Late round fantasy QBs to target
You hear the same every year from the vast majority of fantasy football expert “Draft QBs late”, it is a strategy that more and more of the fantasy community are taking on board & thrive from. Fill up your starting skill positions (RB & WR) and capitalise on the later round quarterbacks that are just sat on the draft board ripe for the picking.
In a sport where the QB position is undoubtedly the most important on the field you would be forgiven to question why you should wait in your own drafts, The answer is a very simple one. Quarterbacks do not hold the same value as the Elite RB’s & WR’s due to the point scoring & roster requirements in standard leagues.
Superflex & 2QB are a whole different ball game, below you will find 3 late round QBs who you should be able to count on in the 2019 fantasy season and bring home those trophies.
All stats & ADP are based on full PPR scoring (4 points per TD), That being said i would still recommend targeting these three in all formats.
Dak Prescott – Dallas Cowboys
Dak Prescott may well be one of the most disrespected quarterbacks in fantasy football. This guy has had top 10 fantasy QB finishes in each of his 3 seasons with Dallas yet he is currently the QB16 on average in ADP.
2016 – QB6 – 3667/23/4
2017 – QB10 – 3324/22/13
2018 – QB10 – 3884/22/8
As you can see above Prescott’s passing numbers over his first 3 seasons do not jump off the page, he is an average passer at best which may lead you to question why he should be targeted for your fantasy team. The first & in my eyes the most important point is his rushing ability that elevates him well above his current ADP, he holds the key that turns a good fantasy QB into a top QB. He has averaged 314.6 rushing yards per season in three seasons and has scored 6 TD’s on the ground every season. Many of these are not designed runs however Prescott has the pocket presence & vision to create yards & touchdowns out of nothing. Just go and look back at some of his rushing highlights.
Another tick in the box for Prescott is his partnership with Amari Cooper which blossomed quickly despite Cooper’s inseason trade & the tendency for players needing to settle into a new system. Before Cooper arrived in Dallas, Prescott had a completion percentage of 62.1% & with Cooper in the lineup this increased to 70.1%, Yards per attempt & yards per game also increased. Michael Gallup,Randall Cobb & Ezekiel Elliott out of the backfield also give Prescott more solid options alongside Cooper.
One area of improvement needed from both Dallas & Prescott is the ability to convert in the red zone, in 2018 they held a 51.8% TD rate inside the 20 yard line which was bottom half in the NFL & over 13% (2016) & 7% (2017) lower than the previous two seasons. Something that should help bring this back up is a fully fit Travis Fredrick returning to the lineup in 2019, arguably the top centre back to form one of the top lines in the NFL.
Dak Prescott is primed for a big year in 2019, he has a true WR1 (Amari Cooper), one of the best RB’s in the league (Ezekiel Elliott), top 5 NFL line when fully fit & he has not yet missed a game since becoming the starter.The sky’s the limit & if prescott can break the 4000+ passing yardage mark & 25+ TD’s alongside his rushing ability a Top 5 fantasy QB finish is a very real possibility.
Mitch Trubisky – Chicago Bears
It appears I have something of a soft spot for players on the Bears in 2019, Anthony Miller is one of the biggest sleepers in my eyes in 2019, they have the electric Tarik Cohen to go alongside a top rookie RB in David Montgomery & Allen Robinson could well find the form from 2017 all fantasy (& Bears) fans have been waiting for.
The common denominator in all of this is Mitch Trubisky, The #2 overall pick in the 2017 draft is entering his third year in the NFL & this is arguably his best chance to show the world what he can really do. We have seen some of it in spurts in his first two seasons. None more so than the three week stretch in 2018 where he scored 105.2 points in week 4-6 & holding the QB2 ranking weeks 4-10 behind only Patrick Mahomes, making him one the best value Late Round Fantasy QBs over this stretch.
