Draft Tips + Hungry For More - Fantasy Football Podcast for 7/30

JK one leg, the end. So I can tell you, so last year, Jay, of the top 10, let's see, we had five first rounders, four second rounders, one third rounder. And then there was one fifth and one undrafted of the top 10. I mean, it's just like the numbers are so against anybody actually doing anything. Ladd-McConkie, Josh Palmer, DJ Chark. Those players have comprised three wide receiver sets and two minute drill. Wait, read that again. Ladd-McConkie. We're talking about the charges, right? Josh Palmer and DJ-chark. Wait, don't they have a first round wide receiver? Have comprised three wide receiver sets and two-minute drill and move the ball periods of the first two days of Chargers camp. I feel like you're forgetting someone. I don't think we are. Oh, Quentin Johnston, who has been left out of that.

Harbaugh did talk him up saying he's been wonderful and gets a bad rap. It feels like a lot. Oh, for sure. And then a video comes out of him. What else are you supposed to say? Just dropping a warm up over the shoulder, track the ball thing, you know, doing a huge. He didn't drop it. He didn't get to the ball. I touched his hands. Ladd-McConkie, Josh Palmer, DJ, DJ, who do you want to take the chance on? I mean, I've said it all offseason. Ladd McConkey is a player I believe in. Ironically, when you talk about the late breakout ages for Xavier Xavier Ligget earlier, he had a late one. Ladd-McConnor technically didn't have one. He didn't get there. But when you watch the film, the dude balls. He is absolutely outstanding. He is a great slot receiver. He will have space. He will be where Justin Herbert wants him to be. And I think he'll be the number one wide receiver for this team. So that's where I'm taking my share. Correction on Jared Patterson. That was 2022 when he had 16 carries. Yeah, that's what I was wondering like last year.

So 17 carries between the last two years. Was he in the NFL? No, he didn't play. I hadn't heard his name in forever. A practice squad. When I saw this, I was like, wait, he's back. He's practice squad. And look, the reports that I have at least heard on Jared Patterson are far more of a, he'll be back on the charges practice squad. Chase Brown. Chase Brown continues to take. This one is significant. This one, yeah, this one has changed my rankings. Bengals running back Chase Brown continues to take the majority of reps at running back with the first team offense at training camp. The day before, the director of player personnel, Duke Tobin, told reporters that Brown would have the opportunity to be the guy or the second guy or in tandem with Zach Moss. But the fact that this is an open competition with opportunities to be the guy is one of the reasons why there's this, like, I think we all wanted to like Zach Moss all offseason.

Mike kept saying the same thing, which is like when you stack up all of the historical data on players like Zach Moss, it almost never works out like this, where you just get a clean run at a starting opportunity, even though we had the success last year. Now it looks like it's a really open competition. There's obviously some loyalty to Chase Brown having an opportunity there that they feel good about. So thoughts? Yeah, so I have reacted to this. It did change my rankings as well, Mike. I've moved them closer because originally, I thought it was, you know, Zach Moss was giving the money. He was brought in. He's a perfect fit for the system. He's a veteran. And so I certainly had him as the well ahead of the timeshare role. I've moved them closer to each other, but I would caution people to not overreact yet. It is so early in training camp. If you want to give all these guys an opportunity to be the guy or the second guy or in tandem, then a report could come out next week saying now Zach Moss is taking all the first team reps. You know, they're giving these guys opportunities. So just.

This is the first major beat of a drum that you want to pay attention to. Does it continue? Because if it does, and it started early, that's great news for Chase Brown. When there's actual real-life defenders blitzing off the edge, we'll see if it's Chase Brown or Zach Moss. All right. And then the Eagles offensive coordinator, Kellan Moore, on his plans to move A.J. Brown and Devante Smith around said, I think those guys are going to move around the game throughout the game, throughout each and every week. We know that the offense is changing in a dramatic fashion in Philadelphia. My biggest curiosity has been like you have a lot of enthusiasm around motion, which the Eagles didn't run much of over the last few years, which was a strange thing for them to do, right? Like we all have a great reverence for Shane Steichen and his innovation in Indianapolis, but he was also the offensive coordinator for this team two years ago. They didn't move a lot. Now they're going to move guys around a lot.

