1117: Players to Avoid
STACKED extracted the fantasy-relevant player signal from this podcast and kept the full transcript here for context.
1 hr 12 min
Duration
Estimated from transcript
Aug 18, 2026
Published
Tue, August 18, 2026
20
Player insights
17
Players mentioned
Topics
De'Von AchaneJ.K. DobbinsMatthew StaffordBrian Thomas Jr.Carson BeckCourtland SuttonJonah ColemanJonathan TaylorMarvin Harrison Jr.Michael WilsonParker WashingtonPatrick MahomesRhamondre StevensonRJ Harvey
Player analysis
Player insights
Brian Thomas Jr.
PositiveProjection27:18
JJ Zachariason is fading Brian Thomas Jr. due to a difficult opening schedule against elite cornerbacks and a role that relies heavily on low-percentage, deep-target air yards. Zachariason suggests Thomas Jr. may be a better best-ball asset than a managed-league starter and warns he could be an early-season drop candidate.
Insight pageCarson Beck
NegativeRole61:03
JJ Zachariason suggests that if the Arizona Cardinals are struggling by their Week 14 bye, the team may pivot to starting Carson Beck to evaluate him against live fire for the 2027 draft cycle, creating uncertainty for fantasy managers during the playoffs.
Insight pageCourtland Sutton
PositiveValue13:33
JJ Zachariason avoids Sutton in middle rounds because he profiles as a 'fine' player rather than a high-ceiling asset. Sutton's efficiency is declining, failing to top 2.0 yards per route run in years, and he faces increased competition for targets with Jalen Waddle now in the offense. Despite running the third-most routes in the league last year, Sutton only managed a 21% target share and under 13 PPR points per game.
Insight pageDe'Von Achane
NegativeValue13:20
Rich Rebar and JJ Zachariason are lower on Achane than the market due to a poor team environment score and the loss of Tua Tagovailoa. Historically, top-tier running backs on teams with poor win projections struggle to return value. With Malik Willis at quarterback, the Dolphins' passing volume and efficiency are expected to decline, which hurts Achane's ceiling. Data shows that running backs drafted in the top 10 with low team environment scores rarely outperform ADP expectations.
Insight pagePositiveValue18:01
JJ Zachariason is lower than the market on Devon Achane, citing that his target share advantage over Chase Brown is likely smaller than the market assumes. Given the stable environment for Brown, Zachariason questions the necessity of drafting Achane at his current RB5 price point.
Insight pageJ.K. Dobbins
NegativeValue18:53
JJ Zachariason lists JK Dobbins as a player to avoid, following his previous analysis of the Denver Broncos' offense and the team's shift toward a more balanced, less pass-heavy approach.
Insight pagePositiveBust18:56
JJ Zachariason views JK Dobbins as a 'single' rather than a home-run player, noting his poor receiving profile (0.32 yards per route run, 4.2% target share) and injury history. Zachariason argues that Dobbins' 2023 RB24 finish occurred under ideal circumstances, and the addition of Jonah Coleman, combined with RJ Harvey's presence, creates a crowded backfield that limits Dobbins' upside.
Insight pageJonah Coleman
PositiveValue21:03
JJ Zachariason has been drafting Jonah Coleman more than other Denver running backs because he is cheap and provides a steady, all-around skill set. Coleman is viewed as a threat to both Dobbins and Harvey, potentially taking goal-line work and serving as a reliable backup in an ambiguous backfield.
Insight pageJonathan Taylor
PositiveValue3:54
Rich Rebar views Taylor as overvalued due to his high correlation with team success; Taylor averages 22.7 PPR points in wins but drops to RB15-level production in losses. The Colts' schedule is difficult, and the offense faces uncertainty with Daniel Jones returning from injury and the loss of Michael Pittman. Furthermore, Taylor's 2024 efficiency was bolstered by an unsustainable 94% goal-to-go conversion rate, and he lacks significant pass-catching upside, having never exceeded an 11% target share.
Insight pageMarvin Harrison Jr.
NegativeValue60:04
JJ Zachariason and Rich Hribar are both below consensus on Harrison Jr. due to the overall offensive environment of the Arizona Cardinals. Zachariason notes he would prefer drafting players like Christian Watson or quarterbacks like Caleb Williams/Dak Prescott over Harrison Jr. at his current ADP.
Insight pageMatthew Stafford
NegativeBust33:31
JJ Zachariason is fading Matthew Stafford as a low-end QB1, noting that his 7.7% touchdown rate from last year is highly likely to regress. Historically, quarterbacks with high touchdown rates and low rushing production see significant fantasy point declines the following season. Zachariason prefers drafting Jared Goff at a lower cost.
Insight pageNegativeProjection36:44
JJ Zachariason notes that Stafford's 2023 touchdown rate was inflated by an unsustainable 54.2% red-zone/long-range scoring rate and a high 73% passing touchdown share. While he remains a solid, affordable option in 2QB/Superflex leagues, he lacks rushing equity and should be priced as a QB14-15; he is not a player to reach for in drafts.
Insight pageMichael Wilson
NegativeUsage60:29
Rich Hribar highlights that Wilson's target share dropped significantly (17.9%) when playing alongside Marvin Harrison Jr. after Jacoby Brissett took over. While Hribar sees a potential 'Jerry Jeudy-like' breakout profile, he warns that investing in a Brissett-led offense carries inherent risk.
Insight pageParker Washington
PositiveValue27:48
JJ Zachariason identifies Parker Washington as the best Jacksonville wide receiver for fantasy purposes this year. He notes that Washington is being drafted well past WR30 and has shown strong target-rate-per-route-run metrics compared to his teammates.
Insight pagePatrick Mahomes
NegativeValue39:42
JJ Zachariason argues Mahomes is a difficult draft pick despite his lower ADP. Over the last three years, he ranks 17th in completion rate, 23rd in yards per attempt, and 20th in touchdown rate. His 2023 fantasy success was heavily reliant on a career-high 25% of points coming from rushing, which is unreliable given his recent ACL injury and the addition of a capable running back. Furthermore, the Chiefs' lack of investment in wide receivers and a difficult schedule make him a risky click.
Insight pageRhamondre Stevenson
PositiveRole46:05
JJ Zachariason views Stevenson as the safer bet in the Patriots' backfield compared to TreVeyon Henderson. Stevenson finished the 2023 season strong, ranking first in rushing yards over expected and catch rate over expected. He also holds a significant advantage in pass protection, which is critical for securing third-down snaps.
Insight pageRJ Harvey
PositiveValue19:16
JJ Zachariason prefers drafting RJ Harvey over JK Dobbins, noting that Harvey is a superior receiver and a second-year player with potential to outperform his ADP. While acknowledging Harvey's struggles between the tackles last year, Zachariason emphasizes that passing game usage is stickier and more predictive for fantasy success.
Insight pageTony Pollard
PositiveBust65:15
Rich Hribar and JJ Zachariason are fading Pollard, citing his 'dead zone' archetype, declining efficiency (yards per route run below 0.8 for three years), and the threat of Tajay Spears and Nick Singleton. Hribar notes Pollard's target share dipped to 8% last year and prefers Rhamondre Stevenson or Jaylen Warren for their superior contingent upside.
Insight pageTreVeyon Henderson
NegativeValue45:45
JJ Zachariason expresses concern over Henderson's current ADP and opportunity cost. While acknowledging his explosive playmaking ability, Zachariason notes that Henderson is likely to start as the 1B in a committee with Rhamondre Stevenson. He suggests that drafters should prioritize wide receivers or other running backs in that range, only targeting Henderson if he slips to the 6th round or in specific auction formats.
Insight pageTrey McBride
NegativeProjection59:25
JJ Zachariason and Rich Hribar agree that while McBride will likely remain a top tight end, his 2023 production was bolstered by a record-breaking 694 routes run. Hribar notes that if his route volume regressed to a standard high-end level, his PPR output would have dropped from 18.6 to 15.4 points per game. They suggest he is currently overvalued in the late second round and should be targeted in the late third.
Insight pageFull transcript
Episode Transcript
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0:35This is the Late-Round Podcast with your host, JJ Zacharyarysen.
0:38What's up everyone, it's JJ Zacharyarysen and this is episode 1117 of the Late-Round Fantasy Football Podcast.
0:43Thanks for tuning in. On last week's show, I talked to Evan Silva about a handful of players that we're targeting in drafts this year.
0:49That's just based off of where we have them ranked and where they typically get drafted.
0:54Today, we're doing the opposite of that. We're looking at players to avoid.
0:57And to help me out, I brought on my friend Rich Rebar of Sharp Football Analysis.
1:02I brought 5 players to the table, he brought 5 players to the table.
1:06It's not that we're fading these guys no matter what, but we do think they're a little bit overvalued by the market.
1:12Now before getting into that conversation, I just want to send another reminder to check out the Late-Round Draft Guide.
1:17There's well over 270 pages of content that includes game theory, strategy, ways to spot breakouts and busts, players to target, players to avoid, and more.
1:24You get cheat sheets with the guide as well and everything is updated weekly.
1:28Check it out. Learn more. LateRound.com Now let's get to these 10 players to avoid with Rich Rebar.
1:33Alright Rich, welcome back. Another year of targets and avoids.
1:36This year you are on the avoid show. Always the more difficult show to do.
1:40It's a little bit tough to talk avoids because people come after us a little bit more with these.
1:45It's a tougher topic to dig into. But again, these are simply players that we like a little bit less than what the market does.
1:52That's what this really comes down to. It's not even a full fade situation.
1:56If these guys are available at the right spot, we'll still take them.
1:59But yeah, these are players that generally we're not drafting a ton of because we don't think they should be going as high as they are.
2:06So with that being said, Rich, give us the first player that you're generally avoiding.
2:10Yeah, I also think too the avoids have gotten a little tougher over the years just because I think the general consumer
2:16is a lot sharper and the market is just being set a lot better in fantasy football.
2:21But yeah, I'm going to start off with a couple higher priced guys here.
2:25And it's not like you said, it's not that they're necessarily avoids.
2:28It's that I think that they're a little bit overpriced or like players that typically go after them more than them.
2:34So yeah, I'm going to start with Jonathan Taylor.
2:36And I think that that one might be a little bit surprising to people.
