Welcome to week 11 of stat chasing.
There's only three weeks left until we hit the fantasy play
offs and this week we got blue balled by the return from injury
from Devana Chan and Justin Jefferson.
This is stat chasing Pat Fryer helmo this.
Is Why This is why I'm Hot 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. You might even say we got a we
got a Turkey from a chain. We we did.
We did. Yeah, that man that was so
disappointing as a man who has like 24% Davana Chan in BBM was
really looking forward to this week.
But alas, I'll I'll have to wait at least one more week for him
to come back. Yeah, yeah, I I I'm so not
consoling myself, but I'm thinking even with the Justin
Jefferson stuff, where? If I can still get some
Jefferson teams in like Low own Justin Jefferson coming off
injury is so nice. The the Justin Jefferson dynamic
is super interesting too because you're gonna have such a high
rate of those teams being paired with Kirk Cousins.
So the Holy Grail is you get a Justin Jefferson Divana Chan
with no Kirk Cousins team through the playoffs.
That's like, yeah, that feels like such a smash to me if you
sneak any of those through. And I, you know, Lord knows I
got a good grip of those, 'cause I was my son ran the 101 pretty
hard this this summer that, you know, I think underdog got wind
that I was becoming a best ball influencer.
So they were just making sure that I got my due of 101's.
And so I'm overweight, JJ, by a good clip, you know, got a huge
bag on a Chan and then I was just about field neutral on Kirk
Cousins. So I might might be able to
sneak a couple of those in there.
How How does this sound? So?
No. Kirk Cousins, Chua, CJ Strad
with Tank, Dale, Jordan Anderson and and Justin Jefferson with A
Chan and JT and Reese. I can only, I can only get so
erect. That's pretty good.
Yeah, that's that's one where if you get that one through, how's
it sitting right now? Oh, it's going.
It's going to advance. Oh yeah, baby, that's nice.
That's really exciting. So it's it's ahead by about well
it's ahead by about 46 points that that is pretty exciting.
Well I had, I had an interesting interesting weekend.
So shout out to J Fresh who was nice enough to invite me along
to King of the Beach as one of his plus ones.
The man was just bee sting and got three tickets through on D
KS King of the Beach tournament. So I was in Miami with him.
You know just doing some doing some scouting of Miami prior to
my trip there for the dog bowl. Really making sure that I've got
the right mindset to take that down.
So it was a it was a fun. Experience airly out of the way
with. So you're just sat down and
focused. Exactly, exactly.
It was very strategic. But you know what I think that
there was a hit that got placed on sacrilegious on my my travels
back. You know, one of my fellow dog
Wolf competitors put it out on me my my plane had an engine
malfunction on the way back from Miami.
I literally, I've never felt this before.
So we're we're flying, we've been in the air for like 3 hours
and the plane like all of a sudden feels like it stops
moving forward. Like not like a hard lurch, but
like we just lost a considerable amount of speed.
Pilot gets on the intercom, he's like, hey everybody, we're
having an engine malfunction. We're gonna have to turn around
and land back in Austin. You just can't trust these
basketball nerds. No, No.
Yeah. So someone out there was trying
to knock me off before the dog bowl.
But, you know, rumors of my demise have been greatly
exaggerated. I'm.
I'm still alive and kicking. So.
OK. I'll have to try again harder
next week. Oh man, what a plot twist.
And and I I hear you, you told me you have some personal news
to share too. Oh yeah, almost forgot.
So my, my work my my content is going to be over at leg up going
forward contributing over at Pat's site.
Super excited to be on board there, I think.
I I can't remember if I've said this on the show before, but
literally the reason that I joined the ship chasing Discord
was I was grinding the FFPC playoff tournament last season
and I had made my own ownership projections and combinatorial
ownership stuff. And I was watching ship chasing
and saw, you know, Pat talking about his ownership projections.
And I I, you know, paid the premium Discord subscription
just to get those projections and compare them to mine.
So you know, obviously Pat's a super sharp dude and very
excited to be working with him going forward.
Yeah. Well now I guess 22 cross
collaborations. Well this this one is smaller
but. Well, I I I don't know where
it's going with that. You're you're you're intertwined
with the ship chasing community. Now I guess they fold into the
fold and honestly, you know, I know we've had a pretty long
preamble here before we get in the charts, but just like the
thing that is keeping me interested in fantasy football
this season, like I I feel like it's normal for people to get
burned out as you go through fantasy season.
It's long, it's grindy, especially if you're doing like
a lot of work either whether it be on content or you're doing
like your own analysis to try and make sure you're staying
sharp and and getting the biggest advantage you can and
the game formats that you play. It's easy to get burnt out by
this point in the season, but honestly for me like the
community is so fantastic that that is really what's keeping me
going. So shout out to the coolest
community you know, not just in fantasy.
You guys are just awesome. So happy to be a part of it.
Yeah well I I everyone in in in the community is definitely have
been happy to to have you and with that said let's say I know
this is a bit abrupt but let's let's kick into the the
quarterback chart and I think I I I feel I feel like if if we're
trying to cut off some of the Turkey to to or or some of the
gravy for Thanksgiving that. I I don't know that we have a
lot more to share on on quarterbacks.
You you want me to rapid fire my takes when I was putting.
No, no, no, no, no, no. Oh, I I mean, I was gonna say
look there's there's really not. You're right.
There's not a ton of things we need to spend time on here.
I I really just had like two or three that I I.
Wanted no no I I don't want to shortchange any point just.
I I'm more making the. I'm more making the point that a
lot of this stuff we we sort of discussed.
Yeah, absolutely. My my biggest take away is just
you know looking at this chart number one.
I mean I've already capitulated on Barack Purdy this season like
he was a great pick for Bestball great fantasy quarterback.
I will still say I think he's not a good real life
quarterback, but it doesn't matter he's in the best system
for a quarterback. I'm pretty sure you could pick
like 80% of the quarterbacks that are on this chart.
Put them in San Francisco and they'd have better numbers than
Purdy, right? That's my whole thing.
But I was wrong for fantasy because it doesn't matter.
It's just the system. So my mental note to remember
going forward is, you know, I'm pretty sure it's going to be
pretty next year. But whoever it is, whoever Kyle
Shanahan's quarterback is, if they're surrounded by the
caliber of weapons that San Francisco has right now, you
just draft that quarterback like that.
That's all all there is to it. It doesn't matter how bad you
think they are, you just draft them.
So that was my my Purdy recapitulation and also
reigniting my fervor that he is not a a good real life
quarterback. But it doesn't matter.
So one thing that I think is a little bit interesting.
Is that Jimmy G benefited from the same system.
Well was never actually that useful as a it was never that
useful as as a sort of fantasy producer like he he definitely
had games. But then there was also games
where like they're like, you know, let's just hand the ball
off 40 times and even though you're going to be really
efficient on a per attempt basis.
The the the overall counting stats were never there.
Do you do you think that I I guess it's it's a somewhat
nuanced point where we don't I I would agree with you where it's
it's hard to make the case that Brock Prudy would be fantasy
useful in an any other team but it is it also like I guess a bit
of an indictment on Jimmy G that.
He was used that differently or or am I just reading way into
that. No I I bet you you know like
like usual the truth probably lies somewhere in between right.
So I would say #1 I I did think Jimmy G was a pretty terrible
quarterback. You know all all the way through
and through. You know and and he always had
been a product of a system. Right When he took over in New
England for that stretch it was it was another good system, a
good situation for him to be in where he could game manage his
way to wins. And then the same thing in San
Francisco. And you know the the one thing I
guess I could say about Jimmy G is he never had Christian
McCaffrey like Brock Purdy does. But not that I think that he
would be putting up the Brock Purdy like numbers.
I think you know Jimmy G might just be worse than Purdy but
that's I don't think that's saying very much.
So I I bet you that I'm probably a little biased against Purdy
just and I think it's like the opposite of the endowment
effect, right? Like I don't have very much
Purdy. I didn't think Purdy was very
good. And so because I don't have very
much, I'm biased against him, but like.
Clearly and just just Sam that that's just some I guess non non
fantasy football technical term. So the endowment effect is that
something you have you value more than if you don't have it.
And it's something that that's sort of like psychological
testing like. It's it's it's a reason It's
sort of like when somebody drafts A-Team and then they
actually value the team more than anybody else.
But it's it's like it's it's also sort of like if somebody
just gave you the team, gave you a team with Justin Jefferson,
then by you having Justin Jefferson, you value him more.
And it it's a bit counterintuitive, but it's a
real thing, tested over over decades now.
I am and and and so maybe that's an over explanation but no I I
think that was good just for for anyone out there that was like
what is what is SAC talking about But that was that was my
first one the the Brock Purdy take just got to be good for
fantasy football going forward. The next one is and I'm just
going to say this one once and I'll never say it again for the
rest of the season but play Lamar Jackson every single week.
You know just like he's still sitting in that spot where it's
like Primo regression candidate and and what you're looking at
in in my opinion is he's like if you look at the size of his
bubble for like his rushing yards per game him and fields
are basically the same in rushing yards.
But we know how good that Ravens offense is and we know how many
touchdowns they're capable of putting up and and really it's
just they keep getting. It's kind of like how David not
David Montgomery. It's kind of like how Jamal
Williams just got all of those touchdowns last year.
The Lions just had like chronic get taken down inside the five
itis last season right? And so Jamal Williams cleans up
all the scraps, gets a ton of touchdowns.
Lamar is kind of running into the opposite of that effect
where they keep getting down in these really you know close goal
to go situations and it's OK, Gus Edwards punch it in baby.
And so you know, all it takes is for some of these more explosive
plays. Like for example the 68 yard Zay
Flowers pass that got called back on the Phantom holding this
this last week on Thursday night.
Like if that goes like Lamar's having a even more monster game,
like he had a good game, he has a monster game with that, right?
And. So, so just a comment on on on
sort of usability and so the Ravens next game is the Sunday
night game this weekend. Against the Chargers.
So I guess it's it, It's one of those weird things where it's
going to be an island game. And I I I would really hate it
for all the sort of like DFS stuff if he if Lamar had his
monster game in an island game where you don't really get the
benefit of a of a on a mainsite. And then it's an island game
where he's probably going to be like insanely high oned.
Yeah, I would say just for for the my fellow showdown Bros out
there. I mean, you know at the end of
the day I'm just going to run my process and do what my process
tells me to do. But my very early brain player
take is I'm going to come in extremely overweight Lamar
Jackson captain. And then in the same vein, I'm
going to come in extremely overweight Gus Edwards captain
and just say that, you know, whichever way the game script
plays out in those kind of outlier type games or it's like,
Oh my gosh, Gus got all the touchdowns.
I'm set up well. And in the games where Lamar
explodes and Gus kind of gets starved out, I'm also set up
well. And then for those intermediate
kind of like Gus still got some and Lamar got some, I'll
probably run some like Ravens onslaught type builds with both
Lamar and Gus and have whatever captains kind of make sense
there. I might, might even do that
with, like, you know, one or two Chargers with potentially a
Charger in the captain slot and then Lamar and Gus and the Flex.
