Becoming a Best Ball Bro: Do We Have It All Wrong?
STACKED extracted the fantasy-relevant player signal from this podcast and kept the full transcript here for context.
1 hr 15 min
Duration
Estimated from transcript
Aug 26, 2026
Published
Wed, August 26, 2026
27
Player insights
24
Players mentioned
Topics
Chuba HubbardJonathon BrooksTank BigsbyAshton JeantyBraelon AllenBrock BowersColston LovelandDenzel BostonJames CookJordan JamesJosh AllenJosh JacobsKeenan AllenKenneth Walker III
Player analysis
Player insights
Ashton Jeanty
NegativeInjury55:39
JJ Zachariason notes uncertainty regarding Ashton Jeanty's injury status, which has been inconsistently reported as a knee, lower leg, or ankle issue, leaving his availability unclear.
Insight pageBraelon Allen
PositiveSleeper56:26
Braylon Allen is highlighted as an archetype of a late-round running back who could step into a lead-back role if the starter ahead of him were to go down.
Insight pageBrock Bowers
NegativeUsage72:11
Brock Bowers is identified as a key player whose potential absence or injury would further elevate the fantasy upside of Michael Mayer within the Raiders' offense.
Insight pageChuba Hubbard
NegativeValue42:41
JJ Zachariason notes that Chuba Hubbard's ADP has shifted from the sixth round to the 11th, and expects his ADP to settle in the 7th-9th round range when based on pure projections.
Insight pageNegativeValue65:15
The market reaction to the Carolina backfield is described as 'vibes-based' rather than projection-based. Despite Chuba Hubbard's injury, the massive ADP gap between him and Jonathan Brooks is not reflected in season-long formats, suggesting the best ball market is overreacting to news.
Insight pageColston Loveland
PositiveValue58:33
Colston Loveland is identified as a difference-maker at tight end to target in rounds 3-4 to anchor a zero-RB or hero-RB roster.
Insight pageDenzel Boston
NegativeRole21:37
JJ Zachariason expresses concern that Denzel Boston may be relegated to a 'sacrificial X' receiver role, which is historically difficult for fantasy efficiency, though he acknowledges some upside in the Courtland Sutton-style archetype.
Insight pageJames Cook
PositiveValue61:59
JJ Zachariason notes that starting a draft with James Cook in the back half of the first round would be an awesome start.
Insight pageJonathon Brooks
NegativeValue42:48
Jonathan Brooks saw his ADP rise from the 14th round to the 6th, but JJ Zachariason projects his ADP will likely settle in the 7th-9th round range based on objective projections.
Insight pageNegativeValue65:15
Mark Garcia suggests that if projections were used to set ADP rather than reactive news, both Jonathan Brooks and Chuba Hubbard would likely settle in the 7th to 9th round range, rather than the current extreme ADP split.
Insight pageJordan James
NegativeDepth Chart69:20
Jordan James was identified as one of the two primary candidates to step into the San Francisco backup running back role during early off-season drafting; exposure was balanced 50/50 with Kalen Black to account for the high variance in the backfield depth chart.
Insight pageJosh Allen
PositiveValue58:38
JJ Zachariason suggests targeting elite difference-makers like Josh Allen in rounds 3-4 when employing a zero-RB or hero-RB strategy to ensure the rest of the roster is elite.
Insight pageJosh Jacobs
NegativeRole56:16
Josh Jacobs' situation in the backfield influenced the ADP of Marshawn Lloyd.
Insight pageKeenan Allen
PositiveValue7:13
JJ Zachariason considers Keenan Allen a solid pick in round 14, noting that while he has lost a step and is not a deep-threat player, his consistent target share history—outperforming teammates like DJ Moore and Rome Odunze—makes him a reliable floor play.
Insight pageKenneth Walker III
PositiveValue62:03
Kenneth Walker is cited as a great second-round pick to pair with James Cook in a hero-RB or modified hero-RB start.
Insight pageKyle Monangai
PositiveValue32:21
JJ Zachariason continues to draft Kyle Monongai despite his recent ADP slide due to injury, arguing that he is a strong best-ball asset who can be filled in by other roster spots early in the season.
Insight pageMalik Nabers
PositiveProjection55:20
JJ Zachariason notes that Malik Nabers' ADP shifted significantly as his health status became clearer throughout the summer. If Nabers produces a dominant week 15-17 stretch, he could theoretically be argued as a 1.01 pick, illustrating the volatility of best ball valuations.
Insight pageMarShawn Lloyd
NegativeValue56:16
Marshawn Lloyd is noted as a late-round running back whose ADP was suppressed until Josh Jacobs' situation clarified.
Insight pageMichael Mayer
PositiveBreakout70:45
Michael Mayer carries the highest upside of any round 20 pick due to the Clint Kubiak system's heavy personnel usage and the Raiders' lack of pass-catching talent at wide receiver; he is expected to see usability regardless of injury, with significant ceiling if something happens to Brock Bowers.
Insight pageMike Washington Jr.
NegativeValue11:45
JJ Zachariason is underweight on Washington (under 8% exposure) because he doubts Washington would become a bell-cow back even if Gentry were injured. Despite a strong combine and positive ZAP model draft capital, Washington's advanced metrics—such as 12th percentile avoided tackles and 22nd percentile explosive run rate—are concerning, and he faces competition from Dylan Lowby for pass-catching work.
Insight pageNajee Harris
PositiveRole28:18
JJ Zachariason suggests Najee Harris could have a meaningful role in the Giants' offense, noting that the coaching staff's familiarity with him and his ability to handle a workload may lead to more usage than the market expects, despite his lack of explosive burst.
Insight pageRay Davis
NegativeValue56:10
JJ Zachariason identifies Ray Davis as an example of a late-round running back who provides contingent upside, though he notes his value is context-dependent based on the roster build.
Insight pageRhamondre Stevenson
PositiveValue18:21
JJ Zachariason prefers drafting Rhamondre Stevenson over Mike Washington, citing a better offensive environment and higher contingent upside if the primary back were to miss time.
Insight pageStefon Diggs
PositiveValue59:11
JJ Zachariason notes he is heavily invested in Stefan Diggs, having secured him in the 12th and 13th rounds. While this provides a slight advantage in closing line value, he cautions that it is not a guaranteed path to dominance given the inherent variance of the format.
Insight pageTank Bigsby
NegativeValue64:08
Tank Bigsby's ADP rise to the 13th/14th round was a mistake because his role as a pure handcuff to Saquon Barkley remained unchanged; his value in best ball is tied strictly to handcuff upside, not the 5-7 touches he might receive while spelling the starter.
Insight pageNegativeValue65:48
JJ Zachariason highlights Tank Bigsby as a player who illustrates how the field is mispricing running backs, noting his start in the 17th-18th round.
Insight pageWoody Marks
PositiveUsage57:32
Woody Marks is cited as a player to target in zero-RB builds to ensure the roster gets some production rather than a zero.
Insight pageFull transcript
Episode Transcript
0:00This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human. How do you turn 16 games injury reports, team notes, betting lines and matchup trends into one clear weekend preview?
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1:13Hey JJ, my wife and I have been training for a half marathon.
1:17And on Saturday, we peaked at eight miles. We're almost there at that full 13 and change.
1:23Everything hurt after. When's the last time you did something stressful?
1:26Uh, that would be on Sunday when I didn't know if Ashton Gentie was alive or not.
1:32I'm JJ and over the last couple of years, I've been doing everything I can to be a best ball bro.
1:39And last season, things finally fell into place. I got 40th in the DraftKings Millie contest, taking home $20,000.
1:45Maybe I became a best ball bro, but I'm still looking to learn more about this game.
1:50And I still want others to come on this ride with me.
1:54So even if you consider me a best ball bro, this could be your year.
1:59This could be the year that you officially become a best ball bro.
2:03This episode is sponsored by DraftKings. We partnered up with DraftKings again this year for best ball, and we've got a can't
2:10miss offer on their biggest best ball contest ever.
2:13$20 million in total prizes. It's draft one, get one.
2:16Draft your team once, no weekly lineup management, and your top scorers start automatically each week, all season long.
2:22Download the DraftKings Daily Fantasy app and sign up with promo code LATEROUND.
2:27Enter a lineup in the $20 million best ball contest for $25 and get a bonus ticket for a second entry.
2:33Two shots at the title. Draft one, get one, only on DraftKings.
2:37The crown is yours. Welcome into another episode of Becoming a Best Ball Bro.
2:42I'm JJ Zacharyarysen, joined as always by Rich Rebar.
2:45Rich, we're both wearing blue today. How you doing?
2:47That's right. The blue boys. I almost made it.
2:50I almost. Yeah, that's right. I almost made another blue be alliterative joke, but this is a family show.
