Week 2 is here. We have officially overreacted
and under reacted from Week 1, but tonight we have a public
service announcement. If you or your loved ones
basketball bags have been harmed by garbage quarterback play, the
law firm of Levis, Watson, Young and Williams may be willing to
serve you. You may be entitled to
compensation. This is stat chasing Pat fryer
Helmo. Anita Handjob.
Fix your sight, Jamar. Alpha.
Play Chase. You can't handle the heat.
It looks like we're finally at this point.
You're right, I botched a cold open.
Draco it was. You had it.
You had it going so good as well.
You started so good. I know and.
Then you went into and that they may be willing to service you.
I was trying. To think like was like, what is?
What is the slot? You had the man you had, you had
the right lines. You just you switched them up.
The the play call was great. The execution was poor though,
So what can you do? What can you do?
Speaking of per execution, I I don't have the charts pulled up.
That's OK. We can we can vamp while you
pull up the charts. Definitely some cool stuff.
I was, I was going through them as I was putting them together
today and there were some things where I feel like we're starting
to see maybe like a trend emerging as like, you know, the
the first little green leaf poking through the soil.
It's it's butting up and there are also some things where it's
probably too early to tell yet. And then most importantly, and I
really want to make sure we we provide this kind of context
tonight, there were things where I think that the data might be
lying to us if we're not looking at it in the context of what
actually happened in the games. So definitely want to keep that
in mind tonight. That's why that's why you watch
all the games now. I honestly, I'm really paranoid
about sound quality at this evening because yesterday was
so, so bad. So I'm going to need some
affirmation or or or not and that I sound better this week
while while we try here. You sound great to me, but yeah
we'll we'll see if the chat can confirm or deny.
Well, ship chasing, OK, OK, I'm glad to hear it.
So as we introduced our new chart last week, we were
combining kind of volume with efficiency here.
On the horizontal axis, we've got expected points from
passing. And then on the vertical axis,
we've got adjusted yards per attempt, which is our kind of an
efficiency metric. And then the size of the bubble
is and that that corresponds to rushing yards per game because
obviously quarterback rushing very important.
And So what, what what, what? What kind of interested you suck
this week. Well, I wanted to start with
some of the outliers. The first one is Goff who is
just, you know, a huge outlier with his expected fantasy points
from passing. Just a a ton of volume really.
I think this is mostly due to game script.
They were, you know, behind for a lot of the game against Tampa
Bay and forced to pass and they passed a a good amount in their
first game too against the Rams. And they went into overtime too.
So you had the additional play volume there as well.
And yes, when you got into overtime it was mostly if not
all run. I can't remember, was it all run
plays in overtime when they closed that off against the
Rams? I I did not watch that, but I
didn't. I do remember looking at one of
the outputs for for the box score at the end or to play by
play and it was just run run run.
Yeah, yeah, I but anyway, I, I do think that this is something
where we can expect it to regress.
I don't think Goff is going to have this amount of volume every
week. That being said, I still think
he'll be above average. This is a good offense.
Yeah. So I had a couple of notes here.
And so they're at a 61% pass rate, 45 dropbacks a game and
that's still -5% pass rate over expected.
So like like you said, it is the, it is the game script
causing the pass. And then I think it is a common
trend where when a quarterback is not showing efficiently, that
leads to more volume because when you don't throw
efficiently, that's how we get behind.
And then I do note that in terms of like the per efficiency,
they're somehow they're like they're -2 touchdowns under
expected per game. So in each game, if, if you're
just looking at a neutral efficiency, Purdy should have
had two more touchdowns. And so to me, that kind of
suggests it's like a, you're talking, you're kind of looking
like at a regression candidate in both ways.
His, his points should go up or say his efficiency should go up.
The volume should, could come down.
And I, I think that should lead actually to net higher scoring.
And then I, I, I, I also wonder, I know this is not the tight end
section, but I also wonder if if maybe they get LaPorte and more
involved because he was a a key touchdown scorer for them last
year. Yeah, I I certainly think that
makes sense. Some interesting stuff to go
over when we get to La Porta, but won't won't spill the beans
on that just yet. The other outlier that I wanted
to look at was Derek Carr, the most efficient quarterback in
the league by far. A big part of this is being
driven by the the two Rashid Shahid deep bomb plays, right?
He's got an extremely high touchdown rate because what's
happened in both of the games is the Saints got out to a lead and
then they just didn't have to throw any more.
And this last week against the Cowboys, they were able to score
at will and Kamara put 4 touchdowns in.
And so, you know, Carr didn't have to throw a ton.
And so you end up with this really low volume, which is why
he's, you know, on the left side of the chart, he's below average
for his expected fantasy points for passing.
But then you end up with this hyper efficiency because he
scored touchdowns, They got up, they stopped throwing.
Yeah. And one thing that they're
they're -10 so they're 10% under their expected pass rate.
So even though Gamescript has LED them against passing,
they've actually been passing less than kind of expected.
And then I also sort of wonder with that kind of low volume
and, and drop back, I, I saw some note from one of the kind
of ball watchers that one of the things that Kubiak is doing is
he's avoiding those kind of true drop backs where he's, he's
essentially, he's not making a car have to work very hard.
And so I, I, I know in in your note you'd sort of said maybe
the Eagles will will be able to make a car work after the work
car have to work a little harder.
Yeah, I think this is gonna be a really interesting game this
week where we just are coming off a Monday night game where we
saw the Eagles really fail to get any kind of pressure on the
Falcons. Now that might have something to
do with the fact that the Eagles were respecting the run so much
from Dijon because the Falcons were just absolutely feeding him
and a lot of the offense was going through him.
But the Eagles were failing to get pressure on on Kurt Cousins.
And so I know that the Saints have or supposed to have a worse
offensive line. I haven't I haven't checked
their pass blocking rating, but I wonder if it's, you know, it's
such small sample they haven't been throwing very much that it
might there might not be a ton of signal there.
But I think it's going to be a good test against the Eagles.
And if you ask me to divine what's going to happen for, for
Derek Carr and where he'll kind of move on this chart, I, I
think it's almost a given that his efficiency has to come down.
The adjusted yards per attempt can't stay this high really.
I mean, unless they're just gonna keep blowing teams out
over and over. And I I don't think that's the
case. Right, 40% pass rate and keep
completing bombs as Shahid that that that that'll boost the Aya
pretty good. So just I, I actually, I've,
I've the, the Saints, their, their pass block win rate is
66%, which is 8 highest in the league.
And I do think that's probably a lot to do.
A lot of that has to do with them avoiding those true drop
backs. We're going to have to do 5 and
seven step drops and it's a lot quicker stuff.
And but we will, we will definitely have to see against
Seagulls. Yeah, I I mean, don't don't get
me wrong, I'm not not here poo pooing Derek Carr.
I think he's he is in. We talk about these offenses
that are, you know, the haves versus the have nots.
The Saints all of a sudden have become a have from a standpoint,
you know, despite Dennis Allen's best efforts, Dennis Allen is
getting absolutely bailed out here and keeping a job that he
probably has no business keeping but is.
The the same the same should hire Kubiak at The way things
are going, they should hire him as the head coach next year
rather than have Kubiak leave to be head coach somewhere else and
then keep Dennis Allen. I I did that.
I mean, I, I actually expect that to be like on the current
trend, I expect that that to be what happens.
And one, one thing though, about the car, like it really is on
Kubiak, it really, I think we really do have to see them in a
game where their back gets against the wall.
And like we, we, it's, it's clearly bullish that they've
like absolutely body bagged 2 teams like that does that
doesn't just happen by accidents.
And but I do think it'll be interesting to see how they
react in games where actually you do have to pass now to get
back into this. Yeah, if they are you willing
to, are you willing to like crown the Ants as one of these,
you know, put them in the category of the 49ers, the Rams,
the Vikings, the Dolphins. If they take it to the Eagles
this next week, if they're able to go out and continue to look
really efficient on offense and beat the Eagles, do you think
it's fair to put them in that category?
It's hard it it if they do it to the Eagles too, it will be
really hard not to. I don't I don't think the eagles
impressed. I guess we just saw them last
night and we we were pretty wary on the Falcons and then they the
Falcons are able to look pretty good.
That that would be my one note, like maybe the Eagles defense
isn't that good this year either.
And but if they if they just body back three teams in a row,
it that would be a very like strong, strong sign at least.
Yeah, another one that I thought was interesting.
Another, you know, he he's still looking a little bit like an
outlier, but he's more in line with the rest of the
quarterbacks is Kyler Murray, who had an incredible week to
fighting Marvin Harrison for some spectacular plays.
If you if you didn't watch that game, those highlights are worth
looking up. They were pretty fun and also.
If you're watching this podcast and you somehow didn't see the
Mervyn Harrison touchdowns, you should.
Yeah, yeah. I don't know who I'm talking to
here. Watch the Martin Harrison
touchdowns in our audience right now.
The other thing, the thing you may have missed though, if you
weren't watching the whole game, Kyler looked really good running
the ball. He he had a couple scrambles.
He had one that was a really long scramble.
I'm not sure exactly how many yards it was, but it was he
looked kind of like vintage Kyler Murray and not just the
extending the play behind the line of scrimmage, but really
making the defense pay and and punishing them with a big
explosive run downfield. Yeah, that, that ad that's
pretty fun. I, yeah, I, I think it's, it's
pretty straightforward from the data here.
And you're looking at 58 rush yards a game, you're looking at
9.8 adjusted yards per 10th. And that, that that's higher
than the than the per Oh yeah, that's what we, what we're
showing here. And 9.8 adjusted yards per 10th.
So you're getting efficiency from the, from him trolling.
You're getting efficiency from him running and he's playing
well and I, I, I, I, I think that's it.
That's pretty straightforward. Here's a Here's a fun question.
If you had to pick right now, rest of season, do you want
Kyler Murray or Lamar Jackson? Oh my God that feels like a real
Week 2 gotcha question, wasn't it?
Where? I think it's I think it's
legitimate though, Kyler like. They weren't going that far
apart. And think about how we framed
Kyler, you know, just three seasons ago.
When what was that? The season when he and Jalen
Hurts were going, you know, back-to-back like in the 5th,
6th round, right? Right.
And I don't know. So what's tough about that is
so, and Lamar did play Kansas City and then I guess it the the
Raiders always have one of those defenses where they always like
play teams tough. They they have that.
They have Max Crosby who always causes teams havoc.
So I want to, I want to give the Ravens a little bit of credit
for having played tough defenses.
And then remember, Kyler has paid played, he played the Bills
as well. And and so you have to give him
some credit there. And I don't know, I, I think
that's a lot closer. I think probably you probably
just give it you probably slight tilt Kyler now and just because
they have been efficient throwing the ball and you kind
of believe in their past catching targets a little bit
more now. But that that one does feel like
something where like the like these guys could be very, very
close by the end of the year. Yeah, I, I think it's pretty
close. The other point very slightly in
Kyler's favor is I think it's reasonable to say, you know,
just still, we've got a, a little bit of the mystery box
remaining with Marvin Harrison where we have the signal from
one game where, OK, this guy looks very good, but it's still,
it's such a small sample. We really don't know exactly
what he is in the league yet. We have more of an idea of what
Zay Flowers in it is and Zay Flowers is very good.
But I think it's reasonable to say that Marvin Harrison's like
true ceiling, like above 90th percentile outcome.
He's lapping Zay flowers, you know, like Zay is good, but he's
not he's not going to get to the Marvin Harrison like true
ceiling outcome. So I think you get a point in
the Kyler column there and then also from tight end and we'll
we'll look at this when we get to the tight end charts.
But I think it's reasonable to to pass the torch to Trey
McBride as you know, maybe the tight end one in fantasy, if not
the tight end 2. And and we'll talk about who
could be tight end one later. Spoiler alert, who was the guy
on the thumbnail for this show? Yeah, yeah, I, yeah, I, I, I
agree with that moving. In a more disappointing
direction on the chart guys that we're we're kind of a little
worried about now, Trevor Lawrence.
I mean, you can use the excuse that it was rainy and the Browns
have a good defense, but man. And I mean, I know they they
were missing Evan Ingram too. He had that.
It's the same thing every year with this guy where it's like,
like some of his advanced stuff looks really good.
And then you say, Oh, well, his receivers had a 23% drop rate
and like, that's it. That's an outlier that that's
going to make anyone's stats look bad.
But I feel like we're hearing that every year with Trevor
Lawrence, like, oh, his receivers just dropped the ball.
And, and, and maybe like that makes me think that maybe how do
I say this? Maybe we are looking at somebody
who's like in a bunch average QB who's just like destined to a
career of like per stats because the team around them is bad.
And but that in fantasy football that doesn't matter.
Like tell me, tell me the part to where Trevor Lawrence is
receiving weapons actually be becoming much better and and
then him him actually scoring well.
Yeah, I mean to to play devil's advocate here, I would say
you've got a lot of runway for Brian Thomas junior to yes.
Pretty good, that's the answer. That's that's like the strongest
answer, right. And then I'm not I'm not willing
to say like it's all the fault of the weapons.
I I think a, a big part of this could definitely be, you know,
the coaching and the play calling Like it, it hasn't been
great since, you know, Doug Peterson press Taylor took over
there. You know, they they've been able
to put some stuff together for stretches, but never anything
super sustained where Trevor's been, you know, at the top of
the quarterbacks for fantasy performers or, or real life stat
accumulators. So yeah, he's just, to me, it's
just looking like he's kind of a middle of the pack guy.
Right. So like Trevor Lawrence or Brock
Purdy, given all the injuries the 49ers have to their weapons
rest of season. That that, that, that one there
feels pretty close, I think. I do think Purdy is probably
another one who's kind of a regression candidate and let me,
or at least that's what I don't, I don't note that he he might be
a regression candidate. Let me.
Oh yeah. Because he's another one where
he's been under expectation on touchdowns and, and and maybe
that's, that's some of our youth.
Maybe, yeah, who who knows what that's related to, But he's
somebody who could score a little bit higher if he becomes
positive efficiency on touchdowns.
And I I like Purdy's a heart. He's he's such a hard one to
project because if the 40 when the 49ers get behind, normally
they trail with good efficiency and they do put a points and I
guess that's, that's what we should expect going forward.
Where's Trevor Lawrence is like that's that's that feels a
little bit more like a quagmire where online, not great
receivers dropping passes and and and it's not like he's some
special talent eater like I'm I'm I'd say I'm definitely not
feeling great about Trevor Lawrence.
