I think I'm going to draft Larry Fitzgerald this year. (1 Viewer)

[Eminence]

Larry Fitzgerald is one of those players where it wouldn't surprise you if he caught 1,200 yards / 10 Touchdowns. He caught 10 Touchdowns last year, he needs to uptick his yardage total.

He restructured his contract, so maybe he's motivated to get one last payday? Either way, I think he's going to be valued low enough that it will actually be a steal knowing how high his ceiling really is.

Thoughts? I don't know how low he'll go but Larry Fitzgerald in the 4th Round sounds pretty good to me.

 

[Eminence]

http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-fantasy/0ap2000000306682/QB-Palmer-to-WR-Fitzgerald-49-yd-pass

Looks like those old guys still have it.

 

[Eminence]

Will I be able to go...?

1st.) Adrian Peterson

2nd.) Chris Johnson

3rd.) Julio Jones
4th.) Larry Fitzgerald
5th.) Andrew Luck

That's like a nucleus of greatness. Start dipping into Torrey Smith, TY Hilton, Stevie Johnson in the 6th / 7th. How far does Witten fall? Grab a Rookie RB in the 6th.

 

[Eminence]

Will I be able to go...?

1st.) Adrian Peterson

2nd.) Chris Johnson

3rd.) Julio Jones
4th.) Larry Fitzgerald
5.) Andrew Luck

That's like a nucleus of greatness. Start dipping into Torrey Smith, TY Hilton, Stevie Johnson in the 6th / 7th. How far does Witten fall? Grab a Rookie RB in the 6th. Pick up Doug Baldwin in the later rounds.

Ladarius Green late...

 

[ghostguy123]

Doubt he falls to the 4th, and I dont see any possible way Julio falls to the 3rd. MAYBE if you have pick 25, but even that I doubt.

Talking 12 team PPR.

 

[ghostguy123]

But CJ?K in the 2nd?? All yours.

 

[Coin Flip]

Zero chance Julio is there in the 3rd round

 

[msudaisy26]

Will I be able to go...?

1st.) Adrian Peterson

2nd.) Chris Johnson

3rd.) Julio Jones

4th.) Larry Fitzgerald

5th.) Andrew Luck

That's like a nucleus of greatness. Start dipping into Torrey Smith, TY Hilton, Stevie Johnson in the 6th / 7th. How far does Witten fall? Grab a Rookie RB in the 6th.

Switch CJ and Julio around and maybe. I still doubt Julio falls to 2.08 or 2.09.

I doubt Hilton is there in the 6th. Torrey should be but Johnson should be there in the 8th. Witten should be around in the 7th.

 

[Pickle Rody]

Not gonna pick apart your player/round hopes. Just want to comment that Fitzgerald would be on my list of top 8-12 WR's I'd seriously consider in a redraft in 2014. What round?......not sure as it would depend on my specific draft slot and how the draft begins to unfold in front of me. That being said, I must confess that I do own him in my keep-6 league. He will be one of my keepers, most likely my 6th most valuable as I have other players I value higher. (Absolutely unrealistic to think I could acquire him in the 6th round of a startup/redraft, but that's the keeper value of Fitz to me in my specific league.)

If I didn't currently own him I would be trying to figure out a way to acquire him via trade because I think he's going to have another fantastic year. I don't think too many people are going to be aboard that train.

 

[Sweet Love]

In the two WSL leagues that just completed, Fitz went WR15 and WR10. Small sample size, but it does show he has a sliding value (I'd have a tough time pinpointing where I would take him) so it will be tough to target him. Also, not sure what types of leagues are being considered, but in standard 12 team leagues that are some form of PPR, I doubt you would be able to wait until the 4th to get him. The WSLs are 16 team leagues, but if you adjust for 12 teams, he went in the early third and late third round in those particular draft.

 

[Shutout]

Larry Fitzgerald is one of those players where it wouldn't surprise you if he caught 1,200 yards / 10 Touchdowns. He caught 10 Touchdowns last year, he needs to uptick his yardage total.

He restructured his contract, so maybe he's motivated to get one last payday? Either way, I think he's going to be valued low enough that it will actually be a steal knowing how high his ceiling really is.

Thoughts? I don't know how low he'll go but Larry Fitzgerald in the 4th Round sounds pretty good to me.

I don't think that is a factor because if its $ only, he could just play out his contract and cash in. He's not that type of person anyway.

I guess getting him in the 4th probably depends largely on the format of your league. I can see it happening but I , myself, would probably select him before then.