2:56Yes. Painful. Speaking of painful, yesterday, those couple of hours waiting to see whether or not Ashton Gentry had a fantasy football pulse.
3:04Of course he was. Blood was flowing through his veins.
3:07But for our selfish purposes, we needed him to rise up like the Undertaker, and it sounds like he has.
3:13Yeah, I mean, to a degree seems like, you know, it was probably the best case scenario in those moments.
3:20I mean, I'm a little bit overweight on Gentey and I was drafting him a lot more in like July for some.
3:27I went, I go through these like spurts of like drafting players a whole lot.
3:32And so I haven't drafted him a lot recently, but I am overweight.
3:36So I was sitting there being like, please. And I'm underweight on Mike Washington.
3:40I'm like, please, Ashton be okay. I need you this year.
3:44I need you. But we are I break that down with our guests today in pretty good detail.
3:50A lot of game theory discussion. Probably the most game theory oriented guest that we've had on the show.
3:56We had him on, I think last year, but we'll get to that in just a second.
4:01First, let's talk about some risers and fallers and ADP rich because we're in this this season now.
4:07I'm sure there's going to be one because we just got word that K.
4:12Sean booty was traded to the Texans. We are recording this.
4:15We usually record this part on Tuesday, but recording it on Monday this week.
4:20But K. Sean booty did get traded to the Texans.
4:23So I'm sure he's going to be a riser here, you know, soon.
4:27But let's go over some risers and fallers because there's been a lot of movement in the ADP streets recently.
4:33Yeah, let's start with Keenan Allen, somebody who you were drafting when he was a free agent now on the Indianapolis Colts.
4:41And as of last week, he was starting to go in around 14.
4:45Are you still drafting Keenan? Are you just happy with your position?
4:49Where are you at with Mr. Allen? Yeah, I mean, like I'm fine if I am getting a stack and he's there
4:56and there's, you know, like that range doesn't have a ton of like locked in great wide receivers.
5:01And, you know, do I think he's locked in and great maybe locked in, but not necessarily like amazing.
5:08Like I think that he's certainly lost a step.
5:10He's not that much of a down the field type player.
5:14But the one thing about Keenan Allen, man, is that the last two stops he has been used quite a bit in his offenses.
5:22Last year, he had the highest target share among all chargers wider series by by a pretty decent margin when you look
5:29at it on a per route run basis. And then you look at the bears a couple of years ago.
5:35He had a better target share than DJ more and that was Roma dunsay's rookie season and he had a better target
5:42share by a healthy margin over Roma dunsay. So I look at Keenan Allen as someone who's going to get you something.
5:49I actually had a good discussion about this with the guest as well today, which I'll just say it's Mark Garcia.
5:56But, you know, I had a great discussion with Mark about sort of like the idea of taking zeros and not taking
6:03zeros, because I think a lot of guests have sort of gone with the idea that we shouldn't be taking zeros and
6:10that we should look for just as much floor as ceiling with some of the later round picks.
6:16But Mark kind of disagrees with that. So it's a little teaser for our conversation.
6:21It's a really good conversation. But with Keenan Allen, I think that he is a solid pick still in round 14.
6:28I would assume that he's going to go earlier in a lot of dress.
6:32Obviously, this is ADP. So, you know, there's and I've seen him go a lot earlier in drafts, but this is, you
6:39know, looking at where he was before. It's still kind of catching up a little bit.
6:44So, yeah, I mean, if you're getting him around 14, I think around 13 is fine.
6:49That's an area of the draft where things just start to go kind of south at the wider seer position.
6:56All right, let's stay out on the West Coast.
6:59Talk about a guy you just said you're a little underweight on and that's rookie running back Mike Washington.
7:05There's a bit of noise, I think, in this week's data in terms of his ADP, of course, because of yesterday's craziness.
7:12But a couple of weeks ago, he was settling in around 187.
7:16So regardless, a rise for Mike Washington, who's looked electric in preseason.
7:20So why are you lower than the market, I guess, on Washington?
7:23I haven't drafted enough of him, for sure. Like, I'm under 8% Washington and I have regrets, for sure, based on where we're at right now.
7:32I didn't think that he had a terrible profile by any means.
7:36He actually had a positive draft capital delta in the ZAP model, which tells me that the model likes him a little
7:43bit more than where he was being drafted. It wasn't so big that it made him a low-risk player, but it was on the positive end.
7:51The thing with Washington that's really weird is that the ZAP model inputs do like him more than some of the advanced numbers do.
7:59So, I mean, some of the numbers in the ZAP model are advanced, but I mean some of the stuff that you
8:06see like avoided tackles per rush, etc. So, like, he had a 62nd percentile reception chair in his best season, a 65th
8:13percentile adjusted yards per team play, a 57th percentile adjusted receiving yards per team pass attempt.
8:18So, that builds you a picture of like, oh, this is a pretty above average, you know, production profile overall.
8:24He was an older prospect, but even still, you know, that doesn't look bad.
8:29And then you add on the fact that he crushed the combine.
8:33He had one of the best speed scores you're going to find in the ZAP model.
8:38I think Keith Marshall was the only one who had a better speed score in the model.
8:43I just can't remember completely. But regardless, the advanced metrics are where things start to get a little bit iffier and scarier
8:50for him, where he had a 12th percentile avoided tackles per attempt, a 22nd percentile explosive run rate, which is crazy because
8:58of what he did do at the combine, 16th percentile yards after contact per attempt.
9:02And he did split backfields throughout college. So, part of the reason why I didn't go after him heavily is because, you
9:09know, I just didn't think that necessarily if Ashton Gentry went down, that Washington would be the for sure guy in that backfield.
9:17And I think that we were kind of seeing them talk and speak to this when they would talk about him after
9:24these big preseason games where they would say that he was still working on some of the pass catching stuff.
9:30And they have Dylan Lowby in their backfield, too, who is someone who had a really good receiving profile coming out.
9:37And that's kind of the role that he would hypothetically play.
9:41So, when the news went down, I didn't really send a fire or take out there because I was kind of waiting
9:48for stuff to kind of come out. I figured it would come out.
9:52I honestly thought it would be just a couple of hours.
9:55It ended up being like six hours. But I was kind of shocked by the RB2 placement of Mike Washington because we
10:02know that this environment is not elite, right? I mean, I love the system and I love what it could be, but it's not an elite environment.
10:11The reason we're drafting Ashton Gentry is because he's going to get a ton of work on the ground, but he's going
10:18to get a ton of work through the air more than likely as well.
10:23Like, that's the allure with Ashton Gentry. If that piece was gone for a player like Mike Washington to a, like, let's say halved, right?
10:31Like, if Mike Washington in a lead back role for the Raiders would be like a six to seven percent target share
10:38player and Gentry's double that, that's a huge difference.
10:41It's a huge delta. And so, I couldn't get behind Washington in like the top 30-ish of running backs.
10:47But I think you could start thinking about him right after that just because there's a pretty big drop after that.
10:54Like, I would still be drafting, again, this is not what came to fruition, but I would still be drafting like Ramondre
11:01Stevenson over Mike Washington, for instance, because I do think that their projection in general might be semi-close if Gentry were out,
11:08but there's more contingent upside with Stevenson if Travion, and Travion Henderson's banged up right now too, but if Travion Henderson were to go down.
11:16So, he's looked apart in the preseason. There's not that much predictive value there though, so I'm not going to overstate what that all means.
11:24And there's been enough coach speak sort of that says that he still has some stuff to work on that I don't
11:31think that he would just become a full-blown bell cow in that backfield.
11:35Regardless, I wish I was more in like the 8%, 9%, 10% range with Mike Washington as opposed to like the 5% that I'm at.
11:43Contingent upside and better offensive environment, of course, for Ramondre, right?
11:47Median outcomes project New England to be much better at scoring points than Las Vegas, which at the end of the day,
11:54scoring points is so important for the running back position.
11:57We'll stay with another rookie. This one you're a little more bullish on, especially more than his fellow rookie teammate.
12:03Let's talk about Kevin Concepcion. Concepcion. Yeah. KC, man.
12:06I just think he's really good, and I've been drafting him.
12:10I think others should draft him. He's been rising.
12:13That's why he's part of this list right now.
12:15But I still think that he's at an okay price tag.
12:19I'm not really concerned about... I mean, I'm concerned about the quarterback play, but not specifically the fact they named Deshaun Watson as starter.
12:27I think that regardless of who's under center, it's not going to be great.
12:31But you could also argue that it's going to help some of the underneath stuff, because I don't think Watson can really
12:38get the ball down the field very effectively at this point.
12:42So, yeah. I mean, this is just a reminder that Casey Concepcion, in my opinion, was a...
