AFC West Breakdown + Hopkins, Jacobs, and Saquon - Fantasy Football Podcast for 7/18

It can be an advantage, is my point. Because what if you're wrong? I mean, I waited on Herbert last year. That cost me. If I had spent it on my homes, I'd have been better off. Right, but Mahomes wasn't in the second round last year. Well, Alan. If I'd take an Allen in the second round, that would have worked out. Sure. Right? Yeah. Or if you, like you, identify Jalen Hertz late, then you did both. You got the double whammy, which is great, but you'd have to be able to get it right. Yeah, and I guess that's the point, though, in the game we're playing is.

I identified Jalen Hertz. I won a championship with him in our league of record. Only one team gets to win the championship. So you really want to be the team that plays the scratches. That's the way I see it. I feel like you're spending so much on the homes. And if he has a ceiling, you're going to be all right. You're definitely not going to be out of the running. You're going to be competitive. But it would be nicer to me to try to build. Like, I'm playing the scratcher. I'm going to try to grab Lamar. two rounds later or grab Herbert three rounds later this year and add the second round running back or wide receiver. At the running back position, Isaiah Pacheco, Derek McKinnon, Clyde Edwards-A-Layer. I've been taking McKinnon myself late in drafts. He was the running back two in a five-week stretch at the end of the season. He went crazy. He's a wide receiver for them losing Juju. I think that we have to look at McKinnon as a weapon they're going to utilize in the offense.

can just look to his production. I mean, Andy Reid's going to use a guy that scored nine touchdowns in the receiving game. Yeah, and it's 11th round. I have no problem with it. We've laid out the case of McKinnon's ascension. It lined up perfectly with Clyde Edwards-Alair missing games, not saying that they look at Clyde's production over his career as a chief and say we've got to for sure get him back in there. It could just end up being Pacheco and McKinnon. But for an 11th round, pick for McKinnon, that's nothing. That's worth the risk. I will point out that when both players were healthy, McKinnon had higher snap counts than Clyde O'Dillard did. So he was still on the field around the beginning of the season. In the whole beginning of the season. So he was on the field as much, if not more than Clyde was when they were both healthy. But Pacheco emerged over the second half of the year. I'd say for the beginning of the year, that's part of the issue. What could happen to McKinnon, though, is the, the.

I'm watching the Netflix show, the quarterback show. How is that, by the way? I really like it. I love football. So, I mean, it's a lot of kind of more positive than negative. It's a lot of recapping of last year. But you're getting, you know, like more information. So I'm really, really enjoying it. But you were, there was a play week one or two or something. And some, Mahomes misses a wide open McKinnon who's on a wheel route, free touchdown. and he misses it. And they highlight it because he's Mahomes is just beating himself up for missing it. And then it's like the next play is a Clyde Edwards-Alair receiving touchdown. So that's the issue where Jerich McKinnon went on that tear over those final four weeks. You don't have that roulette option of, okay, the play didn't happen with McKinnon. And now Clyde's in on the play. So he doesn't get a chance to do it. Let me put it this way. Either of you drafting Pacheco at RB28. Not me. Mike?

It's not really an inspiring pick, but I'm okay with it. RB28 is. Are you drafted in Clyde in any league way, shape, or form? 18th round of best balls. Yeah, super, super deep. Grabbed them. Are you drafted in the 11th? Yeah, I'm fine with it. I have not, man. Cadarius Tony, Marquez, Valdez, Cantling, Skymoor, Rashi, Rice, Richie James, Justin Watson. It's crowded. It's crowded. It's probably going to be at the end of the year where, hey. All these guys had a good game. Two of these guys had two good games. One of these guys had four good games, and it's probably not going to work out for fantasy as far as having someone emerge as a superstar. But this is one of those nebulous wide receiver rooms. You have Mahomes. So we've got to try to at least identify who could emerge. Who could be special?

