Fantasy Time Machine + Kyren Siren! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 8/28

Great Scott! If my calculations are correct, you are listening to this before your fantasy football drafts have taken place. I've been to the future, and those that followed the advice from the fantasy footballer's ultimate draft kit had a spectacular season and with certain many victories. It's almost as if Biff had given each of them a copy of Grey Sports Almanac. I'd highly recommend heading over to www.W.W. Ultimate draft kit.com without any further delay. To the Fantasy Footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. Wednesday, August 28th. Jason Moore is here. Mike the Fantasy Hitman. I'm Andy Holloway. And we're ready for a show. Let's see where we're going.

We don't need roads. No, we've got a fantasy time machine episode today. Great Scott. Some, uh, this is a, that ass is just Scott. This is one of my favorite episodes because we, uh, you know, we get to prognosticate. We get to talk about players that were huge surprises last year and try to see. You know, that's the fun part of fantasy. People want it to play out according to chalk and the ADP and how everybody thinks about every player because it feels unjust. You did the work and you did the research and you want it to just work out exactly as it says on paper. But if it did, this would not be fun. No, and the ones who win are the ones who grab the guys that didn't work out due to ADP and not poorly, but, you know, they're the ones that...

drafted Puka in the last round and you got to find the windows and the things like I you know spoiler I know on today's episode we're talking about you know last year's Rashad White but that was that was a sixth round pick who was like how did he volume his way to being a really really good fantasy asset and taking a look at the guys who have things in common I think that I love this episode I think it's really valuable it is it's going to be fun so we've each picked some candidates for a number of categories stepping into the time machine, looking into the future, and obviously being perfectly correct on every one. Of course. The ultimate draft kit, you heard it at the top. It's available right now. You got drafts this weekend. Our big league of record draft is the morning of kickoff day. So that is exciting. We get to draft and then we'll be watching the Thursday night game.

But you've got drafts all the way through kickoff, ultimate draft kit.com. And the draft analyzer, if you want to get your draft graded by us, that is in the UDK Plus. That is very fun as well. You can put your team in there, strengths and weaknesses. And so you can check that out, Ultimate draft kit.com. And then, of course, we want to invite you to participate in the Megalibul, our tournament-style Super League with... I got you, Jay. Thank you. You know, I'm usually one doing the voice. The shark is on rest. Yeah. Yeah, my, my voice is still recuperating. But it is a pleasure to hear the shark and not be the one doing the shark. It was, it was a joy. Thank you, Mike. You're welcome. Yeah, you, there's a, our, I think our ex account posted a picture of Jason breaking his voice, like the moment that it happened. Yeah, he was just on this show saying he had no idea.

What happened? I think we know. When could it possibly have happened? And yet we have a photo. We can hear your voice going away in a photograph. Yeah, it's true if you've seen it. So join. There's over 12,000 of you in there so far, megalobol.com. And you can win a spot in the listener league, win an ultimate foot clan membership for life. And you have a chance to join before the drafts begin, August 31st through September 4th. That is megalobole.com. All right, let's jump in. Welcome to Hungry for More, presented by Uber Eads. Well, I am excited to kick off this segment. Hungry for More candidates. I'm going to go with Michael Wilson, wide receiver for the Arizona Cardinals. So I'm going to go a little deeper here. I like it. The Cardinals' offense is one that, you know, Mike has Kyler Murray as a my guy. The Cardinals spent some, or.

Spent some money picking up Zay Jones. Zay Jones has been suspended. And Michael Wilson was a third round pick who did flash last year. The Cardinals had no receiving options. So Michael Wilson received, you know, the predominant coverage by defenses in this offense. And he only had half a season with Kyler Murray. So he had some big games. He had a seven for 76 and two game against San Francisco. He's going to get a chance to start outside with Kyler Murray, and you finally have another receiver in Marvin Harrison that's going to get the lion's share of the coverage. So do I think Michael Wilson is, you know, T. Higgins? Not yet. But he's going to have opportunities that he has not had before. And a sophomore season, this is when players that showed something as a rookie have an opportunity to break out. It's really funny. The fact that, you know, second year wide receivers are just a great bet in fantasy.

