Last week, I broke down my top 10 quarterbacks for Dynasty Fantasy Football. Now I’m going to kick this week off with what is perhaps the most popular position in the Dynasty format: wide receiver. The league is absolutely stacked with talented young receivers right now, so there are going to be plenty of tough decisions along the way. Feel free to yell at me on Twitter if I rank your favorite player too low; let’s get started.
Dynasty Fantasy Football Top 10 Wide Receivers
1. CeeDee Lamb, Dallas Cowboys
I’m starting things off with a relatively controversial pick; I don’t think I have to tell you who KeepTradeCut (KTC) and the FantasyPros Expert Consensus (ECR) have as the WR1. And it does feel wrong putting anyone ahead of Justin Jefferson. But my logic for this pick is actually fairly simple: Lamb is only two months older than Jefferson, and he is currently going before his fellow 2020 first-round pick in Redraft ADP. Yes, Jefferson is probably more talented in a vacuum. But Lamb is an All-Pro talent in his own right and in a much, much better situation. I don’t think anyone will disagree that catching passes from Dak Prescott with Jake Ferguson and Brandin Cooks as your main competition is much better than catching passes from Sam Darnold/J.J. McCarthy while competing against Jordan Addison and T.J. Hockenson. Situations come and go, and talent is forever, but with two elite young talents, I’ll lean towards the one with the better situation (and who I’m projecting to score more points) right now.
2. Justin Jefferson, Minnesota Vikings
Given that I felt the need to justify not ranking Jefferson as my Dynasty WR1, I don’t think this spot needs much explanation. Jefferson has been a top-five receiver in the league since he first stepped on the field, and he’s still only 24 years old. After returning from a hamstring injury, he averaged 18.4 Half-PPR points over the last four games of last season … with Nick Mullens under center. He’ll be a WR1 for years to come and will return to competing for WR1 overall status as soon as he gets a real quarterback.
3. Ja’Marr Chase, Cincinnati Bengals
Frankly, I think Chase is a little overrated for Dynasty. Where he is often grouped with Lamb and Jefferson as a Big Three at the position, I would have him in a tier below his fellow young superstars. His situation, paired with Joe Burrow for the foreseeable future, is actually the best of the three. But I don’t think he’s quite as talented as the other two, and it shows in his numbers. Chase has never posted a PFF Grade above 86 or averaged more than his 2.44 rookie-year yards per route run. Lamb put up 90.9 and 2.69 in those categories last season, while Jefferson has never fallen below 90 or 2.55 in his four-year career (a truly insane achievement). This shows on the fantasy scoreboard too: Chase’s best season-long Half-PPR finish was WR5 (again, as a rookie), while both Lamb and Jefferson have WR1 overall seasons under their belts. This isn’t to say Chase will never finish as the WR1 — as long as he and Burrow are together, he has a chance. But I’m far less confident that he would still be a top-five fantasy WR without Burrow (which sounds inconceivable now, but things change fast in the NFL) than I am in Jefferson without Kirk Cousins or would be in Lamb without Prescott. With all that said, Chase is still the obvious pick for this spot — he just turned 24 and is being drafted as the WR3 in current Underdog ADP — and a tier above the next names on this list.
4. Amon-Ra St. Brown, Detroit Lions
I’ll admit it. I was once a non-believer in the Sun God, doubting that his red-hot finish to the season as a rookie was sustainable. But I have since repented my sins (and he’s simply improved as a player). St. Brown is 24 years old, coming off a top-three finish, and being drafted as the WR5 heading into 2024. It’s almost unfair to him that the league is so stacked with young receiving talent that he finds himself outside the top three in these Dynasty rankings. Even still, I find it almost hard to justify having him this low. If I had to point to some reason why I consider him a tier below Chase (and two below Lamb and Jefferson), it would be that his lower ADOT role (7.3 yards for his career) caps his ceiling ever so slightly on a weekly basis.
5. Marvin Harrison Jr., Arizona Cardinals
I’m not going too lie, I feel bad about this pick. Don’t get me wrong, MHJ is about as flawless as an incoming rookie can be, with a pristine prospect profile, unimpeachable draft capital, and a great landing spot … but he’s still a rookie. It feels wrong to rank a player who has never played an NFL snap above, for example, a guy who just set the rookie record for receiving yards. But Dynasty isn’t played in a vacuum. And not in a vacuum, MHJ is the consensus Dynasty WR4 everywhere, from KTC, to FantasyPros, to the actual trade market. And that final point is what swayed me to put the newest Cardinal here: trade value. Out of all the names remaining to be ranked, Harrison Jr. has easily the most insulated value of any of them. Barring a truly catastrophic rookie season (or off-the-field issues), someone will be willing to pay top-10 Dynasty WR prices for him a year from now. And that is what forces my hand to rank him here. With his floor in the top-10 WRs and his ceiling at the top of this list, Harrison is the most valuable rookie receiver we’ve seen in years, for good reason.
6. Puka Nacua, Los Angeles Rams
No matter how you look at it, this ranking is crazy. It’s crazy that a 22-year-old who just had literally the most productive rookie season of all time is outside the top five Dynasty receivers. It’s also crazy that a fifth-round pick who averaged under 500 yards per season in college is inside the top 10. Is Nacua a transcendent talent who was overlooked by NFL decision-makers? Or is he just being propped up by the combination of Sean McVay and Matthew Stafford (insert Kenny Golladay comparison)? At the end of the day, I’m going to trust what we actually saw in the NFL: Nacua is awesome. He was the Half-PPR WR4 last season despite scoring only six touchdowns. It is worth noting that his production slowed down slightly when Cooper Kupp returned, as he averaged 13.2 PPG with Kupp compared to an absurd 19.0 without him. But that’s still absurd production for a rookie receiver. I do think it’s true that Nacua wouldn’t have thrived quite as much in just about any other situation, but we can’t hold those hypothetical worlds against him. It’s also true that he’ll probably be less productive when Matthew Stafford retires, but he hasn’t yet. Right now, Nacua is being drafted as a top-six receiver heading into his sophomore season, so he’s solidly in my top six Dynasty WRs.
