0:00Oh yes, we are so back. Welcome to the flagship show. Yes, this is stats versus film. As you know, we go and watch all
0:1016 games from the weekend. Look at the underperformers, and most importantly, your weekly winners, and compare that to the stats, the spreadsheets, the
0:19analytics, the underlying metrics in the hopes of helping you bully your league mates and your friends here in week two.
0:27And boy, have we leveled up this year.
0:28Obviously, we have Hayden Winks joining for all 32 teams just like normal, but the addition, yes, the big man himself, Matt Harmon joins us for the first half
0:40of this episode. Uh, Matt, welcome to the party, boys. It's good to be here.
0:45Uh, this is one of the best, if not certainly the most ambitious shows in the fantasy space. So, I am very excited
0:53to be a part of it this year. I've listened to it. I've watched it before and uh you know now I'm get to be a part
0:58of it. So I'm very excited to chop it up with you guys.
1:01>> Also very excited that you're here.
1:04>> Josh, I was just going to say the the one thing big picture-wise heading into this week is already you feel the
1:09difference between the good teams and the bad teams. And >> oh my god, that's concerning because typically we like get that like week
1:16eight or so. Like the fact that we're already there on about three or four of these teams in week one's uh it's not
1:21good. And something we'll hit on during this is so many new quarterback and play caller tandemss. Some of them hit the
1:28ground running and let's say many of them did not. And we'll see if that improves in week two and week three as
1:34we go along. For everyone out there, we start with about 10 headline teams uh and you know the biggest talking points
1:41either injuries or let's say depth charts and changes for new starters. And then we'll go in alphabetical order after that. So if you're new around
1:48here, hit subscribe. We do this every single Tuesday. We're going to try to do it live every single week at 6 o'clock
1:54Eastern. So, we kick things off with the prime times games that we missed on our Sunday night recap show. The Kansas City
1:59Chiefs only one place to begin here.
2:01Hayden Ken Walker has the most rushing yards ever for a running back that has played next to Patrick Mahomes. And it
2:08only took him one game to do it. He already topped the number of 20 plus yard runs of any Chiefs running back
2:15that they posted last season. He is the franchise altering player that we were all over at the one-two turn this year.
2:23>> Yeah, I think that he would be in contention to be the RB3 if you're reddrafting teams uh this week. Uh and
2:29he had this 29th touch of week one with 11 minutes to go. The neutral pass rate for the Chiefs was a step down from
2:35where it was more under center stuff, more at you runs for Kenneth Walker. The fastest ball carrier they've had since 2019. So like to me this just reminds me
2:43of like Lee McCoy, Jamal Charles, Brian Westbrook. Back in the day, Andy Reed had guys like this. I think they're going to get him the ball through the
2:50air, which we saw this one. He obviously he had that little receiving touchdown on that like 1936 uh play design there.
2:56But really, it's just like the explosiveness and just the best offensive line he's probably played behind, including that noamer undrafted free agent left left tackle uh sprung
3:05free on a couple of these runs as well.
3:07>> Yeah, Khil Benson, shout out, man. Uh Hayden, you and I talked about this game on the night cap for the forecast
3:13yesterday. Uh, you know, God days, man.
3:16What are what are we doing at this point anymore? But it was the biggest takeaway from from this one for me is just like
3:21it is truly, as Josh said, the transformative player that is Kenneth Walker. So much is different about this offense, specifically in the run game. I
3:29have a stat that I put together with Nate uh on one of the coaches shows that we did uh earlier this year when we
3:35looked at like the new play callers in new places. I called it static score.
3:39Essentially, it's like your blend of plays in heavy personnel packages, under center, plays with motion, play action.
3:46The Chiefs were 31st in that last season. They're the 14th ranked team coming out of week one. Uh they're under center percentage is way up. The motion
3:54percentage is way up. Play action is up.
3:56Like Kenneth Walker is awesome. And I I want to keep talking about that. At some point I do want to come back to the, you
4:02know, maybe negative vibes with the receivers and just that 100% the the process. But yeah, I mean Josh Kenneth Walker is exactly what we were all
4:10hoping for.
4:11>> Yeah. And there's like a million awesome stats we can bring up here. Uh, one of the nuttier ones to me was that Ken
4:16Walker also averaged negative rush yards before contact per attempt in this game.
4:22He actually ran for 179 yards. Uh, I before contact, excuse me, after contact. Uh but that only total 173 yards overall in his department. That's
4:33the second lowest mark uh per rushing attempt in the league this week and still he was one of the best assets if
4:40not the best asset in fantasy football just overall. Uh hey now I do have to ask this question. Is this too much?
4:47Like did we get a bit rich here for Ken Walker in week one? Like what are you expecting uh his workload to be every
4:53single week? uh factoring in that he was, as Matt noted, the only operational aspect of this entire offense for many large portions of this game. I think
5:04he'll touch the ball 20 plus times almost every single week. The Chiefs defense like was obviously had a really standout game. A lot of their rookie
5:11defenders were making impact plays. Uh on top of that, null Williams, like a good sleeper corner, uh had a really nice game as well. So, I think he's
5:18going to touch the ball 20 plus times.
5:20If you are concerned about it, and you should, I think EMTT Johnson is somebody that needs to be rostered in almost
5:25every league. He had a couple of nice plays as a receiver. He uh helped run out the clock as well. They really
5:31appreciate him. And with Kenneth Walker's injury history, I do think that he's one of the premier handcuffs. He's he should be uh someone that we talk
5:38about uh in the waiverwire shows and obviously that those happen tonight. So, I would say EMTT Johnson would be somebody that you should uh be picking
5:45up, especially if you have someone like Kenneth Walker. Um, he should be rostered in like 80% of leagues.
5:51>> Yeah. Matt, can I send it to you on the wide receiver front? Uh, quickly with Emma Johnson, by the way, uh, he was one
5:56of these players at Nebraska who, you know, had some really high underlying metrics in terms of force miss tackles.
6:02However, he like would constantly get tackled immediately after he broke a tackle, I felt. But Hayden, I thought he looked better here in week one than
6:09almost any tape that I watched in college. And and it was very clear that this is like the one two. And I do kind
6:15of wonder if we see a little bit more IT Johnson sprinkled in uh in the future, but at the same time that shouldn't stay
6:21in the way of Ken Walker just being nutty here. Matt, you can take it from there or we can talk about the wide
6:25receivers because it was almost uh Jacqueline Hyde situation that these Rashid Rice savior worthy types could not uh let's say unlock the manto man
6:35coverage that the Denver Broncos were putting on them.
6:37>> Oh man. Yeah, 100%. I I'll I'll come on to the that in just a second here. Just the the positivity on the run game. I do
6:44do want to give a shout out to Eric Benemy here because like he's a coach that I was a little bit hard on when he
6:48was the single play caller like the the guy in Washington but it you know spent a year in Chicago with a lot of
6:56underenter heavy personnel play action the whole deal and that is certainly what we saw in week one but it is a
7:01shame Josh like I mean I [snorts] feel greedy almost looking at this Chief's offense and thinking like can we just get one one guy to make a play here in
7:11the passing game consistently down the field because like You look at the passing chart for Patrick Mahomes last night. It's ridic it's it's pathetic.
7:17It's it's ridiculous. It's just to me I think that it's it's just tough with these guys as as receivers. And you know with Rashid Rice
7:27like obviously there's you know he's coming back from the injury rehabbing in jail. Like I want to be fair and intellectually honest about that part of
7:37it. But, you know, he was targeted on 6.9% of his routes in that game last night. That's the lowest of his career
7:45if you throw out the one game that he ran three routes before tearing his ACL in the 2024 season. Like, you've got to
7:50go back to his rookie season to get games consistently where he was under 20% targets per route run. And yeah, it's just like you said last night, the
7:58Broncos just decided to play man coverage and took these guys away down the field. And in week two, they get a
8:03Colts defense that played over 60% man coverage on second to fourth down. And so that's a matchup to watch certainly this week. But yeah, it's just a shame
8:12that I don't trust like either of these receivers to consistently make >> hay on what's going to be some good favorable looks like. Like maybe Worthy
8:18at some point, but I also just thought Worthy's route running on uh Monday night was just left a lot to be desired
8:24in terms of breaking at the right times.
8:28>> Okay.
8:28>> Yeah. Yeah, with Rashid Rice in partic Well, Josh, just real quick, the neutral pass rate, it dropped by 10 percentage
8:33points. It was at 58% over the last three seasons and then this last week 48%. It's super dink and dunk like Matt
8:40was saying. But if if that's going to be what this new offense is, like the PPR scam stuff from Rashi Rice is a long
8:45ways away. So, I think he's like somebody that no way we we would be drafting him in like the third round
8:50right now. I think that he's like probably going to be sitting in my like wide receiver three territory as as the
8:55season develops. I couldn't believe it when I opened up the, you know, fantasy pros to do the rankings this morning and
9:00he was like wide receiver 11 in consensus rankings. That'll probably come down over the course of the week. I know he scored a touchdown. That's part
9:06of it, but yeah, I was I was shocked to see that. Like to me, yeah, he's he's going to be below a lot of folks as we
9:11head into week two.
9:12>> Yeah, I will say he was still out there for 88% of routes. So, uh we've seen, you know, worse performers uh this week
9:19in terms of expectations of of being out there, too. And look, the more and more Ken Walker is success with his runs, you
9:25would like to think um that this passing game can at least create a little bit of juice, but they certainly look like an
9:31organization that spent their entire budget on the franchise altering running back and then didn't improve at all at wide receiver and tight end. Okay, let's
9:38talk about their opponents in the Denver Broncos. Hayden, I did not expect Jaylen Wadd to have a single game this season
9:46for one catch and two yards, but we got that in week one. So when you went back and reviewed the tape, what happened?
9:53>> Yeah. So I thought that the uh offensive line, particularly the center and then the running backs and tight ends didn't
9:58block well and then Bo Nicks didn't play well. I thought that the scheme actually ended up being like just okay. They got
10:03Jaylen Waddle moving around a lot more than uh I was kind of anticipating.
10:07There was a lot of switch releases that gave him some free uh looks. He was in the slot on 59% of his snaps. A third
10:13and seven seven slant that he just dropped. Like that's got to get created uh got got to get corrected. But there
10:19was a route out of the back field on top of it. There was a choice route on third and four. So to me, just like looking at
10:24this, Bo Knicks felt like so panicked and sometimes that happens against Steve Spagnolo. I I did not think that Jaylen Wadd was like being kind of like pushed
10:31away in the offense. Like to me, he was the featured player out there and the Broncos were first and neutral pass
10:36rate. So it was a terrible game from Jaylen Waddle. I can't believe that he only had 11% target share. But like on
10:42review, it seemed like what they were trying to do was get Jaylen Waddle more involved and Bo Knicks just played so
10:48poorly that it was not able to materialize.
10:51>> They were the worst offense in the NFL if you look at a lot of like the metrics that matter. You know, below the Titans,
10:57below the Steelers, they were one of the worst offenses that we saw in week one.
11:00And you know, and in hindsight, guys, it is kind of tough. like Davis Webb making his debut as the man. Like the buck
11:07stops with me now on offense going against Steve Spagnolo in Kansas City in week one. You know, maybe that was a lot
11:13to ask of Davis Webb, but yeah, I thought the offense looked sloppy, particularly with protection rules as you mentioned, Hayden, like tight ends,
11:19running backs. I thought missing assignments there. Schematically, yeah, I went back and watched like I thought Wadd's role was fine. I thought he
11:26played fine. uh definitely ran into like some zones and stuff where he's just not an eligible receiver at that point, like
11:32not somebody you're going to throw the football to. But um the slot stuff that was promised was there, the layup opportunities were there. Bonick's just
11:39really never got the football off. And like this is part of who Bon Knicks is, too. He's got a little bit of Baker
11:44Mayfield to him where he can play in chaos and then create some more chaos. I mean, there were times last year where,
11:51you know, Courtland Sutton would disappear for long weeks at a time because he wasn't able to he was again playing in chaos. wasn't able to get the
11:57ball down the field. That's just kind of part of his game. Unfortunately, I did think there were going to be more like
12:02easy button touches for Wadd and I didn't see that in week one. That was the problem.
12:07>> Yeah. I mean, I can understand when Courtland Sutton disappears where Troy Franklin goes on to be, you know, the team's leader in red zone targets for a
12:15stretch of last season because, you know, those guys are a certain level of talent. I thought Jaylen Wadd was brought in to be the guy like the
12:22metronome, the consistent piece of that.
12:25And then when we're getting and I love Pat Bryant, but like wide receiver screens to Pat Bryant and like Marvin Mims is still getting snaps here too.
12:32That was the frustrating aspect to me.
12:34So, you know, there's going to be a whole conversation coming out of this of hey, is you know, uh is is Shawn
12:41Payeyton going to do the uh I'm the captain now thing to Davis Webb at any point. I will say rap sheet was on, you
12:48know, ESPN today saying that the reason why Shawn Payton gave this up is he said, "I would rather give up play
12:53calling than lose Davis Webb to another organization." And Hayden, I I I guess the point is we sat here 365 days ago
13:00and you and I advocated for everyone to draft George Pickkins. And he goes out there, four targets, three receptions, 30 yards in week one last year against,
13:09you know, the uh Philadelphia Eagles.
13:11And we said, "Hey, stay patient, stay calm. That's a tough defense for him to face. Can we sit here and say the same
13:17thing with Jaylen Wadd?
13:19>> I hope so. I think the fact that they were number one neutral pass rate and they're going to play with enough speed
13:23that there should be plenty of routes for Jaylen Wadd. I thought that scheme was like totally fine. The role is totally fine for Jaylen Wall. So, I'm
13:28not panicking on him. I will say the one potential thorn is if just Pat Bryant is like that level of player, 22% target
13:36share. A lot of that stuff was kind of underneath. And if if he's like an actual like third weapon in the pass
13:41game, like that's where Jaylen Wadd's ceiling like could be a little bit more capped than we were hoping for. But I
13:46would say no panic for now on Jaylen Wadd. I think that he's uh still a very boom bust wide receiver, too.
13:52>> Panic meter, Matt, for you? I mean, I know that you uh do this episode uh every, you know, single Monday, and
13:59since this was a Monday night game, you didn't get to have a panic meter on Jaylen Wadd. So, give it to us. Give us
14:04the exclusive. Yeah, we did a little bit of this when Hayden and I talked about it uh for the recap show, but I mean
14:10like I guess a little some panic, right?
14:12A guy has one catch in week one, you don't want to see that. Like I I agree with you, Josh. I thought the floor
14:16would be higher, but um if you were giving me like would I buy or you know not buy Jaylen Wadd, I'd be buying rest
14:23of season. Um you know, next two matchups are Jaguars, Rams. I I I think we're going to see more than that. I I
14:29guarantee like the sentiment with Jaylen Wadd cuz I saw it on, you know, on Monday night during the game is going to
14:35be so low because he was kind of a weird risky player to buy into. Uh I I think he feels like a still a good buy at this
14:41point. They're not going to have games where they just look that bad and that disorganized throughout the course of the season. And yeah, Pat Bryant
14:48definitely an interesting variable. I I the one thing I would just say some panic about is they do constantly talk about from for like
14:55all the Broncos coaches and you know even some of the beat reporters and you kind of saw it during the game too like
15:00man this guy's going to really create a lot of space for our other players. I'm like how about you know we need to
15:04actually get the guy who creates space.
15:06Yeah, cool. That's great. Uh we also should probably get the football in his hands a little bit more.
15:11>> Yeah. Hey and I want to ask you about the running backs real quick. Um, so if we look at targets and red zone work, RJ
15:16Harvey completely outpaced JK Dobbins in this one. Obviously, the game got away from the Broncos, but 51% of snaps for R.J. Harvey compared to 43% for JK
15:25Dobbins. Um, look, I still doubt games go like that again for Denver despite them like leading the league and missed tackles on defense. But to me, Hayden,
15:34it is notable that RJ Harvey still seems to be a target player for them. not just obviously in the passing game, but once
15:41they get down to the red zone, we saw some of his best work last season was that cool ass play stuff uh in the red
15:48zone. And if it stays that way, like what is the point of JK Dobbins in fantasy football other than just early
15:55down carries?
15:56>> I still think he would get the goal line carry if they got there. We they were nowhere near the goal line for a lot of
16:02this. JK Dobbins still started. He handled eight of the 11 running back carries. Now, it's like such a trapback kind of profile here and I think there's
16:08like really like no ceiling with JK Dobbins right now. I think the good news for both of them is that Jonah Coleman
16:13like pretty much didn't play at all.
16:14Some of his snaps were like when they were kneeling the game out uh uh kind of surrendering out there. RJ Harvey RB 40
16:20in expected points. Both of them had really bad mistakes in pass protection in this one. So, I think it was kind of
16:26a sloppy game all around in the back field. But because the the this team is going to be pretty pass heavy, I I just
16:32don't think that either one of these guys are much more than just kind of like desperation flexes.
16:37I'll say this about Jonah Coleman. If neither JK Dobbins or RJ Harvey like show some spice to their game and the
16:46offense like continues to be a bit stale, I could see that being a pathway to Jonah Coleman potentially getting a shot here, you know, as an injection of
16:56some other type of talent. So, I understand he like didn't touch the ball at all in week one, but uh the season is
17:01very long and the Broncos look quite bad in week one. So, if you want to change the look from being bad, maybe adding a
17:06new piece onto that is is one pathway for him to do that.
17:09>> Uh okay, >> the interesting part rate over expectation real quick is just like, yeah, that did not work in week one and
17:15that felt like one of the things that stuck in Shawn Peyton's crawl the most.
17:18So, I I would expect him to at least try to establish the run in week two. Let's see it. Let's talk about Sunday night
17:24football here with the New York Giants.
17:28Isaiah likely is the headliner here, is he not, Hayden? I mean, he eight catches, 78 yards, and two touchdowns.
17:35Uh, you know me, I have a thing for uh part-time players, but we can talk about that with Isaiah likely and even Don
17:42Kate a little bit later on. He was still a part-time player. 49% of snaps, 67% of dropbacks, though he did play. So when
17:49you went back and watched it, how did really everything funnel through Isaiah likely in the passing game here?
