Fantasy Football Podcast 2015 - QB Rankings Part 2, News & Notes, Mailbag

about 19.9 fantasy points a game. So I wanted to jump in and I wanted to look at Tannehill and see how many times he actually surpassed that number for the entire season. And so I went in and I looked at that and it only happened five times. Only five of his 16 games did he surpass that top five quarterback average. But I went in and I looked at Drew Brees and guess how many times he did it? Five. Five.

Five times. Oh, five times. So that was kind of interesting. And for comparison's sake, Aaron Rogers did it 10 times. He went over that number 10 times. So it doesn't mean, obviously, we're projecting Tanna Hill forward as a young quarterback, getting some different players there. But I just thought it was interesting to look at because it's a scary, it's scary to put Ryan Tannaho. We have him above Breeze, above Newton, above Stafford on our consensus rankings, above Brady, above Romo. So talk about Ryan Tannehill, Mike.

Here's the deal about Ryan Tannenhill, why I like him so much this year. He has done exactly what you want from a young player. He has improved every single year by a good amount. So you can go back to his rookie year, not so good, 282 completions, 12 touchdowns. That.

The next year, 355 completions with a completion percentage of 60%, 24 touchdowns, 17 interceptions. Last year, 392 completion, 66 completion percentage, which is very high. 27 touchdowns, only 12 picks. And so you have a steady rise in his play, in his numbers, every single year. And then you look at the bonus.

stat, which has also increased every single year. His rookie year, he rushed for 211 yards. The next year, 238. Last year, 311 yards. The 311 yards is a... That's a big chunk for a past first quarterback. Exactly. That's what we call the bonus point runner, the BPR. That's a new stat. The BPR in fantasy. And here's also why I like Mike Wallace. Or, no.

Ryan Tano. I like him because they got rid of Mike Wallace. Sure. I don't think Mike Wallace had the chemistry with Tana Hill. Tanyhill, his deep ball is not the best. So this next part of why I like him might surprise you, but adding Kenny Stills, I think, is a tremendous upgrade to that offense over Mike Wallace. Explain yourself. Kenny Stills has great hands. He's a good team player. He's not Mike Wallace. Hey, coach, I don't really want to play anymore. Sin.

That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Kenny Stills was expanding his route tree. When he came into the league, he was only a nine runner. Now he can do more things. You have a second year from Jarvis Landry, who was a rookie sensation PPR machine. I love me from Jarvis Landry. Jarvis Landry is going to be good. And you throw in, Lamar Miller wasn't, he's not featured. A ton in the passing game. I think he had 38.

I don't think I wrote down. I think he had 38 catches last year, so he is capable to take the dumps, and he can take them for a good amount of yardage. So I really like... He's going to be taking those dumps, man. I realize that as I was saying it, but I've brisked through it. I really think the Dolphins team is going to be improved. They've improved their defense. A sneaky addition by subtractions. I got rid of Cortland Finnegan, who is a disaster.

You guys even? No, no Cardinal and Finnegan hot takes? No, I think he's, didn't he retire? Yeah. Okay. But just with all those things combined, I, as long as Tannenhill can improve again, which I think he's going to do, then he should be a top 10 quarterback. Now this is, we're talking, I think some people are going to hear the takes on Ryan Tannehill and they're going to freak out because this is not.

This is not a small jump for him in ADP. Right now, I think his ADP is probably around the 13th or 14th quarterback off the board. Which is beautiful. Oh, delicious. So value-wise, you're going to get him really late. Yeah, nobody's... Nobody's going to be... Ryan Tannahill is not a...

a sexy pick. Nobody is going to be excited for that, which means you're going to be able to get him super late. And I just don't see. It's just like Mike was saying. It's all about his trajectory. His trajectory on every statistic is better and better and better. He's basically thrown for 4,000 yards the last two years. His touchdowns went from 12 to 24 to 27. The team is getting better. There's no reason to think that he's going to be...

anywhere below top 10. I mean, for him to finish below top 10 would be, you know, an injury. And so you're going to be able to get him, I believe, very late, very, very late. You can probably pick him up after everybody has a quarterback in certain leagues. And so that's what I'm looking for. Value was, I love it. And I totally agree with you. If I was a listener of this, I'd be like, what?

Ryan Tannahill, are we really talking about Ryan Tannahill as good? Because I surprised myself. When I put these numbers in, I was conservative with him. I looked at his history, took a look at some film and just thought, okay, this is clearly what he's going to do this year, you know, a little bit better here, a little bit better here, you know, about the same here. And it just projected him above all those other players that I thought I would have been higher on than Ryan Tannahill. So value-wise, love him. Yeah, I mean, you're talking about Drew Brees. He's going to go on the fourth.

Right. Exactly. And Ryan Taniel is going to go in the eighth or ninth, tenth round. And we're talking about projections that could be similar, where Drew Breeze is coming off of a loss of weapons. Tanahill's getting weapons. Taniel reminds me a little bit of a Matt Ryan before he was in elite category of quarterback where you just kept waiting for it to happen. But even last year, there's, I mean, it's a lot scarier to go into the season with Ryan Tenno compared to.

a Romo, a breeze, a Stafford who have had prolific years. But we talked last week about the benefit of having a guy that you can stream with someone else if you need to. Yeah, we're talking about value of, let's say you go all in on Tannahill, and after two weeks, it's not working out. The cost that you've invested in him, you're going to be able to grab another quarterback off the waiver wire. However, I don't think that's going to happen. I think Tannenhill is going to be a guy who,

who is dependable for you. Now, sure, he may be, he might not be a matchup-proof quarterback, but because of the investment, it shouldn't be a problem grabbing that second quarterback who has the great matchup off the waiver wire for just in case there's a couple weeks where Tannenhill doesn't have the matchup that you're looking for. A quick point to what you were talking about, where you had him at five weeks finishing at,

the 20-point threshold of being a top-five quarterback. That's the thing, a thing of fantasy football is getting consistency where, yes, a quarterback, like, let's say Ben Rothesberger, finished number five, you weren't getting the best game from Ben Rothersberger every single week. You're saying he, because he only had five.

