Top 10 QB Rankings + Player Tweaks, Tom Riddle - Fantasy Football Podcast for 8/13

He was, but he was the focal point of the offense when he was out there. I mean, that's very high volume. And that included two targets as well. And Washington's defense is pretty good. That defensive line is one I would not want to play on the other side against. That guy is a monster. Logan Thomas? Yeah, he had a nice reception. Obviously Curtis Samuel not out there. Termin was out there. Let's move on.

Okay. Jeremy Fowler from ESPN reporting Darren Waller's ankle injury is, quote, not concerning, which is what we've heard. Are you not concerned anymore? You know, it's nice to hear this because we had a kind of a different source saying that they thought it was just an ankle injury that they're being cautious with. And then it comes out afterwards that that's exactly what is going on. So I am less concerned now. It's not.

not going to be a long-term injury. It's not something that's, you know, I'm fine taking Darren Waller in the third. Mike Williams, hip flexer. Here we go. Not going to play in the preseason. So Mike Williams is very, very proficient and efficient in terms of getting injured. Yeah, unfortunately. I'll still take him with like my last, now that he'll drop with this, my last pick, he's.

the potential wide receiver two for Justin Herbert, and he's going to be probably available on your waivers after draft. Treyquan Smith missed his eighth straight practice on Thursday. Michael Thomas had a productive meeting with Sean Payton to move past their frustration. That's good. I mean, there was, of course, trade rumors. It helps. It helps you know where to appropriately put the returning from injury, Michael Thomas. All right. I think that's it. Brooks, you got anything else for us? Nothing else.

All right, that was today's news and notes brought to you by Sleeper, the largest dynasty platform on the planet. And, you know, you can tweak. You can do some tweaks. You can do some tinkering with those dynasty settings. Very customizable. So check that out. Let's get into the quarterback rankings. Quarterbacks.

I'm excited to talk about the quarterback position in general. I mean, every year we have similar discussions with regards to how do you value them? Where do you take them in fantasy drafts? Everybody out there, if you're a brand new player, default mindsets in fantasy football, they revolve around who's the MVP of the National Football League, who are the players that get the most media coverage, and that's always the quarterback position. But in fantasy, you have to evaluate your roster by a lot of other factors.

And in truth, quarterbacks, you start one of them unless you're in a super flex league or a two quarterback league. And so there are a lot of pretty good quarterbacks in football. So you have to pick your spot when it comes to grabbing one of these guys. And now we're going to talk through the top 10. And maybe one of those questions I'll have for you guys is which of the top 10 represents the very best value if you're going to go in on one of them?

Last year, scoring was way, way up. There were 74 more passing touchdowns last year, despite only 154 more attempts. It was a weird year. The touchdown rate skyrocketed to 4.8%. I mean, I believe there were 38 quarterbacks for the top 12 week. So, Mike, you've talked about it. Defense didn't get a big opportunity to prepare last year. We might have felt that on the field.

I'm curious, do you guys think that those numbers change this year, or is this just more indicative of the future and what they do for offenses? Oh, it definitely is going to change. I mean, the offense is becoming more and more prolific and the rules are favoring the offense. And over time, the needle is pointing up for sure. However, the outlandish amount of offensive production last year is just a clear outlier. But that's really...

You know, it's for the most part irrelevant when you're talking about a ranking of the quarterbacks because I think it'll be a kind of a universal thing. It's not like it was all because of Josh Allen and Josh Allen alone and he's coming back. So really when we're cycling through these quarterbacks looking at, you know, why we like one versus another and where they are slotting in in drafts whether or not even if they're our favorite quarterback.

Or our second favorite quarterback, maybe there's someone that we just flat wouldn't draft because of the value. That's the interesting conversation as we dive in. And remember, you know, for the vast majority of the season, there was nobody in the stadium. There were no fans. So I think the experiment of does home field advantage actually matter?

I think we have a resounding answer here that when the road team is on the field and can call plays and talk to each other without fan noise, it's a lot easier to score. That's a good point. I mean, that was a huge kind of intangible that was removed. Kyla Marie is number one on our rankings. What? Yes. But that's your whole argument? Yeah. His name? Yeah. I mean, Patrick Mahomes is the best quarterback in the league. Would you agree?

I mean, I haven't ranked one. So yeah. It's a pretty good argument. I'm saying, yeah, thank you, Brooks. Well, sure. I have, I have Kyler at two. You guys have Kyler at one. He's being drafted as the QB3. So I think the VOP that you should have said was something to do with like, he's just there because you're a Cardinal fan.

That's fair. We are Cardinals fans. And so this might be viewed as a Homer pick. You know, out of 100. More of it like a March pick. You know, expert consensus rankers. I think there's only three people with Kyler as the number one. But it is really.

