February 2019 Dynasty Superflex ADP Round-Up

John Hogue

Super Bowl LIII concluded; the “non-points-scoring season” (shout-out to the hosts of the Trade Addicts podcast for coining the phrase) is officially underway. Player values are up in the air, with free agency a month away and nearly three months until NFL Draft, yet dynasty superflex startup drafts are in springtime bloom.

The team at DLF and the amazing readers worked together to run four superflex mock drafts to compile the most up-to-date superflex ADP as a guiding tool for early startup drafts. Check out the full mock results and ADP here, and join a mock in the coming months by following coordinators John Hogue (@SuperFlexDude) and Ryan McDowell (@RyanMc23) on Twitter; watch for their tweets for mock draft participants in the coming months.

In the meantime, let us reflect on the mocks that gathered this 2019 pre-Combine, pre-Free Agency ADP data.

First Round

One month removed from the first set of SuperFlex ADP of 2019 season, the latest iteration gets a little more running back heavy at the top of the draft. Patrick Mahomes drops a spot, DeAndre Hopkins falls three spots, and the running backs shuffle a little but still dominate the top six.

Those moves are attributed largely to rising RB values, but two corrections at the quarterback position also push wide receivers down and – in some cases – out of the first round. Aaron Rodgers jumps from 15th overall to eighth overall (driven by yours truly, thank you very much), and Andrew Luck jumps from 13th to 10th.

We’re getting closer to the quarterbacks holding the type of value they should hold in a superflex league, but it’s at the expense of top wide receivers, not the RBs. Ezekiel Elliott takes the 1.02 spot away from Todd Gurley, which puts Zeke’s value a little too high, and hints at Gurley nearing value status.

[am4show have=’g1;’ guest_error=’sub_message’ user_error=’sub_message’ ]

Second Round

Luck and Rodgers jump from the second round in January into the first round in February, supplanting Tyreek Hill and Odell Beckham Jr., who respectively lead off the second round. Both are amazing values at that point in the draft.

Julio Jones, Antonio Brown and David Johnson all sneak back into the end of the second round, and are (arguably) better suited for the third round. The round looks virtually identical to the January version otherwise… except for Jared Goff being replaced as the QB5 by Baker Mayfield.

Mayfield is an intriguing young quarterback, but in the middle of the second round (ahead of Goff, Russell Wilson, Carson Wentz, etc.) values him as if he has already reached his potential. At 2.08 – 20th overall – Mayfield is likely the most overpriced and overvalued player of the entire draft.

Third Round

Russell Wilson and Jared Goff highlight the third round, falling out of the second round from January to February. Wilson only drops four spots, but it’s enough to move him into the third round, which should be too late for a 30-year old quarterback who is 13 months removed from finishing as the fantasy QB1 overall. Goff, meanwhile, falls an entire round – from 2.09 to 3.09 – after playing a feature role in the snoozefest Super Bowl LIII. Goff’s ADP is likely to rise as the memory of his offense managing just three points in the season’s climax slowly fades.

Brandin Cooks is also punished for the Rams’ Super Bowl performance, dropping out of the third round and making way for Kenny Golladay to jump up to 3.12. The draft slot is about right for Golladay, and he certainly should go ahead of Cooks, but the Rams’ skill players are all primed for a bounce-back and are inexpensive in the meantime.

Derrius Guice continues to hold strong at the end of the third round, ahead of fellow 2018 draftees Sony Michel and Kerryon Johnson, and members of the 2017 running back draft class Leonard Fournette and Aaron Jones, not to mention high-floor players at other positions such as Matt Ryan, Adam Thielen and Zach Ertz. Guice’s value continues to be inflated by the same mystery and intrigue that launched Mayfield into the second round before he justifies the hype.

Fourth Round

After Sony Michel kicks off the fourth round, one of the more interesting developments in average superflex drafts plays out at the tight end position: George Kittle (4.02) jumps ahead of Ertz (2.05). His historic 2018 season left dynasty players wanting more, and Dallas Goedert may be compelling drafters to choose Kittle over Ertz. Kittle’s value is already a little high, but both TEs being drafted in high-end WR2 range (ahead of Brandin Cooks, Adam Thielen, T.Y. Hilton and A.J. Green, among others) is the more egregious reach.

Jameis Winston (4.03) takes one of the largest jumps, going from 61st overall in January to 39th overall in February. Not only is he a sell candidate at that value, he creates a little added value for fourth-round QBs who went ahead of him: Matt Ryan (4.04), Dak Prescott (4.08) and Mitchell Trubisky (4.10).

