Late Round Rookie Darts- is there a 2024 Puka Nacua? (3 Viewers)

[3 hour lunch]

Who do you like in the 3rd round of rookie drafts or later and why?

I’ll nominate Bucky Irving. I know he tested terribly but he’s a tough runner with good hands and I think could run with an opportunity.

Who ya got?

 

[TartanLion]

Estime - big strong back that has a surprise amount of immediate burst and wiggle, despite lacking long speed. Think he could get a chance and do something

Franklin - just have to take the chance at the price, the ceiling is too high

Burton - ditto with Franklin

R Wilson - does he count as late enough ? Steeler WR factory is proven, good chance he becomes a serviceable and startable WR

Vidal - opportunity as those ahead aren’t inspiring

Johnny Wilson - physical freak, worth a dare throw

 

[sushinsky4tsar]

Guys that I'm zeroing in on as late round targets, or those to keep an eye on in camp:

(second) Kimani Vidal sd 6th -- might not be much of a sleeper by draft time, this already reeks of another Waldman back that I'll end up drafting way too early.
(second) Audric Estime - den 5th nd
Tyrone Tracy Jr. - nyg 5th rnd
Dylan Laube - lv 6th rnd
Jawhar Jordan hou 6th rnd
Rasheen Ali bal 6th rnd
Cody Schrader - sf undrafted
Blake Watson - den undrafted
Kendall Milton - phi undrafted
Dillon Johnson - ten undrafted

Javon Baker - ne 4th rnd
Malik Washington - mia 6th rnd

Jared Wiley - kc 4th rnd
Tanner McLachlan - cin 6th rnd
Jaheim Bell - ne 7th rnd

 

[sushinsky4tsar]

Burton - ditto with Franklin

R Wilson - does he count as late enough ? Steeler WR factory is proven, good chance he becomes a serviceable and startable WR

Vidal - opportunity as those ahead aren’t inspiring

Can second these. To the extent that I have already moved them up to the back half of my round 2 draft board in 1QB, along with 4th rounders Jaylen Wright and Javon Baker.

 

[eighsse2]

After what Nacua, of all people, did last year, I think I've got it figured out pretty well.

What you'll need:
Image files of all the later-round rookies
Printer
A large bulletin board
Thumbtacks
Darts

How to:
... I think you can figure it out from here.

 

[sushinsky4tsar]

After what Nacua, of all people, did last year....

Yep. If you can convert your 1.3 WR into Nacua levels of dynasty value, you're a happy camper. I'm nowhere near this aspirational with my late round dart throws.


Nacua was a guy in the mix, but way down my draft board. I feel like there was a lot of like. A guy worth mentioning, but not a lot of love. I was too blinded by other "priority" sleepers to give real consideration to spending the roster spot on him.

 

[eighsse2]

After what Nacua, of all people, did last year....

Yep. If you can convert your 1.3 WR into Nacua levels of dynasty value, you're a happy camper. I'm nowhere near this aspirational with my late round dart throws.


Nacua was a guy in the mix, but way down my draft board. I feel like there was a lot of like. A guy worth mentioning, but not a lot of love. I was too blinded by other "priority" sleepers to give real consideration to spending the roster spot on him.

Yeah I mostly just follow rankings, but I'm at a loss after last year. No disrespect to Nacua, and I know some folks very few and very far between had a big crush on him, but man he was not on my radar at ALL based on watching the rankings move around all offseason. So far down that after his first big week, I didn't even attempt to put a claim in on him. "Plenty of guys have a big game and then don't do anything. No way am I cutting Deuce Vaughn, Abanikanda, or Sean Tucker for that guy."

 

[sushinsky4tsar]

After what Nacua, of all people, did last year....

Yep. If you can convert your 1.3 WR into Nacua levels of dynasty value, you're a happy camper. I'm nowhere near this aspirational with my late round dart throws.


Nacua was a guy in the mix, but way down my draft board. I feel like there was a lot of like. A guy worth mentioning, but not a lot of love. I was too blinded by other "priority" sleepers to give real consideration to spending the roster spot on him.

Yeah I mostly just follow rankings, but I'm at a loss after last year. No disrespect to Nacua, and I know some folks very few and very far between had a big crush on him, but man he was not on my radar at ALL based on watching the rankings move around all offseason. So far down that after his first big week, I didn't even attempt to put a claim in on him. "Plenty of guys have a big game and then don't do anything. No way am I cutting Deuce Vaughn, Abanikanda, or Sean Tucker for that guy."

100%. I'm thinking it would be very worthwhile for me to find Cecil and Bloom's 2023 draft review shows. Matt Waldman and Ray Garvin are other analysts I tend to put a lot of stock in. I feel like he was highlighted as a guy to keep an eye on, but yeah, not aware of any "get this guy now! He's going to be the second coming" takes in the 2nd week of August.