12:47I don't want to say far superior, because that doesn't frame it properly, but he was definitely at least a tier or
12:54two above what Denzel Boston is, in my opinion.
12:57In Boston, I do have some fear, to take a term from Matt Harmon, that there's a little sacrificial X to his profile this year.
13:05I do think that there's some upside with Boston.
13:08He's in that kind of like Cortland Sutton archetype.
13:11If you want to take that a step further, you get into Ted O'Rowell and McMillan, then into Drake London, right?
13:18And so there's that kind of archetype going on with Boston.
13:21But I think Concepcion fits what we really would want from a player in this offense, which is getting looks all over the field.
13:29They're going to manufacture touches for him. And if you want to...
13:33I made this comparison whenever the draft happened, but this could be Todd Monk is like Zay Flowers, in a way, in this offense.
13:41So I'm pretty hype on Concepcion. I think he's a good prospect.
13:45And I'm not... I'm concerned about the offense, but obviously, if he were in a better offense, he'd be like a seventh-round pick, not like an 11th-round pick.
13:54It's just so hard to play X in this league and be efficient from a fantasy perspective.
13:59Yeah, especially in a bad offense. Yeah. You can't...
14:02Not everyone's just Nico Collins. Like, go stand on the outside and dominate people.
14:06We want guys moving and getting spammed with easy targets.
14:10Another rookie. I'm curious to hear your take because the steam continues for Dijon Stripling, who's up two more rounds since the last time we talked.
14:18Yeah. I mean, like, I get it. I understand it.
14:21I think that there's a lot of reason to click his name still.
14:25You know, it's more so, though, I'm going to probably be a little bit more inclined.
14:30You know, I'm trying to not let CLV get in the way too, too much, but I do want to, you know,
14:38with like a May through August contest, like the Millie, you know, there's going to be a lot of teams that got
14:45Stripling in round 18, 19, 20, as opposed to round nine.
14:48And there, you know, I have another CLV conversation with Mark, but I don't think it's the end of the world if you're drafting him in round nine.
14:57But we're beginning to get into a place of, like, opportunity costs.
15:01Like, I've definitely changed my tune on Stripling over the last month or two, just, just by doing a little bit more
15:08research and thinking about his positioning more on this team while also obviously, you know, reading into the hype and watching him.
15:15Like he's got very strong hands and he's very physical and those things alone.
15:20And he can produce yak and those things, you know, in a Kyle Shanahan offense can work that alone.
15:26The thing that I'm trying to be reasonable with is the fact that Mike Evans hasn't been playing.
15:32Christian McCaffrey hasn't been playing and George Kittle has been playing.
15:35And so obviously those three guys are going to be, you know, more focal points of the offense than what Stripling is going to be.
15:43So I'm not against drafting him where he's still going.
15:46If he starts to creep up into, and look again, like once you get into like round six, as early as round
15:53six, you start to get into very questionable wide receiver profiles.
15:57In my opinion, I'm certainly not saying that like he has a horrible ADP, especially from like a wide receiver standpoint.
16:04But I do like some of the running backs in rounds, you know, eight to nine and some of the quarterbacks that go there.
16:11You can complete a lot of stacks. Even the tight ends at times will fall and you'll get a discount with them.
16:18So I'm not going to push it that much further than this, but you know, if you're only doing 10 to 20
16:25drafts or something and you don't have enough stripling or whatever the case may be, I think it's fine to draft him,
16:33you know, in this range because there's plenty of upside with his profile.
16:37He's still mega, mega, mega undervalued and season long leagues.
16:40Like it's pretty crazy how, how little love he's getting in those on major platforms.
16:45So if you want to get your exposure and you're playing season long in that way, I'd probably do that, but you
16:52can still do it in best ball too. We started the riser segment with a veteran free agent signing and like the
16:59Phoenix all ends with beginnings and we'll start and finish.
17:02Najee Harris signs with the New York giants. And despite his fancy footwork in those videos online, he's only going in the 19th round.
17:10Yeah. I mean, there was a tweet and I can't remember who sent it.
17:14And so somebody can tag me and I'll retweet it and give them love because I'm not trying to plagiarize here, but
17:21someone made the point on Twitter where they said that Najee Harris coming off an Achilles isn't a big deal for Najee
17:28Harris because he didn't have any burst to begin with.
17:32Right? Like, like he's the kind of player that this might not matter as much for because having that like quick speed
17:39and acceleration was never really part of his game.
17:42I'll be honest, rich. Like, I think Harris could have some role in this offense this year because he's a player that coaches seem to like.
17:50I mean, our sample size is obviously the Steelers with Mike Tomlin who loved him despite Jalen Warren being the better running back.
17:57And then look, I know that there's a skill to be able to handle a big workload, but there probably should have
18:04been more of a split with with Jalen Warren throughout Najee Harris's time in Pittsburgh.
18:09And then he goes to LA last year. And, you know, I like Amari and Hampton as a prospect.
18:15And I thought that he was he actually wasn't as bad as some people think last year.
18:21But regardless of all that, like Najee Harris was in store to probably see a decent amount of work in that backfield before he got hurt.
18:29And so now you look at this coaching staff in particular with Harbaugh and company, and it's kind of, you know, a veteran staff.
18:37And I'm not going to be surprised if Najee Harris is just one player that they lean on and like more than
18:44what the fantasy masses want them to, you know, in the way that we feel about that.
18:49So I still think Cam Scadaboo is fine. I've cooled off on him the last couple of months, but regardless, like the
18:57last month or so, I think that we should bump him down a little bit from this.
19:02And his ADP has fallen a little bit from this, but it's not going to surprise me if Harris has some role.
19:09I've actually drafted him a couple of like, I haven't avoided drafting Najee Harris in the 19th, 20th round because I wouldn't
19:16be surprised if he just ends up playing as their RB2 this year.
19:20And I mean, they're brothers, right? If John pick up the phone and ask Jim what he what it was like having
19:27him on the team in the running backs room as a player.
19:31If Jim didn't endorse it, John and the staff don't bring him into New York.
19:36So there's something there. Let's talk fallers. And Kyle Monongai has this nagging injury, which seems like it is scaring a bunch of people off of drafting him.
19:45He's fallen a full round over the last week.
19:48But JJ, we know the money in best ball is later in the season and perhaps a recovery might be in tune for Mr.
19:56Monongai. Yeah, man, this is what we were talking about last week.
19:59We're like, I'm trying to not like make too big of a deal out of the early season injuries.
20:06I do think that, you know, DeAndre Swift, who got pushed up based on this news, he's like a mid fourth round pick.
20:13Now I like Swift. I think that Swift is a good pick, but I'm still drafting Monongai when he falls.
20:19And sometimes he falls even further than like the round and ADP just because, you know, obviously some of this data needs
20:26a little time to like fully catch up. But to me, Monongai is still a decent click, decent enough click in a best ball environment.
20:35He's actually a better in best ball player, in my opinion, because I think there could be some unpredictability in your managed
20:42league, especially a shallower league for him, because there's not gonna be that much pass catching upside, similar to how if you
20:49like a Chris Rodriguez or like a JK Dobbins or whomever, you know, they're, they're better in best ball type players.
20:55But yeah, I'm trying to not, this just goes back to what we talked last week.
21:01I'm trying to not overstate this early season stuff because we could be looking at this in week five and be like,
21:08oh yeah, I forgot he missed weeks one and two or whatever the case may be.
21:13He might not even miss any, who knows, but I don't want to draft injured players.
21:18Don't get me wrong, but I am more okay with drafting injured players who have a timetable to return that is early
21:25in the season when there's no bye weeks and we have players that can fill in for them in our, in our best ball lineup.
21:33So I'm still drafting Monongai and my bear stacks.
21:36Yeah. I mean, that's, that's where I'm at with him overall.
21:39Final guy, Rashad white. Everybody loves themselves some bill.
21:42Yeah. Nobody loves themselves some Rashad white. I'm still drafting both of them.
21:46I do think that bill has kind of like just based on reliable beats out of Washington.
21:52Sounds like that they're getting a more involved as a pass catcher, which is exactly what he needs.
21:58But look in college bills, best season reception share.
22:01And he was an older prospect in college. His best season reception share was 8%, which is really low.
22:07It's like a 22nd percentile number. And then last year he had a sub 30% route share and Rashad white in a,
22:14in a non full-time role last year was still in the top 20 and route share at running back.
22:20So like, I still think that they're going to have a split backfield and that's enough for me, especially in a best
22:27ball environment to lean into the ambiguous backfield while also recognizing that these guys both might get and should get some usable
22:34weeks for this offense, you know, tonsil out regardless, you know?
22:38So I think that this is the right kind of ambiguous backfield to attack because there are outs for both of them.
