Good morning once again from sunny and beautiful Grand
Island, NY. I'm Mike Shope, welcome back
under the ship chasing umbrella for another week.
We are, I'm told, exactly 100 days from the NFL opener.
Cowboys, Eagles, plenty of time for your 5 or 10 or 150 best
Ball Mania drafts. I've asked our heroes this week
to send me their five most challenging, puzzling teams for
fantasy. Actually, I asked Pat for
backfields, but we'll make it work.
There was some overlap in the choices, but not one team was
picked by everybody. Of course, risers and fallers,
that's our brand. And look at the elite tight end
market and the trends there with our heroes.
Pat Crane, Davis Maddock, Jacob Sanderson.
I'm Mike Shope. This is ADP chasing May 27th,
2025. In Underdog Best Ball, ADP is
set by two separate yet equally important groups.
Streamers that set the market and the slappies that chase it.
These are their stories. Speaking of our brands as a team
and individually, Davis has his yesterday's beverage ready to go
this very controversial topic from a couple of weeks back.
Unacceptable. The worst part about this is I
haven't had coffee yet. I've got you'll hear.
I'll do the pour later. I've got the big.
Oh. Yeah, French press, but I
haven't had coffee yet, so Davis is like kind of beating me by
drinking. He's got caffeine in him from
his yesterday's flat. I've I've already had, I've
already had, I've already had coffee too, you know?
We're we're only have like this glass amount of cold brew
remaining and it's all gone now and and now I'm a little sad.
Yeah. Here on the East Coast we're
well past coffee hour, but that's good.
Memorial Day weekend. Not a ton of news or anything,
but we have mini camps, you know, sort of this morning had
the unfortunate thought it is a big injury coming.
We really haven't had that yet this season.
Did I just speak that into existence, Pat?
Is it my fault? Hopefully not.
He goes about it now. I'm giving you a hard time.
Well, I I know about it. We haven't.
Had a lot of chaos. There's a lot of chaos.
I don't mean injuries, even though I do.
We haven't had the big preseason injury either the last two
years. We we thought we had one I guess
Cooper Cup last year and and puka but but ADP never reacted
to puka despite us being told and.
No one's. That he what?
Well, but we didn't know. No, I know.
We were, we were being, we were being lied to.
We had a couple that we actually got and we're like, it's not a
big deal. It's, it's, it's no big deal
that McCaffrey hasn't practiced in a month, dude.
Everyone relaxed. Why is he in Berlin?
It's not a big deal. Yeah, I mean, the Puka 1 is
crazy because Greg Rosenthal said on the ETR podcast he was
like, I would not be drafting Puka Tukua in my fantasy drafts,
right? But then everyone was like,
dude, he's fine. And then he basically was fine,
which is crazy is he went on IR and then was fine.
How often does that happen that a guy goes on IR and then is
fine? That's pretty.
I mean, you never really get. That oh, I, I remember the buka
thing very clearly because I was very, very, very strongly puka
over Cooper Cop. And then like I remember, you
know, the first like 6 or I guess first three weeks of
season, there's everybody being like, if you drafted puka,
you're a fucking idiot. Clearly it was Cooper cop the
whole time. And then you know it, obviously
it turned, so it was nice. I love that everybody has a
voice of the fan that they just do not see.
Eye to eye wear. Yeah, none.
Of them are flattering nobody. Has like a no, it's like
flattering, yeah. No pro voice of the band.
Most annoying voice they can. Come on most annoying voice
you've got. That's it.
And you guys know he goes like this.
He. Gets more Canadian when he does
his annoying voice, Jacob when he does his.
More annoying get. Super Canadian.
Right, yeah, he leans into. It it's sort of it's it's
confusing. A little bit more like this.
So what did you oh boy, there go hang on Andy and turn down to
the local market to grab your Beaver tail.
That's like a little bit more where if I'm.
Trying to think it's pretty Canadian, yeah.
I could use a Canadian Bill Simmons at some point.
Have you done Canadian Bill Simmons?
Can buy those I don't think. That would be pretty good, Bill.
Simmons I'll I'll put it in there some.
More This is a This is a potential.
I'll get in the lab for you. I'll get in the lab is the
Canadian Bill Simmons. So I used to have a good
Simmons, but then my Simmons turned into me doing Pete as me.
It it, it blended like I used to.
I used to have a good Simmons and now it's gone.
Pete really changed your impression game.
I my favorite thing is whenever I listen to you and Pete
podcast, like the pyramid of Davis voices where I'll just
hear like actual Davis and then Pete doing Davis and then Davis
doing Pete doing Davis and it's like trying to keep track of
what those is happening at any given moment is is hilarious.
Well, the the the Shipshaving discord had a good bit this
morning that we should do the randomizer.
I'm hosting as Pete, doing me Pete, then doing me as Pete.
We we switched the goals, doing the bits.
It's a pretty. Interesting idea.
I definitely will. I like it.
Pat, what's your voice for? Oh sure, 4 wide receivers in a
row. That'll work.
What's what is your what is your, you know, average Joe
sound like Yeah, why don't you? Just take 4.
Why don't you just take 4 wide receivers?
Yeah, it would be that. It would be we, we would, but
the guy would be going. Pat Pat kind of goes like 90s.
Like making fun of someone. Yeah, yeah.
Why, why? Why wouldn't I just take the
best players? Why wouldn't I just take the
best players? That's kind of thing.
A little bit more New York, a little.
Bit more New York, a little bit more like, you fucking idiot.
Well, let's get right to it. Fun first slide.
Go ahead, Gilbert Arenis. And talk today, apparently, as I
mentioned ship chasing. I've said people will be
thrilled that we didn't discuss hockey today as I learned about
ship. Chasing, yeah, people, people in
the mandate in the chat were telling me to to zone out and
get ready for the hockey talk. Yeah, yeah.
Not how much time. It's in the last ship chasing
episode for me, you know to tune in.
I'm like can't wait to spend an hour and a half with my
favorite. Podcast well listen, fair
enough, but the the the sign on the door even says it.
These are our stories. The guy flies across the country
to go to game seven for his favorite team.
I mean, we don't have favorite. Teams, I thought we were doing a
bit, I think. From Vancouver to Toronto, I,
you got to ask him about that, that loss.
I mean, it was kind of. Crane, I was.
Crane, I think I can get you back.
Crane, I think I can get you back into the hockey talk here.
I have a just like a truly unbelievable stat.
I apologize. I this is this is not on me
that. We survived about it.
I I didn't have anything to do with it.
This is a this is a like a a Dallas Cowboys level streak.
The Carolina Hurricanes are O in 16 in conference finals games
over the last. Oh, they did.
They win last. Night.
Last night, yeah. I fell asleep.
So they're one. They're one in 16 they.
Want to know OK. That moment was worth all the
hockey talk. They're one.
In. 16 invalidated last night because he fell asleep.
Because I fell asleep. I did actually have the
conversation. 16 is still pretty crazy.
Yeah, with my wife about about the hockey point and I, I
wondered how many NHL teams Pat could name.
But let's not do that. I'm now just picture you like
the Hurricanes like. I think I could name a like.
The 18 fucking one. Fair amount Penguins, Jazz,
Hurricanes. Jazz, jazz that's so good.
Jazz is right now what is Please lose Blues.
Blues, it's a four, it's a music, it's a genre music.
Yeah, I knew it was. I knew it was jazz Adjacent.
It's adjacent. I love that to like go to like.
A Knights barn. They're Knights Las Vegas in.
Chicago and be like, hey, yeah, are you guys jazz adjacent?
They they would have to say yes. I guess you're not guys
adjacent. The the gold, the Golden
Knights, Sir, the Golden Knights to give.
The Golden Knights give it to him.
The Golden Knights. Now, now, Pat, the Golden
Knights are sort of this unbelievable.
Rangers in. Rangers 2, which is like, it's,
it's kind of a fascinating case study for expansion teams that
maybe the NFL should study if they're ever going to do it.
But now. They're raised.
No, that's the baseball. That's baseball.
I'm out. I probably do a bit more, but
I'm going to start. I'm going to start to have to
mix in baseball teams a little more aggressively as we go, so I
think we can move on. The Blue Jays Blue.
Jays. There has to be a Tigers in at
least one of these sports. Pat, they had a whole team that
did not have a name. Their first season this last
year, they were just, they were just EU.
The Devil rays. The Devil Rays, by the way.
That's that's mixing up two things.
That's a defunct team. That's also no longer their
name. They're just the Rays.
They're just the rays. They're just, well, so this is
The funny thing, is it? It used to be the Toronto Blue
Jays and the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, and then the Blue Jays
became just the Jays, and then the Blue Jays went back to being
the Blue Jays, but then the Devil Rays went back to just
being the Rays. Wouldn't the New Jersey Devils a
thing? Yeah, yeah, they are.
That's still a thing. They don't have.
Any that's what I I've told you I'm going to start mixing up
with baseball, but. This whole.
Show David Potty famously was a New Jersey Devils fan and wore
entirely scary Devil mask because he's got to support.
The team, well, I got the Devils then.
This whole show will be oh, what about Luther Burden?
And then Pat yells out twins. That's just going to be yelling
out names if baseball teams are. Going to think of he needs to
know less. I'm rich.
Wait, we were talking about Jordan Mason.
Well, Delaware. 'S so I just thought of a
baseball team man. Delaware's never had a hockey
team, right? Well, they've never had any
teams. All they have is just like LLCS.
Come on man, don't do Delaware exactly accurately LLC.
Such a good burn, damn it. That would be their team they
ever got hockey team, the Delaware LLCS.
Delaware's teams are in Philly and Baltimore.
That's where. Delaware's or in DC depending on
what part of the Dover. Favorable tax laws for
corporations. I'm not saying it's good for the
overall, but I think. My be the Wilmington.
But is for this to not happen? I think what I'm supposed to be
here for is for this to not happen.
That's correct. Again, let me try it.
The first. Slide Was it the weekend of
bully QB? We've got Pat, we've got Gilbert
Arenas. I mean, what a way to start, you
know, quote, start. We're 12 minutes in.
Audio listeners. Here he is on the left daily
Rojo himself. He loves his Drake May people
are talking about it still happening and then Gilbert
Arenas what what is happening here?
He thought he start, he's in these drafts and he starts Josh
Allen, Lamar Jackson, Jaden Daniels, Jalen Hurts, like
what's what's going on, Cormac? 'S putting those butts so he
obviously some portion of his 1099 contractor agreement gets
paid out an underdog site credit.
He's probably sitting there with however much 5 figures, maybe 6
figures of site credit. I really couldn't say and said
oh, there's this tournament $2,000,000 is to 1st I'd like to
get the most projected points. Obviously that's how you win
right? By getting the most points.
He does his default rankings by projected points presses the
plane adios. That's it that's all I need
right? It's.
It's literally that simple. He's.
Not he. It's funny.
He's not drafting, he's just organizing by points and letting
it, you know, bleed. Would you would you say that
he's an unsophisticated auto drafter?
I would I would say that he. Is that sounds right?
Yeah, I would say, I would say unsophisticated auto drafting.
By the way. Exactly how I would describe it.
That team on the right, I mentioned the quarterbacks who
are shown, it's 4 quarterbacks and five tight ends.
Then after that, yeah, running backs.
Because because if you sort by projected points as the as the
chat is pointing out, this will be a thing that you would note
your your tight ends are actually getting projected for
more points than Diami Brown or or or Adam Thielen or Stepper.
No, but he's drafted 5 tight ends to start.
By the ninth round. He doesn't have a running back
or receiver yet, so he's. Maybe he literally, maybe
literally in his app, he accidentally clicked the tight
end tab instead of the wide receiver tab when he was
clicking all the rankings or like his personal assistant
who's doing this. Like I I think I think.
He might just be digging around in the app.
He might be have his phone out. He's I promise you, he's not
drafting these. I promise you I'm not.
He's he's auto drafting I think. It's way more fun if he is.
Yeah, me too. That's.
True that that that that didn't happen.
I love the idea that Gilbert Arenas was like, yeah, I'm just
gonna, I'm just gonna do some phone shit and underdog.
