The TRUTH: RBs Part 1 + Saquon Smash! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/23

He is, he takes the momentum and literally runs with it every single time. Like it, it becomes much more of a judgment call on the defender on whether they want to try to stop this guy with their whole heart. Yeah, the business decision. Yeah, so entering year two now for Derek Henry. And you had some hilarity of, like when you have running backs for Philadelphia or Buffalo. And they get in close, and you're like, oh, Josh Allen's going to steal my James Cook touchdown. I know he's going to do it. And it was, Lamar did steal touchdown, but because of play action. Like, it was the, it was not the, the read option. I mean, Lamar had four rushing touchdowns on the year. So it was just, if you had Henry, oh, man, that was the worst.

when you get into the goal line. You just knew. They're like, it was done. They're going to hit the play action because if I were calling a play, even if I have Derek Henry, I think I'm going with the play action here. Yeah, I mean, they didn't do it that much though. I mean, he had 10 rushing touchdowns inside the five. When they got down there, they said, hey, big guy, go go into the painted area. Yeah, 16, he was at 1921 yards. Sequel was at 2005 and 16 rushing touchdowns. It was outrageous. Number three. Bird of a different feather to some degree, right? Jamir Gibbs came in at number three in fantasy, number three in consistency. And in the first half and the second half, fourth and fourth. I mean, very consistent. It was wild because of all the players that you would think would have more inconsistency. You would think it would be a guy that was in a committee until the last three weeks of the season. 81% good games, never busted. 31% great games. I had Jamir Gibbs on our League of Record team throughout the entire year.

I'd go in, these games would start and you'd have a first quarter of no points. And it was all the time. It would be David Montgomery gets the first drive. He scores. And if the other team takes, you know, it's a three and out here for the Lions, look, the first quarter would end. And I'd be in the single digits, low single digits with Gibbs. And every game would turn out fine. And I had Montgomery on the other side. We won't talk about David Montgomery on today's episode. That'll be next one. But. Just spoiler. He was consistency ranked number seven. I mean, he was as consistent as it comes. I don't know how this team. And do you have fears with Ben Johnson leaving that the running game might change? Or do you have hopes that, you know, as the Gibbs manager, that Gibbs will be more involved than it will be less of this committee with a new offensive mindset? I think I would expect things as of right now to be very much the same. I think the identity.

the way that Dan Campbell wants to be winning football games is to hit people in the mouth and to use both of these guys that they have huge investments on. Like Montgomery got a big contract. Gibbs was a high draft capital top 12 pick, right? So I don't think it changes. What changes, the fear of change to me is because I think that the running back split is that's also part of Dan Campbell. Like I think he's going to be. telling the offensive coordinator, no, you, we were going to play both guys. The concern would be they were the highest scoring team in football. The highest scoring team of football is going to have a great fantasy running back kind of just regardless. And that's the, they were fifth, you know, two years ago. They jump up to first this year. Can the offense, whoever's designing things for Jared Goff.

Will it be as successful? Because if they drop back down to fifth, which being a top five scoring offense is great, you probably aren't getting this Jamir Gibbs. It'll still be great. If you drop down in scoring, it comes out of Montgomery's pocket, in my opinion. Okay. Because from an explanation, I mean, you were facing Jamir Gibbs in your title game in our dynasty league. Yes. And every time he gets given the ball, you're like, he can score. Yeah, I mean, he was number one in explosive runs. 10% of all carries went 15 plus yards. That's absurd. So one out of every 10 times you handed him the football. He got to the point where you were like, oh, he's gone. Now, you were not always right, but that was the case. 25 runs of 15 plus yards. That is the same as Saquan and Henry, despite getting fewer carries. He had 250 carries for 1,400 yards and 16 rushing touchdowns. That number, we'll see.

We'll see if that number can stay up there. But the fact you caught 52 passes, 517 receiving yards, four receiving touchdowns, that's a 20 touchdown year from this guy. Yeah, I mean, it was incredible. The thing that I think most managers wanted to see more of from Gibbs was the passing work. He was involved, but David Montgomery was involved as well. If you look at the end of the season when Monty went down, the last five games, that's what you wanted from Jemir Gibbs. The last five games, he was on pace for. 90 targets. He was used all the time in the passing game. And it was very effective. You know, 9.8 yards per reception on those plays. For running back, that's a great number. It's an easy checkdown to a first down when you've got Jemir Gibbs. So hopefully the new coordinator comes in and says, let's utilize him more in the passing. And they could stay in-house. They could end up staying in-house for that move.

