Fantasy Football 2018 - 10 Things to Remember from 2017

with a quip electric toothbrush. Again, that's get quip, quip.com slash footballers. You know what may have been one of the best inventions? The streaming quarterback. Oh. Number four on the 10 Things to Remember list, I want you to stream your quarterback or at least consider it. I want to break this down for you, okay? Because.

We're going to get into this a lot in the offseason, but this is something to remember, and here's what I want you to see. Last year, here were the top 10 quarterbacks by average. Safest position to draft, right? Oh, certain. Well, let's see. Here were the top 10 in order. Draft it. Rogers, Brady, Breeze, Matt Ryan, Russell, Wilson, Derek Carr, James Winston, Marcus Mariotta, Cam Newton, Kirk Cousins. Or here's another way to say it. Injured, 2, 10.

15, 1, 17, 22, 19, 5, 7. And then Andrew Luck was the 11th off the board, and we know how that turned out. So, four of the top 10 drafted ended up as top 10 quarterbacks. Now, if you had one of those four, maybe you're happy. Maybe you're not. I mean, Drew Brees ended up. You're still probably not. Drew Brees ended up the number 10, right? So he's in that top 10, but he was the third quarterback off the board.

Here's some of the players that went undrafted. Carson Wentz, Alex Smith, Deshawn Watson, Rivers was a ninth round pick. Stafford was a 10th round pick. You saw Matt Ryan, Derek Carr, Marcus Mariotta, James Winston, Drew Brees. They all regressed in fantasy terms. And so what I'm saying is, like Mike said, the kind of temptation is this is the most consistent, safest place for you to invest your picks. You saw major injuries. You saw major regression from different players. And look.

From our 25 stats article, we saw a record 43 different quarterbacks end up with the top 12 week. 43. And that's why it's a replaceable position. We tell you who to stream. It's a replaceable position. You can't. In fantasy. Yeah, in fantasy. Yes, thank you. I went over those numbers of who's finishing as a top running back. That's why in top wide receiver, you have to spend the early picks on them. And you.

Once again, we recommend you stream the quarterback, but we're saying draft one late because take a shot. Yeah, maybe you don't have to stream, but you didn't. Maybe you drafted Carson Wentz or Alex Smith, and then they turn into your every week started. Then you don't have to stream. Right. The fact is you spent a low equity pick on someone that if they flamed out, you can easily grab a replacement off of the waiver wire, play those matchups. 43 quarterbacks, including CJ Bathard.

Brock Osweiler, T.J. Yates. These guys all put up a top 12 week. And you can stockpile your wide receivers and running back while people are drafting Aaron Rodgers. And that is to say nothing of the fact that you get to draft another player when you are not. So Drew Brees, you brought him up, right? He was drafted inside the top 10. He finished 10th. Maybe you're happy? I certainly wouldn't be. Because you can replace that position.

Look at who goes around Drew Brees in the draft. Two picks ahead of him. DeAndre Hopkins. Two picks behind him. Alshan Jeffrey. Out of that group, you're probably happy with Russell Wilson is the fifth off the board. Yes. And Cam Newton is the ninth off the board. Oh, Cam Newton. Yeah, he busted a lot, but you're happy. Cousins, probably with 10th off the board. I'm just saying, like, you know, you brought it up. It's just let's remember this going into next year because.

Last year, everybody wanted Matt Ryan early. Everybody wanted to make a big deal of this. And this is the ebb and flow. Players do not put up career years every single year. And just the 43 quarterbacks sort of top 12, that's not an anomaly. The past few years, it's been 40 or more every single season. So this last year, it was, I mean, this was a late round streamer's dream. It's not always as good as this. A streamer dream.

You got to be careful with this dream dream. Yeah. But it always happens. All right. Number five on the things to remember to not forget from 2017. I love this one, by the way. Great job. Great job, Jason. I want you and I want me to remember the success. Me, not I. Me, not I. I want you and me. You and I. That's what I'm here for, people.

Podcast of the year. We fooled them. FSWA podcast of the year. I want you to remember the success that NFL teams have been finding and especially how much success they found this year utilizing past catching running backs. Look at the best teams out there. I mean, the Patriots, the Saints.

I mean, all the teams, I mean, look at what Todd Gurley got involved this year in the passing game. Kareem. Yeah, Alvin Camara was a revelation. Christian McCaffrey, look at the last few years. In 2015, there were five running backs in the NFL with 70 plus targets. So five running backs in 2015. In 2016, there were six. So it's going up. And this past year, there were 12.

and the 12 that, you know, were above that mark, they generally speaking played for pretty good teams. I mean, they were, they were playoff bound or hopeful. I mean, you do have your Duke Johnson in there like in front of you. I have the, I have the target list if that's what you're. Well, actually, I was going to ask about what the carry counts were for those players. I was just curious to how many of them had, you know, 150 plus carries. Those are the, I mean, those are the elite of the elite, but.

That's when you're talking. 12 running backs with 70 plus targets. You're getting over a third of the league in terms of the past catching running back making a huge impact. Yeah. And so if you play in any kind of half point or full point PPR, you need to realize the difference that it makes when you are looking at drafting a guy that is involved in the passing game or isn't always, always lean on the guy that is involved in the passing game. The only exception.

The only two exceptions I could think of are Ezeko, Elliot, and Leonard Fournette. And they're still involved. But Elliot's a fantastic pass catcher. He is. They just don't utilize them that much. And he's not as good when he's suspended. Like his pass catching totals go down. It goes to zero. The thing is, this is changing the NFL where a passing back, a running back with great pass catching skills, they shoot up. No longer are people just trying to get the old prototypical running back. You're like, oh, this guy.