They are one of the, you know, easiest layup picks to find value against their ADP. And Michael Wilson, I think because of Marvin Harrison Jr. coming in. It's because of also McBride. Sure. I mean, but as in the wide receiver core, especially with Zay Jones now being suspended, he is the number two wide receiver on this team. He'll be there, I believe, in two wide receiver sets as a year two receiver four, what should be a good offense. And it's. terrible defense. Yeah. The Cardinals have no pass rush. I don't believe that they can go four quarters without. They're actually considering starting thin air instead of a defensive end. Yeah, they're going to go 10 on 11. It might bring more pressure. Yeah. The Cardinals drafted Darius Robinson with their first round pick. He is injured. I think he's going to miss a little bit of time at least. So yeah, they're going to have to throw the ball a lot. I, it's your turn, Jason.

Okay, dude, I'm hungry for more Josh Jacobs, baby. Oh, oh. I never doubted him. Everything I said this offseason was a long con. So there's a lot of news. In fact, in the news segment, I can't wait to discuss a big breaking hullabaloo. Yeah, you can say it now. Well, we'll talk about the Kyron Punt Returner news later. But for now, Josh Jacobs news is news that is. actually important and there's nothing that can be done about it. So I have spent the offseason worried about his efficiency a little bit, but more worried about the fact that LaFleur always uses a committee. That's what he wants. That's what he says. He says it so confidently like, guys, you know my system. I don't like putting a workhorse back out there. But guess what? He don't have no choice no more. Like to start this season, you have Emmanuel Wilson as the backup running back. Well, let's break that news. A.J. Dillon was put on

Season ending. Season ending injured reserve. That is a headline that's part of this story that nobody knows yet. Yeah. Also part of it reportedly, Marshawn Lloyd was going to go onto the IR and miss four games. That was retracted. So he has avoided the IR. I mean, obviously Lloyd is still dealing with a hamstring injury if they were even considering that. But they're not going to use. Lloyd won't be ready for week one. Right. Yeah, yeah, I agree. They're not going to put Lloyd on the IR and use a designation to return. They're just going to keep him on the – they're just – they're not going to do anything with him, but he will miss time. Yeah, put it this way. Let's say we're heading into week two of the NFL season. And week one started the way that we thought this was a three-way backfield committee. Everyone was healthy. And in week one, AJ Dylan goes down to a season-ending injury.

and Marshawn Lloyd gets injured for at least like two or three weeks. We know he's going to miss a chunk of time. I mean, Josh Jacobs skyrockets. There's just not the choice to have a true committee. So, you know, and the Packers are a great offense. They're due for rushing touchdown upside. And Josh Jacobs has been on the every other year plan. You know what I mean? Good year, good year, bad year. He's coming off the bad year? Have you moved him so much in your draft rankings? Like, are you taking him ahead of? Pacheco now. I haven't gotten to that point because I don't think this will be a season long thing and I still worry. And I love Pacheco, but I think it's fair to put him in that tier. He is on a great offense, projects right now to have a lot of volume. What about Kairn, a player that people are questioning the workhorse back, whereas Jacobs is falling into the workhorse back? Yeah, I mean, I've still got Kiron ahead. Kiron, to me, is where he's been the whole offseason, which is my running back five.

He said, it's like we always say, stay stone. Well, no, I mean, I think there's news that you change on, and this is news I'm changing on. I've moved Josh Jacobs up tremendously when we get to the news and talk more about the one line about a punt return. It's like nothing has changed. This is. We'll talk about it. Yeah, we'll talk about it. We have different opinions. We're still hungry. Mike, hungry for more. Jordan Mason, because this was huge news from yesterday as well. Well, all the cuts were going on. Elijah Mitchell. The backup four years for the San Francisco 49ers was put on a season-ending IR. He had a hamstring injury. I read that it wasn't really widely reported, but then he'd like re-aggravated it. That was kind of what turned into this. We got to shut him down. We got to make some decisions here. On top of that, JP, Jordan Mason, Ponchez out here with the elite name, but he has been, he's been playing fantastic.

He's always been a speedster. If you've watched the preseason games, he looks like he fits the scheme perfectly. We haven't seen him in a ton of real-life game action, but last year against Dallas, he was mopping up, 10 for 69 in a touchdown. It's a good game. It's the backup for Christian McCaffrey, I should say, the backup for San Francisco has always had huge fantasy value. And Mason, I think, is... He's looked so good. I think that he has looked tremendous, and he is now like Blake Corum in a range where if I'm in a 12-teamer, he's in consideration to draft and sit on my bench as an upside play. All right, that was hungry for more presented by Uber Eats. Get almost almost anything for game day delivered with Uber Eats. Official on-demand food delivery partner of the NFL. Order now.