They usually do. I mean, I do have fears a little bit of, you know, the Philadelphia Eagles. They were a great story, had such an awesome season, a great run to a Super Bowl. Their offense was outstanding. Their defense was great. And then they lost both coordinators. And they really did struggle. They hired internal in-house. They said, hey, next man up. And that didn't work last the season prior to this one. You know, they took a major step back. They had to replace both coordinators again with more proven commodities. So it's TBD for whether it just works for the lines. I have to imagine they will regress as an offense this next year. Just by the. Just by simple odds. The teams finishing number one in points in back-to-back years is not common. You're telling me they lose their offensive coordinator who has been a big part of what they've done.

And they're going to stay there? It's probably not going to happen. No, but they could be in the midst of a Rams-like run where you have a good handful of peak years. Yeah. And I would expect that. What's funny is the first three names are they're all players who, if you made the bull case for them before the season, that bull case came true. I'd say first four. Well, let's go to number four. Bejan Robinson. Consistency was number two. The second most consistent running back in football, number seven in the first half. and really turned it on in the second half. He has been the kind of the posh pick, I think, for people to put it at number one next year or put him at number two next year. It's been, should we really be looking at Bijon at 22 years old, going on 23 with the way he finished the season, number two, number eight, number 11, 852, all these top 10 finishes, 81% good games, 38% great in a season where you had a quarterback change. Is this the time that we finally hand the baton to Bijon Robinson?

going into year three. Yeah, I mean, it was handed to him. It really, you know, you start the season and you had a lot of... Well, us as fantasy managers is what I mean. Oh. Are we ready to hand him the baton at the top of the list? I think that some people are. I'm not simply because of Sequin Barclay. I think that that team makeup is one that I want a part of more than the Atlanta Falcons. That would be the whole reason. If you swapped those players, you know, if you put Bejon... On the Eagles, he would be everyone's number one. When you're, you know, not even 23 years old, you are electric every single play, adding more every single play. Tyler Algier is a good player and they need to spell him and he would come in and do some stuff. But then it would kill drives because Bijan every time he got the ball.

would make a cut and just get an extra three or four yards. He didn't have the same amount of breakaway runs like Jemir Gibbs, like Sequan Barkley. That's something. Yeah, what did you read into that? Because I noticed that too. That's how it felt. Yeah. He was tried and true, but not there were not those like old school AP breakaway runs that made the headlines. Yeah. And that's, I think, what limits his upside to just say he's absolutely going to be the number one player because those breakaway plays are almost always. for the running back position. When you have a 60-yard run, it's a touchdown. It's a house call. So you're taking away, you know, there's a reason Jemir Gibbs and Sequin Barclay have so many touchdowns because when they have these big plays, they end in, you know, an extra six fantasy points. Bejohn didn't really have that, but what Bejohn did have is 75% of the snaps. And later in the year when they made the quarterback change, 82% of snaps, you started to see him utilized the way that...

He should be the way that his talent and body and draft capital allows. And so it gives me a lot of confidence. Like he'll be my number two running back next year. Know what his longest run of the season is? I just looked up because I was curious. I have no idea. I guess like, I don't know. 37 yards. What can I guess 36? Mike said 70 something and I retracted. Yeah, his longest and on a per game basis is if I read them out. Oh, I was just, I had Berkeley up. 13, 19, 7, 9, 28, 16, 26, 13, 16, 37, 9. It's just interesting to me because I don't, I didn't have any shares of Bijan this year. So I didn't have my eyes on him as closely as maybe a Gibbs or, or even watching Derek Henry, who's on prime time all the time. Like Atlanta was not. And so, um, I do feel like this is one of the quieter, unless you had him, kind of a quiet number four finish. It,

If you had him, you loved the ride. I mean, obviously, zero bus games the entire season. He had almost 2,000 combined all-purpose yards. So this was outstanding. His utilization just kept going north and north. I think with Michael Pennix going into year two, there should be a lot of optimism. To me, it's just touchdowns. How many can he get? You know, I mean, it's not like he didn't score touchdowns this year. Finished the last three weeks of the season, two apiece and had 14 touchdowns. You believe in the future of Michael Pennix and what that will provide for the offense because you've got to be a top tier offense to really put up the kind of numbers that would get number one. It's difficult because the Pennix Junior games, that was the final three games of the year, which was the Giants, Washington, which their defense was kind of relapsing a little bit in that span. And then the final week was Carolina. So it's like we have not seen.

