Fantasy Football - Too Hot to Handle! + Risk vs Reward - Podcast for 7/1

Welcome to the fantasy footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Welcome in. The fantasy footballers, it is July 1st, Jason Moore, Andy Holloway, and a cardboard bear extraordinaire. Jay Gris in the building today. No, Mike. It's a weird welcome. It's a weird. show because we haven't been here for a while that's right we uh but it doesn't seem that way to you right we's magic we we pre-recorded some episodes and we all uh took our annual summer family vacations and we try to do it at the same time so that no one misses a show right because we pre-record them together that's we leave at the same time we all come back yep boom bam boom bam i mean 10 Sundays till football 10 Sundays

until football. So we're getting getting the family time in pre-recorded a couple episodes. We had a mock draft show. We had an AMA show. Everybody survived the flights back from where they were. And then you're completely upside down time wise because you went overseas for the first time in your life. That's right. I woke up at 3 this morning. Yeah. And we thought we were good. And then we got word this morning that Mike. met his demise with somebody in the plane gave him something. So we'll see if he's back later this week. But we've got a great show ahead. Just the two of us and the cardboard bear, Jason. So lots going on. I mean, even on the drive into work today, we got more NFL news, almost like a punctuation mark at the end of the Steelers, Dolphins news of the weekend. It felt less like a punctuation mark and more like a punchline.

Like it felt like a joke to me. It really is. He's back. Who would have thought Darren Waller would be back in the NFL? We're all wondering, you know, the rumors are the dolphins are looking to trade for a tight end to replace John Hussmith. We'll get to all this in the news. But as we look, oh, is it going to be Kyle Pitts? Oh, is it going to be Michael Mayer? It's like, what about the guy who retired a couple years ago? Yeah, we'll have to update the graphics there. He's going to have a New Jersey on. But yeah, we'll talk about that momentarily. One of the big announcements that we want to make, because it is July 1st, it means a couple of things. One, we are moving to three shows a week. There will not be a show on Saturday this week, July 4th, the day before.

Fourth of July weekend, there won't be a Saturday show, but then it will be three shows a week for the rest of July, and we move to five shows a week starting in August through December and the end of the NFL season. So we are almost there. This is one of the reasons why we snuck out of town for a minute. July being here means that the draft analyzer has launched. Yes. So all of you that have the UDK Plus, or if you're an ultimate foot plan member. You already have the tool if you've done any drafts or even if you do a mock draft or if you've got a Dynasty League and you just want to check on your roster, you can import or manually put them in across many platforms and get your grade. Now this year we're grading the entire league. So that was really cool to see in our Dynasty League. How bad your team was, Andy? Oh, it's as bad as it gets. You tore it down to the nubs for a rebuild. But I love that we've never had the tool to compare the whole league.

Was that right? Al, am I an F minus? You are an F. I don't know if it was minus or not. Oh, you threw the mind. I mean, it should be an F minus. Yeah, I mean, it's on purpose. So you can't feel bad about it. I actually feel better about it. Not like I did it right. I stand corrected. You have a D. You're the only one in the league with a D, but you do have the D. Yeah. Okay. Well, no, this is a new feature. And what's cool is it breaks down not only the grades of your opponents in your league, but it also breaks down their position grouping. So it's a really unique tool.

in addition to the draft analyzer that allows you to target teams for trades. So, you know, a lot of dynasty teams will get plugged in right now because those drafts have happened and rookie drafts have happened. And then later through August, you'll plug your redraft teams in there. And then you can identify weaknesses on your opponents, which is brand new this year. And you can make trades based on that. We're working on some in-season trade tools. We're just trying to make the products better. I mean, that's the TLDR of it all. Everything's always updated. If you want our help throughout the season and in draft season, get the ultimate draft kit at ultimate draft kit.com. I mean, I was changing stats at 36,000 feet because John Hussmith got traded. I wasn't going to wait around. I thought it was 37,000. You were only flying at 36? Yeah. Sorry. It was, you know, and they were showing it in meters. Ridiculous.

