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Welcome to Sleepers, Busts and Bold Predictions for the 2024 fantasy football season. Our Chris Meaney and Daniel Kelley are going to go team-by-team around the league all summer. They’ll pick sleepers, busts and bold predictions for each team. Sometimes they’ll agree! Sometimes they will go completely opposite one another! And that’s fine, because they’ll defend their positions, and you can decide for yourself who to side with. Up today: The Arizona Cardinals.
Below, they tackle the team, starting with their picks in “The Answers,” then expanding on their picks in “The Explanation.”
2024 Sleepers, Busts & Bold Predictions: Arizona Cardinals
The Answers
Favorite Sleeper
Meaney: Michael Wilson
Kelley: Kyler Murray
Biggest Bust
Meaney: Trey McBride
Kelley: Trey McBride
Bold Prediction
Meaney: Kyler Murray Finishes as a Top-3 QB
Kelley: Trey Benson Outscores James Conner
The Explanations
Sleepers
Meaney: Michael Wilson
Michael Wilson is expected to be the third option at best in Arizona behind Marvin Harrison Jr. and Trey McBride, but his price is appealing and I love his game. Wilson will open up as the No. 2 wide receiver even with the addition of Zay Jones. The biggest appeal is the fact you can get Wilson outside of pick 170 as WR76 on average. Say what you want about the Arizona offense, but there aren’t too many WR2s going that late in drafts. It’s a very small sample size, but Wilson averaged 15.5 fantasy points per game in his final two games of the season. He also dealt with three different quarterbacks in his rookie season. With Marquise Brown out the door, Wilson has an opportunity to grow in Arizona’s offense and establish himself as the No. 2 opposite of Harrison, who will see plenty of attention from top corners.
Kelley: Kyler Murray
By fantasy points per game, Kyler Murray was QB9 last year. That’s his worst per-game finish since his rookie season (which even then was QB11). He did that with a wide receiver corps highlighted by a banged-up Marquise Brown (who missed four games) and Rondale Moore, who are both gone now. There was nothing in Arizona in 2024 remotely resembling Marvin Harrison Jr., who arrives in Arizona this year as the best receiver Murray has ever had for a full season, even as a rookie. And yet Murray is QB11 in early ADP? That feels like drafting him at his floor. Assuming he stays healthy, Murray should have little trouble finishing as a top-seven (or so) quarterback.
Busts
Meaney: Trey McBride
McBride had a fantastic sophomore season in 2023 which saw him reel in 81 of his 106 targets for 825 yards. He averaged 8.3 fantasy points per game in a half-point settings, which was the ninth most at his position, and he finished as TE9. McBride went from one of the better waiver wire pickups last season to a top-45 pick this season. That’s right, McBride is getting drafted as the third tight end off the board at pick 44 on average. So what’s with the big jump? Well, McBride only had eight catches and 15 targets in his first five games last season, and he didn’t have more than five grabs in a game until Week 8. From Week 8 on, McBride had at least five catches in eight of his final 10 games, and he averaged 10.1 targets per game over that span. He quickly became Kyler Murray’s No. 1 option in the passing game. That won’t be the case this season with the draft selection of Marvin Harrison Jr. fourth overall. McBride will still get his, but a top-45 pick is a steep price to pay for someone we’ve only seen a handful of good games from. McBride only scored three touchdowns last season and only picked up 11 red-zone targets. Arizona will remain a bottom-10 offense, and I expect Harrison to be the go-to guy Kyler looks at in the end zone. Don’t get me wrong, I love the player, but he’s on the same tier as Dalton Kincaid, Mark Andrews, Kyle Pitts, Evan Engram and Jake Ferguson, who are all going much later in drafts. Ferguson and David Njoku could have similar if not better seasons, and you can get them outside of pick 80.
Kelley: Trey McBride
“Bust” is a relative term, because I would still be happy to have Trey McBride as my starting tight end in 2024. But right now he’s the TE3 and going in the fourth round of drafts, and we have to pump a whole bunch of brakes, friends. McBride came on extremely strong last year, the TE3 from Week 8 to the end of the season. He took himself from a backup to Zach Ertz to a surefire starter, he nearly tripled his target and reception totals from his rookie year, he was one of only four tight ends — along with Evan Engram (4), Travis Kelce (2) and T.J. Hockenson (2) — with multiple games of 10-plus receptions. But he did the vast majority of his damage as basically the only game in town in Arizona. McBride’s hot stretch coincided with the return of Kyler Murray, but it also overlapped with injuries here and there to Ertz, Marquise Brown, Michael Wilson and James Conner. Adding Marvin Harrison Jr. and Trey Benson to this offense this season will put more of a cap on McBride’s ceiling, just because the offense will diversify some. Top-10 tight end? Sure thing. Fourth-round pick? No way.
Bold Predictions
Meaney: Kyler Murray Finishes as a Top-3 QB
Kyler Murray was limited to eight games last season but showcased flashes of his pre-injury brilliance and upside throughout the second half of the season. Kyler’s 18.3 fantasy points per game were tied for the ninth-most at the QB position with C.J. Stroud, who is going 30 picks earlier in drafts. Kyler only averaged 30 rushing yards per game compared to 40 per game in 2022 before he suffered a torn ACL. He didn’t run as much when he first came back, but he ran more as the season went on (35 yards per game final four games). He also didn’t have much to work with in the passing game, but he has a new shiny toy in Harrison Jr. to lean on. I don’t want to compare Harrison to DeAndre Hopkins, but Kyler averaged 23 and 21 fantasy points per game in 2020 and 2021. He has that kind of ceiling, and that ceiling is QB1 overall. He topped 20 fantasy points in four of his eight games. Keep in mind QB1 overall Josh Allen averaged 23.1 fantasy points per game last season while scoring a career-high 15 rushing touchdowns. Jalen Hurts was your QB2 and he averaged 21 per game. There are reasons to believe both QBs will see a dip in rushing touchdowns this season, especially with Hurts, as the Eagles went and got themselves a red-zone beast in Saquon Barkley. We have Kyler for just under 500 rushing yards in our projections, but don’t be surprised if he gets back to the 500+ he had in his first two seasons in the league. That would put him in the top-5 conversation and would make him one of the better mid-round targets at QB.
Kelley: Trey Benson Outscores James Conner
I love getting two ways to get to my bold prediction. It’s called hedging, baby. First, we have the obvious injury problems. James Conner has missed multiple games every season of his career, including four each of the last two years. Running backs don’t get more durable at age 29. He’s already at risk of missing time, and add in that the team now has what should be a competent backup in top-of-the-third-round Trey Benson, and the team has every incentive to go easy on Conner any time he’s even a little banged up. But also … Benson might just outscore him. There were no obvious signs of regression in Conner’s game last year — in fact, by some measures it was his best and most efficient season — but still, it’s not that hard to imagine a 29-year-old oft-injured veteran to start to see deterioration. Benson was the second running back off the board in the draft, off back-to-back 900-rushing-yard (1,100-scrimmage-yard) seasons at Florida State. He’s the best running mate Conner has had since … Le’Veon Bell? Something in that range. And he could supplant the veteran by midseason.