 

[FF Ninja]

I liked him last year and I still like him for 2014. That hamstring injury really hurt his numbers, but he won't be able to excel unless they get Palmer some protection. If that line is a sieve again, Palmer won't stand a chance against Stl/Sea/SF.

 

[Peeps Inc.]

he's on the downward trend and will continue so until retirement, just traded chris johnson and him last month and couldn't be more about it

 

[fightingillini]

I liked him last year and I still like him for 2014. That hamstring injury really hurt his numbers, but he won't be able to excel unless they get Palmer some protection. If that line is a sieve again, Palmer won't stand a chance against Stl/Sea/SF

That's the problem with drafting Fitz fairly high. 6 games against SEA, SF, and STL.....3 very good defenses. Likely AZ will play at least 2-3 more tough defenses, so you're looking at least half of Fitzgerald's matchups being tough or really bad.

I think Fitz will still put up decent stats but won't be very consistent, and I would rather take other WRs with more upside like Desean Jackson or Victor Cruz.

You also have to worry about Michael Floyd continuing to emerge on the other side and taking more targets away from Fitz.

So I don't think Fitz would be a bad 4th round pick, but there are a ton of WR options out there.

 

[Pickle Rody]

I liked him last year and I still like him for 2014. That hamstring injury really hurt his numbers, but he won't be able to excel unless they get Palmer some protection. If that line is a sieve again, Palmer won't stand a chance against Stl/Sea/SF

That's the problem with drafting Fitz fairly high. 6 games against SEA, SF, and STL.....3 very good defenses. Likely AZ will play at least 2-3 more tough defenses, so you're looking at least half of Fitzgerald's matchups being tough or really bad.

I think Fitz will still put up decent stats but won't be very consistent, and I would rather take other WRs with more upside like Desean Jackson or Victor Cruz.

You also have to worry about Michael Floyd continuing to emerge on the other side and taking more targets away from Fitz.

So I don't think Fitz would be a bad 4th round pick, but there are a ton of WR options out there.

No denying it, Arizona's offense has tough defensive matchups all year long.

I consider Floyd's continuing emergence a benefit to Fitzgerald as he will draw coverage away, thus Fitz will see less double coverage. Weren't some of Fitzgerald's best years of production when Boldin was drawing coverage away from him? Seems like a toss-up point of contention to me, unless you feel strongly one way or the other.

 

[Banger]

he might offer some decent value but I imagine he'll rise up and end up around WR15 or so. If that's the case, I'll probably pass as I often will wait and load up on guys in the WR20-35 range that I think will have some good upside.

 

[fightingillini]

I liked him last year and I still like him for 2014. That hamstring injury really hurt his numbers, but he won't be able to excel unless they get Palmer some protection. If that line is a sieve again, Palmer won't stand a chance against Stl/Sea/SF

That's the problem with drafting Fitz fairly high. 6 games against SEA, SF, and STL.....3 very good defenses. Likely AZ will play at least 2-3 more tough defenses, so you're looking at least half of Fitzgerald's matchups being tough or really bad.

I think Fitz will still put up decent stats but won't be very consistent, and I would rather take other WRs with more upside like Desean Jackson or Victor Cruz.

You also have to worry about Michael Floyd continuing to emerge on the other side and taking more targets away from Fitz.

So I don't think Fitz would be a bad 4th round pick, but there are a ton of WR options out there.

No denying it, Arizona's offense has tough defensive matchups all year long.

I consider Floyd's continuing emergence a benefit to Fitzgerald as he will draw coverage away, thus Fitz will see less double coverage. Weren't some of Fitzgerald's best years of production when Boldin was drawing coverage away from him? Seems like a toss-up point of contention to me, unless you feel strongly one way or the other.

That's true, but remember that AZ offense was much more dynamic when Fitz had Boldin next to him and Kurt Warner throwing him the ball. Situation now and back then is not an apples to apples comparison.

From 2005-2008, AZ QBs (mostly Warner) averaged about 4400 yds per season, while Palmer threw for about 4200 this year. So the pie is about 5% smaller.....and I would expect Palmer to throw for less yds in 2014. Second, Warner loved to throw the ball downfield to his WRs......about 80% of the passing yards went to the WRs. Warner never really threw to the TE...TE had only 7% of the passing yards during this timeframe. Fitzgerald averaged about 29% of the passing yards in this period.......Warner was a great QB who could get it downfield to Fitzgerald (and Boldin as well).

