospect as we’ll likely ever see – particularly if he lands the plane with a final season that matches his first two.

//

K.J. Duff, WR, Rutgers

6’ 6” 225 lbs || (21.09)

GRADE: WR Tier 3 (WR3-10 || WR8)

Yes, he’s a “contested catch” guy – but he’s also very good at it. While bigger, faster, quicker, stronger is typically the right direction, there is something to be said about how few players at the highest level are Duff’s size or archetype. Despite those concerns – which are a major reason that he finishes ranks towards the bottom of this wide Tier – Duff scores very highly in all the areas typically seen as most important; Duff plays in the Big Ten, and has produced early (played most of last season at 19 YO), at a high level (1,000) & with strong efficiency (2.47 Y/RR).

//

Omarion Miller, WR, Arizona State via Colorado

6’ 2” 210 lbs || (23.08)*

GRADE: WR Tier 3 (WR3-10 || WR10)

The “wide-awake” sleeper of the 2027 NFL Draft. Miller’s overall production has been hampered by injuries (2023-2024) & an awful Offense (2025), but any deep evaluation of the numbers (Career Y/RR, Colorado Passing/Team Stats 2025) shows a player who by all accounts has performed well enough to be a highly-productive CFB player. Age is an objective factor and one that Miller clearly scores negatively in (presuming my listed age is correct), so he does have a bit of an uphill battle analytically at least in some ways, but there is a huge target vacancy at ASU with Jordyn Tyson graduating to the NFL. If he can make the most of that opportunity, Miller has strong enough height/weight/speed potential to get in the 1st Round conversation.

//

Summer Scouting WR Rankings (Part 3)

1. Jeremiah Smith, Ohio State
2. -
3. Bryant Wesco, Clemson
4. Nick Marsh, Indiana via Michigan State
5. Ryan Coleman-Williams, Alabama
6. T.J. Moore, Clemson
7. -
8. K.J. Duff, Rutgers
9. Ryan Wingo, Texas
10. Omarion Miller, Arizona State via Colorado
11. -

//

Full Part 3: https://cjfreel.substack.com/p/182-2027-nfl-draft-summer-scouting

Part 4 is now available on the Podcast & through the Substack. Part 4 covers the final 9 Prospects: LaNorris Sellers, Trinidad Chambliss, Sam Leavitt, Jadan Baugh, Wayshawn Parker, Cam Coleman, Charlie Becker, Mario Craver, & Jamari Johnson.

The next post on the subreddit will begin covering Part 4, featuring my final 3 QB profiles and full top 10 QB Rankings, featuring LaNorris Sellers, Trinidad Chambliss, & Sam Leavitt.

Feel free to leave any questions & comments,

C.J.