Fantasy Football 2016: Skill Position Rankings and Top Sleepers

NFL quarterbacks usually hog the spotlight—except in fantasy football drafts.

At this point, a column preaching patience when selecting a signal-caller is as commonplace as saying not to draft a kicker before the final round. Since the league is more pass-friendly than ever, the position is littered with quality options.

Avoiding the top-tier passers isn’t always the correct strategy, especially if everyone else is doing it. Anyone who takes Coby Fleener over Andrew Luck is getting too clever for his or her own good. 

Quarterbacks matter, but football fans know them well by this point. So let’s give everyone else a chance to shine with rankings for the other skill positions tailored to standard-scoring leagues.

Running Back

Sleeper: Isaiah Crowell, Cleveland Browns

Isaiah Crowell saved and buried handfuls of fantasy players last year.

Heading into Week 14—when most leagues begin the playoffs—the Cleveland Browns running back had not rushed for a touchdowns in his last 10 contests. That changed when he delivered a season-high 145 rushing yards (topping his previous high of 72) and a pair of touchdowns.

Crowell accrued 309 rushing yards over 60 carries in Cleveland’s final four games. Duke Johnson, ranked 12 spots (No. 27) ahead of his teammate on FantasyPros, averaged 6.5 carries per game and 3.6 yards per rush. He’ll stay in a pass-catching role as new head coach Hue Jackson pounds the rock with Crowell.

Under Jackson’s watch, the Cincinnati Bengals finished in the top 10 in rushing attempts in 2014 and 2015. For all of his inconsistencies, Jeremy Hill received all of the goal-line touches over Giovani Bernard, scoring 21 times with Jackson as his offensive coordinator over the past two seasons.

As numberFire’s Joe Redemann noted, Crowell’s added touches should extend into the red zone:

The Bengals have also had a team average of 4.12 yards per carry over the past …

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