7. Tyreek Hill, Miami Dolphins
I’m straying from consensus hard on this one, as Tyreek is the Dynasty WR9 in ECR and all the way down at WR13 on KTC. But I’m ranking him this high for one simple reason: He provides truly elite production, and truly elite production wins championships. Yes, the 30-year-old Hill sticks out like a sore thumb on this list of rankings for a game that is all about long-term thinking. But I would rather have two more top-three peak Hill seasons than eight seasons of WR2 or even backend WR1 numbers. The kind of positional advantage that Hill provides (he has been the WR2 in each of the past two seasons and a top-six WR in six of the last seven seasons, including five top-five finishes), is irreplacable. He showed no signs of slowing down (literally) last season, so I’m happy to ride him into the sunset on my contending Dynasty teams while other managers priotize younger players with very replacable production.
8. A.J. Brown, Philadelphia Eagles
I’m following up Hill with another (relatively) old receiver in Brown, who will be 27 before the season starts. AJB slowed down with the rest of the Eagles’ offense down the stretch of last season, but still posted his second straight top-seven finish since arriving in the City of Brotherly Love. He signed a fresh extension this offseason that will theoretically keep him in Philadelphia (and playing next to Jalen Hurts) through 2029, his age-32 season; he should be a top-10 fantasy WR for at least the majority of that contract.
9. Brandon Aiyuk, San Francisco 49ers
As a 49ers fan, I can definitely be accused of bias here (Aiyuk is the WR14 on KTC and WR13 in ECR). But I honestly believe Aiyuk is one of the most talented receivers in the league. If you don’t want to take my word for it, consider that Aiyuk ranked second to only Hill in PFF Grade (91.5) in 2023, while ESPN’s Receiver Tracking Metrics had the 26-year-old as the single best WR in the league. The only thing holding him back from putting up truly elite fantasy numbers (and he still averaged 14.4 Half-PPR points in his healthy games in 2023, more than all but seven WRs for the season) is playing on a stacked San Francisco offense with many mouths to feed. With Deebo Samuel on the last year of his deal and George Kittle already 30 years old, that’s not going to last forever … if it even lasts until Week 1 with trade rumors swirling. As soon as Aiyuk is the undisputed WR1 on his team, watch out.
10. Nico Collins, Houston Texans
I have been comparing Collins to Aiyuk for much of this offseason now, so it’s fitting they land back-to-back here. Having Collins on this list is even more of a break from consensus than Aiyuk, as he is outside the top 17 receivers in both KTC’s rankings and ECR. But I simply can’t overlook how impressive Collins’ 2023 season, his third in the league, was. He ranked second to Tyreek in yards per route run with an absurd 3.11 and posted a 91.4 PFF Grade. That’s higher than the peak grades of the top four names on this list: Lamb, Jefferson, Chase, and St. Brown. I’m certainly not worried that he can’t coexist with Tank Dell, as he actually performed better with the rookie on the field in 2023 (15.0 PPG on 7.9 targets per game vs. 14.1 PPG on 7.5 targets). The addition of Stefon Diggs does complicate things further, but the veteran is only under contract in Houston for one year. Like Aiyuk, it might take him a year to unlock a truly elite ceiling, but Collins is barely 25 years old. I expect him to provide elite production while catching passes from C.J. Stroud for years to come.
Notable Exclusions: The 2022 WR Class Is Overrated Edition
In including Hill, Aiyuk, and Collins on my list, I’ve left out some names that you probably expected to see. The most notable of those names are all members of the 2022 Draft class of receivers: Garrett Wilson (KTC WR7; ECR WR6), Chris Olave (KTC WR11; ECR WR10), and Drake London (KTC WR10; ECR WR14). Yes, this is obviously a trio of talented young receivers. But they simply haven’t provided the production (or even really the peripheral metrics…) to justify top-10 Dynasty status. In their two years in the league, the highest any member of this trio has finished in fantasy scoring is WR19 (Olave in 2023 and Wilson in 2022). Yes, they haven’t had ideal situations, but Olave’s situation isn’t changing, and are we really expecting the addition of aging quarterbacks coming off Achilles tears (that’s a weird coincidence) to elevate last year’s WR39 (London) and WR32 (Wilson) to top-12 production? Even QB and offense-independent metrics like PFF Grade and targets per route run don’t paint a picture of these guys (with the possible exception of Olave) as elite options. Wilson, especially, is being drafted as the WR6 despite finishing as the WR39 in points per game, WR42 in PFF Grade, WR16 in targets per route, and WR52(!) in yards per route in 2023. I just don’t get it.
That was a bit of a rant, so let me take a step back for a second. These are all very talented receivers, and I do expect all three of them to exceed their 2023 performances in 2024. In fact, I would bet that at least one of them breaks into my top 10 Dynasty receivers by this time next year, having taken a step forward in their third season and actually delivered WR1 production (that’s what Collins did in 2023, his third season). But I can’t tell you which one of them it will be, and their current WR2/WR3 numbers are simply not worth their Dynasty pricetags, even given their youth.
