Fantasy Football Podcast 2016 - Fantasy Election Special, News, Mailbag

then he becomes relevant again. So the Redskins seem confident that Matt Jones will be their leadback. How confident are you guys in Matt Jones as their leadback? Man, those fumbles are scary. I think we have to wait until after the draft to see what their words say. I mean, there's so much misinformation before the draft when they come out and say, oh, we're really confident. This is our guy.

That's them saying, hey, hey, everybody, we're not taking a running back. So you can go ahead and if you're right before us, don't worry about taking them. You're right. Just too early to see. Why do they sound like Jerry Seinfeld? I don't know. And so for me, I would say too early to tell if he is the lead guy, I like him because of opportunity and talent. But I'm not convinced that he is fully capable of being the guy. I loved some of the stuff I saw last year.

You know, if a guy's fumbling as often as he was, you can't have him be a lead back for a whole year. You're going to lose all your games. All right. The Rams have once again come out and said that Case Keenham will be their starting quarterback. Eight and eight. That's the champion call coming out of the Rams. Ooh, the brass. What are they doing? I don't know.

What are they doing? First round tender on Keenham. They seem committed to them. They're fisherin. And then I saw. Fishing. I saw a quote of, I think it was from Fisher. He said, you know, we can win games with Case. I know this. But we're also going to give Nick a chance. So you have no quarterbacks on your team. That's the kind of confidence you have in a great quarterback because you always say you give the other guys a chance on the team. I'm not fully convinced. I know.

Jeff Fisher has a knack for 8-and-8, which is very impressive. It's not just a knack. I'm not convinced that he can get 8 wins this year. What this means? 8-8 is the goal, Jason. That's never the... We don't want. It's not the standard. 8-8. That's what we want. We could do it this year, guys. We also want to make sure all wide receivers in St. Louis remain irrelevant to fantasy football owners. All right, the Raiders GM Reggie McKenzie said he will get some help in the backfield. They...

The Raiders seem very committed to not giving Latavius Murray the amount of carries he had last year, which was 266 carries. Why won't they, Jason? With a guy so... Look, Latavius Murray is extremely talented, but you did see...

Peaks and Valleys last year with his production. I think that it's good to get another guy in there. If they go out and draft EZE, this is very bad for Latavius Murray. It's a guy that supplants Latavius Murray, and now Latavius Murray is the help for EZE. But if they go out and get a guy in the third, fourth round, fifth round, then I like that for Latavius. Latavius is clearly going to be the starter if they were to bring someone in that is not.

Ezekiel Elliott or Derek Henry. You know, that means he's their guy, but he can get some rest. I mean, he had no opportunity last year to have any rest whatsoever. Our boy, Roy Hulu. Oh, Hulu. Goodbye. Goodbye. He was nowhere to be found. He was injured most of the year. And so I think Murray broke down at times and he's got the talent.

where if he can get a little bit of rest, but the majority of the workload, where he will be a RB2 at the worst. Sure. And our last piece of news is Chiefs linebacker. Justin Houston will be sidelined six to 12 months after a knee scope dealing with an issue with his ACL. Massive blow to the Kansas City Chiefs if Houston is not on the team this year. Yeah, he's their premier past rusher.

He had recurring injuries at the end of the year. It's just an unfortunate thing if he is going to miss that much time. He's certainly going to miss some. He's one of those guys where when we talk about it's kind of hard to gauge a defense because one single player missing completely changes. He's their Von Miller or their JJ White. He's their best pass rusher. It puts so much pressure on them. And, you know, Tomah Lee's back, but he's older.

A guy like that is going to make your safeties better, your cornerbacks better. It's the entire defense better. Yeah, just him. Guys, it's almost election time. It is almost election time. But before we get to that, I want to thank our good friends, the sponsor of this show, pristineauction.com. You've heard us talk about them before. It's where we got our beautiful sign David Johnson jersey that hangs next to Mike the bearded.

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He wrote out his stat line. It is the best looking piece in my office. I love it. It's tremendous. Yeah, and we want to let you know that pristineauction.com has daily auctions, literally hundreds of daily auctions that end every single night. So it's really fun to go on there. See if you find something that you like. They have weekly auctions. Right now they have a, I saw this this morning, a Peyton Manning.

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Only from the most trusted sources and everything on there is very affordable. There are a lot of very cool pieces. You can show your fan support for your team by grabbing some of the awesome gear that is on there. So check them out, pristineauction.com. All right, guys, it's time to represent the candidates. What you can do for your... All right, like I said, we are going to each represent a candidate for a number of offices.

And then we are going to post all of these on Twitter at the FF ballers. Go cast your vote, make your mark on this fantasy football democracy. On history. On history. So do we start? We start at the top. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So we're starting with the president of the 2016 fantasy season.