17:55>> All of his routes looked like the Travis Kelce routes. He was kind of like doing the thing where he stopped in the middle
17:59of the field, cut back to the other side of it. He got schemed up in the red area. That's how he got that touchdown
18:04on the coverage bust as well. I was pretty impressed with Isaiah likely.
18:08Finished it second and expected half PPR points as well. and he's just going to be the number two pass catcher on this
18:13team like very clearly especially we'll get to Cam Scato but they didn't throw the ball to the running backs pretty much uh at all at least not Cam Scatabo
18:20so I think that's like the optimistic angle with Isaiah likely Malik Neighbors was not a full-time player either but uh both of them looked good and Jackson
18:28Dart I think like that was like the big takeaways he did not miss underneath like he only had one incompletion on
18:33every pass under 10 yards and this offense was very dink and dunk lots of like get uh Jackson Dart outside the
18:39pocket get some easy completions and a lot of those are going to go to Isaiah likely. So, I think we should be riding
18:45this one. There's a ton of fantasy bust at tight end and I think Isaiah likely should like very firmly be a top 10 one
18:52and I think that there is a lot more upside maybe than we were giving him credit for.
18:57Josh, we've talked about this where sometimes you say something in, you know, May, June, July, you're like, man, I I really, you know, I'm feeling this.
19:06And then as the summer, you start to change your opinion >> and then sometimes the season starts like I should have stuck with my first
19:13instinct. Like June, uh, July, Harmon was all about Isaiah likely. And then Neighbors, you know, kind of get starts to get the positive views. I start to
19:21back off Likely. and I just did not draft enough of him because I I agree with Hayden on this one. I I wish I
19:26could go back to my uh June opinions where man I thought likely was just set up really well in this offense. I also
19:32thought it was this was one like new coordinator, you know, Matt Naggie, Greg Roman kind of holding hands up there in
19:38the booth together. They rolled out a good game plan in week one and they just ran the Cowboys off the field. Literally
19:46kept them off the field by running the football consistently out of these heavy personnel groupings with Pat Ricard. And I thought Dart, who I think you could
19:53like Dart's rookie season was a little bit of like a roar shock test. You could kind of see whatever you wanted to see
19:58and maybe just like confirm or deny like really just confirm your priors off what he was as a rookie one way or another. I
20:03thought this game in week one, he played really under control through just like a very catchable football for especially a guy likely who can be a yards after
20:11catch monster because he's just bigger in the open field than some of these other players. And obviously at some point that'll happen for for neighbors
20:17as well. But really impressive debut I thought for this Giants coaching staff here. Organized everything and Dart was definitely really impressive here. Just
20:26I I'm interested to see like where it goes from here because this is kind of pretty typical of a Greg Romanish Greg
20:31Roman coded offense. Like we we start off well and maybe it peters down the road or maybe that's 2027's problem.
20:38Matt, I do want to boomerang this back to you with Malik Neighbors. uh because on only 52% of offensive snaps, he still
20:47gets nine targets, six receptions, 69 yards, we literally didn't know until an hour before the game that he was going to play. Uh Matt, all things considered,
20:58all things taken in, that's very promising to me. Uh, and on top of it, it felt like he just hadn't played
21:05football in a long time in terms of once he caught it and he was trying to set up for yards after catch, he would kind of
21:11slip or or go down a bit too easily. And you can tell that frustrated him on top of it. So maybe that changes even as
21:16soon as week two. And if that's the case, then we have some real explosive plays uh coming up here from Malik
21:21Neighbors. Yeah, there was one play where he cuts on a he does an outcut and he catches the football and the guy kind
21:27of like just tackles him at a bit of an odd angle and he just immediately hits the turf because he knows that like at
21:33100% he breaks that tackle and we're talking about a big explosive play here.
21:37Yeah, I thought Neighbors like that's the worst he's going to look all season and it wasn't all that bad. Neighbors and Mahomes are the guys that just like
21:44when you're a top top percentage athlete like you get to break the rules for typical comebacks and everything like that because yeah typically you don't
21:52want to take a player with this type of injury coming off all the you know negativity at times during the offseason
21:57and you know even him casting some doubt on it right before week one and he did look like all the things he said I think
22:04you could back that up on tape where he looked a little bit hesitant where he didn't look totally comfortable in situations where there was contact
22:10coming but you know as a separ operator as a guy that's like running these routes. You saw plenty of impressive stuff from neighbors and I think it will
22:19only go up from here.
22:21>> Explosive in a straight line. He did slip the three times like you guys are talking about, but I thought just the
22:25explosiveness was was awesome to see there. And then wide receiver, 14 expected half PPR points in the debut.
22:31103 airs, 31% target share. Like that's like the type of profile where by the end of the season like he could be a top
22:36five fantasy asset. I think like every single month he's just going to look a little bit more comfortable out there.
22:41Uh but really promising debut especially because they were running the ball so well and they were not in negative game script and they certainly will be at
22:47times like the fact that they still funneled the ball to him uh at all levels of the field I thought was like
22:51really really promising stuff. Hey, any closing thoughts in the running back room here? Um obviously Kim Scataboo is the one that gets 18 carries despite
22:58everything that they said all summer.
23:00Jackson Dart still takes some big hits and gets 11 carries for 54 and some signs stuff for him as well. And then we
23:06all saw that one drive with, you know, Devin Singleary with the four straight dump offs to the left flat. Uh, like the
23:11Cowboys defense had never seen the easiest play in the playbook. And, you know, that's where he gets 22 yards and a touchdown.
23:17>> Yeah. I think the one concerning thing with Cam Scott was zero targets. He averaged three uh receptions per game when he was a top 12 back on a per game
23:24basis last year and he hadn't gone uh catchless in a game since uh 2023. So, that was like maybe the the negative
23:32spin on this. I would just take the positive one where I think the Giants offense is going to be pretty competent
23:37this year and he is without question their top guy. Naji Harris was uh in a healthy scratch. Tyrone Tracy barely plays. Uh and Deon Singleary is going to
23:47be out there to catch some passes, but he's going to get all the goal line work and he's a little bit more of like a a
23:52standard league guy at this point. He's probably not going to be the top 12 fantasy asset that he was last year
23:57because he's probably not going to catch as many passes, but he ran so physical like he's like kind of like the backbone
24:02of the team. uh right now. So, I think that he's he's probably a low-end uh fantasy RB2. That's kind of where you
24:07were drafting him as.
24:09>> All right, let's go on the opposite end.
24:11Talk about the Dallas Cowboys. Matt, I'm going to open this with a defense stat because I think it kind of tells the
24:17story of where the Cowboys are at right now from our buddy Shio Kapadia. Based on EPA per drive, the Cowboys had the
24:23worst defensive performance by any team in week one. It was worse than all but one of their defensive games last year
24:30among 574 games since the start of last season. It ranked 571st.
24:37Uh four touchdowns, one punt, one fumble, and then they ran out the clock.
24:40Uh that was what they allowed. So Matt, if the defense is that bad, this is why I get concerned when you know we prop up
24:48when defenses are bad in fantasy football and say it's a good thing because Matt, then this limited the offense only to seven possessions as
24:54well. Like that's a big deal. it can impact that group and that led us, you know, to only 12 Javvante Williams
25:00carries. That led us to only, you know, 22 completions here for Dak Prescott. So hopefully this improved Cowboys defense actually hits the field in week two.
25:10>> Yeah. And you see this sometimes with guys that come off the Fangio tree that it takes a little bit for everything to
25:16come together. Now, obviously the stats bear this out. It couldn't have been worse. and like just some super basic fundamental things that the Cowboys
25:23defense is getting wrong like how can you leave the flat open that much and like there are times where I get it you
25:29want to you want to bracket or make sure there are two eyes on neighbors and there were definitely moments like that
25:33but you can't then sacrifice entire space there because Dart who again who was making good decisions was just picking them apart with like layup throw
25:40layup throw layup throw I think in that way Josh it's a little bit of the just two kind of outlier variables with this
25:48defense that can't stop this one thing and a very heavy physical offense that's just going to bleed the clock on you.
25:54You know, in a couple of weeks when they play the Ravens, obviously you're not going to feel good about that. They play
25:59the Ravens in a couple of weeks. They know how to make explosive plays. Like that's the type of offense that they
26:04want to be. So, I think in that way, if you're galaxy braining how this can work out from a bad defense, good fantasy
26:09perspective, it's like an outlier, like you know, kind of two very combustible variables in once in week one. But it's definitely a concern and you know it
26:18makes you regret saying things like well it can't get worse. It can't get worse.
26:21It can it can always get worse in football. [laughter] I >> I will say with George Pickkins because I think he's probably the one people are
26:31having concerns with because there's like CD Lamb onoff splits. He did draw a 41 yard defensive pass interference on a third down. He had three underneath
26:38catches I think on pretty strong route running. 20% targets here 104 air yards.
26:42I still don't think there's any like reason to panic on either of the uh wide receivers. Like they're going to run a
26:47lot more plays than what they did uh in the week one. I thought that the biggest takeaway was just the Javvante Williams
26:53stuff. He turned 22 routes into six targets. Uh he had 27% of last year's receiving fantasy points in this debut right here. They just don't have anyone
27:02else. Is Amari Di Marcado. They were using their fullback Hunter Lebi uh in like the two-minute drill going into halftime after losing Malik Davis. So
27:09Javvante Williams is going to be like he's like just pretty much not going to come off the football field and he was
27:15uh top 10 in usage last last uh year. He was top 10 in usage in week one. Like this is what a low-end RB1 in fantasy
27:22looks like. Um and there's like really like no threat to to anyone taking his job.
27:26>> Uh Hayden Javvante Williams is just going to absolutely cook in like the grossest way possible. Fine. Don't care.
27:33He's going to be a great pick in fantasy this year. Just doubling back on the George Pickins things. If listen, if I
27:38told you guys out there that George Pickins is going to have a game where he drops two like ugly passes and you know
27:43there's some maybe questionable route running against zone coverage, you would 100% believe it. It's just a shame that it happened in week one, the first game
27:50instead of like a random week seven game or something like that.
27:54>> Yeah, it's good to get that out out of the way in uh week one. Let's put that way. All right,
27:59>> think think you know which players are about to have a big Sunday. Put that fantasy football knowledge to work. We
28:06have teamed up with DraftKings to give you another way to build your takes with DraftKings daily fantasy sports. Start with the players you believe in. Find
28:14value deeper in the player pool and put together a lineup for that day's contest. Then follow every catch, every carry, and every score as your picks
28:23unfold. New DraftKings customers play free for your share of millions in prizes. Just deposit $5 or more and receive one $3 DFS ticket. Choose a
28:32contest, build your lineup, and make your call. Who are you building around?
28:36Get in on the action and sign up using my promo code, JH Fantasy. That's JH Fantasy. Open DraftKings Daily Fantasy Sports and start building your lineup
28:46today. All right, let's talk about some big topics. And the first one here is the Los Angeles Chargers disappointment.
28:53The biggest one for me in week one.
28:55Hayden, when I went back and watched every single play of this, uh, and I'd love to get your input on this, I felt
29:01like every single play was a different formation, personnel grouping, motion shift that almost Mike McDaniel was trying to do too much. Like there was
29:10misdirection. There was the order of operations that he kept from, you know, the Miami Dolphins days and to a tongue of Aloa needs that to run a high-powered
29:18offense. I don't think Justin Herbert does. So, I wonder if that's going to change in week two or if this is just
29:23who Mike McDaniel is as a play caller and that's a bit too complex to grasp a hold of and run efficiently in week one.
29:30>> Yeah, I think he's just going to stick with it because it's worked for so long and I think like it is like the best way
29:35to run an offense. Like even if you do have Justin Herbert, I just think the reality is is it takes a long time to
29:41like get your system in place, especially when you're bringing in uh new players. Uh especially on the interior, they couldn't really block
29:47anybody one-on-one. So, I I thought there was like some scheme uh issues uh with with them, but I really just thought that the the skill players
29:54didn't play all that well. Their center and right guard were really abysmal. I think they lost with power and with some
30:00communication problems. Uh and I actually thought that Justin Herbert was like not seeing the field well at all.
30:05Had a couple like, you know, uh inaccuracies, which like he typically doesn't have. I thought Huj wasn't creating a whole lot of separation. So,
30:11like everything went wrong here. I will give some credit to the Cardinals. their ability to kind of like swarm the middle
30:17of the field really did stand out to me.
30:19Uh, and they have like uh some some pretty interesting linebackers right now. So, I don't think the Cardinals are going to be like quite as bad as we
30:24thought maybe going into the year, but definitely very concerning. And I and I don't want to make too many excuses for
30:29Justin Herbert. Like that was I think largely uh his issue in this one. And like there was not many uh positive
30:36plays uh from anybody.
30:38I think the only guy, you know, outside of the the tackles who come come out of this feeling pretty good about
30:43themselves is Lad Maki, who also comes out with an injury, too. So, you're not feeling great about Lad Maki in that
30:48way. Uh, yeah, that was a bad ball from Herbert that got Maki pinned on the on the play that he gets hurt. It was not a
30:54good Justin Herbert game. It's interesting like to compare the Chargers and Cardinals in this game from an offensive standpoint because I'm with
31:02you Hayden. And I said this a little bit on our recap show where yeah, they they you know in terms of the the Chargers,
31:09you got to give them credit for the fact that it's a big offensive change. Their plays from in heavy personnel went from
31:1431st to eighth this year. Their uh play action went from 17th to first like motion 18th to second. These are big
31:22changes and sometimes that does take a minute to adjust. On the other side of it, the Cardinals, you know, that's a
31:29new offense, too. And and they did not need time to adjust. Like I I think I know we're not >> but it seemed like much more traditional
31:34for the Cardinals like if if I was watching them you know it was like hey stuff Jacobe Brassette has done for
31:39years and years and years versus you know no one is running with the amount of personnel changes and the motions that Mike McDaniel brings to the table
31:47and to me like we we can put I think a lot of the issues on that that it's just it took two years to do that you know
31:54we're just expecting Justin Herbert and company to get that with the landmarks and the interoffensive linemen when they did things correctly they allowed a ton
32:01of disruption too. So, um maybe I'm, you know, wish casting here a little bit, but that is, I think, a big hurdle that
32:09maybe didn't have enough conversation heading into week one.
32:12>> Yeah. And the other thing, too, is that like Mike McDaniel didn't do much that I wouldn't expect him to do. That's not
32:18necessarily a a dig. It's just like this is what the offense is going to look like. And Mike Lafleur knows that
32:23offense, you know, like the back of his hand. So, I think they that was my point that, you know, when you said Hayden,
32:28they swarm the middle of the field.
32:29Yeah. because that's where they know they're going to over and over again and there just wasn't like a real lack of
32:33counter punch there which I think from a concern perspective if they don't have Maki I am worried that they don't have
32:40enough like all of these other guys are you know interesting like QJ is a passable number three but he's kind of
32:47overcast as a number two don't really care if he fits the offense or not that's just who he is a player Trey
32:52Harris interesting depth player the tight end's fine but it's like you need the one superstar to revolve this whole thing around which should be Maki So,
33:00his injury is big, not just because he was I mean, it was very obvious watching this game like, yeah, he's going to cook
33:06and he's going to have an incredible season, but not only are you you losing that, you lose him, I think the whole
33:12offense kind of starts to fall apart.
33:15Hey Hayden, anything you want to say about the running backs with, you know, Amaran Hampton had a really nice early touchdown run where he did his typical
33:22I'm big, I'm strong, I'm going to shake off these tacklers, but then, you know, coughing up a fumble by running into
33:28your own man is not a great look. And then I think there are other ways where we love when Mike McDaniel can give, you
33:35know, his backs a runway, but they've really struggled, I felt, to give him a runway. And when that happens for Martin
33:40Hampton, he gets kind of indecisive and choppy.
33:43>> Yeah. He really just can't turn. And I think that's like where I think this system is going to be like there's a
33:49difference between Devon Aan and Omar and Hampton here. Even though they're both fast players and he's going to rip off some big plays there because I
33:55thought the tackles did play well.
33:56You're just not going to be able to overcome the center and right guard play. And I thought the left guard, they
34:00were kind of in a rotation. I thought that wasn't that big of a deal in the in the run game. Uh but there that was a
34:04concern in the pass game. I think maybe the most shocking part of this is zero targets to the running back position. If
34:09you look at my expected uh fantasy points to running backs, the Chargers were dead last in usage uh because they were not involved there at all. Katon
34:18Mitchell got some of the carries in the first half. Um but Omar and Hampton still had a 75% carry share. I think
34:24just maybe zooming out if he's not going to be as involved as a receiver and maybe the Chargers are not going to be
34:29the top, you know, five uh offense and maybe like their 14th this year. I think that's how Omar and Hampton's not gonna
34:34kill you in fantasy, but there's probably gonna be a lot better picks uh in round two. Like Dererick Henry, if you were doing Omar and Hampton versus
34:40Derrick Henry, like that's already looking pretty suspect.
34:45>> All right, let's talk Chicago Bears next. Um Ray and I talked at length about this on the Sunday Night Recap, by
34:51the way. Insane numbers for that Sunday night show. Thank you all for watching.
34:54I mean, when people watch it for over 32 minutes, that's instead of, you know, an HBO program. So, shout out to all of
34:59you. And if you're new around here, hit subscribe, leave a thumbs up. Uh, it helps us out truly. Hayden, I know you
35:04went back and watched the, uh, light show, the fireworks of this offense.
35:09What do you want to talk about? There's a million things we can bring up here for the Chicago Bears.