A true, like Washington, that's a good matchup. But the Giants in Carolina, that's not a battle testing quarterback scenario for an entire season. No, that's a little upsetting. It was nice, though, those last two games, five targets. Yeah, Bijon dominated. Bejon was great, but I like seeing in a game script where you're, you know, you're not being blown out because a lot of times that's where the inflated seven, eight, nine targets to a running back happens. Five targets in those games is really nice. Number five, Josh Jacobs. Consistency rank was number eight. First half of the year sucked, man. First half of the year, he was all over the place. Some question marks. After four weeks, you were like, uh, uh, is this working? Is this working? Number 17 and consistency in the first half, number five in the second half, 25% great, 63% good, only.

one bust game, very good against both top and bottom defenses. So whether they were great or not, very consistent. Same with home and road splits. And this was not the backfield that maybe the Packers envisioned in the very, very beginning. But they knew, and one of the reasons they signed Jacobs was they knew he could handle a huge workload and 301 carries later, 15 rushing touchdowns, 1,300 rushing yards contributed in the receiving game. Obviously, this was a workhorse role for him and very impressive. The end of season is so wild for him. Because, I mean, it was incredible. It is definitely propped up by touchdowns. I mean, he had 15 rushing touchdowns on the year. And, you know, like the bulk of them came after the...

after the bi-week, 12 of them. Through week seven. Twelve of them were week 11 on. Yeah, I was going to say through week seven, almost two months of the season, he had one touchdown. It's up at 15. Yeah. That's a furious pace. I mean, most touchdowns inside the tin of anybody. And then you have, and then over the stretch of that incredibly effective in the receiving game, but then would have games with literally zero targets. And like, so it's, I'm. He is a very difficult one. Very difficult guy to think about what really happened and trying to project moving forward because it was so successful. He is a very good running back when he's not Fat Thor. But will, does this feel sticky for the Green Bay Packers for next year? It does to me. Do they, I mean, they have been historically.

with LaFleur, they've been a running back by committee, and I don't think they had the true clientele to run that the way that they want to. They went into this season, as far as not into week one, but they went into after the NFL draft with AJ Dillon as the backup, and then they drafted Marshaun Lloyd. Right. This was going to be a committee with Josh Jacobs, Lloyd, and AJ Dillon, and those two guys got injured. The backups, they did their best, but they just had to use Josh Jacobs. So I have a huge question next year as to whether or not Josh Jacobs is like, hey, I proved. I could take 344 opportunities, not get injured, be awesome, score touchdowns. I became the machine. And I could see Matt LaFlor being like, I can't, I can't go to an inferior back. Like he can handle this. Yeah. I can see that. But I can also, it's going to be transactions. It's going to be transactions to me. What is, what is there? There won't be any, there won't be any more.

I mean, this is Josh Jacobs had already secured himself as a workhorse running back in the vein of Sequin and those and Henry and those backs. And then they went and spent the money on him. Then he did it and delivered. I'm with you on the. But what if they go out and draft a running back? Or I mean, Sean Lloyd is they have. I mean, they have personnel there already, right? Well, they have Emmanuel Wilson. Yeah, if they draft the running back super high, sure, you can change the conversation. But what I'm saying is Josh Jacobs in league circles and with the Packers and with his history of running and playing the position. That is who he is. Oh, you don't want to bring up history, Andy. If you want to bring up history, you're going to find out that Josh Jacobs was the running back eight in 2020.

And then he fell to the running back 14. And then he was the running back 3 in 2022. And then he fell to the running back 27. And then the running back 5. I mean, this is a red light, green light situation. So history says he's going to have a bad year. I can see all the arguments for him just saying that for next year. He's a year younger than Saquan on a winning football team that got all the red zone carries. And it worked. Next year, he will be. This is why he'll be the least sexy pick for people. He's going to be a really high pick. He'll be a second round pick. People will take so many more sexy names over Josh Jacobs again for the third time in the last four years. They will draft the wrong guy. Whose offense is better next year? The Atlanta Falcons or the Green Bay Packers. Of course it is. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, Jacobs will do what he continues to do because Matt LaFlor is a prolific offensive head coach. They have a franchise quarterback.

and it will be, it'll be great. Just saying that that coach Matt LaFleur was the one who kept putting A.J. Dillon on the field over Aaron Jones. I mean, they did put him on the field over Aaron Jones, who was frequently hurt and always been a limited workload player. A smaller back. I really can see both sides because I talked about it a lot. I mean, I got this wrong. I talked about going into this season a lot. LaFleur himself came out and said, you know me. I want a committee. I like using multiple backs. He said that so many times it was clear, and he's got a pretty, you know, he's a trustworthy coach. So I don't know how much of it was the fact that he lost the players they had going into the season to be the committee, you know, if they get the backs, but also Josh Jacobs proved he can do it and did it and is capable of doing it. If LaFleur decides, I'm going to use him as workhorse next year. He's going to be great, period. That's.

