Brock Purdy - 2023 Fantasy Football Breakout Candidate

In Brock Purdy's five regular season starts last season, he finished as a top-12 quarterback three times. The final pick of the 2022 NFL Draft surprisingly emerged as a top-tier superflex QB and a borderline QB1, even in single quarterback leagues.

He also became one of the most debated quarterbacks on fantasy Twitter (or X) – and remains so to this day. Purdy's fans joke about him being the GOAT. (He did defeat the old GOAT in Brady's hometown in his first-ever start.) Purdy's detractors say he got lucky and that anyone – even Sam Darnold – could look good in the Kyle Shanahan offense.

The latter point is mostly irrelevant when it comes to fantasy football. If Shanahan makes his offense easy and accessible for quarterbacks, that's a good thing for Purdy's production in 2023. Will Brock Purdy be a 2023 breakout? Will he be even better than he was in 2022? Let's take a look.

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Brock Purdy's Storybook 2022 Season

In 2022, Purdy stepped in for Jimmy Garoppolo, who hurt his foot in Week 13. He threw for 210 yards, two touchdowns, and an interception as the 49ers beat the Dolphins 33-17. I remember that week. I was in Cincinnati watching the Bengals beat the Chiefs, and I was disappointed I was going to miss that game.

At the time, the 49ers had not yet become a top-tier contender in the public's eyes. Pro Football Network ranked them #10 in their pre-Week 13 power rankings. When I saw the news that Jimmy G went down, I assumed the Niners would lose and stumble to the finish line. Instead, the score kept flashing across the jumbotron, with San Fran expanding its lead.

The next morning, I was sitting at the bar of a cafe when a 49ers fan sat down next to me. I asked him if Brock Purdy would lead the 49ers to a Super Bowl. He sadly shook his head. But Purdy almost did. He finished the season with a 67.1% completion percentage, 1,374 yards, 13 touchdown passes, and four interceptions in basically six games. His passing quality was getting better each game, too.

Pro Football Reference tracks "bad throws." In Week 12, Purdy threw five poor passes, 13.9% of his attempts. He let loose about the same number of bad passes in his next two games, but then in Week 16, he only threw one bad throw, a rate of 4.8%. In Week 18, he didn't throw any bad passes.

PFF's graders arrived at the same conclusion. His passing grade improved from 58.9 against Miami in Week 12 to 76.2 against Arizona in Week 18. In Weeks 14 and 15, his passing grade was in the 60s, but in the final three games of the regular season, it was in the 70s. Even when the competition got tougher in the playoffs, Purdy achieved a 70.3 passing grade against Dallas, and PFF's graders said he didn't throw a single "turnover-worthy" pass from Week 18 through the conference championship. (Somehow, that pass up the middle into Anthony Barr's arms and through Trevon Diggs' hands wasn't "turnover-worthy." So the numbers might not be perfect.

Unfortunately, Purdy joined Trey Lance and Jimmy Garoppolo on the sidelines when he tore his ulnar collateral ligament in the NFC Championship Game. He had to come out only to go back in when San Fran QB4 Josh Johnson left the game with a concussion, and the 49ers didn't have a QB5 to turn to. My friend at the cafe in Cincinnati was ultimately right.

Brock Purdy From a Fantasy Football Perspective

If you extrapolate Purdy's numbers over 17 games, he would have thrown for 3,893 yards, 36 touchdowns, and 8.5 interceptions. He would have ranked No. 9 for passing yards and No. 2 for passing touchdowns.

That level of production was better than what Garoppolo was doing in the same offense and also better than all but one rookie quarterback since 2016. The only quarterback to have had a better rookie season than Purdy? The guy he beat in the Divisional Round of the playoffs -- Dak Prescott.

Each of the other top-four quarterbacks on this list has had extremely productive fantasy seasons. But if you look deeper in the top ten, you see some who washed out (Wentz, Mayfield) or have yet to prove themselves (Jones, Pickett).

It is irrelevant whether Purdy's production was a result of the Shanahan system or reflects his decision-making and ability to make plays under pressure. If Shanahan can engineer production for Purdy, then he'll put up fantasy points in 2023 while under center. Dynasty managers might be right to devalue Purdy if he's a product of the system because his value could tank if he leaves San Francisco, and the team might not prioritize resigning him if either Shanahan is eventually fired or they think they can just do the same thing with another, cheaper quarterback.

The only thing that matters for redraft, however, is whether Purdy will be healthy and whether he can repeat his 2023 prowess.

Brock Purdy's Injury Status

Niners coaches have said all along that Purdy is the starter as long as he is healthy. Now it looks like he is healthy. Purdy played in the 49ers' second preseason game against the Broncos and completed 4-of-5 passes for 65 yards.

He didn't look limited at all. He even took a run towards the goalline and popped up A-OK. Everything is lining up for him to start Week 1.

All looks good now, but research has shown that UCL injuries may be more likely to occur in people who already suffered from one. There is no way to predict whether Purdy might suffer that fate in Week 2 or Week 12. But there's an inherent injury risk with anyone in football. Quarterbacks with much higher ADPs, like Lamar Jackson and Tua Tagovailoa, have even more injury risk than Purdy at this point.

Brock Purdy's 2023 Breakout Potential

What defines a breakout? Is it sustained success over a full season after showing flashes the year before? Is it improving from good to great? Already Purdy has shown he can play very well, but skeptics question whether he can keep it up. Maybe Purdy's rookie season was an outlier. He will fall back down to earth as an average-at-best signal caller.

Maybe Purdy benefited from teams having no ability to scout him. Unknown quarterbacks come out of nowhere a couple of times a year when opponents don't know what to expect. Usually, they get figured out if they aren't so good and crash down to earth before eight weeks as a starter.

I think Purdy has a good chance to maintain a high level of production, similar to what he did last season. The 49ers still have one of the most dynamic offenses, with Brandon Aiyuk, Deebo Samuel, George Kittle, and Christian McCaffrey catching passes from Purdy. Their offensive line, anchored by Trent Williams at left tackle and three young guys in the middle (Aaron Banks, Jake Brendel, and Spencer Burford) who were all first-year starters last season and now have a whole year of experience under their belts, is still one of the top ten or so despite the loss of right guard Mike McGlinchey.

Yet Purdy is going on average as the QB22, behind Kenny Pickett and Jordan Love in National Fantasy Football Championship drafts. Even the positive news about Purdy's health hardly boosted his ADP: he rose only a handful of spots since June.

QB22 is too low for the 49ers' starting quarterback. Yes, Brock Purdy should be discounted somewhat because of the potential for regression. but there are a lot of other quarterbacks in front of him who have bigger problems that call for discounts. If you can get Purdy beyond round 12, he should be a steal as a QB2.