A coach is worth real money in your auction. Some staffs have made the same position pay off for thirty years. Others quietly hold back a position their roster is built around. Every entry here names the coaching habit, then names the 2026 player it moves.
UnderpricedQBMIASep 8
Jeff Hafley has coached defense his whole career, and Miami’s offense under him is going to run through Malik Willis’s legs
Hafley has never called an NFL offensive play. He ran Ohio State’s defense in 2019, then spent four seasons as Boston College’s head coach, then two years as Green Bay’s defensive coordinator. A coach who spends that long on one side of the ball tends to build the other side to protect it once he is finally in charge. The clearest recent version of that is Bill Belichick’s 2020 Patriots: a lifelong defensive coach handed the offense to a mobile, unproven passer in Cam Newton, and the scheme leaned on called quarterback runs near the goal line instead of asking Newton to win with his arm. Newton scored 12 rushing touchdowns that season, more than any quarterback in the league.
Miami is set up to run the same play. Tua Tagovailoa is gone, traded to Atlanta this offseason, and Malik Willis is the new starter behind a receiver room that has already lost both Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle, in front of one of the league’s weaker offensive lines. Hafley does not need Willis to be a sharp passer to build his offense around him. He needs a low‑mistake, run‑heavy game plan that protects the defense, and Willis’s legs are the easiest tool on the roster for building one.
Who it moves: Malik Willis (MIA, QB). He is barely priced at all off a shaky 13.2 projected passing touchdowns. His 546 projected rushing yards and 3.4 rushing touchdowns are the part of his game a defensive‑minded first‑year head coach leans on hardest, and that floor is worth more than a bad completion rate suggests.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above a bottom-tier streaming price, concentrated in rushing production
UnderpricedRBCINSep 8
Sam Wyche built Cincinnati’s offense around a receiving running back forty years ago, and Chase Brown is the same idea with a far better quarterback throwing him the ball
Wyche coached the Bengals from 1984 through 1991 and is remembered for the no‑huddle “sonic boom” attack that sped the game up before a defense could substitute. James Brooks was the back who benefited most, catching 65 passes in 1988 alone on top of a real rushing role. Wyche’s Cincinnati offense never treated the running back as a between‑the‑tackles specialist. It treated him as a second receiver who also happened to carry the ball.
Cincinnati’s offense still runs through the passing game first, with Joe Burrow throwing to Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins on early downs as much as third downs. Chase Brown is the back catching the checkdowns and space throws that scheme creates, projected for 64 catches and 435 receiving yards on top of 1,038 rushing yards, with only journeyman Samaje Perine behind him on the depth chart. That is the same dual‑threat shape this building fed a running back decades ago, just with a much better arm throwing him the ball.
Who it moves: Chase Brown (CIN, RB). He is still priced by some rooms like a good rushing back who happens to catch a few passes. The receiving workload alone, on a pass‑first offense, is a real RB1 floor, sitting on top of a rushing role no one else on this roster is taking from him.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a rushing-only RB2 price, on dual-threat volume
UnderpricedTEINDSep 8
Tom Moore turned the Colts’ tight end into a featured receiver for over a decade, and Indianapolis just handed that same job to a rookie
Moore was Indianapolis’s offensive coordinator from 1998 through 2010, the span of Peyton Manning’s prime, and one clear signature of that offense was how much it fed the tight end. Dallas Clark set what was then an NFL record for the position with 100 catches, 1,106 yards and 10 touchdowns in 2009, and Marcus Pollard had already shown the position could carry real receiving volume there years before Clark arrived. That passing game never treated the tight end as a blocker who occasionally ran a route. He was often the first read.
Indianapolis just handed a rookie the same kind of workload. Tyler Warren, the team’s first‑round pick, projects for 85 catches, 894 receiving yards and 5.5 touchdowns — a bigger receiving line than every wide receiver on the roster, including Alec Pierce and Josh Downs. That is not a modest rookie‑tight‑end introduction. It is the same shape of job this franchise has handed the position before, just with a different name on it now.
Who it moves: Tyler Warren (IND, TE). He is priced in some rooms like a rookie tight end still learning an NFL route tree. The receiving workload already projected for him matches the biggest tight‑end seasons this franchise has ever produced.
Projected effect: +9% to +14% above a rookie-TE discount price, on target-share ramp
UnderpricedRBNYGSep 8
Bill Parcells built the Giants around one physical runner who carried the offense, and Cam Skattebo is walking into the same kind of workload
Parcells coached the Giants from 1983 through 1990 and won two Super Bowls running the ball behind a dominant offensive line instead of asking his quarterback to beat anyone. Joe Morris was the back who cashed that identity in, rushing for 1,336 yards and 21 touchdowns in 1985 and 1,516 yards the year after, both built on a heavy, downhill workload rather than any real role in the passing game. That kind of offense did not need its lead back to do everything. It needed him to take the ball twenty‑plus times a game and finish every one of those carries north, not sideways.
New York’s offense is shaped for the same kind of back again. This year’s staff leans on heavy, two‑tight‑end personnel more than almost any team in the league, the kind of run‑first identity that has always meant fewer plays for a passing‑down specialist and more for a physical, between‑the‑tackles runner. Cam Skattebo, a downhill rookie‑year standout, projects for 1,007 rushing yards and 45 catches with no real competition behind him on the depth chart — Tyrone Tracy Jr. projects for barely 150 rushing yards by comparison — a true workhorse role in an offense built to feature exactly that.
Who it moves: Cam Skattebo (NYG, RB). He is priced like a solid early‑down piece in a crowded backfield. The personnel this team already plays says the workhorse role is his, in the same style of offense that has fed one physical runner in this building before.
Projected effect: +7% to +11% above a shared-backfield price, on workload share
UnderpricedRBBALSep 7
Defensive coordinators who inherit the play‑calling almost always run it more than the room expects, and Jesse Minter has the best runner in football to do it with
Vic Fangio spent three seasons, from 2019 through 2021, as Denver’s head coach after two decades as an NFL defensive coordinator, and his offenses never stopped looking like a defensive coach’s idea of football: protect the ball, win the field‑position battle, and keep the game short. He leaned on Phillip Lindsay, then Melvin Gordon, and used the run to shorten the game for a defense he trusted more than his own passing attack. A lifelong defensive coach does not suddenly install a pass‑first identity just because he is finally the one calling the shots.
Baltimore just handed that exact profile an offense. Jesse Minter, promoted after Todd Monken left for Cleveland, has never called a single offensive play in the NFL. Lamar Jackson’s legs already do a lot of the work a scheme like that leans on, and Derrick Henry is the safest possible complement: a proven, bell‑cow runner who needs no install period and no target competition to be effective. A first‑time offensive play‑caller with a defensive background does not go looking for a new identity when a future Hall‑of‑Famer at running back is already sitting in the room.
Who it moves: Derrick Henry (BAL, RB). He is already priced near the top of the board off last year’s workload. Minter’s own coaching background is one more reason that workload does not shrink, even a year older.
Projected effect: +4% to +7% above his current price, on early-down volume share holding at last year’s level or higher
UnderpricedRBSEASep 7
NFL teams have handed a rookie the whole backfield the moment the depth chart clears and never looked back, and Seattle just did it with Jadarian Price
Le’Veon Bell was thrust into the Steelers’ backfield as a rookie in 2013 after the two backs ahead of him got hurt, and once he had the job, Pittsburgh never took it away — he handled a full three‑down workload for the rest of that season and never split touches at the position again. A clean opening at running back, once it actually appears, tends to get filled by whoever is standing there when it opens, not by seniority.
Seattle has that same clean opening right now. Zach Charbonnet is still working back from the torn ACL he suffered in last season’s playoffs with no clear Week 1 timeline, and rookie Jadarian Price has already taken over as the workload back, held out of the final preseason games purely to keep him healthy for it. He projects for 922 rushing yards and real receiving work, with no committee standing behind him.
Who it moves: Jadarian Price (SEA, RB). He is still priced in some rooms like an unproven rookie sharing touches. The opening in front of him is not temporary, and rookies who get handed a clean backfield rarely give it back either.
Projected effect: +7% to +11% above a rookie-committee price, on workload share
UnderpricedTEDALSep 7
Dallas has kept its tight end fed even at the height of its receiver depth for twenty years, and Jake Ferguson is this year’s version
Jason Witten played fourteen seasons in Dallas, including the Terrell Owens and Dez Bryant years, and he kept catching 60‑plus passes a season straight through the most receiver‑rich rosters the franchise ever built. The tight end’s role in this passing game has never been a function of how many outside threats were on the roster. It has been a standing job, handed to whoever plays the position.
Dallas just added George Pickens alongside CeeDee Lamb, building one of the deepest receiver rooms in the league — exactly the kind of depth that has always discounted a Dallas tight end’s price without actually touching his role. Jake Ferguson still projects for 73 catches, right in line with the position’s long‑running floor in this offense, even with two clear No. 1‑caliber receivers drawing the top coverage.
