Regress or Impress + Weird Players, Offseason Q&A - Fantasy Football Podcast for 3/7

On today's episode, we talk a little regress or impressed, and then we jump into the mailbag. It's your questions. Mailbag. Make sure you subscribe to this channel so you don't miss a single show and enjoy. To the fantasy footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Welcome in the fantasy footballers. Jason Moore is here. Mike Wright, present accounted for.

I'm Andy Holloway. Happy to have you with us. We've got a good show for you today. It's going to be fun to hang out. Great show. Great show. Oh, thank you, Mike. I was worried. That was close. I was like... That was close. Is this just a good show? I thought our goal was to lay down a bunch of mid to good. So that way later... When we get to like the football season, we're peaking. That's what I'm saying. Are you willing to commit to that? All right. Let's take it down a notch. No. I'm in. I'm in. You're in? Yeah, I'm just doing good. He's been in for a while if you noticed. I've been in for about nine years. I only do good. Okay, well, I'm going from great to excellent. Oh, so we're doing great shows and then you're going to jump it up. Excellent, which we, me and Jason, we can't get there. It is a bar you cannot clear. Speaking of it, not excellent, I mean, I'm looking at the back wall of our studio today and I'm seeing this. What's not excellent? This happy, go lucky Justin Jefferson. Oh.

on the back wall and then I'm thinking about these rumors of Kirk Cousins going to Atlanta. He's so happy in that picture. Yeah, he looks like he's just got his whole future ahead of him. It's okay, man. Russ is out there as a free agent. Yeah, so like I said, he looks so happy back there. And, you know, I guess, I guess money, money will make him happy, right? Because he's going to get a bunch of that. Yes, he will get the cash. So, yeah, that was, you know, we'll talk about. a number of news items, but that is one that's come out as, you know, whether Kirk Cousins goes back to Minnesota. And I started to have a bit of a change of heart there. Oh, no. Did the Florio report get you? It wasn't the Florio report. It was it was taking a step back in recognizing what a 35 year old off of an Achilles, Kirk Cousins, you know, it's so easy to just like kind of put the default Kirk Cousins forward as.

as the standard. And it's like, what if, what if like Minnesota would be right not to overpay him? Like, if it's, if he's not himself, like it's not like Kurt Cousins has been, it's not Mahomes, all right? Sure. I think Kurt Cousness is a very underrated, high quality. He's a starting quarterback. Top 12 actual talent quarterback starter. I would, but you know what I'm saying? I know exactly what you're saying. I mean, basically, you know, there were a lot of questions when the Seahawks got rid of Russell Wilson. of like, you know, but they knew. They were like, yeah, this is fine. We're not paying. We know what's the writing that's on the wall. We're not going to pay that contract. But the difference here is that they knew. They were working with Russ. They saw what Russ was doing. This is totally different. You can't know. Like the last we saw Kirk. He was great. And then he got. Yes. And then he got injured. Yes. I guess I just mean there's a percentage chance that if they brought Kirk Cousins back.

we look back in two or three years and say, you know, maybe that wasn't those. Now they're having to restart the quarterback position in Minnesota and like Justin Jefferson's career is going to be much longer than Kirk Cousins. And so it was my first time kind of thinking through that and saying, well, basically thinking as a Viking general manager, you open to the window to maybe that actually isn't best for our franchise. Correct. Correct. Yeah. And like, you know, some legends at the wider server position, they obviously have gone through multiple quarterbacks. Larry Fitzgerald had his day in the sun and he had, you know, the heyday with Kirk Warner. And then seasons we don't speak. And then you had like the John Skelton ears, but then you got like Kevin Cobb. And then Carson Palmer comes back around and like, I just wonder in the long view. Larry Fitzgerald had a three season stretch. Let's see, 16 games, 798 yards. 16 games, 954.

