The TRUTH About Fantasy QBs: Part 1 + Wild Card Reactions - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/18

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There is some additional quarterback info on the website. Kyle put out an article 25 quarterback statistics from 2021. You can check that out. This year we got a new record. 49 different quarterbacks, 49 different quarterbacks who registered a top 12 performance this year. If you took the entire league of 32 teams and then you took half of that league again, and you added them together, you would still not hit 49.

The Raven Saints and Jets had three different quarterbacks each register multiple top 12 weeks. That's the first time that has ever been accomplished. Impressive. Injuries abounded this year. COVID, you know, benchings happen. And so a lot of backups. What is that? COVID benches. Oh, no, COVID. It's this new thing. It's pretty cool. It's very, very contagious. Okay. All right.

League-wide, we saw a dip in completion percentage in the highest interception rate since 2018. Obviously, different quarterbacks, not all the same. Well, to remember how outrageous last year's scoring was. How do we feel? Before we really dig in the truth, how do we feel about the quarterback position as a whole this year? Do you guys think it was up, down, bad, good? Just generic feeling when you look at quarterback play this year? I...

I guess they didn't feel as top heavy. Right, sure. Yeah, it felt like the players that you knew were going to be good or he projected to be good, they were good. And turns out that playing on the road where there's 80,000 people screaming at you much more difficult than playing in a completely empty stadium.

When I look at this season, maybe it's because of last year's crazy, you know, scoring for the quarterback position. I felt like it was a pretty down year. He had injuries to some of the main guys, Lamar Jackson, and even Kyler missed a handful of games. You know, Mahomes started slow. And so I went this morning and I looked at the last decade. I took a look at...

the total scoring, who the top guy was, what the average of the top 12, top 24, what the total quarterback scoring was. And I was really surprised to see that this year we just finished was the second highest average of the top 12 quarterback scoring only to last year, was the second highest top 24 average, was the second highest total for the quarterback position. So this was a really...

up year for fantasy scoring. That's the truth, and that's what we're getting after today. It's not like how did it feel, but what was the actual truth? And the truth was a lot of scoring this year for quarterbacks. I think in the last few years, we've had a definitive singular quarterback or two that have had the headlines from day one of the year. We had MVP candidates that spanned Kyler, Dak, Brady, Allen.

Lamar, Rogers. So, you know, if you ask the average person right now who finished number one at the position, I'm not sure everybody knows. On the top of their head, they wait, the way they did in previous years. And the answer is Josh Allen. And it's the first time all decade that it has been the same person in back-to-back years. Josh Allen last year, Josh Allen this year. Oh, thank you, Brooks. Thank you. He is excellent. The stallion. Josh Allen ended up number one overall.

total scoring, but number three, in terms of consistency. So that's why I didn't quite feel that way. You had some lulls, you had some off games. You had weeks where, especially at the very beginning of the year, you were like, okay, we're seeing what we've seen before, which is you come off an MVP caliber season where you dominate every week and you blow away every metric that is kind of disproportional to average and then all of a sudden you come back to Earth.

but you got a lot of what you wanted from Josh Allen. Number one overall finishes five times. Yeah, that's 30% of his games. 30% of his games. He was not a quarterback. He was the best quarterback on the week. And yeah, he wasn't the most consistent had a handful of games outside of the top 12. But I would say he was. You were happy. Yeah, you were definitely happy because he would go out there and win you some weeks. And even when he had down games, you know, he wasn't usually having what.

behind the scenes we referred to as as a megabust yeah um he didn't crush you we do in in the in the truth we do now wait we have bust and megabust yes in the truth docs the the algorithm that we score these players with uh we do have a mega bus it says megabus yeah oh wow yeah

That sounds like powerful. Takes for the invitation. Like Super Shredder? But Brooks was surprised about that this year. He saw it and was like, ooh, what is this? But it's usually just in a hidden column and I unhid the column. So it's been megabuzz forever. So you proclaimed that around the scenes we all refer to it as a megabus, but in fact, it is just you. In a hidden, in a hidden column. No one has ever seen. We as a brand.