But that's we're We're getting way too into the Showdown,
Rabbit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
You you got six days. You're 6 days from a showdown
site. I'm and what I I get it.
I get it. It's helpful for people to think
about how how exactly how to play it.
How it it's it's usable. And then my my last quarterback
take just from this chart, it's just that CJ Stroud is
absolutely him. I mean, we, I I think I've said
it like six weeks now, but this guy's so good.
I'm super excited to watch him for his career.
Like I I hope that Trevor Lawrence has more games like he
did this last week where he, and we've seen this from him in the
past where he sneaks in these couple rushing touchdowns and
he's efficient in the passing game too and he just goes off.
I think you could end up with something really fun in the AFC
S between Anthony Richardson, Trevor Lawrence, CJ Stroud and
then you know, whatever bullshit the Titans end up doing.
But seems like that could be a really fun quarterback division
going forward. Might might come in way
overweight on that division in some way.
Too early basketball type stuff, so.
Makes makes sense. And then I guess the other other
person worth calling out is a new a new addition to the chart
which is DT or who. I didn't even see him on the on
the first time I looked at it. Like, literally he he is in the
bottom left hand corner. Yeah, they didn't even let him.
They did not even let him drive the bus.
He was more so just pulling the wagon.
They didn't trust him behind the wheel of a motor vehicle, but
they're like, I mean we got to get somewhere so you can pull
this little wagon buddy. And yeah, that's that's the type
of play that we got from him. So not not really fantasy
relevant. Yeah, and like what's
interesting there is So obviously we're what you call
it, we only have one game from, but it was like what, 43
attempts? So it's not like it's like a
sixteen attempt and then? Tiny sample size, like he played
a full game. He just played awful.
Yeah. From from what I watched, too,
my my film grinder takes on it. He just he looks like the kind
of passer that people were worried that Anthony Richardson
would be. Looks grossly inaccurate in
spots. You know, I didn't even really
see him take very many deep shots down the field.
So he's lacking that strength that Anthony Richardson has.
He does have a little bit of juice in his legs, but I'm
pretty sure that that the Browns are a well coached team.
I I think that Stefanski knows what the team's strengths are
and they're going to do everything they can to hide DTR
and and just the way that they're going to be calling
those games is really going to be hard for him to produce any
kind of usable fantasy week. I mean you're you're pretty much
purely looking for some crazy rushing upside type game and I
think the only way you get something like that is the
Browns play against the team that's actually able to score on
their defense and stop the run and pressure the passer and take
away the short throw. So you're like you need to hit
like a five leg parlay for DTR to potentially have a ceiling
and and even then then he still has to actually go out and and
rush. So I'm not interested.
Not, not, not interested. And and and we can talk about
Brown's players later, but definitely take some of the some
not to do as much. Any mustard on the hot dog
already, but even less now. Yeah, I think that's it for
quarterback. If you want to move on to the
running back charts, 'cause we got four of those to get
through. Yeah, yeah.
So this is our running back snaps and usage chart and we
have, we have rush attempts, we've routes, we pass blocks and
and running run blocks and those are all expressed as a
percentage of the team's overall plays.
And obviously we want rush attempts, but we also want route
percentage because we we want players that are out there
running around. You can't get a check down
unless you're out there running. You can't get a check down if
you're pass blocking and if you're not even pass blocking
then the the coaches don't even trust you on passing downs and
so so that that's sort of how this is set up and I I guess
another note sorry to put you up this this is the the last four
week average so week 8 through 11 it it is what we've got sorry
99 and sorry forgot the count 8 through 11.
That's correct. Yeah and really just for me it's
my my biggest notes because again most of this stuff we you
know we've we've gone over we've talked about you know these guys
roles and how they've kind of changed and crystallized over
the course of the season. There's really not.
Too many huge movers or changes, so.
Expected that Devon Singletary is the workhorse.
But with 11, it's not. It's not even, it's not even
worth talking about. It's like just what?
What do you expect? I mean, we talked about Devon
Singletary the last couple weeks.
I know, I know he's your favorite player.
I know that for it's. Just so funny.
I talk bad about Brock Purdy and good about Lamar.
You need to talk about Devon Singletary.
So so yes we can we can acknowledge that Devon
Singletary is getting an absurd amount of work and it looks like
you know even if even if Pierce plays this week, I would still
expect Devin Singletary to be the 1A in the backfield and
Pierce to take more of A1B roll I, you know, it's it's kind of
the coaching staff is not going to just throw that away and say
all right Devin Singletary you're back to the you know,
relegated to getting only a few touches roll he's he's going to
be getting the lion's share I would assume going forward.
The the things that I wanted to point out just for like ways
that you guys can apply this information going forward.
Last week we talked about the Saquan Barkley role and how he
was kind of mispriced in Dog Bowl drafts, and I actually had
a couple different Saquan teams live for another Miami ticket.
Unfortunately, I fell a little bit short.
I had a two teams where with one more Breeze Hall touchdown, I
could have potentially snuck. 2IN1 would have gotten in for
sure. The other would have depended on
the yardage with the Breeze Hall touchdown, but they had Saquan
on them. They also had either Trevor
Lawrence or Calvin Ridley. Unfortunately, I didn't get that
combo on either of the teams that had Saquan and Tyreek on
them, which is what I would have needed to punch my ticket.
But I think the the theme is the same this week.
So Saquan has moved up in the market a little bit this week.
You know, now that people have seen it recently, they're
realizing, Oh yeah, the rule's still good.
I'm willing to click Saquan, but there's two guys who the market
is just disrespecting so, so much right now.
I think I have one of them in every dog bowl draft I've done
so far this week and I'm going to finish my drafts tonight for
the I'll be done for the week because I'm just going to get
these players right before they move up because they'll they'll
project well in ETR stuff and they're going to climb up you
know in the market. But that's Josh Jacobs and
Rashad White and the roles are elite, elite for these guys.
They're so, so good. And people are are like, I feel
like people are scared off of Jacobs because he had a kind of
bad game against Miami, you know, didn't get very much done.
And they're going to play the Chiefs, which is a good defense.
But I mean, the role is just so good that, you know, I think
that you just lean into it and you can get Jacobs in like the
fourth round or you probably could get him in the fifth
round. I wouldn't know.
I just click him every time he gets to me in the fourth though.
But yeah, people just don't want to click the guy.
And then same thing with Rashad White.
Like Rashad White's role is so, so good.
I believe, and correct me if this stat is incorrect, but I'm
pretty sure he is second in the NFL in receiving yards for
running backs only behind Christian McCaffrey.
And it's like guys, does anyone remember that we're supposed to
care about you know, passing game work for running backs?
Like that's that's the high value touch stuff.
Like we we care about this and this guy's just doing it at an
elite level and people are just letting him go in like the
fourth round in dog bowl drafts. So Josh Jacobs, Rashad White go
get them while they're hot. They're going to move up.
But yeah, that's. I did.
I did Fact Check you right. So Christian McCaffrey number
one with 364 receiving yards. Rashad White number two with 354
receiving yards. So 10 lit.
Yeah. So that's yards than CMC.
Yeah, so. So that's what I'm saying.
Like we have in our brains the bias from before the season of
Rashad White sucks and then the bias from the early part of the
season of Look, now we have data and Rashad whites inefficient
and he sucks. Guess what?
He could suck even worse than he had sucked, and if he gets this
passing role, it doesn't matter. Like it?
It couldn't matter less. Like, you could honestly take
away, like all of his expected points from rushing and he'd
still be a usable fantasy running back.
He wouldn't be good, but he'd still be usable, you know?
So the receiving role is just too, too good to pass up there.
So absolutely love that. Both of those are super
inefficient spots in the underdog VR streets.
I I'm only doing dog bowl entries, so that's what's
framing it for me. But just a heads up to the
people I don't. Let's see the other other
interesting stuff this week, he got the Aaron Jones injury, but
and AJ Dillon's been slightly better.
He's one of those other players where he had some stink on him
from earlier in the season from being really inefficient.
He's still pretty inefficient, but he's been like a little bit
better And so I would say, you know if you're in a pinch and
you need a running back start, give AJ Dillon a chance.
I I don't think he's going to do anything terribly exciting for
you. But you know, I I think that
he's he's. Certainly usable Are Are you
talking about if Aaron Jones misses time?
Or even if Aaron Jones plays, Aaron Jones is missing time is
what I mean. I I would bet bet you dollars to
Donuts that he's missing time that that MCL sprain is gonna.
I I don't think they're rushing it back from that there.
There's no like, what are they playing for, you know, like.
Right. Nothing, absolutely nothing.
And the other thing, the OR one thing that I thought was sort of
notable here was that even as David Montgomery comes back,
Gibbs is still, he's still got the the, the, the 1A shirt
touches. So if I just look at this week,
he's on the field for 58% of snaps.
And and as he was last week too. So I I guess unless David
Montgomery has further to come back from injury and I don't,
we're not going back to the way we were before.
I guess Montgomery is going to still be the the goal line and
back the predominant goal line back not all the time, but.
This, this, this, this is a pretty it's a pretty 5050 split
with Gibbs being the the the top end of the split.
Yep. Yeah, very, very well put.
And like you like to say, you know the genie is out of the
bottle. You can't put the genie back in
the bottle on Jamir Gibbs. And so one one thing that I'm
looking at is like kind of a a niche usability thing here is if
I ever see ADFS slate where the two Lions running backs are
cheap combined, like not, you know, Gibbs could be expensive
and Montgomery's cheaper or Montgomery expensive, Gibbs
cheaper. How it'll likely be going
forward is that Gibbs ends up being priced higher than
Montgomery. I think you probably need like
one or two more weeks to get a situation like I'm describing.
But if you ever get a spot where they're both cheap enough, I'm
really, really excited to play both.
I actually, I just talked about this with some people this week,
but the Miami backfield situation, they were just a hair
too expensive this week for me to do it.
But I think if you between the two of them it was like most of
it was 6600 and a Chan was 60 or most of it was 69 and a Chan was
66. I want to say if between the two
of them they're about 1000 less, I think that's cheap enough
where you play them both and you get a really, really interesting
spot because you're almost none of the field is going to play
both of them. And so if you happen to catch
one of those, you know lightning in a bottle weeks where they're
right like it gets going Broncos exactly you're you're going to
shoot up the leaderboard. So I'm really interested in
backfields like that where the backfield can take all of the
scoring for the week and and the team will still be moving the
ball and productive on offense. It's not just oh, they ran that
piss out of the ball like the Falcons want to and they only
scored two touchdowns. Like I'm looking for like the
four or five kind of touchdown games where the backs get right.
All of them or all of them but one and.
So, so, so just to just to to put a an even more actionable
point on this, so the the lines are on the Turkey ball slate.
And so then these sort of short slates are where it can make
sense to to play boat running backs.
So Gibbs is 6800, Montgomery is 6300.
So we have a slate where Gibbs is more expensive.
And I I feel, I feel like the the the cat is out of the bag a
little bit in terms of like people understand that you can
play boat running backs. In Showdown, and never mind that
Showdown and these sort of true game slates, but yeah, on the
shorter slate, I think you gain less from it.
