Fantasy Football - Rookie Review + Worrisome Wideouts - Podcast for 2/17

to the fantasy footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. Oh, man. Oh, man. It's going to be one of those shows. That's not mid-season or off-season. That's mid-season. No, that's the beginning of a season. All right. We just began. We just do whatever you want season. We just began 2026, Mike. Just now. I mean, it was like a month and a half ago, but... No, no, no, no. Football. Yeah, we're gonna... We have the Mayan calendar. Right. And the NFL calendar. That's how I live my life. Exactly. I think I saw somebody talking about how, like, we don't... Like, we shouldn't do New Year's the way we do New Year's. Like, the new year should be like when spring starts. You know what I mean? Because, like, our New Year is like...

the dead of winter and people are stuck indoors like it should be in association with spring and newness well i think we should rotate like the calendar basically what you're saying is the final month of the year should be like march correct but i mean i don't know when spring starts because we don't have seasons in a based off of where we have hot or less hot because the uh i mean the less hot's pretty nice though we have you have the reverse seasons down under Yeah, I don't they don't they're not part of our world Mike by the way I am sorry Australia you see we had the the hottest February in Arizona in history by a lot I felt like it it was like an average our average temperature for those out there people don't know I know buried in snow man I want you to understand this you got it all our average temperature this month was 69 degrees that's not cold that's pretty nice

the highest previous was like 64 as a high average like we're our water is our water is gone this is not good for we don't have snow runoff we got no water don't worry snow people we're about to get it yeah we are we are we are doomed it's coming for us oh i'll say it once i've been saying it for a while we need to get this state indoors. We need to build a dome. We need to build a whole, I mean, I'm team dome on the state of Arizona. Put the whole state inside of a dome. That'd take a while. I feel like it. That's a pretty big project. Yeah, what is that city they're building over in the Middle East? They canceled it. The line. Yeah, it's done. No, they're doing that. No, I just saw it got canceled. Wait, fully canceled? Yeah, we're done. I think they built a couple houses. That's the one where they, uh, they also because it was Dubai, right? Dubai would put a lid on it. This idea.

Hmm. They canceled it fully. What if we put a giant mirror in the middle of the desert? Yeah. Nothing will go wrong. That actually really disappoints me. That was the first city that seemed like it would be from like cyberpunk or something. You know what I mean? What is this show? What do we talk about normally? We're going to talk about rookies of last season and how they fared. Because this is a fantasy football podcast. Yes, it is. And we are the host of that show. It is Tuesday, February 17th. Welcome in one and all. Ultimate Draft Kit pre-order available at Ultimate DraftKit.com. Order by March 1st, and you'll be entered to win a listener league spot to play with us. The listener league winner of this past year sequentially beat myself, I think then Mike and then Jason to win the title.

He laid down on the tracks. I beat myself in the championship. To be fair, I was in the championship. To be fair. Yeah, so the very worthy winner is what I'm saying. My team was awesome and it got beat. Yeah, yeah, I felt good about mine and it went down. Lowest price of the year as well, Ultimate draft kit.com. Our quick question of the day, kind of around, you know, wide receivers, what wide receiver are you the most nervous for for next year? There could be a lot of reasons why things that you saw over this past year. free agency, you know, coaching changes, and any reason is fine, but is there a receiver that comes to mind where you are a very nervous right here right now? Yeah, I mean, for me, I don't think I need to really explain the reasons if you paid any attention to football last year. That's right. And that drop really hurt him. When Gronk came out and said, Emika a big boo.

That was the turning point for Emeka Egbuka. He said that on a very large NFL pre-show. Yeah. Pre-Egg-big-boo, okay? He was 89 yards per game, 18 fantasy points per game. We're talking overall wide receiver one territory post-ig-big-boo. To start the year, in his first five games, it was the second most fantasy points of all time to start a career. behind Pook and Akua. And then in front of Malik neighbors. And then a big boo happened. And from that point on, 41 yards per game, six fantasy points a game. That is the obvious reason why I am nervous. This is a player who I loved in college, made him a my guy going into last year. He is a good wide receiver. He was talked up through the entire camp process. Baker talked about this rookie is coming in. Looks like a vet. Does everything right. Loves him as a man. Just.

