Final Fantasy Positional Rankings

Here we are another set of rankings that changed both more and less than I would have thought. Thanks for reading and enjoy.

Running Back

Stars (1-7)	Starters (8-14)	Starters With Questions (14-22)
Le’Veon Bell, Pittsburgh	Lamar Miller, Miami	Alfred Morris, Washington
Adrian Peterson, Minnesota	Jeremy Hill, Cincinnati	Andre Ellington, Arizona
Eddie Lacy, Green Bay	Justin Forsett, Baltimore	Joseph Randle, Dallas
Jamaal Charles, Kansas City	Frank Gore, Indianapolis	Latavius Murray, Oakland
Marshawn Lynch, Seattle	LeSean McCoy, Buffalo	Chris Ivory, Jets
C.J. Anderson, Denver	DeMarco Murray, Philadelphia	Rashad Jennings, Giants
Matt Forte, Chicago	Mark Ingram, New Orleans	Arian Foster, Houston
		Jonathan Stewart, Carolina

The order has changed up to, but not by much, and with lone addition C.J. Anderson. Anderson moved up and into the top group, because Ball and Hillman are both clearly backup options to Anderson. Foster dropped out of tier 2 because of his injury, but maybe not as far as you’d think. Miller is the big jumper here, from 17 to 8. I wouldn’t have expected it, but I think Miller is the clear one in a Miami on the verge of a jump. McCoy and Murray dropped, because the more I thought about drafting either at ADP just didn’t work for me. Foster falls to 21, where even if he misses 4-6 games he will give you first round value over the second half of the season. Hill jumps into the top 10, and he’s still one of the most puzzling pieces to the fantasy puzzle. With options I don’t love who were previously above him, well, here we are. Ellington has been creeping up and I think it’s a case of no competition and hopefully a case of less is more on touches. To round out Ingram, Randle, L. Murray, Ivory, and Stewart are all lead backs in varying degrees of goodness.

Flex-ible Options (23-30)	Top Backups (31-38)	Solid Backups (39-49)
Isaiah Crowell, Cleveland	Giovani Bernard, Cincinnati	Darren Sproles, Philadelphia
Melvin Gordon, San Diego	LeGarette Blount, New England	Reggie Bush, San Francisco
Ameer Abdullah, Detroit	C.J. Spiller, New Orleans	Shane Vereen, New York (N)
Devante Freeman, Atlanta	Joique Bell, Detroit	Branden Oliver, San Diego
Ryan Mathews, Philadelphia	T.J. Yeldon, Jacksonville	DeAngelo Williams, Pittsburgh
Doug Martin, Tampa Bay	Todd Gurley, St. Louis	Alfred Blue, Houston
Carlos Hyde, San Francisco	Tre Mason, St. Louis	Jerrick McKinnon, Minnesota
David Cobb, Tennessee	Knile Davis, Kansas City	Jay Ajayi, Miami
		Tevin Coleman, Atlanta
		Duke Johnson, Cleveland
		Denard Robinson, Jacksonville

Tier four has a two high upside 2^nd options (Abdullah may start as Detroit’s first), 1^st or 2^nd year players, and a player that flashed a couple years ago before injuries slowed his career projection to a stop. Gordon, Abdullah, and Crowell have the upside for me and the talent. Freeman and Cobb are better than their competition. Hyde and Martin, don’t really have competition. 31-38 is a pretty straight forward, Blount is the starter to start the season, but I’m just not feeling it, Yeldon is the starter in Jacksonville but I don’t want any part of him, and Gurley will be great but they’re playing it slow and Mason will play more early on at least. Davis, Bernard, and Spiller are second options, and Bell is hurt and the default second option. Of the backup options in the 39-49 range, Williams and Blue are behind players that will miss time early, Ajayi, Coleman, and Duke are all rookies, with Johnson having the highest upside pairing up with Crowell. Robinson was good, but Yeldon fits scheme as a bell cow, meaning his upside is probably around the Sproles or Vereen upside. The rest are second options of offenses with varying degrees of competence.

Rookies & Lottery Tickets (50-67)	Dropped Out
David Johnson, Arizona (49)	68) Chris Sims, Tampa Bay (51)
Cameron Artis-Payne, Carolina (NR)	69) Bobby Rainey, Tampa Bay (54)
James Starks, Green Bay (57)	70) Montee Ball, Denver (58)
Josh Robinson, Indianapolis (45)	71) Robert Turbin, Seattle (60)
Matt Jones, Washington (NR)	73) Steven Ridley, New York (A) (61)
Khiry Robinson, New Orleans (NR)	76) Travaris Cadet, New England (62)
Bishop Sankey, Tennessee (52)	77) Ronnie Hillman, Denver (65)
Buck Allen, Baltimore (59)
Andre Williams, New York (N) (66)
Fred Jackson, Buffalo (64)
Terrance West, Cleveland (34)
Darren McFadden, Dallas (53)
Lorenzo Taliaferro, Baltimore (NR)
Roy Helu, Oakland (NR)
Jeremy Langford, Chicago (NR)
James White, New England (NR)
Danny Woodhead, San Diego (63)
Jonas Gray, New England (NR)

Johnson, Artis-Payne, Allen, Jones, Langford are all rookies with clear shots at #2 roles and are talented players. The rest are #2s or in a couple cases #4s who I think are talented or behind meh starters. On the dropped out side, well they all dropped out of the top 67 and are options that should be watched on waiver wires.

