Fantasy Football - Top 10 RB Rankings + Undrafted Gems - Podcast for 8/12

We're not managed by the, you know. You should have sent Trayvion Henderson a note to, you know, keep it under control in the preseason because he's hurting the ADP a little bit. Yeah, he really is. All right. This is a big name to talk about. Number eight. Bucky Irving comes in at number eight. We all have him slightly below ADP. Just a tiny bit. Just a tiny, tiny bit. I love. Love, love Tampa Bay. I love the offense. I love Baker. I love the stability. I love the fact that you have a system that has worked to produce big numbers year after year. And I absolutely was blown away on a weekly basis by what Bucky Irving was doing out there on the field. He was the RB 7 from week 10 on when his takeover really came to fruition. We, you know, Rashob White's got the groin injury right now.

Sean Tucker is talented. I don't know what kind of work he's really going to get because they've been talking about Sean Tucker being talented for three years. But you look at the 46 running backs with 100 plus carries on the season. He was fifth in yards per carry, seventh in explosive rush rate, seventh among all running backs and rush success rate, third and fours miss tackles per attempt. There is a world, and it's not one we're predicting by putting them at eight. But there's a world where Bucky Irving is. You know, you get six, seven, eight weeks into the season and we're like, he's sitting at RB3. Yeah, it could happen. And you're like, man, that is that dude. The talent he showed on film last year absolutely says he could do that. If he gets the workload and if he can handle the workload. Now, there's three good backs here right now. Rashad White is a little injured. So maybe you get off to a hotter start to begin the year and give Bucky a huge workload. I think that Bucky is good enough to be a Lashon McCoy type of player.

where he could be a fantasy, you know, game wrecker on as a smaller back with high volume. But there's always the worry I have in the back of my mind is a 195 pound back. You know, he had a game where he had 28 opportunities and dominated. He was the running back one. He had 152 yards, you know, 6.1 yards of carry. He was awesome. And he didn't miss the next game. But he got... He left that game. Looked like he was prepping for a sarcophagus. He was mummied up. He was full wrapped. And then the next game, he plays 16% of snaps, gets five total opportunities. And it, because he was, he was just, he took too much damage for a 195 pound back. Which I think he spent a lot of the offseason has been a focal point, is getting stronger, getting, getting, getting the body.

capable of handling that kind of a workload. He wants to be that guy. What would you put your odds that he finishes the top five back? He's being drafted as the eighth back off the board. Give me a percentage chance. Top five? Top five. I'll go, I feel like it's 15%. Yeah, I'm more like in the 30. I was going to go about 20, 25. Okay. When we look at the three checkboxes of, you know, are you a workhorse? Do you get the touchdowns? Are you on a winning team? Like the team is good? We're not sure if he's a true workhorse back here. If the volume will truly be there with three other backs. And then will he be the touchdown machine. He averaged three targets a game. And that was, you know, even with a slower start, the fact that he was a fourth round running back, who's the incumbent took like every snap. I mean, Rashad's White's superpower when he was good for fantasy was he just was there all the time.

for a fourth rounder to steal the job, not from an injury to Rashad White, just because Bucky was so much better. That speaks highly. Where did Rashad White end up finishing last year? Was it like 18 or something? White was still very relevant because he... 24 on the dot. Because he catches so much passes. So, I mean, you had Bucky at just over three targets a game, and then you have Rashad White at 3.6 targets a game. Yep. Yeah. So Bucky Irving at 8. Number seven. Devon H.N. Devon H.N. comes in at number seven. This is a very unique analysis situation to me. He was the RV7 last year. It was impressive. He could handle the workload. He didn't. You know, injuries were a concern in the rookie season when he was so explosive and then missed time.

