Avoiding busts in your fantasy football draft is arguably more important than hitting on some of your early picks.
Burning a pick over the first half of your fantasy draft can put your team in a hole that simply can’t be overcome in many circumstances.
Here are a few receivers that could fall into the bust category by failing to meet the production their current draft capital demands.
Fantasy Football WR Busts
For those of you who are a bit unfamiliar with the term bust in the realm of fantasy football, it can simply be described as a player who failed to meet expectations in a given season.
For example, Tee Higgins finished as the WR51 overall in full-PPR formats, while Wan’Dale Robinson finished as the WR53 in 2023. So, why was Higgins considered a bust last year while Robinson wasn’t?
Much of this has to do with the expectations fantasy managers had for Higgins heading into last year, as he was selected as a top-24 wide receiver in many fantasy drafts.
His WR51 finish means his production came in far lower than what was expected — making him a bust. Robinson on the other hand, had fairly low expectations heading into the season, which makes his WR53 finish far more in line with his projections.
Davante Adams, WR, Las Vegas Raiders
Price point is everything regarding whether a player can even be considered a bust if he produces a poor amount of fantasy football production in a given season.
Las Vegas WR Davante Adams’ ADP at No. 16 overall in the second round as the WR9 off the board means he will need to produce low-end WR1 numbers to meet the expectations tied to his current stock.
If you simply look at Adams’ résumé of fantasy production over the last eight seasons, it becomes pretty clear why fantasy managers feel comfortable selecting him in the second round.
Davante Adams Fantasy Positional Ranks Since 2016
- 2023: WR10
- 2022: WR3
- 2021: WR2
- 2020: WR1
- 2019: WR23 (WR6 on a points per-game basis)
- 2018: WR3
- 2017: WR14
- 2016: WR10
This type of sustained greatness likely means Adams will be making a trip to Canton, Ohio, somewhere in the very near future.
Yet, Adams’ current draft price would require you to pass on Chris Olave, Mike Evans, and Jaylen Waddle, who I would argue are all in better fantasy situations approaching the 2024 season.
Something that can’t be denied is the elite target share Adams has seen during his days with the Raiders. Last year, Adams saw an absurd 33.1% of the team’s targets (175 total targets), which ranked second amongst wide receivers. Additionally, he managed to catch 100 passes for a fourth straight year, which includes his first two seasons with the Raiders.
Adams’ production of 103 receptions for 1,144 receiving yards and eight touchdowns was still a solid season from an overall production standpoint. But upon a closer look, there may be some cause for concern that Father Time is starting to tap him on the shoulder.
Yards Per Route Run With Positional Rank
2023: 2.03 (30th)
2022: 2.59 (eighth)
Yards After Catch With Positional Rank
2023: 336 (25th)
2022: 493 (sixth)
Are these all signs suggesting that Adams is washed? Absolutely not. Adams is still amongst the best route-runners in the league, and the context of his quarterback situation certainly speaks to some of the drop in target efficiency last year.
Yet, that elite target share could realistically take a hit with the arrival of a generational TE prospect like Brock Bowers entering the mix this upcoming season.
Adams will turn 32 years old before the end of the 2024 season. Even if the decline in play is minimal, it may be enough to drastically impact his fantasy numbers if the quarterback play continues to subpar and he loses some of his elite volume to Bowers and other Raiders pass catchers.
Adams isn’t cratering down my rankings, but I do have him just outside of my top 20 at the position heading into 2024.
Stefon Diggs, WR, Houston Texans
Another veteran who has seen nothing of an elite target volume over the last four years is Houston Texans WR Stefon Diggs.
There is no disputing how much of a fantasy force Diggs was as a member of the Buffalo Bills. His 445 receptions for 5,372 yards and 37 touchdowns produced an average of 111 receptions, 1,343 yards, and nine scores every season he was in a Bills uniform. That volume and production led to Diggs finishing as a top 10 fantasy WR every year in Buffalo with Josh Allen.