Who it moves: Jake Ferguson (DAL, TE). He is priced like the fourth read behind two star receivers. Twenty years of Dallas history say the tight end’s catches have never actually depended on how many receivers were ahead of him.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a TE2 price, on target-share durability behind Lamb and Pickens
UnderpricedRBTBSep 7
The safest job in a crowded NFL backfield has always been the passing‑down back, and Kenneth Gainwell already has it in Tampa Bay
J.D. McKissic never held a rushing job across three seasons in Washington, finishing more than one year with fewer than 50 carries, but his role in the passing game never depended on who was starting. He caught passes on early downs and late ones alike, topped 70 catches in his best season there, and kept that job even as the run‑game starter in front of him changed almost every year. A back who is trusted catching the ball out of the backfield keeps that job independent of the depth chart above him.
Tampa Bay is already sorting its backfield the same way. Bucky Irving remains the clear rushing leader, projected for nearly 1,000 yards on the ground, but the receiving math looks nothing like a true workhorse split: Kenneth Gainwell projects for 59 catches this season, well ahead of Irving’s 37, on a job that has nothing to do with who is getting the carries.
Who it moves: Kenneth Gainwell (TB, RB). He is priced like a committee afterthought sharing scraps behind Irving. The receiving role by itself is the safer weekly floor of the two jobs in this backfield, regardless of who leads in carries.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a committee-back price, concentrated in full-PPR scoring
UnderpricedTEPITSep 6
Brian Angelichio has coached tight ends his whole career, and Mike McCarthy just made him Pittsburgh’s play‑caller
Angelichio has coached the position almost everywhere he has worked. He spent four seasons, from 2022 through 2025, as Minnesota’s passing‑game coordinator and tight ends coach, and before that he coached tight ends in Green Bay from 2016 through 2018 — the same three years Mike McCarthy was the Packers’ head coach. Every stop on his résumé has the same job title next to it. This is not a coach who happens to know the position. It is the only position he has ever coached.
McCarthy just brought him back as Pittsburgh’s offensive coordinator, their first time working together since Green Bay. Pat Freiermuth is the tight end waiting for him — a proven receiver at the position who is now catching passes from Aaron Rodgers and running routes for a coordinator who has spent two decades making sure the tight end gets looked at first, not last.
Who it moves: Pat Freiermuth (PIT, TE). He is priced like a steady, unspectacular possession tight end. Angelichio has never coached anything but this position, and his own track record says a good tight end in his room gets more targets, not the same ones.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a standard TE1 price, on target-share growth under a tight-end-focused coordinator
UnderpricedWRDENSep 6
Sean Payton always finds one receiver to feed no matter who is running the route, and Denver’s own numbers already say it is Jaylen Waddle
Payton’s passing games in New Orleans always had one clear favorite, and it was never about measurables. Marques Colston caught passes at a Pro‑Bowl level for a decade on unremarkable athletic testing, purely because Payton’s quick, timing‑based passing game got him the ball in easy spots over and over. Michael Thomas took the same blueprint further, setting the NFL single‑season record with 149 catches in 2019. Payton does not need a specific kind of receiver to build his passing game around. He needs one who wins the easy completions the scheme is designed to create, and he always finds one.
Denver added Jaylen Waddle this offseason, and the projections already have him ahead of incumbent Courtland Sutton in the counting stats that matter most — more catches, more receiving yards. That is exactly the shape of a Payton passing game finding its favorite target again. The market is still pricing Waddle like the new addition splitting a crowded room, not like the receiver already winning the target competition on paper.
Who it moves: Jaylen Waddle (DEN, WR). He is priced like a complementary piece next to Sutton. Payton’s own history says whichever receiver wins that competition keeps winning it, and the numbers already say that receiver is Waddle.
Projected effect: +6% to +9% above a shared-WR1 price, on target-share concentration
UnderpricedRBJAXSep 6
Liam Coen already turned a fourth‑round rookie into one of football’s most efficient runners, and Jacksonville’s backfield is now Bhayshul Tuten’s alone
Coen’s only full season as a play‑caller is still the clearest proof of what he does for a running back. Tampa Bay’s rushing offense had been near the bottom of the league for two straight years before he took over the play‑calling in 2024, and it jumped to third in the NFL in yards per carry that season, with rookie Bucky Irving — a fourth‑round pick — leading every rookie in the league in rushing yards and yards from scrimmage. Coen did not need a proven veteran to make the running game work. He needed a scheme, and whichever back was holding the ball cashed it in.
Coen is Jacksonville’s head coach now, and the backfield in front of him has cleared out much the way Tampa Bay’s did before Irving took over. Travis Etienne left for New Orleans in free agency, and Bhayshul Tuten, a fourth‑round pick in 2025, is the clear lead back with only journeyman Ameer Abdullah behind him on the depth chart. Some of the market is still pricing Tuten off the crowded‑committee reports from earlier in the summer. That committee never showed up.
Who it moves: Bhayshul Tuten (JAX, RB). He is still priced like a committee back sharing early‑down work. Coen’s own history says an efficient runner with a clear path in his scheme does not stay a committee back for long.
Projected effect: +7% to +11% above a committee price, on workload share
UnderpricedRBTENSep 5
Robert Saleh has always leaned on one back to shorten the game, and Tennessee just handed him a proven one
Saleh ran the Jets from 2021 through 2024, and the offense underneath him was built the same way every year: protect a strong defense, control the clock, and keep feeding whichever back had earned the coaching staff’s trust. Breece Hall took that job as a rookie in 2022 and never lost it, leading the team in touches in both full seasons he played there even as three different play‑callers cycled through the coordinator’s chair around him. The scheme on top of it kept changing. The commitment to the lead back never did.
Saleh is Tennessee’s head coach now, and Tony Pollard is the back walking into that same setup. He projects for 1,044 rushing yards this season with no real competition behind him on the depth chart, while Brian Daboll’s passing game is expected to throw down the field more often than last year’s bottom‑10 unit did. A passing game that adds more shots downfield does not usually take touches away from the run the way a shorter, higher‑volume passing attack would. Saleh’s own history in New York says the lead back gets fed no matter what the passing game around him is doing.
Who it moves: Tony Pollard (TEN, RB). He is priced like an early‑down back who could see his workload dip if Tennessee’s passing game actually improves. Saleh’s own track record says the lead back’s workload is the one thing a scheme change upstairs does not touch.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above his current price, on workload durability
UnderpricedTECHISep 5
Ben Johnson fed a rookie tight end like a true No. 1 target in Detroit, and Chicago’s rookie is already tracking the same way
Johnson called Detroit’s offense from 2022 through 2024, and his clearest fingerprint at the position showed up immediately: Sam LaPorta caught 86 passes for 889 yards and 10 touchdowns as a rookie in 2023, run through a route tree built like a No. 1 receiver’s rather than a conventional tight end’s. That was not a scheme accidentally funneling targets to whoever happened to be open. Johnson built the passing game to feature the position the moment he had a player who could handle it.
Chicago just handed Johnson that same kind of player. Colston Loveland, the Bears’ first‑round rookie, already projects for 80 catches and 897 yards this season — a bigger target share than every Chicago receiver except Rome Odunze, and well ahead of veteran Cole Kmet on the same roster. The market is still pricing rookie tight ends for a slow, blocking‑heavy introduction to the league. Johnson’s own history with LaPorta says his rookie tight end gets force‑fed from Week 1.
Who it moves: Colston Loveland (CHI, TE). He is priced like a rookie tight end easing into the league. Johnson’s own history says a rookie tight end in his offense is a target hog from the start.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above a rookie-TE discount price, on target-share ramp
UnderpricedQBATLSep 5
Kevin Stefanski has rebuilt more than one battered quarterback, and Tua Tagovailoa just walked into that same project
Stefanski has done this job before. Baker Mayfield had bounced from high pick to punchline by the time Stefanski arrived in Cleveland in 2020, and Mayfield promptly delivered the best season of his career, then returned to real relevance again in 2023. In between, journeyman Joe Flacco stepped into that same play‑action, quick‑rhythm passing scheme in relief that year and instantly looked like a competent starter again, at an age when most quarterbacks are retired. The through‑line across both is a scheme built to make the position easier, not a specific arm.
Atlanta just handed Stefanski a similar reclamation case. Tua Tagovailoa arrived by trade this offseason, and the Falcons’ initial depth chart already names him the Week 1 starter over an injured Michael Penix Jr. The market is pricing Tagovailoa off a threadbare 2,171‑yard seasonal projection built for a timeshare he is not currently losing, not off what Stefanski’s scheme has already done for two different passers dropped into exactly this spot.
Who it moves: Tua Tagovailoa (ATL, QB). He is priced like the forgettable half of a timeshare behind an injured starter. Stefanski’s track record says the passer who gets his scheme, even briefly, usually outplays his depth‑chart slot.
