Fantasy Football - The Fantasy MVP Episode! - Podcast for 8/28

a piece of the Minnesota Vikings offense for cheaper and then be like, oh, no, I got, I want to bet on D'Andre Swift. The hardest part is just to you, which is wild. Would you put Jordan Mason out in your lineup in a flex spot in week one? I think that's the question. People don't know how to answer it. No, I think you would not. Oh, I'd be willing to do it. Yeah. So there's where I've passed on Mason, but the opportunity's in front of him and the team, if they give him more of the workload, it's a huge opportunity. All right, J.J. Zacharisen's next.

at late round quarterback host of the late round fantasy football podcast living the stream he has been a part of this show for quite some time i am sort of teasing like before i put this up i just don't know what graphic that's what i was one i was just like we usually play his little kid picture i don't know what let's find out hello you beautiful gentlemen it's your good buddy j jay here to give you my fantasy MVP for this twenty twenty five season i really tried to not go with this player because he's just cruising up draft boards at the moment

It's like I'm just leaning into the hype, but I'm having a hard time not saying Trayvion Henderson. Henderson looked great in the Zapp model, and that's no surprise because his past catching profile was awesome coming out of Ohio State. As a freshman, the dude caught 27 balls for 312 yards and 4 touchdowns. That was on a team with Jackson Smith and Jigba, Garrett Wilson, Chris Alave, Marvin Harrison Jr., and Emeka Igbuka. Now in New England, he's sharing a backfill with Ramandre Stevenson. Stevenson might steal a lot of that ground game work, but he's coming off a really poor season and yards per route run. I'm expecting Henderson to capture his high as a 15% target share in that offense. And maybe the rushing volume form will be higher than we expect. It doesn't even have to be insane for him to hit in a PPR format. Since 2011, there have been just five instances where a running back hit between a 50% and 60% running back rush share and a 13% to 16% target share.

Those are both well within Henderson's range of outcomes. Those five running backs ranked 18th, 13th, 12th, 8th, and 6th in PPR points per game. I'm in on Henderson because his floor is really solid, but he has room to grow for a really nice ceiling outcome too. All right. I never even heard of that guy. Which one? Henderson or JJ? No, JJ. I mean, we're in a chopped league on Sleeper. I took Remandre late because I think, I know the train is coming. But it's like if I'm going to get anything out of Ramandre, it's going to be the first couple of weeks when he gets the most work he's probably going to see all year. Henderson, you know, he's not going to be every down, but he is going to be so efficient for this office. He's very, very talented. Man, 15% target share. If he, if he hit 15%.

Goodness gracious, he's going to be incredible. And I agree with JJ. Like that, that is something that could happen. When we, you know, we, the New England Patriots, they, we've talked about them a good amount of their, their win total is much higher than you expect. And it's like, and the wide receivers, it's Stefan Diggs. And then you got like, Pop Douglas. Okay, that's a fine slot player. But who's the wide receiver three? No idea. Henderson might absorb a lot of targets. All right, Trayvon Henderson, Jordan Mason, two running backs in a row. We've got Kyle Borgannoni, his MVP pick coming up right now. What's up, Foot Clan for the 2025 season? My pick for MVP is Colts rookie tight-in, Tyler Warren. If home leagues are essentially a vicious street fight against your league mates, I want someone on my team who is a certifiable dog. From the Wildcat formations at Penn State to being an absolute terror in man-to-man coverage.

Warren is simply a matchup nightmare in the NFL. Ignore your platform's ADP and be willing to take Warren a round or two ahead are the rest of the Gibronies in your league who are waiting on tight in late. The Gibronies and the Borgonones. Look, my guy. I have been reaching on him everywhere. And sometimes I've missed because somebody else has done it. Yeah. Do not play the ADP game with Tyler Warren. You will. If you want him and you're like, well, according to his ADP, he might be my next pick. Sixth round? Um, let me, let me look at seven whatever the last league I've been in, you know. Tyler Warren went sixth round in a two QB. Cause his, his 80. No, he went six round. Yeah, he went six round. He went ahead of his ADP is late eighth. So seventh round in, we went ahead of Ingram. Our league of shadows were playing with Eisen. So I mean, he's, I think seventh round is where you're going to have to take him.