14 games, 784. I mean, that's in the prime of his career and then had the Carson Palmer resurgence. Yeah, so I don't know how it's going to turn out. We're going to find out soon. It comes down to how long of a contract does Kirk Cousins want. To me, if I'm the Vikings manager, I'm willing to take the gamble because I know what my quarterback position looks like and the... I don't remember the source of the rumor where it was starting. It might have been me. I could have started this rumor that one of their rip cords is trying to trade for Trey Lance. So, I mean, that's where you are if you don't get Kirk Cousins back. That's true. So I'll go. I'll give Kirk a two year. That makes sense. But if you flip it the other direction, you look at Atlanta with young Bijan, young Drake, London, young Kyle Pitts.

brand new head coach, and you say, you don't want them to end up in the Russell Wilson situation where they're the Denver, right? They pick up a Kirk Cousins who's not 100% healthy. Oh, yeah, sure. So give them a year to be 100%, you know, or whatever. Maybe this year's not, then he's 36. Atlanta. I mean, it should be fine, but it's just kind of, if you have to reset again in three years in Atlanta when you've got the number eight pick and you could take J.G. McCarthy. potentially. Yeah, sure. Then do you, you know, Denver wishes they would have drafted a quarterback. I mean, I just saw, because Russell Wilson is going to be gone, and it's Jarrett Stidham. Right? And so Jarrett Stidham is the guy until he's not the guy in Denver. And they would have been better off finding a way to start Jarrett Stidham two years ago in Denver. That was, that's the truth.

Yeah, with the knowledge that we have right now. It's a tough game. I mean, obviously, you don't win without a quarterback, but whether Atlanta's got that money, they want to send out for cousins, they believe in the rehab. Guess we'll find out very, very soon. But before we get into things, got a quick question special for you guys today. Reminder, the Ultimate Draft Kit. You can pre-order it now at Ultimate DraftKit.com. If you get the UDK Plus, you get instant access to the Dynasty Pass, which includes now premium articles, this entire offseason, big time articles, meaty. Yeah, they are meaty. They are substantive, if that is even a word. That's 100% a word. Fantastic. You even pronounced it right. And it's currently receiving the post-combine update. So.

Some of the rookie rankings are being adjusted. Some of the startup rankings are being adjusted. New mock draft. New mock draft just hit there as well. So it's always improving. And Kyle's. So in my top 10 things to remember, I was highlighting some thresholds for yards per run and talk about wide receivers. And, you know, it's in the context of the podcast. So I have, you know, a couple minutes for my monologue. And there is a beast of an article right now written by. the Kyle Borgogan talking about those, the wide receivers and really fleshing it out. I believe it clocked in as a 27 minute read possible. I did it. Yeah, every word? I put in the work. All right. Yeah. Too long didn't read. It was, it was pretty long. Well, it's good information. Jason's that on audible yet or? Jason's like, whoa, is that hold on. Is that two sentences? Too long. Um,

It's a good article. It talks all about some things we hinted at on the show about young first to second year wide receivers, targets per route run data, and what has proven itself true in the majority of cases over a long period of time. So you can make great decisions regarding your dynasty wide receivers. And I'm still, I'm sitting here and I'm going, Mike, you're now 41 years young. And you haven't tried. substantive on for size until now. So congrats on that new vocabulary draft pick. When I'm speaking, sometimes you know, you say words because in your head you go, that makes sense. And then you find out it wasn't a word. Oh, so this was the opposite. I was, yeah, I was throwing it out. And it, we landed safely. I wanted to thank the Foot Clan for all the support over on the podcast platforms. Every time you review the show over there,

You help us out a lot. It's just a quick and easy way to, you know, help us with the algorithms and building the show. I mean, the Foot Clan is responsible for everything that we've been able to build, your listenership, your support. And so when you do those little things that make a big difference on the platforms, we really appreciate it. We do read those reviews. They come through to our Slack channel and we see them. So thank you. Apple Podcast, Spotify. or if you subscribe over on YouTube. So here's our quick question for the day. Okay. All right. We're doing a regress or impress. Boom. My mind is blown right now. That video graphic is regressed. What's going on with the hat on my head? Yeah. I mean, you look, you look like you were out of Florida retirement home. It looked like my head would have to be another five inches tall for that. He has gotten taller, though.

I mean, it's happening, but I'm not there yet. What I'm laughing at is the fact that this entire day, Al Borland has been singing, you don't impress me much. And I thought this was from nowhere. And he's getting it in Papa Josh's head, who's mad at him. And, no, it was from the quick question, apparently. But Jason, yes. Regress or impress, Dak Prescott, does he have a top five finish in store for 2024? I, if I've got a. Pick between regress or impress, I have to pick regress. You know, we've seen him have monster seasons before back in 2019. He was the quarterback, too. You know, he can put it together. This last season, Mike had the great call of like this second half sleeper look to be Dak Prescott. Part of that was because of the specific schedule that they were going to hit. Tough run defenses, really easy pass defenses, and it all came together.