2:40You know, the guy that led the NFL in rushing attempts, rushing touchdowns and, you know, had 85% of the Indianapolis backfield
2:46touches really doesn't have any competition again this year.
2:49Those are all very high notes for Jonathan Taylor.
2:51He's finished as an RB1 score in four of his six seasons.
2:54The only blemish was something that we saw at the end of last year, even with Daniel Jones' starts that's gone on for his career.
3:01It's that when the Colts struggle as a unified team and winning games, this is where Jonathan Taylor typically slows down.
3:07He's the highest correlated running back in terms of like winning and losing.
3:11And that's been a thorn for his entire career.
3:13He's averaged 22.7 PPR points per game for his career and wins.
3:16That is the most of any active running back since he entered the NFL.
3:20He goes to RB15 in losses. Last year, he averaged 32 points per game and wins that to 12.3 PPR points per game and losses.
3:27And even if we remove all the Philip Rivers, all the Riley Leonard stuff and his four losses that Daniel Jones played
3:33in full, he was the RB21, RB29, RB28, RB18 in those games.
3:36And why that is noteworthy as we head into 2026, we've got Daniel Jones returning from an Achilles injury.
3:41Michael Pittman's gone. Braden Smith's gone. We don't know when Alec Pierce is coming back at this point.
3:46Alec Pierce is a pretty big deal because he's the only guy in the offense that can stretch the field.
3:52Over the past two years, Jonathan Taylor's faced eight or more defenders in the box on 43.2% of his runs with Alec Pierce off the field.
3:59That's 155 attempt sample too. It's not like 25 carries or anything.
4:02And then with Alec Pierce on the field, it goes all the way down to 28.7% because you have to respect Alec
4:08Pierce stretching the field, occupying a box defender. Right now, the Indianapolis Colts are only favored in six games on their schedule.
4:14That's 21st in the league. They have a really tough opening gauntlet.
4:17They go Baltimore, Kansas City, Houston. They have an international game against Washington, which we're not scared of.
4:22But then after that international game, they forego the bye week and on a short week, go to Pittsburgh.
4:28And then so it's like this is a really tough opening schedule for them.
4:31And then when you look at the Indianapolis Colts, just their team, when I do my team regression series, that just kept popping up week series after series.
4:39Jonathan Taylor scored the most points from fantasy from the one yard line last year.
4:43Almost 20 more fantasy points they had scored in any previous seasons.
4:46No team was better last year at converting goal to go opportunities than the Colts.
4:51They scored an offensive touchdown 94% of their goal to go opportunities.
4:54There's a third best rate for any team in the 2000s.
4:57And it was a 32 trip sample, too. Sometimes you see these teams like convert 90%, but they only have like 15 chances or something like that.
5:04And then they scored on 51 and a half percent of their drives, which was the most in the NFL.
5:10Since 2010, there have been 24 other teams to score in at least half of their possessions.
5:1420 of those 24 teams scored fewer touchdowns the following season with an average loss of 12 touchdowns per team.
5:20So yeah, when I line up all the things for Jonathan Taylor, it just kind of looks at, I look at other
5:26guys that are growing in his area, like, you know, Chase Brown, even Saquon Barkley.
5:30These are guys I think that I just have a little bit higher than them and have more faith in their team environments than Jonathan Taylor.
5:37It's not that I'm out on Jonathan Taylor. I just have a more lower as like more of a floor based RB1,
5:43kind of like this year Saquon where we were with Saquon last year.
5:47Statistically, I think he's still going to be an RB1.
5:49But are you getting like that weekly hammer with any consistency?
5:52I think it's me a lot more volatile this year.
5:55I think straight up the reason that this is an avoid for me too, if you want to dumb it down is
6:01simply that I like James Cook a lot more or at least like a decent bet more like a 70 30 type
6:07outcome situation with the two of them versus Jonathan Taylor.
6:10You know, the thing with like a James Cook profile is that there's a very clear path of room for growth with James Cook.
6:16And that's in the receiving column, right? Like they if reports are true and they do use him more and obviously you
6:22have this like Ty Johnson thing going on, which actually could help cook a little bit.
6:27But with Jonathan Taylor, like there's not much room for growth.
6:30You know, he's seen 92 percent and 86 percent running back rush shares over the last two years.
6:35That's elite numbers that I think projection wise, you can probably put them in that bucket, but that's still a really hard to sustain number.
6:42And we've seen a very, very large sample now of Jonathan Taylor not being a huge pass catcher wasn't really a huge pass catcher in college.
6:49I'm not saying you can't do it, but wasn't a huge pass catcher in college.
6:53And then he still hasn't seen more than 11 percent target share in the NFL.
6:57So like there's not that much room for growth for him.
7:00And then, like you said, it comes down to that environment.
7:03And the environment is very, very, very scary. I mean, the Colts through through the first 10 weeks last year, their first
7:09in points per game, first in drives, ending in touchdowns, you know, first by a wide margin percentage of touchdowns.
7:14It came on the ground to, you know, like they were scoring, you know, very much via the ground, which is something that regresses.
7:21So I'm with you at Jonathan Taylor. You're probably a little bit lower than I am, but it's still a fade for me generally.
7:27Like he was a player in the in the draft guide immediately upon release where I will say I cooled off a
7:33tiny bit because when I released that, the Daniel Jones stuff was still very much up in the air.
7:39It sounds like that's at least a little bit better.
7:41But now you have the Alec Pierce thing, too.
7:44And it's all, you know, just pointing to a scarier profile than I think people realize.
7:48Yeah. And I still have him like ninth overall.
7:51It's just like I've got him in a spot to where you're going to I always want to steer people to where
7:57they're taking James Cook, Chase Brown, say, and I have Kenneth Walker over him, too, which a lot of people probably bristle
8:03at because we've done the Kenneth Walker thing before.
8:05But definitely look at his environment and his opportunity as being a little bit more stable as well.
8:10Yeah. All right. I'm going to move on to a player that everyone's been making fun of me for because I bring
8:16them up on every show as like an example of the kind of player that I don't typically draft.
8:21And that's Cortland Sutton. Okay. This to me profiles as a single, not a home run type player.
8:26And when you're in the middle rounds, I want that triple.
8:29I want that home run. Like I want to go for a player that I think has a legitimately high ceiling.
8:35I mean, he averaged fewer than 13 PPR points per game last year in a wide receiver room that was, I mean, beatable on paper.
8:42You had a rookie Pat Bryant, Troy Franklin, who essentially lost his gig as the season went on.
8:47You know, Franklin went from from being their wide receiver one, if you will.
8:51And I'll get to that in a second to then, you know, losing a lot of snaps.
8:55And obviously now they have Jalen Waddle. But last year, Cortland Sutton had a 21% target share.
9:00His targets per run rate was under 20%. It's not like he was being hyper targeted in this offense without Jalen Waddle.
9:06Right. And this is also an offense that doesn't necessarily just feed their ex.
9:10And I think that is very, very key for what they did and getting Jalen Waddle.
9:14Last year, Troy Franklin was playing that zero. And we saw remember that five week stretch where Franklin was like an eight plus targets per game.
9:21And the narrative was Troy Frank Franklin is the Broncos wide receiver one.
9:25I think that's very much role based. But the difference is, is that instead of Troy Franklin playing that role, you have
9:31Jalen freaking Waddle playing that role, who's one of the most efficient, better wide receivers in the entire game.
9:36So much tougher competition for Cortland Sutton. Not only that last year, he ran the third most routes in football.
9:41Like there was a team that I do expect to still drop back to pass a decent bit.
9:46We saw that the last couple of basically since Bo Nix has taken over.
9:50But he had the third most routes in football.
9:53He barely eclipsed a thousand yards. Despite that he had a 1.62 yards per route run rate.
9:57And now he's entering year nine and he hasn't topped two yards per route run in years.
10:02I mean, he hasn't been that efficient of a, of a receiver at all for, for a while.
10:07So my, my TLDR was Sutton is that like, he's fine.
10:10I just don't want to draft fine when I get into the middle rounds of drafts.
10:14And I know that people who play best ball are sitting there being like, first off, this is not a best ball take so much.
10:21Like, I think that he can have spiked weeks, but people look at best ball ADP and they think that that's like
10:27where Sutton will go in a season long draft, but he goes a lot higher.
10:31There's platforms like on, on Yahoo, where he's going ahead of guys like Parker Washington, Josh Downs, even some running backs that I like more.
10:38If you look at ESPN, he's going way higher than he's going over some very, very legitimate, you know, like, like guys
10:44that I have my top 25, top 30, a wide receiver on that platform.
10:48And maybe not in your league. He doesn't, that doesn't happen.
10:51But I mean, I've been in drafts already where Sutton's a more of a brand name household name, and it's a good
10:57offense that we want to invest in because of Sean Payton.
11:00And he's just not giving you that crazy upside.
11:02I just worry a lot about what this looks like with Jalen Waddle entering the picture, considering the fact that Sutton still
11:08only had a 21% target share last year without Jalen Waddle.
11:11I think it's a big, big problem. So he's just not someone that I'm going after this year.
11:16Yeah. It's hard to disagree with that one at all.
11:19I mean, he was outside of the top 40 and targets per out run and yards per out run last year.
11:25And like you said, just the against way weaker competition that we'll have this year and the run game should be better.
11:31That's when they really swerved into the past last year was after the Dobbins injury.
11:35And now that they have Jonah Coleman as insurance for if and when Dobbins, you know, uh, misses time for the season
11:41that they won't have to go extremely that pass heavy, that they'll be able to be a lot more balanced.
11:46And like you said, I mean, it wasn't even a five exam, but it was from weeks two to 11, and Troy
11:52Franklin outside and Tim, uh, out targeted Sutton outside and him too.
11:56Yeah. And what's crazy about that was especially with Jalen Waddle.
11:59Cause you think about Sutton and you're like, well, he'll still have like touchdown equity, right?
12:03Like he's the big clasher, but it was actually Franklin was out targeting him in the end zone and Troy Franklin.
12:09One of the weirder things about him is, is they had all these plays dialed up for him in the end zone.
12:15And he had like three, two point conversions too, which don't even count on like the end zone target stuff, but like
12:21that's all stuff like Jalen Waddle can do. And the other thing too, with adding Jalen Waddle is Sutton's going to have
12:27a lot more deeper, like depth of target. He's going to be not, he's going to lose some of those intermediate, like those fantasy smoothing routes.
