10 Contract-Year Players to Watch in 2026 Fantasy Football

Contract-year narratives can get a little dangerous if we let them do too much work. We don’t need to pretend every player in the final year of his deal is suddenly going to unlock a new level because there’s money on the line. Football doesn’t really work that cleanly. Opportunity, health, offensive environment, age curves, and depth-chart competition still matter far more than a player’s contract status.

But contract years are still worth tracking. They can tell us which teams may be approaching a decision point, which players are trying to secure one more major payday, and which fantasy situations could shift dramatically by this time next year. Sometimes that means a veteran trying to prove he still belongs as a starter. Sometimes it means a young receiver pushing for a market-resetting extension. Sometimes it simply means a player’s current team has to decide whether his fantasy-friendly role is worth paying for again.

With that in mind, here are 10 contract-year players whose 2026 seasons could shape both their NFL futures and their fantasy football value.

Quarterbacks

Kyler Murray, Minnesota Vikings

We’ll kick things off with one of the more intriguing storylines across the NFL this summer. With the Arizona Cardinals essentially kicking Kyler Murray to the curb and eating the rest of his contract, the Minnesota Vikings swooped in to thrust him into a quarterback battle for nothing more than the league minimum. Though that battle, in many people’s minds (including my own), has already been decided.

This is, obviously, a very important season for both Murray and semi-incumbent J.J. McCarthy, though the veteran is probably under the greater share of pressure, as a failure here in the Kevin O’Connell scheme could mean massive questions for his career trajectory. Assuming Murray takes over, he’ll have gigantic upgrades moving on from Marvin Harrison Jr. and Michael Wilson to Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison. He might be losing some juice in the tight end room (more on Hockenson later), but he’ll be playing behind a better offensive line and inside an infrastructure that propelled Sam Darnold to a 35-touchdown season two short years ago.

It’s hard to say exactly what will happen in the ‘27 quarterback market if Murray does succeed and revitalize his career. Will the Vikings pony up to keep him around, or will they continue this cycle of one-year rentals? Will the quarterback land on another contending team, or will this begin a stretch of “bridge” years? Regardless, Murray has legit top-10 upside if he can lock down the job for 17 games, but he’ll have to outright win this job before we put all our eggs in that basket. Instead, he should be treated as a QB14-17, with room to grow over the coming months.

Baker Mayfield, Tampa Bay Buccaneers

After spending a year exploring both the east and west coasts as a spot starter for both the Carolina Panthers and Los Angeles Rams, Baker Mayfield found himself in Tampa Bay looking to fill the void of the recently retired Tom Brady. The only thing that stood in his way was Kyle Trask, who entered the 2023 competition with nine career attempts over his first two seasons in the league. Mayfield, of course, won that competition, going on to throw for over 4,000 yards before locking in a three-year, $100M deal that presently ranks as the 16th-highest QB contract in AAV.

The quarterback’s camp has an easy argument here; the former Oklahoma Sooner has thrown for well over 12,000 yards and nearly 100 touchdowns over the last three seasons, which equate to something higher than a QB16 paycheck. Inversely, the club can show Mayfield and his agents that his 6.8 YPA was his lowest since his journeyman year, while his 4.1% turnover-worthy play rate was the highest of his career, and he’s clearly dealing with the same shoulder injury that would get him run out of town in Cleveland.

The good news is, they have actually been in talks about an extension, so that’s a step further in the right direction than a lot of the names in this article. It’ll be an interesting scenario no matter which side wins the battle, as Mayfield will be making well north of $50M a year if he falls in the QB8 range, which is quite a big number to swallow. That would put him ahead of Jalen Hurts ($51M) and Justin Herbert ($52.5M) and right behind Josh Allen and Joe Burrow ($55M/apiece). Mayfield has shown flashes of that level of play, but Herbert/Allen/Burrow have either shown far better consistency, or have simply done more with less.

For fantasy, the contract piece matters less than the shoulder. If Mayfield is healthy, this is still a stable QB2 with touchdown-driven spike weeks. If the arm strength or turnover issues linger, the floor gets shakier than his name value suggests.

