Tim Riordan: Dynasty Fantasy Football Superflex Rankings Explained

Welcome back to another installment in our series of articles where DLF rankers not only explain their dynasty fantasy football rankings, but also include a number of the 2024 rookie draft pick selections so you can see how we each, individually, value those dynasty rookie picks in comparison to players as if it were a dynasty fantasy football startup draft. As would be expected, you will find a great degree of variability in the valuation of these picks as well depending on the style of the ranker. Each draft class has its own quality and depth and, depending on how the ranker values that quality and depth, individual rookie selections will appear earlier or later on the list.

Be sure to catch all of the Dynasty Fantasy Football Rankings Explained series.

DLF has always offered our readers multiple sets of dynasty fantasy football rankings from different experts to provide a broad view of player rankings. With many different strategies for building a successful dynasty team, no single set of rankings could possibly meet the needs of every coach. Instead, we’ve long subscribed to the idea of our experts providing their own individual rankings, ultimately giving our readers the opportunity to gravitate to a particular expert who closely matches their own style of ranking or, perhaps, instead choosing to use an average ranking across all experts.

A note about the tables. The Rank column indicates this ranker’s personal rankings. The AVG column indicates the consensus rankings value at the time these rankings were created. The “+/-” column indicates how much higher or lower the ranker is to the consensus average.

Each week we will provide rankings for 120 players and 2024 rookie draft picks, alternating between 1QB and Superflex rankings. For a deeper list of rankings, please visit our consensus dynasty fantasy football rankings.

SUPERFLEX DYNASTY FANTASY FOOTBALL RANKINGS: Tim Riordan

With the NFL playoffs underway and fantasy football championships crowned, it’s easy to take a step back and forget about your dynasty teams for a bit. You have time now to reintroduce yourself to your spouse and children, check out some other sports, and maybe even go outside every once in a while. The grind is over and you can sit back and relax, right? WRONG! This is Dynasty League Football, where “there is no off-season!”

Now is the time to take a look at the big picture of your team, and the best way to do that is to check out the Dynasty Fantasy Football rankings at the site and in this series of articles. See where your players stack up in the dynasty fantasy football world, consider the value of your rookie picks, and make a plan for the NFL off-season to win in 2024 and beyond!

That’s the approach I take with my dynasty fantasy football rankings. I’m not interested in rebuilding my teams, or hoping to hit on a miracle sleeper to turn my teams around. I want the best players on my team who are going to help my team win now and win later. It’s called “dynasty fantasy football” for a reason! Think of the great dynasties in history. Did they intentionally lose for years in order to eventually take control? Did they sell out to reach the peak of power just to relinquish it a few months later? NO! In dynasty fantasy football, I take the Tywin Lannister approach. I want to “establish a dynasty that would last a thousand years!”

With that in mind, I build my rankings with the next three years in mind. The players who are going to be able to be contributors for the next three years are going to get pushed way up the board, while players who are on the decline fall way down. The veterans on the decline can be useful as a finishing touch, but they’re just the cherry on top of the delicious ice cream sundae you’re creating with your team. Unless they have two or three good years left, you shouldn’t be prioritizing them in your dynasty leagues.

As for the young players that haven’t shown it in the NFL, I tend to tread carefully with them as well. If I haven’t seen them prove their high-end potential at the NFL level, they’re going to slip down the board. But, the ones who I’ve seen come through big-time at the pros, they’re going to be on the rise.

Finally, I’d like to address the valuation of running backs vs. wide receivers. Wide receivers certainly have a much longer shelf-life in the NFL, but bell-cow running backs are vitally important for dynasty leagues. I tend to find that the teams that win the dynasty leagues that I am in, tend to have a talented, deep roster of running backs at their disposal. Target the players getting the most opportunities and make sure you have enough of them to make up for an injury during the season.

Let’s kick off the off-season with a look at my superflex rankings!

Rankings: 1 – 24

Quarterbacks lead the way in my superflex rankings, with Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson, and Josh Allen securing the top three picks. This was a roller coaster year for quarterbacks, and an extremely tough one to manage for dynasty superflex leagues. These three quarterbacks were healthy all season long and they’re in the early primes of their careers. They’re the signal callers that I’m most certain will be on their teams and succeed for years to come, so that’s why they’re at the top of my list.