The fantasy footballers, I mean, it's always been built. It's always been built into the truth series. And, yeah, so we, the universal. Thanks for sharing it with the people. Yeah. What, I should say this at the beginning of these, these episodes, the way we look at consistency is we do break players down in an algorithm, percentage of great games, percentage of good games, percentage of bus games.

For quarterbacks, that means great games are over 26 points. Good games are 21. Bus games are fewer than 15. Alan has that magic quality where he starts the game, maybe the first half, and he's a bust. And then by the end of the game, no matter what the game script seems to be, he finds himself into that top 7, 8 at the position, which saves your week and then sometimes wins it. He can come all the way back to number one.

And this was always only six rushing touchdowns, which was the lowest of his career. So he still got it done. This was with Diggs having a year that wasn't the same as last year. He played great on the road, four more fantasy points on the road than at home. He played great against bottom 16 defenses, scored a couple points more per game against them. Stayed healthy, which is obviously important for finishing as the quarterback one. Is he your quarterback won for next year? Yes. Agreed. Yeah, I think you probably.

But that doesn't mean he'll be on my team. Yeah, he's drafted too high. Because these other guys that we're going to talk about today, if they're two rounds lower, I'm totally comfortable with them. It was the lowest rushing touchdowns, but the highest rushing yardage. Did someone say that? Nope. You did. 763 rushing yards, man. We've been known around here to have said that. What? He's just saying that because you said something we can say that we say that around. Oh, yeah. I'm just saying we're known for that phrase you just said.

And around the studio, when a quarterback has 760 yards, I refer to that as mega great. I was so hoping you go megastalian. Because that was the joke. The joke was megastalian. And when you said mega, I thought you were going to hit. That's the rapper. That's the mega stallion. Yeah. Thank you. I like it. I'm there. I'm there. We're not there. I mean, this show is offseason. Yeah, we're not really cool enough to talk about it.

If Justin Herbert goes two rounds later than Josh Allen, he's my quarterback next year, because he ended up number two for the Chargers, and he was number two in consistency. If you look at him from week 11 on, my goodness, top 12 every single week, percentage of great games lower than Josh Allen, 29%, good games higher, 53%, because not as many great, and then 29% of the time he busted.

He played even better against good defenses. He was up to the challenge and had the weapons to do it. 29 points a game against top 16 defenses, exactly the same scoring at home or on the road. And how fun is it to watch Justin Herbert? 5,000 passing yards, 38 touchdowns. Ridiculous. He has more ceiling. He really, really does. He has more ceiling. He can run more.

100%. And you can throw more touchdown. I was going to say there's only a few guys in the league with this new league that we're in, the passing league. That 45 touchdown mark that used to be this impossible once in a decade type of performance, I think, like I would be surprised if Justin Herbert retires without hitting that number. The fact that he's got a head coach that's...

go for it at all times. I love that. It's so great for fantasy. Say whatever you want. You don't like Brandon Staley. You think he's dumb for going on on fourth all the time. Who cares? This is fantasy football. Go for it every single time. As someone who had Justin Herbert in our main league and went to a title game with him, having a coach like that was it, it was so fun. Because you know, the biggest thing for fantasy is you don't want to lose the drive. Oh, they got a punt. They never punt.

and he completed so many fourth down passes. He is one of a handful that have thrown for 5,000 yards before turning 24. Mahomes, Marino, Stafford, Herbert. That's it. And the offensive line, it's improved. The coach is stable. I think they bring back Mike Williams. I really do. I think Mike Williams had enough inconsistency this year to be at the right price for them to bring them back.

Yeah, I think that that is a huge deal as well. They have tons of cap space. Even though they have, you know, Joshua Palmer looks like maybe he could step up next year and they've got other weapons there. I do think that Mike Williams is crucial to Herbert being this tier, this, you know, quarterback, the quarterback one, the quarterback two next year. If Mike Williams isn't there, I think that probably doesn't happen. Dynasty-wise. Dynasty-wise, Herbert.