Looks like I had him #39 on my draft board. I highlighted him as my third highest rated rookie that went undrafted in our 5-round rookie/free agent draft. However, I was WAY more intrigued by Zach Evans and the Deneric Prince hype at the time of consequence. Dell, Michael Wilson, Mingo, Reed, Hyatt, Mims, Rice, Downs, QJ, Addison, Flowers ahead of him. Along with non-WRs Jerome Ford(FA), Gray, McLaughlin, Chase Brown, Tucker, Vaughn.

 

[ZWK]

Tyrone Tracy & Kimani Vidal

Showed some athleticism, elusiveness, and receiving ability, and have great opportunities with depth charts led by Devin Singletary & Gus Edwards.

You can add Jaylen Wright & Isaac Guerendo, if they're going late enough and you don't care as much about a rookie year breakout.

Jermaine Burton definitely my favorite guy who has been mentioned in this thread, if you count him as "late round". But he was an NFL 3rd rounder, and would've gone earlier if not for character concerns, so not under-the-radar like Nacua was.

If you're looking specifically at WRs who went in the 2nd half of the NFL draft: Jacob Cowing (SF 135), Ainias Smith (PHI 152), Jamari Thrash (CLE 156), Malik Washington (MIA 184), and Johnny Wilson (PHI 185). They're more like fantasy 5th rounders or guys to keep an eye on, but they all have some good things in their prospect profiles. Washington's 2023 for Virginia, Thrash's 2022 for Georgia State, and Cowing's 2021 for UTEP are among the best single seasons by any WR in this draft class if you ignore level of competition, and Thrash & Cowing continued to put up pretty good numbers after transferring to P5 schools. Wilson is huge with some movement skills & outproduced Keon Coleman in 2023, Smith is a RB convert with some after-the-catch skills & outproduced Evan Stewart in 2023.

 

[Hot Sauce Guy]

To be “the next Kupp” a dude would have to go in the 5th round of rookie drafts? If yes & we’re talking about longshot FF superstars, I’ll throw out Tanner McLachian, TE, Bengals.

Erick All has struggled with injuries, and Gesecki isn’t as spry as he once was. McLauchian is a good route runner and has sticky hands.

He’d need an opportunity, but if he gets one he could be valuable this year.

Not planting a flag, just throwing out a name.

 

[TripItUp]

QB: Jordan Travis

RBs: Tracy, Vidal, Johnson

WRs: Washington

TE: All, Stover, Bell

 

[TripItUp]

Burton is not "late round"

Do better shark pool

 

[Hot Sauce Guy]

Imma go with Rattler. In SF he’s a great dart throw. If Carr continues to waste Olave’s talent I don’t see NOS going with Taysom Hill. IMO they’re gonna want to see what they have in Rattler, which could be serviceable for FF, with a greater than zero chance he’s something resembling good enough to give him a year in 2025

3rd round isn’t quite Puka territory, but it’s late for a QB in SF.

 

[TartanLion]

Burton is not "late round"

Do better shark pool

The OP says 3rd round or later. In fairness, Burton has been going early to mid 3rd round although that might be moving.

But you should def go get Isaiah Williams he’s going to be the next big thing in Detroit

 

[steelcityman]

Here is rd 4&5 from my rookie/FA draft, these are starting to get into later rd dart throws

4.01​	Bo Nix
4.02​	Will Shipley
4.03​	Joshua Palmer
4.04​	Isaac Guerendo
4.05​	Devontez Walker
4.06​	Khalil Herbert
4.07​	Rico Dowdle
4.08​	Malik Washington
4.09​	Rasheen Ali
4.10​	Erick All
4.11​	Elijah Mitchell
4.12​	Theo Johnson
5.01​	PIT Team Defense
5.02​	Dylan Laube
5.03​	Brenden Rice
5.04​	Jalen McMillan
5.05​	Cade Stover
5.06​	Michael Penix
5.07​	Cornelius Johnson
5.08​	Jalin Hyatt
5.09​	Joshua Karty
5.10​	Tucker Kraft
5.11​	Darnell Mooney
5.12​	Ryan Flournoy

 

[Boone22]

I’m going with Brenden Rice. I picked up Nacua after our rookie draft last year based purely on situation and I just drafted Rice at the end of the draft (late 4th round) for the same reason. There are a lot of question marks at WR for the Chargers. Even if we assume McConkey lives up to the hype as a rookie, the rest of the depth chart is Joshua Palmer, Quentin Johnson, and the newly added DJ Chark. Not a lot of hurdles in the way to a starting spot based on what those guys have all shown so far.

Edited to add… just like with Nacua, I’m not expecting top 12 WR numbers. Just a solid depth receiver for the end of my bench. What Nacua did last year was pretty much unheard of. Nobody should be expecting that to happen again this year.