You're meaning his average is pretty... It wasn't Andy Dolman. You're not getting top five numbers from that quarterback every single week, which speaks to playing the matchups and not being scared to play a quarterback who has a great matchup, who you think can put up those numbers that particular week. Yeah, he was basically three points a game off the top five pace.

And so that's a decent amount to make up this year. So we're thinking he can get there. He was actually exactly tied with our number seven guy, Drew Brees, in our consensus rankings. So his average ranking from us was exactly the same as number seven. Drew Brees, the man losing his weapons, the man who, I think, even though he's still a fourth round pick right now, do we need to be concerned about him or is this going to swing all the way over to where he's a value?

I don't think it possibly makes its way to the, all the way to the value. You're going to have, you'll have too many people chasing the name of Drew Breeze. And I also want to clarify this with my quarterbacks, I believe, like 6 through 12, there is not a tremendous point difference. So if you're looking at my list and you're seeing, oh, he, Drew Breeze over, or Tannenhill over Drew Breeze. And so I'm not, if you want to take Drew Breeze,

go ahead. We're just saying that the value of Tannenhill that you're going to get week to week compared to Drew Breeze, where I can take an RB2 in that fourth round that I get to play every single week. So, Jason, talk to me. You're the only one that has, you have Breeze two spots ahead of Tannenhill, which I don't blame me for. But talk to me about what you like about Drew Breeze. You have them at 7. You have Tannehill at 9.

Well, what I like about Drew Breeze is that he's Drew Breeze. We know he's proven. He throws for 7,000 yards every game. And so he actually scares me a lot, especially lately with losing the weapons. The reason that I've got him ranked higher is just from stat projections. I believe that he's going to still throw for plenty of yards. I actually...

really love C.J. Spiller. I think that C.J. Spiller's going to be a huge weapon for him. He's going to get some touchdowns through the air from the running back position that they've kind of been missing out on since Darren Sproles has left. So I think that that's going to make up some, but I certainly expect regression from Drew Brees. I don't expect him to be as good as he was last year, and last year he wasn't as good as he was the year before. So I think that he's going to finish, you know,

I've got him finishing at seven, which is where exactly, I mean, it makes sense. That's where I think he's going to finish. His value is going to be awful. He's just not going to be on my team because somebody will draft him solely based on the fact that he's a Hall of Fame quarterback. Didn't they? Well, that's the danger of Drew Brees is the unknown of what the Saints, exactly what the Saints are doing, where year to year you knew who they were. You knew that offensive identity.

This year, this offseason, the Saints have completely shaken everything up. They appear to be going really all in on the running game, getting Ingram back, trading Jimmy Graham for Max Unger. It speaks to a wanting to shift the balance of power to the run, and we're not saying that. I just read something this morning on that where they said they want to have to score less to win. Yeah, I saw that too.

It makes total sense with what they're doing. We're not saying Drew Brie's won't throw, but you want attempts in the fantasy game, and Drew Brie's attempts are going to go down. Let me give you a percentage here. 39% of Drew Brees' touchdowns last year went to Kenny Stills or Jimmy Graham. 39%. So in some regards, he's getting weapons. If you talk about CJ Spiller and you talk about Brandon Cook's being healthy again because Brandon Cook's pace was decent, but he's not a goal line guy necessarily.

Probably 7-8. He's more of a Randall Cobb type of talent. Although Cobb obviously put up touchdowns last year, he's just not the prototypical size. He's a slot guy. But 39% of your touchdowns leaving at least should put some question marks into your mind. And so when you're looking in the fourth round, it's something that's scary. I'd rather, like you said, take that better running back opportunity in the fourth round. I think the scariest part.

about Drew Breeze is kind of what we were talking about a minute ago. You, Andy had said, you know, or maybe it was Mike, said that Ryan Tannahill is not necessarily matchup proof, right? I mean, you're going to take him out of the lineup if he's playing a good team. Drew Breeze has always been matchup proof. Until last year. Well, yeah, yeah. But my point is mentally. Mentally, Drew Breeze is a guy you leave in your lineup. You're not going to bench Drew Breeze.

From that name standpoint, you're not going to feel good about benching him, especially for where you take him. So it's the worst of all kinds. I really see Drew Breeze, even though I've got him ranked ahead of Tanna Hill from finishing, as far as where he finishes the year stats-wise, I see him as fantasy poison.

on your team because he's going to be in games that you should not be playing him in. He's going to be in your roster as you're starting quarterback in a game where you should bench him and put in somebody with a worst name and a better matchup, and you're not going to do it because he's Drew Brees. I agree. That's a good take. And we'll have to see what the rest of the offseason holds for them. Maybe they draft somebody at that position and were less worried. Colson's still there took a restructured deal. But Colston's...