Draft yeah, I could see him phone shit yeah, I don't think
he's using the sidekick, you know, looking at this team, but
he's he might be. I don't think we have to worry
about real time assistance. But I think he might be on the
phone. It is John Roto.
Rod had the best take about this, but it is very funny that
like within two weeks we had everybody furious that Best Ball
was dead because of real time assistance and then now Best
Ball's dead because Gilbert Arena because.
Gilbert is killing your. Dream and it's like it's like
these can't both be true like you can't be like these guys are
drafting too good of teams. I don't have any edge like this
guy just drafted the four quarterbacks.
I'm going to do a little super team because my bride, Thomas.
There's another new voice, by the way.
There's another new voice. Yeah.
What gets a draft cancelled like would that?
This would get a draft cancelled if it wasn't Gilbert Arenas I
would say. No chance.
Also also also clearly a misunderstanding like Pat I, I
you're definitely wrong because the key thing that happens with
cancelled drafts is if there are two little projected points,
like if you start taking like Jacori, Kroski, Merritt in the
sixth round and then that honestly might even fly.
What doesn't fly is if you have like 14 guys who are like UFL
players that is going to trigger a draft to get cancelled.
Like you have an entire roster of projected zeros, but it's
it's pretty clear you don't. Think they're doing anything
positionally like the you're like you're running back 1 is
you know, and your wide receiver 1 is like you have like
literally no projected points at running back wide receiver seems
bad like if. They if they started to cancel
drafts for having no projected points at running backs, we
would have. A lot of yeah, I was going.
To say the ship chasing. Community would be we'd all be
screwed. Like if you look at his teams.
All of our accounts. All of our accounts are
suspended. The the ADP drafts are just not
that. Like the ADP of the picks are
not, they're just not that far of a spread.
They're just they're they're really just really shitty auto
drafted teams like they're that they look weird, but there's
nothing about it that is it's going to project for like 10th
in the pod in week 1. You know what I'm saying?
Like it just it really. There's nothing about it that
would be cancelable. I mean, taking all four of the
elite quarterbacks and then drafting five straight tight
ends. How many?
How many times did? How many times?
Did he was pretty bad? How many times did Gritty get a
draft cancelled? He was like doing this on
purpose last year. Yeah, OK.
Yeah. I don't know.
I don't. I actually don't know what gets
the draft cancelled very well, so you may very well be right
that this is totally fine. I see.
People in the discord all the time referencing it feels like
anyway they're cancelled drafts. I've only ever been in one that
I remember getting the. I've had a few cancelled and I
don't I bet you've. Had more than you think show.
I bet that has been ones that you like just mysteriously
disappeared on you without being aware that.
Feels good there. There's two things going on
here. The first being that I believe,
based on my anecdotal experience, that they have
widened the gap of what they consider a cancelable team.
This is true in battle royales and this is true in like I think
I mean, I did 300, two, 170 big board drafts and I think the
only ones that got cancelled were the the day of the Super
Bowl. The Chiefs equals.
Yeah, those got cancelled, yeah. We're like Justin Watson was
going in the seventh round, right?
But I mean, even in, even in, even in BRS, I've like the two
game BRS, I've noticed that the band of things that are quote UN
quote allowed or not tossed out has gotten a little bit wider,
which frankly, I think really the only reason the draft should
be thrown out. And this is a general rule.
I'm not saying that this is unilaterally true.
Would be obvious collusion, right?
Yeah. Or yeah, a team of 16 undrafted
players, you know. That's that's really more what
it Yeah, but you're right. That's what gets teams thrown
out because that's kind of the collusion element.
That's how you do collusion right as you come in and you
just draft a bunch of stinkers. You draft some 18 pick, 18 round
picks in the early rounds so a guy can get a much better pick.
Like I remember the last draft I was in that was cancelled for
sure was one of the big board drafts where a guy got sniped on
Zay Flowers. It was just very funny.
He got, he got sniped on Zay Flowers with Lamar like in a
totally normal way. Like Zay Flowers was like a
fourth round pick and he lost his mind and started taking, you
know, like Ronald Jones or whatever in round.
Come on, man. Yeah.
It's just, it was, it was top, it was top of mind and, and and
that one. Delaware, the LL has got
professional LLCS and Ronald Jones gets draft cancelled.
You guys are killing me this morning.
But I remember that that was the last one I remember being tossed
out but. But jazz adjacent.
Well, sometimes what'll happen is it'll be during a streamed
draft. This is my experiences.
It'll be during a streamed draft and then a person will start
doing this and then you'll remind them that they can get
their account banned for purposely throwing drafts
because it's happened and they realize the person doing this
tilting is like, oh I don't want my account banned, let me go
back to drafting. Right.
Yeah. Credit to Zach Lennars once
again for I mean, what a great job here with the two poses,
like perfectly mirrored. How could you do better than
that with that arena's pose versus Pat?
It really is good. I've got a, I've got a pour and
I've got a question. So here's.
The Oh nice. Oh yeah, that.
Hits the. Rig where you want to get.
It is that. Is that a pour or is that porn?
Well, I think it depends. Depends on how much you like the
poor, I guess. I.
Think it's more ASMR than than porn.
Fair. That's fair.
The question is, should taking Drake May with Kyla Murray and
Dak Prescott get get your draft toss?
Discuss amongst yourselves. I I do have questions on like
the taking Dak's 17 picks ahead of ADP just to take Drake May
exactly at ADP later. Dak was a Lamb Lamb team, no
doubt. Yeah, Lamb Dickens.
OK. All right.
Yeah. How much may are you into this
year of last year? It was the pretty pretty good
amount. I.
Enough to take him directly at ADP without any stack partners.
A lot of Kyler DAC team so I'm thinking that's pretty.
Into it pretty into Drake, man. Yeah, the I am, I am more into
the three quarterback builds this year than than I have been.
We're going to have some stuff on that soon, but this was
mostly me just loving Drake May. I do recall because I would, I
did like a ton of puppies yesterday.
I only got in like 50 total, but I was just slamming them
yesterday and so I was multi tabling for this one.
But I do recall coming back to this team and being like a
little thin at running back now. Kind of I.
Wish I had a running back around 124 let's say, but I took my
medicine here. We've probably all been in in
drafts, maybe like most drafts where you get to that range and
you hate everybody else. Like you just don't want any of
the running backs, you don't want any of those receivers.
So like. That's why, that's why I have
33% facial tootin because I get there and I'm just like.
Davis matters. And yet you don't have the
highest facial tootin percentage on this podcast.
I'm not gonna have the highest percentage of any player because
by the end I'm gonna have 8.3% of every player in the player
pool. Yeah, I I'm the opposite
actually. It's funny that Davis has gotten
that way. I've gone completely the
opposite way. I used to always, even when I
had rankings, I've never drafted my rankings set.
I would always draft with off the ADP.
I've changed that this year. I now draft exclusively off of
my rankings, which at first I was doing just to sort of like
force me to keep. Tinkering with my rankings and
make me better. Which has been helpful I think
within like every day, but also it's it's meant that I just
don't see 80 of the players in the player pool.
So I I will have you know what higher percentages, which is
like kind of what I actually want, but like.
That's an issue I'm. Currently like 35% or higher on
like. 10 so I'm I'm having an issue with that too.
There are just some guys I literally never see.
Like I just, I just. Don't.
I don't think it's an issue I don't want.
I don't want to draft. Well, when you know the players
that you don't draft are literally the record-breaking
highest ADP advance rate players in the history of famous
football, it's a bit of an issue.
I don't believe based on what evidence, man, this, this panel
right here, these three of like, bro, I've been 7% of my teams
last year. There's very little evidence for
self belief. Jacob like I, you know,
sometimes you got to take it on the chin and have a.
Little bit of humility band called Chumba Wamba Davis.
I am of course. Right.
Like sometimes you get knocked down.
S 1 slate, buddy, just one slate.
We've had better slates. The yeah, that my thing with
like the 10 player, like over the years I've kind of tended to
be I've tended to be much more likely to regret like my medium
stance than my big stance. So like if I have a guy that I
think I should have like 30% of, I'm like rarely like what was I
thinking? Because I've put a lot of
thought into it. And even if it's wrong, you
know, I'm like, it's rare that I kind of like slept walk my way
to something like that. But I have slept my slept walk
my way a little bit to like 2324% type stuff which is where
I'm. I have a trying to refine that.
Right now, Corinne, I have a sleepwalking percentage of 23%
of Roshan Johnson right now. There you go and it's.
An easy click. He's an easy click.
I was gonna say it's totally defensible, right?
Like clear running back to an offense we expect to be good.
He should play some passing downs.
He should get some goal line stuff but he can also be sent to
like literal turbo nuclear 0 by like JK Dobbins just showing up
in Chicago. I'm actually very comfortable
with my 32% of ROSHA jobs today. No, it's fine.
I mean, but sometimes you sometimes you sleepwalk, right?
And then you wake up and you're like making a sandwich.
Well, and you're like, oh, sick. And then you eat the sandwich.
You know what I mean? Like you don't have to, but wake
up and check what you're doing and.
The. You know, and sometimes you
sleepwalk and, you know, you're, you're like my uncle once told
his future brother-in-law that he was going to kill him.
And as he was sleepwalking and the brother-in-law had come home
for the weekend and didn't know anyone would be in his room.
So, you know, that can happen too.
So yeah, you might. That's why I felt, that's why I
felt when I looked at my 35% Luther burden and then I got the
notification that he had a soft tissue injury that that I felt
like my nephew is in grave danger.
Yeah, yeah. So sleepwalking can go a couple
of different ways. It's good to just wake up and
check out what's going on. What a delivery.
So that can happen too. You know your uncle can tell
your brother-in-law he's about to die.
You know that can happen too. You know.
You guys guys, you guys want to know how little faith I have?
I only have I only have 18.5% of Xavier worthy.
Wow. Yeah, I have 0.0 but.
You're not taking worthy. I I take it way too fast dude.
In a puppy 1 so I I have a bunch of puppy slows.
I, I only, you know I worthy. Doesn't seem like a player
you're typically fading. Let's talk me through it.
Well, first of all, you know, I have to make time in my life to,
to go on various dates to find a woman to live with and listen to
the new pornographers. So I, I can only fast draft
BBMSI, just slow draft the puppies.
So there's some words in there. Oh you're saying you auto
drafted? Him.
Is that what? Is that what you were telling?
Me. No, no, I'm saying I I have
taken worthy. It just hasn't hit my my
exposures yet. Got it, Got it.
Got it. But no, I just he.
I mean, we've had the worthy discussion before.
I don't. Think yeah, you you plug, you
plug a 42140 into Jacob's model. And like I want I want like 35%
Travis Hunter, so I take him ahead of Xavier worthy every
single time. And then if I I also want like
35% of Breece Hall so I take. Yeah, well, that that's the name
I was hoping you were going to say.
You can just take. Breece like worthy if I ever
want well well, but I take well, I take breeze and hunter
together in like most of my drafts.
And then if I ever don't want to take hunter for some reason, I
will prioritize TAT and. 35% Travis Hunter is like flying the
slappy flag. Like it's like, it's like
approach like you're, you're, you're on your, you're on your
ship approaching the coast and you're trying to signal to
someone your intentions and you just slap up the 35% Hunter.
Exposure and they're. Like, all right, we, we know
exactly what we're dealing with, right?
Here 35% Hunter is like the slappy like guitar guy from from
from Mad Max on the on the truck.
It literally, it's like if someone ever asked me now, like
define slappy. I'll be like, just show me your
Diami Brown and your Travis Hunter exposures and I can tell
you exactly who you are. Buddy I have I currently have
42% by Shell Tooten 32% Trevor Lawrence. 32.
Percent Travis Hunter and 14% beyond the ground.
Duval. Yeah, I'm gonna.
I'm gonna win Duval the money. He's got his Colts.
You know it's Jacob. He's got his Colts with it.
Jacob is gonna be the world's number one Liam Cohen and Trevor
Lawrence Hayter when in Week 4. Hunter is running 17% of the
routes with two Ender rounds per game and Travis Mutien is
averaging 3.7 yards per carry on 22 touches a game.
Yeah. That's fair.
So yeah, you're right. This is how Jacob's getting his
cults. They can't draft the cults
directly, so there has to be bring backs on massive
Jacksonville exposure. That's true.