35:14>> Yeah. So, I think the first thing that's like maybe the most questionable is just like what the heck is Khif Raymond doing
35:20out there? And I think like that's a pretty big deal because um, he fit the offense kind of perfectly. Uh, Luther
35:26Burton played like some slot, but it was not like just like an entirely like a Monro St. Brown role. Uh, and all the
35:32other like ancillary players like stepped up. Cole KT on that uh, wheel route. I mean, what a perfect pass from Caleb. I thought Caleb was super
35:39dynamic. Hit 20 miles per hour a couple times there. The throw to Roma Dunce down the sideline was as impressive as
35:45it gets. And then DeAndre Swift like continuously he just does not make nearly as many negative plays as he had uh, previously. And when you have the
35:53right side to run behind, that's how they got his first explosive. Like you're at such an advantage there. Kyle the Nung guy. He got sprung open because
36:00players like Luther Burton and Khif Raymond are are blocking out there. So, this is an offense where everyone's going to get home. I'm not worried about
36:07Coloulston Lovelin. He played almost every single snap out there. Like, everyone's going to eat here. There's so many different options that it's going
36:13to be a little bit volatile week to week, but uh I I would expect the Bears to be a top five offense this year.
36:19>> Oh my god. Yeah, they're definitely going to be a top five offense. They they were a little higher like no huddle
36:23percentage than you might have thought to. Just like a little tiny tweak. Uh, I thought their pass rate over expected was a little bit higher as well, which
36:30was which is crazy because they were an elite rushing team in week one. Caleb was amazing in this game. Um, I he was
36:39incredible here. The the scrambles, the being decisive with the football, just feeling things out. Like I think that's one of the reasons that Khif Raymond has
36:48this big game is that like he was he was the right read for a lot of these plays.
36:52like he's he's open, he's finding him, which is stuff that just like did not happen. You know, like there were times
36:59last year where Zakius would ruin drives for this team as the number three receiver. Like having Khalif Raymond in there is a big deal for the Bears and
37:08like keeping the train on tracks. I charted Luther Burton this morning. Um that was like okay game for him. He was
37:14really impressive on uh some of the in cuts like the the digs and stuff like that which are key to this offense. made
37:19a couple of great catches there where he snags the football away from his frame.
37:22Probably still like working back into 100%. Um, but I would agree with Hayden that like this guy's not playing the Aman Ross St. St. Brown role. Like he's
37:31much more of a vertical receiver than St. Brown was in his second season. I thought Adun looked really good too. Uh,
37:38fluid down the field. Hopefully he gets a higher snap share going forward. But yeah, I mean they do have some really
37:43interesting ancillary players. Khif Raymond and Jay Walker has like got a little something something to them.
37:48Matt, you mentioned the Aman Ross St.
37:49Brown role. Should we kind of just eliminate that from our vernacular when talking about this version of the Chicago Bears like obviously Caleb is so
37:58explosive with his downfield ability.
38:00They have Coulson Lovelin. They can run 12 personnel. You know, I don't know if this is a carbon copy of what he was
38:06doing in Detroit. And you can disagree with me if you want with that statement.
38:09>> No, I think we should have dropped this like two years ago, man. I I thought that was if you were still talking about
38:13that after watching this offense >> in the first season with Ben Johnson in Chicago, like you're crazy. This this is a different unit than what we saw with
38:22Detroit, by the way, because they're two different style of quarterbacks. Very good in their own rights, but to guys who play the game differently, and
38:29that's what good coaches do. Like Ben Johnson created the Aman I know he's had other slot players, yada yada, that's cool. He created the Aman Ross St. Brown
38:36role because Aman Ross St. Brown is really good at doing exactly that. It's really good with Jared Goff. Yeah. So, um, that's not a knock on any of these
38:42guys. They're all very good at what they do as well.
38:45>> Yeah, like Caleb's second phase plays are just outstanding. And actually, the Panthers did a somewhat decent job at times taking out the first reads and
38:53then they just couldn't stay sticky on wide receivers like literally running across the field at full speed and then Caleb was able to find them. So, like
39:00that that's impossible coverage here.
39:01Hey, now I do want to bring up Matt mentioned Zakias. Aland Zakias had one of these Khif Raymond games last year.
39:07uh he had like a wide receiver 13 week and so I'm kind of attributing to that uh that this it's this version of Khif
39:15Raymond. Tell me if you disagree. Um I also think the reason why you know Rome might not have as much other than you
39:20know him being limited in participant and you know Luther Burton being and missing a whole bunch of training camp head penning into this. Uh it's because
39:26Caleb had two long touchdowns and you had the Raymond stuff. like, >> yep, >> as much as a big pie and they score 59
39:32points, at some point seven people can't score fancy points in a back field, you know?
39:37>> Yeah, Rome's going to run way more than 58% of routes that he had last week. I think that's going to get pretty close
39:42to 100% of the routes. Jade Walker, he was out there for a lot of like the other like uh you know, 12 personnel um
39:49looks out there as the second wide receiver. And I think that's the player that was actually taking Luther Burden off the field. Khif Raymond was out
39:55there for all the three wide receivers set snaps, but so was Luther Burton. It was actually like Walker versus Burden.
40:01I think that was something that was probably not projected across uh the industry. So like I think there's of anyone that you can have some concerns
40:07with, it would be Luther Burton in the in the fourth round. There's a lot of good picks in the fourth round right
40:13there. So I think that he's more likely going to be like a boom bust wide receiver three. And at the same time,
40:17just looking ahead, they're projected for 27 points uh next week against the Vikings defense. And that's one of the better defenses in the NFL. So, like if
40:25you're going to start all these guys, live with the results, and I think you're going to be happy with it.
40:29>> Yeah. I'm not worried about any of them.
40:31I I don't want to put the worry tag on on any of these Bears players. And yeah, you guys mentioned Caleb scrambling. Uh
40:37the most carries of 20 plus miles per hour over the last two seasons. Caleb Williams actually is tied with Keith Mitchell for the most in the NFL among
40:45all running backs. That [laughter] is that is crazy stuff from from a running back. Uh, Matt, I'm gonna send it to you
40:52first here with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Uh, I mean, I was going to leave with the running backs, but since you're the wide receiver guy, let's go
41:00there first. Like, Parker Washington is a name all three of us mentioned over and over and over this summer, and he
41:06hit in a big way. But there were some, I think, interesting wide receiver rotation pieces along with BTJ getting banged up that other than maybe Parker
41:15Washington, it still is a bit murky of what exactly we know uh from a series of series standpoint from this Jaguars wide
41:23receiver trio.
41:24>> Yeah, it's also really hard to get a glimpse of what this offense wants to be from this game as well because let's be
41:31honest, the game was over after, you know, like 20 minutes. They were the Browns were never going to come back.
41:36So, I don't want to take like too much from all of it. You know, I think actually the run game was the most
41:41interesting part to talk about. Uh, and I'm curious to hear your guys' thoughts on that because in the passing game like
41:46yeah, Marco Washington like I mean dusts the guy off the line of scrimmage for his touchdown like the deep corner route. It's just a reminder and you know
41:53his reception perception backed this up too that once they finally got him in that role as a slot receiver his he just
42:00like checks every box. It was when he was playing as an outside boundary receiver early on last year. Just was that was when it was kind of hit or
42:07miss. It was just miscasting of the player. He's been great there ever since. I think he'll be he'll continue to be good. He's like one of the most
42:13productive receivers coming out of week one and he didn't even play every single snap. Um the other guys are interesting like Jacob Myers, Jacobia Myers, uh you
42:20know, I think he's going to be what he's going to he's going to kind of continue to be the metronome that he is. I don't
42:25know what to make of the Brian Thomas Jr. you know, work in week one because I thought he actually did have some nice
42:30moments and nice plays in this game, but they kind of are still limiting him. Is that because of the shoulder injury? He
42:36got banged up in this game again. That's just something to keep your eye on cuz you know Josh Cameron got some play out
42:43there and there was some buzz on Josh Cameron out of training camp uh from John Shipley and you know I I I did some
42:50charting on Josh Cameron. Now, he is a profile on the site uh for prospects and you know, obviously super raw player,
42:58you know, I mean, he's definitely not, you know, he's a he's a Baylor wide receiver lining up on one side of the
43:02field running like two routes. Okay, so that was what he was as a prospect, but big physical guy and I mean his his
43:09throw to or his touchdown from Trevor Lawrence is probably like one of the best throws you're going to see all season long, too.
43:16I think the Brian Thomas stuff they're like I'm reading into this one because the role was like pretty defined with him. I know he missed some time but he
43:22didn't miss that much time in this game.
43:24He was out there for the non three wide receiver set snaps on two of 27 of them.
43:29That's only through the first three quarters. So like I'm like eliminating a lot of the garbage time. Uh and the guy
43:34that was coming in there, it was a rotation between obviously Jacobe Myers and Parker Washington, but Josh Cameron was out there a lot. So, that's the
43:41reason why none of these guys were full-time participants is because there was a rotation. The two wide receiver set snaps and then the the the three
43:47wide receiver set snaps was the top three guys that we're expecting. But, it was pretty evident on tape. I agree, Matt, that Brian Thomas like he still
43:54had a pretty solid game and a nice play over the middle, a totable for like an 80 yard touchdown from time
44:02to time, but he's running so many clear out routes. And like a couple of those Parker Washington plays down the field,
44:07you can just see there goes uh Brian Thomas like sometimes maybe not at full speed uh because he knows the ball is
44:14going over to Parker Washington. So 29% target share, 102 air yards even if he if even if Parker Washington is not a
44:21full-time player. He is absolutely a candidate to be a top 20 wide receiver in fantasy this year. And I do think
44:27that Brian Thomas his floor is non-existent. probably to the point where if he is your wide receiver three in fantasy, you're probably in trouble.
44:34>> Josh, uh, this is the designated X, by the way. The guy that doesn't he's not the X in two receiver sets, but he
44:40becomes >> kind of sounds sacrificial to me, too.
44:42>> Well, he's See, I think he might be both. I think he might be both.
44:47Whereas like Marv is definitely the sacrificial X in Arizona, but at least he's the X all the time. Brian Thomas Jr. might be the sacrificial and the
44:55designated X based on week one, which, you know, that doesn't feel good. I I I hope Hayden that it's, you know, because
45:01he was banged up late in camp and he's got he's like dealing with this shoulder thing again. Like this is >> that sounds like a lot of excuses to me
45:07though.
45:08>> Sure. I mean that's it's it's either reasons or excuses and and we'll like we'll find out. Like I I do think the
45:13thing with Thomas is that he is a talented player. You saw it in this game, but you know, he's kind of got
45:18like a limited application and this is an offense that likes versatile players and they happen to have two really good versatile players on the roster in Myers
45:26and and Parker Washington. Totally. And yeah, the Josh Cameron stuff, I mean, he has a role in the offense. He played red
45:31zone snaps. He played 13 personnel snaps. I also want to bring up the 12 personnel stuff here from the Jaguars because so much conversation is about
45:38the three receivers plus Travis Hunter plus Josh Cameron that they have.
45:41>> They led the league with 42% of their plays out of 12 personnel in this game.
45:46Now, a lot of that might have been towards the end, but that's notable to me as someone that loves Britain Strange
45:51because in that moment, like Nate Borcer is a heck of a blocker, was creating a whole bunch of canyons, but then that
45:58can make Britain Strange the second or third option in the passing game there.
46:02So, Britain Strange is someone uh that I'm looking at, especially in tight end premium leagues and even as like a top
46:0812 tight end at moments this year.
46:10Hayden, I want to send it to you with the running backs. Um, so much conversation this summer from Liam Cohen was about efficiency, but it was also
46:19about, you know, creating yards on your own, picking up more than what's blocked. I thought Bachel Tutin was fantastic at that in this game. And the
46:29more and more runs he stacks like that, I think he's going to become undeniable in this backfield.
46:36>> He started and he also finished the game and I think they were just giving him more touches so they can like get him
46:40some more experience out there. I thought that he was pretty good. He's like very clearly way more athletic than Chris Rodriguez. That takes like one
46:46touch from each of them to like get that feel. I did think that he bounced and like kind of miss a missed a couple
46:52reads there, but I'm really nitpicking.
46:53Uh 8.1 expected half PPR points. That was RB33. He had a a screen reception that went for a nice gain there. We did
47:01not get a a clean look at the goal line uh carries. Chris Rodriguez was out there for that play action uh touchdown
47:08to Josh Cameron in the red area. Uh Chris Rodriguez also got a wildcat uh run on a third and one, but Basel Tutin
47:15also had a couple uh third and one carries as well. So I think this is like a kind of an incomplete Quint Allen was
47:21out, Amir Abdullah played a little bit.
47:23Uh maybe like the the biggest surprise was when this game was like clearly over. They gave Bashel Tutin a lot of
47:28like closeout carries where I maybe would have thought that was going to go to Chris Rodriguez. So I thought kind of
47:32incomplete here, but I think it it's fine for Bashel Tutin. Uh maybe not like round five fine, but I think that he did
47:38enough to like leave the light on.
47:43>> Matt, >> I felt pretty good about what I saw from Bachel Tutin. Uh just you know for me >> I really I really thought he looked good
47:52in week one. Uh it just again like can he and I felt really good the fact that like they came out Liam Cohen did right
47:57after and was like quick to praise Bachel Tutin because I think that's going to be a big part of this like
48:01continuing to earn more and more. I'm I mean, yeah, he's definitely gonna have some issues in terms of the other guys
48:07in the back field, but like Chris Rodriguez is fine. Like he's he's totally fine. He's not a guy that that is a total impediment here to baselin.
48:14So, I'm hoping he can continue to slice off more as things go on.
48:18>> Yeah. Like Crod, we know what he is, you know, and right Liam Cohen knows what Chris Rodriguez is. And so I could have
48:25painted a narrative of this backfield kind of going in two directions where if Bachel Tutin struggled in pass protection in week one or you know had
48:35some negative runs that he tried to bounce a bit too often uh and fell flat in his face in the first game and the
48:40second game and they kind of give more of the pie as it goes on to the metronome that is Chris Rodriguez and
48:46Matt to me this was the opposite you know it was Basel Tutin like claiming some opportunities saying hey I've improved moved since last season. Like
48:54he had a pitch to the left early on. He has to work around a block in the back field. He's hit by two defenders at the
48:59line of scrimmage. He runs through that and drags them for another five yards.
49:03The very next play, it's off tackle on the opposite side to the right. He's hit one yard short of the line to gain by
49:09two Phil safeties. He falls forward for an extra three yards and a first down.
49:13He has another one off tackle to the left side where he ducks under an arm tackle, then one-on-one at the second
49:17level. He easily avoids that and then picks up 13 yards. It is like Liam Cohen's all about the hidden yards this
49:24year. And Bachel Tutton was fantastic at the hidden yards here. And so that's all I wanted to see with Bachel Tutin in
49:29terms of him being a somewhat risk as a fifth rounder. But Matt, to me, this is only going one direction if again these
49:35performances continue to stack.
49:38>> Yep. I I agree with that. And just in closing here, I do think again I just want to cautious like caution taking any
49:44big big takeaways here from just like splits or workload or this that and the other from Jacksonville. Uh because I can't stress this enough. This game was
49:52over so quickly. I know like we can where do we define garbage time?
49:56Anything like that. Uh this was one of the games I for some reason had up on this screen. I've got the four TV I got
50:03three TVs. One of them splits four ways and I got them the the secondary monitor. Turned the secondary monitor around for Jacksonville Cleveland on
50:10Sunday. That was a quick change because Deshawn made sure us made sure that game was over very very quickly. So just want
50:15to note that.
50:17Okay, let's talk Buffalo Bills here. Um, according to our buddy Robert Maize, 48% of their passes went beyond the sticks in this one, Hayden. Uh, they were 22nd
50:29in that category last season. So, a nice improvement there. DJ Moore, Donincan Cade, that even changed Kosha's role, I felt a little bit here. And maybe they
50:40stunned, shocked this Houston Texans defense with how both spread they were and then other times convinced and compact. And I thought Joe Brady was
50:48fantastic in week one.
50:50>> I thought it looked a lot different than last year. 48% neutral pass rate for the Bills uh in 2025. 56% neutral pass rate.
50:57A lot more downfield shots. Like there was definitely like some Khalil Shakir.
51:01Like certainly there was, but Don Concaid was working way down the football field. 16.3 average depth of target for him. He was pulling away from
51:09defenders. He was dunking on defenders.
51:10Like Dalton Concade look looked like one of the best receiving tight ends in the league. He played a little bit more than
51:16he typically does. And then DJ Moore, like he showed up a little bit of like a not a complete broken play, but kind of
51:22like a a third read on on that touchdown near the sideline. Uh and then also had a slot target, multiple downfield shots
51:29beyond that. 47 yard defensive pass interference in the end zone on top of it. that that was an under center play
51:34action play. So I thought that the all the skilled guys like either with DJ Moore coming in or Donald Dade being
51:41healthier uh you felt that uh in this offense and I think that did come at the detriment of James Cook just a little
51:48bit here. So this seems so explosive like the fact that they put up that many points on the Texans like all these guys
51:53will get home but I think like rating positively for DJ Moore and Don Kade is like the biggest takeaway uh from week
51:59one here >> a thousand%. Uh, I'm really excited about what I saw out of Buffalo's offense. Their seconds per play went
52:06from 32nd last year to eighth in week one. They played faster. They they played with more just like pass first intention. And man, this is your 13
52:16personnel team this year. 43% 13 personnel in week one. And it's because of Dalton Concincaid. Like last year, I said this a lot during the offseason. I
52:26know you guys said the same thing. Last year, the Rams were able to pull off 13 personnel because they had a tight end
52:30and Terence Ferguson who could be a downfield threat and could actually lift the lid. The Bills have that now in Daltton Concaid. It's kind of taken four
52:37years to get there, a lot of injuries, everything like that. But, you know, I've I've dogged Daltton Concaid for being way too small to be like a real
52:44tight end. I thought he looked bigger, clearly more explosive in week one, over a 100red yards gained as a receiver out
52:52wide. And, you know, he's just running these big downfield routes. Then you can get like Dawson Knox who's kind of a if
52:59we're doing the Rams comparison, you know, a little bit of like a a Kobe Parkinson where he can be in line but
53:05also can can catch passes too. Jackson Haw is like that pure pure blocker. So I think he I I like Dalton Concade's a big
53:12stock up for me after this game. DJ Moore was used the exact right way where it's these big like break it's bigger
53:18downfield routes like go stops goes stuff like that as opposed to like timing routes that he was used last year in than the Bears offense. I think both
53:26these guys are big big stockups and uh you know obviously that's good for Josh Allen too.