Yeah, I mean, in that direct 1 to one comparison between
Lawrence and Purdy, I, I think, you know, this is something
where if you can figure out like these big macro trends for
fantasy and just apply them, I, I feel like it can go a long
way. And so one of the the things
that I first noticed in my my fledgling fantasy career many
years ago was, oh, if I just pay attention to who the really good
offensive lines are and draft the running backs behind the
best offensive lines, that's a really easy way to get good
running back production, right. And now I feel like the easy
like that super. It's way too simple.
This sounds like it shouldn't work.
It it shouldn't be this easy. Cheat code is if you just have a
quarterback that's in one of these like Shanahan style scam
systems where the offense is designed exceptionally well and
they give the quarterback lots of easy looks like the Saints,
like the Vikings, like the Dolphins.
You know, you're just gonna those quarterbacks are going to
produce efficiently because the offense is well designed.
They're you're simply playing, you're playing with a stack deck
against, you know these. Right, right.
And, and it certainly seems like Trevor Lawrence's offense, the
Doug Peterson 1. And I, I remember Sean Siegel
said that Doug Peterson might just be done the way to like a
player is done, that maybe the game has evolved beyond his
capabilities of being effective. Yeah, I mean, it's certainly
looking like Shane Seiken may have been the brains behind the
operation when they were having their run in Philly.
Success. They won the Super.
Yeah, let's see. Last note I had on QB charts is
this group, the the law firm of bad QBs, if you will, this Levis
Watson, Williams and Young all down at the bottom of the chart
here. Deshaun Watson barely eeking
ahead of, you know, just above average his his 13 expected
fantasy points for passing or thereabouts.
Big part of that just came from the extreme volume that I mean,
that's that's what expected fantasy points is it's a volume
measure. But the Browns are throwing the
ball a lot. They're not doing so
particularly successfully, but they are trying.
But I mean, even even with that, I, I couldn't imagine starting
any of these guys like none of these are are viable starters in
a managed league. Caleb actually showed some signs
of life this week. Like it looks like he the player
is not a total, you know, and I I didn't think he was a total
bust following week 1. I I just thought that the team,
the coach. We saw some positive signs.
We saw some positive plays where it was turned down.
He had to do something and he pulled something out.
Right. And he was doing more.
He was doing less of the, you know, Caleb the magician stuff
that made people fall in love with him when he was at USC.
Like, oh, I'm going to extend the play.
Oh, off platform. Oh my God, a broken play, huge
touchdown. Like he was doing less of that
trying to make magic happen and more of like the I'm going to
drive the bus. I'm operating the offense.
I'm going through my reads. I'm finding the open guy.
I'm making the throws. And it wasn't like he was just
making like easy throws. Either he had a couple really
impressive throws too, or it's like, okay, that was like a lot
of armed talent and he diagnosed the covering and got to the
right. Like I don't think Caleb is bad,
I think. It might that looks like a have
not offense. Right.
Yeah. The online isn't good, the play
callings just really bad. Just really, really bad.
What was it like 4045 pressures or something ridiculous like
that on him like? Yeah, and and like you had stuff
like where it was they were running on early downs a lot
when it wasn't working at all, sort of getting forced into
these third and long situations. When they did pass, it was like
screens and and design touches to these like fucking dust balls
and it's like you have DJ Murr. Why not do the design such as
the DJ Murr this like I, I, I don't know, but I'm I'm I'm with
you where it looks like there's that the talent that got them
selected first overall is there. And I guess we're probably
getting some more rookie growing pains than than maybe we would
have wanted. And but bigger story probably is
per online play, per play calling.
And you, you're going to have to see that that stuff improved
kind of dramatically to, to feel better about the offense.
Yeah. I mean, I think that if you're
if you're the Bears, the best thing you can do is just clean
house on your coaching staff right now.
Like you're at the start of this extremely talented young
player's career. You have a ton of draft capital
that you got to invest this year in an elite wide receiver in
Roman Doones say, elite generational quarterback talent.
And Caleb Williams, you've got all these pieces, and I think
it's such a mistake to just wait at the season and say surely
this tiger will change his stripes after.
Like, you know what Eberfluse is like you if you didn't know what
Aldrin was because I don't know, like you didn't watch any of the
Seattle games like he was there like.
But I just just to just to bring it back, I guess the take away
is this, this Bears offense becomes a shy away offense,
right? Yeah, one 100%.
Unfortunately, unfortunately become went from one we were
kind of sneaky excited about to like really excited about to
yeah, it it might be a stay away.
And yeah, I think all of these are are stay aways here.
The with Levis, like if you saw the the play where he does the
he just freaked out and did like the weird lateral when he was
getting sacked and and LED to a fumble, which is just like
terrible decision making. The only if you want a silver
lining for the Titans, it's that the whole show is Calvin Ridley.
And so maybe it's functional there for for him only.
I mean, Tony Pollard's also getting a lot of work too.
But like Levis is not not startable in any format.
Unfortunately, he is not. We got we got a yeah, we got a
couple of questions here. I I I like don't like just
walking by yeah, questions and we got one from it and we're
going to go true, true them got one.
Are we leaving the light on for Justin Herbert in fantasy?
And I think you I think for Herbert, you need like one of
those like negative game strip games and where they're
trailing. This team does not want to pass
the ball. They're at a 45% pass rate
negative or 11% underexpected on that.
And then Herbert is real good. We know he's really good, but
his his receiving the receiving around them is not.
So that that makes it pretty tend to get strong efficiency
there. So I think I think he's he like
he was going so cheap in basketball that like a lot of
the stuff that I'm saying that was kind of priced in.
So I don't think you need to feel bad and but in like a yeah,
a twelve person or 12 team one QB league.
I, I I really don't see any reason to to start Herbert and
and would be like even in in kind of daily stuff would I
think it would be kind of questionable.
Like you'd really need the stars to align to consider to make a
strong consideration forever. Yeah, agree 100% with your
assessment there. And then should I drop that?
Should I? This is an interesting one.
Should I drop fields for Sam Darnold?
Yeah, I would. Yeah, I think so.
So, yeah. And we kind of seem the fields
show with the Steelers. So like Fort, fortunately,
they're, they're not making him do anything that's going to get
himself benched. Unfortunately, that kind of
usage leads to 8 expected fantasy points from from
passing. And, and so that, that, that
that understates his, his, his actual, his volume a little bit
because you do have the rushing stuff and then you can make the
case that a lot of his big players got pulled, pulled back
from penalties. So like maybe it could have been
a 2022 point game for Fields. But I, I, I think, I think you
can kind of look elsewhere. I'm I'm dropping fields this
week in FFPC managed. You know, you know, what is the
funniest timeline? I mean, it's the timeline that
we're living in, but Justin Fields is very well the absolute
best pick at quarterback you could make in the Eliminator,
provided that he starts the whole season.
His floor is exceptional. He's averaging 42 rush yards a
game. He has a little bit of ceiling,
like if if those big plays don't get called back or he he runs a
little hot and gets a touchdown or the Steelers end up behind,
like that's how you access the ceiling and the floor is good.
Like and he was a 18th round pick and he like it's so funny.
No one if you'd asked people going into the season, you know,
is just. The old complete opposite of
what we expected. It's like he's not going to
start many games, but when he does, oh baby.
Turns out he's an eliminator aspect.
And then this one isn't much of a question.
It's more of a statement. Is Bone Nicks finished or is he
done? Yeah, yeah.
Looking pretty rough. Yeah, he, I mean, he just looks
like he's drowning, man. It's not.
I mean, unless you've got a. Unless you're a masochist like
it's not. Or you're or you're his mutter
missus Nicks. You can still play but bow in
fantasy. Anybody else?
Yeah, I mean, Missus Nicks, you absolutely cherish, you know,
the years that your son has in the league and he seems like a
super nice young man. And to be fair to him, one of
the best quarterbacks in the world, just not one of the 32
best. Right, Unfortunately, I I I
mean, maybe this is a future dynasty question, not really
when the scope here, but I do wonder how much is Sean Payton
the GM Sean Payton the coach. But after making that excuse for
Bryce Young last year and and seeing how it's paid off, not
not in a rush to make that for Bonex here.
I mean, especially if Peyton is still coaching next season,
which you have to assume that he the the Broncos are in such a
terrible spot. I mean, their roster is entirely
devoid of talent and they're stuck with Sean Peyton, who
looks like a guy that just stepped out of like the cryo
freezer. You know, he's just stuck in the
past and does not show any signs of being willing to change.
So pour one out for if you know any Broncos fans you know, just
give them a hug. Yeah, for sure.
So should we move on here? Yeah, I think, I think that
about covers it on the quarterback chart here.
OK. And excuse me while I zoom out a
little bit here. There we go.
And so this is our running back Snapse and usage chart.
So with, with, with running back being such a volume driven
position, obviously we focus in on those rush attempts.
And then I, I feel like I, I try to explain this every week.
We want routes, we want to look at routes over targets because
in the vast majority of cases, a running back getting a target is
more often than not a check down or an accident in the play.
That wasn't the intention and so it's hard to kind of pin that in
on the skill of the running back with with few exceptions, CMC
and not playing. But he is one of the the few
exceptions. And so we we basically want the
guy who's on the field for when they can receive the check down
and we look at a pass block as well.
It's not fantasy useful, but or it's not the fan.
The pass block in itself doesn't score points, but it's helpful
context to know who is being trusted to pass block for the
the offenses main main player and then one block we're we're
building at the complete picture for Heather on the field.
But really, who cares? Yeah, man, the the first one
that stood out to me now that we've got, you know, double the
sample size that we had last week is Ramondre Stevenson's
role is incredible. I mean, for where he was going
in drafts like this guy is looking like the smash of all
smashes. And it doesn't even seem to
matter that the Patriots are not particularly fun offensively and
they're not scoring lots of touchdowns.
He is just getting there through sheer C volume.
And and then 11, interesting piece as well.
So obviously the efficiency hasn't been great, but they do
seem to have played some some tough run defenses.
And so hopefully for them that if they can get some softer
defenses, then maybe the maybe the the what you call it, maybe
the efficiency can be a little bit better.
Yeah, just a little note for this week.
They are the Thursday night game playing against The Jets.
Every one of the Patriots offensive lineman is listed with
an injury on their most recent injury report from practice.
And so it's it's looking like they might, gosh, I'm trying to
remember who there. There's one of their offensive
lineman has an injury that sounds a little bit more
serious. And, you know, everyone else
seems like kind of banged up, but there's one that's a
slightly more serious injury. I'm wondering if that's going to
impact their ability to run the ball now they are against The
Jets. I haven't looked at how good The
Jets. So you said, did you say that
the The Jets have a lot of online on the Patriots, the
Patriots, Patriots, Yeah, and I'm looking at it right now.
The Jets are one of the best teams and they're the 4th best
team in the NFL and and run and run stuff right.
Okay, yeah, so. Prefer.
ESPN, Yeah. Might not be the week.
Not this week, yeah. Probably.
Maybe not this week. Don't want to be too
deterministic, but probably not this week.
Right. Let's see another so another
role that, you know, I feel like people were ready to to say it
was Jover for this guy after week 1 when he had a really
costly fumble, fumble into the end zone and his backup, the
previously much maligned tank Bigsby, you know, out out
produced him on fewer carries as far as total rush yards.
But Travis ET NS role is still very strong.
Now, granted, Bigsby did injure his shoulder this week.
He did play after the shoulder injury, but he didn't get any
offensive snaps after the shoulder injury.
It was just a special team. So I'm gonna be curious to see
what what that actually is. Is it just something minor?
Is it gonna be something that actually impacts him?
Will this affect Etns workload going forward for the positive?
But just as a whole, Etns workload still looks very very
good. The only, the only thing I
wonder about ETN is I see, I I've seen him or I saw him go in
like the third round a lot. And on FFPCI, I'm, I'm sure he
was going later on on underdog and, but I think even with this,
even with this solid workload, I, I think that that was
probably still an overpay. And but he's definitely he's
definitely a running back where when he's going around the end
of it, like I'm just trying to think of a way you can play them
is when he's going around the end of a draft in in in the
dailies on underdog. Like he's definitely somebody
where if you're going to try and play a bounce back week for the
Jags, Travis Etienne is probably a pretty strong candidate for
that. Yeah.
The other thing is the Jags have have struggled like they have
not gotten a ton going offensively.
So it would not surprise me in the slightest.
You know, when when teams are struggling, they're just
grasping at like, Oh my God, we got to get something to work.
And, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if they're just like, you
know what, let's just give the ball to this guy 20 times
because we've seen them do that in the past.
Or they're like, just give it to ETN a bunch of times.
So I wouldn't be surprised at all with them struggling here.
They're going to want to change something up, see if they can
get something going. Right, right, right.
That, yeah. And I think, but I think that
that is definitely the way to try and play.
Yeah. ETN.
Yeah, Yeah. When he's relatively cheap in
whatever format it is that you're playing, be it, you know,
salary cap DFS, if he's, you know, priced down in a in a
week, you know that the role is there where he's going to get
the touches. And so if you're you're getting
to basically buy those touches for really cheap, that's good
and same thing. And you know, draft style, the
battle royales, if he's going undrafted or going really cheap,
you know, the role is there, but really in the in the battle
royales, you know, even like the the dog hole, the 12 man's, the
goal line stand too. There's a you can pretty much
always get running back volume at the end of those.
You know, you could have gotten Devin Singletary, He he was
going undrafted. Most, you know, Brian Robinson,
like those guys were regularly available, you know, in the
sixth round of the 12 man draft. So the the volume is is there in
spades if you want it, if you want it cheaply.
Another guy who's getting the volume in spades but doing even
less with it than Travis CTN is doing is DeAndre Swift, who's
right above him on the chart, got a pretty good role.
I think the question that we have to ask ourselves here is.
How long can he play like dog shit and still get the ball
right? That's the question.
Yeah, well, we'll put. And the Bears already are
showing. This was one of the things where
I I mentioned like, oh, we're starting to see some trends, you
know, poke out of the dirt the first little leaves and sprouts
coming out. The Bears coaching staff has
started to realize, oh, we should not be giving this guy
the ball as much because Khalil Herbert finally started to get
some work here in week two. Week 1, he got damn near
nothing. Week two, we saw his role grow.
You think that's a trend? Yeah, yeah.
