Fantasy Football - AFC East Breakdown + Late Round Strategy - Podcast for 7/10

Awesome. James Cook played 45% of the snaps. You know, he's in a mega time share. And how 18 total touchdowns to put you at the running back eight is troubling. But what does that regression look like? If you're going to be a run-heavy offense where he is definitely the most talented player. I mean, he was almost five a carry last year and these touchdowns didn't all just come in one game. You had so many of them that there were. four games in the entire year he didn't score so that says to me it's like he was the running back eight he's being drafted as a running back 14 if that goes from 16 total touchdowns to I guess he had 18 total 16 on the ground but if it drops to 12 which is super reasonable for a team that's number two and points per game he'll be great if it drops to 12 but I mean if it drops to seven which I think is totally in the range of outcomes for him considering

He had what his career high was two before last year? Am I misremembering that? I mean, crazy low. Well, yeah, the year before, he had a higher snap percentage in total. Two rushing. He went from two to 16. I mean, he had six total touchdowns in 20, but he had two on the ground. So I'm going to go look at ADP. He's in the fourth round. Tell me if you, these are the couple running backs going right before James Cook. Do you prefer James Cook over any of these guys? Let's go Kyron. I would take Kyron. Chase Brown. Or take Chase Brown. Brees. I would take James Cook. Yeah, I would too. I have an agreement with everything he said. And then directly after James Cook, Ken Bone Walker. I would take James Cook. I'd take James Cook. Alvin Camara. Cook. I'd probably take Cook. Joe Mixing. Mixing. I would rather have Mixing at that value later in a draft. It's the same round, though. I would probably take Nixon ahead of Cook. Okay. That one's close. So then ADP-wise, even though we are concerned about the regression, it seems like he's going.

That's kind of why I brought it up. He's not being drafted as RBA. He's not being drafted with those expectations. And, you know, there are, you got to reward a player in some ways for what they do, right? Like, not just, I don't like it. Just not financially. I just don't like, like, he's got such a brief career. I don't want to just look at the first two seasons and be like, that's his, his average touchdowns per year for his career is going to be two. Like, that's not a reasonable situation. In fact, last year, One of the reasons he was a favorite in fantasy drafts was because we saw that number as ridiculous. Yeah. Yeah. We knew it was going to go up. But you also have to, you know, he's 190 pound back. So it's like he doesn't project to be a 16 rushing touchdown type of guy. Right. So they start the year against Baltimore. That's going to be fun. I think that's the first game of the year. Well done NFL. So Baltimore at home, first week, and then the Jets, Miami, and New Orleans.

He had seven touchdowns from inside the five. Yeah. Wait, who's home? Is it Baltimore or in Buffalo? It's in Buffalo. And then it's the Jets on the road in the Miami and New Orleans at home. So, you know, still definitely the favorites in this division. They, you know, Sean McDermott has been there a long time, nine years. Joe Brady continues what got them a lot of success last year. You know, is it Brandon Bean? Is that their general manager? Am I getting the first name right here? There's too many beans doing general managing. Kyle said correct for you. You know, he is so annoyed with the view that they don't have the weapons they need on the offensive side of the football. And for good measure. You go out and you score the second most points in the league. You get an MVP at quarterback. You succeed. And then it's like your expectation is we've got to find somebody flashier at wide receiver? No, you got to win a Super Bowl. Yeah, you got to win a Super Bowl.

Miami 8 and 9 somehow last year. Their win total, though, before the season projected for 10 by Vegas, which they didn't accomplish this year. It's at 8.5. Is that surprise you at all? Or is it more indicative of just the AFC East? Because that's how it feels to me. Yeah, I mean, you got the Jets and the Pats. You would think that Miami should pull out four wins there, at least three. Last year was a step back on offense, 22nd and points per game, 18th and yards per game. The big plays for Miami, they evaporated. They had only 45 total plays all year long of 20 plus yards. That is the opposite of what you expected for Miami. That was 31st in the NFL. So you basically became the least explosive team. Yeah. Least explosive down the field. And then also you couldn't run the ball.

