Biggest fantasy football regrets of 2019: Lessons learned from turbulent season

“So you’re telling me there’s a chance” with Will Fuller

Doing projections can be wildly helpful. I actually think you’re losing an edge if you don’t at least take a small walkthrough of the exercise leading up to the season, just to slice out opportunity. However, doing projections for the Texans led me astray on Will Fuller. When you parsed out the Houston offense heading into 2019, it was easy to find a big slice for Fuller and with his efficiency, project him to crush it in that role. I ended up sliding him aggressively up my draft board while not accounting for the natural risk that his injury history and vertical skills brought to the equation. There was a way to draft a player like that wisely but taking him in the sixth or seventh round as a player I was counting on to be available more weeks than not left big holes on too many of my teams. - Matt Harmon

Believing Lamar Jackson was the future vs. the present

Like the dad in Dirty Dancing, when I’m wrong, I say I’m wrong. And I was W-R-O-N-G about Lamar Jackson’s ability to produce in his first year as the team’s starting QB. I never doubted his athleticism and lauded the Ravens for surrounding their franchise signal-caller with exciting young receivers. BUT I did underestimate Jackson’s maturation process as well as the team’s willingness to fully lean into his unique playing style. Furthermore, after losing numerous key defensive pieces over the offseason I felt Lamar would be forced to throw more regularly and that would highlight a still-developing part of his skillset. That clearly wasn’t the case, as he threw for 36 TDs (QB1) and managed a true passer rating of 112.5 (QB2) as well as a true completion percentage of nearly 71 percent. I’ve never been happier to be wrong and look forward to a glut of “Where we taking Lamar in 2020?” debates heading into the fall. - Liz Loza

Drafting O.J. Howard aggressively

I was more than willing to pay above ADP for Howard, happily grabbing him on the majority of my teams. After he finished third among tight ends in yards per route run as a sophomore (while recording 11 touchdowns over the first 24 games of his career), he was a lowly 23rd at the position in 2019, sandwiched directly between athletic stalwarts Jack Doyle and Jason Witten (Howard also sported the third-worst drop rate). Howard stayed relatively healthy yet somehow wasn’t a top-25 fantasy tight end (a thin position) despite his quarterback leading the NFL in yards and finishing second in touchdown passes. I clearly underestimated the impact of Bruce Arians’ history of not using the tight end position, although I’ll be the sucker taking another flier on Howard (this time later) at drafts in 2020. - Dalton Del Don

Saquon Barkley > Christian McCaffrey

Without question, my biggest regret of 2019. And I say that as someone who happened to win a pair of highly incentivized leagues thanks to Barkley's monster performance in Week 16. Barkley took me to the consolation bracket elsewhere, of course, as he spent a decent portion of his season dealing with injury. McCaffrey was not only terrific in title week (173 scrimmage yards, 15 REC), but he also carried nearly every team that drafted him into the postseason. Across all Yahoo leagues, teams that rostered CMC had an 82 percent chance of qualifying for the championship bracket. He was obscene, a true league-winner. - Andy Behrens

Paying Down at Tight End

It’s not that I need to be talked into Travis Kelce, Zach Ertz, or George Kittle as elite players; Kittle and Ertz were two of my most common owns in 2018. But last summer, I thought the price on all three pushed to a point where I was more comfortable playing the value game at tight end. Sure, that was fun for a while with Austin Hooper, but overall, fading Big Tight End goes down as an unquestioned loss in 2019. With the position looking as top-heavy as ever, I’ll try to be more proactive with these name brands in 2020. - Scott Pianowski

What were your biggest fantasy regrets from 2019? Let us know in the comments below and hit us up @YahooFantasy!