Projected effect: +8% to +14% above his current backup-tier price, for the weeks he starts
UnderpricedRBWASSep 5
Dan Quinn’s backfields have always kept a receiving lane open no matter who was starting, and Rachaad White is stepping into that same lane in Washington
Quinn’s Atlanta backfields always found room for a receiving specialist, regardless of who held the primary rushing job. Devonta Freeman caught 73 passes in 2015 on his way to a monster season, and the receiving work in that backfield stayed real even after Freeman fully took over as the every‑down back the following year. A Quinn backfield splits work by what a back does well, not strictly by who is listed as the starter.
Washington is already shaped the same way. Jacory Croskey‑Merritt has the early‑down job and the goal‑line work, but Rachaad White, signed as a veteran free agent, projects for 40 catches out of the backfield — more than double Croskey‑Merritt’s own receiving total. That role is not contingent on White ever taking over the starting job. It is the same lane Quinn’s backfields have kept open next to the lead back for a decade.
Who it moves: Rachaad White (WAS, RB). He is priced like a committee back waiting on an injury in front of him. Quinn’s own history says the receiving role he already holds is safe on its own, regardless of what happens to the starter.
Projected effect: +7% to +11% above a pure-committee price, on the receiving role staying independent of the starting job
OverpricedTEBALSep 4
Todd Monken took his tight‑end offense to Cleveland, and Baltimore never replaced the coach who built it
Monken called Baltimore’s offense for three seasons before Cleveland hired him away as head coach this year, taking passing‑game assistant Travis Switzer with him. His signature there was feeding the tight end — a run‑action‑heavy scheme that still finished at the top of the league in explosive pass rate while funneling targets to the tight end as often as any staff in football. Mark Andrews was the player who cashed that scheme in, producing at a Pro‑Bowl level even in years when the receiver room around him was thin.
Baltimore replaced Monken with Jesse Minter, a defensive coordinator with no NFL play‑calling history of his own. A first‑year staff installing its own passing game rarely keeps every position’s usage exactly where the old coordinator left it, and the tight end’s role — tied specifically to Monken’s run‑action design — is the one piece with the least guarantee of surviving the transition intact.
Who it moves: Mark Andrews (BAL, TE). He is still priced off three years of Monken funneling him targets through run‑action looks. The coach who built that role is running Cleveland’s offense now, not Baltimore’s.
Projected effect: -6% to -10% below a Monken-scheme TE1 price, on the loss of his specific tight-end usage
UnderpricedTEGBSep 4
Matt LaFleur has fed a play‑action tight end since his first year in Green Bay, and Tucker Kraft is the one holding that job now
LaFleur built his reputation on play‑action, and one specific piece has cashed it every time he has had it: the tight end running open on run‑fake pass concepts before a defense can react. Robert Tonyan turned that job into 11 touchdowns in 2020 on just 52 catches, one of the most efficient touchdown rates at the position the league has seen, purely off the openings LaFleur’s run‑action created. When Tonyan moved on, LaFleur simply installed the next tight end into the same role.
Tucker Kraft is that tight end now, and the target math around him is splitting the wrong way for a normal receiver but not for LaFleur’s tight end: Green Bay’s receiver room is crowded between Christian Watson, Jayden Reed and rookie Matthew Golden, with no one of them clearly ahead of the other two. A crowded receiver room does not touch the tight end position the way it touches a third receiver, because LaFleur’s tight‑end usage was never built on volume math in the first place — it is built into the play design.
Who it moves: Tucker Kraft (GB, TE). He is priced like a solid TE1 in a crowded passing game. LaFleur’s own history says the tight end job in this offense is insulated from exactly that kind of target competition.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a standard TE1 price, insulated from Green Bay's crowded receiver room
UnderpricedWRWASSep 4
Dan Quinn’s Atlanta always fed one outside receiver no matter who called the plays, and Terry McLaurin is that receiver in Washington now
Quinn was Atlanta’s head coach from 2015 through 2020, and the play‑caller changed constantly underneath him — Kyle Shanahan ran the offense in 2015, then Steve Sarkisian, then Dirk Koetter. Julio Jones did not care who had the headset. He topped 1,400 receiving yards in three different seasons under three different coordinators, because Quinn’s own teams have always built the passing game to answer coverage with one receiver, not to spread it around.
Washington is doing the same thing under Quinn now. Terry McLaurin has been the only Commanders receiver a defense truly has to respect since Quinn arrived, and nothing has changed that this offseason — no proven complementary receiver has been added, and Jayden Daniels’s legs already occupy the part of the game plan a second receiver would otherwise unlock. McLaurin remains the one target on this roster Quinn’s offense is built to feed.
Who it moves: Terry McLaurin (WAS, WR). He is priced like a solid No. 1 receiver in a run‑first offense. Quinn’s own history across three different play‑callers in Atlanta says the No. 1 receiver holds that job regardless of who is drawing up the routes.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a standard WR1 price, on target-share durability
UnderpricedWRHOUSep 3
DeMeco Ryans has kept Nico Collins as Houston’s top target through every shake-up in the receiver room, and this year is no different
Ryans became Houston’s head coach in 2023 after two seasons as the 49ers’ defensive coordinator under Kyle Shanahan. He does not call Houston’s offensive plays, but the team he has built keeps landing on the same answer at receiver every year: whoever else walks through the room, Collins is the target the offense trusts first. He broke out in Ryans’ first season with 1,297 yards, then stayed the clear No. 1 receiver in both 2024 and 2025 even as the rest of the room turned over completely around him.
The room turned over again this year, and the pattern held again. Houston’s plan was to pair Collins with second‑year receiver Jayden Higgins, but Higgins tore his ACL in an August joint practice and is out for the entire season. That leaves Collins as the only proven target in the passing game once more — the same spot he has held every single year Ryans has been the coach.
Who it moves: Nico Collins (HOU, WR). He is priced like a very good No. 1 receiver in a crowded room. The room just lost its No. 2 option for the year, and Ryans’ Houston has never let that job go to anyone else anyway.
Projected effect: +6% to +9% above a standard WR1 price, on target-share concentration
Two-sidedTE / WRLACSep 3
Jim Harbaugh has always built a physical, heavy‑personnel offense, and Los Angeles’ formation mix is already taking snaps from Ladd McConkey and handing them to David Njoku
Every team Harbaugh has coached has leaned physical. His Stanford teams ran through power back Toby Gerhart. His 49ers, from 2011 through 2014, built around a bruising running game and a big, athletic tight end in Vernon Davis. Michigan’s national title team in 2023 was built the same way, with two tight ends on the field as often as almost any team in the country. The personnel grouping decides who is even on the field before a single route is run, and Harbaugh has always preferred the group with an extra blocker in it.
Los Angeles is already showing the same formation mix. The Chargers signed tight end David Njoku in May, thinning out the target competition behind him, and Ladd McConkey has already been kept off the field for some two‑tight‑end snaps in the preseason, even though he still runs a full route tree out of the slot whenever the offense stays in three‑receiver personnel.
Who it moves: Up — David Njoku (LAC, TE), who walks into a run‑first offense that is going to play a lot of two‑tight‑end football. Down — Ladd McConkey (LAC, WR), a true slot weapon whose routes depend on how often Los Angeles stays in three‑receiver sets, and that number is already shrinking.
Projected effect: +7% to +11% above a TE2 price for Njoku, on personnel-group snaps; -5% to -8% below a full-slot price for McConkey, on the same personnel shift
UnderpricedWRSEASep 3
Mike Macdonald builds his team to avoid mistakes, not to spread the ball around, and Jaxon Smith-Njigba is the one receiver that protects
Macdonald spent two seasons as Baltimore’s defensive coordinator before Seattle hired him in 2024, and he has run his program the same way ever since: protect the football, lean on the defense, and keep the passing game efficient instead of adventurous. A low‑mistake passing script does not need five options on every play. It needs one receiver a quarterback can trust against any coverage, and in Seattle that job belongs to one player.
Smith-Njigba commanded a 35.7% target share on 162 targets last season, an enormous number for any receiver, and Seattle added no real competition for that volume this offseason. Cooper Kupp is a complementary veteran at this stage of his career, not a true 1B. The concentration that already made Smith-Njigba one of the safest receivers on the board is exactly the kind of volume a careful, defense‑built program keeps leaning on.
Who it moves: Jaxon Smith-Njigba (SEA, WR). He already prices like one of the safest receivers in the league. A coach who wants to protect the football rather than spread it around is one more reason that target share holds up.
Projected effect: +3% to +6% above his current price, on target-share durability
UnderpricedRBBUFSep 3
Joe Brady’s offenses always find the easiest way to get a dangerous ball‑carrier extra touches, and Buffalo’s rushing champion is walking into exactly that plan
Brady built his reputation at LSU in 2019 as the passing‑game coordinator behind a national championship season, running an offense that manufactured easy, high‑percentage completions instead of asking his quarterback to work through a full progression on every snap. He carried the same instinct into his NFL coordinator stops: find the matchup a defense already has to respect, and get him the ball the fastest way available, whether that is a called run or a checkdown. Buffalo made him its head coach for 2026 to bring that identity to an offense that already had the right personnel waiting for it.
