Busts + Key Position Battles

Look, I'm not going to draft him in a redraft league. But if you're playing DFS and you want a cheap tight end option, Nick Venet is not going to cost you hardly anything for week one. And he will be involved for that week at least. Mike, Nick Vinette or Doyle? Doyle. Doyle by a lot. Okay. But we do know that tight ends come out of nowhere.

This is just what happens, and there's a lot of opportunity. Look at all those Jimmy Graham targets, Jimmy Graham touchdowns. Now, I'm not projecting all of those onto Nick Vinette, but that's a huge opportunity for a player that they invested a pretty high draft pick in him a couple years ago. And he's looked good in preseason. Yeah, no doubt about it. Let's go ahead and jump into our bus. Bus. All right, busts are always an interesting topic because people define them differently. I always look at a bust in fantasy football to be a player.

that vastly underperforms relative to their draft value. You draft them with an expectation, and this can be anybody. This could be, you know, we see every year in the first round you have players that bust, right? You draft them to be a top tier running back, wide receiver. They perform like maybe a wide receiver too. Is that a bust? For some it is. For someone like Mike Evans, is he a bust last year? Or is he a, I'm very disappointed in you, son. I think it's just a disappointment. All right. Well.

We've each picked out two guys that we've identified as bust candidates for 2018. Let's go ahead and kick it off with Mike. Mike, who do you have as a potential bust this year and why? All right. I'm just going to get it out of the way because he's up on the wall. That is Juju Smith Schuster. I think that I think he is going to.

disappoint people currently in Fantasy Football Calculator going in the middle of the fourth round. He is the wide receiver 16. Wow. That's top, top end. And this is, here are the problems. I mean, it's, it's draft price. That's, that's the biggest problem. Big Ben in his illustrious career has supported two top 16 wide receivers once, one time. Now, maybe your argument is the talent for juju. I mean,

Okay, that's not really a tangible, we can break things down, argue. It's just you either believe in the player or you don't. When he throws the ball, it can only go to one player at a time. Exactly. And we know Antonio Brown is going to be, if he's on the field, he's the number one wide receiver. We know Levyon Bell, if he's on the field, is a top two running back, and they're going to command targets. I'm going to tweet Juju real quick, let him know what you're saying.

And it pains me because I love the player. I think he is extremely talented. But the wide receiver 16 off the board is just egregious. Last year, this is a stat I talk about frequently. It kind of refers to efficiency. And it's where a player finishes in their targets compared to where they finish in fantasy points. Last year, players of the top 50 in top 50 of targets.

The person who outproduced their target finish, number two, was Tyreek Hill, meaning he finished 15 spots higher in fantasy points than he did in targets. Number one. So that's number two. That's the second highest discrepancy was Tyree Kill at 15. Juju was 29 spots higher in his fantasy finish compared to where he was in targets. Now, you can choose to read that how you want to.

I read that as juju vastly outproduced his opportunity. His opportunity will surely increase this year, but to finish at 51st in wide receiver targets, but you were wide receiver 22 on the season. You're going to need some 90 yarders. You're going to need some 90 yard touchdown. So I'm not buying into juju at his price. What he does have, what he does offer you is if something were to happen to Antonio Brown, juju becomes what a.

Top five wide receiver in the league. I will acquiesce that that is built. That's part of who Juju offers you, or what he offers you as a fantasy player. But if everything goes to plan for the Pittsburgh Steelers, I just don't see him.

giving you value as the wide receiver 16 off the board. So do you think that the reason he's being drafted that high at wide receiver 16 is because Antonio Brown is on the cover of Madden then? No, I will admit, I need to weigh in here because I've been such a supporter of Juju. I think his talent is unquestionable. But I completely agree that he is being overdrafted. I, you know, I wanted to, he was in consideration for my, my guys. And the reason I could not.

select him was because he's being drafted pretty much at his ceiling barring an Antonio Brown injury. Look, if you're the wide receiver 16, that's great. You had a phenomenal year. But like that is his ceiling as the second or third target, really, if you include Levi-on-Bell. Right. In that offense, it's just going to be his talent is there, but he's being overdrafted right now. So for where you're getting him, I can somewhat get behind the bust. Yeah.

It doesn't make me happy. It doesn't make me happy. Sometimes a star burns too bright and it hurts your average draft position. Look, they go supernova and then they just turn it. Stop getting touchdowns of preseason. I'm going to bring you my bust. It's Jimmy Garoppolo. Graham. No, no. Jimmy Garapolo. Jimmy Hansom. You know what's not handsome to me? It's the QB10 draft price you're paying for Jimmy Garoppolo. That's all in. I don't love the schedule.