22:45And I think both of them have a very real chance of giving you a number of usable weeks in a, in a best ball environment.
22:53Yeah, totally agreed in the rare times that I've gone zero ish or waited a little bit on running back.
22:59I mean, in this PPR environment, someone like white, it's just such a nice click to be able to grab there in
23:06the, uh, the early double digit rounds. For sure.
23:09For sure. All right, let's get to the guest.
23:12Mark Garcia, best ball analyst at one week season.
23:15He does work for stat rankings as well. It was a great conversation.
23:19You guys will definitely learn something. There were times where I had to like really focus.
23:24And now I know that people say this all the time about the late round podcast where they're like, sometimes I got
23:32to like really focus on the things that you're saying.
23:35Cause it's just boom, boom, boom, boom. And I felt that way with Mark sometimes where I'm like, I got to make
23:42sure I'm, I'm, you know, hearing what he's saying here because he's going very deep into the game theory world.
23:48And that's what this conversation was about. We talked about Ashton Gentry.
23:52We talked about CLV. We had a very deep discussion about zero RB.
23:56That was not surface level whatsoever. So hopefully you guys dig it.
24:00I really enjoyed talking to him. So without further ado, here is that interview with Mark Garcia.
24:06All right, Mark. So we, we had kind of this weird thing happen on Sunday where Ashton Gentry was thought to essentially
24:13have lost his season where he gets, he gets hurt.
24:16We didn't know if it was an ACL. We didn't know exactly how long he would be out for.
24:22Now we know that it was an ankle injury, but there was this six hour window where best ball drafts were going
24:29on and folks were drafting Gentry as late as the double digit rounds.
24:33Mike Washington was going as early as like round four, round five.
24:37My question to you is not necessarily specifically about the Gentry and the Gentry situation in the Raiders backfield.
24:43It's more when an injury like this occurs and there's this unknown window, this, this, this window of ambiguity, what is your game theory angle?
24:51And do you think that people are now today sort of making too big of a deal out of, oh, there are
24:58these Millie rosters out there and lineups out there that have Ashton Gentry round six that just ruined the entire turn?
25:05Yeah. So two part answer, I guess for a two part question, right?
25:09To answer the first part, it comes down to risk management.
25:13More broadly speaking, I think portfolio management. So like if you're a player that you just started drafting, like put yourself in
25:20a situation where like you just started drafting on Sunday afternoon and like you're, you're going to use the last three weeks
25:27of this draft window to draft your entire portfolio, whether that's 20 drafts, 50 drafts, a hundred drafts, however many you get
25:34in, but you didn't start until right now. So that's a different discussion than if you have been drafting since late May
25:41and you've been, you've seen the ups and downs of the cycle of ADP.
25:46You've gone through all the motions there. You've seen kind of how things have shaken out and you can adjust and basically
25:53adjust your own portfolio versus what has already happened.
25:56So two different, very different situations that would also require very different answers.
26:00So you kind of have to look introspectively and say like, where do I fit in that spectrum?
26:05And those are probably the two extreme examples, right?
26:08Where do I fit in that spectrum? How should I optimally approach this situation?
26:13So the answer is probably like, it depends, which is like a, everyone loves hearing that answer, but it really does depend on your own portfolio.
26:21How many drafts you're putting in say for, for me personally, if I'm putting in 500, 750, a thousand drafts even, and I've been drafting since May.
26:30And I look at my Ashton Gente exposure level and I'm at like six to 8%, which I was, I was a
26:37little bit below the, below market, I would want exposure to later Ashton Gente.
26:41Now how far that like, and there's so much variance and so much extra stuff that we can throw into that discussion,
26:49but that's really what it boils down to is like, where is your own risk management at for your own portfolio?
26:55Because it's not really a one size fits all answer.
26:58Like we could say, yeah, we want to get exposure to Gente, but like, if you just started drafting, you could say
27:06like, I see that I have zero Ashton Gente.
27:08This is my first draft. Do I want to take on that additional risk of say, taking an Ashton Gente in like
27:16the sixth round where he was at the one, two turn it's again, it's over to your own like risk management.
27:22So it really comes down to each individual user.
27:25I'd say from a game theory backed perspective, we should want to lean into increased variance when the field is kind of shying away from that.
27:34We'll talk a little bit more about that too, because there's this whole discussion to be had about like what leads up
27:41to this discussion over the last four months. Um, but that's kind of the short answer.
27:46Now I forget what the second part of the question.
27:49So, so I've been having, I've been having so many discussions recently on the show about CLV and, um, you know, because
27:56I, I, I think on one hand, like, of course we all understand like you want CLV, of course you want positive
28:03and favorable CLV because that's going to help your portfolio.
28:06But then I see the reactions that I'm seeing on social media today where there are people basically saying like those teams
28:13are the ones to beat because they got Ashton Gente in round six.
28:18And, you know, obviously he's obviously banged up, but I want to hear your take on like why that response is, is
28:25probably just too extreme in general, you know, with the way that, that things went down.
28:30There is so much variance and all come to like a lot of what we're going to discuss comes back to this buzzword variance.
28:37There's so much variance in this contest that we're playing.
28:41You can't say with any shred of like certainty that that having Ashton Gente in the sixth round is any more beneficial
28:48to having him in the, at the one, two turn.
28:51We have no idea. And especially for playoff formats, right?
28:54So your draft Kings, your, uh, your BBMs, um, it's a little bit of a more, even more nuanced discussion for cumulative
29:01formats where obviously you, you draft a team and you're playing for most points, uh, between weeks one and 17.
29:08But for playoff style formats, we have to understand that we really only have one way of measuring like success in this
29:15contest because we have such a small sample size and that's really expected value.
29:19And the thing with expected value is there's a couple of assumptions that not a lot of people understand when we're talking about expected value.
29:27One, it assumes an infinite sample size. We don't have that.
29:31So like, who's to say that our expected value will have, like, even if we played this till we're a hundred years
29:38old every single year and all these contests remain the same throughout that time period.
29:43Like we still don't have a sample to say, I'm a good basketball player.
29:47I'm a bad basketball player. Like we just don't know.
29:50But the second thing that expected value assumes is that all other players have a similar starting point to us.
29:57And we're going to get like heavy in the game theory here.
30:01The assumption of like, and I'll liken it to poker in this, I hope this isn't too meandering of a discussion, but
30:08there's a lot to like, no, I think that's important.
30:11Yeah. The thing that we can measure being expected value, it assumes game theory, optimal play.
30:16Now with game theory, optimal play, we'll liken it to poker.
30:20Right. And that's, that's my personal background in like the, the gambling sphere is like I had my come up in poker,
30:27started playing when I was 14 under my dad's name, which was like how I got my come up into this kind of sector of gambling.
30:35Um, but in game theory, optimal in poker, there are some assumptions.
30:39One being the infinite sample size to being that everybody else that you're playing is also abiding by game theory, optimal play.
30:46So then if everybody's on the same playing field, we can accurately analyze expected value and we can accurately analyze if these
30:53plays that we are making are profitable or not.
30:56Hmm. So loop that back to best ball. If we know for certain when, and we know this in poker too, like
31:03not everybody is playing game theory, optimal poker. If we know now that not everybody is playing theoretically optimal best ball play,
31:10that calculation for expected value is even more muddied.
31:13So those are two things fighting against us here to say, like, are we playing this game as optimally as we can?
31:20And now our answer is like, I don't know.
31:23Like we don't have the sample. We variances off the charts.
31:26So if we're talking about like a specific player or a specific situation as you cannot overcome that, like sixth round Ashton
31:34Jainty, you can't say that we have no idea.
31:36And then you talk about like playoff style format contest.
31:40The variance is amplified that much further, you know, like, is it one of 16 advancing from week 16 to week 17?
31:47Is it one of 12? Is it one of four?
31:50All these things go into this calculation of expected value.
31:53Now, the one thing that we do know about expected value, and this is we're able to calculate this is where does
32:00the expected value from these contests come from? If we add it all up about 80%, and again, this is going to
32:07change based on the format and how many people are advancing weeks 14, 15, 16, whatever the case may be, right?
32:14About 80% of our expected value in playoff formats comes from the combination of advancement rate and week 17.
32:20So if we know that those are the two most important things, we should theoretically speaking be focused on those two things the heaviest.
32:28Right. So there's a lot of talk this year and last year about like week 17 is all that matters or advancement rates all that matters.
32:36Like, no, neither of those is correct mathematically speaking, but those are the two things that we can kind of control the
32:43most when we're putting together these rosters. So like, do we care about week 15 correlation and week 16 correlation and game stacking?
32:51Like we probably shouldn't like the math says we shouldn't like that's how we get to week 17.