James Cook led the entire NFL in rushing with 1,621 yards last season, largely as a between‑the‑tackles runner with a limited role in the passing game. Brady’s history says that gap does not last. A back who has already proven he can carry a real workload on the ground is the easiest kind of weapon to get more touches in space, and Buffalo pairs him with a dominant offensive line and a quarterback who can find him underneath. The receiving work raises his weekly floor as much as it raises his ceiling.
Who it moves: James Cook (BUF, RB). He is priced like a pure runner who happened to lead the league in yards. A coach whose whole identity is finding easier ways to get his best weapon the ball is exactly what a receiving-role bump looks like before it shows up in the box score.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above his current price, on receiving-role upside beyond the rushing floor already priced in
Two-sidedWR / TECINSep 2
Zac Taylor’s passing game runs through two outside receivers only, and that leaves Cincinnati’s tight end running on fumes
Taylor built his passing game to live through Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins from the day he arrived in 2019, and everyone else on the field works around that. Cincinnati’s tight ends have been an afterthought in the target math for years — C.J. Uzomah, Hayden Hurst and Irv Smith Jr. all passed through the room without ever turning into real weekly weapons, no matter how good their hands were.
The touchdown math backs it up. Higgins has scored like a true No. 1 receiver in nearly every healthy season he’s played, even though he has trailed Chase in raw targets every single year — a defense that has to account for Chase first keeps handing Higgins the matchups he needs once the ball gets inside the twenty. Mike Gesicki, on the other hand, signed with Cincinnati as a receiving tight end, and the offense has no real plan to feature him there. He projects for just 32 catches, in line with every tight end who has passed through this room before him.
Who it moves: Up — Tee Higgins (CIN, WR), who keeps scoring at a rate his target share alone doesn’t explain because Chase draws the coverage first. Down — Mike Gesicki (CIN, TE), a receiving tight end walking into a scheme that has never had room for one.
Projected effect: +5% to +9% above a standard No.2-receiver price for Higgins, on touchdown rate; -8% to -12% below a receiving-TE price for Gesicki, on target share
UnderpricedTEDENSep 2
Sean Payton has always had one big year in him from a mismatch tight end, and Denver just handed him the player to do it with
Payton has done this before with the right player. Jimmy Graham was a basketball convert with almost no traditional tight‑end background when Payton got hold of him in New Orleans, and by 2013 Graham had turned into one of the most dangerous red‑zone weapons in football — 16 receiving touchdowns, more than every wide receiver in the league that year. Payton didn’t do it with scheme alone. He needed an athlete who could line up all over the formation and win matchups a normal tight end couldn’t. Denver’s tight end room hasn’t had that player since Payton arrived in 2023.
Evan Engram is that player now. He set the NFL single‑season record for catches by a tight end in 2023, with 114, and Denver added him specifically to be the mismatch piece this offense has been missing at the position. The rest of the receiving room is crowded — Courtland Sutton and Jaylen Waddle both need targets too — but Payton has never been shy about funneling the ball to a tight end who can actually win the matchup, once he has one.
Who it moves: Evan Engram (DEN, TE). He is priced like a complementary piece in a crowded passing game. Payton’s own history says a real mismatch tight end gets fed regardless of how many receivers are also on the field.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above a standard TE2 price, on target-share upside the crowded receiver room hasn’t priced in
UnderpricedRBDALSep 2
Brian Schottenheimer already turned one Dallas running back into a 350‑touch workhorse, and Javonte Williams is stepping into the same setup
Schottenheimer already ran this exact play in Dallas once. He called the Cowboys’ offense in 2019, and Ezekiel Elliott led the entire NFL in touches that year — 301 carries and 54 catches, nearly 360 touches in a single season. That is not a passing‑game specialist getting fed a few extra checkdowns. That is a coordinator who hands his lead back the ball on early downs, on third downs, and near the goal line, and doesn’t bother building a committee around him.
Schottenheimer is back in Dallas now as head coach, and the backfield behind Javonte Williams looks the same way Elliott’s did in 2019: thin. Malik Davis and rookie Phil Mafah are the only other backs on the depth chart, and neither profiles as more than emergency insurance. Williams is set up to be the every‑down back in the exact system that has already produced one before.
Who it moves: Javonte Williams (DAL, RB). He is priced like a solid early‑down starter who gives back some work on passing downs. Schottenheimer’s own history in this building says the lead back keeps the ball in every situation.
Projected effect: +9% to +14% above a standard early-down-back price, on workload share
UnderpricedTEMINSep 2
Kevin O’Connell has always scripted easy completions to his tight end, and T.J. Hockenson is fully healthy again to cash them
O’Connell has always built easy completions into his offense for the tight end. As the Rams’ offensive coordinator in 2020, his scheme leaned on scripted play‑action looks that got Tyler Higbee free access underneath before a defense could react. When O’Connell became Minnesota’s head coach in 2022, he traded for Hockenson mid‑season and turned him into an immediate focal point — before an ACL tear cut his 2023 season short, Hockenson was on pace for one of the biggest target totals for a tight end in the league.
Hockenson is now fully removed from that injury, with a full training camp behind him instead of a midseason trade or a rehab schedule. Justin Jefferson still commands the defense’s best coverage on the outside, which is exactly the setup that has already produced a monster season for O’Connell’s tight end once. Hockenson’s own projection, 78 catches, already reflects a real target share — the market just hasn’t caught up to what that role is worth with him fully healthy.
Who it moves: T.J. Hockenson (MIN, TE). He is still priced off two injury‑shortened seasons. O’Connell’s scheme has already shown what a fully healthy version of this role produces.
Projected effect: +7% to +12% above an injury-discounted TE price
UnderpricedWRPHISep 2
A run-first team still needs one receiver who wins on his own, and Philadelphia’s is DeVonta Smith now that A.J. Brown is gone
Steve Smith Sr. is the clearest example of how little a true No. 1 receiver needs from a run‑first offense to still put up real numbers. Carolina spent most of his career leaning on the ground game first, under multiple different coaching staffs and multiple different quarterbacks, and Smith kept producing anyway because a defense still has to cover the one receiver who can beat man coverage by himself, no matter how run‑heavy the game plan is.
Philadelphia is exactly that kind of offense under Sirianni — Saquon Barkley’s workload and the short‑yardage quarterback package both cap how often this team throws the ball. But A.J. Brown is gone, traded to New England, which leaves DeVonta Smith as the only receiver on this roster a defense actually has to respect one‑on‑one. A lower‑volume passing game concentrates around fewer targets, not more, and Smith is now the only one left standing at the top of that list.
Who it moves: DeVonta Smith (PHI, WR). He is still priced like a No. 2 receiver splitting the room with Brown. Brown is in New England now, and the whole receiver room’s targets funnel through Smith instead.
Projected effect: +7% to +12% above a No.-2-receiver price, on target-share consolidation
Two-sidedRBLARSep 1
Sean McVay has never let one running back keep the job for long, and the pattern is back with Kyren Williams and Blake Corum
McVay does this every few years. Todd Gurley carried the offense in 2017 and 2018, but the moment his role started to erode in 2019, McVay did not hand the job to a single replacement — he opened 2020 by naming a three-man rotation of Malcolm Brown, Darrell Henderson and rookie Cam Akers instead. The committee kept reshuffling for three more seasons, with Henderson, Akers and Sony Michel all taking turns as the lead back, before Kyren Williams finally stabilized the job in 2023.
The pattern is back. Blake Corum is lined up for close to a 50‑50 split of the carries with Kyren Williams this season, continuing a share he already took down the stretch a year ago, per multiple outlets including Yahoo Sports and Sports Illustrated. Williams still opens the year as the starter and keeps the goal‑line work, so his job is not in danger — but McVay has never let a starter keep the whole backfield for long, and a real committee is a real committee, whichever name sits atop the depth chart.
Who it moves: Up — Blake Corum (LAR, RB), who profiles as a genuine committee partner now, not a cheap handcuff. Down — Kyren Williams (LAR, RB), still priced by some rooms like a true workhorse when his own backfield already expects to split it close to evenly.
Projected effect: +8% to +12% above a handcuff price for Corum; -6% to -10% below a workhorse price for Williams
UnderpricedWRGBSep 1
Davante Adams once had the whole Green Bay passing game to himself, and Christian Watson just inherited the same empty room
Adams’ last two seasons in Green Bay are the clearest proof of what happens when a Packers receiver has no real competition left in the room. He led the NFL with 18 receiving touchdowns in 2020, then followed it with a career‑high 123 catches and 1,553 yards in 2021, because there was nobody else on that roster a defense had to respect.
Green Bay has cleared the same kind of space around Christian Watson. The team signed him to a four‑year, $110.5 million extension this offseason, and with Romeo Doubs and Dontayvion Wicks both off the roster, camp reports already have him drawing the early targets as the clear No.‑1 — a 14‑yard catch on the second offensive snap of the preseason opener, and a target share that keeps climbing. His projection still lists him for just 55 catches, a number built before that competition left the building.
