Fantasy Football 2015: 7th-Round Values to Target and Reaches to Avoid

Preseason injuries are hazing up outlooks as fantasy football owners sift through seventh-round values to target and reaches to avoid. Julius Thomas’ projections downgrade as he misses time working with a less potent offense, while C.J. Spiller’s prospects remain optimistic as he joins a traditional juggernaut.

Championship rosters are fortified in the late-middle rounds while the other guy is worrying about filling out his starting lineup. Avoid reaching on team defenses until at least the 12th or 13th, and save kickers for the last round of your draft (see the Honorable Mention slide).

Last season’s seventh round delivered pleasant surprises like Russell Wilson (ADP No. 76) and Sammy Watkins (No. 80), according to My Fantasy League. But disappointments loomed as well from the likes of Maurice Jones-Drew (No. 78) and Robert Griffin III (No. 82).

Use the following list as a guide to make sure you’re not taking someone too early or waiting too long as your fantasy draft grinds through the middle rounds.

Guidelines

• Players listed are currently being drafted in the seventh round on average—the 73rd through 84th positions overall.
• Only the standard-scoring, season-long, redraft format was considered when compiling this list.
• Reach simply indicates the player’s average draft position (ADP) is well ahead of his expert consensus ranking (ECR), according to FantasyPros.
• Value means the opposite: said player is dropping well below his ranking in ADP and should be targeted in between those two positions.

Honorable Mention

Matthew Emmons-USA TODAY Sports

J.J. Watt and the Texans D/ST aren't worth a seventh-round ADP, and neither are the Bills

Reach: Buffalo Bills and Houston Texans D/ST

Tristan H. Cockcroft of ESPN.com wrote an excellent piece on why fantasy owners should wait until late in their drafts before selecting team defenses.

“The Buffalo Bills topped the position leaderboard with 170 fantasy points, which was the worst position-leading total in any non-strike year since 1959. Meanwhile, the league as a whole averaged 6.4 D/ST fantasy points per game, which was its worst number in any season since World War II.”

So as NFL offenses score more and more points, the relative fantasy value of offensive players increases while team defenses logically decline in fantasy performance.

Fantasy owners are currently drafting Buffalo second among D/STs at ADP No. 79, then Houston third at No. 81.

Cockcroft charted D/STs for the last 10 years based on positional ADP, and the results were damning. The second D/ST off the board (ADP No. 77) averaged 8.4 points per game and finished ranked 10.7 at the position. The third (ADP No. 86) averaged 8.1 PPG and finished 13.3.

Take a defense early if you must, but streaming lesser defenses against weaker opponents is just as effective from week to week.

Reach(?): Jason Witten, Dallas Cowboys

Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press

Witten's (No. 82) fantasy owners will benefit if Dallas once again turns to Romo's arm (No. 9).

Technically, Witten is a reach given his ADP (78th) outpaces his ECR (91st) by a full round. But the experts might be too bearish on Witten’s prospects if head coach Jason Garrett and offensive coordinator Scott Linehan decide to rely more on the passing attack after the departure of DeMarco Murray.

Witten’s 10th-place finish in fantasy scoring among tight ends marked his lowest since 2006, according to Pro Football Reference. The dip coincided with an offensive philosophy shift in Dallas, focusing more on the run than in years past.

Witten’s total targets (90) also dropped below triple digits for the first time in eight seasons.

The 33-year-old’s production should be expected to slow as his 12-year career glides into the downswing, but he hasn’t missed a game since his rookie season. Pro Football Focus reported Witten participated in all but 11 of Dallas’ offensive snaps in 2014, finishing ranked second among tight ends.

If Dallas allows a healthy Tony Romo to pass more often in 2015, Witten could well be worth a seventh-round look. If not, the eighth-round rank is probably more accurate.

Draft-day takeaway: Witten ranked fourth in NumberFire’s net expected points rating, directly ahead of Jimmy Graham, Martellus Bennett and Travis Kelce.

Value(?): Roddy White, Atlanta Falcons

John Bazemore/Associated Press

White still has plenty left in the fantasy tank for 2015.

White’s health is the largest concern heading into his 11th season. The All-Pro wide receiver hasn’t started 16 games since his last Pro Bowl season in 2011.

Still, the former fantasy stud feels he has two to three good seasons left, in an interview on 680 The Fan’s The Front Row (h/t Jay Adams of Atlanta Falcons.com).

"

Actually, I feel pretty good. Throughout the end of the season, I felt like my legs were under me. I wish I hadn't missed two games. That was my goal this year, to get through the year completely healthy, but that didn't happen for me. I feel I could play two or three more years, if I could just stay healthy through the whole course of a season and not miss any games.

I feel like I'm playing at a really good level. Anytime you can go out there and catch 80 passes in the NFL, you're doing pretty good.

"

White needed his knee drained before Falcons minicamp, but he said if he needs to drain it again in the future, it won’t cost him game time, according to Vaughn McClure of ESPN.com.

"If I get my knee drained on a Monday, I can practice on Wednesday. It's not an issue where I'm going to miss a game, because it's such a small issue. I'm not worried about it—not at all.''

McClure tweeted on Sunday, “Dan Quinn said Roddy White will have minor right elbow surgery but will be back for Week 1.”

White’s final stat line—80 receptions for 921 yards and seven touchdowns—tied him with Sammy Watkins for 26th in fantasy scoring among wide receivers in 2014. It marked the seventh time White nabbed 80 catches or more in his career and the sixth season with at least seven touchdowns.

Fantasy owners aren’t undervaluing White egregiously—his 82nd-ranked ADP is just seven spots below his 75th-rated ECR—but there’s still a gap worth exploiting if you’re looking for a high risk/reward WR3 in the seventh.