That's really surprising to me. This is not a Homer pick. I'm not a, I'm not someone that loves every Arizona Cardinal by any means. But my case for Kyler Murray is we've already seen him really be like a, the quarterback one. Last year, as a reminder, through the first 11 weeks, he was.

far and away the quarterback won. Like Patrick Mahomes and Russell Wilson were fantastic. They had 260 fantasy points and Kyler was up at 291 fantasy points. Then he got injured, injured his shoulder. And from weeks 12 through 17, he was the quarterback 17 struggling through that injury. Didn't run as much, didn't throw as well. It was really a problem. You saw it on the field. He was so good in those first 11 weeks.

that week 16, like your, you know, everybody's fantasy championships, Kyler actually was the quarterback one. He finished if you take out week 17 that nobody plays as the quarterback won. That's how good he was before the injury because he has the seven, 800 rushing yards, the potential for double digit rushing touchdowns. And then he can also throw for.

4,500 yards and 30 plus touchdowns. And so that's why I think the potential for him to take that leap forward in the passing touchdown category in his year three, adding A.J. Green, adding Rondale Moore with the legs, I think he is the most valuable asset for the quarterback position in fantasy this year. If you look on the other side of the coin, though.

And I would, for the record, I'd rather take Kyler Murray in the fourth round than Patrick Mahomes at the end of the second. So I'll do that every single time. Like I don't look at the gap between them, you know, as insurmountable by ADP standards. But it's very difficult to have consistency at the position. We saw Lamar Jackson go from all of your arguments. All of the arguments last year would have been, okay, Hollywood's going to have.

You know, he's got every reason to have a better year, and Lamar is going to, you know, he's always going to give you this rushing baseline, and it was a rougher ride. Does that exist for Kyler in your mind where I think the reason Mahomes is there is because you have a longer sample of elite quarterback consistency? That's it. And a little bit more of a guarantee at the touchdown in terms of not rushing, but passing. Like, I would bet my house on Patrick Mahomes' touchdown totals being above a certain level.

before any other quarterback in football. Yes, completely agree with you. The difference, though, between Lamar Jackson and Kyler is the passing work, right? Lamar Jackson was, he was inconsistent, even though he has that rushing baseline. His breakout year was 3,100 passing yards. Right. Last year, he had 2,700 passing yards. That is not like with the Arizona Cardinal Cliff Kingsbury offense and Kyler's passing ability, he's going to, I mean, 4,000 yards is pretty much.

guaranteed for Kyler. 11 rushing touchdowns is probably not guaranteed for Kyler. Not guaranteed, but obviously indicative of what he can do around the goal line. Yeah, and the floor is safe. You saw... Very safe. I mean, he takes care of it inside of the, as far as like running the ball inside the five. He had eight carries. Like he frequently calls his own number. And so I have, I have Kyler as my number one guy as well. And his...

I don't like the early quarterback in terms of spending a high pick on them. But Kyler, who drops into the fifth round sometimes is he's at least interesting what we're talking about these top guys. Right now he's 406. And there are just, there's wide receivers in the fourth round that I would 100% of the time take over Kyler. He can get, I've seen him get into the fifth round where I will draft him in the fifth round. There's kind of a break in wide receivers there. So.

If he drops, I'm willing to draft him. But even though he's my number one, I probably am not ending up with him in the fourth round. And improved offensive line. The acquisition of Rodney Hudson, superstar center that they traded for from the Raiders, that is a huge deal when you have someone with that experience and that can give you that level of protection. Massive upgrade.

Yeah, all right, before we get all the way down to Patrick Mahomes, I want to thank today's sponsors, Helix Sleep. Look, I know some of you are sleeping on old saggy, nasty mattresses at night, and you deserve better. You deserve to give yourself an upgrade. I sleep on a Helix mattress. We've replaced our guest room mattress with a Helix mattress because we loved it so much. I need to replace the kids' mattresses because they love sleeping in our bed. It's like...

You're bad so comfortable. And, you know, I just need to value them. Get out. But listen, everybody likes a different type of mattress, and he looks sleep matches it to your custom desires. There's a...

quiz it's two minutes they match it to your body type look i'm team hefty boys they have a hefty boy mattress a plus size just for us heavier guys and it makes a difference just go to helix sleep dot com slash footballers you take their two minute sleep quiz and they will match you to a customized mattress that will give you the best sleep of your life and right now helix is offering up to two hundred dollars off

all mattress orders and two free pillows for the foot clan at helixsleep.com slash footballers. That's helix sleep.com slash footballers for up to $200 off and two free pillows. We also want to thank Upstart for supporting the show today. Really believe in this product. If you're carrying a credit card balance month after month.

trying on a number of cards, it can feel like a never-ending cycle of debt based on the interest rates you're paying. And so what Upstart does is they try to help you make that final payment so that you can get ahead. They are the fast and easy way to pay off your debt with a personal loan all online. So you can pay off all the cards with a personal debt. You can consolidate high-interest debt. You can get strategic and smart about getting your debt paid off, which gives you more flexibility.

for life. They know that you are more than just your credit score, so they are expanding access to affordable credit. And you can find out how Upstart can lower your monthly payments today when you go to upstart.com slash.