Explain Yourself! + Rankings Debates, Metcalf Island - Fantasy Football Podcast for 5/30

who when I watched last year, I thought, excellent running back, looks good, young running back. That's always great. And I don't want any part of him in fantasy where he's going is going to be ahead of where I would be willing to draft him. And I have two main reasons for this. One is the historical context and data on draft capital. And you mix that with a new coaching staff that was not here for that rookie breakout last year. Damien Pierce is a day three pick. And for better or worse, the difference between a day two pick and a day three pick in the NFL is massive. It's very meaningful for a franchise. About a day. About a day. But it's like 24 hours. The second round and third round picks, those are perceived as so valuable. So much work is put into them. And then.

Day three is like, okay, we're going to shotgun, you know, fourth through seventh, get special teamers and whatnot. But here's the proof, right? I went back over the last decade. I looked at all of the best fourth round running backs over the last decade. So I'm not talking about, like obviously people picked at the fourth should be worse than people picked in the first. I'm talking about the ones who performed well, the best of the best over the last decade, who proved they were good. The next year, their sophomore year, on average, those players lost. 42 fantasy points per season on average. And in fact, almost all of them were worse. Only two of the top 10 were better in year two, Tereke Cohen and Ramandre Stevenson. And if you compare that to the guys picked in round three just barely ahead, on average, they score 20 more fantasy points per game and 50% of them improve on their rookie numbers. But day three picks just don't have the same. The team is not invested the same way.

And so that's another issue. They went out this offseason with this coaching staff and picked up Devin Singletary. Devin Singletary is making $3 million. Damian Pierce was the day three pick making a million dollars. And Devin Singletary does not get enough respect in my opinion as a running back. He is a good veteran running back who just played meaningful snaps. for a Super Bowl contender who took a second round pick in James Cook and said, no, you're the backup. I got 177 carries. You get 89 carries. You combine all of this and you look at what, I mean, we were talking in the profile video today for Damien Pierce that'll be in the UDK about the percentage of running back carries.

that went to Damien Pierce. I mean, yeah, he had a great season, but part of the reason he had a great season was because his prime, the next most carries went to Daria Gumbawale. Like there was nobody else to hand the ball to. Ten of the 13 games he played, I believe he was at 85% or higher. Yeah, that's just never. Six or seven games at 100%. So that's, that was like, that's what remember James Robinson's rookie year? That, that, that was what happened. That's what we talked about in the office. Because the. The percent of the market share of your running back attempts, if you have just a monopoly on them at 85%, like good things happen for your fantasy production. So that's just not in any way, shape, or form going to happen. This doesn't project to be a great team. They have a rookie quarterback who will probably start week one. If you look back at the last decade of how their running backs performed, only one was a top 24 running back. So I'm completely out on Damien Pierce.

I worry he could be the next Jeremy Langford. And you might not even remember Jeremy Langford. Well, I remember that name. He was a fourth round pick who had a great rookie campaign. Great rookie campaign. Everybody loved them. I feel like we had this conversation about Jeremy Langford. Oh, yeah. I'm sure we did. Because that was Jordan Howard, right? Yep. Who, yeah. So, I mean, it's one of those things where it's like, it's just he's a, he's a fourth round running back. He's not getting better this year. He's getting worse. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's. pretty fair from your assessment that efficiency would have to increase. Touchdowns would have to increase. If he wants to equalize what he did last year, look, if he gets a fewer, a smaller percentage of the running back carries where he scores eight times, you're going to have the same finish. He definitely looked talented. But, oh, I mean, he's a very tough runner. He is a tackle breaker. For some reason, Kyle doesn't like him. I don't, I think it's just kind of blindness. That's because the.

The hype machine guy. He didn't like him even going into the season. Did you like the 1,200 yard pace he had, Kyle? He didn't get to 1,200, did he? Did you like the pace? He got steamed up way too much last year. You don't think he paid out on the steam? I don't know. Kyle? I don't think I didn't draft him. I'll tell you that. No. Kyle holds grudges. He really does. And his entire argument is everyone likes him. Oh, this is true. Yeah. We have been digging into this Kyle hates the majority. That was it. The contrarian in him. Too many people find him attracted. So if we all turn against him, is there any chance you'll go? Oh, all in. The chips will go all in. Not at RB20. That's too. That's where you're going right now? Yeah. That's a little too rich for me too. Especially with a, there's a possibility that Devon Singletary splits the carries with him. There's a strong possibility. So.

