Risk vs Reward, Love Letters, LIVE in Dallas

Because I'm talking about things that are actually repeatable. Of the wide receiver ones, he had the highest discrepancy between targets and fantasy finish. What we've been talking about lately, the metric. Yeah, lay that out. So there is a high correlation. Targets equal fantasy points. And you can spot regression either in a positive or negative way compared to their target finish and fantasy finish. He's being drafted at the 308, the wide receiver.

14. Here's the reward. Last season, he was the wide receiver 7. It didn't feel like it, but he was actually consistent. 53% as a wide receiver 1 or 2. That's better than AJ Green. That's better than my best friend, Larry Fitzgerald. It's better than Keenan Allen. That's better than Adam Thielen. That's better than Des Brian. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, what's the temperature here on DES right now? Is this a pro-des room? Yeah, what do we think about it? Do you miss him? We're riding a wave right now. Yeah, it went up, it went down. Now, I'm sure the saved by the bell riff, it went over very well with this crowd. So I know that you all remember Mortal Kombat. We all remember when you put in that cheat code, oh, I got that one button fatality.

That's what Tyreek Hill has. He has the equivalent, the one-play equivalence of winning your week. Of giving you an entire week's worth of fantasy points. His target to fantasy finish, what I just talked about, it was even crazier, his rookie year. So maybe he's just a guy who breaks that measuring technique. You cannot hold him down by efficiency metrics. So the reward is huge for Tyreek Hill.

But with the new quarterback and Sammy Watkins. Is he somebody that could be one of the bigger disappointments of things go wrong? If these risks outweigh the rewards? So wide receiver 14 off the draft board, wide receiver 7 finish. I'm going to have to peg him at 40. I don't want a 55 again. So I'm going to have to drop it to 44% that he gives you a positive return. Josh Gordon, Tyreek Hill.

Yeah, I think I'll take Hill there. Adam Thielen? Feeling. Yeah, my wife. So these are all back to back to back in PPR League. T.Y. Hilton and Tyreek Hill. How's Andrew Locke feeling? Does anyone know? Does anyone have his cell phone number? I'd like to talk to him. He's throwing full-size footballs? I don't know. Okay. Larry Fitzgerald or Tyreek Hill? Fits. Fits. All right, Stefan Diggs. Diggs. Come on now. Interesting. All right.

Jason, I want you to give me a special name. Well, I'm going to stay in Houston right now. Are you really?

I am. I'm fascinated. Last season, I said a lot in the offseason how fascinated I was with the Minnesota Vikings offense. They were the team that I wanted to see the most in preseason. Right now, I feel like that's the Houston Texans. They're the one that I want to see how Deshaun Watson's health is, you know, how Will Fuller is doing as I talked about, and this guy, who is a player that I absolutely loved last year. If you've listened for more than a year, you know that this was one of my favorite guys.

Deonta Foreman. That is correct from the crowd. Deontza Foreman, I think, is a... You didn't win anything, I'm sorry. Yes. A false sense of security is now yours. Deontza Foreman is a really talented player. This is my firm 100% belief, but the risk is high. You liked him before last year. Yes, I liked it before last year, and we saw him break off. You even liked him before the Achilles injury.

I liked him a little better before the Achilles injury. That's one of the largest risk factors. Now, you know, if come draft season, it's official that he's going to be on the pup. Obviously, the risk becomes less fearful. If you want him, take him at the very last round and then throw him on your IR. Otherwise, don't draft him. But as of right now, we're not sure if he's going to be ready for the start of the season. If he is, he could make some serious noise. However, let me lay out the risks. The Achilles injury...

is a serious injury. A lot's been made by Mike, by others in the past. Am I others? I wasn't pointing to you. Kobe. That running backs have not come back strong from the Achilles injury. This is both true and irrelevant because...

Tell me more. There are no good... Nostradamus. There's no good... Yes, Your Honor, I said it's true and irrelevant. Yeah, now what you got. I admitted it was true. Next... Next defense. New strategy. No, here's why it's irrelevant. Name me the best young running back who had an Achilles' tear. They didn't come back. McKellashore? Like...

Kindle Hunter? Like, there is no great young running back who had draft capital spending on him that didn't... Running backs are thrown away in the NFL. It didn't used to be cool. They don't need... We have examples. Demarius Thomas came back. He was just as explosive. It's not like you can't come back from this. In fact, a recent... I know there's articles out from, like, 2013 that are worried about running backs, but a very recent study showed that 73% of players in the NFL with the Achilles tendon...

repair, come back healthy, and there's not a big noticeable difference in performance and in games. Now, it is a little worse for running backs, but my point is, yeah, late in his career, Aryan Foster. So that's one problem. Obviously, we're in Texas. You guys know that the offensive line, a little bit of a problem, I would say, for Houston. And currently, he projects to be the backup. So there are...

you know, a lot of risk. So what is the reward? How good is he? Here is...

my outline of why I think he's good. His production in college and what he showed last year was incredible. Kevin Cole, formerly of RotoViz, used to have a running back model, a success rate model that was a statistical data analysis that compared different things and it would get an output number and it was extremely accurate. Anyone that ever scored over a 0.45

This is the list of all those players. It doesn't matter if they were a drafted high, drafted low. The only players that ever scored over a 0.45. Chris Johnson, Darren McFadden, Matt Forte. So three wins. Kevin Jones. No. Michael Turner was a win. J.J. Arrington. No. DeMarco Murray, great. Latavius Murray did it in the NFL. Ledani and Tomlinson. Richard Mindenhall. Reggie Bush. Adrian Peterson. Jonathan Stewart. And Larry Johnson. I mean, those are almost entirely...

