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5 Boom or Bust Players (Fantasy Football)

5 Boom or Bust Players (Fantasy Football)
Brandin Cooks

Brandin Cooks is a prime candidate for touchdown regression in 2016

One of the hardest parts of drafting a solid fantasy football team is to know whether a high-risk player is going to payoff for you and your lineup. There are times when one of these “boom or bust” players is worth drafting, but for the most part, you will do better by sticking with the players that have the highest likelihood of success in a fantasy league setting.

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Blake Bortles (QB – JAC)
The Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback had a surprisingly great season last year. He averaged 276.8 yards per game last year and threw 35 touchdowns, some of the best numbers in the game. However, if you look at the top 10 QBs from last year in the yards/game category, he had more interceptions than anyone else with 18. There’s a pretty strong chance that Bortles’ great season was a fluke. If this is a risk you’re willing to take, he could once again have a great season, but there’s an equally good chance that he will disappoint.

Rob Gronkowski (TE – NE)
This is sure to be a controversial choice as a “boom or bust” candidate, but with New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady being out for the first several games of the season, much of Gronkowski’s ability to produce is likely to disappear. Don’t get me wrong, Gronk is the best tight end in the NFL right now. But, he has also had the backing of one of the most accurate QBs in the league throwing to him. It’s hard to tell just how much of his performance is his own raw talent, or because he had the QB with the third highest amount of passing yards in the league targeting him. He will still be a fantasy threat, and probably will be worth adding in the latter part of the season, but you should avoid him for the first half of the season. He will be expensive, and his statistics are not going to be as strong as they could be. He’s certainly not a first-round pick this year, and maybe not even worthy of a second-round pick.

Brandin Cooks (WR – NO)
Cooks, the wide receiver for the New Orleans Saints, was a fantasy favorite for many last year. However, the Saints have a much different field this year, and Cooks will not be the only choice for QB Drew Brees. He will have Mark Ingram receiving more than last year, and rookie Michael Thomas will be a contender for targets, too. Cooks had nine touchdowns last season, but only two of them were thrown to him when he was in the red zone. In other words, although he has potential, there’s a greater possibility of him fizzling this season. There’s no doubt that he has potential—he showed us all that last year. But there’s more room for him to disappoint than ever before.

Jimmy Graham (TE – SEA)
The Seattle Seahawks’ tight end suffered a devastating patella injury last year, one that very few athletes are able to come back from. He ranked 8th of all TEs in the game when considering yards per game, but the odds of him coming back at the same level are pretty bad. However, he could still be a fantasy contributor, and because he’s likely to be available in latter rounds of the draft, he might be worth considering. There’s more downside than up with him, but he could be a decent value depending on where he is taken.

Devonta Freeman (RB – ATL)
Freeman had a great season with the Atlanta Falcons last year. The running back turned in some great numbers, finishing 7th overall when it came to total rushing yards for the season. He also had 11 touchdowns, putting him in a four-way tie for first with the most TDs by a running back. Freeman isn’t the Falcons only choice this year at RB, though. With Tevin Coleman healthy, confident, and a year older, Freeman is likely to find himself being relied on less and less over the year. However, because Coleman has had a shaky beginning to his career, Freeman could thrive once again. This is a 50/50 gamble in my book, setting Freeman up as a perfect Boom/Bust candidate.

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Matthew Young is a correspondent at FantasyPros. For more from Matthew, check out his archive and his blog at www.windailyfantasy.com or follow him at @AuthorMGYoung.

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