12:34We don't want to lean just in on those guys that requires like playing the, the, the boundary X and doesn't get a lot of those free squares.
12:41So yeah, he's a guy I haven't, I haven't even thought about drafting once in like a managed league yet.
12:47But yeah, yeah. I mean, like I said, I think you could, you could make the case easily in best ball because
12:53you, your consideration set should be pretty wide in a best ball environment, but yeah.
12:57And season long in a managed league, it's a lot more difficult.
13:00All right, Rich, give me your, your next player here.
13:03Yeah. This one is one that I think some other gamers have too, and you've probably heard this one before too, but
13:09it's similar adjacency to my Jonathan Taylor take is not that I think this guy's going to be like, like brick out,
13:15but, but Devon Achan is, you know, he's just an a very unique case here.
13:19And especially with like a lot of the conversation that goes around him.
13:23So one thing I didn't bring up with Jonathan Taylor here, because it definitely applies more so for Devon Achan and Jonathan
13:29Taylor is you look at since 1990 yearly top three scores at the running back position.
13:33Like we talk about ceiling, right? Like ceiling is what we look for.
13:37They've played for teams. They averaged 9.9 wins per season.
13:39Just 17 of those backs, which is 16.7% played for teams that won fewer than eight games.
13:44If we extend that out to top six scores per year, those go, that goes to 9.6 wins per season.
13:50And over that same period, only 18.8% of those guys, um, uh, for top 12 guys, that is have been on teams
13:56that win six or fewer games in a season.
13:58Like you can do it because you know, 18%, that's what, you know, out of, out of 12 guys, we're still getting
14:04one to two of those guys a year. Right.
14:06So you still could be that one, but are you going to cut your teeth and say, I'm going to get the
14:12one, uh, we have a, and we have a few of these guys down here at the bottom this year, you know,
14:18you know, as to JT's down here, uh, Jeremiah love was pushing.
14:22I think we're going to see him not get there in terms of ADP.
14:26But the other thing too, with H and is, you know, he's clearly the best player that Miami has an offense.
14:31So it's easy to expect him being like the centerpiece of the offense, but we still need to price in some fragility with all these moving parts.
14:39The crazy part to me is that we already have a sample of this, right?
14:43Like he's played eight games without to a tongue of oil over the past two seasons.
14:47And in those games, you ever just 10 and a half PPR points per game is one RB one scoring week, uh,
14:53compared to 20.3 PPR points per game with two, a tongue of a low.
14:57And now we lose Mike McDaniel on top of that, uh, in the two games that two have missed last year, like things didn't bottom out.
15:04Use the RB 14, the RB 17, because again, that touch value, right?
15:0818 touches, 21 touches in those games, but we didn't have the ceiling that we were accustomed to.
15:13Uh, now we're getting, you know, um, this offensive Malik Willis, and it's just going to reduce the overall passing upside of this team.
15:19You know, with Malik Willis on the field for his career, offenses have thrown the ball 40 percent of the time.
15:25Uh, you know, in green Bay, it was 38.7%.
15:27It's, it's probably going to be proxy, just be higher than that, but they're going to be a run based team here.
15:33We talk about it all the time too, with like running backs attached to mobile passers.
15:38Um, Malik Willis is number one in the NFL since the NFL and scramble rate highest league 14 and a half percent.
15:44Now his target rate to running backs is only 10.2%, but it's going to go up by default of throwing to H
15:50and versus, you know, Josh Jacobs and, you know, Derek Henry, but it's still going to be something that lowers based on two.
15:56Uh, we saw H and play with Tyler Huntley.
15:59He ran 85 routes with Tyler Huntley and Tyler Huntley starts.
16:02He was targeted six times on those 85 routes.
16:04Um, and then when you talk about a lot of people say, well, Miami was already bad last year, right?
16:09I want to, let's add some context to the 2025 dolphins.
16:12This was a way more, uh, competent team that I think anyone remembers them being.
16:17They won seven games. They were 16th in rate of snaps led last year.
16:20One spot behind the Buffalo bills. They were 14th in snap rate trailing ahead of the lions ahead of the bills.
16:26They even led by double digits at the seventh highest rate in the NFL last year.
16:30Like this is not the same environment for a team that is favored in one game right now.
16:35They're projected to be 31st in scoring. They have an average margin, um, of spread of minus 6.9 points.
16:41It's only the Arizona Cardinals are worse. Uh, like these are not, these are not competitive, uh, comparable, you know, apples to apples, you know, environments.
16:48Like this is not where we hunt for upside in terms of team environment.
16:52Again, I think this is another guy that can maybe flirt with like being like an overall RB one.
16:57Like, but we talk about this all the time, JJ, this time of year where people cite like this guy was the
17:03RB nine or the RB 11, or even if from a points per game stance and just like, they don't apply any context, like what that actually meant.
17:10Right. Ask anyone if they are owning Ashton Jainty as an RB one last year, felt like they had an RB one when they set their lineup.
17:18Right. Right. And I think that's what we're getting here.
17:21I think this is going to be a very volatile weekly RB two that could finish as an RB one.
17:26Yeah. Just to give you some more context and some more data around the team environment stuff.
17:31Uh, we look at team environment score in the draft guide this year.
17:34Uh, it's really just a way of, of, um, putting a number to player ADP.
17:38So it just takes ADP of a certain team and it brings it together from an expected fantasy point score perspective.
17:44And the number itself doesn't need to make any sense to you, but, uh, uh, scores below 75 team environment scores below 75.
17:50There's been since 2014, 14 running backs drafted in the top 10 at the position with team environment scores below 75, which
17:56is where HN finds himself this year. Um, 12 of those 14 then played at least eight games that following season, that
18:02upcoming season, only three of them outperformed ADP expectation.
18:05And the average running back played two points per game below expected, which is not good.
18:09I mean, that's a really, really bad hit rate.
18:12So everything you said, I totally agree with. And I know that people are going to say again, in best ball, he
18:18goes later than what he goes on some of these platforms, CBS ESPN.
18:21He's the RB five. Realistically. Do I think Devon HN is going to have a higher target share than like Chase Brown this year?
18:28Probably maybe, but I think that it's probably closer than we would want to admit.
18:32And if it's closer than what we would want to admit, why would we be so anxious and ready to draft Devon
18:38HN over a guy like Chase Brown when we know the environment is completely stable?
18:42So, um, you know, that alone is a reason for me to, to be a little bit lower than the market on, on Devon HN.
18:49Okay. Next on my list, I already talked about one player from the Denver Broncos.
18:53So why not just double dip here and go with another one?
18:56I'm going to go with JK Dobbins as another player that I'm generally avoiding this year.
19:01And honestly, the logic's pretty similar to what I talked about with Cortland Sutton already, where, uh, I just see Dobbins as
19:07someone who is a, a single and not, uh, a, not even a double, I would argue, but just, just a single,
19:13uh, definitely not a home run type player in the middle rounds.
19:16And, you know, I know that, that people will look at his ADP and say, oh, but RJ Harvey's going higher than Dobbins and yada, yada.
19:23Well, first off on some platforms, that's not the case.
19:26Dobbins goes ahead of RJ Harvey on some platforms.
19:28But, uh, on the, uh, the other side of that is again, I'm shooting for upside.
19:33I would argue very strongly that the upside sits more with an RJ Harvey type, uh, who's a second year player.
19:38Yes. Had very questionable between the tackles numbers last year, but was a very good receiver way better than Dobbins.
19:44And I'll just talk about that now because I'm talking about Dobbins.
19:47So I would argue that Dobbins was in a near ideal situation last year before he got hurt.
19:52Uh, RJ Harvey wasn't playing a ton on early downs.
19:55We were getting that rotation in Denver, but Dobbins was seeing a lot of work in that Denver backfield.
20:00So my first question to people who are very pro Dobbins is, do you still think that he's going to see that same kind of work?
20:07I think most would say who are drafting him would say, yes, he's going to see that, that kind of work and
20:13that, you know, what, what he was getting pre-injury.
20:15I would argue them back. Why are you so excited about this, right?
20:19His workload, he ran around on just 30% of Denver's dropbacks last year when he was healthy.
20:24He had a 4.2% target share. His yards per route run rich was 0.32, which RJ Harvey was actually really strong on a per route run basis.
20:31So I see no reason for them to all of a sudden change things up and not use Harvey in that pass catching role.
20:38And there's really no indication that that's going to be the case.
20:41Uh, Dobbins was good on the ground. There's no doubt.
20:44Um, but the receiving profiles is really, really questionable.
20:46And if you look at how he actually performed on a points per game basis last year, he averaged 11.6 PPR points per game through week 10.
20:53Last year, JK Dobbins was the RB 24 and fantasy football under relatively ideal circumstances for him right now.
20:59And I say that because I don't think the workload is necessarily going to get better.
21:03All they did was add Jonah Coleman this off season who already has looked the part.
21:07I thought, you know, I think you and I both really liked him as a prospect within the context of this class, of course.
21:14Um, and then, you know, RJ Harvey's another year better or another year in, he might end up being a little bit better.
21:20So I just see Dobbins really paying off only if RJ Harvey gets hurt.
21:24Uh, and he, and Denver's able to use him more as a pass catcher.
21:28But even if that's the case, I think Jonah Coleman is still going to block him to some degree.
21:33And also we know that like, I'm making this argument against Dobbins without even mentioning the fact that he's hurt every year, right?
21:39That he's been banged up year in and year out.
21:42And, uh, I could see a scenario where Denver wants to keep him fresh and keep them going where they don't feed
21:48him that same workload that they did last year.
21:51And I think that's a huge reason as to why they went out and they got Jonah Coleman in the first place
21:57is that he's a very steady all around back.
21:59He can play a backup role to both RJ Harvey and JK Dobbins.
22:03And then on top of that, again, like Coleman himself could end up taking some of the goal line work in this
22:09offense because of his size, uh, and not wanting Dobbins to be so, so banged up.
22:13So all of that to say, this isn't an ambiguous backfield and I want to attack ambiguous backfields.
22:18I will attack ambiguous backfields. I've been drafting the most.