You know, when I statted everything out for the ultimate draft kit, my initial rankings were very high on Cadarius Tony. We've seen him be special. I've pulled back a little bit from that, but I remember seeing a quote just the other day from Mahomes talking up Cadarious Tony, and obviously you're going to talk up your own players, but he said, Quote, he can be one of the best receivers in this league. Like he really is loving Cadarious Tony. Now they've got an actual offseason with him. Remember, they brought Cadarius Tony in midseason. He was injured when they brought him over, so he couldn't even work him in. And they really never did work him in. They use them as a gadget player on a handful of plays every game. But there is a narrative to be built at the very least where with an offseason program, with Juju leaving.

with Cadarious Tony having the opportunity to emerge as the wide receiver won for the team, he's got the talent to do it. And so if I wanted to put a bet on one of these players, that's where I would place my bet. It's tough. NBS, would you say he was an important part of the offense last year in Kansas City? Yes or no. Important to the offense? Important to the NFL offense. Yes. See, I would say that too. And you can be important to Kansas City and end up. Outside the top 50, a wide receiver like he did. That's the challenge. But Cadarious Tony, I mean, it's amazing that Mahomes' top wide receiver options being drafted as the wide receiver 40. So it's Travis Kelsey. Yeah. Travis Kelsey is the one and the two in the offense, and then they have 16 wide receiver threes right now. Let NFL in Red Zone targets. That includes wide receivers and touchdowns. That's what's so beautiful about Kelsey.

is that it's like you're around the goal line and you expect him to be the one that scores. They just as does the defense. And it makes no difference. Indie Reed is too creative. I really want like the NFL to split up like it's still a passing touchdown. That's fine. But I want to see how many. shovel passes and tap passes. Like what percentage of most touchdowns are just these manufactured basic handoffs that just go forward to open up a lane for a touchdown? There's, you know, in the show again, that you're reminded of there's multiple Travis Kelsey highlights of him. Yeah, he's getting the ball in space. And then he's just stiff arming defenders into oblivion. So it's so fun when you have them on your team.

So it comes down, Travis Kelsey is simply an ADP discussion. Right now he's slotted for the middle of the first, which is, that is very, very expensive for a tight end or a onesie position. I don't think any of us have taken him in any mocks. I don't know that I've had the ability to. So I would, I'm more on the side of, if I'm in the later half of the first round, I am 100% fine. taking him because like we're like seven eight nine yeah like in that range i am okay taking him because to me travis kelsey will still be uh the difference maker if you if your strategy is is mark andrews then i'm okay with that because he's going a multiple rounds later but it's like unlike where mahomes and the the discussion about the big three quarterbacks i think some other quarterbacks can catch them and catch up and close that gap

I still have Mahomes and those guys on top, but some other quarterbacks are going to put up a fight. It's hard to see what other tight end in this current landscape could actually challenge Kelsey or Mark Andrews. 152 targets. And watching Kelsey play last year, I mean, he was outrageously good, you know, 12 touchdowns compared to nine the year before, more yards this past year than 2012. So it's not like we didn't see. a weird dip in Travis Kelsey's production and go, uh-oh, is, is Travis Kelsey at the end? I don't think so. I think we have for sure, at least another season of Travis Kelsey being dominant. And you can't catch up with those points where I can try to catch up with wide receivers and quarterbacks or wide receivers and running backs. It puts your team at a weird position. If you start with him.

But I'm okay with it in the second half of the first round. Let me ask Jason if his philosophy is identical around the tight-in threading of the needle. Because it's obviously a lot easier to identify a late Jalen Hertz, a late Josh Allen from years ago, a late Lamar from years ago, Kyler. Finding a quarterback seems like a lot of, it's much more of an exact science. Yes. Then it is. You know, it's David Najoku this year. That's going to be a top two tight end. Yeah, no, I don't do the threading of the needle at the tight end position because there aren't options. There's one. You just do the drafting of the Andrews instead of Kelsey. There's one needle threader that I grab around the six, seven turn. So I get Mark Andrews and if I can't get Mark Andrews, I am trying to thread the needle with a six, seven turn Kyle Pitts. I'm taking that chance. And then after that, I just don't care. I'm going to grab. Okay. I don't.

