It is now officially fantasy football draft season. There is no better time of year. Whether you are gathering with friends and having a live draft or doing one online, draft day is one of the best of the entire year.

Let's face it though, the best part of the draft is the first five rounds. You get your fantasy football studs, adding the names you know and love to your team. That is not to say the later rounds aren't important — they are extremely important — but the first five rounds are the most fun part of the entire draft.

Here are 10 players I am targeting in the first five rounds of the draft to help build a fantasy football champion.

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Fantasy Football Targets in 2021

Here are a look at 10 players to draft in the first five rounds this year in fantasy football.

1. Travis Kelce is a fantasy football cheat code

Yahoo ADP: 12.1

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The tight end position has the largest gap of talent from the elite to mid-tier options of any position in fantasy. Last year, Travis Kelce scored 110 more points than TE3 in 0.5 PPR settings. The same 110-point drop at receiver would take you from WR1 (Davante Adams) to WR17 (Marvin Jones). Kelce’s season last year would have had him finishing as WR4 with 260 fantasy points, and he likely would have led the league in receiving yards had he not sat out the last game of the season. He finished the season with eight straight 80-yard games — still active, that streak is the second longest in NFL history, and he has a good chance of continuing that success. That run of games was when the Chiefs increased their passing volume, no longer trying to get Clyde Edwards-Helaire healthy as pass attempts per game increased by 10 (34 to 44) in the final 9 games of the season. Kelce gives you a weekly advantage every week. He can produce like a WR1 or RB1 overall and is attached to the best quarterback and pass offense in football. With an ADP of 12.1 he is a steal in fantasy drafts in 2021. 

2. Stefon Diggs could be a league leader again

Yahoo ADP: 12.0

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Josh Allen took a massive step forward last season, and he can thank Stefon Diggs for helping him do it. Last year’s receiving yards league, Diggs crushed as a top option in an elite offense. He saw a ridiculous 168 targets — the most in football — and dominated in both air yards and target share in his offense, per FTN air yards tool. In fact, Diggs WOPR — his weighted opportunity share — was third among all NFL players and second among players who are going to be healthy at the start of the season (Michael Thomas was second). The reason Diggs fell so far behind Adams last season was his 10 fewer touchdowns. A couple things working in his favor is that Aaron Rodgers is highly unlikely to repeat 48 touchdown passes this season and Diggs only saw 8 fewer red-zone targets than Adams. If Diggs is able to get into the end zone a few more times this season he could finish as WR1 overall at a WR3 price tag. 

3. Antonio Gibson — Buy the hype in fantasy football

Yahoo ADP: 18.2

Gibson came into the league with questions about how he would be able to handle an NFL workload at running back. He only had 33 career rush attempts in college, but the 4.39-speed, 228-pound back proved he could make the transition. Gibson improved as the year went on, averaging 5.05 yards per carry in his final six games after averaging 4.34 in his first eight. That is a big deal, as playing running back and running between the tackles was new for Gibson and seeing him get more comfortable could mean even bigger things in Year 2. It wasn’t only his yards per carry that improved; his yards before contact went up nearly a full yard from 2.44 to 3.40 while his yards after contact improved from 1.44 to 1.79 in the last five games of the season. 

While his rushing upside is immense, currently sitting top eight on DraftKings Sportsbook to lead the league in rushing, the real way Gibson unlocks his upside is in the passing game, where he was used sparingly last year, but has the opportunity to dominate in this area. In college, he averaged a ridiculous 11.2 yards per catch, and in his rookie year he averaged 1.52 yards per route run, ninth among backs. Washington's coaching staff has been talking all offseason about how his passing-game role is going to grow and they will even use him more at wide receiver. Last year, Gibson had four games with five or more targets and finished as a top-five back in two of them. When (not if) Gibson becomes more involved in the passing game, he has top-five upside at the position. 

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4. Clyde Edwards-Helaire has top-five upside in fantasy football

Yahoo ADP: 22.4

(Looking to get fantasy football advice from someone who has over one million dollars in career winnings? Look no further than Nelson Sousa who you can get personal coaching sessions from this season.)

Our Nelson Sousa has long been none as one of the top fantasy football players in the world and one of his bold predictions for 2021 is that Clyde Edwards-Helaire finishes as a top five running back this season, and who am I to disagree with him?

People are down on Edwards-Helaire after he was overdrafted him last season, where he sneaked all the way into the top six overall. Now he is going at the end of Round 2 because he disappointed, but he still has all the same upside of last season at a depleted price tag. The Chiefs revamped their offensive line, adding Orlando Brown, Joe Thuney and Creed Humphrey while also getting Laurent Duvernay-Tardif back after he opted out last season. The Chiefs project as the league's top offense, and Edwards-Helaire projects to play over 70% of the snaps — that right there is a beautiful formula for fantasy goodness out of the second-year back. The knock on Edwards-Helaire is his lack of touchdowns, but that is overblown. He finished with 9 goal-line carries, but only one goal-line touchdown. In other words, he is due for major positive regression in the area. No other running back currently on the team had more than one goal-line carry, and Edwards-Helaire out-touched Darrel Williams 29-4 on red-zone carries

5. A.J. Brown is a must-draft at cost in fantasy

Yahoo ADP: 22.0

We are always cooking up something in the lab at FTNData, and one thing that is in the works for the future is the playmaker index. It is FTN’s proprietary formula for how good a receiver is — and so far, A.J. Brown has the two best seasons ever. Brown finished fourth in yards per route run, fifth in touchdowns and seventh in fantasy points per game last year, and now he will have Julio Jones as a sidekick. Teams will likely have to keep a defender in the box with Derrick Henry there, meaning seven defenders in the box. Last year against seven-man boxes, Brown averaged 4.3 yards per route run — the league leader overall was Davante Adams at 2.96 — and no team in football faced more seven-man boxes last year than the Titans. As Brown continues to ascend, his ceiling as the top overall fantasy receiver and getting him at the end of the second round is stealing. 

