The Fantasy MVP Episode! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 8/30

I feel like Garrett Wilson has risen to the top of that list for me simply because of hopeful ups. I mean, I guess I've still got puka ahead of Garrett Wilson. But the rest of those guys, you know, we know for sure. Derek Carr is not going to be 2018 Aaron Rogers. We know that for sure. Right. Maybe Aaron Rogers can get back to being, you know, old school Aaron Rogers. Also the, you know, Adam's seasons were number one caliber seasons. So if Rogers is 80%. But, you know, think about what is Garrett Wilson had. He's had the equivalent of 4% Aaron Rogers in his first two years. He's had two. That's being generous. I believe he had 1999 Aaron Rogers throwing him the ball. Young. It was a little baby. Little baby. Little baby who could not throw the ball well. The high school Aaron Rogers might be better than.

Was 1999 high school for him? I was trying to go to like. I assume so. Oh gosh, I needed to go way. I forget how old he is. He's as old as you are. 1882 Aaron Rogers. Aaron Rogers is older than me. Wow. So that would have been soft. That would have been like sophomore junior. Aaron Rogers. That would have been amazing for Garrett Wilson. That would have been incredible. To be fair. To be fair, I think I actually comped it perfectly. Like high school Aaron Rogers is probably exactly what Zach Wilson is. Here's what I'll say because to give the counterbalance of the case and we've seen it, you know, Wilson's had a rough ride. There are not good vibes in New York right now. And they are the New York Jets. So you combine those things, you know, there's talk of the locker room not really being what it should be. Rogers being not a team player in terms of, you know, we don't know.

Sure. But what I'm saying is that if it goes bad in New York, it might go real bad. We're talking the end of Rogers, the end of Sala, and a full reset again. Like if it doesn't work for them this year, think about where the Jets are at. They don't have a quarterback, right? You're not going to have a head coach. Like you're talking full reset for Garrett Wilson. You look at what's on the line for Dynasty managers of Garrett Wilson right now? It's really heavy. Oh, you're playing a dangerous game. You're walking on that edge of the mountain. All right, we are going to, the next two we're bringing in-house. And we're going to turn the page to Kai Borgannoni. He's our editor-in-chief. He's the host of the DFS and the betting and dynasty pods. Smart guy. And here we go. Yo, yo, yo, yo, this is Kao-Raganoni. All things stats related with the fantasy footballers. And my pick for fantasy MVP this year.

is the Philadelphia Eagles offense. We can often take a binary approach with teammates in fantasy, stating it's going to be this guy or it's going to be that guy. You might think that Jalen Hertz around the goal line is going to take away opportunities from Sequin Barclay. Or that A.J. Brown, he's the alpha wide receiver for this offense. Or maybe Devonta Smith is the one getting those slot snaps in Kellyn Moore's new look pre-snap motion offense. But what if it's everybody? What if this is a rising tide lifts all boat situation? What if Hertz ends up the season as a quarterback one? Barkley finishes the top five back. And Brown and Smith both end up as wide receiver ones, something they did in 2022. This offense is going to roll. And I think it's possible that all their top options exceed their draft costs and make fantasy managers happy. Thoughts, Mike. Now, Kyle, you're on the microphone. You can hear us and you can respond to us. So what?

The acronym MVP, I just want to know in your opinion, what does that stand for? No, no, no, no, no, no. Answer the question. Oh, okay. And now who would you say your most valuable player would be? Yeah. There is. There we go. And that's the not coward answer. I know this whole off season. Like, Devante Smith was so close to being one of my my guys. And talking behind the scenes, Kyle was all about that. I've been in on Devante Smith. He has. This whole off season. But the same reason I didn't take him is the same reason that coward Kyle comes out here and is like the Eagles because it's like, ah, it might be AJ Brown so good. You know, it's like, I agree with your take. But.

MVP. Yeah. Most valuable people. Kyle is wanting it to be Devante Smith. But if the, if AJ Brown is the wide receiver one, he's just going to slide in there. Remember? Remember what I said? Most valuable. Yeah. I have. Get out of here, Kyle. You know what? Thank you for entertaining us. Look when I, when we got your MVP audio yesterday for the show. I knew when I pushed that button, it would be Devante Smith. And so to hear the hedge, I get it. The Eagles are one of the most interesting storylines in football to me. Yeah, you've been talking about the Eagles a lot behind the scenes, off the microphone. I don't know. Yeah, I don't know how public I've been with my doubts, but I mean, I do not, I have money on them not making the playoffs. And I put money on two or three things before every season, like almost nothing. Yeah. I don't bet.