22:21If I look at this backfield and the three of them, I've gotten the most Jonah Coleman of the three because it's
22:27very cheap to just go that route. And I can see what happens more of a best ball thing because I haven't
22:33drafted so many teams to be able to say I'm definitively one way or another, but I definitely have been taking more RJ Harvey than JK Dobbins.
22:40Because again, if you look at trends and what's worked out historically out with middle round running backs, year two guys, pass
22:46catchers, and not overstating and overrating what they did on the ground the previous year, because ground game work does fluctuate quite a bit year over year.
22:53I don't think Harvey is more than likely going to be special or anything.
22:57Right. But I do think that there are outs here where he could still outperform ADP and be better than where he's being drafted right now.
23:04It's just really hard for me to get there with, with JK Dobbins and making that same argument.
23:09So, you know, to me, we've had this discussion before and I know that you're a big arbitrage guy, but all summer
23:15long, my arbitrage with JK Dobbins has just been Jordan Mason, who, you know, goes after, uh, at one point he was
23:21going like three or four rounds after, uh, it's the same kind of bet.
23:25I mean, you could even squint and say Chris Rodriguez is the same kind of, of bet even later.
23:30Right. Uh, I would, I would much rather be spending those costs on these, these two down profiles and going for JK Dobbins.
23:37Yeah. One hundred percent. I mean, there's a place it's a bummer because, you know, JK Dobbins is a guy I think
23:43a lot of people want to root for snake bit.
23:45He was, there's a place in the multiverse where this dude probably already has like, you know, 7,000 rushing yards, you know,
23:51at this point of his career, he was such a good prospect.
23:55He's just been, like I said, really snake bit, but 11, 11 receptions last year for 37 yards.
24:00Like this is he had one week last year where he finished as a top 24 running back without a touchdown.
24:05Like, so if he doesn't score a touchdown, he's basically giving you one unusable production.
24:09And even with touchdowns, his highest scoring game was 15 and a half PPR points.
24:13I did an article like five or six years ago on, you know, how running back to production in your weekly lineup
24:20is like the most replaceable commodity that you can find.
24:22And that's like what we have here. Like there's no sense of paying a premium for this archetype, even in non PPR,
24:28even if you're doing something that's half PPR or standard touchdown driven.
24:32You brought up Jordan Mason typically goes about two rounds after him, almost two full rounds.
24:36Chris Rodriguez. You can even squint and say when Zach Charbonnet comes back, this is what Zach Charbonnet is.
24:41You can even tell yourself a song on like, this is what Tyler Algier is, which is probably not, but you know, maybe.
24:47But you know, this, this type of guy is, is just so replaceable and it's a bummer.
24:52Like I said, he's on, he's on a good team.
24:55And you think like this archetype is, is going to get elevated because of that, but it's just not the case.
25:01Yeah. And I look, I know his ADP isn't out of control, but I don't want to use that as an excuse
25:07to draft players that I don't think can, can really give you that upside.
25:10Right. Like there's still an opportunity cost to a degree in that area of drafts because the opportunity costs are players who do have that kind of upside.
25:18Right. And like, again, it feels like I'm on an Island with this take.
25:22Cause it feels like a lot of analysts are way in on Dobbins this year and really do like him and hate
25:28RJ Harvey because he just wasn't very productive on the ground last year.
25:31But it's one of those things where like, we know historically ground game numbers fluctuate and what is stickier is the passing
25:37game work and how they, how they're deployed that way.
25:40Not only that, we know the Sean Payton offense favors pass catching running backs and has historically, I'm not to, I'm not,
25:46this isn't a pro Harvey argument by any means.
25:49Like I've been like one or two running back spots ahead of market with Harvey.
25:53It's not like a strong stance or anything like that.
25:55It's more so me just saying, I want to sit with the upside case and go with the upside play as opposed
26:01to drafting a player like JK Dobbins. Like maybe in some environments, if he falls and you really, you know, you went
26:07like hero RB and you really need a running, you just need some production at running back.
26:12You click Dobbins name, but it's even in that scenario, I'd rather just wait and try to get a Mason or something like that.
26:19Who I, I think Mason might even have more upside than Dobbins because there's just less in his way in terms of
26:25competition and in terms of really pass catching stuff.
26:27And like I said, Dobbins pass catching work last year, genuinely horrific.
26:30I mean like the yards per route run stuff, 0.32.
26:33You almost never see a player come back from that and give you a good target share the following season.
26:39So just a lot of reasons why I'm out on that.
26:42All right. Give me your next player, Rich. All right.
26:44I started with at least some players at the top here.
26:47Now I'm going to soften up a little bit.
26:50But, and this, this one's interesting because usually one of the tried and true ways I play fantasy football is, you know,
26:56if a guy makes like a giant price market jump from the previous year, it was like a cheap player that became real expensive.
27:02I'm always kind of, I always kind of questioned that of paying the iron price.
27:07And then inversely, when a player was really high priced and falls, I'm like, you know, more open to saying, Hey, I'm going to buy the discount.
27:14But in this case, I've had a really hard time warming up to Brian Thomas Jr.
27:18He's coming off of that down second season. You know, obviously I just don't think he was a fit for Liam Cohen's,
27:24you know, system, which more of the, like the, the intermediate crossing routes.
27:28And, you know, he played through, you know, wrist and shoulder injuries, you know, that didn't help those things.
27:33But when the Jaguars kind of found their footing, cause this is, I think a lot of people forget like the Jaguars
27:39were like an awful offense for like the first eight weeks.
27:42Like it was absolutely horrendous. When they found their stride is when they made the trade for Jacoby Myers and then the
27:48elevation of Parker Washington to the Travis Hunter injury.
27:51Everyone kind of found their stride with Brian Thomas Jr.
27:53Then in that point was playing the X wide receiver in this offense.
27:57We had Park Washington and Jacoby Myers kind of fluctuated between slot Z a little bit of sprinkling for slot stuff for Brian Thomas.
28:03It was mostly those two guys that were intermixed.
28:06And when all three wide outs were on the field together, they were on the field for 106 routes together.
28:11And Thomas was third on that trio in target rate per out run at 17 percent, 21 percent for Myers, 26 percent for Parker Washington.
28:18I mean, Liam Cohen has said some positive things about Brian Thomas Jr.
28:22this season. But dude, he talks like he talks about Parker Washington like he is blood.
28:26Like, but but the thing is, they've already said like Brian Thomas Jr.
28:30is basically going to play primarily X in this offense.
28:32And from week 10 on, he averaged 17 air yards per target.
28:3633 percent of his targets are 20 or more yards downfield.
28:39That is a very, very tough way to live as a viable weekly fantasy target.
28:43I mean, it's just really you need those like we talk about those smoothing targets, those freebies that in a sense like this.
28:49He was basically operating like Jacksonville, Kayshawn Booty. That's like what his role is in the offense.
28:54And so if we think he's going to play primarily X and like I said, he can still get a little bit of sprinkling.
29:00This Jacksonville schedule in terms of what they face in terms of outside perimeter play.
29:04And I'm like no like wide receiver cornerback like we have to fade all these guys.
29:09But listen to this schedule for Brian Thomas Jr.
29:11Denzel Ward, Patrick Sertan, Christian Gonzalez, DJ Turner, Quinion Mitchell, Derek Stingley, by week sauce Gardner.
29:16That is eight weeks of the seat. You're eight weeks into the season.
29:19What week are you going to be like, I am confident putting Brian Thomas Jr.
29:23in my weekly lineup? Like you were just hoping he scores a touchdown or cashes in a big play.
29:28Like it's it's just really hard for me. I think with all the tea leaves that saying like he's in a role
29:34in the offense that's not going to be conducive for consistent fantasy points and then it's going to run up against I
29:40think the worst of the defensive opponents that Jacksonville faces over those opening two months.
29:44I have a hot hot take. I think we might see Brian Thomas Jr.
29:48in some like shallow managed leagues outright released like at some point earlier in the 2026 season.
29:53Yeah, I mean, I could see it. That was I remember, you know, I was doing that early season schedule analysis episode.
29:59And I referenced a lot of sharp football stuff with the secondary rankings and whatnot.
30:03And Jacksonville popped up as a OK, this could actually be pretty tough the first half of the season.
30:08Like it's it's a very, very tough schedule. And obviously, you know, you noted him seeing the toughest matchups in that offense,
30:14a wide receiver is it could end up being really tough.
30:17I hate to use this. I do think he is a better in basketball type player because the because the big playability
30:23is certainly there for for a player like him.
30:26Right. But I do think that there's going to be a lot of that unpredictability to your point, you know, in the way that this offense functions.
30:33And it just, you know, all these all these signs just point to Parker Washington just being being a I mean, some
30:39of these platforms, he's still going so late. Washington.
30:42I'm still getting him at, you know, past way past wide receiver 30 price tags.
30:46And to me, he's just like easy, easily the best Jacksonville wide receiver in fantasy this year.
30:50And this this just plays into that a little bit more.
30:53You made a great point. It's I think a lot of people think about better in a basketball is just like the big play archetype.
31:00But it's not necessarily that it's it's because J.K.
31:03Dobbins fits that mold, too. It's just knowing that you get the weeks that they hit in your lineup.
31:08Right. And they but in a managed league, like you have to guess that, like if you want to get Brian Thomas, Jr.
31:14Right. Like you basically just have to leave him and you're going to have to just leave him in the lineup.
31:20Right. And you're always going to question it. Like when you're looking, you're going to be like, oh, Brian Thomas, Jr.
31:26is going to it's Patrick Sertan this week. Well, my wide receiver five has a pretty good matchup.
31:31Should I go with should I go with him instead?
31:33Like that's what it's going to be like, I think, for the first two months of the year.
31:38I've taken I've taken Brian Thomas in one league so far out of the many managed leagues that I've drafted.
31:44And the one that I took him in was one of the Kings Classic ones.
31:48It was the auction. And the reason for that.
31:50Well, I was kind of getting it was kind of scary with one of the players in that.
31:55I mean, it's a crazy draft 14 team. But there's deep starting starting lineups, too.
31:59Right. Where I think a player like this is a lot easier to take on when you don't have to make those decisions.
32:06Right. Where you're just like, I'm just going to take the lows with the highs and then allow the other guys in
32:12the lineup to just kind of, you know, be the baseline for me.
