Early Sleepers & Values - Fantasy Football Podcast

Cobb, it feels kind of gross even bringing it up. Is this the same random com from like 22 years ago? Yes, he's been in the league since 1963. Okay. He's been around forever. But here's the deal. He was, he's a new acquisition of the Houston Texans. They grabbed him after they traded away DeAndre Hopkins. And this wasn't just.

a low-level veteran minimum contract. This was a three-year $27 million deal. That's, okay, maybe that's inflated, but $18 million guaranteed. His agent is good. Maybe, maybe he just has a great agent. But over the second half of the season last year for Dallas and his quick stop there, over the second half, he was averaging 70 yards a game. Deshaun Watson throws two.

the slot wide receiver position. 26% of Watson's targets last year, as far as I could find, went to the slot wide receiver. A lot of which last year was DeAndre Hopkins. DeAndre Hopkins saw a huge surge in slot targets because they just, I mean, they're moving around and they simply did not have that reliable player. Perhaps that's why they went after Randall Cobb. You talked about, Jay, the vacated targets for Philadelphia.

Why about the second most vacated targets? Because DeAndre Hopkins, who's gone, 150 targets that they have to figure out, where are those going to go? Deshaun Watson's not going to disappear. He's going to throw for about 4,000 yards. He averages 26 touchdowns the past couple years. It's going to go somewhere, and this is a complete shakeup of the wide receiver core. Who's the number one wide receiver for Houston? Probably, Brandon Cooks? Probably.

Probably Brandon Cooks. Maybe it's Will Fuller. It's most certainly... Maybe it's David Johnson. Maybe it's Duke Johnson. Maybe it's... I'm hearing a lot of maybe... Kenny Stills. That's what I... Well, it's definitely not Kenny Stills. Stop it. But that's my point is that Randall Cobb could come in and see a much larger target share than anyone could possibly have imagined. He's... He feels like old busted. If you watched him, he's...

I still think that he has juice remaining. If you watched him playing... He's 29 years old? Yeah, I think he'll be 30. That seems impossible. I think he'll be 30 when the season starts. He's interesting to me. We were... We, and I'm saying we as like the universal, the fantasy community, we were getting pretty excited for Kiki in Houston.

And that's because he was the slot-wide receiver. We saw a huge target share when he was available in games, and the team is clearly moving on from him and giving that job to Randall Cobb. With such an ambiguous situation, Randall Cobb feels like a sleeper to me and someone who could pay off way, like way, way, way more than drafting it. Then last pick in the draft. Wide receiver 70, where his current ADP is right now, which is.

He's just not, he's not being drafted. This is his 10th season. Wow. He is certainly not going. I think he beats his wide receiver 70. The issue is just how high does it go? And while I do think Randall Cobb will have good games when the inevitable injuries come down for, you know, the Will Fuller, Kenny Stills, Brandon Cook's injury trifecta, you know, I don't know about drafting him because I feel like he's the fourth or third on the team. But it is.

It is worth noting what you said. The money is real. And when you pay a guy, you involve a guy. It's not monopoly money. He had the most yards per reception since his rookie season last year. And it's the most in his career at 15.1, 828 yards, 10 per target, which was the most since 2014. And he kind of just did it quietly and probably on no fantasy rosters last year for sure. Yeah, I think Aaron Rogers made him a lot of money.

I would say that. I would say Dak made him money last year. My point is I still think he's living off of yesteryear when he was this great number two next to Jordy. He only has one thousand yard season in his soon to be 10. Look, I'm not saying he's a top 10 wide receiver.

Just saying you need to pay attention of somebody who might be a target monster in Houston. I think the most compelling argument is the one you made with Kiki, where it's like you were looking at an opportunity in the slot when Kiki is completely unproven. Here they pay a guy to come in and you have such an injury history around the rest of that wide receiver core that it is an interesting name to bring up like he deserves to be brought up for sure. Value time? Value time. Jason's not going to be able to handle mine. Values.

he might not be able to handle my value pick but i can handle his so i'll let him kick it off and get us in a good mood yeah look last year this was a my guy for me is he's someone that is perennially undervalued and lo and behold he comes back again this year and he is undervalued i mean robert woods i mean people just don't see the the woods from the trees you know what i'm saying because he is look

He's leading the entire NFL right now in how many years that he is beating his ADP. Seven years in a row. And granted, some of that was, you know, former Bill's time. But seven years in a row, he has outproduced his ADP. And it's going to happen again because right now he's being drafted. Shout out to Rich Rebar on that stat as well. He's being drafted as a wide receiver 19.

And over the last three years, he's the, the wide receiver 10 over those three years as far as total fantasy points. He is the number one wide receiver for the Rams. Now that doesn't mean necessarily that he's going to be the number one fantasy.

option because he's not the red zone machine that Cooper Cup is. And so at the end of the year, Cup could very well outproduce him. And I made this argument last year. And, you know, it came true. When it comes to targets and who is the actual first read and who is the wide receiver one, it is Robert Woods. And you saw this at the end of the season. At the end of the season, when they made the shift that has been talked about so much with the tight end involvement with Higbee, getting more.

tight-ins on the field, and then Brandon Cooks and Cooper Cup were splitting time down in the, you know, 60, 70% of snaps. Robert Woods never left the field. He was on there at all times. And during that time, you know, you look at those last eight weeks, the second half of the season, Robert Woods was the wide receiver eight. He was really, really good. And what happened is it took him until week 14 to score a touchdown. Yeah, I was going to say you got burnt, like your numbers of outperforming ADP.

