XFL Fantasy Awards - Most Promising Player

It feels weird to be writing about season-long awards in mid-March, but here we are. With COVID-19 putting the whole world, let alone sports, on pause, most leagues have decided to postpone their games and others such as the XFL have just decided to cancel their ongoing seasons.

It's been five weeks since the XFL kicked off its 2020 season and second iteration. While it has not been a long ride during this first year of games (of which we've only watched 20 over a month and change), no one will convince me of this league not being fun as any other one out there. The XFL is here to stay, like it or not, and we here at RotoBaller are all for it.

With that in mind, it makes sense to cover what the first XFL season has given us by taking a look at the best (and worst) players and teams to feature in the league during this 2020 year by handing out some awards. I will be writing a handful of columns covering each of these "fake" XFL fantasy awards with the hope of you, the reader, getting to know better who was who during the past few weeks and who to keep an eye on going forward. Let's get to it!

Most Promising Player - Winner: BJ Daniels (QB, SEA)

The Dragons started the season with QB Brandon Silvers at the helm, let him play four games, but ultimately handed the reins to BJ Daniels to finish the season as the starter by Week 5. In just two games compared to Silvers' four, Daniels was able to rack up 37 PPR points to Silver's 45.1 and he almost doubled the PPG average of Silver (11.3) with his 18.5 PPG in just a couple of outings, one of them off the bench.

Although small samples are always going to leave us wondering if they were real or not, Daniel's two performances don't seem to be just a mirage. Daniels attempted 32 passes in his two games, completed 19 of them (59.3% completion rate) and threw one touchdown against one interception. Those are reasonable numbers and nothing too exaggerated for a two-game sample.

The biggest impact Daniels caused in the game, though, came on the ground. In just two matches Daniels rushed the ball 17 times for 114 yards. Those numbers ranked tied for third and tied for second respectively among all quarterbacks in the position, no matter the number of games played. Daniels also scored two rushing touchdowns, the second-most only behind Taylor Cornelius' three. He should start for the Dragons come 2021 from the start of the season, and we can't wait to see him keep growing.

Most Promising Player - Runner Up: Tre McBride (WR, LA)

When it was announced Nelson Spruce would miss time due to injury and stay off of the field for the LA Wildcats, every single eyeball out there looked toward Tre McBride. Both wide receivers shared the field just one game back in Week 3, and that was the game where McBride broke out for the first time, outperforming Spruce to finish the day with 30.9 PPR compared to Spruce's 10.5.

Even in a limited amount of playing time (three games played on the season, debuting in Week 3), McBride (74.1 PPR) finished as the WR3 only behind Cam Phillips (136.5) and Donald Parham (83.7). That is an incredible feat considering he only saw 24 targets compared to Phillips' 45 and Parham's 43.

McBride made the most of his chances by hauling in 16 receptions for 271 yards (16.9 yards per catch) and four touchdowns that ranked him second-best in the scoring department only behind Phillips and tied with Parham. Not that there were a lot of trades in the XFL, but McBride was part of the most impactful one when DC sent him to LA in exchange for dud Rashad Ross. Absolute winning play by the Wildcats there.

Most Promising Player - Third Place: Luis Perez (QB, NY)

The Guardians were good for a game, then a mess, and then good again to close the season with back-to-back wins against no less than LA and Dallas. Matt McGloin, New York's starter for the first two games, was incredible in Week 1 (17.5 PPR) but mediocre in Week 2 (negative-0.2 PPR, you read that right), and although it took three weeks for NY to give Perez the reins he finally took over starting in Week 3, the weekend he made his debut in the XFL.

While Perez started slowly (5.6 PPR in Week 3) he stepped up his game with each passing week improving to 10.2 PPR in Week 4 and 17 PPR in the season finale. The fantasy points he racked up aligned with the heavier role he steadily took on while on the field, going from five to 26 to 30 attempts, four to 18 to 16 completions, and 39 to 150 to 229 passing yards in the weeks he played. When all was said and done, Perez had thrown three touchdowns against just one interception and he was also able to add 20 rushing yards on his four rushing attempts. We'll see if New York trusts him from day one in 2021.

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