Fantasy Football 2017 - Breakouts + Keep/Trade/Cut

in free agencies. Matt Aziata? No, thank you. Let's see if he even makes. Yeah. See what I'm saying? We knew that the tuba look good enough play. You gave me a quick opportunity there. He's just, he is the lead bag. And this, once again, Amir Abdullah is not injury prone. He did not miss a game in college. He played in all 16 games as a rookie. He had a Liz Frank problem in his foot.

He was injured, is what you're saying. Exactly. He was injured. He's not injury prone, just because he's a little bit smaller. The talent is undeniable. Go watch week one from last season. He is unbelievable. And while I'm saying breakout, I'm not talking about running back one. This is, Amir Abdullah is. You don't think he has running back one potential.

There's the potential, but it's going to be the touchdowns. Yeah, this is like the Lions hampered the RB one upside. I think as a team, they're rushing potential. This is, it's like Shady McCoy, right? Which we all love him right now, and that's fine. But there are years of LaShawn McCoy's career where he's carving up defenses. He's putting up major, major yards. And then he scores three rushing touchdowns on the season.

So that's very possible. That's in the outcomes for Amir Abdullah that the touchdowns just do not fall to him. But I project him as the lead runner for this team. I project he will be heavily involved in the passing game. It's not all theoretic. Amir Abdullah has major passing game chops. He's in the fifth round. And a running back who I think is an easy plug and play running back too. And the fifth round is that spectacular value for me. And so I'm back in.

One of the things I... On the Abdullah Express. I really like is everything out of camp has been good on Abdullah. The coaches have, you know, said they want to get him involved. And then every preseason, they have taken him out of the game so quick to say, you're our guy. You're good. We don't need to see anything else. We don't need to see you play. We don't want the potential of you getting hurt. Let's throw Zach Zinner in on, you know, the fourth snap of the game and head forward. So I... All right, let's bring...

Bring it to the anchor. Let's make it a little heavy. The anchor man. The anchor man. Excuse me, I have a very important announcement. Marcus Mariotta is my breakout candidate that I think. I believe it's Mariatu. It depends if you're going to Godell or not. Marcus Marietta has a great potential to break out this year. He has not yet broken out, even though sometimes we feel like he had because he had that stretch last year where he was.

Liquid magma and lighting the entire league on fire. We're doing that again. He's the only kind of magma there is, which is liquid. He's the only kind of magma. He is. There is no solid magma. Well, it's like saying he's, he's hot fire. There's no other kind of fire. Fair. But it's still an adjective. There might be soon. All right. So Game of Thrones. Here. Oh, come on, man. I guess is, yeah, your spoiler. I think you're spoiler free on that. All right. So here's a thing with Marcus Mario.

Marcus Marriota came out in his rookie year, and he looked pretty darn good. He was a quarterback two. He did not have a wide receiver finish in fantasy football in the top 50. It was all Delaney. He was literally the only quarterback that could say that now in the top 50. His number one wide receiving option. Do you know who that was? Do you remember who that was in 2015? As far as a wide receiver? As far as a wide receiver goes, he finished this one. Oh, my goodness. Was it Kendall right? It was not?

No, no, no, I'm thinking about this. He's, he's been traded around a lot and is currently, I believe, without a team. If he's not, he should be. It's Doriel Green Beck. Oh, is it really? Yeah, that's how bad the wide receiving situation was for Marcus Mariot. Now they brought in last year, ooh, huge free agent acquisition. Richard. Hey, don't crap on Matthews. No, look, I like Matthews. You like Matthews. We've always been higher than on him than most. Not a.

But he's not a spectacular. Yeah, he's not a top tier wide receiver. He's never been, he's just a, you know, he's a solid route runner with good hands, and, you know, he can be decent. And he was decent. Marcus Marietta turned him into a pretty fantasy, relevant player. And Marioita finished as the quarterback 13, just outside of that quarterback one. And keep in mind, Marioita did not play 16 games last year. So had he played 16, he probably would have been a quarterback one. What do they do this year? They've got Richard Matthews there.

They've got Delaney Walker there. Jono Smith, the tight-in they brought in, looks like another legitimate pass-catching option. But he wasn't their first pass-catching option taken. Before he was taken, I believe, Tewan Taylor. Before him, Corey Davis, a top 10 pick in the NFL. Oh, let's bring in Eric Decker, too. I mean, he has all the weapons to throw to. He has the talent. We've seen it on the field. And the only knock, the only knock on Marcus Mariotta.

is actually a good thing for fantasy football. The knock on him is that he has pretty massive splits between when he plays a top half passing defense and a bottom half passing defense. And you go, oh, yeah, he only carves up the bad defenses and plays poor against the good defenses. Great. Guess who's going to get it right when you go to decide whether to start him or sit him?

In fantasy football, that's the one split that I like to see when I'm not taking a top pick. If I'm in round one, round two. If you're seeing those splits, you don't really like it. Yeah, I mean, you're talking about a guy who's right now the 10th quarterback off the board. You're grabbing him late. And I think he has the potential, unlike a lot of guys, he has the potential to finish this year as a top five quarterback. I mean, I can go back two years and remember we made predictions on the show. Who we thought would be the better fantasy quarterback.

Long term. James Winston, Marcus Mariotta. Going down to that week one. You remember the week one? Oh, yeah. I mean. Mono e mono. Jamis was really good in that week one. James is. Especially that first pass. James was still a breakout candidate this year as well. And so what is your take? Who do you think ends up as the better fantasy guy over the next five years? Man, I think they're both going to be good. Isn't it still a tough decision? It is still a tough decision. I'm going to lean on. I still lean James.

Do you? Yeah, but it's if he can get, it's the, the overtrusting your arm making these bad decisions. I think I'm going to go Mario. It's mental for him. I'm going to go Marioita because brain and legs. Mario is going for fantasy football when you are a Russian quarterback. Not that James can't, but Marioata is much more involved in the Russian game. Brain and legs. Brain and legs. All right. Hey, look, I'm going to throw a couple of their names out there before we close out. Devante Parker.

is another potential candidate. You've got Stefan Diggs. Eric Ebron, if you can get healthy, Willie Sneed in that starter role. So pay attention. Isaiah Crowell, too. We talked about him earlier. He's a breakout candidate. With that improved offensive line and the things he's done in Cleveland, if Kaiser gives him something that they didn't have last year, even if it takes a little bit of time, I think you'll see some higher rushing performances from Crowell and higher volume. So.

Yeah, a lot of good guys. And there's obviously a ton more guys that we consensus agree on in the UDK. So make sure you grab that. And also don't forget, you want to make sure you get the NFL game pass so that you can stay on top of games. Even when you miss the games on a Sunday, you can go back, watch them short. It's the NFL football. If the game happened, NFL game pass has it. So kick off the 2017 NFL season with a free NFL game pass trial. Sign up now at NFL.com slash fantasy footballers.

All right. That is it for today's episode on the road here in Anaheim. Wish us luck. We got the Academy of Podcasters Awards tonight. That'll be exciting. And don't forget to check out Playdraft.com slash ballers. I'm bringing three pairs of underpants tonight, fellas. See you later. Goodbye. Thank you for listening to another episode of the Fantasy Footballers podcast. Join our fantasy football community on join thefoot.com. And follow us on Twitter.

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