Fantasy Basketball Draft Guide 2026: Reviewing Last Year’s Sleepers

The most important part of any kind of analysis is being able to review your work and assess your hits and misses. Transparency makes for better results in every field, but especially something like this. It’s always nice to win one, but even when you’re off the mark it’s good to go back and look at the totality of things; what went right, what went wrong and why. With that in mind we like to take some time in each Draft Guide to look back at last year’s hits and misses, with particular attention paid to the marquee Sleepers category. It’s everyone’s favorite topic, after all.

Nothing quite matches the rush of calling a sleeper correctly. It’s the simplest indicator that you knew better than your competition — if they knew, they would have picked him multiple times over by the time a true sleeper comes off the draft board. All of the players we pick as sleepers are available for every single one of your leaguemates, and if you snatched one (or more) of them up then you were just rolling in profits. Only a few people get the chance to draft the certified league-winners, but everyone had multiple chances to select every player on this list. Every year we tend to come away with one or two big wins and the trend continued last season, especially for managers who really dipped into the bag and read our selection for deeper leagues.

Standard Leagues

Kyshawn George

Results: George delivered on his absurdly low ADP and gave fantasy managers a strong half season before falling victim to the tank.

Verdict: We’ll take it.

Reason: We were eyeing George as a priority late-round selection after his strong finish to his rookie season even though his ghastly percentages left him with only late-round appeal. The presence of some veterans in the Washington rotation left George without an ADP on the major sites at all, and those who did pick him were thrilled to see him climb the depth chart without any real effort. George was an every-night starter who stormed out of the gates with great production. His final rankings (77/112 in 8/9-cat) are respectable enough but those also include some tank-related slowdowns. Over his last 10 games of the season (from the start of February onward), George averaged just 20.1 mpg and his numbers all dropped as you would expect when you lose a third of your playing time. Prior to that, George was a top-55/80 value with a line of 15.7 points, (.445 FG%, .779 FT%), 2.2 triples, 5.8 rebounds, 5.1 assists, 1.2 steals, 0.9 blocks and 2.9 turnovers in 31.3 mpg. The shooting improved significantly and George’s multi-cat ability was allowed to shine. The elephant in the room is that George missed the final six weeks of the season with an elbow sprain, leaving fantasy GMs holding the bag in the head-to-head playoffs, but considering the initial investment you’ll take half a season of clear middle-round value. The fact that the Wizards were obviously going to be tanking from February onward also helped managers move on quickly when George’s season started to go off the rails. You never want to be without a player for six weeks, but if you have to lose somebody you’d want it in circumstances like this where the outcome is obvious and you’ve already gotten your return on investment and then some.

Reed Sheppard

Results: Sheppard battled inconsistent playing time but the stat set proved too good to hold down and he went on a tear to finish the season.

Verdict: Easy victory.

Reason: We got a lot of questions about Sheppard in the first half of the season, which helps explain why he was so underdrafted to begin with. There was some initial disappointment when Sheppard was not given a starting role in the wake of Fred VanVleet’s torn ACL and it meant that fantasy GMs were overly reliant on his shooting holding up as his minutes dipped around without ever getting too high. The roller coaster resulted in top-120 production up to the All-Star break, which was still 12-team viable but below his ADP. Sheppard was hitting the waiver wire in many leagues despite positive underlying numbers: 4.4 combined steals, blocks and 3-pointers in 24.7 mpg meant only one break needed to happen for a big surge. He caught that break as his role expanded after the All-Star break and yielded top-45/35 value in 29 games on the back of 15.1 points (.438 FG%, .857 FT%), 3.5 rebounds, 4.1 assists, 1.6 steals, 0.8 blocks and 3.4 triples in 28.9 mpg. It wasn’t the smoothest season and the vibes weren’t always matching the output, but at the end of the day you had a guy taken outside the top-100 who held above the drop line the entire way and posted top-50 value in the home stretch of the fantasy season.

Neemias Queta

Results: Queta secured a full-time starting spot and while Nikola Vucevic slowed his roll, he ended up vastly outperforming his ADP.

Verdict: Another win.