Deshaun Watson, Cleveland Browns

We can keep this short, but I felt it was at least worth mentioning that Deshaun Watson’s flop of a contract is finally over at the end of the upcoming season, and whether it makes sense or not, he seems very much in the running to start the year as the Browns’ starting quarterback. The team will be entering training camp by rotating Watson and Shedeur Sanders the same way they were deployed during minicamp, so we’ll still get a couple more months of a terrible quarterback battle before we get the answer as to who we should fade in fantasy drafts.

In typical 1QB leagues, Watson is a name to avoid, but his presence still matters because it clouds the entire Cleveland passing game and keeps Sanders from being anything more than a late-round, deep Superflex speculation play.

Running Backs

Jonathan Taylor, Indianapolis Colts

Back in October of 2023, Jonathan Taylor signed a three-year, $42M extension upon returning from an ankle injury/surgery amidst a drawn-out dispute between himself and the team. After being eased back into his typical bellcow role, he finished the season on a strong note (188-yard, RB3 performance in Week 18) before ripping off 3,016 yards on the ground over these last two years, third to only Derrick Henry and Saquon Barkley.

And now, with that extension expiring at the end of the ‘26 season, we’re back in potential contract talks. Taylor said he’d “love to be a Colt for life,” so we know where he stands; now it’s just a matter of whether talks will wrap up before Week 1 kicks off. As things stand, Taylor’s $14M/year averages out to the RB7, just a tad behind Ken Walker ($14.3M) and quite a chunk behind Barkley ($20.6M) and Christian McCaffrey ($19M).

From the Colts’ perspective, it probably doesn’t make a ton of sense to drop nearly $20M/year on a fresh new contract if the offense looks as paltry as it did after the Daniel Jones injury last year. With Jones at the helm, the team averaged a healthy 0.15 EPA/play and 0.17 EPA/passing play, numbers that dropped to -0.12 and -0.08, respectively, with Philip Rivers and Riley Leonard. That’s essentially a fall from a top-7 passing attack to a bottom-7 one, even with Rivers performing better than expected. If Taylor truly does want to stay in Indy for the remainder of his career, Jones recreating the first half of the 2025 season would go a long way toward making that possible.

D’Andre Swift, Chicago Bears

The projected demise of D’Andre Swift was such incredibly poor foresight that we should all hold our heads in shame. Given that Ben Johnson was potentially instrumental in letting Swift walk in free agency back in 2022, it was assumed he would move away from featuring him in a workhorse capacity when he took over the reins in Chicago, with Roschon Johnson and/or Kyle Monangai getting involved early and often. Instead, Swift handled 268 regular-season opportunities, ranking 18th in snap rate (57.8%) and 16th in half-PPR points per game (13.2). This is an incredible return on the three-year $24M contract he signed back in 2024, an $8M AAV that ranks 20th at the position.

Swift is entering his seventh NFL season, but his heavy early-career rotation, combined with the fact that he doesn’t turn 28 until January, means he doesn’t have the typical wear-and-tear/age-curve concerns that other backs would be running up against. On his one-year “prove it” deal back in 2023 with the Eagles, he nearly doubled his previous career-high in yardage by breaking the 1,000-yard mark, and he’s got a fantastic offensive infrastructure to squeeze out one last big contract. Whether that will be with Chicago is still up in the air, but some added pressure makes him that much more of a slam-dunk RB2 for fantasy purposes.

Tony Pollard, Tennessee Titans

With an extra year of workload compared to the aforementioned D’Andre Swift —and what we can and should assume will be a much less potent offense— Tony Pollard has more of an uphill battle to see a big extension or a big splash in 2027 free agency. Further muddying the waters are a healthy Tyjae Spears to eat into passing game work and fifth-round selection Nicholas Singleton, who could either work as a goal-line option or a potential replacement heading into next season.

Pollard wrapped up last year with a breakaway run rate below 23% for the second time in his career, so if another year continues to sap his homerun ability, we could be looking at a low-end RB3 for fantasy purposes. If Pollard keeps the lead role and holds off Spears/Singleton near the goal line, he can still grind his way into weekly RB2 value. If the explosiveness continues to fade and the Titans divide the passing-down and short-yardage work, he becomes one of those backs who looks useful on the depth chart but is difficult to start outside of bye weeks.

