Three Players To Avoid In Your 2026 Guillotine Leagues™ Drafts
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Three Players To Avoid In Your 2026 Guillotine Leagues™ Drafts

Ian Hartitz highlights a trio of players to fade in your 2026 Guillotine Leagues™ drafts.

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Playing Guillotine Leagues™ is kind of like if a lion is chasing you and your friends: You don't have to have the highest score or be the fastest, just don't have the lowest score or be the slowest person there.

Make sense? Good.

Accordingly, the following three players are big-time avoids for me in Guillotine Leagues™ this year due to their potential to start the season slow and, accordingly, nosedive whatever poor drafter has the audacity to add them to their squad in the first place.

As always: It's a great day to be great.

Avoid These Players In 2026 Guillotine Leagues™ Drafts

NYG_giants-logo.svgMalik Nabers | WR | NYG

The latest update on Nabers, courtesy of The Athletic's Charlotte Carroll:

"It’s impossible to know right now if Nabers will be “fine” for Week 1, as general manager Joe Schoen recently told Yahoo Sports he expects the receiver to be. It could be he’ll need more time to recover after undergoing a cleanup surgery this spring following an initial surgery in the fall to repair the ACL and meniscus in his right knee."

Maybe Nabers is indeed good to go for Week 1, but man: Early-season snap counts are possible, as is reduced effectiveness in a new offense led by *throws up in mouth* Matt Nagy. 

Let somebody else use an early-round pick to deal with this recovery, and then feel free to get one of the game's most talented receivers at a discount on the waiver wire later.

KC_chiefs-logo.svgPatrick Mahomes | QB | KC

The good news: Mahomes is tentatively expected to be good to go for Week 1 following last year's season-ending torn ACL.

The bad news: It'd make a lot of sense if his mobility is at least a little hindered, and also if the Chiefs attempt to not ask their franchise quarterback to be Superman from the jump. This is problematic because Mahomes' 2025 return to FANTASY glory was almost entirely due to his newfound rushing upside.

It's terrifying to fade the best QB of his generation at his lowest price ever in redraft land, but in Guillotine Leagues™? Don't sweat it: Let someone else start Mahomes out of the gate against *checks schedule* the Broncos' reigning third-ranked scoring defense.

SF_49ers-logo.svgGeorge Kittle | TE | SF

Getting the theme yet? There's optimism that Kittle will be able to suit up for the 49ers' kangaroo-themed season opener against the Rams in Australia, but that's not a guarantee, and it'd hardly be surprising if the 32-year-old stud is eased back into action.

Look, Kittle was the league's most efficient tight end on a per-route basis last season. This has been the case for most of his career, and it's accordingly helped him provide elite fantasy production with less-than-stellar volume in the ever-crowded 49ers offense. 80% of Kittle could be awfully problematic considering he's already someone who struggles to get the same number of targets as the Trey McBrides and Brock Bowers of the world.

Throwing a late-round dart at Kittle would be one thing, but he's expected to be one of the position's top-10 players in more drafts than not. At that cost, respectfully, I'm out.

Players Mentioned in this Article

  1. Malik Nabers
    MalikNabersQ
    WRNYGNYG
    PPG
    12.0
    Proj
    190.6
  2. Patrick Mahomes
    PatrickMahomesQ
    QBKCKC
    PPG
    20.4
    Proj
    283.6
  3. George Kittle
    GeorgeKittleQ
    TESFSF
    PPG
    11.2
    Proj
    123.1

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