Reason: This was one of the easier calls in the field after the Celtics let Kristaps Porzingis, Al Horford and Luke Kornet go last summer, but Queta remained undervalued even as he stood head and shoulders above his competition. Chris Boucher, Luka Garza, Amari Williams and Xavier Tillman were all in the mix but Queta was on the inside track and managed not to mess things up. With his role and stat set, Queta was worth taking a couple rounds ahead of has last-round ADP and he blew past that with a 96/68 finish in 8/9-cat leagues. The big man started in all but one of his games and smashed previous career-highs in playing time (25.3), points (10.2), rebounds (8.4), assists (1.7), steals (0.8) and blocks (1.3) while shooting .653 from the field. It’s a great stat set that only needs playing time to take off and Queta more than held up his end of the bargain. The late-season arrival of Nikola Vucevic was a potential threat but Vucevic suffered a finger fracture that kept the seas smooth.

Nikola Jovic

Results: Jovic was roundly outplayed by everyone else in a Heat uniform and fell out of the picture.

Verdict: Swing and a miss.

Reason: The Heat place high value on Jovic but his fourth season was his worst yet, and it casts major doubt on his long-term outlook. No longer the uber-young prospect with all the tools in the world, Jovic’s expected fourth-year breakout was anything but. The Heat’s wealth of depth options and Erik Spoelstra’s high standards combined to leave Jovic out in the cold and his play on the court gave him no real path back into the mix. He played in just three games after the All-Star break between a back injury, a left ankle injury and the fact that he just wasn’t in the rotation. His shooting efficiency collapsed, especially behind the arc (.269), and there was no justification to put Jovic on the court over anyone else on the roster. He landed in the top-400 ballpark and was one of the bigger letdowns in the league, even relative to more modest expectations.

Ryan Kalkbrenner

Results: Kalkbrenner had the starting job but lost it to Moussa Diabate and never brought any of his NCAA 3-point abilities to the table, leaving him stuck in the second unit.

Verdict: Close but no cigar.

Reason: Kalkbrenner was drafted into a favorable situation as the Hornets continued to search for a long-term answer at center and had just Moussa Diabate and Mason Plumlee on the roster otherwise. A burgeoning 3-point threat in his college days, Kalkbrenner had an element that could set him apart from the competition and got off to a fantastic start. Kalkbrenner started 25 of his first 26 appearances, averaging 8.7 points, 6.4 rebounds, 0.7 steals and 1.8 blocks in 25.7 mpg while shooting a blistering .787 from the floor for must-start value in the top-100 ballpark. An elbow injury knocked him out for 10 games to end that run and by the time he came back, Diabate had jumped him in the rotation. Kalkbrenner averaged just 18.9 mpg from that point on, resulting in top-240/220 value. He was able to maintain specialist value with 4.9 rebounds, 1.3 blocks and a .721 mark from the floor but did not have enough playing time to be a clear hold in all 12-team formats. A 180/154 finish in 8/9-cat is respectable but not good enough to declare him a win as a sleeper call.

Isaiah Jackson

Results: Jackson could never break out of timeshare minutes and was traded at the deadline, locking him into a backup role for good.

Verdict: Should’ve picked Jay Huff.

Reason: This one is fairly simple as Jackson got outplayed by Huff. The Pacers center timeshare was predictably ugly in the beginning of the season but Jackson did earn the start on opening night, providing some real optimism that he would rise to the top of the heap. Unfortunately he played just eight minutes and that set the tone for the remainder of his Pacers tenure. Even though Jackson continued to draw starts, it was a toss up as to whether or not he would play meaningful minutes and even when he did play his production was far from guaranteed. He started nine of the first 10 games but averaged just 18.3 mpg and only had four total blocks in that span, basically wasting his chance to put his stamp on the starting role. A trade to the Clippers offered no reprieve as Jackson was limited to 15.8 mpg in his 17 games even with Ivica Zubac off the roster. Jackson was a top-275 value despite plenty of potential.

Cason Wallace

Results: Wallace did his thing but small steps back limited his fantasy appeal on a deeper Thunder squad.

Verdict: A very slight win.

Reason: This one is a win by a slim margin as Wallace finished 136/101 in 8/9-cat against ADPs of 124.3 and 141.1 on Yahoo and ESPN, respectively. It’s a bit more nuanced than that, as any manager likely to draft Wallace to begin with was probably building a roster that could really leverage his strengths, so those in the know got good value here. Wallace remained an elite steals specialist with a career-best 1.9 per game, and adding him to your roster with the expectation of elite steals and non-zero output in assists and 3-pointers meant that he was right on target. The reason that Wallace didn’t sleepwalk to the top-100 is a decline in his shooting, posting a .432 mark from the field after going .491 and .474 in his first two seasons. Outside of that it was business as usual. It should be noted that when Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was sidelined from February 4 to February 25, Wallace was the No. 48/40 (8-cat/9-cat) producer over a nine-game stretch with 14.8 points, 1.4 triples, 3.9 rebounds, 5.4 assists and 2.0 steals, also shooting .475 from the floor in that span. There’s clearly some big potential to Wallace as a fantasy option but he was unable to truly find the gas pedal, even if he made good on his ADP.

Walter Clayton Jr.

Results: Clayton made no headway on the Jazz and got dumped into a huge crowd in Memphis.

Verdict: Brutal.

Reason: Keyonte George’s breakout erased any chance that Clayton might have had to get involved. The Jazz looked competent when they were trying and with a solid guard duo both playing to their capabilities, there was no room for Clayton to get involved. He ended up with 18.7 mpg and most distressingly, shot just .308 behind the arc. His one hope was silly season since the Jazz were still going to tank at the end of the day but he was included in the package for Jaren Jackson Jr. and landed on a Memphis roster that was flush with guard depth. More playing time led to some deep-league viability but there was nothing overly valuable stemming from the change of scenery. In his time with the Grizz, Clayton put up 9.7 points, 2.1 rebounds, 5.7 assists, 0.8 steals and 1.3 3-pointers in 25.0 mpg, but those gains were largely volume-driven as he shot .307 behind the arc. The Jazz leaned heavily on a rookie PG in the two previous seasons but a three-peat was not in order and Clayton didn’t deliver on his trademark skill, ending up outside the top-300.

Deep Leagues

Josh Minott

Results: There were multiple instances where Minott looked on the cusp of breaking through but could not get over the hump.

Verdict: Frustrating L.

Reason: Minott finished just inside the top-250 and left a lot of meat on the bone; so much that we can’t claim victory despite a few very promising stretches where he held legitimate 12-team value. Joining a depleted Celtics forward rotation was a promising start and Minott turned some heads when he was given a run in the starting five that produced single games of 15 & 9 with a steal, a block and a 3-pointer; 11 & 15 with three steals, a block and two 3-pointers; and 21 points, three steals and three 3-pointers. Unfortunately Minott did not do enough to earn a longer look, and his last two starts in that run resulted in just 16 and eight minutes played before the Celtics moved on to other options. Minott was eventually traded to the Nets and the move was a quasi springboard for his value. The problem was that Minott ended up being too useful for the tanking Nets. His high points included 24 points, three steals, three blocks and three 3-pointers; 22 points, five rebounds, one steal, two blocks and six 3-pointers; and 15 points, two steals, three blocks and a 3-pointer, but Minott exceeded 25 minutes just twice in 16 games with the Nets. To compound the problem, Minott would get regular DNP-CDs and they often followed his good games, meaning Minott would get added in fantasy, benched by the Nets, dropped in fantasy and then have a good game again. Some more consistency would’ve made Minott a clear win for us but it was not meant to be.

Collin Murray-Boyles

Results: Murray-Boyles’ impact was felt immediately and his basketball IQ translated to the box score quite nicely.

Verdict: Nice little win for deep-league GMs.

Reason: More than skills or ability, the worry about Murray-Boyles was his fit with the rest of the Raptors. His strengths and weaknesses already aligned with those of the roster at large and meant that the rookie had no real avenues to stand out from the crowd outside of simply playing very well. Lucky for us, Murray-Boyles did exactly that. A classic winning player with big on-court impact, Murray-Boyles made good things happen whenever he was on the floor and was given lots of opportunity to do so thanks to Jakob Poeltl’s troublesome back. He took off in the winter, starting with a run of 15 steals and 17 blocks in just 11 games in January. Murray-Boyles ended up being a regular fill-in starter when he wasn’t sidelined by his own hand injuries and produced 9.1 points, 5.7 rebounds, 2.7 assists, 1.1 steals and 1.2 blocks on .575 shooting in 26.9 mpg across 22 starts. At his worst, Murray-Boyles was a quality defensive specialist and at his best he was a well-rounded six-cat contributor. Despite some annoying injury absences he managed to slot into the top-200 with a unique stat set that allowed CMB to help a variety of roster builds. He was also superb in the playoffs and although that doesn’t count anything for fantasy, it’s just a testament to the caliber of player he can become. In other articles we’ve spoken about the informal “No Bad Players” rule when assembling your fantasy squad and the natural combination is “Draft Good Players.” That certainly fits here.

Baylor Scheierman

Results: Scheierman took half the year to get going and did finish strong, but was wholly unremarkable.

Verdict: We can’t count it despite the good finish.

Reason: The Celtics being better than expected took a lot of the wind out of Scheierman’s sails. His skill set is a great fit with the team’s playing style but Scheierman was stuck on the edge of the picture, failing to push for 20 mpg regularly until January. He kept grinding and was given a multi-week run of starts in February and March before eventually becoming a regular fill-in starting option when one of the regular guards was out of action. Scheierman was expected to be a straightforward 3-point specialist but had a little more going on under the hood, making a bigger impact than anticipated on the glass. Unfortunately Scheierman never accessed the next level of 3-point volume that would have made him a difference-maker. He converted at a strong clip and was able to post top-230 value after the All-Star break, but without the volume to carry him it was still late-round work. As for that February-March run of starts? Scheierman struggled at the wrong time and shot just .317 from distance over that aforementioned stretch. A little better timing could’ve unlocked things for him but at the end of the day, slotting inside the top-350 is just not enough.

Jaylon Tyson

Results: Tyson was a fixture on the wing in Cleveland, parlaying Max Strus’ injury troubles into long runs of legitimate standard-league value.

Verdict: Solid win.

Reason: One of the driving forces behind this call was the fact that the Cavs didn’t have very many secondary contributors who looked like they could have a hand in changing the team’s fortune. Tyson was one of the rare exceptions; a versatile 3-and-D wing who actually had a chance to raise the collective ceiling. A major injury to Max Strus and De’Andre Hunter playing poorly were like rocket fuel for Tyson, who quickly established himself as a key presence on the wing. Tyson was a top-100 guy through the end of January, averaging 13.9 points, 5.5 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.4 blocks and 2.1 triples on .514 shooting in 27.9 minutes a night. That alone paid off his acquisition cost and softened the blow of his post-trade deadline slowdown. A revamped bench unit resulted in Tyson falling outside the top-250 once Keon Ellis and Dennis Schroder arrived from Sacramento, and the eventual return of Strus didn’t help matters either. Tyson shot just .444 in 24.8 mpg with the associated fall-off in points, rebounds, steals and 3-pointers and also missed a couple of weeks at the end of the season with a toe sprain. The final act wasn’t great but Tyson going from late-round dart in 20-team leagues to legitimate must-start guy in all formats for over half the season is a clear win for fantasy GMs.

Ryan Rollins

Results: Rollins was dynamite and rewarded any managers smart enough to take him at the end of drafts.

Verdict: The annual smash victory.

Reason: Our only regret is not getting more aggressive. Rollins started the season in a timeshare situation with Kevin Porter Jr. and Cole Anthony, and the intrigue lied in both Rollins’ strong finish to 2024-25 and the fact that Porter and Anthony were both known quantities as starting PGs. A little patience was to be required but when Porter got hurt on opening night, Rollins saw the crack in the door and blew it wide open. He ended up starting 67 of his 74 games and scored in single digits just four times, rising up the pecking order as the Bucks’ season circled the drain. Career-highs across the board in the counting stats came with solid percentages and Rollins was excellent from wire to wire. From being treated as a last-round dart to a 42/52 finish in 8/9-cat leagues, this year it was Rollins who was our signature sleeper call.

