Fantasy Football 2018 - The TRUTH About Fantasy RBs in 2017, Part 1

Gordon busted more, 19% to 6% for Kareem Hunt. Both of them struggled a little bit against top tier defenses, not surprising, especially at the running back position where you see teams, you see players do this at times, although if you roll back to Camara, he had that problem, didn't really see that with Gurley. Gurley was actually better against top defenses and Lev Bell was unaffected. But Melvin Gordon, 16 games played.

Still caught 58 passes. And, you know, I don't know if it was because I didn't have shares of him this year like I had last year. I just didn't feel Gordon. He was just there for me. Mike, what was your experience when you look at those two players? And are you surprised at those poll results Jason just brought up? Maybe. It's a little surprising when you look at the big difference for Hunt and Gordon is would you rather have a couple fewer bust games?

Or would you rather have a couple fewer games where you're just good? You don't hurt my team. You do help because you're basically running back too. So it's interesting to see how people view that, the bust versus the good. See, he performed that experiment on me. And I ended up going with the Melvin Gordon line. Did you? I did. I was willing to take a couple extra weeks where he was a pure bust.

and sacrifice for the level of play that was more consistent. Very interesting. But it really, it is a somewhat, you know, subjective to what else is on your team and how do you play and, uh, it's interesting. But four or five. And to say, so just real quick to speak to the rank here that we have, Melvin Gordon, uh, as the consistency rank seven. There are two guys who have, uh, I think they're both tied at consistency three.

So they pushed some of these numbers down. But that was David Johnson because these are, you know, game agnostic. He was very consistent. He was very consistent. He had one good game and no bad games. So that one kind of doesn't count. And Dalvin Cook, who was amazing. But unfortunately, he left us this year. Yeah, a lot of players left us this year. They'll be back. They'll be back. So who would you rather have next year, Cream Hunt or Melvin Gordon?

Man, I'm with you. That is a great question. I'm with you, Jay. I want to see what the chiefs do. I'll take Melvin Gordon. I want to see what the chiefs do. I'd lean Kareem Hunt, but is Char West back? Is Spencer Ware back? Do they draft someone who profiles as a pass catching back? What is the impact of Pat Mahomes of Alex Smith is gone? Right.

Mark Ingram comes in at number six with a consistency rank of number 12. That is two Saints running backs in the top six performers in fantasy. 230 carries 1100 yards, 12 touchdowns, 58 receptions for another 416 through the air. Did not score through the air. It's surprising on that many receptions, actually. 71 targets caught 58 of them, proving that he's still a very high efficiency back out of the backfield.

25% great games, 56% good games, only 6% bust games. And he, too, like Camara, had a little bit of that beginning of the year, dealing with Adrian Peterson in the rotation. Look, what can you say, Mark Ingram? Just playing good and real good at home. Yeah, his interesting thing is plus six at home, which people read into this differently. Some people like the high home road splits because you know exact one to play him.

Ingram had that a little bit more because he was plus six at home, and he was five points better against bottom defenses. So you get that bottom 16 rush defense at home? Oh, you were good to go. You knew that Mark Ingram was going to have a monster game.

Yeah, yeah, I like Mark Ingram a lot. I mean, one of the things we have to keep in mind is when we talk consistency, this is all just 2017 consistency, but we've got consistency charts in the ultimate draft kit that look at their career, which I think are extremely helpful. And you could just take a glance and be like, oh, yeah, Mark Ingram has three years in a row, been a top 10 back, and you're not going to have to draft Mark Ingram. I was just going to say, where is Ingram's draft stock? Ingram's going to be drafted in the second round at the highest. Behind Camara.

Oh, absolutely behind Camaro. During the super stretch of the year, that nine games stretch in the middle, eight of nine games Camaro was in the top 12, six of those nine that Ingram was in the top 12. That's incredible. You think second round? Yeah. I would just take the, I'm going to lower. I'm saying, I'm saying that's the peak. He won't ever be drafted. Give me the Jason Moore. This is where Mark Ingham's going to be drafted. Well, Jason Moore will draft Mark Ingraham at the back of the second. Not where you will draft him where the people.

I think that the average person will disrespect Mark Ingram, and he will go to the third round on average. I will take the better value between the two Saints running backs. Which would be Mark Ingram. Yeah, I agree. Camara will be a first rounder. 58. 58 receptions. So Camara scored five times through the air on 81 receptions. Ingram scored zero times on 58. And it's not like he doesn't have game-breaking ability. He took a bunch of long runs to the house. It's interesting. LaShawn McCoy finished seventh.

Consistency rank on the year was 11th. 287 for 1138 and 6. 59 receptions for 448 and 2. Busted 13% good 69% great 25%. And very good. 6.7 fancy points better at home than on the road. Fairly large split. You know, the truth was when they were at home.

It was a better team. Yeah, they were a better team. These games were closer. These games were closer. They could lean on the run. McCoy for next year, it's an interesting case because I don't think Tyrod's back, but you do have a coach that led him to the playoffs for the first time and a long time. You have a new OC. You're going to have a new quarterback. It's shady will be. Are we going to undervalue him or overvalue him next year? That's the question. I think I'm going to undervalue him. That's how I worry.