News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. All right, now we can talk about the Kyron Williams blurb from yesterday. That is what I think is scaring some fantasy. It is scaring fantasy players. That is a factual statement because his ADP has dropped in certain places. The Rams head coach, Sean McVeigh, said running back Kyron Williams will be their team's punt returner. We generally... generally speaking, not just isolated to the Rams. Generally, when you find out a player is going to be involved in special teams, you cringe as a fantasy manager because you just don't want that opportunity to be injured. It's normally something reserved for players that you are protecting. Damian Pierce last year being named the kick returner comes to mind where it was like, oh, what? Antonio Gibson had happened to. Yeah. So.

This news put some fear into fantasy players. Now, I am a Kyron Williams manager. I spent an offseason trading for him in our league of record, making a calculated decision. And as much as I'd love to say that our home rosters never bias or impact the way we view a player, we're human beings. And sometimes, you know, it's chicken or egg, right? You trade for the player because of what you believe and you believe in the player. And so you go trade for them. And they work together. Look, I am on the record as being concerned, not because of one piece of news from Sean McVeigh, but because the more, like eventually, like if you're dressing up for Halloween and you're going to dress up as a duck, like, I need a bill.

Yeah, but like, you know, maybe you put the shoes on. I need a tail. You put the shoes on first. You put the tail on. The shoes. Whatever. You put on parts of the costume and eventually. Ducks wear shoes? Eventually a costume. I've never seen it, Jason. I've never seen a duck with shoes. You're not a duck. You don't become a duck on Halloween, Jason. Oh, okay. You do become a, you wear a costume of a duck. Right. I just thought I had like a webbed foot. I mean, whatever, man. You see some weird ducks out there. How would you put it on? How would you put your web foot on? I'd slide my foot into the web foot. Oh, okay. So it's like a shoe. Yeah, okay. Listen, eventually you put the bill on and you are a duck, is my point. And this has been an off season where I started with concerns. Blake Corum is my favorite. He was my favorite running back coming out of college in Michigan. He has done it all. I have tremendous confidence in the Rams and who they draft.

and what they believe they can do in the offense. Blake Corm has moved from the second team to the first team. Sean McVeigh has been, you know, you talk about Doug Peterson trying to say that Travis E. Tian needs a break. Like, they've never done that. Sean McVeigh has said it so many times and really needs that for Kyle Williams, who did get hurt. And now you're making them your punt return. So for me, this is a downgrade because I went from. in my head a 90, 95% chance of being a workhorse back at the beginning of the off season to the draft happening, to practice happening, and now he looks like a duck. And so now it's 80% or 70%. And I want the workload chance. Not that he has to have it to be amazing, but Jason is on the opposite side. I want to give him the floor. Well, before we give him the floor, I want to hear what does that mean to you? Like where has it, like Jameer Gibbs? I would take Gibbs over him. Jacobs.

I would be thinking hard about Jacobs. Yeah. ETN. Yep. Okay. Seque Juan. Yeah. Yes. Okay. So you would take him above. I would take him above Pacheco. Okay. Uh, still. But, but Jason is not concerned at all. So I want to give the other side. And I am more interested in Jason being right here. That is much better for my team. I don't want to dress up like a duck. So. When Blake Quorum was drafted, it definitely affected things. It affected the outlook of Kyron Williams. But what it didn't do is it didn't say, oh, they're in a committee now. Like, as in he's not the primary ball carry. I don't expect, I don't want, genuinely. I don't want him to be on the field 93% of the time. Last year, he was the only player at 20 fantasy points or more per game and half PPR along with Christian McCaffrey. If you take five opportunities away.

every game from Kyron, and then you get 17 games out of it, that is way better for fantasy. So when Blake Quorum came, I mean, I've got Blake Quorum with 136 carries this year. I have it being a shared opportunity. However, Kyron Williams is the main guy. And if you listen to the whole quote talking about how this was a question about releasing a certain player. And he just mentioned, he said, yeah, Kyron's our punt returner. And now we've got Blake Corum and we've got... Ronnie Rivers where if Kyron needs a spell, he can get it. I see that as a good thing for him, but I don't see this as new information. We've known that they drafted Blake Quorum for months. We've known that he's been having run with the ones for a while. Kyron Williams, I don't know if you remember this last year when he started so hot on fire. He was their punt returner last year. Weeks one through three. Weeks one through three when he's still got a lot of work. Cooper Cup. Cooper Cup was there because they didn't have any backups.