All right, Andy, you're going to be up next here. And we're talking about a player who I think we all like. Nobody's going to argue against the talent here. But you like him a whole heck of a lot. You like him more than Mike and I. Mike and I have him at 18 and 23. You have this player at number 10. And this team just went and drafted an additional target taker. on the field away from him. And we're talking about the biggest, baddest man, D.K. Metcalfe. There it is. There it is. You jumped it too soon. Yeah, I guess I'm a little surprised that I am somehow on Metcalfe Island here. This one, see, and Kyle, you said it was hot that I had him at 10. Where's his ADP right now? Do you have that? Whiteer's here 15. Yeah, 10's hot.

Okay, 10 is a little hot. Look, this is one where, you know, we've talked a little bit about this offense. We've seen the impact on the ADP of Tyler Lockett with the drafting of Jackson, Smith, and Jigba. We saw Metcalf stay the same, and I think that that is appropriate. There are a handful of true alphas at the NFL level in terms of physicality, size, speed. Metcalf can win down the field. Metcalf can win. And up close, he's the best friend of quarterbacks. He's bigger than you. He's stronger than you. He's faster than you. And I don't think you guys are debating that with your ranking at all. What I think happened last year is you saw just a very, very anomalous touchdown total from a guy that is maybe more other than a couple of players in the NFL, probably the most built.

like Des Bryant to end up in the end zone, or Mike Evans, to end up with double-digit touchdowns every single year. He did it in year two. He did it in year three. And then last year, here he is with six touchdowns, despite the fact that he literally led the NFL in-zone targets. He had 21 of them. So that ended up being kind of a letdown year. He ended up at 18, being drafted at 15. But I think. I think Metcalf doesn't get impacted by Jackson Smith and Jigba. I think this is a player that 141 targets, 90 for 10.48. You give him 10 touchdowns. We're not talking about him being a letdown in any way, shape, and form, and he should have had 10 touchdowns. We're talking about him being almost as good as Tyra Lockett, hey? Hey, hey. Hey, comrades. But we, Kyle, Kyle helped me do some research here. And this was very, very interesting because he looked at the last decade of wide receivers.

and there were 12 of them that averaged eight targets per game in their fourth year. That's what Metcalf did last year. He averaged eight targets a game. If you watch those games, he was the centerpiece, even though Lockett was the touchdown king. And so he looked at these 12 wide receivers that average eight targets a game in year four and C, and then average eight targets a game in year five, which is this year. And the list is kind of staggering in terms of how often those players end up being top eight. the next season. So if D.K. McCaff maintains eight targets a game, he's a true alpha. He's going to end up in that category. And you can look at this list from 2013 on. And other than Jarvis Landry, who in Miami, remember that one year in Miami? Oh, my gosh. Did he score 10 times that year? Nine times, 10 times? He had a kind of a crazy year. He got 230 passes. That's how it felt. And so other than Landry, every single other player on that entire list, when they maintained eight targets,

They ended up as a top eight wide receiver. So I think the ceiling is statistically built into the outcomes for him. I'm just kind of placing him closer to the ceiling than you guys are, which I understand hesitancy there. You probably like some other wide receivers a little bit more. But I think Metcalf is a very high upside player at his ADP. And I think you're getting a true number one for your fantasy team when you take him. If you went running back early, you end up with D.K. Metcalfe. I think you should be very, very happy, and you're going to get output that you're happy with. Yeah, I don't have any problem calling your shot on DK Metcalf. Two years ago, he was the wide receiver 12. Three years ago, he was the wide receiver seven. We already know he's got the ability to be a top 12 wide receiver. Obviously, those were with Russell Wilson, but Gino Smith looked fully capable of supporting, you know, a wide receiver one. It's just got to flip between Title Lock and D.K. Metcalfe.

When push comes to shove when drafting and you're looking at this team is that I think it is at least a, it's not maybe a coin flip as to who finishes higher between Lockett and Metcalf. You know, let's call it 66% chance it's going to be Metcalf and 33% chance it's going to be Locket. Sure. But the gap in where you draft those players is not. in any way reflecting that. So obviously you don't have to draft him at 10 and you're putting him down at 10 for that upside, which, which I like. I can fully appreciate it. And I, and I don't think that you are crazy to think that. I think Debo is going ahead of him. That's. Oh, man. Debo is another player. Debo's one spot ahead of him. No, Debo is wide receiver 17. Oh, okay. So just behind him. Not according to our ADP page, Kyle. Well, our ADP is a sleeper.