Wide Receivers

George Pickens, Dallas Cowboys

Directly before the 2026 NFL Draft, George Pickens put pen to paper on a Cowboys franchise tag, essentially putting the onus on the player to replicate the success he enjoyed during his first year with the team. En route to out-producing CeeDee Lamb, Pickens would finish up 2025 with the league’s third-most receiving yards (1,429) and eighth-most touchdowns (8), far out-kicking his fifth-round ADP with a WR5 fantasy season.

If he’s able to even come close to repeating that performance, he’ll be in line for a massive payday, more than likely returning to the team he’s currently suiting up for. Pickens has had criticisms for taking plays off and general maturity issues throughout his college and Steelers career(s), but much of that has died down after he flashed so much consistent success last fall. Considering it only cost the team a Day 2 and a Day 3 Draft pick to pry the receiver from the Steelers, their next investment is going to be far larger than what they’ve paid up to this point.

Puka Nacua, Los Angeles Rams

Now, this one might not stand the test of the rest of the summer, but as of the time of writing, Puka Nacua is still technically on his rookie deal. Unlike recent market-shifting signings of Ja’Marr Chase and Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Nacua doesn’t give the team the cushion of a fifth-year option, as he was famously selected all the way back in the fifth round of the 2023 Draft, so his decision comes one year sooner.

It also comes with some odd off-field concerns we’re not used to seeing out of players going in the top-10 of fantasy drafts, let alone ones who may be setting a new market price for the position. The second-leading receiver over the last three seasons, Nacua’s contract year has also been marked by some off-field noise, including questionable stream appearances and a lawsuit filed in the spring. It seems unlikely the team will use that as a legitimate bargaining chip, though, and if they do decide to let him play out the last year of his rookie deal, it would probably be inviting unwanted issues in what could very well be the final season of the Matthew Stafford era.

The Rams are clearly going all in on a Super Bowl, which also happens to be taking place at SoFi Stadium. This feels like a contract issue that could be cleared up before the team reports to training camp, which is all the more reason to keep drafting Nacua wherever you can.

Josh Downs, Indianapolis Colts

Jonathan Taylor is the much bigger name of the two Colts’ fantasy assets entering a contract year, but Josh Downs has a very obvious path to get himself a gargantuan pay raise with solid play. The former North Carolina Tar Heel is set to earn a little under $4M on the final year of his rookie contract, with the only thing holding him back from an obvious huge payday is his 5’9”, 170-pound frame and his lack of usage outside of the slot. Through his first three seasons, he has taken only 17.4% of his snaps in a wide alignment, but with the team moving on from Michael Pittman Jr. and recently paid Alec Pierce recovering from ankle surgery, the Colts may have no other choice but to move him around the formation.

Luckily, Downs’ Reception Perception shows someone who can absolutely find success at all three levels of the field and may slide directly into the role Pittman has held over the last few years. A comparison that Matt Harmon particularly likes is mid-career Tyler Lockett, who was not-so-quietly the WR6 in fantasy points scored between the 2018-2022 seasons. A WR6 finish is a pretty hefty bet to make on Downs, but if you want to buy into a contract-year breakout for a player who has looked great on minimal usage through his first three seasons, it’s only going to cost you a ninth- or tenth-round fantasy pick.

Tight Ends

T.J. Hockenson, Minnesota Vikings

This section was going to be far more robust, but with the recent extensions of both Brenton Strange and Kyle Pitts, the mid-to-high level of tight end free agents mostly evaporated. Is T.J. Hockenson still in that range of talent? That’s to be determined, but he’s still only heading into his age-29 season, in what looks to be potentially his final year in Minnesota. Hockenson signed a four-year, $66M contract in August of 2023, but tore multiple ligaments in his knee four months later, putting a cap on a very productive 960-yard year prior to the injury.

Back in March of this calendar year, Hockenson and the team restructured that contract to essentially wipe out the final year of the agreement, so there is plenty of incentive to hit the ground running in what should be an improved passing game. Either Kyler Murray can bring some of that Trey McBride magic to the table, or J.J. McCarthy shows such a vast improvement that he wins back the starting nod; either scenario would be a positive. We currently have Hockenson in the back-end of the TE2 rankings, due at least in part to the signing of Jauan Jennings, who will offer the Murray/McCarthy pairing another big-bodied option to move the sticks. At cost, he’s a best ball or TE streaming target more so than a player we should be chasing aggressively, but he’s at least tied to a passing game with enough talent to make a rebound season plausible.