Did they change two feet like halfway over the ocean? How does that work? I think you get back to your home style. British Airlines on the way back. So the whole thing was better. And you did have a good time on the trip despite the waking up at random hours. Despite the time zone change and Parisians, we had a great trip. In general. I heard it was very hot in Paris, which was not the break you wanted from Arizona. It was brutal. But it was a great trip. It was a great trick. All right. Well, we have a lot of news to talk about. We also have a fun segment today called Too Hot to Handle. We'll be talking about some players whose average draft position might be a little too steep, but we'll discuss whether we agree. And a couple other reminders. You can watch the show on YouTube. YouTube.com slash the fantasy footballers. Now is the time to subscribe. Click the bell. Make sure you catch our live events, including Sunday Live every single week of the year.

where the hitman himself or one of us will be with you in the morning getting you ready for your matchups and start sit decisions decisions uh and make sure you follow on spotify and apple right now drop us a review we would really appreciate it it helps the show out let's jump right into that uh wild news news and notes from around the league what we thought it could happen and there were rumors and arthur smith has has an infatuation for somebody, and his name is Johnny Smith. John who Smith was traded after a career best year in Miami. A lot of implications from this move, but he goes to Pittsburgh along with Jalen Ramsey and a seventh round pick. And then they signed John who do a one-year deal, which, I mean, we can talk about Pittsburgh in general.

Pittsburgh seems like one year is really a good descriptor of their strategy right now. Yeah. With Aaron Rogers, Jalen Ramsey at his age, older than Minka Fitzpatrick, and then Johnny Smith on a one-year deal. I'm very curious your reaction to this. I know you like Tomlin. Pittsburgh is weird. Yeah, I mean, they are obviously going for it. They believe they're in a win now mode. And obviously, if you've got Aaron Rogers. That is, if you make the decision to grab Aaron Rogers and put him at the head of your franchise, you need to do exactly what they're doing. You need to say, okay, this is our window is a year. So how do we have the best team now? And if we need to tear it down and rebuild after Aaron Rogers is gone, then that's what we'll have to do. So I don't blame them for any of these moves. I think for fantasy football purposes, the Jono Smith trade is pretty massive. Like it had a larger effect. A lot of times,

People change teams, a trade happens, a free agent signing, and very little changes. But here, Jonu Smith went from My Titan 4, who on, you know, last week, I was super excited to draft him. Yeah, it feels like one got deleted. Yeah, he's deleted. He's done. Pat Friermuth is deleted. He's done. They're going to cannibalize each other. On the dolphin side, though. The fantasy football porpoises side. Yeah, they, I mean, there was, John who was a real, real problem. in his target market share for Tyree Kill, for Jalen Waddle. And then Devon A-Chan has more room. That's the area of the field where it was like it was all Janu and A-chan with those short dink of dunks. So those three all get a bump up. And now obviously we've got to factor in the walrus showing up. But I don't personally think that the walrus is going to have a massive impact. I don't think he's going to have a 20% target share like John H.

at 33 years old coming off of retirement when he didn't look good last time we saw him. I tend to agree. I mean, he'll make an impact in the red zone most likely, but from a total reception standpoint, it won't be close to what John who did. I'll go back to the Steelers. We'll just talk about that for a second. I think right now we know how devoid of past catching options they are at wide receiver. You can say you like Calvin Austin. He's a role player. D.K. McCaff is their guy. But now you're looking at a lot of 12 personnel. I mean, that, and a lot of the running game balance. I mean, I think, you know, you look at them, they can run Friermouth and Johnny Smith out there. Johnny Smith will do a bunch of different things in the offense the way he did with Arthur Smith in Tennessee and Arthur Smith in Atlanta. And we kept wondering in Atlanta why Arthur Smith was giving Johnny Smith a bunch of work and Kyle Pitts was nothing.

Now we kind of understand we saw Johnny Smith's impact. Because John is better. Yeah, he's a better player. And he's more versatile. He does more things. You can throw him the ball behind the line of scrimmage. You can hand him the football. He can play a fullback. So Arthur Smith will do a lot with them. And it's kind of a weird situation for fantasy players because, look, I'm confident in D.K. Metcalf. I think he's a great value in drafts right now. But now look beyond that. You just deleted both tight-in. Both of those tight ends seem like they're not going to be week-to-week starts. You also have a running back situation. You like Caleb Johnson. I like Caleb Johnson. But it's still an enigma right now. It's still a question mark. You have Jalen Warren. Well, you hope that the 12 personnel, like he will run, Arthur Smith runs two tight ends far more, far more than anyone else in the league. By the way, they have three good ones. Right. They're a Washington too. Yeah, a great.

sixth offensive lineman in, in Washington. So I think this is good news for Caleb Johnson. But it's just the second pass catcher on this team, which I thought Pat Fryermuth had a had an avenue to get Luth, the Muth. And that just seems gone because they're both going to have enough opportunities from game to game. But you can't, I don't think we'll have any kind of predictability where we can decide, I want to start. Pat Fryomew this week, or I want to start Johnny Smith. I can't imagine either of them have such a stranglehold over the target pecking order. So it just feels like two players that got deleted. And they, we know the evidence of Arthur Smith. They're not going to throw the ball as much as we want them to. No. They won't. So, I mean, that's just going to be, it's just interesting. I mean, the Steelers, they still have to figure out T.J. Watt.