32:15But if you're starting two or three wide receivers, especially if it's like a two wide receiver, one flex league, you're just
32:21not somebody that's very appealing because of how unpredictable and volatile that production is going to be.
32:26So and again, like I was going to say this, like the Dobbins thing, you bring that up.
32:31I think that he's another guy in Chris Rodriguez.
32:33And like they're probably better in best ball players than they are managed because, yes, they're going to fall into the end zone.
32:39We don't know exactly when that's going to happen.
32:42And you don't have that baseline of them being, you know, reliable receivers to give you at least some production on the ground.
32:48So I'm with you. It's not it's not only the big play ability because, I mean, certainly J.K.
32:53Dobbins, you wouldn't look at him and be like, oh, this is a huge big play guy.
32:58But, you know, it's just the unpredictability aspect of things.
33:00And it used to be the receiving running backs a week.
33:03That archetype has kind of gone away a little bit like the James Whites, because you never knew when James White was going to catch 10 passes.
33:11But best ball, he actually was undervalued because you just get those weeks when he got them.
33:15Yeah, exactly. When game script went south. Yeah. All right.
33:18I'm going to move on from the the Broncos.
33:21I'm not going to name all. Give us another Bronco.
33:23Do you go next? Waddle would be on the other side of this list.
33:27You know, we'll go with we'll go with Matthew Stafford right now.
33:31I think that the quarterback market is pretty sharp this year, and it's it's kind of hard to really have like a hardcore fade.
33:37I'm just saying Stafford, because if you do look at some season long platforms, QB eight on ESPN right now, which is a lot higher than I expected.
33:45QB 12 on CBS. I think Yahoo. It's a little bit more reasonable.
33:48The market is getting smarter, though. So dating back to 2014, we've had 13 quarterbacks earn an ADP after posting a touchdown
33:54rate of at least seven percent while averaging fewer than five fantasy points per game via rushing the previous season.
34:00So they weren't doing much on the ground, but they gave you that outlier touchdown rate season.
34:04Every single one of those quarterbacks the following year were top 10 options, and the majority of them, the average was in
34:10the QB five to QB six range. So the fact that that Matthew Stafford is at the highest being drafted as a
34:16low end QB one tells me that the market's getting sharper because we know that touchdown rates regress.
34:21Stafford had a 7.7 percent touchdown rate last year of those 13 quarterbacks I just mentioned, 12 of them played at least eight games the following year.
34:29And of those 12s, these are guys who had a 7 percent touchdown rate or better.
34:33They averaged only 18 points per game the following year, which, you know, they the majority of them played below expectation.
34:39You know, obviously the Rams are going to be good this year more than likely.
34:43So I don't I don't want to discount that.
34:45But dating back to 2014, I think we also have to recognize that last year's Rams were third and passing touchdowns per game.
34:52They were sixth and total touchdowns per game. That's all NFL teams across all those seasons since 2014.
34:57That was on a team, though. There's also 28th in yards per play.
35:00So they weren't as strong. There's really good at converting last year.
35:03There was just a very, very strong offensive team.
35:06And they were ninth in percentage of drives across that time frame that ended in a touchdown.
35:11So, you know, it was a very efficient offense that I question, you know, will they be able to do that and repeat that year over year?
35:18I'd also argue that the defense could end up being a lot better.
35:21But I just think that it's a it's a tough bet when I don't really see much of a difference between Matthew Stafford and like Jared Goff.
35:29You know, like I don't think there's any real difference from a projection standpoint.
35:33I'd maybe give Stafford the edge like a 52 to 48 type edge.
35:36But that's not what ADP is going to show.
35:39You're going to be able to get Goff multiple rounds after that, you know, on a lot of these sites.
35:44And then obviously there's players that you can draft late this year that are going to give you that three to five point per game with their legs.
35:52That's just really difficult for, you know, we know Matthew Stafford is not going to get there.
35:56He's going to be under one this year. So, you know, all that I don't think Stafford's terrible in like the QB 15 range to QB 17 range.
36:04That's fine. But if you're drafting him as a low end QB one, this is the kind of profile that we generally
36:10generally should be fading year over year. I mean, this is since we've been doing this show, I'm trying to think how
36:16many years we've actually done this home and home, I think five or six.
36:20And I think the previous year quarterback that had the seven and a half percent touchdown rate has been a staple of this of this program every year.
36:28I think it was Baker Mayfield last year. I don't remember who it was.
36:31If you just go down and check each year, it'll be that guy.
36:35And, you know, just unfortunate Stafford. I mean, the Rams definitely were trying to get him at one point, get him to MVP.
36:41Like, it's just, it's just try to chew it.
36:44I mean, he, it's crazy how many more touchdowns he had last year than the pre and you can't just say it was only Devante Adams.
36:51You know, like you can't point to that and be like, oh yeah, he threw 17 more touchdowns because of that.
36:57He does have one other 40 touchdown season with the Rams.
37:00But I mean, you look at, so last year, the Rams as a team, they, they reached the red zone or scored
37:06a long range touchdown by proxy to skipping the red zone on 54.2% of their drives.
37:10Only the 2007 Patriots have a higher, had a higher rate than that.
37:14And then you just look at the short yardage touchdowns that he had.
37:1773% of their touchdowns were through the air last season.
37:20The previous three years, the Rams are at 59 and a half percent, 59.1, 51.6%.
37:24Like it was, it's just so much stuff lines up where they were just trying to get him these touchdowns.
37:29They're like natural aggression, probably a little bit of a boost for the running touchdowns to be up.
37:34Like you said, they're probably going to be in a little more.
37:38If the defense is this good, they'll be in better scripts.
37:41You remember at the end of the year when their cornerbacks got really banged up and, you know, they had Trent McDuffie and Jalen Watson this year too.
37:48That's when they started to get involved in like a little bit of shootouts at the end of the year.
37:54You know, they had, they, they outright just lost to Atlanta chasing points.
37:57They actually had to score a lot of points against the Cardinals, even in like week 18, when they played their starters,
38:03they played that crazy game against in Seattle, right?
38:06They got, that got pushed. The Lions pushed them in a game as well.
38:10They ran away in the second half. So there's all these things lined up that just converge on Stafford, you know, hitting that, that touchdown rate.
38:17I think he's still like a, like a solid bet.
38:19Like if you want them in like your two QB leagues and stuff, you can, and he's affordable.
38:24Like if you still want to just like, if you break glass, right?
38:28Like if you keep pushing the position and he's there.
38:31Yeah. I don't think he's going to be like a, a throwaway pick at like QB 14, QB 15 when he slides in those leagues at all.
38:38But that's where he should be priced because you're not getting any rushing equity and these pocket passers.
38:43We just have so many of them down the line.
38:46Even he going where he is at a fair price.
38:48Like you said, has arbitrage options, you know, Jared Goff.
38:51I would argue Jordan Love is an arbitrage option on him as well.
38:55So like, yeah, right. Yeah. There's just no, basically this is just the PSA to just not reach for Matthew Stafford.
39:00Right. Is what this really comes down to. 100%.
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39:38All right, man. Next one for you. I'm going to stay at quarterback too.
39:42Like you said, it's really hard to like really push back on anyone that says like, hey, I'm in at this quarterback.
39:48I think the market's price fit pretty fair. But I think in the pocket where he still goes, Patrick Rahulme's still been
39:54the toughest click for me, I think, at the position for like guys that you actually like that get drafted in every draft.
40:00You know, Patrick Rahulme set the bar so high in his career that I feel like we've, one, overlooked exactly what the
40:06Chiefs have given us passing and what he's giving us passing the last like three years.
40:10And then like us just like always are constantly chasing like that ghost of what we saw the ceiling, right?
40:16When a player or like a team shows you their ceiling, it feels like, man, like what if they just get that back?
40:22Because this is the cheapest Mahomes has ever been.
40:25That's the argument you always hear, right? Like this is the cheapest Mahomes has ever been.
40:29And I do think if you're in like a 2QB super flex keeper league, he is appealing in those formats because in
40:352027, the offense could just be outright different again.
40:37And he's a year removed from the ACL. But over the past three years, Patrick Mahomes is 17th in the NFL in completion rate.
40:44He is 23rd in yards per pass attempt. He is 20th in touchdown rate.
40:48He is 20th in interception rate. From just that passing points perspective, he's not been good.
40:52And now what has helped him last year was that he was the QB4 in points per game because he ran more than ever.
40:59He had 25% of his fantasy points came from rushing alone.
41:02That was the highest rate of his career. He himself, even before we get to the injury, has said, I think I
41:08maybe was running too much last year. And he's coming off the ACL.
41:11So we just can't count on that. Even if he does like start to ramp up and he does scramble more as the season goes on.
41:18The passing stuff is really hard to bank on coming back.
41:21Because a lot of people say, well, Matt Nagy's gone.
41:24And they're getting Eric Biennemi. But like Eric Biennemi's overlap also is apex-tyree kill.
41:28Prime Travis Kelsey. What did Eric Biennemi do after he left Kansas City to give you a vote of confidence and say, you know what?
41:35It was probably Eric Biennemi. That's why this law worked out.
41:38So bringing him back is going to work out.
41:40Matthew Harmon brought this up. And far be it from us to push back on anything Andy Reid is going to do
41:46in his career because he's going to walk right into the Hall of Fame.
41:50And he's been an incredible head coach. But when you look at the way the NFL has tried to solve for this
41:56defensive meta, you could argue the Chiefs were at the forefront of driving us to this point.
42:01They have not done the easy button stuff. They're not doing the under center pre-stamp motion stuff.
42:05Now they're going to do some of that more this year with Kenneth Walker.
42:09But they never changed anything with their wide receiver room.
42:12I mean, the big thing that's happened while the NFL has changed defenses is the Chiefs have gone the opposite way.
42:18Teams have just tried to play more man coverage against them because they don't respect their wide receiver room.
42:23You look at the man coverage stuff for Mahomes the past year.
42:26He's been 26th in quarterback rating, 21st in completion rate, 28th in yards or pass attempt.
42:31And they run this offense through a very Debo Samuel-esque player and Rasheed Rice.
42:34Great for fantasy that he's used that way. Xavier Worthy, you know, if you want to give him a hall pass for a year or two, that's fine.