I'm curious what's going to give. Is it going to be, you know, fewer, you know, option runs? What RPO's? Yeah, RPO's for Jalen Hertz because he's not in the shotgun as often. Is it going to be that goal line? We don't have Kelsey so we don't get the push push. Like, I don't expect every single player on the entire Philadelphia Eagles offense to have an upshot just because of change. So I'm really just curious broadly who benefits, who suffers. under a transition this dramatic. Yeah. So when you're looking at that, and I think everything you said there was well laid out, it's not necessarily great for everyone. What I want to do, what I want to bet on is talent. I go, okay, this system's going to change, who's it going to be, who's going to succeed. We do know that motion and these pre-snap movements, things like that, they put players in better positions to succeed. It makes things a little bit easier for the passing game. So when I look at AJ Brown and Devante Smith specifically,

Those two wide receivers are awesome. They are human beings that are great wide receivers. AJ Brown is fortunately for him. An athletic freak, a tank. Unfortunately for Devante Smith, he is not, which is why he's the clear number two here. But if you just talk about wide receiver talent, there's no question that these guys are elite, awesome, world-class wide receiver. So if you would put them in positions... that open things up for them to be a little bit easier, maybe catch the ball in stride, maybe create more space. I'm betting on both of those players specifically. I don't think it goes to the entire offense. I'm not betting on Dallas Goddard. I'm not, you know, just across the board saying I've got to get every eagle I can. But I think it will be a significant year for both AJ Brown and Devonte Smith. It will be a big adjustment too for Jalen Hertz, who struggled with the passing game over the back half of the year last year.

that'll be something to watch too. Adjusting to a new offense is not always smooth or maybe it takes some time. Does it start worse than it finishes? You know, those are a question. I feel like he has had a new offensive coordinator for about 20 years. Like back to college, like every year was, you know, he's transferring schools that he gets here and then it's failure causes a change. Then success causes a change. Then it's like every year he's got a new system. He's, I don't know what will happen if he has two years of the same system. Yeah, I mean, they were. We'll never know. They were obviously a really good offense until the tumult of the end of the year. Yeah, the second half of last year, I don't know if it was just teams figured out the very vanilla offense or something was, you know, broken in the actual play and talent. But I lean more of the latter. Ricky Pearsall is back from the active NFI list. Rookie.

first round wide receiver for the 49ers. And do we have any, uh, all the lock-ins or the lock-ins? The, uh, hold-in's still happening, Mike. We saw no Jemar Chase last we heard practicing. We have no, uh, CD-LAM. We have no, Brandon Ayuk. What, what's what the Cowboys? Oh, that is a, look, I mean, there was a. A clip that kind of went viral there about Jerry Jones talking about how he's going to time up the market perfectly and comparing it to a read option of you got to wait until the very last second sometimes to know if the timing is perfect. And the timing is not perfect. It is, in fact, terrible for them. And they have botched this with every, especially like those two quarterback contracts.

You tell me Dak in Dak's representation is not like, that's nice. That's not. Yeah, this is not better for the Cowboys. That's not. You tell me, uh, Jordan Love just got 220. They get paid every two weeks. So these checks are just smaller leading up to the. So it's so weird. Here's a cool stat for all the Cowboy faithful, the Cowboy fans to just get excited about this upcoming season. Right now, their free agent guaranteed money they've spent this off season, $9 million. So that's all they've, that's all they've doled out. That's pretty, pretty powerful offseason. They need to pay probably a little bit more than that to lock up C.D. Lamb and Michael Parsons and Dak Prescott. Yeah. And Trailience looks terrible in camp. So no, he's not going to work. He's not going to work. He's not going to work. He's running as the third string. I saw video. For now. I saw video. For now, guys. I saw video. And look, you should have seen those plays and then like walked off the field and handed a contract to Dak.