The thing is, is I'm not saying that Kyron is going to get the insane workload he got last year. But I haven't been saying that at all since they drafted Korm. I've been saying he is their main running back and he's going to be really, really valuable for fantasy. I still believe that. You know, Cooper Cup was their full season punt returner when he was the officer player of the year and the Triple Crown Award winner. This isn't a role. I don't think McVeigh looks at this like. like, well, I can't use him as a running back now. This is like I want him to have more opportunities to impact the game. And so I just think it's overreact. I just drafted him in the fourth round of a real draft. It was super flex. It was a little, you know, you wouldn't have expected him to be up where he was. But I was happy to grab him in the fourth. If he drops to being the running back 10, 11, 12, I'll scoop him up everywhere. I'm mostly worried that he's going to miss drives, not plays.

He will because McVeigh... Which means he's going to miss touchdown opportunity. Yeah, I mean, I will say this. Like McVeigh, they play fast. The reason that he's always had a workhorse, a guy that, you know, whether it was girly or whether for small stretches, it was Cam Acres, or whether it was Darrell Henderson, he employs a back that stays on the field for all three downs. And that is what Coram is. Corum can come in and give him relief and play drives. I agree that we're kind of saying the same thing. The only difference is I don't think that's changed for me. Yeah, I get what you're saying. And I'm not, look, this is not saying one of us believes Kyron's a top five back and the other believes he's, you know, shouldn't be drafted. That's insane. Like, Kyron is very highly ranked. But when you invest in Kyron, you want more security. And the punt return thing gives me a little bit of fear. And Ronnie Rivers is healthy again. And I don't ignore him.

The team loves him. The team was using him, even with Kyron on the field, before he got hurt. So it'll be interesting. I just, I want to believe that Kyron can finish number one. I do not believe that anymore. That's the difference. That's the difference. That's fair. Antonio Brown returned 187 puns. Yeah, but wide receivers are different to me. Genuinely, there's a lot of them that return kicks. I mean, that's happened a lot in the past. Not as many running back. I, I moved Kyron down. What if CMC was named the punt returner tomorrow? That would put some fear in you. I wouldn't change it. No, I wouldn't move Chris McCaffrey at all. His chance of injury is very high on this place. That's why. I bumped Kyron down slightly. I don't even know if he actually, like the market share that moved. I don't know if that moved him in my rankings overall. But this is an exciting moment because this feels like a pivotal piece of.

draft changing news that we're going to look back on and go, man, we didn't react enough to the punter news or you're going to say, look at all those idiots who overreacted to the punt return news. I think it is, it will be an apex moment. This is not a Kyron siren. Nice. I love it. Jamar Chase, Mike. He's, Zach Taylor says he's confident he will play in week one. That's right. That's right. Pretty important. Well, I mean, this is this is actually fair to report on because. We had, you know, whispers, like growing louder and louder by the moment of Jamar Chase won't step on a field until he gets his contract extension. His leverage situation is not like Brandon Ayukes where Jamar Chase has two more years that the Cincinnati Bengals have the rights to him to be on the team. And it's been really wishy-washy comments from Taylor.

And the most recent ones, it was far more of a, no, Jamar Chase is going to be there in week one. Kendry Miller is going to start on the IR for the Saints while, I don't know if you saw this, Jason, Dennis Allen, one of your biggest enemies. I just love them, man. He came out and went on a full-on, I love Tayson Hill rant yesterday. I don't know if you got to follow that. It was like, I don't know if you've ever seen a player like this. Nobody's like him in the history of the NFL. He does everything. He's amazing. He does my taxes. He did it. It was a whole bunch of that. Did you see when... He's nothing like Kendrae Miller, I believe, is what he said. Did you see he tried to have Tayson Hill be the Mike linebacker back when... Is this real? No, no, he talked about it. Honestly true. I think it was on the Kay Adams show like a week or two ago. He wanted...

to use him on defense. Sure. But he wasn't the head coach and even in that. He wants Tase him to be the OC. He couldn't. I'll bet he couldn't even name Sean Payton. He's like, he's like, you know, the head coach wanted. I'm like, I don't know. I don't like anything. I am, I mean, the IR is not surprising. I am a little bit surprised that they didn't just shut him down the way that Dennis Allen hates him. So you're not coming back, dude. We'll see you next year. Dalvin Cook was signed to the practice squad for the Cowboys who released Roy Freeman and Malik Davis. Tom Pelliserro is so excited. Mike is so bent out of shape over Tom Pelliserro. Because the tweets are out of control. It's fine. I think he's on the take, man. It's an agent tweet, man. That's why I'm saying it's so ridiculous that, look, this is a, this is an NFL reporter who just called.