A common theme to being a good fantasy QB is rushing ability, Prescott previously has it & Trubisky has more than shown he has it as well. He ran for over 400 yards in 2018 in 14 games (#5 most among QB’s) & 3 TD’s, he was on pace for 677 rushing yards in the first half of the season. Add to that 248/2 in 12 games his rookie year. Trubisky is an instinctive runner & has shown superior ability on the ground, a commodity you cannot ignore in FF.
Another plus is the Matt Nagy offence, now going into its second year with the majority of the offensive pieces intact and the addition of a more viable RB in this scheme (David Montgomery) we should see Chicago as a whole take a leap forward in 2019 & Trubisky is in the driving seat. This Offence unit ranked 10th in scoring in Nagy’s first year, He has also built a sneaky good offensive line to protect Trubisky (Ranked #9 in 2018).
Yet Trubisky is currently the QB19 on average in ADP & is being looked at as no more than a QB2 for many fantasy rosters. The vast majority of fantasy owners are put off by his inconsistent play in 2018 & they may be right, but they may be very wrong. Consistency will be key for Trubisky in 2019 if he is to establish himself as a top QB & we have seen what he can do on his best day (Tampa Bay week 4, 73% passing completion & 43.4 fantasy points) & we also saw the lows (LA Rams week 14, 53.3% PC, 3 Ints & 4.7 FP). If the offence takes the expected step forward & it all clicks with Mitch Trubisky then the ceiling is incredibly high, just watch for that potential floor.
Jimmy Garoppolo – San Francisco 49ers
Jimmy G’s ADP has suffered massively due to the devastating ACL tear in week 3 of 2018 this will then lead to him being one of the Late Round Fantasy QBs. The once up and coming QB in the NFL, Jimmy G torched defences in his 5 games in late 2017 with San Francisco, 2018 did not start off with the same fire we all saw in 2017 & unfortunately we were unable to really see who Garoppolo was after being shut down for the year with the injury.
Jimmy G was a force to be reckoned with in his short spell in 2017, in his 5 starts he threw for 1560 yards & 7 touchdowns along with adding 1 TD on the ground & ended with a 67.4% pass completion rating. In his 10 total NFL starts (2 of which he left due to injury) Garoppolo has averaged 275.6 passing yards per game & scored a total of 16 touchdowns
His stock is at an all time low and is currently averaging the QB22 in ADP, He is close to undrafted in many league setups based on this ranking & he can be picked up well into the double digit rounds.
Much of my confidence in a solid fantasy year for Garoppolo comes from the San Francisco offence and the man at the helm Kyle Shanahan. Under the Shanahan offence, backups CJ Beathard & Nick Mullens were able to put up 198.5 fantasy points in 13 games all with a very underwhelming supporting cast outside of George Kittle.
San Francisco & Shanahan have overhauled the disappointing offence roster for 2019, bringing in two rookie receivers to go with Dante Pettis who many see taking a step up as the WR1, a new pass catching running back in Tevin Coleman alongside the return of Jerrick Mckinnon from his own season long injury & one of the top tight ends currently in the game George Kittle. This may be the year we see the true Shanahan offence we have been promised since coming over from the Falcons.
I am not expecting Jimmy Garoppolo to set the world alight & his previous history does not show that he will, what i can see is solid QB production for pennies on the dollar & free up valuable higher draft picks on those week winning skill position players.
These are three QBs that I have identified as my main late round targets however there are a handful more that can also be considered for this strategy (Lamar Jackson, Josh Allen, Philip Rivers, Ben Roethlisberger).
If you were to take one point away from this entire article it should be this, Target those late round quarterbacks & don’t lose a week winning RB or WR by drafting a QB early. Mahomes may have ended scoring 417 points in 2018 however not only were his stats historic & unlikely to be repeated Mahomes was himself a late round quarterback in 2018.
Written by
Ash Goddard – Addicted2FF
Sources
https://www.playerprofiler.com/
https://fantasydata.com
https://www.pro-football-reference.com
