Midseason Review + Predictions, Smelling Salts - Fantasy Football Podcast for 10/28

but he's only got four games played. We did it by five games played. So obviously he is, he's ineligible. I'm going to pick Devonte Adams will finish as a quarterback one. Locket in the snapshot tool is comedic because, you know, he's got two number one finishes on the week, bookending a 72nd and 53rd finish. It looks like Christmas.

And, you know, it was like 72nd against Miami, 53rd against Minnesota games you thought he would smash. But that is, you know, that's just part of fantasy football. And you have a choice to make. You can accept the realities of fantasy football and not be emotionally destroyed. Or you can choose to pretend they don't exist. Expect every player to be number one every single week and just be mad all the time. Those are your two possible outcomes. One of those sounds better. I mean, if you think about.

DeAndre Hopkins and Tyler Lockett, right? Tyler Lockett's these huge games and a couple of bust games. But it's not, it's not, that's not really true. You know, you look at like DeAndre Hopkins has two weeks outside of the top 36. Now, he didn't finish 53rd, but like his good week at 39, two weeks ago, where he was the wide receiver 39, he had 8.3 fantasy points. Compare that to Tyler Lockett the week prior having.

6.4. Okay, so you got two fewer points on a bad game. All wide receivers have bad games. They all do with the sole exception of yesteryear Antonio Brown. Otherwise, and I'm sure Jerry Rice. And last year, Michael Thomas. Yeah. That's like three examples over 30 years. Now, the irony is that when you look at the snapshot tool, you get a visualization of consistency. And the most consistent player on a week-to-week basis right now is Tyree Kel.

in terms of not having at least multiple outside the top 30 type of games, which is funny. I mean, it's just not necessarily how you looked at him, not necessarily how you looked at Amari Cooper. But let's talk about that same question. Someone inside the top 12 you think will be out by season's end. For me, it's pretty obvious. It feels unfair, but it's Chase Claypool. I mean, Claypool is sitting at the very edge.

this was an opportunity situation for Chase Claypool. I'm sure he will have some more big games. I'm sure he will have more games like last week where he's irrelevant. Yeah, certainly. For me, another somewhat cheaty thing, but it's definitely going to be Amari Cooper. Amari Cooper with Andy Dalton was going to be okay. I talked about that 75%. And I don't think that we're going to be missing Andy Dalton the rest of the way.

But if he ends up missing a couple of weeks, you've got a third string coming in who you have no idea who the number one target is going to be. And if he can even get the ball to him, the offense as a whole is going to take a major downturn. And I, you know, Amari Cooper is still going to be the guy.

who's getting the best defensive cornerback on him. So when you go down to these wide receiver or these quarterbacks that are down on the depth chart, I don't think Amari Cooper is going to be able to hold in the top 12. I agree with you completely, by the way. That was my first answer until I saw you put it in there. Mike? Yeah, I like both of the choices that you guys have brought up. I'm going to highlight Justin Jefferson not because he is bad. He is great. He is a good player and Kurt Cousins is a good quarterback for the Minnesota Vikings.

Really all or nothing. You have his number one finish, his number two finish, other than that outside of the top 30. So he's the guy that I can see slipping outside of the top 12. That one feels a little unfair. Why is that? Because week one and two, he didn't have snap counts, and he's a rookie. He wasn't in the offense. You could say the same for Chase Claypool. Sure.

But you didn't say it. So I'm saying it. So I'm not disagreeing with you. Justin Jefferson was my first answer to this. I didn't want to, you know, the rookie narrative that was used for Justin Herbert. I didn't want to double that up. But the reality is this is a team that, I want to say this is a team that doesn't want to throw the ball that much, but they are. They have to. Yeah, their defense is not good. Yeah.

I think because Jefferson's role is more secure than Claypool, I would have a better bet on Jefferson. Oh, certainly. But just share my opinion. Sure. Someone outside the top 12 that you think will be a second half star. It's Kenny Galladay for me. He's been great since coming back, and he was a top five, not just in projections heading into the year, but in results from last season. So the fact that he is sitting here outside probably by only.

the qualifier. I think Kenny G. Oh, so he shouldn't count. You took Devante Adams as is, is, is getting all the already already in. The guy that I absolutely love and I think he's going to be great. He has been great and he's got a better quarterback situation here is Terry McLaurin. I mean, Terry's awesome. You watch these games. You look at him in the locker room. He is the centerpiece of this team now in only his second year.

And now with Dwayne Haskins, not at quarterback, I think sky's the limit for Terry McLaurin. And he's just outside of the top 12, like Andy highlighted. But Keenan Allen, I want to highlight him because I think Keenan Allen is a player you should try to get right now. I get it. You're paying up for Keenan Allen because there's no dip to be had here. But Keenan Allen with Justin Erbert.

through the rest of the season. I think that Keenan Allen is... It sounded like an actual burp. Herbert, Herbert. I think Keenan Allen is a... Just and ribbet. I believe that Keenan Allen, by the end, is going to be a league-winning type of wide receiver. It's certainly possible. I love what I see from their willingness to just entrust the rookie to throw the ball. And he's smart because he throws it to Keenan Allen. And then he looks like a genius. Who would you rather have Keenan Allen or Terry McLaren? Keenan Allen.

It's close for me. Is it? Yeah. Yeah, I didn't agree with any of your contentions about his quarterback. I agreed with all of your contentions about McLaurin's skills and abilities, but those have been present since middle of last year. And I don't think Kyle Allen's a great quarterback. Well, yeah, I mean, it wasn't that he's got Kyle Allen. It was that he doesn't have Dwayne Haskins. Though it was an upgrade. So far. Yeah, addition by subtraction. I think that is what they call it. Yeah.

