Fantasy Football 2018 - The TRUTH About Fantasy QBs in 2017

I'm focused on how consistent he can be versus just his big monster blowup games. Yeah, and you can see his production where things fell, kind of fell apart for him, at least for fantasy purposes. I mean, specifically speaking to the fantasy playoffs where you weren't getting what you needed from Tom Brady or what you would hope for. It kind of coincided with the Achilles injury that was, it wasn't really talked about very much, but you,

saw him throw an interception in five straight games. Tom Brady doesn't do that. So you have to hope that that is what happened towards the end of the year. And he can still perform. I think he will still be overdrafted, though. Didn't Brady only throw like two interceptions last year? Something I can. I'm looking. Yes, that is correct. Two interceptions last year. I mean, two is an outlier, but yes, he's seven the year before.

I mean, it's always extremely low. He also wasn't affected by top defenses. Cam Newton, Russell Wilson, both performed minus 4.8 fantasy points for Russell Wilson. Russell Wilson was a lot better against bottom defenses. Right, right. And Brady was actually better against the better defenses. Alex Smith was the fourth-ranked and the fifth ranked in terms of consistency at the quarterback position. Over 4,000 yards this year for Alex Smith, 26 touchdowns. Just five interceptions.

And he ran the ball a little bit. 60 carries for 355, kind of what you were getting from Alex Smith in years past. Busted only 27% of the time, good 53% of the time. And look, this was a banner year for Alex Smith. It showed that he could do a little bit more behind center and get the ball down field. 540 more passing yards than his previous season high. He's never been over 4,000 yards. So other than talking about him leaving, what if he comes back? Is he still a...

Is Alex Smith the vanilla name a great value in drafts next year if he comes back with Tyreek Hill, with Travis Kelsey with Cream Hunt? Yeah, I think he will be a good value. I don't think Alex Smith will, as soon as draft season rolls around, okay, the narrative will not be great for Alex Smith because like Andy said, he's a vanilla name, he's never been a fantasy superstar, and everyone in the draft.

They want to grab the next best thing. And I don't think people are going to project that forward for Alex Smith. But if he's in the same system, and specifically with guys like Tyreek the freak hill who can take a screen pass and all of a sudden it's an 80-yard touchdown bomb from Alex Smith, I think that Alex Smith would have value next year. I worry if he changes teams because, you know, Andy points this out a lot over the years. You kind of, you don't like when a player...

is kind of having that career year, career highs and all these different categories, usually that means they're going to regress. Now, Alex Smith will, right? I mean, you just said it, 540 more passing yards than his previous career high. So you should expect a little bit of regression. Who would you draft next year? If Alex Smith stayed in Kansas City, would you take him or would you take Matthew Stafford? So that's a great example. I would probably end up, this is all draft cost. I will take whoever is,

cheaper later in the draft, which would probably, I still think, be Alex Smith. Who do you think goes higher next year? I think I disagree with Jason. I think Alex Smith will go higher in the draft. All right. More question marks here. But I'm with you that you got to be careful of the regression for Alex Smith. I think he's a good quarterback. But is Tyreek Hill really the one piece?

that can put Alex Smith into that range where you go, oh, well, I have a QB1. Yeah, I think so. You think so? Combined with the rushing. The rushing is what scares me because two years ago, Alex Smith stopped running the ball. Last year he was like, oh, I can do this. Do that, Alex. Carson wins at number five. So despite the injury, still finished the year as the fifth best fantasy quarterback and the second most consistent. Look, you watched.

the evolution of Carson wins. You watched him grow up into an incredible quarterback this year. His pocket presence, his ability to extend the play. You saw from him what you saw from Russell Wilson, which was the ability to extend the play, find Nelson Aguilar down the field, find the broken play down the field. And his efficiency in the red zone was unparalleled this past year. And so now...

