Dynasty Analysis
Get a FREE preview of the DFF 2026 Dynasty Rookie Draft Guide. Access expert scouting reports and rankings to dominate your dynasty draft.
@jim_DFF reveals his two-round dynasty rookie draft selections based on a recent NFL mock draft from A to Z Sports.
In this week’s episode of Always Be Scouting, @DffFrankPanthro and @John_mancuso5 break down their Top 12 incoming freshmen for 2026.
Modern tight ends have one job above everything else: catch the football. Blocking matters. Athleticism matters. But if you can’t be trusted in traffic, none of it plays. Eli Stowers gets that. And it’s why his transition from quarterback to tight end has turned into one of the most impressive developments in college football. Stowers didn’t just convert positions. He became the focal point of Vanderbilt’s offense. In 2025, he led all FBS tight ends in receiving yards, and he did it by winning the same way every NFL tight end has to win: hands, feel, toughness, and consistency. At 6’4” and around 235-239 pounds, Stowers isn’t built like an old-school in-line blocker. He’s built like a modern weapon. And he plays like one. Production That Matters The breakout didn’t come out of nowhere. It was built year by year. In 2025, Stowers caught 62 passes for 769 yards, the most receiving yards by any tight end in the country. He averaged 12.4 yards per catch and played all 12 games as a centerpiece of the offense. The year before, he put up 49 catches for 638 yards and 5 touchdowns, earning First Team All-SEC honors and Mackey Award semifinalist recognition. Across three seasons at Vanderbilt and New Mexico State, he finished with 146 catches, 1,773 yards, and 11 touchdowns. That’s not gadget production. That’s real usage. How Stowers Wins Stowers catches the football first. That’s the foundation. He has strong, reliable hands and shows comfort working through traffic. He doesn’t panic when bodies are around him. He secures the […]
Here is my breakdown of Nick Singleton (Penn State) as […]
Published January 2026 Welcome to players 11 to 20 in my Dynasty rankings series. Players 10 to 1 can be found here. Players 21 to 30 can be found here. Those who follow my work know I approach all of my rankings from an analytical foundation and then layer in additional context on top of that. This series is no different. The foundation of my Dynasty rankings is a proprietary model that utilizes a combination of predictive metrics with an emphasis on prior season fantasy points per game and then combines that with a position-specific age multiplier, flattening of TD luck, and position adjustment. This is the Dynasty 1 Score. From there, I layer on situational adjustments that pure statistics can not identify. I also prioritize consistency in my rankings. How likely are the players to be able to repeat their prior season performances based on their archetype? With that introduction, let me introduce you to my Dynasty rankings series. Note these are a snapshot in time vs. the always-evolving rankings you can find on our rankings site. But in this article series, you get the context and thinking behind the ranking that is not supplied by the pure ranking. Rankings are always fluid, and at DFF, we update them continuously here. These are a snapshot with the thought process behind each that you don’t see in simple rankings. These ranks are a snapshot as of January 2026. Superflex, Full PPR, TE Premium *Data sources: PFF, Pro Football Reference, Player Profiler, NFL+ Premium The rest of this rankings article series […]
I wanted to do a deep dive into wide receivers. I have struggled in years past with my wide receiver model. I am happy with my other models for fantasy purposes. As I just wrote in my rookie draft hit rate article, after the top 6 wide receivers in each class, the hit rate is not good, so I wanted to find out who to target in those top 6. Some of the people that I have dug deeper into their stuff from Twitter were @NoFilm_Analysis, @DynoDayTraders, and @DynastyZoltanFF. I want to combine what I have read from the three of them and apply it to the first and second round wide receivers since 2019.
Kaytron Allen is the type of running back I fall in love with. Not because he’s going to run away from everyone. Not because he’s going to give you 60-yard highlights every week. But because he’s the kind of back that keeps drives alive. He finds the hole, stays square, and gets you what’s there. Over and over. At ~5’11” and 220-225 pounds, Allen is built like a real NFL runner. Compact. Strong. Low center of gravity. He’s hard to stop once he gets moving, and when contact shows up, he’s still finishing forward. Production That Actually Means Something Allen’s 2025 season was the best version of himself. He ran for 1,303 yards and 15 total touchdowns while averaging 6.2 yards per carry. He had five 100-yard games, and his biggest outings were loud: 226 yards at Rutgers, 160 yards and two scores against Nebraska, and 181 yards with two touchdowns at Michigan State. But the real headline is simple. He became Penn State’s all-time leading rusher with 4,180 career rushing yards, passing Evan Royster’s record. He also finished with 769 career carries, and that kind of workload tells you what Penn State thought of him. Trust. Durability. Give him the ball again. How Allen Wins Allen’s game starts with vision and patience. He’s not dancing behind the line, trying to bounce every run outside. He presses the line, lets defenders show their hand, and then makes one clean decision and goes. That one cut style is what makes him steady. It keeps him on schedule and keeps the offense […]
In 2026 rookie drafts, Jeremiyah Love is the clear 1.01, and Fernando Mendoza sits right behind him at 1.02 in Superflex, PPR, and Tight End Premium formats. After those two, my next pick starts with Carnell Tate, then Makai Lemon, then Kenyon Sadiq, and then Jordyn Tyson. That order comes down to a mix of safety, upside, positional value, and how clean the path feels to early fantasy relevance. Tate is the safest wide receiver in the group. Lemon brings the most explosive upside. Sadiq gets a real bump in tight end premium because the athletic ceiling is different at that position. Tyson has the talent, but the risk profile is heavier than the other three.