And I think, I think we should expect and, and, and who knows
on timing, like who knows how how stubborn and coaching staff
can be and, but I think it's a pretty fair expectation for
Swift to get phased out and it may happen suddenly.
I I don't want to like I it's hard to be too confident on
that. But he's playing badly.
He's playing very, very badly and you see like stuff like his
his his yardage underexpected is he's way under expectation on
FFP, sorry on PFF on next Gen. stats.
And then you see the the run block win weight rate is is
actually pretty solid on their own line.
So like their own line actually from a run blocking perspective
actually might be decent, but he's just playing very poorly.
So if it's it's tough to see Swift getting that much run and
much longer. And definitely hopeful for the
Kalua Herbert bags going forward.
Yep, couldn't agree more. Man, this guy is exciting.
And and just as a reminder for how these charts work, you know,
this is aggregating the usage week over week.
So right now we just have an average from week 1 and Week 2.
So guys who saw a major change in their role from week 1 to
week two, you're not going to see that reflected, you know, as
as much here if their role was way smaller week one, it's
bigger week two. And the guy I'm thinking of
specifically here is Zach Charbonnet, who man, Zach
Charbenet's price was very wrong in best ball drafts because he
what he got you in Week 1 when he was just the backup.
And granted, he he ran hot and got a touchdown, right?
But like that level of usage for where he was going in best ball
drafts, that is exactly what you got, what you were paying for,
right? And they have the contingent
upside, which is there is some probability that Kenneth Walker
misses a game or multiple games and then Zac Charbenet's value
increases, what he's gonna produce in fantasy increases.
That contingent upside was not priced in at all for Zac
Charbenet because he he got a lot of work and did pretty well
with it. I mean, if you look at the next
Gen. stuff on him, it wasn't great.
He's not terribly efficient. You know, he he's not grading
super well in PFF, but he's just one of those backs who's like,
but damn it, he can do it all. You know, like he doesn't do
he's well. The fact that he was also
getting targets, yes, and receptions.
And so you're not just relying on, OK, so he's in the game now
and he's going to get 40 yards. God help us, please get a
touchdown, right? You have the goal line work.
You have they trusted him to catch the ball.
So even on a week where he was relatively inefficient on the
ground and he still got pretty close to 20 points just because
of that, like you said, how multifaceted he is.
When he plays Jack of all trades, master of none doesn't
really matter though. When you're a big bodied running
back like him, like that's, that's pretty good.
That's all we can ask for, so. And and and and and.
We're dropping Kenny McIntosh this week, if in case that
wasn't clear. Yes, yeah, Zach Charbonnet just
gobbled up all the work It it is if Kenneth Walker's out in Zach
Charbonnet's world and we're just living in it.
And the Seahawks offense looked revitalized compared to how they
looked Week 1. So that was encouraging.
Shout out to to Jay fresh from the Deposit Kingdom, who was off
his showdown Millie maker win. Not sure if anyone was paying
attention, but on Sunday he was live to literally win a
back-to-back Millie in the bit. You know, the big Millie maker
on the main slate with a Seahawks double stack.
And man, that that would have been pretty fun.
But yeah, Seahawks offense look good as long as Kenneth Walker
is out. Zach Charbenet looks like a
fantastic play. You can, if you've got him on a
a lineup 'cause you, you know, drafted him for the contingent
value or what have you. That's a plug and play.
As long as as long as the Walker's out.
Yeah, Yeah. The next back that I wanted to
talk about is a guy that is right next to Charminet here on
the chart. But man, another guy whose usage
in Week 2 was just truly absurd probably shouldn't have gotten
the usage that he got, to be frank.
And it's not because he wasn't efficient with it.
No, he was very efficient with it.
It's just because his team was way out of the game and he was
still in there getting meaningless carries.
And you think that a team would would want to protect a
superstar like Devana Chan because he looks extremely
electric? If we had to redraft right now,
even in a world where CMC was healthy, I I think that you
could make an argument that a champ should be going right next
to CMC and I I wouldn't even be mad at you if you wanted to take
him over him. You would have him as like the
one O 1. I mean or.
Or in the top 4 picks. It it's he's in the mix.
I think he's yeah, top four top five picks.
Certainly he's probably not the one O 1 because when other backs
are healthy in his backfield, he'll get a little bit less
work, but he's just so efficient and he's getting so much passing
game work. Like the work he loses when
other backs come in is like the least valuable work.
So it's just like, oh darn, he lost 4 touches.
Yeah, those four touches. I mean for any other back they
only project for like, you know, two more points for him of
course. He's gonna get, he's gonna, he's
getting. Or he's at the very least right
now, he's getting all the high leverage picks or touches for
his team where if this is a really important carry, IE on
the goal line, if if they want to target a running back, it's
going to be a chance. He like even McDaniels, he got
asked, hey, don't you think you should scale back on a chance
touches? He kind of, he got kind of hurt
and he said, and he said something along the lines of
actually, he's doing so well. I I kind of want to increase his
touches. I, I love him, he's so good.
But yeah, just a, a quick note on the, the injury concern,
'cause I see so many people talk about like, oh, but he's just,
he's small so he can't hold up. There's no way it's gonna work.
I mean, like, no running back can hold up.
Guys like all of these guys are gonna get injured.
You know, if, if, if you don't get injured as a running back,
you ran super pure, you know, so like at every, if you look at
this chart, by the end of the season, half of these names will
have missed a game. That's just that's what it is.
Right or may no may no longer be on the chart.
Right, might not, might not be on the chart at all 'cause
they're out for the season, you know, got I mean, knock on wood,
like we don't wish injury on any of these guys Like we love
watching them and want to see them succeed, you know, with the
exception of a. But it's that kind of
association bias where you see a running back miss a game and oh,
he's small, injury prone. Yeah, where's I don't think
anybody like if, if, if let's say the injury that happened to
Pacheco, like don't, don't, we should not happy about it.
And but if the injury that happened to Pacheco happened to
a Chan, everybody would say, Oh yeah, this is the risk that you
took. He's injury prone.
But nobody, nobody said anything even remotely like that for
Pacheco. Like it wasn't even a top.
Yeah, very, very well put. Yeah, so just no, please,
please, guys. No one, you know, victory
lapping injuries or saying like that.
You knew that that was gonna happen when a player gets
injured. Like if you say that a guy's
gonna get injured, chances are you're right.
You know, just like, but other than a Chan, another guy whose
role looking even better after Week 1, definitely to me,
looking like a trend right here. Grouped with a Chan and
Charbonnay is Tony Pollard to me looking like the clear 1A on the
Titans which is great for his fantasy value because if he
wasn't the clear one AI don't think him or Spears are very
useful just because of how bad this team is going to be.
But. When sorry, when you say to 1A,
you don't mean he's the 1A to Spears's 1B or, or is that what
you mean? Is that that he's, you're saying
he's slightly ahead? Yeah.
OK, OK. What do you do?
You interpret it differently. And it feels a little bit more
like a yeah, like he's a little bit better than A1A where he
he's kind of the starter. And then to me anyway, Spears is
a little bit more not change of pace, but he's got he's got
receiving, he's got receiving. But certainly in the in the
running game, in the running game, he's more of a change of
pace guy. So he's he's change of pace in
the running on this team doesn't seem that valuable because that
that that that's that's not that doesn't seem to be what they're
what they're interested in doing is trying trying to the trying
to the backs. Yeah, No, I I agree with you and
definitely I think Pollard is the one that he's the back to
own on this team. Don't think there's very much
value for Spears. I mean, he's got contingent
value. Pollard goes down.
I mean, if you had to redraft today and Spears and Charbonnay
and assume Kenneth Walker's healthy, but Spears and
Charbonnay are going next to each other, do you think that's
reasonable? Would you take one over the
other? And oh man, that that that's a
right real punch in the gut. And so just just I pulled up the
stats for Spears. So if you're looking at, at
where he kind of charts, so 33% of his team snaps, he's either
has a rush attempt or drop back and that's 8% and rush attempt
25% of routes. And so I think that's probably
around where and Charbs and maybe a little bit higher than
Charbs would be without an injury.
And and so they, I guess he's a little bit higher maybe
standalone value and then unclear and contingent upside
likely very strong, very similar sort of contingent upside.
But then the question is how much does that matter with
Tennessee not being very functional and Seahawks actually
looking good? And just as I think through
this, I mean, he's Spears would be going for if we had to
redraft today, Spears would be going pretty late, right?
Yeah, I know I would. I'd clearly be sharped over
Spears just for the. Right.
Like he's kind of going in like I, I, I almost envisioned him
going in like Khalil Herbert kind of range.
Wow. Give given what we know, I mean,
unless they say, unless the coach says, I don't know, Coach
said. Hey, we want these guys to be
much closer and like, and I guess that that's still like
you, you still have outcomes where it bounces back like this.
But if you given the price you're paying you, you really
need that and it doesn't feel like the most likely right now.
Right. Yeah, one of the other guys who
again saw his usage increase week over week.
It's Jameer game. Am I still?
Frozen I I see a comment here where I froze.
No, you're you're back now. OK, my power flickered and
unfortunately so that's probably what happened there.
Jameer Gibbs getting more work out, snapping Montgomery this
week, getting more work. We're we're seeing the thesis
behind why he was going at the 1-2 turn playing out where, you
know, people were thinking, well, he's clear.
The more talented of the two backs, they spent an incredible
amount of draft capital on him. They're going to want to use him
more. He'll he'll get the high value
touches and you know, Montgomery will still be involved.
He'll get some goal line stuff too.
And and keep some of the high value touches for himself.
But that was the thesis behind Gibbs and it, it looks to me
like it's playing out. I I guess the question I have
for you is, seeing what we've seen so far through two games,
does the Gibbs price at the 1-2 turn seem pretty reasonable to
you? Yeah, it it it does.
It does. I mean the the issue and, and
this could have been this might have been the wrong way to look
at it. The issue I always had with the
Gibbs price was that I always compared it to the a Chan price
and I'm like, I like a Chan just as much if not more.
I mean, going cheaper, why do I do Gibbs at the 1-2 turn?
But then maybe the answer was a Chan Giga Smash Gibbs,
appropriately priced. Yeah, yeah.
So. The way I was looking at it was
probably not not not correct. And SO12 turn definitely feels
that pretty, pretty appropriate and if not a tad on their price,
you probably looking at this kind of usage, you probably take
them maybe before like the A.J. Brown kind of tier of receivers.
Yeah, that's close. That's close for me.
I mean, it's certainly making me think about, gosh, how fun would
it be to have a team that has Gibbs and a Chan on it as a, you
know, hyper fragile kind of team.
That would be a little fun. I and.
The the other note I have here is it looks like Gibbs is
another regression candidate where he's gotten at minus.
So he's he's down a 2/3 of a touchdown on so he's two 2/3 of
a touchdown. So 4 points in fantasy below
expectation and so give given what we believe about their
offensive line and his talent and that should certainly be
positive rather than negative. Yeah, that's a good point.
And yeah, so I I certainly think that Gibbs best games are still
ahead of him. Definitely a fun one to have.
You got to be happy about Jameer Gibbs if you've got him on your
teams right now. And if you you know a guy where
you got the green light to target him in in good matchups
and you know, DFS battle royales, he he's just all
around. You know one one of the running
backs that you want to play around.
Right, right, right. Here's here's one who his role
is up near the top, right next to.
We talked about how good a role from Andre Stevenson has, man,
how about Josh Jacobs and the role becoming even more
solidified with the Lloyd to IR news today.
I mean. Is that's brutal.
Just is Josh Jacobs just going to get 400 touches this year?
I think I think they're probably going to just feed them until
until it breaks. Yeah.
I do I, I do remember seeing their their other backup Wilson
looking fairly good in Brazil when they played the Eagles and
so don't want to lose sight of that.
I think he he can still be a factor and but they they're
going to they're likely especially short term going to
heavily focus on Jacobs. And I, I think it is interesting
that the, the, the Colts run defense that they played against
this week, it did seem like particularly bad where like they
they gave up a lot of yardage to Joe Mixon and then Joe Mixon
against the Texans, like completely bottled up.
And and so that that's I think that's a kind of important
context unlike his overall production this week, but rolls
certainly very strong. Yeah, that, that is a good
point. Who?
Let's see, who do the Colts play this week?
Anyone fun for us to target here in the DFS or vRS?
And cold schedule. So they play the Bears.
So. Load up DeAndre Swift.
I mean, could you Matt like if there is a get right spot?
So so here's here's the real question.
If DeAndre Swift doesn't post a good game against the Colts
defense, is it Jover? Oh, completely Jover and yeah,
completely jover. And you just know that the, the
bears were going to establish the shit out of it.
And, and I, I mean, hopefully for their sake, they do get
Kalil Herbert more involved, but that, that just feels like
they're going to establish it so hard.
Can't wait. Those are all the notes I had
for this chart. I've got a couple on the backups
I wanted to talk about. Did you have anyone else you
wanted to point out here? And no, no, I'm, I'm happy to
move on. I, I mean, I think I, I, I
remember you sent me some notes that I maybe want to touch on
them quickly is do we think bookie Irving is going to his
role is going to increase and do just a note on that White is
playing really, really bad, just really, really bad play from
white and, and, and would hope that, I mean, that in
combination with Brookie playing well does lead to a higher shift
to book. And then I think you also had a
note about what's his name, Deonte Foreman.
Yeah, both, both of them are on the backups chart there.
Oh, OK, OK, I'm just blowing through the black.
No. That's OK.
But yeah, with a little context with the Bucky Irving stuff too,
Rashad White did have a minor groin injury.
He reentered the game. He didn't he wasn't like held
out of the game after he injured his groin.
But I think, you know, that's that's opening the window for
Bucky Irving. And with a player like Rashad
White, where we can all tell he's bad, you know, he's not
efficient. He he's got, you know, use as a
pass catcher like he's, he's perfectly fine there.
But as a rusher like he is, he is well below what an average
NFL back would do in the same circumstances as him.
So when you're a player like that and you open up the window
to a guy who we we don't know how talented Bucky Irving is
yet. You know, we've only seen a
little bit of him, but what we have seen looks a lot better
than what we've seen from Rashad White.
And so I think that I mean this, this could very well be the last
stop on the train if you're trying to buy Bucky Irving like
the time is now, it might. So that's a that's a homely take
right where you're you're either trying to pick, get them on your
roster if the if it's a yeah short roster league where you're
trying to trade for them. And I, I don't, I don't think
that's the situation where you can play it before.