Give me Higbee. I don't care. You're just punting. Yes, I'm punting the position at that point. Okay. Yeah, that's good to know. All right, looking at the Los Angeles Chargers. Last year they were projected for 10 wins. That's where they ended, 10 and 7. This year is 9.5. They went 1 and 5 against teams with winning records last year. I feel like every bit of excitement that we had going into the season was metaphorically and maybe. literally hit by a Mack truck in the sense that injuries plagued this team. You had a quarterback in Justin Herbert that was playing injured throughout the season. You had long, long stints of Keenan Allen and Mike Williams missing time. Jalen Guyton went out before the season. Joshua Palmer didn't, you know, there's a lot on his shoulders to expect him to come out and carry the load and didn't quite deliver.

still a team that played very fast, still a team that had a ton of passing attempts. But overall, last year, if you drafted any of those guys, it was a bust. Herbert, Keenan, Mike Williams. I mean, other than maybe Gerald Everett, I think it's a full bus. Maybe. I would say if you were able to tread water and hold on to Keenan Allen, because the second half was not just like, oh, Keenan Allen, it was pretty good. No, Keenan Allen was. great. He was the wide receiver four from week 11 on. Thank you. So it's a busted draft pick. It's it probably feels like it for most people because I imagine they moved on. If you don't have your guy until week 11. Yeah. That's a busted draft pick because you know, you don't get them in 18. That's really tough. I feel like most leagues that I was in, the person that drafted Keenan Allen did not get Keenan Allen's greatness. So they draft Quentin Johnston to add another wide receiver to the room. It's exciting for.

Justin Herbert, even if you don't necessarily believe in Quentin Johnston as a potential sleeper this year. I don't know if you guys stand in that camp. I do. I do take some shots on Quentin Johnston. He's got the talent. He's got the yards after catchability. And he's in an offense with an offensive coordinator and a quarterback that can get the job done. He's an unknown rookie with high draft capital. There's a lot of reasons to. take the shot on him and he doesn't cost much. You know, he's the wide receiver 42 off the board. So when I'm in that range, I'm looking for someone that could come out and kind of surprise us. My pre-NFL draft outlook on him wasn't the best. I didn't see him as a dominator. I feel like all three of us are like, what are you doing with Quentin? I'm like, I don't know. What are you doing with Quentin? And we're all like, you don't know why? I guess he's two.

pre-drafts. The reason why is that one, and we haven't even mentioned his name this offseason, but Joshua Palmer plays for the Chargers. He's a very competent wide receiver three. So we don't even mention it. So the room is getting more, you know, it's busier than it used to be. Quentin Johnston. is a bet on an injury, and we don't like doing it. And that's why we're like, what are you doing with him? Because are you betting on Mike Williams or Keenan Allen to get hurt? Because if they don't get hurt, Quentin Johnson is probably not having some huge breakout season, is he? Probably not. Probably not. Because if that's the case, then you're saying either, A, he's outperforming those other two, which I assume, is that a possibility to you? That's a possibility. Mike Williams and Keenan?

Yeah, I mean, he just be a secret weapon. He projects more to be the Mike Williams type of role. Mike Williams is, you know, obviously older and I don't necessarily think he's going to outproduce them. I don't have them statted that way if they're all healthy. Obviously, Mike Williams is never always healthy. He misses a handful of games all the time. But it's just one of those things where you go, okay. You know, this division. He goes like Julio to the Roddy of Days of Old. With Herbert, Herbert can throw 45 touchdowns. Like that is one of the range of outcomes with Kellan Moore and with health. You know, last year, Herbert was a major disappointment for fantasy drafters. But he lost Mike Williams a bunch. He lost Keenan Allen for half the year. He broke his ribs and played through it when he could barely move for several of those weeks.

There were a lot of things that went very poorly for Justin Herbert, and they won 10 games. So, you know, if Justin Herbert has his weapons, has a more creative offensive mind to open things up and make them easier, adds a first-round rookie weapon. This is an offense that I think if you end up the year with like 45 touchdowns, then they all three had good seasons. Kellan Moore's teams, Dallas, obviously. Number one and number four in points scored the last two years. Too many. Too many. It's too many. It's too many. For old McCarthy. How dare you? Number one and number four, and you get canned, huh? I think it was a mutual. I don't know. Was it a firing? It just seemed like, yeah, he wants to move on because he heard he could get Herbert. Yeah, I don't, I mean, it's, there's a lot to be excited about.