53:31>> Yeah, 72% snaps for Don Kade. He didn't get close to that number last year. Uh I think it's only three games of over 50%
53:39of snaps last season. So, it was very cool. Like you guys keep saying, this balance of, hey, we're going to have two
53:45wide receivers way outside the numbers, like spread everything out and then also run some 13 personnel stuff and very condensed and closer. And then also,
53:55when we run the tight ends, we can then spread you out and go empty out of that formation. So, again, Joe Brady has
54:01obviously been the play caller here for a while, but um >> he put his own twisted his own spin on it. Yes. Um, now Hayden, I do want to
54:09say if you looked at the first three plays, I think in the last couple of seasons, you'd expect it to be an
54:15awesome James Cook day. Like you had a run of nine yards, a run of 11 yards, and a catch for three yards. And then
54:22now in this version of the Buffalo Bills, it was just kind of mediocre. Are you do you have any takeaways from that?
54:29>> I thought James Cook looked really good.
54:31He had that uh was like the fumble out in out in open space. Um but uh it just didn't have like the same volume late in
54:38the game. Uh and then you also have Josh Allen tush push touchdown on a fourth and one. They went Josh Josh Allen in a
54:43wildcat uh formation as well. So like that's where it just gets a little bit more difficult. He led the uh NFL in uh
54:51carries per game last year. I just don't think that's going to happen necessarily. Like the increase in neutral pass rate like those type of
54:57like downfield shots where instead of like there's probably going to be more like six play drives for the Buffalo Bills rather than like 10 12 play
55:03drives. uh this year round. So I think that James Cook probably a little bit stocked down. Target share did jump from
55:088% last year to 13%. It's a really small sample size there. But uh I would say like for round one players like I would
55:15be definitely be concerned if I was drafting today. Uh I think that he'd firmly be like middle of the second round if not a little bit later.
55:23>> I hate that as the guy that took James Cook eighth overall in our uh in our fantasy [laughter] league.
55:28>> Yeah. If if the producers could throw back on that that running back fancy usage chart, um the bottom five, there's
55:35a lot of one two turn running backs there. Um I mean look at Philadelphia at 27th, Buffalo 28th, Miami 29th, and then
55:46the Chargers at 31st. So Matt, you, me, and probably Hayden, too, because we have I think all these players are hoping that that changes fast, including
55:55in in week two. I mean, Josh, I agonize so much like, do I take James Cook because that's like the p the player
56:01that I want to take or do I take Saquon Barkley to to troll you in the in the analyst draft and I should have just
56:07taken Jackson Smith and Jigba and logged out. [laughter] >> Well, we we'll talk about uh actually let's do Saquon Barkley right now. Let's
56:15talk about the Philadelphia Eagles.
56:16Okay, producers, I'm skipping a team. Uh maybe this is Cope. Okay, Landon Dickerson basically benched himself this this past week. Uh he's
56:27on IR for four weeks. He was truly one of the worst players I saw in week one.
56:32And again, some will say I'm coping here. Hayden, I think this is a positive. I think this is a positive for
56:37the offense. I think it's a positive for Saquon Barkley.
56:40>> Again, he was clearly the the weakest link on that team. I understand that he has been part of Super Bowl championship
56:46rosters in the past, but they get the Tennessee Titans here in week two. So, from what I saw with my own eyes, Saquon
56:53Barkley, when given the first level, still looked freaking awesome. However, he was hit behind the line of scrimmage on seven of his opening 12 carries. And
57:03I think that can change and get better with a second team left guard.
57:07>> Yeah, I I thought after re-watching this that I felt pretty optimistic about what the Eagles are going to be able to do
57:12here. I think the the negative for me was obviously Landon Dickerson, but I think the backup's just going to play better than he is. I thought the four
57:19other offensive linemen actually blocked pretty well. I was pretty impressed with Cam Jurgens and my obviously I think Steen actually had a pretty good game uh
57:27clearing guys out. Uh there was a couple times where the commanders and the commanders have like a Brian Flores disciple calling their defense and like
57:35you felt that watching that. There was a couple times where it was just like a a unblocked player in the backfield
57:39hitting Saquon Barkley. think that Shawn Manning's got to figure that type of stuff out. But I did think that the offensive line looked healthier aside
57:45from Dickerson and I thought Saquon Barkley looked awesome and Jaylen Herz I thought played pretty well all things considered too. So it wasn't like the
57:52cleanest game certainly. Uh but I thought that there's probably going to be some like 150 rush yard games from Saquon Barkley at some point.
57:58>> Yep.
58:00>> Yeah. I I generally think that this was not a good week uh debut week for the I was a backup quarterback yesterday play
58:08new play callers. Uh, but I think I think Shawn Manion actually probably had the best of the bunch. Now, there's definitely still some things to work on.
58:16Um, you know, I mean, listen, again, the bar is like, was it better than Davis Webb or David Blau? And yes, I think the
58:22Eagles offense was better than was better than that. Like, we're I'm talking about the lowest bar here, Josh.
58:27But, um, I think the one thing to note, too, is like again, we talked about this with the Chargers and the Cardinals,
58:32like were you a first-time play caller who caught the defense offguard? I think that happened with the Giants against the Cowboys defense. I think that
58:39happened uh with the Cardinals offense against the Chargers defense. New play caller there. I think the inverse happened here where they weren't quite
58:47ready for some of the blitzes and some of the chaos that Washington threw at them. Uh because you kind of had to
58:52split the difference of like is this going to be Dan Quinn's defense or is this going to be Donte Jones defense? I
58:56think it was more of the latter than the former which you know that's just part of it when again it's a new play caller
59:00who was a backup quarterback two minutes ago.
59:03>> The other thing on the Saquon Barkley tape is he only had one reception in the box score. He also caught a pass that
59:09was called a run. It was a swing pass that just the ball barely went backwards on that one. So that was like a designed
59:15target to him. He also had a reception called back on the hold and then he dropped a a ball out in the uh in the
59:21flat. So I thought there was more like receiving work hidden here like and the box scores wouldn't pick that up. But
59:26like he nearly had four receptions and we haven't had four receptions from Saquon Barkley uh in quite a while.
59:33>> Yeah. Look, the viewers watching us right now here live on YouTube know that my favorite start in drafts this year
59:39was Saquon Barkley and Ken Walker.
59:40Obviously, half of that I feel immensely proud of. Uh, and I still feel fairly good about Saquon Barkley moving forward. Matt, I want to throw it to you
59:48about the wide receivers. Um, I mean, all of us expected Dallas to go 77 yards and two touchdowns in week one, but
59:54other than that, it was Dante Wix 73 yards in a score and that, you know, long 64 yard was out of 13 personnel. He
60:02was the wide receiver on the field for that. Devonte Smith, three for 53 and then Mai Limon, three catches, negative five. So, what did you see when you were
60:09looking at these wide receivers? Oh, boys, it feels good to talk about Dantavian Wix in like a positive way again. You know, it's nice uh for we'll
60:16see how long it lasts. But yeah, I mean, I thought his role was a little bit more versatile, too. That was what was
60:21interesting because that's the type of guy he was for Green Bay. I mean, it was pretty much like [snorts] Damonte Smith,
60:26you know, welcome to X receiver zone.
60:28And he even talked about this after the game where there was a lot of like cloud and bracket over to his side. So he even
60:33he said he went to Dantavian Wix during the game and was like uh let's go you know you're it's up to you make some
60:40plays and he made two really big plays in this game. One of which uh and you could see this by the design of the play
60:45that it was supposed to just basically be a clear out route. He said he never got that target in practice did
60:50Dantavian Wix but he's like hey Jaylen is going to throw you that clear out route every now and again so you got to
60:54make a play. He he did make a play which, you know, for Dantamon Wix, that's good. That's progress. Uh I still
61:00like Wix's fluidity and his timing uh within breaks. Knows the offense, knows the motions and the shifts, which is really good to see. There was a lot more
61:08motion in this offense. Uh overall in week one, they went from 30th last year to eighth in week one in terms of motion
61:14percentage. I I'm I'm optimistic about Wix, especially these next two weeks. If you need wide receiver help, they get the Titans and the Bears. The schedule's
61:23really good. I think Smith will have, you know, rebound days. Lemon, I thought obviously the targets like they were gross. Who cares? Um, I did think he
61:32showed at least some decent separation route running ability when not targeted though.
61:39>> Yeah, Malay it was like complete like slot only. Like he had his A dot was negative. Uh, not a good not a good
61:45sign. He also did have a I believe it was called for him um a a uh like a little bubble screen where he wasn't on
61:53the same page and Jaylen Herz had to throw it away. I think that was designed for Mai Lemon. So I think he's a work in
61:58progress. He's a firmly a bench stash.
62:00Dantavian Wix that touchdown that was like an option route that he was like kind of uh [laughter] uh uh uh uh for
62:05like 12 yards against Mike Sandril. It was one of the funniest routes I've seen the entire weekend for a touchdown.
62:10>> Sandil was in a blender, bro.
62:13>> Yes.
62:13>> It was not good. not a good debut for him. Um, but I thought Jaylen Herz for the most part, like there were some
62:19really funky looks from from the commanders and maybe they weren't like fully expecting those. I thought he generally played pretty well. There's a
62:25couple times where he had to scramble around and I thought he looked a little bit faster than he did last year and
62:29there was like four or five touch throws. You had one to the sideline to Dvonte Smith, like incredible play. Uh, the Dallas Goddard touchdown was
62:35amazing. The Dontavian Wixs uh go ball that Matt was talking about. So, I thought for the most part it wasn't completely clean. Um, they have some
62:43things to clean up. I think for the most part, I thought Jaylen Herz like actually played uh pretty well here.
62:48>> Yeah. And like you guys said, Titans next week that's on the road and then it's the Bears on the road, but Monday
62:53Night Football. So, those could be two defenses here that the Eagles like really look good from from a fantasy football lens. Okay, one more here
63:02before we let Matt go and let's talk about the Cincinnati Bengals. Matt, after all the conversation this summer of under center play action, blah blah
63:12blah, the Bengals went under center for just 31% of their plays. That was 24th in the league. And guess what? Despite
63:18all of that, they still ranked fifth in explosives passing play rate on offense.
63:24So, this team, and we talked about it on Sunday night, are notorious slow starters. I think you saw that a bit
63:29with Joe Burrow in this game. And yet, they actually won this game when other times they would not. And they were
63:35still explosive.
63:37won this game because of their defense.
63:38Let's be real. And Baker Mayfield, let's let's be real. That's that's why the the Bengals won this game. Um, at the same
63:44time, yeah, I think you could kind of come away with some positives, some negatives about the offense. I generally think that they're going to just throw
63:50this under center stuff in the trash.
63:52Like, I mean, they'll do it a little bit. Um, there'll be some kind of like illusions to it. You know, maybe it's a
63:57little bit more often than previous, but I do think for the most part they're going to do what Joe Burrow wants to do
64:03because he's the most important person in for the franchise and you know that's what they want. Now I think the offensive line played well in this game.
64:10Amarius Mims. I [laughter] mean he just >> he just >> that's a tough draw for Ruben Bane where you know I was swallations about your
64:19arm length and then you go against some areas man.
64:22>> You go against a truly like a physical freak and yeah it was not a good debut uh for for Ruben Bane. Josh you know
64:30this I have a personal trainer. Shout out to me. Uh and he he's a Bucks fan.
64:35I'm not looking forward to tomorrow's session where he's going to be asking me about Ruben Bane because he was jacked up about Ruben Bane. Uh we're gonna have
64:42to get some more sets in tomorrow for Ruben Bane. Uh my god, that was not a good debut. But yeah, Amarius Sm was
64:48awesome. I think the under center stuff was whatever. I think this offense will generally be what we know it to be,
64:53which will still be frustrating at times because they don't really blend the run in the pass game. Like their runs out of
64:58shotgun were pretty pathetic in this game, but when they did get under center, it was at least good for for Chase Brown there. So, um, we pretty
65:04much know like what the the Bengals are and I think we'll continue to see it be that way.
65:09>> The under center stuff I thought like had like some positives. Chase Brown had the touchdown um under center run where
65:16both they have two blocking tight ends now, Eric All and Drew Sample out there.
65:20Like that's also like a little bit of a bonus for uh the under center stuff. And then the big difference was as you guys
65:26can see here is uh in shotgun AOT 6.3 yards downfield got the ball out in two and a half seconds when they were under
65:32center. This is this is typical. You hold on to the ball for a half second longer there, but the eight out goes to
65:3814.3. Now, Nate Ty put it in a a pretty funny way. He said like some of these were performing like there's like a T.
65:44Higgins uh ball way down the football field where there was like a safety sitting right there, but they did create a couple of explosives like over the
65:51middle on it. Um so I think like they're probably going to stick with like kind of this um formula here where it's going
65:57to be a lot of the shotgun stuff, but there will be more under center stuff.
66:00Uh, and I actually don't think that's going to be a bad thing for T. Higgins or Jamar Chase. Josh, maybe I'll kick it
66:05over to uh to you on this one. Jamar Chase, I thought that he looked like mostly the same. There was a couple
66:11times where I thought he stumbled a little bit, so like maybe he's kind of working back from things, but uh third
66:15and neutral pass rate, like Jamar Chase, I think even if this is like a little bit more under center play action stuff.
66:20I think that Jamar Chase probably a little bit more likely to have some explosives.
66:24>> Yep. I mean, I'm I have obviously zero concerns here with Jamar Chase. And we only have to go back to week one of last
66:29season, Hayden, where he had five targets, two receptions, and 26 yards.
66:34So, I talk about slow starters. The Bengals are notorious for this. And uh unfortunately, it's been Jamar Chase over the last two seasons. Final closing
66:40thought here on the Bengals. I mean, was this not the theory of the play and theory of the pick with Chase Brown. We
66:45talked about their struggles and under center and blah blah blah, but yet the environment is so freaking good. They still get 16 carries, 56 yards, and a
66:52touchdown, which is fine. Three and a half yards per pop, but then also gets five receptions for 22. like it's just
66:57an environment that points are going to be had and he's the only guy uh in in the backfield. Matt, you are not the
67:02only guy here.
67:04>> It's been incredible >> to have you on this new episode with us every week. Um we'll see you next time.
67:10>> That's it.
67:11>> Yeah, good to be with you guys and uh I'm excited. I'm excited to do this every single week and uh you know, just
67:15more tape watching, more spreadsheets.
67:18What What more is there to life, guys, than that?
67:21>> All right, Matt, we'll see you next time. Hayden, you got to stick around because we still have, you know, just 22
67:26teams to talk about after already 60 seconds. [laughter] >> Shout out to all the viewers right right now. Uh, leave a like, leave a thumbs
67:34up, and leave a comment. We love showing those on the screen at this moment.
67:37Okay, alphabetic order. Let's talk about the Arizona Cardinals. And I know you want to bring up Jeremiah Love from Mike Laflur after Jeremiah Love got 32 snaps,
67:4511 carries, two receptions. quote, "I thought Jeremiah Love had the perfect number of reps and we will see where week two goes." Did you think it was
67:54perfect?
67:55>> Um, I could use a little bit more Jeremiah Love. I thought he was sensational. Like his stop start ability is just outrageous. His touchdown, like
68:03he really had like no business scoring there and he pretty much went untouched on that. 13.2 expected half PPR points.
68:09Like that's enough to be a boom bust RB2. I think there's going to be more targets available to him when they're
68:13not like blowing out the Chargers, for example. Uh, Algier did start. Algier did get um a goal line attempt there as
68:21well. So, it's not going to be like as clean as like he's just going to be a fantasy RB1 yet. But, I'm pretty
68:26confident that the RB1 days are coming, especially as the Cardinals looked a lot better. So, I just I just see someone
68:31that's like very clearly a Pro Bowl caliber player, if not even better than that, and that there's a very clear difference to me between like Algier
68:38between the tackles and Jeremiah Love.
68:41Yeah, I I just keep going back to Michael Flor's first season as a play caller with Bree Hall as a rookie. And
68:48it kind of took until week four for him to really explode and become like the 1A and they gave him anywhere from 12 to
68:56eight touches and all that type of stuff. So, all that we care about right now is one that the Cardinals are
69:01functional and they show that they were functional in this game and two that Jeremiah Love looks good and looks healthy and that's it. Like once we keep
69:08checking those boxes, that's really really good. And it's pretty amazing that Jeremiah Love actually had negative rushing yards before contact just like
69:15Ken Walker did. In fact, he was the lowest out there. So, we go to a player Hayden that looked athletic and looked
69:21spry. Uh, now we have to have the Marvin Harrison Jr. conversation. Um, my big fear with Marv after in this game just
69:28one catch for 33 is, and I think we can say this over the sample of his career so far, he has not put together
69:35stretches of, oh man, that was a special skill um, ever. Like, he just hasn't, and he kind of just disappears here. He
69:43disappeared for Kendrick Bourne in this game and he disappeared for Michael Wilson. So, where we at with this wide receiver trio at this moment? And would
69:50it be outlandish to project Kendrick Bourne as maybe like third in receiving points at the end of the year?
69:56>> Oh man. Um I don't think it's outlandish. I wouldn't project it forward. Uh I thought that Marvin Harrison like his one catch was
70:04phenomenal. He always has like one catch that's phenomenal. I think what you're saying though is like so true. There was just like to me like a lack of energy
70:11with Marvin Harrison. I posted a a route out there where if he knows he's not getting the ball or like if there's like
70:16even like a 20% chance that he's going to get the ball, he's just like not putting in that much effort. Like I
70:21don't like calling out effort because like you just never know, but like he's just not coming out of his breaks with
70:26much energy. He's not firing out uh as well. And all of like the schemed up stuff is going to go to Trey McBride who
70:31absolutely roasted Derwin James the entire game. And then I think that Michael Wilson is is maybe a better player straight up than Marvin Harrison
70:37at this point. And the Kendrick Bourne stuff was like extremely effective and he's going to work underneath like if they're going to uh drop into quarters
70:45coverage and there's like some some alleys underneath there, he's just going to gobble up those targets. Like Marvin Harrison's never going to have those
70:50targets. So I'm extremely worried about Marvin Harrison. Um he's a bench player to me right now. The Cardinals once again the Seahawks are only projected
70:58for 18 and a half points. I think they're going to like continue like kind of beat those numbers because the the
71:03rest of the offense looks pretty capable. But the offense has not flow through Marvin Harrison. really has never done that before and I think there
71:10are reasons why players like Trey McBride and Kendrick Bourne get the ball more uh because Marvin Harrison's kind like run like lethargic routes down the
71:17field.