espoused as much as he could about this rookie, like telling people, hey, he is the real deal. You come out first five weeks of the season. Obviously it was correct. So what in the freaking heck happened to make it to where you couldn't throw the ball to him? He had all uncatchable passes. When the ball went his way, he would drop it. I am really nervous because I feel like I'm so invested in Ibuka on a number of levels. that I feel like my normal default reaction would be to find a super clear path to tell you why he'll be fine. Like that's how I feel like my default reaction would be in this situation. Like I feel biased towards his success. I, whether I'm rostering him and had him as a potential keeper, he won't be a keeper anymore. I just love what I saw in the field and the player. And yet I can't get on this podcast and be like,

Well, I'm not worried about it at all. It's totally fine. Like he'll be totally, totally fine. It's not a big deal because I don't believe it. Because the path that you would describe happened for him when it all went wrong. He got the opportunity to be the dude. Mike Evans was injured. Chris Godwin was gone. It's like, hey, wow, this great rookie step up. And that's when he stepped down. So we don't know the status of Mike Evans, current free agent. I don't think it's. He had gotten hurt, he got hurt too, and there's a lot of talk ever since the hamstring injury for him, not the same player. Yeah, I mean, I don't believe the situation around him really makes an impact. If Mike Evans is there, if Mike Evans is gone, Chris Godwin is fully healthy, if McMillan is a huge part of it, I think it's irrelevant. It's all about Bigbuka. Is it a mental thing? Was it a physical thing? Was it, you know, maybe a little bit of Baker in there too?

had blinders on when he threw to Abuka. I believe it's going to work. I, you know, if I have to, I will have to when we start staten out the UDK player by player, start at the team level, look at how many passing yards. I think Baker's going to have the percentages it goes. I'm going to put a Mecca as a player that I believe is going to. Your chips are in? My belief is in. I'm holding some chips back. Not all the chips, yeah. Because I'm nervous. Look, my player that I'm most nervous for at wide receiver, this is not going to be a surprise. I think a lot of people are annoyed, nervous, all of that. But for the first time this morning, I actually thought about maybe an unfortunate comp. Before you give the name, I think it's the connection here of being nervous about Emeka Ibuka and being like your guy,

You're going to name. You can name if you want. Okay, it's Mark. It's Marvin Harrison. I mean, this was... Spoiler alert. You're going into years. Why would you do that? I'm so sorry. But it's like, hey, year two. First round wide receiver. Ohio. This is wide receiver. You know, nothing. He will be just fine. And then Marv was not... Oh, you're saying Abuka's one year behind on that same path? Yes. Potentially. Look, here's the comp I started thinking about with Marvin and what people are going to have to reconcile. And the nervousness, it's across the board. Who's the quarterback, new head coach, Michael Wilson's emergence, Trey McBride is the true number one and will remain the true number one. And if Michael Wilson gets more work, because I don't know, if I'm Mike LaFleur and I turn on the tape, I saw a lot from Michael Wilson. I didn't see much from Marvin Harrison. He had three weeks.

in his first 29 games as a top 12 fantasy wide receiver. Mike, there is a player that plays for Pittsburgh who you begrudgingly kind of got on board with at the very, very end, but mostly hated all offseason and his name is Mike Kaff. DK Mike Kaff. I would like to follow motion to remove your name from his name. Motion to die. There's a reality for Marvin Harrison where he. never, ever, ever meets any of your expectations for superstardom, but settles into the worst version of D.K. Metcalfe that you could find. Yeah. That is, that's what I. Yeah. When I watch Marvin Harrison, like everything I saw for Michael Wilson was better than what I've seen from Marvin Harrison. Marvin Harrison has more often than not, not made the big play, not made the difficult play. He has made a handful in two years of plays where I was like, oh.

And the rest have been very pedestrian. Even the production, it plays any wide receiver should make. It's, it's Michael Pittman, which is no, it's not disrespect to Michael Pittman, but it's good wide receiver. It's like, dude. That's not who Marv was drafted to be. You spent too much draft capital to get Michael Pittman or the worst version of Metcalf. You were searching after. A hall of favor. Yeah, you were searching after a world-class wide receiver. I still. I still believe. I still believe. And there is enough on tape. I know you're saying that Michael Wilson, honestly, Michael Wilson on tape definitely looked better than Marvin Harrison. He did more. Were you watching Ohio State tape? I remember the Ohio State tape. But I mean, in the first nine weeks of the season before he got injured, 55% of his games, he was a wide receiver two or better. Like, that's a good clip for two.

