Fantasy Football 2017 - The “My Guys” Episode + Early Targets

since the year 2000 for a rookie quarterback. Okay, the other. Y2K. The other guys, you got Cam Newton, you know, you've got, he's up there above in Andrew Lux's rookie season. He had an incredible rookie season. So the question for most people is, does that go away? And I don't think it does because he is legit good. He has a great team around him, a great offensive line. He's got Des Bryant. I realize right now he's in a difficult division.

They've got some good defenses. His defense has taken a step back. With missing, you know, the first six games for Ezekiel Elliott, I think that more of this team is going to have to go on the shoulders of Dak. And I believe he's going to be able to get the job done. If you want to look at how consistent he is, sure, he might not give you the, you know, number one quarterback that week type of games very often.

But he is not going to crap your team very often either. Here's the list of guys, if you take his week 16 out where he basically didn't play and the rest of their starters. The percentage of games where he didn't finish as a quarterback won, here's the list of guys who were better than him. Matt Ryan, Andrew Luck, Aaron Rogers. That's it. And one of those things is not like the other when you look at where you're going to draft him.

You're getting Dak Prescott, who finished last year as the sixth quarterback overall in his rookie year. You're getting him as the 15th quarterback. 15th quarterback right now in average draft positions. America. America. Get your deal together. That's in the 10th round. He is my target right now where if I'm in the double-digit rounds and Dak is there, he's who I'm hoping for. I believe he will be consistent. He'll be plug and play, locked and loaded. I think he's going to have a great year.

Because I believe he is a great quarterback. What round? He's a rushing quarterback. So if you're in, he's a rushing threat. Yeah, he had six touchdowns on the ground last year, and he's going to be able to put up several hundred yards on the ground. That helps. That's why. That's why he doesn't finish outside of the top 12 as often as other guys. As far as what round I would draft him, it depends on, I mean, I usually, I like so many quarterbacks late that I'm waiting until at least that ninth round.

So I would say that's probably the earliest I'll take him. But the nice thing is, is I won't have to reach for him if his average draft position is the 10th. I can let him fall to me. I like it. He passes the eye test. It's just a matter. Great in preseason. I brought this up before. It's the same thing as what happened with Russell Wilson, his rookie year, built into Dak Prescott's ADP is the fact you just, and it's nothing he can do about it. There's not three years of track record. So when you don't know what a guy can do over three years, you see the ADP drop.

Mark Ingram, Zachers, Dak Prescott, your guys. Yeah, those are my guys. Mike, you've gone all wide receivers. Yes, I've gone all wide receivers, and this is a guy who I'm targeting in the seventh round or so because I project that he can break out this season. He only played 13 games, yet he was 14th in receptions. So in 13 games, he had more receptions.

that Amari Cooper, Julio Jones, Brandon Cooks, missing three games. I'm talking about Stefan Dix. Now, I like the Minnesota offense. I think that Dalvin Cook changes a lot of things for this team, and they have upgraded on their offensive lines. Sammy Biscuits gets another year. He gets an actual training camp to learn with this team instead of packing his bags and just showing up and saying, hey, guys, I'm going to throw the ball for you.

I'm saying Bradford. I took on my shoulder pads. See how high these shoulder pads are. Last year, Stefan Diggs, his floor, his floor per game was at least five targets. There are, there's not many wide receivers who are getting at least five. And then there's multiple instances of him getting double digit targets. They had a three game stretch where every single game is over 10 targets a game. And we've seen the evidence that he can take over a game.

He did it multiple times last year, including week two when he was just absolute magma. He has that built into him. He had a sensational rookie year. I think he backed it up with last year. Injuries are a concern. Injuries are absolutely a concern with Stefan Diggs. I don't think that he can play a full 16 games, but you don't have to spend a very high pick on him. And the question for Diggs is, can the touchdowns improve?

And I think that they can because I'm projecting the Minnesota offense as a whole to just be better. Yeah, I agree with you there. One of the things I like about Diggs, you bring up the fact that his injury risk is kind of one of the bigger concerns for him. But what he's done this offseason is he's changed his diet. He's talked a lot about what he needs to work on is not.