Not a hundred dollars. That's fair. Yeah, not, I wasn't looking at best ball. I was looking at current redraft. But, but if that's the, if those are the players that we're talking about, that's where I think he's, he's a steal. But, um, fair enough. Mike, no thoughts on him. Well, it's, I'm, you know, I'm over here. I'm trying to make my Tyler Lockett jokes. Um, because Tyler Lockett's been better in three of the four seasons that D.K. Metcalf has been in the league. And then you look, and it's Metcalf 2020. He was the wide receiver 7 with Russ Wilson. Then he went to 12. Then he went to 18. And it's like, I just, I think D.K. Metcalf is that guy. I mean, they gave him the contract, but I'm saying that guy for fantasy football. But I think that there, like, there are some doubts that are starting to, to sneak in, just like creep under the gate here of, is D.K. Metcalf?

really going to become that guy that we think. The stats of the year four into year five, that's very interesting. I'm excited to see if that pays off here for D.K. Metcalf, because I feel like if you get another season, is that D.K. Metcalf? Yeah, was D.K. Mokhov. Okay, I got you. Like, if you get another season where Metcalfe is like wide receiver 15. or later like you're going to close the book on you're going to go is like will we ever actually see that ceiling yeah that that top three type dominant uh potential i agree there um all right mike you're going to be up here this next player and this is a player that i thought i really liked but apparently i don't mike does i've got him at wide receiver 30

I think he's a good wide receiver, but I got him at 30. Yeah, I mean, that's not, you don't really like a guy at 30, Jason. Well, 30's not really liking a guy. I like him for his talent, but not for his team, not for his situation, not for his quarterbacks. I've got him at 28. I love him. Yeah. 28.30, that feels about right. Mike up here at 14. Yep. That means you have him ahead of D.K. McDow. So Mike considerably. At 14. And foolishly. On Chris Godwin, it is time. for you to spline yourself so it is this is so much spice it is the rod god it is christopher godwin who is 27 look it starts here with this is the second year recovering from the ACL last year was wild that he tore his ACL towards the end of the season two years ago the fact that he was ready to go at the beginning of the season was pretty shocking it was it was pretty bumpy along the way but it wasn't just chris godwin like

Tom Brady, that was not a good version that we saw last year of Tom Brady. That did not stop Chris Godwin from racking up a bunch of counting statistics. In 15 games, he put up the sixth most receptions of wide receivers last year, targeted on 23% of his routes. So he still has it. But there was a massive touchdown problem. for Chris Godwin last year who had what I believe three yeah three touchdowns so nothing Baker can't fix well sorry I'll let you defend yourself yeah I mean and also you apologize because nothing Kyle Trask can't fix is what you meant to say there we go it was the worst touchdown percentage of Tom Brady's career I think Tom Brady was just toast so that's why I was laughing at your Tom Brady to Vegas that would uh

That could be something special. But last year, so that made Chris Godd of one of three wide receivers ever to have 100 plus receptions, a thousand yards, and fewer than four touchdowns. Funny enough, one of them was Mr. West Welker with Thomas Brady. Well, it was 2008. Was that the ACL year? I don't remember Brady played that year. It's been too long. But the point is regression, or I should say, as we say on this show, positive regression should come for Christopher Godwin if he's still going to get that amount of receptions, that amount of yards. Over the last five years, wide receivers average a touchdown on about every 13 receptions, and that puts him closer to eight than instead of the three. I think that Chris Godwin still has it. He will be even healthier. It's funny, you know, the DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett, there are massive parallels to those two,

to Godwin and Evans, then to the Seattle wide receivers who last year we just buried in ADP because Gino Smith was going to be the quarterback for that team. That's your best point. That's your best point. That's your best point because we did and people did. It was like, guilty as charged. And I think we did have a couple of those times when we were just like, is this the dumbest thing ever? We've seen them play football. They're great. Yeah, and Mike Evans and Chris Godwin, I think, are still good wide receivers. If you want to say that Mike Evans is probably losing a step or two, okay, he's a bit older. But Chris Godwin at 27 in the prime of his wide receiver career, or his wide receiver years, I think that people are massively undervaluing a great route runner, a player with good hands, and someone who, like, look at the weapons on this team. I mean, Chris Godwin should.

should see easily 24% of the targets. Here's the, Jason, I'll let you speak to, but the worry here should, would not be the case for the Metcalf Lockett under rating of last year. It's, it's welcome to Deontay Johnson's life. That would be, that would be the bad case here because you lose the confidence of the Big Ben and Tom Brady. Like, it bothers me a little that Chris Godwin can have 104 receptions in a season and finish at 20. Like, that's, I mean, yards per catch going down four straight years, you know, production going down four straight years, touchdown wise. Deonti Johnson is the bad case. The good case would be the Metcalf Lockhe kind of situation. But that is, that's like, are you Kenny Pickett Baker or are you closer to Gino Smith Baker? And I believe with the offensive line for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, we've seen.