Wide receiver two? Yeah. That's a real. Yeah. Okay. How about the same exact thing? So half the time he was a wide receiver two or better, I think you're making my point. I don't think you understand the, I don't think you understand the percentages of, I mean, outside the top like four or five wide receivers who are up there 80 to 90% of the time, that's not a bad rate for a wide receiver at all. But we want top 12. Okay. So you're telling, let me put it this way. 45% of the time he wasn't even a wide receiver two.

Correct. On a week. Sure. Yes. Okay. You can't get him with the... Whoopi! Let's these facts. Get out of here. Let me read you, D.K. Metcalfe's fantasy finishes in his career. 32, 7, 12, 18, 16, 31, 26. I hope that's not what we're reading off in five years. That's all I'm saying about. Marv. Do I want him to succeed? Of course. But his play is so inconsistent right now, whether those numbers are, you know, those numbers notwithstanding, his play on a play to play basis is inconsistent. The great ones don't do that. The great ones, they don't go ping ponging between what are you doing on that play and, oh, that was nice. You know, that's my point. And I'm really nervous. I'm really nervous.

Because who's playing quarterback for Arizona? Yeah, I mean, how long is the journey going to be from here to relevance? The quarterback issue is probably the biggest issue with Mark. Yeah. All right. I think it's Kyler. My guy that I'm nervous about is another first round wide receiver. Another top 10 wide receiver is Romo Dunzee of the Chicago Bears and the, like a Bucca. It's such a good name. The first month of the season was great for fantasy because Mr. Rome put up five touchdowns in four games. Five touchdowns and four games will absolutely keep you afloat. So Rome appeared in, you know, he got hurt at the end of the year. He missed five of the regular season games, but he played two games in the playoffs. So you're talking 15, or I'm sorry, 14 games. He was over.

Like, do you guys know the average to get to 1,000 yards now with 17 games? It's like 59 yards. Yeah. He was, which that's for fantasy, that's garbage. If you're telling me you're averaging 59 yards a week, like that's not going to get it done. And even that mark, he hit it five times. Five? Five. I'm counting the playoff games too, which maybe you're like, hey, I'm not going to count the playoff games because he was coming off the injury. I'm going to count him because the issue is. Colston Loveland, Mr. Loveland, Luther Burden. Like, DJ Moore is already not even in the equation anymore, at least in my opinion, for fantasy of who can be. In the financial equation. Oh, yes. He's very much. He's a Chicago bearer. I'm saying he won't, like we aren't worried about DJ Moore or saying, hey, guys, I think the number one target for Chicago is still might be DJ Moore. I think that that is not happening, but you have two other guys who are.

top contenders to be that for the Chicago Bears. Mr. Loveland was not even really, he wasn't part of the equation when Rome was having the good games at the beginning of the year. I'm very concerned for him, especially considering like the investment into Rome. It's like Marv, where Abuka kind of fell a little bit in rookie drafts compared to how a first round wide receiver normally. But people were in on Rome. People were very in on Rome. And I'm just like, I don't know that there is a path for him to ever become anything close to what he was drafted to be. These three names, I think at one point if you threw them all on a dynasty roster, you'd be. Oh, you'd be. Oh, my gosh. Maybe like three weeks into last year. I've got the future of the national football league on my roster. I will have a dynasty in our dynasty league. Yeah. And now you're hoping like.

Oh, tell me one of them works out. So put him in order of nerves for you, Jason, like most nervous to least nervous about. Because it sounds like Marv is your least nervous probably. Yeah, I think I'm most nervous about Rome. Not based on what I've seen from him specifically, more based on what I saw from Loveland and even Luther Burden. The fact that the bears, I think, are going to be able to spread the ball around. And Rome to me profiles now as a touchdown dependent player. He is not going to be the alpha. But he can be good at that. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. He could have a season where he, you know, only has 60 receptions, but has over 1,000 yards and, you know, nine touchdowns and is really good for fantasy. That's, you know, that's fine. But his pathway, like if the touchdowns don't come, he might be the third wide receiver on his team.