But the way that I would probably do it for this, you
know the three-game Thanksgiving slate is play both of the
Detroit running backs and then just not have any other Lions on
my team. And I'm really searching for
that absolute ceiling outcome where the backs take all of the
touchdowns. So that's that's probably how I
would do it. But again, I think the benefit
you're getting from that is a little diluted than what it
would be on a full slate where you're going to get so much less
of the field willing to play both running backs.
Right. It it it's it's not going to be
an unpopular build, right? Right.
I had one other guy that I think we need to talk about here, Zach
Charbonnet. It looks like he could be you
know an end of season kind of hammer here with with Kenneth
Walker dealing with that. You know what, what's been
described as you know a potentially serious abdominal
injury by Pete Carroll. You know, you might end up with
Charbonnet getting the vast majority of the work going
forward and he's. I kind of want to it's, it's
feels weird to compare him to another rookie because we just
don't have a huge sample on either of these guys.
But I kind of look at him in the same vein as Roshan Johnson,
where they're both these like they're more like your classic
workhorse type backs where they do everything well, but they're
not great at any one thing. And they're they're big body,
they're like they would be able to carry the full load if their
offense wants to give it to them.
And so I'm really interested in Chardonnay going forward and by
extension I am a little interested in Roshan.
Just with the injury to Deonta Foreman, obviously Chardonnay is
in a much better spot because you know, now that Ken Walker's
gone, he's, he's clearly the lead guy.
And with Roshan, you know you you still got him behind
Herbert. But anyway, just Charbonnet.
Definitely a a good one to keep an eye on going forward.
Certainly interesting. Yeah, I think the the sentiment
doesn't seem to be that Kenneth Walker is just done.
So I I I think you probably still get, you probably still
get in terms of season long stuff and not that he's going to
be a waiver pick up, but. The consensus is probably more
towards like a sort of spot start rather than like a a total
end of the season every game guy but so but with with these
injuries especially with the Seahawks you never know what the
how good the reporting is how accurate it it is so that I
guess that want to see Walker come back but that could be
upside. And for the rest of the way for
Charbonnet hi I wanted to ask you about Javonte Williams role
going forward cause the previous game it kind of looked like it
was starting to be wheels up for Javonte and that he might just
run away and dominate the backfield and really squeeze out
P Ryan and Julie McLaughlin. But in this last game, we saw P
Ryan super involved in the passing game.
And you know, if you were. The, the, the, the true down.
Passing down and this, this and stuff went to P Rein.
Yeah, and. And so I'm wondering, how do you
feel about Javonte going forward?
Do you think that last game was more indicative of what we're
gonna see for the rest of the season, that somewhere in
between the last two games? What?
How? How do you feel about that?
And so I think that it's it's hard, it's honestly really hard
to tell game to game. With how these how these running
backs are are going to be used because it's it.
It does seem very situational here where if you have a if you
have a game where there's lots of clear it's lots of clear
passing down back work that P Ryan does seem to be that guy
for him. But then on the other hand you
you can you can get games where there isn't there isn't that
sort of like hurry up. Get back in the game stuff but a
running back can still get very involved in the passing game.
So I I I think it is one of those things where it's still
going to be volatile week to week.
I think that the backfield is is is I I think you had a good read
on this early in the season where a a lot of this offense
does run through the the running backs where even in the even in
the passing game. They are targeting the running
backs at a really high rate and then their running backs are are
are they're also getting good good sort of goal line stuff.
So I guess I I'm, I'm thinking more that and and maybe this is
wishy washy, I'm I'm thinking more that you you you probably
will get weeks where Javante gets a really high percentage of
the stuff. But it it it has that volatility
element where when there's like hurry up stuff and and and and
two-minute drill stuff that they are going to get pre run
involved there. So do you think it'd be fair to
say that in games where the Broncos get out to a lead and
and they're having a lot of success running it, those are
the games where you'd be most likely to see like a big game
from Javonte. Yeah.
Yeah, I I I think that's fair. Quick, honorable mention DeAndre
Swift had a great game. I didn't get to watch almost all
of that game because I was, you know, trying to avoid Draco's
assassination attempt with my my plane delay.
But you know, Swift. Swift put up a good game there.
You know, from what I I saw from highlights and things like that
guy still looks explosive, you know, saw a little screen pass
late in the fourth quarter from what I got to watch live.
And yeah, he just, he looks like a really exciting back, you
know, definitely someone that can deliver those spike weeks,
you know, certainly as we start to transition towards playoff
basketball, that's one where, yeah, I'm, I'm very interested
in DeAndre Swift for that format.
And then the last guy I wanted to talk about, he's clearly one
of their best players. Yeah.
Yep, 100% and just, man, I I know that.
I know people like the Lions. I know they found a route for.
I know we like Dan Campbell. Like I like Dan Campbell.
I think the Lions are still the the Lions are.
They're doing a lot of stuff, right?
But man, if they could just plug these leaks of doing stupid shit
with their draft capital and like getting rid of their best
players. Because like man, can we can we
get like some, some like relationship mediator into the
Lions to like fix these relationships with some of their
best players where like someone, someone gets off on the wrong
foot with someone and they're just dead to the team.
Like, I feel like the Lions have lit so much talent on fire over
the last couple years where they would be such a stronger team if
they had been able to manage their roster better.
And who knows, I'm, I might just know, not be Privy to the locker
room dynamics and what have you. But I just, I kind of see what
the Lions have done with their roster, where they're getting
rid of, you know, really quality players for basically nothing
and spending extremely high draft capital on players to
replace them. And just like, what if?
What if we had? The roster management of going
from Gibbs to Swift to Gibbs was particularly poor.
Yeah, it's pretty. Just pretty just just to close
the loop a little bit on my last comment, I'm looking at the
rotaviz sort of pace tool. And so in Week 11, the Broncos
had 18 plays where they were trailing by 7 or more and and
and then Week 9 or 10. They didn't have any often
offensive plays, obviously. So to me that that's a pretty
extreme difference and and and that's where you're seeing that
volatility that's a that's a great call out very, very sharp
analysis there Draco glad glad for you to to point that one
out. My my last guy that I wanted to
touch on before we move to the next chart was just Tony Pollard
you know decided to give us just enough to remain an enigma for
us you know is Tony Pollard dust is Tony Pollard back still
nobody knows and I I kind of I'll be interested to see the
Tony Pollard price in playoff basketball that that's going to
be another really interesting one to me.
It's really going to yeah the the whole Cowboys offense is
going to be very very interesting in playoff
basketball. I think you can get some pretty
cool stuff there and we'll I'll tease that we may be discussing
that over at Legendary Upside and and how you can sort of take
this strategy and apply it to playoff basketball going
forward. But that was the last thing I
had for this chart. Did you have anyone else you
wanted to touch on before you move on Draco?
No, no more than happy to keep them moving.
And so now we have the the same chart, but it's the it's the
backups. And again we're we're sort of
looking at who who for backups is playing a high percentage of
snaps on average over the last four weeks.
I just kind of want to speed run this one.
Yeah, I mean we know, we know Jalen Warren has had, you know
some pretty explosive games lately.
He had a a big breakaway touchdown run that contributed
to a large amount of his fantasy production this last week.
You know, he's looking exciting and with Matt Canada getting
fired, you wonder if the offense could potentially take a step
forward. I'm cautiously optimistic other
you know Khalil Herbert coming back from injury looking like a
pretty good spot there with the backfield potentially
consolidating to just him and Roshan if Dante Foreman were to
miss more time. You've got Gus Edward.
The The Ravens backfield is starting to become a little bit
more clear in that Justice Hill is losing work to Keaton
Mitchell and has has squarely moved into.
You know, not fantasy usable territory.
Right. You drop them.
Yeah, it It's not usable. RIP my Justice Hill bags.
They seemed so good at week one. But alas, Justice Hill continues
to to taunt me. So the other one, the one I want
to point out to here is that Ty Chandler and even if you just
look at last week, week 11 alone still only playing at 31% of
the. On the snaps for the team so he
he's definitely he's he's not a 1B but he's definitely like a
backup with A roll which is a lot better than he was at the
start of the season and and you're happy you're very happy
with that if you got him and sort of airily in drop season in
in in the last few rounds but and and and we're we're at we're
still starting him and start chasing FFBC but.
Even with the points that you got and I I guess just to call
it out don't get too excited because the the snap share
definitely right now it's not indicative of of sort of like
what he what he's at what he scored and and and and I guess
him playing well can always push him up more but he he's not
there yet on a snap basis that's that's the only note that I
would have on that that he looks very good you know he he clearly
looks like the best back. Yeah and it's not like Oh well
Madison does some things better and Chandler does some things
better like Madison looks like all around the better player.
And so you you know I I kind of look at this as like how rookies
come on later in the season typically.
Well now Chandler's finally getting his run and so if we can
kind of look at these weeks as like his run up and ramp up
period to a a larger role, I wouldn't be surprised to see Ty
Chandler be the guy that you need in one of the the playoff
weeks for best. Ball so I think they they were
using him in pass blocking in sort of key situations at the
end of the game and I did see one where he just got blown up
like and and and it was like a bad play for the offense and so
I I. I guess that that that gives me
a little bit of concern that like how much are they going to
pass them on on passing down stuff.
But it's like you said Madison is not good and and and Ty
Chandler is explosive. So you you just sort of hope
that they see that and they lean into it.
Yeah and my my last Ty Chandler note we you know everyone gave
Evan Silva crap for the Madison touting over the summer but I I
want people to remember he also had Ty Chandler way up in the
rankings. He would he was kind of the
first you know on the Ty Chandler frontier really really
pumping him up and hey he he was correct on on the Ty Chandler
call. So I think, I think we need to
put put one in the West column for Evan Silva there on the the
early Ty Chandler hype. Man just does not get enough
wins. We got it.
We got to shout him out on stop chasing.
That was everything from the backup chart.
Oh, slight interest in Ezekiel Elliott this week against the
shitty New York Giants with Romandre.
You know, potentially not at full strength with the back
injury. I know that he he got cleared
and the the back injury looks to be minor, but you never know,
maybe maybe Zeke gets a little bit more.
Of the of the touches this week and that Giants defense is not
very formidable. So maybe this is your vintage
Ezekiel Elliott game where he falls into the end zone twice
and is fantasy relevant. Makes that That definitely seems
like a possibility, except for the Patriots will never be
anywhere near the end zone twice.
They might get near the end zone once, so he could fall in once
so. Now we have the turd over 4.
Running back charts and and this is expected points in efficiency
and we have rushing expected points and receiving expected
points and then the size of the bubble is a corset bonds to
their points over expected and and two notes that I like to
make on this chart is one. We have this split up into two
charts. We often get comments Oh hey, so
and so isn't on your chart. How come we split it up?
Because if you put them all onto the same chart, it just gets so
bunched together. And so we have it, we have it
set up so that you're getting 2 readable charts basically.
And second note is that I I think is important is that just
because it's over expected, it's it.
