If you are a serious fantasy football player, you know the importance of avoiding busts with your first few picks. As the saying goes, “You don’t win your fantasy football draft in the first round, but you can lose it.” Today, we will be looking at three players in the first two rounds that you should avoid selecting in your upcoming drafts.
For the purpose of this article, we will be using the average draft positions (ADP) listed below are from standard 12-team PPR leagues via MyFantasyLeague.com.
Keep in mind we are not using the words “fantasy football bust” with these players; sometimes the juice of where you need to take them isn’t worth the squeeze.
Kansas City Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes (ADP: 8.4)
What a start to Patrick Mahomes has had for his career. After just two years as a starting quarterback, he’s already accumulated an NFL MVP, a Super Bowl ring and a Super Bowl MVP award. In only 31 career regular-season starts, he’s thrown for 9,412 yards and 76 touchdowns. But despite all those accomplishments, he’s still a bad first-round pick that you should avoid at all costs.
Mahomes is likely to have another monster season for the Chiefs and it’s very likely that he could win another MVP award. However, the value just isn’t there in the first-round to warrant being picked inside the top-10. And the same could be said for Lamar Jackson as the quarterback position stretches well into the double-digit rounds.
While it’s unlikely that Mahomes will “bust” without an injury, missing out on the top running backs is just too difficult to overcome. Instead, let your opponents take Mahomes and Jackson early and, alternatively, target solid, consistent quarterbacks like Tom Brady or high-upside players like Jimmy Garoppolo 10-11 rounds later.
Kansas City Chiefs WR Tyreek Hill (ADP: 16.3)
Like Mahomes, Tyreek Hill is probably someone you should avoid in the top-20 of your draft despite being an elite talent. Hill has been named a Pro Bowler every year of his career and has scored at least seven touchdowns from scrimmage in each season.
While Hill had somewhat of a down year by his standards, but it wouldn’t be surprising if he returned to his 1,200 yards, 12 touchdown self this season. However, the wide receiver position is deeper than ever and you can find 1,000-yard receivers rounds and rounds later. For that reason, you should avoid picking Hill in the second round in favor of a player at a scarcer position, such as running back or tight end.
But if you are dead-set on getting a piece of the Chiefs’ offense, consider selecting Travis Kelce around the same range. He offers the same upside, but the drop-off from Kelce to TE7 or TE8 is massive.
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Tampa Bay Buccaneers WR Chris Godwin (ADP: 23.4)
As we mentioned with Hill, the wide receiver position incredibly deep this year. A good, general strategy this season is to avoid picking a receiver in the first three or four rounds and instead load up on running backs and tight ends.
Of all the receivers being drafted inside the first two rounds, the one you should avoid the most is Chris Godwin of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. While it’s easy to get excited about Godwin after his fantastic 2019 season, there are some reasons to be pessimistic this season.
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The biggest reason is that he’s unlikely to repeat his efficiency from last season. Godwin caught 71 percent of his targets, averaging over 11 yards per target last season. He saw 121 targets last season and with the additions of players like Rob Gronkowski and LeSean McCoy, it feels likely that Tom Brady will spread the ball around even more this season.
Another problem for Godwin is that he isn’t the clear-cut No. 1 receiver on the roster. Mike Evans continues to be a superstar in the NFL as he went over 1,000 receiving yards for the sixth-straight season to start his career. Evans could easily see more targets than Godwin this season, limiting his upside.
Godwin is going to be a productive receiver in this offense. However, it’s hard to envision a scenario in which he out-produces his ADP. And given what we know about the depth of receivers in fantasy drafts, pass on Godwin in the second round of your fantasy drafts in favor of players like George Kittle, Austin Ekeler and Kenyan Drake.
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