Whatever it takes, whatever it. Takes and I do.
I have. John Cohen is a Morton.
Joe Jacob a war boy. Yeah.
Oh, God. All right. 35% hunter is is is
that like even if you the the the band of outcomes doesn't
contain enough sees like I just I like Travis hunter.
I'm totally fine with this being a pro Travis Hunter show.
They're they're just I don't see the volume.
I think he's going to have some crazy spikes, but like, he just
is they're. Going to throw like 650 passes
and there's two players that are good enough to catch any of them
they they play at a high pace they're gonna have a high pass
rate. I like, I know that people don't
like Trevor Lawrence. This is like the big.
I just am a massive and always have been a Trevor Lawrence
believer and I'm very willing to just like ride or die with
Trevor in a good situation this year.
And if to me, like if Trevor just isn't good, then I'm, I
have just been like wrong about Trevor Lawrence for four years
and I can like fully. Accept that honestly I I think
the 35% hundred drafters are going to be like fist pumping
him matching Xavier worthy stats from last year.
That's my truth, Sierra. Yeah, I think if Travis Hunter
has 1.51 yards per out run, I would be pretty surprised.
No, his yards per out run will be better.
Because he's gonna run a lot of routes.
I, I, I just think like personally, and this is like,
obviously there's a wide range of outcomes.
It's like actually very easy to figure out how like this loses
me my best ball season. Yeah, that's the part that I
have a little trouble with with Hunter is that like you can
pretty easily see why. But we're all gonna lose anyway.
Like this. Like that just doesn't.
That just doesn't. Yeah, but I mean in the fourth
round. That's such a good point, Jacob.
Like to me, like I, I like This is why I take a high stand on
guys. Like I would rather just like
have the fewest number of things that I need to get right for me
to have an awesome season. So it's like I understand like
if Hunter is a massive bust, like my season's over.
But like I know that if Hunter and Bree Paul are awesome, then
like I will have an awesome season.
And I would rather just bet on those two things happening and
then we'll see where the cards fall.
Where they're only The thing is, is they're only awesome is if
the there are other round four, round three players that do do
not outscore them weeks 15 through 17.
Yeah, fair. But I mean, that's that's.
A big yeah, but the The thing is like you have big edges in like
terms of structure and building teams that are actually like
built to win the tournament and stuff.
So it's not like I feel like you're resorting to, you know,
like a player take thing that you don't have to if you're if
you're like, well, my season just rests on, you know, these
this third and fourth round pick like.
It doesn't have to rest on that than it's been in years past.
I think a huge portion of the field is just building their
teams correctly in terms of exposures and balancing.
Week 17 and everything. Guess you're not paying
attention to the Gilbert Arenas discourse.
No, yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm really like paying attention.
To RTA stuff has very much like influenced me to take larger
stands on on players. That's fair.
As long as there's not too much
of an overreaction to the running back, you know, crushes
from last year, I think I would agree with that.
Overall. Risers ready?
Yeah, let's do it, let's do it. It'll be interesting to see like
in August when the more like casual groups come in, how high
the running back ADP gets. I.
Am at the top of the list today. Christian McCaffrey, 13% from
pick 12:00-ish to pick 10. Also listed Jameson Williams,
George Pickens. These are the risers, 3 backup
running backs we'll talk about in some more detail a little
bit. Jalen Wright, Will Shipley,
Justice Hill, then Ricky Piersall, Josh Downs and Travis
Etienne. Here we go.
Like that is a player that people had said enough already
going into the 10th round and are willing to take that chance
more than even a week ago. Yeah, well toot and fumble once
in practice so you know, I got to re evaluate.
I, I have AI have a, an admission.
I, I in the in the puppy that is currently closed.
I, I'm in like 50 slows or whatever.
When I had a back half pick like 7 through 12 or whatever.
I just took McCaffrey every time because I'm like, I'm pretty
sure McCaffrey is going to get to the Bijan Gibbs range by like
July 1st. So I was just like, let me just
let me just get a good amount of these bags packed now and then I
can do more normal exposures on that later.
I think that's probably right. The McCaffrey thing scares me.
Like I, we've seen similar things, like last year, for
instance, with Cop was a player that like I became apparent he
was going to rise, but I thought he was a very bad pick at his
opening price. So I just didn't care how much
he rose cuz like I, I was like 0 worked for me and I, I've always
been, this is like more than I think you guys.
Like I, I acknowledge your point.
I, I won't, it won't change how I draft, but I acknowledge your
point that maybe I should have fewer 35% stands on players.
I actually totally disagree on the idea of the, the exposure
blanket. Like I actually like I'm very
comfortable zeroing players. So like with, with the Cub, I
didn't care with McCaffrey, it's a little bit more dangerous.
I, I do like totally see how he beats me and I think it's pretty
likely. So I probably would like to just
like squeeze in as much now as I can because I don't think I'm
going to want to draft him if he gets into like the 6-7 range.
Yeah, I could easily see him getting there.
He that's where he should go probably if you know, things
proceed like they look like they're going to so.
Yeah, McCaffrey or Gentie. McCaffrey could probably will
flip Gentie. I think most likely will flip
Gentie, yeah. That's the thing where like I, I
do like Gentie more. I have them ranked higher, but I
I have taken McCaffrey ahead of Gentie a couple times just
because I I do think he's going to flip them.
The, the problem that I'm having with McCaffrey and Gentie is
that like I think I just want Kuka and neighbors and Amanara
and Nico like at a pretty high clip.
And so as like with both of those guys, I used to just slam
Genti when he was anytime in the late 1st.
And then McCaffrey I was, I never quite got there in terms
of like the drafting behavior. I was like truly slamming him.
But I mentally was like, it's time to slam McCaffrey.
But now that they're moving up a bit, it's like, it's not that
they shouldn't move up, but I'm just like looking at the draft
landscape and I'm going to have an article out on my draft plan
this week. I just I just really want the
first round receiver in a lot of cases.
Might might that have something to do with a certain running
back that you like? 3 fourth turn.
Yeah, it does it. And I specifically worried about
Bree Saul in the draft because he's like a big part.
My whole thing is like, I'm like.
What? Can I get later in the draft?
Can I get like some? Can I get someone who's going to
like could be easily the top five at their position at
running back, Like, yeah, like I have a bunch of options
actually. And at receiver it's like a
little bit tougher, you know, to to see yourself like hitting on
a top five receiver and running back if you go running back and
then you know, try to grab the receiver in like the 4th, 5th or
6th. So.
And there's also Bowers there, Pat, maybe like in that same
region. Well, that there isn't Bowers
there now. He's he's in the middle of the
second, but he should. Be 206 there, yeah.
Right. Yeah, Well, that's the thing
that's been the big thing I've been experiencing was that there
I actually like a lot of the running backs in like round six
and seven more than some of the receivers, but I've basically
not been able to take them because I take a ton of Bowers.
I have 42% Breeze Hall currently, yeah.
And so it's. Like you know then if I.
Take and Bowers and Hall like I kind of just like it's like
Trigon Henderson, like kind of can't join those teams.
Like I can't really take like it's.
Like I think he can. Yeah.
And I've done it on occasion. I've done it on occasion, but it
it makes things a little bit more difficult.
It does. It's a little more comfortable,
but I think he can. I think he can be on those
teams. Is is kind of where I'm at?
Yeah, So I, I've, I've mixed in builds like that, but it's,
it's, it's I've taken more of the receivers in 6-7 than I
actually want to. So I, I have tried to experiment
with getting ahead of that. And sometimes I've just done it
where I just load up on the running backs early.
And other times I, I try to break ties to neighbors or Nico
or, or something or Brian Thomas.
Yeah. Yeah, this this group of
because, because like in the current environment, you know,
like last year, one of the big things that I took away was
like, it was not a good idea to get like boxed into taking a
bunch of Christian Kirk, you know, like, oh, I got to, I got
to, I got to take a receiver. Surely, surely I want to regret
sixth round Jacoby Myers. I mean just surely that's just
like really good and prudent ways to to use your hard earned
US or Canadian dollars. I just can't see any possible
way that that goes wrong for anybody.
Or this very top to just accept 9.9 half PPR points per game in
round 6? Yeah, I mean, and, and you know,
there's guys in that range that are like, like Calvin Ridley, I,
I have the whole pre draft period, I was like, this guy's
going to go on the fifth round as soon as I draft KM Ward
number one. I don't know why he's not going
there now. And now he's going in the fifth
round. He's got an ADP of 55.9.
But like I didn't I haven't seen him in my app.
Yeah, well, fair. And like good for you because
he's not. I don't think he's a bad pick.
Like, and if you're in a position where you need
receiver, like, you might as well get it done and take Calvin
Ridley. Like don't punt receiver.
But like, is he going to outscore the running backs
there? Is he going to outscore Joe
Mixon on the season? Is he going to outscore RJ
Harvey in the playoffs? Like not.
Going to happen. Just take the running back, you
know, like that's there's, there's a couple different.
Well, when you start, when you start doing that, it gets tricky
pretty quick because the running.
Back haven't you haven't you heard that the optimal IS0 wide
receivers through 7 Davis? So you know.
But that's that to me only makes receiver more important in round
one. Yes, yes.
You know that is that is the answer.
The the answer is literally that the most important players in
the entire pool are the top 8 wide receivers in the pool.
And frankly, I expect one of the best advanced rate structures
for the entire year to be wide receiver in the first round,
three straight running backs and then not picking a wide receiver
again until 5 or 6. When you when you realize that
Travis Hunter's gonna average 27 points per game in the playoffs,
then your wide receivers, you know you're just getting that in
round I'm. I'm interstellar window yelling
at you right now, but like in real time, like without the time
delay, like I'm like you're. Actually, you guys are.
Just yelling at me. Like I thought, like I
understand why YouTube commenters like and and Twitter
commenters hate me for this. Like I I expect that, but like I
thought you guys had like a little bit of like gumption in
your life and a little bit of like you're you were sadly, you
were sad. I mean, one of the most elite
talents to ever enter the NFL coming into this incredible,
terrible environment, Like, come on, have a little fun in your
life. I'm I'm taking TET man, if I'm
going to take receiver Breeze Hall there, give me TET.
Ted McMillan was the 8th overall pick and is like also in an
awesome situation for for just getting immediate, immediate
target volume and can like easily spike down the stretch.
Like I think I mean Hunter, OK, well, I mean, I don't see how
because you've got like 35%, this is a three player turn for
you. Yeah, yeah.
That's. A little.
Literally, that's correct. Yeah, by the way, let's not let
it be forgotten how Pat earlier, just a minute ago, used his
mocking voice on himself in the Christian Kirk example.
Yeah, yeah, the mock. I'm not safe from the mocking
voice. Past you gotta use it on
yourself. Yeah, past me has has made some
mistakes, you know. I just, I just think it's so
obvious how. Travis Hunter.
Fails that I don't want to have more than like It's also very
obvious how he. Succeeds like how he succeeds is
he just shows up and he's Odell Beckham junior and.
Then yeah, I think it's, I actually think it's less
obvious. I I think it's it's pretty like
self-evident. How less obvious it is is that
he's no ability to ascend to the top target the a la CD Lamb, a
la Justin Jefferson. I you know what you know what a
good comp for his rookie year. I think it's actually.
Pretty easy to see him ascending to the top target like he he
could just be one of the best talents in the National Football
League from the start. He was the second overall pick
with team traded a first round pick for he.
He was one of. The best players, he's not
better than BTJ. He's just.
Not he could have a he could have a much higher targets per
route run in part 'cause he's not going to run all the.
Routes, I was going to say when you it's a lot of As.
Marvel as Marvel, but like, why isn't he going?
Why isn't he going to run all the routes?
Like if he just shows up. He's going to play cornerback,
too. He's going to play cornerback.
She's also going to play cornerback.
That's going to last for as long as it's makes sense.
No, he's going to play cornerback too, like.
In corner. The the trade up is why he's
going to play cornerback like that.
You don't trade up like you know he's he's was not nearly as good
of a prospect as like Malik Neighbors or Marvin Harris.
We had this discussion like in like January and I, I just
disagree. I I think he is as good of a
prospect as these guys. Thomas wasn't.