But I bet on that because I'm very concerned. And I think the loss of Jason Kelsey is massive. And it's going to put so much more on the shoulders of Jalen Hertz. And if they had a great season and then they lost one playoff game that got ugly, I wouldn't be feeling that way. But the fact that the head coach and the quarterback didn't talk for a really long time, the fact that. that collapsed the whole second half the season. Yeah, they lost six of seven games, I think, and that's like, that's hard to do. Kelsey chooses to walk away. Yeah, which is more so old. No, no, no, I know. I don't know if you've heard he's doing okay. Yeah, he's doing okay. But I think to Andy's point, if the vibes of that team, if they were having fun, like Travis Kelsey could have walked away. He's old enough to walk away, but they're winning championships and the locker room is fun.

I think Jason Kelsey was like, this was a tiring, exhausting season. I don't want, like the vibes. He's going to be 37. No, but I mean, look, this is not, we don't have to speculate on what Jason Kelsey said because he came out on an interview and literally said it was bad. He said like, it's not just one thing. It wasn't one player, one situation. It was coaching. Here's what we know about the Eagles. They don't get Shane Steichen back and they don't get. Jonathan Gannonback. They tried two new coordinators last year. It didn't work. They're trying it again this year. There's going to be a new coordinator. It could work. It could be great. But a lot's going to be put on Jalen Hurts' shoulder. And we saw at least a long enough stretch of bad football to know that bad football is in the range of outcomes, even when you have the talent. Like it's easy for us in fantasy to be like, you've got maybe.

legitimately may be the best trifect of wide receivers in the game with AJ Brown, Devante Smith, and Jehan Dodson. That might be the best three. But even with the best players on the field, they struggled. So to say that they're going to struggle, look, they have the upside of being the best team in football. I just have my doubts that it's going to be as smooth as people. You know, he does have to learn a new system. That's all he does every year of his entire life. is learn a new system. Genuinely, there's only been one time since high school, one year, one season where he had the same coordinator for the second time. And he was like the MVP of the NFL that year. Who was the famous quarterback Campbell? What's his first name? Jason Campbell. Jason Campbell. You remember this? I remember Jason Campbell. Jason Campbell, I believe, had a new offensive coordinator for like 10 consecutive years. It just reminded me of that.

Where he never got a fair shake. Here's, here's since 2016, Jalen Hertz, offensive coordinator. Lane Kiffin, Brian Dable, Mike Loxley, Steve Sarkisian. Locksley. Sorry, go on. I love it. Doug Peterson. Had to be done. Shane Steichen. There's the one, Brian Johnson and Kellan Moore. So he's used to this. I will say this. And then we'll move on. The news that Kelsey was doing all the protections. that he was the one in charge of calling out the protections, making sure that, you know, reading the defense in that sense. That came out recently that it was verified as truth, and Hertz was talking about how that stopped his learning, and you could spin this one of two ways. You can look at this as a really bad thing. Like, this is something Hertz hasn't done before, that he's going to have to add to his plate, and it could really not work, or you could spend this the other way and say, I think Hertz should be the one.

calling the protections. And I think he's capable of that. And he should be better now that he's in charge of more. And I think we are separate because I've always since college, I've always been a Jalen Hertz believer who was a my guy a couple years ago when he had that breakout season. I think he is that dude. I think he is the hardest working, smart, capable, talented in every facet of his life. And so I'm like putting my belief. I'm with Kyle here in that. I'm in on the Eagles. Yeah. Yep. So it'll be a fascinating thing to watch this season. You sharing those offensive coordinators, I couldn't help but notice that the elite Super Bowl year was the first time he got to be in the offense a second time. So it makes me wonder a little bit about acclamation this year. Does that happen? How fast does it happen? Didn't that happen to Matt Ryan too? Kyle, that was happening to Ryan, right? It was just like over and over.

Until he got to repeat it. Yeah, I mean, it happened with Bruce Ariens and the Carson Palmer offense where year two, everything came together. So we'll be very interesting to watch. Time to turn it over to Matthew Betts. What's up, Foot Clan? This is Matthew Betts, host of the DFS and Dynasty podcast. And my fantasy MVP for the 2024 season is none other than Rashi Rice. I'll admit, I do feel like I'm cheating a little bit with this answer because if it weren't for the off-the-field issues, Rice would be going a lot higher, probably in the third round. of drafts. But right now, over on ESPN and Sleeper, he's going in the seventh round. That is an absolute steal for a player who developed into Pat Mahomes' top option down the stretch. And look, is there some risk with this pick? Yeah, of course there is, right? He could get suspended late in the year. The legal issues could come back. But that's already baked into the ADP, and we just got news this week that they will not place him on the commissioner exempt list and they're going to let the legal situation play itself out. That means this thing could easily get pushed to the 2025 season.

