Transcription
If you play in a fantasy football league, this might be the most important video you watch all year. Because today we are breaking down the seven players that I would bet my house on this season.
If you're not familiar, I'm Sal Vetri. I've helped over 10,000 people win their fantasy leagues the last few years alone, and I plan to do the same for you with this video.
And we're starting with a tight end position, a position that doesn't really get all the love in fantasy football compared to running back, wide receiver, and even quarterback, right? But tight end Tyler Warren this year is somebody that I would be betting my house on as it currently stands. Let's talk about what he did in year one because he was absolutely eating in his rookie season especially when Daniel Jones, his quarterback, was healthy.
Overall, Warren finished that season with the third most targets at the tight end position despite not playing the final five games or so of the year with his quarterback Daniel Jones. That was third in the NFL amongst tight ends, 112, over a 20% target share, very strong especially when you consider he was battling last year Michael Pittman, who earned 111 targets, breakout year for Alec Pierce who just got paid this off season, Josh Downs was still there, Jonathan Taylor's role as a pass catcher increased, and still Tyler Warren, a rookie tight end, was getting a 21.2 percent target share.
But as I mentioned, when Daniel Jones was healthy is when he really uh shined. In those 12 games with a healthy Daniel Jones, 13 fantasy points per game, uh six and a half targets per game, 57 receiving yards per game, compared to the final five games of the year without Daniel Jones when the Colts fell apart, didn't make the playoffs after a strong start in trading for Sauce Gardner at the trade deadline. What happens those final five games? Just six fantasy points per game, just 26.6 receiving yards per game. Everything started to fall apart because of that. But those first dozen or so games of the year with a healthy Daniel Jones is when you saw that tight end one potential, overall tight end one upside from Tyler Warren, exactly why he was taken in the first round of the previous year's NFL draft.
And the guy who manufactured that breakout for Warren to start the season, Daniel Jones, was now locked up on a two-year deal worth up to a hundred million dollars according to multiple sources this off season. Not only that, but Michael Pittman is also gone. He was traded to the Colts shortly after. I'm talking about basically minutes after they resigned Alec Pierce this off season. They traded Michael Pittman to the Colts, and Michael Pittman, he's walking out after posting 80 catches last year, 111 targets the two previous seasons, right? This is a guy who is going to leave a lot behind. Josh Downs, the wide receiver, should be taking on potentially a larger role in two wide receiver sets, but the guy who is going to take on probably even more of a target share of where he was already getting targeted last year is Tyler Warren.
Another thing that's important about Michael Pittman, if we pull up his stats on PlayerProfiler, last year he ran 283 slot snaps. All right, so that was 19th most in the NFL. Those are now all up for grabs. More middle of the field production is going to be there since the Colts really didn't replace Michael Pittman with anybody all that desirable in my opinion. If you look at this, if we pull up the Indianapolis Colts here on the team changes tracker, which is a part of the fantasy blueprint actually released today, you can check it out at jointheblueprint.com for 2026 while there's still spots available at the lowest price of the year, you can see right here the only guy they added was Nick Westbrook. That is a massive downgrade for Michael Pittman. That is not a guy who has proven in his career that he could successfully play at a high level or as high as Michael Pittman, especially out of the slot. And in the NFL draft, Deon Burks was one of the last picks in the draft in round seven was added. So, really for the most part, nobody was replaced here. A lot of that middle of the field production is going to go to Josh Downs, but also, most importantly, Tyler Warren. The competition is currently going to be these two guys, Josh Downs and Alec Pierce, and that's basically it. You'll still have Jonathan Taylor out of the backfield. You have Alec Pierce, who's actually coming off of a an injury that's going to take about 3 months to recover from this offseason. And Josh Downs, who it already looked like Tyler Warren was beating out last year in the middle of the field.
