The TRUTH About Fantasy RBs: Part 1 + Playoff Reactions - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/25

So if he leaves, and I believe Chase Edmonds is not under contract as well. Connor and Edmonds are probably two of the top five free agent running backs. Yeah. And it's possible. Like if Arizona were to go out and spend a second round draft pick on a running back or something, bring in Brees Hall. This would be a really valuable situation because they do around the goal line give it to the running back right up the middle. And, you know, you've seen a lot of touchdowns from Kenyon Drake and James Connor in the last two years. I think it is more likely.

that James Connor is back with Arizona than it is that Chase Admins is back. I would agree. Let's say he's back. Chase is gone. They bring up Eno or they draft a six-round running back. What do you do with him in the draft next year? How high? Because he was the running back five. I think it would be he'd be a running back eight to 12.

So back of the first? I would lower him compared to his finish. Would you do that? 20% great game, 67% good, 13% bust. I think I would have them in the first round. In the first round. So you're not talking about top 12. Yeah, if you look at what happened, the first. It would be so scary. It would be so scary. That wouldn't be a confident draft pick.

But if you look at what happened with him the first six weeks of the season when he didn't, he wasn't really the guy who's the running back 44, 60, 12, 8, 31, and 32. He wasn't given that opportunity. It's fair. Once he got it, he was just so dominant. So if he has it for a full season, I mean, you've got injury risk with him and maybe he won't hold up. But he had 15 touchdowns on the ground, three more through the air, and he was limited the first half of the season.

Second most goal line carries in the league, adding to your point about Arizona's running game. Zeke, oh, Zeke, what a bad year, finish number six. Twelfth in consistency, though, ninth in the first half, 20th in the second half, played on a torn PCL, did not give you prolific finishes pretty much from week six on. Your highest finish for Zeke from week six on was eight overall against Atlanta. He had a number...

10 and number 10 finished from back to back weeks in weeks 15 and 16. But if he was your running back in the championship game, it was a huge dud against Arizona. He was better against better defenses, better at home. And, you know, the RB6, that's not how he felt and that's not what you got, really. Well, it's skewed because of the injuries to the top guys.

you know, Alvin Kamara and Christian McCaffrey and Derek Kinry and, you know, they- But he wasn't graded on a curve this year. No, I'm just saying that, you know, on a per game basis, they were stronger. So if everyone was healthy, like Zeke is the running back six because he was healthy and great, or played through injury, you could say, if he wasn't necessarily healthy. But he was obviously disappointing. The utilization of Tony Pollard is not going away. He might-

be their best running back now. And, you know, after the first five weeks of the season, he didn't put up 20 points the rest of the way, not one time in half-point scoring. He's obviously under a massive contract. His contract is, he's owed a lot of money for a lot of years. Tony Pollard really doesn't concern me with Zeke. Why? Because, I mean...

Zeke at this point in his career is a volume guy. And I think he will get the same amount of respect in future years on this contract as he's currently received. And if this is true that he played through injury from week five or six on, you know, you saw them turn to Zeke despite the limitations throughout the entire end of season and heading into the playoffs. So I just felt like they, I felt like the team probably overcommitted to him.

despite the injury. And that tells me that they're going to commit to him when he's healthy. Why would they change their tune if they were willing to play him when they shouldn't have been playing him already? Oh, I don't think they're going to change their tune. But the two, so for instance, so the last two years, he's had over 300 carries, which is like, or I'm sorry, over 300 touches, which is what the dream is, right? Like you are hoping for massive.

workload in these guys. But the last two years, been 315 and 302 opportunities. The two years prior, he was up at 377, 390. 399. If you grade him based on old Zeke. But that's my point. My point is you're never getting old Zeke again. That's gone. You're not like the fascinating. You're going to have narratives because it's Dallas and there's going to be a lot of publicity that he was playing with the torn PCL, that he's in the best shape he's ever been in.

And you're going to have a lot of people hoping that you have old Zeke back. And I just don't believe that that's ever the case. I think that's very fair. I think you're not going to get old Zeke back. You're not going to recover 370 touch. But I think if you give him 302 touches next year, you should get this or better. You should get the running back 8 to 10. Okay. But you're saying better or worse on an efficiency level next year.

I'm saying same or worse. I don't think he'll get better next year just because of the whole PCL argument. He's going to get older. The Cowboys' Offensive Line is getting worse. I think the counterpoint would be looking at that game log and saying until he got hurt, he finished 8, 1, 6, and 6 on the week. Yeah, the very beginning of the season, he was very good. You know, Carolina was a great defense. Yeah, I mean, it's going to be a hotly debated player because there's fatigue with Zeke, there's age.

More alluring, exciting options out there. And I think some of the names after him in today's show are going to be names that get brought up. When I'm in the first round, everyone in the first round is good. I'm going for new hotness over downtrending. And Zeke is down trending. So I will probably have him a few spots. I won't have him in most of my drafts. I'm assuming. You'll draft him over James Connor. Wouldn't you? Oh, that's, yeah, I would.

Oh, man. I feel like I have to, but I also think that that's the wrong decision. You know what I mean? Like, I feel like taking James Connor over Zeke is too hot. But like at the end of the year, you're alone in a room. No one can see what you're doing. No one? No one. It's just. No cameras. No one's going to talk to. Just you in a draft. I think if it was just James Connor and no Chase Edmonds, I think I go James Connor. They're the same age.

