By: Malcolm McMillan

It is officially the fantasy football playoffs. I can only assume that you made it into the fantasy football playoffs or are preparing for next year. In either case, congratulations on doing the right thing. Prepping ahead of the competition and being active in your dynasty league will pay off next year. You know you can wait until after the Super Bowl to take a break from fantasy football.

This week’s article will be a little different. Like in previous weeks, these players are still widely available, though one of them is only available in about 40% of Sleeper dynasty leagues. The goal is to find players with 50% rostership or less, but after last week two sets of players stand out. One set of players for those managers still making their playoff run, the other for dynasty fantasy football managers looking beyond the 2021 NFL season (though redraft people can pay attention too).

First up, two running backs that could make a difference in the 2021 fantasy football playoffs.

Jermar Jefferson vs Craig Reynolds vs Godwin Igwebuike: Which Detroit Lions Running Back Do You Want?

Last week everyone thought that they made a killer waiver wire addition in Jermar Jefferson. After all, both D’Andre Swift (shoulder) and Jamaal Williams (COVID-19) were out for the Detroit Lions Week 14 matchup against the Denver Broncos. Sure, Jefferson had been sick in the lead-up to the game, but plenty of experts assumed he and fellow running back Godwin Igwebuike would see the work out of the Lions backfield.

Unfortunately, neither Jefferson nor Igwebuike saw meaningful work in Week 14. Igwebuike at least got to touch the ball; Jefferson was on the field for a mere six snaps. Instead, Craig Reynolds stole the show (relatively), with 11 rushing attempts and a pair of receptions that resulted in an RB20 finish in half-point-per-reception (half-PPR) formats. Williams and Swift are both out again for the Lions Week 15 matchup against the Arizona Cardinals, so the pressing question is: which Lions running back do you trust?

In terms of athleticism, betting on Jefferson is not smart. Per PlayerProfiler he lags behind both Reynolds and Igwebuike in every athletic metric. Igwebuike is the most athletic of the three, though Reynolds does have some mildly impressive agility. The problem is that none of that has mattered all season. All three running backs have been anything more than bench depth until now. Jefferson had a brief flash in Week 10, and Igwebuike has been involved regularly on special teams, but Reynolds made his season debut in Week 14.

Unfortunately for Jefferson and Igwebuike, Reynolds made the most of that debut and probably qualifies as the “hot hand” going into Week 15. If you have to trust a Lions running back in the fantasy football playoffs, Reynolds is the player to roster, though do not be surprised to see Igwebuike cut into Reynolds’s workload. Detroit is not seeing what they have here. All three of these running backs are undrafted or seventh-round picks firmly behind Swift and Williams on the depth chart. The Lions just need a body to carry the ball, and that body will look like Reynolds’s until Swift or Williams returns.

Jalen Guyton and Josh Palmer: A Dynamic Dynasty Duo

If Jalen Guyton and Josh Palmer are still available in your dynasty leagues, they need to be on your roster. Now. The Los Angeles Chargers passing attack has become red hot with Justin Herbert under center, and it is not just the usual suspects that are benefiting. Keenan Allen and Mike Williams still dominate the wide receiver room. The Chargers’ current studs each have over 100 targets after 14 games. However, both Guyton and Palmer are flirting with fantasy football relevance recently.

Let us start with Guyton. Guyton showed a connection with Herbert in 2020, but things have heated up over the past few weeks. In half-PPR fantasy football leagues, Guyton led the Chargers wide receivers in fantasy football points from Week 12 to 14. Week 15 was more subdued but still saw Guyton score a touchdown for the third game in a row. With Mike Williams headed for free agency after this season, the Chargers may make Guyton the next man up. He already has a connection with Herbert and an impressive athletic profile. At just 24 years old, what is not to love?

But Guyton is not the only intriguing up-and-coming wide receiver on the Chargers roster. While not as athletic as Guyton, Palmer was the Chargers’ third-round pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, which is not insignificant. Plus, while Guyton has been the third wide receiver this season, Palmer did fill in for Allen in Week 14 to great success. Palmer’s seven targets that week led all Chargers players, and the five receptions, 66 yards and a touchdown were enough to finish WR16 on the week. The best part is Palmer is flashing this production all before turning 23. He will be just 25 when his and Allen’s contracts expire at the end of 2024. The Chargers bringing back their 25-year-old WR rather than the 32-year-old wide receiver will not be a surprise, and this role seems to be Palmer’s for the taking. Worst case, he should become one of the top three wide receivers in Los Angeles when Williams leaves at the end of the year.