If we're talking about like the downsides to a profiler for a Tyler Warren, for me, the biggest thing would just be Daniel Jones himself. Like, was that a flash in the pan last year, especially now coming off of an Achilles injury? We've seen guys like Kirk Cousins and Aaron Rodgers come back from Achilles injuries and really struggle that year after, albeit those guys were much older than Daniel Jones coming off of his. So, that is really the biggest concern here, but in my opinion, a lot of that concern about Daniel Jones is baked into the price point of Tyler Warren. According to DraftKings ADP, this is on DraftKings, that's where I'm drafting right now basketball drafts this summer, and you should, too. They have a lot of awesome drafts out there and available at all different buying levels. He's the tight end for in drafts, which might feel like an expensive price tag. But if you look at this, the 58th overall player on DraftKings. This means that Tyler Warren is a fifth round pick and very close to being a sixth round pick in fantasy drafts. If you're talking about your elite tight ends, Trey McBride, Brock Bowers, those guys are going to go in the first two rounds of drafts. Colson Loveland might even go in the third round of the draft by the time it's all said and done. He's currently going in the early fourth round. And then you can get a discount on Tyler Warren rounds later after what he already did as a rookie and now there's even more targets up for grabs.
I like that a lot. I also really like Kyren Williams this year based on where he goes currently right now. Because the last two seasons he's been declared a bad pick in the round two of fantasy drafts. In both of those seasons he finished as an RB1. Check it out for yourself. You can see right here, these last two seasons Kyren Williams and he had kind of different workloads in each of these years, right? 2024 he had the massive workload of over 300 touches, a career high. Last year it dropped to 259 carries, but still a strong role. 36 catches, average 4.8 yards per attempt. So really regained the efficiency after not as efficient on a bigger workload in 2024. But most importantly, both of these seasons when he was declared a bad pick, top 10 finish at RB. Obviously the year before that was his big breakout with a second overall finish. Always scoring touchdowns in a good Rams offense that should continue to be good this year with Matt Stafford coming off of an MVP season. You still have Sean McVay, you still have Demarcus Robinson Puka Nacua right there. Going to move the ball and get to the red zone for more touchdowns for Kyren Williams.
Now Kyren's ended his year pretty strong. Like 15.2 fantasy points per game despite being later in the season and dealing with bumps and bruises. He had 15 carries per game, 76 rushing yards per game. When you add in receiving yards, he had over 90 yards per game during this stretch. When you look at the postseason, they trusted him, but it was still kind of a split backfield, right? Blake Corum had 13 carries, Kyren had 13 carries, but he was operating as more in the more important situations. On passing downs, in the red zone. So when you look at this, especially in the in the division around, 21 carries for Kyren and two touchdowns, just six for Blake Corum. NFC Championship when they lose to the Seahawks, very interesting split backfield here. Nine carries for Corum, 10 for Kyren Williams. You look at the receptions, three for Blake Corum, two for Kyren Williams. So, in the most important game of the year, they went back to more of a split backfield, but you still like Kyren Williams getting those important touches by the red zone and passing downs. I think we're going to see similar usage this year. I mean, the proof is in the pudding from last year. Kyren Williams still finished as a top-10 running back despite seeing less of an opportunity share with Blake Corum still involved. But, that opportunity share was still good. 69.9% snaps was number seven in the NFL. His opportunity share was 65%, 19th in the NFL. So, it went down year before, but the efficiency remained strong and the touchdowns remained there.
Now my concern for Kyren Williams this year, if there was one, would be the fact that that the opportunity share did go down last year. If that happened to continue trending in that direction and Kyren did lose some of that goal-line work to Blake Corum, that's really upside goes away. If Kyren goes from scoring 10 to 15 touchdowns a year and now he's only scoring six, obviously a big letdown, but we're going to address that. We're going to say that based on projections, I don't think he's scoring six. I think he's going to score closer to 10-plus based on the role we're giving him from these past few seasons and the same coach still there. It is worth mentioning that the Rams, at least on offense, really did nothing this offseason. The big thing in the draft that surprised was the first-round picks, entire Ty Shelton, maybe even second-round pick in Max Duggan as a surprise, although there was a run on tight ends, but nothing in free agency in terms of noteworthy names. So, the running back position is going to be the exact same for the Rams and Kyren Williams this offseason.
But, something that is a little bit different as of this recording on DraftKings Best Ball. Again, check out DraftKings, there'll be a link in the description below. You can check out their best best ball product. He's going 32nd overall, Kyren Williams. He's currently going in the middle of the third round. In past years, it's been very frequent that he would go in either the early second or last year more often the late second round. Now, you can get him in the mid-third to late third. I think he's a value.
I also think at the quarterback position, it's really hard to not like Brock Purdy. We liked him last year. He delivered for us despite limited games. He only played in nine games. He wasn't even fully healthy in all of these. Despite that, 69% completion percentage, 7.6 yards per attempt, remained an extremely an extremely efficient and productive quarterback. Three more rushing touchdowns, top five in fantasy points per game, 20.8 fantasy points per game. Had that massive game at the end of the season in the fantasy playoffs. If you recall this, 37 points. I mean, his fantasy playoffs were incredible. This was the end of the year for him for fantasy playoffs. 26 points, 31 was the QB1, 38 was the QB1 once again. So, a great end of the season when he was actually finally healthy out there. He was absolutely fantastic. And basically now, every year as a starter, he's been a QB1. Top five last year in points per game, top 10 the year before, sixth the year before that. So, every year as a full-time starter, this guy is a QB1. Even if you go back to the rookie year in 2022 when he started that week 13 and on he averaged 18 points per game, was a beast there as well. So, you're getting four straight seasons basically as a top 10 overall, top 12 overall quarterback. Three straight as a top 10 overall quarterback, top five finish last year in points per game. And that was with not the best weapons, right? You're talking about George Kittle tearing his Achilles. And now you're uh, no Brandon Aiyuk, right? Ricky Pearsall banged up again. And now you're getting Mike Evans to sign a three-year deal. Might only end up being one year based on his age, right? But a three-year deal, he's going to be there this year, a big red zone weapon. So, this overall receiving room is completely revamped. You get Mike Evans in free agency, you get Ricky Pearsall healthy to at least start the season, you get Christian Kirk who in my opinion will start in three wide receiver sets to begin the season. That's good. George Kittle didn't have a full or like a terrible Achilles tear apparently, so he's going to be ready it seems by week one. You still have Christian McCaffrey who's coming off of arguably the best season of his career, right up there as one of the best, finally stayed healthy. So, the weapons are completely revamped.
I get it that Mike Evans is like the big addition from this off season. I get that he's older at 32 years old, coming off of like, I think it's five straight seasons of him either missing time or injury report with a hamstring. But, it's hard to ignore what he does when he's still healthy. Like, he was dominating last year when healthy. The two years before that, 1,000 yards, 1,200 yards, right? These are in his age 30 seasons, and he still had top 10 finishes in both those seasons. Still a massive red zone threat, 11 and 13 touchdowns in 2023, in 2024 his last more to fully healthy season. So, I think he's going to be a high-end red zone threat. Even if you don't like Mike Evans himself for this year because you're too worried about the injury and the age, for Brock Purdy, there's no doubt about it that this is an upgrade for him compared to what he had last year in this position.
So, if we were to be concerned about like any downside for Brock Purdy, I guess maybe it's durability. He missed eight games last year with multiple different injuries from like a toe injury, he's had the shoulder injury concerns in the past and like surgery as well. So, durability would be the only thing. He's mobile, so maybe he takes some hits. We can say that about half the quarterbacks in the NFL. Durability and mobility leading to maybe taking some unnecessary hits. But right now, it's hard to ignore Brock Purdy because he currently goes as the 91st overall player. We're talking about just like last year, a late-round quarterback. He's going on DraftKings Best Ball right now in a very similar spot that he went last year despite just showing you that he could be a top-five quarterback in points per game last year and winning fantasy leagues in the playoffs. He's going after Justin Herbert. In my opinion, that's a mistake. He's going after Patrick Mahomes. In my opinion, that's a mistake. Matthew Stafford. In my opinion, that's a mistake. I get it, he won the MVP last year, but more importantly, that was last year.
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Next up, we're going to talk about a guy in Garrett Wilson, the Jets number one wide receiver, former first overall, top 10 overall pick, who's just been dominant since he's been healthy in the NFL. This is a guy who last year we've talked about him this off season cuz he was like a a free agency winner. No big names came to him. Uh but this is a guy, in my opinion, who is prime for success where he currently goes in drafts as like a fourth round pick. Because last year, if you look at those games where he was actually healthy to start the season, the first five games of the season, not week six where he got hurt and then he came back and got hurt again, but those five games to start the season, 19 fantasy points per game on 9.6 targets per game and 76.4 receiving yards per game. He was out earning a 34.5% target share last year. That was number two in the entire NFL. He was on his way to a fourth straight thousand yard season, no doubt about it, until the injury.