Fantasy stars at some point. They were almost all running back ones, and Deontso Foreman scored a 0.53 in that, which put him as the eighth best. Then, when you watched last season, if you take out the games where he basically didn't play, I'm talking less than 3% snaps. Okay, he was on pace for 800. He was on pace for 812 all-purpose yards, okay, while averaging 25% snaps.

He barely played. He barely played, and he was very, very efficient. So Lamar Miller, who in the beginning of the year, was averaging 75 to 85% snaps through the whole season. Once they got to the end of the season, they're like, dude, this guy's not getting it done. They borderline benched him. Oh, they benched him. Yeah, I mean, he was getting less than 50% of snaps.

He got less than 30% of snaps. So if Deonta Foreman comes back healthy, I'm telling you, he has the talent to be a star. However... Doesn't it scary that 73% of people come back and play well? No, because of what I mentioned about... I mean, that's just... I know that that's still above 50? But if you talk about all players that got this injury, you're also... I just think it's scary for a young running back to undergo a serious injury. Yes, but the 100% number includes journeymen.

Sure. No, I understand. Where you get injured and you're just not going to get another contract. So the 73% number isn't as bad as you think. However, I'm going to handicap this. The more that I did a lot of research on this. You did not draft him in Scotty Fishbowl today. I did not. We had the opportunity. I bypassed and I told Mike, look, oh, here's a good opportunity. Oh! Because I know I'm going to get heat from this. It's the glasses. I know I'm going to get heat from this, but I don't care.

I'm back on Lamar Miller. I think Lamar Miller is a huge value. In the fifth round, in the fifth round, he's a value. Deal with it. Yeah, that's one of your best. He did set a new world record for uses of the word, however, in giving an argument. That's troubling. That's generally bad.

Yeah, Guinness, though, I would still like the certificate. Do we still have DeMarco Murray fans in the audience tonight? This is news that we didn't share yet, but DeMarco Murray announced that he was going to sign with five teams a couple days ago, and then he retired today. So the career of DeMarco Murray is over. That's weird. The advice to draft him as your last round of best ball did not age well. Yeah, the risk reward of DeMarco Murray is now firmly in the risk column, but he's not my name.

I'm going to go with the player DeMarco Murray chose to endorse for whatever that's worth. And that's Derek Henry. So Derek Henry, I think he is one of the most polarizing players because everybody wants him to be a superstar for years, right? We want him to be a star. We want to find a way to start him, and you don't have DeMarco there anymore. The wrists of Derek Henry in this office, and I've never been a giant...

Derek Henry fan is that he might not be good enough, right? This was somebody who made all of his fantasy fortune on end of the game runs. He's got the highest yards per carry in the fourth quarter, but first half of games, he's a 3.1 carry guy. So he might not be very good. He wears him down. Well, yeah, that's what they say, except for he's not a full-time back. Fourth worst percentage is football. He uses other people to wear down the team. What do you expect big guys to be able to do?

Answer that question. What do big guys do? In a yard per carry? No, what do big guys supposed to do on the field when you give them the ball? Score touchdowns. Score touchdowns. Where down the defense? Short yardage. Eat well. Fourth worst. On the field? Sure. I mean, Zix always like feed me. Blue 42. Okay. That was easy. Yeah, where are your cowboy Zubas, by the way? Seriously, I was, I was grief. That's disappointing. Grief to no end.

for my Minnesota pandering. Meanwhile, Houston Texan boy over here. We're just letting him off the hook. I'll be honest. Listen, listen, my geography, like, I know Houston's in Texas, obviously. He's claiming ignorance now. I have 100% claiming ignorance. I didn't think there would be Houston fans here. If I was pandering, I would have gone Dallas. I thought of anything, it would be like they would boo them. Anyways, continue. Yeah, all right. I'll move on. Look, the draft price is another problem with.

Derek Henry because everybody believes he's going to be great. He's a third round guy in standard leagues. Dionne Lewis is a sixth round guy. In every major category, Dionne Lewis was better than Derek Henry last year, including short-yarded situations. In fact, Derek Henry, fourth worst percentage in football on third and short. He converted third and short 40% of the time.

We've got some Derek Henry haters out there. Getting bodied in the first row. And so you've got to pay a draft price. Mike, do you want him more than Geis? No. Penny? No. Doug Baldwin? No. Tyreek Hill? Maybe no. Maybe. Ajaji. Maybe. A warmer. Yeah. Now the reward is that, look, he comes in like a wrecking ball and scores 10 touchdowns. Miley Cyrus, touchdown. Yeah. I don't think that nickname's going to stick.

But in two shorter years, 10 touchdowns. I mean, five a year from Derek Henry. And if they choose, see, coaches can be stubborn about this. They can go into the season and say, Dionne Lewis is going to be our third down guy and he's going to be our between the 20s guy. And Derek Henry is getting the ball inside the 20 no matter what. And inside the 20, he was actually okay in the red zone. So he's only stuffed six times in the red zone. So maybe he gets an extra red bull in his system.