42:42But like we still have to take a step of faith that he's going to play better in year three.
42:48He still has an undersized receiver. You put hands on him.
42:51Can he beat man coverage? And then on top of all this, I mean, Kansas City has a gauntlet.
42:56I mean, they have a rough paper. They opened the year with Denver in week one.
43:00They have a little soft little pocket. But remember, Mahomes is a week five bye.
43:04So he's the earliest bye. So you have to plan on like you might not want to play him in week one because he faces Denver.
43:11And then he has a week five bye. So you need a quarterback for him in that.
43:16So you're probably taking two quarterbacks with Patrick Mahomes and one quarterback leagues.
43:20And then outside the bye, Chargers, Seahawks, Broncos. Like those aren't going to be spots where you're going to count on like
43:26pure passing volume to get you there. And then, you know, in the fantasy playoffs at the end of the year, it's it's rough.
43:32And like that there's fluidity there. Like we could have injuries.
43:35These defenses could not look as good by the time we get to that point of the season.
43:40But, you know, Patriots, 49ers, Chargers, like you're not excited about those on paper either.
43:44So when I look at Mahomes and some of the guys going after him, I just think like they're still just outright
43:50better clicks to keep waiting at the position. And there are still guys after him that I think give you do a
43:56little bit of that dual dual purpose, that like duality that give you a little bit of rushing, you know, depending on,
44:02you know, where where, you know, Jackson Darko's we got Bo Nix in there.
44:06Like we brought up even Stafford going after like Stafford is probably arbitrage of Mahomes now and maybe is even better.
44:12Yeah. So, yeah, I get it. I get all the things like the cache of the Mahomes brand and the prices as cheap as there have been.
44:19But I still think he's a really tough click where he's at.
44:22Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm with you. Look, he had 5.2 points per game last year via rushing his previous career.
44:28How was three and a half? I mean, it was very clearly a totally different season on the ground for him.
44:34Now he's coming off an ACL. And oh, by the way, they finally invested in a running back who is good, right?
44:40That can create explosives. I think that there's a very real chance that we just see them completely change the way they
44:46operate too close to the end zone, which is going to be a really big deal for his fantasy value.
44:51He's also been like the crazy thing is that there's been all this Cyrus Allen hype, which you know, I think is it's fine.
44:58Like he was he was an interesting day three pick, but they almost like need him to hit the way that this offense is situated right now.
45:05Like they need that piece and that that versatility of the offense because like Cyrus Allen's profile was pretty vertical and in
45:11college and he was able to I mean, he played a decent bit in the slot, but he played outside too.
45:17He had some verticality to his game and I think it would I mean, it would be mega helpful if they just
45:23like had a hit at wide receiver because it's just how they've been operating is just not as you said not been working.
45:29So I'm with you with my homes and him coming off the ACL assuming that he can maintain some of that rushing
45:35production is to me a little bit foolish, especially because they added Kenneth Kenneth Walker to the mix.
45:40All right, my next player I will go with I'm going to go with Travion Henderson next.
45:45So I look I was in on Henderson last year.
45:47It was a mistake. Yeah, I regret my not really well sort of my process, but obviously the end decision he had his moments.
45:54I don't think he was nearly as big of a bus as he could have been, but obviously it ended up being
46:00not a great season for Travion Henderson. I look at what's going on right now in New England.
46:05The drumbeat is pretty loud in Ramond Ray Stevenson's favor.
46:08I would say at least it's not moving in Travion Henderson's favor and our baseline in my opinion should be that Ramond
46:14Ray Stevenson is the lead back in the backfield or at least like the RB 1A.
46:18Look at what happened in the playoffs last year.
46:20Stevenson had a 71% snap share to Henderson's 31%, 13% target share to Henderson's 5%, 55% route share to Henderson's 25%.
46:26And last year in total, because of this resurgence that Stevenson had during the second half of the year, he was so
46:32much better the second half of the year versus the first half of the year.
46:36He was first among qualified running backs and rushing yards over expected per rush according to next gen stats.
46:41He was also first and catch rate over expected among qualified running backs according to next gen stats.
46:46So he was both good on the ground and through the air.
46:50Ramond Ray was all while being, as we know, the better pass blocker and the guy who was better in pass pro.
46:56And so I look at what's going on here and I worry, you know, I know there was a recent report about
47:02how we could see a 50 50 split where Ramond Ray gets the early down stuff and the short yardage and goal
47:08line work and Travion plays more on third downs, but there was a caveat that said, if the pass pro holds, and that's a big caveat.
47:15Like that's a really big deal. Last year when, when Ramond Ray Stevenson was healthy, he had an 88% long down in distance snap rate.
47:22Whereas Travion Henderson, if you include the games that Ramond Ray was out was under 30%.
47:26So they use Ramond Ray Stevenson in those scenarios.
47:29And I think the, the pass pro stuff is a very real concern because as they were using Ramond Ray, the, the
47:35Patriots last year ran just 27% of their plays while trailing.
47:38That was the lowest in the league. The schedule is tougher this year.
47:41So that's a number that's going to be hard to maintain.
47:44And if that's the case, Stevenson played twice as many snaps as Travion Henderson did last year when the Patriots were behind.
47:50So I'm just very, very worried. Like I get the allure with Travion Henderson.
47:54Trust me. I fell into it last year. I get the big playability and historically rich, like what he did as a rookie running back.
48:01If you look at his explosive run rate, uh, you know, his big playability, those guys do generally pan out at a decent rate moving forward.
48:08The difference between what I talked about with like the, the Denver backfield to what I'm talking about here with new England's,
48:14because you know, everyone knows that I'm a, an analyst.
48:17I want you that, that will tell you to chase upside.
48:20Once you get into like the middle rounds and stuff, Travion Henderson's got a pretty big opportunity cost where he's going.
48:25This is not a RJ Harvey situation where you can get him two rounds later or three rounds later when there's a
48:31very, very big drop in the kind of wide receivers and honestly, other running backs that you will be drafting him over.
48:37You know, like I'll take Deandre Swift over Travion Henderson all day.
48:41You know, like I, I think he's a, a far better pick than Henderson.
48:44I would argue very strongly that Bayshall Tootin, despite the reports right now has a higher ceiling than Travion Henderson does because
48:50the environment he's in, maybe you could say is a little bit worse.
48:54I wouldn't even argue it's a, it's a substantially worse, but the competition's Chris Rodriguez was Ramondre Stevenson, right?
48:59Um, of course you would say, Oh, the Travion Henderson's, uh, you know, talent profiles better.
49:04Sure. I get it. But I think that you're at least like having those discussions very, very easily and clearly.
49:09And so there's a lot of opportunity costs of running, running back, but there's also opportunity costs of wide receiver, like Christian Watson types, right?
49:16Guys who have a lot of upside as your wide receiver three that you're going to be drafting Travion Henderson over.
49:22Uh, when Henderson to me, you know, I think he's going to enter the season as it at the very best, the one B in this backfield.
49:29Um, so at this moment, and I had this decision that I had to make in our apex league that we're in
49:35and, uh, where there was a big drop off where, but I needed to go running back and there was a big
49:41drop off both running back and wide receiver. So it was fine to, to go this direction, but I just took Ramondre
49:47Stevenson straight up over Travion Henderson in that draft.
49:50And, uh, it was, to me, it's just the safer bet at this moment.
49:53Um, and one where if you are a little bit thin at running back, um, and you don't have the opportunity to
49:59sort of just like shoot for the moon and chase that ceiling.
50:03I do think you should go Ramondre in those situations.
50:05And I do have Ramondre, I think in the same tier, but ranked ahead of Henderson right now, because I'm worried about
50:11what this will look like when we saw the success that they had when Ramondre was more so the lead back.
50:17Um, this is a very tough backfield, uh, to diagnose like for in terms of just like, cause all right, so let's
50:23say we simulate this season 10 times. I would say what six to seven times out of the simulation.
50:28It's just like both these guys are like hurting each other and then you get a vice versa.
50:33Like when, uh, you know, guys go down and so it'd be very hard.
50:37I think when you, cause it's even Ramondre outside of the playoff stretch when the kind of the chips are on the table.
50:43And remember Henderson had like a late season concussion.
50:46They'd open the door back up for, you know, Stevenson, like the Stevenson stuff's like very small sample stuff too.
50:51Then when you look at just kind of like from a ceiling perspective, I mean, Henderson had the Hyatt's yardage total for
50:57either of these backs and it came in a game with Stevenson playing, uh, that was the Buffalo game.
51:03Uh, and then he had Henderson actually had seven of the top 11 yardage totals of this backfield of the season last year.
51:09Right. But then it's just like, if you, so like, how does this work with both guys?
51:13Like you almost have to have a Detroit lions type run out where it's your pattern matching like Henderson is Gibbs and Stevenson's Monty.
51:20Right. And like, that's just really hard. Like it's just really hard to have two running backs on a team operate to that degree.
51:27This Patriots offensive line is good. Like if you would get it, but like you said, the, uh, the, the schedule is
51:33a lot harder to bank on that. They added AJ Brown.
51:36They added Romeo Dobbs. So they're going to have like two full-time receivers when last year they had no full-time receivers.
51:41It's a, it's a very tough team. I think from a fantasy projection stance outside of just saying, you know, AJ Brown's going to be a good pick.
51:49Yeah. Um, so I've had a real hard time.
51:51And then, so the thing is like, I want to be in on Henderson, the player he's like what I look for,
51:57you know, the, the upside, like the four 50 yard touchdowns.
52:00We haven't had a rookie running back to this and Saquon.
52:03We haven't had a player have two games at multiple 50 yard touchdown runs since Chris Johnson in 2009.
52:09Like this is the level of player we're working with, but you brought up the big thing with Travion Henderson is the cost.
52:15Like this guy's going in just a hotbed of one, how I've been building my teams in 2026.
52:20I'm almost always taking wide receivers where his pocket comes up.
52:23And then like you brought up too, even the running backs, he's going like, even in full PPR, he's going like right
52:29after David Montgomery, who we know is going to have more touches and maybe more touchdown equity.
52:34Uh, you know, you're, you brought up basial too, and he's kind of sandwiched in between those guys, you know, Jadarian price
52:40could Jadarian price like hit early in the season enough to like where if Charbonnet comes back, he's just, the things are
52:46in motion and he's got that, that body of work and he's taking over.
