Fantasy Football Season Review: Quarterbacks

Strategy hardly ever changes for quarterbacks. Late round quarterback has been the way to go for quite some time in the fantasy football world. The last two seasons we had eruptions from late round quarterbacks Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jackson. We even had a big late season showing from Jameis Winston who was being drafted outside of the top 10 of quarterbacks. Fantasy football seems so easy!

The difficulty always lies in finding the RIGHT late round quarterback. If you put your sleeper eggs into the Mitchell Trubisky basket, you probably found yourself drowning your sorrows in a bottle Malort. Ahh, Malort. My favorite Malort saying is, “It’s easier telling someone that you have nothing to live for.” 

Rookie quarterbacks are so exciting. There are always a few new names to look closely at. I was extremely impressed watching Joe Burrow a couple of weeks back. We already know that Burrow is 99.99999% going to be a Cincinnati Bengal next year. Unless he decides to pull an Eli Manning and tells his agent that he would refuse to sign in a rust belt industrial purgatory. So assuming Burrow ends up smoking cigars in Cincinnati, the Bengals would be wise to improve their offensive line during free agency. The Bengals ranked 26th in the NFL in adjusted sack rate in 2019. 

Even if the Bengals don’t do much to improve their line, I was impressed during the national championship with how well Burrow was able to escape pressure and make plays with his feet and his arm. I think that he is the real deal. If A.J. Green comes back, that gives Burrow 4 pretty good playmakers in this offense when you add in Joe Mixon, Tyler Boyd, and Auden Tate. I view Burrow as bottom end QB1 heading into the 2020 season, similar to Kyler Murray in 2019. Obviously it’s a different skill set, but the results could be similar. But that’s looking too far ahead with playoff football still to be played, so let’s review the quarterback position from the 2019 fantasy football season. 

Studs

I mentioned Lamar Jackson in the opening paragraph and the incredible season that he had. Jackson even surpassed Patrick Mahomes’ jaw dropping 2018 season with 421 fantasy points in 2019. I played in 3 fantasy championships this year and I played against Lamar Jackson in every single one of them. Even though I won two of those matchups, Jackson was THE fantasy football difference maker this season. And if a team had him paired with Christian McCaffrey, you could probably guess which team won that league. A big part of Jackson’s production was his legs, but he also threw 36 touchdown passes behind the 3rd best offensive line for the passing game. 

Jameis Winston came alive in weeks 3 and 4 with over 350 passing yards in each game and 7 touchdowns combined. He didn’t slow down either and finished as the QB4 for fantasy football in 2019. He especially peaked in weeks 14 and 15 during the fantasy football playoffs while nursing a broken thumb. In those weeks alone, he threw for a combined 910 yards and 8 touchdowns. 

The problem with Jameis has been and will always be his rogue method of quarterbacking. He is and probably always will be a turnover machine, no matter what coaching staff is calling the plays. Now you have to add in the uncertainty of where he will be playing next season. It really seems like he won’t be back in Tampa based on rumors and strong exit interview words from Bruce Arians. Some possible suitors for Jameis in the future could be Oakland or the Los Angeles Chargers. 

Josh Allen finished as the QB6 for 2019, and while it might be surprise for some, it makes sense when you look at the rushing stats. Josh Allen led all quarterbacks in rushing touchdowns in 2019 with 9 and snuck in 20 passing touchdowns and just over 3,000 passing yards. I believe that with the ugly fashion that Allen finished the way that he did, he could still come as a discount next season, so keep your eye out for that. 

I didn’t think that Dak Prescott would finish the way that he did in 2019, but it turns out that Kellen Moore can do wonders for an offense. Dak Prescott averaged 21.8 fantasy points per game, but he didn’t quite show up when it counted in the fantasy playoffs. Another quarterback with the same type of story was Kyler Murray. Kyler Murray was one of the most consistent scoring fantasy QBs early on in the season, but production tapered off later in the season. Going forward, Kyler should be a great option as Kliff Kingsbury continues to implement his scheme and make improvements to their terrible offensive line.

Duds

Patrick Mahomes didn’t live up to expectations in 2019, but it obviously wasn’t his fault that his knee cap went to all of the wrong places. The touchdown regression probably still would have been a thing without the injury but who am I to talk shit about a dude that’s about to play in the Super Bowl. Patrick is the best quarterback in the NFL and if he can stay healthy in 2020, his numbers will most likely reflect as much. 

Phillip Rivers finished as the QB15 in 2019 with 23 touchdowns and 20 interceptions. So basically Phillip Rivers was a 12 game (buzzed estimation) sample size of Jameis Winston this season. Except he did it in 16 games. So it totally makes sense that the nitwits in Tampa want to bring him in as the Jameis replacement. Just kill me now please. 

Aaron Rodgers finished as the QB10 in 2019. A lot of this can be attributed to the absolute disaster that the receiving corps turned into because of injuries. There is no doubt that shades of one of the most talented quarterbacks to ever play are still hiding behind that scowl of his. 

Jared Goff totally fooled me. Well, at least partially. Or maybe it was Sean McVay? I don’t know, but I had a lot of Jared Goff this year and it was a damn roller coaster. Jared Goff played incredible at home this year and terrible on the road from what I remember. Except for that one time that he threw for over 400 yards in Arizona. Jared Goff finished at QB13 and was a good best ball pick for a decent value but was a weekly roll of the dice in normal redraft formats. 

Mitch Trubisky had an abortion of a season and his career probably is too. I’m not sure how you recover from the beating that he took from the media and fans this year. Not to mention, Matt Nagy has made it clear that Trubisky wasn’t an asset that he wanted (without saying it out loud, of course). Anyways, Trubisky will be back in 2020 and we can expect more of the same.