Rostering A.J. Brown in fantasy football last season was a trying experience. The highs were super high, but the lows were super low.
With the Eagles making wholesale changes to their offense in the form of a new offensive coordinator, should fantasy managers draft Brown this season?
A.J. Brown’s Fantasy Profile for the 2024 NFL Season
I do a lot of auction drafts — far more than snake drafts. I like to have at least one top WR on my teams. Every year, there seems to be one guy who just happens to be a little bit cheaper than his contemporaries, resulting in me landing him on multiple teams. Last season, that guy was Brown.
As someone who rostered Brown, I paid extra attention to his performance. Watching Eagles games, it certainly didn’t feel like Brown was commanding a 30.1% target share. But those are the elite numbers we look for.
In fantasy, the second half of the season is more important than the first half. Specifically, Weeks 15-17 are of the utmost importance.
From Weeks 3-9, Brown was that elite WR1 we wanted him to be, averaging 26.0 fantasy points per game. Unfortunately, once Week 10 rolled along, Brown’s value plummeted.
It wasn’t quite as bad as the Stefon Diggs disappearing act. In retrospect, Diggs should’ve been dropped in every league after Week 10. Brown wasn’t quite that bad.
However, from Week 10 through Week 17 (I’m excluding Week 18 because the Eagles pulled starters at halftime), Brown averaged just 12.3 fantasy points per game. He didn’t have a single game of 20+ fantasy points over that span.
The thing is, Brown was so good over the first half of the season that his overall metrics still look great. He averaged 2.59 yards per route run, ninth in the league, and was targeted on 28.1% of his routes run.
It wasn’t just Brown who struggled over the second half, though. The entire offense fell apart. The Eagles blew the division, limped into the playoffs, and were summarily disposed of by the Bucs.
I believe Nick Sirianni would’ve been fired had he not agreed to make significant changes, most notably replacing the offensive coordinator with Kellen Moore.
Earlier in the Summer, I was mostly out on Brown. I would take him in the right spot, but he wasn’t someone I would be excited about drafting. My concern with Brown is his capped ceiling.
Brown is 27 years old. After five seasons, he’s never averaged above 17.6 fantasy points per game. It’s unlikely he will suddenly morph into this 20 ppg elite WR1.
At the same time, isn’t it fair to say he did that last season? Granted he couldn’t sustain it, Brown still gave fantasy managers six consecutive weeks of otherworldly production.
Is Brown a Good Fantasy Pick?
There’s a clear top five at WR: CeeDee Lamb, Tyreek Hill, Ja’Marr Chase, Justin Jefferson, and Amon-Ra St. Brown. After those five, it’s fair to consider A.J. Brown. He can reasonably be ranked anywhere from WR6 to WR8.
Even during the time when I was mostly anti-Brown, I was still willing to draft him in the back-end of the first round.
Those five WRs go ahead of him for sure. I recently moved Puka Nacua behind him. He is also firmly behind the big three running backs. But that doesn’t move Brown out of the first round.
Brown’s ADP is WR6, No. 9 overall. I would take him at No. 9 or No. 10 overall, depending on whether I felt like going Jahmyr Gibbs over Brown or not.
After thinking about it more, and gathering more information, I have warmed up to the idea of drafting Brown. I am buying into the notion that Moore will utilize more pre-snap motion, as well as put Brown in the slot more frequently to create mismatches.
Brown is a very safe pick. I don’t draft safe because safety doesn’t win championships. However, I do think it would be unfair of me to say Brown lacks upside, especially in light of the changes the Eagles are making. Therefore, you all have my blessing to draft Brown as early as No. 9 overall.