You see, it can't, can't play it in DFS right now, can't really
play it in like a battle Royale cause 'cause Rashad White is
still gonna get plenty of the work.
You're just hoping we're trying to get ahead of Bucky looking
good on more work and then the coaching staff coming out and
and telling us, hey, we're gonna we're gonna see what we've got
here for. Right.
We're gonna play this guy a lot. Yeah.
Or or or even a game where we just got a closer to a 5050
split and then people do the the trend.
Right, Yeah, really, I mean really the the greatest tragedy
is that we don't have a showdown slate with the Bucks here, you
know, before their next or for their next game, 'cause I that's
the spot where I would jam Bucky, you know, just before the
usage is out there and and abundantly clear to everyone
where you can really IKB the projection and say Bucky's usage
is going to go up and we're under projecting his efficiency
right now. So I'm just going to going to
absolutely attack the spot so little so.
What I'm, what I'm hearing is that you're going to call the
NFL league office and, and say it's a travesty that the that
they're not in prime time. I need a prime.
I need a prime time Bucks game. Get them to flex the books into
prime time and then your order. Note was that Dante Foreman?
Yeah. So let's move to.
I want to move to the backup chart to show Deonta Foreman's
usage here. Are we not on the backup chart?
I'm not. Seeing it, Are you sure?
I mean, Derrick Henry is not usually on the backup chart, but
this is the backup chart. Chat, can you can you let us
know if you're seeing it? It might it might just be on my
end or it might just be on Draco's end.
But if you if you're seeing the the greater than 40% rush
attempts with Dijon Robinson at the top, let us know and.
OK. And does it show now?
So Nick, I had a note from Nick that was showing the starter.
Yeah, try and maybe try and and close it out and re share your
screen. I think it something may have
happened when your when. Your power went up there.
OK, that yeah, good, good call. So.
But yeah, while you while you get that pulled up.
So Deonta Foreman took over at the Browns backfield this week.
As far as opportunities are concerned, Ford was still more
efficient than him, but Foreman got substantially more work and
I'm so I'm a little bit of a, a Danta foreman truther.
I, I think now, granted, if you, if you're starting to look at
Danta Foreman advanced metrics and peripherals, they're not
gonna be pretty OK. But I, my read on Danta Foreman
is that NFL teams like him because he, he runs as he is
expected to run. Like, hey, the play says do this
and he goes and he does it and he'll break a tackle here and
there. And he, he's a bigger body guy.
So he can handle, you know, goal line stuff between the tackle
stuff really well. And he's not a total zero in the
passing game like he, he can, you know, get some receiving
work. You know, he's got a little bit
of routes here on the chart. I'm wondering, do you think that
this is the flipping? Is Deonta Foreman taking over
the backfield over Jerome Ford or was it a blip?
Here's what I think. I think it's one of those things
where when the Browns have a lead and and they're solving
that lead, I think it is Foreman.
And now that's a pretty tin reading of it.
And that is based on where rare I've got.
So Foreman, he had 6 touches in the first half, nine in the
second-half. And he was kind of, he was kind
of even when with who who's, what's the guy's name?
The other running back. I know you just said it.
Ford, Foreman. Yeah, Ford.
I think Ford and for Foreman were pretty even in the first
half. And then Foreman pulled away in
the second-half when they had that lead.
So that's a tin reading of it. And, and it's it's based on like
kind of interpretation because that that's that's really small
numbers. But I think that's what makes
most sense to me, that they have that they have clear roles in
mind for these guys. And when they're ahead, it is
going to be the Foreman show. OK, yeah, I I think that makes
sense to me. So, yeah, not a not a full
flipping, but definitely, you know, if you were, if you were
feeling really good about Jerome Ford, hate to hate to burst your
bubble on that. Actually, I'm lying.
I love to burst your bubble on that.
I thought Ford was an awful pick.
Sorry. Sorry, not sorry, but yeah, I, I
mean, I just think that really what it's going to come down to
is not that Deonte Foreman is now this great fantasy asset.
It's just, to me, it's almost a stay away because Brown's
offense looks bad too. So.
You you you, you need a QB change to kind of go after this
offense I think. Shall we move on to the
efficiency charts? Tell me if you see the new
efficiency chart. I do, I do.
And this I, I really like what this chart shows just because
it's easier to kind of visualize how good Romandre Stevenson's
role is. We we already talked to him, so
we'll spend a ton of time on it. But I mean, look at this 8
expected receiving points. They're just about 16 expected
rushing points per game. Like, this guy's set up for a
legendary season and this stuff continues now, Grant.
Well, just just I, I went and I got into a back and forth with
somebody about this and the legendary season.
It does contemplate that running back also having positive
efficiency. Yes, I, I, I think, I think, I
don't think, I don't want to like close the door on that for
Stevenson, but and I think that's something that that is
easy to overlook, that is very important.
Yeah, no, I I certainly agree. I, I don't think, I mean he
again, yeah, you're right. We won't close the door on him
having positive efficiency, but I, I think the thesis of the
Stevenson play is the volume is there, you know.
If you get efficiency and and and you paid a great price for
that volume, a fantastic price for that volume, which is I
think your point. Now you want to talk about
another guy who you got at an absolute screaming bargain?
Basement price for what he's doing is JK Dobbins.
Now, Dobbins does not have a ton of expected points because #1
the Chargers don't throw the ball.
So how could you get very many receiving expected points?
And #2 he didn't have a ton of carries in Week 1.
You know, he had more here in Week 2.
But he's just so efficient. He's leading the league in
breakaway yards. Like I, I think that, you know,
near the end of draft season, we were, we were starting to kind
of hammer Dobbins as it became abundantly clear that he was,
you know, going to make the team, which that was the reason
we were kind of scared of him earlier in the season.
The team didn't have any kind of real commitment to him, just
$50,000 guaranteed on his contract.
Guy coming off an Achilles injury following back-to-back
seasons of brutal knee injuries to where the last time we saw
him on the field, he's like dragging a dead leg behind him.
Still hitting pretty impressive top speed for having a dead leg.
Like I'm certainly not keeping stride with JK Dobbins, but I
mean, he looks great. Like is can you take the air out
of my JK Dobbins bowl case right now or, or are we just are we
all in? And so I, I think you're, you're
you're certainly happy to play, to play Jacob Jobbins until that
until shown otherwise. And it's kind of like he, he, he
doesn't seem to have the long speed anymore.
And, but with how well, how good the old line is and his vision
and kind of ability to make those cuts and you don't need
the long speed, like, and there's certainly been running
backs who don't have long speed, but have been kind of crafty in,
in, in navigating that line of scrimmage and who've made a
living. And he looked, he's looked
really good doing that so far. And I, I think though that I
don't, it is tough for me to see somebody of that kind of profile
becoming like this kind of a bell cow.
I think even if they tone Zach Moss down, they probably rotate
in some of the other guys rather or not Zach Moss and Gus
Edwards. And if they rotate in, I think
they'll rotate in other guys. Maybe they will bump Dobbins up
a bit. But I think if they if they give
the Gus the Hawk, it'll be to to kind of other guys benefit like
let's say yeah, either Vidal and then maybe some Patterson as
well. So, so you're not expecting this
monster workload for Dobbins, but I certainly think that five
weeks from now he's going to be in this, you know, probably 10
to 15 expected fantasy point band.
And, and near the, the top of that, closer to the 15 expected
fantasy points, 'cause I think they're, they want to give him
more touches, I would assume, but I, I don't like you said,
they're not going to turn them into a huge workhorse or
anything. And I mean the.
Charge is really hard to get to 15 as well.
Just that. Almost purely true.
True rushing. That's a, that's a good point,
yeah. So I I think 10 to 15 is
probably like the right range or the the good expected range.
And then maybe he adds like 5 on top, like 5 is a lot and put he
he adds a little bit on top with his good play and the online
being good, but at at the price you got him like that, that is
fantastic. Someone who you're not happy
about, the price that you got in is Derrick Henry, who is more
and more just looking like fancy David Montgomery.
He's sitting here in this 10 to 15 expected fantasy point range.
If we actually go back one chart I want I want to point out the
Derrick Henry snap share just to highlight.
So there they are at the top of the chart.
Derrick Henry and David Montgomery.
They're basically the same thing, you know, except I would
argue Derrick Henry probably gets fewer high value touches
than David Montgomery because David Montgomery will get the
occasional target here and there and the Lions offense will
certainly happily give him the ball at the goal line.
That's not to say that Derrick Henry's not gonna get the ball
at the goal line. It's just this is this is the
same type of profile, right? Like a guy.
Who? Same type of role?
I I don't know. Same type of role.
That's that's better, yeah. And like to be honest, it when
you look at some of the metrics, Derrick Henry looks fine.
And which is like a disappointing way to describe
Derrick Henry because it like the lot for for a long time now,
he just been this monster. And I don't think we're seeing
that so far this year. So like from that perspective,
that's like Derrick Henry is fine.
Is is that disappointing? Yeah, the The thing is when
you're paying a third round price tag for Derrick Henry,
like fine is not an acceptable outcome.
If if you're trying to make money in your league, if you're
trying to root for Derrick Henry while you lose money, then
that's a great price to pay. You will do that very
successfully. So like in the next Gen. stats
stuff he has .7 yards over expected per attempt.
Which again is like is fine, it's.
Fine, Yeah, my, my issue is purely with the price, right?
The price you're having to pay for Derek Henry was just not,
not. Powerful, right?
Right, Right. You, you completely overpaid for
what you got here. Like this is like a Javonte
Williams Derek, not Derek Henry David Montgomery type of bet
unfortunately. Now, now, hang on, because I'm
about to do the biggest heel turn of all time on you, because
I'm making it sound like there's just no way that you can play
this guy. But what if I told you that he's
playing against what could potentially be one of the worst
rushing defenses in the league this week?
The same one that just gave up four touchdowns to Alvin Kamara,
the Dallas Cowboys. R.E.M.
Are the cowboy like you're you're closer to it than I am?
Are the Are the Cowboys that bad?
I mean, they just look like they have the same old problems that
they've had on defense for the last couple years, which is they
cannot stop a Nosebleed in the running game like it.
And and it's it's almost as someone who's watched like every
Cowboy snap for the last couple years, you can almost kind of
like feel it like when when the team starts losing to the run
game, like you, if you watch the playoffs crumble, Yeah.
If you watch the playoffs against the Vikings last year
where Aaron or sorry, you mean, yeah, where Aaron Jones was just
absolutely decimating them, like you could kind of see them get
deflated. And that's that's happened, you
know, for a while for the Cowboys.
And so I mean, watching Dusty Alvin Kamara just take it to him
really makes me think this might be an offense or a defense to
target on the ground. And so I mean, if there's one
spot where Derrick Henry can look like vintage Derrick Henry,
where he's ripping off the big 80 yard touchdown runs and just.
I know you're kind of like the spawn and sort of like semi
Cowboys fan. Are are the Cowboys really in
that category where like they're in with the Carolina Panthers,
are in with the Rams, where like this is truly just a God awful
run defense? The Colonels I should say.
I don't know that they're like probably all the way as bad as
the pants. Maybe below average?
They're definitely below. I would be very confident in
saying that they're below average, yeah.
And so with the Ravens, so then with the Ravens being good and
like this could be a bounce back spot for the Cowboys.
But and the way the Ravens win, you think, is by like running
Derrick Henry down their throat. Yeah, the Cowboys have a pretty
decent pass defense. I mean, not evidenced by the,
you know, absolute nuke that Derek Carr put up on him with
the the Rashid Shahid long touchdown again.
But again, that was just like a little bit of efficiency and
then they just ran the ball down their throats.
And so, I mean, the other thing is this game could set up to be
really fun because the Cowboys will run a lot of plays.
You know, if they especially like, if you can get them
behind, if Derrick Henry can get up early on them.
And then the Ravens are more incentivized to run and just
keep feeding Henry and the Cowboys are down and they're
going to pass a lot. Like man, you can have a pretty
fun game here and an interesting way to play it where I don't
think a ton of people are super excited to play Derrick Henry
after the first two weeks. I I love this comment.
He has zero contingent value. It's like completely correct
with his new value. Also comes with 0 contingent
value, but you also don't want your second 2-3 turn pick to
need contingent value. I think I think that was more in
response to like comparing him to David Montgomery because in
the event where David Montgomery's contingent value is
incredible, right when if Jamir gives this his time, like I'm
absolutely David Montgomery over Derrick Henry, you know, and
twice on Sundays. So I think that was more the
point and and that's kind of what I'm getting at.
It is just like the price in basketball was never reasonable.
Right, right. I'm like I'm I'm agreeing with
the point. It's also just a really funny.
Way to frame it, yes. Yeah.
OK, let's go back to the efficiency charts.
The second one. Yeah, let's let's get to the
second one here. I feel like a lot of the other
guys on the first one we either touched on in the volume chart
or or not too much change week over week.
The other guy I wanted to touch on here, just Jordan Mason with
CMC going to IR Devo. You know, missing multiple games
is what it's currently looking like, man Jordan Mason just
looking like the absolute smash of all smashes and basketball
drafts. If you got Jordan Mason teams,
you've got to be happy about that.
The one caveat that I want to like the little cold water I
want to throw on it. I guess there's two caveats.
Number one, I think the 49ers offense might be a little worse.
They're missing demo Samuel, they're missing Christian
McCaffrey. They might not be the same super
high-powered offense we're used to.
I still think they're going to be functional.
They have, you know, like Kyle Shanahan is a good, he's a good
coach. Like it's gonna, he's gonna find
a way to make it work. The other thing, though, is if
the 49ers find themselves trailing, Mason is not super
involved in the passing game. Like, if you look at his
expected fantasy points here, it's pretty much all coming to
the ground. So.
Right, he he's running, he he's out there running routes.
But it's like, hey, do you want to throw it to George Kittle,
right, Brandon Iuke, or you want to throw it to Jordan Mason?
It's it's the answer is usually not to throw it to Jordan Mason.
Yeah, I mean, even if use check is on the field running a route
like I would, I would probably wager that use check is more
likely to get the the ball than Mason, you know, provided all
things are equal between them. So my caveat would be if if the
Niners are going into what could be a really tough game script,
you know, they're they're playing against either A-Team
that's a lead at stopping the run, which might not matter
because, you know, you said that The Jets are are one of the best
runs stopping defenses, you know, really high success rate
against the run. 49ers did not give a shit about that, right?
Jordan Mason ran all over him. So maybe it doesn't matter.