71:18>> Yeah, I mean this point by Levitan Marv has never had a game with eight plus catches. Kendrick Bourne just did that
71:23eight for 75 in his debut with Mike Lor who by the way they have history on the staff together. He started his career
71:29with San Francisco. Lor was on that staff as well. It was kind of tongue-in-cheek with what I said, but Hayden, when you watch this game, it
71:34truly was, hey, Kendrick Bourne knows the offense really well. And it was just a bunch of set routes versus zone underneath stuff, some inbreakers, while
71:43Michael Wilson and Trey McBride and Marv were just pushing down the field. He was kind of the underneath option on top of
71:49it. Um, you know, this when we did the show every single week last year, I loved what Jacobe was doing because he
71:54would stand there, rifle passes down the field in in heat, you know, in the face of pressure. Um, I wish I knew that we
72:01were going to get 17 games of Jacobe Brassette this season. I can't still sit here and say I really hope we do, but I
72:08don't know if we do. And the other part of this, Hayden, is that Chargers defense, while it was good last year,
72:13that was with Jesse Mentor calling it, right? And it didn't look like they were prepared for this one. And now over the
72:19next three games, let's put it that way.
72:22It's Seattle's defense, it's the 49ers defense, and then it's the Giants defense with all their pressure and all their pass rush up front, too. So, it is
72:30on my radar that yes, Arizona uh overperformed expectations here in week one. Um I'm still I maybe a little more skeptical than you are that they're
72:39going to continue doing that each and every week.
72:42>> Well, the good news is Trey McBride looked like the best tight end in football. Uh he had a ton of production
72:47here, but so much of it was just straight up one-on-one versus Derwin James, who could not tackle Trey McBride. Trey McBride routed him up
72:55multiple times, scored touchdowns. Like to me, it was like as impressive of tape gets at the tight end position against like the most difficult matchup with
73:03Derwin James playing all that nickel stuff. I do agree the Chargers defense like was not very, you know, potent in terms of the pass rush. Uh, and then I
73:11just didn't think that their communication on some of like the zone stuff was was quite as uh crisp as it was with with Jesse Mentor, who I
73:18thought the Ravens defense, they did handle that pretty well. So, uh, Trey McBride, this chart looks exactly like the chart from uh, last year. So,
73:26Coulson Lovelin when Brock Bowers gets healthy, like they got their work cut out because Trey McBride got all the easy stuff in this offense and deservely
73:33so.
73:35>> Atlanta Falcons are next. Unfortunately, signs point to Cooper Rush starting again. On top of that, Chris Lindstöm, their best offensive lineman, is in
73:45concussion protocol. Hey, now I covered this game on Sunday, regrettably. Uh hopefully you went back and watched this offense. I mean, they built literally
73:5490% of the touches close to it around Bejian Robinson and they could barely function otherwise and they barely function with him touching the football
74:0190% of the time.
74:02>> I love Bejon Robinson. 45% target share is not a good sign. you know, that that's just the reality of the
74:08situation. Uh Cooper Rush was so immobile. Like I I thought Kurt Cousins was moving around better than Cooper Rush. Uh so just to hit on like some
74:18like the the stuff that we can like actually take away from this, uh Drake London, his slot rate went from 34% last
74:24year to 16% in this year. They they've added more slot bodies. I didn't necessarily love that for him. And then the Kyle Pit stuff, he straight up beat
74:33Jaylen Ramsey down the field like up the seam and that should have been a 60- yard touchdown and Cooper Rush threw the
74:38ball what 10 yards behind him. Um so like super frustrating usage here. Uh but we should expect this with Cooper Rush uh next week. So um you maybe you
74:49could sneak Drake London inside like the top 30 wide receivers, but obviously his floor is non-existent. Bean's always just going to get there because it's so
74:55easy to get him the football. Uh but Kyle Pittzy can't play with Cooper Rush and like we're just like waiting for uh
75:00Michael Pennix to get back and he just said like he wasn't confident enough to play. So yeah, I I don't want to take
75:06too much away from this like in terms of like seasonl long projections because like once Michael Pennix gets out there like that's way better than Cooper Rush.
75:13Like Cooper Rush like he >> he's probably should be an offensive coordinator in the next couple years instead of being a a starting
75:18quarterback.
75:19>> Yeah. And Drake London's numbers have been way better with Michael Pennix than any other quarterback that he has played with. Now, the Falcons only posted 13
75:26points in this game. Uh they do at home get the worst defense in week one in the Carolina Panthers. Uh and they're
75:34projected for 20 and a half points.
75:36Hayden, do you think the over or under in that 20 and a half?
75:40>> I mean, I'm not setting the lines over here. I wouldn't have set them at 20 and a half. Uh maybe they're hoping that Tua
75:47or Michael Penn can get out there. I mean, it's not going to be >> I I think they believe it's Cooper Rush.
75:53I think that is just maybe appropriate disrespect to what the Panthers put out there in in week one.
75:58>> Yeah, I guess. Fair.
76:00>> Baltimore Ravens. It sounds like Z Flowers has a chance to play this week.
76:06And if not, Hayden, correct me if I'm wrong, it's at worst one game he's going to be sidelined here. We also got Jacobe
76:11Lane uh with surgery on his wrist. Uh that's a fracture on top of it. uh after he got like three red zone targets and
76:20was going to maybe be like the featured wide receiver after that. I'll say this just overall and the Zlowers injury stinks because he was, you know, the
76:29fastest man alive on that Indianapolis Colts turf. But as we've talked about, other OC's and quarterbacks that were new to the pairing just were not ready.
76:38But Lamar and Declan Doyle were in sync from snap number one where we got that 49 yard Tuesday Flowers.
76:44>> Yeah. Yeah, how'd you like to finish?
76:45Third in EPA per carry, fif fth in EPA per drop back, sixth in success rate, and also uh second in explosive plays.
76:50Like everything was working. Derrick Henry was a total monster. The usage from Zay Flowers was very encouraging and fun. Like you just love when wide
76:58receivers in the back field getting easier matchups there. He looked extremely fast. I don't know if he's going to be out there or not. Uh I will
77:04say this, there is zero depth uh at wide receiver. Um they were using Leonte Wester uh and Chris Moore and Rashad
77:12Baitman out there in three wide receiver sets after Lane and Flowers uh weren't out there. Uh that's enough for Mark Andrews to to be a start in in fantasy.
77:21I can't say that I loved the Mark Andrews tape. It was like kind of a lot of you know just sit eight yards down
77:25the field, catch the ball, and kind of just that's it. Um, but if Lamar Jackson is going to look like an MVP, and he
77:30certainly did in this one, looked super explosive. And I think Declan Doyle was the best uh uh first year play caller
77:36here, you got to start Mark Andrews.
77:39There's there's really not a wide receiver that I can recommend beyond that if Safe Flowers is out though.
77:44>> Yeah, I totally agree with that. Um, I'm just hoping Zay comes back because I mean, doing all that in the first half
77:49and then us not getting a second half from it, uh, Zay looked freaking incredible here. uh and they get the Saints defense that we know had, you
77:58know, some struggles at times against the Detroit Lions in in week one. Okay, let's now go over to the Carolina Panthers. Um I talked about this game a
78:09lot again on Sunday. Coker, T-Mac, Chuba Hubard were the big winners here and they had the fourth highest explosive play rate in the NFL in week one at
78:19nearly 20% of their passes going 15 plus yards down the field.
78:23>> Uh 15 plus yard gains. Now, over the next three weeks, they get the Atlanta Falcons defense, the Cleveland Browns defense, and the Detroit Lions defense.
78:32So, dare we say that there's some optimism in Carolina that this is, you know, somewhat of again one of the more
78:40explosive offenses in the league.
78:42>> Well, I'm not sure if I would say that, but they are going to have to be because that defense was so bad and uh both
78:48these players on on the perimeter were were really excellent. Jaylen Coker a couple of double moves down down the football field like really took
78:55advantage of facing Tyreek Stevenson. Uh but over like the last 10 games it's it's pretty much a tossup between T-Mac and Jaylen Coker and that's like the the
79:03split when Jaylen Coker uh went to like a full-time player uh out there. I I think maybe my my film takeaway here was
79:10uh Tedro McMillan like I felt those 12 pounds on on a couple of those reps.
79:14Like there was a one kind of like downfield curl route where that uh there was like not much separation, a couple
79:20crossing routes and I thought last year uh people that weren't watching the tape were like Tedro McMill McMillan's slow and he was running by guys down the
79:27football field. In this one it wasn't quite as clean as that. Now he still routed some players up. He's going to
79:32work over the middle. He's going to still be an effective player, but I I will say that I I kind of felt those 12
79:38pounds um that he put on this off seasonason. And uh I do think that the gap between Coker and McMillan in
79:44fantasy drafts is probably uh was not tight enough versus what the reality of the situation is going to be moving forward.
79:51>> Yeah, just like you said, over the last eight games for this team dating back to week 12 of last season, including the
79:56playoffs, I believe, Jaylen Coker, 39 receptions, 548 yards, and six touchdowns. T-Mac 26 receptions, 422 yards, and three scores. And that's on a
80:06very similar number of of targets. Uh your read of the Chuba Hubard backfield uh worked out very well towards the end
80:14of draft season. He had 71% of the backfield snaps. Compare that to Jonathan Brooks's 19% that 40 plus yard catch that he had along the sideline
80:23that was just a sensational throw and adlib play by uh he's not going to have one of those every single week. You
80:30know, Jonathan Brooks. So I Hey, I didn't make Brooks a dropless player in the waiver column. would you have?
80:38>> Uh, no. I would hold on to him. Um, but there's like other players that I think I would like straight up have like
80:43Hayden Black like comes to mind. Um, but uh, Chiba ran away with this one. It was not even close. He got both of the goal
80:50line opportunities. He started each half. Uh, they threw him the ball a couple times. The the Jonathan Brooks stuff was not like designed play. That
80:56was like just out of structure stuff from there. Um, and yeah, this is how he finished the season. Like that game
81:02against the Rams, he was the player that got the ball the most. And I do want to rewind back in 2024 pretty much in this
81:09exact role he finished as a top 15 fantasy running back. I'm not expecting Chuba Hubard to do that this year. Um,
81:14but there's at least like some precedent of this kind of like dead zone profile kind of paying off. So long football
81:19season ahead. Jonathan Brooks survives, stays healthy in this one. I'm not sure if the gap's going to be quite as large
81:25uh moving forward, but Chuba doesn't do a whole lot wrong. Um, and I think that Jonathan Brooks kind of has like his
81:30work cut out to like overtake Chuba Hubard.
81:34>> Yep. I thought Monroe Freeling after maybe without the first quarter really settled in at right tackle did a very good job. And then again an
81:41underdisussed change this off seasonason was Dave Cal giving up play calling and going to Bradzik. I remember like week 10 of last season I went on a monologue
81:49talking about how yeah Bryson 2024 finished as one of the most efficient downfield passers and then for the first nine games of last year they just
81:57refused to throw the football down the field and then from like the first series in this one they were targeting like you said the out and ups the double
82:04moves and really trying to push the ball down the field and along with some hurry up stuff and you know spreading it out.
82:10But I thought there was just a noticeable change from Brad Edick calling plays to Dave Canales last year in a good way.
82:16>> Yeah, I thought Bryce played really really well in this one as and I think that his touch down the field is like
82:21probably his best trait and he he can evade some players as well. Um and he did in this one for for that uh score
82:27against Jay Jaylen Johnson. Uh I guess like to kind of wrap this up, Jaylen Coker last eight games he's the wide
82:32receiver 11 on wide receiver 27 usage.
82:35Like if we do the wide receiver ranking show and he's my wide receiver 24 in rankings this week like is that like
82:41that outlandish?
82:43>> No. No, not at all. I mean he closed draft season this year as wide receiver 55. And I think at worst he should
82:50probably be ranked as a top 36 wide receiver each and every week. So you got with a what wide receiver five price tag
82:57a wide receiver three the rest of the season. Like that is already one of if not the biggest winner of week one in
83:03terms of value out there. And that's why I always include the postseason stats.
83:06Like those were those are the ones that matter the most. That's the two huge victories. Jaylen Coker and Shouba Hub are like the huge players in that game
83:13and those are two huge winners right right here.
83:16>> Cleveland Browns. Um >> oh boy, >> there's not that much to talk about.
83:20We're going to talk about them though.
83:22You hate to see injuries Hayden. Let's start in the back field, but does Dylan Samson going on IR dim the lights up
83:29maybe like one notch for Quinn Sean Judkins in that maybe he gets a little bit of passing down usage and that's
83:34going to be very important in this offense that looked horrible >> maybe. But they they were playing what is it Rocket Sanders um kind of out
83:42there at times. It wasn't like all like Quinch Judkins. Um and this week it's going to be Tampa Bay Buccaneers which
83:48is like forever been a pass funnel out there and we'll see. I I thought Quinnshaw Junkus had a really nice reception in the flat. Made made a
83:55defender miss. Um but there was just like not a whole lot of rushing lanes for him and Deshawn was like completely
84:00pathetic aside from that Denzel Boston stuff. They're doing like weird things as well. Like they're doing like sevenstep drops out of shotgun which
84:06Nate Ty was talking about. Like nobody does that. Uh they did it like a couple times in this game. So either Deshawn is
84:11like completely just like freestyling back there or like they're just kind of doing funky stuff in this offense.
84:16Conpsion fumbled the ball but he was clearly their manufactured touch player.
84:20Denzel Boston full-time player, but it's going to be hard to kind of track down stuff. Uh, I guess maybe Josh Harold
84:26Fandon temperature check because like he was the PPR scam. You didn't get that in this week. Like it like is he a top 12
84:32tight end that projected for 16 points?
84:34I mean, I think he was one of the players I faded all draft season, you know, in terms of as soon as we saw
84:41Casey Conpsion out there and he was getting the easy buttons, then that put alarm bells off for me that, hey, that's
84:46how Harold Fannon got home and a bad team last year. And if they're a bad team this year, then if he's not going
84:51to get those and Casey is, then where's the path to production? By the way, Casey Conception, >> there were some good moments. Okay, some
84:58good moments I thought against a good Jaguars secondary. Um there was one really nice route that he had as a top
85:05of a stack that he faked the over route.
85:09Uh Jordan Lewis kind of looked back towards the quarterback and at that exact point he broke it out towards the sideline. Uh made a really nice catch on
85:16that one and then Trayvon Walker stopped what would have been like a 60-yard touchdown. Now, I don't know if, you know, Deshawn Watson would have made an
85:23accurate pass or a pass that could have gotten 60 yards down the field, but Casey Conpion on a vertical route, burn
85:28number four out there, had him reaching, had two steps on him, and uh that would have been really nice. So, look, it's
85:34going to be tough to watch the games if you are playing any Browns out there, but uh there was nothing wrong I felt
85:41with Casey Conception's rookie debut >> other than the fumble.
85:44>> Yeah, totally agree.
85:45>> Yeah, the fumble was was Yeah, but you know, those are fluky, so you can pretend that didn't happen.
85:51Yes. Okay, let's talk about the Detroit Lions. Might be a boring team to discuss every week. Hayden, it is the most
85:59concentrated offense in the league.
86:01Shootouts though for the next weeks. Uh, as I mentioned, some of the teams they're going up against and they're down both safeties and down quarterbacks
86:07and they're playing on Thursday night football against the Buffalo Bills. What do you want to say here against the Lions?
86:12>> The secondary is complete trash. Uh, they were losing uh players due to injury in that game as well. Um, Jir
86:18Gibbs 30.9 expected uh full PPR points in this one. Like that is like unconscious stuff. So um I didn't like have like big many big takeaways here.
86:28Monro did his thing. Some choice routes got a touchdown. Uh we had some Sam Leaport to like traditional work over the middle type of stuff. I think he's
86:36going to be heavily utilized this year.
86:37And then JO I think like he's going to be back to like the boom bust category.
86:41Uh maybe more downfield stuff. That was like what the splits were with with and without Sam Laaporta last year. So, it
86:46was kind of like exactly what I was expecting. I think the defense is going to really struggle. Jamir Gibbs is not
86:50going to come off the football field very much. Uh, and then I think all these wide receivers and tight ends are
86:55going to eat eventually.
86:57>> Yeah, JMO had a huge drop on a 41 yard pass, then another one 18 yards down the field, too. His box score would have
87:03looked entirely different if that happened. Sam Leaporta had one endzone target here. But like overall, Hayden, 14 targets for Aman Rah, eight for Sam
87:11Leaporta, nine for Jameson Williams.
87:13Again, this is going to be one of the most boring teams that we talk about on a weekly basis because you got engineer
87:17Gibbs and we know what we're getting here each and every time. By the way, if you're watching us live on the Yahoo
87:23Sports Network, we're signing off on there, but you can hop on over to Yahoo Fantasy Football with Josh and Hayden on
87:29YouTube to catch the rest of the show.
87:32Okay, let's jump to the Green Bay Packers Hayden. Uh the Packers in this game, actually last season, excuse me, ranked 18th in neutral pace of play and
87:4224th in pass rate over expectation. In week one, they ranked second and sixth in both departments. That is from Paul Patterson here. This is exactly what you
87:54expected.
