Fantasy Football Podcast 2016 - Rising Stars, Preseason WK2, David Johnson Interview

pretty much the guy. What I saw last year when Forte was out was a guy that could get it done for fantasy. But all the reports, all the scare this offseason of Jordan Howard's going to take that role. And it's going to be a complete committee there really started to make me not buy it. But what I saw in that first preseason game from Jeremy Langford was he was the guy.

He got the bulk of the carries. I'm talking he was in on first down, second down, third down, goal line, red zone. He received a pass out of the backfield, and he looked good running the ball. He made some nice cuts, looked big and fast and strong. Eight for 55 and a touchdown, another eight yards through the air. So Jeremy Langford is a guy that if he ends up in that workhorse roll.

will be a value for where he's going. Jeremy Langford and Matt Jones were in the same conversation, the same sentence for many weeks. Fourth round running backs. Right now, I'm definitely on the Jeremy Langford side of that equation. Agreed. All right. Look, guys, a rising star. You might not have heard of him. He's a wide receiver for the Jacksonville Jaguars. You took that to the limit. Took it to the limit. Hey, Alan Robinson's pretty good. And maybe it feels a little wrong to put him in the Raising Cain's Rising Stars of the Week. It's final of me. But I'm putting them in.

I'm putting him in. He actually, I have him now ahead of Des Bryant in my official wide receiver half point rankings. I want to give you some perspective on Alan Robinson. And part of this is because, look, he's 22, 23. He's still ascending. I saw some things from Blake Bortles this weekend that made me very excited about just some of the types of throws that he's making. But Alan Robinson is an elite wide receiver. Jason said it last week.

It was back on tape again this week, making catches, making plays over and over and over again. And look at this. Last year, Alan Robinson, in a half-point format, our league format for our league of record, he scored 17 fantasy points less than Brandon Marshall. Total, right? 17 total fantasy points less on the year. Marshall was the number three ahead of O'Dell Beckham Jr. Marshall had 109 catches. Robinson had 80. Marshall had 22 more targets than Alan Robinson.

And the gap was that small. That just shows you big play. And they matched each other in touchdown. So it wasn't just, you know, Robinson had more touchdowns than Marshall. It was, the gap was so close despite that type of a reception difference. Basically, the difference in my ranking this year is I see his reception total rising a little bit.

And so I think it's going to be higher than 80. I think it's going to be in the 90s. And he plays on 100% of plays, 100% snap count last year. I really think he's a top five guy. I don't have him ahead of AJ Green or O'Dell Beckham Jr. or Julio Jones or Antonio Brown. But basically he's right there. He's the top of that next tier for you? Yeah, he is. He is. And so I just...

I went out and put my money where my mouth is this weekend. So I went out and traded for him. My question here to see how high he's rising for you, because I know you're madly in love with Brandon Marshall. Yes. Brandon Marshall or Alan Robinson? Brandon Marshall. And then it goes Alan? Yeah. All right. Yeah. Actually, I technically have Brandon Marshall three. I think I have Alan Robinson five or six behind Agent Green.

All right, that's the Raising Cains Rising Starts of the Week. Remember, everybody, game day tastes better with Raising Cain's tailgates full of fresh 24-hour marinated hand-battered chicken fingers. And fresh-brewed, sweet tea, which is so very good. Visit Raising Cains.com, find your nearest location. A bunch of you guys reached out on Twitter said you've already been doing that. Get the extra sauce. Yeah, you always get an extra sauce there. That's a pro tip.

Yeah, that one should have been in our top ten tips and tricks episode. Get the extra sauce. That's number three or number two somewhere around there. All right, let's get into the preseason. Weekly rewind. I think our technology has a case of the Mondays as well. Yeah, I don't think that's me, man. I hit the button about five times and just didn't do anything. You know, it happens. It happens. All right. Let's get into the weekly rewind. We're going to walk through these games. We're going to give you the bullet points. Nothing more, nothing less. Let you know what's going on. The Eagles.

