The TRUTH: Top Tier Fantasy RBs in 2019 - Fantasy Football Podcast

1,540 yards. 16 touchdowns. No passing game involvement, really. 18, 18 receptions. Which is so weird. You would think it would just accidentally happen if you're on the field for that many snacks. You see him in the screen game. I mean, at least once or twice a year, he rips off of 70 plus yards screen. They should up it. Give him a couple more. Why not try more? Yes. Because he's not in. Because on third down, Dionne Lewis still was on the field. I mean, I saw this in the playoff game. And I was like,

Come on, man. I said this about Mark Ingram and Justice Hill. It's like, I get it. I know why you're out there. I know you've got a role. I know that you've been in practice. That's why, right? You're in practice and you've got your third down formation. And everybody goes out there and it's like Justice Hill has his role or Dionne Lewis. But.

You throw a screen to Mark Ingram or Derek Henry, you're going to be a lot happier with the result more often than not. That being said, here we go, 102.7 yards per game. That's a league leading total. This was just a fabulous year for Derek Henry. He's a free agent, an unrestricted free agent. He's not ready to talk about his salary yet and his upcoming contract. But we are, and it's hard for me to see him leaving Tennessee. And the truth for Derek Henry was...

he should be happy that Marcus Mario da got banished because those first six games, he was fine. He was solid. He was performing. We wouldn't be talking about him right now in this show if that transition doesn't happen. But he was performing the way that he had been drafted. I mean, he was drafted basically as a running back to. And the first six weeks with Marcus Marioata, he was the running back 14 with 14. With 14.1 points per game.

He had two great finishes, but then the other ones, you know, low-end running back too. He was averaging 19 carries for 69 rushing yards per game. Marcus Marriota gets benched. Ryan Tannenhill comes in. The number that was the most insane to me. With Marioita, 19 for 69. With Tannhill, 21 carries a game. So just two more carries a game. 125 rushing yards per game. Now, that's bloated by some.

monster performances, but those monster performances also happened. It was just, it was such a transition for the Tennessee Titans offense to put Ryan Tanhill in there at quarterback, and it turned into massive, massive fantasy production, just an increase of numbers across the board, snaps per game, rushing yards, fantasy points per game. It was a really big deal for him. I think that's, I mean, that's what winning does.

Right? Yes. You win. You put a quarterback in. You're more competitive. You start winning ball games. A.J. Brown's assent. Winning.

Game scripts plus Derek Henry equals happy fantasy owner. Well, he was only in, in those first six weeks. He was only in about 58% of the offensive snaps. That number jumps up to 68%. Well, and that's because at the end of those games, like Andy said, they were winning. And so if this is a team you project to be winning next year, assuming he is back with the Titans, then he should repeat. And there's going to be a lot of conversation.

about regression with Derek Henry. The touchdown numbers being bloated. He had 16, right, the same as Aaron Jones on the ground? I'm not sure. That is correct. It's 16. You know, the craziest stat that I've seen is their red zone efficiency. When they got in the red zone, they scored a touchdown pretty much every single time. No field goals. Did you see that in the game? Yeah. The fact that their field goal had, they hadn't kicked the field goal in 49 days.

Yeah, I mean, when you get in the red zone, you score a touchdown every time. So that's not going, you know, you're going to hear a lot of conversations about what's going to stop him from repeating it. And I think that Derek Henry is just an outlier human being. Yeah, it's like March on Lynch's touchdown potential when he was at his peak. You didn't come into the year saying, you know, regression to under 10. I mean, 12 to 15 touchdowns.

in the same role seems really reasonable for Derek Henry. He is taken over the lead dog of the team. He is the center of the offense. And next year I'll be projecting him to be what he was this year, which is a dominant running back on the ground. As long as he's on the Titans. Sure, yes. Which I believe. Well, he might get Zieg money. He might get that type of cash. Yeah. So I still am going to side more often than not on the...

more balanced PPR element of a Zeke or a Delvin Cook or a... Yeah, the 18 receptions. That sucks, man. But it does show you that even in today's NFL, you know, that was a distraction from drafting Derek Henry. It's not like we came into the year thinking, oh, maybe he'll be involved in the passing game. We said he won't be. So that means he must be brought down a rung or two. And he said otherwise. I mean, when you finish it three overall,

Five inconsistency. You can still get it done without the passing work if you're an outlier. Yeah, exactly. You have to be an outlier. We're calling it. He's an outlier. Yeah. As in, he's going to continue to be an outlier. Unless he shrinks. Right. Yes. Don't leave him in the dryer too long. Or the man comes out of the robot. It's an alien. The overcoat comes down and all of a sudden you're like, wait a minute. It was Dionne Lewis.

And friends. All right. Number four, Ezekiel Elliott. It'll be interesting for us to reflect on Zeke's year. Number four overall, consistency of number three. You look at his fantasy finishes. He never finished outside the top 24 on the entire year. He never busted. 94% of the time he was good. So that's 10 or above. 31% great games. Most of those happening over the back half of the year, especially weeks 11 through 15.

consistent at home consistent on the road consistent against good defenses consistent against bad ones zeke was so good that you're disappointed in him because he wasn't great he felt he was just strangely vanilla he was so good and solid but never gave you those

especially in the beginning of the year, right? Your first 10 weeks of the season, you drafted a guy to be more like CMC, to be more like Sequin Lasser, more like Zeke of years past, where you have these monster two, three touchdown games and 150 yards and, you know, he's more about... Derek Henry, four finishes inside the top, inside the top four on the week. Zeke never finished inside the top four. Yeah, so, I mean... I'm sorry, he finished at four, but he never finished in the top three.