I I think where it matters most is if the 49ers are playing an
explosive offense and they might just get too behind to really
even be able to run. So that's a little cold water on
Mason, more of like a weekly, you know, DFS or battle Royale
kind of lens to view it through. You know if you've got them in a
home league or you know a a managed league, you're probably
starting in most weeks unless you got some really good
options. Right there, there, there.
There's some downside there is what you're saying, even with
the work horse role for him. OK, the last thing I wanted to
do on these running back efficiency charts, and we'll
we'll ultimately need to toggle back to the first chart after we
do it on this one, but I want to hit you with some rapid fire
legendary RV season watch. And so we're going to look at
all the guys that are right about that 20 or more expected
fantasy points threshold. And I just want you to really
quick hit me with a yes or no if you think that a legendary
season is on the table for these guys.
So Kyron Williams. Not with the injuries, I don't
think. I think it was always like he's
he's, he's a fine player, but I think some of his legendary
season case was always on the offense being good and then
some, some of that being funneling to him.
It's, it's, it's hard to see a legendary season for him in that
in the context of all the injuries.
Yeah, and you mentioned earlier a really good point about
efficiency is is part of a legendary season and you can
look at his his little tiny bubble and he has not been very
efficient so far. You know, long season, there's
time for that to change. But I definitely think I fall on
on your side there. All right.
Don't they? Don't they have online injuries?
Yeah, they have like their two best receivers are injured.
Yeah, it's. Like it's it, that's that sounds
pretty rough to me. Yeah, OK.
Breece Hall. Yeah, of course.
Saquon Barkley. And I, I think maybe this is
controversial, but I think that he has a legendary first month
of the season. And.
But it's real. It's really tough for me to see
him having a legendary last month of the season.
It's just for me, so much of it comes down to the touchdown
stuff. Like right now, it looks like
how they're using him as a receiver is basically the same
way they use Swift, which like Barkley looks better than Swift.
You know we can. He's a better receiver, he's got
good receiving skills, which is definitely, to his credit, to
his favor. It's just the role as far as the
receiving work for the the primary back for the Eagles
doesn't through two games, small sample doesn't look like it's
changed. OK.
And he is playing efficiently when you look at the yardage
stuff or relatively efficiency and and with tanks the O line.
And but somebody like he is in that older range.
And like, I know he's had a really good overall career, but
in the context of like kind of declining metrics for him and in
prior seasons and then even behind the really good online
only kind of like I'm like his his next Gen.
Stats are like pretty still pretty like mediocre and and and
and and him being older it it's really hard for me to see him
like maintaining a good level of efficiency that you need.
We may have to change the title of of this stat chasing the two
nerds cope that they didn't draft enough Saquon Barkley.
OK, next on our legendary RB watch Devana Chan.
Yeah, Yeah. I think we touched on this on
the reason why, yes. Yeah.
All right. Let's go to the the previous
efficiency chart just for the last couple of rounded out.
Ramondra Stevenson, we already touched on you said probably a
no because of the efficiency. How about Alvin Kamara?
And I mean, I think I, I, I feel similar to how I do about Saquon
and where like if you, if you look at the long term trends,
the efficiency's been down for him.
And so it's hard for me to see that kind of this kind of great
efficiency to continue. And however, with the with the
price that you got him, especially on underdog where I
think he was cheaper than that FFPCFFPC, he was kind of like
4-4 rounds, 5th rounds and which you're, you were getting bites
up some good receivers there still.
And I still, I still, I think I, I think especially on underdog,
he could be a really, really and and he probably is already
locked in as a really high advance rate player and and
could still get there on FFPC with the higher price tag.
And, and, and still, I, I mean honestly, still make noise in
the playoffs and but probably not like a one-on-one sort of
legendary season, I don't think. Yeah, yeah, I I think when we
look back on the season, he's a pretty strong candidate to kind
of be in the mold of the Josh Jacobs shark jump season.
You know, like insane, insane advance rate just drags a bunch
of teams to the playoffs and then, you know, the the age
catches up to him. What we've seen in the
underlying metrics, you know, comes home to roost and he's
just not able to keep it up in the playoffs.
All right. Last one, Jamir Gibbs.
Yeah. And there's another one we
already talked about, I believe. Yeah, All right, let's get to
the tight end charts. Yeah.
And here we go. And so this is tight end
utilization and efficiency. And the chart part is what
percentage of team dropbacks we're running a route.
And then for completeness, just because it helps us get the full
picture and what, what does their path blocking look like as
well? So then when you combine the
two, what percentage of their team drop back where they're
actually on the field? Yeah.
So I wanted to start this chart. I think the best way to look at
this tight end chart is I want to look at the good, the bad and
the ugly. And so we're going to start with
the good. And the good is I mean first
Trey McBride like incredible targets for route run good A dot
even even with you know, Marvin Harrison having his big day,
like Trey McBride still was there as an integral part of the
offense. Like this guy looks like he will
be either the tight end one or tight end 2 for years to come
for redraft. Yeah, yeah.
Incredible tight end pick. Incredible tight end, yeah.
The next one that this one is I think maybe a little murkier,
but Hunter Henry sitting here with a 25% targets per route run
pretty good a dot. You know, 7 point OA dot.
However, his his week two game is doing a ton of heavy lifting
here, right? He was just hyper, hyper
targeted, you know, leading receiver on the Patriots by a
country mile. Honestly, if you didn't watch
this game, number one, I don't blame you #2 go back and watch
some of it and just like take a look at how the Patriots ran
their offense because it was all Hunter Henry and Ramondre
Stevenson. Like that was it pretty much.
Honestly, the Patriots should have won this game, but they
just ended up too conservative. They really like cost themselves
the game. They probably should have beat
the Seahawks if they had just been a little bit more
aggressive. But so anyway.
I do wonder, I wonder a little bit if like if this is kind of a
sign that the Seahawks are like a tight end funnel because, and
maybe maybe I'm not reading, maybe I'm reading it wrong, but
Hunter Henry has not been like a 25% targets per out run guy.
Like for his career, he's been kind of closer to like somewhere
between 12 and 15. And then you get the red zone
looks and, and and that's how you win with Hunter Henry.
And, and I'm not saying that he's going to go to 12 to 15
over the course of the season. And but that, that like the
Longview stuff there with Henry does give me a little bit of
pause there. And especially with, like you
said, we've only had two weeks. And then one of those is Week 2,
which is boosting this a lot. And I, I, I, I have a little bit
more caution there. And however with, with, with,
with that cost, the cost that you paid, you're clearly
delighted, clearly delighted. And like for for waivers, for
example, like he's probably the best thing out there by far on
waivers right now, like if you're in a managed league,
right? I I don't, I think Hunter Henry
was, was drafted. Are you?
You're talking about like you're.
Not more. Yeah.
More homely. Yeah.
FFPC, he's going to be rostered. Right.
If, if, if you yeah, if you, if you're struggling on a tight end
and unless you have Evan Ingram and you need someone to fill in
and he he, he's he, he is a strong pick up.
Yeah, other guys in the good category, George Kittle doing
his part to really try and help the 49ers make up for the lost
production from CMC. Man, it's it's kind of setting
up to be George Kittle monster season where Cause a lot of the
time the frustrating thing with George Kittle historically has
been they just don't need him. He's not necessary for them to
win and hang a ton of points on an opponent, but the more key
components of the offense that go down, the more necessary
George Kittle becomes. And I mean whenever.
He's very important. George Kittle is this.
This offense almost has to run to George Kittle this week.
Yeah, and, and whenever he's called on, like I, I, you know,
I don't remember many games where George Kittle's getting a
lot of targets where he's not doing something with him.
Like the guy's a baller. So George, George Kittle, the
the trend is upward here. It's going to be fun to watch
him here while the 49ers weapons are diminished.
And then the last guy that I had in the good category and
honestly good is not kind enough for this guy because in my
opinion, this is the the tight end one overall rest of season
is Brock Bowers 27% targets per route run.
And this ain't no Hunter Henry like, oh, he did it all from one
big game. You know where he got a bunch of
targets, force fed them thing like no, Brock Bowers is just
getting targets and look at how many routes he's running.
He's not like he ran you know what 65% of the routes like so
and believe. Me 65% of the routes and then
35% target threat run last game and 71% over the average of the
two games, 27% targets per at run and over the average.
And but like it, it, it, it what's crazy is that he's
already the like and he's already one of the top five.
Like he's I, I don't know, top five in in scoring already and
in in just the last two. And then you do you do kind of
like the mental adjustment for like, OK, he's a rookie.
So they're actually going to ramp up his workload.
They're going to ramp up the routes he's he's running.
They're probably going to add more variety to the routes that
he's running. And then by the end of this, by
by week 17, it could just be like it could just goodbye like
it they're they're this this is this is probably a Week 2 of
reaction as well, but doesn't feel like it where like he could
be like he he could just by next year when we're doing redraft on
FPC or our best ball and FPC, he's probably a top tree pick.
Oh, he's he's the one O 1 next year on FFPC probably, yeah.
I'll, I'll just I'll. That's that's what I.
I'll say it if you won't. OK, I, I'm glad I that's what I
had in my heart. And, and, and I, I appreciate
that you had the braveness, the courage to actually say it.
Because look, here's here's what the other part of it too, is the
Raiders this week. So week one, I was so extremely
frustrated with the Raiders because they just made many,
many donkey mistakes, right? Like it, it was, it did not look
good. But this week they actually
threw the ball like they were willing to pass.
They had a really high pass rate.
And so I was, I was a little encouraged there and they got
the ball for their best players like Devante Adams and Brock
Bowers both ate. And that was basically it.
Like they just like, these are our best players.
If we want to win the game, we got to get into the ball.
So I I'm like a little bit encouraged by the Raiders not
being total donkeys. I think, I think they definitely
are not like they're not as sharp as some, some of the
sharper teams out there, but I also don't think that they're
like the. Their coaches don't lose the
game for them. Yeah, yeah.
And. Well, they did.
They did in week. One, but we had a question here,
are we buying the pass rate over expected?
I mean, I think you kind of have to.
And yeah, so they had a 71% pass rate or, sorry, over two games,
6% over expected. And it's like they did say over
the offseason that the plan was to establish the run.
But then you look at the box that they have, which is.
What are their names? Alexander, Madison, Zamir White.
Yeah, yeah, I know the names. I'm bad with names, though.
And and then you look at the receivers they have, which is
Devante Adams and Brock Bears, and it's like maybe passing is
actually how they win, how they move the ball, and that's how
they look at it. So yeah, I think you have to
tentatively buy it. Yeah.
I mean, the reason I'm willing to buy it is I just needed to
see it from. I needed to see that they were
willing to do it, that's all. You know, like against the
Ravens, too. 'Cause they're gonna, this is
the thing. Like they're gonna have to do
it, you know, like how else if pretend that the Raiders like
truly in their heart of hearts want to run the ball.
And so they maybe a couple weeks down the road, they get away
from the Pat, They're they're really feeling themselves,
right. And they're like, we're going to
go into this game, we're going to establish it and dominate
them out of the gate. And when that doesn't work, like
at least now I know that they know like, Oh yeah, we can
always just throw the ball. So that's that's the thing that
I'm looking at. And what's really fun as well is
like minshew being like fun bad Minshew.
Yeah, yeah, Minshew. Minshew is doing what he did in
Indianapolis, right where he's like, I know to throw the ball
for the best guy, I'm just going to do that.
So it's like, all right, cool. That's all we need you to do to
just drive the bus, Gardner. Just we have we have Mr. Big
Time who finally come in to listen to the show again, say,
oh, I designed this chart. I now, I mean, to be fair, I do
think that you made some improvements to this chart,
Rico, so. Right.
I made I made the improvements to the content and then you made
it look better. Like, let's let's be honest
here. But but yes, we can.
We can throw Sam a bone here. You know, the original, original
concept. You know, he gave us a, He gave
us a. Great version one version one
that credits Sam Sherman. Absolutely.
OK, so those are the good on this chart. 011 other one that
you know he's he's popping in the targets.
Well, two guys. I don't want to spend very much
time on one of them. Brenton Strange huge A dot, huge
targets per route run. You had a good note about this
though that the stats might be lying to us.
Can you expand on that? The so the the backup bam,
what's his name? Strange.
And where he had 7 targets, he had like this plus 770% / 70%
route run and then like 17A dot like 27% and targets per run.
So I, I should give credit here where, where it's due and call
Dvor check. He when I I sent him to this, I
sent him these these kind of stats when we're working on a
manage waivers this morning and he watched every route and and
he said that, yeah, he doesn't look good.
And and so he was a yeah, he was, I think it was a second
round pick in 23. And he's this kind of Uber
athlete from Penn State, but he wasn't really a receiver there.
He was a blocker. So good information there.
I think the kind of net net is we should probably shouldn't
consider him like an actual good tight end, but especially in
tight end premium, he is like probably one of the strongest
tight end pickups of the year. And I don't know how to buy in
too much. I don't want to buy in too much
to this role here. And, but like even the routes
here are good that the targets are good and and until that I
guess one of the best targets until Evan Ingram comes back,
OK. The last guy I wanted to touch
on who was, you know, still still in the good category, but
again, kind of like the Hunter Henry numbers getting propped up
from Week 2. The Isaiah Likely numbers are
getting majorly propped up from Week 1, right?
All all of all of the week 1 cope of likely is kind of
getting proven right. Yeah, now he didn't all the way
turn back into a pumpkin, right? But it's just it's looking more
like, Oh yeah, this guy is the the backup tight end for the
Ravens, or he is. He's the third pass catcher for
the Ravens, which again, has never been something.
Yeah, I'm not excited about he had a 49% and RAP run.
He had a 17% targets per out run in the last game.
So like those are like solid outcomes for likely and but like
you said, he didn't become not a backup tight end, still a backup
tight end. Yeah.
OK, let's get to the bad. All right.
First, Kyle Pitts, I mean, week one, we were really excited.
He had 100% of routes run. That was really cool.
But he just hadn't, he wasn't earning targets.
We were hopeful that maybe that could turn around, but man,
watching the Monday night game and just wondering why Ray Ray
McLeod was getting just peppered with targets over and over and
Kyle Pitts could not get a target to save his life.
A little frustrating as a Kyle Pitts owner.
So it's it's just you got to wonder like, is this just a a
blip? Is he going to earn more targets
as the season goes on? I think with Kyle Pitts, people
are just so quick to react and say, Oh my gosh, it's more of
the same. I got rugged on Kyle Pitts
again. But what's your read on this?
