Our fantasy football takeaways from the 2024 season continue. These articles are designed to help you formulate your 2025 draft plan. Whether you won a high-stakes fantasy championship or are a recreational player who won your home league, you must be proactive. Developing your draft plan now, we feel, gives you a serious edge against your fellow competitors. Like anything in life, you do not stay the same; you get better or worse. Fantasy football success is no different.
The NFL calendar is year-round, and savvy fantasy players are on top of past season results, coaching movement, and free agency. We are continuing to dig into last season’s statistics and look for important data points. Today, the focus will be on two players that were fantasy enigmas in 2024. Our findings are designed to help fantasy football managers build championship rosters for the 2025 fantasy season. We found two more important quarterback trends for today’s article.
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Fantasy Football Player Enigmas From The 2024 Season
Dontayvion Wicks Fantasy Football Outlook
The Green Bay Packers’ Dontayvion Wicks was perhaps the most frustrating fantasy football player anyone rostered in 2024. Wicks’ receiving metrics pointed to a potential breakout season last year, but that simply did not happen. Wicks led Green Bay wideouts in many categories but provided little in the way of fantasy production. He led all Packers wide receivers in red zone targets, endzone targets, and expected receiving touchdowns. Guess what, Wicks finished as the PPR overall WR72.
Entering the 2024 season, Wicks had the markings of a potential breakout fantasy wide receiver. In 2023, Wicks was first among Packer wideouts in yards per target, second in yards per reception, and third in targets. His quarterback, Jordan Love, finished 2023 as the overall QB5. However, similar to 2024, Wicks finished 2023 as the PPR WR58. Wicks will enter the 2025 fantasy football season as a boom-or-bust-WR5 with upside and best suited for best ball format.
At What Point Do We Consider Kyle Pitts a Bust?
The only fantasy football player who might be more frustrating than Wicks is the Atlanta Falcons Kyle Pitts. Pitts was considered an elite NFL tight end prospect and an elite prospect overall. Pitts ended the 2024 campaign with a very disappointing overall PPR TE15 finish. I, among others, figured with Kirk Cousins’ affinity for the tight end that Pitts would break out.
Here is the truth of it: Pitts is regressing. His yards per route run has decreased every year since 2021. Pitt’s usage rate began to shrink last year as the season progressed. In weeks one through seven, he played 75.8% of the offensive snaps. From week eight on, he played just 52.3%. His season high came in week one at 96%, and in his last four games, he had a mere 44% snap rate. Hence the enigma we spoke of. Being a coach myself, there are a couple of reasons for the lack of usage, considering Pitt’s elite talent. One, he does not work hard enough in practice or pay attention to detail, or two, he simply is not as good as he was touted.
Now, if you are not ready to give up on Pitts, there is some hope. Atlanta quarterback Michael Penix Jr. ranked first among rookie quarterbacks in PFF passing grade, and his 87.6 was an NFL best since the 2021 version of Robert Griffin. We feel there are a few statistics that are crucial as you begin to evaluate fantasy receivers and tight ends. The previously mentioned yards per route run, yards per target, and yards per route run. Pitts’ 8.1 yards per target were higher than Brock Bowers and Trey McBride, the overall TE1 and TE2, respectively. His 12.8 yards per reception was third among all tight ends with at least 70 targets. Is there any bigger fantasy football enigma than Kyle Pitts?
Main Photo Credit: Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports
