Projecting Kevin White’s 2017 Fantasy Value
Is Kevin White worth a risk on your 2017 fantasy football team? We evaluate.
Four games. Four games? Four games! Kevin White is entering his third year in the NFL. In his first two seasons, he has played a combined four games. That’s not exactly what Ryan Pace had in mind when he took White in the first round of the 2015 NFL Draft.
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Selecting Kevin White for your 2017 fantasy team comes with significant risk. He might miss half the season, heck, he could miss the whole season. Until White proves that he can stay on the field and these two injuries are just an extreme case of bad luck, fantasy owners have to assume that White is injury prone.
Here’s the good news, White was improving last year. His last two games he had 12 catches for 117 yards. While that certainly isn’t eye-popping, and granted it’s a small sample size, that still projects out to 96 catches for 936 yards. And like I said, White was improving. White was just learning to become a better route runner and also just started flashing some big play ability that Ryan Pace believes he has.
Also, despite the fact that White has a significant injury history, he still enters the season as the Bears’ WR2 with very little depth behind him. That means White is going to be on the field and he’s going to get opportunities.
If White stays on the field he has fantasy sleeper written all over him. So, how do you go about landing White on your roster? First of all, he cannot be one of your top two wide receivers and he shouldn’t be one of your top three. He’s just too risky of a selection and could leave you totally crippled at wide receiver if he goes down. Personally, I think he could be an incredible WR4 on your fantasy roster. If he stays healthy, he should be good enough to spot start and has sleeper potential to become a solid WR3, maybe even WR2 capabilities.
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What can you realistically expect from White? It would be hard to imagine another catastrophic injury, if he has one, that’s probably it for his career. But to be fair, it’s also hard to imagine 16 games played either. If White is on the field, he will be a part of the Bears’ offense. Maybe not to the extent of Cameron Meredith, but Mike Glennon will try to work him the ball.
As of now, White is worth having in all re-draft leagues, although 10 or 12 team leagues should have at least three receivers before even considering him. Deep leagues could consider him as a risky flex. Keeper and dynasty leagues should consider drafting him because after all, he was a consensus top ten talent, he just hasn’t been on the field to prove he’s going to develop. This is a make-or-break season for White. Bears’ fans will cross their fingers and hope he doesn’t break again.
Kevin White 2017 Projections: 11 games played, 57 catches, 735 yards, 12.9 YPC, 3 TDs