Top Five Fantasy Football Quarterbacks
Here we go pro football fans. The 2017 season kicks off tonight with the annual NFL Hall of Fame game in Canton, Ohio between the Dallas Cowboys and Arizona Cardinals.
Keeping this in mind, the fantasy football scouting season is officially underway with drafts taking place beginning in the next few weeks.
Conservative Daily News will be featuring news for all of you FFL warriors from now until championship week.
Let’s begin with the top quarterbacks – none of which should be any surprise to y’all.
Aaron Rodgers: Look for yet another big year from Rodgers whose numbers benefit from the Green Bay Packers having very little in terms of a running game.
Rodgers put together a monster fantasy season in 2016 with 4,428 yards, 40 passing touchdowns, 4 rushing scores and only seven interceptions.
He could be even better in 2017 as his receiving corps should be healthy and two new tight ends in Martellus Bennett and Lance Kendricks joined the Pack in the offseason.
Rodgers should be the first quarterback off the board in most fantasy drafts.
Tom Brady: The ageless wonder should have a huge season this year as the New England Patriots have greatly improved their receiving corps.
All Pro tight end Rob Gronkowski returns from the injuries that sidelined him last season and the Pats stole speedy wide receiver Brandin Cooks from the Saints as well as added tight end Dwayne Allen via free agency.
Julian Edelman and Danny Amendola will also be back and as we saw in the Super Bowl, Brady will also use his running backs in the passing game.
The only downside is that Brady will be 40 years old this season and while he continues to play at a high level, as history has shown, it can go downhill very quickly once Father Time starts nipping at your heels.
Matt Ryan: The Atlanta Falcons veteran is coming off a career season when he passed for 4,944 yards, 38 touchdowns, and only seven picks.
The Falcons’ offense was deadly until it imploded during the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl in what has to be the greatest championship choke of all time and Ryan was the key.
Despite the departure of offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan to San Francisco, look for Ryan to have another big year, especially with a healthy Julio Jones at receiver.
If he is able to shrug off any lingering psychological damage from his epic Super Bowl collapse he should put up similar numbers again this year as the offense returns largely intact and there will be plenty of shootouts in the high-powered NFC South.
Drew Brees: The aging New Orleans Saints quarterback continues to put up great numbers every year and at the age of 37, he threw for over 5,000 yards and 37 touchdowns.
Not only has Brees become one of the NFL’s most prolific passers since ending up in the Big Easy, but the lack of a running game or a defense guarantees that the Saints will be playing from behind a good deal of the time.
Brees has racked up insane numbers over his New Orleans career and barring hitting the wall due to his age, look for him to continue to rack up the numbers as he heads towards his eventual enshrinement in Canton.
Derek Carr: Before he suffered a broken leg during garbage time in the second to the last game of the year, Carr had led the Oakland Raiders to the cusp of the home-field advantage in the playoffs. Then it all went to hell after head coach Jack Del Rio failed to pull him in the fourth quarter of a rout.
Carr is expecting to be healthy again now and hopes to build on his fantastic breakthrough of 3,900 + yards, and 37 touchdowns which earned him a gargantuan contract.
Oakland also beefed up the ground attack by signing former Seattle Seahawks’ wrecking ball Marshawn Lynch. With Beast Mode coming to the Black Hole it could lead to Carr putting up great numbers again this year now that he has a running game.
Honorable Mention:
Matthew Stafford: Has consistently put up great numbers in Detroit despite being trapped in the NFL’s version of Purgatory.
Cam Newton: Can the former NFL MVP rebound from a downward spiral ever since his 15-1 Carolina Panthers were destroyed in Super Bowl 50 by the Denver Broncos? One gets the feeling with the mercurial Newton that it’s a head thing.
Dak Prescott: The Dallas Cowboy phenom exceeded all expectations when another Tony Romo injury turned him into the quarterback of the present instead of the future. Can he avoid the dreaded sophomore jinx?
Andrew Luck: The Indianapolis Colts star would easily be in the top five if not for injury concerns. Luck has yet to begin throwing this year which is not a good sign.
Jameis Winston: The Tampa Bay Buccaneers youngster is entering his third season with the offense built around him and a plethora of weapons, can he stop being a human turnover machine?
Marcus Mariotta: The Tennessee Titan youngster is on the brink of stardom but can he manage to stay healthy for an entire season?
Ben Roethlisberger: The Pittsburgh Steeler great has been suggesting that he may be close to hanging up his cleats. The guy takes a tremendous beating and has heart as well as a pair of Super Bowl rings. This could be Big Ben’s last hurrah.