The Best Value Per ADP At Every Position

After covering the worst values at each position according to ADP here, today, we will focus on the best values by ADP, which will be provided by Fantasy Pros. This does not mean that these players will all be first rounders in 2024 drafts, it just means that they will perform like players drafted much higher than their current ADP suggests.

Quarterback Best Value: Anthony Richardson, Colts (ADP: 107)

Richardson has been officially named the starter, so we could see his ADP spike as we march toward actual drafts, but it’s unlikely to approach where is ceiling really is. This comparison is not particularly original, nor the first time I have made it myself, but it bears repeating: the fears about Richardson’s passing are not dissimilar from what we have already seen from Justin Fields, who was a Top 5 fantasy QB.

Think about it, if Richardson is the worst version of himself as a passer in Year 1, would he average about 155.8 yards per game? Fields hasn’t topped that in either of his first two NFL seasons. Are we afraid that he won’t throw the ball enough? Fields never threw 30 passes in a single game last season. What Fields did was average 10.7 rushing attempts per game, the second most in the league only to Jalen Hurts, whose offensive coordinator, Shane Steichen, is now coaching Richardson. Steichen was brought in to liven up the worst offense in 2022 by a mile, and he committed huge draft capital to Richardson, a player who has some similarities to Hurts, and named him the starter off one preseason start. Richardson blew away Fields, and pretty much every QB prospect ever, physically, at the Combine and he’s built like Cam Newton. Richardson is going to run the ball a ton as a rookie, and with his traits he’s going to have a lot of success doing that.

Fields showed how a QB can be dominant for fantasy without much passing production, and now Richardson can follow that blueprint under the tutelage of Steichen, who was heavily involved in helping Hurts – who also fit this mold once upon a time – break out. Right now, Richardson is the QB15, and I find it hard to imagine a world where he does not finish inside the Top 12 with his rushing floor.

Running Back Best Value: Brian Robinson Jr., Commanders (ADP: 93)

Robinson serves as an excellent example of our goal here. It’s not to say that Robinson is going to be a Top 10 back in 2023, it simply means that for this ADP, you’re getting a lot more productive player than is typical for this range. Robinson is going right around guys like Khalil Herbert, Rashaad Penny, and teammate Antonio Gibson (covered here), but unlike those players, Robinson is a sure bet to lead his backfield in touches.

The big knock on Robinson is that he doesn’t catch the ball. Last year he didn’t, and no, he probably won’t. So what? We’d love for our weekly starting RBs to be able to contribute in the passing game; the value of a target is more than a carry, and in many leagues we’re giving either a half point or full point per catch. But players can thrive without being super productive receivers out of the backfield. We have seen them be elite like Derrick Henry or Nick Chubb, and we’ve seen them be quite good like…Robinson in 2022. He played 12 games last season, and upon returning from gunshot wounds in the offseason, he carried the ball 205 times for 797 yards while scoring three total touchdowns. He averaged 17.5 rushing attempts, the sixth-most in the NFL, and graded as a Top 10 RB per PFF. His massive stature gives the impression of a big stiff goal line hammer, and while he’s undoubtedly going to have a lot of goal line opportunity this ranking shows that he’s actually a good RB rather than just a big body. His overall finish was hurt by the lack of touchdowns, but smart fantasy managers know that touchdowns are fickle. Washington finished No. 1 in the NFL in Stuff %, a measure on Football Outsiders that shows how often teams were stoned in short yardage situations. That was all Robinson, because Washington’s offensive line was rated by PFF as the worst in football last year. Robinson is a great bet to see a massive TD spike and provide major value on this ADP.

Best Wide Receiver Value: Diontae Johnson, Steelers (ADP: 79)

Johnson scored zero touchdowns in 2022. That was definitely a product of a stagnant offense with bad QB play, but for a player as talented as he is it’s screaming positive regression. While I fully understand nobody is excited for Year 2 of Kenny Pickett based on his rookie output, if a receiver is good enough it doesn’t matter to a degree who is throwing him the ball. Of course, the great QBs can take a great WR to an elite level, but players with Johnson’s ability tend to thrive regardless. And if your rebuttal is Johnson in 2022, I’d counter with you are wrong about how he played.

Scoring no touchdowns will kill your value, but it was an anomaly. Prior to 2022, he’d never scored fewer than five touchdowns in a season. He drew 147 targets in 2022, seventh-most among all wide receivers and eighth-most among all pass catchers. That was no accident, as Reception Perception studied his campaign and couldn’t find an area in which he was below average. Johnson couldn’t be covered in zone (83.7% success rate, 88th percentile) or in man (76.1% success rate, 85th percentile). He couldn’t be pressed either (77.9% success rate, 84th percentile). In fact, the main thing holding him back was his own offensive scheme; Johnson’s least successful route was the nine route, and that was actually the route he was asked to run the most (18.9%). Johnson also has a 76.9% contested catch rate, so Pickett can fire it into him in tight quarters and expect him to win the battle. We are basically looking at Stefon Diggs here before he broke out. No, Johnson won’t have Josh Allen to bring him into the WR1 overall conversation, but I’ll happily continue to bet on talent like this, especially when he’s not even a Top 30 WR off the board.

Best Tight End Value: Darren Waller, Giants (ADP: 57)

Waller has been well-covered both here and in the Giants’ team preview but of all the values, bargains and properly priced players this year I believe strongest in him. Waller is a perfect storm of available volume, actual talent and situational fit. Talent-wise, Waller is elite and he can certainly finish as the No. 1 overall TE. In 2019 and 2020 we saw him cruise past 1,100 receiving yards and in 2020 he threw in nine touchdowns as well.

The backbone of that production was not just his speed and skill, it was that he was the offense’s focal point. Waller was force fed the ball because he was surrounded by limited receiving talent, and that is the exact scenario he once again finds himself in with the Giants, who do not have a single WR going inside the Top 55 at the position. He was among PFF’s Top 12 TEs in 2022 despite his middling stats and his DVOA was inside the Top 20. And for all this goodness, you only have to spend a pick toward the back of the Top 65! There’s a very easy argument that Waller should be the TE3 in drafts, and he’s just inside the Top 5. T.J. Hockenson (ADP: 43) has never hit 1,000 yards or scored more than six touchdowns, George Kittle (ADP: 49) hasn’t played a full season in four years, Dallas Goedert (ADP: 60) has to contend with A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith in the same passing game, and Kyle Pitts (ADP: 63) was arguably the biggest bust in fantasy last season.