Fifth and Sixth Rounds

Some of the more notable fallers from January to February finally land in the fifth and sixth rounds, particularly at the WR and QB positions. T.Y Hilton, Kirk Cousins, Jimmy Garoppolo, A.J. Green and Corey Davis all drop out of the top 48; meanwhile, Ben Roethlisberger, Philip Rivers and Josh Allen all see their ADPs rise into this range and Lamar Jackson and Sam Darnold hold steady in the same range as January, as the consensus shifts their attention away from RBs and back to the QB and WR positions at the same time.

This trend creates the illusion of QB and WR value available in these early-middle rounds, but the run on the two positions tells a different story. As the entire draft scrambles for a quarterback after fading the position through the first four rounds, the drafter who has already addressed the position can take advantage of the value remaining at other positions, as RBs like Leonard Fournette, Marlon Mack, Tarik Cohen, Phillip Lindsay and Devonta Freeman all slide into this range despite their RB1 upside.

Kareem Hunt represents the worst value, perhaps in the entire draft; he sneaks in at 6.12 despite the facts that he’ll serve a to-be-determined suspension, and then play out his one-year contract with Cleveland as the backup to Nick Chubb.

Seventh – Ninth Rounds

Evan Engram is the big riser, jumping over O.J. Howard and David Njoku as he virtually climbs an entire round, from 8.03 to 7.04. The bottom drops out on Will Fuller (who drops from the late sixth to the early ninth) and Alshon Jeffery (late seventh to the early ninth), and their value was far more accurate in January, before gravity got ahold of them. Other players (Rashaad Penny, Christian Kirk, Jerick McKinnon, etc.) also drop a little, though not as precipitously as Fuller and Jeffery.

The big reason for the falling ADPs is the first inclusion of 2019 rookies. The rookie class makes its first appearance in superflex startup mocks in round seven of the February mocks, and they flood the draft in the seventh-ninth round range. Running backs David Montgomery (7.08) and Josh Jacobs (7.09) are the first rookies off the board, followed by WR N’Keal Harry (7.12), QB Dwayne Haskins (8.01), WR D.K. Metcalf (8.04), QB Kyler Murray (8.05), WR Kelvin Harmon (8.07) and WR A.J. Brown (9.12).

While it’s still a little early for players who had yet to test in the NFL Combine (let alone land on NFL rosters), this gives us an early glimpse of where rookies are likely to start coming off the board – with a round or two bump once they are drafted – and sets a market price for rookie draft picks that are included in startup drafts.

10th – 14th Rounds

The infusion of rookie talent continues to push veterans down the draft into “buy-low” territory, as players like Lamar Miller, Nick Foles, Robby Anderson and Doug Baldwin find themselves a round lower than they were drafted in January. Anthony Miller, Keke Coutee and Austin Ekeler continue to provide late-round value by holding steady in the mid-late rounds, surrounded by rookies who are full of intrigue but unproven talent and unknown landing spots.

Chris Herndon (158th overall in January to 126th overall in February) and Albert Wilson (184th to 142nd overall) – two of my personal favorite sleepers for 2019 – make tremendous jumps, but still represent excellent values. Another tremendous sleeper – Dede Westbrook, who will benefit greatly from the upgrade to Nick Foles at quarterback – plummets through the shine of the rookies, dropping from 115th to 138th and creating a buy window.

Quarterbacks largely dry up by the tenth round, but Foles (10.05) and Joe Flacco (12.03) make it to the back half of the draft, despite multi-year starting opportunities.

15th – 22nd Rounds

Ryan Tannehill (15.12) and Tyrod Taylor (19.12) are sneaky values at the end of the draft, with opportunities to move on to starting roles as bridge starters in 2019. A lot has to go right for this to come to fruition, but at the end of the draft, they’re worth the flier.

While drafters throw blind darts with rookies throughout the end of the draft, WRs like Adam Humphries (16.03), John Brown (16.09), Taywan Taylor (19.03) and Rashard Higgins (20.06), RBs Jay Ajayi (16.12), Jalen Richard (17.01), Josh Adams (17.05) and Chris Warren (18.03), and TEs Mike Gesicki (15.07), Jared Cook (15.10), Mark Andrews (16.11), and Ricky Seals-Jones (22.08) all represent amazing value at the very end of the draft.

[/am4show]

john hogue