52:49There's just a lot of stuff around his pocket.
52:52You can even kind of start to talk yourself into like looking at the QB ones in that range too.
52:57I really, I rarely am, but also the, the tight ends in that range too, are, are a little bit more appealing too.
53:04So he just really falls into a pocket where he's just a tough click because I just feel like so much more
53:10confidence in every other player around him, uh, even, even for me.
53:13So auctions are where I'm targeting him. Like to kind of dabble just the seeks, you mitigate some of the opportunity costs
53:19in auctions and then maybe some large field stuff where just the running back pool gets diluted because everyone's hammering these running backs earlier.
53:25And you know, who knows if we have the, if the next three weeks go like this weekend, the whole, there's be
53:31some jostling in that RB two range anyways. Yeah.
53:34Yeah. I mean, look, I do want to be clear.
53:37Like, I think that Travion Henderson is fine in a running back heavy build.
53:40If, if, if you go that direction, like the problem though is, is, you know, if you're going running back heavy and
53:46you're starting robust RB and you have like two or three in the first four rounds, my argument would be, you should
53:53be taking a wide receiver in round five. You know, you shouldn't be thinking about going Travion Henderson's direction at the early
53:59parts of that, of that round, but let's just pretend that he slips.
54:02Right. And you have a couple of, of wide receivers and you already have two or three running backs early.
54:08I think it's fine if he slips to like the sixth and he's there and that totally, you know, that that's what
54:14we're talking about when we're talking about liking players or not liking players on today's episode versus their cost.
54:19I think Henderson makes a lot of sense for a lot of builds.
54:22My bottom line is that, you know, you have to speak to what is most likely going to happen, which is ADP.
54:28And again, I just think that there's a lot of running, like there's, there's, to me, there's a lot more, there's just
54:34more safety concerns with him based on the fact that Ramond Ray is, is more than likely at least going to start
54:40the season as, as their lead guy. And then maybe Travion starts to take over a little bit.
54:45I just don't see this as the same kind of scenario as like a Denver backfield or something where the cost is
54:51so much different and where you, and honestly too, like once you get into like the early sixties and drafts, that's when
54:57there's a very clear drop off in my opinion, at both running back and wide receiver.
55:02And, and right before that, I can see him being at the bottom of, of that like final tier of guys like
55:08at the, you know, end of the, end of the fifth, into the sixth round.
55:12That's where I think he belongs more, but he's not usually there in the end.
55:16And like I said, if you want to play it a little bit safer and you need, you know, again, that was my RB two situations.
55:23I went really wide receiver heavy in that draft.
55:25I would then just take Ramondre Stevenson over Travion Henderson, but I have them in the same tier because that's giving you
55:31this idea of, okay, what does my team build look like right now?
55:35Okay. I can then pivot to which guy I want based on what I've done earlier in the draft.
55:40But I think there's a lot of risk with Henderson.
55:43I like him as a player. I'm still optimistic about his future.
55:46I just worry a little bit about what we're going to see here in 2026.
55:50I think that that apex draft that we're, we're in and you know, a lot of people that are listening to show
55:56a lot of people that they are familiar with are in that draft, you know, Ian Harder, it's Mike Clay, Sean Siegel, Matthew Harmon.
56:03And in Travion Henderson, I believe that's where he was priced appropriately.
56:06And he went to a team roster construction that made sense for him.
56:10Right. Exactly. I actually had a chance to take him and I took Jerry and price over him as my RB three
56:16and he would have been my RB three, but he went RB 27 at pick what?
56:2060, 71. He had picked 71. And honestly, it might even be later than where I would have taken him.
56:26You know what I mean? Like it was like, I, but you're right.
56:29I think that's about where he should probably be going.
56:32Just given the risk. Yeah. And he went to a team that had Jameer gives us RB one and then just hammered
56:38wide receiver afterwards and said, I'm fine having this volatility, but upside as my RB two.
56:42And that team also grabbed Jordan Mason later is kind of like the, even maybe, maybe like a insulation on that part too.
56:49But that's kind of, I think where you see like a group of, I don't want to pet us.
56:54Maybe removing myself sharp individuals. You know, this is kind of where you see, like when you get a bunch of people
57:00that are like playing the game inherently, like the way we, we believe we're playing it optimally all in the same room and where he's priced.
57:07That's it feels right. Yeah. Yeah. Agreed. Agreed. All right.
57:10You have one more to go over, but it's more than one here.
57:13So, so let us, let us hear it. Yeah.
57:16I'm cheating. And it's funny because you, you know, you were heading down the Denver Broncos path, but obviously there are Broncos you want to draft.
57:23But my last kind of, you know, fade here is the Arizona Cardinals.
57:26That's a collective. Yeah. And let me break this down as it goes to each position too.
57:31And I'll try to do my best here. Cause I don't want to just like hammer.
57:35I don't take like 15 minutes on each player.
57:38The Cardinals are the only team this year, not favored in any game entering the year.
57:42They're protected score. The fewest points in the NFL.
57:45I do believe there's enough talent here to where they aren't 32nd in points.
57:48Yeah. But then this team got absolutely ramrodded by the schedule this year.
57:52So the NFL, we know your opponents, right? Like it's, it's set, but the, where you play and when you play these
57:58teams is up to the league, Arizona opens the year against the chargers, the Seahawks, the 49ers, the giants, the lions, the
58:04Rams, the Broncos, the Cowboys, the Seahawks, the Rams, the chiefs, the commanders and the Eagles week 14 by there are two
58:10spots on there where you're like, eh, that could be okay.
58:13Not only are they front loaded against teams that literally, I just ran off a bunch of Superbowl contenders to compound matters.
58:19They play four home games through 11 weeks and their four home games are against the Seahawks, the lions, the Broncos and the Rams.
58:26So like they have to go on the road when you're like, yeah, giants could be fine.
58:30Right. Or like, uh, you know, uh, commanders have to go on the road for those games too.
58:35So it's even like, they didn't even get a hall pass on there.
58:39Uh, this team too. I think when a lot of people are looking at the Cardinals and saying, Hey, what, what happened
58:45last year, if they're bad again, we can run that, that back.
58:48And like, it just can't, like, you have to look at what happened to the 2025 Arizona Cardinals in isolation.
58:53Like not only did Kyler Murray get injured, their entire backfield got injured.
58:57No running back even carried the ball a hundred times for them this season.
59:01The offensive line, their most frequent offensive line combinations on the field for 23% of their snaps.
59:05It was 26th in the league. The defense was obliterated on injuries at every level.
59:10The final nine games of the year, the Cardinals led for 47 offensive plays.
59:13Only the Raiders and jets had fewer. And just that intersection of events created an offensive environment that you just don't see year over year be sustainable.
59:21Uh, at the end of the year, Trey McBride ran 694 routes, just under 700 routes.
59:25It was the most ever by a tight end since we've had route data.
59:29The previous high was 623. To add some context to this, the average tight end, tight end one, like a high usage
59:35tight end runs 30 to 35 routes per game.
59:37So this, so Trey McBride essentially last year played 22 football games last year.
59:41He ended up running 120 routes more than the next tight end, which was Kyle Pitts, which is basically four extra games worth.
59:48Um, and what that did is it created, um, the largest tight end one to tight end two disparity in league history.
59:54Uh, Kyle Pitts only produced 66.7% of Trey McBride's total.
59:56It was only the third time since 1990 that a tight end two failed to produce 75% of the tight end one output.
60:03And just the 10th time over the past 35 years, we've had the tight end two be fewer than 80% of the tight end ones.
60:09So even if you believe Trey McBride's going to be the tight end one again, which I still think he's going to
60:15be fine in the context of tight end scoring.
60:18Um, you just have to bet on the field being better versus the tight end one this season.
60:23Uh, and then, you know, that all bled into Michael Wilson was, you know, second in the NFL was 630 routes run.
60:29We had a 330 route sample of him with Marvin Harrison on the field and he only was target on 12% of his routes.
60:35Even when the back half of the season, you know, happened, uh, and Marv came back and played and we already saw
60:41Michael Wilson, like build up some head of steams.
60:44It completely reverted back to Marvin Harrison. Uh, you know, his, his target per route rate was only 17.9% of his routes
60:50with Marvin Harrison after Jacoby Brissett took over. And then Marvin Harrison Jr.
60:53We're just three years in and you're saying like, what do we have here?
60:57Then when you look at the Cardinals and I said that schedule, I, that week 14 by is the big point that
61:03I want to bring up because if we don't believe the Cardinals have enough wins by week 14 and their schedule actually
61:09is okay for the fantasy playoffs, we have to believe that's at least the point that the final firewall where Carson Beck's
61:15not playing and they're just giving him a look the final month because they're going to be in the mix to draft
61:21a 2027 quarterback and they just have to see him against live fire.
61:25We could see him earlier than that too, but that's the firewall where I think we see Carson Beck.
61:30And then we're counting on Carson Beck in the fantasy playoffs to carry our guys.
61:34And it's just a really tough bet. I'm actually pretty neutral with the market.
61:38Like in Jeremiah love and where I was before this weekend, we'll see kind of what, where everything kind of settles at with where he kind of is.
61:46Um, but like, I just look at this team and I look at their whole team environment and I factor in like,
61:52where we're going to be looking at these guys down the fantasy stretch.
61:55And I just kind of say like, I'm going to probably go in another direction versus all these guys.
62:00Yeah. I'm, I'm a hundred percent with you. Um, even, you know, Marvin Harrison jr.
62:04I'm a couple of spots below, you know, consensus wide receiver wise.
62:08I'm a decent bit below with Michael Wilson because of the splits last year and Trey McBride technically my, my tenant too
62:14still, but like where he gets drafted in the context of where Brock Bowers goes, I have a much, much bigger gap between those two.
62:21Um, and I think McBride should go like more in like the later third, as opposed to like the late second, you
62:27know, um, you know, you mentioned the routes run stuff.
62:29I wrote this in the guide where McBride average about 0.45 fantasy points per route run last year.
62:34If those 120 routes were declined, you know, were taken away from him.
62:38So he just, he still ran the most routes in the NFL at tight end.