I think DAC is fantastic. I think he's talented. You know, his touchdown percentage wasn't outlandish. It was like 6.1. Looking back, it's like the last couple of years, 5.8, 6.2. He's right around there. So I don't think is, you know, is absolutely, you know, a crazy outlier. He'll never be anywhere near as good as he was in 2023 again. But he's almost certain to regress because he was so hot and so fire the end of that season. It just doesn't make sense to keep that kind of a pace when you don't have the same schedule that lines up. So if I've got a pick between regressor and press, I think DAC regresses. It was the quarterback one in that stretch, and it was from week six on. So it was a long run. When you look back historically, 2019, he averaged more points per game than he did this last year. That was that number two finish you alluded to. He finished at number six back in his rookie season at almost 18 points per game.

How many quarterbacks did we have? I mean, Joe Burrow was knocked out of contention, right? Justin Herbert was knocked out of contention. Am I forgetting some other ones? Mahomes obviously was, he was a down year, very down here from Mahomes. That's what makes it more difficult for me. Do I think that he could average 20 fancy points a game next year? I do. Kyler was gone for half the year. It's just whether that ends up being top five. That's a tough line, which is why this is a good question. The house would be on the not being able to impress with it. I'm going to go with impress. I think he sneaks in. I think he ends up quarterback four or five next year, bringing back the same recipe for success, one of the best wide receivers in the game and currently no solutions at running back. I think it's all on his shoulders. He's going to redo the contract and the numbers are going to be insane. And I think Dak's going to come back and sneak inside the top five. He absolutely could be. We could go through the exercise of seeing. Oh, what, another real?

Quarterbacks? Yeah, you know you're going to have Josh Allen and Jalen Hertz problem. Mm-hmm. Right? So do you think he does better than Mahomes this next year? Uh, yeah. I'll still say no. I'll say no. Lamar Jackson? That's, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I'll go, yeah. If you're, yeah, there, then I think, I think impresses that going to work. Because then you're talking about Borough, Herbert, um, Kyler, maybe Anthony Richardson, and he's in that tier. Agreed. All right, Mike. Where are you? Regressor and press? I will take the field, even though I think he could certainly do it. He had a lot of things working for him, especially Tony Pollard's inefficiency at the goal line. We'll see what they do at the running back position, but we don't have the linear schedule, but we do know who the opponents will be.

And so I can just, I mean, of course, his division, you know, so the Giants, the Manders, and the Eagles, we'll play them twice. But then we got the Saints, the Bucks, and the Lions. And these are home games. The Ravens. Okay, those are pretty good so far. The Ravens, the Bengals, the Texans. Those are not as good. See? And then on the road, we have the 49ers, the Falcons, the Panthers, the Steelers, and the Browns. It feels middle of the road. Yeah, I mean, so you went with the field. Top five is just, that's a lot. I get it. I get it. Follow up question. Will it be drafted as a top five fantasy quarterback? I don't think so. I think that there will be people that are hot and bothered for certain names like Anthony Richardson, like C.J. Stroud. If Justin Fields landed in Atlanta. Yeah. Yeah, he would be in that conversation. And so he will.

He could end up being a value in consecutive seasons. All right. Let's talk news. News and notes from around the league. Michael Pittman, we talked about it on the last show, but it's official now. The franchise tag for Michael Pittman. They have yet to reach an extension agreement, but he is going to be a cult. Dalton Schultz. We got one right so far. Yeah, we did. We all said he'd go back to the Texans, and he did. I almost said batting a hundred. That's my baseball. Oh, really? Yeah, you don't want that. No, you want to be batting a thousand. Normally for free agent predictions, batting a hundred is about how it goes. Three year, $36 million extension. He was actually the tight-in three during a seven-week stretch in the middle of the season. He's a very good player. He's a very quarterback-friendly tight-in for CJ Stroud. And they had a ton of money. So this is just...

It made a ton of sense. I'm happy for him because I felt like this last year, I feel like he was really shunned in the free agent market. There were other tight ends and not as good as him that were getting money. And then he couldn't find anything. So he bets on himself, does a one year deal and came through. Good for you, Dalton. The doctor got paid. I wonder if you know this news yet, Jason, because it just broke. But Zach Earts, a one year deal with the Washington commanders. All of us dynasty, Zach Earts owners, rejoice. We did it. They dumped Logan Thomas to go good Zachertz. It makes so much sense. Because of Cliff? Because of Cliff. Cliff Kingsbury peppered Zacherts with targets in Arizona. Ertz is still, I hate to break it to. He's still very capable. He's certainly as capable, if not more than Logan Thomas, who had relevance in Washington. But he was prior to the really bad knee injury. I mean, it's kind of like what you were talking about with.

