IDP Free Agency Winners and Losers

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We’re a few weeks into free agency, and while there are still plenty of players still looking for a new home, dozens of defenders have signed contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars. For some, it meant staying put. For others, it meant moving on. Some players will be stepping into larger roles. Other players created an opportunity for someone else by leaving.

It has been a frenzied few weeks that has altered the IDP landscape in a major way.

In an effort to discern which individual defensive players have seen the biggest boost in fantasy value and who took the biggest hit, John "The Guru" Norton and Gary "The Godfather of IDP" Davenport have gathered to identify the biggest IDP winners and losers from free agency in 2023.

Now that we are two weeks and change into free agency, who is the biggest IDP winner on the defensive line? Who was the biggest loser?

Guru: The free agent pool was/is a little shallow along the defensive line this year. Not so much in terms of quality NFL players, but in terms of box-score-friendly IDP guys. There are a few defensive tackles with upside in their new homes, but no one jumps out at me as the guy that is sure to excel. There is, however, someone that has my interest.

Ogbonnia Okoronkwo is hardly a household name, but he might prove to be the biggest IDP winner of this year’s class. A former fifth-round pick of the Rams in 2018, he didn’t see much action over his first three seasons. Last year Okoronkwo broke out with 32 tackles, 12 assists, 5 sacks, a forced fumble, and a pair of batted passes for the Texans. Those are not particularly impressive numbers as a whole but when we consider that he was 8-4-0 through week nine, it sheds a different light.

Okoronkwo tallied double-digit fantasy points in six of the last nine games, with five sacks and a forced fumble over the final six weeks. He signed with the Browns, who parted ways with Jadeveon Clowney shortly thereafter, leaving the path open for Okoronkwo to possibly land the starting job opposite Myles Garrett, who is arguably the best in the game.

There were not many high-upside pass rushers in this free-agent class, to begin with, and most of those, guys like Robert Quinn and Leonard Floyd, have yet to sign. The biggest loser I see so far is Marcus Davenport. He did nothing last year, but this guy had nine sacks in 2021 and twenty over his first four seasons, despite spending far too much time in the trainer’s room.

Davenport had plenty of opportunity while with the Saints. When healthy, he either started or had a significant role in the rotation. In signing with the Vikings, his role could be significantly reduced. Za’Darius Smith and Danielle Hunter played 1790 snaps between them last year, with D.J. Wonnum and Patrick Jones II getting virtually all the rest between them. All four of those players are currently on the roster, so at best, Davenport is looking at a share of the backup snaps.

Godfather: I’m inclined to agree with Mr. Norton here—it wasn’t a great year for free agents along the defensive front, and much of what we saw from the free agents who did change were lateral moves. Whether it was Zach Allen going from Arizona to Denver as a replacement for Dre'Mont Jones (who signed with Seattle) or DaRon Payne re-upping with the Commanders, many defensive linemen this year have seen their fantasy value largely unchanged.

I also agree that Okoronkwo saw a nice bump in value with his move to Cleveland—if his per-snap productivity stays anywhere close to what it was in 2022, the increase in playing time the 27-year-old should see this year could move him into DL2 territory.

There are a couple of other edge rushers to keep an eye on—one who switched teams and another who didn’t. In Indianapolis, the Colts elected to replace Yannick Ngakoue with Samson Ebukam, who tallied 36 tackles with a career-high five sacks in 559 snaps in 2022. Ebukam’s departure from San Francisco created a hole opposite Nick Bosa, and to date, the 49ers have done little to replace him. If that holds (and the team doesn’t bring back veteran end Kerry Hyder on the cheap), then second-year pro Drake Jackson could be in for a massive uptick in snaps. On a loaded front, that increase in playing time could matter—a lot.