As I mentioned, Rice was awesome last year as a rookie averaging 2.2 1 yards throughout run and a 27% target share down the stretch after became a full-time player. And, you know, the target competition, yes, it's more difficult with Xavier Worthy and Hollywood Brown. Of course, Travis Kelsey's there. But Rice proved he's a talented player. And if they do continue to limit Kelsey's snaps this year, as they've said they will do with their eyes on the postseason, Rash should be the direct beneficiary of that, getting those shorter area targets as Mahomes go-to guy. The Chiefs last year, their offense was not what we're used to, but their moves tell us they want Pat Mahomes to throw, throw, throw, throw. You get Xavier Worthy. You sign Hollywood Brown. You got Rashy Rice still there. Like, all the moves say we're going to throw more when we did a year ago and really get that explosive element of our pass game back. Mahomes is going to bet as anyone to lead the league in passing touchdowns and yards. I want a piece of that passing offense. Rushie Rice is a great way to get it this year. It's a...

It's a good pick. I feel like every draft right now, it's who's going to pull the trigger first on Rashi Rice. That's everything because my chips are all in. Like I have Rice now projected. I'm projecting the full season. He's your wider receiver 17. Yeah, he's in my top 20. To the point of I'm drafting him that if a suspension happens at the end of the year, I don't care. Because my goal is to get into playoffs. If I have to deal with that later, I will deal with that later. And it's to the point of he's great because his ADP is still low. He's not going to go there. In casual leagues, he might go there. If you're in a competitive league, he will go higher. So, like Andy said, where are you willing to take him? I'm willing to go fifth. I'm even willing to go into the fourth. Because in the fourth, that's where, like, ADP-wise, you're talking about, that's the late teens of the wide receivers, and that's where I have the range. ADP, he's at the back of the seventh on sleeper, the wide receiver 38.

So I think you should be able to nab him in the fifth round if you like him there. And I would do that every time. Yeah. Yeah, I'm literally making some rankings tweaks to my positioning of Rashi Rice because while there's the risk, Mike outlaid it very well. It's too valuable, a commodity for the potential that he's there all year. which I think is, I mean, I don't know how we would handicap it, but I would say probably 75, 25 is where I'm out in terms of being there all year. I'd be in the 80%. So, yeah, I think it's a really important name to bring up. And, you know, I just want to applaud Matthew Betts for just not going with, he said a lot of things about Kansas City's offense. He did. But he didn't choose the offense as the most valuable player. You know what I mean? Well, that's not a player. Right, right. MVP. MVP.

All right, we're going to turn it over to great friend of the show, JJ, Zacharison. Hey, losers. Hey, I hope everyone's doing well. Nice picture. My MVP pick this season, look, I went back and forth on a handful of guys. I could call out Kyler Murray here, but everyone's probably going to call out Kyler Murray. So I'll switch things up and I'll go with Brian Thomas. Let's get a little weird. Thomas scored well in my Zapp model, my prospect model. He had a score of 94.5. Since 2014, we've had 23 rookie wide receivers get drafted in the wide receiver 40 to wide receiver 60 range with a ZAP score above 90. Over 39% of those rookie wide outs exceeded average draft position expectation by three or more PPR points per game. That's an absurd rate. A normal sample would be around the 21, 22% mark. Thomas could play the Calvin Ridley role in this Jacksonville offense this year.

And while Ridley had some struggles last season, he was a fringe wide receiver won and expected fantasy points per game. So we've got a good prospect and a good situation. To me, he's a great pick at his current cost. Well, look, I mean, we're... I'm so in. I love Brian Thomas, Jr. Now, unfortunately, JJ did not put the junior in there, so I'm pretty sure he chose his father. Right. That's a dumb pick, JJ. Not on a roster. Terrible 40 times. Yeah, and I think he's past the H-cliff, too. It's just a stupid pig, JJ. Yeah, I mean, you didn't endear us with the hey, losers start. That's the only reason the picture stayed. Yeah, that's true if you're on YouTube. I was ready to turn the page on that, but then he calls his losers and that hurt my feelings. Honestly, yeah, YouTube.com slash fantasy footballers go over there and make sure that. You see his beautiful picture. It is a picture of JJ.