Kirk Cousins, maybe he doesn't come back as strong off the Achilles. He already came back. I mean, the teams evaluated him and he signed with the lines. He just didn't get to play with him. At least in that regard, we have a lot more time. I mean, he's not going to be meaningful. Let's just tell the truth. Yards after catch, an average, yards after catch per game over under two yards. Oh, under. Okay. After? Yeah. I don't care if he runs with it. I want him to catch it. Dennis Pitt of style. Just catch it in the bread basket and go down. And he can do that. He was very, very good at doing that. He had two games over 50 yards last year in set through seven weeks. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I can say. How'd Hollywood do? Uh, how'd Michael Wilson do? Yeah, not good. Yeah, I mean, Arizona was a bit of a mess. I mean, the year before.

In his 10-game stretch. Tell that to James Connor. It was still at 80 catches. But yeah, he's not going to be good. I don't know why I'm talking about him. I defend stupid players. Ian Rappaport talking about the fact that Broncos have not just informed Russell Wilson of his release, but they're allowing him to pursue his next contract ahead of time. A little bonus time for Russell to go talk. Broncos country. We rode. Oh, man. Yeah. Now. Which. Now, contractually speaking, do it. The, yeah, we got to get this in for Russ. Oh. Unlimited diarrhea. Unlimited. Thank you. So much. The maximum quantity of contract diarrhea that you could possibly have made. So the Denver Broncos owe Russell Wilson $39 million. Now.

that contract will be offset by whatever he has offered. Yeah, like a veteran minimum. So that will be a very fun game to play of how much do these teams want the Denver Broncos to eat it? And Russ included in that of like, I'm just going to take the veteran minimum. I'm going to sit over here and I'm going to collect 30 plus million dollars from the Denver Broncos. But it's a. pretty crappy thing to do to a team. That's not going to happen. Zero percent chance. But what if he did it with the Raiders who are, I believe the second highest odds right now of getting Russ, in division? I would, yeah, I mean, the game's been shipped, signed a veteran minimum. How do you, if you're in Denver pay all of the contract? How do you not do it? That's brutal.

Year one. So wait, it's an, so he gets the same amount of money no matter what. Correct. So he could. Okay, I take back my zero percent chance. You can say year one, you make five million. I don't know. Isn't it weird to be in the locker room and not making that money from that team? Isn't that a weird thing? Yeah. Okay. Well, he's a weird guy. It's perfect for Russ. Indivision starts to be because that's a competitive advantage. A major one. If you, if you're going to collect $40 million, no matter what. And it can come from the pocket of your opponent or your team's pocket. Why wouldn't you? Yeah, I mean, the new Broncos owners can, they can laugh at this money. So it probably won't be an actual competitive advantage because it doesn't change the- The cap number is the same, right? Yes. Okay. But let's move on to more significant, sad news. The Seahawks have released. Will Disley. We still love you, Will. Big Montana.

voted the greatest nickname of all time by the foot clan that was number one it was number one because of this song the song certainly helps right off into the sunset one last clap for big montana look at that deuzer's alley going we're all right we miss you buddy yeah you'll find a new home and we'll hit that button again big montana seahawks save seven million dollars against the cap for that move good amount yeah it is And CJ Usama, goodbye. The Jats have released him. He never made a mark there at all. Okay. Conk. Yeah, he's gone. So, yeah, conk conk. Yeah. Conk. If you believe in Aaron Rogers, Tyler Conklin seems to be the only Titan, tight end around currently. Do you call him a Titan? Tightened. Tightened.

All right, quick break and we'll be back with some more spectacular footballers. All right, we're back and we're going to jump into the mailbag, answer your questions, get you ready for whatever you've got going on, the free agency period, quickly approaching, dynasty trades, NFL draft, whatever you've got for us. We're going to answer them right now. Mailbag. We've got... A lot of questions. No voicemails today. If you have a question, though, you can visit the website, the fantasy footballers.com, click the submit a question button, or you can dial our voicemail hotline, 3024-464 TFFB. Instagram question from B Blakely, 123. How does Puka rank among the 2024 rookie-wide receivers? Jason is nodding. It's such a good question. So you just throw Puka in with the class.

