Is Joe Burrow Worth His Best Ball ADP in 2023?

Joe Burrow is one of the shining examples of the disconnect between fantasy football and reality. There aren’t many teams in the league that would say no to Burrow as their signal caller if he was available. For fantasy purposes, he’s lacking the one thing that makes his peers so tempting - rushing upside. Rushing can cover up so many flaws in fantasy football that Justin Fields is going as the QB6 in this year’s drafts. Burrow is penalized twice here because of his ADP. Being sandwiched between Fields and Lamar Jackson in drafts means that I won’t have much Burrow this season.

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A Look At Burrow’s Career

You can’t knock his skill as a passer. In 2022, he was fourth in completion percentage over expectation (CPOE) and sixth in Pass EPA per Play. Burrow was Top 5 in both of those metrics in 2021, as well. He’s also helped his receivers to top finishes. In each of the last two seasons, he was able to support two Top 20 pass-catchers. He’s had some knee issues but hasn’t missed significant time over the past two years.

Burrow's fantasy finishes after his 2020 was cut short (10 games) have been both among the top 10, ending as QB10 in fantasy points per game in 2021, followed by a QB4 performance in that category last season.

Floor vs. Ceiling

It’s difficult to say that his ceiling is “capped” as he’s already had high finishes in his career and can have spike weeks. But from a season-long perspective, he has more work than some of his peers to finish as the overall QB1. The benchmark for the QB1 most years is north of 25 points per game. His per-game rushing average is 12.3 yards and 0.2 touchdowns or 2.4 fantasy points per game. Since 2019, there have been 16 quarterbacks to average 25+ points per game. Only four of those signal callers were able to hit that threshold with less than 2.5 rushing points per game.

Roster Construction Implications

Drafting your QB1 in Burrow's range has proven to be a good decision over the last two seasons.

Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Lamar Jackson have populated that area of drafts, though, so it’s a bit of selection bias. Justin Herbert (2022), Dak Prescott (2021), and Kyler Murray (2021) have disappointed drafters in this range, so it’s been a bit of a mixed bag.

The other consideration that needs to be made when drafting in one of the Underdog tournaments is stacking. Last year, Burrow managed a 20%+ win rate, as long as drafters were savvy enough to draft less than four quarterbacks.

Burrow has two of his wide receivers going in the first two rounds. He has a proven track record of supporting two top 20 wide receivers. Given that the Bengals play the Chiefs in Week 17, people will be chomping at the bit to stack that game. If you want to be unique, here are two unconventional strategies for getting exposure to the Bengals-Chiefs game.

• Draft both Burrow and Mahomes as your only two QBs with only one other skill player as a stack.
• Draft Burrow by himself from Cincinnati and take multiple skill players from Kansas City.

Bottom Line

Even within Burrow's ADP range, I believe there are better bets to be made if you are looking for the overall number-one quarterback. However, that's not always the only goal. When we’re talking about drafting a portfolio of teams for a large tournament like Best Ball Mania, we have to look at the larger picture. Since avoiding Burrow entirely isn't an option, we need to figure out how best to utilize him within our portfolio in 2023.

• Focus on getting unique when you do take him in drafts
• You can pair him with another early quarterback (potentially with rushing upside) or wait until later in the draft and pair him with two fliers at the position.