NFL Best Ball: Early Fades & Players to Avoid (Fantasy Football)

Last year, this article came out on March 17. Now, it’s coming out in mid February thanks to Underdog releasing their Big Board Tournament in late January (sicko stuff, really). But, that’s the state of best ball! People love it, and they can’t get enough…hey, neither can we!

At this point in the off-season, there’s so many unknowns. Coaching and coordinator changes can affect how offenses are run, free agency hasn’t even taken place, and the NFL Draft is still two months away. Because of all of those moving parts, it’s more difficult, in my opinion, to know exactly who to target while it’s much easier to identify players who are overvalued in the market.

With almost seven months until the start of the NFL season, there’s so many ways for players to lose value. Getting ahead on some of those players and fading them at their current cost is one of the biggest edges in drafting best ball teams in late February and early March. In this article, I’ll highlight some of my top fades based on current Underdog ADP.

Editor’s Note: The Best Ball Primer and Best Ball Rankings will be available on June 1 as part of the 2024 Ultimate Draft Kit+, which includes access to the DFS Pass.

*ADPs in this article accurate as of 2/21/24*

Alvin Kamara – RB15, 61.5 Overall

Kamara has been a fantasy stud for years. However, he’s entering his age 29 season, and no NFL RB carries a higher cap hit in 2024 than Super Kamario. The Saints can save $11.7M against the cap if they designate him as a post-June 1 cut candidate, notable as the Saints are currently 32nd in the league in available cap space and a whopping $82M over the cap as of mid February.

The Saints do have other ways to save money (moving on from Taysom Hill and/or Michael Thomas, for example), so it’s not a foregone conclusion that Kamara is gone, but there’s certainly a possibility the team moves on this off-season or restructures his contract.

On top of the contract concerns, Kamara has shown signs of decline for a few years in a row, both as a runner and as a pass catcher. His yards per target has declined in four straight seasons (7.1 > 6.6 > 6.4 > 5.4), and his 6.6 YAC per Reception in 2023 was the lowest of his career. As a runner, Kamara also showed some signs of decline as he set career lows in each of the following categories: Breakaway Rush Rate, Elusive Rating and Yards after Contact per Attempt. He was also 46th out of 49 qualified runners (Min. 90 attempts) in NextGenStats’ Rushing Yards over Expectation per Attempt metric, besting only Dameon Pierce, Kareem Hunt and Jamaal Williams. Considering you have to spend a fringe Round 5/6 pick on Kamara, he’s an easy fade at this point in the off-season.

Nick Chubb – RB19, 71.6 Overall

Chubb has been a dominant rusher in the NFL for years. Unfortunately, he’s now 28 years old and coming off a significant left knee injury. For more details on that, be sure to check out my Injury Tracker in the Dynasty Pass. While it’s certainly possible Chubb returns to form, the odds on probability outcome here is that Chubb sees a reduced workload and is less explosive in his first season off this injury, which required multiple surgeries this past fall. Because of the multiple procedures and extended recovery, it’s also possible that Chubb lands on the PUP list to start the season.

Without the projected rushing volume + efficiency combination (because of injury) that has made Chubb so valuable in fantasy for the last five or so years, it’s a tough sell for me at RB19, especially considering he’s not a RB who’s likely to pile up receptions as a pass catcher. For reference, Chubb has averaged just 1.7 receptions per game since 2019. To me, there’s so many outs where this bet at 72nd overall is simply not a best ball winning type of pick. If you want to get exposure to Chubb for 2024, I suspect you’ll be able to get a much better price as his ADP is likely to fall multiple rounds over the next few months.

Joe Mixon – RB24, 82.8 Overall

Out of all the guys on this list, Mixon is the guy I feel least bearish on. In other words, I think the ADP is fair, but I’m approaching him in early best ball drafts with caution. The Bengals can save $5.8M if they move on from Mixon this off-season, so it’s possible they decide to move on and go with another option at RB for the 2024 season. After all, there’s this guy named Ja’Marr Chase who needs a mega-extension very soon, and they’ve got key starters on both sides of the ball hitting free agency, so they could be looking for ways to save money.

While I don’t think it’s a foregone conclusion that they move on from him, the possibility that it happens makes him a bit fragile at 83rd overall. After all, his fantasy value is tied to his awesome workload on a good offense catching passes from Joe Burrow. Fortunately, Mixon is due a $3M roster bonus on March 18, so we should have an idea sooner than later on the Bengals’ plans at RB. If he’s on the roster after that date in March, I do plan on taking some Mixon, and while I think his ADP will start to climb, I’m okay to miss out on “the best price” given the downside associated with this situation right now.