So Harrison and neighbors and Adunze and, you know, Puka. So where does he rank? Where would you take him? I believe I would, and I've wrestled with this one because to me it's, it's, Puka is definitely above neighbors and the rest. For you? For me, yes. In my opinion, Puka has done it. He's shown it. I mean, he literally had the best rookie wide receiver season of all time. You can't ask for. literally anything more than that. And so, you know, you're, if you're taking a prospect, you're saying, well, I hope he's good, but no, no, no. I hope he's great. The only way it's better, because it's not even an age thing. It's not like, well, you get one more year. It's like, Pooka's a young guy. I think he's 22 right now. So I definitely have him above everyone, but I wonder with Marvin Harrison, I look and I go, you know, he's more prototypical. He's going to have that draft capital.

You know, Matthew Stafford won't be around forever. And so I go back and forth there. So you think about putting Pooka ahead of Harrison. I think I do put Pooka ahead of Harrison. But I think about putting Harrison ahead of Pooka. I have Pooka three. I would take Harrison and I would take neighbors over Pooka Nakua. Wow. Oh, three just in the rookie wide receivers. At first I thought you were saying you got them as your third wide receiver overall, which I wouldn't blame you. No, I was answering the question. Yeah, it makes sense. I would put him three. You know, Puka had, yes, the best rookie season ever. It is not some sort of infinite upwards line for players based on their rookie season. I think neighbors in any other draft in the last 10 years would be the number one pick at wide receiver, a top five pick if Harrison wasn't in it. Maybe not the Chase here. Chase might have been ahead of him. But Harrison is more prototypical.

I like his long-term outlook season-to-season to be a dominator. So I'd put Pooka 3. I look at Puka a little bit more through the lens of maybe what Anquan Bolden did. Anquan Bolton, one of his best seasons ever was his rookie season. He was a tried and true, great fantasy, good output wide receiver for 15 years. It's a great comp. But I look at Puka more through that lens where I think there will be some ups and downs. It will come with quarterback change. I still think he's amazing. I mean, I could be completely wrong in that. But I would put in three. The hardest part is just with both Marvin neighbors, this is all speculation. This is all projection. So it is the best rookie season of all time. I get that maybe somehow one of those two guys ends up being a better player than Puka.

I think I would put Pook ahead. But now I'm trying to think if I actually had the 101 in this year's rookie draft, would I just straight up trade it for Puka? Exactly. And I would not do it. It might be a boat. Let me change your perspective. Let me see if I can talk to you and do it. Okay. He had the best rookie season ever. Yep. He finishes the wide receiver four. He had 105 catches for 1,486 yards and six touchdowns. Okay. Okay. And so that was the best rookie season we've ever seen in terms of those numbers. The yardage. But 105, 1486, and 6. Like, that's a good season. That's like a really good season. Wide receiver 4. But that's not necessarily, like we've seen like Jefferson on a completely annual basis. Chase on a, I guarantee you if you look at Chase's numbers over time probably over the next five years versus Buccas, you're probably going to see.

Higher touchdown totals, similar yardage numbers, if not better. Jefferson is probably going to be what, 1,800 to 1,800 yards for the next 10 years. So that's how I'm looking at it through the lens of like, do I have a chance at getting, like I think Harrison could be Jefferson. But I guess. So you trade Puka for Jefferson, right? Yes, yes, for sure, because we've seen it. We know what Justin Jefferson is on the NFL field. It's not projection. Well, I mean, the fields are the same. The fields are the same yard markers. We've seen them on the NFL field with different hash marks. The markings are different. I remember this conversation about Jamar Chase, and that's why he went in the seventh round. Sometimes you just call a spade of spade. You know what's coming. Well, sure, but the alternate arguments are there too. When Corey Davis was the fourth pick in the NFL draft and was.

this outlandish superstar that everybody loves. You just don't know. And today, if push comes to shove today, the hardest part is there is still a chance that the Patriots take Marvin Harrison. And so it's like, okay, even if he's a better prospect, well, now he's got no quarterback and now he's, you know, maybe he'll get one a couple years from now. And, you know, so how many years do I have? And it's all for all of that is like, let's say that Marvin Harrison hits, which I think he will hit. And that's why it's so tough. And let's say he hits to the degree of Justin Jefferson. He is Justin Jefferson. You're trading an extra 300 yards and, you know, three or four touchdowns for the, for the chance, you know, it's not 100% guaranteed. Well, yeah, but neither is Puka's rookie season to repeat. Sure. That's not guaranteed either. It's not guaranteed, but I think it's a much higher hit rate. We've seen it, you know, in all the analytical studies,