Key takeaways
- The draft gets won after pick 100, not before it. This is where opportunity and depth-chart math beat name recognition, if you know where to look.
- Two names have the clearest "why" behind their rising price. Josh Downs inherits 111 vacated targets in Indianapolis, and Jonathon Brooks steps into a backfield that just lost a 250-plus-touch workhorse.
- Efficiency doesn't need volume to prove itself. Bhayshul Tuten scored seven touchdowns on just 93 rookie touches, a rate worth betting on again even before the workload grows.
- Scheme fit is a cheap, real edge. Quentin Johnston landed in a YAC-heavy passing scheme and the market has started to notice, up 36 spots on DraftKings over the past six weeks.
- A late-round bench spot is worth less than the FAAB budget behind it. This league spends roughly 47% of its entire season-long waiver budget in the first four weeks alone — hoarding that budget beats drafting a marginal round-13 dart you'll probably cut by October anyway.
Your first five rounds get decided by talent. Your last five get decided by homework, and almost nobody does it. Every 12-team league has a handful of managers who stop paying attention once the name recognition runs out around pick 100, and that's exactly where this league's real late-round draft targets live: players whose value moved because of a trade, an injury to someone else, or a scheme fit nobody's fully priced in yet.
None of what follows is a lock. Names taken outside the top 150 or so come from a much thinner sample of drafts than your first-round picks, and a shift of a few spots one way or the other can look bigger than it actually is. But when the same names keep showing up as risers across multiple platforms, and when the reason behind it — a vacated target share, a cleared injury, a coordinator who feeds his skill players — actually holds up, that's worth a late pick over another lottery ticket you're taking on vibes.
The late-round draft targets worth a pick
Start here, because these are the names with the clearest "why" behind them — not just a rising ADP line, but a specific reason the opportunity exists.
- Josh Downs, WR, IND (FFC 85.0 / ESPN 131.8). Michael Pittman's departure vacates 111 targets in that offense, and Downs is the returning slot receiver positioned to absorb a big chunk of them. It doesn't hurt that Alec Pierce is dealing with an ankle issue either — every game Pierce isn't full-go is another game Downs sees a bigger target share.
- Bhayshul Tuten, RB, JAX (60.4). Seven touchdowns on just 93 touches as a rookie isn't a fluke you shrug off. That's an efficiency rate that, if it holds anywhere close, makes him a real weekly factor the moment he sees a fuller workload.
- Quentin Johnston, WR, LAC (FFC 96.8 / ESPN 140.2). The Chargers brought in Mike McDaniel's YAC-heavy scheme as offensive coordinator, and the market has already started to move — Johnston is up 36 spots on DraftKings over the past six weeks. That's a name to grab before the rest of the room finishes catching up.
- Jonathon Brooks, RB, CAR (126.5). He's cleared a second ACL tear, and he's stepping into a backfield that just watched a 250-plus-touch workhorse walk out the door. That's an unusually clean opportunity for a running back going this late.
- Kenny Gainwell, RB, TB (99.6). Already one of the biggest full-PPR value gainers on the whole board — his passing-down role is worth more than his ADP reflects in a three-flex league that pays for catches.
- Jayden Higgins, WR, HOU (121.4). A depth piece behind an offense that already has plenty of established mouths to feed, but at this price he's a cheap bet on target overflow if anyone ahead of him misses time.
Two quarterbacks worth the very last picks
This league only starts one quarterback, so nobody should be reaching here. But if you're filling your last couple of QB slots and want more than a coin flip, two names stand out:
- Tyler Shough, QB, NO (151.2). He finished as the QB5 from Weeks 12 through 18 last season at 18.6 points per game — that's not a small-sample fluke, that's most of a half-season of QB1-caliber production from a name still going in the very last rounds.
- Kyler Murray, QB, MIN (150.5). He's now in Minnesota after leaving Arizona, and whatever the offense looks like, his legs have delivered 30-plus rushing yards a game in seven straight seasons. That rushing floor is worth something even in an unsettled QB2 role.
Both of these sit outside roughly pick 150, which is the range where ADP data starts to get thin and shaky. Treat the exact draft slot as a rough neighborhood, not a promise.
One more deep dart throw at tight end
Greg Dulcich, TE, MIA (roughly 183). This is about as deep as this list goes, and the ADP here is thin enough that it's closer to a name to remember in October than a pick to bank on in August. Still, in a league with no mandatory tight end slot, the format rewards taking a shot on upside at the bottom of the position instead of rostering a second kicker.