Draft-day takeaway: White either tied or outscored Julio Jones in three of their four seasons together, although Jones’ 26 career touchdowns bests White’s 25 during that span.

Value: Chris Ivory, New York Jets

Noah K. Murray-USA TODAY Sports

Ivory's combination of tackle-breaking power and sneaky acceleration make him an interesting sleeper RB1 candidate.

Watchful fantasy owners have been waiting for Ivory to bust out since he sat buried on the New Orleans Saints depth chart as a 2010 undrafted free agent from the Division II Tiffin Dragons.

Joseph Juan of NumberFire is the latest analyst to predict the five-year veteran’s coming-out party.

The key for Ivory to make the jump from low-end fantasy RB2 to RB1 is receiving out of the backfield. The Rex Ryan regime sent Bilal Powell or Chris Johnson out on obvious passing downs, but new head coach Todd Bowles is interested in getting Ivory more involved, according to ESPN New York’s Kieran Darcy.

"

He’s as advertised. We knew he was tough and he could pound it up in there. But he cuts well, he’s got good vision [too]. He’s going to have to become a better receiver. He has decent hands. He just needs to concentrate a little more.

If we are running the ball well, and [Ivory's] getting some nice runs in there, he’s getting some carries, he can easily [be an every-down back]. He’s built to do that. But we have other guys that we don’t want to wear down that we want to play also, so it will be a feel of how the game is going.

"

The “other guys” are Powell, free-agent signee Stevan Ridley and trade pickup Zac Stacy. If Ivory stakes his claim to New York’s RB1 job in camp, none of them will be a legitimate drain on his playing time.  

Ivory is ranked 64th in ECR, but fantasy owners are watching him drop to 77th in ADP, the 31st running back off the board. JJ Zachariason of NumberFire studied running back ADP from 2009-13, finding zero percent finished as an RB1, and just 20 percent achieved RB2 numbers.

Even if Ivory doesn’t completely shine in 2015, scoring RB2 totals like he posted last season is definitely worth the RB3 asking price.

Draft-day takeaway: Pro Football Focus ranked Ivory third in its “elusive rating,” charting a runner’s success beyond his blockers.

Reach: Julius Thomas, Jacksonville Jaguars

John Raoux/Associated Press

Thomas won't catch another pass in the preseason after suffering a broken hand against Pittsburgh.

Thomas left one of the strongest offenses in the NFL for one of the weakest, which is only the beginning of the trials fantasy owners will face when choosing the four-year veteran.

He bookended his Denver Broncos career with ankle injuries, stunting his development in his first two seasons while sidelining him for five games—missing eight total starts—during his Pro Bowl campaigns. His Jaguars career is starting just as dubiously, suffering a freak hand injury in Jacksonville’s first preseason game.

ESPN’s Adam Schefter tweeted Thomas suffered a “stable fracture” to the back of his hand, which will cost him the rest of the preseason but shouldn’t interfere with his regular-season availability.

The injury also costs him valuable practice time with Blake Bortles, something the quarterback laments, according to Hays Carlyon of the Florida Times-Union.

"

It’s hard. We’ll go throw routes to the tight ends and he’ll run the routes. No one will throw him a ball, but he’ll run the route, which is good for him. He’s staying in shape and working on his route running. It’s difficult when you’re not able to throw him a ball, feel the spots he’s in and where you need to throw it. As soon as he’s able to catch a ball, we’ll get back to it and try to pick up where we left off.

"

Thomas still projects as a TE1 given how soft the second-tier group of fantasy tight ends looks in 2015. But owners spending a high seventh-rounder (ADP No. 73) on a player rating just inside the back of the eighth round (ECR No. 96) are reaching too far considering the risk.

Draft-day takeaway: Thomas’ average run-blocking performance marked one of the reasons the Broncos found him expendable in free agency—Pro Football Focus graded him 16th out of 35 starting TEs.

Value: C.J. Spiller, New Orleans Saints

Gerald Herbert/Associated Press

Spiller's pass-catching ability will serve fantasy owners well as he joins the Saints high-powered offense.

It’s surprising fantasy owners are allowing Spiller’s ADP to dip into the start of the seventh round (74th) given all of the positive press coming out of Saints camp. The Advocate’s Nick Underhill, the Times-Picayune’s Jeff Duncan and ESPN.com’s Mike Triplett layered praise on the free agent before he mysteriously disappeared from practice.

It turned out the 28-year-old will miss the rest of the Saints preseason after undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter on Twitter. The costly lack of practice time could be contributing to owner’s trepidation, but ESPN’s Britt McHenry tweeted the five-year veteran is on track to return Week 1.

New Orleans’ offense offers more opportunity for Spiller to produce than the Pro Bowler ever enjoyed with the Buffalo Bills. Head coach Sean Payton praised Spiller’s ability in the open field during a June press conference.

"He understands what to do in the passing game. He'll provide versatility. He can do a handful of things pretty well. It's up to us to find ways to get him the ball in space."

The Saints haven’t had an open-field threat like Spiller since Darren Sproles’ three-year tenure ended in 2013. The change-of-pace back averaged 140 touches for 1,016 yards and seven touchdowns in his three seasons with New Orleans.

Payton and Drew Brees will be looking for alternatives without Kenny Stills and Jimmy Graham. Spiller (59th-ranked ECR) figures to be a major part of those plans.

Draft-day takeaway: Rotoworld’s Evan Silva reported New Orleans lead the league in running back targets last season with 166.

Average draft position and consensus ranking courtesy of FantasyPros, NFL statistics courtesy of Pro-Football-Reference , fantasy stats provided by CBS Sports.com, contract and salary cap information provided by Over the Cap unless otherwise noted.