I mean, that's still something hanging out over the team. And then the Dolphins, the initial reaction for me was consolidation of targets. You know, Tyree K. L. Jalen Wattle, Devon A. Chan, all get a bump. I loved A. Chan already. It's kind of a little bit, maybe unfortunate, ADP-wise, because I think he will rock it up. But you and I, we made our adjustments. We got him at three and four. Yeah, I was really surprised that he ended up at three for me, but I. I look at the area of the field and the quick targets, the two alikes and the personnel of who that could go to. And so I don't know once I put in Darren Waller, that news just broke this morning. So I have not yet updated the stats. Maybe that pushes A Chan back to running back four. But I mean, he is, he is very, very high. And if you look at top tier. Yeah, top tier with the amount of targets that are coming his way. If you look at the dolphins in 2023 versus the dolphins in 2024, you can see like,

Just look at the wide receivers and tight ends in their target shares. In 2023, before John O'Smith, 68% of the targets went to wide receivers and only 9% went to tight ends. They were not throwing the ball to the tight end position much. They didn't have a tight end of note. And then last year, it dropped from 68% to wide receivers all the way down to 50%, which is terrible. Tight-ins, 9% went all the way up to 27%. It was really frustrating last year. If you remember, we were watching these games just being like, stop throwing it to Janu. He's fine. He's good for tight-in. But it was like, get the ball to Tyree Kilt. Get the ball to Jalen Waddlemore. Those are bigger plays. So, you know, hopefully this is good for fantasy football and those three more important players than Johnny Smith. Yeah, and people want to talk about Malik Washington, who will have an opportunity. But you got to remember, they also added nine.

touchdown Nick Westbrook Aquine from Tennessee who will have time on the field it won't just be Malik Washington so now you have Waller in the mix and so it's hard to really project a huge breakout I think from Malik me personally I don't project that but it's it's within the realm of possibility and then they they go and pick up Darren Waller Waller I see as just I mean we don't have them stated yet we just got this news but probably tight-end 13 to 20 something in that range. I mean, where do you? No, that'll probably be where he lands. If I had to throw a number, I would have said like Titan 16. Yeah. But genuinely, once you're tight in seven, you're irrelevant. Right. Yeah, no, it's just. You're not making a fantasy impact winning, you know, you're streaming the position at that point. All right. So that's the initial breakdown on all those moves. And all of that will be updated in the ultimate draft kit. All our stat projections have been updated outside of.

Waller, which we'll do shortly after this episode. A couple other news blurbs. Adam Schefter said there's quite a gap between the commanders and Terry McClorin. Not surprised there. His age combined with the production, he's going to think more of his season than they probably will. Yeah, I am surprised simply due to the fact that he's such a core locker room. You know, like the leader of the team, I'm surprised that it's not getting a deal done. It shouldn't be surprising. They should not be giving Terry McLaurin a massive contract at his age just because he had a bunch of touchdowns last year. So obviously there's something's got to get figured out there. Yeah, I wonder if this will be a lot of smoke and McLaren will show up or, you know, they can't sign him to a long term. No, that's what I was going to say. They need to give him a big money, one year extension. Move some money. Or make it like a two year deal or do one of the.

fake three-year deals where there's like no money in the third year and it's really a two-year deal. Yeah. It can sound good on paper. But then, you know, you've got a rookie quarterback. Like Sutton once. Probably the same thing they need to do with Sutton and Denver. Sean Payton, speaking of Denver, too early to project the running back depth chart. This was discussions around J.K. Dobbins. We got RJ Harvey. So it'll be really interesting. I'm starting to think J.K. Dobbins might be one of the best. picks in fantasy. That's gross, though. It is, but he is, he's not going to be drafted until double digit rounds. And I think that if you look at everybody being drafted and I don't know where he is right now. It's got to be low. It's got to be in the 12th, 13th round. There's not running backs who have a chance. So yeah, he's running back 43 in the 12th round right now. Yeah, it's worth a. There's a chance he's the starter. There's the chance that he is.

you know the main fantasy scorer this year over rj harvey you're not wrong it's just it's not fun because fun if he's the star it's yeah if you have him sure but it's one of those things that the process for that to be true i think is annoying to fancy players because it means that rj harvey's not what they wanted him to be and so it's going to be sure he would be a bust Yeah, no, that's fair. And I will say that usually the fantasy community over the last five years, we get it right more often than not. The running back who is the first one drafted is usually going to be the start of that. It will obviously be RJ Harvey. Right now he's going in the sixth round, running back 24. And he is the more explosive player at this stage of their careers.