Baker be good. We've seen Baker be bad, but I've never seen Baker be good under pressure. I mean, if Baker's got guys coming at him, Baker turns into the worst quarterback imaginable, and he's going to have guys in his face. So that's really the difficult thing. And then you look, a wise man once said earlier this morning that Tom Brady threw for 733 passing, passes. There were only 11 quarterbacks who threw for over 500 last year. So if this team goes from 733 to 550, which seems very reasonable, that's just so, you know, you can't worry about, well, positive touchdown regression. You're going to lose so many targets just because the pie shrinks, even if your target market share is good. I like Chris Godwin. And what my favorite part about it is the being year two from that injury, because that was a severe, it wasn't a clean ACL.

He shouldn't have been there for week one. I think Tom Brady just made him will it to happen. Stitched together with broccoli. Yeah. And so I'm excited to see a healthy, talented Chris Godwin this year. But the team situation around him scares me for thinking he could be top 15. There's a chance both guys are losing a step. There's a very good chance both guys are. Because, I mean, there's not a guarantee Godwin gets back to any of the form he had before. Sure. And so it is probably like it could be both of them. It could be a new era for Tampa with the number one pick. And all of a sudden we're talking about like, you know, Marvin Harrison arriving in Tampa next year. Jason, I don't know what the hell you're doing with this selection here. I'm surprised that you decided that you wanted to speak on behalf of this player because I thought he was already on your Mount Rushmore of all timers. But Terry McLaurin.

Terry McLaurin, Jason's champion? Don't read the rankings. Read them. Read them and weep. I mean, it makes, I don't get it. Jason has him at 14, which I think is a reduction from where he had him. Mike has him at 25. I got him at 23. That feels generous to me. You know why I don't like Chris Godwin? Because Baker Mayfields is quarterback. Now let me tell you about why I love Terry McLaurin with Sam Howell. Jason is alone when it comes to the underdog universe, the best ball universe, who has him at 26. He's 27 years old. You got three years left on a deal. Last year had 1100 yards and five touchdowns. Jason Moore. You guys are crazy. It's time. Explain yourself. Do it.

Terry McClough? Where's the, you don't have a jersey on for Terry McLaren today? I got a tattoo, but I don't want to take the shirt off right now. It's, it's fresh. You got to wait for that to heal up. You haven't had it on in previous years. It is. No, I look, we would all agree, Terry McLorn, very good wide receiver. Situation, maybe not that great. I mean, this is a team who last year ran the ball the fourth most times, and they were 20th in passing attempts. That's not great. And in that team with bad quarterback play, you want to know where Terry McLaurin finished if you didn't remember? Wide Receiver 14. So I don't think it's that crazy that I got him a wide receiver 14 at all. In fact, I think maybe I am too low. And I really think that because I had to move him down to wide receiver 14 when I actually finished my initial rankings. And a lot of this is because of Eric B. Enemy and Scott Turner. Scott Turner, their former offensive coordinator, who was.

apparently best friends with Curtis Samuel. He came from Carolina, played with Curtis Samuel and all of that jazz. He's out. He's gone. Who'd they bring in? Eric B. Enemy. Eric B. Enemy, obviously, we don't know how great he is. He's had Patrick Mahomes. So, like, all of his numbers are going to look good. You can't look at, well, how was his yardage and touchdown numbers? Pretty good. He had Patrick Mahomes. But you can look at the passing attempts and the rushing attempts. What did he? want to do in a perfect world, and he lived in a perfect world because you had Patrick Mahomes. And if you look at those numbers, you find someone with rushing offensive attempts. And this was for a team that was winning and running the clock out at the end of the games at 23rd in the league, 27th, 23rd, 20th, 25th, and passing attempt numbers for their offense, fifth in the league, second in the league, third in the league, ninth in the league. Now, obviously, we've got to be realistic and say, well,