He gets to play the Rams a couple of times this year, the Cardinals a couple of times. He's got a Broncos matchup on the schedule. I don't love it. Last year in the five games of impressing the world, seven touchdowns. Seven touchdowns in five games. That's not going to get it done in fantasy either. I'm simply hesitant. And when I look at that roster, I think Jimmy Garamplo is going to pick people apart between the 20s. I still don't see the red zone.

weapon on that team, right? Marquis Goodwin, all the hype. Well, yeah, he's going to get some long touchdown. Pierre Garcin's never been more than a four or five touchdown guy. Jared McKinnon out of the backfield, he's not going to bang it into the – I just don't see where the red zone efficiency is going to come from. He's being overdrafted because people love the talent. I think he's a great quarterback. I don't know if it's going to translate to top 12 fantasy performance this year. There are a lot of quarterbacks I like more.

There's so much hype around Jimmy Hansel. I'm going to pass. I'm going to pass on Jimmy Garoppola. Yeah, I don't blame you. We'll talk in a minute about a counterpart that I think is going to be a bus. But I'll hold off on him for now. My, look, it couldn't be a bus show. It could not be a bus show. If I didn't put on hate blockers. You're already going to the glasses. I feel like this was the original hate blocker moment.

Where I had to wear these shades. And because I was wearing them, I felt like I could just say whatever I really believed. And I didn't have to worry about repercussions because nobody can see me. I'm wearing the sunglasses. The window to your soul has been, you got the shutters down. Right. And so I declared that Ronald Jones was a bust because I really believed. I didn't like his tape in college. I didn't think he could run through the tackles of his size. And he didn't catch the ball in college. And so I thought he was going to be a bust.

I say he's just an honorary mention now because the problem is he's sucked so much in camp and in preseason and Peyton Barber's been great. His average, what is he like the 30th running back being taken right now? I see him go higher though. People get tempted with that name. And here's the thing. Be careful. Be careful about that victory lap through two preseason games. Certainly. Be cautious. But who's your real bust? Yeah. For Ronald Jones, it's real quick.

You can check out Adam Spinks is the running back scout. What he does is he looks at running backs. And he had a thread a great thread this morning where he broke down every single one of Ronald Jones carries. And I'm with Jason on the side of I am worried about Ronald Jones being a bus. But when you break down every preseason carry this season, the offensive line is.

especially when Ronald Jones is playing has been horrendous. I watched that thread. The offensive line has been bad. But my issue with Ronald Jones is that he will not be a pass catcher. And he's not a goal line back. And what was the quote? So what is he going to be for fantasy football? Yeah. From his running back coach. The running back coach said something along the lines of I guess there was a reason they didn't use him as a pass catching back in college, which they didn't. And it's because he can't catch the ball. But anyways, my real actual.

Bust. Bust is the word you're looking for. I'm going to go with Greg Olson. What? Wow. Offensive coordinator for the... Yes, Greg Olsaan, offensive coordinator for the Oakland Ray. No, no, nobody expects anything good of him. That would have been a great pick, by the way. That would have been funny. I agree. But similar to Ronald Jones, just too low of equity given to Greg Olson. No, Greg Olson, a perennial...

top three tight end, a tried and true workhorse tight end, if there is such a thing, is going to be a bus. This is just so disrespectful. It's, I see, I don't, I don't think it is disrespectful because I'm acknowledging his long and illustrious great career. I've always been a fan of Greg Olson and what he's done, but he is going to turn.

34 years old this year. And if you look at his usage this past season, I shared this on a recent episode, but I don't think people remember what he was doing when he was on the field prior to the injury. This is healthy. I mean, it wasn't like he was kind of injured and then he got surgery. He got injured in one game. Before that, he was healthy. Here were his healthy first three games. Two receptions for 18 yards. One reception for 10 yards.

one reception for 10 yards again. He was just getting ready to get injured. Yeah, and then he got injured. Then he comes back as this big monster game, but after that one, three for 27 and another one of his trick, one for 10. That was his trick. That was his one for 10. He had three games of one reception for 10 yards. He got a first down, I hope, so long as it was, you know, no pre-penalty. My point is his utilization dropped.

He is coming off of an injury that has a 20% chance of needing that second surgery. We've seen it with all sorts of great NFL players. And then you add in the fact that, well, they now have other weapons. They have DJ Moore. They have another year of rapport with Devin Funches. I don't think they need to use him that much. Tori Smith. Curtis Samuel even looks good in preseason. And then on top of all of that,

Let's just say, okay, maybe his utilization comes down a little bit more, but tight-ins are important for what reason? What do they do around that goal line? They get the touchdowns. They give you the big weeks. That's never been Greg Olson's thing. He averages, and I'm just talking, I'm not talking about his Chicago career, since he's been in Carolina. He averages five touchdowns per 16 games. He's traditionally been a yardage tight-in. Exactly. So I just think you're drafting a name, and I'm not saying he's going to just...

be terrible this year, get injured in week two, and never be a producer. I think he's being overdrafted because of his name, and he will disappoint you. There's better options like Tray Boo-woo. All right. Hey, before we move on to the rest of the bus, I want to thank NFL Game Pass for sponsoring today's show only with NFL Game Pass. You get every out-of-market preseason game live, including tonight's game. You get to see those rookies we talk about, comeback players, new players, new teams. That's always fun in the preseason. Hasn't been as fun with Sammy.

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