2022 Dynasty Fantasy Football Rookie Drafts: Late-Round Lottery Tickets

Late-round picks hardly ever pan out. Maybe in the course of your life, you can get one or two to make it work, and historically there’s been at least one good player to be found later in the draft. I’m here to help you figure out what positions pan out the most, and who to look for this year.

In previous years, we have the following fourth-rounders who far exceeded their return on investment:

• Elijah Mitchell (2021)
• Darnell Mooney (2020)
• Gabriel Davis (2020)
• James Robinson (2020)
• Hunter Renfrow (2019)
• Kenny Golladay (2017)
• Aaron Jones (2017)

This is not a bad list to be a part of. There are no quarterbacks or tight ends listed here, so the focus of this article will squarely be on running backs and wide receivers.

What the above running backs have in common is that they were all taken late in the NFL Draft, all had amazing burst scores, and all were expected to start the season as a backup to someone who was not guaranteed to hold the position.

As for the wide receivers, all sans Darnell Mooney tested poorly at the Scouting Combine, all were drafted between the late third and early fifth, and all were drafted to a team with a below-average wide receiver corps. It’s a small sample size to work with, but so is this year’s draft class.

Now that some parameters have been set, let’s look at a small list of potential candidates to be lottery tickets in this year’s rookie draft.

Keaontay Ingram, RB ARI

I’ve written about him before, and I’m still perplexed as to why he wasn’t more heavily desired by other teams. He’s a sixth-round pick, his speed score (4.52 at 221 pounds) is in the vicinity of the other draftees mentioned above who found success, and he’s on a team where the only other real option is oft-injured James Conner. Ingram isn’t even being drafted in some rookie drafts, which I think is borderline criminal.

I gave Ingram a late second-round grade before the draft, and other than the fact he fell slightly further than I expected, I like everything else about him. If you need a running back and you’re desperate to find one late, I think Ingram is a solid choice. I wouldn’t hesitate to take him with a mid-late third, let alone a fourth or later.

I don’t think he’s a long-term solution for the Cardinals, but I think he can give you a solid rookie season, and then you can choose whether to flip him for a profit or to keep him around for another season or two before he loses his value. Either way, I think you’re going to get a useful player for an inexpensive pick.

Kyle Phillips, WR TEN