Can we just spread the production from Caleb Williams into all the quarters of the game, please? So we can just see normalcy. I'm probably the most nervous about Abuka in that bunch. Sure. And I probably, I would probably be, I'd probably be the least nervous about Marv two. Of those three, I think that's my, because he is the, Abuka could be the one, two, three, four or five pass catching option. Rome could be three or four. Marv, it's going to be two or three. My list would be I'm most nervous about Rome. Second would be Marv. I'm least concerned about Ibuka. Yeah. Okay. Well, that makes me happy, Mike. Persuade me. No, not now. Oh. Throughout the entire off season, just persuade me, keep saying nice games. He's going to need a constant drip of positivity. That's it. I mean, Mike Evans is the first shoe that has to drop. Yes. Off the team and into the Hall of Fame. Oh, that. Let's do it.

Let's do it. Fourth ballot, Hall of Fame. Yeah. Wide receiver. I am curious about current best ball ADP on these three players. Oh, yeah. If you haven't seen it, what order do you think they're being drafted in? Oh, this is awesome. Wow. Are we, we're in baseball? I'm going to guess, okay, upside. I'm going to guess that Adunze is going ahead of Marv. And I'm going to guess that Abuca is going behind both. Okay. You're correct on one, incorrect on another. I'll tell you in a second. Oh, man, I'm going to guess. We're playing mastermind right now. Okay, yeah. Crap. Okay, I think the first person would be. That's impossible. There's only three names. Yeah, you just got to say. I'll go. Shoot your shot. I'll go Marv. Marv Abuka Rome. It is Marv last. Yeah. As the wide receiver 33. Yeah. Two years. Rome.

wide receiver 28 and a buca is still being drafted pretty hot and heavy wide receiver 23 okay okay okay Luther burden wide receiver 22 yeah that's right baby that's right that feels that feels dumb just another on the year with Mike that came on at the end I don't know if we can actually hit but he is so good see Luther burden here's the thing but both Luther burden and Roma dunzae I think they're both super talented and they share the exact same problem, which is. Colston Levin. Yeah. Yeah. There was a switch in the NFL headquarters that said what is happening and Mike turned it to what I want to happen. Yeah. That is literally click.

But Luther Burton is going to siphon off both these guys. And then each one of those two, they'll take turns. They'll be like, oh, Luther's so good. Look, oh, Rome sucks. And then Rome will get two touchdowns in a row. You'll be like, ah, Luther's done now. Rome's stepping up. It's just going to be like that forever. All right, we're going to take a break. We're skipping news. We're pre-recording this show by a couple of days. And we're jumping into a rookie review. All right, here we go. Rookie review. All right, we're going to take a little walk through the.

positional groups for the rookies in 2025 and compare them historically. And we're going to start with the quarterback position. So we want to see how this quarterback rookie class compared to previous years. Over the last decade, we only had four years where multiple rookie quarterbacks average 17 plus fantasy points per game in their starts. Hard to do for rookie quarterbacks. So four times in 10 years or about as many times. as Marv is a wide receiver too. And 17 points per game, the reason we're using that metric, that's basically what the quarterback 12 is on average over in a given season. So this year there were multiple. There were two rookie quarterbacks who hit that mark. And it's- Pam Ward. Nope. Oh, no, no, no. It's Jackson Dart and Tyler Shuck. Now what's interesting is neither of them really had this like, it wasn't like the whole season.

Right, Tyler Shuck came on at the end. Jackson Dart had a nice run, injury. What's going on? Good run, injury. Yeah, so. Nice individual run, injury. Yeah, so it's interesting. Jackson Dart, Tyler Shuck, I mean, they were the most exciting rookie quarterbacks, both from an NFL and a fantasy perspective. It wasn't Cam Ward, although he played better over the second half of the year. He did. Probably had the least total at his disposal, I would say. in terms of weapons, offensive line, all of it. For sure? For sure. Yes. Yeah. I would say for sure. I mean, I know Chris, I love Chris Olave, but there was not much else to work with. Chris Olivae is a, is a great player. Juan Johnson is a serviceable tight end. I think if you switch the quarterbacks, if you switch the quarterbacks, you'd be saying Calvin Ridley still had it.