So I think that was the issue is you missed the giant big blowup games, but he was so unbelievably consistent. You never were let down by Zik. He never hurt your team. And you know what his longest run of the year was? I don't. You don't take a guess. 40. I know what you already know. 33 yards. Wow. So that's a part of it too. Flashy plays and then the flashy top three fantasy finishes distorted what.

The truth was, the truth was Zeke was pretty much what you wanted to get. It just didn't come in the same fashion in the past, and it came on a reduced amount of passing game success. Targets dropped from 95 to 71. His attempts were actually slightly down per game. He still had the second most touches at the running back position. But what we did get was the positive regression for rushing touchdowns where he had that weird.

six. He had six rushing touchdowns two years ago, and it was just like, what? How was, how was a man garing the ball 300 plus times getting six rushing touchdowns? Do you, I know we're going to break down all the coaching changes in a specific episode, but do you have any gut initial concerns, worries, anything of that nature with McCarthy coming in, or it's just a matter of, look, we know what Zeke is, he's paid to be Zeke, and $90 million later, he's the same guy. Yeah, if it, honestly, if it weren't Jerry Jones at the top,

and it was Mike McCarthy coming in, I might at least have some concerns in the back of my head, but there's no way that McCarthy came in talking to Jerry Jones and saying, well, I'm going to have this split. Let's squeeze out the $90 million. I'm going to split back field and Jones, no, I just paid that man. He will be the focal point of the offense. Yeah, I think that there's probably even a higher probability that the passing game involvement could ascend a little bit under McCarthy, but we'll see.

Did you have any other thoughts on Zeke, Jason, before we move on to Dalvin Cook? No, I guess the only curiosity I had in my brain. It's almost, it's crazy to think like, oh, does Zeke holdout? Wait, was that this year? Yes, that was this year where he came, he didn't miss any games or any time. It was overshadowed by Melvins. Sure. But I just, I feel like that was 12 years ago at this point. It's like, wait, that was this season where he came in late. So maybe that, you know, we talked about how.

He was really, he was more of his dominant self towards the end of the season. You know, those first six weeks were rougher for him. Again, he never busted, but he just wasn't dominant. I wonder if any of that had any kind of factoring in, coming in without the training camp and without, you know. Yeah, it could have. Before we talk to Alvin, I'm going to pause because I've realized something about this show.

It's very important that when you have the opportunity to talk about Phillip Rivers that you take that opportunity because it's very entertaining to me. I'm out of here. Jason Lockenforah did tweet earlier today. He's hearing a lot of buzz about Tampa as a potential landing spot for Philip Rivers. They did move to Florida. Back in late November, he and the Chargers were likely headed to a parting of the ways.

What do you think about this rumor, Jason? Are they doing that little flip-floppy, Swippy Swapsky here? Now, how do you go from, like, the Interception King to the other Interception King? Why is that the... That just seems like you cap your upside because of the age of Philip Rivers. I like the interceptions. I'd like the touchdown total to come down a little bit, though. Oh, you want to get Rivers? Look, I would hate, hate, hate, hate, hate if this happened, because if Philip Rivers... From the charges, I'm like, James, let's go. Sure. Straight up.

If he went to, if Philip Rivers went to Tampa, that would be sad. You would have to be in on Rivers fantasy value. And I refuse to be. So. Remember that Nick Foles, Sam Bradford, straight up trade from a few years back? Sure. Yeah. Maybe we'll get one of those. A little Philip for Winston in his final year. Let the chargers worry about that contract. Not the case. Gross. They'll draft somebody. But, um, yeah. They should just bring back James and have him.

allow him to have year two with Aryans. Yes, they should. Look, for listeners of the show, it brings me great joy to know that it's more likely we'll be talking about a playing football Philip Rivers next year than it is a retired and out of Jason's heart and mind, Philip Rivers, because I want to see you experience Philip all over again. I think Philip Rivers would be an excellent commentator.

I'd really do. I think he would be, he'd have fun. He'd be one of those guys. He's watching it. He's passionate. He's enjoying the game while you're enjoying the game. I want that. I want that for him. And I will be his friend again. Did you, did you freak out? Because you just don't want like Chris Goddron and Mike Evans dependent on Philip Rivers. I don't. I feel like that's why you sat back in your chair like that. No, yeah, because I knew if he's in this system and he's got those receivers, you're going to have to draft him and play him. It's the last thing you want to do. You can't make me.

Dalvin Cook at number five. Finished at number five was the number two most consistent running back in fantasy. Those first eight weeks, they were beautiful, especially. And where are you out with Dalvin? Dalvin, to me, is in the conversation for the number two pick next year. You see this where he's, you know, the number two.

most consistent running back because our consistency score does not, you know, it takes out games missed because nobody's putting them in your lineup. So, you know, the games that he missed does not count against him here. This is when he was started and he was in your lineup. How do he do? And the answer was awesome. Yes. He was fantastic. The only issue with Dalvin.

is injury, and that's it. You don't have a worry about his passing work. You don't have a worry about his goal line work after this year. You don't have a worry about his team's desire to utilize him or a coaching change or anything. He is excellent. It's just health. Is he able to withstand the workload that the Vikings want to give him? And I'm going to...