32:56But the two things we should be focused on the most are advancement rate and then optimizing for week 17.
33:03So to say like sixth round Ashton Gentry when, you know, 75% of the field has one to turn Ashton Gentry.
33:10Like we just don't know, dude. Uh, like let's let the variance shake out.
33:14Let's play this game a little bit. Yeah, I think that that's especially the playoff stuff is so key.
33:20And this is where I've been having a lot of discussion with people, especially, you know, like Malik neighbors is a great
33:27example of this because obviously folks were getting him at like late fourth for some of the summer into the fifth sometimes.
33:34And now he's not going there because we obviously know the end result.
33:39And like, I've dumbed it down to essentially saying, look, if Malik neighbors has a great week 15 through 17 stretch and
33:46dominates there, you could take, you could argue you should take him one Oh one.
33:50Right? Like, like you, like you, there's, there's no telling that like he's a good or bad pick at that point.
33:57And there's also so many other variables in a, in a 20 team on DK lineup that can influence this, that I
34:04do think that we get to a point of just like dumbing down what best ball is when we say, Oh, other
34:11teams have Ashton Gentry in round nine now. Oh, I'm dead.
34:15I can't, I can't come back from that. But Gentry is very easily able to have a dud, you know, and it's
34:22similar to like, even last year, I remember, you know, obviously running early, early around running back did great last year, generally
34:29speaking, but then you get into the playoffs or like Saquon member Saquon's great year a couple of years ago.
34:35And then you get into the playoffs and like that, that first week of the playoffs, like he, he gave you a dud.
34:43And then all of a sudden, a lot of those teams struggled because he was carrying those teams into advancing.
34:49And he was a big part of that. I shouldn't say he was just carrying, but he was a big part of it, obviously.
34:57Yeah. And so, you know, it just goes into, into your point about variants and about the fact that like, there are
35:04so many inputs here that I don't want to overthink.
35:07And this is my, my general theme this year.
35:10And maybe this is like, kind of like under thinking it, but like, I think CLV might be a little bit overrated
35:17from the standpoint of this, what variances and what kind of CLV you're actually getting.
35:22Of course, we would rather be on the favorable side of CLV.
35:26Like, of course. And this is not like, I joked earlier because I was a little bit underweight on like neighbors and I joked earlier.
35:34I was like, this is, I promise you, this is not cope for, for the, you know, the, the slight underweight with
35:41neighbors thinking that I could get neighbors cheaper as the, you know, as the summer went on.
35:46But to me, it's just like, like I have a ton of Stefan digs, right.
35:51And I got digs at, and round 12, round 13.
35:54Yes. I'm at a slight advantage. Probably, probably with that, but I don't think that we can definitively say one way or
36:02another that this is definitely just, you know, the way that this season is going to go and that these lineups are just going to dominate.
36:10We just have no clue at the end. Yeah.
36:13And let's unpack that through a theoretical framework a little bit more.
36:17When is the only time in ADP's life cycle that projections are influencing the numbers?
36:21I mean, I would imagine throughout. When they're set.
36:24So when the contest kicks off, that's the only time.
36:28Oh, I got you. I got what you're saying.
36:30I get what you're saying. Yeah. Sorry. That was probably framed a little poorly.
36:35No, no, no, no. I get, no, no. You're right.
36:38I mean, ADP is, you're saying ADP is framed when projections are originally set and that's the framework that we're working off of.
36:46That's the only time throughout, you know, from late May to September.
36:49Right. Where the ADP numbers are mathematically influenced solely by projections.
36:53Correct. Right. After that, it's heavily industry sentiment, player inputs.
36:56Yeah. Sure. Beat writers. Yeah. That it influences all that stuff.
37:00So if we, if we look at like the, the life cycle of ADP and we like to think that it approaches
37:07more what in game theory framework, we say Nash equilibrium, which is like the most perfect state of balance where no player
37:14can gain an appreciable edge over another through any action.
37:17So, and we know that ADP never reaches Nash equilibrium.
37:20So like it's never perfect, but we like to think that as it approaches September, ADP becomes more accurate.
37:26Even that thinking, that framework of thinking is a fool's errand because we are so far removed from that ADP structure, having
37:33any mathematical basis that it like, it doesn't matter.
37:36So like within that discussion, if we look at closing line value, like, yeah, we want to think because like, we think
37:43we have control over this stuff as humans. Like we want to be like, this is my comfy area.
37:49I'd be closing line value. Yippee woohoo. Like there's all this variant stuff that still has to happen.
37:55Like during the season, before the season injuries. And we can talk about all the variants stuff a little bit heavier later,
38:02but like closing line value means next to nothing.
38:05And like there have been, and I don't want to, I don't want to poo poo on, on the good work that
38:12has been done in best ball to describe closing line value, but that's exactly what it is.
38:18It's descriptive in nature. It's saying that these rosters that finished top 0.1% or top 10, or however we want to work
38:25out that sample size, we're describing what those rosters had in common referencing closing line value.
38:30So it's completely descriptive in nature is 0% predictive.
38:33It doesn't mean anything to us. It just means that like we are able to capitalize on ADP fluctuations in a plus EV manner.
38:41Yeah, that's, that's a really good point. I do think that that gets lost in a lot of this is how and
38:48why ADP is moving the way that it's moving, right?
38:51Without really thinking through like, is this a mathematically sound reason as to why this is happening right now?
38:57Or is it simply, I mean, you, if you draft throughout the summer, you see the ADP shifts just based off of
39:04a hamstring injury that we know will be fine.
39:07You know, I mean, look at like Makai Lemon right now, for instance, or, you know, maybe you don't want to go the rookie route.
39:15I think the, the, the more interesting example of this is like the Chuba Hubbard, Jonathan Brooks stuff that's going on right now.
39:22Oh yeah. That's a pretty extreme example. Yeah. Where like, like, you know, we start the summer and, and Chuba Hubbard has an ADP above Jonathan Brooks.
39:31Obviously there's this Jonathan Brooks injury stuff that we're getting more and more confident because he's just playing.
39:37But I think that in most outcomes, Jonathan Brooks would have just been playing and not gotten hurt just based on where, you know, things were at.
39:45But regardless, like even after the Chuba Hubbard injury that recently happened, and even though the timetable was pushing them like at
39:53week one, the gap in, and this is where it's interesting because like season long, you're not seeing this, this gap at all.
40:00I mean, it does not exist in a season long environment.
40:03It's the, the reactive best ball brain that this is really happening more, but on DK, you'll get Jonathan Brooks at the
40:11end of round six at eight from, from an ADP perspective now and Chuba Hubbard's around 11 pick.
40:16Right. Yeah. And I'm, I'm not even a pro Chuba analyst.
40:20Like I think that there's a lot of like to like about Jonathan Brooks and I was drafting him a lot and
40:27I was in on it, but there comes a point in time where it's very clear that some of the shifting and
40:34ADP is very just vibes based and based on what some of the news items are saying, as opposed to what does this actually mean?
40:42Like, what is this doing? What are my projections look like?
40:46As you noted, whatever the case may be, how are we logically thinking about where this player should go?
40:52I wonder what I'm wondering right now is like how much more efficient your, your drafting would be if you do anchor
40:59a little bit more towards that like initial ADP look.
41:02Right. Because if those, if that ADP is more anchored on what our projections are saying, and there's going to be some
41:09plenty of cases where like we're shifting projections just based off of like news items and stuff like that, or whatever the
41:16case may be, like just, you know, health or what have you.
41:20Like obviously Malik neighbors were shifting our projection on because Malik neighbors is now seemingly a lot healthier than we thought back in May or something like that.
41:29Right. But I do wonder, cause I haven't done enough analysis.
41:32Like we do a lot of analysis on like the end ADP, right?
41:37End of August ADP and what that looks like, but seeing the shifts and how much more predictive or less predictive that
41:44really is, I think is something that we should at least keep in mind while we're drafting.
41:49Within that same discussion. We now, this is really the first year where like things like AI is really coming into play.
41:56We, you know, we've had AI around for three, four years now, but it was never something that we could confidently train yet.
42:04We'll, we'll phrase it like that. Now we have the ability to train an AI to think how we want it to think.
42:11And within that, we can feed it starting ADP.
42:14We can feed it injuries that happen. We can feed it.
42:17We can say like, Hey, we'll go back to the Carolina backfield example.
42:22We can say it probably, the projections probably started as 65, 35 to 60, 40 in favor of Chuba Hubbard.
42:28As far as workload split went, we can now say, let's shift that to 55, 45 in favor of Chuba.
42:34The other way and say, project this out, rank them.
42:38Give me a new updated ADP. See where that settles.