You know, 33 touchdowns, 3,200 yards, only 7 interceptions. Right there, that 33 to 7 is something that you've got to keep your eye on going, okay, is he really at the Brady level? That in the 7.5% touchdown rate. Yeah, and so. That's super high. If he hadn't been hurt, I think we'd still all be here saying we love Carson wins, but regression seems like it's coming. For sure. And then you trade in, you know, draft cost.

and look, I like the fact they locked up Alshan Jeffrey. You give him a weapon consistently for the next four years, but you do have the injury he's coming back from now. Could limit some of that ability to escape the pocket at least earlier in the year. So the truth about Carson Wentz, he had a great year, but he's probably not going to end up on any of my fantasy teams next year. Yeah, the truth about his current year.

is unbelievable. If you don't realize how good he was, his big blow-up monster games, they came at a clip that just flat out one new weeks, and he barely busted at the same time. He had eight starts as a top five quarterback, which is the most this year despite playing only 13 games. It's as many as Tom Brady, Philip Rivers, and Jared Gough combined, and he only played 13 games. But everything Andy said about...

Regression. To me, look, if I'm in Dynasty, I love him, right? He's a young superstar and will be. But a lot of what kept his drives alive, what made him special was his ability to scramble to run and, you know, extend the drives by picking up, you know, a 15-yard third down. And dousing himself in oil. He was so, that play where he basically got sacked and then squirted out of the pocket was amazing.

But coming off of a late season knee injury. I think the thing people need to understand is we are not talking negatively about Carson Wins. Carson Wins can come out next year and lead the Eagles to a Super Bowl and still underperform on the expectations he set in fantasy football. Simply on the basis that is touchdown percentage was so high, they may run the ball in in those drives 10%, 20% more often.

Because a block goes the right direction. Maybe they're protecting Wentz a little bit more. Who knows? He could be a great NFL quarterback and still not live up to your expectations if you're drafting him to be this guy. Right, exactly. Even if his touchdown percentage drops down to six, which would be a buck, which would be. It would be fine. He could lead the league with that. Yeah, he won't lead the league. But he, yes, it would be a very good percentage. Yeah, I mean, at that point.

you're still losing a lot of touchdowns off your number. So he'll disappoint next year. Yeah, just be careful with that situation. And look, I'm in a couple of keeper dynasty leagues where I have to make the decision, do I hang on to him versus somebody else? Do I bank on him next year in my dynasty league or do I have to go find another quarterback to compliment? These are tough decisions. And we're obviously, we have the offseason to follow injury reports and figure out where he's at. He obviously has a structure around him to succeed. Good offensive line.

Good running backs, good coach, stability there, and some wide-up. Great defense. And, yeah, and Zaccurates helps a lot, too. You notice having that tight-in, that go-to tight-in as a stabilizing force for these quarterbacks at the top. Look, Alex Smith, right? Has Travis Kelsey. Russell Wilson at the top had Jimmy Graham. Tom Brady has Rob Grancowski. These are all prolific tight-ins that seem to directly affect these quarterbacks. That's very in. Cam Newton as Greg Olson. Greg Olson. That's an interesting.

Little nugget you have a little observation. The top five quarterbacks all have, well, top 10 tight ends. Yes. I will not call Jimmy Graham Elite, but he was elite. He helped in the red zone. Elite at catching touchdown. Aaron Rogers is over in the corner laughing. I don't need your tight end. I don't need you? Kurt Cousins. I'm Aaron Rogers. No, don't they have Martellus Bennett guys? Discount number check. That is the best joke you've ever said. Kurt Cousins comes in a number six.

Fantasy's number six quarterback with a consistency rank of a middling quarterback, number 15 in consistency, busted 44%. He busted as often as he was good. He busted the same rate that Cam Newton did, and he didn't have as many great games as Cam. I mean, Kirk Cousins, sorry, Mike, he might have finished the year number six. He was garbage this year for fantasy owners. He missed Jordan Reed.