Now, despite only playing in seven games in five of those games fully healthy, this is how bad the Jets offense was last year. Garrett Wilson didn't even play half the season. He played just eight games and he led the team in receiving yards with 395. That's how bad this offense was. Nobody topped 400 receiving yards. The guy who only played half the season was your leading receiver. Brutal. Because the Jets last year, due to all their bad quarterbacks, they ranked dead last in passing yards per game by almost 500 yards to the next closest team. The Browns had no quarterbacks. The Titans had a rookie with no weapons around him. The Vikings quarterback situation and even the Raiders was awful last year. And all those teams threw for like 500 more yards than the Jets. That's because that's how bad this offense was. That's exactly what Garrett Wilson was dealing with last year and really every year of his Jets career. We can pull it up right here. This is the Jets quarterbacks who started games uh per year right here. Last year, Garrett Wilson was dealing with Justin Fields, Tyrod Taylor, and Brady Cook right here. He didn't play in in some of these games with some of these quarterbacks, but Justin Fields, more importantly, to start the season and some Tyrod Taylor. The year before that, it was Aaron Rodgers who was just check-down city at that point in his career, but he still saw a big Garrett Wilson season despite battling Davante Adams. The year before that, you're getting Zach Wilson experiments those two years. Trevor Siemian, Tim Boyle was starting games and those were some ugly games. And still, in those years when he was healthy, he was topping a thousand yards.
And now he might actually have the best quarterback of his career entering 2026, which is crazy. Right up there with like an older version of Aaron Rodgers from 2024. But that quarterback, as you now probably know, would be Geno Smith, who the Jets went out there and traded for because they didn't want Geno Smith hitting the open market as a free agent if the Raiders cut him and then any team can sign him. The Jets said, "No, we want Geno Smith to be our guy." At least for the next year. And look, I get it. Last year was brutal. 6.8 yards per attempt, 67% completion. He was throwing interceptions left and right. But if you look at the three seasons before that, when he actually had some decent weapons and coaching around he didn't have with the Raiders last year. You look at the three seasons before that, look what Geno Smith was doing. From 2022 to 2023, this was a guy who was going out there throwing for 4,300 yards, 3,600, 4,200, had a 70 set a 70% completion percentage on 578 pass attempts in 2024. He was very good. That's when he had weapons. That's when he had sound and coaching in Seattle. Now, who knows if that's going to be the case this year, but the Jets do have weapons. They drafted a bunch. They have Garrett Wilson. They just extended Breece Hall. And they do have new coaching, so we'll see what happens here. But as of right now, the competition competition is going to be for Garrett Wilson, Adonai Mitchell, who I actually like, former second-round pick, could have been a first-round pick that year he came out of Texas if there wasn't some like asthma problems and like character concerns. But either way, Garrett Wilson way better wide receiver than an Adonai Adonai Mitchell. And then after that, you're talking about Omar Cooper, who the Jets traded up for to draft in the first round. Think he'll be out there in three wide receiver sets. Should be solid. And then you're going to have solid tight ends in Mason Taylor and Kenyon Seddik, the first-round pick Kenyon Seddik from this year. So, there's more target competition, definitely, compared to this time last year or at least the start of the season last year when Adonai Mitchell wasn't there. I don't think John Metchie was there at that point when Garrett Wilson was going off. It was basically just Garrett Wilson and second-round rookie at that point, Mason Taylor. So, expect some more competition in terms of targets, but like the only honest concern I can think of would be Garrett Wilson coming back this year. One, his health coming off of an injury. And what does the Geno Garrett Wilson connection look like because these guys have never played together and Geno is coming off of a down season. But overall, I think in the fourth round where he's currently going in Best Ball drafts as the 46th overall player, the late fourth, early fifth round, I think this is going to rise over the summer. I definitely want him over Zay Flowers and Ameka Egbuka who currently go uh potentially close to a round before him. Give me Garrett Wilson around four. At that price right now, he is definitely somebody that I would consider betting my quote-unquote house on.