And I'm, I'm still, I'm have honestly, I'm having a tough
time reading it. And with the the kind of
preseason reports of him not being in shape and then all
being short targets and short a dot targets, I think even the
biggest car pits Bull in your heart of hearts, when you first
started thinking about Carl Pitts as an NFL guy, the the
thesis was not that he's going to get a lot of short targets.
It's like, no, this guy is basically basically a wide
receiver with tight end designation.
And it's that part is not feeling, not seeming to be true
and anymore and. Well, it depends on the which
wide receiver you think he is. Like if you you know, if you
think that he's like a like a Jalen Bute yeah, or Keyshawn
Bute, then then yes, he is. He's just like a a wide receiver
now I'm I'm not willing. I'm like semi leaving a light on
for Kyle Pitts. I don't want to just throw it in
the trash right now but like I'm trending bearish.
If I yeah, yeah, that's how I feel too, where it's like one of
those things where it is tough to overreact the two weeks of
data, but it's also very tough to not react to what we've seen
here. I mean, it's the earn a target
over Raven or Cloud or Darnell Mooney challenge impossible
here, which is just like that sounds terrible, you know, So
another candidate in the bad column here.
We've got Kelsey, who, you know, low, low targets per route run
here. Is is this just a blip or is it
is it a trend? Because now the chiefs have
actual competent receivers so they they don't feel the need to
just force feed Kelsey. So are we seeing the, you know,
scaled back Kelsey's usage plan right now?
Like what? What's your read on this?
So didn't the nuance to me is that it's still like, I mean,
you're still talking about Travis Kelsey like you still
have like what we're what we're the the stats that we're seeing
right now on Travis Kelsey is absolutely fucking garbage.
Like these are bad, bad stats. And so I think, I think that's
probably a mix of and he is a little bit older, so maybe not
quite as effective to like probably a good chunk of it is
just weird and small game sample stuff.
And, and, and it's like in a in a prior year, you just wouldn't
see small game sample stuff problems for Kelsey.
It's just like, no, he's Travis Kelsey smashing and I think over
over full season you probably will see decent or not not
decent production at cost, but you will see like usable games.
It's not going to just be in the toilet every game.
And but with the with the prior that he's aging and they're on
the start being this slow, it like I think you have to at
least adjust your expectations still.
Like maybe he's just a little bit older now.
He won't be quite as effective. He can still be.
I think you're still gonna get some Travis Kelce games, but
it's probably not the same as it was before.
If you want the spin zone maximum dose of Kelsey Cope,
what we're actually looking at is a low advance rate play at
its cost. But when we're into the fantasy
playoffs is when the Chiefs will really be needing to win games
to secure the one seed in the BI and they'll really be getting
Kelsey going and that's when his usage is going to ramp up.
So he's. Right, you're, you're right the,
the, the Chiefs haven't been playing close must win games the
first two games of the year against Baltimore and, and the
Bengals. So they're, they're, they're
just leaving him on the shelf. Yeah, I said it was cope.
I didn't say it was OK. Let's see other other guys in
the bad category. This one I don't need to spend a
bunch of time on, but just wanted to mention him.
Dalton Schultz just looks unnecessary, right?
Like, I mean, shit, Tank Dell is having trouble getting targets
again. It's only through two games.
I'm not worried about Tank Dell at all, for the record, but like
I'm worried about Dalton Schultz.
He just, he doesn't look necessary in this offense.
Yeah. And so I, I the routes are 74%.
I think that's a that's a fair outcome for Schultz and 10%
targets per run. Again, I think that's actually
what you should have projected. I think that's pretty close to
what you should should have projected for Dalton Schultz and
A dot a .3 pretty close to what you should have projected.
It seems to me that the Schultz play was always about finding
the odd touchdown and his his price didn't reflect that.
Certainly on FFPC, his price did not reflect a bomb, not bomb
like a Jag tight end who needs to touchdown to hit your lineup.
And and to me this is kind of what right in line with
expectations. Yeah, that's fair.
Non derogatory. One of the other guys in the bad
category, Sam Laporta. If you drafted Sam Laporta in
baseball, you're extremely disappointed with the price that
you paid for the guy. I mean, I, I kinda, so my thesis
for why I was lower on a Monroe this year was that you've got,
you know, the potential emergence of Jameson Williams.
People are projecting Jamir Gibbs to take a step forward.
And I was thinking, well, Sam LaPorte is also gonna cut in to
that a Monroe target share. And so far it's, it's gone the
other way where Jameson Williams and Jameer Gibbs definitely have
seen their roles expand. Like I, I think we can say that
pretty confidently here going forward.
But, and Montra saw, you know, that hurt him a little bit in
week 1, but here in week two, he just got, you know, 20 targets.
So and Sam Laporta has really been the victim of you know,
just hey, there's only there's a finite number of targets now
granted what did what did the the Lions have for total number
of pass attempts this week was it is some.
Well, it was it's been 909090 attempts, either 90 attempts or
90 drop backs. Give me a second.
But it for per week, but it's been it's been it's been high
volume for the offense. Yeah, 8383 attempts over the two
games. Yeah, certainly high volume for
the offense. And I, I'm not, I'm not actually
not worried per SE about Laporta.
And you're still getting like kind of 80% routes, routes run
there like I don't, I don't think so he's at 10% target for
a run for the season. I don't, I really don't think it
settles there. And so I think you're, you're
probably, this is probably a buy it a dip moment for Laporta.
And like I mentioned, they have been really low in terms of
getting the touchdowns that they want.
And if they want to improve that, I think Laporta has to be
part of that. And so I, I, I do think there's
pretty, there's, it's pretty easy to tell the story of how
Laporta bounces back. I agree with that.
Well, we'll put last one in the bad category.
Mark Andrews who similar targets per route run to Laporta sitting
just at 11 percent, you know, big, big increase from week 1
and his A dots also looking pretty good sitting at 9.91 of
the highest A dots on the chart here.
But are you worried about Mark Andrews is the little bit that
likely, you know, likely he's getting 17% targets per route
run this week still is that concerning for you for Andrews?
What do you what do you think his outlook is for the rest?
Of so Week 2 definitely more promising for Andrews where
still only like 73% route run, route run.
I think that that's that has to be under what you would have
projected, what you would have hoped for on Andrews and 19%
targets per run and much more positive than before, but under
what you would have hoped for on Mark Andrews.
So I think you have to be a little bit concerned with
Andrews. It's definitely not the
apocalyptic week 1, sort of like panic, but you have to be, you
have to be a little bit concerned that even even in in a
bounce back that it wasn't quite to where you needed it to be.
And but it's it's certainly not that.
I think the outlook for Andrews is probably a little maybe a
little bit better than for for Kelsey just given that we had a
stronger bounce back. And but you are you're
definitely not in the elite tight end usage category here.
You're kind of in the mediocre like low end tight end one usage
right now. Yeah.
And like the other point as well is so 19% target spread run is
like it's fine. But when they're only running a
limited route set, like that's also compounding a little bit as
well. Normally when it's lower there,
you expect them to be targeted more heavily when they actually
do get on the field. So yeah, I guess I'm mushy
mounted there and like, I'm like worried.
But it's yeah, I think low end, tight end 1 is probably a great
way to handicap it. Yeah, as someone who's one of
the highest drafted tight ends that I have is Mark Andrews,
I'm, I wasn't really worried after week 1.
After week two, I'm like, and I know a lot of people be like,
oh, why are you worried? Week two got so much better than
week one. I'm just, I'm slightly worried
after week two. It just seems harder for him to
to be the true like Smash where he's, you know, returning like
one of the best seasons he's had in his career.
It just. Seems that that seems off the
table unfortunately. Yeah, seems, seems at least a
lot thinner. I don't know that I'm ready to
call it totally off the table yet.
It's just two weeks of data, but it seems thinner for sure for
me. All right, the we've gone
through the good, we've gone through the bad, and now we're
to the ugly. I had a joke here that I think
works a lot better over text, but I'm going to say it out loud
anyway. So it's not Dalton Kincaid, it's
Lalton Kincaid as in lol because this guy is getting only a 12%
targets per route run with absolutely no target
competition. I mean Keon Coleman's out here
getting 0 targets. You're competing with what
Khalil Shakur and Mack Hollins? And I mean now granted part of
it is the Bills didn't throw a ton of passes, but still targets
per route run is a percentage that now also don't so.
And and and and. To be fair, in Week 2 Kincaid
got 27% targets for everyone. He did, which brought his
targets per route run up substantially.
Now that number's a little misleading because he missed a
lot of the game where he it was kind of a weird sequence, he so
to start. They they established Kincaid
early. Yeah, he gets 2 targets right
off the bat. They're both negative, A dot,
you know, little like screenplay.
Just get the ball in his hands and try and get him to do
running through the air with Kincaid, you know, and then he
gets kneed in the head and goes off, misses a couple drives,
comes back. But by the time he's back,
they're really, you know, the Bills were ahead and they were
they were just running the ball. So he doesn't get a lot more
looks. And so, yeah, to to take the the
mask off as the, you know, president of the Dalton Kincaid
Hater Club. I don't think, you know, like as
fun as it is to, you know, dunk on Dalton Kincaid.
Like I would definitely take him over Dalton Schultz.
You know, like I'm absolutely like, he's not in the same
universe as George Kittle for me, or like I would.
Definitely take him over Brock Wright, certainly.
I'd take him over Brock Wright, but like, here's here's a fun
one. This one's actually kind of
interesting. I think it's Kincaid still.
But what do you think about Pat Fryer news versus Dalton
Kincaid? That is Kincaid.
Yeah, I I think so too. But here's another fun one.
Tucker Kraft, who has similar targets per route run to Dalton
Kincaid, but he has a infinitely higher A dot.
Well, actually it's a, it's a negatively higher A dot if we're
multiplying because Kincaid has a negative A dot here.
But Tucker craft similar situation to Dalton Kincaid as
far as his targets for route run and A dot again I I'm clearly.
I, I yeah. I mean, it's Kincaid.
Yeah. Give me a hard one.
All right, you want a hard one? Let's see.
I mean, OK, so here's the problem.
The the tier that Dalton Kincaid falls in is like so clearly
after all of the other tight ends that we would say are
actually like good. Right, so he's going to get,
he's going to get absolutely gapped by by Tray McBride and.
Here's one. Here's one Kyle.
Pitts is punishing at his price. Go ahead.
Sorry. Kyle Pitts or Dalton Kincaid.
Kincaid probably. Yeah, for me the answer is
neither right like. I mean, I, I mean like.
So just maybe to play devil's advocate here, so the 27%
targets per run in Week 2, is that like that's a least sign
that they that they intend to like actually establish Kincaid
that they have he's in their plans like if Kincaid can place
decently, like he's going to get a lot of targets.
And the problem is that he hasn't played decently yet.
And, and the games, even last year, the games where he did
play decently were, were like not that many.
But I, I, I still like if, if you were like a, a Dalton
Kincaid bowl, I think that the like, I think the upside is
still like that. What what you were playing for
is still kind of there. It's a little bit tender, but
like you can still tell yourself a story right now because
especially it's only Week 2. It's honestly the situation is,
I mean, not, but like how you're feeling about it and like the
the path to it becoming good for you is probably not all that
different than Mark Andrews, right where?
Yeah, I, I, I think you're probably looking at, you're
probably are looking at Silent Killer for Kincaid.
You're like you're you'll get what feels like decent
production, but absolutely shellacked by Bearers and
McBride. Yeah, Oh, man, if I could, if I
could trade all my Kincaid shares for Brock Bowers, I'd do
if I could, if you made me trade 2 for one, I've got to take
every two Kincaid teams and turn it into one Bowers team.
I'd do it in a heartbeat. I'd do it in a heartbeat.
If anyone's interested in the trade and you've got some Bowers
teams that you'd like to trade some Kincaid teams for, slide
into my DMS. There you go.
That's. An interesting one.
But no, honestly, in like analyzing the Kincaid situation,
I actually came away more bullish after this week.
Like if we, if we want to be truly honest about it, it's just
too fun. It's too fun to dunk on him.
But no, like I, I was encouraged by by you know, the team clearly
knows that you know, they're they're receiving options are
not fantastic and they wanted to get him involved early.
So I'm I'm leaving a light on for him, but it's way more fun
to be a hater. He he he is probably median
outcome is some sort of like Evan Ingram scam season, right?
And we have like we're told that he's going to flash this
brilliant play that we just haven't seen yet and we haven't
seen it yet. So there's still like some hope
for that. But the most likely outcome is
some kind of scam season. Yeah.
And that's still that feels more likely now.
Yeah, you paid for fancy Evan Ingram.
Yeah, and. Not a ton on the backup.
I mean, we can flip to the backup tight end chart here real
quick. I don't think there's a ton
here. I mean, Jonny Smith not not
really anything. I mean, he's going to get scheme
touches. You're just you're praying for a
touchdown. Jonny Smith is just like a This
is a player who's on the field that can score a touchdown in
offense that's well schemed so. And the one that my one take
away is by who's actually on this chart who we weren't
expecting Juan Johnson being on this chart.
Yeah, like being this kind of like committee tight end.
That's not what we drafted him for.
No, it's not great. I definitely am feeling much
more bearish on Joan Johnson now.
I do I do remember seeing easy he had a note that he played in
all the 11 personnel snaps and that the game script has been
like anti using Joan Johnson because like.
You're they're not throwing, Yeah.
Right, you're not going to use him much in a positive game
script. I mean, yeah, look at he's got
zero blocking. He's literally just.
I noticed that too, so. So Jawan Johnson, you, you know
what? It's funny.
Jawan Johnson is what everyone wanted Kyle Pitts to be.
He is a receiver with pipe and eligibility.
Unfortunately he's got full back usage.
Yeah, we'll, we'll see. I mean man, the Eagles.
Eagles would be a fun spot though potentially if they can
hang some points, maybe get a little more jawan involvement
that that might be fun. Yeah, yeah.
So you're is that a prime time game?
Let's see. I don't.
I don't know. No, it's probably not game.
I don't think it is. Probably not.
Yeah, I don't believe it is. I think it's a Sunday main slate
game. Yeah, I don't know why I had
that in my head. So should we move on to the
Yeah. Let's get to receivers here.
And so we've got receiver opportunity versus fantasy
points, so horizontal weighted targets per run, which is like
targets per run, but ways to deep down the field targets more
heavily and plot that against fantasy points because we don't
just want usage, we also want the score to points.