So what? What would be the like
analytically? There's like no case that he's
as good as those. Yeah, I mean, analytically
there's I think his I think his stats analytically are very
underrated by the context of the offense that he was in.
How many four wide receiver sets they ran, how many like gimmicky
screens. He's just standing there
watching dudes. But like, so I, I don't like
really care that I I think it's just in terms of the draft
capital that he received. Draft company was always going
to receive the film on him. That I think is pretty
unbelievable how he moves as an athlete, what he was able to
accomplish. And then just like embrace a
little bit of the fact that this is like an incredibly unique
Unicorn who played both sides of the ball, was one of the best
players in college football on both sides of the ball.
And just kind of like if you just zoom out and think about
like what kind of dude is humanly capable of achieving
these things? And do I want to be in the side
betting on this Unicorn or against this Unicorn?
And I just like will always want to be on the side of betting on
the built different hall. Of fame members Jacob I'll I'll
tell you this if I had not been beaten down into a state of
submission last year I'd totally be with you but that was the
experience I had so I can't do it but you're you're clearly
your position is moral and just and if I was taking the
philosophically correct position towards this activity I would be
with you but I am a coward and we.
You're spooked. Well look, I mean I like I
believe Hunter is my highest owned or if not very very close
to my highest owned guy in the big board.
There's like this argument was one I was making when he was in
the 6th and 7th. I think when he comes up to the
3-4 turn, you do have to like I am embracing him as a Unicorn,
but that comes with he's going to play cornerback like they
they traded up to #2 because he's going to play both sides of
the ball. And so when I'm looking at his
rookie season production, is it a worthwhile mega stand at the
3-4 turn? You know, to be on a guy who I
would say is pretty unlikely to like be running 90% of the
routes at any point this season, you know, in some ways it limits
the ceiling a little bit. It's not that he like can't be a
better target earner than Thomas, but like they don't need
him to be the clear cut number one in the offense.
They can get. They can get something out of
him by playing him less on offense, which it just like
never happens for other receivers.
Like the fact that they can limit him on offense and get
more out of him as a player. It's just it's not ideal.
And at some point I want to like.
I also just, I, I just want to be clear, I have 17% of Travis
Hunter, so it's not like I think he's a a bad pick, but obviously
part of that is self selecting because Worthy is right there.
Guys, I mean, all, all the takes here are correct.
We just don't know what they're going to do.
We just don't. We have to find out what they're
going to. Do we just we just don't know.
We just don't know what they're. Going to do the last thing about
the hunter thing is that I just think that people consistently
discount how correlated it is, what his route rate will be and
how good he is like if he is not that exceptional, then I agree
with what you're saying about the route rate.
If he comes out in Week 1 and has seven catches for 110 yards
and two touchdowns, I don't think that they're going to be
like, well, let's keep his route rate down like they're.
Going down with you there and this is?
This is a good point. This is just like if he is one
of the 10 best wide receivers in the NFL then he's going to run a
fuck ton of routes and so I'm just betting that he is.
Right. But there's yeah.
And I don't like, it's sort of like the how right do you have
to be to win the bet thing? And it's like I just when I when
he starts to come up and it's like him versus Ted McMillan.
I don't do I need Ted McMillan to be one of the 10 best wide
receivers in the NFL to win the bet?
Like I don't I I'm going to be 20th any wide receiver.
To be one of the 10 best wide receivers to win a bat because
like otherwise, it's. Just no Ted.
Ted can running backs Ted can Kelvin Benjamin his way to 13.2
points per game in the back half of the season.
Yeah, I I'm talking about is he going to be drafted like 10th in
a, in a, you know, he's the wide receiver 10 where we blow up the
NFL and everyone re drafts. That's different than can he
score like the wide, like the 10th best wide receiver in the
NFL, right, Because, because guys who were like the 30th,
40th best receiver in the right situation can score like that.
So that's where I mean like, do I need Ted to be this incredible
talent or is the situation good enough?
And he's, you know, he's doing it down the stretch and he's
good. It's not that he's bad, but he's
just not like a true superstar. And I can still win.
I I think I can at this price. So you know it, it's about the
price for me. I'm at 14% hunter as well.
So this isn't a guy I'm like fading.
It's just the mega stand that I'm that I'm.
I mean, I probably. Won't actually finish.
At 35, I'm guessing I'll end up somewhere between 25 to 30 is
probably where I'm going to be. But I mean, well, that's if he
stays at the current price. I actually think he will move
down. I don't, I don't really worry
about stuff like that because then I just get to draft him in
in different. Comments.
You have different combos. So I do think he probably will
will move down and then my exposure might get even higher.
But I I take a lot of tete as as well.
I'm I think I'm well, I'm actually only 9% TAT, but I'll
probably decline my. 2 rookie numbers.
A little bit exclusively to get tat a little bit higher.
I, I don't know, I think that the Yeah, see.
I'm 33 tat that's that's my guy. OK.
Yeah, then. All right.
Well, then we're just going to end up doing basically the same
thing. In One of Us is going to have a
great year. I mean, it sounds like we, it
sounds like we might both have. I mean, it sounds like we're.
Both gonna be brief, says a Goodyear.
We're having a Goodyear. Yeah, we're arguing about this.
It sounds like our our plan at the 3-4 turn is not that
different. It's so such a rookie wide
receiver brief a lot of 1 rookie wide receiver and a little less
of the other rookie wide. Receiver arguing about 6%
differences is kind of a core tenet of this show sounds like.
It's the. Same plan with.
One. Yeah, it is.
I'm trying, I'm trying to get us back.
They they will be on the same field Week 1.
That'll be fun. I mean, actually, probably
literally if McMillan is going against Hunter and there's that
contested ball, we'll have a lot of takes in the opener.
Carolina at Jacksonville quickly.
Any of the other receivers here to win?
This bat, she shuts down tat and then he goes and scores up
right. Any of the other receivers on
the risers worth a quick mention here?
Jameson Williams? George Pickens?
Ricky Pearsall? Josh Downs?
I keep hearing the same thing on Downs, which I like.
I'm in on him just because he's good and the price is pretty
cheap. So happy to draft Downs.
Downs is a great pick. I I still think downs is like at
least 10 picks undervalued, maybe more like 15. 3036% Josh
Downs. Yeah, he's, he's Josh Downs is
just suffering from like, we can't, we can't perfectly
picture how it's going to happen, you know, And that's
fine. We don't need to know the exact
details of how Josh Downs score points this year.
He's good. He's good.
I do have to just concede to Davis.
I mean, I I think that you're you're wrong and he won't be a
good pick at this price. But clearly your argument on
Jameson Williams was incredibly convincing because this is 2
straight weeks of him on the riders list.
So I mean, Jameson Williams, actually.
Like I'm pretty scared of every decision I'm making this year,
like all I see. Is I'm aware.
I just like how could Jameson Williams possibly let me down
other than like like doing a nine leg FanDuel parlay from.
The You mean the guy with a career has 90 targets?
Yeah, I don't see how that goes badly in.
Room. Nah, he'll be fine.
I I just like, I feel, I don't know man, I just feel cool, calm
and collected when I click the button on.
Jameson. The thing with the Jameson
Williams, it reminds me. Of Travis Hunter, who's all
right? It reminds me of the DJ Moore
debate from a couple years ago where like DJ Moore and I was on
the pro DJ Moore side, but it's like DJ Moore can't pay off this
ADP. And you know, Leone was right.
Like he wasn't able to pay it off except he had a 50 burger
and had another couple awesome games.
So he like also easily like he was a terrible season long guy
who got there like huge and was actually like a pretty solid
basketball pick. So it reminds me a little bit of
that. It reminds me a little bit of
Gabe Davis. The year that Gabe Davis was, Oh
my God, putting. Gabe Davis in James No, No.
You know what? Dave Davis spiked a few times
that that year and the rest of the round was such a disaster.
He was an OK pick. Touchdown merchant 4th round
pick? Absolutely, absolutely not.
Yeah, Davis, none of this sounds like Jameson Williams to me.
No, this is the first round pick dude.
This is a guy we left for dead. Like you know how many?
Times What was the rule about when you say someone's a first
round pick in their fourth year? They're turbo dog shit.
No, no, it this. It's when a guy changes themes.
It's the Kayer Elam rule. It's when it's it's Kayer Elam
former. Jehan Dodson was the first round
pick. Should we draft him?
John Dodson has never been for one second what Jameson Williams
has been on the football field. These these these guys are these
guys are are not comparable players.
And anyway, not not draft capital.
What's your Kadaris tone position young joker?
Just has to mature. Treyland Burks is just dying to
break out. Treyland Burks.
You guys, I just I refuse to allow actually, if he's
efficient, he'll get the ball more to be a pro ETN thing and
then for Jacob on the other side of his mouth to say it's
actually bad that Jameson. Was just so.
Efficient. We're in a ETN.
Hunter I don't I literally don't even know that my brain like
I'm. Stroking.
Out right now doing this argument.
Hunter. Hunter Yeah, I will.
Do you know what I'll do this I'll I will offer you a wager
right now. Jacob 50 American dollars.
Jameson Williams I will offer, I will offer you either, you can
either have points per game or or total points or I will even
offer you weeks 1516 and 17 total points.
You can have any of those 3 terms.
Yeah, well, I will go with points per game because I think
that reduces my variance the most, but I'm quite.
Sure. Minimum.
Minimum 10 games. Minimum 10 games sounds true.
Booked. Put it, put it on the board.
Minimum 10 games of playing offense or just playing
football. That might be important.
If he's, if he's, if he's active in in coverage, it does.
It does. You might want a minimum route
rate. You might want to throw that in
there. No, we're good.
We're good. Next slide is a look at the
backup running backs who are highlighted here, Jalen Wright,
Will Shipley and Justice Hill all on the risers list.
Shipley is a Pat Kerain Last Call product from maybe the very
first week of our contest at the end of the show each week and
really nothing has changed for the worst there.
No, nothing. No, he's he's a straight backup.
Yeah, these are all fine picks. Jalen Wright, I think we are.
I think we're, we're sleeping on, on Mr. Wright.
The only way we're not sleeping on him is if you're a big
Alexander Madison guy. I don't think you have to be a
big Alexander Madison guy. You you could the answer can be
Alexander Madison. And I don't know if there's
certain guys every year where I'm like, well, there's no way
we. Created an.
Egg. We're we're saying, we're saying
in this in this analogy, Raheem Mostert is Jason Giambi and and
some portion of Jalen Wright, Ollie Gordon and Alexander
Madison are are recreating. The only problem is he's
Alexander Madison. So Wright has a couple things.
First, he could just be Mostert, right?
It's definitely possible. Two, he could be the he could be
the handcuff running back to a 186 LB player who has been
injured every single year of his career, right?
And then three, the whole market is just a little bit down on the
Dolphins based on their offensive line to like
weirdness. And I think we're kind of all
other than Tyreke, we're all kind of saying we expect
positive progression. Like the Dolphins are the 9th
best offense in the NFL. Jalen Wright is like a giga mega
smash like potential potential best pick on the board actually.
So my thing with Wright is that like that, that's where I, you
kind of lose me a bit because he wasn't good last year.
He wasn't. He didn't have a Yeah, so.
H chain was bad too. H chain was bad too.
Efficiency. Wise, yeah, but like HN was
getting all the work right. So it's like, you know, that
tells you something about the talent differential that the
team thinks they have there. He wasn't was he a third round
pick? It's not like he has a ton of
draft capital behind him. So he was.
A. 4th. But they traded a 3rd, 4th a
future year to draft him in the 4th.
OK, so day three guys. The Woody Marks trade,
basically. Right.
Yeah, bad as a rookie, more of an early down guy than a, you
know, someone who can work in as a receiver and then they draft
like another early down hammer type in Ollie Gordon.
They've got Madison. Like I was taking some Jalen
Wright earlier, but like the check in I have is like, is this
the RB2? Because if it's not, what am I
doing? Like, I don't think this guy's
good and and he really doesn't have much of A Moat to to a guy
like Alexander Madison. Like Alexander Madison could
easily be the running back 2 here.
We've seen Madison be trusted by by coaching Staffs like
repeatedly, even though he's not good.