Who it moves: Christian Watson (GB, WR). He is priced like the boom‑or‑bust field‑stretcher he used to be in a crowded room. The room is not crowded anymore.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above his current price, on target-share growth the projection has not caught up to yet
UnderpricedRBWASSep 1
An undrafted rookie can still take over an NFL backfield in one camp, and Jacory Croskey-Merritt is proving it in Washington the same way James Robinson once did in Jacksonville
James Robinson went undrafted out of Illinois State in 2020. Jacksonville released Leonard Fournette, a former top‑five pick, right before the season and turned the backfield over to Robinson instead of paying up for a proven veteran. He rushed for 1,070 yards as a rookie. A strong training camp has always counted for more than draft pedigree once a coaching staff actually has to pick someone.
Washington is watching the same story play out. Croskey‑Merritt went in the seventh round last year and still rushed for 805 yards and eight touchdowns on 175 carries as a rookie. Camp reporting already has him as the favorite to open the season atop the depth chart, with veteran Rachaad White — still working back from a hamstring injury — ticketed for a complementary role instead.
Who it moves: Jacory Croskey-Merritt (WAS, RB). He is still priced like a seventh‑round afterthought. The depth chart already reads like a lead back’s.
Projected effect: +9% to +14% above a late-round price, on the lead-back role camp has already handed him
OverpricedWRBUFSep 1
The Marv Levy‑era Bills never let one pass-catcher run away with a season, and this year’s room is doing it to DJ Moore
Buffalo’s no‑huddle offense under Marv Levy was built to spread the ball around, not feed one target. Thurman Thomas led the NFL in yards from scrimmage four straight seasons from 1989 through 1992 by adding fifty‑plus catches a year out of the backfield — on an offense that also started Andre Reed and James Lofton at receiver. Nobody in that group ever had the passing game to himself.
Buffalo’s current room is doing the same thing to DJ Moore. He arrived this offseason as the presumed No.‑1, but Dalton Kincaid and Dawson Knox have both stayed heavily involved, and the room is deep enough that Josh Allen’s best weeks can now run through any of three different pass‑catchers instead of one. That is good for Buffalo’s offense and bad for anyone pricing Moore like the passing game’s one focal point.
Who it moves: DJ Moore (BUF, WR). He is priced like a true alpha receiver. The room around him was built to make sure nobody gets to be one.
Projected effect: -6% to -10% below a true-No.1 price, on target diffusion across Kincaid and Knox
OverpricedTEATLAug 31
Kevin Stefanski has never let one tight end run away with the job, and he just brought his own second option to Atlanta
Stefanski ran a two-tight-end room for two full seasons as Cleveland’s head coach, pairing David Njoku with Austin Hooper from 2020 through 2021. Neither one topped 50 catches in either year. The Browns leaned on Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt on the ground instead, and whatever passing-game work was left got split down the middle rather than funneled to a single featured tight end.
Atlanta just handed Stefanski the same setup. He signed Hooper as a free agent this offseason, and the preseason snaps are already following the old pattern: Kyle Pitts played only 9 of the Falcons’ 14 first-team snaps in the preseason opener, down from the 87.7% snap share he carried all of last season. Pitts is still the better player by a wide margin, but Stefanski’s own history says that doesn’t stop him from carving out a real role for the second tight end anyway.
Who it moves: Kyle Pitts (ATL, TE). He is still priced like a true top‑five target earner at the position. Stefanski has already shown once, with a similarly talented tight end room, that he won’t let the touches concentrate that way.
Projected effect: -8% to -12% below a 90-plus-target TE1 price, on snap and target-share dilution from the two-tight-end personnel
UnderpricedWRBALAug 31
An uncontested No. 1 receiver has put up monster years in far worse passing games than Baltimore’s, and Zay Flowers has zero real competition for the job
DeAndre Hopkins is the cleanest proof of how little a receiver needs around him if nobody else on the roster can take his targets. In 2015, playing for a run‑first Houston staff and catching passes from Brian Hoyer, a quarterback so unremarkable the team benched him during the season, Hopkins still caught 111 passes for 1,521 yards and 11 touchdowns. A shaky offense caps a receiver’s efficiency. It does almost nothing to a receiver nobody else on the roster can replace as the No. 1 read.
Baltimore is built the same way. The offense still runs through Lamar Jackson’s legs and Derrick Henry’s carries first, but Flowers is the only Ravens receiver anyone treats as a real threat — the projections have him at 82 catches and 1,171 yards, more than double Rashod Bateman’s 38 catches and 614 yards a tier behind him. That gap is what an uncontested No. 1 job looks like on paper before a single snap is played.
Who it moves: Zay Flowers (BAL, WR). He is priced like a complementary piece in a run-first passing game. The size of his lead over the next Ravens receiver says he is the exception a run-first offense still has to feed.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a run-first-offense discount price, on target-share concentration
Two-sidedRBMINAug 31
Kevin Faulk built a decade-long career in New England on third downs alone, and Minnesota’s backfield is already splitting the same way
Faulk never won a starting job in thirteen seasons with the Patriots and never had a 1,000‑yard season, but Bill Belichick kept him on the field for third downs and two‑minute drills year after year regardless of who else was in the backfield. A back who is safe in protection and reliable catching the ball out of the backfield is the hardest role to take away once a staff trusts him with it, even when he never touches the early‑down carries at all.
Minnesota’s Aaron Jones and Jordan Mason committee is already sorting itself along those same lines. The two have been described as a muddled timeshare all camp, but the receiving work is not split evenly: Jones projects for 47 catches this season against just 13 for Mason. The rushing competition is still unresolved. The passing-down job already looks decided.
Who it moves: Up — Aaron Jones (MIN, RB), whose receiving role gives him the safer weekly floor even if Mason wins more of the early‑down carries. Down — Jordan Mason (MIN, RB), priced like a clean lead back in a committee that already looks likely to cost him the passing downs.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a committee price for Jones, on receiving-role safety; -5% to -9% below an early-down-lead price for Mason, on the passing downs he has already lost
UnderpricedTEARIAug 30
A true mismatch tight end has always outrun a bad quarterback situation, and Trey McBride is proving it in the worst one in the league
Antonio Gates spent a decade and a half as the clearest example football has of this: whoever started at quarterback in San Diego, healthy or hurt, Gates stayed the first read in the red zone and on third down, because a tight end built to beat a linebacker or a safety one‑on‑one does not need a great arm behind him to stay open. A shaky quarterback shrinks the throwing windows every ordinary receiver on the field depends on. It barely touches a mismatch nobody on the field can actually cover.
Arizona is running the same experiment now, just from a worse starting point. The team released Kyler Murray and handed the offense to Jacoby Brissett, a downgrade that drags down the ceiling on every skill player in the building, on a roster already built around a run‑leaning identity rather than a featured passing game. McBride is the one player that downgrade does not really touch. His catch radius makes him the safety‑valve target no matter who is throwing him the ball, which is exactly the profile that has survived a bad quarterback before.
Who it moves: Trey McBride (ARI, TE). The market has already priced in Arizona’s quarterback downgrade for the receivers around him. It should not be pricing McBride the same way — his role is the one part of this offense a bad quarterback cannot shrink.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a standard TE1 price, insulated from Arizona’s other downgrades
Two-sidedRBDENAug 30
The receiving back is historically the safest job in a messy committee, and Denver’s crowded backfield is about to prove it again
Darren Sproles never won a single training‑camp competition for the nominal starting job — not in San Diego, not in New Orleans, not in Philadelphia. It never mattered. Across three franchises and three completely different coaching staffs over more than a decade, Sproles kept his third‑down and two‑minute role fully intact, because a back who is safe in pass protection and dangerous with the ball in space is the hardest role to take away once a staff trusts him with it. The name atop the depth chart changes constantly. The safest job in the room almost never does.
Denver is running exactly that kind of muddled committee right now. J.K. Dobbins is back on a two‑year deal and still projects for the bigger rushing workload on paper, but he has missed 54 games in six NFL seasons, and the touch split has stayed murky enough all camp that beat coverage keeps hedging on how the three‑man group divides up. RJ Harvey already took over as Denver’s lead back for stretches last season once Dobbins went down, and it is specifically his receiving role that gives him the safer weekly floor of the two, not his standing on the depth chart.
Who it moves: Up — RJ Harvey (DEN, RB), priced like the back half of an even timeshare when his receiving role alone gives him the safer weekly floor. Down — J.K. Dobbins (DEN, RB), priced like a clean lead back despite an injury history that has already cost him 54 games in six seasons.
Projected effect: +8% to +12% above a committee price for Harvey, on the safety of his receiving role; -8% to -12% below a clean lead-back price for Dobbins, on his injury history
Two-sidedWRLVAug 29
Klint Kubiak already turned play‑action shots off the zone run into a superstar receiver once, and Raiders camp is already showing who gets that role this time
Kubiak called plays for Minnesota in 2021, running the same wide‑zone rushing scheme his family has run for three generations, and it did more than feed the running back. Dalvin Cook’s heavy workload set up play‑action off nearly identical run looks, and Justin Jefferson turned that look into 1,616 yards in just his second season. Adam Thielen finished the same year over 1,000 yards too. The runner draws the safety down. The receiver who wins the play‑action shots is where the rest of the value goes.