This would be essentially the MVP of the year. Our projection, who do we believe will be the most valuable player? And I will add this caveat. The most valuable player is not always the first pick in the draft. It is also the player that will make the biggest mark from where they're at, kind of the player that can win you your league if you select that player. And if you select... He's pointing to me. I'm going with Eddie Lacey.

Oh, gross. My big old fat pants, Eddie Lacey. Go ahead and make your case for Eddie on stage here. That he will be the president next year and the fantasy MVP because... How big are his hands? They're big enough to carry many touchdowns for your fantasy team last year. So last year he was a consensus top two pick. He was usually going at the first or second...

pick of the draft so everybody hates Eddie Lacey and that is why this year he is a great value I see him average draft positions at the very back of the second sometimes into the third round I didn't even believe that when I saw it so I went and did some mock drafts and sure enough there at the last pick of the second round when I was at the turn I got Eddie Lacey and that is incredible because

In 2014, the year beforehand, he had over 1,500 all-purpose yards, over 40 receptions and 13 touchdowns. He's a beast. The problem is, last year, he's a beast. He was a big beast. Bell cow, key word. Yes, he was certainly a very large bell cow, and he came in out of shape.

He couldn't get on the field. There were complaints from him from training camp, from the first week, all through the season. You could see it when you watched film. He did not look like the Eddie Lacey of old. He looked like two of them. And here's what they did in Free Agency. They toyed around with Matt Forte. They didn't pick up Matt Forte. They actually re-signed James Starks, who's been there for the last several years, and is clearly the backup. They even win fat Eddie got too fat.

They gave him the chance to take over that role, and James Starks showed the world that he can't really do that. So Eddie Lacey is the guy. I like what they didn't do in free agency for him. I like his draft position. You're going to be able to draft, you know, for my draft when I'm at the number one spot, if I can get Antonio Brown with that first spot and then wrap around to the turn and grab Eddie Lacey, who I think is worthy, is going to have as good a season as any other running back.

He will be the type that will win you years this year. Let me say this. Do you want another year like the one you just had with Eddie Lacey? He's the establishment's pick, and he's not my pick. I'm going with Todd Gurley. You need new blood as your fantasy MVP. I don't care if he's going in the top five. That's where he belongs. All he did with Case Keenum, their, quote, starting quarterback, was a pace.

of over 300 touches and 20 touchdowns with Case Keenham under center. He is a powerhouse running back, a young running back, in a world of uncertainty at the running back position. Do I want to dance with Fat Eddie? No, I don't want to dance with Fat Eddie.

I don't want to risk another year like that. He had opportunity after opportunity under McCarthy. There were disappointments not just on the field, but in the work ethic. Just because we think he might be back in shape doesn't mean he will be. And so I'm standing on the solid ground of Todd Gurley. Listen, America. I've heard what my fellow candidates have said here, but I would like to elect a man named Mark Ingram running back from the New Orleans Saints.

Here's the thing with Mark Ingram. He only played 12 games last year. Over 160 carries, nearly 800 yards. Here's the big thing for Mark Ingram. 60 targets in that time. 50 catches over 400 yards. From week 1 to 10, he was the number 3, the number 3 running back. He only played 12 games, like I said formally. Do you know how he finished in PPR? He was still a running back 1.

In standard, he was the running back 15. You give him his average per game, he becomes the number three overall running back. What happened when Mark Ingram went down? They brought a castaway in, a castaway named Tim Hightower, who put up 70 points in three weeks. You think Tim Hightower is seeing the field when Mark Ingram is there? No, those 70 points are going to Mark Ingram.

who will be dominant. And just like, I like what Jason said about the value, because Mark Ingram right now, you will get him at the back of the second round. I can get a superstar wide receiver or even a Levion Bell, an Odell Beckham. I can pair them with Mark Ingram. Like I said, Weeks 1 through 10, the number three running back. Not bad. I don't mind that pick. I don't mind him as a candidate. Maybe next year.

All right, let's move on to the vice president of the 2016 fantasy season. And we are defining the vice president as a player that will become elite for the first time. They've never been the MVP, but they will be elite this year and be ready to step into the presidency if needed. All right. So let's go ahead and let Mike start this one off. Oh, back to back. Who is your candidate?

For the vice president of the 2016 season, who's going to be elite for the first time? My candidate is Amari Cooper, wide receiver for the Oakland Raiders. Last year, 130 targets. His rookie season, 130 targets, 72 catches over 1,000 yards and six touchdowns. Now, this comes off. He had a very debilitating foot injury that limited his end of the season. The last 25% of the season.