Wide Receivers

Stars (1-4)	Starters (5-11)	Starters With Questions (12-19)
Antonio Brown, Pittsburgh	Randall Cobb, Green Bay	Deandre Hopkins, Houston
Dez Bryant, Dallas	Julio Jones, Atlanta	Alshon Jeffery, Chicago
DeAnthony Thomas, Denver	Calvin Johnson, Detroit	Vincent Jackson, Tampa Bay
A.J. Green, Cincinnati	Odell Beckham, New York (N)	Allen Robinson, Jacksonville
	T.Y. Hilton, Indianapolis	Golden Tate, Detroit
	Mike Evans, Tampa Bay	DeSean Jackson, Washington
	Emmanuel Sanders, Denver	Andre Johnson, Indianapolis
		Jordan Matthews, Philadelphia

The big change up top is the loss of Jordy, and you’ll see that there are no other changes in the top two tiers. Tier three has seen a major overhaul and combined with tier four to make a bit more of a usable tier. I’m all in on Robinson this season, and despite his QB, he’s going to get a ton of targets.

Low Starters, High Flex/3rds (20-30)	Good Flex Options/3rds (31-44)	Upside/Injured Starters (45-54)
Brandon Marshall, New York (A)	Keenan Allen, San Diego	DeVante Parker, Miami
Brandin Cooks, New Orleans	Julian Edelman, New England	Torrey Smith, San Francisco
John Brown, Arizona	Mike Wallace, Minnesota	Victor Cruz, New York (N)
Jarvis Landry, Miami	Jeremy Maclin, Kansas City	Roddy White, Atlanta
Amari Cooper, Oakland	Dorial Green-Beckham, Tennessee	Brandon LaFell, New England
Nelson Agholor, Philadelphia	Michael Floyd, Arizona	Malcolm Floyd, San Diego
Devante Adams, Green Bay	Pierre Garcon, Washington	Eddie Royal, Chicago
Martavis Bryant, Pittsburgh	Anquan Boldin, Arizona	Corey Brown, Carolina
Eric Decker, New York (A)	Steve Smith, Baltimore	Cody Latimer, Denver
Sammy Watkins, Buffalo	Kendall Wright, Tennessee	Marvin Jones, Cincinnati
Charles Johnson, Minnesota	Kenny Stills, Miami
	Terrance Williams, Dallas
	Marques Colston, New Orleans
	Larry Fitzgerald, Arizona

The second half of the former Fine Starters tier, these are possession 2nds, starters who I’m wary of target upside and a few rookies. Adams and Cooks are second year players I’m probably too low on. Both will see a high amount of targets, and I’m admittedly more open to Cooks just busting out, but Cooks didn’t flash on a so-so receiving corps last season, and all the underlying studies say Adams wasn’t great last season. We’ll call the fifth tier the old standbys. Other than Allen, Green-Beckham, and Stills this is a collection of players that have been in league for a few years, who we have a pretty good grasp of place, talent, and regression. Parker is my Beckham this year, not to say that he will take the league by storm, but an injured rookie who will impact your fantasy season when he breaks into the starting lineup for the Dolphins. Cruz, White, and Lafell are all hurt and Royal and Brown have ascending to roles because of injury and not talent, and worry me.

Note: The Bryant news came out while I was writing this, he would have been 19^th without the suspension and is now 27^th. Still like him, just drops a round or two.

Lottery Tickets (55-74)

Dwayne Bowe, Cleveland

Doug Baldwin, Seattle

Cecil Shorts, Houston

Mohamed Sanu, Cincinnati

Marques Lee, Jacksonville

Michael Crabtree, Oakland

James Jones, New York (N)

Phillip Dorsett, Indianapolis

Breshad Perriman, Baltimore

Harry Douglas, Tennessee

Marques Wheaton, Pittsburgh

Donte Moncrief, Indianapolis

Devin Funchess, Carolina

Brian Quick, St. Louis

Taylor Gabriel, Cleveland

Nick Toon, New Orleans

Percy Harvin, Buffalo

Rashad Greene, Jacksonville

Jeremy Kearse, Seattle

Andrew Hawkins, Cleveland

These are you lottery tickets, with upside and talent, but roadblacks or major questions in the way of breakouts. The Dorsett through Gabriel group is where I think the greatest value is if not the highest expected point totals.

