3 Rookie Sleepers To Target In 2025 Fantasy Football Drafts
In today's Fantasy Life Newsletter, presented by Gopuff, 3 rookie sleepers, great offenses, cheap player targets, TE sleepers, and Fantasy Life Draft Kit.
In today's Fantasy Life Newsletter, presented by Gopuff:
One of my favorite things about this time of year is how sleepers can emerge out of seemingly nowhere.
Itās tempting to dismiss buzz or preseason hype for rookies you had never even heard of a few months ago, but itās important to remain flexible and adjust to new information.
Below are three intriguing rookies who should be on your radarāas either late-round picks in your draft this week or at the very least on speed dial for your Week 1 waiver wire run ā¦
Commanders WRāJaylin Lane: Washington selected Lane in Round 4 of the 2025 draft, but he has mostly flown underneath the fantasy radar until the past couple of weeks. There are three main selling points here: 1) Heās very fast (4.34 40-yard dash), 2) His QB is Jayden Daniels, and 3) the Commanders rested him with the starters in their final preseason game.
Combine all this with a deceptively thin WR depth chart and you have the ingredients for a legit sleeper.
Browns TEāHarold Fannin: Look, no one wants to draft Browns players ā¦ much less a rookie backup TE on a team that projects to be one of the worst in football. And yet it is impossible to ignore the drumbeat on Fannin. Like Lane, heās been getting the startersā treatment throughout the preseason and scored a nice TD over the weekend. But itās not just recent buzz that makes Fannin compellingāheās a legit prospect who ranks No. 3 overall in Dwainās TE Super Model thanks to his absurd age-adjusted production at Bowling Green.
I know it seems thin, but this is one of those spots to zoom out and bet on the talentāeven if he runs like a duck.
Dolphins RBāOllie Gordon: Itās hard to imagine things breaking better for an RB than they have for Gordon. Alexander Mattison is out for the season with a neck injury, DeāVon Achane is dealing with a soft tissue injury, and Jaylen Wright has looked abysmal in the preseason while also getting banged up. This opens up the door for the Round 6 rookie to have a sneaky role as early as Week 1, specifically around the goal line.
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You either had fantasy drafts this past weekend ā¦ or tonight ā¦ or this week ā¦ or Labor Day Weekend. We know, and weāre here for you with more great content. First, donāt forget your Fantasy Life cheat sheets when you enter your draft. You can also peek at our Projectionsand ADP tools to get even more ready.
To borrow from the great Eleanor Roosevelt: "Fantasy football is all about points. Hot, nasty, bad-ass points."
It's not as if every league winner plays on a high-scoring offenseābut it's certainly easier for a guy to outperform expectations in a big way if his team is one of the best in the league at moving down the field and putting the ball in the paint.
So it makes sense to target players on teams likely to put up a lot of points.
And oftentimes players on these teams are not always as expensive as you may assume. Or, at the very least, there are cheaper alternatives that give you exposure to these high-upside offenses.
TE Sleepers: Dalton Kincaid and Tyler Warren are Ready
Tight end may be the most important, and hard to figure, onesie position in fantasy football. Quarterbacks, even if you miss the elites, there are enticing passers late in the draft to target. Tight ends? If you miss on the big dogs, you might have missed all together. Or could we see some players who are available late in drafts and are ready to pop?
Dwain McFarland, Kendall Valenzuela, Matthew Freedman, and Ian Hartitz joined forces to provide tight end sleepers for your readingāand draftingāpleasure. This is the culmination of the four-part series where they also covered Quarterbacks, Running Backs, and Wide Receivers. See which tight ends youāll be drafting coming up. ā¬ļø
Before we sign off, we wanted to make sure every single one of you drafting tonight has everything you need to go in with confidence.
Our full (and free) 2025 fantasy football draft kit is updated and chock-full of sleepers, breakouts, busts, strategy, rankings, and everything in between.
Looking for positional strategy from every single draft position? Youāre covered.
Looking for league winners at each position? Check.
Looking for the perfect draft strategy and contingency plans to accommodate it? You got it.
Everything you need for your draft is here, and free. ā¤µļø