And then a couple of very smart people made this point over the
years that the actually the strongest and predictor for next
season, for this season points is last season points.
And so keeping a track of who's actually scoring is helpful too.
Yeah, sometimes the game doesn't have to be hard.
Just look at the fantasy points here last year.
That'll help you predict next year, really and honestly.
Yeah, no, I I know I'm being serious, man.
The the guy though, that is, I mean his ascension last year,
like we were all getting hot and bothered about this guy and he's
just continuing Nico Collins just looking like an absolute
alpha. I don't know if you're watching
this game, but they were they're comparing him to Andre Johnson.
It was. It was pretty fun.
Fun comparison. It feels like a fair.
I mean, that's helmet scouting, but it also feels fair.
Yes, I mean, yeah, Nico Collins just looks dominant.
He's the question was, is there really a wide receiver one on
the Texans or is it just gonna be guys that trade off?
I think, well, I, I think if you want my like actual answer on
that, I think the answer is yes to both.
Like yes Nico Collins is the wide receiver one, but also
there will be weeks where Steph Diggs gets his or Tank Doug gets
his but Nico is the alpha like he's establishing.
Himself as the alpha like I think if you reran A2 week data
sample of the Texans in in random sequences, it's like
there's a lot where different receivers are look like the wide
receiver one. Yeah, yes.
And so he's going to score a lot of points, like really excited
about his prospects this year and but certainly don't write
out the other guys. In this same quadrant with him,
we've got some new additions and some some familiar faces.
The new additions. I mean this this guy was here
last week. But Jameson Williams showing
that week 1 was not a fluke still continued to earn volume
was out targeted by almond raw this week.
But you know, you can see that Jameson Williams is definitely
was not just a one week blip on the radar.
They will both be, you know, solid fantasy producers for this
season. The other new addition here is
rookie Malik neighbors who had and I.
I just want to I want to make sure that I'm right on this
AA60A60. What percent targets per out one
right or 6060% target share. What was it?
And so Malik Neighbors and actually, so he had a 3231%
targets per out run, but I think his overall target share is
something like 60 something percent, Yeah.
It's just absurd. So, so crazy.
Oh oh. Wait, sorry, 31%?
That's for the season. Yeah, My, my, my bad.
Gotcha. Yeah, I think, I think it was
like 66% this week is what I believe my memory is serving,
but. Yeah, that sounds, that sounds
more right. Kind of kind of seems like the
Giants figured out like this is our best player.
We just need to get in the ball over and over and over and over.
Do you see that changing at all this season?
Was this a week where it was like, we need, we need to feed
him just so he's happy and then we'll we'll go back to like
spreading it out a little bit more, obviously with himself,
the wide receiver on. Are we just going to see?
I mean that I think the thing about it is, is like you're not
going to see a player finish with a 63% target shift around
the year. Like you're not, but I think it
it could stretch the bounds of like credibility where like it
could be so it could be like more than 40 like.
That'd be that'd be so insane, but very fun.
Right, like, but like, I'm just trying to, I'm just trying to
put a realistic flag. No, I, I and I think that's,
yeah, I think that's reasonable too, which is crazy.
Just like if he told me that he'd have a 40% target share
coming into this season, I would have laughed at you.
But here we are. Like in a healthy season, it's
it's not, it's, it's certainly not less than 30.
It's probably not less than 35. Yeah, pretty wild old familiar
faces up here. Devante Adams, Justin Jefferson.
Surprise two of the best receivers in football for still
two of the best receivers in football.
DK Metcalf shows up after a big nuke game with his teammate
Jackson Smith and Jigba. This is one I really want to
watch. I I would anticipate that the
Seahawks receivers can't maintain this level of fantasy
production that they got from Week 2, but also I I don't think
it's going to be anywhere near as bad as week 1 was.
I think in reality, you know the boring answer is probably
somewhere in the middle, but very exciting to see both these
guys here. Yeah, yeah.
And we were kind of very sad about JSN not getting the
targets in Week 1 and then to see a bounce back where they
targeted them heavily and it actually like became an
important part of them winning the game too, of getting
production through him. Very, very exciting.
And then it wasn't just the short yardage stuff.
It was also like intermediate. And it definitely feels like in
in in, in versions of this season where the Seahawks
offense is good and I can move the ball and they they have to
involve a healthy amount of JSN, which great to see.
Yeah, absolutely. Another guy who is a new
addition to this quadrant is Calvin Ridley.
And we we alluded to this earlier that the offense is
Calvin Ridley, but it's it seems to potentially be making him
fantasy viable now. I think it's just like, can he
survive the utter stink of Will Levis to remain fantasy viable
now? DeAndre Hopkins was able to
survive the utter stink last season.
And now with, I mean, for for people that are, you know,
somehow out of the loop on the DeAndre Hopkins stuff, he is
playing with a torn MCL right now.
He did not opt for surgery. He's just like, I don't need
that ligament. That's a luxury ligament.
I'll just go on with. That it's only it's only pain on
the function of my knee. Yeah, So obviously that is
majorly hampering DeAndre Hopkins.
So Calvin Ridley is like the only show in town right now
because I don't know if you saw Tyler Boyd that the the the
Titans, you know, should not have been in that game, but they
kind of were. And then Tyler Boyd gets a
chance to, you know, make a grab near the end of the game and it
just hits him chest. He drops it.
It's like, all right, let's just let's pack it up here.
We're done. So what do you what do you think
about Calvin Ridley's outlook rest of the season?
Does he belong up here? No, no, I think you probably
should expect like AI don't know, probably like 15 points a
game, maybe a little. I guess he's he's that's the
part that he's in. I think 15 points a game is
probably on the high end somewhere between 12 and a half,
15 and so certainly not less than 10.
I mean, if they're just like, that's the thing about the NFL,
if they're just going to focal go make him the focal point and
feed him targets, then just true volume alone.
He probably will he probably will finish somewhere in that
range. And but it's it's tough to see
them like just like get away with that where like what, what,
why? Why wouldn't a defense just
like, OK, we're just going to put the safety over Calvin
Ridley and you don't have an answer for that?
Yeah, that, that seems right to me.
I would not anticipate him crushing for the whole season.
Another with the short sample you also he did get the benefit
of that improbable and touchdown catch.
Yes. Like I I don't think you should
be projecting like like 88 that happening 8 more times.
No, certainly not OK a receiver who you're hoping changes for
the better if you've got him on a roster.
Michael Pittman, junior who is out there with his weighted
targets per route run. The problem is the offense is
not throwing all that much. Now, granted, they did throw a
lot more this week than they did last week, but they threw almost
as much to the other team as they did to their own team.
Anthony Richardson. Yeah, this.
Is this is not a Michael Pittman offense?
No. It, it, it just, it does not
suit them where it's a low volume, then they're going to
chip deep. Like I guess the, the the
question then is, so he's right there around just under 7 1/2
points of like that doesn't feel startable right now.
No. And so you're benching Michael
Pittman in, in, in most places where you have him and and
you're, you're, but you're not, you're not cutting him.
And because like what? Except in very shallow leaks,
you're not. You're certainly not cutting him
in an FFPC managed, but you have a really tough time starting
them like you're you're sad to start Michael Pittman.
If you're starting Michael Pittman and it probably means
that you're losing that week, right?
Right, right. Another guy in the same quadrant
is Michael Pittman. It's Chris Olave, and he's also.
He's right next to Gabe Davis, too.
So are we. Are we officially worried about
Chris Olava yet? It's true.
Yeah. You.
You challenge, I was worried about him last week.
You challenged me on that. And and I think when you look
into the trends on the Saints a little bit more with the, the
low pass rate and then they'll happen to do like true dropbacks
and not really challenged as a as a passing attack.
I think that has a lot to do with the low Olava use here.
And you can certainly see the the Eagles pushing their their
defense a lot more. So their offense actually has to
go out and throw it. And, and I think that it that
that's where they're going to need Olave.
So do you think this is a good bounce back spot for Olave?
Would this be, you know, I'm Yeah, I haven't done.
He's a quite low calendar, isn't he?
Yeah, yeah, I think I've done one Dog Bowl draft so far this
week, so I don't really been been in the streets a ton there,
but I would assume he goes pretty late there.
You think this is a good spot to to try and hammer him?
Yeah, yeah. I haven't looked at as AI just
called him a Bilocan that I haven't even looked at as his
expected points or anything like that.
So let's have a look at that. And so the expected points last
week was three and this week his expected points were 10.8.
And so he's not going to pop. He's not actually going to pop
in a buy low model and certainly not and but given how important
he would be when when the Saints offense actually has to do some
true drop back passing game certainly bounce back candidate.
Yeah, I I agree. OK, really quickly last section
on this chart I wanted to go through, but we'll we'll get
into the Wind Sprinters anonymous quadrant, which is
this bottom left quadrant here. I'm just going to rapid fire
here and I want you to tell me if the guy is just destined to
live in this quadrant or if he's going to move to greener
pastures and move to the right side of the chart where he's at
least getting more weighted targets per route run.
And hopefully that's translating into more fantasy points per
game. So I'm just going to hit you
with some guys here in this bottom left quadrant.
Christian Kirk. He's probably stuck here.
Kerry Mclaurin probably stuck here.
Jacoby Myers. And yeah, he's stuck here now.
He's been supplanted. Amari Cooper.
I mean, over full season he probably moves right?
Yeah, Roma Dunze. I mean, he should move right?
If the Bears offense is gonna succeed, he should move right?
After watching the the Sunday night game, it doesn't feel like
he will, but he has to. Like, I'm gonna give them that
coaching staff just a tiny bit of credit and say he moves,
right? Brandon Iuke.
Yes, they. Have.
Yeah, that one's the clearest one to me.
Last one, Keon Coleman. And they probably have to target
him. They have to make him more
important as well. Like if they have playoff
aspirations and they're like, oh, really?
Hope this is a Khalil Shakur game.
It's gonna say. We got a touchdown from Mac
Collins here. Like they they need to bring
that guy on. You don't think you can build
the plane out of Khalil Shakur Mac?
Collins I I I enjoy this note from KZ.
DJ Murr is bound to give up eventually, where he'll just
lose his will to play like he's like, you know what, I retire.
I'm good. Thank God.
I mean thank God he got paid though, right?
Like at least he's he can be rich and miserable.
Right, financially rewarded for his good play.
Let's let's go to our 70 to 85% routes run guys here.
So these, yeah, this chart has a lot of guys who, you know, we
normally would see on the other chart in like Mike Evans and CD
Lamb, but they just haven't been, you know, I think like for
the Cowboys, for example, there really wasn't a need for CD Lamb
to be running that many routes at the end of both of their
first two games, right? They were beating the brakes off
the Browns and they got the brakes beat off them by the
Saints. So, you know, he didn't run a
ton of routes. So I don't think this is really
like indicative of how many routes he's going to run.
He'll probably graduate to that. That first chart here.
Tyreek kind of always lives on this chart.
That's just how he is, right? He was here last year, all year.
He was perpetually breaking the chart.
He's an older, he's an older hyper efficient player.
So right. But they this is not a mansion.
Jane, Jane Reed, I would expect to probably stay.
He, he's a, he's gonna be a fixture here, I would assume.
Right slot only, but you're you're where are you drafting
them? You're really happy with this up
to? 80 Yep, absolutely.
Guys that I thought were were worth mentioning here, Chris
Godwin. Maybe people overreacted last
year to Mike Evans, you know, being the touchdown hog.
Maybe Chris Godwin is still good.
Maybe all he needed was to operate out of the slot.
What do you think? Yes, that's that's certainly
seems to be how it's worked out. It's interesting.
So Mike Evans, so Chris got 182% red shirt.
Mike Evans 84, McMillan 87. So that does feel a little bit
more rotational than a than a typical offense.
Well, because they are. They're getting Trey Palmer
worked in there too, right? Right.
And but Trey Palmer, he's at 21%.
OK. And so I guess you that that
sums to 274%. So like 2.7 receivers a play.
Yeah. And they're mixing in.
They're mixing in tree guys a lot.
So I think that is a little bit interesting, but obviously
they're doing it very effectively.
I guess the question is we shouldn't expect the books
offense to operate this well and this efficiently all season, or
should we? I mean, if you maybe pick one
way or another, if they're going to stay this efficient or
regress a little bit, I'd probably pick regress.
But I also think it's kind of what we talked about in in
reverse for the Lions where Goth had all these attempts, right?
And and it was because of the game script and the Bucks really
slowed down passing in this game, like in the second-half,
they they didn't need to to pass as much.
So Baker Baker didn't throw as much and I, so I think that you
could see them become a little less efficient, but have the
volume tick up a little bit. And so I, I'm, I'm kind of of
the opinion that the Bucks receivers might just be like, we
might be seeing like their baseline production right now,
Like they this may just be like a pretty good offense this year.
Right, not not make sense. And one thing that I notice
here, and I'm actually I'm not sure where it's this stands in
the context of the rest of his career, but Mike Evans is 8 odds
is just 11 and 21% targets per out run and that like it's only
two games. That does feel like a little bit
of a fade off. But yeah, I'm not.
I want. To check it here.
Yeah, I'm, I'm willing to chalk that up to small sample stuff.
Not not ready to say like he's always lost a step or what what
have you. Right.
It, it, it is, it is too early to say that.
And so, yeah, last year he was 24% targets for a run and so
he's at 21% now. So that's that's certainly when
kicking range and then as a dot was at 15 last year, so a dot
down and target for a rundown. So then I guess the thing the
piece though, is if you expect Godwin's production to stay
where it is like you like you kind of need it to be true that
Mike Evans. Has lost.
Yeah, I'd, I'd say what it what I think is the most likely thing
to happen is that they they kind of alternate where it's not
going to be that, you know, Godwin keeps us this exact
production every game for the whole season.
But just they oscillate back and forth where Evans will have
these big efficient, you know, deep plays where he's, you know,
hauling in a really deep ball, you know, or mossing a guy for a
touchdown or something like that.
And Godwin then loses out a little bit on what he can
produce because Evans is just eating up.
Hey, Mike Evans, just. Had it hauled in a 40 yard
touchdown. So the drive's over like Chris
Godwin can't keep earning targets anymore because the
drive's done. So I, I think it'll probably
oscillate back and forth between them.