87:55>> This is exactly what we needed to happen. And after watching the tape, it even makes more sense. Now, I am worried
88:02that the offensive line is in such bad shape that like Jordan Love like could get injured or that the ground game is
88:08going to be so bad that uh this team is just going to be like either explosive play or punting the football. Like
88:14that's how drastic the offensive line was. Now, because they're playing with so much pace and because Jordan Love's so good, because I think all these skill
88:20guys are so good, this is going to be a team that's going to be top five, top 10 in passing production this year. I feel
88:26very confident that's what Jordan Love was uh in this last game where he was the the uh quarterback 10 in fantasy
88:32points. I think the big storyline here is number one Christian Watson. We know what he can do over the middle. Take it
88:3881 yards. It's Matthew Golden. He was wide receiver two in expected points. He had the explosive over the middle. They got him kind of going in like the Romeo
88:46Dobs plus role here. if they're going to drop back this many times and he's not going to come off the football field,
88:51which he didn't in this one, like Matthew Golden, no doubt about it, fantasy starter immediately. And I think that there was a chance that he's like
88:57one of the best picks that you could have made. Uh, and I think that all like the sleeper appeal came through right
89:02away with him.
89:04>> Yeah, no doubt about it. Using that phrase, if you watch this channel all summer long, you left your draft with
89:10one of Christian Watson or Matthew Golden. And hopefully that happened because both these guys I think are going to be fantastic assets really all
89:18all season long. And it's why to me I loved opening with running backs because I could get later on wide receivers like
89:25Jaylen Coker and like Matthew Golden and felt comfortable uh as I went along in in my draft.
89:31>> Um I did want to bring up that I really feel like the Packers need a running back if it stays this way and we don't
89:37know how long it is going to stay this way. like there is a strong chance to me that Marshon Lloyd is a replaceable
89:43level back. Now, I don't know if his snaps in this one are going to stay true and even Chris Brooks, you know, open
89:49this game and we've talked about it that that likely was because of the defense that they were playing and pass protection, all that type of stuff. But
89:56I I keep saying it and this dates back to the preseason like when Marshon Lloyd gets the ball, I just don't really see
90:01it with him.
90:03>> Yeah. Well, I don't think he sees it. I think that's kind of the problem. Like I think that his vision and like when he's
90:08just kind of jumping around the football field, it's like more like Frogger style running back like that's not like teach tape out there and they clearly don't
90:14trust him uh in pass protection. Like that's why Chris Brooks started and played like a lot of the snaps ahead of
90:20Marshon Lloyd. We knew that was going to be coming against the Vikings. Uh they are four and a half point favorites uh
90:25moving forward. So Marshon Lloyd looks a little bit better this week than last week, but this is a low-end flex play
90:32and I thought like he was very clearly like the most obvious sell high going into this last week. I think we're
90:36already at the point where people are probably feeling more optimistic that Josh Jacobs is going to be coming back like probably around week seven and
90:43Marshon Lloyd completely flopped. Like I don't even know what you can get from Marshon Lloyd right now. And I would still trade him away. I agree with you.
90:49Like this is just like unacceptable running back play, unacceptable offensive line play. And I just don't see how uh anything's really going to
90:56change.
90:57>> The other part of this, Christian Watson is a yes in your lineups every week. Ma Matthew Golden is a yes. Tucker Craft is
91:02a yes. And it was awesome seeing him play so many snaps and creating some explosives out there, too. Jaden Reed, who was being drafted almost in the
91:09exact same round as Matthew Golden. To me, Hayden is a good luck with your week and knowing what you're going to get.
91:14He's in that high variance wide receiver 4ish territory.
91:19>> Completely agreed. Uh ran 29 routes on 40 setbacks. now 29 routes if if they're going to drop back this much cuz they're
91:25playing faster like that is enough for him to get home. Uh but I think that Matthew Golden's a real player.
91:31Christian Watson's coming on and I think that uh once Tucker Craft is out there for even more routes. Like it's going to
91:36be pretty hard for Jaden Reed to be trusted. Tucker Craft, by the way, 22 of 46 uh routes. They they said that he
91:43played 45 snaps. They want him to play 40. I think every week we can just like add, you know, four or five snaps per
91:48game. came and I think by the by the he said about Halloween like week eight somewhere in that range is like when he
91:54anticipates to be fully back. I thought that his tape looked good and that they were just kind of holding him back but I
91:59do think that that's going to be the status quo for a little bit. Let's talk the Houston Texans. All right. Uh on the
92:06box score the Dave Montgomery three touchdowns Hayden makes it look like the run game is fixed and that it was an
92:14excellent week overall for that Texas running game.
92:18underlying metrics kind of point in a different direction and Hayden my eyeballs kind of do too like was the running game actually fixed because to
92:26me he was hit the line of scrimmage very often and you know the touchdown was even three straight runs from the two
92:32yard line which is great that Deont had that opportunity but it took him multiple times there were other short yardage things that you know were not
92:38fixed um we'll talk about some other aspects but just overall what do you think of the running game >> I don't want to sound like a salty hater
92:45because I like I was telling people not to draft David Montgomery and he absolutely goes crazy in this one and like he's got the goal line roll and
92:51like that was excellent. Um I agree with you on what happened on tape and then what the data is is suggesting as well.
92:5816 of his 19 carries went for under five yards and that's removing the actual goal line touchdown that he had which
93:03was the third attempt with that. I thought that Woody Marks looked better on tape like just straight up. Uh David Montgomery's uh touchdown was an
93:12untouched one up the middle that I think like you and I could have scored on. And Woody Marks did play more snaps by one
93:18than David Montgomery. So this team like if Ste played like I thought he had a pretty good game and I think the
93:25offensive line maybe was like a little bit better than last year's but it was not an offensive line that was wowing me
93:30by any capacity. They still have no depth as the skill group. So, like if people are going to be viewing David
93:36Montgomery as like a top 15 running back, I would still fade that. Uh, but I know that sounds kind of weird because
93:41like that's what I was saying and I I'm just like not that moved, I guess, after this performance.
93:47>> Now, there are stretches of the season like their fourth game is against the Dallas Cowboys, their fifth game against the Tennessee Titans that that twoame
93:54stretch we can again have some fireworks from Dave Montgomery. And I understand the headlines of the 50/50 split uh drew some attention and it again doesn't look
94:04like it in the box score, but as you said, when you look at it, snaps were 40 for Woody Marks, 39 for Dave Montgomery,
94:10carries were then 20 for Dave Montgomery, nine for Woody Marks, routes 14 a piece, and then targets three for Deont, and one for Woody Marks. And
94:19yeah, whenever Woody Marks got in there, he looked explosive to me. So yeah, I barely drafted Dave Montgomery this year. This was an awesome debut, but I'm
94:27just a bit hesitant to make the leap that oh, they have fixed this one. Um, I will say one thing that they did fix was
94:35they went four or five in red zone touchdowns in this game and last season they finished 29th in the league with
94:4249% of their red zone touchdown success rate. So again, if Nick Kay can improve on anything, that was a huge number for
94:48him and Woody Marks was a part of that getting three straight goal line carries.
94:52>> Yeah, definitely. So, uh, my last note here was with >> Yeah. Uh, with Nico Collins though, I did want to mention the Bills defense.
95:00Uh, a little bit different. New defensive coordinator. Christian Benford, one of the better corners in the league, was like pretty much
95:06shadowing Nico Collins. I think that's like something we need to take away just as we uh uh are ranking players against
95:12uh the Bills. The the rest of their corners were kind of like battling like in the middle of the game while Benford
95:17was kind of shadowing. Now, Nico Collins got the best of them for for most of those reps. A lot of press man coverage
95:22there. a very difficult assignment for for Benford. Uh and then Nico Collins just beat him up straight up. But really like to see a 27% target share for Nico
95:30Collins in this one. And uh I think that's going to continue because the rest of these guys like a big rotation.
95:35Kahan, Jaylen, uh uh Hutchinson, all those guys are going to be rotating and it's going to be all Nico Collins this
95:41year.
95:43>> Indianapolis Colts are next. Uh again, that first series that they had against the Baltimore Ravens was fantastic. They marched down the field and then they ran
95:52into a bit of a buzzsaw where all of these pieces on the Ravens that might have been questionable in the past or
95:59had some down seasons like Roan Smith for example, even Marlon Humphrey has had some up and down moments. Uh they were fantastic. You add in Cal Hamilton
96:08who was awesome against Tyler Warren and then Nate Wiggins was like a shutdown corner on the outside. So the Colts could do absolutely nothing. Um, I will
96:17say I think this was a rough matchup for Tyler Warren. He still got a touchdown late, which helped. He still played 93%
96:23of snaps. I think we're going to be fine with Tyler Warren rest of the season.
96:27>> Yeah, I'm not concerned about like any of these guys. I thought just watching the the the tape, I thought Daniel Jones
96:32was pretty statuesque in in the pocket, but I don't think like it was like so so bad either, especially like for a debut.
96:39Hope hopefully he gets a little bit better. I don't think that he was like throwing the ball with like a bunch of
96:42zip and maybe there like a 10% discount versus what some of those sideline throws would be looking like. But Alec Pierce, they said that they were going
96:49to play him in a part-time role. They did. That's going to scale up. Uh Tyler Warren's going to have much easier
96:54matchups. I think that the Baltimore Ravens defense was flying all over the football field. Uh and throwing the ball over the middle, especially against that
97:01defense with Kyle Hamilton over there is like a very dangerous proposition and that's where the Colts were like lighting people up last year. So I think
97:08a difficult matchup for them. I thought they looked fine enough. So, I'm not I'm not really moving any of these guys up
97:13and down. If I was like doing the same reddraft as as last week, I wouldn't move anybody up or down.
97:18>> The unfortunate part, though, is their schedule. It was the Ravens in week one.
97:22Then it's on the road against Kansas City on Sunday Night Football in week two. Week three is a Houston Texans who
97:28might fix their defense by that point.
97:31And then week four, as you mentioned it, the Donte Jones now led Washington Commanders that do some funky stuff up front. So, that's a tough four game
97:39stretch, I think, just overall for for the Colts, but we know that they overcame a lot of tough defenses last year. Uh, and and hope they can get back
97:46on track here in 2026. Las Vegas Raiders are next. Hayden, Ashen Genty, and the Raiders offense smashed the easiest opponent on their schedule for months.
97:58Uh, what I liked most though was the receiving work in this game. Like, I love the angle route touchdown that he
98:03scored, even his second reception.
98:06While on the TV copy didn't look like it, when you look at the all 22, it was a designed one as well. They had two
98:12crossing routes from the left side going to the right side to take away the coverage and then he just leaks out into
98:18space behind his fullback for a walk-in score. So, uh, that was very promising usage from Ashen Genty.
98:26>> As good as it could have gone. I think that he would be a first round pick if we were reddrafting today. I didn't see
98:31any, uh, uh, signs about the ankle sprain and the receiving stuff was like the headline story. It was it was two
98:36screen targets, two choice route targets. One of them like a choice route, Texas routes. It's almost like the same exact thing. That play action
98:41leak route they're talking about. And then he also had like a kind of a a return route as a checkown, but more
98:47like a design checkdown. So like everything just like felt smooth. And that's like what we should expect with Clint Kubak. Played 74% of the snaps. So
98:54that's down from last year. Mike Washington played a little bit, but if Ashen Genty is going to get all the designed uh receptions in this
99:01backfield, then uh who cares? And I just thought like the the entire team looked pretty confident uh over there. So yeah,
99:07RB5 and RB2 overall usage 22.7 expected half PPR points. I didn't draft any Ashen Genty. I'm not feeling great about that right now. You guys probably did.
99:16You guys should feel good about it. Uh the good news is uh I was drafting at least Kenneth Walker ahead of Ashen
99:21Genty. So maybe I get bailed out.
99:24>> Yeah. Um, you know, Clint Kubak was asked about the downfield passes because as we have discussed in both his previous stops, New Orleans Saints,
99:33Seattle Seahawks, neither one of those teams reviewed it as an explosive passing offense and yet he transformed them into that. He said you just have to
99:39throw it down the field in order for it to work. Uh, I don't know if Kurt Cousins can necessarily do that with at
99:44least >> how he is operating right now. So again, if maybe he gets some frustration or doesn't get the feeling that they can
99:51operate in that way, Hayden, that might again make the time speed up to the Fernando Mendoza era here.
99:58>> Yeah, definitely. So now, if they're winning ball games, this probably makes them a little bit less likely to do it.
100:02Um, yeah, pretty difficult schedule over the next couple uh like month or so here. Um, but I saw that Clint Kubak
100:09like had this team a little bit more settled. I I don't think the offensive line is great. like there they just
100:14still missing a couple guys, but it there was not like guys in the back field like the entire game.
100:19>> Hayden, there is some buzz that Brock Bowers might suit up in week two. If it trends in the direction that he's
100:26playing, would you play him in your lineup?
100:28>> Yeah, of course. Um but like what can go wrong here, Raiders? Like, can we just like take a deep breath? You're one
100:33and0. Could we could we could we wait a second week?
100:37>> I I agree. like wait a week extra than you think you should for Brock Bowers is is how I would handle it. Let's talk
100:44about the Los Angeles Rams. They're up next. Um this was a losing effort and the backfield snap looked like it was a
100:52losing effort. As I kept mentioning with last year stuff when they were trailing or tied, Kairen Williams played about 75% of the snaps. In this one, Kairen
101:00was at 64%. Blake Cororm 23%. Kairen played on 23 of 33 drop backs. Cororum just three of 33. So while we don't
101:10expect the Rams to trail or be tied very often heading into this year, Hayden, maybe, just maybe, it's slightly likelier now with Miles Garrett on
101:19injured reserve and Jared Verse also not on the roster to take his place.
101:24>> Yeah, maybe. So we'll see about Aaron Donald playing shortly. Uh I just thought that was like a pathetic uh game
101:29from Matthew Stafford in particular.
101:31Like it just seemed like like kind of the fundamentals and like he was like trying to do too much stuff. like I know
101:35that he had all those like no look passes but it just seemed like he was just putting a little bit too much out
101:40there. Um so I I was pretty discouraged about that. A really sloppy game in general. Um now I was in Australia they
101:47just got off the flight. I'm sure Matthew Stafford's back was feeling uh not great because they probably didn't bring the immortal immortal chamber
101:54across uh the world. Um so maybe that was what we can uh write off here but not a pretty showing by anybody.
102:01>> Any Terren Ferguson thoughts?
102:04Um, he played like just enough for like to give it another week here. But I don't know, like Kobe Parkinson pretty
102:11much didn't come off the field and like I think a good bold prediction would be like Colton outscores Terence Ferguson again, but I think both of these guys
102:17are like tight end too, like just hoping for something to develop. They're projected for 28 points. They get the Giants uh here on Monday Night Football.
102:25So like any of these guys can pop off. I thought Devonte Adams like maybe that's probably where I have like the most like
102:31concerns just in general of anyone. Um, but we'll see.
102:36>> The T for was interesting because he played about 77% of dropbacks or snaps and I think it was dropbacks in in the
102:43first half and then down to like 22% in the second half. Uh, so we need we need more sample size. Let's put it that way.
102:50>> Yes.
102:51>> Okay.
102:52>> Miami Dolphins.
102:54I don't think I need a bigger sample size to say this. Hayden, >> Caleb Douglas was one of the players that impressed me most in week one. Yep.
103:01when reviewing the game. He is an easy mover. He's going to always be on the field. He's going to learn on the job.
103:07So, even when he makes mistakes or doesn't get two feet in bounds or maybe has a tight window drop, that's okay.
103:13They're going to live with it. And just hopefully the offense just improves as the season goes along. But even if he
103:20doesn't, he's going to run a ton of routes and I think command a number of targets. He might be my true waiverwire
103:27favorite pickup this week because he's gonna be available in 99% of leagues out there.
103:33>> Couldn't agree more. My opening statement, and by the way, I I do write and you guys should probably read this
103:38over on Yahoo. But my opening statement for him is Douglas needs to be rostered.
103:42I think it's like as simple as that. He was the wide receiver, 23 on wide receiver, 38 usage, 26% target share,
103:48near full-time player. He had a nice route in man coverage, a dig route over the middle where he like literally turned him around. That was uh pretty
103:55cool. A lot of like downfield looks, a lot of downfield routes is which is what you want to see there. Malik Willis like
104:01tossed up a total prayer for an interception way down the field, but that was to Caleb Douglas. Um so yeah, I
104:07think the Dolphins defense was as pathetic as we anticipated to be. Like Ashen Genty like went untouched over the middle for the entire game. Um and
104:17that's going to make Malik Willis have to drop back uh plenty here. So of everyone, it's Kayla Douglas for now.
104:23We'll see how much more Chris Bell is going to play as they as he ramps up here. But Caleb Douglas needs to be
104:28rostered. Like the number one receiver on N on every NFL team needs to be rostered in fantasy and like he's clearly the top guy.
104:35>> Yeah. And even Willis had that cover two whole shot to him as well. Like Willis is going to throw it on the field
104:40whenever he drops back multiple times per game. Uh and yeah, like you said, the awesome gain of 30 where it was
104:46basically a seven route like he voided the space and then attacked that as well. It was it was cool stuff. Yeah, he
104:51he played 35 of 40 drop backs. Um his 42.7% team yardage market share ranks third highest among all week one rookie
105:00wide receivers over the last six seasons. That's from Kyle MFF on Twitter. Anything you want to say about Devonte Chan or Malikos or should we
105:09just move on?
105:10>> Uh I think so just because probably people are scared of the Devonte Chan stuff. The Dolphins I will say this,
105:14they ran the third slowest offense and I think that's going to be something that's going to be a little bit difficult to overcome. Malik Willis did
105:20have a 13% sack rate. Now, one of those was because Devon Aan just did not pick up the Blitzer, so can't really say that
105:26was Malik Willis's fault. They only ran 50 plays. That's most likely going to be an outlier. Like the NFL averages around
105:3260 plays. Uh even the worst teams in the NFL do not run 50 plays on a per game basis. So, that should go up. I will say
105:38with Devon, like the the run game, they didn't have like that many carries, but it did look like the Mike McDaniel run
105:44game. Like a lot of stuff to to the outside, and I think that eventually that will kind of come together. But
105:48like to me it just looked like the same kind of run offense. Um and then on the the pass game stuff there was two wheel
105:55routes down the field. There was a Texas screen route as well. There was two checkdowns on top of that. He was only
106:00credited with four receptions. I swear I counted five of them. So we we need to look uh look into this. Maybe build
106:05another data center or two to figure out why he didn't have a fifth reception in this game. Uh but I thought in general
106:11like the usage like wasn't that bad for Devonte Chan. Like that was a pretty bad performance all things considered. and like that was the the lowend outcome
106:19that people were projecting. Uh but he was very clearly like the focal point of the offense.