It doesn't always mean that the player played well, like good
play is almost always efficient. And bad play is almost always
inefficient, but you're also that you're using the error term
in in in sort of fantasy football model to correspond to
efficiency. And so sometimes that's not
always quite correct. So things to keep in mind,
things like a player scoring a touchdown on an attempt is
always going to be something that goes over expected, because
there's no attempt where a player has a 100% probability of
scoring A touchdown, right? So every time you actually score
a touchdown, you're going to go over expected unless unless you
have like 6 other carries where you didn't score a touchdown,
where you should have right one couple and then the other.
Note is. I guess on that is like.
Another example of of a play where it would be points over
expected but maybe not good. Everybody remembers that Austin
Eckler run where he went for 30 of the slowest yards we've ever
seen. That that's a that's a a
positive fantasy but points over expected play and but is that
him playing well? Like did he get, did he actually
perform what he should have done on that play?
I I would say no. No.
Yeah that that should have been a breakaway touchdown and that
one. That was honestly the play that
made me the most sad, 'cause like I you I want to root for
Austin Eckler. He's a super cool guy.
Like he he's just he's one of the good ones.
You know like there's a lot of guys in the league where you're
not excited to root for him but he's he's one you're you're
happy to root for. And I was just sad cause for me
that felt like, OK that like this is some pretty strong
signal that this guy is, is pretty close to dusted.
Yeah. So I'll, I'll go ahead and say
like if Eckler's going really anywhere in the first two rounds
next season, I'll probably have like very close to 0.
And I I had pretty close to 0 this season.
But I'm, I'm feeling good about my stand.
I'm feeling sad about it. But I feel like it was the
correct decision in the game that we play.
Yeah, the first, first guy I wanted to call out, he he's like
one of my favorite players to talk about on this chart.
I've mentioned him many times, but Breece Hall, you can see is
is getting so much more of his expected points from the
receiving game right now. And really what you're looking
at if you watch these Jets games, they they've started to
realize we can't move the ball, the offense sucks.
Zach Wilson sucks. I'll go go back to the previous
chart. Oh mind mind bond.
You're you're good. And so they've really started
dialing up these little screen passes to Breece or these little
like late release dump off type passes to him in in the last in
this last game this weekend I saw at least two times where
Zach Wilson failed to execute a screen pass that now now listen
like I'm going to go ahead and say like I can't do anything
that any of these guys on NFL field can do.
But I actually think that in these two screen passes that
this guy fucked up. I could have gone out there and
gotten the ball to breeze. I would have gotten blown up.
I would have died you know like I'm I'm 100% dead after taking a
hit. But they were just it was the
stupidest fucking absolute no ability to process.
You know the the game going on around you that I've ever seen
from a quarterback on an NFL field where it's it's exactly
what you want from a screenplay. Like everyone on the defense is
in the backfield. All you need to do is just like
lay it up over the top of the defenders.
It's not like sometimes the screen gets blown up right where
the defenders pick up on what's going on.
Someones hugging Breece Hall, they're not gonna, he's just not
getting this right, Right. But that wasn't the case.
Like they had a convoy down field for him ready to go
Breece's wide ass open with no one next to him.
And Zach Wilson is doing this little like double clutch.
I'm not sure if I should throw this or not.
Bullshit and taking a sack or like throwing the ball away on
what should be. I mean one of them looked like
to me like this is a breeze house call which was especially
tilting as someone for someone who is sitting there with two
dog bowl teams that would have catapulted into the top three
with a long breeze touchdown. There with Tim Boyle in in in
the seat all you need you don't need much at all it can my my
biggest question is, is Tim Boyle more capable of executing
a screen pass than ZAP Wilson. That's literally all I need and
and I would say that Bruce has the ability to, I don't think
his expected fantasy points will increase very much but I think
that you could see his efficiency increase
substantially because he's he's a home run player you know
you're just you just need to get him the opportunities to hit
that home run especially I did. See that, Tim Boyle.
The last time he had a season where he threw more touchdowns
and interceptions was high school.
He never had a good college season.
Yeah, he hasn't looked great. So you know, with this iteration
of The Jets offense, where their offensive line is in shambles,
they have no they have nothing approaching like, you know,
competent NFL quarterback play. You know, you're really just
hoping for. Can can the quarterback actually
deliver the running back the ball on takedowns for?
How much worse than Zach Wilson can he be?
He can exactly, yeah. And and and hopefully he's he's
he's marginally better. Other guys I wanted to call out
on this chart. I mean, we talked about Gibbs,
but yeah, he's he's looking really strong going forward.
I would expect as we get a couple more of these games to
fall off, like the ones where Gibbs had some just monster
usage, like the Ravens game comes to mind, where he just had
an absurd, absurd amount of usage.
I bet we see him land just behind this 20 expected fantasy
points. He'll be in the top tier of this
15 to 20 expected fantasy points range.
I think that's probably where he truly lies and how he finishes
out the season. But you know, one of the better
fantasy running backs to have looking really, really strong
and then so. And if you just look at week 10
and 11, he's he's he's still like 20.8 over the last two
weeks. Expected points again.
OK. Yeah, I I.
I don't know if that's I don't know if that's carries forward
but definitely bullish yeah I I certainly not wanting to to
throw any cold water on Jamir Gibbs but yeah I I just think
with how he how he finishes on this chart he'll probably come
down just a tiny bit but I I would not be surprised at all
for him to hover right around that 20 expected fantasy point
number but you know who he's right next to is the guy that we
brought up that no one's putting respect on his name is Rashad
White. Like I mean you you poo poo at
all you want but like the role is just so good that you know
Rashad White is going to get his.
So I I'm just I'm I'm past the point of you know being out on
Rashad White. Like the role is there give me
Rashad White. I'll I'll happily bank the level
of consistency that is giving you week in and week out.
Yeah, yeah, especially, yeah. Especially at discounts like I I
I don't, I'm not I'm not like draft him in the fifth round
next year or anything like that, which is where I think his his
role profile that someone he should be taking him in like the
fourth or fifth round but in in in week to week stuff and you're
getting like a big discount. It's a no brainer.
Yeah. I I think the way that I want to
play the Bucks backfield next season, you know, provided not
too much changes there. Say Baker still the quarterback,
Canals is still offensive coordinator Rashad White still
on the roster and you know you got a couple of the other
running backs that are currently on the roster still there.
If they add any kind of rookie talent at the running back
position that I'm excited for and and you can get them, you
know, relatively cheap, I'm going to hit that pretty hard.
And if Rashad White's expensive, like if he's in that that true
kind of dead zone, it it, you know, to me it seems like if he
was going in the 4th and 5th round this season we wouldn't we
wouldn't be talking about him so so fondly.
He still would be doing fine, but it's it's because he was
going in, you know, the 8th, 9th round that makes him so good for
this season. Right, right.
Yeah, agreed, agreed. And.
Just I I I guess just just a note that like there's a I I'm
just trying to note that there's a difference between somebody's
like over a long term season profile versus like game to
game. Like you, you can feel pretty
good about Rashad White's role game to game and and and
probably for the rest of the year now that we have the the
sample that we do but. He he, I I think he still
profiles as somebody where you know that could easily all go
away. Yeah absolutely he's he's what
I've I've heard people refer to as a a churn back in the NFL.
He there's nothing all that special about him.
You know, he's he's just a placeholder until a more
talented running back comes along on the roster and takes
his job. And so if no one's there to take
his job next season, then you can probably take him with at
least some degree of confidence that'll have a good role.
Again, you know all other things remaining consistent, but if you
get anyone that looks like they might be able to push him from a
talent perspective, that's that's where I'm going to go.
Elsewhere. OK, so let's let's move on to
where we lost that running back chair.
Anybody here stick at you that that we haven't sort of.
I'm I'm like a little interested.
So this guy's been trending in the wrong direction for the last
few weeks. But I'm wondering if potentially
this week I think it really depends on the quarterback
situation on his team. But Alvin Kamara, you know, we
saw he came out of the gate just extremely hot.
You know, never never had good rushing efficiency even in his
first couple weeks back. But was just having such an
insane role in the receiving game with Derek Carr cap and
check down now you got Carr injured.
It's uncertain if he's going to play this week or not if it's
Jameis I think I'm pretty out on Kamara just because Jameis is he
he's just going to sling it man. He he's not about that check
down life but if you get Carr coming off of an injury where he
might be even a little more timid than usual I I could see
you know this being one of those like Kamara gets 13 targets type
of week. The other thing on the other
side of the coin with respect to Kamara say that car is out.
How do you feel about Taysom Hill this week for Fantasy?
And what format? Let's first let's talk about a
format where you can play him as a tight end.
And so you're talking about Jameis is playing and.
You can you can you have to play Taysom as a tight end.
I mean he's not terrible. It it it that really does depend
on on who else is there on the on the slave 2 and so I I mean
he's always going to be in play for two or three touch for a two
or three touchdown game. So when he's cheap with low
ownership like he's he's where to play but.
I I I definitely like playing real tight ends over Taysom
Hill. Yeah.
I for me if it's Jameis playing this week, I just I think that
the Saints staff knows what Jameis is.
They know that this dude is going to get out here and just
absolutely rip it and sling it with reckless abandoned.
And I I've got a they just got a hunch that if they get in close
you know in the Green Zone it's not going to be Jameis taking
snaps there like they don't they don't want gunslinger Jameis
down there taking risks when they're in close when they have
a weapon that they know. I mean they've, they've been
deploying Taysom with Derek Carr down there and I I think right.
He's a good offensive weapon or actually red zone weapon.
Yeah. So and and also they've been
showing that they're not as confident in Kamara's rushing
ability. You know Jamal Williams has been
doing nothing. Kendra's injured.
So I I think you could get one of the true you know full on
utility games from Taysom where he you know rushes 6 times,
catches 3 passes and throws a couple passes.
I so like in a in a large field GPP, I'm probably going to come
in extremely overweight taste some I I really like the game
environment too. So just that was that was my
note on Kamara and that whole Saints situation.
There, Yeah, it makes makes sense for sure.
Makes sense for sure and do like seeing even though I had that
note about Tai Chandler, his snap share not being great, it
does look like even though the snap share is a low.
He is getting the ball quite a lot when he's on the field which
is which is helpful. So like do like seeing him being
at over 10 expected points despite like only playing a
third of the snap and and some players are like that where I I
guess it caps their upside a little bit that they're not
trust trusted when they're not getting the ball, but this
despite getting a low snap share.
Getting the ball when they are on the field, so maybe maybe a
little bit better done than I was sort of talking about
earlier. The I mean this.
This isn't really terribly fantasy relevant or actionable.
I'm not going to tell anyone stuff they don't know, but is
Christian McCaffrey is now the only running back that would be
live to put up a true legendary season.
Is that pretty? Pretty correct.
Yeah, I think so. I think we're, we're definitely
in play for like one of those weird running back years.
Yeah. It's just, yeah, I mean the way
that it's ran out this year is you pretty much wanted to just
never draft a running back. You know, you just you wanted to
take them, you know almost as late as possible.
Yeah. Only when absolutely necessary.