42:41I can guarantee you it's not going to be a complete flip-flop of their ADPs from Chuba Hubbard in the sixth round
42:48and, um, and where he's now at 11, uh, and the other way around, like from probably 14, Jonathan Brooks started like 14 rounds.
42:56And now he's up to the sixth. It's probably going to have them both settle.
43:01If we just, again, just went purely by projections and, and, and we can feed this engine to learn like us.
43:07Now we can say like, that's probably going to put both those backs in the seven to eight, nine round range.
43:14Right. That would be, that would be the game theory, optimal answer of when we want to be targeting those players.
43:21Right. Right. The, there's more variants and stuff that we can talk about that goes into this discussion too, but this is now something that we can do.
43:30Like this is, this is where we are in 2026 as far as AI goes.
43:35So if you wanted to simply every single day, have an AI repopulate in an ADP based solely on projections and remove
43:42all the noise from the industry, from the talking heads, from everybody that's playing this game, we can do that.
43:48And that would probably, if we were all, if, and again, if we were playing game theory, optimal and everybody else was
43:55playing game theory, optimal, that would probably be what we wanted to do and draft based on that ranking.
44:01I do want to ask you too, about some of these more unknown commodities that have been getting steam, you know, Dajon
44:08Stribbling, Jacoby Lane could throw like a Caleb Douglas in there.
44:12A lot of these rookie wide receivers, even like, you know, a Pat Bryant, Don Tavian Wicks, you know, they've been rising a little bit as well.
44:21In these cases, you know, are you leaning into the hype?
44:24Are you afraid to lean into the, to the rising ADPs?
44:28Or is it just like a case by case thing for you?
44:31Like, how do you view, you know, those, those sort of cases of, of these unknowns rising?
44:37It's a case by case basis with one specific caveat for me.
44:41That specific caveat is late round wide receivers have a extremely low hit rate in this point.
44:46We know this, this has been proven. So, I mean, it's like Pukenakua and nobody else.
44:51Like the hit rate is extremely low. And when we're talking hit rate, we want like league winner stuff.
44:57We're playing best ball. We're not talking about like Jacoby Lane returns 14th round value and you, he was being drafted in the 17th.
45:05Like that doesn't do much for us. We want like world beaters.
45:09We want the, and then that's what we need to be targeting in the later rounds.
45:14Like, I think this is a key mistake that the field is still making is like, we want to have that semblance
45:21of control in this game that has so much variance.
45:24So we play it safe in the later rounds.
45:27We should be swinging for the fences. And when we look at the historic hit rates of wide receivers coming from rounds
45:3415 to 18, and we can say, you can, you can frame that whether that's where they start in ADP or where that's where they finish.
45:43Like it really doesn't matter. I would say it's probably more accurate to frame it when ADP is released based off initial projections.
45:50So that encompasses all the names that you just listed off.
45:54So knowing that the hit rate of wide receivers found in that range is extremely low.
45:59Again, talking about like players that actually make a difference in best ball.
46:03I would say it's probably futile at just blanket statement.
46:06It's probably futile to be chasing those players up.
46:09The flip side of that is historically where do like world beaters value come from?
46:14Uh, what positions in the 15th to 18th round it's running backs and tight ends.
46:19Right. So I just kind of blanket statement want to be targeting running backs and tight ends at a heavier frequency in
46:26those later rounds, which by extension means that I don't really want to be chasing those wide receivers up.
46:32Now there's this, like, I know better or I know best like human mentality where even I fall victim to it, which
46:39is like, Oh man, Deshawn Stribbling's pretty fucking good, dude.
46:42Like I kind of want to, I kind of want a little bit there.
46:47So I think it's fine. I would say that not all of those players are created equal.
46:52Let's just compare like Dontavian Wicks to Deshawn Stribbling.
46:55Like what is the ceiling case to be made for each of those players?
47:00Stribblings. And it'll probably take a lot of stuff going his way.
47:03And he has a lot of aging skill position players are surrounding him on that offense.
47:09Right. Mike Evans 33, um, George Kittle 32, 33, uh, Christian McCaffrey 30.
47:13So the thing, the path to like pure ceiling outcome is probably a little bit more straightforward for a guy like Deshawn Stribbling where Kyle Shanahan offense.
47:21If things go right, Debo Samuel gets hurt. Mike Evans gets hurt.
47:25George Kittle is, you know, coming back off an ACL tear or Achilles injury.
47:30Um, it's probably a little bit cleaner and clearer case for the pure upside for a guy like Deshawn Stribbling compared to
47:37like Dontavian Wicks where it's like, we've seen him be really, really efficient on a per target basis.
47:43Right. But he's still, there's a reason that he was not a heavier snap rate player in green Bay.
47:49He doesn't do like the down and dirty stuff as well.
47:52Directly compare that to Deshawn Stribbling, who is one of the more polished, like all around wide receivers come out of this class.
48:00He's able to get in the trenches. He's able to block for runs.
48:04He's able to do all that nitty gritty stuff that you have to kind of do in a Kyle Shanahan offense.
48:11Going back to like Pukunakua, which we brought up earlier, like he did all that shit really well too, coming out of college.
48:18Um, and there's a reason why he was on the field a lot more than we thought he would be.
48:24It's cause he did all that other stuff. Right.
48:27But yeah, I was, so just directly comparing, like I would want to chase a guy like Deshawn Stribbling a little bit
48:34up more than a guy like Dontavian Wicks, even Jacoby Lane.
48:38Um, his path to pure ceiling is probably a lot more muddied, uh, just comparing the two directly.
48:44So you said something in there about kind of chasing ceiling and going after those like league winning types.
48:50So I'm curious how you feel about the notion that has definitely been pushed, you know, especially like me talking to best
48:57ball bros on this show or, you know, just interacting with people on social media, but the idea of not drafting zeros late in your draft, right?
49:06This, this notion of like, you want somebody that's getting you something.
49:09So therefore I don't, I don't want that to mean that like those people are saying chase floor, you know, I, I
49:16don't think that that's necessarily the, the true outcome of, of what they're stating and saying, but I do think that someone
49:24listening to this might want to hear your take on that because it seems a little bit different than what others have
49:31generally said about, about not taking those zeros. And I know exactly what you're talking about.
49:36And again, the reason I think the reason for that notion is more descriptive in nature.
49:41It's saying, let's see what has worked over the six, five seasons of best ball data that we have and it's like, okay, sweeping generalization here.
49:49We see that taking zeros is harmful for where it matters the most in the playoff rounds.
49:55It, it also influences taking zeros heavily influences your advancement rate.
49:58So we know that advancement rate and week 17 are the two highest contributors to expected value where all the money is made in these contests.
50:07If I flip that mindset and say, we are playing these contests to win the entire thing.
50:12Right. And this is coming from DFS background here.
50:15It's a kind of, it's kind of akin to a 50, 50 mindset or cash game mindset versus like a GPP mindset.
50:22If the goal is to have a 40% advancement rate and just let variants handle the rest, I think it's fine to
50:29say, I don't want to take zeros in the later rounds because that's where that comes into play.
50:35It comes into play in advancement rate and that's fine.
50:38Like we, we still don't know what we want to be optimizing for outside of what's optimal.
50:44Right. Tells us. So if I flip that into my GPP mindset, it is where can I, or how can I absolutely lap the field?
50:52How do I get position myself, my portfolio, the individual rosters in my portfolio to have the highest upside to go and win this thing?
51:00And that is shooting for the outlier stuff. Mm-hmm.
51:02So my frame of thinking is I want to be okay, leaning into variants a little bit more, especially in the later
51:10rounds and take those home run shots. Because if we think of an 18 team or 18 player roster or a 20
51:17player roster, as we have on like trafters and DK, we have the ability to absorb some of that miss or some of those misses.
51:25Right. We have, you know, we're playing nine players on a weekly basis.
51:29We have double that plus on each roster that we put into play.
51:33Yeah. So bringing that kind of full circle, giving a specific example for this season, like my late round targets are almost all running backs and tight ends.
51:42It's I want to be putting myself in the position to make the most if I am right.
51:48Yeah. And the way to do that is to look at the data.
51:52Where do league winners from the later rounds come from?
51:55Most often from running backs and tight ends. Yeah.
51:58I'm okay taking misses. I want to be swinging and understand that that's going to influence my advancement rate a little bit and be okay with that.
52:07So like everybody, everybody should have their own answer to this question or this discussion.
52:12It should come down to your own personal risk management and how you want to be optimizing your portfolio.
52:18Now, all of that comes with the caveat that we have to have basic like roster construction down because none of this theory stuff matters.
52:26If we're like drafting for running backs in the first five rounds or we're not taking or we're like take two quarterbacks
52:33in the first 10 rounds that you just don't do those things.