106:24>> Yeah. I I guess my thing is it can look like Mike McDaniel's offense that was successful running the ball, but that
106:28doesn't mean it's going to be Mike McDaniel's offense that it's successful running the ball. Like again, this is the Las Vegas Raiders defense that we're
106:35talking about here and he got 11 carries for 36 yards. And then you look on their schedule, it's the Raiders next, then
106:41it's the Chiefs, then it's the Vikings.
106:43you know, those are some tough defenses to run up and that's the sled that, you know, >> Devon Ain is going to run up against.
106:50So, I just want to keep that in mind.
106:52>> Okay, speaking of Minnesota Vikings, let's talk about them. Ian Rap report says Kyler Murray will likely be the starter once returning from his
107:00concussion. Um, I didn't even know about that early interception until I turned the film on.
107:07Like, just throw the lollipop.
107:09>> Yeah, >> that was not good. Yeah, I mean, we only got what, like 10 snaps of him out there, and it was a total mixed bag, so
107:15I don't want to, you know, write what his Vikings career might be like off those 10 dropbacks. But, uh, hey, it
107:23wasn't a good start.
107:24>> Uh, no, I I'm trying to remember. It was the one where I think it was like a quarters uh coverage and he put way way
107:29way too much arc in there and like the other corner like got back to it in time. So, like that was just one where
107:34like you just got to have the right loft on the pass there. Uh, and that was against like an allout blitz if I'm
107:39remembering it correctly. Um, yeah, incomplete. I will say Carson Wentz like he threw the ball down field. Uh, Justin Jefferson's touchdown was it was such a
107:47funny play because it was a free play and Justin Jefferson was to the left and Carson went like for whatever reason was
107:52like I I'm going to look to the right at first and then he remembered Justin Jefferson's on the field halfway through
107:57the play and finally threw it over to him. Uh, some nice stuff like underneath like be running behind the offensive line lineman for Justin Jefferson. Like
108:04that's how he got his second uh touchdown. So, uh, pretty cool performance. Like at least like the there's a floor in place with Justin
108:11Jefferson and then, uh, the running backs. There's a rotation like kind of as expected.
108:16>> Yeah, they get the Bears defense this week. Uh, and so I would pick up Carson Wentz and play Zublex if you need a
108:23quarterback like if Sam Darnold went down for you or Kyler Murray went down obviously. Um, and then yeah, I mean this it's so obvious that if you know
108:31where to go with the football and you just trust the offense and just throw it there that the system is for Justin
108:36Jefferson to have fantasy points if the quarterback does that.
108:40>> I will say the one thing to keep an keep an eye on is they had a 38% neutral pass rate in this game. Um, I don't know if
108:47that's because they just thought their offensive line could just take over the the the Packers defensive line, which uh they did for a lot of this, or if this
108:54is like a Carson Wentz thing, but they're typically top five in neutral pass rate. That was second lowest in week one. So, like not panicking, just
109:01something I'm going to be monitoring moving forward.
109:04>> Yeah. And that could be notable because again, both Jordan Mason and Aaron Jones get in the end zone uh in in this one.
109:11And this is one of those back fields that hey, if they don't score points, then it's split down the middle and it
109:15doesn't matter in fantasy football, but maybe there are contests and or even a trend like you just talked about that if
109:20that's the case, then maybe both uh do work out in some capacity in some contests. Okay.
109:26>> Yep.
109:26>> New England Patriots are up next. I mean, this was a weird one, wasn't it?
109:31Like obviously the Seahawks are a tough defense and that's really back-to-back games against the Seahawks defense. The first one, immense amount of pressure
109:39leading to sacks on Drake May. And then in this one, Drake May throws it away in terms of at least sending it to
109:47overtime. But Hayden, I think the most shocking thing to me was the Romeo Dobs usage. Like he was destined to be the
109:53wide receiver for in snaps on this team and maybe just maybe his season is saved in part to AJ Brown going on injured
110:00reserve.
110:01>> Yeah, he wasn't playing. Like I don't know why they paid him that much and they just weren't playing him. So, I
110:05would not put him in my fantasy lineup.
110:07I think there's a chance he can pay off with that. But, they got M. Collins in there for a lot of snaps and that's
110:12because they want to to run the ball and like that's their best run blocker. Uh Kyle Doug uh Kyle Williams for for a
110:18couple snaps in there. Pop Douglas as like the primary slot. There's a lot of moving parts. Josh McDaniel is so infuriating because like there's
110:24sometimes where I think he's a decent play caller, but there's like just way too many times where his pass protection rules just get completely eaten up,
110:30especially against the best uh defensive coordinators like what the Seahawks uh had. They threw a bunch of stuff at them and they were just like not prepared. So
110:39um Drake May did not play well, but I don't think that the scheme was doing him any favors. Um and then we'll see
110:44about it sounds like Trayvon is going to be returning for this one so he can pretty much throw out all the Raandre
110:49stuff out the window from uh week one.
110:52Okay, let's talk about the New Orleans Saints.
110:56Another shocker. What did you make of the Travis Achan split? Um because he didn't play as much as I was expecting
111:04to in the first half either.
111:07>> No, I was going to ask you. I was just go flip it right back to you. What am I supposed to make of this? Like this is
111:12like so shocking to me. There was nothing about the like game plan or anything. Like there was I wasn't reading anything. So tell me.
111:19>> Can we do some Brian Winhorse stuff?
111:20Like I don't know how a team can pay someone that contract and also Alvin Camaro get injured and then get to week
111:30one and be like actually we're going to split this backfield three ways unless something maybe Travis Achain is not 100% right now. And I I'm just
111:38theorizing but it doesn't make any sense to pay him that contract and then not play him like Ken Walker was yesterday for example.
111:49>> Yeah. I have no idea what the hell happened. Uh he's not a good pass protector. So like that's why CJ
111:54Donaldson was out there. It was more just like the Kendry Miller stuff. Like he was playing like like on early downs
111:59at his expense. So this is like going into halftime this tweet that you're seeing on the screen here. Uh but yeah,
112:04like every other play was like Kendrick Miller on early downs and he just was not playing the passing down snaps. Um
112:11and then at halftime Tyler Stuck just went into like just chuck it down the field and like everything was working out and that was super impressive. But,
112:18uh, luckily Travis ETN got a bunch of, uh, targets. Um, but that was also because the game script was so lopsided.
112:25They ran a ton of plays. It was like 80some plays in this one. Like that's because they run the fastest pace
112:30offense in the NFL. Uh, but that was also because they were in in chase up mode. So, it was a really wonky game all
112:36around. But, credit for the Saints for hanging in there.
112:39>> Yeah. Han's day was kind of saved by that second half and them remembering that he can catch passes. Um, but you
112:45could say the same thing about, you know, Jawan Johnson, for example, who ran the most routes of any tight end in
112:52week one and he got there on the final drive because of the touchdown and some catches that he had in overtime, too.
112:57>> And then like Devon, Hayden, I think you can say that anyone has upside if they play 91% of the routes on a team with 67
113:06dropbacks. And that was the case with Devon here.
113:09>> He was the wide receiver 10 and wide receiver 14 usage. I think that he is like, you know, the the worst version of
113:15like Jaylen Coker, like for the next couple weeks here, like he's a full-time player and there there's enough pass attempts and he's just good enough to
113:22kind of squeak by. I know Coker is really good at football. I don't think that Veil's to that caliber. So, definitely like that's like the big
113:28difference. But, will Vele be a top uh 50 wide receiver in in these rankings this next week? Probably. So, the unfortunate part is they're in trail
113:37mode, but it's against the Ravens. like the Ravens defense is so much better than the Lions one and he's going to
113:41have to go up against some Nate Wiggins and some Kyle Hamilton over the middle as like a power slot player. So, um
113:47yeah, that maybe next week's asking too much, but he in deep leagues he should be rostered. I think >> the Saints are only projected for 19
113:55points this week. Uh and are eight and a half point road underdogs.
113:59New York Jets, let's talk about them.
114:02Their offensive line gives them a platform to succeed every single week.
114:05that's why they continued invested in it over and over and over again. Like even when they faltered too, I actually felt
114:12in this game Hayden that Gino didn't crumble. Um you know there's that third and five at midfield only up seven to
114:18three and he escapes the pressure runs it to make it fourth and two. They go for it. It's an ISO slant win for
114:25Garrett Wilson. There's a first down. Uh so I thought all the pieces that we were hoping for uh performed at the level
114:32that we were hoping for when we drafted them.
114:36This is the first team I have not actually watched the all 22, so I'm not going to make up notes aside from fifth
114:40in success rate, ninth in yards per play. Um, and the ground game uh looked really good by the numbers and I know
114:46what you just said and what Ray was saying the same exact thing. So, I think promising debut. I'll watch them uh
114:51maybe tomorrow.
114:52>> It's exactly what you were expecting like Adai Mitchell on these big outside breakers and vertical stuff that he catches some big time passes down the
114:59field. Uh Garrett Wilson shimmy and shakes his way for some separation and some important ISO targets. Uh I will say Brilan Allen did get a third and one
115:09and fourth and one carry on a singular drive, but at the same time Bree Hall's touchdown was a goal line one. So uh I
115:15know Omar Cooper is sidelined right now and they got Kenan Sadique in some funky looks and got him a rushing touchdown. I
115:22will add that there was one set that I believe Frank Reich threw out, you know, four tight ends on the field and they
115:29spread it out as well. Um, so maybe Frank Reich is trying to beat the allegations from me that uh the NFL has
115:36passed them by a little bit, but let's also keep in mind that was the Tennessee Titans they faced.
115:40>> Well, I mean, what we're talking about like 04 personnel like that that's >> Yes.
115:45>> bonkers stuff like that. Maybe maybe that's overthinking it to to your point there. Um, Isaiah Davis didn't play. I will I will say that like just looking
115:52at the the the snap counts that's a big deal because like at points this was a three-back uh committee. If it's at
115:58least down to two and Bree Hall got both the goal line uh carries in this one um that's still pretty good. I think that
116:04the big story here is like if the offensive line is not terrible and it's average if not even better than that.
116:09That's how you find underrated offenses.
116:12Pittsburgh Steelers, you drafted a ton of Jaylen Warren this summer. How are you feeling after one game?
116:21I felt pretty good about it. I thought that he was very clearly the better player on tape. They both split time
116:27here very clearly. Jaylen Warren did have the fumble, so like huge caveat aside from that, but he had a pancake block and pass protection. Rico Dowel uh
116:34it was a play action rep where Aaron uh Rogers was trying to hand the ball off to the right. Rico Dow ran to the left.
116:41Then there was a blitzer coming in and he missed the the blitz pickup and then got Aaron Rogers hit. Like that's the
116:47type of stuff that Rogers is not going to like. and Jaylen Warren was much better at that type of stuff. I think
116:51that Warren like looks just way better on on film to me. Uh now I think the big takeaway with this one is the Steelers
116:58were fourth in neutral pass rate under Mike McCarthy who's like just notoriously very pass heavy. Um but we'll see if that like continues because
117:06like I wouldn't say it was like the cleanest game from the pass game on top of that. Um, and they'll face much
117:11>> Shouldn't you be a running team in the environment that they were in against the Atlanta Falcons, too? And then like
117:16they were still just a neutral pass rate team on top of it.
117:20>> Yes, I think you can kind of do whatever you want against the Falcons uh defense right now. They just like don't have
117:25enough bodies there. Um, but for for Jaylen Warren, 13 and a half expected half PPR points. Uh, Rico Dattle was at
117:3110. I feel more comfortable with Jaylen Warren. I think he's the better player.
117:35That's that was my kind of I guess bias.
117:37It's my my evaluation of the two and that's what I saw in week one.
117:41>> Yeah. I wonder if Mike McCarthy agrees, you know, like that that has to be the jump and the leap for him to take too
117:47because if you just look at and this is just pure snaps. Rico played 58%, Jaylen Warren 37%. He also played more passing
117:54down snaps 22 to 15. Now Rico had nine pass reps compared to zero for Jaylen Warren. And that's where Jaylen Mo, you
118:01know, gets the receptions by not being there in in pass protection. So, it it was an interesting backfield split that again, if you're also fourth or third or
118:10whatever it is highest in neutral pass rate, then if we're splitting a backfield that has the limited touches with that in half on top of it, then uh
118:18I get a bit nervous how relevant that's going to be on a week- toeek standpoint.
118:22>> Uh Jaylen Warren RB 17 expected points, Rico Dattle, RB27. the big difference like in the numbers. Rico Dattle had an
118:298% success rate rushing the ball.
118:31Negative 60 uh% rush yards over expected in this one. So, um we'll see. The season's not about one week.
118:40>> Nope. And speaking of, I mean, DK Metaf, I think, had like the most hidden or lost yardage in week one. Yes. Some of
118:46it was because of some mis passes down the field, but also some >> OPI and DPI on top of it. So, it was
118:53going in both directions here for for DK Metaf. So Aaron Rogers talked him up constantly in August saying he had a
118:59fantastic camp. Uh Hayden, I I don't know if I really want to buy in other than our expert league where I have both
119:05of these uh Steelers pass catchers somehow someway. Uh but DK Metaf, if we're looking at like the the air yards model, is popping
119:15204 airs. He was a wide receiver six in expected points. He had a 27% target share, 20 uh.4 average depth of target.
119:23like that's what you want. Uh we'll see if it continues though. Like some of that stuff was not very effective. He
119:29had that drop over the middle like like you said OPI and DPI. Um so really interesting game. They were throwing the
119:35ball down the field. That was the the big takeaway from last year is like they did not do that ever with DK Mechaf and
119:40then this week completely flipped.
119:42Michael Pitman like >> not really involved.
119:45>> Yeah. And the move didn't work. you know, we we listened to Aaron Rogers and towards the end of draft season, I had
119:51my, you know, ear to the ground and started drafting more and more Pat Frymouth and especially in titan premium leagues and and it worked out and I
119:57think that's going to continue in that way. Unfortunately, the negative news here, Hayden, is that on the road against the Patriots, the Steelers are
120:03only projected for 18 points here.
120:06>> Yeah. Yeah. I I think that Jaylen Warren's a flex play DK Metaf is startable and then everyone else is is
120:12not startable. Um, my last note, Darnell Washington out in the flats against that DB. I mean, just like send him to like
120:20the earth's crust. I mean, it's the funniest thing ever. The sideline absolutely erupted like it it might be the funniest play in football is Darnell
120:26Washington like leaking out like it is.
120:28Look out.
120:31>> San Francisco 49ers. It feels like they played two weeks ago. But let's talk about this running back split. Okay, this was the first time a 49ers running
120:39back 2 and Chris McAffrey both saw 10 plus carries in the same game since 2023.
120:46Now, there's a lot of other factors going on here. Uh, one is that the game was in Australia. Two, we heard about
120:54CMC's cramping. But hey, maybe I'm on an island in saying I think that this is close to the goal. Like I I think that
121:02this is what the 49ers kind of want it to be. Maybe not necessarily, you know, Kaylin Black getting more carries than
121:10Christian McCaffrey, but Kaylin Black hovering around that 36 to 40% snap stuff because when CMC got the ball
121:19either as a rusher or as a receiver, it paid off. It was proof of concept in terms of him actually looking explosive
121:26and him, you know, getting to the second and third levels.
121:30Yeah, there was a quote from Shanahan back in May that he just was like, "We can't do this again with Christian
121:34McCaffrey." And I think most people read into that as like he always says this, like easier said than done. But then
121:40they drafted Kaylin Black in the third round. None of the people uh grinding prospects uh in the spreadsheets thought that was a good idea, but Kaylin Black
121:48at Indiana like what was he good at?
121:50Pass protection. Just kind of like running hard like up the middle type of thing. Like you're not wowed by him, but
121:54you're like I trust this guy. Obviously, you know, Fernando Mendoza and uh the entire Indiana staff, which is obviously very sharp uh or organization right now,
122:03like they all trusted him. So, I think they trust Kaylin Black and I think that this will be a real split. I think like
122:10maybe Kaylin Black can do like Blake Cororm type of stuff. I don't that he's like startable. I think like if he's
122:15starting a nun guy adjacent.
122:19>> Yeah. Um possibly. I'm leaving the light on for it. I wouldn't rank him that way currently, but I think he has to be
122:25rostered in every single uh Yahoo League right now. And then for Christian McCaffrey, like that's like the big story line.
122:32>> I would drop him in rankings, >> but I wouldn't like bury him in rankings. Like he's still going to catch
122:37the ball. He's still going to get the goal line carries. I think that I would still draft him at the round one two
122:41turn. Like would I draft him fifth overall? Probably not. But now he's more likely to stay healthy. He was without question looking better uh on tape. like
122:50the couple carries right after halftime, maybe he was all pissed off because Kaylin Black was playing so much, but that was like the best he looked uh
122:58between the tackles in quite a while.
123:00So, I think like if he plays a little bit more, he's maybe a little bit more efficient on the ground. It's not as
123:04good as like getting all the work, but I would still probably take him as like my RB5.
123:09So, can we be selfish here for a moment and only look at this through a fantasy football lens, right? Would you rather
123:15have as a fantasy football player Christian McCaffrey with the running back one and expected points every single week with horrible underlying
123:23metrics or would you rather have the running back 12 and expected fantasy points with him looking a bit sprier and explosive?
123:32>> You want what happened last year with Christian McCaffrey where it did does not matter. He had like 25 expected fancy points. like this year it's going
123:38to be like, you know, 17 expected fantasy points and he might like average 18 fantasy points per game. Uh, which is
123:45not 23 or whatever it was last year. So, I think like that's the difference here.
123:48Uh, if Kayen Black gets hurt, I don't think the rest of the running back group would get this role. Like I think
123:53they're like appreciating what Kaitlin Black could offer, see how long this lasts, and then hopefully Christian McAffrey um just looks a little bit more
124:01explosive. Now, I think the other big takeaway with the Mac McAffrey stuff is the offense just like so functional.