He's 23 years old. We all have him right where he's being drafted, almost on the dot. Jason one spot higher. The past catching work is unbelievable. The targets are worth a lot more than the carries. And, you know, this was the number one running back reception leader in the game. The running back room is thinning out. I mean, Alexander Madison, who was making waves in camp, now out for the season. Jalen Wright, not sure that he's going to be trustworthy enough. He certainly wasn't last year. And then Ollie Gordon, you know, this is a rookie. So it's definitely all on. Was Ollie Gordon's seventh round? Yeah, he fell. I mean, maybe sixth. But he, you know, Devon A-chan has he has the workload. I don't know how good this team will end up.

with the offensive line situation. I don't think that matters. Yeah, my chips are wrong. I don't think it matters if the dolphins are good or not because where Devon Achan thrives is the passing game. What matters is if Tua is there. When Tua is gone, so is Devon A. Chan. That's the risk. That's the worry. If you look at the splits with and without Tua, when Tua is gone, we kind of explained this when he went down. Like, The whole defense is like, okay, now I'm stacking the line and you're not dumping it off to Devon A-chan. He basically disappeared 7.7 fantasy points per game in those games without Tua. But when Tua was there, six and a half targets per game, 19.5 fantasy points per game. For context, Derek Henry last year was 19.2. And, you know, he had 700 rushing touchdowns.

This is a player who, in my opinion, in my strategy, if I'm there where he's being drafted and he's on the, you know, he's available, I'm grabbing him. Yep. I believe he has the potential to be top three running back. He will have the workload. There isn't a depth chart here with, you know, with Alexander Madison getting that season ending injury, the Ollie Gordon and the Jalen Wright, like I'm not worried about them. He's going to have extreme. Terry Gill says you should be. Well, Tyrick Hill says you should be worried around the goal line. But the past catching work, with Jonu Smith gone in that area of the field who already had almost, I think he had 100 targets, this is, this guy's just going to get nonstop wide receiver PPR numbers. Yeah, they tried Jen and write four times on the goal line in preseason week one, and they didn't work. So they may need to either throw it around there and let A chance stay in the game on the field. It's wild, though, just the risk.

of it not being just does A. Chan get hurt, but like Tua getting hurt. You know, look at Josh Jacobs. You have Jordan Love go out. Of course, the offense doesn't work as well. But Josh Jacobs is going to have so much work. Like we're going to counterbalance the efficiency of the offense with volume. With H.N. If Tua goes out, then it's just. you are sad it just shows i mean he only had he had three rushing touchdowns on 15 attempts inside the five so it's straight that is it's straight up did not work effective it did not work inside i mean i don't think it would work with a different back though that offensive line is so bad well i mean maybe a slightly more talented bigger back it would work but the line is terrible i'm just saying like if they had succeeded inside the five it's not like the opportunities weren't there

You're talking about a player that would have finished higher than RB7 last year. You talked about the points per game numbers. He would be the complete package if you could get inside the end zone when they have those goal line opportunities. But he feels very, very safe this year. Number six. All right, it's preseason bust. Ashton Ginty. Negative. He's a turd. 21 years old. I've got him at four, Mike at five, Jason, and seven. His ADP is... five and so our consensus rank is six. You know, you saw him briefly in the first week. And, you know, you're going to see a lot more of him over the course of the season. First round running backs traditionally, they dominate, they crush for fantasy football. You know, I think as the season gets started, I do think you're going to see Rahim Mostert on third down quite often. That seems to be the plan right now for the, for the Raiders. But, you know,

Do you see Gentie as any sort of like bust risk at all? Yeah, I mean, so he's certainly a bust risk because we've never seen him on the field of, you know, in NFL games. He played for a college program that was, you know, he's not in the SEC. He's not facing the extreme awesome talent. But he is drafted where he was in the NFL for a reason. I don't think he will fail as an NFL player at all, at all. He is as locked as you can be at the running back position. But for fantasy purposes, where he's being drafted, you know, you talk about those three checkboxes. Is he going to be a workhorse? Absolutely. He'll have the workload. That is a guarantee for where they drafted him and what the depth chart says. Will he have the touchdown opportunities? I don't know if this offense in a tough division, you know, they're currently, you know, slated for six and a half wins in Vegas. Yeah, they're underdogs, by the way, for six the first seven weeks.

So, you know, he doesn't check all the boxes and you haven't seen it yet. The reason he's this high is because as a prospect, what you're hoping for is one of those generational players who can finish as the running back one simply because he is that good. You're betting on the talent. You know that the opportunity will be there, but the team is what scares me. Yeah, they were the worst running game in the NFL last year, which not surprising when you look at what they had in the backfield, combined with the offensive line play and the quarterback play and all the play of all the players. But you're looking at rejuvenation here in Las Vegas, and you're going to need them to put it together on a weekly basis. But I think that's the plan. I think the plan is to give them every opportunity to be exactly what you'd want in fantasy. Yeah, you hope that with Chip Kelly and.

