7 Ideal Late-Round QB Pairings and Where to Draft Them

Aug 04, 2017

Last season, 4for4 contributor Joshua Lake proved in this pass-happy NFL era that streaming quarterbacks can be a viable strategy. Through Week 16, our optimal streaming QB scored 21.2 points per game, good enough for QB10 overall. The takeaway from last year's results is that we could’ve achieved QB1 production from the waiver wire alone. Overall, our streaming choices averaged 18.1 points last season. In the words of the great Larry David, prettay, prettay, prettay good.

Now it’s my turn to help take that strategy and apply it to the later rounds of 2017 fantasy drafts.

Other Late-Round Pairings: TE | D/ST

The goal is simple: find quarterback pairings that will give you the best possible matchups for as many weeks as possible, with those quarterbacks having an average draft position (ADP) no higher than round 10.

In order to find the best matchups, I used 4for4’s aFPA tool to pinpoint which defenses fell outside the top-25 in adjusted fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks. In other words, I was looking for the best seven teams a fantasy quarterback could play last season. Those teams were the Titans, Lions, Falcons, Colts, Bills, Saints, and Browns.

Below you will find the late-round quarterback pairings that resulted in the most favorable matchups in 2017.

Andy Dalton and Blake Bortles (10)

Despite a rough Week 1 situation, no other pairing of late-round quarterbacks produced as many favorable matchups as these two, with ten against the bottom-seven defenses in adjusted fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks. In addition to the 10 total weeks versus those defenses during the fantasy regular season (Weeks 1–13), at least one of these quarterbacks will face a bottom-half defense in QB aFPA nearly every week after the first week of the season.

Bortles has a 14th-round ADP. You’ll see below Dalton functions as a bit of a skeleton key in this exercise, as no other late-round QB (11th-round ADP as of August 1st) has as many matchups against bottom-seven QB aFPA defenses as he does with six.

Joe Flacco and Sam Bradford (9)

Flacco’s back injury needs to be monitored closely, but this pairing offers nine weeks against the bottom-seven in QB aFPA. Overall, Bradford has the easiest schedule of all quarterbacks this season. Together, Flacco and Bradford also offer a great start to the season with Bradford opening at home against the Saints and Flacco hosting the Browns in Week 2.

Bradford’s ADP sits in round 15, while Flacco is routinely being drafted one round earlier.

Continue reading for five optimal QB pairings...