All right. Other than that, we had a small report. Actually, I saw multiple reports of this. And this is important. Going back and forth, actually. Oh, really? There was a report earlier that Kenny Pickett had the lead in a Cleveland job. Snips, snap, snip, snap. But then it later came out, Cameron Wolf, at least reporting that Joe Flacco is the favorite to land the starting job. Fantasy players want Joe Flacco? Yeah. The Browns might not want that. Might not be the best thing for their future. Kevin. Kevin, listen up. I was looking in our studio to see if there was a Kevin in here. No, Stefanski is not in here, but he's listening. Kevin, obviously. Just, just put Joe behind center, okay? Just put Joe, get rid of Kenny Pickett. He's not, he's not going to be your future. He's not going to be your present. Let Joe Flacco air it out. Give us Jerry Judy. Give us David Nogoku. Give us some great. Cedric Tillman. Oh, yeah. Cedric Tillman. And then develop Shador Sanders. Like that's, that's, that's.

We're done here. Kevin, just obey. So just cut picket. Yes, get rid of him. Okay. You traded like a fifth for him. That was probably compelling enough for him to make a change. Yeah, I'd like to see Flacco. And look, every team in the NFL has a shot. With that defense? Who knows? You can win games with that defense and Joe Flacco? You can't win that. You can't win with Kenny Pickett. I don't think. I don't think you can. But I can't wait to hear in our comments the people that believe that you can. All right, we'll take a break and we'll get into too hot to handle. All right, it's time to take an in-depth look at where players are falling in average draft position and whether we think you're going to have to stay away. Hot to handle. All right, we're going to talk about some players, Jason, that are looking maybe too hot to handle at their current average draft positions, although I don't know if we'll agree on every single one of them. I hope we don't talk through some players. The opportunity cost is what we're talking about.

ADP is so important for fantasy players to, you know, everybody wants to draft and get value. And if you draft the player at their ceiling, they have to perform up to that ceiling for them to be worthy of the draft pick. And it can be very, very difficult for that to happen. Look no further than a few years ago, Baker Mayfield with Landry and Beckham, looked at C.J. Stroud last year. You draft the player at a certain. point in your fantasy draft and you put you put yourself in the position where you're locked in with them and it can hurt you so we'll we'll talk through it these are basically bust picks these are these are they now yeah you don't want to piss away these picks you know what I mean yeah no well done but this is it's it is the opportunity cost if jk. Dobbins is gonna jk. Dobbins can't be a bust it's impossible to be a bust in the 12th round correct so this is more not a piss poor pick

Exactly. Yeah. This is more about, should they be going where they're going? So let's start here at the tippy top of the quarterback position because Jaden Daniels is being drafted higher than any other sophomore quarterback in fantasy football history. So that statement alone. It reminds me a lot of Marvin Harrison last year being drafted higher than any rookie wide receiver in the history of fantasy football. 305 as the quarterback three right now. Jaden Daniels did not finish as the quarterback three. He was the quarterback five last year. He had 148 rushing attempts. That's the seventh most all time for a quarterback. And I see her head kind of... This is so hard, man. Dive down. I don't think it would be wise. This is my personal opinion. I don't think it's wise to draw the connection between Jaden Daniels and C.J. Straub.