That's YouTube.com slash the fantasy footballers, JJ. We love you, JJ. Brian Thomas has a great opportunity. We brought up names yesterday, Trevor Lawrence, the fact the offense can get going at various times. And the fact that Brian Thomas is the, you know, he's the explosive weapon in that offense. So it makes a ton of sense. All right, we had the chance to hop on to. Up and Adams, the Kay Adams show over on YouTube the other day. Jason got golden ticketed. You got golden ticketed into a wonderful take on Sam Darnum, who you love. I love him, man. So we asked Kay to come and share her fantasy MVP pick. Hey, Foot Clan, it's Kay Adams from the Up and Adams show. My fantasy MVP, thanks for asking.

It's Justin Jefferson. It's about value. It's about production, track record. It's about belief in a high volume offense. He's going eighth overall in average drafts. Did I read that correctly? That's crazy. He's fifth at receiver? There's a great chance. Feeling very confident that he outproduces everybody at the position. The man played in eight full games. Read it and weep. Eight games for different quarterbacks still put up over a thousand yards. So sure, is it fair to have questions about Sam Donald? Fine. I know that Jason doesn't. He let golden ticketed his way. into falling in love with him. But I love him, too, in this offense. I believe in Kevin. You know, I don't think this is one of those receivers. It doesn't matter who's sewn him the ball. As proven last year, he's going to put up his numbers no matter who's back there. And he actually averaged the most yards per game of his entire career last season. We love Justin Jefferson. By the way, he'll be on Up and Adam show. Check it out on Fandual TV and on our YouTube. Thanks, guys. Love you. Yeah, this is the, it's.

It's crazy. Jefferson. Justin Jefferson of the, do we get to the end of the year? And we all go, oh, why are we so stupid? Nope. Probably. Probably. Well, look, Jason's all none. The fact that Jefferson can be in this show and be in this discussion and not have it be, you know, like a goofy pick. You know what I mean? Like you're just taking the top guy off the board. Like Jefferson needed to be brought up. It's the great debate. I mean, there are, what's happening right now is he's not going very high relative to previous seasons and when you take him, you feel like, uh, like, yes, yes. Okay, I settled for the best receiver in the national football. I took him on our mock draft yesterday and I didn't feel great about it. I would have rather have had a J. Brown who has a good quarterback.

You know, any one of the other top guys. But I think we've got him appropriately placed in the sense. Like, I've got him down for 1,600 yards. I'm not anti-justin Jefferson. I just think he's going to end up with six touchdowns. And if that's the case, a back, or really not even at the end of the first round, like he's sometimes going as the fourth wide receiver off the board in the middle of the first round. It's going to be tough to be happy with that. If you. if you end the season with six touchdowns. And so that's the real question is just can Darnold throw enough touchdowns? Yeah. And he will be positioned to and given the opportunity in the offense to see what he's got. And you made both cases on her show, Jason. And so there is a case. Do you believe in the Vikings offensive play calling? Yes. I do too. And I believe in myself.

And if I were the play caller and I'm down at the 10, if I'm down at the 5, if I'm down at the 15. If you're on the football field. I am, yes. Regardless of the hash mark. Do we have the ball? No, my point is when we get to a condensed defense, I'm going to focus on running the ball and not put it in Sam Donald's hands. Oh. I thought we were saying the same thing of if we're on the football field. Yeah, but you're not going to be able to do that because Aaron Jones is over the hill.

I don't think so. And you're down four scores. That's true. So we'll find out. We're going to take a break and come back with each of our MVP picks to finish up the show. All right. Last year's fantasy MVP picks, Jason mentioned it. He had Bijan on this episode. I went with Debo, who he had a good season, ended up in the top 12. Mike had Zay Flowers, which it was really good that first. part of the year for Zay Flowers. He was a difference maker for your team. And championship week. And championship week. It did help. I don't think. I needed to refresh my memory, though, on who he picked. I couldn't remember. I don't think there's a chance that either myself or Mike can go first. Andy has been looking forward to this show because he has been excited to talk about this player. I just felt like he was, he was a player that I was, he was on the board as a my guy for a long time.

And unfortunately, the My Guy episode kind of lined up with an injury to his quarterback. And it gave me the hebi-jeebies. Okay, it got me a little bit nervous that I was going to pick a player with dependency on a currently injured player. Like you're going to, like Waddle. Like a player who has an undisclosed injury for two weeks? Mike's super happy about that. We're at three weeks now. Well, it's finally disclosed. Oh, okay. All right. Now he's got a disclosed injury. How happy will you be when he runs out onto the field on play one with a red jersey on them? Can you do that? He's going to try. Of course. He's Jalen Waddle. He needs that. My fantasy MVP for 2024 is none other than Cooper Cup wide receiver for the Los Angeles Rams. Cooper Cup of coffee.