Las Vegas is already sorting out which receiver that is. Tre Tucker played nine of the Raiders’ ten first‑team snaps in the preseason opener against Arizona, more than any other receiver in Kubiak’s offense, and got the early targets on the opening drive. Jalen Nailor is also starting, but the lead role and the play‑action shots are going to Tucker first.
Who it moves: Up — Tre Tucker (LV, WR), still priced like a committee piece even though camp has already named him the first read. Down — Jalen Nailor (LV, WR), who keeps a starting job but loses the shots that made Jefferson’s early seasons special.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above a committee-receiver price for Tucker; -5% to -9% below a full-starter price for Nailor
Two-sidedRBNEAug 29
Mike Vrabel rode Derrick Henry as a true bell‑cow for five years in Tennessee, and New England’s backfield timeshare is already tilting toward one back
Vrabel does not manage a good running back’s workload down once he has one. Derrick Henry led the NFL in rushing in both 2019 and 2020 under him, clearing 300 carries both years and topping 2,000 yards in 2020, and he stayed the featured back through 2023 even as the passing game struggled around him. Whichever back proves he deserves the ball keeps getting it in a Vrabel offense, without a timeshare stepping back in to protect the other player’s workload.
New England has been splitting carries between TreVeyon Henderson and Rhamondre Stevenson, but Henderson’s snap share has already started climbing late in camp. That is the same kind of shift that preceded Henry taking the Titans’ backfield over outright, and it is exactly the signal a Vrabel offense tends to act on rather than smooth over.
Who it moves: Up — TreVeyon Henderson (NE, RB), still priced like one half of an even timeshare while camp reports already show him pulling ahead. Down — Rhamondre Stevenson (NE, RB), priced like a true co‑starter in a backfield that Vrabel’s own history says will not stay split much longer.
Projected effect: +8% to +14% above a 50/50 timeshare price for Henderson; -8% to -12% below a co-starter price for Stevenson
UnderpricedWRKCAug 29
Andy Reid has always built one receiver to run past everybody, and this year the job is Xavier Worthy’s alone
Reid has done this since his first Philadelphia rosters. Rookie DeSean Jackson caught only 62 passes in 2008 but turned them into 912 yards, averaging nearly 15 yards every time he touched the ball in a role built purely to stretch the field. Reid rebuilt the same part in Kansas City around Tyreek Hill starting in 2016, and Hill’s vertical role became the engine of the league’s scariest passing game for half a decade. The names change. The job of forcing a safety to stay deep every snap does not.
Rashee Rice is suspended for the first six games of 2026, which leaves Worthy as the only proven vertical piece on the field for a month of the season. Reid has never let that kind of opening sit empty.
Who it moves: Xavier Worthy (KC, WR). He is priced like a No. 2 receiver waiting for volume. Reid’s own history says the field‑stretcher gets fed the role the moment the other option is off the field, and Rice’s suspension hands it to him for the whole first month.
Projected effect: +9% to +15% above his price for the first six weeks, settling toward +5% to +8% after Rice returns
UnderpricedWRNOAug 29
Kellen Moore has fed one true No. 1 receiver everywhere he has called plays, and New Orleans just cleared the field for his
Moore called plays in Dallas from 2019 through 2022, and the Cowboys always built the passing game around one receiver at a time. Amari Cooper was that receiver in 2019, banking 1,189 yards. CeeDee Lamb inherited the job and kept growing into it, banking 1,359 yards by 2022, Moore’s last year calling Dallas’s offense before his run through Los Angeles and Philadelphia. The name at the top of the target sheet changed. The one‑receiver structure around him did not.
New Orleans just handed Moore that exact setup. Rookie Jordyn Tyson, the presumed No. 2 receiver, injured his hamstring in an August joint practice and is expected to miss roughly two months, which leaves Chris Olave as the only established target in the offense for at least the season’s first month.
Who it moves: Chris Olave (NO, WR). The market has already priced in his health recovery. It has not yet priced in a play‑caller with a decade‑long habit of building his whole passing game around whichever receiver is left standing alone at the top.
Projected effect: +7% to +12% above his current price, concentrated in the season’s first month
OverpricedRBMIAAug 24
The coach who built De’Von Achane’s game left for the Chargers this offseason, and his price hasn’t caught up
A wide‑zone rushing scheme is what turned Achane into an explosive part‑time back in 2023, averaging close to eight yards a carry, and the same scheme got a career year out of Raheem Mostert the season before. That coach spent four years running Miami’s offense before this year’s move to Los Angeles, where he now calls plays for the Chargers. The cutback lanes and manufactured yardage that made Achane special travel with the coach who designed them, not with the back who ran through them.
Everything else around Achane has also come apart. Miami signed Malik Willis at quarterback, lost both Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle, and projects with one of the league’s weakest offensive lines. Defenses no longer have to respect the deep pass, so boxes get heavier and the cutback lanes that made Achane’s per‑carry numbers special shrink right along with them — the exact mechanism the scheme used to be built to beat.
Who it moves: De’Von Achane (MIA, RB). His price still trades on three years of scheme‑built efficiency. The coach who built it is running a different backfield now.
Projected effect: -6% to -11% below a 2025-usage price, mostly from yards per carry
UnderpricedWRSFAug 24
Kyle Shanahan invented the “wide back” role for Deebo Samuel once, and San Francisco’s roster says he is rebuilding it
No play‑caller in the league manufactures touches for one specific skill set the way Shanahan does. His clearest example is still Samuel’s own 2021 season: motion, jet sweeps and screens turned him into a player who racked up 1,770 total yards from scrimmage without ever being schemed like a conventional No.‑1 receiver running a route tree. The role was not about targets. It was about getting the ball into his hands in space by any means available.
San Francisco has since added Mike Evans and kept Christian McCaffrey, both of whom now sit ahead of Samuel in the target pecking order. That is precisely the setup that puts him back into the manufactured‑touch role instead of asking him to win as a true No.‑1, which is not his job in this room anymore. His 2025 line of 72 catches, 727 receiving yards and another 75 rushing already reads like the wide‑back role, not a featured receiver’s.
Who it moves: Deebo Samuel (SF, WR). He is priced like a fringe flex who needs target volume to matter. Shanahan’s own history says the role travels with him even at a low volume, in spike weeks the raw target count will not predict.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above a standard flex price, concentrated in boom weeks
UnderpricedWRTBAug 23
Todd Bowles has kept a 1,000‑yard receiver in Tampa Bay every year he’s been the head coach — now it’s Emeka Egbuka’s turn
Since Bowles took over as Tampa Bay’s head coach in 2022, the Buccaneers have had a 1,000‑yard receiver every season, no matter who was calling plays or throwing the ball. Byron Leftwich ran the offense in 2022. Dave Canales took over in 2023. Liam Coen had it in 2024. Tom Brady retired and Baker Mayfield took over at quarterback in the middle of all that. The names around the job kept changing, and the job itself kept producing the same result anyway.
Mike Evans held that job through all of it, and now he is gone, traded to San Francisco. Egbuka steps into the opening as a second‑year receiver, and the numbers already treat him like the new No. 1: he projects for more catches, yards and touchdowns than any other Buccaneer, well ahead of a healthy Chris Godwin working from the slot.
Who it moves: Emeka Egbuka (TB, WR). The room is still pricing him like a No. 2 receiver finding his footing. Bowles’s track record says whoever holds that job in Tampa Bay gets fed like a true No. 1.
Projected effect: +7% to +12% above a No. 2 receiver price
UnderpricedRBLACAug 23
Mike McDaniel’s outside‑zone scheme keeps turning ordinary backs into monster rushers, and Omarion Hampton has no committee to share it with
In Miami, McDaniel’s wide‑zone rushing scheme produced huge, efficient seasons out of backs nobody expected it from. Raheem Mostert led the league in yards per carry in 2022 running behind it. Rookie De’Von Achane averaged close to eight yards a carry in 2023 in a part‑time role. The scheme creates the cutback lane. Whoever gets the ball turns modest gains into long ones.
McDaniel is now the Chargers’ offensive coordinator, and unlike in Miami, there is no timeshare cutting into the workload. Los Angeles did not draft a running back this offseason. Kimani Vidal is the only depth behind Hampton, and he projects for barely a third of Hampton’s rushing yards.
Who it moves: Omarion Hampton (LAC, RB). He is priced like a solid early‑down back in his second year. A zone scheme that has already made two different backs into league leaders in efficiency, with no real competition for his touches, is worth more than that.
Projected effect: +6% to +11% above his price, mostly from yards per carry
Two-sidedRBARIAug 23
Mike LaFleur has already shown he won’t hold a job open for an injured back, and Arizona’s backfield is about to test that again
LaFleur’s history with running backs is short but instructive. He was the Jets’ offensive coordinator for two seasons, and in the second one, rookie Breece Hall was off to an explosive start before tearing his ACL in Week 7 of 2022. The Jets did not build a committee to soften that loss and wait for Hall to come back. Whoever was healthy simply inherited the job for the rest of the season. LaFleur’s offense goes to the back in front of him, not the one on the roster with the pedigree.