I think that would be a mistake. For fantasy purposes, they play so wildly different. CJ Stroud, not a great mobile, you know, running quarterback. For fantasy, Jaden Daniels has a superpower. And so I think the only correlation there between Stroud and Daniels is simply the group think of year two always gets better. That doesn't always happen. Year two is not always better. You've talked about the schedule. For Washington. I've talked about the fact that there's headroom, obviously, in the passing touchdown department. He only threw, I mean, only, I mean, it's a lot, 25. But it's, there's room there, 3500 passing yards. There's room there. It would come probably at the expense of the 891 rushing yards if he threw the ball more. But he scored six times on the ground, 25 passing, so 31 total touchdowns. It does not always get better. The question here is,

Will you be disappointed with Jaden Daniels drafting him in the third round, which is behind two other quarterbacks? So you're not taking him as the first quarterback overall, obviously. But, you know, are you going to be disappointed with the opportunity cost of Jaden Daniels when there are other players on the board? You know, in our mock draft, Jalen Hertz went much later. I took Joe Burrow much later. You have players like Baker much later in the draft, six round. And then you have other position players like Kyron Williams going around that spot, Chase Brown going around that spot, Garrett Wilson. Like it is not a non, it is very consequential to make that decision. Yeah, this is going to cost you a lot and you're calling your shot for an upgrade. If he does what he did last year, which he was a, he was a consistency score of an A. He helped people win championships and that, you know, you know.

how good he was, but he helped you win championships because he was a later round pick. So you already had your stable of running backs and wide receivers solidified. The question is if he were to do what he did last year again, which I think is a very fair baseline to start from. Some things are going to get harder for him with a year of tape and a much more difficult schedule in year two. Yeah, so if he did what he did last year, are you happy? at 305. I think you're not crushed. I think you're okay, but I don't think you're happy. I don't think if he does what he did last year, finishes as the quarterback five, and you're drafting him in the third round as the quarterback three. No, I don't think you're, I don't think you won the championship. Okay, that's a good way to put it. At the end of the year, I don't think that that pick helped you win the championship. The question is, for this to be good, is Jane Daniels truly that dude where he can go out there and throw for 4,000?

rush for 800, throw for 30 plus touchdowns. I do think he could do that. I do not think it is probable that he will do that. But I do think that is within the realm of outcomes or the range of outcomes. Where do you have, do you know where you have him, right, you've got him at quarterback four? Yeah, and I was going to say I would feel really cozy with him in the fourth round. Because I, grabbing three more names ahead of him in the draft and then going to Jaden Daniels. Like I guess that's a way of saying I think he is a little bit too hot to handle and I we had the show the underrated overrated I was on I was the only side of underrated for the Washington offense you two both went overrated yeah on Washington I have him projected for 4,000 passing yards because his passing attempts they went way up over the second half of the years he became more comfortable in the pocket and this this was an elite season I mean this was

borderline MVP type of year for Jaden Daniels as a rookie. But I do have him at four. And it really, again, it's a comparison of who you could take later. And I'd be very happy with Jalen Hertz. And I'd be very happy with Joe Burrow. And I'd be pretty happy with Baker Mayfield. And if because I'm happy with those other positions and I could stack up running back on wide receiver, I do think he leans towards too hot to handle. Yeah, I, um, I am fine with where he's going, but ironically, I would take Jalen Hertz over Jaden Daniels, like straight up if they both cost the same thing. The fact that Jalen Hertz is around later, and I compare him with one of his wide receivers I like more. Like if I'm building a stack, I don't really want the Jaden Daniels, Terry McLaren's stack as much as I would want the Jalen Hertz and either one of his main two wide receiver stack. So I lean on the two hot to handle. It makes sense, and that's not a...

It's not an insult to Jaden Daniels. It's a reaction to the reaction of the fantasy community and where he's going. I will say where he is going. There seems to be a break between players like ahead of him being drafted, Kyron Williams, T. Higgins, T. McBride. I see those guys is awesome. extreme difference makers. Behind Jaden Daniels, those players, there's Terry McLaren and James Cook and Brees Hall. And none of us are taking McLaren over Jaden. No. In the third. No. So I don't think he's going in a terrible spot. It's just a matter of what other quarterbacks you believe are better or worse than him. Speaking of other quarterbacks, it's actually interesting to bring this name up, but Jared Goff is the only quarterback to finish in the top 10 each of the last three years. And yet.

Eighth round, Jared Goff, top of the eighth round, is the highest he has ever been drafted. So his current price 802, lots of offseason discussion around the offense, does it take a step back, simply based on the law of averages, the fact that you can't keep doing what you're doing, and now you've lost your offensive coordinator. Sorry, he's one of three quarterbacks. to finish inside the top team each of the last three years. I misspoke. Alan Hertz and Goff. So the other two you're paying a really high price for. Jared Goff has always been sneaky good, sneaky good games, top tier performances, but not necessarily. He's the worst man. He's the worst. He's the worst. He's the worst pick. I can't fathom taking Jared Goff in. I can't fathom taking Jared golf in.