Risers and fallers over the past six weeks
ADP doesn't sit still, and the direction a player is trending tells you almost as much as where he sits today. Here's the shortlist of names moving the most across the sites that track it:
| Player | Pos | Team | Direction | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adonai Mitchell | WR | NYJ | Riser | Biggest mover on Underdog this month, roughly 3 rounds |
| Jonathon Brooks | RB | CAR | Riser | +43 spots on Underdog |
| Quentin Johnston | WR | LAC | Riser | +36 spots on DraftKings |
| Jaydon Blue | RB | DAL | Riser | Climbing |
| MarShawn Lloyd | RB | GB | Riser | Climbing |
| Rachaad White | RB | WAS | Riser | Climbing |
| Greg Dulcich | TE | MIA | Riser | Climbing, still a deep ADP |
| Terrance Ferguson | TE | LAR | Riser | Climbing |
| Aaron Rodgers | QB | PIT | Riser | Climbing |
| Drake Maye | QB | NE | Riser | Climbing |
| Quinshon Judkins | RB | CLE | Riser | On track, climbing |
| Brandon Aiyuk | WR | SF | Faller | -54 spots on DraftKings, still on reserve |
| Tyreek Hill | WR | Unsigned | Faller | -43 spots, no timetable |
| Stefon Diggs | WR | Unsigned | Faller | Biggest faller in the draftable range |
| Malik Nabers | WR | NYG | Faller | Round 3 to round 4 after a second knee surgery |
| Rashee Rice | WR | KC | Faller | Dipped on surgery news, has since stabilized |
| Kenyon Sadiq | TE | NYJ | Faller | Buried 3rd/4th on a crowded TE depth chart |
A few more names moving without a clean team-and-role story behind them yet: James Conner slid 13 spots in a single week after landing buried on his own depth chart, while backs Nicholas Singleton and Emanuel Wilson are both trending down for similar crowded-backfield reasons. Worth watching, not worth reaching for.
Why a late-round roster spot is worth less than the budget behind it
Here's the part of this list that matters more than any single name, and it comes straight from six seasons of this league's own waiver-wire history. ITFFL runs FAAB waivers with a $1000 season budget and a $1 minimum bid, processed every Tuesday. Across those six seasons, managers have made 548 winning claims and spent roughly $43,555 combined — and the way that money actually gets spent should change how you think about your last few draft picks.
Bidding here is a barbell, not a bell curve. Season medians sit in the $20-40 range, but 18 to 28 claims a year land at $100 or more. And those big bids cluster hard at the start of the season: 7 of the 12 biggest bids in league history landed in Weeks 1-3, and 10 of the 12 landed by Week 7. Weeks 1 through 4 alone consume roughly 47% of the league's entire season FAAB pool on about 32% of its claims. aal3's $1000 bid in Week 4 of 2025 — the biggest in league history — is the extreme example, but Athletic Supporters ($777, Week 1, 2021), End Of Story ($756, Week 1, 2020), and Hollywood Home Team ($655, Week 1, 2023) all made the top-12 list before September was even over.
Meanwhile, roughly three-quarters of every roster move in this league's history has been a free-agent add that cost nothing at all — not a won bidding war. Put those two facts together and the picture is clear: a round-13 or round-14 dart throw you drafted is competing against a wire that mostly restocks itself for free, while the FAAB dollars you're holding onto are what actually buy the roster-defining pickup in October. Spending big doesn't guarantee winning, either — Any Given Sontag has claimed two of the last six titles while averaging about $429 a season in FAAB, 11th of 13 regular managers, while the league's top spender averages nearly $1,000 a year with no championships to show for it. The discipline that wins in ITFFL isn't hoarding every dollar or blowing it all in August. It's knowing that a marginal bench stash on draft day is worth less than the budget it costs you to just wait and win the claim that actually matters.
How noisy is deep ADP, really
Be honest with yourself about what these numbers are. Once you're outside roughly the top 150 picks, the ADP feeding this list comes from a much smaller pool of drafts than the numbers driving your first-round board — sometimes a handful of drafts, sometimes a few dozen. That's plenty to tell you a name is trending. It's not nearly enough to promise you an exact pick number. Mitchell at 164.4, Shough at 151.2, Murray at 150.5, and Dulcich around 183 all fall in that thin-sample territory. Draft them because the underlying story makes sense, not because the decimal point looks precise.
The pick'em angle: find the story before the market prices it
The instinct that finds a late-round draft target is the same instinct that finds value on a weekly pick'em slate. Nobody needs help identifying the obvious side; the market has already priced that in. The edge is always in the situation nobody's fully adjusted to yet — a receiver who just inherited 111 targets, a backfield that lost its lead back, a coordinator who scheme-designs yards after the catch for his skill players. Check the leaderboard and you'll see the same pattern every week: separation usually comes from a handful of decisions nobody else made, not from copying the obvious favorite over and over.
None of these names are locks, and a few of them will be forgotten by Thanksgiving. That's fine — that's what a late-round pick is for, as long as you don't confuse it with the more important decision underneath it. Grab the ones with a real reason behind the rising ADP, but remember that the round-13 flier and the FAAB dollars in your pocket are pulling from the same budget of "chances to get better later." This league's own history says the dollars win that trade far more often than the dart throw does. Check how the format actually pays out with the full-PPR value gainers and losers breakdown. If you want the fuller injury picture behind names like Brooks and Nabers before your pick comes up, the 2026 Fantasy Draft Injuries: What the ADP Market Missed Coming Soon has the rundown.