Fantasy Sports Writers Association Hall of Fame member Bob Harris and Gary Davenport have well over 40 years of experience as fantasy football analysts, with three Football Writer of the Year Awards between them. They know their stuff—or at least that's what they tell themselves.
Each week during the 2026 season, Harris and Davenport will come together here at Footballguys to answer five of that week's biggest fantasy questions. But it's important for old people to stretch before exercise to avoid pulling a hammy, so they are taking a couple of warm-up laps before the season begins. Get some practice in.
And what better topic for some practice than the state of the fantasy landscape with all 32 NFL teams busily doing the same.
Battles Under Center
The quarterback "battle" in Las Vegas may be over (for now), but several teams still purportedly don't know who their Week 1 starter will be. Pick one of those unsettled teams, and riddle our Readers this—who will win that battle, and what does it mean to the rest of the offense?
Harris: Kyler Murray signed with Minnesota for $1.3 million while Arizona still owes him $35.8 million. That price and his pedigree were a clear signal the former Cardinal had the inside track over J.J. McCarthy. That's less clear-cut after recent minicamp reports suggested McCarthy was closing the gap, and NFL Network's Ian Rapoport says the competition could run into the season.
Still, multiple local sources say Murray would start today.
If he wins the job, Murray inherits Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison, Jauan Jennings, and T.J. Hockenson, plus his own rushing upside -- enough to land him in the weekly QB1 mix. My QB17 ranking matches his current ADP. As the starting job becomes clearer this summer, expectations should rise. If ADP doesn't move with it, Murray drafters get a real discount.
Better still, it gives Jefferson investors hope after the star wideout played like anything but a star with McCarthy as his triggerman last year.
In fact, in the eight games that McCarthy was the sole passer, Jefferson averaged just 9.6 fantasy points per game. His best finish was WR19 in a Week 9 tilt in Detroit. He was WR20 or worse in the other seven games -- including four single-digit scoring efforts and a pair of finishes outside the top 70 at the position.
Murray would at least give us reason to believe Jefferson, who finished no worse than WR6 in his four full seasons before last year, could come closer to his usual finish.
Davenport: If only we could say the same for Drake London with Tua Tagovailoa potentially the new starting quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons.
Tagovailoa missed some time in camp with back tightness, but he made it back onto the practice field, and with Michael Penix Jr. still working back from an ACL tear, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com is already calling Tagovailoa the likely Week 1 starter after joining the Falcons following his release by the Miami Dolphins. It doesn't help Penix's case that he was the only quarterback in the NFL with a worse bad-throw percentage last year than McCarthy—at a staggering 24 percent.
The problem for London is that Tagovailoa just doesn't push the ball down the field anymore. In 2022, Tagovailoa led the league in air yards per attempt at 9.2. Fast-forward to 2025, and he tied a career-low at 6.2 AYPA—a decrease of almost 50 percent.
Tagovailoa under center may well be good news for Kyle Pitts Sr.—Tagovailoa made Jonnu Freaking Smith a top-five fantasy tight end in 2024. But all-day dinks and dunks is no bueno for London's fantasy ceiling.
Blurry Backfields
There's no shortage of murkiness at running back as camps get underway—for every bellcow back, there's a crowded backfield looking for someone to emerge. Is there a player in one of those crowded backfields you are especially excited about? One you are particularly avoiding?
Harris: After parting with Austin Ekeler and Chris Rodriguez Jr., the Commanders signed former Buccaneer Rachaad White in free agency. While most view Jacory Croskey-Merritt as the likely lead back, he's got plenty to prove. And if White gets an opportunity to move to the front of the line, it wouldn't be the first time he's outperformed a modest role.
He was a featured back in Tampa Bay in 2023, rushing for 990 yards and six touchdowns while adding 64 catches for 549 yards, finishing as fantasy's RB4.
White has been used situationally since, but he's an elite receiver. White is the only back with 40-plus catches in each of the past four seasons, and his 89.1 percent career catch rate is best in NFL history among backs with 100-plus targets. That role could carry over in Washington, where he reunites with quarterback Jayden Daniels, his Arizona State teammate from 2020-21.
ADP reflects the buzz -- White (RB37) has passed Croskey-Merritt (RB40), both going in Rounds 8 and 9, respectively.
White doesn't need to win the job outright to pay off that price.
I'm less excited about Rico Dowdle in Pittsburgh. Yes, he's had success in Mike McCarthy's offense during their time together in Dallas. As Yahoo's Hayden Winks noted last week, in his 24 seasons as an offensive coordinator or head coach, McCarthy's offenses have finished 11th in pass attempts and 18th in rush attempts. They lean heavily into three-receiver sets. He wants to be pass-heavy, and Winks contends that Jaylen Warren is a better fit for that scheme than Dowdle.
Davenport: This may well get me pelted with vegetables (or rocks), and it isn't to say that I'm doing cartwheels over rostering Chuba Hubbard in 2026. But I'm not buying the torrent of hype surrounding Jonathon Brooks in Carolina this season.
Yes, Hubbard wasn't especially effective last year—he averaged just 3.8 yards per carry and lost the lead back role to Rico Dowdle. And yes, training camp has been one long love-fest for Brooks—a day hasn't gone by without a glowing report or prognostication of some sort. Brooks is going to seize the Carolina backfield! The sky is the limit!
There's just one small complication. Brooks has played three games in as many seasons and has torn the same ACL twice—before his 24th birthday.
Hubbard's ADP is still higher than Brooks—but the youngster is rapidly closing the gap and is going ahead of Hubbard at times. Two years ago, Hubbard had a career-high 293 touches, surpassed 1,250 total yards, scored 11 total touchdowns and finished as a top-15 running back in PPR points. He's going to be Carolina's lead back in 2026—quite possibly out of necessity.
Brooks isn't the only training camp hype darling whose asking price is nearing "no thanks" territory—Bhayshul Tuten of the Jacksonville Jaguars isn't making it out of Round 5. There's your signpost that you have entered "The RB Dead Zone."
Did Tuten show flashes last year? Yes—he was 11th in avoided tackle rate (21.7%), 14th in yards after contact per attempt (3.22), and seventh in success rate (46.9%). He also plays in a very fantasy-friendly offense. But Chris Rodriguez Jr. is getting healthier, making a dent on the practice field, and has averaged 4.6 yards per attempt over four NFL seasons.
The Jaguars have the makings of a full-blown committee attack in 2026—and that's going to make it difficult for Tuten to return value with an RB2 price tag in many drafts.