And you know partially that's because this year was a little
bit of an aberration. But I think in general this year
is really illustrative of the whole thesis of going heavy at
wide receiver which is a much more talent driven position than
running back which is a much more volume driven position and
and just relying on the chaos of the season to get you what you
need at running back. And the the the points
leaderboard for earning back is is.
Honestly, Shocking. So CMC number one, he's gotten
that 20 points a game. PPR #2 is Raheem Monster #3.
Travis Etienne For Brian Robinson.
Gus Edwards Like Kenneth Walker. Josh Jacobs, Gander Swift, David
Montgomery. Who's missed, like many games.
#10. Is Zach Moss like running back
is just unplayable this season? Like, honestly, people that
could keep. Going But that gives you a
flavor. People have talked about abolish
the tight end position for fantasy football.
I'm going to be the first one to say it.
Abolish running back. Don't make me play these guys.
It's just give me, give me wide receiver leagues with flex.
Like, give me, give me 3 wide receiver spots I got to fill and
three flex spots I got to fill. Like, don't make me draft any
running backs if I don't want to.
Like Zach Moss or B10 on the year.
Yeah it's it. I mean and and just that you
know that kind of distribution really shows you why the teams
that spent so little in running back capital are successful
because none of the early running backs are are beating
you like it doesn't matter you could have you know someone
putting up you know next to no points is going to be like RB15
if you got some usable weeks. It it's just it's crazy and and
you're not gaining anything from the capital that you spent early
at the position. So it'll be really interesting
to see how this, the best ball playoffs shake out because I
think what this kind of distribution is going to lead to
is you're going to have pretty spread out ownerships for
running back when we get into the best ball playoffs.
And so it's going to be really, really interesting to see you
know if that ultimately consolidated, you know when we
get to the finals or or how that shakes out or if you if you get
these, you know, dominant CMC games in the fantasy play offs,
it might just be like a no CMC, no money kind of year.
So really, really interested to see how that shakes out.
I did want to touch on Travis Etienne who you mentioned at the
top of that list. We've seen he's had you know 2
less than great games recently here won against the 49ers with
a really strong defensive performance coming off there by
and then last week where Trevor Lawrence hogged all the
touchdowns. But he's he looks to be getting
a little less work recently and it's it's more so just because I
feel like they finally realized that Tank Bigsby, they got
bamboozled by the name Tank and that this isn't an NFL player in
the slightest and they need to use Jernis Johnson, who is an
NFL player. He's he's a backup running back,
but he's actually an NFL backup running back.
Tank Digsby is like, you know a a practice squad kind of guy.
So right I'm, I'm a little concerned.
I know that you and I have both been really high on ETN, but a
big part of that was how elite his role was and I.
Think and how bad his backup was.
Yeah. We're starting to see enough of
that get siphoned away that in my kind of like tearing of the
running backs. I think I'm moving ETN down a
tier. This is a a comparison that I
wanted your opinion on that I was I was kind of thinking about
here Jonathan Taylor and ETN go very close in the dog bowl this
week. Who would you prefer to take
just in a vacuum you're on the clock.
It's near the you know. Yeah right.
That's what I'm saying. And like going away right
though. The role is so much.
And The funny thing is Zach Moss is probably a better player than
Darren S Johnson. But the Colts are like, Nope, we
paid JTA bunch of money, so we got to give him the rock.
And yeah, I I think I think we might get a couple nuclear JT
games here to close out the season.
It just kind of looks like it's getting they're going to give
him the opportunity to do it. So now we're just going to see
does does JT have that in the tank to to deliver one of his
classic blow up games with a couple breakaway plays And I I
firmly believe that he's got that in the tank.
SO11 talk about this, and maybe I'm just wrong, is that the last
two weeks have been sort of blow out games in either direction
for the Jaguars. So that that may be like mixing
up the the the, the usage stuff but I I I think you're
definitely direction directionally right where the
row for for Travis Etienne is smaller than it was prior to the
buy, but maybe it's a little bit bigger than it has been weeks 11
and 10. I think I think that's a great
call out. And you've you've had a couple
points like that today which I think is some of the most
valuable analysis that we can do in in this game with such small
samples is looking at the context with which we got a data
point like why did this happen. You know really, really getting
more granular on it and understanding where that
specific piece or point of data came from.
And and so I I just you know for everyone out there that's you
know wants to think critically about the game and be really
process driven. I think that's definitely a
really strong note is to think about it in the way that Draco
has has done today where he's pointed out a couple things or
hey, you know this, this definitely looks like it could
be a trend. But here's maybe a little bit of
a reason for the aberration that we've seen over these last
couple games compared to the rest of the sample we have over
the season. And so maybe the truth lies
somewhere right in between. And so I just wanted to point
that out. It's good, good process.
Thank you. That's very nice of you to say.
So I think, I think are, are we ready to move on from this one?
Yeah, let's let's hit tight ends here.
Talking about process, I need to get my zooming process a little
better. So we've got our tight end
utilization and efficiency chart and essentially we're just
looking at routes as a percentage of drop backs.
And then we do have pass blocking in here too because we
want to see how often they're on the field and it also gives us a
flavour of how they're used when they are on the field for
passing and downs. We've got targets per out run.
Obviously we love targets and we've got a dot which tells us
how deep down the field, tight ends are targeted.
And as a rule we generally prefer further down the field
targets. But it's it's it's more of an
art than a science. Like you don't want like you
don't necessarily want a tight end with like a 15-A dot because
that that that that's like not not necessarily representative
of a of a true sort of workhorse eater.
But definitely the closer towards 10 the better I would
say. Yeah.
And so there's been a tiny bit of a shake up near the top of
the chart. Not that you know anyone that
wasn't near the top had has emerged but just kind of the
order of guys as we again we're looking at these as like a
rolling 4 weeks. And So what we've seen here is
Kate Auten refuses to ever come off the field for the bucks.
You know he he's out there the whole damn game and you know
he's not he. He had the one spike week game
where he he randomly got the two touchdowns against the Texans.
But the reason I'm I'm talking about Kate Aughton is
specifically for this week's slate on, you know the dog Bowl
or like the main slate vRS. You actually, you're probably
never taking him in the main slate vRS.
But in the dog bowl, Titan is so thin this week there's like a
couple good ones at the top. It's like Kelsey, and then you
have other, you know, a few other usable ones.
You know, you've got your your Schultz, you've got your Trey
McBride, you've got your Evan Ingram.
But then after those, that tier of guys, it's just there's no
one like you're going to have teams that end up with, you
know, Chigo Conquo or Tyler Higbee or, you know, like those
are going to be the Titans that get drafted in 100% of drafts
because of how bad the back end of the tight end tier is.
And so Kate Auten goes in that group and he shouldn't be going
there. I I mean, like he should be in
that tier, but he's just like clearly the best one.
And I think that in a week where you have so few good tight ends
on the slate, I think you really want to place a premium in a guy
that is much less likely to totally goose you because he's
out there all the time. He's getting targets every week.
He's not going to do anything terribly sexy or exciting.
You're you're praying for like a three for 30 and he falls in the
end zone outcome. Right.
But like he he's not going to totally brick you like some of
these other tight ends can. And I really like the game
environment these in two and just the the way that the
quarterback distribution looks like it's shaping up this week
as well. It's like there's good
quarterbacks and then there's just like 50 feet of crap and
then the other quarterbacks and Baker also goes pretty late.
So I think that you can do some really good builds where you're
doing like a Baker double with like Mike Evans, K dot and Baker
Mayfield and then you find a bring back from Indy that's, you
know, Pittman has an incredible role and he's undervalued in in
his ADP for what his target share has been.
And then Josh downs as well, just for his from a talent
perspective where he goes. He's also being undervalued and
and from a game environment, so wanted to shout out Auten and
then. I guess just one one sort of
context or or framing note on on Auten is I'm looking at his the
no we don't show this in the chart but I'm looking at his
like expected points per game. So that obviously incorporates
all the targets, all the stuff like that and and and what his
expected points per game would be, it's 8.4 in PPR which.
It's it's not awful. It it is just not awful at all
and which is sort of how you were talking about them but is
is sort of worth noting that you you you do need a a bit of a
ceiling game to to to really get on the board with them.
Yeah and and what I'm looking at him as this week in Dog Bowl as
I'm looking at him as an extremely correlated bet on the
Bucks passing game with Baker Mayfield which allows me to just
go heavy on the skill position players early in the draft and
really soak up all of that value that I see there with guys like
Josh Jacobs. Like I honestly would even
consider like a Rashad White, Kate Aughton Mike Evans Baker
Mayfield giving 1 Colt to bring it back.
Play it as a full game onslaught cause the slate is kind of
yucky. Like I I don't think I'd do a
ton of that. But if it fell to me, I I I
wouldn't, you know, I wouldn't say I'm never gonna do it.
Right, right. Like there's only there's only
1010 games on the slate. So on the main slate and so
you're you're only getting 20 tight end Tony starting tight
ends anyway, between 12 people. In in a dog bowl draft.
So it's like you're saying it it's it's pretty tin.
So especially as like the sort of last guy or last round stuff
it that that that's why you're interested.
But just as a sort of statistical framing on his on
his profile. Yeah.
And the other one that I wanted to point out again, this is
really just specifically for for Dog Bowl and the reason I'm I'm
kind of using the tight end chart in this context is I don't
think there's a ton of stuff that we haven't already talked
about in the past, right. It's like most of these guys are
what they are. So if I want to give you guys
some usable Nuggets. And so I do really think that
Hunter Henry is the next best thing to Kate on in that last
year of tight ends playing against the Giants bad defense.
The Patriots passing weapons are extremely extremely thin coming
off the buy I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Hunter
Henry more involved. He he had been dealing with an
injury and so I I think you know giving him a little bit extra
time to get fully healthy maybe we see him you know emerge with
one of his more more vintage Hunter Henry games gets in the
end zone. I I always I've got a inside
joke with my wife who's a Patriots fan and you know back
when they they got rid of Gronk everyone is sad there's no more
Gronk on the Patriots and then they got Hunter Henry and I
would always tell her that Hunter Henry was Gronk at home
from the mom. Can we get X?
No, we we have Gronk at home and that's Hunter Henry.
So whenever he pops off, he's Gronk at home.
That that was a very niche joke. I'm I'm sure like 10 people are
gonna get that, so. No, I I think that's a popular
enough meme, all right. So yeah I I guess there's
there's nothing really else to share and do do like to see
Michael Mayer as sort of like he he's he's definitely firmly in
the starter chart starting tight end tight end chart now but I
guess we we that doesn't mean as much now with how the how the
Raiders have been playing and. So hopefully he can sort of
continue to consolidate and and and maybe yeah maybe get a
couple more targets on Perret run stuff but definitely feeling
I I think he he's probably a turbo of those guys that we just
talked about right. Yeah I I just I think it's it's
such a crapshoot I I think that if he gets the volume it'd be
great. I I'm just like not I don't
have. Enough.
He's just knocked out in the volume.
Yeah. Speaking of guys not getting the
volume, can I can I ask you one? And you tell me if it's too
gross? So I've got a lot of these.