Two downs. He's going to grind it out. He's huge. They want players that can actually catch the ball. And it's more than that. It's not just you've got a pass catching back and they have a low volume. You can get a volume now as a pass catching only back to still be valuable in fantasy football. We saw with Danny Woodhead years ago. Corey Clement might be that next year. If it's an Ajai Clement backfield, or we'll see what happens. Mike, I'm in love with this next one on the list. Oh, fantastic. So why don't you share? On this list.

The number six thing, don't forget to remember. What is the? Yeah, no, just go on. Move on. Running backs on good teams. Now, this is, it's a little more difficult because the NFL has some turnover, a also known as Todd Gurley, where the Rams went from worst to first. And so the person you might not know that the team's going to be good or bad. Sometimes you have to project what teams are going to make a leap as a whole.

There was only one running back in the top 10 on a sub 500 team. That was Carlos Hyde. And that one, you could see it because he was going to get the volume. Only three running backs of the top 15 running backs were on sub 500 teams, Carlos Hyde, Jordan Howard, and Duke Johnson. So when you're spending this pick on an early running back, you want them to be on a good team.

a high scoring team. I know that sounds like common sense, but you just don't reach on guys like Isaiah Crowell. He was the poster boy where we. The offensive line's great. And Hugh Jackson wants to run the ball, but they weren't a good team. Early in the off season, Isaiah Crowell, we talked about him a lot because in mock drafts, people are getting him in the fifth, sixth round. Fine. I'm fine spending a pick on a bad team running back there, but all of a sudden he jumps into the second.

You just know that the probability is so low for him to have a good fantasy year. You took a little bit of a shot with Leonard Fournett projecting that the Jaguars would improve. But again, you're drafting a huge amount of volume. So when you're taking an early pick on a running back, just try to project that that team is going to. Let me ask you this. Let's tease this out a little bit because one of the tips that we just brought up was how good rookie running backs have been. Sure.

And you're going to have Saquan Barclay go to a team without question. Please no. That was terrible. Please no. No, I mean, he's going to. He's going to go to a team. That was terrible. Now, whether they will be terrible is another story. But it's going to be Cleveland or it's going to be the Giants or it's going to be another franchise. Could be indie and they could be great. If they get Andrew Luck back. Right, but we still have the. It's kind of like Ezekiel Elliott went to the Dallas Cowboys when they had a, you know, a high pick. But.

They weren't really terrible. That was a Romo injury. So if Seekoine Barkley goes to the Browns though, Mike, and with the talent level that he has, but the facts that you just outweighed, what do you do? Or do you downgrade him in your mind? You're going to have to downgrade him, but Barclay with over 1,200 rushing yards, over 50 receptions last year. That's why he is special. He will, he can become one of these Levium Bell players.

That's getting 70 or more targets and 200 plus carries. So the volume will be there. Touchdowns could be a situation for Barclay next year, which is why if he does go to Cleveland, he'll probably be in my running back one still, but he won't leapfrog players that you may just suspect he will be like, oh, Sequin, taking a number four. He's got to be in your top five. All right, number seven on the list. Depth.

Depth, depth. One of the ways that I think that we help you, right, as a show, when we break down players, rankings, mock drafts, all these things. Look, it doesn't take a rocket science. It doesn't take a rocket science? It doesn't take a rocket science? Did I say science? You sure did, my friend. Well, it doesn't. We tricked them. It certainly doesn't. No, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to tell you to draft Antonio Brown. It doesn't take one to tell you to draft Ezekiel Elliott or, you know, this next year, Todd Gurley. Where I...

think we help people the most is by giving them value, hopefully, finding value, helping you find value in the back, middle to the back of the draft. And the reason why that helps so much is because of this next point. Depth. Do not forget the importance of depth on your team. This used to be my problem as a fantasy owner.

Maybe it still is in some capacity because you get stars in your eyes. And if you trade every great player you have and you assemble the best one through eight on your fantasy roster as possible, it is just beautiful. You can screenshot your roster. You can print it out as a poster and you hang it on your wall. But the fact of the matter is that top heavy juggernaut team, it's very unlikely that they're going to survive the season. Okay, 12 of the top 50 picks.

by average drop position. They missed time with injury, ranging from season-ending stuff, Odell Beckham Jr., David Johnson, Delvin Cook, to the bumps and bruises that cost them two games here, one game here. That's just under 25%. So 1 in 4 of that top 50, you're not going to come out unscathed. It's a very, very low probability that you're going to have this perfect health season. Plus, you've got to deal with bye weeks, plus you've got to deal with changes in the depth chart, things that you aren't projecting,

So the message here is build your roster from the first picked to the back of your bench. Don't take any of that for granted. And kind of the caveat here that I want to bring up on top of the enforced point of, hey, depth, depth, depth. The caveat is this, don't give up. Because injuries, all of these injuries I'm talking about, 25% of these top 50 players, that reconfigures the season. So we had a lot of listeners that were able to go from, you know, one in three, oh, and four starts.

to playoff contention in championships because they did not give up and injuries reconfigure, you know, Aaron Rogers goes down and all of a sudden Carson Wentz goes down. Remember, depth, depth, depth. When you don't have depth and you're building this juggernaut that Andy's talking about, you're building a juggernaut who skips leg day. Look, when you got the shirt off, the pecks are rippling. Right. The biceps are bulging. You're looking good. And then all of a sudden you got little chicken legs.

Like we hide that on the show. I mean, you don't know what our legs are like. Oh, well, they're huge. They're so riply. We do the inverse. Yeah, you might look like we don't work out, but we're all legs. Are huge. We're MJD under here. The depth for the season is crucial. We talk about on the show when it's time to start trading to build that starting roster for the playoff run, but it's a marathon. So get them.