I mean, when people are like, hey, what do you need to get better at? His answer is I need to get my body prepared for 16 games. That's been his focus. I like when a guy focuses on what he should be focusing on. He knows how to run routes. He knows how to catch the ball. I'm sure he's not leaving those things behind. But he has been focusing on getting his body trained and ready to take the beating. That's great. I agree completely. If he, if Sam Bradford through.

The most accurate quarterback season of all time. If he threw 30 touchdowns, I mean, Stefan Diggs would be a top 10 wide receiver. The problem is can he? Will he? Yeah, and I guess this would be one where I don't disagree on you being bullish about him, but it depends on what that translates into. I don't think that the ceiling for Stefan Diggs is much different than the ceiling for Jarvis Landry. They're both the exact same size. Landry 511, 200. Diggs is 6 foot 200, right? These guys have...

wide receiver touch. I mean, they have touchdown caps to me. And what you've seen is the best years out of Jarvis Landry is you finish the season 13th in fantasy and then 14th in fantasy the next year. Diggs doesn't have the kind of 50-50 ball body to go up and get those. Thielen does and we saw him do it. I just don't know how often in this offense with Minnesota, with the way they play defense, how often you're really going to see explosive Stefan Diggs versus PPR Stefan Diggs. PPR Stefan Diggs is the 15th.

ranked wide receiver and you're going to be happy with it but he's not a top 12 to me so i understand you get behind i'm not projecting wide receiver one for stephan diggs okay i i but i am projecting for a wide receiver two and a wide receiver two that you can draft in the seventh round is ridiculous that's that's spectacular value so let's say i always talk about going i won't be running back heavy at the beginning of my drafts that's just how i play the game so maybe i end up going running back running back

And then in the fourth round, I'm grabbing Crabtree. And then in the sixth round, I pick up Stefan Diggs. Yeah. I mean, I'm excited. Your baseline is wonderful there. All right. I'm going to give you my last guy. I want you to walk the plank with me. Okay. Uh-oh. That sounds not good. I'm going to try to unravel some things that I think are wrong about the way we evaluate this player. Cam Newton is my guy for this year. And if I had to tell you come, it.

Take one of my three guys and have the most confidence. I have the most confidence in my Cam Newton take than I do either of the other two players. This is something that has grown immensely over the last month and a half. And I want you to come and walk along with me for a second. What is the biggest complaint that you hear about Cam Newton? He's a bad passer. He's a bad passer, right? Has he ever been a great passer by the metrics we talk about, right? Sam Bradford, the most accurate quarterback in history. Well, guess what?

Cam Newton's a career 58% passer. He was a 58% passer when he finished third in his rookie year. A 58% passer when he finished fourth the next year. 58% when he finished third. And he finished first, we can remember, right? 2015, he was the number one quarterback. His game is not this upper echelon passer complete. Now last year, 52% outlier from his career. Career 58 guy. Terrible year. The whole season fell down around him. But he's a career 58% guy. And you want to know why?

because nobody in the league has more of his yards as air yards than Cam Newton does. Him and James Winston. You want to know who doesn't? Sam Bradford, Alex Smith, Matt Stafford. Those guys have 47%, 48% of their yards as air yards. You know what Cam Newton has? 63%. The guy takes shots down the field. He takes big play shots. That's why the completion percentage isn't there. He's got this monster arm. We've seen the Ted Ginn highlights. And I'm telling you, this year,

The schedule they have, third best schedule in the league for quarterback starts the year against the 49ers, Bills, and Saints. I'm telling you if you draft him, you're not going to regret it. Even if he falls off a map, if you start him those first three weeks, you're going to be really, really happy. Benjamin, Funches, McAfree, Shepard, Olson, Samuel. That's a positive thing? I'm giving you all the weapons. Yes, come to me. I'm giving you all the weapons. Big or small. He's got, he has the weapons.