124:06Like Mike Evans played well, Debo Samuel had a couple moments. The offensive line really held up against Miles Garrett, um who's obviously playing through
124:13injuries, but like >> if the 49ers aren't, you know, eighth in scoring and they're back to first, and by the way, they're projected for 30
124:19points against the Dolphins in this one, like even if Christian McCaffrey is not getting all the touches, if this offense is going to be elite, like he's still
124:26gonna be an awesome player.
124:28>> Yeah. The reason I I called Kaylin Black K Nai Jason is kind of for this matchup this weekend. like as you said the 49ers
124:35are supposed to post 29 and a quarter points last year when the Bears were projected for you know 26 27 you were
124:43able to put Kungai in your flex like if there was a case of both guys getting in the end zone and I think there's a case
124:49to make that Kaylin Black and Chris McAffrey both get in the end zone at least once for CMC if not twice for him.
124:56>> That's why I think maybe I'm still leaning towards like Blake Corin because I I think Kyle Manunga would get goal
125:01line carries. I think like when push comes to shove, Christian McAffrey is still going to get those type of looks where like that's where like Kyron
125:06Williams gets a little bit more of an advantage. Uh especially like, you know, you're talking about the Kairen Williams plays a whole lot more in passing
125:11situations if they're trailing. Like that's what would happen here. So I think this is like Yeah. You know, Kairen Williams plus and then, you know,
125:17Kaylin Black's like, you know, like Corum.
125:20>> Yeah. I don't want to again say it too loudly because they face the Dolphins and they should obliterate them this
125:25weekend, but I I don't necessarily know if CMC is going to pay off as the fifth overall player, but like as a 12th
125:30overall player. uh that's about the range where it makes sense. So, it's it's not he's gonna he's not going to tank your season, but he just might not
125:36be the league winner like he kind of was >> last year. When you talk about the wide receivers, because we know the strip
125:42club is closed, it's empty. It's under renovations here for the next fourish weeks.
125:46>> Uh unfortunately, it was going to hit and I understand he didn't have any targets or receptions or any of that
125:52stuff, but when you play the most snaps on this 49ers team, uh there were going to be targets in his direction. So, it
126:00freaking sucks that we have to sit here and say, "Well, the process won out, but in actuality, it did not." So, Hayden,
126:06what is the replacement opposite Mike Evans here? Because we saw both Demarcus Robinson and Debo Samuel in this game.
126:13>> Yeah, I think we kind of know what both those guys do. Demarcus Robinson, what what we saw is work down the football
126:18field on very low volume as like a clear out guy, and that's what he was on the Rams. He's going to play enough snaps
126:23where like in the deepest of leagues, you can pick him up. I think that Debo Samuel is going to be like flirting with
126:27enough production to like actually start him. So last week, for example, he was the wide receiver 13, a wide receiver 16
126:33usage. That was not going to be the case if dribbling was was out there. But I think that I will be considering Debo
126:40Samuels like a top 36 uh option uh this week as they're projected for uh the most amount of points in week one. And
126:46then Mike Evans, he was running some like quick out stuff and like this was a little bit more uh kind of bankable
126:53volume type of stuff for Mike Evans. And like if is what he was saying was true, which was all the ice around my knees
127:00and my my groin and my my calf and all that stuff in August. Like maybe it was to cool him down. Maybe it was to keep
127:05him fresh. But if he's going to be out there full-time and like look good, then he can be an awesome pick uh in the
127:10fifth and sixth round.
127:12>> Yeah. Know it was as if Debo never left.
127:14He got like three targets out of the back field and they were in all different looks and sets and two. So
127:19like that that's always cool things because if lines up in the back field, I would give it an 82% chance he's getting
127:25the football on on those snaps.
127:28>> Uh Seattle Seahawks, let's talk about those Seahawks. Um >> we'll begin with Jarian Price. I think this is the main talking point of this
127:36entire conversation.
127:38>> I mean, the rookie was shot out of a cannon, Hayden. Uh he has the juice.
127:42It's so clear to see when watching live and going back on the tape. I guess the question though is can Jadarian Price
127:49get to the point where he is undeniably better than George Hani over at least these next three games or did the
127:56Seattle Seahawks see a proof of concept last year with Ken Walker who also shot out a Kanan and really good and that
128:03they're just going to stick with it because it won them the Super Bowl and it's going to be a 50-50 split no matter
128:07what.
128:08I'll probably take kind of like the middle ground between the two, but I think for now it's more of like they're
128:13going to kind of stick to this formula and like you can't like project in like rankings like that things are going to
128:18flip until it kind of flips. He didn't play a single snap on third and fourth downs and I think that's okay if he's
128:24going to get the goal line stuff cuz like hold on he's like just not going to get that. The unfortunate part was
128:28Emanuel Wilson played four snaps. Three of them were being subbed in for plays with two or fewer yards to go including
128:34at the goal line.
128:36That is the part.
128:37>> But they did fail. They did fail.
128:39>> They did fail. Um some of the Charbanet stuff failed as well and they didn't care about that. So I think that's where
128:44it's like, man, if they couldn't get Kenneth Walker out of this, like I'm not sure if they're going to get with
128:49Jadarian Price out of this as well. I think he's still absolutely flexible. Is he an RB2? He's not. Like he's not until
128:56he proves that he's getting a role here.
128:59I I agree with you. He looked really good. They drafted him in the first round. The Seahawks team's going to be
129:03pretty good. Uh but like with with Drew Lock out there, they're projected for 23 points. It's middle of the road this
129:09week. Um he's definitely a flex, not an RB2.
129:13The other part of this, and again, we can paint whatever narrative we want outside of week one, is that they were
129:19the early game on a Wednesday after Jarm Price missed some training camp. This was his rookie debut. So, highly doubtful he would go in there because
129:28rarely running backs do as rookies and get 75% of the work, you know. So I could see his role increase from week
129:35one just because of that and not even hey he looked freaking awesome whenever he got the football in this game.
129:42>> Yes. Uh and then Charbanet comes back and then I think it's just going to be K Jaren Price is in the Kenneth Walker
129:48role. Charbanet uh is in the Charbanet role. By the way, just like put some context here. Uh when Charbanet was healthy last year, Kenneth Walker was
129:56the RB22 on RB28 usage. Um, and I think that's kind of like the best case scenario for Jadarian Price because that
130:04Seahawks team was like averaging like 28 30 points and I I just don't think that this team's going to be able to do that
130:08quite as well. So, firmly flex to me until proven otherwise.
130:13>> Anything you want to say about the wide receivers, the tight ends, or should we move on?
130:16>> You're still going to start JSN with Drew Lock. So, yeah, that's it.
130:19>> Yeah, I mean, of course. All right.
130:22Yeah.
130:22>> Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Um, I think the big talking point here is Bucky Irving.
130:27His touchdown was from inside the 10 yard line. He saw seven targets in this game, the fourth most of any running
130:34back. You guys brought it up on the Sunday night show that if Kenny Gainwell in negative game script is not just like
130:41dominating the targets, then like what is the use of Kenny Gainwell, especially if Bucky Irving is getting the goal line work to? Yeah, it's RB58 and expected
130:51points in a game that he should have been more involved and Shawn Tucker is coming back and like Shawn Tucker I
130:56think is going to get some level of work because they giving him like $2 and half million dollars. So, um yeah, I don't I
131:02don't get the point with Kenny Kenny Gain Weltus. Uh Bucky Irving looked really good like that looked like James Cook type of tape. Uh really good
131:10offensive line as well. Um they're not going to be trailing as quickly as they were in this game as well. So, I thought
131:17Bucky Irving looked really good. He caught a bunch of passes, a career-high seven targets, had a drop, uh, also had a fumble here, but I thought he looked
131:25healthy, and that's all you can ask for.
131:28>> Yeah, he was attacking the edges, and I think thought he was doing a good job like pressing the lane and then kind of
131:32working on the flow of the offensive line, too. So, uh, yeah, Bucky was a riser throughout draft season for me.
131:38And, uh, again, week one didn't dissuade that at all. Uh, anything about the wide receivers, any Mechbuka, Chris Godwin? I mean that this was, you know, derailed
131:48by Baker Mayfield wanting to take over the game uh like he sometimes does. It just started a bit quicker this year as
131:54last year he started on fire.
131:57>> I think there's a huge difference between Chris Godwin and Nakabuka. Um I think Chris Godwin's just kind of done.
132:03Uh I think that he does not have much uh juice like in straight line. I will say this, he's still so big and so physical.
132:12He caught the ball underneath. He had three of his four targets were behind the line of scrimmage and on a couple of
132:17those he just pile drive some guys to the to the ground. He can still do that.
132:21I just don't see him like opening up and like running down the football field.
132:24And then meanwhile with the Mecha Igbuka that was the most like Ramscco coded wide receiver usage that you'll see.
132:31They had him in motion all the time.
132:33They had him like on a motion like to get up to full speed to send him on a big wheel route up the sideline. Uh he
132:39also had multiple routes where he was running like through the B gap as well.
132:43Like there's only a couple wide receivers that get like this type of usage. Like this was like you know kind of Z Flowersy from from this this week
132:51where all the fun stuff is going to him and he was by far the most athletic wide receiver that they had out there. So
132:57like I think very encouraging stuff from Egmech Ibuka. We didn't like totally see it in the in the box score, but in terms
133:03of just like who's the ball going to, who's supposed to get the ball, it's very clearly a mecha Ibuka. And I feel
133:08pretty good about him as a as a fourth round pick.
133:12>> Yeah, this is one of those occasions where that might all pop up. The underlying stuff that you saw with your
133:16eyeballs in week two because they get the Cleveland Browns, uh they're projected to win by eight and a half points, total of 25. and that Browns
133:26defense, let's just say the tackling looked a lot worse with whoever the DC is now versus, you know, Jim Schwarz last year.
133:32>> That's one way of putting it.
133:33>> Yeah.
133:34>> Y >> uh Okay, we got two more to go.
133:37Tennessee Titans.
133:40Um Okay. On plays where Cam Ward was not pressured, so we can't blame the offensive line here. He had the third
133:48highest offtarget rate despite ranking 27th in AOT at 5.2 yards. That's from our buddy Track. I'm just gonna leave with the big question here, Hayden. Are
134:00we entering bench and take a breather territory with Cam Ward like Bryce Young got to early in his second season?
134:09>> I'm so glad you said that because I literally almost interjected on the recap show and saying like we we needed
134:15Bryce Young this one. Um, and I'm glad that you pointed to the exact same situation. Look, you can't be that laxidasical with your with your throwing
134:23motion and be an NFL quarterback. It's like kind of as simple as that. There was two uh throws behind the line of
134:28scrimmage. One was dirted like three yards in front of the receiver. The other one was like completely thrown over his head and then down the football
134:35field there was like I think it was a wheel route to I think it was Tony Pard.
134:39And the ball because there's the green grass and then there's like that big white chunk of turf and then there's the
134:45rest of the green. The ball hit the other green like way out of bounds. And then there was another play to Carnell
134:51Tate uh near the sideline where Carnell Tate did not even try to jump because the ball was thrown so far over his
134:56head. And then beyond that, we almost had a couple of those like Cam Ward moments which were running around to the
135:03point where he almost got safety three plays in a row. He almost did Daniel Orloski out of bounds uh in the back of
135:11the end zone. There was a couple times where David Bailey was chasing him out outside the pocket. He almost threw the
135:17ball away to get a um intentional grounding uh in the end zone as well. It was really bad. Um I I don't know what
135:25to say. Like this looks like a bust like until until proven otherwise. Like this looks like what a first overall pick
135:31bust looks like.
135:33>> And it could get worse in week two.
135:35They're at home. Oh no.
135:36>> But they face Vic Fangio and the Philadelphia Eagles.
135:41I I guess I would just say you can't start anybody because the split between Tony Pard and Tai Spears got concerning
135:47in the second half uh of of that game.
135:49Yep. And then Juan Delale Robinson was not PPR scamming that much. Um he was like out there plenty but like not
135:55enough to like fully do the scam stuff and he's going to be facing Cooper Deene. Carnell Tate, just to hit on his
136:00tape real quick, all four of his receptions were like quick outs against off coverage or like a blitzer. Um and then he had a crossing route. didn't
136:09create that much separation, but completely missed. I talked about the the ball over over his head near the sideline. So, couple quick outs type of
136:15stuff, but like man, there was like they weren't even like attempting stuff down the field. Um, that's concern.
136:20>> Yeah, like I think you could look at the box score and think of some preseason stuff. Think of a couple years ago,
136:27think of last year and say, "Hey, this was an offensive line problem." I'm not saying the offensive line was good, >> but I I don't think it was the reason
136:34why this thing crumbled. I also want to put some blame on on Brian Dal. I mean, some of the calls were just ridiculous
136:40as we discussed on Sunday Night Football. But while like the entire league spent all off season draft, free agency, you know, adding heavier bodies,
136:50tight ends, fullbacks to run, you know, heavier personnel groupings. The Titans had the fewest amount of 12, 13, and 21 personnel snaps at eight in the NFL. So,
137:00it was just like, hey, we're gonna play Wel Robinson in three wide receiver sets, and this is what we're going to
137:04be. We're gonna be totally predictable, and good luck out there. So, like it it's an all-encompassing thing, namely from like the OC to the quarterback and
137:13then I even might throw like Robert Solen here as a head coach.
137:18>> The punt was egregious. Um, and that was against the Jets. You know, the Jets defense look at you guys can look at our
137:23lads and look at their depth chart on defense. You cannot tell me that's a good defense. I will say this, David
137:27Bailey, that is a real NFL player chasing you down. Like that guy was as impressive as like they were hoping for.
137:34I mean, all the young defenders you can point to like Arville Reese chasing down and swarming to the outside. You can
137:40look at Sunny Styles running over Saquon Barkley. Uh maybe the one I didn't isolate him, but Caleb DS and that Cowboys defense. Um okay,
137:48>> we'll close things out with the Washington Commanders here. I think there are better days ahead for Terry McLaren. Uh he got Vic Fangio just like,
137:59you know, George Pickkins did last year.
138:01I will say there were 63% of snaps for Stefon Diggs in this game which was a tick higher than what he played with the
138:09New England Patriots which was nice. Uh and he took Cooper Dean to task a few times and now he gets the Dallas
138:14Cowboys. So I am contemplating starting Stefon Diggs in a few leagues.
138:21>> Yeah. Consensus rankings early wide receiver 37 commanders projected for the 18th most points this week for for the Terry stuff. Like you face Quinnon
138:29Mitchell, you go to the fantasy bench.
138:30It's as simple as that. It's like f facing Patrick Certan. There's a couple uh top corners and top defenses where it's like it's just it's just not going
138:37to work out. So, I'm okay with Terry McLuren. I was expecting him to dud. He duded and that's kind of it. This is one
138:43of the teams I've not watched on all 22.
138:46I do remember Antonio Williams crossing up Cooper Deene. I was like, and Trayon Burks was a healthy scratch and Luke McAffrey was a healthy scratch. like in
138:54the deepest of leagues if you just want to like say Antonio Williams is like the rookie that's just going to like over
138:59the next couple months play more uh and has some theoretical upside. Um that was kind of like my takeaway from the the
139:06couple snaps I saw from him.
139:08>> Yeah, the Antonio Williams stuff was fascinating because I believe he only played like 14 snaps in entirely. Um yeah, 12 of 41 routes, but on those 12
139:19routes he saw four targets. So like the targets per route run is incredible.
139:24Part of me thinks that he got more run especially in the second half because Chiggo Quano went down with an injury
139:29and maybe that gave him a chance. At the same time when you take advantage of that chance when you are a rookie that
139:35should earn you more snaps. So it's a blessing for Antonio Williams to to get that opportunity and again he took advantage of it.
139:43>> Yeah. Also like the trail Burks just going from like he's the number two to literally just inactive was like stunning.
139:51Yeah. Uh maybe you'll see the same thing when you turn this on. Bill Crosky Merritt is by far and away this team's
139:57best runner. I mean, not even close.
140:00Rashad White just looks like he's running at 0.85 speed whenever he's out there as a ball carrier.
140:06>> And on top of that, like didn't get any receiving usage on it, too, because when you're attached to Jaden Daniels and
140:11he's back to scrambling, uh kind of like the Kenny Gainwell stuff. I am trying to figure out what Rashad White might bring
140:17to your fancy lineups.
140:20He's going to be out there in pass protection. That's but you don't get points for that. Um Jakoy Kroski Merritt uh over the last four games like
140:27including last year and and week one here he's the RB22 on RB27 usage and he looked like the best player like you
140:35said. So um I think that he is flexible uh even even in some shakier matchups.
140:41Uh >> you should turn on the uh Kron Allen uh handful of carries that he got to end your night as well, Hayden. You'll like
140:48them.
140:49Okay, good. I was gonna say sometimes that like those type of players make me nervous because like, hey, that's that uh day three running back that you
140:56liked. It's like, oh my gosh, it's not going to work. But okay, now I got something to look forward to.
141:00>> Uh and just to close us out, the Commanders actually on the road against the Cowboys are now favorites. The markets have flipped on that one. Uh the
141:08Cowboys opened as four-point favorites and now the Commanders again on the road are half point favorites over the Dallas Cowboys. Do you buy that?
141:18I mean, this this is this is news to me.
141:21>> Okay. Well, I mean, it's already been like a four and a half point swing uh since since that open, which is
141:26>> I think you're I think I think you're getting you're getting AIed right now.
141:29You need to check your sources.
141:30>> No, I'm looking at it right here. Right here, right now. Uh anyways, we'll be back here tomorrow with the running
141:35backs ranking show. Uh that'll be in your feeds tomorrow evening. Thanks for sticking with us this long episode. It's been live. It's been fun. Shout out to
141:44the producers behind the scenes for uh allowing us to go for two hours and and 20 minutes. Um let us know what you
141:49think in the comments after you're watching this video. If it worked out, if it didn't, we'll take all the feedback and uh we'll be even better
141:55next week. So, leave a thumbs up, hit subscribe, up the villa. We'll talk to you guys soon. See you.