With the NFL Draft dust settling we can finally decide which rookies landed in good positions for fantasy football and which ones did not. The NFL season always brings some surprises, but as we sit here several months away, these are the rookies with the worst landing spots.
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NFL Draft Worst Landing Spots
QB Michael Penix to the Atlanta Falcons
There wasn’t a single pick in the draft as confounding as Atlanta’s decision to take Michael Penix with the eighth overall pick. Owner Arthur Blank had made it clear he wanted to see the team return to their previous winning ways. Regardless of how highly you rank Penix, he does not help you win in the near future unless you have buyer’s remorse on their massive free agency splash for Kirk Cousins.
Perhaps the Falcons are used to wasting top-10 picks on offensive players after incorrectly utilizing Kyle Pitts, Drake London and Bijan Robinson over the previous three years, or perhaps Raheem Morris spent too much time around the Rams’ ideology of ‘F*** them picks’ for him to know what to do with a round one selection. Either way, this selection registers as a complete zero for the Falcons’ offense and is a massive hit to Penix’s stock that would otherwise have been surprisingly high given his last rise up draft boards.
Penix is a very different quarterback to Kirk Cousins and projecting how this offense might look with him under center is incredibly difficult, given it could be multiple years before we see it. The Falcons have had a great offseason, but they can’t seem to get out of their own way at times.
When I watched Michael Penix Jr., Bo Nix, and Spencer Rattler at the Senior Bowl, I didn’t see two guys who should be drafted early in the first round and one guy who should be drafted in the fifth round.
I saw three guys who should have been drafted in the third round.
— Mike Maher (@mikeMaher) April 27, 2024
WR Rome Odunze to the Chicago Bears
In dynasty formats, this is by far a bad landing spot. One can argue with 32-year-old Keenan Allen on an expiring contract and DJ Moore with only two years left on his contract that this is an excellent spot for Rome Odunze. In redraft or best ball formats, however, Odunze’s rookie season ceiling is somewhat capped by the competition he faces from an excellent surrounding cast that the Bears have given Caleb Williams. When Justin Fields entered the league he had Allen Robinson, Darnell Mooney and Marquise Goodwin to throw to, as well as a very porous offensive line.
Williams finds himself with two receivers coming off career years and a wide receiver that could have been the first one drafted if he had come out a year ago. Odunze will have spike weeks because he is a very talented player, but will he be the first or second choice on plays? Both Allen and Moore earned targets at a rate of over 2.3 yards per route run in 2023, so something has to give and the rookie is most likely the one to struggle to earn snaps the majority of the season.
TE Brock Bowers to the Las Vegas Raiders
The Brock Bowers slide felt inevitable as he became a non-storyline throughout the NFL offseason due to lingering hamstring issues. Without athletic testing, Bowers generated less buzz than he saw over the last few years. A player once viewed as prolific wasn’t at the forefront of conversations in the way he could have been. It’s also possible some NFL teams have wisened up to the lack of value in taking a first-round tight end after seeing players like Kyle Pitts, Hayden Hurst, Noah Fant, David Njoku, OJ Howard and Evan Engram all either take a long time to return value or never do so.
The Raiders deserve praise for sticking to their board and taking the best player available, something many teams preach but rarely do when on the clock. Now they find themselves with the welcome problem of having two talented tight ends to accommodate. Michael Mayer was viewed by some as the TE1 heading into the 2023 NFL Draft. Like many rookie tight ends, he didn’t hit the ground running. The expectation is he could take the leap in 2024, now with having to share snaps with Bowers.
With the Raiders potentially ping-ponging back and forth between Gardner Minshew and Aidan O’Connell at quarterback things might be less fruitful for either tight end. Minshew ranked 21st in passing expected points added (EPA) among QBs with 50+ pass attempts, while O’Connell ranked 34th. Minshew ranked 34th in completion rate with O’Connell 38th. Given the above-average receiving options in Las Vegas but the substandard quarterback play, Bowers will have to fight for every target. He might end up mainly seeing designed plays as a way to get on the field early, but little else until deep in the season.
Did the Raiders have Brock Bowers in their queue and get auto-drafted?
— John Hansen (@Fantasy_Guru) April 26, 2024
RB Blake Corum to the Los Angeles Rams
Fresh off a season where Kyren Williams averaged a league-leading 21.7 touches per game and finished with 1,350 yards and 15 touchdowns, adding another running back didn’t feel like a priority need. However, the Rams have drafted at least one running back in every draft since 2018 and weren’t about to stop. Blake Corum came off the board with the 83rd overall pick in the third round. Everyone had expected the Chargers to draft Blake Corum but they passed him by in the second and third rounds, resulting in him falling to the Rams instead.
Corum doesn’t bring much that the Rams aren’t already getting from Kyren Williams, who is also a smaller back. While Corum is slightly bigger at 205 pounds, it’s not a big difference. Corum is more powerful in short yardage but doesn’t outrun players, something Williams has excelled at with the Rams. Perhaps Corum steals some short-yardage work, but Kyren Williams had the fourth-most running back red zone rush attempts last year and the fourth-most touchdowns.
Inside the 5-yard line, Williams had 17 touches that resulted in nine touchdowns, showing he can be relied upon in that area of the field. Corum will be able to spell Williams, but he doesn’t do anything well enough to force this into a true committee any time soon. Even if this is another classic rug-pull on a late-round RB we thought had fantasy value, Corum was expected to be one of the few backs with standalone value. At very best, he is now in a timeshare.
WR Adonai Mitchell to the Indianapolis Colts
Pre-draft reports from reputable insiders suggested Adonai Mitchell could be drafted as high as pick 20 overall, and the consensus opinion was he had enough upside to be drafted in round one. This didn’t come to fruition with Mitchell sliding to pick 52, selected as the WR11 off the board. Mitchell is a big-bodied athlete who is a good route runner but fails to produce and doesn’t always play up to his size.
Often in the NFL size is overvalued and prospects are talked up too much for one quality when the lack of production is more important. Mitchell never topped 850 yards in college and only had one season above 500 yards. Now he’ll face competition from Michael Pittman, who saw 10 targets per game in 2023, Alec Pierce who played 94% of snaps last year and Josh Downs, who had an 18% target share. Mitchell can be relevant in best ball, particularly with Anthony Richardson possessing a canon of an arm but don’t expect to enjoy deciding when to start Mitchell in managed leagues.
AD Mitchell film VS analytics pic.twitter.com/sbcEux50Dv
— Tom Strachan (@NFL_TStrack) April 25, 2024
RB Braelon Allen to the New York Jets
The Jets seemed fairly well set at running back with stud workhorse Breece Hall finishing as the PPR RB4 in total points, despite the complete dysfunction in New York last year. Behind Hall was Israel Abanikanda, who the Jets drafted in round five of the 2023 NFL Draft and showed out well enough when called upon, rushing nine times for 43 yards in Week 16 when he got his biggest workload.
However, the Jets decided they didn’t have enough options and drafted Braelon Allen in round four, who profiles as a solid all-around back but one without elite speed or skills in the receiving game. Allen had been expected to go inside the top 18-24 picks in rookie drafts, as someone who could carve out a role in the NFL. With Hall and Abanikanda ahead of him and the Jets also drafting Isaiah Davis in round five, this is a very crowded room. Hall’s talent likely rises well clear of everyone else. Allen will have to be hyper-efficient on limited opportunities — not a good recipe for fantasy football success.
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