I have these three quarterbacks projecting for very, very close
in fantasy points. So that's Baker Mayfield,
Gardner Minshew and Matt Stafford.
Now, it looks pretty likely that Cup is gonna miss this week from
what I'm seeing, right? What do you think about Tyler
Higbee? That sounds interesting.
And especially, I mean probably less interesting on on underdog
stuff where it's like half PPR. My brain is is set to sort of
FFPC mode. So I'm thinking like, oh wow,
he's gonna get lots of catches. Or he could get lots of catches
that could be 20 points. And I I guess may, May, maybe as
a maybe. He's probably in those the same
tier as those guys. That we just mentioned maybe
maybe that the bottom of of of the tier before them or ahead of
them, OK. That, that, that.
That's my lean, anyway. I just needed your validation.
I've already drafted him, so I needed to tell me that I wasn't
an idiot. And I I, I I assume that was
enough validation. Even if it was, if it was faint.
Yeah. No, that was plenty.
I feel I'm gonna sleep like a baby on my Stafford Puka.
Dekua. Tyler Higbee, Double Stack.
So let's let's move on under backups.
And I I, I I have a pretty short trigger finger to to to get to
the next one here I I was going to say, and we're done with the
backups. Right.
This is a this is a cruel joke that that sound played on me
that I'm still happening to live through the backup.
I think. Yeah, I think where the backup
chart can be useful just this is we're gonna do a little stat
chasing meta discussion here guys.
You're gonna see how the sausage is made.
Early season, I think we should have the backup chart.
I feel like halfway through the season next year we just Nix the
back once. Once things kind of like
crystallized, we Nix it. I agree.
Like, let's let's have a look at it before each week before we
decide not to use it. But yeah.
Assuming that there's nobody there popping and just just cut
it. And so now we're onto the wide
receivers. We've got what what weighted
targets per out run, we've got fantasy points per game and
we've got the route share. And we sort of like loosely
described the the four quadrants of this chart as the studs
getting volume, the guys getting volume but not popping in
fantasy. So possible regression
candidates we've got. The negative regression
candidates, guys who are not getting volume but have scored
points. So we're looking for sort of
like a negative regression there.
And then we have the milk carton guys, these are guys who running
running routes but not scoring points and not getting targets.
Another chart that that tends to be pretty stable once we get a
couple of weeks in there, but I'm a little bit disappointed is
that. Am I reading this right that
that so zay flowers and he's in this chart and and his dot is
the one just above Terry McLaren.
Yeah, he Zay, I believe is actually the he's the yellow dot
where Terry is the red dot. Yeah the the little lines are
not. So clear, right?
Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah.
Zay zay flowers. Is is the the yellow dot.
Right next to Terry Mccoran's name.
Yeah, yeah. And.
And I think I mean now with Mark Andrews being out for the
season, I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Zay move in the
direction that we'd like to see him.
You know, up to the to the right hand quadrant, top right of the
chart. I think we certainly could see
him get a lot more attention in the offense and you know, with
the. With that big 68 yard touchdown
play getting called back this week I do think that that's
something where we want to keep that in mind as hey he you know,
that should move. It's not going to fix
everything. That's not going to take him
from you know being slightly in the melt carton quadrant to
being a stud but it's going to move him in the right direction
and and so just wanted to to have that note but I'm I'm
personally not too worried about Zay Flowers but I I think that
he's pretty close to where I'd have him in in his peer group
like you you see him kind of near in the same neighborhood as
Jordan Addison same neighborhood as Calvin Ridley right.
Chris Godwin Terry Mclaurin. I I think.
I think that is what he is in, in this offense.
And that's not to say that he couldn't progress next season
out out of his rookie season, but I think for for this season,
that's what he is. Do you think that's fair?
Yeah yeah I think that's fair. I think he was sort of used as a
as an extension of the running game early in the year that's
what seems to have gone away a little bit and and he's still I
I I feel like he's still probably the favorite especially
with Andrew. Dan still the favorite for sort
of short area targets and but. Like you said he he, he will, I
think he will have to improve and throughout this this season
and and into next season to truly deliver on on the
excitement we had for him and moving on.
You were talking about the Saints and the possibility that
Jim is would start this week. If that's the case, then Olave
is just like. Level of a Lava Week, right?
100 percent. It's a guy that you know, don't.
Don't everyone watching this go out there and screw up Chris
Olave's ADP for me? Or if you see me in the streets
later tonight, please let me get a couple of Lava shares because
I've been trying to get him and I've just landed in areas of the
board where it's like I he'd taken him a lot earlier over
guys that got a little higher but I def I I fully.
Volunteer you at at his current ADP Yeah, I I fully.
Which is around 23 and a half. Yeah, I I intend for My
Portfolio to be pretty overweight.
Olabe this week in a dog bowl. So yeah, I definitely like that
as a call out, another one, Here's this one.
Silly. And I've seen some of the sharp
players getting on this already but Deontay Johnson goes
undrafted like that. Shouldn't there there shouldn't
be any guy that's getting 70% weighted targets per route run
and running between 95% and 100% of the routes that goes
undrafted. That's just not right.
Like that's fantasy football 101 take take the guys that are
getting great projectable volume like and and you have the
additional volatility of now we get an offense that's not being
called by Matt Canada. And when we're playing these
games where we need extremely you know we need to hit high
outcomes like we want that volatility.
And so when you're when you're telling me here's a player with
a ton of volume and there's a little additional volatility
attached to him for this week, it's like and he's going
undrafted it's like sign me up. He'll by I promise when ETR
rankings come out he's going to scream up the board it's going
to be really it's it will be comical so go ahead and get your
last round Deante Johnson now but that's one where that's it's
just a huge mistake It I I see stuff like this every once in a
while in the underdog be ours and it's like got it the game is
is really really good like if you're if you were playing this
game seriously like you you should be crushing at it because
there's there's stuff like this most weeks where some it's just
the markets really wrong and it takes a while to correct.
I am pretty fair and the other guy and and and this is this is
honestly a tough one to answer. What's the story with Calvin
Ridley where like he's sort of been a ghost for a while now and
then he pops off with one of the best games of the week?
I I feel like not to to toot my own horn, but I did a a write up
of my best ball exposures like right in the middle of week one.
I don't think that that week one had fully concluded yet.
Or maybe it was done anyway. And I I wrote up my thoughts on
the Jaguars offense for the season and how I had kind of
diagnosed it during draft season and I said I was pretty
confident that it was going to be every receiver and and Evan
Ingram in this offense was going to be capable of delivering
spike weeks and it's just going to be you know the carousel of
whose turn is it. And so I was I was pretty price
sensitive in that and I had almost no Ridley after he
screamed up. I got a good amount of fourth
round Ridley early on and then had no second round Ridley and
and no third round Ridley and and I I think that that's just
what we're seeing like sure you've got the the Zay Jones
splits you know when Zay Jones is in Ridley.
That's so funny and and I think part of that is noisy and part
of that is, is the role that they're asking Ridley to play
with and without Zay Jones. But I I think that we're trying
to look we're trying to make it too simple of an answer.
If we say oh Zay Jones in Ridley Smash I, I.
Truly, that works like that, yeah.
I truly think what it is is it's it's the carousel of you know
this offense is good enough that it can deliver explosive weeks
from any of these receivers. Like if if Zay Jones is fully
healthy and he keeps playing, I I would not be surprised at all.
If Zay Jones is the guy you need in in the basketball playoffs.
You know, like it wouldn't shock me in the slightest to see a 30
point Zay Jones game. So it it's just the nature of
this offense where you have 3 competent receivers and a good
quarterback and a competent offense.
You know, any of these guys can blow up in any given week, so.
Yeah, and then and then there's also the piece where he scored
two touchdowns and that's his third on four touchdowns of the
year. Like his, his targets, his area
yards were up there with like 126 and which is around the
upper end of where he's been this year.
But he's had 1234 other games. Where he's had over 100 air
yards and and and sort of targets that have been up there
in in like 117788. So I think there's probably some
of it that is just touchdown variants too.
But it's it's it's obviously a case too where like you said
where you're going to have weeks where one guy is, is is getting
all the targets and then the next week.
And other guys getting them all. Yep.
Sorry that that was a long way to to just agree with you, but
no, no, that's I I was happy to hear you agree with me.
I didn't have anything else I really wanted to to touch on
here. No, me neither.
I guess I can. I can take one more shot at my
favorite punching bag of Adam Thielen who continues to to do
worse than he did on his screaming hot you know, start to
the season. It's just it feels so good to
see the Adam Thielen slappies not not get there.
I, you know, I'll, I'll be very, very happy to see teams with
Adam Thielen on them in my playoff pods.
So it's just everything feels right in the world, you know?
You know, he's just going to be lower owned in the playoffs now
he's he's going to be so high on in the playoffs, Adam Thielen's
advance rate is going to be absurd.
Just what what he did already is enough to like.
Right. He was gone so late.
The only the only way his advance rate goes low is he
needs like, I mean, yeah, it's not even possible because in
basketball you you're never going to count his bad scores.
I was going to say you need him to fumble like 20 times in a
game and deliver a huge negative week.
But yeah, it's not not possible. You're going to have a great
advance rate if you have feeling.
You know I am. I'm going to be a little bit
contrarian here and say even last week he didn't have 2.1
yards per right run. He didn't.
Yeah, he just didn't score a touchdown.
And I guess he's an older player.
So it's like, it's a question of like how much can you get his
sort of like for him his peak and quality output, but it it's
Adam Taylor and he scores touchdowns.
So like that that that that could be a thing.
Again SO11 supporting data point for for my shitting on Adam
Thielen is his. His pass route grade from PFF
has been on a pretty steady declining trend for the last few
weeks. He was you know pretty squarely
up in the high 70s and 80s over the first six weeks of the
season. And then three weeks ago he was
all the way down at 51. Then two weeks ago he was at 61.
Last week did a little better at 71, but you know, I'm I I
wouldn't be surprised to see him still kind of hang around those,
those lower grades. Are you talking about like his
his his his receiving grade from PFF?
It's it's pass route. So I believe it's his route
running grade from PFF. OK because.
That's so weird, because maybe we could just be wrong.
I've got. Or I could just be wrong.
I've got them having done 37 drop backs last week with 36
routes for Adam Thielen. Oh, I was.
I was saying his grade, not. Not.
Oh, he's great. He's great.
OK, OK, got it, got it. Yeah, which is which is very
subjective. Like it's it's not a not a stat
that I'm going to rely on all the time, but it supported my
case that Adam Thielen bad, so that's why we're talking about
it. OK and yeah, I'm I'm not an I
don't feel an lover eater and I I just, I just, I guess and he's
getting targets and if he scores touchdowns he's going to be,
it's going to be score points I guess.
Yeah, I'll. I'll wait till he buries me in
the playoffs. And so.
Yeah. Let's, let's move on from this
chart on to as I say every week it's the Tyree Kill chart where
we just have to we've got everybody else.
And then we have Tyree Kill at 25 points a game in 90% weighted
targets per hour run which just far and away.
Yeah, better than everybody else.