 

[Ilov80s]

I took my super late stab on Ryan Flournoy:

NFL Size at 6'1" and 200+ pounds. 4.4 speed and 98th percentile athlete for the WR position. Landed with Dallas who is extremely thin at WR and especialy when it comes to an X WR body. Now he's coming from a smaller school with weaker competition and his path to the NFL was odd (ACL tear, lost a year to COVID, transfered to a community college) but the size, athleticism and depth chart seems to make it a worthwhile dice roll for the 5th round. He is already 23 so no need to keep a long leash. If he can't deliver year 1, it's very safe to cut bait.

 

[Hot Sauce Guy]

I took my super late stab

Who are you, OJ Simpson?

#toosoon?

 

[Berlin]

To be “the next Kupp” a dude would have to go in the 5th round of rookie drafts? If yes & we’re talking about longshot FF superstars, I’ll throw out Tanner McLachian, TE, Bengals.

Erick All has struggled with injuries, and Gesecki isn’t as spry as he once was. McLauchian is a good route runner and has sticky hands.

He’d need an opportunity, but if he gets one he could be valuable this year.

Not planting a flag, just throwing out a name.

Thanks for this post. 6 shares and growing. I love the tape......he has a chance.

 

[Gally]

To be “the next Kupp” a dude would have to go in the 5th round of rookie drafts? If yes & we’re talking about longshot FF superstars, I’ll throw out Tanner McLachian, TE, Bengals.

Erick All has struggled with injuries, and Gesecki isn’t as spry as he once was. McLauchian is a good route runner and has sticky hands.

He’d need an opportunity, but if he gets one he could be valuable this year.

Not planting a flag, just throwing out a name.

Thanks for this post. 6 shares and growing. I love the tape......he has a chance.

I just picked him up in post draft auction for $16 FAAB dollars. More than expected to spend but what the hell....

 

[steelcityman]

My last couple picks were Flournoy, WR Dallas, J Bell, TE Patriots, and Jawhar Jordan, RB Texans.
Gonna be tough to keep any of them unless there is a real clear cut starters role earned in camps. But, at least no one else has them and I can FAAB them back.
Same was probably thought last year when I took Nacua.

 

[menobrown]

To be “the next Kupp” a dude would have to go in the 5th round of rookie drafts? If yes & we’re talking about longshot FF superstars, I’ll throw out Tanner McLachian, TE, Bengals.

Erick All has struggled with injuries, and Gesecki isn’t as spry as he once was. McLauchian is a good route runner and has sticky hands.

He’d need an opportunity, but if he gets one he could be valuable this year.

Not planting a flag, just throwing out a name.

I like this call a lot and stayed mum on it until my drafts were over.

I "only" drafted him 3x because I had some deep TE teams on shorter rosters and struggled to see how I could keep him but kind of wish I'd have worked him in a little more.

Daniel Jeremiah's second ranked TE I believe and 68th overall player(which upon seeing that is when I first went to watch him and liked what I saw). He's obviously pretty old and has another rookie TE to contend with but he looked like the better pass catcher to me, plus as you pointed out Erick All has a hard time staying on the field.

Also while on the subject of crazy old rookies. Denver drafted a guy in round 7 who is a 27 year old rookie WR *(ETA he won't turn 27 until Dec). DeVaughn Vele. A legit 6'4", super long, tested well and got some good early reviews so far in rookie camp. IMO it's wide open in Denver for the top WR and he's got a chance. He's not as heavy as Coltson and Bo Nix is not exactly Drew Brees but hard to totally erase from my head that Colston was a 6'4" 6th round draft pick by Payton. Vele is getting a lot of Tim Patrick comps, which may not sound great, but in the department of we'll never know I think Tim Patrick was going to have a huge breakout year last year before he got hurt and not sure with all his injuries he can get back to form, the role they had in mind for him might be Vele's.

 

[Hot Sauce Guy]

Also while on the subject of crazy old rookies. Denver drafted a guy in round 7 who is a 27 year old rookie WR *(ETA he won't turn 27 until Dec). DeVaughn Vele. A legit 6'4", super long, tested well and got some good early reviews so far in rookie camp. IMO it's wide open in Denver for the top WR and he's got a chance. He's not as heavy as Coltson and Bo Nix is not exactly Drew Brees but hard to totally erase from my head that Colston was a 6'4" 6th round draft pick by Payton. Vele is getting a lot of Tim Patrick comps, which may not sound great, but in the department of we'll never know I think Tim Patrick was going to have a huge breakout year last year before he got hurt and not sure with all his injuries he can get back to form, the role they had in mind for him might be Vele's.

Alas. He got drafted in my 16 team SF. 6th round.