So that's that's where I we ended up.
He's we're behind on him now, but it's just because I'm like,
I mean, I need the info. I think this is one of those
guys I need the info on. Is he the running back too?
Yeah. My concern too is that I think,
I think that he is probably the team's preference to be the RV 2
because he's the one that they invested the most in and and
obviously they liked him at least at some point in time.
But we've seen spots like this where this type of player might
start camp as the RB2, might even start the season as the
RB2, but does not finish the year as the RB2.
Like I remember the year that like Eno Benjamin was, was
finally the RB2. And then we were right.
And then he had like one really good week.
And then eventually they were like, actually no, like he's no.
I think off the field stuff with him though.
He was good enough. I remember there was another
example of like Chris Evans was, was the RB2.
He was getting really early reports.
He was clearly the RB2 and then like I think he had like AI
don't. Think we ever even have?
It's really in the offseason. And then it was like he, Ron
took over the spot and, and I don't know, I, I just get unless
I see something very concrete. Like right now all we have is
the coach speak where they said his name 1st and someone in the
chat already said this but like they asked him a question about
Jalen Wright and then he and then he his answer to the
question specifically about Jalen Wright said Jalen's name
1st and then named all of the other running backs.
It. Was not as bullish as as I think
people think that it was. It was like, yeah, it was like,
what do you think? I forgot what the question was,
but it's basically what's in store for Jalen, right this
year. And they were like, yeah, Jalen
and Devon are gonna. Have what's in store is also the
other. Guys.
Yeah, yeah. That's actually, that's a really
keen observation because we've gotten to a point where we're,
you know, coach speak, index, everything we're we're listening
to, we're reading the quotes. But it is important to also
sometimes know the question because without knowing the
question, it's not necessarily that indicative.
The answer is not necessarily indicative of anything.
But that might be an example where it is right.
I I can never click on Justice Hill because I like Keaton
Mitchell too much. I I like Justice Hill because he
serves a specific purpose that I often need in my running back
rooms, which is like. Jacob.
Jacob needs to. Know what his role is going to
be because like I yeah, because like I take a lot of like the DJ
Giddens, I take like obviously by shall Tooting on every single
team. I take a lot of Trevion
Henderson. So it's like it's nice for me to
have like one guy at the very end of my draft who I know has
like a reasonable chance of getting the 11 points starting
in in week 1. And I feel like his role is is
very secure, but he's a specific use case.
There's teams where I don't think he makes any sense on.
Yeah, I think he strikes in as more of like a redraft type of
guy. We're like I for the exact use
case you said. We're like, you're just like
plugging him in in week 1 and then you're like, oh God, like
I, I got to figure this out soon.
You're going to be scraping waiver wires and stuff to to
find running backs. But given the pricing on running
backs earlier that we talked about, like I'm tending to build
teams that are like I'm getting my chaperones a little earlier.
Basically, I think there's, there's a number of ways to play
that like you can, you can do it with, you know, mixins and the
breezes and, and those guys. So I think, you know, like I'm
not, I've never really been a mixing guy, but it's the price
is pretty good for, you know, trying to do advance rate stuff.
But then you also have like you got Chuba, you got Kenneth
Walker, you know, in into the 6th, into the 7th into the 8th.
You can, you can build, you know, those chaperone type of
plays out. So I haven't really been on
hill, but. I probably will be in redraft.
Let's move on to Fallers. Sorry to lose you there for a
minute. Brock Bowers on top of this list
with a still small change, but it's of course early draft
capital. Same with Nicole Collins and
Brian Thomas. At first I thought maybe that
was Mike Leone and Justin Herzig, but I'm told it's Brock
Bowers. And no, that's embarrassed.
Yeah. Hi, Mike.
This is I, I call this list the we're all trying to find the guy
who did this. And it's Michael Leone going,
you know, in the hot dog suit. He's like, why does no one like
rookies? Why does no one like players who
were 23 years old? And I mean, this is it's, it's
we all, we all knew what was going to happen, right?
I mean, the, the contest opens, everyone's like, dude, if I
don't get Amari and Hampton right now, I'm going to die.
And then by May 15th, you're like, I don't know, man.
Naji Harris, dude, they're paying him a lot of money.
Harbaugh You know, I mean, it's just, it's at like all of these
guys. It's absolutely classic.
Yeah, Hunter, let's let's see how that goes for you guys.
Brian Thomas, Caleb Williams, Omerion Hampton, Devin Neil,
Dylan Sampson and Luther Burden. Speaking of rookies that fills
out the list. Is there anything significant?
Well, you know, maybe Davis just said it all.
Is there anything significant to any of those changes between
like pick 11 and 16? Like Collins and Thomas are
following specifically because McCaffrey is rising.
Those are are that's a direct consequence of the McCaffrey
rise. I don't think that really says
anything about Collins or Thomas.
Nothing Burden got injured and is also rookie.
So that's that's a double fade. Hunter ran routes people didn't
like on Twitter and he's also a sloppy player and all of the
sloppy players are are falling slightly right now, which I
think is also what's affecting Brock Bowers is like you, you
get the slappies are a little bit more diluted in the pool and
now you get the people that are like a tight end the 1-2 turn.
Oh heavens. And so it's nice because
initially, like through, I mean just full, it wouldn't matter if
Brock Bowers ADP was the one-on-one.
There's just not like any world in which I was ever going to
have less than 10% Brock Bowers. But when it opened, it was very
difficult to like be like if I want to have a massively
overexposed Bowers position, like do I have to take him out
of Brian Thomas on occasion? Do I have?
To take him out, I was doing that.
Now and I and I was doing it and I don't regret it, but now it's
great. I can just take him like I don't
have to reach for him. I have never once felt remotely
conflicted about taking him ahead of like A.J.
Brown or LAD or HN. So if that's all I have to do to
get 1520% like rock, rock on. I think Brock Bowers is
legitimately just Aman Ross St. Brown with the tight end
designation, so I don't really understand why he's going
significantly behind him. But.
Works for how many? How many players do you think
had more receptions than Brock Bowers last year?
One probably like 2. Two Jamar Chase and Amin Ross
St. Brown.
Did you know that you had more receiving yards season?
Sorry. Oh no, you play fun facts first
then. I'll no you had more receiving
yards than Lad Mcconkey. So you want to talk about like
rookie like And who had a better situation Lad Mcconkey with 0
target competition in Justin Herbert or Brock Bowers who had
to play with Desmond Ritter in week 15?
Well, Bowers didn't really have target competition either.
Bowers had Jacoby Myers. It's better than enough.
Enough already. Every.
It's like I can't go anywhere without people.
Dude, Jacoby Myers is a good targeter.
Like I I know that you don't want to believe Myers.
I know you don't want to acknowledge reality because he
runs too slow for you, but like. He enough 20. 4%.
Of Kobe Myers, he goes Jacoby Myers is is is like you just
miss Shuster's transition period, you know, between being.
Yeah, that's what the Patriots thought, and look what happened
to them. No, Jacoby Myers, Jacoby Myers
can play. He's he's been good like every
single season he's been in the league.
He had he's not amazing, but like for a rookie tight end or a
rookie in general, he's he's I'm comparing him to Quintin
Johnston, man, like I'm comparing him to Josh Palmer.
Like this dude is clearly better than what Vlad Mcconkey had to
compete with for targets. And then at the same time he's
getting he's getting targeted by Aidan O'Connell at best.
Gardner Minshew. It has been read or like it was
and and and it's in a Luke Getzi offense and you.
Don't even, you don't even have to care if he's good.
It's 129 targets. Last year the point was
competition and it was 129 targets.
Myers, whether he's good or not. Yeah, so it's it's crazy.
Like what Bowers did last year is actually crazy.
And now the situation he gets Gino Smith like one of the best
quarterbacks for a guy who gets targets underneath and you know,
in the in shallow like yak, like this dude just fed JSN.
It's the JSN bet with tight end eligibility.
He's in a Chip Kelly offense. We know they're going to run a
ton of plays. Like they it's it's Pete Carroll
who's like a program builder like this stuff.
It's all moving in the right direction for this guy.
And we're like, I don't know, elite tight end hasn't worked
the last couple years, so not going to take him.
OK. Like I I truly like this is one
of the best picks we've ever had access to.
Like this dude is an insane pick right now.
Second year player coming off the best rookie season of all
time at his position and everything in the offseason
upgraded him and he's falling to the middle of the second round.
Like holy shit. It it is like I haven't heard a
single anti Bowers argument that makes any sense to me
whatsoever. I I would love to hear one that
like makes even the slightest shred of rationality for me.
But it is so strange. Like he had his rookie season
last year. 153 targets, 112 receptions, 1194 five
touchdowns. And again with the worst
quarterback situation in the NFL and a complete joke offensive
coordinator like Pooka, Takua's rookie season had six more
targets, 7 fewer receptions, did about 280 more yards and one
more touchdown. And that was one of the best
rookie wide receiver seasons of all time.
They play functionally the same position, like Bowers is an FY
receiver who has tight end eligibility.
Like him, Puka Aman, Rah St. Brown, Godwin, like these guys
all basically play the same position in an offense.
He has more receptions in his rookie season than A.J.
Brown has ever had in any season of his career.
If you're looking at guys that go like right next to each other
and it's like, OK, do you think that potentially a little bit
more yards, perception efficiency and touchdowns is
possible going from Aiden O'Connell and Minshew and Ritter
to Gino and Luke gets see to Chip Kelly?
It's like seems like the answer is like to me, obviously yes.
Like, yes, he can get a little bit more yards per reception, a
little bit more touchdowns. So it's it's absolutely stunning
to me. And I also find like anytime
it's both the receivers, Oh, Brian Thomas going into your two
neighbors going into your two lad going into your two, Marvin
Harrison going into your two. We're always projecting your two
growth for for young players as we should.
But for whatever reason, tight end, it's like, I don't know,
man, like he, if he does what he did last year, it's not going to
pay off. It's like, well, one, I'm not
actually that sure about that. And two, like, why is it he's
the only player that has no ability to progress?
It's a talent going into year 2. Like I, I just, it's, it's wild
to me. People are.
Saying any of these things. Yeah, that's why he's falling.
He's on the Fallers list. It's hardly a change in the
McCaffrey point. This is a pretty big change
actually that like when you're when you're talking about him
versus Nico and Brian Thomas to now where you're talking about
him versus A.J. Brown, like I think that's
that's a pretty big difference. And just like clear cut, like
give me Bowers over Brown London Mcconkey like this.
That's not close. That's not.
Close. Did someone in the chat point
out that it's the blue, it's the tight end, that's the whole
thing? I mean, I, I appreciate you guys
are hearing these sort of quote criticisms of Bowers.
But the comment section is like full of like, yeah, can we hear
the excuses when Bowers has 180 points this year?
Yeah, 0% Bowers. Good luck.
It's gonna be wild when Gino turns Jacoby into his JSN
instead. Like all this is is just like
powers the entire comments. Yeah, it's it's LaPorte.
I think LaPorte. Let's talk LaPorte quickly
because they think that's for like it is funny that probably
yes. The answer is people are snake
bitten by LaPorte. LaPorte and pits have scared
people. I mean, I would compare it more
to closer to pits where, you know, he had a really good
rookie season. They did draft Drake London
though. You know where he's he's got
Jack Besh coming in, but there is a rookie receiver coming in.
He's coming off the really good rookie season.
So you know there's a new. White wide receiver, tight end,
hybrid in town, brother. There's a new, there's a new F
in town. So I suppose, you know, it's
it's definitely possible that Bowers is not as good as I'm
thinking, but I'm getting like, we're trying to draft guys who
can win this season, who can, who can be like true league
winners. And like, yes, Pitts didn't work
out in his second season, but Pitts went above this, I'm
pretty sure, didn't he? Am I?
Am I crazy? I don't remember.
No, he didn't. He went in a few.
Three turn. But he also played a very
different position than Bowers. He's also like I love.
I obviously took too much pits that year but like his rookie
season was nothing compared to Brock Bowers rookie season.
Like it was 1000 yards. It was 1000 yards.
