Shawn Siegele investigates Kyren Williams’ league-crushing campaign to find out what it can tell us about fantasy running back drafting. Can two dark horse candidates follow in his footsteps?
Every so often we get a lightning-strike player who completely turns the fantasy season on its head. In 2023 that was Kyren Williams.
Searching for players like Williams can present problems. We don’t expect to get a player like this very often, and in most circumstances we may want to avoid the types of characteristics these players possess.
But implicit in any quest to find the next Kyren Williams is the idea that perhaps he’s not such a rule-breaker at all. Perhaps his resume included positive indicators that were either obscured by other dynamics or not properly appreciated by the draft community. We want to always keep asking the question: Who are we missing because we’ve gotten so confident in our evaluation rubrics that we can’t see the trees for the forest?
More from Shawn’s Player Value Series
- This Free Alvin Kamara/Tony Pollard Clone Is a Must Draft in All Formats
- 2023’s Best Player Hack Provides 4 League-Winning RB Options
- A Race to the Tier Breaks: 11 Players Who Help Orchestrate Your Grand Strategy
- SF Cheat Code Supercharged: The 5 Best Player Values
- Draft Season Is Here: Shawn’s 27 Priority Targets
2 Dark Horse RBs Poised to Deliver Key Aspects of the Williams Breakout
Today’s exercise works through the circumstances that led to Williams’ inexpensive price, examines whether the evidence suggested more talent than perception indicated, and asks if we might be missing 2024 candidates in the same way.