in the short yardage area. 31st in EPA per rush, 30th and percentage of runs stuffed at the line because their offensive line was bad. Yeah, so for the record, the least fun team to watch most of the time last year was Miami. If you if you cannot run the football, after week one, week one was awesome. They come out, two of it's looking good, he gets injured in week two. And when he came back, it was like, please don't make me watch that. No, it kind of reminded you of like when, uh, New Orleans was going through different quarterbacks and you just have to watch. It just takes so long to get down the field. Yeah, and they couldn't run. So, you know, their defense, their defense was pretty good. That's one of the reasons why they could pull off an eight and nine season. Well, no Ramsey now. No Ramsey, but they had Minka on that trade. Mike McDaniel, probably a hot seat coach at this point or close to it, a warming seat. His took us as a little warm.

and their O.C. Frank Smith. Yep. Yeah. Sorry, Frank. Is that like a generic name? Yeah, it really. Is that what? No offense, Mr. Smith. But yeah, my name is Frank Smith. Sure it is. What's your real name? I sell insurance. Yeah, like that's, that's my burner name. Um, player subtractions this year, Johnny Smith, Rahim Mosterd is gone. And they added Darren Waller. Oh my God. They added Nick Westbrook-Akeenae to the wide receiver room from Tennessee, and they added Alexander Madison. They loved Waller's tape from last year. So we got to get that guy on the team. Yeah, supposedly Waller only wanted to play for Miami to come back. Yeah. Which is good because there were quotes about, I don't know if you remember how he ended up walking away, deciding he doesn't want to play football.

But it was basically he was in there and they were calling a bunch of run plays in a row. And he's like, why am I in here blocking? And then he's like, I don't want to play football anymore. This guy wants to like, like that was from Waller. You're a tight end, bro. No, no, no. He's a past. He's a past catcher. He's, he is. So the fact that he is like, I'm willing to come back, but I only want to go to Miami makes me feel like at least, you know, he's looking at the Johnny Smith target machine from last year. I think he had 111 targets, something like that. And.

hoping that he can fill that role. Now, 33-year-old Darren Waller, who wasn't that great last time we saw him, I don't expect him to even be able to replicate Jonu Smith from this last year. But it is worth noting like he might be more involved than we think in the target pecking order. Yeah, when you lose Johnny, we've been talking about target consolidation with Waddle, Tyreek, A. Chan. If Tyreek, like if the storyline with Tyreek is that target consolidation does not equal more explosive plays again and Tyreek's kind of done, then that that is even more of an argument to why Waller could have a role. None of us have him ranked in a way that we're foreseeing that right now. Correct. And you guys might have a different opinion, but like me watching Tyreek Hill, the film, I don't look at him. I'm like,

it's it's totally gone like it just it didn't I never saw anything that made me think he was gone at all that's it was it was such a perplexing situation of like no he still seems okay maybe he's not did maybe he's not as fast but he still seemed fast enough to be to be putting up more plays than he did I mean yeah he wasn't slow but he didn't do what Tyreek did so much every single year prior, including the year prior, which is run away from people. I know he had the wrist injury, but it's like, how does that, you know, how does the wrist injury really cause? Maybe it was one of those things where they're not going to run them deep because a deep pass is less likely to be caught. I don't know, but once he had the ball in his hands, I felt like he was a little bit different. He had the third fastest time in the NFL on the field last year.

In week 5 hit 22.01 miles per hour, which, by the way, his teammate, Devon A-chan, was the fourth highest at 21.93 during the season, and that's a good transition into the running game. And whether Devon A-chan can be a true RB1 for your team. Yep. Yeah, he can. And hold up. You know, the injury concerns are fair with Devon A-chan. If you have to rely on him to that degree, any player is going to be more vulnerable for injury. But last year he did hold up. Let me tell you the target counts for Devon A-chan with Tua playing. Seven targets? Seven, eight, eight, five, four, four, nine seven, seven, seven. It's like a, you know, call that number. But those are like outrageous. Seven targets, a game is delicious. Those, those are great. 29% of his routes he was targeted. That is fantasy.

gold a target is worth two and a half times a carry and so i i really like i'm very bullish on on a chan this year especially the post john new smith trade yeah and they're there you know when you talked about the quick question of the day the backup situation with madison there and then jalen wright like theirs is a perfect example of if you have a chan it's it's really tough to take a shot yeah at who you think would be the backup because it's going to be it'll be a committee if H.N. went down and won't just be one guy. We've seen that. Jalen Wright needs to, I think Jalen Wright's a, he's an interesting guy to put at the back of your bench just in case in a draft and see what happens at week one, but he will need to improve like dramatically. Massively. And Madison was unfortunately effective. He's just, he's a fine player. He can catch the football.

