Sunday, July 15, 2018

2018 Fantasy Football Mock Draft: 12 Teams, 10th Pick

As the saying goes, practice makes perfect. While we may not be able to draft a "perfect" fantasy football team, the more we practice, the better our teams will be.

Starting on July 7th, we began drafting (at least) one fantasy football team per day using the 2018 Fantasy Football Mock Draft Simulator and we will continue to do so up until the start of the 2018 NFL season.

Each day, we will switch things up -- e.g., PPR vs. standard scoring, league size, draft slot, 2-QB leagues, auction leagues, etc.

In addition, we will centralize links to our daily fantasy football mock drafts for an easy way to keep track of our mock drafts.

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Details of today's mock draft:
  • Scoring: Standard scoring (i.e., non-PPR scoring)
  • # of Teams: 12
  • Draft Slot: 10
  • Starters: QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, TE, Flex (RB/WR/TE), K, DST
  • Bench Size: 6

With that said, here are the results of today's mock draft:

1.10 - DeAndre Hopkins, WR, Houston Texans: Leading the NFL in receiving touchdowns (13) last season, Hopkins now has four seasons with 75-plus catches and three seasons with 1,200-plus yards through his age-25 season. With a league-high 174 targets last season, Hopkins had 35-percent target share in 10 of 15 games and double-digit targets 11 times. As the focal point of Houston's offense, he arguably has the highest floor among all receivers in the league.

2.03 - Dalvin Cook, RB, Minnesota Vikings: Before having his rookie season cut short by a torn ACL, Cook carried the ball 74 times for 354 yards (4.78 YPC) and two touchdowns with 11 catches for 90 yards through four games. That's equivalent to a 16-game pace of 1,776 YFS, 44 catches and eight TDs. If he's able to stay healthy, Cook has top-five upside in a run-heavy offense.

3.10 - Stefon Diggs, WR, Minnesota Vikings: With 20 fewer receptions year over year, Diggs finished 2017 with 64 catches for 849 yards and a career-high eight TDs. Diggs has missed multiple games in each of his three NFL seasons, but he could improve upon his WR18 season if he's able to stay healthy for a full season.

4.03 - Larry Fitzgerald, WR, Arizona Cardinals: Incredibly consistent, Fitz has 100-plus receptions and 1,000-plus yards in three consecutive seasons. With the trio of Nuk, Diggs and Fitz as my starting WRs (and Michael Crabtree later), wide receiver is this team's strength.

5.10 - Mark Ingram, RB, New Orleans Saints: Even with rookie Alvin Kamara finishing as fantasy's RB4, Ingram set career highs in 2017 with 1,124 rushing yards, 12 touchdowns, 58 receptions and 416 receiving yards. Filling Ingram's RB2 spot in the first four weeks won't be difficult and I love the discount I get for the production he'll provide in Weeks 5 to 16.

6.03 - Michael Crabtree, WR, Baltimore Ravens: As part of a 1-2 punch with Amari Cooper in Oakland, Crabtree had three (well, two if you don't count 2017) productive seasons as a Raider. During that span, Crabtree has 25 touchdowns -- eight-plus in each of the past three seasons. The move to Baltimore means that Crabtree now becomes his team's clear No. 1 wideout.

7.10 - Tevin Coleman, RB, Atlanta Falcons: Even if he's the 2 in the team's 1-2 rushing attack, Coleman has finished as a top-24 running back and exceeded 900 yards from scrimmage in each of the past two seasons. The contract-year back has scored 19 total touchdowns since 2016.

8.03 - Rex Burkhead, RB, New England Patriots: Missing six games in his first season with the Patriots, Burkhead scored eight touchdowns. Week-to-week volatily should always be expected for New England's running backs, but Burkhead should lead the backfield in touchdowns and we've seen LeGarrette Blount rush for 18 touchdowns only two seasons ago. In addition, his versatility and ability to play some slot while Julian Edelman serves his four-game suspension could make him an even better suspension-replacement for Ingram (RB2) in Weeks 1 to 4.

9.10 - Sterling Shepard, WR, New York Giants: Even though he missed five games, Shepard posted a career high in receiving yards (731) and set a career high in receptions on a per-game basis (5.36). Shepard will have an opportunity to post full-season career highs as the team's WR2.

10.03 - Jordan Reed, TE, Washington Redskins: If he ever puts together a 16-team season, Reed has the potential to lead all tight ends in fantasy points. Unfortunately, he has missed at least four games in four of his five NFL seasons including 10 missed games last season. In his healthiest season (14 games in 2015), Reed had a monster 87/952/11 line.

11.10 - Andrew Luck, QB, Indianapolis Colts: In his past three full seasons, Luck has finished as fantasy's QB4 (2013), QB2 (2014) and QB4 (2016). If he can stay healthy for the entire season (I suppose a big if), there is plenty of profit potential with Luck in Round 11.

12.03 - Giovani Bernard, RB, Cincinnati Bengals: Joe Mixon missed some time, but Bernard was highly productive down the stretch. In five December games, Bernard had 507 YFS, averaged 4.75 YPC with 24 receptions and two scores.

13.10 - David Njoku, TE, Cleveland Browns: Playing less than half of the team's offensive snaps as a rookie, Njoku posted a 32/386/4 stat line in 2017. Coach Hue Jackson says that he expects a big jump from Njoku in Year 2 and he's a high-upside option to pair with the injury-prone Reed.

14.03 - Philip Rivers, QB, Los Angeles Chargers: Except for 2012 (21st) and 2016 (14th), Rivers has finished as a top-12 fantasy quarterback in the eight of his past 10 NFL seasons. In addition, Rivers has thrown for at least 4,286 yards and 28 touchdowns in each of the past five seasons.

15.10 - New Orleans Saints D/ST

16.03 - Greg Zuerlein, K, Los Angeles Rams

- View full mock draft results here

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