Fantasy Football Draft Targets: Tyjae Spears, Blake Corum, Pat Freiermuth (2024)

A fantasy football league certainly isn’t won at the draft. The adjustments and trades made along the way will ultimately decide who is victorious in early January. That being said, pinpointing value in each round of drafts can help kickstart your team and limit the amount of housekeeping required over the course of the season.

It’s important to recall that every round will contain players who will ultimately fail miserably as well as those who achieve incredible success. Below is a list of players who, assuming health, will fall in the latter category. Here are fantasy football draft picks to target in each round. Below we dive into a few of our top targets for 2024 fantasy football drafts.

Players to Target in Each Round

For the sake of this exercise, we will be analyzing the players available in each round of a 12-team, half-PPR league. Here are fantasy football draft picks to target in each round.

Round 10: Tyjae Spears (RB – TEN)

The arrival of Tony Pollard seems to have scared drafters away from Spears. According to PFF, the explosive sophomore outperformed his running-mate in nearly every efficiency metric in 2023. He had a higher elusive rating, more yards after contact per attempt, and more yards per route run.

While the contractual situation suggests that Pollard will be the Week 1 starter, Spears will eat into his workload over the course of the season. With key off-season additions such as Calvin Ridley, J.C. Latham, and Tyler Boyd, this offense is in great position to improve drastically in 2024. Spears will be the primary beneficiary of this.

Round 11: Blake Corum (RB – LAR)

Despite an incredibly productive season from Kyren Williams in 2024, the Rams invested a third-round draft pick in Corum. It’s interesting to note that Williams has quietly been dealing with a foot injury and will be missing offseason workouts. HC Sean McVay has always been wildly unpredictable with his RB usage (see Cam Akers in 2023), and Corum may be in line for a greater workload than we initially expected.

At this stage of the draft, very few players have the upside that Corum possesses. The starting RB in any McVay-led offense is a highly-coveted asset in fantasy. What’s more, Corum has the talent to make the most of this opportunity. He scored an outstanding 27 touchdowns during his final season at Michigan.

Round 12: Pat Freiermuth (TE – PIT)

While many may question Arthur Smiths’ ability as a play-caller, there’s no doubt that the new Steelers OC knows how to get tight ends involved in the offense. Both Kyle Pitts and Jonnu Smith played key roles in the Atlanta offense in 2023. Other than the emerging WR George Pickens, the pass-catching options in Pittsburgh are quite thin. Freiermuth will be given plenty of opportunities to succeed in 2024.

Arthur Smith was a TE coach in TEN for 6 years before getting promoted to OC.

ATL was 3rd in the NFL in TE fantasy points last year (291.6).

& Pat Freiermuth is the ONLY TE in PIT (where Smith now calls plays) with 200+ receiving yards in a season.

If PIT doesn’t have a second… pic.twitter.com/WbZxtqNHVJ

— David J. Gautieri (@GuruFantasyWrld) June 4, 2024

While last season was disappointing for Freiermuth, he’s showed flashes in his first three seasons as a pro. Per PFF, he’s averaged 4.6 yards after catch per reception and 1.42 yards per route run across his career. Tight ends tend to breakout at an older age in comparison to other positions. These numbers suggest Freiermuth may be due for a career year in 2024.