Now come to the 2013 season under Palmer. He threw for 4200 yds, but Palmer spreads it around a lot more and uses the RB and TE much more than Warner did. RBs and TEs accounted for about 34% of Palmer's passing yards, compared to 20% under Warner. Fitzgerald only caught 23% of Palmer's passing yards, a significant decrease compared to the 29% of Warner's passing yards from 2005-2008.

So in summary, it's hard to conclude that Floyd's emergence will benefit Fitzgerald. It's possible that Palmer threw a lot to the RBs and TEs because the OL sucked, but it also could be because they have a very good pass catching back in Andre Ellington who is a playmaker in the passing game. The pie is smaller in total and the WR pie is significantly lower.

So given the data, I am going to have a hard time projecting Fitzgerald for anything over 1100 yards.

 

[Andrew74]

I liked him last year and I still like him for 2014. That hamstring injury really hurt his numbers, but he won't be able to excel unless they get Palmer some protection. If that line is a sieve again, Palmer won't stand a chance against Stl/Sea/SF

That's the problem with drafting Fitz fairly high. 6 games against SEA, SF, and STL.....3 very good defenses. Likely AZ will play at least 2-3 more tough defenses, so you're looking at least half of Fitzgerald's matchups being tough or really bad.

I think Fitz will still put up decent stats but won't be very consistent, and I would rather take other WRs with more upside like Desean Jackson or Victor Cruz.

You also have to worry about Michael Floyd continuing to emerge on the other side and taking more targets away from Fitz.

So I don't think Fitz would be a bad 4th round pick, but there are a ton of WR options out there.

Just for the record, this past year in my 0.5PPR league, Fitz averaged 20.50 ppg in the 4 games against SF and STL. He put up 24, 22.10, 21.60 and 14.50. He really only sucked against Seattle. And I think he was hurt (hammy and concussion hangover) in both Seattle games (if that mattered against that D).

 

[Rhythmdoctor]

I'm starting to wonder if Larry Fitzgerald is as good as perceived. We all know he's had questionable QBs other than Warner but we've seen plenty of WRs do more with the same/less at QB. Is it possible that Larry Fitzgerald isn't as dominant as once perceived? Floyd put up more yards last year. TDs are very unpredictable and sort of a crap shoot.

I'm asking because I truly don't know the answer. I find myself considering him as well in a current re-draft as my 3rd round pick but there are a bunch of other WRs with equal upside, imo. Fitzgerald has never been the fastest WR. He has great hands but is he getting separation? Maybe he's lost a few steps? I'm full of questions. I would love to have him as an undervalued WR going into the 2014 season but I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe he is not who we thought he was ennyGreen:

 

[cstu]

I'm starting to wonder if Larry Fitzgerald is as good as perceived. We all know he's had questionable QBs other than Warner but we've seen plenty of WRs do more with the same/less at QB. Is it possible that Larry Fitzgerald isn't as dominant as once perceived? Floyd put up more yards last year. TDs are very unpredictable and sort of a crap shoot.

I'm asking because I truly don't know the answer. I find myself considering him as well in a current re-draft as my 3rd round pick but there are a bunch of other WRs with equal upside, imo. Fitzgerald has never been the fastest WR. He has great hands but is he getting separation? Maybe he's lost a few steps? I'm full of questions. I would love to have him as an undervalued WR going into the 2014 season but I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe he is not who we thought he was ennyGreen:

He's 6-3, 225 and catches every ball thrown to him. I'm not sure he has any 1400 yard seasons coming again but a few more 90/1000/10 are very possible.

 

[Rhythmdoctor]

I'm starting to wonder if Larry Fitzgerald is as good as perceived. We all know he's had questionable QBs other than Warner but we've seen plenty of WRs do more with the same/less at QB. Is it possible that Larry Fitzgerald isn't as dominant as once perceived? Floyd put up more yards last year. TDs are very unpredictable and sort of a crap shoot.

I'm asking because I truly don't know the answer. I find myself considering him as well in a current re-draft as my 3rd round pick but there are a bunch of other WRs with equal upside, imo. Fitzgerald has never been the fastest WR. He has great hands but is he getting separation? Maybe he's lost a few steps? I'm full of questions. I would love to have him as an undervalued WR going into the 2014 season but I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe he is not who we thought he was ennyGreen:

He's 6-3, 225 and catches every ball thrown to him. I'm not sure he has any 1400 yard seasons coming again but a few more 90/1000/10 are very possible.

