2026 IDP Bounce-Back Candidates
Last year's disappointments in fantasy football are set to bounce back and deliver a much better season in 2026.
Injuries and inefficiencies are the plagues of the fantasy football world, but for the fantasy managers who are willing to forgive and forget, several options are ready to make things right in 2026.
Listed below are five players who fantasy managers have depended on in the past but are coming off down years. Not included are some of the more obvious options, like Nick Bosa and Fred Warner. Instead, we focus on players who missed some time and/or also disappointed as fantasy assets and aren’t drafted as highly in 2026.
LB DeMarvion Overshown, Dallas Cowboys
Overshown missed his entire rookie season due to injury, but when he was on the field in Year 2, he looked like a true locked-in weekly IDP starter, delivering 14.3 points per game, which was good for LB10 in 2024. Unfortunately, that season was also cut short by a season-ending knee injury that lingered into most of his 2025 season, limiting him to just six appearances and sinking his IDP value.
Heading into 2026, it appears that Overshown is finally fully healthy and ready to return to the productive ways that put him on IDP radars back in 2024, which feels like a long time ago through a fantasy football lens. Overshown is in contention to wear the green dot in Dallas (along with Dee Winters, Caleb Downs, and Jalen Thompson), which would lock him in as an every-down linebacker, and that alone could help breed production.
Even last season, Overshown delivered slightly above average in Tackles versus Expected, and we’ve seen him translate that efficiency to IDP production as well. His 2024 season was a showcase of what he could be as an IDP, delivering five sacks, a pick-six, four pass breakups, a forced fumble, and a fumble recovery on top of solid tackle numbers. While that high rate of big plays is not sustainable, it’s hard not to be enticed by his talent and potential to come close to that level of IDP production again. He’s currently projected as our LB22 and a player who can be acquired at LB4 prices, according to our ADP, thanks to shortened seasons keeping his price in check.
LB Azeez Al-Shaair, Houston Texans
Al-Shaair’s 2023 season with the Titans was his peak, delivering a massive tackle year that led to a high-end LB2 finish and helped him land a new contract with the Houston Texans. Unfortunately, his first year with the Texans was marked by missed time due to injury and suspension, and his 2025 season, while mostly healthy, was not nearly as effective for IDP purposes through 15 games.
Al-Shaair came out of 2025 with just a 10th percentile mark in Tackles versus Expected, which was by far the worst mark of his career, and a number that I’d expect to improve in 2026. The bulk of Al-Shaair’s inefficiencies came from his work in coverage, as he ranked in just the 2nd percentile in Tackles versus Expected on passing downs, which tends to be more unstable when facing different passing offenses and when situations vary wildly year-to-year. That’s one clear area where Al-Shaair can experience some positive regression as a tackler and improve his standing for IDP.
Al-Shaair’s big play production in 2025 wasn’t out of the ordinary for his career, or for the position, as he managed two interceptions but didn’t land a sack, so those two stats alone will likely balance each other out in either direction this coming season. We’re mainly looking for him to maintain his full-time role and improve even closer to average as a tackler, and that should allow him to outperform his current LB27 ADP.
DT Ed Oliver, Buffalo Bills
Oliver’s 2025 season was cut significantly short due to injury, appearing in just three regular-season games before a lightened workload in his return during the NFL playoffs. In his three games during the fantasy football season, Oliver was the DT1 in points per game thanks to three sacks, five QB hits, and seven tackles for loss over that span. Oliver has been starting to click in recent years for IDP, but the missed time in 2024 and 2025 has hurt his potential to build on that improvement and remain a fixture in our IDP lineups, as was the case in 2023.
Oliver’s potential comes mostly from his ability as a pass rusher, having delivered a 97th percentile mark in Expected Sacks in 2023, and an 87th percentile mark in that regard in 2024 with three missed games. If Oliver is able to continue producing as a tackler on top of his high-end ability as a pass rusher, he should track for a DT1-type season, and he’s a player that can be had at DT2 prices in drafts right now. Oliver should be the team defensive interior leader in snaps if healthy, which gives him real potential to emerge as a top option at the position, as evidenced by our projections listing him as the overall DT2 for 2026.
DT Dexter Lawrence, Cincinnati Bengals
Lawrence is undeniably the league’s best nose tackle, which is partly because the true nose tackles in today’s NFL are a rarity, but also because he’s just one of the best defensive linemen in the league. Unfortunately, none of that translated to IDP in 2025 as Lawrence appeared in all 16 games, but managed just a half-sack and finished as the overall DT50 as a result. This was obviously a far cry from his 2024 season, in which he recorded 9 sacks and finished as the DT7 in points per game (12 games).
Lawrence landing just a half-sack despite owning a top-10 PFF pass-rush grade and finishing in the 96th percentile in Expected Sacks makes him an easy positive regression candidate in the sack column, which is already a reason to buy an improved 2026 for IDP. Coupled with the fact that an elite mark in Expected Sacks has become the norm for him, ranking no worse than the 90th percentile in that category in all years since 2021 minus 2024, when he missed four games (86th percentile).
Lawrence is going to continue playing a lot of snaps on his new team in Cincinnati, where he should be considered the best defensive lineman on the team at the very least. Lawrence’s tackle production is also due for a bounce-back, as this past year was well below his norm. Combined with high-end playing time and a great improvement in sack production, he should once again push for a DT1-type finish.
S DeShon Elliott, Pittsburgh Steelers
Elliott was off to a burning hot start in 2025, performing well above average as a tackler and averaging 13.1 points per game through five appearances. Elliott’s efficiency as a tackler has been his calling card for most of his career; he’s just failed to maintain any of that momentum for an entire season, due to injury or not being given an every-down role.
Heading into 2026, Elliott still appears on track for an every-down role, as was the case when healthy last season. Even with Jaquan Brisker joining the roster, Elliott should still get his fair share of use around the line of scrimmage, with both players being more interchangeable in that regard. This would move Jalen Ramsey back to the nickel role, after he filled in at safety last year out of necessity.
Elliott has finished among the top 95th percentile in Tackles versus Expected in two of the past four seasons, and was 99th percentile in Tackles versus Expected per game in 2025. This gives hope that even if he isn’t given an ideal deployment around the line of scrimmage, he should still find ways to be productive and rack up tackles. If Elliott is healthy, he could be one of the best bargains in IDP, as he's currently being drafted as DB55/S41.
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