Yeah, and that's fine. Yeah, I mean, that's the other part of the equation to me. Like, I'd do it. I would try to do it. At that point, you know, I talk about the lack of wanting to take a fifth round tight end, even though they're presumably better, because in the fifth round, there are really good running backs and wider steers. But when I look at what you're taking Tyler Warren over Javante Williams and Tyrone Tracy, and it's like, those guys could work out, but you're in a spot where it's like, take a shot at a huge, you know, Javante Williams is not going to.

win you your fantasy league like there's no world where that happens right clip that um but tyler warren could uh he would need to take some drugs um all right matthew bets our injury expert one of the hosts of the dFS and the betting dynopod or the dfs and the dinopod there you go i just throwing words out there um with his fantasy MVP pick what's going on foot clan in the middle rounds of my drafts i like to harness the mentality of someone like Ricky Bobby. If you ain't first, you're last. After we've locked up our starting running backs and wide receivers with projectable volume with our first few picks, we should be shooting for massive upside in the middle rounds of our drafts, not drafting for safety. And this year's ADP landscape presents a unique opportunity to draft a wide receiver with true league winning potential. Year of 2025, fantasy MVP is none other than Travis Hunter. Sure, you could play more corner than we realize and it might be tough to play both ways in the NFL, but this dude is different.

And if we knew we were getting a full-time wide receiver in this scheme with this draft capital, he'd be going way earlier in drafts. Liam Cohen has already suggested Hunter will play around 80% of the snaps on offense, and that should be plenty of opportunity for Hunter to crush this ADP. Currently going off the board in the sixth or seventh round, depending on your platform, Hunter is an awesome target as your wide receiver three in drafts this weekend. Good luck, Foot Clan, and let's bring home those hashtag Foot Clan titles. Dooball! Travis Hunter, I do not feel has gotten enough love on this show or in the fantasy community because he plays corner. If we were able to just vary in a linear way. I think it because he's also the number two. Like when Brian Thomas Jr. is on the team, you don't imagine Travis Hunter's walking anybody like Ted McMill. Yeah, no. You're like, he's the dude. It's fair, but our analysis gets, it's not clean. Right? Like if he was, let's say Travis Hunter was just.

the best wide receiver in college football and drafted at number two. If Malik neighbors landed on that team, I think we'd have talked about him more, is my point. A little bit. And I agree with what you're saying at the Brian Thomas thing. I just, it's very easy for us. We go to Tetaro McMillan, it's like, you're the dude. Travis Hunter, is there a possibility? He's just the dude. I don't know if we can get there. Yeah, I think it's both. It's the fact that he's going to be playing cornerback. And he is. He's absolutely going to be playing both ways. So exciting to see how that works. But the talent is there. He has, you know, the potential to be the wide receiver rookie of the year. I mean, Mike Evans has been a one his entire career, right? Yep. Yeah. Okay. We've had Chris Godwin be a dominant fantasy force. Sure. A lot in a Liam Cohen offense. He was on a role.

It's one A, one B potential, I guess is what I'm saying. Yeah, there is the potential for that, of course. Yeah. So Travis Hunter's the pick. We'll move on. We got a great friend of the show, Jamie Eisenberg, fantasy football NFL analyst for CBS Sports. It's Jamie Eisenberg from CBS Sports. My fantasy MVP for the 2025 season is Christian McCaffrey. Bang! He's a top five overall player for me. I'm taking him as the number three running back behind only Bajon Robinson and Jemir Gibbs. And by the time we get to week one, I might like him better than both those guys. There's just so much upside with McCaffrey. You know what he's capable of when healthy. He scores like a quarterback over 24 PPR points per game in 2023. 2024 was a disaster, as we're all aware, only playing four games, Killies injury, knee injury. It was a Greek tragedy. But I think McCaffrey will be back and hopefully better than never. Look, everything around him is falling apart. The backup running backs are decimated. They had to go trade for Brian Robinson. The receiving core is a mess.

He's going to be involved in the passing game maybe to a higher level than we saw in that 2023 campaign. As long as he stays healthy, he's going to be in contention to be the best player at his position, one of the best players in all of fantasy. And I want him on my fantasy team. So if I get a pick in the top five and those other four guys in front of him, again, Bejohn Robinson, Jamir Gibbs, I'll take two receivers over him as well for now in Jamar Chase and C.D. Lamb, I just think McCaffrey's got maybe more upside than anybody we've seen. So.