But they're in a division that you see them as is not the best team in the division. Well, we don't know yet. Stay tuned. Hey, whoa, whoa. Got to keep the listeners. They have a good O line. They lost Rashon Slater for 14 games last year. That hurt. I remember when that happened and Herbert was beat up and it was like, there's no hope any of these weeks throwing the ball to Josh Palmer and no one else. So Herbert has a tremendous upside case. I have a QB5 right now. I guess that's the highest. I don't know where you guys have them.

But we're all in on Herbert this year. Ackler was the RB2 last year. He has 36 red zone touchdowns the last two years. He's been targeted on 27% of his routes. He has a tried and true weapon. And he's planned for a contract on a contract year. You know he's out there. And he's, he's feeling pretty spicy. I mean, he is like the, he. The quote was him saying, you know, when I look out there and there's backup wide receivers making more money than me, like he is. It's not fair. He's, oh, yeah, I totally agree. But he's, he is rightfully upset. Yeah, the running back salary situation is not, I don't think it's not fair. You, you didn't bring this up. I just think, no deal, by the way, for Josh Jacobs. Yeah, you didn't bring it up earlier. But if you look at the franchise tag.

values from 2015, the cost of the franchise tag to put it on a quarterback has gone through the roof. It's just, you know, obviously salaries always go up. Everything is going to. Wide receivers through the roof. It's cheaper today to franchise a running back than it was in 2015 because they don't, because the franchise tag is based on the top five paid players like that. Yeah, it is. And they've gone down. And nobody pays running backs. Yeah, because it's a bad bet. Yeah, it is. It's not good for the team. It's like none of us want our teams to go pay the running backs. Right. Right. We say that we want our, we want our fantasy players to have contracts. I got a quote here, guys. Oh, boy. I want to play. Hold on. Hold on. Can we play a game? Breaking news. All right. I want you to tell me if this seems like positive sentiment or negative. Okay. Okay. Okay. This is direct from the source. You haven't seen this yet, Jay. I haven't seen. Okay. This is from Sequin Barkley.

Superstar Running Back, New York Giants. He has recently tweeted, it is what it is. Okay, all right. Now, you tell me, is this positive or is this negative? This is negative. This is not a happy man. This is throwing my hands up. Has anyone ever said it, like, I love, in a good way? I love phrases like this, like everything is everything or it is what it is. But has anyone ever used that because, like, things were going great? Oh, right. Like just everything's going well. It is what it is. How did you win those millions of dollars? I don't know, man. It is what it is. No. No. Sequin and Jacobs will both be if they play, which I assume they will play at some point, it's going to be contract year's story for them just like it is for Echler at the running back position. Jacobs did that last year. He was playing for a contract last year. Right. Then he gets franchised because he played so well. Also.

This is incredible. Kyle just dug this up. According to the New York Times, the phrase, it is what it is, appeared as early as a 1949 article by J.E. Lawrence and the Nebraska State Journal. Lawrence used the phrase when describing the difficulty faced during frontier, frontier era life in Nebraska. Oh, man. Frontier life in Nebraska. It is what it is. No, that's what it's like being a running man. It's like being on the frontier in Nebraska. Oh, man. But for what it's. for what it's worth, they will both make $10 million this year. Yeah, I don't get caught up in that. It's just, it's comparing it to your peers and what you bring. It's not easy being a running back. No. It's not. And they should make a new rule. If you want to fix this, I got, I got your fix. You're not allowed to draft running backs except for every other year. Something like that. You can't replace them with cheap labor.

Yeah, you know, neither players sign their Tinder. So we'll keep you up to date with that. Echler. Well, they're not going to sign until they want to show up. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's the point is we'll figure out whether they participate in some of camp or not. If, you know, they just decide, hey, let's show up and start collecting checks and let's move on towards getting a contract next year. That's where we're at. Yeah, maybe the hold in. All right. So. Yeah, let's, what is this? More news, Brooks? What's going on? No, just confirmation. All right, neither player reached a deal. All right, so Echler, he's been dominant for the last two years, playing on a contract year. Unless you want to sit here and make the same argument that's been made against him for three years about him scoring too much, compared to averages.