Cooper Cup, I have taken everywhere in all my drafts. Even in the listener league, a round ahead of Devante Adams because I was afraid of not getting him. In our League of Record, I just did a mock draft of our League of Record, Keeper League. I had him mocked going to you in the first round at Pick 9. And I'm telling you right now, look at me in the eyes. He's not getting to you. Sorry. What are you? Yeah, what is going on? You control one team, Jason. I control a pick right before you, and Cooper Cup is not. You have picked five. And he's not getting to you. So that, I mean, for the record, then that's Jason. He's going to take him over Pacheco. I know that's good to know. You get one pick, Jay. You get one in that draft. I'm talking to our entire league right now. I know you are. Don't let him, don't let him get there. What are you doing? I'm just saying, I think Cooper Cup is going to be really good this year.

I shared on our live show in Los Angeles that I believe the Rams will win the West. I think the 49ers, albeit they made the move. They got Brandon Ayuk. I think it's hard. It's very difficult to just maintain that kind of dominance year after year after year. And Sean McVeigh is a crafty fella. And I love what this team has on offense. I believe that Puka and Cup can both finish his top 10 wide receivers. and the value you get on Cooper Cup right now, it's outstanding. There were areas last year where Cooper Cup already edged out Puka Nakua despite the injuries in the limited season. That was in the slot. He had more receiving yards, touchdowns, yards after catch, higher targets share than Puka in the slot. And also inside the red zone. He had more targets, more receptions, more touchdowns, higher percentage of first reads. We've had the report this offseason. This offense runs through Cooper Cup, and it still does.

Puka did amazing things last year, but none of them were in replacement of what Cooper Cup does from a game planning standpoint. There were in replacement while he was hurt, but this is Sean McVeigh. He's not a fool. He's not going to go and discount the former number one overall player who broke a ton of records just because he missed some time. To me, it's about the pick and the value, obviously, with Cooper Cup. You can sneak him into the fourth round. That's the storyline. He is ranked above his ADP by all three of us. And I think we get back to, you know, a very high value fantasy option at fantasy MVP at a discount price. That's what makes an MVP to me. A lot of it has to do with the draft cost. So Cooper Cups my fantasy MVP for 2024. All right, Jay, you're up. I'm up. Look, this is a guy.

I talked about the opening of the show. My MVP this season is not someone I think is going to break fantasy. I think he's just going to help your roster construction better than just about any other player in the draft. I think there are three guys in the draft this year that at value roster construction wise are unbelievable. Two of them are my guys. It's Mike's Kyler Murray. It's Andy's Jaden Daniels. And now my MVP, Dalton Kincaid. Dalton Kincaid is going to allow you to have an elite tight end this season and depth at running back and wide receiver. Like we all want a great quarterback. We all want a great tight end. But when you have to take him in the second or the third round, I look at Travis Kelsey, I just pulled up his ADP right now. And as of this moment, right before him is Devon A. Chan, one of my guys, right after him is Isaiah Pacheco.

I want those players. I want those running backs. And if you're telling me that the gap between Travis Kelsey and Dalton Kincaid is the same as the gap between, you know, these top flight running backs and a fifth round, let me look at a running back that's going there. DeAndre Swift, no, it's not the same. Kincaid has a chance to be the number one tight end this season. He's connected to Josh Allen and his usual 4,400 passing yards. Who's it going to? I have him down as the target leader for this team. Dalton Kincaid is really, really talented. Because of Sam Laporta, Sam Laporta is the reason that Dalton Kincaid is undervalued. Because you didn't realize what a great rookie season Dalton Kincaid had. For fantasy, not great, which is why I'm always like rookie tight ends don't work. But for rookie seasons, it was really good. He had the fourth most receptions ever for a rookie. And then Gabe Davis leaves.

The wide receiver one for this team. And then Stefan Diggs leaves, the wide receiver two for this team. That's stupid. I was trying it on for size. It doesn't make no way. It doesn't make any sense. But he had seven top finishes as a rookie Dalton Kincaid did. That's as many as Jake Ferguson or Trey McBride had last year. I project him to be the number one target earner in the Buffalo offense. I have him down for 133 targets. 93 receptions, over 1,000 yards, and only six touchdowns. If he ends up with eight or nine touchdowns as a tight in for Josh Allen, he can be the, you know, the number one tight in, regardless of if he's the number one or if he finishes the number five tight end. From a fantasy perspective, week after week after week, you're locked, you're loaded, you're good. You're going to get enough targets, enough yards to be happy with him at the 5th.