Hopefully stays healthy for the entire season. Hopefully by the end of the year, we're talking about Christian McCaffrey leading a lot of people to fantasy championships. Well, Mike liked that. I heard three hopefulies in there, and that is the story of McCaffrey. It is. There's a handful of players where there's not really a lot to analyze. If he's on the field, he's great. He's not always on the field. So you're just playing a little bit of, you know, some people love slot machines. Okay? Right. And that's what this is. It's put the money in and maybe you hit the jackpot. Yeah.

All right, we have one more before we share our MVP selections for 2025. It's Rich Eisen of the Rich Eisen Show and everywhere else. Rich Eisen, legend of the industry. Here we go. My fantasy football MVP for 2025 is going to be Jamir Gibbs. I have a feeling. I don't know what it is. I just feel he's going to get the ball a lot more. And I feel like his home run ability from the last couple of years is just going to get more tape measure. So I'm looking at you, Detroit. I'm looking at you to get the ball to Jemir Gibbs. And yeah, I understand he might get vultured by Knuckles, but I think Sonic is going to go crush it. My two cents. Eisen's got the vibes. The Gibbs vibes. Yeah, and he also drafted Gibbs in our league of shadows.

I almost took Gibbs there because I was one pick ahead of Eisen and we had this video in. So I knew that was like his guy's like, ah, if I don't take Gibbs there, but I couldn't take him over Barclay personally. So I took Barclay and he got his, he got his Gibbs. So Jemir Gibbs, I mean, I've said it. I believe it could be the number one overall running back very easily this year. I don't think people are giving that enough, you know, potential. I, I, I was thinking about this this morning, knowing we're going to talk about Gibbs, and I've had a slight bear case for him with the workload of David Montgomery and how high he's being drafted. I've really cooled on that. Gibbs is too talented. He is probably the best offense of weapon, including Amin Rae St. Brown, on the Lions, which is a great offense. And so the idea of not getting him more and more involved as his career gets more and more into his prime would be foolish.

Obviously, David Montgomery is there. He's going to score plenty of goal line touchdowns, but it was just too good. He's just too talented to be stupid and make a bear case against him. All right. We have three more to reveal our own fantasy football MVPs for 2025. Let's take a break and come back with some league winners. Foot Clan, draft day is on the way. You got your rankings. You got those sleepers. You got you can't miss picks. But you know what? You need sometimes. a backup because well even the best fantasy football team in the world doesn't go according to plan sometimes those starters they don't show up wouldn't it be great if you could have the same peace of mind everywhere else with progressive you get more than just a policy you get a playbook full of coverage options you can count on for your home and for your auto want to customize your protection no problem you can build your coverage just like your fantasy team making sure that you have the right players in every position and a backup when you need it most

And when life throws an audible like a fumble in the driveway or a hailstorm at home, Progressive is there with 24-7 support. Don't get caught without a great backup. Visit progressive.com to quote today. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company, affiliates, and third-party insurers, not available in all states or situations, coverage subject to policy terms, limits, and conditions. All right, to run a back, Rich Eisen had Jamir Gibbs as an MVP, Jamie Eisenberg with CMC, Matthew Betts with Travis Hunter, Kyle Borgononi with Tyler Warren. Love that. JJ Zacharisen with Trayvion Henderson, Nathan Yankee with Jordan Mason, Rich Rebar with Tederoa McMillan and Matt Harmon with Drake London. Jason, who is your fantasy football MVP for 2025?

My fantasy football MVP for 2025 is rookie running back for the Pittsburgh Steelers Caleb Johnson. This is a player I adored the film on and not everybody did. There were disagreements on whether or not he was truly an elite college prospect or not. because he's a patient running style with explosive afterburners once he gets going. And we've seen that already in the preseason. There's been tons of reports from camp. He was, you know, named offensive rookie for them. And Caleb Johnson has been very good so far, I think, early on. He's had some, you know, reports of not the best pass protection. Look.

