The Commanders went all-in on getting Jayden Daniels set up for success this offseason. They revamped the line, getting Nick Allegretti, Tyler Biadasz, and Andrew Wylie in free agency, and picked up Kliff Kingsbury to run their offense. They also added Austin Ekeler, Ben Sinnott, and Luke McCaffrey to catch passes from their rookie quarterback. What should we expect from the revamped Washington Commanders offense for 2024 fantasy football leagues? Let’s dive into the most overvalued player, check out an undervalued player, and take a look at a sleeper!
Overvalued: Brian Robinson, Running Back (RB33, Pick 97 Overall)
I keep coming back to Gus Edwards’ 2023 stat line and final fantasy football ranking when I look at Brian Robinson. Gus Edwards finished 2023 with an impressive 13 touchdowns. Unfortunately, he didn’t catch many passes (12 receptions) and he split his carries just enough to not matter (198 carries). All of that came together to find the man with the third-most rushing touchdowns last year finish just RB34 in fantasy points per game. I fear that this is Brian Robinson’s future with Austin Ekeler and Jayden Daniels in town.
Robinson is a banger and a bruiser, who the Commanders pushed into being a pass catcher last season, but that’s something they won’t need him to do as much this year with Austin Ekeler in tow. That leaves him as a rusher with some goal-line opportunities. And, as a rusher… he was fine. He had zero games with over 87 rushing yards, and just 3 games over 65 rushing yards last season. If you take away his receiving… things get rough in a hurry for him. Then you add in both Austin Ekeler and Jayden Daniels taking rushing touchdowns away, and you have a narrow band of success for Brian Robinson this season.
Undervalued: Jayden Daniels, Quarterback (QB18, Pick 125 Overall)
Jayden Daniels is getting pushed down due to collective blindness from the fantasy football community. We aren’t sure if he’s good yet, that’s true. We are not sure if he is a good NFL quarterback. Yet, we take that evaluation and ignore that he is an extremely good dual-threat quarterback, and we push him down. Saturday’s preseason opener saw him rush for a touchdown, something he did 21 times in the last two years at LSU (while rushing for 2019 yards in those two seasons, as well). Here’s the entire list of round one and round two quarterbacks in the FPS era to run for 2000+ yards in their college career: Lamar Jackson, Jalen Hurts, and Jayden Daniels. He is in rarified air, and he did it while throwing for over 10,000 yards in college, something that neither Lamar nor Jalen Hurts did.
Get Jayden Daniels as your QB2, profit. It’s that easy.
Sleeper: Jahan Dotson, Wide Receiver (WR64, Pick 154 Overall)
In Kliff Kingsbury’s four seasons in Arizona, the WR2 averaged 6.8 targets per game, which throughout a seventeen-game season, comes out to 116 targets for a guy who is going around team defenses and kickers. Dotson should be able to produce with that target volume, as he is a good receiver who has been saddled with bad quarterback play. Dotson has eleven career games with at least 6 targets, and he has a touchdown or 100 yards receiving in six of them. In games with at least 6 targets, Dotson averages 4.63 receptions for 56.5 yards per game, scoring six touchdowns in eleven games. Over a seventeen-game season, that comes out to 79 receptions, 960 yards, 9 touchdowns, and 13.5 PPR points per game.