Outside the aforementioned Marcus Davenport (whose IDP value has cratered, barring the rumored release of Za'Darius Smith), the biggest loser up front may well be Ngakoue. The 27-year-old is one of just five players in NFL history with at least eight sacks in his first seven seasons, but as the calendar turns to April, last year’s DL36 remains without a team. The longer that continues, the less likely it is he’ll stretch that run of eight-sack seasons to eight.

Who was the biggest fantasy winner so far in free agency at linebacker? The biggest loser?

Guru: There are a bunch of linebackers that could qualify as the biggest winner. I know that both Gary and I like Azeez Al-Shaair. Bobby Wagner, Cole Holcomb, Nicholas Morrow, Robert Spillane, David Long, and Denzel Perryman are all among the guys that landed in potentially productive situations. The guy I see as the biggest winner, though, is Bobby Okereke.

He was an absolute tackling machine for the Colts last year, racking up 99 solos and 52 assists to go with 4 takeaways and 5 pass breakups. The story we don’t see in the numbers is that Okereke was on the sideline on third downs when Shaquille Leonard and Zaire Franklin were both available. Had he remained with the Colts, Okereke would have been hard-pressed to put up similar numbers in 2023. In signing with the Giants, he becomes the lead man at inside linebacker and is very possibly the best player New York has had at the position since Michael Barrow. His numbers may not be any better in 2023 than they were last season, but they should be similar, which is a big win in my eyes.

The biggest loser at linebacker is an easy call for me. Drue Tranquill was the Chargers’ best off-ball linebacker last year and finished among the top ten linebackers in most leagues. Now he will find himself looking at Nick Bolton and Willie Gay Jr in the linebacker meeting room. There is nothing good for IDP managers in this signing. Bolton should remain the lead man and play every down, but even that is not a sure thing at this stage. Remember 2021 when Ben Niemann and Anthony Hitchens were in the mix? That year, no Kansas City linebacker logged more than 733 snaps. At best, Tranquill supplants Gay as a starter and gets around 750 snaps. At worst, he ends up in a part-time role as the third linebacker and is virtually useless to us.

Godfather: You’ll get no argument from this analyst that Okereke was one of the big IDP winners from free agency this year. After posting top-15 fantasy numbers last year, Okereke should see a higher snap share in New York than in 2022 in Indianapolis with less competition for tackles. There’s a real chance that Okereke will finish his first season with the Giants inside the top 10.

But as The Guru alluded to, Okereke was far from alone in seeing a boost in value due to a change in scenery or circumstance—and some should be reasonably priced in fantasy drafts this summer. David Long has shown the ability to be productive when healthy in the past, and he’s likely the best coverage linebacker on the Dolphins roster. Azeez Al-Shaair posted 102 total tackles in 13 starts for the San Francisco 49ers in 2021, and he’s a good bet as things stand now to lead all Titans linebackers in snaps. Nicholas Morrow isn’t an elite talent, but while the IDP community fawns over Nakobe Dean, it’s worth noting that Dean played all of 34 defensive snaps in 2022. It’s entirely possible that Morrow winds up the highest-scoring fantasy linebacker with the Eagles in 2023.

If you are looking for IDP losers from free agency, look no further than the Emerald City. Last year, Jordyn Brooks amassed the sixth-most tackles in the NFL on the way to a top-five fantasy finish. But as if it wasn’t bad enough that Brooks tore his ACL in Week 17 last year, now Bobby Wagner is back in Seattle after signing a one-year, $7 million contract. Brooks has shown he can produce with Wagner on the team, but between the injury (and Brooks' uncertain status early in the 2023 season) and Wagner’s return, a third straight top-10 finish is highly unlikely. And if you thought that a new team would help Devin Bush’s lagging IDP value, think again—in Seattle, Bush is, at best, the team’s third linebacker, and after the Seahawks signed Julian Love, there’s a good chance that the team plans to employ a lot of three-safety looks with Love, Quandre Diggs, and Jamal Adams. Even if Brooks' injury lingers well into the season, Bush may still not get the snaps to be IDP-relevant.