You know, this team wants to run the ball and have a fast pace of play. So there's some good things here. But the bad things, you look at Josh Jacobs, who clearly still has it. Last time we saw him with the Raiders with that offensive line two years ago, he was not good. He was inefficient. Last year, 32nd best team at running the ball. Zemir White. Right. But, you know, but my point is Josh Jacobs is really good. And he sucked there. So I don't know that this offensive line and that the system is. really improved enough. Three new starters. And like I said, they're going to start up. You know, you go to New England in week one. You're going to play against the Chargers in week two, Washington and week three, Chicago week four, on the road again in week five. I do think it might be a little bit. Now, he could put me wrong. You can go out and have 260-yard touchdowns on week one. But it might start a little slow. Like I said, working in Rahim Mosterd a little bit and the matchups to begin the year, I think we'll get there for Gentie. I love Gentie.

I mean, you know, I've got them at seven. But when I look at the draft and how it goes, I feel like where Genties going in the first round, if you were to take a wide receiver there, one of the elite studs at wide receiver, and then you, you know, just on, you know, later in the second, you get A-chan or you get Josh Jacobs. I don't know that you're really sacrificing much. No, that's a good point. And that's the decision-making you're going to have to make in your drafts. I will say this. What's stopping that is people. It's fun to draft Ash and Genty. Yeah, that's part of it. The excitement that you might have the next greatest of all time. Might be a yacht. Right. Right. No, it's true. All right. We'll take a break and we'll get into the top five. Foot Clan draft day is on the way. You got your rankings. You got those sleepers. You got you can't miss picks. But you know what? You need sometimes.

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back again long live the king long live the king you're talking about the number two running back in fantasy last year just ho-hum 19.2 fantasy points a game he is the he's the player that if you doubt him you pay the price that has been the story for what three years now of you know three years of doubt because he had the injury in 2021 missed eight games the shoe finally dropped right it was like oh boy this is the end he follows that up basically playing every game in the last three seasons and finishing top eight for three straight seasons. And now is on a way better offense with a better offensive line than he ever remembered in Tennessee. Yeah, this, this is the age is the only concern and I'm not concerned. Some people are not some people. Some person is built differently. It's Derek Henry. He's he's not.

a regular human being no he's not he i think it's fair to be slightly concerned about the age but that will not stop me from drafting derrick henry do you guys remember after week one where it was the game against the kansas city chiefs derrick henry's debut he only gets 13 carries yeah runs for three and a half yards he did he got the touchdown so he saved the fantasy day and then after that was the the presser with harbaugh like We didn't bring Derek Henry in here to just give him a bazillion carries. And I don't know if he was playing some media rope-a-dope with his week-two matchup because then from then on out, you have like so many games of 20 plus carries. It was the highest, like you could argue it was his most consistent season ever. He only had 6% bus games and 81% good. How many, like how many great teams?

Has Derek Henry been a part of? What do you mean? As in like for, like when he was on Tennessee, how many years of where they were top-notch team? Yeah, where you're like the Titans? Zero. The Titans were great that year. I mean, I don't know if it was zero. Never a Super Bowl contender. I think, I think they had a couple. They may have. My point. The point being of you put Derek Henry, even at this age, on a team that's the number one seed that is going to win. Wait, they were a number one seed? The Titans? Well, they won the division a bunch of times. Maybe not number one in the whole conference. Yeah. Okay. But my point being, that was probably, if I had to look at the and just guess, I'm going to guess like 2019 or 2020. I'm going to guess 2020, just based off of when they were good. Look, the point is Baltimore is great. They will be leading far more than they will be trailing. And when they're leading, it will be Derek Henry.

salting the game away and scoring so many rushing touchdowns. Yeah, then Kyle said they were the number one seed overall. I remember one year where he was in the MVP race as a running back, so it must have been that season. But yeah, he's he is that dude. Yeah, Frable got, Frable got him going a little bit. They were 12 and 5 in 2021. Yeah, look, this is just a perfect match. Baltimore. 2020, told you. Baltimore, Derek Henry. Perfect match. Same, I mean, Baltimore's in the running to be a Super Bowl champ, 11.5 wins, favored in most of their games, so very exciting. And, you know, Keaton Mitchell, they need people to spell Derek Henry here and there, but it's not going to impact where we rank them. Number four. Jamir Gibbs, 23 years old, entering the prime prime time. Jamir Gibbs last year, number three overall. I've got him at three.

