Gross Bombs: NFL Props for Week 16
Josh Gross
We’ve covered the fantasy football sleepers for 2024. Now, heading into the biggest draft weekend of the year, let’s go even deeper. These are the sleepers even by the standards of sleepers, the deepest of sleepers for 2024.
The players here probably won’t be drafted at all this year — at the least they’ll be drafted near the very end of drafts — but there’s at least a path to being interesting. No one with an ADP in the top 250. What follows are zero sure things, but if you’re digging deep, you could strike gold.
Deepest Fantasy Football Sleepers for 2024
Running Back
Keaton Mitchell, Baltimore Ravens
ADP: 266 overall, RB71
We won’t see Keaton Mitchell for a while in 2024 after a Week 15 ACL tear last year. But he was electric before that, averaged 8.4 yards per carry on 47 attempts. He and Derrick Henry could be the thunder-and-lightning duo of our dreams.
Dylan Laube, Las Vegas Raiders
ADP: 293 overall, RB83
Arguably no team has a more set of unknown quantities in the backfield than the Raiders. Zamir White is set up to be the starter, but his stretch of being a relevant fantasy name is one month last year during which he scored 1 touchdown and caught 9 passes. In other words, he’s hardly a sure thing. After that in the backfield, we have failed Vikings starter Alexander Mattison, hasn’t-had-500-yards-since-2017 Ameer Abdullah and rookie sixth-rounder Dylan Laube. Laube had at least 16 touchdowns each of the last two years at New Hampshire and caught 68 passes in 2023. If White flames out, Laube could find himself relevant very fast.
Michael Carter, Arizona Cardinals
ADP: 547 overall, RB137
The hype around Trey Benson fell off early in camp before rising back a bit in Week 2 of the preseason. Still, he doesn’t have a catch through two postseason games. Meanwhile, the Cardinals have a backup back who has 101 receptions through three years (mostly with the Jets). Carter has some sneaky PPR upside if Benson doesn’t develop as expected.
Jawhar Jordan, Houston Texans
ADP: 844 overall, RB200
Joe Mixon is going to open as the bell cow in Houston, but he’s 28 and was nearly cut in Cincinnati. Are we sure he’s going to handle it? And if not, the next options are Dameon Pierce (who crashed and burned last year and has struggled in preseason) and Dare Ogunbowale (who is just a receiving back). Jordan’s college work aligns well with the Texans’ offensive scheme.
Honorable Mention
Cordarrelle Patterson, Pittsburgh Steelers
Cam Akers, Houston Texans
D’Ernest Johnson, Jacksonville Jaguars
Carson Steele, Kansas City Chiefs
Sean Tucker, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Wide Receiver
Jalen Tolbert, Dallas Cowboys
ADP: 272 overall, WR82
CeeDee Lamb is the only known quantity in the Dallas receiver room, and he still isn’t even in practice. Brandin Cooks? He fell off in every category last year. Tolbert hasn’t done much in his first two years, but as a small-school prospect coming out of college, he was always seen as a project. Now is the due date for that project.
Greg Dortch, Arizona Cardinals
ADP: 274 overall, WR83
The Cardinals had the short parade last year in Greg Dortch, Rondale Moore and Marquise Brown. Now, Brown and Moore are gone, and relative giants Marvin Harrison Jr. and Michael Wilson are slated to be the top two receivers in Arizona. Dortch is the holdover, and when he gets work, he produces — per the FTN Fantasy splits tool, whenever Dortch gets at least 4 targets in a game, he puts up flex-level numbers:
Luke McCaffrey, Washington Commanders
ADP: 302 overall, WR89
This ADP is likely to jump between when I write this and I run it, because I’m writing it Thursday afternoon only a few hours after Jahan Dotson was traded to Philadelphia. But for now, Luke McCaffrey is a rookie second-rounder on a depth chart that has almost nothing behind Terry McLaurin. There’s a very clear path to relevance.
Tim Patrick, Denver Broncos
ADP: 332 overall, WR103
Courtland Sutton is locked in as the WR1 in Denver, but the WR2 has been a mystery. Marvin Mims Jr. was the early favorite, but he’s been hurt by Sean Payton apparently hating him (I might be drawing a bit of an unfair conclusion), and rookie Troy Franklin hasn’t done much. After missing the last two seasons with a torn ACL and a torn Achilles, Patrick could be finding his way back to the heart of the Broncos’ target tree, operating as Bo Nix’s favorite target through preseason.
Honorable Mention
K.J. Osborn, New England Patriots
Tyquan Thornton, New England Patriots
Malachi Corley, New York Jets
Cedric Tillman, Cleveland Browns
Tre Tucker, Las Vegas Raiders
Brenden Rice, Los Angeles Chargers
Dyami Brown, Washington Commanders
Olamide Zaccheaus, Washington Commanders
Kalif Raymond, Detroit Lions
Jordan Whittington, Los Angeles Rams
Jauan Jennings, San Francisco 49ers
Tight End
Michael Mayer, Las Vegas Raiders
ADP: 307 overall, TE36
The bloom came off Michael Mayer’s rose after the Raiders drafted Brock Bowers, but it certainly looks like the team plans to use Bowers more as a receiver and keep Mayer lined up as a tight end. If he’s going to play full-time snaps like that, he’s going to find his way to fantasy relevance just by brute force.
Tucker Kraft, Green Bay Packers
ADP: 325 overall, TE42
This has been my canard all offseason — Tucker Kraft is going to outscore Luke Musgrave in 2024. Musgrave is too much like the team’s wealth of receivers and will get boxed out, while Kraft plays more like a traditional tight end and will be on the field more as a result.
Darnell Washington, Pittsburgh Steelers
ADP: 342 overall, TE45
Darnell Washington only caught 7 balls as a rookie last year despite playing all 17 games. But he should be able to play more in Year 2, and with a complete void in the Steelers’ receiver room after George Pickens, there might be a path to the team using more two-TE sets with Washington alongside Pat Freiermuth.
Honorable Mention
Brevin Jordan, Houston Texans
Greg Dulcich, Denver Broncos
Hayden Hurst, Los Angeles Chargers
Juwan Johnson, New Orleans Saints
Colby Parkinson, Los Angeles Rams
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