After the top three, we jump right into the wide receiver game, with three receivers in a row who are absolutely incredible players, and I believe deserve to be valued higher than most of the quarterbacks even in superflex leagues. I’ve moved CeeDee Lamb up eight spots to number four overall, and the number one wide receiver overall. I did this mostly with PPR leagues in mind, so that may change a bit for half-PPR or standard leagues, but what CeeDee Lamb did this season was off the charts. He dominated the ball in Dallas, finding paydirt 14 times and catching 135 balls this season. Lamb averaged 10.65 targets per game, which is the driving force for me pushing him up above Justin Jefferson and Ja’Marr Chase. We’ll have to see what the Cowboys do in the off-season, and if Mike McCarthy or Dak Prescott stick around, but for now, CeeDee Lamb is the wide receiver I want the most in dynasty.

Breece Hall moved very high up the board from me as well, jumping 17 spots from 25 to 8th overall. His ceiling is limitless in the Jets offense as long as he can stay healthy, mostly thanks to his work in the receiving game. In week 16 against Washington, Hall totaled 16 targets, catching 12 of them for 96. That is the type of week-winning running back who should be valued as a first round pick, even in dynasty and even in superflex. With Aaron Rodgers coming back next season, and hopefully some improvements on the offensive line, Hall could have a better season than Christian McCaffrey had this year. At only 22 years old, he’s primed to be a dynasty superstar.

As we move into the teens and twenties, I’ve slotted in two rookie draft picks, one of them representing Marvin Harrison, Jr., and the other Caleb Williams (I value them in that order, but others may flip them for this format). Harrison, Jr., doesn’t seem to have any weakness in my early analysis of his numbers and film. He can do it all and will be a quarterback’s best friend the second he hears his name called in Detroit this Spring. The only wide receivers I have ahead of him right now are the three I mentioned above, Amon-Ra St. Brown and Tyreek Hill. End of list. As for Caleb Williams, I’m trusting the hype around his college career. Being on the west coast, I unfortunately have not seen him play enough, but as the spring goes on, I’ll dig into his game much deeper. At that position, he ranks as my QB10, which is a fair spot for someone who took a step back in his final season at USC and may have some growing pains in the NFL. As I do more research, I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets moved up a bit.

Rankings: 25 – 48

This next section of the rankings kicks off with the most interesting man in dynasty fantasy football this off-season, Puka Nacua. In a season filled with incredible rookie performances, Nacua’s may be the most impressive and the most unexpected. The 177th pick in the 2023 NFL Draft played head-and-shoulders better than any of the 19 wide receivers selected ahead of him. General Managers around the league are kicking themselves for missing out on him, and dynasty managers are shaking their heads seeing where he was selected in last year’s rookie drafts. I have Nacua as the wide receiver nine, pushing him up five spots over DLF’s overall rankings. With Cooper Kupp fading, Nacua will gain the room to become an alpha receiver in this league. The only thing that could hold him back is quarterback play, as Matthew Stafford is an aging veteran who could call it quits at any time. Going into his second season, he leads all receivers from the 2023 draft class in my rankings.

Down the board a few more spots, we have Nacua’s teammate, Kyren Williams. If Nacua was the breakout star of the 2023 season at wide receiver, Kyren Williams was the breakout star at running back. After a horrible Combine in 2022, Williams dropped way down draft boards and dynasty rankings. He did nothing in his rookie season to suggest a breakout was imminent, and was likely sitting on many waiver wires at the start of this season. Now, at 23 years old and coming off an RB2 finish in fantasy points per game, I’ve pushed Williams up 31 spots to 29th overall, the eighth running back off the board. We’ve seen this play out before, where a running back will come out of nowhere, dominate for a season, and then fade away into the fantasy abyss. Look at Jamaal Williams last year and Cordarrelle Patterson the year before that. But, Sean McVay really holds Williams in high esteem. Ever since Todd Gurley left, McVay has struggled with the position, trying and failing with the likes of Darrell Henderson and Cam Akers. Now, he’s found a player that he can really trust in the backfield, and if McVay treats him like he treated Gurley, 29th overall will be too low for Williams.