Arizona spent the No. 3 overall pick and a record rookie contract on Jeremiyah Love, and the plan was always to hand him the offense. But Love suffered a high ankle sprain in the preseason opener, and LaFleur has not committed to a Week 1 timeline. James Conner, the healthy veteran directly behind him, is the back left standing.
Who it moves: Up — James Conner (ARI, RB), whose price still assumes he barely plays. LaFleur’s own history says the healthy back plays now, not later. Down — Jeremiyah Love (ARI, RB), still priced like a locked‑in Week 1 workhorse despite a coach who has already shown he won’t wait around when a back’s timeline is unclear.
Projected effect: +10% to +16% above a handcuff price for Conner in the short term; -8% to -12% off a locked-in workhorse price for Love until his timeline clears
UnderpricedQBTENAug 23
Brian Daboll turned Josh Allen into a deep‑ball weapon in Buffalo, and Cam Ward is his next reclamation project
Daboll called plays for Buffalo from 2018 through 2021, and Josh Allen’s deep passing improved every year he was there — more yards per attempt, more explosive completions, a genuine MVP‑level leap by 2020. Daboll did not change who Allen was. He changed how often the offense asked him to throw the ball down the field, and the numbers followed.
Ward’s rookie season did not go that way. He finished as a bottom‑half starter, averaging just 5.9 yards per attempt with only 15 touchdown passes, a profile built on short, safe throws instead of any downfield rhythm. Daboll’s arrival in Tennessee is a scheme change aimed at exactly that problem, and depth of target is the fastest way to fix a low yards‑per‑attempt number.
Who it moves: Cam Ward (TEN, QB). The market is still pricing him off a rookie season with almost no deep shots. Daboll has already fixed this exact issue for a different young quarterback once.
Projected effect: +8% to +12% above his rookie-year price
UnderpricedRBNOAug 22
Kellen Moore fed Ezekiel Elliott for four years, then turned Saquon Barkley into a 2,000‑yard back — now he calls the Saints’ plays
Moore called plays in Dallas from 2019 through 2022, and Elliott was a true bell‑cow through most of it, clearing 300 touches in three of those four seasons. Moore left for Philadelphia in 2024, installed the same zone‑heavy rushing structure, and Saquon Barkley ran for 2,005 yards — the second‑highest single‑season total in NFL history. Two different backs, two different rosters, the same outcome: whichever runner Moore hands the ball to gets fed like a lead back, not managed like a committee piece.
New Orleans is the next stop, and the backfield picture has already resolved itself in his favor. Alvin Kamara sprained his MCL in an August joint practice and is expected to miss at least a month, handing the early‑down and third‑down work to Travis Etienne Jr. Moore’s history says he does not hand a workload back in small pieces once a back has earned it, either.
Who it moves: Travis Etienne Jr. (NO, RB). The room is still pricing him for the committee that resumes the day Kamara is healthy. Moore’s track record says the back who takes the job in Kamara’s absence keeps more of it than that price assumes.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above his committee price
UnderpricedQBINDAug 22
Shane Steichen’s offense manufactures quarterback rushing touchdowns, and Daniel Jones is the newest one to get them
Steichen called plays for Jalen Hurts in Philadelphia in 2021 and 2022, building the league’s most productive quarterback run game around him. Hurts scored 13 rushing touchdowns in that 2022 MVP‑runner‑up season, most of them on designed runs and short‑yardage keepers rather than scrambles. Steichen brought that same identity to Indianapolis as head coach in 2023, and it survived the switch from Anthony Richardson’s legs to Daniel Jones’s.
Jones was never miscast as a pocket passer in New York, but the Giants stopped using his legs as anything more than an escape valve. Steichen’s offense does not have that option. Designed quarterback runs and goal‑line keepers are a feature of the system, not an emergency plan, and the system does not care who is taking the snap.
Who it moves: Daniel Jones (IND, QB). The market is still pricing him off his passing line, the same way it always has. Steichen’s system adds rushing touchdowns to that price for free.
Projected effect: +9% to +14% above a passing‑only price
UnderpricedRBNYJAug 22
Defensive head coaches play it safe on offense, and Aaron Glenn’s Jets already look the part
A coach’s background is one of the most reliable shortcuts in football. Coaches who came up on defense tend to build offenses that protect field position and shorten the game — more called runs on early downs, more clock burned, fewer total possessions. Bill Belichick’s Patriots and John Harbaugh’s Ravens both ran this identity for over a decade, leaning on the running back long before either team had a great one at the position.
Glenn, a career defensive coach hired to run the Jets in 2025, fits the mold, and the 2026 numbers already show it before a snap is played: Geno Smith’s projected passing volume sits near the bottom of the league among full‑time starters, exactly what a program built to protect its defense produces.
Who it moves: Breece Hall (NYJ, RB). He is priced like a complementary back in an offense that still throws plenty. A staff built to shorten games leans on its lead back more than the raw pass‑attempt numbers suggest.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above his price
UnderpricedRBDETAug 22
Dan Campbell never stopped daring it on fourth down, and that always creates a market for a short‑yardage back
No coach in the league goes for it on fourth down more often than Dan Campbell, and that is not a personality quirk — it is dozens of extra offensive snaps a season inside plus territory that a cautious coach would have punted or kicked away instead. Those plays cluster in exactly the situations where a physical, downhill runner earns his keep: third‑and‑short, fourth‑and‑one, the goal line. Detroit has leaned on a designated short‑yardage piece for that work rather than asking its lead back to do all of it, which is part of why the Lions’ rushing touchdowns have never belonged to one player the way the yardage does.
Isiah Pacheco arrives from Kansas City into exactly that kind of role, behind Jahmyr Gibbs rather than ahead of him. He does not need three‑down volume to matter in this offense. He needs the ball inside the five, and Campbell’s fourth‑down habit means he will see more of those snaps than a typical backup would.
Who it moves: Isiah Pacheco (DET, RB). He is priced as pure injury insurance. Campbell’s fourth‑down aggressiveness turns him into a real source of rushing touchdowns even with the starter healthy.
Projected effect: +10% to +18% above a handcuff‑only price, most of it in touchdowns rather than yards
UnderpricedWRNEAug 20
Mike Vrabel already turned A.J. Brown into a target monster once, on a worse offense than this one
The pattern is not subtle. From 2019 through 2022, Vrabel’s Titans were a run‑first, defense‑built team with Ryan Tannehill at quarterback. Brown still made two Pro Bowls there. He put up 1,075 yards in 2020 and a career‑high 1,496 in 2022 — the No. 1 fantasy receiver on an offense that did not throw enough to produce one. Vrabel does not need a pass‑heavy scheme to feed his best receiver. He needs one true No. 1, and he throws to him on early downs as often as on third down.
Philadelphia showed the other side of it. Traded away from Vrabel, Brown still produced, but it took Jalen Hurts’s MVP‑caliber 2024 to get him there. Now the two are back together in New England, and the rest of the offense fits even better. Romeo Doubs helps around him without taking his targets, and Drake Maye is exactly the kind of rising young quarterback this staff has built around before.
Who it moves: A.J. Brown (NE, WR). The room is still pricing him off a down finish in Philadelphia. It has not priced in the coach who already made him the focal point once.
Projected effect: +8% to +14% above his current price
OverpricedRBPITAug 20
Mike McCarthy has not built a workhorse backfield in almost two decades, and Pittsburgh is about to prove it again
Thirteen years in Green Bay produced exactly one true workhorse season: Eddie Lacy in 2013. On either side of it were committees — Ryan Grant and Brandon Jackson, then Ty Montgomery, then Aaron Jones splitting touches with Jamaal Williams even after Jones proved he was a top‑12 back. Dallas told the same story from the other end. Ezekiel Elliott was already a workhorse when McCarthy got there, and by 2021 and 2022 Tony Pollard had played well enough to force a real timeshare anyway. The thread is a coach who would rather leave touches on the table than run one back into the ground.
Pittsburgh signed Rico Dowdle for early‑down and goal‑line work, and is running him next to passing‑down back Jaylen Warren. The staff is already describing a real two‑man plan instead of a clear starter. That is the McCarthy pattern showing up right on schedule.
Who it moves: Jaylen Warren (PIT, RB) and Rico Dowdle (PIT, RB). Neither is priced like a committee back yet, and both should be. Warren catches passes, which makes him the safer of the two discounts in PPR.
Projected effect: -8% to -14% below a workhorse price, for both backs
UnderpricedQBCARAug 20
Dave Canales has rebuilt one quarterback’s career already, and Bryce Young is the second
Canales left Tampa Bay after the 2023 season, having helped turn Baker Mayfield’s career around. That was a Pro Bowl year for a quarterback who had bounced through three teams in the four seasons before it. No coach deserves all the credit, but the timing points at him as much as at the player. Carolina hired Canales in 2024 to do the same job for Bryce Young, and the season followed the arc that pattern predicts: benched in the first month, back in the lineup by midseason, and clearly playing better by the end. The Panthers have not looked at the position since.