What people do with Josh. That's what they do. That's what he's been. So we'll see. We'll see. I do think that this will be the problem with people. This is why he'll drop down. People don't like Josh Jacobs for some reason. How low you think we can get him? I think you guys can drive him down even lower. Let's get him to the third mic. We'll take a break. That's a tough. That's a tough ask. We'll give you the last five names here momentarily. Kyron Williams comes in at number six. was drafted as the RB8 in the second round. His consistency rank ended up at five. He was number two in the first half. The second half it did dip to number 12 overall. 75% good games, no bus games, 13% great games. So you didn't have those monster, monster performances on a regular basis, but he, you know, 1,200 yards, almost 1,000 touchdowns. Not a lot in the receiving game.

34 receptions for just 182 yards. So you ask, hey, how does a guy like that end up at six? He didn't really get involved in the receiving game. We should see some changes on the offensive side of the football for the Rams next year. Yep. But, I mean, this was a successful season. Is that how you would describe the pick? I mean, I think if you took it. Oh, for sure. where he was being drafted, you were very happy. You're very happy. I mean, he was the running back six. He was consistent. He didn't bust. He won you some weeks and never really lost you. This is a player that I don't fully understand because he's 5-9, 200 pounds. He's a smaller back. He plays so strong and is so hard to take down. I mean, we loved his film in Notre Dame, loved him as a prospect. And it's so fun to watch him.

I really enjoy watching Kyron Williams. I just don't get how it works. Because he has strong muscle, not fast muscle. I do have some very important news. That's that's scientific. You can't argue that. Kyron Williams returned how many punts? Oh, yes. For the Los Angeles Rams in 2024. At least the first one. How many total punts? I'll go five. I'm going to go four. Twelve. Oh, all right. He received 12. The whole punt returner narrative. And he returned 21. punts in 2023. So he went down from 21 to 12. So this was one of the things that we talked about going into the season. And one of my top 10 tips and tricks to remember is that if you've got a great player who is succeeding and they draft depth at the position, do not be afraid of just saying that that player's great and they know he's great. Maybe that speaks to your Josh Jacobs.

you know, argument that they're going to keep using him that way because this was a player who two years ago played 76% of the snaps. And then they go and draft Blake Horm and you're like, well, he's not going to be like that. Do you know how many? Do you know the percentage of snaps you played this year? 81%. They're like, we could do it even more. Blake Horm averaged 3.4 rushing attempts per game. You had a period of time from weeks two to seven where no Pooka Nakua was on the field. He was a red zone dominator. Over the last two years, he has 31 total touchdowns and 28 games played. Only Gibbs matches that number. And so he's entering the final year of his rookie contract. Does he get an extension? How long will the core of this team stay together? There's always questions about Stafford. Get that schmoney. Yeah, get that schmoney. The problem is you're playing for the Rams who I feel like this regime, this general manager, this head coach.

learned a very costly lesson when they had the best running back in the NFL in their eyes and Todd Gurley, and they paid him accordingly. And then the running back did what running back sometimes do. He fell off a map as he didn't have the same burst all of a sudden. And then you had to deal with cap hits for multiple years hurting your team's chances. I don't know that they're going to give him. a big enough contract. Kyron needs to go get that money wherever he can get it. Yeah, he does. I don't know if he'll command it on the open market or not, but I will say from a dynasty perspective, he is one of my, I have fears. I have no fear. Next year redraft, I will be all in on Kyron. I was all in on Kyron this year. The talent's too good. The offense is great. McVeigh knows how to use him. He plays well in the system. They use him in the Redsone. There's nothing not to like about Kyron Williams. But I'm not sure he's here two years from now.