Dalvin Cook a marquee signing. Do you know how they get their insights and their tips and their tricks? Yeah, they work with agents and they grease the wheels. If you were running that account, you would you would copy paste the same tweet because that's what he did. I'm going to take that money. Yeah. Look, I'm not an ethical man. I'm going to take that money like Tom. You're going to hear from him. I don't think he took money. I think he's just, you know, you rub my bag, I rub yours type of thing. It is so the signing is. Look, they cut Royce Freeman yesterday. If you missed that during the trim down, Dalvin will go into the practice squad. I don't know if he makes it onto the active roster at any point. If this, like, if you're not in on my Rico dattle take, I don't blame you. It's a bold prediction. It's a hotter take. But Dalvin Cook should not, if you were in, Dalvin Cook should not be pushing you out. All right. Just really quickly, because we've got to get.

get through the news here. Trace Sermon, still the backup for JTT. Evan Hole was waived. The Browns released Deontiformin resulting in a number of texts or sorry tweets at me. But the rumor is that he's going to be returning. I brought Deontiformin up in a hungry for more segment during the preseason when he had a pretty good game. We'll see if he's back on the roster. If you're a four-year vet or more, then you don't go through the waiver system. You're a free agent to sign anywhere. So this could very easily be a situation where they talk to him, say, hey, we're going to resign you. It's accounting. They only have two active running backs on the roster right now. You can't go into the season like that. And then O'Dow Beckham is on the IR to begin. The pup. He's on the pup to begin. And Tim Patrick. Yeah. Signing with the Lions. Yeah, a practice squad guy.

He'll work his way. Yeah, he'll start there. But I mean, it's hard when you've been hurt that many years in a row, like to make an impact. But they got opportunity there for sure. That was today's news and notes presented by USAA Insurance. Learn more at USA.com slash insurance. Back with the fantasy time machine in a moment. All right. This just in. Kyron Williams is now, he's actually bringing the water bottles to the other running backs. Oh, no. I don't know if that what that means to you. Does that that then now that's a needle mover. That is a needle move. Now you're changing. For sure. You've got to come back with me. Where? Back to the future. Oh, this is my favorite show. Good work, Mike. Yeah, incredible, incredible creativity. Hey, man, sometimes you've got to just pay homage to greatness. Indeed. All right, we're looking at the fantasy time machine segment here, looking first to find.

2024's version of Rashad White. He was a sixth round pick drafted RB24 and was arguably the second most valuable player in fantasy at the running back position from week seven on. That is a majority of the season. That was 22 opportunities a game. He was the RB2. And that was incredible. He was a really good pass catcher. You cannot argue efficiency on the ground. You can argue. He was just dynamic through the air. He would make the first man miss. He ran the most routes among running backs, fourth most receptions, third most fantasy or, sorry, receiving yards. So we're looking for a dead zone running back who could make his way into being an RB1 for fantasy. I'll kick us off because mine is the highest drafted. But he's still in the fifth round, which I think is a great value. When I think about Rashad White, I think about an inefficient player who.

PPR his way to real greatness. And I genuinely believe that's what happens with Alvin Camara this year. Alvin Camara is not going to be a super efficient player at this point in his career, not for this system. Derek Carr just giving him the ball right over the line, right in front of a linebacker over and over and over. That being said, from weeks four through 15, remember he started the season suspended last year. He was the running back two in total fantasy points scored. And it was on the same basis of just non-stop checkdowns. Now you have Kendra Miller, who is a non-factor, at least to start the season. And Jamal Williams, no matter how much the team loves him, he.

He's wonderful. Love the dude. He's done. He doesn't have much left to give. So I really think you're just going to have nonstop volume for Camara. And they don't really have a great receiving core. You know, you're talking about Chris Olavi. One of the reasons I like Chris Olave is coming after you, man. Yeah, I know. Shahid, this will be the year. But Camara is going to be their number two target, I believe, in this offense. And if that's the case. You're just going to have pure volume in the fifth round for a player who it doesn't matter if it's pretty. Don't watch the Saints games. I try not to. Yeah, no, I mean, Camara showed it last year already that he can do that. Like this is not a player that we haven't seen it from. Like he was an inefficient dominator in fantasy from weeks four through 15 last year. I hate where I have Camara ranked.