That really is overblown. I know he's a rookie and you want to get on the field of being good at past protection is great. But for fantasy football purposes, you go back and look at who is PFF's lower graded, you know, past protectors. A lot of times it's the guy's getting dumpoffs. Go figure. So Caleb Johnson, first of all, ignore the depth chart. He's a rookie. You know, this. I know you got Arthur Smith there, but, you know, for what it's worth. Devon A. Chan started third on Miami depth chart at this point in time. Look at what he did in college production profile-wise and how that translates to the NFL. He had a 52% dominator rating in his final year at Iowa. That's a wild stat. The most predictive stat from college to the pros is rushing touchdowns for running max. He had 21 rushing touchdowns his final year. And this was a team where he was.

The yards per team play, it was Caleb Johnson. The defense knew who to stop. It was Caleb Johnson. Here are the round one through three NFL draft picks, so a day two pick or earlier, who had a 40% dominator score and a two plus yards per team play. It's Levion Bell, Derek Henry, Christian McCaffrey, Saquan Barkley, Dalvin Cook, Breece Hall, A. Chan, and Caleb Johnson. He is a really good running back. You know, a lot of people in this preseason have complained about a lack of explosiveness, you know, because he is that patient run style. He hit 22 miles per hour in college. He is fast. Forget the 40 time. Only 4% of running back attempts go for 15 plus yards. But when you get that break, can you take it to the house?

I promise you Caleb Johnson can. You will see a 40-plus yard rushing touchdown this year from Caleb Johnson. He had eight forced mistackles this preseason that led the whole preseason. He only had 24 total attempts. Just for context there, only three running backs all last season had eight force-miss tackles on 24 or fewer attempts in a game. James Connor, Henry, and Mixon, like he's a good back. And you look at the situation. That's the final thing I want to say is his situation. I think is really nice for fantasy, for being a good draft pick. You've got Ashen Genti being drafted it in the first round. You know, he's going to, you've got to get lucky to even get him. Amarian Hampton, he's, he's at the, I looked at the ADP across all platforms that I took each rookie's top because they're probably all going to go ahead of what their ADP is right now. Amarian Hampton was 304 ADP. Trayvion Henderson is 407 ADP, the highest ADP on Caleb.

is the 6-11. He's at that 6-7 turn. And on some platforms, he's in the ninth round. He's got to compete with Jalen Warren. Okay, Jalen Warren's a starter. He's going to start the year as the starter. But Jalen Warren's never had 150 carries in his career. And at the goal line, do you think Jalen Warren's a starter? He is not. He had four carries inside the five last year. You've got a team that obviously you've got Arthur Smith there. I don't like that. But Arthur Smith was there last year when Najee Harris, a slow plotting, Najee Harris, had, you know, 300 plus opportunities, and Jalen Warren was the helpful back. I think Caleb Johnson is too good to stay off the field by the end of the year. I think he has a chance to be a workhorse back here, a league winning back, and he doesn't cost the farm. He can be a non-starter week one. He can go in your flex for where you can get him in draft. So I think he's my fantasy MVP. I love the talent.

And I expect him to be a very good player this season. Mike, thoughts on Caleb Johnson? I'm not as hot and bothered as Jason is, but I do like the draft cost of getting, he was third round NFL pick, Jay. He was pick 83 overall. Which was their second pick. They didn't have a second rounder. Yeah, and I mean, they really needed him. They chose Warren over, over Najee. Like, that for sure happened. and I don't know if this was part of the plan of they said, okay, well, we're going to let Najee go because in this draft class, we can find the bigger body player for that type, that archetype for our offense. He is, where he's going in the drafts, I think it is a fine upside kick. I'm a little worried that people will end up taking the pick and getting nothing for a while and then feeling like, I do think it starts slow. And feeling like, well, what do I do now?

with this dude on my bench and am I actually just waiting for an injury? I'm not as comfortable with the player or situation as Jason is. Jason's been strongly convicted. I remember him having the same convictions around Brees Hall and then Brees Hall working out. One of my favorite things about Caleb Johnson is that it is not universal. Who doesn't love Trayvion Henderson? Well, now. Everybody, you know, I mean, it's true even of the NFL GMs because RJ Harvey, Quinchon Judkins, Trayvon Henderson, these are all players that went ahead of Caleb Johnson on teams that needed running back. Exactly. So I don't think, like me making him my fantasy MVP steaming him up right now, I don't think he's going to go super high in your drafts. So that's what I love about him. He actually could be a value. It's crazy because I think you were so close. I mean, you got the like, you know the guys on the beach that bring out the metal detectors?