Yet, his move to Houston brings far more target competition (Nico Collins, Tank Dell, and Dalton Schultz), which makes me worried he won’t see the type of target share he saw regularly with the Bills.
Stefon Diggs’ Target Share with the Buffalo Bills
- 2023: 29.5% (9th amongst WRs)
- 2022: 28.4% (10th)
- 2021: 26.4% (13th)
- 2020: 29.1% (3rd)
Over the last four years, Diggs has seen 644 targets. Do we really believe he can step in and see a similar target share with a new quarterback (C.J. Stroud) who already has rapport built with three talented pass-catchers? I certainly have my doubts about his current ADP of No. 25 overall at the top of the third round as the WR23 off the board.
In a similar fashion to Adams, Diggs showed some concerning signs over his final nine games of the 2023 season.
From Weeks 10 to 18, Diggs was the WR44, with an average of just five receptions for 44 yards during that span. This was an extraordinarily quiet finish for a player of his caliber who was still playing with one of the best quarterbacks in the league.
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Diggs could benefit from less attention from opposing defenses, but ultimately I believe his increased competition for targets could see him produce numbers a bit more similar to what we saw from him in Minnesota when he had Adam Thielen to contend with.
Combine that with Diggs’ increasing age and struggles over the back half of last year, and I find myself fading him at his current price.
Hollywood Brown, WR, Kansas City Chiefs
I understand Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes is the current final boss of the NFL. He is an outstanding player who has mastered the art of winning football games.
Yet, I will need to hear a more compelling argument from Hollywood Brown truthers than, “He’s catching passes from Mahomes,” before I believe in a career year from a player who has mostly been a fantasy disappointment throughout his first five years in the NFL.
Brown is coming off of a two-year run with the Cardinals where he failed to produce a single top-40 fantasy WR season with his former college quarterback. Brown finished 2023 as the overall WR52 with 51 receptions for 574 yards and four TDs.
Sure, he dealt with some injuries last year, but Brown’s average of 9.6 fantasy points per game in full-PPR formats over 14 games played is nothing to write home about.
If you closer at his 2023 season, the numbers don’t get much more flattering. Brown’s 1.27 yards per route run, 5.7 yards per target, and 11.2 yards per reception all ranked outside of the top 65 at the WR position and feel like a major disappointment for a player who ranked inside the top 30 in target share and air yards.
I am fully aware that the Chiefs’ passing offense had well-documented issues with drops and overall production last year. Yet, this pass-catching group still has the best fantasy TE to step on the field, Travis Kelce, and Rashee Rice’s role as an underneath RAC threat feels very secure.
This leaves a vertical playmaking threat potentially available in this offense, which would be far more exciting if the Chiefs didn’t trade up in the 2024 NFL Draft to select Texas WR Xavier Worthy, who posted a 4.21-second 40-yard dash at the NFL Combine, the fastest mark posted by any player in the event’s history.
Without knowing Rice’s potential suspension situation at the moment, one can realistically see him and Kelce earning north of 100 targets this season. Worthy was utilized very often in the screen and manufactured touch game, too, during his days at the University of Texas, which really isn’t Brown’s calling card.
Brown will certainly have his spike weeks and big performances, yet this is by far the best target competition he’s ever had in his career. This makes me nervous that he could fail to see 100 targets for the first time since his rookie year.
If the volume is a concern, then Brown’s long injury history, which includes issues with his right foot, sprains, bruises, an ankle injury, and a Lisfranc fracture over his playing career, is also a concern.
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Brown has one season where he has finished as a top 35 fantasy WR. That means his ADP price tag in the fifth round as the WR32 is more along the lines of drafting him closer to his ceiling than his floor.
Brown falls into the “better in real life than fantasy” category because of his exceptional top speed to vertically threaten opposing defenses. But I feel more comfortable projecting Kelce, Rice, and even Worthy as having larger roles in the passing game than Brown in 2024. This makes him a strong fade at his current price for me.