Road to WR1: CeeDee Lamb

With a career year in 2023, CeeDee Lamb finally broke through and finished as the top receiver in fantasy football in all league formats. Entering his fifth year in 2024, the competition in the wide receiver field will remain stiff but Lamb has the inside track to retain his status as the WR1.

In each progressing season, Lamb has managed to improve on his previous year's production, capped by a career-best performance in 2023 with 1,749 receiving yards and 14 total touchdowns. The receiving yards were good for ninth-best all-time in a single season. Having missed just two games in four years, Lamb has been a top 20 fantasy receiver in each chapter of his career while finishing in the top 10 in his two most recent campaigns.

Lamb's career fully took off in 2022, becoming the top receiver in Dallas with former teammate Amari Cooper moving on to Cleveland. Since then, Lamb has dominated the league in targets, receptions and receiving yards.

Come Week 1, Lamb will return to the field with familiar faces alongside him but without former running mate Michael Gallup and starting running back Tony Pollard.

How CeeDee Lamb can become the fantasy WR1

Without Michael Gallup on the team, Dallas is expected to start third-year wideout Jalen Tolbert who has a total of 24 catches in his career. Brandin Cooks and Jake Ferguson will serve as the second and third options in the passing game but neither should be much of a threat to Lamb's monster target share.

Dallas' defense is expected to remain elite but the offense is all but certain to take a dip from 2023. Dak Prescott will return under center but without Tony Pollard in the backfield, the Cowboys will be relying on a dreary committee of Ezekiel Elliott, Rico Dowdle and Deuce Vaughn. Regardless, the passing volume of the offense led by Prescott and engineered by Brian Schottenheimer was the driving force behind Lamb's value and will only increase without Pollard.

A third-year leap from Ferguson is to be expected but Cooks will be turning 31 in September and entering his 11th year in the league while not having a fantasy-relevant season since 2021. Dallas will have few options other than fully leaning on Lamb to exist as Super Bowl hopefuls.

Even with his workload expected to stay high, asking Lamb to post another 1,700-yard season is unrealistic considering it has only been done 13 times in NFL history. Maintaining a double-digit touchdown season, which he did for the first time in his career in 2023, will be key to defending his WR1 position.

The Dallas offense as a whole is in a worse position than it was a year ago but for Lamb and his fantasy value, not a lot should change. As long as Prescott can remain on the field, the sheer volume of his arm in this system gives Lamb a limitless ceiling and safe floor.