Patrick Mahomes sway some of that. You're going to pass a lot more with Patrick Mahomes. But this is not going to be a team running the ball, the fourth most in the league. And their strength now with Jehan Dodson is Jehan Dodson, Tara McLaurin, are a great one-two punch. If you look from week 10 on, that's when Dotson got back from injury and they stopped doing all the weird gadget stuff with Curtis Samuel. You had a great stretch for Tara McLaur. And he had a 27% market share. And I think him and Johan Dotson, I'm in on both of them. And the thing is, is like, I actually do like Sam Howell. I think that, you know, I had him as a first round grade. He obviously was not drafted in the first round. He could come out and absolutely suck. Or the third. Hold on. Or the fourth. Fifth, we did it. There we go. We found him. But if he sucks, that's fine.

Because Jacoby Brissette is behind him. And what did he do with Mari Cooper last year? The quarterback situation is not great, but it's not worse than it was last year. So to me... Was that a period at the end of that sentence? I'm sorry. I didn't know if you were concluding your offensive. I believe that Terry McLaurin is a great NFL wide receiver. I think his situation is going to be much better with a healthy Johan Dotson and Eric B. Enemy as offensive coordinator. And the quarterback situation... is regardless of if it's better, it's not worse than last year. So we know he's already capable of being the wide receiver 14. Yeah, I think part of it is kind of getting back to the Metcalf Lockett situation. It's like I think John Dodson has a decent chance to be the better fantasy wide receiver this year than Terry McClure. I think that's a possibility. And it's actually kind of interesting when you look at once he returned and was playing over 70% of the snaps because he was coming off an injury that was limiting him.

limiting him, speaking of Dotson, when he first returned. But once he started playing over 70% of the snaps, it's ridiculous if you look at the splits in that time between Dotson and McLaren. The final five games of the year where they were both doing that. McLaren, 1193 yard pace, Dotson 1169. 10.2 touchdown pace. Dotson, 10.2 touchdown pace. 119 targets, 115 targets. 71 receptions, 74 receptions. So that would be my only like, kind of like, Why go all in on TMC if I can get Dotson later? That might be the decision that I'd be making. But, you know, that would be my only commentary. I've got no problem grabbing Dotson later and wanting a piece of the offense that way. I've got both of them very highly ranked. One of the things that I... Dotson, Dotson, we've got Dotson here. One of the things I like about this offense is I think there's going to be a consolidation of targets. You know, I believe Terry McLaurin, Jehan Dotson, are going to be...

basically 50% of the targets. It's going to be those two guys and we've seen it. Why are you dumping on Curtis Samuel so much? Just because obviously Ron Rivera is very familiar with Curtis Samuel and has a loyalty to him too. I think Kurt, I mean, you know I've been a Curtis Samuel guy over the past, but if you look at what happened last year with their game log, when they were using Curtis Samuel a lot, they started, you know, he was very involved those first five weeks. I believe they went one and four those first five weeks. It wasn't winning. And Johan Dotson.

is great. So to me, it's not that I hate Curtis Samuel. It's that Jahan Dotson is just so much better that they're going to go out there. Eric Bianmi is going to see these guys and go, here's my two special players. Let's design an offense around these two special players. Logan Thomas is offended. I am not offended by my statements. The fact that Logan Thomas even played football last year is... He really wasn't that bad either. I mean, I don't know. So Terry McLaren, 14. Watch out for Logan. 14 going on two. Not bad. You can get him there. Also, I think Logan Thomas was pretty bad last year. Was he? Yeah. I think he had. Wait, you think or you looked it up? Let me see. One touchdown 323 yards. That's fair? In 14 games. That's fair. I'm thinking of the year before. Well, you know, the same, considering the injury that he was coming off of.

And we thought maybe he doesn't play football again. Yeah, he was a, he was a tight in six, but that was back in 2020. Yeah. It's been a minute. All right. The final player we're going to talk about it is a running back. It's a running back who has been near and dear to my heart has finished as the RB4 and the RB 14. He may be one of the only true bell cows left. But we'll see if he gets used like that. Jason and I have him ranked as a running back one. Andy more of like a middling running back two. It is Mr. Najee Harris of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Andy, split yourself. I just don't get excited about Najee Harris. I really don't. I'm not. I don't like to hear that. You said middling running back two. I've got them near the top of the running back to 16 is 16 is not bad. 16 is fine.