Like, even if, if, even, like. The I'm I'm pulling back to the
first chart. The first chart doesn't even go
up to 25 points a game. It doesn't even go up to way to
target Spirit run on 90%. We have to stretch the second
chart out to accommodate Tory kill.
So. So here's a fun question.
Knowing what we know now, pretend that you were allowed to
get back in it, get in a time machine and go back to draft a
couple best ball teams for the summer.
Who were you taking? 101 Tyreek Hill or Christian
McCaffrey? And CMC, OK.
I, I and I think it's based on that sort of positional scarcity
that we're talking about. Yeah, I agree.
CMC and then clown cars. Yeah, I I agree you.
You basically, if you were doing this time machine exercise, you
go back, you draft CMC and then you just don't draft any other
running backs like you. You just take a zero at CMC,
zero at my RB2. And let me have a bunch of wide
receivers. And then I guess my my only
other question and and and maybe this is Cope stuff.
It really has been the sort of disappointing season for gel and
waddle. But then when I look at his.
His way to Target's Brett run it.
It's not like he's not getting targeted.
I guess it it's weird that he's only on the field 75 to 80% of
the game. The games.
I'd imagine some of that has been from his injuries and stuff
like that and but I guess looking at this chart it it does
feel fair to say that he's a. He's a regression candidate in
terms of like his route share and and sort of touchdowns and
and and corresponding points. Yep I good good call out because
that was a guy that I had been looking at and thinking about.
You know really through the lens of guys that I want to have on
my squads when I get to the the basketball playoffs.
Not that we have any control over it whatsoever, but it's
just fun to think about. And I real, I thought of Jalen
Waddle as a guy that I really want to have a a lot of get
through the playoffs, 'cause my my interpretation of, you know,
this somewhat lackluster performance so far this year is
you had a a good amount of it marred by injury.
And then really, when you look back at last season for what
made him so good, he kept having these huge explosive plays,
right breakaway touchdown run or deep pass that he converts into
a touchdown. Things like that, where you've
just really haven't gotten as many of those this season.
And I don't think that that's because he all of a sudden got a
lot worse. I think the guy's dealt with a
little bit of injury and you know, has maybe run a little bit
bad and converting some of the most explosive plays.
So I think that what you're looking at here is a player
with, you know, he's still got a really high ceiling in his bag
of tricks and we just haven't seen a lot of it yet this
season. But that doesn't mean that
that's not available for him. And so that's one of the players
where when I see a team get through with Waddle on it, I'm
pretty excited for it. And the perspective that I'm I'm
looking at here is I think the Miami double stacks are probably
gonna be one of the most valuable thing.
I mean like really a Miami team stack is what you're wanting to
have when you get into the playoffs.
Like you sneak through a lower owned Jalen Waddle.
You know you get a an A Chan who is still probably going to have
a pretty good advance rate even after missing so much time.
But you know if you've got impaired with Jalen Waddle maybe
you can can have a slightly more depressed advance rate on that
specific player combo. But yeah, I'm I I think, I think
those Miami team stacks are certainly going to be
interesting. Speaking of playoffs.
Do you think and and and given the fact that you you'll be
talking about the playoff best ball do you think it.
It seems to me that Miami might be one of those teams in playoff
best ball that's sort of undervalued, still somehow
somehow utter than Tiger kill and going with ADP of 6 and you
have a Chua WIT and 19. And then I'm not sure I'm I'm
trying to find Waddle here but he's I I I can't find them.
So it means he's gone pretty late.
He's gone pick 28.7 and Raheem most are 29.7 a Chan 23.
These all seem like for a team that that seems like a lot to
win the division and but not get the first round.
Bye. That that that seems and and
given how explosive their offense has been that that seems
inefficient. Yeah.
So I I see Miami as 93% to make the playoffs in the playoff
simulations that they've got over at Spike week and then
their one seed probability is just 16%.
And so I I mean that's like all systems go for me and Pat and I
will will talk a little bit about the strategy surrounding
playoff basketball and how you kind of like go down the
different game trees when you select your player.
But I I don't think it's going to be any state secret.
You know what we can talk a little bit more about the why
and how to apply this to the rest of your strategy.
But Tyree Kill is going to be probably the best pick overall I
would say in in the first round based on the rest of the Miami
cost. So if if that holds.
The other thing with playoff basketball is the market is so,
so volatile and again we we won't get too into that right
here. But it's something where if you
have a a good strategy and you understand how to handle it, you
can really, really exploit it to to put yourself in a pretty
advantageous position to make some good money on these
contests so. So look look out for for Lego
playoff basketball strategy videos where you'll get more
even more in depth analysis on on on on other teams other than
Miami than that Jericho with the the elite plug game right there.
No. Oh, well, I thought, I thought,
I thought, I thought it was a good spot to like, hey, there's
your teaser. If you want more you know where
to go that was great. I mean you're a you're a
seasoned veteran man yeah other guys on this chart I had a
question for you. So we got Nico Collins and Tank
Dell on this chart together. They're they're you know pretty
close in fantasy points per game.
Obviously tank has been the new hotness lately just absolutely
smashing you know delivering a huge game this last week.
You know they're tank is is at a higher weighted targets per
route run, but not by a ton. Here they're, you know they're
still in the same neighborhood. Do you think this flipping of
Tank Dell is now the wide receiver one for the Texans and
Nico Collins is the wide receiver 2.
Is that accurate in your opinion?
So it it's hard to tell with this kind of week to week stuff
in terms of targets and because you can have, you can have.
Weeks where both guys are sort of like high up on the target
tree and they'll ping, they'll they'll have weeks where they
ping pong back-to-back and then over a longer sample one guy's
higher. I guess my, my one note of
context is that I think it's pretty like it's obviously
bullish for Tank Dell that he's a rookie.
And that he's doing this and that he's challenging Nico at
all and but I I guess also it it it feels to me that it opens up
the case it it makes it it makes the probability of of it being a
flip link much higher like if the if these if he was like if
there were similar experience levels and and all that sort of
stuff I I'd be more inclined to believe this sort of ping pong
teary. But it's it.
Like I said it's hard to call. I I would have a lane to it it
being tanked al over Nico especially given the sort of
long view stuff we have on Nico where you know he he he took a
while to to establish himself in the NFL.
Whereas tank I know I know Tanked Al has Cedar Stroud but
he's doing it immediately. So, so I've got a follow up
question for you. Tank Dell is going in the early
first round. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah. In terms of like the price
sensitivity, I'm I'm saying like I think it's 55% that Tank Dell
is the new one and probably 45% that this is like just variance
and if you're getting like a first round pick to where does
Nico go? Nico goes in the back of the 3rd
and sometimes all the way in the 4th.
So like that. That's where you talk about
price sensitivity. Like like I'm saying I'm I'm
saying I have a lien to yes it's tank but first round versus
fourth round 3-4 in like a 12 round, 10 game slate difference
it's it's it's massive. It's massive.
It's like you you're you're you like to say, I'll bet what
dollars to Donuts like. Sure, that's a that's a sack ISM
that you're you're if you're taking Nico, you're you're
betting Donuts to dollars. And then just we're just going
to give away all the Dog Bowl alpha.
I'm I'm literally finishing all my drafts tonight so that you
you good people don't totally mush all of my alpha before I
can get to it myself. But here, here you go, in the
all of the drafts I've been in, there are 0 tanked or zero.
Nico Collins and CJ Stroud stacks 0.
So just by taking CJ Stroud and Nico Collins, you're getting a
huge amount of leverage on the other CJ Stroud teams.
And it's not like you're having to do it with a marginal play.
You're doing it with a great play at at cost.
And so I. I mean I'll, I'll literally call
it right now that one of the dog bowl teams that wins this week
will be ACJ Stroud, Nico Collins team like I I promise you.
So that's what do you mean you promise?
I I'm just, I'm telling you like it's so much leverage all you
need is CJ Stroud to hit and like you're you're basically
crushing all the other Nico or you're crushing all the other
Stroud. It's it's a very, very strong
combination. It's it's, yeah, If you don't
promise that, that, that's going to be the win.
I promise it. That's the sack guarantee.
Yeah, you know, or or your money back.
Just kidding. Absolutely not.
OK. And so then I guess we're also
talking about Noah Brown. I know he was like a waiver
darling last week after he had the had the big game.
Is. Is.
Is he? Is he still?
Is he still hot or is he not? In my opinion, he's closer to
not I I mean it. It just is more of a testament
to CJ Stroud than Noah Brown. It's hey, whoever is here, CJ
Stroud will elevate. So it doesn't matter if it's
Noah Brown or Dalton Schultz or, you know, freaking Jordan Aikens
or whoever. Like, if you're out there
running routes for the Texans and CJ Stroud is back there
delivering it, you're going to be useful for fantasy and so.
In my opinion, where you got Nico Collins and Tank Dell, you
know, occupying so much of the target share, I don't think that
I'm terribly interested in Noah Brown with both of them healthy.
But that's just me. Maybe, you know, maybe Noah
Brown comes out this week and and proves us wrong.
So he, I guess he was out and he was out in week 11.
So did obviously. No no new news for him there and
just has to come back from that injury but I I I I I just had
been I've been surprised at the about the hype and and and
wanted to ask so I I guess we're ready to move on and.
Let's let's hit the final wide receiver chart here and maybe
maybe note that with Michael Thomas going on IR that that
that that makes Rashid, Rashid Shahid interesting too.
I don't think it changes anything.
I don't think Michael Thomas changes Rashid Shahid at all
'cause they were in two very distinct roles.
And when Thomas went out AT Perry, came in and basically
took over the Thomas role one for one.
What I'm actually pretty interested in is not playing AT
Perry. We talked about that.
We're excited for Olave. I think he could steal some of
the target share that was previously going to Thomas.
But what I'm interested in on this slate with the gross tight
ends in a game environment that I like is Juwan Johnson.
Juwan Johnson is a wide receiver in a tight ends body.
You know he's a converted wide receiver hasn't been doing a ton
this season he he missed a good amount of time to injury and but
I I think that you know. You get Jameis in there.
He's slinging it around. I think that any of these wide
receivers are live to have a big game.
And that's not to say I don't. I didn't mean to come off so
strong as to poo poo Shaheed. I just didn't want people to
change their. I don't think your opinion of
Shaheed should change. With respect to Michael Thomas
being out, it should change because Jameis is there and you
boost Shaheed for that reason. But I wouldn't expect his role
to be very different. He's still going to be running
the same type of routes. So it's it's purely just the
boost from Jameis now. He's not really going drafted in
dog bolt drafts right now so he he did have an 80% route share
last week and and and he's that that's definitely been it.
It seems like he sort of bounces between the 60 and the 80 and he
had a 24% target sprout run and and and so sorry, go make make
your point. Sorry.
No, no, that's yeah, I I think all of these Saints passing game
options are in play. The only one that I wouldn't
mess with this week for fantasy is AT Perry.
Not because I don't think that he's in play, but just because I
think that you can make better bets with Olave Shaheed and Juan
Johnson and AT Perry's interesting.
