Fantasy Football Podcast 2015 - Top 10 WR, Sleepers, News, Mailbag

It's four points. Four points. Very astute. Thank you. Yeah, but I mean, if you think about it, it's not that way with running backs, right? We've got levying on Bell as, you know, a huge gap between him and, say, the number six guy. Tight-ins, give me a break. You got Gromk and the rest. Quarterbacks, where did Aaron Rogers go versus the number two versus the number three? But for us here, these top six, and in my opinion, the top nine wide receivers are really close together here. If you're in standard scoring, I think that when you go to PPR...

Antonio Brown sticks out. Yeah, so I'm going to say something here. Maybe the fantasy experts wouldn't want to be said. Don't do it. Which is, you know. Don't do it. These five or six receivers are, they're all cities inside of New York. They're all getting, they're all getting snow at the same time of year if I'm a weatherman in the sense that it's where the touchdowns are going to drop, right? Right. Because if they have the talent to put up those, I mean, unless you're talking the difference between PPR, right? And.

and a completely non-PPR league, in which case some of these gaps are going to be a lot bigger. You know, I'm going to be honest with you. I don't know if AJ Green or Alshone Jeffrey is going to have more, who's going to have more touchdowns? Yeah. I know where their talent is. I know what, you know, and as the season gets closer, I mean, we don't even have schedules yet. You know, as we start seeing... I don't need them. Well, okay. But if we start... As the year goes on, you're going to start seeing matchups and things like that. But right now...

Yeah, every single one of these top guys have put up double-digit touchdowns. They're capable of it. You just don't know how it's going to fall through the 16 games. Absolutely. All 10 of them. So let's move on from A.J. Green. Let's move on to number six. I got to be honest. I just talked to this guy. And he called me before. He's embarrassed to be here. I heard you guys, your friendship was blossoming. Yeah. Like a blooming onion. Number six. But for you guys, your consensus number six is...

Megatron, Calvin Johnson at number six, fading because of injury? What is this? He's embarrassed to be here and he wants me to represent him on this debate here. I will say this to help your pride and your ego, Mr. Tron. Well, you have him at five. Yeah, he's still on my top five. Jason has him at eight, so I don't even know. To me, it's not so much that it's not really the waning talents of Calvin Johnson.

Other guys are getting better. You had your run of being the best wide receiver in the league. New guys come in every year. I hate to break the news to you, and those guys eventually become the new superstars of the league. Andre Johnson and Larry Fitzgerald aren't the number one and two anymore. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny you bring up Andre Johnson because I was looking at him and his finishes before to have a comparison for Alvin.

Alvin Johnson? Alvin Simon and Theodore. No, I thought maybe Alvin Johnson is appropriate at 6, but not Calvin. Of how Andre Johnson had his second and his first. And then he hung on. He was still a top 10 guy, but the wheels seemed to be coming off. We kind of like him a little bit more this year. But was that happening for Calvin Johnson? That's what I... Pop quiz. How old is Calvin Johnson? 29 years old. We both know. We've done our research. So I had to take a soul-searching look at...

Was that actually happening to Calvin Johnson? Because of the three of us, I've probably been the most outspoken of fading Calvin Johnson. But I took out his two quasi-injured games where he was just the machine. He only played 13 on the field. Right. So he had 13 total. And then you took two out. Correct. Because I'm not those games. Yeah, he didn't even put up. He just was there. He was the catching machine.

So those 11 games, he was on a 182 target base. 182 target base? Yeah. So that would have been his second highest in his career. Yeah, so he was still doing all right. Old snapback was still throwing the ball to him. So you don't have any doubt that he could be that number one guy again. It's just a matter of these other guys are in that echelon now. Yes. So where's your tier breakdown? Out of curiosity. Oh, let me pull it up real quick. So I have...

I'm on Jason's rankings. That's not going to help anybody. That's just making it better, Mike. So Calvin is in my second tier. He is? Yes. So you have, okay, so these other guys that we're going to go through are higher. So Jason, do you have anything to add? Yeah. You have...

Calvin retiring this year, is that correct? No, I mean, I answered a listener question earlier, you know, can Calvin finish number one? Absolutely. Calvin Johnson can finish number one. Here is what I think is important to remember, is that we view Calvin Johnson from his year where he was so much more dominant than everyone else, and we can't seem... Years.

To let go of it. No, there was one year. No, there was not one year. There was 2011, 16 touchdown, 1681 yards. The next year, I almost broke the wide receiver yard record. 205 targets, 122 receptions in 2000. That's why. 200 plus targets.

That's outrageous. That is outrageous. Truly, truly. The receptions are really one of the reasons why. When I look at the guys that are ahead of them and I look at their floor versus Calvin Johnson, who, you know, again, we can't just say, well, you know, I know he was injured three games and then two games that he was on the field playing. He was still kind of injured. But let's, you know, he's going to be totally healthy and play 16 games this year. We can't just like ignore those things.

But if you look at most of the guys, everybody that I have ranked above them, they're all 100 reception type.

players. And so while Calvin has had a year where he got 122, you know, the last two years was 84 receptions and 71 receptions, and he started his career, you know, 48, 78, 67, 77. He's not a career 100 reception type of guy. And so I just think with the lions wanting to go a more run, and also I really feel the need to defend myself and my love for Calvin Johnson.

here because I'm sounding like I'm sour on him. I've got him ranked sixth or seventh. I think he can finish first. I would love to have him as my number one wide receiver, but there are guys that I would rather have above them because of their baseline with more receptions and better offenses that I like. Yeah, the point of throwing less, Jim Caldwell has said he wants to throw less. Whether or not they do, that just remains to be seen, but it's out there.