Mike at four, Jason at five. He is the most fun player to watch, get an opportunity and fantasy, in my opinion, because they can all go to the house. He was number one, an explosive rush rate. 10% of his carries were 15 plus yards. So 10% of the time, I thought he was going to score. I had no Gibbs. I had no shares of Gibbs last year. Just, you know, it was unfortunate. That's how the chips fell. And whenever I was playing against Gibbs, It was a terrible time. It's a nightmare. You're watching, you're watching the Lions game and every time he touches the ball, just watching through fingers like a, like there's a horror film on. Like no, no, don't let him touch it. So many, they barely clipped his foot. Because if that, and if that defender didn't get that one tiny clip, he's gone for 50 yards.

Yeah, I think the story with Gibbs, we've talked about it a lot, so, you know, I doubt we need to focus on it too much, but it's just, how much work does Monty get? Yep, that's everything for Jemir Gibbs. And is there any step back offensive line-wise with the departure of Frank Ragnow? They're all pro center, and they lost an offensive guard. Do they put it together without Ben Johnson? I don't have any doubt that Jemir Gibbs can make. something out of nothing on any play. It's just a matter of your confidence level in those factors. I think when you're talking about the best of the best backs in the league, of which Jemir Gibbs clearly is, what you really want to look at is how does it go wrong? You know, okay, injury for any running back, take that out. Does the offense take a significant step back without their offensive coordinator and their, you know, all-world center? I think that that could happen this year.

That's my fear for Gibbs, but if that happens and he then ends up at the same time as the lines take a step backwards, if that forces Gibbs to get more work over David Montgomery, because they're like, hey, this isn't working, we've got to put our best player out there, it'll probably kind of stay the same. I do think for Gibbs to truly match this draft cost, you know, he's basically drafted as the the second or third running back usually, I feel like David Montgomery has to get close to vanishing. If David Montgomery goes out there and gets 10 touchdowns and plays the majority of the season, Gibbs is not going to hurt you at all, but he's not going to be that number one, number two running back. 10 touchdowns would be a problem. But if he becomes, if Monty becomes the Algier in the situation for Bijon, then I'm more excited. Gibbs averaged 3.7 targets per game, and that includes

Two weeks of zero targets. Like he's an absolute, it's like a chain. He's just an animal when it comes to receptions. Absolutely. Number three. Well, this guy's at three. I didn't realize where he ended up, but it's perfect. It's because that's where Jason has him at three. Mike's got him at one. I've got him at six. It's Christian McCaffrey. Christian McCaffery, Christian McCaffrey. I don't like talking about Christian McCaffrey. It's not fun. We've done it a lot. We've done it a whole lot. This is a team projected to win a lot of games favored in their first four matchups. We know the story of McCaffrey. He was league winner for two years, league loser for three of the last five seasons. It's a tall task to ask a player that has been injured frequently to play 17 and give you 300 plus opportunities. If he plays 17 and you get less than that amount of opportunities, I don't think he's worth the number three pick.

is healthy and they give him all those opportunities, he will be the number one running back in football. So that's your equation. It's a risk-reward situation. You know, the rhetoric is Mike's very much playing to win. He says, don't play scared. I think you have alternates to also win in this draft cost, so I don't take that approach. But he is the player that if he plays 17 and gets over 300 carries. or 300 opportunities, he will probably be the number one running back. You do not need Christian McCaffrey to win a fantasy championship. You can win it plenty of other ways. If you don't want to deal with what we have dealt with three of the last five years and his injury, don't. And I wouldn't even say that you're playing scared. You could say you're playing wise because you don't need him to win. However, if he plays last time he played two years ago, he wasn't good, he was in...