62:42He just ran a normal number of routes. He would have ended up scoring 15.4 PPR points per game instead of 18.6
62:48PPR points per game, which is a dream. I mean, look, 15.4 points per game is good.
62:53Uh, really good, but it's certainly not like what you're drafting for.
62:56Not only that, but he had some unsustainable stuff in end zone targets, the way that he was targeted, uh, you know,
63:02in the, in the red zone and, and, you know, his touchdown scoring something that we never thought that we would be
63:08saying about Trey McBride after the way that he started his career and what he did in college too.
63:13But, um, yeah, I'm with you. It's a very scary offense.
63:16I think you could even take a step backwards and maybe this will sound idiotic by the end of the year, but
63:22like, are we this confident in a Jacoby Brissett led offense?
63:25You know, like I know that he played better last year, um, than what was expected.
63:29But I even think if you just dumb this down to that degree, aside from buying into the volume stuff, cause like,
63:35I think you can make the argument that Michael Wilson, if there's one profile that looks like last year's Jerry Judy, it's
63:42Michael Wilson where, you know, the splits look really good when that's what happened with Judy, when Cedric Tillman was injured and
63:48when he had Jamis Winston and like, it's exact same kind of scenario.
63:51Um, you know, I think that there's at least a little bit more to like about Wilson and maybe there is just
63:57a slightly later breakout with him regardless of all of that.
64:00I just think it's scary to be investing in a Jacoby Brissett led offense the way that we're, uh, you know, investing in.
64:06So there's just a lot of scariness to the, uh, the Arizona Cardinals offense, but maybe they surprise us.
64:12We'll see. Yeah. And like I said, when you, when you just put dollars for donuts, where all these guys go in
64:18ADP, you know, excluding Brissett, who's not going to go into one QB leagues, you know, you could, if you want to
64:24take them into, you could be a no pushback really, but it's just where they go in drafts.
64:29There's just another guy in that point where you just have more confidence in, in their terms of, you know, offensive environment.
64:35And that's what makes it really tough. Cause I think like Marvin and Michael Wilson are, are largely probably fairly priced where they go.
64:41But like, again, like, are you going to take, you know, you know, Marvin Harrison Jr.
64:45You're, you know, over, over even Christian Watson. Right.
64:48Like no, no chance. I'm doing that. Or Parker Washington, who we talked about earlier on the show.
64:53Are you taking him over where we start to look at quarterbacks?
64:56Are you going to take him over like a Caleb Williams, Dak Prescott, where he usually goes against, uh, you know, so
65:02it's just, I just think it's just really hard when you get to each portion of the draft where those guys come up.
65:08And even if you think they're fairly priced, there's just no insulation there.
65:12Right. Right. All right. My last guy is Tony Pollard.
65:15Um, you know, we, we actually talked before the show and some of the hiring guys that you mentioned, I like, I
65:21certainly would have mentioned like an HN. So, uh, I'm just so people know, I am in agreement with, with everyone, everything that, that rich brought up today.
65:28Uh, but Pollard's a guy that I have pretty heavily faded this year.
65:32Uh, even in best ball, like I just have not clicked his name.
65:35You know, that's a, a range of, of best ball drafts where there are those really elite quarterbacks still going like Jaden
65:41Daniels and Jalen hurts and the, the upside guys.
65:44But even some wide receivers will slip there and just straight up.
65:47Like I want Ramondre Stevenson over Tony Pollard, for instance.
65:50Right. I would, I'd rather just, just go that route.
65:53Contingent upside still sits there with Stevenson in a way better environment, but let's just talk about Pollard.
65:58I just think it's a very traditional dead zone kind of archetype of player.
66:01Um, he's not quite traditional dead zone. He's not quite as high, but he's the next tier down from a lot of those guys.
66:08Uh, you're, you're definitely not buying Pollard because of his environment.
66:11You're, you know, there's questionable quarterback play. We already saw that in the preseason, bad offensive line.
66:16You're doing it because of projected volume for, for Pollard.
66:18But I'm worried about that. You know, he, he posted a yards per hour run rate below 0.8 last year for the third straight year.
66:25Again, very predictive of future, or at least pretty predictive, a future target share.
66:29And that target share did dip, uh, to just 8% last year.
66:32And he also, he had that stretch without Tajay Spears last year where his usage numbers looked really good.
66:38Right. But when Spears was healthy. So, so in that four game stretch without Spears, he had an 89% snap share, 69% route share.
66:44Great. They were using him as a, as a bell cow in that backfield with Spears.
66:48Those numbers were 54% in terms of snap share and 40% in terms of route share.
66:53Now we don't know exactly how this coaching staff is going to deploy this backfield, but Spears has been a viable pass catcher.
66:59Um, we saw a lot of Spears play a lot with cam ward in their preseason game for what it's worth.
67:05You know, I'm not saying that's definitive that that's the way they're going to deploy things, but I think that he's a legit threat.
67:11Um, and then also maybe later in the season, they want to see what they have in Nick Singleton.
67:17I know he had a bad pass pro rep that was going viral, but, um, they might want to see what they
67:23have in Singleton also later in the season. It's just, to me, I want to, you know, in this range of drafts,
67:29I would much rather be shooting for the better offensive environments than going with a guy like Pollard.
67:34You know, closer getting closer to 30 years old.
67:36Um, just hasn't been the same back that he was even a couple of years ago.
67:40Uh, and now that, that Tajay Spears is healthy and obviously they drafted Nick Singleton.
67:44I just worry about what that volume is going to look like as the season goes on.
67:49Yeah. Yeah. And Pollard, the only caveat I'll say for Pollard is he's, is I will take him when I take two
67:55in or Jadarian price, like, cause he's like insulation.
67:58It was like the same process that got me to like, so I was not bullish on Travis ETN or Javante Williams
68:04last year, but when I was taking, and I recommend this in the, in the draft guide was when I was taking
68:10Trevon Henderson and RJ Harvey last year, I was like, this is where you take ETN or Javante Williams just as like,
68:16Hey, these guys can at least they'll be, they won't be a zero for you.
68:20If these guys turn out to be zeros. Right.
68:22Uh, that's the only time I take Pollard. But, uh, yeah, I mean, you just look at the profile.
68:27He's had more than six touchdowns in one NFL season.
68:30Um, you know, how, how many touchdowns is he going to score on Tennessee Titans?
68:34You brought up the splits, uh, with Tajay Spears, who got a little bit of usage at one point, you know, this
68:40is a guy in a contract year who they, they were talking about maybe a cutting or trading this off season.
68:46If they're just, you know, going down the drain, do they just play singleton just to see what he has?
68:51There's just a lot of, you know, outs here where you just don't have a lot of upside or like true median.
68:57Like I said, the only spots I'll take them is when I'm looking just for like that glue, just like the patch
69:03up work where I took a little risk. Like, cause if I take a, a Gibbs, a B John, a CMC, then
69:09I treat it as like almost like an anchor build.
69:12And then I'm taking like a Jerry and price or one of those other guys, but that's really it.
69:17That's the only time I'm taking him. And he'll fall sometimes, but like a lot of these platforms have them at like RB 27, RB 20.
69:25I'm like, I'm like four or five running back spots below that.
69:28And that's, again, that's, that's not just four or five running, running back spots.
69:32It's also overall ADP where I'd rather be going wide receivers instead of going after, you know, the, you don't have, you're
69:38not forced to take a running back in that range.
69:40But like, you know, if you're, if you're in a, uh, any, any sort of PPR format and you're staring at like
69:46Jalen Warren versus Tony Pollard, like I'm taking Jalen Warren, I'm taking Ramond Ray Stevenson, uh, for the, the, the upside case
69:52of what they can do as receivers, you know, like Warren, especially just someone who's just been a unbelievably good football player.
69:58You know, I know that there's risk of, of split backfield, but I would argue there's a risk of split backfield here with Tony Pollard too.
70:06Well, I mean, their, their contingency upside is, is far greater because we've seen it with Pollard already.
70:10Like he's the, the lead running back for the Tennessee Titans.
70:13He's basically been the last two years. Exactly. Right.
70:16Like, what are we, what are we really hoping for here?
70:19So yeah. So Pollard has been someone that I just haven't clicked very often at all this year, but rich, this was fantastic as usual.
70:26Uh, let everyone know where they can find you and what you're going to be working on, you know, that over the
70:32next couple of weeks until the season starts, but then also in the season.
70:36Yeah. Like you, uh, you know, finishing up the draft guide kind of, you know, you know, please turn injuries off these last few weeks.
70:42I mean, every, it feels like every week. And yeah, I don't know about you, but it's not the, the big injuries
70:48like we can deal with because like, there's things that go in motion.
70:52Like if a guy's going to be out for the year, we can kind of divvy up.
70:57It's these, the injuries that we've had, like the Ibuka, Brees Hall, Jeremiah Love, like, could they, could this get into the season?
71:03Could it not? Like, what do you adjust? Like, these are the toughest ones to kind of diagnose.
71:08Uh, cause you also want to keep one foot in on some guys you like too.
71:12And it's like, all right, like, so those are tough, but please turn injuries off these last three weeks.
71:17But so finish up the draft guide. Uh, and you know, last year you guys helped me out a lot on, on this program.
71:24Cause you know, JJ has the best podcast in fans, football on the best audience.
71:28And you guys, uh, love the promo I dropped last year.
71:31So I'm going to drop one more here for you.
71:34And it just JJ and you guys are all my people too.
71:37If you like JJ stuff, you probably like mine, but you can use promo code draft at sharp football analysis and you get the draft guide for free.
71:45I'm just going to give it to you guys for free.
71:48Uh, so check that out. And then I also do this show with JJ.
71:52We oscillate where the voids, uh, were his show this year.
71:55We're going to do my show. We're going to do the targets and JJ will have first pick of the target.
72:00So look for that next week to see the guys where we're not pessimistic on.
72:04Yeah. Yeah. This is the, this is the downer episode.
72:07We get to do the fun one next week where we're excited about these guys, but rich appreciate it as always.
72:13Uh, everyone listening, make sure you check out late round.com.
72:16Check out the draft guy. Make sure you are subscribed to both the podcast and the YouTube channel, youtube.com slash at late round FF.
72:22Otherwise everyone. Thanks for tuning in. This is an I heart podcast guaranteed human.