Look, we just talked about the time. He really missed Jordan Reed. Yeah. Finishing drives, having third down conversions. Jordan Reed was the master of that. Yeah, he missed the hype of Trail Prior, too. Yeah. Yeah, we all missed that. The way that he performed this year, sure, he finished his number six, but if you were relying on him, you didn't even make the playoffs because you had stretches where it was like, okay, he had 20 points, 27 points. Okay, so.

He's great. You're going to start him. Everything lined up great. And at that start, you know, when you were like, oh, he was fantastic, 10 points, then 8 points. So it's like, okay, maybe he's in a lull. I'm not going to start him. Back to 27 and 25. And then he drops down to the teens to 8, finishes the year with a 7-point game. I mean, it was hard to predict him. You couldn't get these games right. And every time it looked like he was getting it together, he collapsed. He caused a lot of.

Mike knows that from first-hand experience. Certainly. You rolled him out there over James Winston in one of the fantasy playoff weeks? I can't. I don't remember if you did or not. I feel like one week you did. He was tough to predict, like Jason said. We'll figure out where he's at. Is he going to be back in Washington with another year with Jay Gruden? Or is he going to be in a new destination? He's another one of those guys. Jason and I both put him down as one to watch this offseason because, look, you bring a great quarterback into another situation and you change everything.

It is, it is worth noting, you know, coming into this season. New England, maybe? I was, you know, down on the Redskins because of all the change. When you lose your, I mean, this is, the inconsistency was not like this. They lost two years ago. One thousand yard receivers. Exactly. And their offensive quarter. Yeah, they're OC. So when you lose all of that, it's hard to be consistently good, even when you can have those big games.

So if he does change teams, it's worth realizing he might have some bad games while he's figuring out the new set of receivers, the new playbook, all of that stuff. He's still a good quarterback. I would, you know, as an Arizona native, I'd love him to come to the Cardinals versus having nobody. Where's it go? Where are we calling our shot? Put it on the on the books. Where's Kirk Cousins playing quarterback next year? I'll give you. You can have two options. You can give two places.

Two locations. I'll throw Arizona in as one. And do you have them in mind? Yeah. Denver. Yep. Arizona or Denver? That's on my books. Denver would be my number one. I'm going to go Denver and Cleveland. He said he would play there, which if I'm a Brown's general manager, any player that says, hey, I would like to play there. Bring him in. He says he wants to be here. Oh.

All right, where are we going? We're heading to Maddie Snapback. You should turn that hat around. In honor of Maddie's snapback, the ball cap has gone backwards for Mr. Holloway. Oh. Oh, you're going to doler. I'm going to drink my coffee sidearm. Oh, I like it. Very nice. If you're not on the YouTube, it's filled everywhere. Oh, man. If you're not, if you're just listening on the podcast app,

We thank you for being there, subscribe, give a five-star rating. And also, get on over to the video product over on YouTube. I feel like I did that with my mind. Yeah. I'm going to drink sideways. I'm like, that's going to spill. I think gravity took that one. Mike didn't gravity with this. You can control gravity, Mike? What are you doing this show for? You're an X-Man. But your only power is to drink beverages sideways. That's all you can do. To make people spill. Okay. Matt Stafford.

I got the hat on backwards. Look, he had another good year. 29 touchdowns, only 10 interceptions. One of the reasons why this lion's head coaching job and why we think Matt Patricia ends up there and they try to turn this thing around. Jim Caldwell was kind of like, to me he was an anchor that the boat had to drag. And I don't mean to be disrespectful to Caldwell, but that was pretty disrespectful. Yeah. But I just mean... It's pretty accurate. It's just...

No, I said no offense. The anchor only affects the ship at some, later in the journey when you want to go to the next level. He could not carry the, I feel like they reached their camp with Jim Caldwell, is my point. And so Matt Patricia is going to come in here most likely, but Matthew Savage is a franchise quarterback. If you could ask for something under your tree as a new coach.