And you had, you had Epic Isle Manor and you had Chigo Conquo. I would disagree. Watching them, it was, they were not good. And the, and then I'm, I'm also including that coaching. Sure, coaching. It's, Dart is the ceiling play. He is the far scarier player who keeps running headfirst into the ground and into defenders. And sometimes his offensive line. And. I am a little bit nervous about Matt Nagy being the mastermind of the offense for the Giants. You know, we talked about the Callahan stuff. He's the, what, the passing game coordinator. It's not as, he's not as high on the level as Nagy is who. Nagy has like two years of success. And those were with Mahomes. And then he had years of not being great with Mahomes. And then he had his own team. And it was awful. And they didn't, you know, he's not taking a, a.

better role right somewhere else and then so but but dart is the the player who he runs so for fantasy football that's what we want tyler shuck might end up being the guy because he can make all the throws he does run enough or you know to to boost the floor and his coach his coach gives his like killing more i mean you know we get hot and bothered by a lot of of different coaches and people might Be like, I'm tired of hearing about it. Wherever Kellen Moore has gone, there has been fantasy goodness because of how he runs his offense, you know, specifically fast-paced. When you are playing multiple, when you get multiple snaps more per game over the course of the season, it really, really adds up. So while Dart is the, he's the one I prefer, you know, no risk it, no biscuit, no biscuit. I think it could easily end up being Tyler Shuck, who's just this real steady top eight.

you know, like top six to eight quarterback for fantasy. I think one of the best things Callen Moore did was entrust Tyler Shuck to throw the football and make bigger plays. Yes. And give him responsibility. Like sometimes these offensive coordinators can just try to do too much protecting of the young player. And then you don't get to see enough. I think they protected him in the right way, which was via Spencer Rattler. Sure. They gave him time to not just. By comparison, Spencer Rattler. Look how good Shuck is. But having Spencer Rattler win the job start in week one and letting Shuck have the time on the bench, that could have been helpful for him, even though he played 20 years of college. So fantasy-wise, looking at, I mean, those are two guys over 17 fantasy points per game in their starts. And Jackson Dart, by the way, fifth best among rookie quarterbacks ever.

averaging 41 rushing yards per game in those starts. But among the quarterbacks that have done that have gone over 17 fancy points per game in year one, 50% of them were a top five quarterback within the next two years. That's wild. So shoot your shot, right? I mean, year two jumps for Lamar Jackson, Justin Herbert, Kyler Murray. for fantasy-wise. I agree with Mike. If you have to call your shot one of these guys being top five, which is a real fantasy asset. It's Jackson. It's got to be Jackson Dart with the incredible amount of rushing that he does. He did all that without Malik. Yeah, I mean, you want to talk about the worst receiving core. Wondale and... I think Wondale's good. No, Wondale's good, but I'm saying that's that's his best. He's not as good as Chris Olave. Agreed.

So maybe Dart. I mean, all three of these guys did not have a ton to work with. There you go. So, you know, look at those other quarterbacks who hit 17 plus fancy points per game. There was some regression in year two. Baker Mayfield, C.J. Stroud, Bo Knicks, those are players that their fancy points per game decreased by three fancy points per game. We might have been. having that conversation about jaden Daniels had he gotten more of the season too like jason brought up frequently how nice their schedule was in his rookie season year two we didn't see like when we did the true series and we talked about jaden for a minute like we just didn't see the peak games and the you know in the few that he got but um yeah and we'll see where cam ward falls in next year with i mean maybe uh an extremely talented wide receiver being added to the roster and some offensive line improvements they gotta do something

and spending a lot of that capital new head coach, new offense coordinator, Brian Dable. Like there is a lot of reasons. I mean. Being drafted at the one-on-one by some time. I mean, Bryce Young is still playing because if Bryce Young was drafted in the second round, he would have been moved on from already. And that's where Cam Ward can compete with Tyler Shuck and Dart from not so much Darb, but Shuck. You know, if things go wrong, the rug can get pulled. If things go wrong for Cam Ward, it won't get pulled. I would still definitely bet on both Dart and Shuck over Cam Ward. Do you realize, I mean, when you look behind the scenes, I know the fantasy numbers weren't prolific or anything, and again, his weapon sucked. But I'm looking at Cam Ward's game log right here, right? He started the year, and he threw four touchdowns and what looks like, one, two, three, four, five, six interceptions, okay?