College Fantasy Football: Early season trends, sleepers on waiver wire
Four weeks into the season is a good time to reflect on some college fantasy football point surprises. Here’s a look after breaking down some numbers.
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WIDELY-HELD RUNNING BACKS NOT DELIVERING
There are some exceptions here in the 99 and 100 percentiles with Kentucky running back Benny Snell (104.72 points) leading the way and Wisconsin’s Jonathan Taylor (93.3) and Boston College’s A.J. Dillon (83.6) having solid seasons so far, but other high-level running backs are not producing much in fantasy leagues yet.
Stanford’s Bryce Love has scored only 42.1 points even though he’s owned in 100 percent of leagues. Cal’s Patrick Laird, Washington’s Myles Gaskin, Ohio State’s J.K. Dobbins, Iowa State’s David Montgomery, Utah’s Zack Moss and Georgia’s D’Andre Swift are not loading up on fantasy points through four weeks.
STILL SOME RUNNING BACKS PUTTING UP POINTS
Snell and Taylor lead all running backs in fantasy points so far. That’s not a major surprise. Third on the list is Oregon State’s Jermar Jefferson, who wasn’t even expected to be the star in the Beavers’ backfield this season, and Washington State’s James Williams, who’s putting up major points in an offense that loves to throw the ball all over the field.
In an Ole Miss offense that’s dominated by its receivers, Scottie Phillips is having an excellent season as he’s fifth among all running backs in fantasy points. Penn State’s Miles Sanders is shooting up the charts after rushing for 200 yards and three scores in a blowout win over Illinois last week.
QUARTERBACK NUMBERS ARE INTERESTING
The first five names on the top scorers list at quarterback make complete sense - Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray leads the way, followed by Syracuse’s Eric Dungey, Penn State’s Trace McSorley, Ohio State’s Dwayne Haskins and Missouri’s Drew Lock.
If you guess No. 6, well, you probably cheated and looked at the list. It’s Virginia’s Bryce Perkins, who started his career at Arizona State, transferred to Arizona Western C.C., and has now found tremendous success in Charlottesville. So far this season, Perkins has thrown for 867 yards with nine touchdowns and two interceptions and has also rushed for 317 yards and three scores.
Owned in only 25 percent of leagues, Perkins would be a tremendous steal early in the season as other fantasy owners wait for “bigger-name” quarterbacks to start delivering more points.
WIDE RECEIVERS COMING THROUGH
Rondale Moore is owned in only about half of fantasy leagues but the Purdue freshman is leading all receivers with 94.9 fantasy points and the only other players at that position within 10 points of Moore are Stanford’s J.J. Arcega-Whiteside (93.3) and Texas Tech’s Antoine Wesley at 89.9 points. Wesley is also owned in just over 50 percent of leagues.
Fourth on the wide receiver list is Colorado’s Laviska Shenault, who impressively is high at the position even though Colorado has already had a bye week. The former three-star receiver from DeSoto, Texas, has been one of the biggest surprises early in the season.
WHERE ARE THE BIG-TIME RECEIVERS?
The only receiver that’s owned in 100 percent of leagues is Mississippi’s A.J. Brown and he’s not even leading the Rebels’ receivers in fantasy points (that is D.K. Metcalf although the two are less than a point away from each other).
Of the 13 receivers that are owned in 90 percent of leagues or more, only two - Wake Forest’s Greg Dortch and Arizona State’s N’Keal Harry - have scored more than 70 fantasy points. There have been seven other players who have scored more than 70 so far that aren’t Dortch or Harry including Kansas State’s Isaiah Zuber, who is owned in only four percent of leagues.
Come on people. Go out and get Zuber as soon as possible.