RADIO
Who to draft in fantasy football? Justin takes a look at the Bears wide receivers, DJ Moore, Keenan Allen, and Rome Odunze. Can they be reliable fantasy football assets in 2024?
The Chicago Bears have revamped their receiving corps over the past couple of seasons. Go back to 2022 and you'll find that the leading wide receiver was Darnell Mooney with Dante Pettis and Equanimeous St. Brown as the main backups.
In 2023, the team added D.J. Moore in a trade with the Panthers. Then this offseason, Chicago brought in veteran Keenan Allen and drafted Rome Odunze in the first round of the draft. Suddenly, wide receiver is a huge strength for the Bears.
How does this new embarrassment of riches at wide receiver impact things as far as fantasy football goes, though? How many fantasy-relevant receivers can rookie quarterback Caleb Williams sustain?
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2023 Numbers For Moore and Allen
We'll get to Rome Odunze in a minute, but first let's talk about the two receivers here with actual NFL experience. DJ Moore spent last season with the Bears, while Keenan Allen comes over after playing 11 seasons with the Chargers.
Moore served as Chicago's No. 1 receiver last season, catching 96 passes for 1,364 yards and eight touchdowns. It was a monster year for Moore, and he could have done even better than he did. Per RotoViz, Moore averaged 88.69 yards in the 13 games that Justin Fields played, which extrapolates out to 1,508 yards. He averaged 0.62 touchdowns per game with Fields playing, which would be 11 over a 17-game sample. If Moore had competent QB play for all 17 games last season, he could have finished a couple of spots higher in the ranking of top receivers by yardage.
Allen played 13 games last season for Los Angeles. His 150 targets were the third most of his career and his 95.6 receiving yards per game were the most Allen had ever averaged. 11 seasons in, Allen had arguably the best season he's had in the NFL. He's not some washed-up veteran joining the Bears. He's still a very good NFL player, even though there are a lot of people who seem to be down on Allen right now and think he'll take a backseat to Odunze.
2024 Fantasy Football Outlook
What can we expect from the Bears receiver room in 2024? Well, it depends on a few different factors.
Before discussing the outlooks of the receivers, let's first talk about Caleb Williams, the new quarterback for the Bears. While he's a rookie, Williams comes into the NFL in a really good spot. He has two high-end NFL wide receivers plus a very talented rookie third receiver around him. He's got Cole Kmet at tight end. He's got an above-average offensive line to protect him. When talking about the receivers, I'm tempering expectations a little on Williams, but I'm still anticipating him to have a really good rookie year. Maybe not 2023 C.J. Stroud-level good, but he can threaten the 4,000-yard mark.
Of the three receivers, I see Moore being the clear No. 1 receiver. He was sixth in the NFL in receiving yards last season and gets an upgrade at quarterback. The 27-year-old wideout had an NFL-best 100% route participation in 2023 and his high volume allowed him to showcase how he excels at all levels. He can make things happen in the short passing game when he gets the ball in his hands, as he ranked eighth among receivers in YAC last season, per PlayerProfiler. He can also make huge plays down the field, as he was fifth in deep targets.
Keenan Allen gets the first shot at the No. 2 role. Allen's had injury concerns, but he's coming off a year where he was 11th in receiving yards despite playing just 13 games. When he was healthy, Allen looked like he was still one of the NFL's elite receivers. Playing second fiddle to Moore and the downgrade from Justin Herbert to Caleb Williams -- even if it's not that much of a downgrade -- means that Allen doesn't reach his 2023 heights, but he's still one of the NFL's best No. 2 receivers.
Rome Odunze may be this year's Jaxon Smith-Njigba in fantasy. Bears have an embarrassment of riches offensively. Caleb can be great and still not be able to support them all. Great for the Bears. Miserable for fantasy. Odunze is a lot better than JSN though. https://t.co/YNNAawQrAu
— Katz (@jasonkatz13) April 26, 2024
Rome Odunze landed in a great spot for real-life football, as he'll be able to be brought along slowly. However, the previous sentence I wrote isn't what you want to see written about a guy if you're rostering him in fantasy.
As far as fantasy goes, Chicago is a tough landing spot when it comes to his 2024 value. He has the potential to be elite, but he'll also be the third option on a team with a rookie QB. There's been some Jaxon Smith-Njigba comparisons here and while I think Odunze's situation should be better than JSN's was, I can see why the two are getting comped. Good players who land on a team with two established top receivers. The big difference is that Allen isn't an incumbent with the Bears, so there's no guarantee that he will keep the No. 2 role on lock all year.
Current Fantasy Football ADP
Obviously, there's still a lot of time left before the 2024 season begins, so take any ADP data we have right now with a grain of salt.
With that being said, we can at least get a sense of where the three Bears receivers are being drafted and can determine if they're values at their current ADP or not.
Moore is currently being drafted as the WR11 and the 22nd player overall. Allen is currently being drafted as the WR24 and the 49th player overall. Odunze is currently being drafted as the WR33 and the 70th player overall.
Of those three players, I see two of them being fantasy values: Moore and Odunze. Nothing against Allen, but he's pretty much being drafted right about where his value is, which is as one of the NFL's best No. 2 receivers. His ceiling is a midrange WR2, and he's being drafted as a low-range WR2. That's about what we can expect.
As for the two that I do see as values, here's my reasoning.
For Moore, it's that he's a highly talented player who has the ceiling of a top-five fantasy wide receiver. Sure, Allen and Odunze could cut into his targets, but he has a better QB situation than he did last year when he was sixth in the NFL in receiving yards. He should be drafted at least a few spots above WR11.
DJ Moore on New QB Caleb Williams
“Anticipation is there, he’s expecting us to be open at certain times so that’s one of the things that’s better.”
He does not mince words. 😂
— Max Markham (@MaxMarkhamNFL) April 30, 2024
As for Odunze, I like him so much more than Allen in fantasy, even if I lean Allen being the actual better receiver in 2024. Allen is being drafted right around his ceiling, but Odunze's ceiling is basically Allen's ceiling: a solid fantasy WR2. Sure, his floor is significantly lower, but I can live with that when he's getting drafted as a WR3. He's going right in the range where I'm willing to take a big upside swing.
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