The Steelers, what do we got out of this game? All right, so the Eagles and Steelers, my quick takeaway is, look, I've been riding the Coats of Coats, Sammy Coats, and it was a very mixed game for him, you know, was personally responsible for an interception. Two interception. Well, okay, two, but then I honestly didn't remember the second one, but came back and made an incredible, incredible sideline catch.

The thing that I noted out of it, though, they are feeding him. They want to get him the ball. They want to see what he can do, which I think bodes well for him over the course of the season. I'm still taking Wheaton. Me as well. And that's fine. They want to see what he can do. And, you know, I came in the offseason really excited for Coats. He just has not impressed me with the ability. It looks like he's not able to track the ball well. And his opportunity is there. But.

You have to keep in mind that Landry Jones looks horrific. So, I mean, he has yet to really be working much with Big Ben. The only other guy I would point out from this game personally was Eli Rogers might be a name to store. PPR guy. Somewhere in the background should Coats not get it done. Eli Rogers, I believe, is that next wide receiver up for the Steelers. Anybody on the Eagles that stood out to anybody? Kenjin Barner looks okay.

and he is clearly going to be the two. Sproles was getting involved. They were moving them all over the place. So you can feel confident. I still feel confident in Ryan Matthews. I don't feel confident really drafting guys from that team. It's funny. This is how preseason works, of course. But my big takeaway from the Eagles was they're going to be bad. They won 17 to nothing, right? They're going to be bad.

You have this wide receiver core of just enigmatic non-stars. Like Doreal Greenbeckham, inconsistent. Ruben Randall might. I mean, he's going to make the team, but he's inconsistent. You've got Nelson Aguilar. Nelson Aguilar, they said he's struggling to create separation, struggling to catch the ball, struggling to run consistent routes, or tie his shoes. To tie his shoes. Chris Givens was in camp. He hasn't done Jack. And Matthews is still hurt. I believe he's on track to play week one.

It's always scary to me when you hear a player who gets injured this time of year that's on track for week one. Yeah, that's not a fun drafting situation. That's the reality for that. So that, you know, that's what I get out of the game. Did you guys mention Eli Rogers catching a bunch of passes underneath? Yes, we did. The Bengals and Lions played a game of football. Yes. And for me, what stood out was the, what I think.

Was wide receiver one talent of Marvin Jones in this game? You know, he's a big guy. He can do things. Golden Tate's a great player, great hands, great separation. You can't do certain things with Golden Tate. You can't throw the ball up on, you know, and let him go get it. You know, Marvin Jones won at the point of attack multiple times in this game, heavily targeted. To me, the value difference between them in the draft. Marvin Jones is on every one of my teams. Golden Tate's on none if I'm having to pick one based on value. Yeah, absolutely. Let me say something.

Marvin Jones is rising. The public is taking notice. He has gone from the ninth round to the middle of the seventh, and I think he will continue to rise. But where's Tate? Four? Let me double. And the truth is, even in the seven. Five back of the very back of the four. So in the turn, give me Marvin still. Yeah, I would take Marvin there. I think they're close. I actually have a water bet from early in the off season with a listener over Golden Tate versus Marvin Jones out of the year. I haven't been worried about that at all. I still, I've said the value is better than Marvin Jones.

starting to get a little worried because he looked like a first read. And here was my takeaway from the Lions. I want Lions. There, no huddle offense that they showed was an offense that's going to get more snaps in a game. And we know for fantasy football, look, I mean.

You've got Stafford who is going to throw the ball a bazillion times. I've been talking Stafford for a long time. And I am officially on board. I think that the wide receiving core, Anquan Bolden makes a big difference here. He does. Eric Ebron's not even there. Marvin Jones and Bolton Tate and Theoretic and Abdullah. You have weapons here when you're going with a no-huddle, fast-paced offense that, honestly, I'm not sure how great the defense is. There's going to be some points scored for the line. And I want to say this about Theoretic.

