Our analysts have put together fantasy football outlooks for all fantasy-relevant players. You can find them on our player pages and via our Expert Consensus Rankings (ECR). These will be updated throughout the preseason to help you navigate your fantasy football drafts utilizing our bevy of tools, including our FREE draft simulator and cheat sheet creator. We’ll cover players in different groups to help you identify those to target and others to avoid. Let’s take a look at Konami Code quarterbacks to consider in fantasy football drafts.
By now, most fantasy football managers have heard of the term Konami Code. As it sounds, it’s become a cheat code of sorts. Rich Hribar of Sharp Football Analysis coined the term as it relates to fantasy football. In his words from this 2013 article:
If you’ve never played Contra, it doesn’t matter (except we can never be friends). What’s important is that this is the most famous cheat code ever created. And I’m here to tell you that the Konami Code has been entered into our game of Fantasy Football, namely the rushing quarterbacks and how they affect standard scoring.
Since then, rushing quarterbacks have taken the league by storm. It’s important to know of the strategy and identify potential Konami Code quarterbacks to target in fantasy football drafts. Here’s a look at 2023’s crop of Konami Code quarterbacks.
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Fantasy Football Konami Code Quarterback Draft Targets
Here are 2023 Konami Code quarterbacks. Pat Fitzmaurice provides his outlook for each of the QBs listed.
Josh Allen finished QB2 in fantasy scoring behind Patrick Mahomes last season after finishing QB1 in 2020 and 2021. Allen remains capable of putting fantasy teams on his shoulders in any given week with multi-TD spike games. He’s thrown for more than 4,000 yards in three straight seasons and has finished with 35 to 37 TD passes every year during that span. Allen adds immense value with his legs. He’s run for 700+ yards in each of the last two years and has had at least six TD runs in each of his five NFL seasons. Allen is likely to be the first QB off the board in most 2023 fantasy drafts.
Hurts gave us a taste of his fantasy potential in 2021 and then cooked a seven-course meal in 2022, improving his passing numbers across the board, providing enormous rushing value and leading all quarterbacks with 25.6 fantasy points per game. Hurts was a highly efficient passer in his second full season as a starter, completing 66.5% of his throws at 8.0 yards per attempt, with a miniscule 1.3% INT rate. But it’s the running game where Hurts really makes his bones. He ran for 13 touchdowns last year and has 23 TD runs over the last two seasons. Hurts has topped 750 rushing yards in each of the last two seasons, averaging 51.5 rushing yards per game over that span. He plays behind one of the best offensive lines in football and can throw to three terrific targets: A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith and Dallas Goedert. Hurts belongs on the top QB tier along with Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes.
Drafters might get a slight discount on Lamar Jackson this year after a second consecutive season in which injuries limited him to 12 games. In 2021, it was bone bruise in his ankle that prematurely ended Jackson’s season. In 2022, it was a sprained PCL in his knee. Jackson has been a lethal running threat throughout his career, averaging 63.4 rushing yards per game over his five NFL seasons. Jackson will be playing for new, pass-friendlier offensive coordinator Todd Monken after the Ravens parted ways with Greg Roman. Even with the uncertainty and the recent injuries, Jackson is still an upper-echelon fantasy quarterback capable of a QB1 finish.
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