47% of championship games. It was just super easy to get a championship if you had Christian McCaffrey. So he's like a cheat code sometimes. So, you know, it feels less like playing scared and more like gambling. Like I'm playing the, you know, the lotto and I got some pretty good, like if the lottery, if you could go out there and get a scratcher ticket and you had a 33% chance of winning. I mean, okay. Look, if McCaffrey was a, you know, if he stayed late second, I mean, he obviously would be a home run because I'd already have another running back on my roster that I could lean on. Mike is as bullish as one can be for Christian McCaffrey. Mike's ensuring he gets picked in the first round and ever leave. It just, it's that of like if he, if he's healthy, he's multiple points better than.

the running back too. Did you care about any of the games last year coming back from the Achilles and not giving you the fantasy numbers that you would have hoped for? I didn't. Because there were four games, I think, or three and a half before the Buffalo injury. It was definitely a slower start. And then in the Buffalo game, when he finally got knocked out of the season, it's like, oh, there he is. There's Christian. It is the insane Saquan Berkeley year of last year, 2,000 rushing yards, 13 rushing touchdowns. You know, a bunch of receptions. Christian McCaffrey, and just two years ago, was a full point per game better than Sequin Barclay was last year. And, like, people are like, the Berkeley season. Like, don't forget what Christian McCaffrey can do. The schedule for San Francisco is very favorable. They're projected to win 10 and a half games. They're favored in 15 of 17 games, and their running back schedule is one of the easiest. So it's the injury.

If you want to bet that he's going to get hurt, then don't draft him. Dude, if I can get him at the turn, if I can get him at 201, 202, I think there will be home leagues out there where it does happen. I don't think so, man. I think every time push comes to shove, it will happen. Push comes to shove, someone's going to be like, I don't know, taking that. No, because there's a lot of someone's, at least three in the last five years that have been burned. So you might have three people. Not true. In our league, it's all the same man. One guy three times. That is the irony of the thing, you know? Yeah, Mike should be the one stopping. Yeah, you, uh, no, because they're running backs. They all get hurt. He's getting a tattoo this afternoon. He likes, he likes pain. Hey, like, you know, remember when, uh, Frank Gore was injury prone? Remember when Matt Forte was injury prone?

Yeah, but those don't count, man. Those don't count? They don't count because they're not doing what Christian McCaffrey's doing, which is every other year for his whole career. These are league losing seasons. These are break your team in half. Those are not like. Like Frank Gore was injury prone for a couple years and then went on a like decade long. Not why he was the number one picking the fantasy like three times. I get both sides. I'm going to draft him. All right. Number two. Saquan Barkley, it was a magical year. The question for fantasy players is- Remember when Saquan Berkeley was injury-prone? That's way more fair. That is actually feels, because he was the number one pick in drafts and then didn't play. Three devastating injuries in a row. He had missed most of 2020, and then he missed three games in 2021. I just like, but he was really bad in 2021 because he kept getting hurt. Okay.

Yeah, last year, 21.2 fantasy points per game. We have them at number two. None of us have them in the number one slot. That slot belongs to Mr. Indestructible. He just won you your league. He should do very similar things in Philadelphia, but also that was, you know, he was not at that level in any recent history. So. You got to put, you know, the big place, the 60 plus yard touchdowns, you know, that type of stuff. That's hard to bet on. But 66% of his- He's the one you bet on it, though. 66% of his rushing yards came before contact. If you remember Kenneth Walker yesterday, 71% of his came after contact. Yeah. That is called, this is why- It's why DeAndre Swift looked very good in Philadelphia. You got an offensive line rank number one.

They are dealing with a little bit of injury concern right now with Dickerson. They got great news, though. Landon Dickerson looked like he was going to miss the season, and now he's hopeful for week one. So he'll be playing the majority of the season. So, you know, we're at the point in the countdown where you're just splitting hairs over players. I think you can take take one number one if you want to. Sure. That's fine. It's going to be great. Yeah, he belongs in the conversation. If he stays healthy, I mean, this is coming off of 417 opportunities. That is a lot of workload on the body. You know, it's ironic because Christian McCaffrey, we always want to say whatever happens last year happens next year, but it's almost the opposite in reality. You know, wide receiver won, the wide receiver one almost never finishes as the wide receiver won the next year. And you can't just predict that, but.