I think Theoretic is going to be on the field a ton this year. Theoretic is a good passenger protector. They trust him to protect Stafford in that type of a quick hitting offense. You know, we know Abdullah just shed the non-contact jersey and he's finally going to get a chance, so I'm not going to throw Abdullah out the...

out the window here. He's going to be on the field plenty as another weapon. But I think the way that this offense runs, from a past protection standpoint, Theoretic is going to be on the field a lot, and he's obviously a great past catcher. So I just don't think he should be ignored in drafts, especially half in full point leagues. On the other side of the ball, you know, Mike, you talk about Eddie Lacey bouncing back this season. You know, two years ago, he looked like...

A superstar top three draft pick. Same thing for Jeremy Hill two years ago. He was a superstar top three draft pick running at a huge yards per carry clip. Last year he struggled. I still think he's kind of a headcase. But he looked good in this game. Yeah, I had put the note. I wasn't sure what you guys would say about it because I thought he looked good. I was the Jeremy Hill truth, but I thought he looked strong. I thought he looked more importantly decisive. That's what Jeremy Hill did not have last year. And also draft Andy Dalton late. He looked good, too.

He was on pace for a top five season before he broke his thumb. Draft him late. Thanks for getting on board with that. The last guy I will get out there is a guy who was my second. You know, I love Sterling Shepard in the offseason. I love Tyler Boyd. Tyler Boyd looks like what I saw. I know some people aren't high on him. When Matt Harmon, when we got lunch with him, we were kind of, him and I were disagreeing. And he knows, look.

Matt Harmon is a great expert on wide receivers, but there's something I love about Tyler Boyd. It's just like that gritting. It's a good name. Yeah, he's my Boyd, you know? He looked great, you know, second preseason game in a row. So who would you, I mean, at this point, I had been saying I would rather have just fantasy-wise because of the Marvin Lewis offense, Brandon LaFell over Boyd, but I'm switched now. I would rather have Boyd. Interesting. Yeah, I don't know.

I don't know. Brandon Lafell, I think, will have the opportunity to be the guy that you should have picked. But I don't know if he'll follow through at that opportunity. He is practicing now or are going to be practicing here soon. So Lafell should be back on the field. We know they're going to start the season without Eiffurt, but he'll be back shortly. So that offense should come into shape. Patriots, Bears, the Garoppolo continues.

We've talked at length about Jeremy Langford and the Bears. The other thing I saw from this game was Alshan Jeffrey looked absolutely great to me. He will be force fed. He will be forced fed. Yeah, I feel fine about Alshan Jeffrey, where I have him ranked. And I don't want to overreact too much on this. Oh, I hope this is what I was thinking. This better not be a J. Cutler to say. No, okay. No, I have been very disappointed.

with Kevin White this preseason. I've wanted to see better routes. I've wanted to see better hands. He had one catch. Yeah, he just, I'm not on the plays where he's even targeted. I just haven't been impressed with what I'm seeing from Kevin White. I really want to love Kevin White a lot. It's going to take time. The nice thing is he's going to, yeah, he's going to take some time. And then you got a white on the other side, James White we've talked about at length as well. So both of those guys were covered quite a bit in the news. Is there anything else from the Patriots offense in this game? Just the question. Where are you looking to get white now?

It's a great question. Give me some names. Give me some names somewhere later on. Okay. Let's figure it out on the air. Okay. So I think that James White will, I'm going to think about like maybe the sixth round. So what are the names around? I don't think you're going to take him in the six. I'm just saying where I think he might rise to. Okay. So where's Danny Woodhead going right now? Danny Woodhead's going in the eighth. Okay. So give me some names in the eighth round.

Uh, in, in the eighth round would be Danny Woodhead, Jay Ajay, T.Jelden, LaGarrett Blunt. Okay, I'm taking all those guys ahead of James White. Uh, if you're going to the ninth, Charles Sims. And this is in standard. Sims looked great. Yeah, I would say, let's look at PPR. You're in standard. So in standard, I don't know that I'm looking for him strongly. 10th round or later. Yeah, but if you're in a half or a full point PPR, then changes. Then, you know, like the 6th, I'll think about it.