He's like, if you get the default settings and Madden for a running back and you haven't added points to anything else, you just get the, it's everything across the board is just regular. That's how I view Madison. Yeah, I think that was true two years ago. And then one of the little bars got removed on each one of those topics of like there. He's just a little. He was better last year than year before. He was scoring touchdowns. I think that I don't like how the coaches talk about. Alexander Madison in the positive. Like they're, they're including him very much as like part of their plans. I just don't, I don't think he's, I don't think he's that good. I hope it's Ollie Gordon. They, they spent a six round, six round pick on Ollie Gordon. This was a player who two years ago looked like he was going to be a sensational young, big bodied running back, and then had a down year last year, fell to the sixth round.

But hopefully he could do something. That would be a little bit more exciting, but I agree with the assertation that you don't have any idea who the firm backup is, and there probably isn't one should A-chan go down. Mosterd and Madison just swapped spots. Did you realize that? Yeah. They just flipped teams to be backups on the other person's team. Who would you rather have? Saved the M. I'd rather have Moster. Yeah. Rather have to. Even at this age. At this, yeah, just because there's more clarity in that backfield. which we'll get to at some point. No, no, no, I'm saying if you're a general manager. Oh, right now, would you rather have, who would you rather have as the backup behind agent? Most. Yeah, me too. Really? He, man, he was. He was not great. He was, he was, he was pretty bad last year. Yeah, they're both, they're both pretty bad now. That's why I'm hoping for Ollie Gordon. Not Gillen Wright.

Or Jalen Wright. I mean, Jalen Wright is a, you know, 215 pound back that runs sub 4.4. I love those. He just looked. He was so tremendously awful last year. No vision. You know, coming into year two. Open your eyes, man. I hope that, I hope that, you know, he figures out the scheme a little bit better because obviously if you get the guy, the ball in space, he's got the speed and the size to just take off. If you drop Jalen Wall at his ADP, which is the. Last pick of the fifth round, you are going to end the year, fill in the blank. You will end the year. Pleasantly surprised. Hope, what is the new phraseology we have? Oh, something. Hopelessly. No, no, pessimistically. Happy? I don't remember. You is your phrase, bro. I know. It just comes out while I black out. That's what happens. I think Jalen Waddle at the back of the fifth, early sixth round, is.

Worth drafting. Okay. They play Indianapolis in week one on the road, the New England, Buffalo, and the Jets. So divisional after the indie game. Shall we take a break and then talk about those jets? We shall. All right. Let's do it. The Jets were 5 and 12 last year after a preseason win total of 9. And Aaron Rogers's return. They started out 3 and 8th. And the general manager got fired after week 11. This year, we've adjusted. The projected win total is five and a half. I believe that is the lowest in the division. Am I wrong? Yes, yes. It is by far. So new expectations, new quarterbacks, new questions around the Jets, 24th and points per game. Will they fix it with Justin Fields at quarterback? I don't know if that's going to happen. I don't know if they have enough personnel to...

really get that done, but that's why we're talking about him right now. Aaron Glenn, new head coach, got a new offensive coordinator, Nathaniel Hackett, goodbye. Oh no. And no more Aaron Rogers, no more Devante Adams, no more Tyler Conklin. But we replaced those two Hall of Famers and the tight end with Justin Fields and Josh Reynolds. And Mason Taylor. And Mason Taylor. That's their rookie tight end in the second round who. I do think is, you know, a late round dart throw. Tyler Conklin's vacating a lot of targets here. And they're the depth chart for pass catchers on this team. I mean, this is why I love Garrett Wilson. If you want to make the pro bowl case for Garrett Wilson, it's like, who are you throwing the ball to other than Garrett Wilson? 200 target case? Yeah, for sure. I mean, the only thing against a 200 target, like if there was a different quarterback here.

