Ian Allan answers your fantasy football questions. In this edition: Is it time to pull the plug on Jordy Nelson? Blue-chip players for 2018. Should one sell high on David Johnson? And will DeVante Parker ever develop into an elite receiver?
Question 1
In a dynasty league, would you trade David Johnson for A.J. Green and Jordan Howard? My thinking of trading Johnson is Palmer and Arians are gone and he will be 27 next year. Green is an elite receiver and Jordan is 23 with a new coach who loves the running game.
HOWIE FISHMAN (Hermosa Beach, CA)
A fine idea, I think. Johnson is one of the top few pass-catching running backs in the league. He proved that two years ago, not only catching 80 passes but averaging 11.0 yards on those receptions. But Bruce Arians is gone, and that was a huge part of that success. Like Sean Payton, Arians is one of those offensive coaches who knows how to draw up the plays, putting his guys in the right positions. I’m not sure who’ll be running Arizona’s offense now, but there could be a huge dropoff – similar to what Atlanta got last year when Kyle Shanahan left for San Francisco. The Cardinals ended last season with one of the half-dozen worst offensive lines in the league, so their hope is to use Johnson more like another Jordan Howard, trying to bang things out between the tackles, that might fail miserably. Will Johnson even be better than Howard? I’m not confident he will be. So I would gladly swap those two if it allowed me to bring on A.J. Green.
Question 2
I wanted get your early take on two players I could acquire for 2018 in different trade offers. The first is DeVante Parker. I know he's a physical freak and oozing with potential, but lots of these guys just never figure it out. After years of watching him get outperformed by Landry and Stills, is it time to accept that he "is what he is" – just another guy – or do you still see growth potential there? The second is Jordy Nelson. I love the guy and love that offense, but I'm worried. His collapse in the middle of the season was written off to Brett Hundley, but when Rodgers came back he still did nothing. One game, I know, but he sure looked like a guy at the end of the road. What do you think? Bounce back year coming, or is he ready to fade into the background? Appreciate your thoughts.
BILL REHOR (Culver City, CA)
I’m not giving up on Parker. He’s definitely got the size, speed and talent, and at times it’s looked like he might break out. He missed about a month of last year with an injury; otherwise he would have finished with about 75 catches and 900 yards – and that was for a bad team. It could still happen for him. Jarvis Landry is a free agent, and that’s a key situation. If they end up letting Landry go elsewhere, they’ll need to use Parker a lot more. If I were walking into a 2018 draft today, I would think Parker would be one of the first 30-35 wide receivers selected. I am more leery of Nelson. He’ll be 33 in May, and I think it’s an old 33. He’s lost a lot of speed. If you go back to 2014, Nelson was consistently running through defenses for long touchdowns. He had 8 receptions of 40-plus yards that year. That’s gone. He’s undergone a hip surgery and he missed all of 2015 with a ACL reconstruction. Antonio Freeman, Robert Brooks and Greg Jennings were Green Bay receivers. Nelson is becoming one of those guys. It’s either over, or he’s right at the finish line.
Question 3
I see some sites are already doing "best ball" drafts for 2018 ... any thoughts on who would be your top few players at each position, if drafting today for 2018? Late-round fliers? Players to avoid? Thoughts?
Bill Yates (Churchville, NY)
With quarterbacks, I’ll probably have only Aaron Rodgers and Carson Wentz as players to potentially go after early. At that position, you only select one in the first two rounds if you have some confidence they might separate from all of the other good quarterbacks. Next tier might include Wilson, Brady, Cousins, Luck, Watson, Stafford, Garoppolo, Goff and all four quarterbacks in the NFC South. With running backs, Ezekiel Elliott, Todd Gurley, Alvin Kamara, Leonard Fournette, LeVeon Bell, Kareem Hunt, Melvin Gordon, Devonta Freeman should be in the top group. Probably David Johnson and Dalvin Cook as well, but we’ll need to see how Cook’s knee progresses and if the Cardinals can patch up their offensive line. At wide receiver, I’ll definitely have interest in Antonio Brown, DeAndre Hopkins, T.Y. Hilton, Tyreek Hill, Odell Beckham, Davante Adams, Julio Jones, Michael Thomas, Mike Evans, A.J. Green and JuJu Smith-Schuster. With Jon Gruden taking over in Oakland, Amari Cooper could/should move up into the top 10 statistically. Corey Davis had a handful of impressive catches as a rookie, including a pair of touchdowns at New England; he might be one of the first receivers I would select after the known quantities are off the board. I saw a blurb go by that the Jaguars might put the franchise tag on Allen Robinson, and that would be hard to understand – I’m not sure that he’s any better than about three other wide receivers they have down there.
Question 4
In a td heavy dynasty league, please rank your order for running backs, wideouts and tight ends for rookie drafteees. I recognize the difficulty since we don’t know what teams they will be on and some studs have not declared yet.
HOWIE FISHMAN (Hermosa Beach, CA)
I haven’t looked carefully yet at the college guys. At this time last year, for example, I hadn’t even heard of Kareem Hunt. As we move into the offseason, I’ll start looking more closely at the players who’ll be selected in the first and second rounds, and conclusions can start being drawn when they’re actually on NFL teams. Let’s see how they measure at the combine. For now, I’ll say that I’m very curious to see where Saquon Barkley and Sony Michel wind up. Michel reminds me of Alvin Kamara; I was very surprised how effective he was against Alabama in the national championship game. And Barkley looks like he’ll be better than most of the running backs who have been selected with top-15 picks in recent memory. I like his speed, vision and elusiveness, and he also weighs about 230 pounds – I expect he’ll be ranked among everyone’s top 10 running backs as a rookie.