Starts of the Week + Week 15 Breakdown, Farewell to Urban Meyer - Fantasy Football Podcast for 12/16

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It's playoff time. Oh, yeah. You've got to win. Wanted to throw some new lyrics in there? That's fine. I like it. I need to write an opera. Or an 80s cartoon. Oh, I could do that, too. That sound, when you threw that in, that sounded like the, like a power line in the middle of a, like, intro to a G.I. Joe or something. What if I... You've got to win!

Just really motivational in the lyrics. By our toys. Yeah, that's, yes. All right, welcome in. So much going on. So much going on. Al Borland is behind the scenes keeping things together for us today. The judge isn't with us. You riding dirty back there? Yeah.

Oh, yeah. That's Brooks's thing. Yeah, but I'm on the throne right now. Okay. All right. That means you're wealthy as well. Never not working on today's show. Everybody has enjoyed that segment. We've got some really good insights for you there. News and notes, injury updates to talk about a very exciting development in the world of the head coaches. Well, dude, for most people.

There's one guy who's pretty bummed about it. Yeah. And fantasy forecast matchup starts of the week. Boom, boom kicker. There's a lot going on. You can find us on Twitter at the FF Ballers. Stay with us. I mean, people call it the offseason. We just call it the preseason. Like when the regular season ends and the fantasy season is over.

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Jason, near and dear to your heart. We're talking about team hefty boys. Yeah, let's go big fellas. We're talking about the boys in the trenches, the offensive line because it is important. It is very important to fantasy football. They are the unsung heroes, in fact, because they score zero fantasy points. Well, maybe they're line up and they're eligible and they, and you get the, uh,

But yes, they score zero fantasy points. Have you guys seen the trend that we are, it's out there being called the thick six whenever one of the big boys scores? Oh, yeah, baby. It's sensational. So I'm all aboard with that. But anyways, offensive line, we want to talk about and look at some of the, or look at the biggest approver and the people that have had the biggest slides because it can, the offensive line, because you have five people, things can improve overnight.

And things can just vanish in an instant. So take, for example, the Los Angeles Chargers. They finished last year dead last in the PFF offensive line rankings. You know, you had some injuries. Somehow Herbert was able to overcome that. But they have managed to turn that around and are currently sitting at the fifth best in terms of pass block efficiency. And it's... Is that the biggest improvement this year?

It is, well, from dead last to number five. Like, that's a pretty solid jump. And just to say of, like, the, we're not going to talk about the Steelers' offensive line, but that's where, like, it comes to mind of the, the biggest knock for Najee over the offseason was, well, the offensive line, right? You're like, you can't possibly improve. The Chargers are showing you, yes, you can, you get some pieces back, you make some moves like you, you know, you make a.

a first round pick on the offensive line. And you can actually solve things pretty quickly like the Chargers have. The Colts should have done that for Andrew Luck. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Well, they trying to do that because the Colts are in fact one of the biggest slides where they came into the season ranked as PFF's number two offensive line. And that pass blocking has dropped to 29th.

They were seventh in 2020. They are 29th currently this year. And you've seen that. Like Michael Pittman has been the only somewhat consistent pass catcher for the passing attempt for Carson Wentz and in Indianapolis. And then you can look at also the Saints. Like what's going on with the Saints? Their offensive line was always heralded as they just, they have elite players.

And now you have to ask yourself the question, was it the offensive line or was it in fact Drew Brees? Because as a saint, over half of Drew Brees' past attempts that came out in two and a half seconds. Like he was always one of the fastest passers in the league. And then you look at what James, Trevor, and Taysman have done. They are 31st. The only player who's holding onto the ball longer than those quarterbacks is Taylor Hineke. And you've seen their pass blocking drop to 19th currently in 2021.

Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. I mean, both of those, right? You went from Philip Rivers to Carson Wins, someone that is going to hold the ball, take sacks. So I think going forward, looking at those quarterback changes when you're going from a vet someone else, the pass blocking grade probably is affected by that. But I want to go back to the charges real quick. Sure.

Because early in the offseason, we had, you know, kind of offensive line previews. And they were our biggest, they were the team that made the best offseason moves. We wanted Ryan Lindley as Cardinal fans. Oh, we lost out on the great center. They got him. They got Balaga. They spent a first round pick. And we were like, this is an offensive line that was bad that's going to be good. And it did come to fruition. Yes. And look what it's done for Austin Eckler. Not that he was bad before, or he couldn't be Najee Harris.

this year. But he's way better than Najee because the offensive line is opening things up and it's goal line, it's touchdown. So next year coming in when we've got that offensive line look, I think that, you know, I'm going to take it even more seriously when it comes to goal line opportunities. We also have to correct you, Jason, because you said Ryan Lindsay, who was a quarterback. Oh, yes. You meant Corey. Yes, I did. Yeah. He would not be a good center. Probably not.

It is interesting to me the correlation between the quarterback play and then how it translates to the grade that the offensive line receives, right? You have an interdependency there. You have a chicken egg situation? Yeah, and we saw Herbert overcame a bad line and looked really good. And so maybe the offensive line improvements were a reason to believe that it was that he wasn't going to regress at a minimum or that he could improve. That is a very good point. And so, you know, you're not going to find.

your receivers down the field if you're under pressure all the time. And so if you look at sustainability of a breakout year and tie it into offensive line play and improvement, that could make a big difference. You know, we've seen some of these younger quarterbacks that have never been afforded that kind of protection. We haven't really, you know, not that I'm giving him a pass at this point in his career, but we've never really seen Daniel Jones protected.

Oh, never. No, the past blocking for Daniel Jones has been atrocious for his entire career. And you combine that with play calling from Mr. Garrett and you had problems. So it is an interesting thing to look at that correlation, and it's a good example with the Chargers specifically at, you know, paying attention to two or three teams that make active moves in the offseason. Theirs was, you know, a first round pick plus the...

the signing and other teams need to do the same thing to get their young passers and opportunity. Yeah. And the Cardinals are a good example of that too. I mean, Kyler is an MVP Canada or it was for the majority of the year and they made the investment in Rodney Hudson and it's made, it's paid dividends throughout. Yeah. And for, you know, the charges, I think it just, again, just kind of reiterates how forward thinking the, that whole organization is now. I mean, with the change of how they're looking at fourth down.

They didn't go with the situation of the coach feeling like, well, my offensive scheme is just so good that I can overcome a porous offensive line. You know, Seattle. I'm not, I don't want to name any names. That would be not just my system. That would be my quarterback so good that we don't even care. Like Russ was never given that. Yes. It was always Russell Wilson bailing them out because they never fixed the offensive line. So that's just.

That's a good piece. We will be tracking over the off or the off season or the extended buy, whatever we want to call it here. But who is the team that really makes the investment to try and fix that offensive line? Because that does turn into positive fantasy implications. Get up to 100% danderth protection that is never not working with head and shoulder scalp shield technology available at walmart.com. News and notes from around the league presented by Sleeper.

He gone. Goodbye, Urban Meyer. Oh, oh, man. That was actually, you might have thought that was from a musical or something. That was live feed from the locker room. Mm-hmm. That was, you listened, you heard that voice. They've been working on it for weeks. That was Marvin Jones, the tenor there. James Robinson. James Robinson was in there. Which, he's a bass. The only person mad about this was Laquant Treadwell.