Fantasy Football Cheat Sheet: Bench Targets, Training Camp Injuries, and More
Sam Wallace rounds up the week of content at Fantasy Life in the form of an easy-to-digest fantasy football cheat sheet.
With a full slate of NFL Preseason games this weekend, let's take a look back and catch up on some of the best from this past week in Fantasy Life. In this fantasy football cheat sheet, expect to find actionable updates, news, and notes all designed to make you a better fantasy football player.
Fantasy Football Cheat Sheet: Everything You May Have Missed At Fantasy Life This Week
Freedman's Favorite Bench Picks
Not only does Matthew Freedman create incredible content, but he also brings useful insights and actionable nuggets for fantasy managers everywhere. In one of his latest pieces, 2025 Fantasy Football Draft Strategy: My Favorite Bench Picks, Freedman brings much-needed clarity to the Green Bay Packers wide receiver room.
With all the excitement surrounding Matthew Golden, we could very well be overlooking Jayden Reed.
Currently, Reed has an ADP of 102.1 (WR44), but our projections have him at WR34. Perhaps even more intriguing is the path to even more upside and value than that. Here's what Freedman had to say about Reed:
Since entering the league two years ago, Reed has been one of the NFL's most efficient players (9.8 yards per target, 9.1 yards per carry). And his raw production hasn't been paltry (1,932 yards, 17 TDs from scrimmage).
The biggest variable going for Reed right now is the number of snaps he's getting in two-WR sets. With Christian Watson (knee) sidelined for the foreseeable future, Golden has been stepping into that downfield role nicely. That's left Reed, traditionally a slot weapon, free to soak up the No. 2 role in the offense.
In fact, our projections have Golden (181.5 PPR) and Reed (181.3 PPR) finishing with essentially the same number of points this season. Romeo Doubs is way down in third with 132.4 PPR.
In the words of Freedman: Reed has the upside to be a true No. 1 WR this year.
Drafting From The 1.06
There's no getting around it: Chris Allen is undoubtedly one of the best wordsmiths in the industry. The way in which he crafts his content makes me go back and read it time and time again because I'm always learning something new.
He's currently working through a series in which he lays out draft strategies from each draft slot in Round 1. In his latest,1.06 Draft Strategy For Fantasy Football 2025, he touches on one of the more controversial players heading in this season: Christian McCaffrey.
We've all experienced (and enjoyed) the insane highs of the early-to-mid portion of his career. However, in the same breath, we're all feeling a bit iffy about going back to the well after we were burned last season.
What version of CMC are we going to get in 2025? Even the Fantasy Life staff can't fully agree.
I, for one, am all in on CMC this season. Our projections have him as the RB4 in PPR scoring formats, just three points shy of the RB2 slot.
Even without the projections, just look at what the 49ers have done this offseason. Jordan Mason is now backing up Aaron Jones in Minnesota, and the remaining RBs on the roster (Isaac Guerendo and Jordan James) don't profile as players who will take a sizable workload.
Toss in the departure of Deebo Samuel and the subsequent questionable timeline of Brandon Aiyuk and this team (Brock Purdy) is going to need to lean heavily on CMC and George Kittle.
The middle of the draft can feel like no-man's land at certain points of the draft, and you generally want to avoid drafting landmines with your first selection. Even so, the upside and track record of a player of CMC's caliber are too much for me to pass up.
Test the 1.06 and any other draft position for free with our Mock Draft Simulator in Draft Champion!
Stock Watch Risers & Fallers
I love a good fantasy football stock watch article. In fact, I write quite a few of them throughout the year from a dynasty perspective.
This week, Geoff Ulrich took us team-by-team (for ALL 32 teams) and highlighted which specific players experienced significant movement in their redraft ADP and how fantasy managers should respond.
Let's take a closer look at some of my biggest takeaways from his latest piece: Fantasy Football Stock Watch Risers and Fallers.
It appears as though the collective fantasy football community is gearing up to get hurt by Kyle Pitts…again. The convergence of an injury to Darnell Mooney, coupled with some hype from Michael Penix, has pushed Pitts' ADP up the board. We'll have to see if this is the year when he can finally turn things around.
The Denver Broncos are poised to be one of the more exciting offenses starting as soon as this season. The obvious benefactor is No. 1 WR Courtland Sutton. However, there's no clear No. 2 option in the passing game, which has opened the door for rookie Pat Bryant to emerge. Keep an eye on him in the later rounds of your drafts this month.
The player with seemingly the widest range of outcomes for this season appears to be J.J. McCarthy. After essentially redshirting his rookie year, all eyes will be on Kevin O'Connell as he tries to recreate the same magic he worked with Sam Darnold. No one is questioning the coaching or offensive weapons, which means it falls on McCarthy not to mess this up.
Training Camp Injuries
We know these things happen every year, without fail.
Players get banged up before a single snap of meaningful football is played, and we're left to decide how risky we want to be in drafting a player coming off a preseason injury.
In one of his recent newsletters, Pete Overzet broke down a handful of key injuries that he's monitoring, as well his concern with each.
One key injury I'm following is the high-ankle sprain of Khalil Shakir. His steady progression and improvement throughout the early portion of his career landed him a solid contract extension and the assumed No. 1 role in the Bills passing attack.
This ankle injury certainly puts that in jeopardy. With many eyes now focused on Joshua Palmer, one also has to wonder if second-year wideout Keon Coleman can step up this year.
Pete's concern level: 4.6/10. Personally, I'm a bit higher than that.
Let's wrap up with Matthew Stafford (back), who is, yet again, dealing with another nagging injury. Pete's concern level of 2.4/10 should tell you all you need to know but for me, this goes beyond Stafford. I probably wasn't drafting a ton of Stafford anyway, but this definitely impacts how I feel about both Puka Nacua and Davante Adams.
Keep an eye on this one in the weeks to come.
Want to check out the rest of Pete's injury roundup? Make sure to give his newsletter a read!
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