But I, I think like as a, as a baseline, like if you kind of
split the baby on where they're at on the chart where you know,
Godwin is, is super high with above 20 fantasy points per game
right now. And Evans is in that 15 range,
probably both of them closer to that 15 range, maybe a a shade
above, but it's looking like a pretty good passing offense.
Yeah. And then the other piece as well
is I know he doesn't belong on this chart.
No, he actually does. He does and jail and McMillan,
we were pretty, all pretty hyped about him getting the role and
he was he was a ship chasing clip.
And but then his, his targets per run is just it's what's like
9%. And then yeah, he's actually,
he's on the the previous chart, but he's in the wind sprinter
quadrant. Oh, OK, OK.
And he's getting this like 17A dot, but rarely targeted.
And so the, the, the, that's the other question of is he, is he
going to stay there all season or is this just like the day one
rookie roll is to clear off the safeties, run off the safeties
and then maybe they expand his, his usage more.
I, I think it's the day one rookie roll, but I think that if
you're expecting him to be exploding with a huge breakout
halfway through the season, I think you're probably a little
overly optimistic. To me, what this feels like is
you have two very good incumbent receivers here with Godwin and
Evans and McMillan, you know, could be very good and it it's
just going to be hard to earn targets alongside those guys.
So incredible contingent value because I think that if you saw
a void, you know, in, in the offense, he could definitely
step in and fill it. And then also, I think that as
the season progresses and they get to trust him more and more
and he he he'll make some big plays here and there.
Like, I mean, week one shoot, he he could have had multiple
touchdowns. So the guy, the guy can make
some big plays. So I think we'll see his role
grow over the season. I think it's going to be really
hard for him to usurp either of these guys because they're both.
Good, right. They're they're good.
They're playing well and they're entrenched.
Yeah, that that makes sense. Two other ones on this chart
here that I I like. Now they're they're both similar
in where they're at as far as now where did I'm I'm missing.
I can't find my Deonte Johnson dot.
Where did where did Deonte Johnson go?
There he is OK. He's all the way down near a
little above 50% weighted targets per route run, but only
around 5 fantasy points that bottom right quadrant.
So Rashid, I wanted to to talk about him and Rashid Shahid
because they kind of feel like they're they're two ships in the
they're just so different in the way that they get there, where
Shahid is getting there on extreme efficiency, but not a
ton of targets, right? But his weighted targets per
outrun look really good getting such deep passes, right.
And then also the offense, there's just not a ton of routes
happening. And then Deonte, well, you're in
this entirely dysfunctional offense, but now you get the
quarterback change. So I'm, I'm wondering, you know,
if you had to pick between these two guys, Rashid Shahid or
Deonte Johnson? Oh God, rest of the season, who
do you think is going to end up in the more favorable spot on
this? Chart and who, who, who's?
Who's going to score more points?
Who would I project for more? And I'd probably give slight
edge rest of the season. I'd probably give slight edge to
Deonte. And but that's because, I mean,
we've kind of seen the the, the one negative on Shaheed is we've
kind of seen this start before where he's catching these deep
bombs and it looks great and we feel great about it.
But then has he I don't think he has sustained it over a full
season. So like we obviously shouldn't
just expect Jaheed to just be catching deep bombs every game
and that to be how the Saints offense works.
Like it's going to happen again this year.
I'm not going to say I'm not trying to say that it won't.
And then the I think his, his rate stuff is being pushed up a
little. Shaheed's rate stuff is being
pushed up by the low attempts. Whereas like it's almost like a
bomb that Shaheed then call it a day.
Yeah. And in two weeks of data, I
don't, I don't feel great about just projecting that kind of
like rate stuff going forward. Whereas Deonte, I do think, I
think like he's been a target earner.
He's continuing to earn targets and now he has like this kind of
borderline competent quarterback where he's going to get those
targets from. So he probably will score good
points the rest of the way with Dalton.
Yeah, I think, I think that's how I land as well.
It's really fun to be the Rashid Shahid Bowl right now, though.
It sure is. Those screenshots are looking
nice. Yes, But OK, moving, moving on
to another receiver. Here's here's what I'm just I'm
curious, how does Ray Ray McLeod have greater than a 50% weighted
targets per route run in an NFL offense?
Can you answer that question? Yeah, yeah.
So last week our our kind of explanation was that Kirk was so
tentative and he was just like, kind of like tossing it down to
Ray Ray and but it seemed it it, it certainly feels like he has a
good comfort level with him and. He's he's operating in the
intermediate zone too. During during that game on a
night was he was, he was doing a lot of the, you know, find the
soft spot in the zone across the middle or he was doing like the,
you know, 10 or 15 yard out stuff like Yeah, yeah.
Especially Darnell Mooney was kind of doing the same thing.
Yeah, Darnell, where Darnell Mooney finally made his hey, was
he, he had that, you know, deep shot where he he broke away for
the incredible touchdown and then had the front flip into the
end zone. But.
Well, I'm sorry, what I meant was it's, it's it's surprising
that Mooney was a favorite target of Kirk as well.
Yeah. That piece I'm I'm perplexed by.
I'm honestly like the, the, the information seems to be saying
that he those two guys have Kirk's trust and that he's going
to use them a lot and and that it's somewhat working and but it
doesn't jive for me. It doesn't feel right to come to
that conclusion. And so I don't want to have
like, that's kind of like super strong stance on it.
So. So what I'm hearing is you'd be
buying low on Drake London then? Yeah, yeah, of course.
OK. Let's see.
OK, so there's. We do have, we do have an oh, go
ahead. Oh, there, there's a guy in the
wind sprinter category here on this chart that I I really want
to highlight ahead of the Thursday night game this week
'cause I think he's actually a fun spot for short slate stuff.
You know, like the prime time Palooza drafts on Underdog where
it's just the two gamers. You get the Thursday night and
the Sunday night or for showdown and that's Demario Douglas.
So earlier in the show we mentioned how the Patriots
offensive line is all banged up. Literally every single starter
is listed on the injury report with some more serious injuries
than others. So they're probably going to
have a hard time pass protecting here.
They're going to have a harder time running the ball even
though we know they want to run the ball.
But it's against The Jets outrun defense.
So it's going to be challenging there.
And just this week, the coaching staff said of Demario Douglas
that we need to get him more involved.
He's one of our most explosive players.
We have to find a way to get him the ball.
This is like the Primo squeaky wheel spot for me.
And it's it's not like Demario Douglas, some superstar where
it's like, Oh my God, I can't believe we haven't been
targeting Demario Douglas. But I'm reading the tea leaves
here and I feel like this is a really good spot to attack
Demario Douglas, especially just from the the way the match up
works out. He's he's running.
I believe it's 82% of his snaps have been in the slot so far
this season. So he is pretty that's like one
of the highest slot rates you're going to get.
You know, so he's going to get to avoid some of The Jets best
corner play. You know he he's getting to
avoid Sauce Gardner, the name of their other really good corners
eluding me right now, but he's avoiding that their strongest
coverage play and he's ideally set up to be able to take
advantage of the fact that the patriots probably need to get
the ball out quick. So I'm.
Looking, yeah, 33% slot, right? Well, actually, no, no slot
snaps. Yeah, Yeah, yeah, you're right.
You're right. I assume the wrong map.
You're right. We we do have a question in the
chat before we go to the next chart or or not a question, but
more of a a demand held hostage by KZ who demands that we talk
about QJ who did in fact have two touchdowns this week.
Man, you just you just wish that it could go to lad Mcconkey.
Just please use lad Mcconkey instead of QJ.
But to Q JS credit as like a noted QJ hater, I have to say he
didn't drop the touchdown passes, which has been a big
problem for him in the past. I'm hesitant to to say that it's
sticky and it's gonna stay, but I don't know what do you are.
Are you, are you willing to revise your opinion your prior
on QJ? And no, no, I am not.
And we have, we have some and this is another one where we
have some really strong rate stats and for one week of data
or well in fairness we have two weeks now and but this is a
really low, this is a really low kind of like sample size.
And So what do we got? We've got total we've got 51
drop backs for this for this team.
And then you've got like what what where are we coming in at
the average and for QJ we're coming in and where is he on the
chart? He's coming in 62% and way to
tigers per run. So like that's good that that's
honestly good. And he's so he's getting he's
getting our yards, he's getting targets on the fields.
And but it's tough to see that kind of like good rates start to
to continue over a larger sample size.
Like, and then you catch 2 touchdowns and a 22 drop back
week and it's like, oh, wow, this guy's amazing.
Like, I mean, I think he's a waiver pick up.
Like I think I have a team we're probably going to and put in a
bid to pick him up, but it's truly like AI don't know
dumpster diving like, oh, we did something.
Let's see if we can do it again. Like, but it's hard.
It is hard to have a lot of confidence that that will be a
thing going forward. I see Steph had the note that
leg up or pushing him back into where the dynasty ranks and I
mean, he should be ranked in dynasty that that seems fair to
me. And but like I said, it's hard
to have a lot of confidence that this kind of thing is going to
continue. What?
What do you think? No, yeah, I'm, I'm with you.
You know, I, I don't want to. I'm a little conflicted because
it's truly a barren. Like there's a reason that I was
willing to draft, you know, Jerry Rice junior, you know,
because like it's a barren wide receiver room.
So that's, that's the part that makes me a little bit more
willing to be like maybe I'll, I'll pick him up on what I, I
think you put it well, like you can pick him up on waivers.
I'm, I'm not, I'm not like playing in, in DFS or, or battle
Royale or anything like that. But it's just like that.
He was totally flat lined before, like I, I, you know,
and, and now maybe like you heard, you heard a little.
Something got 10 seconds of pulse.
Yeah, you heard a little something on the heartbeat
monitor, but you're not sure if it was just noise or whatnot.
So anyway, we can move on to the last, wider secret chart here.
Yeah. This chart is mostly
Windspringers. There's not a lot here.
There's really only. Two guys on Jalen Waddle.
Yeah. So Jalen Waddle with the, I mean
classic Jalen Waddle and you know, miss a bunch of snaps due
to injury. He.
Can't keep getting away with this, yeah?
Surely, surely it changes. The only two guys I had notes on
that I wanted to get your opinion on Xavier Legette.
Kind of same vein as the Deonte Johnson stuff we talked about,
but Legette's got good weighted targets per route run.
Now, granted, it it's come from a totally dysfunctional offense,
so that might change entirely with the new quarterback.
But do you, are you interested in Legat here with Dolph?
Yeah, yeah, the the rookie having this kind of like high
weighted target spread run out the gate is super interesting.
Obviously you do run this kind of risk that it's like on a low
ish snapshare and like 5050 to 60 is is not that bad.
It's not like it's on like 20% or 30% right share.
And but that that is some risk there that if they wrap it up
that he can't maintain that efficiency.
But to me, that's super interesting that you get a
rookie earning targets on that kind of rate and then guess a
yeah, QB upgrade that that that that could end up being really
fun. So you want to, you want to hear
something disgusting? If you want a really creative
way to lose your money this week, the Raiders and the
Panthers play. The Raiders have shown us
they're willing to throw the ball if necessary.
The limiting factor here is going to be can Andy Dalton
actually do something against the Raiders defense which was
feisty enough to give Lamar Jackson trouble, right?
So, you know, keep keep that in mind, but.
Right. I mean, Andy Dalton has been fun
in the past. They're and Andy Dalton will
sling it. So I'm I'm kind of thinking like
maybe a little little Brock Bowers, that tight end.
And then I play the Andy Dalton double with a little Xavier
Leggette, Deonte Johnson, absolute vomit stack and just
jam chalk everywhere else. How stupid am I?
Can you really play a 50% red chair guy unlike the Panthers in
DFS? I mean.
I mean the answer can you is yes.
Should should you is the better question.
No, honestly, like the if you if you want like a legitimate idea
of how to play it, like you probably just do Deonte Johnson,
Andy Dalton's skinny stack with Brock powers and and just that
that alone, you know, right, Andy Dalton's going to be
bargain basement, so. Right, you heard it here first
on stack chasing. You don't need to double stack
Andy Dalton. You you don't need your.
Skinny suck is fine. I might, but you don't need to.
OK, last guy here. Another interesting one to touch
on before you get to the Thursday night game.
But this guy scored his first NFL touchdown was also his only
catch of the game, I believe. Is that Jalen Polk?
So Polk looks Polk is doing the rookie wide receiver thing where
he's getting more usage week after week.
He's earning more snaps. The other guys are like starting
to take more. Taekwon Thornton is he has fully
turned back into a pumpkin, right?
You know, he's he's off the field.
Jalen Polk is in for Taekwon Thornton.
You're you're getting less of these, you know, pure dust balls
out there running routes for the Patriots.
So are we at all hopeful for Polk or is he just probably not
going to be fantasy relevant until you get like a Drake May?
So you've got the increase in red chair from 62% to 69% week
over week and and that 69% came with a 14% target spread run.
And so you do have some increase there.
And I think I mean, you, you have room to grow there.
And with it being early days in his rookie season, but without
AQB change, that doesn't feel like very promising.
That doesn't feel like enough of a standing to like, make it any
kind of real bet on a guy, to me anyway.
Yeah, I agree. He's not.
You can't play him in DFS, You can't play him in like full
slate battle royales, like a prime time Palooza or a
showdown. He's definitely viable.
Right, right, right. Where it's basically a showdown
in the prime time palooza. That he's not even, like he's
not even a stash on, you know, in a home league or he's not
even. Right in a short, in a short
bench league, he's not really worth stashing, Yeah.
Was there anyone else on this chart that you wanted to touch
on before you wrap it up? No, I don't think so.
I don't think do we have that much interest.
I mean, yeah, I don't think we have that much interesting to to
say. I guess I'm looking at this
chart and I'm kind of interested in Jennings because like I know
every every time I see him, he's looking awesome.
But then I'm like, oh, why is he in the the low kind of like
route chair? Is it the injury?
So he's 58% week, 169% Week 2. So Jennings is probably like an
OK and pick up with the Devo injury and if you're really
truly in a pinch, but that still feels pretty gross but worth
mentioning on time. Yeah, yeah, it's a good call.
Yeah, that's I do like that Matt Collins is hidden behind the the
box thing here. Yeah, he is.
He's sneaky there. But no more interesting notes, I
don't think. All right.
So I think that's stack chasing. We shaved a lot of time off of
last week. Whole hour.
And so we're now at 2 hours and 40 minutes.
And then thanks for everyone who stayed on.
I appreciate the love, Kazy. And that's it for me.
See you guys next week.