Okay. Tight-ins. George Kittle at 1 in points per game? That's true, Brooks? Yeah. Number one in points per game? The number one he had in week four was ridiculous. Oh, okay. Yeah, that's when it's a little bit interesting. He has two finishes inside the top 15 on the year. Both were in the top two. Yeah, but they were one and two. So Kittle...

One, Kelsey two, Waller, three, Mark Andrews, four. Johnny Smith is five. T.J. Hawkinson is six. That's nice to see. Robert Tunyon at seven. Noah Fant at eight. Jared Cook at nine. Jimmy Grandpa at 10. Haydenhurst at 11. Tyler Higbee at 12. Showing you just how competitive the tight-end position is.

Yeah, it's a yikes. I mean, there is one week that you would have been happy with Tyler Higby, and he's still in the top 12. Someone inside the top 12 you think will be out by season's end. I mean, it's Higby. It's Tyler Higby. And it's the guy Jason is going to bring up. Yeah, for me, yeah, outside of Higby, it's Robert Tungin. Because he had one of those Chase Claypool type took.

advantage of a wide receiver being gone and targets being necessary. He did have two weeks where he did it, but this is not an offense that's historically used the tight end all that much. And I think by the end of the year, he'll have another couple touchdown games, but I think he will fall out of the top 12. Well, the hard part with him was right before he had the breakout game, I said not to play him because Rogers can throw it to Lewis and he can throw it to Sternberger.

and then he just threw it to Tunyon. And then you saw last week in the week before, he is spreading it around a little bit. And outside the top 12 that you think will end up inside the top 12. Oh, I'll let you take this one, Andy. It's Rob Grunkowski. Yeah. Yep. He's looked great. The targets, the results, it's all there for Rob Grunkowski. And, you know, this is a player that hadn't been on the field for a while. Now he's acclimated. Opportunity with O.J. Howard out.

which Stephen A. Smith wasn't aware of on yesterday. Oh, no. Come on. Sounds about right. He was going on this big rant about how the Tampa Bay is going to make the Super Bowl and Antonio Brown and how great he is and Tom Brady is going to win the MVP. And he's like, you know, just going through all the players. It's like, you know, and he's got, you know, Mike Evans and Chris Godwin's and is O.J. Howard out? I don't think he is. Didn't he do the same thing with Hunter Henry? Yeah, depth charts are not a strength.

Stephen. Shame on you. Come on, man. But Gronkowski has such a great opportunity. And so I'll just throw on the tidbit here of for both Gronk and AJ Green. We had a great ceremony for AJ Green. We retired him. We had moved on both Green and Gronk were elite players.

who missed a lot of time over a year. More than a season, yeah. And it's maybe it just, the old lawnmower wouldn't start in those first few weeks. I like that. But they finally got it going. And so we'll have to remember that for the next time this happens. That once week four or week five comes around, still give the appropriate advice, but maybe don't.

Don't retire them. Have you seen the targets for AJ Green the last two weeks? I didn't even see them. Oh, they are insane. Have you seen them? I mean, I'm aware that his role changed. He moved inside. 11 and 13. Yeah, he's being an inside target hog. And the same thing happened for Grunk where O.J. Howard went down. I don't think it's just the age and they were gone for a while. Both of their situations changed where their targets.

you know, Gronk's targets in the beginning of the year were there. It wasn't like, yeah, it wasn't like he was, you know, not healthy enough or something. And, and AJ Green had targets at the beginning of the year and he was missing him until they moved him inside. I did see a tweet from a good friend of the show, JJ Zachary, and talking about AJ Green's efficiency on those targets being super bad, even on a weekly, every single week, including the last couple of weeks on expectation.

for the targets that he's getting. So I'm curious, but the role is there for him. I do kind of worry about Gronk in the sense that, okay, OJ. Howard went out, and they obviously have been missing back and forth a little bit of Godwin. Does Antonio Brown coming in and now having the three-headed wide receiver core, that's great, will that then take some of those targets that Gronk has been needed for away? It certainly will, because Antonio Brown will get targets.

And there's only so many to go around. But the end zone. You know, Scotty Miller will give his up. Yeah. At a moment's notice. That's true. Yeah, I mean, it could fluctuate. I like seeing where, you know, around the end zone, what they're doing. Dallas Goddard could have a nice. Yes, Dallas Goddard was going to highlight. Both Dallas Goddard and Jalen Rager have been activated off of the IR from the Philadelphia Eagles, which means they are in their practice window. That doesn't mean they're coming back this week.

It doesn't mean they're coming back next week or even the week after that. They have 21 days. Exactly. If 21 days of practice before the team has to make a decision to shut them down or bring them back. But one Scottard is back and he is going to come back. I think Dallas Goddard is going to be fantastic. Yeah, he definitely could. And Peterson said that Rager's going to practice today and then they'll see where he's at. Thursday night breakdown.

All right, the Atlanta Falcons at 1 and 6 take on the Carolina Panthers at 3 and 4. Reminder, take Thursday night players out of the flex. Mike, you said something at the very, very beginning of the show. I've already forgotten. That I'm going to bring up right now. And I don't know if you were prescribing it. But you mentioned, yeah, you need a nap. And I'd like you to take it. Thank you. Goodbye. No, it was about Teddy Bridgewater. He's your stream of the week this week. He's obviously in this matchup at home.

Atlanta is on pace to allow 5,500 yards, which is the record. It would be the record given up in terms of, I guess they were comparing that to like Peyton Manning's record setting yardage season. Atlanta would like to break that. But Teddy Bridgewater, Jason was talking about Josh Allen and talking about him being a potential top 10 guy, is he a top 10 guy this week against New England? Were you implying?