When I was growing up, bringing home an A on a math test was a big deal. I was a fine student elsewhere but I was to math as Peyton Manning was to the read option. It wasn’t my thing. My brother, however, was Lamar Jackson at Louisville. He was a math machine. An A on a math test wasn’t a big deal, it was expected.

That brief anecdote and self-massaging Peyton Manning comparison is all to say – tiers in fantasy football require interpretation.

What made a player an RB1, WR1, etc and why? Did they beat their average draft position? What does it tell us about the position as a whole, going forward into next season’s drafts? Adam Thielen finishing as the WR15? Impressive. Expected? Maybe not, but it’s great for us Thielen managers this year. Tony Pollard finishing as the RB14 however, was my brother getting an A-minus in math. It’s far from a disappointment, but the standard was much higher.

Let’s break down our top tier at each position and hypothesize their relevance heading into next season.

• 2024 Dynasty Fantasy Football Draft Kit
• 2024 NFL Draft Guide
• 2024 NFL Mock Draft: First & Second Round Picks

2023 Fantasy Scoring Tiers

Quarterback

The grand total of points needed to finish the year as a QB1: 264.9

Russell Wilson, this year’s QB12 scored the second-fewest points of any QB12 in the last six seasons. This was a bit of an outlier considering higher QB scoring in recent years. Injuries could definitely account for this as well. When sorting by points per game, names such as Joe Flacco, Kirk Cousins and Kyler Murray are all in the top 12.

Here is a list of the QB12 since 2018:

• 2023: Russell Wilson, 264.9 points
• 2022: Justin Herbert, 272.5
• 2021: Derek Carr, 255.3
• 2020: Matt Ryan, 293.3
• 2019: Tom Brady, 271.6
• 2018: Kirk Cousins, 283.1

The first quarterback tier also had both a lower floor and a lower ceiling. This was the first season in four seasons to have only two quarterbacks average more than 22 fantasy points per game (Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts).

I have a hard time buying any spinning of numbers leading to a conclusion other than – more often than not, draft a quarterback later rather than earlier.

If you landed on Allen or Hurts, congratulations. You likely drafted them in the first or second round. You probably drafted them before Travis Etienne (RB2), Derrick Henry (RB10) and Amon-Ra St. Brown (WR3). How are the people who drafted Patrick Mahomes over CeeDee Lamb feeling?

If we draft a quarterback in the first three rounds, there’s a good chance we’ll end up with a QB1. Mahomes, in a down year, was the QB7. However, in standard leagues, where RB and WR positions take up five or six roster spots, drafting a high-end player there can still give us a greater advantage positionally and in terms of roster construction.

Streaming this year was still much easier to do filling only one position: QB, rather than rolling multiple dice to concoct two running backs, two receivers and one or two flex spots.

Running Back

Of this season’s top 12 running backs, only three (Christian McCaffrey, Bijan Robinson, Derrick Henry) had average draft positions in the first round prior to this season per fantasydata.com.

That’s the fewest number of players drafted in the first round finishing as RB1s since the 2016 season.

What does this tell us for next season? For starters, keep drafting your stud wide receivers in the first round. More on that in the next section.

To me, this number seems like a regression to the mean candidate. Has the fantasy community all of a sudden lost the ability to evaluate which running backs should be selected in the first round? It’s more likely this number will get a bit more normal next season, which means we should avoid being overly reactive.

If we evaluate the best pick in next year’s first round at any given point to be a running back, we shouldn’t pass on that running back simply because he’s a running back. I suspect there will be tons of value at the running back position in drafts next year because of how exceptionally volatile it was this season.

Keep drafting talent.

The poster child for this fantasy football commandment is Bijan Robinson. This season his situation was lamented to the point that if you weren’t paying attention, you might think he was getting outright benched. The narrative surrounding Robinson (and justifiably so) was that he was getting egregiously underworked. He finished as the RB12 – an RB1.

Your sixth-overall pick finishing as the RB12 did not lose you a fantasy season.

Additionally, Breece Hall, someone anyone would agree is spectacularly talented and explosive, was the RB14 in drafts, selected in the third or fourth round. He finished as the RB4. Were we really that worried about Dalvin Cook and an injury from last season that didn’t keep Hall out of a single game this year?

Wide Receiver

Once again, highly-drafted wide receivers (mostly) returned their value.

Look at Ja’Marr Chase, for example. Jake Browning played nearly half the season instead of Joe Burrow and Chase still finished as the WR10.

Drafting wide receivers early has become the status quo over the last few seasons and I don’t think it’s going anywhere. Receivers are generally on the field more than running backs.

Targets are more valuable than carries in terms of fantasy points. Backup wide receivers don’t (often) come out of nowhere and completely supplant an alpha number one wide receiver. There’s less ambiguity about pecking order at the top of depth charts because (often) more receivers are on the field than running backs. We have the opportunity to see a larger sample size of routes from receivers because there are often three of them on the field at the same time.

Similarly to my point with running backs, I wouldn’t reach for a wide receiver simply because they’re a wide receiver. However, don’t be shocked if next season you once again have six or more receivers go in the first round of your 12-team draft.

Another point underscoring the importance of prioritizing running backs and wide receivers in your draft:

Three QB1s finished the year rostered in fewer than 66% of leagues. To get even close to there at running back we have to go all the way down to RB26, where Zack Moss was rostered in 68% of leagues.

In the last 10 seasons, only three RB12s have scored more points than Bijan Robinson, this year’s RB12, who scored 220.2 points. Before this season, the average RB12 since 2014 scored 213 points.

Tight End

The parity at tight end this year was awe-inspiring.

Six TEs finished the season with between 200 and 225 points. Here’s how many did that over the last 10 seasons:

• 2022: 1
• 2021: 0
• 2020: 0
• 2019: 4
• 2018: 1
• 2017: 1
• 2016: 3
• 2015: 1
• 2014: 3

Tight ends also scored fewer points than usual. Sam LaPorta finished as the TE1 with 225 points. The last time the TE1 had fewer points than LaPorta was in 2016. Before then it was 2006.

This leads me to assume next year will regress to the norm and we’ll have a true top-flight TE or two. Think it will be LaPorta? Based on this history, LaPorta has a strong case to be a first-round pick next season.

There could be some value at TE at the beginning of drafts next season if they start to slip because your league mates have recency bias toward the general parity at the position this season. I wouldn’t shy away from thoroughly-involved receiving TEs such as LaPorta, Travis Kelce, Mark Andrews, T.J. Hockenson or Trey McBride at the right price at all, even if it’s early in drafts.