Yeah. Also, it reminds, Trey Lance reminds me of, Mike, what was that quote that you saw from Sam Howell? Oh, that was spectacular. It was fantastic. There was a report from the Seattle Seahawks that Sam Howell is three days into an almost alarmingly inaccurate camp. I mean. Like you've crossed the line to from inaccurate to alarmingly inaccurate. Almost. Almost alarmingly inaccurate. It's like we're not there yet. Couple more days and we'll be alarmed. Almost alarmingly inaccurate these three days. The beep reporters, please give us stuff like that. Like if you're going to share your opinion, make it entertaining. That is killer alliteration. It's excellent work up there. Yeah, I, Cowboys got to figure this out because we would like to see.

we'd like to see those players under contract. Yes, we would. Mike still has zero of his three Dynasty wide receiver because you won't trade them to me. I mean, I can do this for you. Don't get paid. Guys, they're going to get paid. All right, we have a ton of great questions to answer as we get ready for 2024. Quick break and we're back with the mailbag. Mailbag. All right, it is time to jump into the mailbag. Excited. These questions really matter. The year is on the way. And if you have a question for the show, you can go to the website, the fantasy footballers.com. We are here to help. Click the submit a question button or dial our voicemail hotline 302464 TFFB. I got a question before we kick it off. My own question. Where is the third? Where is the third deucer? Oh, yes. Where is math?

Where is the Falcon? No. You did it. You brought it up on the show. Where is the third guy? I don't know. I see an empty chair. Let me count. That man has a family. Al Borland. Say something. I'm here. All right. And then we've got Papa Josh. Oh, no. Papa Josh. And then the Falcon. Yeah, say something. Hold on. Let's listen. He's not there. I'm not hearing anything. Well, my understanding. Okay. is that he had lunch and coffee. And it was possible. Oh, no. It was possible he was brewing a little something. I just haven't seen him in a while. Oh, man. And I was just kind of. We have a note in our chat that he said, I hit both bathrooms out of spite. So he says, he's just desecrating the building right now. The Falcon is fully. He's questionable to return. Yeah, I mean.

We got three bathrooms, Falcon. You got some work still to do. Oh, my gosh. Well, okay. Question answered. Let's jump into the voicemail questions. Here's one from Ryan. Hey, Ballers. I had a quick question on draft preparation in the keeper league. How do you, any tips or tricks to prepare when the typical ADP doesn't apply? Thanks. So I'll lay some groundwork for the answer. Keeper question when they're talking about what ADP just doesn't apply? Just, yeah, draft tips when the ADP doesn't apply to your league, which ADP is the average draft position. When we refer to it on the show, sometimes we might be referring to sleepers, ADP, which is the average place players are going in a mock draft on sleeper, on Yahoo, on ESPN. Sometimes we refer to Underdog, which is baseball and their ADP. There's all different platforms have different ADPs. They are always changing. And I do worry sometimes, I'll be honest, that.

because it's the common way we compare value, that it can seem so universal that it's always going to apply to your league. And so this question is so smart by Ryan to say, look, I'm not going to bank that everybody in my league has the exact same viewpoint on every player. So what are some draft tips when there is variance? When there is, you know, I think the one that we see a lot of is if you draft at a hometown. You know, hometown players might go in a different place than they do on the ESPN ADP, for example. Well, and I think if you even take our league of record, now I would recommend this for all leagues out there that are serious, not like the, you know, if you're at your office league and you've got half the people that don't know what they're doing, whatever, make sure ADP's on to help them to not just destroy themselves and make it an easy victory. But like in our league, you know, we don't have the ADP sorted when you're drafting. You come in with your list. There is no ADP. So I think he's probably talking to a.

a league that there is no predetermined, you know, next guy up in the queue in my league. I know you could do that on the sleeper platform where you just turn it off and it's alphabetical. And so average draft position at that point will still be a guide of where most people in the world are seeing them, but it will be much, much looser because there is something that happens when the ADP is on where people are just like, I got to choose from one of these three guys at the top. Don't be that person. But as far as tips.

When that doesn't apply, first of all, you have to come in with your own rankings. You have to come in. You know, we've got the tiered rankings in the old draft kit. Cheat sheet creator. Yeah, we've got the cheat sheet creator so you could make your notes, you can star your players, you can move them around. But you have to come in prepared with some idea of the order of players you like and you want to a draft without ADP. I mean, our League of Record does not use an ADP. That's what I was saying. Yeah, just like you said.