He's shown number one, number three, number four capability. You're still going to get 90 rushing attempts like you did last year. That's my take. They're not pulling that back. You cannot stop him. What was his expression? You can't tell a lion not to roar. He even came out and said, yeah, whatever. That's basically his response. We want you to be safer with the ball. Yeah, whatever. A lion's going to roar. When push comes to shove, he's going to run the ball. And he's not too old to do it.

I don't like the comparisons that people. Here's the other part I want to unravel, because I'm just going to go forever. The other comparisons we hear is, and Jason's made this argument, you've brought it up before too. This is the age in which running quarterback stopped. Have you ever seen anybody like Cam Newton before? Nope. He does not fit into the mold. You cannot even make a mold big enough for that man. So he doesn't count. I don't give those things arguments. It's a huge mold. Cam, it's a huge mold. Cam Newton, I'm telling you, come.

And ride with me. He's almost a ninth round pick. I like Cam Newton there. And he can give you four times he's giving you a top five quarterback. So there you go. I'll say this. That's all I can say. Because he's falling near those double-digit rounds, I don't have a problem at all with drafting Cam Newton, especially with the early schedule that you pointed out, because I expect whoever I draft. Even Dak, Dak's not going to play 16 games for me.

I'm going to draft them, and maybe I won't drop them. But when there's a bad matchup, I'm going to pick someone else up. I'm going to play them. If I draft someone else, if I get Stafford or Dalton or whoever, I'm fine to cut him. I'm fine to draft and cut Cam. But Cam does have the explosive, super high impact upside. And if the schedule starts out strong that way, I really do like that. Now, the only thing I would disagree with you on is I do expect his rushing numbers to dip. I...

He will still probably be, you know, he'll be one of the top three Russian quarterbacks this year. But it won't be to his level of upside because while he is saying, you're not going to stop me from running. That's a huge part of my game. I have to do that. He will do that. But it won't be called for him as often. So when the play breaks down, he's going to scramble. He's going to get you 20 yards and two fantasy points on that scramble.

But the coaches used to call a ton of designed runs for him. And the reason he had to say, you know, you can't teach a lion to not roar, is because the coaches have come out and said, we're going to avoid that. So I do temper the rushing totals a little bit. But honestly, if the rushing totals come down a little bit and the dump-offs to Christian McCaffrey pad his stats up a little bit, you know, and all of a sudden, it probably won't be an even.

trade, but I don't have a problem with Cam Newton this year. I really don't. They finally gave him some weapons for cheap yards. That's the thing. They finally gave him cheap yard weapons. So he doesn't have to be picking them all up on the ground like Jason just brought up. Now, Cam Newton, those cheap yards, though, will have to go up a lot. If his rushing comes down anymore, he's in trouble because it's not just... It's not one for one. And I'm saying it's not just his accuracy. That's the problem. He's...

he's thrown over 4,000 yards one time. If you take out the outlier 35 touchdowns, which I know, but the other five years of his career, he averages just over 20 passing touchdowns. Right. And you're saying those first three years where he was a top five guy were on the rushing yard. Yeah, because that's what I'm saying. And I don't buy into, I know he's puffing the chest up saying, I'm going to run. But the coach has a lot to do with those things.

Coach wants to win. Yeah, and exactly. The coach wants to win, and he saw what happened to Cam Newton last year when he got the crap kicked out of him. There's only so many times. Yeah, but if Cam goes down, then he gets Derek Anderson. Oh, yeah. So then they can win. There's only so many times that a human being, even one is as large in.

imposing as Cam Newton can take a shot from an NFL player before it starts having a negative effect. I'm just, I'm concerned. That really bad truck accident and the truck was like crumbled. He was just chuckling in the corner? Yeah, it was totally, what was that movie with? So you're saying he's Bruce Willis from Unbreakable? Yeah. Yeah, that's him. All right. Martavis Bryant, Michael Crabtree, Stefan Diggs are Mike's three, my guys. Jason, you went with Ingram, Ertz, and Prescott.