2026 NFL Vacated Targets: Five Offenses With Fantasy Opportunity
Five rooms are holding orphaned targets this season. The club ranks the heirs — from Achane's sure claim to the Stribling late card.
XXIII
Targets are the only currency in this game that cannot be faked. Yards fluctuate, touchdowns are weather, but a target is a decision made by an offense about who it trusts — and every offseason a certain volume of that trust is orphaned by departures and looking for a new home. PFF's accounting of the league's target vacuums is the club's favorite table of the summer, and this year five rooms matter.
The Club’s Verdict
- Selection
- De’Von Achane’s receiving share — RB, Miami
- Opportunity
- 128 vacated Miami targets, with Hill and Waddle both gone
- Market
- Market 15.3 overall · Club line 13.0 (The Morning Line, Aug 25)
- Action
- Buy — still priced as a runner’s bonus
- Also backing
- Odunze in year three · Lemon at the discount · Washington over Tolbert · Stribling as the free late card
- Primary risk
- A slow new Miami offense caps everyone’s volume
- Data as of
- August 28, 2026
The five vacancies
Philadelphia lost more receiving volume than anyone — A.J. Brown's hundred-and-twenty-plus targets are offense-shaping money, and the heirs are a veteran import in Dontayvion Wicks and the rookie Makai Lemon, freshly back from the hamstring that ate his August. Miami is the most dramatic case: Hill and Waddle both gone, 128 targets loose, and a room of Jalen Tolbert, Malik Washington and the ever-catching De'Von Achane to absorb them. San Francisco vacated 139 but employs George Kittle and Christian McCaffrey, which is where orphaned targets in that city have always gone to live. New York's 131 depend entirely on Malik Nabers' health, and Chicago is running the league's most interesting internal experiment — no veteran imported, just Luther Burden, Colston Loveland and Rome Odunze asked to split what D.J. Moore left behind.
| Team | Vacated | Departed | The Heirs | The Club’s Read |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | 139 | — | Kittle · McCaffrey · Stribling | Stribling is the free late card behind two Hall of Fame appetites |
| New York Giants | 131 | — | Nabers, if the knee holds | Everything depends on a full practice |
| Miami | 128 | Hill · Waddle | Tolbert · Washington · Achane | Achane’s share is the surest claim; Washington over Tolbert |
| Philadelphia | 120+ | A.J. Brown | Wicks · Lemon | Buy the proof, not the promise — but buy it |
| Chicago | — | D.J. Moore | Burden · Loveland · Odunze | Odunze is the year-three bet on talent meeting vacancy |
Where the club puts its card
The house ranking, cheapest conviction first: Achane's receiving share is the surest of these claims and still priced as a runner's bonus. Odunze is the bet on talent meeting vacancy in year three. Lemon is the classic August discount — a rookie with a hamstring asterisk in the league's biggest vacuum — buy the proof, not the promise, but buy it. Washington over Tolbert in Miami at their prices. And Stribling in San Francisco is the late card: third in line behind two Hall of Fame appetites, which is exactly why he costs nothing.
What could change the verdict
Nabers’s surgically repaired knee is the swing variable in New York — no full practice, no bet. Lemon’s hamstring has already eaten a month; a September re-aggravation turns the discount into a trap. Miami’s new offense may simply arrive slowly, and a slow offense feeds nobody — Achane’s claim is safest precisely because it survives bad quarterbacking. Cutdown weekend can still reshuffle the San Francisco depth chart underneath Stribling, and any veteran receiver signed into Philadelphia or Chicago dilutes the inheritance. Prices move daily in draft week; check the board before you pay.
Sources & methodology
- Vacated-target accountingPFFTeam-level vacated-target figures from Pro Football Focus, captured August 28, 2026.
- Market pricesADPOverall ADP from public PPR draft markets, including Underdog, August 16–28 window, set against The Morning Line.
- MethodThe ClubRank the vacancies by volume, then price each heir’s claim against role certainty and cost. Redraft, PPR-leaning. The verdicts are the club’s alone.
Vacated-target figures are PFF's accounting; the verdicts are the club's. Entertainment, never advice.