I mean, Zeke ran for 300 more yards this year. Oh, that's tough. I think that'll be your debate. And if we think Connor is going to go late. I don't think Connor's the first round. Hopefully at that point I could take Cooper Cup. That's who I want. You probably would. Leonard Fournett ended up number seven. Maybe the biggest surprise of the year in terms of what he represented to fantasy teams. Consistency rank of 11. But in the second half of the year, consistency rank was four. 21% great, 57% good, 14% bust.

And we talked about Aaron Rogers coming back. Any doubt that Brady comes back? Yeah, I think there's a little bit of doubt. He's at that 45-year-old age that he always talked about. He wants to play until he's 45. It's not a guarantee he comes back. I think he does, but I have no...

I have no insider information. Didn't he lead the league in yards and touchdowns? He led the league in darn near everything. He was unbelievable. He was the best deep ball thrower age 44 yards, touchdowns, everything. He's just, he's unbelievable. He still has it, and he should come back. He should play again because this team is obviously a Super Bowl contending roster. From weeks 4 through 15, Leonard Fournett was the running back three.

I mean, and here's the thing. We said this during this stretch. We almost gave him an apology because Leonard Fournett has always been an inefficient, ineffective, volume-based guy, and he looked good. He looked strong. He looked powerful, capable. His hands were soft. I think that, I think Leonard Fournette's very good. Now, he's not under contract. Ronald Jones is not under contract. Giovanni Bernard is not under contract.

They've got a lot of moving, changing pieces here. Did you see the quotes by Bruce Ariens about that? No. He just kind of said that we're not looking to rebuild, we're looking to retool. But I think it was acknowledging, he kind of said, we'll see what guys want to come back, and then we're going to go from there. So it wasn't like last year where they just re-rolled the same. Everybody came back to try to run it back. They can't afford to do that this year, which is why this is one of the locations.

that I've been projecting a high-end running-back draft pick. If they were to draft a high-end running back, that is financially how you replace the position. Because bringing back Leonard Fournett, Ronald Jones, you're going to have to pay for them. They're not going to just come back on a veteran minimum type of contract. But a rookie second-round pick does not cost you that much compared to resigning those guys. A big part of Leonard Fournett's game, 69 receptions. Nice.

You know, I think if Brady's not there, it's going to throw a lot of question marks into what made Fournett good. If Brady's not there, Fournett will be drafted darn near where he was, which was running back 40 in the eighth round. Right. The success of the Buccaneers is Tom Brady. My question is if Tom Brady walks away, is Brouserian still a coach? I wouldn't be if I was him.

He walked away from Arizona when Kurt Warner left. He's like, yeah, thanks. No things. I know, and he's already committed to coming back. So it's. I think Brady's back. Yeah. I think the emotions will wear off and he'll be realizing how good he still is. And we'll get a year 45, Tom Brady. Oh, year 45. That would be great. Does he? Not just age 45, but like. 45 years? Yeah, in the league. Let's go. All right. We've got number eight, Alvin Camara.

Alvin Camara. What is the story of his season? What is the truth of Alvin Camara? Sixth in consistency, eighth in fantasy finish, 23% great games, 77% good. And we got to see Drew Brees depart and tried to watch this offense function. Yeah, it was okay with James Winston. And then it was mediocre with Taysam Hill. Injury.

Yeah, injury happened. And then I believe you had a couple of horrific weeks later in the season against Tampa Bay where they were shut out. I think the following week in week 16 against Miami was that where they had no quarterback. They were onto their umpteenth string quarterback. Oh, you're talking about the Ian Book? Yes. The Ian Book experience. Did you see how my canvas print of that Ian Book interception came in?

I didn't. Where is it? It's in my office. You can come see it out. I'll be honest, though. I got it and opened it the day after I got eliminated with the Dalvin Cookplay. So it really just, I was expecting to get that and that to be iconic in my championship. And it just, it fell flat. You know who would have won that matchup? Not the Packers. Me. Oh, okay. Yeah. Would you have? You would have won the championship? Oh, yeah. He would have won the title if we could have. Yep. Oh, man. Which all came down to what player could you have played in one? I'm on Ross St. Brown? Correct.

So have you thought, have you rolled that one over on a few sleepless nights? Sure have. Yeah, that's tough. So what is the truth of Alvin Camero? We just talked about how his consistency ranking was actually pretty darn good. He was the sixth best running back in consistency metrics. And if you look at his fantasy finishes, most of the time he was a good running back. You had several, several top ten performances.

several RB1 performances. You just had that month stretch in the middle of the season when he had the knee injury that really derailed things along with that two-game stretch of terribleness with no quarterback and issues there. So do you end up drafting value Camara? I do, yeah. I would take Camara over Zique, no problem. If that's like a debate, if let's say even if Sean Peyton leaves or whatever happens there.

Nothing on the field. I never looked at Alvin Camara and saw anything other than a dominant running back who was hard to tackle, who was quick to the edge. He didn't look like he had lost a step. Obviously, the offense was pretty putrid. The scoring opportunities will be less, which they were this year. I don't think he's going to be a top three running back. But, I mean, even this season, he was.

Pretty much on pace for that. He just missed a month of the season. He was on pace for almost 1,200 rushing yards, another 600 receiving yards. That's awesome. He had as many 15-plus yard runs as Zeke did this year. In fewer games. Yeah. Kind of a year where maybe as a fantasy player, you put all the externals away and you go back to the, go back to leaning on Alvin Camarra again next year.