Under the Radar WR Signings: Fantasy Risers or Fallers?

A flurry of activity in the past week has sent fantasy football owners and sports Twitter into a frenzy. Some huge names changed teams and the domino effect will affect dozens of players league-wide.

Then again, not every signing has to create a seismic shift in the fantasy universe. There were a number of under the radar signings at the wide receiver position that are worth discussing.

So let's discuss them and see which WRs could be risers or fallers for the 2018 NFL season.

Free Agent WR Risers

John Brown (WR, BAL)

John Brown finds himself poised to see an improvement in his fantasy value by virtue of having a clear starting role. Brown is going to be a WR3 at best (more likely WR4), but Brown's odds of being relevant again in Arizona were slim to none. A fresh start is exactly what he needs and I like Brown to beat out Chris Moore and Breshad Perriman and I consider both better options than 32-year-old Mike Wallace will be this season, if Baltimore decides to re-sign him. I won't even bother going through Brown's efficiency metrics because they are all horrendous. He finished outside the top 100 WRs in multiple fields. He is fast, though and Flacco loves to throw the ball deep. I am not optimistic on Brown being a strong fantasy asset, but he should get more of an opportunity share than he did in Arizona.

Free Agent Fallers

Paul Richardson (WR, WAS)

Back in Seattle, Paul Richardson had Russell Wilson throwing him the ball on a team incapable of running the ball and was competing with Doug Baldwin and Tyler Lockett for targets. In Washington, he joins Josh Doctson and Jamison Crowder on a team that wants to run more and likely will with Alex Smith taking over at QB. Smith will also toss a fair amount of targets in Chris Thompson's direction while the early down back will likely be someone the Redskins draft in April. Richardson is experiencing a downgrade in offense, a downgrade in QB, and joins a more crowded situation. Richardson isn't some spectacular talent that is going to command targets. He will be just another cog in the offense. His ceiling is likely WR3.

Torrey Smith (WR, CAR)

The analysis on the final two names on this list will be similar. Torrey Smith has elite measurables such that he should be a highly prolific NFL WR. Instead, he's been Torrey Smith. For some reason, people still think that some portion of his 65-catch, 1,128-yard 2013 season is attainable. It is not. Since then, Smith hasn't caught more than 49 balls in a season and hasn't eclipsed 767 yards. Sure, he scored 11 touchdowns in 2014, but are we really chasing and impossibly high touchdown to reception ratio from four years ago? The Panthers have a void at WR with no clear second option behind Devin Funchess, but I promise you Torrey Smith is not the answer. Whether they sign someone, draft someone, or just roll with what they have, someone other than Smith will be out there. Smith has no business being owned in normal sized fantasy leagues ever again, and it's been that way since 2015.

Donte Moncrief (WR, JAX)

Here is another guy with elite measurables that have never translated to NFL success. Athleticism matters a lot and it gives prospects a better chance at being productive pros. Moncrief has been in the NFL for four years and he has been terrible for four years. Performance at the NFL level supersedes college performance and workout metrics. Donte Moncrief is a terrible wide receiver. In 2014, Andrew Luck threw for 4,761 yards and 40 touchdowns. Moncrief, although just a rookie, caught just 32 passes for 444 yards and three touchdowns. Since then, Luck has been mostly hurt, which people want to use as an excuse. Even if that's true, Moncrief is now in Jacksonville, where he will be competing for targets with Marqise Lee, Keelan Cole, and DeDe Westbrook.

And the targets aren't just any targets, they are Blake Bortles targets. Blake Bortles is an abomination; a blight on quarterback play. I don't care that the Jaguars made the AFC title game last season. Words cannot adequately express how terribly Bortles played in 2017. The Jaguars ran an offense designed to limit Bortles' mistakes as evidenced by his 3.5 air yards per attempt, 28th in the league. Yet somehow Bortles still managed to throw 28 interceptable passes, fourth-most in the league. Moncrief went from maybe having a shot to revive his career with a healthy Andrew Luck to being one of four guys competing to receive passes from Blake Bortles. Best case scenario, Moncrief ends up with somewhere around 90-100 targets and probably catches a little more than half of them. Moncrief has absolutely no fantasy value.

More 2018 NFL Free Agency Analysis