You’ll notice I tend to push the secondary quarterbacks down the board a bit in this round. Tua Tagovailoa, Dak Prescott, Kyler Murray and Brock Purdy each moved down 13 or more spots. In startup superflex drafts, I’m not jumping through hoops to acquire quarterbacks who are not elite. Especially after this season, where we saw so many quarterback injuries and so many fill-ins perform adequately for fantasy, I’m pushing them down even further. I just can’t take a player like Tagovailoa over a superstar, stud wide receiver like Puka Nacua or Garrett Wilson. For that reason, they fall down into the third and fourth rounds for me.

With that being said, Jordan Love is someone who I pushed up 16 spots in my rankings to come in at QB14 off the board. I loved (pun intended) what I saw from the Packers quarterback this season, and there is still plenty of room to grow with this Packers team. Love wrapped up the season as the QB5 in total points, and has now led his team to the divisional round of the playoffs, despite being the youngest team in the league. The wide receiver room and tight end room are packed with young talent, and Matt LaFleur might be one of the most underrated coaches in the league. The Packers deserve a ton of credit for being patient and developing Jordan Love for all of these years, and dynasty managers who hung on to him through all of that deserve a pat on the back as well.

Rankings: 49 – 72

This range of picks features plenty of youth rising up the board, age falling down the board, and several rookie picks to boot. Let’s take a look at Picks four through seven, who all get ranked between 48 and 62. In rookie drafts this season, there appears to be a very clear top seven before there is a significant drop off. If you hold one of these picks, make sure to properly assess its value, especially in trades. Caleb Williams, Drake Maye, Jayden Daniels, Marvin Harrison, Jr., Malik Nabers, Rome Odunze, and Brock Bowers could all be league-winning picks, or at least every-week options in your starting lineup as early as this fall.

Speaking of Brock Bowers, this is a good spot to address the tight ends in my rankings. We’ve seen Mark Andrews and Sam LaPorta ranked in previous sections, but this range has five tight ends, and a pick that I’m mentally assigning to a tight end in the rookie draft, all involved. Travis Kelce has moved down 19 spots in my rankings. The DLF Rankers still have Kelce as their number one tight end while I’ve moved him down to number five, number six if you include the pick for Bowers. Despite finishing as the TE1 in points per game, the cracks in Kelce’s game are starting to expose themselves. At 34 years old, he seems to be well past his prime, and if I’m holding on to him, I’d rather get out a year early rather than a year late. As I mentioned in the intro, if a player isn’t going to contribute for the next three years to my team, he’s going to get pushed down. The fact is, so many tight ends took an outstanding step forward this season, while Kelce took a big step back. I’d really struggle to take Kelce over even Dalton Kincaid and Trey McBride at this point.

Meanwhile, Kyle Pitts slots in at 54th overall, 9 spots ahead of his DLF consensus. Call me a sucker, but there were flashes this season where Kyle Pitts showed why he was a top five pick in the NFL Draft (and why Arthur Smith deserved to be fired). It’s still a leap of faith at this point, and I understand why dynasty owners are shying away, but with a new coach coming to town, and a new offensive system, things could finally be turning around for Pitts.

Rankings: 73 – 96

There are some massive jumps in value in this range, so let’s start at the top with Rashee Rice, who I have moved 32 spots over the DLF consensus all the way to 73rd overall. Rashee Rice finished the season as the WR27 and the fourth-best rookie in total points. He’s continued that success into the postseason, catching eight balls for 130 yards and a touchdown in the Chiefs wild card victory over the Dolphins. It is astoundingly clear that Rashee Rice is now Patrick Mahomes’s favorite receiver, including Travis Kelce. The 2023 second round draft pick got better as the season went on, finishing with five out of six games in the top 22 at wide receiver. In those six games, he saw 56 targets and caught 44 of them for 518 yards and three touchdowns. He’s my WR 27 right now, and frankly, I’m shocked I’m so high on him compared to others.