52:37You can and be profitable. So all of that comes with the obvious caveat that like we have to understand how to
52:44most profitably construct these rosters that we're building. Well, my follow-up to that is actually something that I wanted to chat with
52:51you about and that's obviously general strategy, but let's skip the general strategy of like what's going to work this year and
52:58just go straight into zero RB because that's kind of a strategy that will then dictate a lot of the other strategies
53:05that you might take in best ball in general.
53:08And your answer to the last one makes me curious of if you are going heavy zero RB right now this year
53:15as a both, you know, what hits late or, you know, you've done research and it shows that, you know, obviously late
53:22round running backs and tight ends are going to give you much better hit rates than late round wide receivers, which then
53:29in turn means, well, in the earlier rounds, does that mean that you are going more zero RB and is that also so that's the first part.
53:38But then the second part of that is, is this also a zig while other zag type situation because we are seeing
53:45running backs get pushed up a little bit more in the best ball environment.
53:49One word answer. Yes. The, the, the rest of that discussion is a little bit more nuanced.
53:55So zero RB is going to be much more beneficial to playoff formats because in cumulative, we don't have, we don't have
54:02a 14 week window as being round one. Like we don't have the additional fluff in there built in.
54:08We have to be performing, right. We have to be performing at peak performance for 17.
54:13Yeah. Um, so zero RB is less viable in cumulative and I say less, there's still a semblance.
54:19There's still room to take some swings. We have to first understand like what zero running back was built for.
54:25And it was built to harness the injury variance at the running back or just blanket statement.
54:31Again, running backs historically have been injured at a higher rate than any of the other skill positions in the NFL.
54:37Now that's what zero RB was built to harness that injury variance.
54:41We look at the past three seasons and running back injury rates are way down.
54:46What has been the injury highest injury rates over the last three seasons, quarterback and wide receiver.
54:52So to say like zero RB is dead is just completely missing the mark of one, what it is.
54:58And two, the variance, the injury variance that has been associated with recent history.
55:02So zero RB is absolutely not dead. And if the field is using it at a lower frequency than historic tendencies, we
55:09should want to at least be drafting zero RB as much as we were four years ago, if not more to leverage those field tendencies.
55:17So, and I would say, again, it's a little bit more beneficial to us in those playoff style formats where we have
55:24the additional slop to make up for, you know, one or two down weeks at the running back position within a 14 week window.
55:32But, you know, we, we had a little, we dipped our toes in on Sunday with the Ashton gente stuff.
55:39Like that could have been a massive thing and it still could be, we, we really don't have any, we don't know what the injury is.
55:47It started off being, we think it's a knee and then it was lower leg and now it's ankle.
55:53I don't know. The truth is in there somewhere, but we don't have test results.
55:58We don't have anything official from the team. So we still don't know.
56:02There's a lot of uncertainty there, but. But we look at Mike Washington.
56:06Why was he stuck in rounds 17 plus for so long?
56:10There are others, Ray Davis, um, Marshawn Lloyd for a long time until Josh Jacobs, like for a while.
56:16Yeah. Right. A lot of stuff going on there as well.
56:19But, you know, the Braylon Allen types, the, the, the, the backs, uh, the, the Kalon blacks and, uh, whoever the other guy is, JJ.
56:27Yeah. Jordan. Yeah. Jordan James. Jordan James. Yeah. That archetype of back in a backfield where we would expect them because whether
56:34it be depth behind them or coaching tendencies, we would expect that back to fill kind of a lead back.
56:41At least one, a type role. If the starter went down, that's where a lot of the upside comes from in zero
56:48RB in late round who were targeting. So those are the guys that like, I want to be adding to hero builds
56:55to zero running back builds to builds that like, uh, I don't know, like modified hero running back is like a thing
57:02now where it's like, you take two running backs in the first three rounds.
57:07I don't know, dude. Uh, we're just trying to pigeonhole like this into labels, right?
57:11I know that's a discussion on society. I think more than anything, but like putting a label on everything anyway.
57:18Um, but yeah, so those are the types of players that I want to be targeting as like an RB three on a roster.
57:26And if I'm drafting zero running back, I probably want to have like a Tajay Spears type, a Woody marks type, somebody
57:33that is going to get me something more than a zero because the variance associated with these backs that we're talking about
57:40is like anywhere from a zero to, you know, uh, a workhorse running back pending injury stuff.
57:45So I want to be kind of, you know, if I'm attacking zero running back, hero running back, modified hero running back,
57:52whatever the case may be like drafting two running backs in the first three rounds and then not touching the position until rounds 12 plus.
58:00Um, which I think is the most accurate description of modified hero running back.
58:05There is, if I'm drafting like that, I want to then take into account roster construction.
58:10Cause if I'm taking zero running back approach, hero running back approach, you want to ensure that the rest of the positions on your roster are elite.
58:19So how are we doing that in today's NFL?
58:21That means you must have like one of the top three.
58:25We will say, if we want to extend it to Colston Loveland tight ends, you want to have like difference makers at the other positions.
58:33I want to have like Josh Allen, Colston Loveland in the rounds three and four.
58:38Um, I want to have top wide receivers on stacked on this roster.
58:42I want to have depth at wide receiver. The archetype of wide receiver that I'm taking in the later rounds is going to be more boom bust.
58:51It's going to be a wider range of outcomes guy because I want that ability to attack elite ceiling at the other
58:58positions and let the injury variance at running back kind of take over.
59:02So long again, I led with the one word answer.
59:05Um, but like I want, I want to be leaning into zero running back.
59:10I want to be leaning into hero this year.
59:13Um, I want to be doing these things that have historical proven hit rates that are at a frequency greater than what the field is utilizing.
59:21Yeah. I think that you also bring up a good point.
59:24Two things. One is obviously the, the playoff versus cumulative formats, right?
59:28With, with the zero RB again to advance, you have to be top two out of 12, right?
59:34Which is really not. And this is another thing that I've been trying to kind of talk through with, with folks on
59:41the show this summer is like, I think there's this idea that to advance your team has to be really, really perfect.
59:48Right. But it's more so that your team has to be in a really good spot in the playoffs themselves, as opposed
59:55to getting through to one in six chance, which isn't like, you know, obviously it's a higher end outcome, but it's not like super crazy.
60:03You know, you don't have to have like every right player through week 14 in order to get that, that team advancing.
60:10Right. And so to your point here, that alone also lends itself a little bit more to the ability to do zero
60:17RB, because if you hit on one running back, let's say through, through that point in time, or, or you hit on
60:24one running back through the first like 10 weeks.
60:27And then those final four weeks, right before the playoffs start, maybe you get that second or third one because injuries pile up, whatever the case may be.
60:36And you've got the momentum going into the playoffs, but maybe you barely sneak into the playoffs, which is what we've seen
60:43so many times anecdotally with a lot of these best ball teams that then do really, really well, right.
60:50That, that win or whatever is this like idea that your team is not totally, you didn't smash weeks one, one through
60:5714 because you don't have to, that's not where you have to smash.
61:01You're trying to smash in the playoffs and specifically in week 17.
61:05And so with a zero RB type build or like a hero RB type build, and you're, you're just trying to like find that RB too.
61:13Um, I do think that, that it is very important to shout out that like these playoff formats are where that can
61:20happen in a more consistent way because it is a one in six shot to just get in there.
61:26And then once you're in there, a lot of stuff can, can, you know, go a certain way.
61:32So I think that's a really good point. And the other thing I wanted to throw out there is you make a
61:39great point about archetype drafting and the way that people think like when I go and I draft, I think you kind
61:46of like people who like have been playing fantasy football for a while kind of just do this inherently, but if you
61:53go running back, running back, like if you're in the back half of the first round and you get James cook and
62:00then you turn around and you get Kenneth Walker or something, right?
62:04Whatever it is, you know, which would be a great, which would be an awesome start.
62:09I would love it. Right. Right. And so if you have those two running backs, I'm no longer thinking about the Tajay Spears types like I would otherwise.
62:18Right. I'm thinking about the, the Kalon blacks, the Ray Davis is, well, maybe not Ray Davis with James cook necessarily, but
62:25regardless, you know, you get, you get the idea.
62:28So like, I think that's another really good point to drive home is that when you are sort of constructing this lineup,
62:35don't just think about like the floor running backs that you were noting a Woody marks who, you know, is going to
62:42get something, but probably doesn't have like the most massive ceiling in the world or, you know, some of these like early
62:49down, you know, not big pass catching profile type backs like a Dobbins or a Chris Rodriguez or who, whomever who to
62:56me are probably better in best ball than they are managed because in a managed league is just going to be chaotic
63:04and trying to predict when that production touchdowns happen.
63:06Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. And so like those players though, I don't know, have crazy great up.