You know, he's going to be a dominant force. I mean, he's ranked at the RB2 for a reason. He'll be a great fantasy option. I don't think he finishes. Like, I've got him as running back too. I don't think he finishes there. I would still draft him as the second one because I think you're on a great offense. The depth chart is disgusting around you and you're the main show. You catch a ton of passes. But there are, it's not just touchdown regression. When he was on the field with both Mike Williams and Keenan Allen, his target market share was.

it was like almost 45 minutes last year it was yeah it wasn't it wasn't much but it was almost like half of what it was in the games where it was just one of them and now they add quentin johns and so yeah sorry sorry so target coming down a little bit touchdowns may be regressing but you're still the dude on a great offense it's just so easy if you catch 107 passes it's very easy to be top five It's hard to not be top five. Yeah, and he caught 107 passes. So touchdowns thrown out the window. If you catch 100 plus balls, you're going to end up top five. I have him ranked a bit lower than you guys do. And it's, it's just, for me, it's the combination of, you know, being overly efficient forever. But also, he's 28 now. And it's, you know, the age cliff for running backs. It's right around 27, 28. So I see him.

coming down just a bit. Let's talk Raiders. They're 6 and 11, or they were 6 and 11. They went into last year with 8.5 win total. They said it wasn't McDaniel's fault. It was Derek Carr's fault. Let's get rid of him. This year they're projected for fewer wins, 7.5. They led by double digits at halftime in five games. They went 1 and 4 in those games. They went one in six when they had Waller and Renfro, so you can't blame injuries. And Josh McDaniels looked terrible as a head coach again. Let's just be honest. The best decision he made as a head coach was to take the Hall of Fame game running back Josh Jacobs and give him the ball 10 million times. I mean, Jacobs, if he is the starter, which he should be, if he's playing in week one, you know, he had the fifth most rushing.

yards over the last decade he caught a ton of passes is very similar to what you just talked about with the depth chart in los angeles like this was a player eight seven one three eight a stretch during the middle of the year where he was i mean he had three number one overall finishes last year for a guy that only brooks believed it so um if he plays What's his ceiling? Probably where he was last year, right? Yeah, I don't think he is going to possibly be able to repeat the ceiling he hit last year from a production standpoint because the offense will be worse this year. I think with the change at quarterback, I don't project this team to be better. Obviously, the lost Darren Waller. It's a tough division. But the depth chart around him is such that you...

project an absolute massive workload. He's on the franchise tag. Not worried about Brandon Bolden? No, I'm not worried about any of them. The Adula Express? So you're talking about. He will touch the ball 350 times. And if you touch the ball 350 times, you're going to be great. Your floor is so extremely high. Now, whether or not he's able to get the touchdowns and the big plays that he had last year, that's probably not going to happen at the same clip. So I see him as a really, really safe option that's probably going to finish the year's lower in RB1. Yeah, I mean, I look at him the same as Nick Chub. You know, he's going to, he's going on the back of the first round. You know, to be that official on that many touches shows a level of skill that you saw in the field. But, yeah, I mean, repeating it every year is going to be difficult. Those two players have a hard time. Like right now I have it, Chubb Jacobs, three, four.

I want both of them very badly on my team. Devante Adams, ho-hum, did it again. Is he undervalued at wide receiver 8? Should he be in these discussions the way or are you just so afraid of the quarterback situation? It's funny because this was, it's like the same situation as last year. Hey, he's a little older. He's switching quarterback's major downgraded quarterback. And then I didn't bet on Devante Adams. I was like, yeah, I'm going to let other people do that. And then it was, I should have bet on Devonte Adams. He's so good. And now it's like, well, he's a year older and he's getting a bad quarterback again. That's been the lesson in the last few years. Oh, Tyree Kales got two. It doesn't matter. You know, Devante Adams is Derek Carr. It doesn't matter. We still haven't ranked very high.

But I would say the cautionary flags for him are going from, so you got Derek Carr to Jimmy Garoppolo. Derek Carr is, he doesn't do it a lot, but he's actually like a pretty capable deep ball passer. And we saw like an a dot in a yards per completion here from Devante Adams that he hasn't seen. Let me double check. There's ever. He averaged 15.2 yards per completion. His second highest in that category would have been year three in the league at 13.3. They used Adams a completely different way. And now, what does that look like for Jimmy Garoppolo, who is nearly allergic to throwing the ball down the field? He's very scared to do it. So if we take that back, do we still get, you know, the...