Rasheer Fleming

Results: The Suns were surprisingly competent and Fleming had a hard time getting consistent run.

Verdict: No dice.

Reason: We kept expectations in check with Fleming, looking for top-300 value on a Suns team that had plenty of wing depth. Unfortunately for him, the Suns ended up being a playoff squad and Dillon Brooks in particular was a big part of that. Without tank-related boosts to playing time and guys like Brooks and Royce O’Neale playing well, Fleming had a hard time getting on the court. We were betting on his 3-and-D skills — a line of 14.5 points, 8.5 rebounds, 1.4 steals and 1.5 blocks while shooting .531 from the field and .391 from deep in his last college season is appealing — but Fleming didn’t have the playing time to stretch his legs. He ended up outside the top-450 and made little impact on the court. A player with his abilities on a rebuilding team should be as easy as it gets, but the Suns’ rebuild was over before it began.

Terrence Shannon Jr.

Results: Shannon once again played well when called upon late in the season, but that wasn’t enough for fantasy purposes.

Verdict: Whiff.

Reason: For the second straight season, Shannon ended up seeing his role increased down the stretch and into the playoffs. Maybe this time he’ll be able to parlay that into a larger role, because Shannon’s 2025-26 season was not up to par for fantasy purposes. Injuries played a part in Shannon’s rocky season but the fact that he was such a non-factor even after the Wolves lost Nickeil Alexander-Walker was a tough break. He managed to improve his 3-point mark from .355 to a sterling .408 but with just a shade over 12 minutes a game there was barely anything there for fantasy GMs. He was great when called upon in the playoffs and perhaps the Wolves’ further depleted second unit will create another sleeper window. That said, Shannon gets no credit for ending up just inside the top-475 last year.

Deep Cut Special

Dru Smith

Results: Smith passed the threshold for deep-league value at a bargain basement price.

Verdict: It wasn’t perfect, but it’s a win.

Reason: Smith was able to check in around the top-250 on the back of strong steals production and was able to hang onto a rotation spot until March. Tyler Herro’s late start to the season gave Smith lots of runway to get going and he was a consistent presence early on, logging double-digit minutes in the first 24 games of the season for 2.9 assists and 1.4 steals in 17.2 mpg. While it’s unfortunate that Smith’s impact waned as the season went on, a top-250 return including clear positive value in a defensive stat makes it a winning situation for managers who picked Smith in the deepest of leagues.

In Summary

Every year we get one or two massive success stories to do the heavy lifting. It wasn’t quite to the level of Dyson Daniels and Ivica Zubac last season but Ryan Rollins and Neemias Queta were season-long studs that you could add to your teams essentially for free. There were some misses, but anybody who was drafted more often than not ended up surpassing expectations with the exception of Nikola Jovic. We’re not thrilled with the amount of misses, but thankfully those were all minimum-cost fliers. The guys whose ADPs you needed to get ahead of delivered — Reed Sheppard, Kyshawn George, Cason Wallace — and there was once again excellent ROI on picks in the back half of the draft. Taking one or two of those players gives you a major head start in the best-case scenario and a huge safety net in the worst case.

The overall record sits 8-8-0 (win-loss-push), though we would’ve loved to rack up more wins in the standard league group. One significant win (Queta), two solid ones (Sheppard and George) and only modest opportunity cost on the losses will work more times than not, and if you got Queta in the last round of a 12-team draft you can afford to miss on a couple other flier types. If you rolled the dice on Rollins, even better. If you followed along in deeper leagues and hit on Rollins, Tyson and Murray-Boyles, you would’ve cleaned up in the later rounds. We’ll head back to the lab to scratch our way above .500 while maintaining the track record of a few smashing successes.

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Mike Passador

Mike graduated from Boston University’s Dual Degree Program with a BA in Economics and a BS in Business with Concentrations in Marketing and Operations Management. He is a faithful supporter of Toronto sports and the Detroit Lions and is always ready to be let down. Tweet to him @Mike_Pandador, but if you badmouth Jose Calderon you might get blocked.

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