Fantasy Football Today - FFT Express - UPDATED Sleeper Players for 2026 Fantasy Football! Wan’Dale, Willis, Aiyuk, & More! (05/22 Fantasy Football Podcast)
Episode Date: May 22, 2026Dave Richard’s sleeper list is LOADED 🔥 Wan’Dale Robinson, Malik Willis, Brandon Aiyuk, Jacoby Brissett & more headline this episode as we break down the biggest late-round values and overlook...ed players for the 2026 fantasy football season. Which sleepers could crush their ADP, become weekly starters, and swing fantasy leagues this year? We dive into the upside, opportunity, and risk for names that fantasy managers are sleeping on heading into draft season — including why Dave believes these players are set up to outperform expectations in a major way. If you’re looking for late-round steals, breakout candidates, and undervalued veterans to target in your drafts, this episode is for you. Fantasy Football Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday Shop our store: shop.cbssports.com/fantasy SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dynasty/id1696679179 FOLLOW FFT Dynasty on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2aHlmMJw1m8FareKybdNfG?si=8487e2f9611b4438&nd=1 SUBSCRIBE to FFT DFS on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dfs/id1579415837 To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Wake up, everyone. It's time to talk about sleepers on Fantasy Football Today Express.
Okay, Dave has his updated list of sleepers. Apparently, we just spoke about a number of them on the main show, Thursday's show.
Good morning, Dave. Give me some sleepers.
So the names that we talked about on the show, highly encourage everybody going back to watch or listen to Thursday's show.
Isaiah likely, Travis Kelsey, Mark Andrews, Jonah Coleman, Jalen Naylor, Antonio Williams.
we spoke their names.
They're on the sleeper list.
But here are some that weren't spoken about on Thursday's show.
Let's start with the one that was spoken about earlier this week
when we talked about players that we would draft in the middle rounds.
And for me, it's Wondale Robinson.
Just love the opportunity for him to potentially lead the Titans and targets.
We've seen him average eight plus targets per game.
In each of the past two seasons, he is a Brian Daible guy.
He was drafted in the NFL by Daible.
And now he followed Daible from him.
New York to Tennessee. Cam Ward needs a short area option. This is somebody who can do it.
I don't love them in non-PPR. I only sort of like them in half PPR. But if we're getting a
point per catch and Wondale Robinson's going to get eight targets per game, and I still think he will with
Carnal Tate there, then he's absolutely somebody that I'm going to try and get in those middle to
late rounds in my full PPR leagues might be starting them. Remember we were starting him as a number
two wide receiver last year? I don't know if we're going to start him as a number two wide receiver this
year. But as a number three wide receiver, I think he can do that. So that's my first sleeper.
Okay. Well, I know Robinson. I would say that's a lot of targets, eight targets per game. He's done it two
years in a row. Yep. Exactly 140 targets, which is a little bit more than eight per game, I think.
I don't know. I just don't see it. I just, my issue with him is I just don't think he's that good.
He's fine. He's like a nice, fine, typical slot receiver. But if they didn't bring in Tate, yeah, but I don't
no, for whatever reason, I just don't see it. Now, last year, you could say, look,
Malik Neighbors got hurt, but the year before that, Malik Neighbors was mostly healthy,
and Wondale still got 140 targets. So I, I could see, you know, that's encouraging.
Agreed. That's why he's on my list.
Well, 100, but eight targets a game is a lot. How many, how many you think Tate will get?
I don't, I'm worried that he won't get to six. Oh, okay. All right. I guess.
Yeah, I think that Wondale's role there and the commitment that seems to be made between him
and Daible will continue on.
And it's not like there's a ton of other competition for targets there.
Yeah.
It's a big contract, too.
38 million guaranteed four years, $78 million.
Yeah, I mean, this is fantasy football.
It's not the most talented guy in the wide receiver room.
It's just the guy that's going to get the most targets and is going to get the most stats.
Who's next?
Malik Willis is next, Adam.
Uh-huh.
I went back and I watched a lot of his throws from,
last year and I came away impressed with what I saw from Malik Willis.
We all know him as a rushing threat.
There's no question about that.
He will do that in Miami,
but he made some doggone good throws in Green Bay when he had the opportunity
last year, a nice high completion rate.
It's not just nice and high.
It was one of the best completion rates in the NFL and his A dot was not crumbs.
It was actually good.
And Bobby Sloick led it out that this offense that Miami will run is going to be a lot like
what Green Bay ran last year.
And I know the wide receivers and tight ends in Miami aren't anything to write home about,
but I think Malik Willis is going to end up being a good enough thrower and a good enough runner
to potentially be a starting fantasy quarterback, maybe finish as a top 12 guy.
And you don't have to draft him as one of the first 12 quarterbacks off the board.
On fantasy pros, he's QB21 as a round 12 pick.
That sounds kind of weird.
Like, are there really 20 other quarterbacks going in the first 12 rounds?
that would surprise me in a 1 QB draft,
but I think Malik Willis will be worth that late round dark throw.