63:12Maybe there's some contingent upside shore, but even still you have to think about what would happen if that starter goes down.
63:19And I don't think that there's that much of a difference in Delta between, you know, spending up six extra rounds to
63:26get a Chris Rodriguez for if an injury were to happen to Bayshall Tootin and the, the, the backfield and maybe Rodriguez
63:33isn't the best example, but the backfield then opens up completely versus around 19 running back like Kalon Black or Jordan James,
63:40you know, thinking about the one outcome that could happen for one of those two backs to emerge of Christian McCaffrey going down.
63:48I mean, if we assume that Tootin and McCaffrey were both down, are we really sitting here saying that we would confidently
63:55know that Chris Rodriguez is a better fantasy asset than one of the two 49ers running backs?
64:00You know, like, I don't think that we can confidently say that we would go one way or another.
64:06So you can get the discount and get those guys.
64:09If you're looking for just that injury out as opposed to just getting some production, right?
64:15Which is going to Chris Roger. So you're paying that premium for some production, but you don't need to pay that premium.
64:22If you've already locked down your supposed RB one, RB two in the early rounds, right?
64:27I think it's a really, really important thing to at least, you know, get across because it's something that I think a
64:34lot of people don't actively think about, even though if they, they do it kind of inherently and internally as they're drafting.
64:41There's one player, I think that highlights how the field is getting that so wrong throughout this season, uh, running back wise.
64:48And that's tank Bigsby. So like he started in the 17th, 18th round.
64:52Right. Yeah. Um, and then like Saquon started missing some time and then reports happen that like, they're going to try and
64:59get tank Bigsby like a weekly workload. Uh, and his ADP shot up to like 13th, 14th round.
65:05It's like in a best ball setting that the five to seven touches that he's going to get, even like if he
65:12is spelling Saquon means absolutely nothing to our roster.
65:15He is. His value is as a pure handcuff.
65:18So like, why was he moving up into the 13th, 14th round?
65:22He shouldn't have been. Um, so I had a ton of tank Bigsby like early on in the draft cycle.
65:28And then it, his ADP kind of skyrocketed a little bit because of all the uncertainty around Saquon or, you know, they have Sean Mannion coming in.
65:37Is he going to look to spell Saquon a little bit more?
65:41And now it's like, okay, no, Saquon's back at practice and he's the workhorse.
65:45Uh, and now take Bigsby is dropping again. It's like his, his use to us in a best ball setting never changed.
65:52Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Exactly. So we should have been drafting him just as that elite handcuff guy.
65:57Right, right. Yeah. It makes a ton of sense.
66:00Um, it was a really good example. I want to ask you what you think, you know, you kind of hinted at
66:07like, I mean, I guess you could technically throw what we just talked about into this bucket, but what you think best ball drafters get wrong?
66:16The biggest thing that I have seen that the best ball community is still getting wrong is drafting statically throughout the entirety of the draft window.
66:24So if, again, we've used this buzzword a lot today in our discussion of variance.
66:29If we think about, you know, when the contest that we're drafting open versus when they close, there's a sliding scale of variance within that structure as well.
66:38And it's this time information variance equation. So when contests kick off in May and we have four months of off season
66:45until the regular season starts, and then we have 17 weeks of the regular season, that level of variance is so much
66:52higher than if you're drafting in early September. The issue that I see generally speaking from the field is they're drafting in May as they would in September.
67:01And that is one of the biggest mistakes I think that we can make.
67:05So back to the zero running back discussion, I could tell very, very early that the field was like completely shying away from zero running back.
67:14And this was back to last year as well, right?
67:17Based off the recent injury trends that we noted.
67:20So what is zero running back? It's a highly variant way of drafting.
67:24So where would I want to institute that at the highest degree when the variance is greatest?
67:30So that is right when these contests kicked off.
67:32So like a massive chunk of my zero running back rosters in my portfolio were drafted in the first month of the
67:40off season because that is where the variance was highest.
67:43There's still four months for somebody to get injured before the season even starts.
67:47Yeah. And then there's the 17 weeks of the regular season as well.
67:51So bringing that discussion like full circle, like the field is drafting, you know, broad again, blanket statement alert.
67:58The field is drafting in May as they would in September.
68:01And I think that's a massive mistake. Yeah. That's a very good point about especially zero RB and just going back to the discussion we just had.
68:10But there's stuff that can go down as the summer goes on.
68:14I think that the there could be pushback of and I'm curious what you would think about this.
68:19I'm just trying to think of like a counter, you know, just to see what but like would be, hey, it's May
68:26and you're drafting the zero RB team. So that means that you're relying on running backs that we don't know what their roles might be, even the backups.
68:35Right. So I would assume that the response to that, this is a devil's advocate thing.
68:41This is not me necessarily believing that. Right. I'm my my stance would be and I want to hear if you agree,
68:48is that there's inherent variance to that aspect of things like like who steps up like right now we've been talking about the San Francisco backups.
68:56Right. Like we don't even know how that would would play out.
69:00But that doesn't mean that you can't find that guy in May when you're drafting and you're getting him probably for a
69:07price that is lower anyway, because we don't have that information.
69:10Is that sort of how you would answer that?
69:13And I have it within that zero RB portfolio.
69:16Like I had probably 50 50 exposure to like a San Francisco backup.
69:20If they were on a roster, I probably had 50 50 exposure to both Jordan James and Kalen Black.
69:27They were the two guys most likely to step into that role.
69:30I had no idea. And we still really don't know.
69:34And we still really don't have that much of an idea.
69:37It looked like it's it was Jordan James before he got hurt.
69:41And now it looks like it's Kalen Black because he's been on the field.
69:45Right. But like we really don't know still. So kind of like just saying, you know, if I'm drafting 100 rosters in
69:53May, June timeframe, I would probably want 40% of those.
69:56And this is just how I've handled it. I probably want like 40% of those rosters to be like zero running back.
70:03And I was probably targeting San Francisco backup on.
70:0625% of those rosters. So again, 100 roster portfolio, 40% of them being zero running back, a quarter of those being San Francisco backfield backup.
70:14I probably have like five Kalen Black and five Jordan James shares in that portfolio.
70:19And again, this is like, I don't know what my actual numbers are from a mindset standpoint.
70:24That's kind of how I'm looking to attack it.
70:27Yeah. Makes a ton of sense. All right. We've covered a lot.
70:31We're not even going to get to everything that we were potentially going to cover.
70:36So I'll leave it at this. Give me a bold take.
70:39Think put your crazy variance hat on. Give me give me a bold take for this 2026 season.
70:45Michael Mayer will win somebody a tournament. I love that.
70:48I love that because I've been clicking his name a lot at the end of drafts.
70:53Dude, I put that out in the Twitter sphere in like May and got like all the pushback.
70:59I think my words exactly was Michael Mayer probably carries the highest upside of any round 20 pick.
71:05And everyone was like, no, dude. But if you think about it and like we know that the Clint Kubiak system is
71:12going to be heavy personnel heavy as in they're going to they're not going to utilize a lot of 11 personnel.
71:19And then you look at the state of their wide receiver core.
71:23It's like he's going to be on the field already.
71:26Then what happens with this 32 out of 32 ranked wide receiver core?
71:30If like something happens to somebody that we don't even want to consider being like having an injury.
71:36But like, what if something happens, you know, have him on the depth chart.
71:40What if something happens to Ashley JT? Oh, right.
71:43Like we're here. There's a lot of upside there with Michael Mayer that I think people are brushing off.
71:49Yeah, I completely. I mean, look, I I think we're going to get usability out of him regardless of anything happening, period.
71:56Yeah, like in that offense, like you said, we're going to see enough 12 in that offense, you know, with the lack of pass catching talent.
72:05And then, yeah, upsides there if something were to happen to a lot of these guys, obviously, specifically a Brock Bowers.
72:11So, yeah, man, that's a it's a it's a great take.
72:15I love it. This is a great conversation. I love being able to hear, you know, your your brain spew some game theory knowledge.
72:23And I know that others will love it, too.
72:26So let everyone know where they can find you and what you'll be working on this season.
72:31Yeah, man, on X or the Twitter sphere at Hilo F F H I L O W F F.
72:37In season, I shift promptly to DFS from the best ball streets.
72:41Most of my work is going to be found over at one week season dot com.
72:46And just this season started working with stat rankings dot com.
72:50If you're looking for a stat provider, highly recommend going and checking that out.
72:54If you want to go check it out again, this is a service that was just launched last year.
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73:16That'll get you 20 percent off and you can check out everything we have to offer over there.
73:22Awesome. Awesome. I love it. As always, everyone, make sure you check out late round dot com.
73:28The draft guides out if you need that for your season long drafts upcoming.
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