I don't think he scored a. 1000 yards, a touchdown in London
against The Jets. He was covered by a defensive
lineman. And he probably had like what,
60 receptions, 65 receptions? Like it wasn't maybe close to
the amount of volume that. Bowers earned was he 2021?
I'll pull it up right now. Like I'm guessing he was like 64
receptions or something. He had 68 jammed dude, 68
receptions. So he had like half the
receptions for 1026 yards in a touchdown.
And and the Bowers like he. Still pretty good rookie
deployment. Pretty good.
We're looking at the from a deployment perspective, the only
elite tight end who really has similar deployment is is Travis
Kelsey. He's the one that's closest in
terms of the role he plays in an offense.
Like Pitts was like a weird mix of playing Y tight end and X
wide receiver. Laporta, you know, comes off the
line sometimes, but Brown is really that F wide receiver like
St. Brown and and Laporta plays a
little bit more in line like. It's, well, the porta.
The Porta is the one, Laporta's the one where like at the time,
I didn't want to fade Laporta, but I did in parks.
I was drafting Kelsey and, you know, drafting other elite tight
ends, but. I did last year too.
I faded LaPorte. I thought Laporta was overpriced
because he like the archetype of the elite tight end is that he's
the number one wide receiver on his team with tight end
eligibility. Like that's the guys who have
have been truly dominant and Laporta wasn't that and isn't
that, but Bowers is like that's Bowers was immediately the
number one wide receiver on his team ahead of, you know, a
professional wide receiver, maybe not a great wide receiver,
but a professional wide receiver in Jacoby Myers.
And now he enters year 2. So you get the year 2 upside.
We could easily be taking Bowers in the top five picks next year.
Like it it could seem like a no brainer.
So the idea that there's no. Room to run from here he is top
five. Yes there is.
Yes, there is. On FSPC he is top five almost
always. Yeah, well, he should be the
one-on-one on FSPC. He should be the one-on-one
undisputed like I every if we're doing the ship chasing draft
this summer, like any time that we have the opportunity to
select Brock Bowers, I'm a vote for Brock Bowers.
Bowers and you're not going to get, you're not going to get any
argument for me, me and me and you are both going to be playing
the guitar on the front of. I was gonna say if if if Hunter,
if Hunter is the is the is the the guitar guy?
I mean what is Bowers? Is Bowers is above Hunter on the
slappy list? I mean I have I tweeted out my
dream four pick sequence that I do in like 25% of my drafts,
which is just neighbors Bowers Briefs Hunter, which is just
like the ultimate slappy for start.
Yeah, neighbors, Bowers Breeze Hunter is some serious slapping.
Yeah, you're a slap in the bass. Slap in the bass.
This slide on on the elite tight
ends Bowers the. Memory of Sam Sam Sherman.
McBride, Kittle and Laporta. McBride end of two fine I think
Kittle early 5th and Laporta late 6th with tight end.
What What I'm finding in my drafts is I'm always ending up
with at least three I get near the end, even if it's Hunter,
Henry, Gesicki, guys like that to tack on, whether that's for a
stack or whatever. Ingram and Joku, Tyler Warren
guys in the middle make sense. Just feel like I'd rather have
in general the bulk at the position but nothing against.
I mean at least Bowers and McBride, but I'm not ending up
with Kittle or Laporta hardly at all.
So I end up with a shit ton of Kittle.
I have 39% George Kittle. I have 21% Brock Bowers, I have
14% Trey McBride. So that's that's close to 100%
right there. Combined 74.
I only have 3% Laporta. I'm probably going to start
taking a little less McBride. I do like him a lot in a vacuum,
but you wind up like basically always able to get Kittle at
the. Fern.
And I definitely feel like the gap between Kittle and the
running backs and wide receivers at 4-5 in my ranks is much
bigger than McBride versus the 2-3 wide receivers and running
backs like a lot of the guys there.
So I probably, yeah, I probably want to shift.
I still want to be at or slightly above market on
McBride, but I I can't have that big of a position.
But Bowers and Kittle are are going to be big stands for me
for sure. Yeah, I mean, I'm a little
tournament bride because I like Harrison.
So it's, you know, he's got risk of like not being what I just
said. I want, you know, the, the true
#1 on his team with tight end eligibility.
But he he basically was that last year and he was a great
pick without scoring any touchdowns.
And Matt Irby had a piece for legendary upside identifying him
as a as a pretty clear regression candidate in terms of
the touchdown scoring. We we're like so confident that
like these guys who can't don't score touchdowns aren't going to
score touchdowns except like one of the guys we were confident
about last year, James Cook led the position in in rushing
touchdowns. So like, we're just, we know it.
We know it's like fluky and tough to predict, but like it
can it's kind of crazy, like how tough to predict it is like
this. This guy gets a lot of targets.
He's won his quarterback's favorite target last year.
It's very likely that he gets touchdown regression.
And I think compared to Kittle, like Kittle is a spike week bet,
right? McBride is like just he's a wide
receiver. You're playing at tight end
every week. You know, I think they were a
little bit different in terms of the archetype.
Kittle is one of my favorite picks on the board.
So I'm not like him in the fifth round is a no brainer.
But I, I get I'm struggling a little bit more with like how to
split it because I also really want McBride.
So have you done any teams where you take both?
I have. Bowers and McBride.
I don't know. No, no, no.
McBride and McBride. McBride and Kittle.
It's just so slappy, dude. It's like, it's just like, what
are you like real, like truly, what are you hoping for, man?
Jacob, you're. Hoping for ping pong and tight
end weeks and you're looking at McBride and you're looking this
is 150 target, 100 reception player.
Like what's really the difference between Trey McBride
and Rashe Rice? Like not that big of a
difference. What's really the difference
between? Trey McBride, you thought you
were going to win Davis with that, David.
McBride has a lot of Rashe. Rice.
All right, all right. He's going to the same turn as
Marvin Harrison and Trey McBride's like going to score
more half PPR points than Marvin Harrison.
Like that's gonna happen and they're going at the same turn.
They play the same amount now. Probably true, yeah.
Marvin Harrison's competing with Tip Ryman for Tight End 2.
All right, here's. A good Here's a good fan, I'll
take out the hate. It's it's at least very
plausible, if not likely, that Trey McBride outscores Marvin
Harrison in half PPR points per game.
They're going at the same turn. So like, I don't really get why
you can't take him and then take Kittle and one of them goes in
your flex a lot of the time. And you can also ping pong spike
weeks. Like I, I don't, I don't really
see why that's not viable, but because.
McBride McBride is a is APR merchant.
Trey McBride, This is this will be a good this will be a good
activity for everyone. Since 2008 to 2024, how many
touchdowns for Chair McBride, an organized professional?
Football I like, couldn't care less I've.
Never cared less. This is just not a.
Historical rate of touchdown scoring.
Like I tried to someone got into this fight with me about a lave
on. I just like don't care.
I don't care at all what's what happened, Jensen said.
He's going to run 100 yards and 16 and 20 touchdowns because he
knows how many yards he can get because that's sticky.
But Jensen understands that there's a range between 10 and
20 touchdowns because touchdowns are highly variant.
The the other thing is like it's you're saying it's like APR
merchant like that would imply to me that he's not an efficient
yardage producer, but he is. He's 2.03 yards per outrun in
2023 and 2.14 last year. That's.
Trey McBride is the Charizard of Dalton Kincaids.
Here we go. What's?
No give. It a give me a break.
No, this like dude, this is the easiest fantasy analysis we ever
have to do. Give me a guy who consistently
earns targets, who consistently produces yards on his targets,
and hasn't scored tight ends into tight end touchdowns in two
years. Like this is like 2001 level
fantasy analysis. Like oh touchdowns are not
sticky. These other stats are.
Maybe we should bet on this guy who's really good and just
hasn't been in the end zone in a while.
Like we, we can't do this. We can't fall prey to the like
the easiest fantasy analysis ever and just miss it.
Like come on, like. Like among all wide receivers in
tight ends last year, Trey McBride ranked 26th in yards per
out run, ranked 4th in receptions, ranked 11th in
yards. So like if he was just a wide
receiver? I don't totally get why he would
be mispriced at the 2 three turn and like to me, the argument
against tight ends that has been I still don't really think
proven when you talk about playoff effects in one week
tournaments right, But what what has been which?
Is kind of what? Has been legitimately borne out,
at least over the aggregate of a full season in basketball
scoring, is that, yeah, you probably don't want to take
tight ends who will score fewer points than wide receivers and
then justify it on the basis of scarcity.
I still think you kind of can when we're talking about playoff
weeks. But over the full season that
that's been proven pretty true. But now it seems like people are
trying to go the opposite way where they're saying, actually,
even if they're going to score the same amount of points, I
just want the wide receiver anyway.
And I don't really think that that's borne out in anything.
So like I, I don't if Trey McBride just changed his
positional to wide receiver, he would be totally fine.
Like it. Like, you know who else is APPR
Merchant? Rashi Rice, who I will draft
like 25 to 30% of this year. But like he is also a player who
is going to average 10 to 12 yards per reception, rack up 150
targets and score 8 touchdowns. Like I, I don't understand
really what's the difference between these two players?
Yeah, by the way, let this this is going to haunt me forever.
I took truth serum one day and I and I didn't question it once,
but I did. I was overweight on McBride.
OK, slightly. I took more Mark Andrews.
One difference for me is that I don't like maybe is the the as
Jacob said, the player, the options at the 2 three turn
maybe as much as as you do Jacob or in general like I don't
really want to be drafting T Higgins or Jacobs.
So I have a lot of McBride for that reason too.
Yeah, I I think he's he's much better than the than the water.
Like to me wide receiver kind of hits a tear after Lad Mcconkey.
So now. I agree with that I but McBride
is a fine pick by the way, but slapping those two together I
think is is bad. Slapping them together is is not
my favorite thing either. I think the yeah, the thing I'm
maybe going to try to do with McBride is push him to the third
like a little more to try to get more kittle.
But. There's something but what's the
what's the difference though, between because like the guys
who go with the two three turn just go in any order there.
There is like T McBride or or Wilson like it just it it like
literally does. Them it's, it's honestly just to
try to get Les McBride so that I can get more Kittle.
That's all I'm trying to do, yeah.
But I I mean. McBride is a great pick, so
that's that's why I struggle with it.
Let's skip the quarterbacks for this week because another, you
know, key thing is that we get to the subject that we said we
would either in the right in the tweet or in the open and that
was I. I do have the heart out in 30
minutes also. Well, we got 30 minutes to
discuss the five most difficult to rank teams.
Yeah, well, let's narrow it before we get to the last call.
I asked the guys. Give me 5 teams that are maybe
the most puzzling or, you know, challenging.
And again, like I mentioned the beginning with Pat, I, I said
backfields, but we were just talking about offenses.
Doesn't matter there. There were four teams that were
mentioned by you three guys more than once, Dallas, Chicago, San
Francisco and Jacksonville. And we kind of already did
Jacksonville, if not also San Francisco.
But Dallas. Like if you knew the answers,
wouldn't you love to know what that backfield split is?
Where the will there definitely not be someone else brought in?
I don't know, like that's who what I guess maybe Pat and Davis
mentioned. No, yeah, Pat and Davis both
mentioned Dallas. So.
Right. Davis what?
What's the you know, what's the bottom line?
I mean, I feel, I feel with the degree of reasonable certainty
that one of the three Cowboys running backs is going to be
like an advanced rate supercharger in a way that like
Rico Dowdell would have like kind of I guess Dowdell kind of
was last year, but got outscored by so many other running backs.
I think that. Depends what your advance rate
was heading to like week 13. How low was it?
Was it as low as mine? Right.
And then if you're yeah, he was certainly a supercharger.
Well, you know, it's funny is the Barclay, the Barclay drafter
would have a great job. Of turning a lot of my 10th
place teams into 6th place teams.
I was going to say the I was. The Barclay out of some Rico
Dowdle, Joe Burrow teams in Week 14, I'll tell you that.
The Barkley, Henry, Kamara drafters were taking Zeke.
So they didn't get to. They didn't get.
It from the. Rico points I would say right
now. You made me absolutely bet my
life on it. I think it's Javonte.
Oh God. But that is like, that's what
I'm saying. I can't.
I can't live on this. I can't live on that.