I'd probably project 200 targets for Garrett Wilson, but you know that Justin Fields is probably going to run the ball himself a lot, and they won't just have him airing it out. Well, the way that they're going to win games this year seems like it's going to be that hard-nosed recipe of, you know, Aaron Glenn getting in there, trusting a running game where they like multiple backs, playing defense. They were third last year in total yard given up, and fourth and passing yards given up, so that is their strength. And we also saw Justin Fields have success in more of a managerial quarterback situation in Pittsburgh. You don't want to necessarily put everything on his shoulders, and it's not, you know, it just can go too many places. That's what Justin Field's struggles were in Chicago. It was like, you've got to do everything, you've got to figure everything out. And yes, you may make prolific runs or plays or throws, but then you fumble, and then you get sacked, and then you fumble.

or throw a pick and that it's just too much to put on him i feel like it's all on him again though like last year he was very good for the steelers where it was he had a very good team around him you know he had a great coach and it looks like he went four and two yeah he went four and two starter yeah that was that was what was so impressive when they decided to make the switch yeah to russell wilson was your you're a four and two successful team and you're going to you know, Russ is back and healthy and you're going to go to Russ. And it looked brilliant at first because Russ came out on fire. They won more games. You should have gone back. Yeah. I mean, we talked about on the Steelers. The last four games were a brutal schedule. But I do, I feel like this is Justin Fields back with the Bears where he doesn't have the weapons around him enough to like, I feel like it's all going to fall on him at the end of every game. And he's not going to be able to overcome the bad.

So that's Justin Fields on the field. They're not projected to win very many games, but Justin Fields is the fantasy player on the Bears was good for a time. Yes, and I think he's going to be good for the Jets too. Last year he was actually better than you realize. I mean, two years ago for the Bears, 17.7 fantasy points per game. Last year in the six starts, 18.9 fantasy points per game. He was not bad. And it's because he runs the ball so freaking much. Were you saying? I'm saying that those points would put you as a like a

a bottom of a top 12 quarterback. Yes. Gotcha. And he is not being drafted there. He's being drafted as the quarterback 18. I think he's one of the most mispriced people in fantasy right now. Well, one of the questions that come along with Justin Fields is, do you think he'll keep the job the whole year? Because when you lose games, which they're going to do, it doesn't matter how well you're playing. You could get benched. You could get something could happen. Absolutely. And I think it's an irrelevant thing when you're picking the quarterback 18. in your fantasy draft. Like when you're picking the quarterback 16, 17, 18, you're planning on streaming the position and you're probably not going to have a full season starter. I do think that there's a good chance he starts the whole season, more so than the guys, you know, in, you know, you look at the Giants. Will Russ start the whole season? Probably not. They drafted, you know, Jackson and Dart here, it's like, it's Tyrod Taylor behind him. Yeah, if you make a bunch of mistakes, though, and it's on you.

to lose. That's when you could see a transition. Garrett Wilson, second most targets through three years in the history of the NFL and no one to compete with him. And their head coach basically said, get him the ball as much as possible. That's their goal on offense, which has to be your goal. Breece Hall, Jason has talked about Bruce Hall for three years with different adjectives. Yeah, I think we've had a full traffic. light with jesus talking red yellow green i think it's more green yellow red yeah so look i want to say this like it wasn't efficient or as effective or impressive on film last year but you still ended up with a season as horrible as it was for the jets where he still was the rb 17 still can catch the football how intimidated are you by the third round draft price

I'm very intimidated by a third round draft price. I've got him as my running back 17, kind of replicating what he did last year, despite the fact that, I mean, you could see how it gets better for him. He comes more into the form that he was his sophomore year, more explosive plays. And, you know, if that happens, he'll demand more utilization. He'll get the rock, you know, frequently. However, all of his fantasy goodness through his short career, has really been propped up by the receiving game. It's his work as a pass catcher that is what we want the most. And I worry about that transitioning from an Aaron Rogers check down quarterback to Justin Fields, a scrambling quarterback, when it comes to the not play called, you know, screen pass to Brees Hall, but just the...

improvised. How many of those a game are going to go away from Breece? Total pass attempts if they want to win defensively. Yeah. So I worry about Breece from that. And then there's also talk about having all of the running backs involved. You listen to Aaron Glenn and he's saying disgusting things for fantasy football. Like we have three starters at running back. Yeah, it started really nice for Braylon Allen. The first time we know he's lying. First four games Braille and Allen played. He was four point eight to carry. It really slowed down. You didn't get explosive plays, and the team was terrible. The wild thing is sophomore year, 14.9 points per game running back for it. For Brise? For Brise. Last year, 13.3 a game. I know that's 1.6 per week that adds up, but I think it's more of the expectations of last year of him being drafted. I think he missed the game.