Do not match the emotional reaction of having Robert Woods last year and what you got in that first half of the year. I think that's his point is where he finished and positive touchdown regression is coming. Yeah, I mean, the two previous seasons, he was on a 16 game pace each season of six touchdowns, which is very doable for a guy that's.

basically, you know, 1,100 yards a season, he should be about six touchdowns. To get only two touchdowns last season was anomalous and hurt you in the beginning of the year. And because he got off to a slower start, his draft position is, once again, someone people just don't want. But he is a value. When you draft Robert Woods, you are getting someone who will outperform the wide receiver spot you are drafting guaranteed. I mean, it's locked and loaded to me. Yeah, no argument for me.

Robert Woods, I have projected much higher than the wide receiver 19, as is Cooper Cup. I got to bring Ronald Jones name up in the value section of the show. Jason's shaking his head. If he wants to plug his ears or put on those noise muffled. Go get some water. I believe Ronald Jones, normally you put the hate blockers on, don't she? Was it Ronald Jones? Listen, you're not going to like this, Jason. Just in.

Just endure it. But Ronald Jones is being undervalued in fantasy football. His ADP is 80 overall right now. It's the running back 35. Last year, with Peyton Barber in the backfield, without Tom Brady in the back field, Ronald Jones finishes the running back 26. He had an extreme, I mean, Tampa Bay has an extremely low running back market share. In fact, since 2016, the Buccaneers ranked first in passing yards per game, 30th and rushing.

And yet Ronald Jones put up an RB 26th season. Now, it was not a consistent, easy to predict year. Nobody is arguing that. What I am making the contention on is that Ronald Jones is being undervalued for the opportunity he has this year. Over 1,000 total yards last year, 4.2 a carry. Second best yards after the catch at the running back position in the NFL last year.

He had runs of 10 plus yards on 12.6% of carries. That was fifth best at the running back position. Impressive. And their general manager came out and said, look, he hasn't even scratched the surface on what he can be. He also said they have more faith than ever. Now, you could argue that that's not true because they went and invested in Kishan Vaughn in the draft. But they let Peyton Barber walk. So that was one act of confidence in Ronald Jones in that backfield.

He walked away real slowly. He walked away slowly. And look, we were talking Mike a little bit with Peyton Barber. Yeah, jogged over to Washington. Your super team in Washington with Gibson, McLaren, and Peyton Barber. But Ronald Jones, I am fairly certain we'll have first and second down work for this team for the majority of the season. Now, if you don't think that's valuable in Tampa Bay, don't draft Ronald Jones. That's fine.

I think it's more valuable than the RB 35 spot. And if you listen to Bruce Ariens talking on a conference call in March, he said, look, he thought that Ronald Jones, while he excelled in this screen game, he can't use them at wide receiver. So when they went into the draft, they said, hey, we're going to go try to find somebody to be able to compete with Daray, Agumboale, on third down and become a wide receiving threat. We know that...

Kishon Vaughn can do that. I'm not expecting Ronald Jones to be a third down master in any way, shape, or form. But what I do believe is that first and second down in Tampa Bay is very valuable. Last year, Peyton Barber had six touchdowns. Ronald Jones had six touchdowns. Ten touchdowns is not outside the realm of possible. He's being drafted outside the running back three range. So I think because of the Kishon Vaughn draft selection, there is a disproportionate amount of

hate being thrown to Ronald Jones that does not, you know, the draft position is just too low for me. I think he's worth the shot. I think that he is worth the shot as well. And I'm not a Ronald Jones truther. I think that he is a limited player for the running back position because of his hands. I mean, he is very explosive. He's really, really fast. So it's funny, the hands thing, too, because they won't use him. But we looked at this last year. It was much better than Peyton Barber.

in terms of catch percentage last year. Again, we're using Peyton Barber as the standard, which is a strange place to be going. All right, the player I want to highlight as a value, and this one is, I think he is, well, I guess he basically missed the whole season. Did you buy your Ronald Jones jersey after that, Jason? I mean, Mike did he cut off any retort, but. Yeah, you saved, I thought he was just trying to save Andy from, you know, having me.

just bring up the truth about Ronald Jones. Look, Ronald Jones, you say he's being drafted as the RB 35. I have him currently projected to be the RB 36. I was going to say you have him right around there. Overdrafted. Clearly overdrafted. Hey, if you are taking him as the RB 35, 36, I am fine with that in the sense that what you're talking about and the opportunity.

to take over that first and second down roll. And for Kishon Vaughn to come in and whiff on a pass protection or two, we've seen this with Bruce Ariens. And all of a sudden, that rookie is getting a little bit of doghouse treatment. And it's got to be the Ronald Jones show by the fact that there's not, you know, Daria Gungboale is not someone that should be on the NFL field. Let me say this too. I'm fine taking that shot. I don't believe it happens. Yeah, we talk about Jordan Howard having potential in Miami.

And I would rather have Ronald Jones in that situation in Tampa than Jordan Howard. I would rather have Jordan Howard because Jordan Howard's a guy who's always gotten it done on the NFL field, a thousand yard rusher time and time again for good teams, bad teams. I want the guy who I think is a good running back, who's an NFL prototypical guy. And that's not who Ronald Jones is. Ronald Jones has had a couple flashes. He's certainly very fast.