Other than last year when he was injured, he finished third the year before and first and first. So I'm going to keep him in that top three myself. You'll see that when my rankings come out. But fair points. You can't hold on to greatness forever, I guess. So let's go ahead and get into our top five, consensus top five. Top five. Two of these guys are under the franchise tag. So there's a little hint for you. Number five is the first of those guys. Des Bryant. Desmond.

We were a little worried about that tape. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Did you hear about the tape? We just got rid of that thing. Oh, no, don't bring it back up. That thing is in Area 51, buried with all the secrets of the aliens. Man. So, Des Bryant escapes the tape. Stop talking about the tape. There's no, there is no tape. There is no spoon. Oh, my goodness. So, Des is six for Mike. Des is five for Jason.

I think he's going to be right around there for me. So Des at number five, can you go wrong with Des Bryant? No, because he's a touchdown machine. And that's why when I first did my stats, he was almost at number one. I adjusted his touchdowns a little bit. But again, all of these top guys, all of these top guys for my standard scoring are...

Four points apart. So it's pretty much like a six-place tie for first place. Six-place tie for first place? Is that how you would say that? It's not words. Des Bryant, you both have them at 12 touchdowns. And that's not unexpected. I mean, it's not out of ordinary. His last three years were 12 touchdowns, 13 touchdowns, and 16 touchdowns. That's the Marshawn Lynch of the wide receiving world right there. Yeah. So I think giving him 12 is...

should be expected. And so that's one of those things kind of like how you brought up. The guy who's going to finish first is going to get, you know, a lot of touchdowns. That's the thing we can't predict, but we can predict that Des Bryant's going to get a lot of touchdowns. Yeah, so he's a lock for that top five. Is there anything that basically takes this year and is there anything that can knock them off this perch? Other than injury? Yeah. No, I don't see it going. I think DeMarco Murray leaving helps him.

If anything. All right, let's move on then. Oh, you want to, no, go for it. You got a second. I just had one little bit. We're making good time today. That I thought was an interesting piece of information because he essentially, he averages 90, 1,300. In 2013, though, he had 159 targets and finished with 1,200 yards. In 2012, only 128 finished with more yards. About 150 more yards. Quality. Quality.

Last year, 136 targets. So he's, it may be it's an outlier, but it's shown that, I think the Cowboys have shown that Romo needs to be about that quality and not quantity, just dumping everything at him. Des is a big play guy. Yes. He's a lot like Jordy Nelson in the sense that he can be kind of gone for most of the game and make one or two catches that just change your fantasy game and change the real Cowboys season. So Des Bryant are number five.

Not a lot of surprises there. You're going to be in good shape if you end up with him in the draft. Let's, uh, let me jump back here for a second before we get to our top four. Jason, I'm looking at your rankings here. I gave Mike the chance to talk about Jordan Matthews and his love affair with Jordan Matthews. You want me to run that back? No, no, that's cool, bro. That's cool. But I see something on your list here. You got Vincent Jackson ahead of Mike Evans is here. You want to give me some, give the intel. Tell me how is this going to happen?

Well, we kind of talked about this last podcast about the fact that rookie quarterbacks coming in, historically speaking, especially in recent history in the modern NFL, rookie quarterbacks coming in target their veterans when they have a stud veteran and a stud young guy, they generally speaking.

Target the veteran. Vincent Jackson had a fantastic year last year. He beat Mike Evans and targets last year already. He had very similar stats other than the touchdowns. And Vincent Jackson has always been a touchdown machine. He's always been, you know, 9, 8, 9, 7 high touchdowns. And what did he have last year? Like two? Yes.

Yeah, two touchdowns. That is the outlier. So I think with James Winston coming in, I think their offense is going to be improved over Josh McCown, even if James Winston is not quite there yet. And I think that next year, I mean, if this obviously, if there's a keeper league, if this is a Dynasty League, I mean, Mike Evans is the better player. He's the young stud. Mike only. You can only take Mike's. Yeah, and the Beast. But.

Vincent Jackson, I think this next year, is going to finish ahead of Mike Evans, which clearly I'm not going to be drafting. I'm going to be drafting Vincent Jackson way later and probably bypassing. Maybe not now. Now that you spilled the beans. Yeah. But, yeah, I do think that at the end of the year. 140 targets last year. That surprised me for Vincent Jackson because he kind of fell off the fantasy radar. But that was the 11th most targets in the league. And unless my math is wrong, that's in the top 12.

Good man. 100% of the time. 100% of the time. And that was an outlying season. All that touchdowns. I feel like we need a drop for that. So number four on our wide receiver rankings. Let me run it back here. Randall Cobb at 10. Odell Beckham at 9. Alshon Jeffrey at 8. AJ Green at 7. Calvin Johnson at 6. Des Bryant at 5. And now. Your boy. White chocolate. Number 4. Jordy Nelson. We talked about him a little last week. Jordy Nelson at number 4. Anything we missed from the rundown?

No, I don't want to... He's pretty good. I don't want to say everything that I said last time, but he was third best of wide receivers with 75 plus catches with 50... Man, I cannot speak anymore. I'm just so excited to talk about Jordy Nelson. You are. 15 and a half yards per reception. A 146 targets. Fifth and yards after the catch. He's consistent. He...