Which means you would want to involve the next up as well, potentially, if it helps you. They were getting quorum going at the end. He broke his arm, which is unfortunate. But Kyran, two straight years at RB6. Oh, don't do it again. There's a fragility with the Stafford situation that's always going to be there. I think he's back. Well, I don't mean just him leaving, but the injuries. Oh, yeah. And the. What is this offense? What is the status of Cooper Cup? A lot of questions here. But I'm with Jason. I will probably just be status quo with Carmen. He's great and he scores a lot of touchdowns. Devon A-chan at number seven. Jason's my guy. His consistency rank, though, 17. This is the guy. This is the reality versus the fiction reality situation because drafted RB10.

And I don't think your answer is, I'm happy. I'm happy or unhappy? What was the, what word did you use? No, you're not happy with a second round pick who through the first half of the year was the 27th most consistent running back when you needed him. So I don't. Not happy, but you know what, you know what happened. Yeah, that is. So if we're talking about the truth, the split, I mean, he couldn't get it done in the toolless offense. When Tua was out, which was two different stretches, week 17 and week 18 and weeks three through seven, Tua didn't play for the concussion and then what was the other injury? Is it back or something? It was a hip. Something like that. We'll find out. And Devon A. Chan was completely shut down. I mean, you're talking a drastic split. To put it in perspective, tell me if this changes your opinion here, Andy, on Devon H. If you remove only those weeks leave.

all the Tua weeks. When he played with Tua, his consistency rank would have been number five, which would have been ahead of Kairn Williams. In the games that Tua played, he was absolutely fantastic. That would have been 10 games. Yeah, he was very good with Tua. I mean, he was different this year, though. He would have had very different. He would have had 75% good games, zero percent bust games. Now, obviously, you've got a double whammy of injury risk with Devon Aitam because he is, in and of himself, someone that's been injured before and he's undersized. And then Tua is always an injury risk. This is the first tier of running back that we're talking about today where there are more variables that can go wrong. They don't have to go wrong. There are variables that can go wrong. His injuries, Tua's injuries, the offensive system, Tyree Kill, Jalen Waddle, short area targets, no breakaway plays.

All of these things. McDonald's. Like the way that A-chan got it done last year isn't the way he got it done this year. Oh, correct. Last year it was all breakaway explosive plays. This year was, he was a wide receiver. Yeah, he was. He was a wide receiver. And every running back, every running back is going to take a hit of some kind. And most are basically missed the year, too. If you don't have your starting quarterback because your offense won't be as good. Yeah, I don't want to discredit how good he was at Tua. I just. Even his good games were different than last year. Yes. So it's hard to predict the future with him compared to the other six. But I'm saying like, go to the Baltimore Ravens. Lamar misses three games. Derek Henry doesn't vanish into the mist. Correct. The Philadelphia Eagles, Sequin Barkley doesn't disappear because different archetype of a player. And the fact, it's A chain is so weird because that in fantasy, if you're in a half or a full,

point scoring per catch, you want this more, like you want 70 plus receptions more than you want the 250 plus carries. There's targets and receptions are worth so much more. But if you lose that completely when your quarterback's gone, he is a very sketchy pick. Number eight is James Cook, who is Mike's my guy, drafted at RB14 in the fourth round. Consistency of nine, definitely a win. You saw what he was capable of? I'm taking a win on my guy. Yeah. Go on. Okay. Thousand yards, 16 touchdowns, 38 targets, 32 receptions, 27% great games, 60% good, 13% busts. He took advantage of bad defenses. They were a team that when they were ahead, they knew the recipe. The recipe was to hand that football off. He definitely had a lot of big plays. It was fun to watch this year. The identity of the offense changed.

and, you know, the team struggled to find weapons in the passing game. I didn't need to for a lot of games. But, I mean, he had fewer opportunities snaps and yards than last year and yet had 16 rushing touchdowns. But Andy. Oh, voice of public opinion. Haven't heard from you in a while. I thought that they won't use James Cook around the goal line and he can only have two rushing touchdowns a year. And that was the whole knock on him. Yeah. It was weird because it's not like Josh Allen wasn't scoring. Two rushing touchdowns rookie year. Two rushing touchdown sophomore year. They're like, when we get around the goal line, we're not going to let it. 16. He tied OJ. I won't. I won't have him next year. I won't have Dame Scott. I won't. I won't because I think the passing pendulum will swing back and forth a little bit year to year. Ray Davis is a really good player. They showed a willingness to use different players in different scenarios. And 16 rushing touchdowns is very, very, very hard to repeat. I don't care for really, Sean McCoy.