and they go searching and they go searching like you had the metal detector out and you were so close and you started digging and you accidentally got a tin can but if you had gone a little bit down the beach same team you would have found the true fantasy MVP oh okay so i just i heard the beeps but it was actually coming a little bit down the way d k metcalf will be your fantasy football MVP for 2025 um metcalf is a he's a perfect match for erin rogers in this offense he will have like unrelated to this debate and discussion and bringing MVP forward, I literally, we were going through our UDK rankings the other day. I look at Jason and I, and I'll just pull it up right now. And I'm going, is this, is this really the depth chart at wide receiver in Pittsburgh? Is this actually what they're going into the season with? You're darn shooting. I mean, Robert Woods? Yeah. Calvin Austin? Mm-hmm.

And Roman Wilson? Yeah. And Ben Skoronik somewhere? Ben Skoronic. I mean, D.K. Metcab, this is, even if you don't believe in him, which I do. I think the money says the league believes in him and he is a true alpha. He has the capability to be a top five receiver. No question. But even if you just look at the sheer mathematics, the math equation, the targets, like it's almost impossible. to not be a super relevant fantasy football wide receiver with the targets that think DK Metcalf will get in this offense. Over the last five years, 74 wide receivers have hit 130 plus targets, which seems like a shoe win. I doubt any of us have them for fewer than 130 targets. 92% of those are top 24, 89% are top 20, 65% are top 12. He runs all the routes. He is physical on the goal line. He is going to be targeted a record-breaking amount of times for his career.

I mean, I'll look it up real quick. His career high in targets is 141. I'll be shocked if he doesn't get into 160s, 170s in this offense. Same problem with Arthur Smith. I understand it. I just don't know what you do on offense. I literally don't. They brought him in there intentionally and jettisoned George Pickens who you guys love this year in, you know, in Dallas, obviously. This is D.K. McCaff's show, and this is a late fourth round pick. I got him at a steal yesterday in a draft to be my wide receiver 1. If you go running back heavy and you're trying to identify which guy you want to lock in as a potential later wide receiver 1, to me he is that guy. All right. You know I agree. I mean, he was my value pick. I think that he is mispriced in fantasy. And because he's going into his seventh year, it's not going to change. People aren't going to become excited overnight. He's just a valuable pick for where he's going in drafts.

All right, Mike. Do you want me get the tape from last year? Are you going, are you going to do it fresh? No, we're running it back. Ladies and gentlemen, we are talking about the great Kenneth Walker, Ken Bone Walker. I'm going to back him again here. And it, where's the boo? You want to, I can boo myself. That's fine. I'll allow it. He booed himself. I was doing it for you. Oh, thanks, man. It's a man of honor. I mean, like, it's cool. You just don't like 14.4 points per game, which is what Kenneth Walker did last year. The story is he played 11 games. He did, he, like, he let you down in that aspect. He was not available. And to, to talk to that, like, I will stay super positive, Mike. I'm not going to, I'm not going to go against you on this. I fully acknowledge, I think Ken Walker could be a game breaker.

if things go the right way for him, which is not just the injury thing. It's everything, right? It's the big picture. It's the scheme. Everything that's setting up. We talked about Darnold. Darnold was my pick for... To be the new Sam Darnold. Like, I think he'll do the same thing in Seattle. They'll be more successful. They will be in the running for the division. And so that comes on the back of Ken Walker. I'll be positive for you today. Ken Walker, year one and year two, he played in 15 games. And of course, I want that to be 17, but running backs

For them to miss one to two games a year, that is not uncommon, especially when you are utilized as a workhorse running back, which that's how Ken Walker has been used. In 41 career games played, he has seen, and you can see this on the fancy footballers.com, we call it the workhorse rating, which is a percentage of total team rushing attempts and targets. He's seen 31%. of the total rush attempts and the targets over his career. Anything over 30% is elite. You know, just for that stat over the last three years, only four running backs have averaged 13 or more PPR points plus a 30% workhorse rating each year. That's Barclay, Henry Mixon, and Kenneth Walker. The question of, you know, coming out of the draft, can he catch? Well, his first couple of years, a 7% target share and 8% target share. Last year was 14%.