Quarterback

Elite (Luck)	Really Good (2-6)	Wait, and Be Just Fine (7-17)
Andrew Luck, Indianapolis	Aaron Rodgers, Green Bay	Phillip Rivers, San Diego
	Russell Wilson, Seattle	Tony Romo, Dallas
	Ben Roethlisberger, Pittsburgh	Ryan Tannehill, Miami
	Peyton Manning, Denver	Cam Newton, Carolina
	Drew Brees, New Orleans	Matt Ryan, Atlanta
		Matthew Stafford, Detroit
		Tom Brady, New England
		Teddy Bridgewater, Minnesota
		Eli Manning, New York (N)
		Joe Flacco, Baltimore
		Jay Cutler, Chicago

Jordy’s injury takes enough off Rodgers for me that it drops him to the top of tier 2, and that leaves Luck as the only elite fantasy quarterback. Not much change in tiers 1 & 2, but 3 is where the difference is. I combined Tiers 3 & 4 and made some order changes. Newton dropped a bit on the Benjamin news, because, who outside of Olsen do you trust at all. Tannehill is my darling this offseason and that, like Lamar Miller, could mean the success or failure of a few of my fantasy teams.

Tight End

Elite (Gronk)	High End Starters (2-5)	Low End Starters (6-10)
Rob Gronkowski, New England	Greg Olsen, Carolina	Julius Thomas, Jacksonville
	Jimmy Graham, Seattle	Jason Witten, Dallas
	Travis Kelce, Kansas City	Zach Ertz, Philadelphia
	Michael Bennett, Chicago	Jordan Cameron, Miami
		Delonte Walker, Tennessee

Tier two lost two players and gained one. I switched Bennett and Thomas on QB concerns for Thomas, and a bump for Bennett with White out. I was too far down on Kelce and adjusted accordingly. The Indianapolis TEs adjustment took place, and I’m certainly skeptical of Eifert and his breakout. Williams was the only other tight end to fall out of the top ten tight ends.

Solid Backups (11-17)	Lottery Tickets
Maxx Williams, Baltimore	Jordan Reed, Washington
Dwayne Allen, Indianapolis	Larry Donnell, New York (N)
Heath Miller, Pittsburgh	Richard Rodgers, Green Bay
Coby Fleener, Indianapolis	Austin Seferian-Jenkins, Tampa Bay
Charles Clay, Buffalo	Antonio Gates, San Diego
Tyler Eifert, Cincinnati	Vernon Davis, San Francisco
Jared Cook, St. Louis	Owen Daniels, Denver
	Mychal Rivera, Oakland
	Jace Amaro, New York (A)
	Ladarius Green, San Diego
	Eric Ebron, Detroit
	Josh Hill, New Orleans
	Kyle Rudolph, Minnesota

Rodgers and Seferian-Jenkings are the high upside guys in the lottery ticket category, but they are nowhere near sure things.

Kickers and Defense

Kickers	Defense
Stephen Gostkowski, New England	Seattle Seahawks
Adam Vinatieri, Indianapolis	Buffalo Bills
Dan Carpenter, Buffalo	St. Louis Rams
Cody Parkey, Philadelphia	Houston Texans
Dan Bailey, Dallas	New York Jets
Steven Haushka, Seattle	Miami Dolphins
Justin Tucker, Baltimore	Denver Broncos
Matt Bryant, Atlanta	Arizona Cardinals
Mason Crosby, Green Bay	Carolina Panthers
Blair Walsh, Minnesota	Detroit Lions
Caleb Sturgis, Miami	Minnesota Vikings
Phil Dawson, San Francisco	New England Patriots
Greg Zuerlein, St. Louis	Philadelphia Eagles
Brandon McManus, Denver	Baltimore Ravens
Matt Prater, Detroit	Kansas City Chiefs
Sebastian Janikowski, Oakland	Dallas Cowboys
Chandler Catanzaro, Arizona	Green Bay Packers
Nick Folk, New York	Cincinnati Bengals
Garrett Hartley, Pittsburgh	Cleveland Browns
Nick Novak, San Diego	San Francisco 49ers
Mike Nugent, Cincinnati	Pittsburgh Steelers
Ryan Succop, Tennessee	Indianapolis Colts
Graham Gano, Carolina	Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Josh Scobee, Jacksonville	Atlanta Falcons

This’ll be my last update before you draft and the season. Good luck to everyone and I’ll have a big board up in the next couple of days. And hopefully a bunch of college football previews. As always let me know what you think, where you disagree, and as always why I’m an idiot. Thanks for reading.