I think that the general consensus for Shady will be an undervaluing of, and he's also old. Yeah. When you're talking running back years. 64 years old. He's very old and running back years. He's also now going to hit that threshold of carry.

or touch totals that running backs usually fall away from their, you know, look what happened to DeMarco Murray this season. There's going to be fear of that, and fear of that is going to push Shady down. So next year what's going to happen is really simple. Shady will be a really good value because he's going to go a little bit later than the top backs if he does not fall away. If he falls away, there's...

It's going to be like DeMarco. Where would DeMarco Murray need to have been drafted for you to actually go, yeah, I was really happy with that pick. Seventh round? Exactly. You mean, right. But for every. Murray got hurt. Every DeMarco case with a split backfield, you've got the four-year wait for Frank Gore to drop off. And I want to be clear, LaShaquay did not show any drop-off. That's the important thing. Speculation about his age and his carry totals.

are not the same thing as seeing it on the field like you saw with DeMarco Murray. That's why I think it'll be undervalued. So I think we agree on that. Leonard Four net. Did you guys know that I'm looking over it? Shady has never, never been under 4.0 yards per carry on a season. How many? Never. Yeah. Which this. 4.0 yards. 4.0 yards a carry. It just sounded funny. I think it's still accurate.

Okay. It did sound funny. Didn't it? We were both... Okay, so how would you say it? Four yards per carry? Yeah. Well, but I am getting even more specific. You are? 4.0? Yes. But if you want to get even more specific, 4.00. He's never... Darn you, Jason Moore. It's actually 4.0. Uh, yeah. But the 4.0? That was actually this year. So it's his lowest yards per carry.

But it didn't look like he lost anything to me. Perfect grade point average, though. Oh, excellent. Fournett. Dean's List. Fornett was the eighth ranked fantasy running back. Makes sense. Played 13 games. Consistency ranking number five, though. I was surprised by that. That's great. Yes. He, he, he, 85% of his games were good. A team that runs the ball, busted 15%, great 15%. Not as many breakout superstar games as some of the leaders.

But he sure started the year well. Now, in our ranking system here, he's not penalized for the games that he missed due to injury. And I think when you look at Fournet, you kind of have this feeling similar to Karim Hunt where in the middle of the year, everything kind of went away because you didn't have him for a couple games when he was injured. And then when he came back to a buy week was also mashed in there. It was right in there. And two of the three games.

that were his poorest games were right in that stretch. So there was that period where he wasn't good. But when you look at the hole, he was just utilized so much and performed so well. He was extremely consistent in all of those games. And the nice thing about the reason why we take out these games that you miss due to injury is no one started him. You know, if he doesn't play, he's not actually hurting your team like a bust game hurts your team.

other than maybe the one week where he was a last second shocking, inactive, maybe he would have hurt you there. Just looking at the dates to explain further into your story, Jay. October 15th was the game before the injury. Then he didn't play again until November 12th. So in fantasy football terms, that is also 62 years. Right. 36 receptions. First player on this list with under 53. That was something that you don't get.

You don't get that out of Leonard Fournet. And we saw even in the playoff game yesterday, T.J. Yeldon is a great role player. He's a great player to come out on third down. He did everything yesterday to say, I'm glad you took Leonard Fornett out on third down. I mean, that was what you got. And so there is a game flow dependency situation there with Leonard Fornet. There's also, I mean, I think the lower amount of great games has a lot to do with the fact he doesn't get to dip into both.

bins, right? The wide receiver bin and the running back bin. I wanted, you got to talk about it though. Leonard Fernette and these injuries. Yes, when he played, he was great, or at least very good for your team, only played in 13 games, but what did you have? You had three or four foot or ankle injuries for Leonard Fernette. Is this any concern for you, Jason, for a guy who in college, he had similar problems?

talking you had some issues with melvin gordon up ahead of him you had some issues with lishol mccoy being a little banged up yeah i mean the the the issue that is katy 13 games yeah the the part that's concerning is what you said the fact that it's it happened in college it's happened for several years running that does concern you a little bit more but

it's not going to ever push me away from drafting him or at the draft cost because one of the things you might notice as you're listening right we're talking about these top 10 running backs so far and pretty much everyone is at least a top 12 in the consistency very different than how wide receivers were and how other positions will be because at the end of the year those and this is what we said in the beginning those top running backs they're in a they're in a world of their own

Once you get past those 10 or 11 guys, then you're just completely into guys that are you're streaming or you're playing matchups or you're the centaurs or you're getting a lot of bust games. And Leonard Fournett is one of those guys. I know if he's active, he's getting the ball, he's getting the goal lines, he's going to be a workhorse back. So I'm not going to be scared off because of injury. Everyone gets injured. He played 13, but he missed one that wasn't due to injury. That was due to suspension.

A game, a 14 game. Maybe it was. We need to move on. We're going to get through 10 today and then we're going to get into a bunch of names on the Thursday show like Christian McCaffrey, Lamar Miller and C.J. Anderson, Alex Collins, a bunch of names. I'm excited to talk about. Those, those names will have much more varied rankings in their consistency because you'll see it. It becomes a crapshoot here. But Carlos Hyde and Ezekio Elliott round out our top 10. Hyde was the ninth ranked.

Fantasy running back. Ninth most consistent running back. Played 16 games, something that was on his bucket list. 240 carries for 938 yards. Okay, 59 receptions, but just 350 yards on those. I think that showed he was maybe not as capable in the receiving game, but was a victim of...