Meanwhile, on the negative end of things, Cooper Kupp dropped 36 spots while Austin Ekeler dropped 42 spots. Kupp and Ekeler illustrated why these veteran assets can be so risky to invest in. Prior to this season, Kupp and Ekeler were early-round picks, even in dynasty leagues. They both took major steps back this season. Be it injuries, or changes in offensive systems, or young players outplaying them, even the best players have a shelf life. This season was the beginning of the end for Kupp and Ekeler. The only way I would want either of them on my team is as the “cherry on top,” as I described above. You have to already have a league-winning team, and then you can go ahead and target an older vet like Ekeler or Kupp to potentially put you over the edge for one year, but you cannot count on them in dynasty.

Rankings: 97 – 120

The top 120 rounds out with this final list of 24 players. Near the top of it is one of my favorite players to acquire for dynasty fantasy football this off-season, Tyjae Spears. I have moved him up 37 spots, more than anyone else in my top 120, from 134 to 97th overall, RB24. Derrick Henry has made it clear that he will not be returning to Tennessee. Sophomore GM Ran Carthon appears to be clearing house in order to bring in his guys. Well, the third player Carthon ever selected was Tyjae Spears, running back out of Tulane. Spears fell on draft day, reportedly because of concerning medical results on his knee. It’s possible he won’t have the longest career, but while he is on the field, he’s an extremely talented running back. Henry is gone, and a new head coach will be taking over, but Tyjae Spears will be the leader of this backfield and could play as large a role as Henry has played in past years. In limited opportunities this season, he looked explosive, running for 4.53 yards a carry and catching 52 balls for 385 yards. He was one of my favorite rookie picks last season, and I’m excited to see what he can do with a larger role next season.

An excerpt from @timmymr's post-draft profile on Tyjae Spears last year…

"Despite the well-known knee issues, he was a 3rd rd pick, and the only RB playing ahead of him will likely be gone next season. He’s a risky pick, but could be a league winner."https://t.co/8l64e6RlTG pic.twitter.com/i8MjDEtl6m

— DLF (@DLFootball) January 16, 2024

My final first round pick slots into the 104th spot here, while my first two second round picks wrap up the rankings at 115 and 120 overall. As of right now, I do not project a single running back in the top 12 superflex picks. If you have a late first round pick and running back is a major need, you may need to look elsewhere with that pick. You could consider trading away that pick for someone in this range, like Isiah Pacheco, Spears, or Zach Charbonnet. The pre-draft process is long, and there are plenty of opportunities for a sleeper running back to emerge, but right now this looks like a very weak class at RB. You’ll notice in my rankings that, at this point, many of the wide receivers have some big drops down the board. I believe it is because I’m pushing running backs, quarterbacks and draft picks up a bit higher than most would at this point. The draft is heavy with wide receivers, which will inevitably push veteran wide receivers down and out. Also, as I mentioned in my introduction, I believe running back depth is a very important piece to a winning dynasty roster.

Rookie Josh Downs moved down my rankings more than any other player, from 68th to 116th overall. Downs really didn’t show me anything in his rookie year to prove he was worth a pick higher than Nico Collins or Jayden Reed, so he barely made my top 120. From week five to week eight, Downs was on his way to a breakout, especially when he put up 23.5 PPR points against the Browns in Week seven. That was his only WR1 finish all season long. Over his final nine games in the season, Downs failed to reach double-digit fantasy points in every game. He averaged 6.2 points per game over that stretch. Perhaps, with more consistent quarterback play from a healthy Anthony Richardson, he’d have a chance to be worth a top 35 wide receiver slot, but I just haven’t seen it yet, and there are several wide receivers who I have seen produce, who are on better offenses, with more consistent quarterbacks, that I would rather draft ahead of Josh Downs. I have him at WR 38 in my rankings.

Come back to this series every week to learn how the experts at Dynasty League Football create their dynasty rankings and explain their reasoning behind it. Check out the different strategies and follow the one that sounds the best to you!

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Tim Riordan

Contributor at Dynasty League Football

Tim has spent over a decade in sports radio as a host, analyst, play-by-play broadcaster and a producer. He’s been called the Tom Brady of dynasty commissioners and an expert of player values.

Latest posts by Tim Riordan (see all)

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