This is not Davis that I agreed to podcast with.
I'm podcasting with like fantasy Bros Jeff, who's just like out
here, like fucking counting up the box score.
And it's like, who are you now? What happened?
Who my my skin in the game. My skin in the game answer is I
have 17% Jaden Blue, 4% Javonte, 1% Mile Sanders.
But man, what is what is Jaden Blue's path 'cause I I wish
Jaden Blue was Holly Gordon or I wish Jaden Blue was by?
Me too. I wish it was a guy.
DJ Giddens. DJ if it was Giddens.
Some Cowboys just swap running backs those two picks back to.
Back It would actually be bad if it was DJ Giddens, 'cause I'd
have so much Steve Brown Giddens like I would be.
It would be an outrageously bad pick and I would have a bag.
Even Martinez would have been good.
If it was Dave, if it was Devin Neal, I would for the first time
ever have drafted 40% of a player.
I think if it was Devin Neal. Devin Neal would be so fun.
I wish they did. Just.
Fun. Then you would have a little bit
of joy in your life. Like I would see the twinkle in
your eye again. I have some twinkle in my eye
when I take Brashard Smith in around 18.
That's that's. My, that's a fun one.
That's the sloppy allowance I'm giving.
But I only do that because Reebs told me it was OK, because Reebs
was like, Reebs is like these guys, all these guys all suck,
dude, You know? So just yeah.
On this show, when we talked about it maybe a month ago, Pat
said maybe Sanders is the answer.
And I think I probably have more.
I know I have more Sanders than Williams.
Jacob, you agree? Yeah, I I think Javante is a
really bad pick because I think he's a really bad player.
And I just think like he got the entire role last year in Denver
and he he wasn't worth this cost.
And and he was in a very good situation by an elite run
blocking the line and he got the fifth most targets of any
running back and he did literally nothing with it.
He had like one helpful game. So to me it's like if the answer
is Javante, then the answer is is nothing meaningful because I
just don't see a path for Javante to be more than like a
eighth or ninth round pick value.
So I just don't even care about Javante.
He's like off my board entirely. So the the question is just
like, is the answer someone else?
If the answer is mile standards, that's also probably not that
valuable. But he's an 18th round pick,
right? So he has a much lower threshold
to be valuable. So I'm pretty into that.
And then with blue, I'm like torn somewhere between like I
heard you guys argue about it on, I guess I think it was ship
chasing about blue kind of Davis and pack going back and forth
and I'm somewhere between the two of you.
Like I do think blue is actually a good player, but just only in
like a very hyper specific role. Like I, I think he is just like
specifically good as like a Nahim Hines and there's not that
much more of a there's, there's there's only so much room to go
above where he's drafted. That's particularly exciting.
So I don't think it's quite the same level of upside that Dowdle
was. I I've taken the most of him and
Sanders, but I, I do think that frankly, This is why I didn't
include Dallas on my list is I think that the passing game is
very not interesting. I think we all kind of know how
it's going to go and the running game.
I think it's going to be 1 of Javonte or Sanders in a
committee with Jayden Blue and Blue is going to be like an
average pick. And then either Javonte is going
to be an average pick or Mile Sanders is going to be a pretty
good pick. And I think that's how it's
going to go. Yeah, that's, that's fair.
I I, I've just spent a lot of time kind of thinking about the
Dallas backfield. And it does.
I mean, the blue thing scares me because I'm not.
I'm having trouble getting excited about him because like
you said, I think he's kind of like Naheem Hines esque.
Do you read that Schottenheimer quote I posted yesterday?
Or. On Sunday, basically it's I just
thought it was really interesting.
Obviously he mentioned Javonte and Miles Sanders is like the
quote UN quote, like starters or whatever.
I thought the interesting thing was that he also mentioned Phil
Moffa and Jaden Blue like at the same level, which someone in the
responses was like, oh, did we learn anything from this?
This is exactly what you'd expect a coach to say.
The amount of times I've heard a coach mention the Round 7
running back, I mean, frankly, I'd actually don't really
remember the last time. Like have we haven't gotten any
Laquint Allen quotes yet from, from Liam Cohen, right?
But we've heard him talk about about Tooten.
That is a that is a a bad spot for Blue to be in, in my
opinion. Yeah, especially because like
the thing that I struggle with with Blue is like, I wish he was
Ollie Gordon, a player who I'm not that excited about, but is
like a big early down guy, you know, like I just, I've missed,
I've missed on the running back I didn't think was very good,
who rocketed up, right, Damian Pierce, when he was really
cheap, I didn't have enough. And then he was kind of in the
range of Blues going and I didn't have enough.
And then he ends up like in the seventh round, I think as a
rookie by the end of the summer because it was just clear he was
like the starter and was never honestly that bad of a pick at
any point because he was the starter.
And then Pacheco, I got a little bit of, you know, I learned a
little bit, but I didn't wasn't nearly aggressive enough on his
rise. And you know, he he was actually
better as a second year player. But but clearly, you know, that
info was correct that he was that he was going to be the dude
blue. We feel I feel like we're maybe
like moving ahead of the we're not getting the buzz.
So it's like us anointing him, which is part of why it scares
me. But it all.
But I am also worried that I, I don't want to do the same thing
I did with those guys where I'm like, wow, this guy's not very
good, so I'm not going to take him.
And then like, could he be an eighth round, seventh round
value? Like, sure, yeah, I mean, this,
this backfield's wide open. These these guys is competing
with suck. So I, I'm, I'm kind of like, I'm
just really torn on what to do with blue.
Oh, they're pretty far out over our skis, but the opportunity is
also. There.
So there's another thing I need to mention.
Two things, actually. The other is that Schottenheimer
clearly loves Hunter Lupke. He.
Yeah. Yeah, Lupke.
In his. Group and Turpin is going to get
some some like Patterson esques, right esques.
I know he's much smaller. But you know, the bigger issue,
though, in my head is because we've all, I think we all kind
of agree blue is like sort of this Nahim Heinzi passing down
back. Well, Miles Sanders last year
for the Panthers, that was his role.
He was. Well, that's Javante too.
Javante's A. I know.
Look, you guys, you guys don't want to hear it.
No one wants to hear it. Javante Williams is getting 16
touches week one for the Dallas Cowboys.
Notice he didn't. Do anything?
No, I, I, I don't, I don't listen.
I'm not hearing. That opening night.
Like I, I have no dispute to that.
I, I guarantee you like when I'm writing the Hitchhiker's Guide
in season that the Tuesday morning after week 1 I will
write. Javonte Williams played 57% of
the snaps and handled 62% of the touches.
Unfortunately he broke 0 tackles and had 3.1 yards per touch.
Like that's that would be what is like I'm writing on.
That and and And Hunter and Hunter Lupke got the lone goal
line touch out of the Dallas backfield.
Yeah. Yeah, I was going to draw.
It was. Healthy and active.
But actually, if you think about how bad Javonte is, there's
reason for optimism like. That I was going to try a Davis,
Devante Williams, 16 for 61 and two and a 3419 opening night
loss to Philadelphia, now going in the eighth round at the FFPC
Friday. What?
Dude, FFPC. Boomers if they saw two
touchdowns. From Devante fourth round.
Evening fourth round. Fourth round, Jacksonville,
Chicago, San Francisco, The others.
Jacob, I'll leave it to you because you didn't have Dallas
on your list. Like you said, the Bears.
What? What are you?
What do you want to find out? I mean, the Bears are like
fascinating because we have no idea what's going to happen with
any of their pass catchers there.
They have, you know, essentially 5 pass catchers for four spots
and someone's being left without a chair.
And everybody like the underdog ADP would tell you it's Cole
Comet. But I don't think anyone would
actually be surprised if we show up in Week 1 and Cole Comet
plays 64% of the. And so it's I think it there's
also like this fun thing where everyone there is very
interesting, but also no one there is like provably awesome.
We have like a a good but not elite DJ Moore, who's coming off
a disappointing year and is going to be 29.
We got like a mystery box year, two player in Rome and two
rookies and a quarterback who could be anywhere from one of
the best in the NFL to a complete bust.
And no one really knows. And then you get this running
backroom. And Ben Johnson's a hard ass
now. I thought he was too soft to
coach. Right.
And then you have this running backroom between two guys that
no one likes, but everyone like kind of agrees that like, if
these are the only two guys, one of them's got to be like an
awesome pick, but they might sign JK Dobbins at any moment or
trade for someone. Like it's it's fascinating.
If I could know the outcome of any team, I think I would choose
the Chicago Bears because there's just such a wide range
of outcomes. And I don't think like the
Jaguars to me, because I'm a, I'm a big Liam Cohen and Trevor
Lawrence Slappy is a, my view is like, Thomas is awesome.
And there's also going to be a big winner in the backfield.
And I would love to know if Hunter's going to be awesome.
But I'm like, some people are going to win big.
I actually think with the Bears, like all options are possible.
I think like almost everyone could win.
I think everyone could lose. I think there could be like a
couple of big winners and a few big losers.
Like it feels like every single element of this offense is on a
range of outcomes. Yeah, I think if the thing
that's cool about the Bears is that like or that's really
interesting about the Bears is like a lot of teams.
If you just told me like the snap rates, right, like rap
percentage or just like, yeah, give me the snap shares of every
starter. I wouldn't learn like that much.
You know, even even with the Cowboys, like I'd learned
something, but I'd be still be like, I don't know if Gibonsi
was a good pick, you know, because the snaps aren't enough
the the bears. Like if if swift just plays,
he's a good pick, you know, like he my concern is that he just
doesn't play because he's bad enough to get benched for
Roshan. But like, if you tell me he's
the dude, If you tell me like, which of these receivers is out
there, like running, you know, the the full rate of of snap,
like someone in this, I think there's going to be winners in
this offense. Like in a big way, it's a Ben
Johnson offense. Someone's going to come out of
this at these prices and be and be a pretty awesome pick.
But there's just a lot of guys. I just wanted to say, like for
all the time and energy we put into trying to read coach's
minds and through the offseason, DeAndre Swift has been somebody
where so much of the discourse has been about whether his
coaches like him. Remember, what do Staley and
just sort of what he means to coaches and this coach who is
all that goes there and they do not draft anybody to come in
over the top. We would have assumed even a day
two pick would come in over the top of DeAndre Swift I think and
that did not happen at all. So that probably says something
good about Johnson and Swift. But then they wanted to, right?
Because the report was they. Were like.
Like Matt like super tilted that trivion Henderson got sniped
from them. But then how do you not end up
at one of these? Because.
Because running backs, because running backs don't matter and
they're going to throw the rock around the yard is is the real
answer. But the thing that's so if you
look at Swift's stuff as a rusher, he is bad and kind of
getting worse. He had the worst success rate in
the league last year, like by like pretty decent margin and
he's had a bad success for like every year like this dude is.
He's just constantly looking for the boom bust runs, but it's
just like a bunch of bust, you know, He doesn't, he doesn't do
it frequently enough. So he, just like the coaches,
lose faith in him. He's also not that explosive
anymore. He's not that.
Exposed, like he used to have like big hits.
Whereas I remember with the Eagles, which is the year that I
actually had a lot of swift and I remember like he would
breakthrough the line and I'd be like, oh, we're getting it.
And then he would get like tackled after 16 yards and be
like, Yep, but. He's OK as a receiver.
That's like where I, I do think like if they're going to, I
think I can win the bet on Swift at this price.
If he just like holds on enough holds on for dear life as a
runner and is like a pretty good receiving back, which you know,
like you look at the receiver rating ESPN last year he was
running back 8. You know, he's he was right
behind Rashad White. It's sort of like it's the
Rashad White bet from a couple years ago.
There's no from his second year when there wasn't a Bucky like
that. That's like kind of what it
reminds me of was like, we have now pretty good evidence this
guy's not a good runner, but. How many how many people know
that DeAndre Swift's best ever yards season was last year?
Do you think? Do you think anyone even
realizes that that? Actually doesn't surprise me
because it was I think the healthiest he's ever been.
It was the only season he's ever played every game, yeah.
The Bears just did not do anything about it.
You know, whether the the question of whether he's good or
not is I think been long established.
But the Bears are OK, I think, with DeAndre.