And the same is true for Amari on Hampton, uh the now second-year player, the running back, the 23-year-old for the Los Angeles Chargers, their first-round pick 22nd overall last year. I mean, this is a guy who uh by all accounts is walking into a situation this year where it should be upgraded. Uh the new offensive coordinator, new pieces they did this off season. He himself is healthy. In my opinion, less competition than he had at this point last year to start the season with Najee Harris who's there on a new contract. And now Najee Harris, as of this recording, is currently a free agent.
If we look at Amari on Hampton, if you're not familiar, this guy was a mega producer in college. Final year there, almost 1,700 rushing yards alone. When you factor in his receiving yards, he went for over 2,000 yards, 5.9 yards per carry, 17 touchdowns, 38 catches. He was able to do everything and check every box from a production standpoint. He then went to the NFL draft. Probably surprised some people, including myself, how good of an athlete he was. 86th percentile uh 40 time at a 4.46 40 for a 220-lb running back is great. That's 93rd 93rd percentile speed, according to PlayerProfiler. This is nerd talk for saying he had top 10% speed to ever attend the combine at his size and position. Uh burst score top 10% as well. So, everything checked the boxes there, but his rookie season was a down year because he had a slow start, really the first two games of the year were slow start. People were panicking. And then he dealt with injuries for most of the year. But if you look at the games where Najee Harris got hurt, it was a three-game sample without Najee Harris before Amari on Hampton's injury, he was breaking out. In the first game, 19 carries, so massive workload. This is the game Najee gets hurt and then just six for Najee. 70 rushing yards and a touchdown. Then you factor in that he also had six catches for 58 yards, so he goes for 130 yards and a touchdown in this game. Then the next week when Najee Harris doesn't play at all, he already tore the Achilles, he's done for the year. 12 carries, 128 yards and a touchdown for Amari on Hampton. Oh, yeah, let's add five catches for 37 yards. So, over 160 yards in this game. And then the final game when Amari on Hampton ends up getting injured, 12 carries 44 yards on the ground. So, that's not great. He gets hurt in this game, but he was able to pick up six catches for 26 yards in your half PPR and PPR formats. That's fantastic. That's the type of upside he gives you, but the problem was after that, he ends up suffering an injury that maybe you people thought was only going to be a four-week injury. He ends up missing like half the season.
But now heading into 2026, there's no more Najee Harris, and he has a new offensive coordinator in Mike McDaniel, who in my opinion was one of the if not the best offensive coordinator or coaching options on the open market. Uh in my opinion, the Dolphins made a mistake by letting him go. But Mike McDaniel is a guy who's just going to provide a lot of upside to run games and provide a lot of upside to running back specifically. In three straight seasons, he's had an RB1. He's had four RB1s in the last three seasons. Uh the first one was Raheem Mostert back in 2023 when he was the RB3 overall because of his uh touchdowns he had that year, 21 total touchdowns. And then Devon Achane these last three years uh has been a top RB since he joined the NFL. Since he's entered the league with Mike McDaniel, top five running back back in 20 uh 23 despite Raheem Mostert being there, top 10 running back when Mostert was gone in 2024, and last year his best year ever over 20 fantasy points per game, a top five running back scoring touchdowns every single year. This is the type of upside that Marion Hampton and maybe even Keon Mitchell, who's now in this backfield, are looking at with Mike McDaniel calling the offense.
Speaking of Keon Mitchell, if we look at the Chargers off season changes in terms of offense that are fantasy relevant, you can see here a lot of changes, whether it's the draft, whether it's additions or subtractions in free agency and trades. Offensive line got a revamp. They signed a run-blocking tight end Charlie Kolar, a run-blocking well, a fullback. And Alec Ingold, they brought in Keon Mitchell, who's going to replace Najee Harris. He's more of a speedster, totally different running back. I don't think he's that big of a threat, maybe a couple of touches per game designed for him. For the most part, your former first-round pick that uh Jim Harbaugh, the head coach, is still there. The guys who ended up drafting him are still there. And he's a talented running back in Hampton. He's going to shine in this offense. He currently goes in the early third, probably will go in the second round of most drafts. I think that's fine where for where he currently goes uh right around guys like Jeremiah Love and Chase Brown. I think all these guys are solid picks. Kyren Williams is here as well who we talked about. So, this is really like a nice sweet spot these four running backs in this range. Hampton is the one that I potentially want the most in this overall range. A great pick that is a player I would want to be betting my house on.