He did. So that would have been higher on that points per game, wouldn't he? Well, in total points for sure. Hopefully in points per game. Sorry, in total points. He was like the, what, a top three running back two years ago? It's hard for me to remember that one. Two years ago, he's the running back four. No, no, no. This last, sorry, this past year, in 2024, you drafted him as. Oh, yeah. I mean, he was, his average draft position was first round for sure. So that's part of it is he let you down on the ADP, but. Yeah, it was the RB3 by 80. Yeah, in actuality of a points per game, I mean, Jason talked about him on the Dynasty podcast that we released yesterday, so you can check that out if you want a more in-depth discussion. But that's kind of the biggest question marks around the Jets. You're going to have a new scheme. You're going to have a new head coach. You can have some, you got a tough division. I mean, you're definitely at the bottom. I mean, you look at the Vegas odds in this division. They're like plus 1,800 to win the division.

It is a massive difference between New England and Miami and obviously Buffalo, the favorite. Speaking of New England, they are sitting there projected with a Vegas wind total of eight and a half. Is that? I love it. I love it. That can't be true. No, that absolutely should be true. Who's got an eight and a half? New England. No. That can't be right. No. That is true. It's eight and a half. Yeah, I mean, what? I'll take the over. What? I'm reading it and I'm like. No. Okay. So that puts some tie you're taking the over. So you're in on the Patriots. The Patriots are a nine plus win team. They won four last year. Yes. Their win total was four and a half last year. They won in week one and then lost six straight. Drake May took over in week six. And this year is eight and a half. They do have the second easiest schedule. They're going to need it.

They last year were 31st in yards per game, 30th and points per game per game, but also had a defense that was 22nd and points per game allowed and 22nd in yards allowed. So it was bad on both sides of the ball. You get Mike Vrable coming in. The Gerard Mayo experiment lasted a year. And Josh McDaniels makes his normal cycle around the sun and he's back with New England for the third time, I believe. You had Stefan Diggs, who we don't know for sure we'll be back for week one, but should be back at some point soon. Mack Hollins.

is also a new wide receiver edition, and they draft Trayvion Henderson and Kyle Williams. So they have young talent, and they have, like, we all like Jake May. I think Drake May was unheralded last year. He played. No one did herald him. He played very well, given his circumstances, his offensive line, or if, you know, if you can call it that, the coaching. It was it was bad, and I thought he. looked good. Like he showed enough in his rookie season to make me believe he can take that year to leap forward to becoming a true franchise quarterback. You pair him with a good head coach and Mike Vrable who knows how to pull out games and win the close ones. This is why I'm a believer in the Patriots being they're probably the team that I look at as, you know, the question is always who goes from worst to first. Right. I don't have them going worse first because of Buffalo, but they're one of the teams that you can just see the easy progression.

There's always surprising teams where they're supposed to be trashed, supposed to be one of the worst in the league. And then all of a sudden they come out and they're like, oh, that's a pretty good team this year. I feel like that could be the Patriots here. I mean, if you look at the division, if the, if the dolphins collapse, which is very, very possible with Mike McDaniels, maybe his final year, if they collapse, the Patriots are second by default. Yeah. So, you know, it was really good for Rabel and Tennessee for. four years. It was really kind of rough the last couple of seasons in Tennessee. But he may have the Doug Peterson effect arriving in enlivening this team. I like what they did in the draft where they invested picks, not just in the skill positions, but on the offensive line. So, yeah, I mean, eight and a half, it says a lot about where that division is and what the expectations are. That is four more wins than they were projected to get last year. And it's not like they went out and impressed last year.

No, no, they didn't. The offensive line, I think, should be, I mean, they spent the number four pick in the draft on an offensive lineman to help protect Drake May and Mike, one of your favorite players. Oh, yeah, look, I love Treveon Henderson. Yeah, that's going to help out of the back. Just to amplify your point, since 2015, at least one team every year that was drafting in the top 10, won their division. or had 12 plus or 12 plus games that's next year. So it does happen. It never sounds logical or rational right now, but it happens every year. The backfield, Chavion Henderson and Ramandre Stevenson. I think this one's going to be tough. I know you love Trayvion Henderson. I think he's a very talented player. I do not think the path for him to be a week in, week out, fantasy relevant player is super easy.