Introducing Amari Latimer, 2026 freshman RB for West Virginia. View his official scouting card for HS production, strengths, and weaknesses.
Introducing Vance Spafford, 2026 freshman WR for Miami. View his official scouting card for HS production, strengths, and weaknesses.
@joshreedy5 dives into some historical dynasty rookie ADP to determine which fantasy positions have the highest hit rate year over year.
@jim_DFF wraps up his mock draft series by covering his selections from Rounds 9-15, discussing dynasty outlook and startup strategy.
In Dynasty Fantasy Football startups, the roadmap usually starts to crystallize around Round 9. By that point, I’ve generally established the direction of my roster and identified the players I want as long-term building blocks. It’s also the stage of most drafts where managers begin wheeling and dealing to refine their strategy. For this particular mock, however, we kept things strictly business. The DFF crew came together for a pre–free agency startup draft and ran it without trades, letting the board fall naturally. Below are some of my favorite selections from this team build.
The legal free agent tampering period began at 12 PM on March 9th. By 12:15, the Dynasty landscape had changed significantly. Here were the biggest moves and how they affected the value of Dynasty assets:
Introducing Samson Gash, 2026 freshman WR for Michigan State. View his official scouting card for HS production, strengths, and weaknesses.
Introducing Christian Rhodes, 2026 freshman RB for SMU. View his official scouting card for HS production, strengths, and weaknesses.
@DffFrankPanthro covers his picks from Rounds 8-15 in our recent dynasty startup mock draft, talking draft strategy from 12 slot.
In this DFF exclusive article @joshreedy5 discusses his dynasty startup strategy and picks, drafting from the 1.04 spot.
Running backs come in a lot of shapes, but the ones who last in the NFL usually bring a mix of size, speed, and toughness. Mike Washington Jr. checks those boxes. At 6’1” and around 223 pounds, he looks like the kind of back built to handle a heavy workload. What separates him from most runners his size is the speed. When he hits open space, he can erase angles in a hurry. Washington spent his college career climbing the ladder. He started in the MAC before finishing at Arkansas in the SEC, proving along the way that his game translated against better competition. By the time the 2025 season ended, he had established himself as one of the most productive backs in the conference.
Let’s talk about a tier one tight end that isn’t getting enough love. If #85 Packers TE Tucker Kraft wasn’t injured last year, he would be tier one right now. And it’s not crazy to say he could be the best tight end overall. 25 years old. Kraft is a key offensive weapon who has shown high-level performance. Especially with his yard after catch (YAC). He was phenomenal in a 2025 matchup against the Arizona Cardinals, where he caught a 7-yard touchdown pass from Jordan Love. Kraft was the major factor in the success versus the Cardinals.
Find out who DFF analyst @DynastyFFWolf selected with his first 15 picks in this Dynasty Superflex TEP startup draft.
@jim_DFF breaks down his draft selections in this expert dynasty startup draft. See how the dynasty landscape as shifted as we head into 2026.
Cole Payton is one of those names that sneaks up on you if you’re not paying attention. Small school. Limited starts. Left-handed quarterback. Easy to overlook if you’re skimming box scores. But once you actually watch him and dig into the season he just put together, it’s hard not to come away impressed. Payton just finished a record-setting year at North Dakota State and put himself firmly on the NFL radar for the 2026 Draft. He’s not a finished product, but the upside is very real, especially in a quarterback class that doesn’t have many players separating themselves. A Late Bloomer Who Made It Count This past season was Payton’s first full year as the starter, and he made the most of it. He led North Dakota State to a 12–1 record and played with a level of efficiency you don’t usually see, regardless of level. He completed nearly 72% of his passes, threw for 2,719 yards with 16 touchdowns and only 4 interceptions, and consistently took care of the football. What really jumps out is how clean the overall production looks when you factor in what he did with his legs. Payton rushed for 777 yards and 13 touchdowns, averaging 5.7 yards per carry. He wasn’t scrambling just to survive. Designed runs, short-yardage toughness, red-zone scores. He became a legitimate problem for defenses once plays broke down. By the end of the year, he finished as the highest-graded quarterback in the FCS and set school records for efficiency and total offense per play. That doesn’t happen by accident. How […]
Goodness, gracious. This trade is gold for both parties. D.J. Moore made it possible for Buffalo and Chicago to become better. It cost the Buffalo Bills a 2026 second-round pick. In exchange, the Bears sent D.J. Moore and their 2026 fifth-round pick. For Chicago, this opens up so much in a crowded offensive room. Caleb has the weapons to throw to, even with Moore being shipped out. This opens up opportunities for two promising second-year players to shine: Luther Buden III (WR) and Colston Loveland (TE). Hello, young men! These youngsters will have a chance to be special, special. I guarantee they are both already soaring in Dynasty as hot commodities and will be hot as a spoon is a trap house at the beginning of the month. They have shown they are capable of producing in their 2025 rookie campaigns.