That's the thing though. If I'm drafting Fitz, I want the 1300+ yards AND the double digit TDs. He's still in his prime in WR years which is why I'm wondering… is he really as good as everyone proclaims? He has produced sub-1,000 yards 2 years in a row now. He's been in his prime during that span and still isn't getting it done. I think my question is valid.

 

[Andrew74]

I'm starting to wonder if Larry Fitzgerald is as good as perceived. We all know he's had questionable QBs other than Warner but we've seen plenty of WRs do more with the same/less at QB. Is it possible that Larry Fitzgerald isn't as dominant as once perceived? Floyd put up more yards last year. TDs are very unpredictable and sort of a crap shoot.

I'm asking because I truly don't know the answer. I find myself considering him as well in a current re-draft as my 3rd round pick but there are a bunch of other WRs with equal upside, imo. Fitzgerald has never been the fastest WR. He has great hands but is he getting separation? Maybe he's lost a few steps? I'm full of questions. I would love to have him as an undervalued WR going into the 2014 season but I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe he is not who we thought he was ennyGreen:

He's 6-3, 225 and catches every ball thrown to him. I'm not sure he has any 1400 yard seasons coming again but a few more 90/1000/10 are very possible.

That's the thing though. If I'm drafting Fitz, I want the 1300+ yards AND the double digit TDs. He's still in his prime in WR years which is why I'm wondering is he really as good as everyone proclaims? He has produced sub-1,000 yards 2 years in a row now. He's been in his prime during that span and still isn't getting it done. I think my question is valid.

He was injured some last year and tried to play though the hammy.

 

[Rhythmdoctor]

I'm starting to wonder if Larry Fitzgerald is as good as perceived. We all know he's had questionable QBs other than Warner but we've seen plenty of WRs do more with the same/less at QB. Is it possible that Larry Fitzgerald isn't as dominant as once perceived? Floyd put up more yards last year. TDs are very unpredictable and sort of a crap shoot.

I'm asking because I truly don't know the answer. I find myself considering him as well in a current re-draft as my 3rd round pick but there are a bunch of other WRs with equal upside, imo. Fitzgerald has never been the fastest WR. He has great hands but is he getting separation? Maybe he's lost a few steps? I'm full of questions. I would love to have him as an undervalued WR going into the 2014 season but I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe he is not who we thought he was ennyGreen:

He's 6-3, 225 and catches every ball thrown to him. I'm not sure he has any 1400 yard seasons coming again but a few more 90/1000/10 are very possible.

That's the thing though. If I'm drafting Fitz, I want the 1300+ yards AND the double digit TDs. He's still in his prime in WR years which is why I'm wondering is he really as good as everyone proclaims? He has produced sub-1,000 yards 2 years in a row now. He's been in his prime during that span and still isn't getting it done. I think my question is valid.

He was injured some last year and tried to play though the hammy.

That's a valid point for sure. What about 2012? I can't remember what his situ was then but he played in every game and absolutely fell off the map after week 6.

Again, I understand he's had some awful QBs but he's not the only WR to have bad QBs.

 

[johnb]

True, but the badness of qb play is not fully understood by many. I'm not saying I'm so cool because I watch the cardinals. I'm saying if you didn't have the joy of watching John Skelton, you have no idea how bad his "targets" to Fitz were. Ditto for the 3 or 4 other schmos they paraded through.

Also the hammy was extremely obvious last season. He played a couple games very hobbled

 

[Rhythmdoctor]

True, but the badness of qb play is not fully understood by many. I'm not saying I'm so cool because I watch the cardinals. I'm saying if you didn't have the joy of watching John Skelton, you have no idea how bad his "targets" to Fitz were. Ditto for the 3 or 4 other schmos they paraded through.

Also the hammy was extremely obvious last season. He played a couple games very hobbled

I think Kolb was the worst of them all. Since Fitz was not on any of my teams for 2012 and 2013, I didn't see much of the Cards. Last year with Carson Palmer is what is most alarming to me. Even with Palmer (no savior but an average QB at the very least) Fitz was very mediocre. If his hammy was that bad, why were they letting him play?

 

[johnb]

Cause he said he was good. Arians said on a radio interview in hindsight he probably should've truly shut him down for a week or two.

Even with Palmer, he was hobbled and the o line was trash. Losing Cooper was brutal. Is he ever going to be the WR1 in fantasy going forward? Probably not. But that doesn't mean he isn't one of the best of them in the game. His circumstances over the past couple seasons are the worst I can think of at hampering a career. There were games that on paper he is shown as having 10-12 targets and half of them could never have been caught.