86% completion rate last year for Malik Willis.
I don't know how anyone could watch the tape of the Chicago and Baltimore games
and not come away, just almost blown away, honestly.
Yeah.
I completely agree with you.
He was so good.
Good accuracy, good anticipatory throws, was willing to throw downfield.
That's also going to be something that I would expect Miami to do.
do is to challenge downfield and run a bunch of screen passes too with a lot of slippery wide
receivers on that team, a guy that can make one defender miss and suddenly a two-yard
catch becomes a 10-yard catch, becomes a 20-yard catch.
I kind of feel like we're, we, I don't want to say that we're underrating Willis,
but we're kind of underrating it by not having them even higher in our rankings.
I'm excited for what happens this year.
Let's take a break and get another sleeper or 10.
after this on Fantasy Football Today Express.
All right, we're back.
Dave, who's our third sleeper here?
Brandon Ayuk figures to play somewhere after not playing anywhere last year.
And so any decent opportunity could yield some good fantasy numbers on fantasy pros.
He's currently wide receiver 68 being taken as a round 15 pick.
Obviously, if he signs, let's say, well, not signs.
He gets traded from the 49ers to the commanders, which I think has been a team that's been
linked to him because Jane Daniels loves him,
they're friends. Obviously,
that'll change. And he'll still be a value
if he's a round 10 pick.
We're two years removed from him being
a wide out that average
15.6 ppr
points per game. There were 12
games, this is in 2023, sorry
for being an old head about this, 12
games where Debo was playing
and Kittle was playing,
and IUC still average 17.1
PPR points per game on 6.3
targets per game.
he's obviously had some injuries since then.
He had a falling out in San Francisco.
The Niners are probably going to be a little petty
and hold on to his rights unless the team steps up
and gives up a decent day three pick to get him.
But I don't mind.
If we're drafting right now, he's somebody that I'm taking late
because I figure at some point he will be on an active NFL roster
and he will contribute.
Maybe not 15.6 PPR points per game,
but maybe 11 ppr points per game in round 15, sign me up.
It is a little weird that there's not
more buzz about this guy who was awesome, just awesome, just a few years ago.
All right, you can fire away with more sleepers.
I'm just going to give you names if you want me to stop at any point, say so, or I can run
through the names, then you can tell me who you want to talk about.
Jacoby Brissette, Jordan James, Ketron Allen, Jalen Knoll, Zachariah Branch, Greg
Dulcich slash Jalen Tolbert slash Caleb Douglas, and Jalen Royals.
I went deep for this, Adam.
We are going deep for sleepers now.
You had Jalen Royal.
Who was the other Jalen you had there?
Jalen, Noel.
Yeah.
Noel and Royals.
Why are they on your list?
Royals is only there in case Rice is suspended,
slow to come back from the knee cleanup,
anything else that happens.
He didn't get to play a lot last year,
second year in Andy Reed's offense.
And I thought he'd be a decent slot receiver
to begin with just coming out of Utah State.
I wonder if he earns an opportunity
in a thinned out wide receiver room.
in Kansas City. As for Jalen, Noel, we knew last year he wasn't going to have a big role, but he was made to play the slot. Christian Kirk was the slot for Houston last year. Kirk is now in San Francisco.
Noel is a clear path to being a slot receiver and an easy target for C.J. Stroud. We talked for a second about Jaden Higgins on the Thursday show, the main show, the big show, the show where Dan and Heath went head to head. I wonder if Noel has an opportunity to be second on that team in Houston and targets. And I think he's a pretty good player who can win both in the short area and downfield. We started. We started.
off very few glimpses of it last year, but he's wide receiver 97 in fantasy pros ADP.
He is free.
You can literally take him with your last pick.
No one's taking them right now.
You'll just wait for him to do something off waivers.
But if there's a little bit of buzz about him and we get to week one and I've just, I've got
a player on my bench.
I look at and I go, why is this guy here?
I might cut that guy and pick up Jalen Knoll and see what he does in week one.
And maybe he could end up being a great deep fantasy sleeper.
see if Tank Dell is back.
Maybe Tank Dell ends up being the second highest drafted Texans wide receiver.
He'll be back.
I just don't know if it'll be week one.
And I don't know if he'll be the same guy.
Yeah.
You can't imagine that he would be.
Right.
If he's not as fast and he was very small to begin with,
we're talking about a mild contributor and not somebody who fantasy managers will even be interested in.
I hate to say it.
I loved him.
Remember when he and Nico and Steph Diggs were all on the same team?
We had legit debates about who we liked the most from that group.
There was a time there where I did like Tankdale the best.
Obviously, Nico is the best.
And still is.
Okay.
Thank you, Dave.
Those are some updated sleepers.
We'll have more content throughout the coming months with more updated sleepers and breakouts and busts.
And have a great weekend, everybody.
Talk to you next time on fantasy football today.