College Football Fantasy Five: Week of April 12

Even though there are no official college football games being played, it doesn't mean that we can't start preparing for the 2021 fantasy college football season. I've scrubbed the current headlines and here's a countdown of the top five stories with fantasy implications.

5.) RB Nakia Watson Transfers to Washington State

Jesse Temple of The Athletic put together a nice piece earlier this year detailing Watson's transfer from Wisconsin. At Washington State, he'll likely back up Max Borghi in 2021, however, will have up to three years of eligibility to use in Pullman. In the Cougars high-flying offense, this gives Watson some future appeal if he finds the new school to be a fit. His situational use in the upcoming year will be worth watching as the sample size is small on him right now with just 53 rushing attempts for 191 yards. On the other side of the transfer, it's a huge stock up for the Badgers' Jalen Berger as this suggests he is the running back of the future in Madison, WI. Berger should probably be a first-round pick in college fantasy drafts this fall.

4.) QB McKenzie Milton is Back & Ready to Compete at Florida State

It's nice to see Milton return from a serious leg injury sustained in November of 2018 as he flashed some nice throws at the Seminoles' recent Spring Game. The transfer from UCF is expected to compete with Jordan Travis and Chubba Purdy for the starting job in 2021. If Milton can win the job, he has some serious upside as he did throw for 4,037 yards and 37 touchdowns while rushing for 613 yards and eight touchdowns in 13 games in 2017. He was no one-hit-wonder either as he had 2,663 yards and 25 touchdowns through the air and 307 yards and nine touchdowns through 10 games in 2018. Florida State may not be the vintage UCF offense, but Milton can have some fantasy appeal if he's truly healthy.

3.) WR Jermaine Burton Should be Back in Time for Georgia

Not sure what is going on in Georgia with their receiver group as almost all of them are dealing with an injury of some sort. Burton was carted off during a late March practice with an apparent knee injury which was concerning after George Pickens' season-ending torn ACL. The most recent update has Burton out just 4-to-6 weeks with the expectation that he'll be back for summer workouts. This is good news for Georgia fans as they have a capable quarterback in JT Daniels and just need the weapons on the edges to make their explosive offense work. I recently previewed the Georgia wide receiver room when Pickens' injury was announced. Assuming Burton returns with no issues, I like him and Kearis Jackson quite a bit for the upcoming season.

2.) QB Terry Wilson Will Finish Career at New Mexico

This storyline came out a few weeks ago and I've had some time to digest it. I think this could be a mutually beneficial fantasy pairing as the Lobos have sported one of the worst defenses in all of college football over the last decade. In 2019, they gave up 37.2 points per game which ranked 125th out of 130 teams. Wilson was a true dual-threat quarterback at Kentucky from 2018-2020 with 3,440 yards through the air and 1015 yards on the ground. In this most recent season against a tough SEC slate, Wilson had his most productive year on the ground with 424 yards on 104 carries (4.08 YPC) with five touchdowns. While he won't be surrounded by many weapons at New Mexico, he'll have many opportunities to produce fantasy points. I would take a chance on Wilson in later rounds of fantasy drafts due to his upside as a dual-threat quarterback.

1.) WR Tahj Washington Joins a Talented Crew at USC

USC is loading up the talent for the 2021 season as they have already added WR K.D. Nixon (from Colorado) and RB Keaontay Ingram (from Texas) during this offseason. They should have no problem replacing the production from Amon-Ra St. Brown and Tyler Vaughns as returnees Drake London and Bru McCoy are extremely talented as well. Of this set of receivers, I like London the most and would initially slot Washington into that second spot on the depth chart ahead of Nixon and then McCoy. All this talent is really a big plus for QB Kedon Slovis who should be able to let the ball fly comfortably at heavy volumes this year. Slovis averaged 44 attempts per contest in six games last year, including two games with over 50 attempts. That's elite-level volume and he should be drafted high for it.