6. Darren Waller is just scratching the surface 

Yahoo ADP: 29.2

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Darren Waller was the first read on 34.5% of plays he was on the field for — the next-closest tight end was Evan Engram at 25.2%. In fact, only Davante Adams was the first read on a higher percentage of plays, and Waller was the only tight end to crack the top 15. Waller led all of football with over 800 yards the second half of the season, averaging a ridiculous 130 yards per game in his final five. He is a freak athlete at 6-foot-6 and 255 pounds, running a 4.46-second 40-yard dash (100th percentile) that has proven to be unrecoverable. Finishing with 107 catches, 1,195 yards and 9 receiving touchdowns, Waller will remain the top option in a bad Las Vegas Raiders team that will consistently be playing catchup. Waller is the only player who can match Travis Kelce's upside this year at the potion. 

7. Terry McLaurin is a WR1 in 2021

Yahoo ADP: 30.0

Speaking of first read share, Ryan Fitzpatrick should be funneling targets to Terry McLaurin all season. It is a small sample size, but on two drives together this preseason, McLaurin saw three targets, catching two passes for 25 yards. Last, season Fitzpatrick threw to his first read on 62% of his dropbacks, the 11th-highest rate in the NFL. Fitzpatrick has never been shy about getting his guy the ball, and McLaurin is the unquestioned alpha in this offense.

Last season, McLaurin had 34% of the team’s air yards (next closest was 21%), had 29% of the teams receiving yards (next closest was 17%), and he had a 26% first read share (next closest was 18%). With improved quarterback play, McLaurin's volume and talent gives him plenty of upside. 

8. Robert Woods a steal in Round 4 of fantasy drafts

Yahoo ADP: 45.7

If you have read my previous content, you know I have played a lot of volume on Underdog Fantasy. They currently have the biggest best ball tournament available, and it has led to the sharpest fantasy football minds competing. That leads to the sharpest ADP, which as you can see here. Typically, Underdog is weeks ahead of the rest of the market and when looking at players draft position it can be easy to find values

Robert Woods is one of those values, going a full 12 spots ahead of his Yahoo ADP. Woods has been Mr. Consistent in Los Angeles, going for over 1,000 total yards for three straight seasons, and now gets a massive quarterback upgrade in Matthew Stafford replacing Jared Goff. The thing that has held Woods back from becoming a WR1 is the vertical game, but Stafford threw deep on 11.7% of his passes, the fourth-highest rate in the league. Last year, Goff was 31st at just 7.1% with the eighth-lowest completion percentage among quarterbacks with at least 200 dropbacks. 

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9. D.J. Moore has top-five upside in fantasy football

Yahoo ADP: 54.4

There is love, and there is what I have for D.J. Moore, who I have been writing up all offseason, and there is no reason to stop now. The only receiver in football to post back-to-back 1,200-yard seasons, Moore is a sensational value at 54.4. I currently have Moore ranked 31st overall in 0.5 PPR formats, 23 spots ahead of his current ADP. He is an autopick for me in Round 4, and in Round 5 is an unfair advantage.

Last season, Moore was one of just three receivers to have 92 or more yards in eight games — the other two were Stefon Diggs and Calvin Ridley, who both finished as top-five receivers. The only thing that held Moore back was touchdowns, only scoring four. However, the end-zone usage wasn't the issue — Teddy Bridgewater was. Moore saw 37% of his team’s end-zone targets last season, the second-highest rate in football behind only Adam Thielen. If Moore can come down with a few more touchdowns, you could be looking at a top five receiver going off the board at 54.4 overall on Yahoo

10. Tee Higgins is simply too cheap

Yahoo ADP: 80.2

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I am writing this on Taco Tuesday, but apparently it is Tequila Tuesday, as people have been enjoying themselves too much with Higgins dropping all the way to Round 7 on Yahoo. As I mentioned above with Woods, Underdog ADP tends to be the sharpest around, and on that site, Higgins is 47th off the board and WR23 overall. That is a discrepancy of 33 spots! Simply absurd. Higgins came on strong as the season went on, finishing with double-digit fantasy points in all but three games last year, despite Joe Burrow exiting Week 11 against Washington with a gruesome injury. Higgins showed great downfield efficiency, finishing with the 10th-most deep targets in football and finishing with the 11th-best dominator rating among receivers. Yes, the Bengals added Ja’Marr Chase, but Higgins broke out his rookie year and showed immense upside for what should be one of the pass-happiest teams in football this year. I think he is value at 47, as I have him as the 45th player overall. And even though I am higher on him than the rest of the team, FTN Fantasy’s consensus rank is 58th overall, making him a screaming value at 80.2.

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