And if you're if you're like truly disturbed, he's probably
like Min Price on DraftKings SO. You go ahead and Chuck him in
there, but yeah, I I think the whole Saints offense is really
interesting. I think there's a lot of
volatility in what could happen this week if, you know, if you
get Jameis at quarterback, which kind of segues back into my
Taysom Hill point. So yeah, makes sense for sure.
Oh my God, this is, you know what this, this chart looks like
to me? It looks like and it looks like,
a plague of locusts warming towards me to eat my crops.
Well, I've got good news for you.
We're only going to talk about one player on this chart and one
player only, and that's Jaden Reed.
Because Jaden Reed is the best wide receiver on the Packers.
It's not close. I won't hear anything else like
Dobbs is fine. Christian Watson will be lucky
if his career is as good as Chase Claypools or Martavis.
Bryant's like, that's what he is.
You know we've we've already had the blueprint on this player
archetype. We've already seen it.
We got the red flags last season with Aaron Rodgers telling us
this guy's like fucking off and not paying attention and he's
not running the right routes or doing the right stuff.
He's not sharp in meeting rooms. Like we already knew that this
guy was a chuckle fuck and and this season like it's playing
out he he's not you know it's it was a room that was.
You know, completely devoid of an alpha wide receiver.
It was there for the taking and the alpha is Jaden Reed, baby.
And and Jaden Reed is truly delivering on what I thought was
a pretty dynamic college profile.
You know, I I had heard other people comp into Stefan Diggs
and I thought that was an appropriate comp.
And I'm, I'm juiced for Jaden Reed.
Jaden Reed to the Moon, Baby and well, I I hadn't seen the the
Stefan Diggs. Maybe I'm being argumentative
but I taught Stefan Diggs. He he he definitely was like
somebody who's small school and then stayed for a while.
But he had an outrageous like, dominator rating like outrageous
market share. I I don't think Jayden Reid did.
No, you're you're correct. He, Stefan Diggs certainly had a
much better college profile than Jayden Reid.
But Jayden Reid had enough similarities there and he did
have quite a bit of dynamism. Where?
Who's a great returner? Right.
Yep. And and that's that really
matters to me in, you know, predicting NFL success.
I I want to see guys with that level of dynamism and and you've
seen it. You know it's played out with a
lot of guys that are you know current stars in the NFL.
Like I I really didn't like Brandon IU coming out for his
entire profile, except his his return game stuff.
And that is the only reason why I was like maybe there's I'll
leave a light on for Brandon Iuk and and sure enough the guy is
out here crushing now. But there's there's lots of guys
where if you just if you were only going to follow like 1
little thread it's look for guys that are you know studs in the
return game where in college their coach is looking for a way
for them to touch the ball even more often And and that's to me
that's what Jaden Reed demonstrated and and he.
He's really showing out here at the next level, so excited to
see this guy going forward. I wouldn't be surprised at all
if next season, if Jaden Reed's ADP coming into best ball draft
season is like anywhere later than the 12th round, I'm going
to have a huge bag of Jaden Reed.
Like just absolutely monster. He could easily be my most
drafted player. Yeah, I I I was wondering where
where you're going to set the line there, but 12 rounds seems
pretty, pretty reasonable. Not not hot take enough and I
mean I I I feel like with these rookies who perform well like
it. It still is a red flag for me
that his, for example, his his final college season, his
receiving yards market share was only 25.
His dominator rating was only 24%.
And so I guess to me that mean that to me that makes it so that
like you know he should be priced somewhere between the
8:00 somewhere and now this is a wide range somewhere between
rounds 8 and 12 and and the fact that he's having a a good rookie
year and he'll be a second year player that will make that will
make him a target for sure. But I guess maybe I, I'm I'm I'm
in between saying you know I think what you're saying is
right where where he where he should be a priority target but
maybe I'm like like maybe maybe a a tad tad more hesitant just
I, I I guess I don't like the the college profile quite as
much as you do. So his his college dominator was
35.7%, that's 73rd percentile. He's pretty good.
His college target share 25 percent, 75th percentile.
And his Breakout age, which if you're if you're only looking at
like 2 data points for a college profile, you know active in the
return game. And Breakout Age is probably the
ones where if you're just having a really simple model, those
would be two things where. That's a a good chunk of signal
comes from those so he was 98th percentile breakout age at 18.4
and you know for for guys that didn't have spectacular counting
stats in college like and you're you're not wrong like if you go
through he had a really good you know 4th year he he missed 2019
right. But his his year in 20/21, he
had a really good year put up over 1000 yards on 59 targets,
26% target share. And then he also had just a gang
of special teams yards that year.
But you know, if you look at other guys who didn't have
fantastic production all through college and actually kind of a
similar shape of distribution of when he had his best year and
and what that looked like is Puka Nakua, he did nothing his,
you know? Freshman and sophomore years had
a really great junior year and then his his senior year dipped
off a little bit. Now with Puka you're missing the
dynamism and special teams and you know had a older breakout
age, worst target share, worst dominator.
So you know with with how excited everyone is about Puka.
I feel like if Puka is going before Jaden Reed next season,
I'll just give me right that that.
I think that's pretty fair and I'm probably being pretty harsh
on on the dominator rating stuff where he did actually have, he
did have a very strong freshman and junior year.
But I think it's good for you to throw a little cold water 'cause
I came out of the gate for Jayden Reid there and but good
at good, good, good and and hopefully, yeah, productive
discussion on on Reid. Anyone else that you wanted to
touch on here before we let the good folks go?
No, no, I I I'm like looking at it and there's guys I'd like to
talk about, but I don't know like it Is it worth bringing up
Jameson Williams again? Like, you know, it not really.
Is it Because he's still who he who, who he sort of thought he
was or or where he's doing really well on on this sort of
short and route share? He's getting the deep targets,
but it doesn't seem like they want to do anything more with
them. Yeah.
Can I can I put a little Jameson Williams blurb out there in the
world? Sure.
I think. Jamieson Williams bulls people
that you know if you got him in dynasty or you're excited to
draft him next year, I think we're fucked guys because he's
on the Lions. I think Jamieson Williams is the
most talented wide receiver on the Lions.
But what we've talked about earlier today about the way that
the Lions manage their talent and personnel, I I think that is
going to stymie Jamieson Williams development and his
involvement in this offense, I mean.
I hope they proved me wrong. I hope through the back half of
the season he, you know, his usage ramps up and we get to see
him truly blossom. But I I got a sneaking suspicion
this is going to be one of those players where we're super
frustrated with his usage. We're just, we're pissed off at
the Lions for not deploying him in the way that we think he
should be deployed. And I mean maybe we get
fortunate in that he gets to another team when he's young
enough and still has enough juice that that he can do
something. But from the limited and I'm not
a, you know, I'm not a qualified film grinder or anything like
that. But man, when I watch this guy,
I'm like, I mean that looks like a pretty good route to me.
Like he's, you know he's getting open every every time.
Like he he sure looks to be winning routes like.
I, you know, I'm not here, you know, as a route running expert
or anything, but for my, you know, my unsophisticated eyes,
I'm pretty sure it's good when there's a lot of space between
you and the defender guarding you.
So I don't know. That's that's all I have to say
about Jameson Williams. And then it feels like the
notice is somewhat similar on Rashi Rice where somebody super
excited. The start of the year was was
playing really well as a as he was getting more snaps and all
that sort of stuff. But then you look at last night
and and it looked like he barely played his route.
I guess his route percentage last night was just 52% and his
his 65% in week seven was was sort of like a true peak, which
really frustrating. Well, Draco, what you're
forgetting or failing to realize is that when you have a true
elite alpha like Justin Watson, you can't ever take him off the
field for Rashi Rice. So you know true dot true dot.
It just it it doesn't make any sense.
Yeah. And then I guess sorry I'm I'm
holding this up but I have I have guys who who I think we
should discuss the then the last one and I think this is the last
one is Khalil Shakur where it looks like since week 8 he's
been above a 70% root share every week which I think that's
that's pretty interesting and and and then last week he had a
a 15% target Brett Run, 32% weighted target Brett run.
So definitely not like a target dominant player, but given that
he plays on the Bills and he's he's running like a solid root
percentage, like fantasy relevant I think.
Yeah and it's it's kind of funny because that was my favorite
like Bill's dart throw receiver all offseason.
I just really like the talent profile and it was same the
season prior. I I really liked him, you know
two years ago and it's it's it kind of feels validating when a
team like gets to the same place that you have been where you're
like this guy should be on the field all the time for you guys.
Why is he not on the field? And then finally, you know,
through injury and other opportunities, you know, opening
up for him, it's like, Oh yeah, we should use this Khalil Shakur
guy, this Deontay Hardy guy is is truly just a punt returner.
Like it it should have been Khalil Shakur all the time,
like. And so you know one of those
things where it's frustrating to see the team, you know, you
always feel like you're so smart.
Then for finding that out before an NFL team, you're like I knew
Khalil Shakur was good all along.
It's like, yeah, well you know, we we don't know everything.
We don't know all the dynamics of maybe he's not actually able
to do some of the the things the team is asking him to do and
there might be other deficiencies that we're not
Privy to. But you know, from a fantasy
perspective, he always looked like the most intriguing option
on the team there. Really liked him from a cost
adjusted standpoint compared to Gabe Davis.
Not that I didn't draft Gabe Davis, who I also thought had a
pretty good price this season, but I I wouldn't be surprised at
all if by next year. We see Khalil Shakur and Gabe
Davis more as like a 2A2B, and Diggs is still the clear, you
know, alpha in that offense. So I'm sort of saying fantasy
relevant but not like not like a you got a stardom guy no.
But definitely worth you know worth keeping an eye on roster
bowl. You know could could be a a min
salary punt for DFS or something like that.
Right, 'cause like he had, he had a he had 115 yards last week
but it was 71 yards after the catch and and and he did have
the touchdown. So obviously he played really
well. You'll you'll like to see that
but then in in in other weeks where he's had similar routes it
it's been a more sort of like. You're you're getting like 2
targets, 4 targets, 6 targets, like middling target count.
And so you you do need the big play, the big breakaway plays to
to get a good score from him. But we're we're rostering and
maybe hoping for an improved and even further improved situation
or God forbid like sort of like a desperation play.
Yeah and and those just as a note those 71 yards after catch
pretty much all came on that one breakaway down play that he had
which was a it was a great play. Like he he honestly showed
really, really good like it it was like a punt return style
play he was weaving through defenders.
He he was great in space. Yeah super exciting to watch.
So for me the most relevant Khalil Shakur you know notes
that we can give the people is when you're drafting playoff
best ball and and we'll go into the situations when you should
be going deeper in a team and and building out those larger
stacks of like 3-4 and even five players on a team.
But when you're doing that, Khalil Shakur would certainly be
an interesting one to tack on to your larger bill stacks.
Yeah. Yeah.
Makes makes sense for sure. So I think, I think that's it,
right? I think so.
So thanks everyone for joining and glad to have you listening
to the show. And everybody have a great day.
Thanksgiving holiday, Happy Thanksgiving.
I'll see you next Tuesday. See you next Tuesday.