A full second camp in the same system, with that benching a year behind him, is exactly when a Canales quarterback is supposed to take the next step.
Who it moves: Bryce Young (CAR, QB). He is still priced like a former bust, not like a passer whose own coach has already rebuilt a career from worse.
Projected effect: +10% to +16% above his price
UnderpricedQBJAXAug 20
Liam Coen’s one year calling plays gave Baker Mayfield the best season of his career — now he has Trevor Lawrence
Coen took over Tampa Bay’s offense in 2024, a year after Canales’s revival season with Mayfield, and Mayfield got better again. He set a career high in touchdown passes in an offense built on play‑action and quick, high‑percentage throws. That scheme turned an up‑and‑down veteran into one of the most efficient passers in the league, and it got Coen the Jaguars head job in 2025.
Lawrence is a different project. He was the No. 1 overall pick, and his physical talent has never been the question. His efficiency has. A scheme that manufactured easy completions for a journeyman may fit even better on a talented passer who mainly needs the offense around him to ask less of him on early downs, not more.
Who it moves: Trevor Lawrence (JAX, QB). The market remembers four up‑and‑down years under three different play‑callers. It has not yet priced in the coach who just did this exact job for someone else.
Projected effect: +8% to +13% above his price
UnderpricedRBLVAug 19
The zone‑scheme coaching tree has been making running backs for thirty years, and Klint Kubiak just brought it to Las Vegas
No coaching family has a longer paper trail than this one. Mike Shanahan’s Denver turned a sixth‑round pick into Terrell Davis, then did it again with Mike Anderson, then again with Olandis Gary and Reuben Droughns. Gary Kubiak took the same outside‑zone system to Houston and got a 1,600‑yard season out of undrafted Arian Foster. Kyle Shanahan has done it in Atlanta and San Francisco with backs the league did not want. The runner is not what stays the same. The scheme is. Wide zone with a cutback lane creates yards the back did not have to earn.
Klint Kubiak — Gary’s son, and the third generation running this playbook — now calls it for the Raiders. The family reputation cuts both ways, and it is only fair to say so. This is also the tree that invented the committee. A scheme that makes any back productive has no reason to protect one back’s workload. That is the risk you are taking on.
Who it moves: Ashton Jeanty (LV, RB). The usual knock on a back in this scheme is that anyone could do the job. Jeanty flips that: a real first‑round talent inside the system, instead of a system inventing a back out of nothing. You get the scheme’s efficiency and a player good enough to keep the job.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% above his price, with committee risk as the stated downside
UnderpricedRBKCAug 19
Andy Reid’s lead back keeps finishing better than his price, and this year that back is Kenneth Walker
Twenty‑five years, two teams, one pattern: Duce Staley, Brian Westbrook, LeSean McCoy, Jamaal Charles, Kareem Hunt, Clyde Edwards‑Helaire as a rookie, Isiah Pacheco. Reid’s lead back finishes in the top 12 far more often than his summer price suggests. Volume is not the reason — Reid has never been a 300‑carry coach. Field position and light boxes are. An offense this dangerous through the air faces fewer defenders in the box and starts drives closer to the end zone, so the carries a Reid back does get are worth more than the same carries somewhere else.
The 2026 change makes the pattern stronger, not weaker. Kansas City is no longer the pure passing offense it was. There is more quarterback running, more efficient early‑down running, and a small cap on raw pass attempts. That is the exact setup in which this pattern has paid before.
Who it moves: Kenneth Walker III (KC, RB). He was already one of the biggest winners of any team change on the board. The coach is the second half of that argument, and the room usually pays for the new team without paying for the play‑caller.
Projected effect: +10% to +15% above his price
UnderpricedTECLEAug 19
Todd Monken feeds the tight end everywhere he goes, and Cleveland just hired him
Play‑callers have position habits, and Monken’s is the easiest to read in football: the tight end is a first option, not a checkdown. At Georgia the tight end was the offense. In Baltimore he ran a 60% run‑action rate, used two‑back sets as often as almost anyone, and still finished first in explosive pass rate and air yards per attempt. The tight ends ate through all of it. An offense that lines up heavy and still throws deep is the rarest and friendliest setup a tight end can get.
Cleveland brought in the whole blueprint — Monken and Travis Switzer, from that same Baltimore staff. A scheme change resets who gets the targets, and the market is slow to believe a pecking order it has not seen yet.
Who it moves: Harold Fannin Jr. (CLE, TE). A projection of about 78 catches and 816 yards is No. 1 receiver treatment, not leftover tight‑end scraps. He is priced like the scraps.
Projected effect: +12% to +18% above his price
Two-sidedTE / WRNYGAug 19
John Harbaugh and Matt Nagy will play heavy in New York, and that costs the wide receivers targets
Which players a coach puts on the field is the least exciting signal there is, and one of the most reliable, because it is arithmetic rather than opinion. Harbaugh’s teams have always lived in two‑tight‑end and two‑back sets, and league scheme analysis expects fewer three‑receiver sets in New York under Harbaugh and Nagy. Fewer three‑receiver snaps means fewer routes to split among wideouts. The tight ends and backs pick up the routes they lose.
The roster says the plan out loud instead of leaving it to be guessed at: the Giants added Isaiah Likely and fullback Patrick Ricard. Teams do not sign a fullback to run three‑receiver sets.
Who it moves: Up — Isaiah Likely (NYG, TE), who lands in exactly the role his new coaches like to use. Down — the second‑tier receivers, Darius Slayton and Darnell Mooney, who lose snaps rather than talent. Malik Nabers is mostly safe: a true No. 1 gets his targets no matter who else is on the field, which is why the players behind him take the hit.
Projected effect: +8% to +12% for the tight end, -10% to -15% for the second-tier receivers
Two-sidedWRSFAug 19
Some play-callers answer every coverage by throwing to the same man — and San Francisco is built that way now
The classic example is Scott Linehan. His top receivers were monsters — Calvin Johnson’s 1,964‑yard season, Dez Bryant’s three straight years of 1,200 yards and 12 touchdowns — and almost nobody else in those rooms was worth starting. That was not luck with talent. It is what happens when a play‑caller answers every coverage by throwing to the same man, and it makes the most lopsided receiver rooms in the sport.
You do not need Linehan on the sideline to draft the pattern. You need a room shaped like his, and San Francisco has one. After Mike Evans arrived, the 49ers became the most top‑heavy receiver group in football, with George Kittle and Christian McCaffrey taking the middle of the field and a long drop to the next wideout.
Who it moves: Up — Mike Evans (SF, WR), the man they throw to. Down — everyone behind him. The other 49ers receivers are best‑ball dart throws, not weekly starters, and how uneven the targets are week to week is the reason.
Projected effect: +5% to +9% for the No. 1 receiver; treat the No. 2 and No. 3 as format calls, not bargains
UnderpricedRBDETAug 19
Drew Petzing throws to his running backs, and Detroit handed him the best one in football
Catches are the most underpriced thing a running back can do. Carries depend on the score, the weather and the defense in front of him. Targets to a back are called plays. A coordinator who calls them is handing you the steadiest fantasy points on the field, and drafters still pay for rushing yards instead.
Petzing comes to Detroit from an Arizona offense that threw to its backs often. He inherits a declared workhorse: Dan Campbell called Jahmyr Gibbs the team’s every‑down back for 2026, David Montgomery was traded to Houston, and Isiah Pacheco is a backup rather than a committee partner.
Who it moves: Jahmyr Gibbs (DET, RB). Watch your format here. This edge comes from catches, so it is worth much more in full PPR than in standard, and more again in leagues that pay a bonus on running‑back catches.
Projected effect: +4% to +8% above his price in full PPR
Two-sidedWR / RBCHIAug 19
The best proof a coach matters is what happens after he leaves — Ben Johnson shows both halves
Most claims about coaching cannot be proved either way, which is why this one is worth more than most: you can watch the same offense with him and without him. Detroit’s rushing success rate fell after Ben Johnson left, and losses like that pile up instead of evening out. Worse down and distance means fewer trips to the goal line, and touchdowns are where an inside runner’s fantasy value lives.
Meanwhile, the offense he took over in Chicago is being rebuilt in his image: run‑first, heavy on play‑action, and with the targets going to fewer players now that DJ Moore and Olamide Zaccheaus are both gone. That pair walked out with 166 targets between them, and they had spent most of 2025 lined up ahead of the receiver who now inherits them.
Who it moves: Up — Luther Burden III (CHI, WR), the most logical player to absorb those vacated targets after a rookie year that put him top five among receivers in catch rate (77%), yards per target (10.8) and yards per route run (2.9). Buy him at a mid‑tier receiver price and plan for boom‑or‑bust weeks, because a run‑first offense makes the week‑to‑week swings wider. Down — David Montgomery (HOU, RB), who fades because of efficiency, not because he loses carries.
Projected effect: +6% to +10% for the receiver, -4% to -8% for the back