The Chargers already have their quarterback of the future in Herbert, but it is expensive (if not impossible) to acquire that piece of their offense if you are a dynasty manager. However, you can get either””or both””of their wide receivers of the future for dirt cheap right now. The return on investment will not be instant, but it will be worth it.

The post Deep Fantasy Football Stashes for Week 15 appeared first on Pro Football Mania.

With the NFL Draft approaching, it’s time to take a look at one of the more intriguing prospects: Oregon State running back Jermar Jefferson.

High School

Jermar Jefferson was rated a 3-Star prospect by both Rivals and 247Sports coming out of Narbonne High School in Harbor City, CA. The 5’10 188 running back lettered in football and track while leading his team to a 12-3 record and a state championship appearance his senior year. He rushed for a ridiculous 1,861 yards and 34 touchdowns, going for over 100 rushing yards in 11 out of his 14 games played, while adding another 23 receptions for 372 yards and three TD’s.

Jefferson received multiple offers from USC, Utah St., Colorado St., and Colorado (to name a few) before ultimately committing to Oregon State only two days after his first visit with the Beavers.

College

Jefferson broke out as a true freshman, totaling 1,527 yards from scrimmage and 12 touchdowns after starter Artavis Pierce was injured early in the season. In his first start (only his second career game) Jefferson rushed for 238 yards and 4 TDs.

He finished the year as the Pac-12 Offensive Freshman of the Year and earned first-team freshman All-American honors as the lone bright spot on an otherwise awful Oregon State team that only won 2 games in 2018.

Despite his early success at OSU, Jefferson took a step back as a sophomore, mostly due to an ankle injury he sustained early in the season which stuck with him and slowed his effectiveness for most of the year. Although he had a slow start, he finished his second year on a high note with 289 yards from scrimmage and 5 touchdowns over the final two games of the 2019 season. This set him up perfectly to carry momentum into his junior season. At least, that was the case before COVID-19 delayed the start of play for most of college football in 2020.

Due to this delay, Oregon State did not begin playing until November, but for Jefferson’s sake, that really didn’t matter. He opened his junior season against Washington State with a 170 yard-3 TD performance in his first game in almost a calendar year. He nearly had back-to-back 200-yard games a few weeks later against Cal and Oregon before capping off his junior campaign with a 103-yard rushing day against Arizona St.

In only 6 games in 2020 Jefferson had amassed 925 total yards and 7 touchdowns, vastly outpacing his historic freshman campaign from a yards per game perspective (154 compared to 127). As of this writing he is my RB3 in this 2021 draft class behind Javonte Williams and Travis Etienne according to my prospect model which factors in college dominator, target share, and multi-sport participation in high school.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Strengths:

✓ Vision

✓ Receiving Ability

✓ Agility

✓ Explosiveness

Weaknesses:

✗ Top-end Speed

✗ Physicality

✗ Pass Protection

✗ Size

NFL Team Visits

Colts

Packers

Jets

49ers

Patriots

Overview

Jefferson is a productive, versatile, and explosive back coming out of Oregon State. He has great vision, receiving ability, and is agile & explosive, especially on outside runs.

He has questions about his top-end speed. For a player with a track background, you would expect him to be much faster at his top speed than he appears on tape as he seems to get caught from behind quite often on some of his longer runs.

Some additional concerns are his unverified size and physicality. While listed at 5’10-217, he could be anywhere from 5’8 and under 210 lbs. He can be physical at times, but he doesn’t show a great amount of consistency there when he is finishing runs.

Lastly are the concerns about his pass protection. Per PFF, Jefferson ranked 87th in pass protection efficiency for running backs in 2019. This was also evidenced by his pass protection snaps significantly decreasing year-over-year since his 2018 breakout season. While some of this can be attributed to Jefferson’s lack of skill in the area, I think a fair amount of blame could be because of the low volume passing offenses he played on in 2019 and 2020 (OSU ranked 43rd in passing offense in ’19 and dropped to 80th in ’20) not to mention an overall poor supporting cast (Oregon St. won a combined 9 games during Jefferson’s tenure).

NFL Player Comparison

Jefferson compares closely to Chase Edmonds, in my opinion. As seen above, both players had similar College Dominator Ratings, are close in size, and will most likely have identical draft capital (rounds 3-5+). I believe Jefferson will be a nice complimentary back in the league who can spot-start as a 3-down back should the opportunity arise.

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