But, before we continue, I have to let you know that as of this video dropping today, which is June 1st, you might be watching this later on, the Fantasy Blueprint is now officially live and on sale at the lowest price it will be all year, but that is only going to last for 1 week, so you have to take advantage of it right now. You can check it out with the link in the description below or by typing in jointheblueprint.com. It will take you to this page There's a video explaining everything about the Fantasy Blueprint. There's a lot of information of what's in there. Uh people's real-life testimonials are in here as well. A little bit about me, if you don't know about me and my experience winning 75% of my leagues last year. The Blueprint has helped confirmed over 10,000 people win their fantasy leagues the last few seasons alone. Here's a lot more testimonials that you can check out as well. That is at jointheblueprint.com. Again, it's very important that for a limited time only, the price will be the cheapest it will be with the launch date and the launch week all year. So, if you know that you're going to get it in August or you're thinking about it or you got it last year and you want to get it this year, now is the exact time you need to do that. The price is going up in a week.
Next up, let's talk about Jaylen Waddle who is on a brand new team now with the Denver Broncos. He leaves Miami. In my opinion, that should help him this year in terms of overall offensive upside. This is a guy who's coming off of being a wide receiver 28, his worst season in a couple of years. Tua got benched. Tua didn't play well. The offense completely fell apart. He only had Waddle going for 910 receiving yards despite Tyreek Hill missing basically the entire season, despite Jaylen Waddle being healthier than he was in 2024, only had 100 targets, 910 receiving yards. Did have some big games in there as well, but the offense just completely fell apart. The quarterback situation was not good by any means. We even had Quinn Ewers starting some games as a rookie at a Texas last year, a late round pick. But, although the overall accounting stats were down last year, on a per route basis, he was very good. Top six in the NFL in first downs per route run. Top 10 in yards per route run. Potentially the best efficiency metric we have overall is yards per route run. So, this is still a Jaylen Waddle that is a very good, productive wide receiver, just needs a change of scenery. And really, just means some real quarterback play in a real offensive infrastructure.
When we saw that years ago, right, with Tua Tagovailoa, when we saw that in 2022, despite Tyreek Hill being there for the first year and leading the NFL in receiving yards, top 10 in receiving yards was also Jaylen Waddle with almost 1,400. When we saw that same thing in 2023, uh with Tyreek Hill being there, you got over 1,000 yards for Jaylen Waddle on 72 catches. The problem is these last 2 years, Tua has been inconsistent. He dealt with crazy concussions as well in 20202024. And we just haven't seen the production out of Jaylen Waddle because of the quarterback play. But now he goes to the Denver Broncos, where he should get better quarterback play this year in Bo Nix, who last year proved, especially down the stretch, that he could be one of the better quarterbacks in the NFL. Specifically, Nix last year, if you want to look at it, I mean, this was a quietly very pass-heavy team. You think about them maybe being a run-first team under Sean Payton, not at all. Number one in the NFL with 612 pass attempts. Number three with 71 deep ball attempts, right? This was a guy who ranked top 10 overall in passing touchdowns. He ranked top 10 in passing yards, right, with almost 4,000, 231 per game, despite the games being quicker and the uh more run game, you still got a big year out of Bo Nix, and that contributed to the overall offense being very productive. In 2025, the Broncos ranked top 10 in total yards per game and 14th in points per game, compared to the Dolphins, who ranked 26th in yards per game and 25th in points per game.
Now, compared to what the Dolphins are going to have this year at wide receiver, there's much more competition for Jaylen Waddle, but that's fine because the entire offense should be better. There's still Courtland Sutton, who's a red-zone and chain-moving option downfield. There's still Marvin Mims and Troy Franklin, who have showed flashes in the NFL, but nowhere near the type of player that Jaylen Waddle is. In my opinion, I know Courtland Sutton is there, he's getting older at this point, he's probably out of his prime. I think Jaylen Waddle is a much better wide receiver at any point in their careers, especially right now, dating back to college, than Courtland Sutton. The potential downsides for Jaylen Waddle, I think the like most obvious one here is just the fact that he's in a brand new wide receiver room, he's on a new team, there's already established connection for Bo Nix and Courtland Sutton and Troy Franklin and Marvin Mims and all these guys that are out there. And also, Jaylen Waddle is a little bit older, 27 and 1/2. I still think he could be in his prime of his career and he hasn't topped 1,000 yards in a couple of years. We've already addressed those concerns as to why. 2024, Tua injuries, overall offense was kind of murky, not giving Waddle a lot of productive routes in terms of like middle-of-the-field stuff. And then this past year you had the injuries uh and just benching of Tua and just terrible quarterback play. Waddle currently goes in the fifth round, sometimes the sixth round as the 56th overall player. That's somebody that you want to bet your house on in my opinion in fantasy. He looks great this year.
And so does Terry McLaurin. Now, I'm not somebody who wants to be drafting guys who are going to be 31 years old by the time we're at the season this year, and that's what Terry McLaurin's going to be, especially guys coming off of a season where they were banged up, where they had a down year. Like this is not a good trend for wide receivers, but hear me out. Because the last time Terry McLaurin was healthy, just a year before that, wasn't dealing with contract uh dispute situations which impacted his 2024 season, maybe led to the injury, wasn't with the team the entire training camp. But in 2024, when he was healthy and Jayden Daniels was healthy, played all 17 games, had 82 catches, topped 1,000 yards, had 13 touchdowns, which was the second most in the NFL, and he was an absolute monster that year. That's when he had a good quarterback who was healthy in Jayden Daniels. He and Jayden Daniels were both banged up last year. But it's hard to not believe that Terry McLaurin was one of the biggest offseason winners, especially at the wide receiver position.
If we pull up the Team Tenders Tracker in the Fantasy Blueprint, check it out at jointheblueprint.com, like who did they bring in this offseason? Okay, they bring in a tight end, Cole Kmet, fine, he'll replace Zach Ertz. We'll see if that's even noteworthy. They bring in Van Jefferson and T.Y. Hilton Brown comes back to the team, the team that drafted him. None of these guys are threats, they're journeyman wide receivers. And they draft a third-round pick in Antonio Williams, who I do like, but he's still a third-round rookie, mostly a slot wide receiver. What left this offense? Deebo Samuel left this offense. Zach Ertz left this offense. There's over 170 vacated targets now up for grabs in the Commanders offense this year, and Jayden Daniels is going to be healthy now. So the updated target competition is pretty depressing here. Like there's no target competition for Terry McLaurin. I wouldn't be shocked if he sets a career high with like 150 targets. You're talking about Look at this. Jaylen Lane, Luke McCaffrey as a rookie last year, uh had a season-ending injury and he himself did not break out all that much. Jamari Brooks, a third-round pick and Antonio Williams. Like the starting wide receivers on this team as of right now are going to be Antonio Williams, Terry McLaurin, and one of Dyami Brown or Jamison. My money would be on Dyami Brown, but we'll see. There's also the chance that they sign one of these free agent veterans. Brandon Aiyuk obviously linked to this team because he has a connection with Jayden Daniels. They're good friends. They played together during their time in college at Arizona State. But Brandon Aiyuk's probably not going to be out of his contract until September 1st with the 49ers. Who knows if he's even going to play football. He's now an older wide receiver who hasn't played meaningful football in a year and a half. So like can we trust this guy? Who knows.
The only downsides right now for Terry McLaurin where he currently goes in drafts is that he's getting a little bit older. There's durability concerns for himself and even his quarterback who's a mobile quarterback. And maybe the Commanders go out there and sign a Brandon Aiyuk and he still has juice. Maybe the Commanders go out there and sign a Stefon Diggs and he still has juice and that cuts into the target upside of Terry McLaurin. But as of this recording and even if those guys by the time you're watching this were to join the team, I think Terry McLaurin where he currently goes is the 65th overall player in the sixth round of fantasy drafts is an absolute steal. I think this is a great place to get Terry McLaurin factoring in all the contacts that we just talked about. I think he's somebody you want to be betting your house on.
So there you have it. These seven players that you want to bet your house on in fantasy this year. The fantasy blueprint is also officially live right now on June 1st. So be sure to check it out. That is linked down below or you can head to jointheblueprint.com. I appreciate you all a ton. Now if you want to see the five wide receivers who could be fantasy football league winners this year, you can check out that video right here. I think it's going to help you out a ton and I'll see you in the next one.