T.J. Hockenson – TE12, 102.8 Overall

Hockenson’s ADP has fallen since the Big Board opened a few weeks ago, and I suspect it will continue to fall over the course of the off-season. The Vikings’ TE tore his ACL and MCL in Week 16 and didn’t even have surgery until late January. That makes Hockenson a prime PUP candidate to start the season, and he’s unlikely to be 100% in terms of on-field performance until December (if at all).

I do see an argument for Hockenson and other players coming off injury for their late-season production when it matters most in best ball tournaments, but at TE12 and a borderline top 100 overall player, the juice isn’t worth the squeeze to me, especially considering we don’t know who’s playing QB for the Vikings at this time. If you want some exposure to the Hock Strap, my advice is to wait until this summer when his ADP settles in around 130-140 overall.

Mike Williams – WR50, 105.7 Overall

Big Mike tore his ACL in Week 3 against the Vikings, so he’s far more likely to be ready for the start of the season compared to a guy like Hockenson. That said, Williams’ calling card is not exactly elite route running and separation, and he’s never been a high target guy. Williams’ fantasy ceiling has always come from big plays and TD production, and in my research, these classic perimeter WRs who struggle to create separation generally struggle in year one off their ACL surgery.

On top of the likely injury-related decline, Williams is almost certainly not catching passes from Justin Herbert in 2024 unless he and the team are able to agree to a pretty massive restructure of his current deal. The Chargers can save a whopping $20M by moving on from Williams, and we now have a new regime in town. There’s a very strong chance Williams gets a QB downgrade if he indeed is not a Charger, and even if he is a Charger, the passing volume in this offense with Jim Harbaugh and Greg Roman at the controls is a big time concern. I do see a scenario where Williams is “okay” for fantasy at this ADP, but we’re trying to find guys who can smash their ADP and be league-winning picks. At 106 overall, I’ll bet against Williams being that guy given the reasons mentioned above.

Darren Waller – TE18, 149.2 Overall

Think back to August of 2023 (What a time to be alive, am I right?). Every player is in the best shape of their life, training camp highlights are everything, and we see every player through rose-colored glasses. Perhaps the hype boi of training camp last year was Darren Waller. After all, the Giants did trade for him earlier in the off-season, and the WR room was quite mid as the kids say.

Unfortunately, I highlighted Waller as a guy I was worried about in last year’s Injury Tracker in the Ultimate Draft Kit given his history of hamstring injuries. He played in just nine games in 2022 due to hamstring and knee injuries then only played in 12 games last season due to another recurring hamstring injury. Entering his age 32 season, Waller hasn’t averaged double-digit half PPR points since 2020!

The underlying numbers here also paint a scary picture. Waller’s yards per route run has declined in six straight seasons, and he’s forced a combined seven missed tackles over the last three years (42 games). Perhaps some of that is correlated to injury, but the obvious year over year decline is concerning for a player turning 32 in September. On top of the on-field concerns, there’s also a decent possibility that Waller is cut this summer. He carries the sixth-highest cap hit of any TE in the league, and the G-Men can save $11.6M if they designate him as a post-June 1 cut candidate. I get that he doesn’t cost a ton in terms of his ADP, but I find it hard to see the path where Waller is a ‘big hit’ in the double digit rounds. 

Keaton Mitchell – RB51, 169.2 Overall

Admittedly, the cost on a guy like Mitchell isn’t outrageous, but 169th overall isn’t free either, especially in a format like best ball where we need to make every pick count. The Mitchell fade for me is primarily injury-related because I do like the talent and the explosiveness we saw from him prior to injury. However, he’s a UDFA who’s coming off a multi-ligament ACL injury that happened in Week 15, and he didn’t have surgery until three days after Christmas.

By the time the regular season opens in early September, Mitchell will have had about 8.5 months to rehab his injury. Unfortunately, these multi-ligament ACL injuries generally take closer to a year to fully recover, so Mitchell’s ability to put up fantasy numbers that crack our starting lineup in September – November are quite slim. Could he be a ‘December to Remember’ type of player for the best ball playoffs? I mean sure, it’s possible, but that’s a bet I’m not willing to make, especially considering there’s reports that the Ravens could be line to pay a veteran free agent RB (King Henry, anyone?!), and Justice Hill is still on the roster.