Swift I I think it's a, it's a measure of growth for me that
I'm not trying to make Kyle Manungai happen.
I'm just like, you know what? I think it's, I think we're, I
think I'm good. I'm good on Manungai, you know.
I I've read from our comments said I think Kyle Manungai gets
the first shot at early downs which is like.
That is just like you, you've you've gone so far in the slap
reverse that like you, like you need to come all the way back
around again. I just there's no helping.
There's no helping the the Manungai people really.
There's probably no helping the Jaden Blue people either.
I mean the thing with Swift that I which is the difference
between like Javonte and Swift for me is that Swift is bad but
he is fantasy friendly. So I've dipped my toe into the
Swift pool. He's also a little explosive.
I mean, yeah, exposive enough to make up for his inconsistency,
but he's explosive, right? He is explosive and he's a good
pass catcher and he like has enough size that he can not like
be like a true workhorse, but he can be like a quasi workhorse,
totally kind of like somewhere in between.
So it's like if, if, if a team like I've always this is kind of
I've always been a little 1 foot in one foot out with Swift.
It's like, yeah, do I think it's a smart way to build an NFL
running backroom to make Swift your your clear lead back?
No. But if you do, then he scored a
decent amount of fantasy points, yes.
Whereas Javonte, I think, has reached a point where he just is
incapable of having like more than 3.5 yards per carry.
So I kind of don't really even care how many touches he gets
loaded up with because he's just going to be so inefficient.
Swift is what Pat pick 80 like. It's not too costly.
Yeah, he's pick 82. Yeah.
And I think he's like, he's a target there.
I do. I mean, he's not like I'm
dropping everything to get Swift, but if you need any kind
of running back help, he's the thing with Swift.
Is he will. Yeah, he has a ceiling.
Swift has a ceiling. He's in an offense that we're
excited about. They could take a big step
forward. He could be the clear 1A, you
know, maybe even a clear like lead back.
He's not going to be a true workhorse, but but to Jacob's
point, he can handle enough of it and he's the receiving guy
and he can hit long run. So I think he's got a weekly
spike week ceiling as well. You know, just hoping he he has
the long runs in the right week. I, I, it's not a fun pick, but
I, I do think he makes sense. And I've kind of gone and
reviewed some of these, these grocer picks.
Like I was looking at Pollard yesterday and I was like, yeah,
maybe we're a bit hot there. Like he's the efficiency.
He's not really been a good receiver in recent seasons.
He's got a receiving back that he's sharing with a bit.
And, you know, so I'm like Swift or Pollard.
I'm Swift after looking at him. Really.
I'm Swift, yeah. Yeah, I'm Pollard.
I I would definitely be Pollard. Yeah, I mean, I get it.
It's. They're just 'cause I think
he's, I just think he's a lot better.
Like I, I could see Swift still getting, like I could still see
Swift getting replaced by like basically anyone, 'cause I think
he's just exists at the pleasure of his, of his coaches.
Pollard like stuff for me. Yeah, he.
Doesn't have country Pollard. Could have caps and passes too.
I mean, they don't really have anyone out there outside of.
Spears. I mean, Spears can be.
Able to catch passes Spears. Yeah, no, space is fine.
That's like his thing He was he was running back five in
receiver rating last year. Like he's Pollard was dead last.
There's there's like I'm just feeling yeah, Pollard I think is
more I was like before literally yesterday I was Pollard over
Spears, but I was just like digging into it more and I'm
like, I think this is kind of A2 down guy who's we're like
betting on him to get loaded up with touches again, like he did
last year, betting on the offense to be better with Cam
Ward. It it's fine.
But also like I I don't think he's like as far as the three
down type of upside bet goes. It's really thin with Spears
there and with how good he's been and you know, specifically
not good he's been as a receiver.
So I kind of flipped it. But the to to the point of swift
losing his job to anybody. I mean, Roshawn Johnson I
started kind of lukewarm on. I do think is a really strong
pick. Very, really good.
You know, Jamal Williams type of you know, like just gets there
on touchdowns type of upside with him.
He's big, he's he's he can he can play on pass.
But you talk about like, where does Swift suck the most
consistency? Like right, but it's the right.
Well, sure. He's a massive liability pass.
In a few ways. Like he's he's like one of the
worst pass protecting running backs I've ever seen.
That's Roshan. That's Roshan Johnson's music,
brother Roshan. Like that's why when he was,
he's a good pass catcher, but when he was in Detroit with Ben
Johnson, he lost third down to Justin Jackson because he can't.
Pass. Right, Right.
Yeah, That's true King, our king.
That's true, our king. But.
It's also funny like one of one in the chat says find someone
that hates you like JK hates you.
Andrey Swift. People don't know this, but I've
been solidly above market on John Trace, Swift and basketball
exposure each of the last two years for the reasons I'm
saying. Which is like, despite hating
him as a player, I acknowledge the fantasy appeal.
That's been kind of a theme today.
That's been kind of a theme today, talking pro or con about
a player at length. And then at the end of the
reveal is I actually have the opposite share percentage than
you think from what I've just been saying.
Well, Swift is a guy who used to like the Swift profile used to
cost you a fifth round pick and we would gleefully fade it.
And I'm like annoyed that I don't get to do that.
But I have to like take him now in the 80s.
It sucks. But the way I'm kind of getting
over it is I'm also taking Roshan Johnson, who to your
point, I mean, I'm underselling his ability to be kind of a high
value touch king. He could he could be out there
on 3rd downs in all short yardage, which seems pretty
good. And I don't know.
I mean I guess I don't know for a fact he's the RB2, but I'm
willing to bet that he has a Moat between himself and
Kalmanong guy. That doesn't seem crazy.
And then it's like I'm now I'm fading JK Dobbins signing.
But wouldn't that have happened by now?
Perhaps let's jump to last call here if we can, we'll talk about
obviously these other running back situations.
All summer there is the grid. It's been rough for Jacob in
recent weeks. He's been, you know, scrambling
to come up with a Plan B after I take his guys.
If you want, Jacob, lead us off. I don't have anyone fun this
week, but I I will. I guess I will take 22 Atwell.
He's been a guy that I've been mixing in.
I love the Dome, the double Dome game, the horny Phoenix in week
17. Just like AI think it's a pretty
decent chance he's just running, you know, 60 to 70% of the
routes this year based on the money he got based on they don't
really have an obvious like to me, a three wide receiver set,
excuse me, with Whittington, Adams and Puka feels kind of
slow. So I would want to involve 22IN
that instead. And he's going to have a fantasy
favorable role, especially a basketball favorable role.
So he's like kind of a fun him and Diami Brown are like guys
where if I have too many rookies in my wide receiver room and I
want some just going to get routes, I I click him a decent
chunk. So I'll I'll add him today.
Returns too. I want to eventually get into a
conversation with you guys about returns because the league is
making more moves toward hoping to get more big plays out of
that department. I like I, I take, I take Atwell
quite a bit. I I've got a giga Slappy 1.
Oh hell yeah. Jermaine Burton.
Wow. Nice.
Joe Burrow after I called him Fantasy Bros Jeff, he's gone
back. Joe Burrow.
Like specifically?
Is Jeff real? Do we have to apologize to Jeff?
No, I, I if I I'm sure that there.
Is, but that guy would be named fantasy.
Bros named Jeff. OK.
And so I apologize if there is a person named Jeff who works at
Fantasy Bros. I don't know that to be true.
I just thought of like, what's the most generic and offensive
name you're making? It worse for Jeff now.
It's getting worse. I think it's.
Hard to call you out Jeff, but you just sound generic as fuck.
Now all Jeffs are offended. Not just fancy pros Jeffs, but
all Jeffs. Yeah, Burrow Burrows
specifically was like Jermaine Burton.
You know, he's in meetings, he's doing a good job, yadda, yadda.
So, and it allows me to fade who I think is probably the worst
late round. Click on the board.
Andre Yoshi, boss. Yoshi boss?
Yep, the I. Don't see.
So as we know, you know, zeros can be kind of tough in
basketball mania. But this is this game's early,
you know, we haven't done the analysis.
There's no Leonie's manifesto on Last Call so.
I can get on him about that. I can swing for the fences here
and take some zeros. I'm going to go ahead and take
Taj Brooks. Nice.
Good good game theory pick because he he will probably not
be eligible for this game if if something breaks his way.
If something breaks his way, he'll rise.
You guys will be snapping him up because I never make these picks
until the end of the show. You guys will you guys will be
early to, to, to make it before I even think of him.
So I'm just I'm taking him now because I, I do think he has a
lot of potential to, to make noise this summer.
Oh. My God, Pat Bryant used to be in
the two hundreds. Oh, that was right after the
draft. I see.
Yeah. Wow.
Yep. Getting it in good.
We didn't get to this team on Pat's list, but I'm gonna take
Blake Corum, who's down at 2:02. Damn.
Yeah, insanely nice work, Mike. Just in just in case, right?
Just in case. It's a great one.
That's a great one. I like Hunter more, but yeah,
OK. We're going.
We're going head to head on that, yes.
I don't know that you you are like in an injury.
Wouldn't it be a committee of Quorum and Hunter?
That's true. We don't know, right?
I mean, even when we're talking about we're talking about
Dallas, all these quotes are based on expectations and what
coaches have in mind, but they haven't seen them on the field
yet. So once they get on the field,
like not just mini camp, but July, August, a lot of course
can change, You guys know? Yeah, specifically, JK Dobbins
can get signed one thing they actually have.
There's one thing Davis. Where are you off to?
Is he? Going to sign something I am
playing on with that. He was fine last.
Year he had nine. It's like post, they have to,
they have to. He has to get past this weird
Chargers tag and then I think he can sign wherever, no?
I'm A tag brings him back to the Chargers I thought.
Yeah, it. Doesn't but it it expires, but
it no, it expires. I think he's going to sign JK
Dobbins is going to sign. I thought it.
Expires with him going back to the chart.
I thought the expiration is what makes him better.
Is that the same thing that Elijah Moore had with the
Browns? Davis and then the Bills signed
him away. So I think that's mid June.
Yeah. Correct deadline.
I have to go do this whole cast so I will see all of you in 5
minutes over there later. Thank you, Jacob.
What's going on with you this week?
I. Think I'm going to get back in
the right and right and chair. I've been sort of resting on
ranks and the the massive stream of post draft content, but I got
some stinks kicking around. I'm definitely going to do a
piece soon that is kind of similar to what we talked about
today where I'm just going to highlight what I think are the
most high variance backfields. So we'll get a lot of Jaguars
talk, a lot of Cowboys talk and Bears talk.
That'll be out probably within a week.
Pat. I have a draft plan piece coming
out this week wrote got the the first draft finish last night.
So I'm just kind of going round by round and thinking through
like, what can I get later? Is kind of like the the little
simple framework for for trying to stay, you know, structurally
minded in the, the current ADP environment, which really is
shaking some things up. You know, like, you know, where
where is the dead zone now? It's kind of the dead zone is
like attached to specific running backs rather than being
like a a true pocket. But you know the but the
quarterback window seems very alive and well.
So I kind of go through all of that.
I'm going to be on with JJ Zacharyisen in about an hour.
So so check that out. We're going to be talking
DraftKings best ball and have a a stream.
I'll be streaming with Zach and shady at some point talking
through some some of the research that we've been working
on. Hopefully that'll be this week,
but yeah, Legendary upside and check out the sidekick at
legendaryupside.com/sidekick for Dynamic.
Rankings today on WGR, Apparently from what I'm
reading, I'll be talking about today's news with the Bills,
which is a Joey Bosa calf injury out indefinitely.
Who could have predicted? James Cook is not present for
their mandatory work this week, and when I'm not hosting that
show on the Odyssey app three to seven weekdays, Eastern Time,
I'm going to continue to be DM ING my Canadian friend.
And for every time I go across the border, which this week
takes me to Guelph for another box lacrosse tournament, it's
quite, quite a weekend. Last weekend never came closer
to getting into it with a ref. You know you never want to do
that. I didn't, but I've never been
more tempted from one of the games.
I saw the Six Nations this weekend.
Ask me about it at the bar. OK, Thanks for watching and
listening. ADP chasing, signing off.
We'll see you next week.