Yeah, just like you heard. Just like you heard it. I totally heard it. So nice. You said it twice. But because of that, everybody has to come in with their own plan and there's a level up that happens in terms of my plan versus your plan versus Mike's plan and where we think players are going to pull the trigger and how long you think you can wait. And it's a guide. I would say that the it's always important. Like our league of record does not have an ADP. What? We don't. Oh my goodness. Breaking news. That's crazy. I will say this. The drafting by tiers, which we explained on a recent episode, is always important. But if you are without ADP, I mean, that is the way to win a league is to make sure that you've got your players bucketed together where it's like, because you can end up without ADP gaining extreme value later if you pay attention to guys that are in the same tier of quality. Do you have anything?

to add there, Mike? I do not. Preferably hand out ADP sheets to your league mates and tell them to believe them and make them to your name. I've never gone with that one, but that could work. Yeah, you could just print out a bad one and leave it on the ground somewhere. Backwards ADP? Whoa. All right. I think they'd figure it out eventually. I think they'd figured out right off the bat. Uh... Denver B91 on Instagram writes in and says Beijon 101 and then like a thousand exclamation or question marks. Yes, you can take Bejohn 101. Yes, you can. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, I've said this a handful of times. If every running back plays 17 games, I think Bejohn is the only guy that could outscore Christian McCaffrey this season. I think Brees. I put Breeson into that bucket too, but it'd be better to take Bejohn a 102 or 103 if you can make a trade.

Sure. If you can trade, if that's successful to you. And it's, I think that the larger question to me of this is just, we all have Christian McCaffrey number one. Do we still have McCaffrey number one? I do. That's a group. It's, look, if you have convictions and you have a process that has led you to believe that I think Bijon, I have a higher probability of Bijon finishing as the number one player overall over Christian McCaffrey, and you have the 101, and it's the only place you can get him. Because if you have the 101, You will not get Bijon Robinson in anything. It could be a linear draft. It could be a snake draft. You won't get him with your second pick. If your process is, I like Bijon more than the other guys, it's not egregious. Be bold. Take him up front. The decision you make there simply comes with the fact you need to live with the results, right? Because if you take CMC where you're supposed to at 101,

And he doesn't work out. At least you did what you were supposed to do. I'm just saying psychologically, but if you take Beijon at 101 and Christian McCaffrey laps the field again, you will feel bad. But that doesn't mean it's the wrong decision. No. Because it's very rare for players to repeat. I mean, whether by injury or circumstance or... You know, you could have a better season from CMC, but Bejan could be better over the last eight games, so he's better for fantasy playoffs. Like, that's an outcome people don't consider very often. You just look at the, oh, cool, I've got the number two running back, but he was number one over the last five weeks. I would also throw, I'll throw this out there to anyone that is considering the Bejeon. Like, I would take Christian McCaffrey. That would be what I do. But if these guys that you take in the first are epic failures, it is because of injury. Like, that's.

That's what's going to happen. Like your failures are because of injury. And you can't predict that, but there are certain markers, certain things. Obviously age is a big one. So if you say, well, hey, I would rather have the 215 pound 22 year old who is close enough rather than the 28 year old who's 209 pounds. Okay, that's that's a fair tiebreaker. Yeah. Yeah. Just trying. No, I mean, you're trying. I mean that... I mean, you said epic failure, but you could have like a normal... What's happening here? Is there a trade I don't know about? No, you could have a normal failure. Like, Bejohn could just be okay. Bejohn could be the RB7. Bejohn could be the RV 11. Like those things could happen without injury. Yeah. Just because we haven't had the pet... We haven't had the years of Christian McCaffrey lapping the field for Bijon. That's why Christian McCaffrey is going number one. Because how Christian McCaffrey finishes as the running back seven?

He missed several games. You got it. There is no world where he plays a full season and finishes RB7. There is a world where Bijon plays the whole season finishes RB7. There you go. Makes sense. All right, Mike. This question is from Instagram, Joe Mixen or Mike Evans in a full PPR Keeper League. I would take Mike Evans. My biggest question for Joe Mixon is related to pass catching. Look, we've seen quarterbacks change their play style once they have a player at the running back position who actually is really good at catching passes. The easiest one to talk is Cam Newton, never checked it down. Then he got Christian McCaffrey, and Chris McCaffrey's catching 70 plus passes a year in Carolina. But last year, C.J. Stroud was he didn't throw to the running back position. Is chicken or egg? But then on top of that, that very fair question is,

They've also added Stefan Diggs into this offense. So it's, you have three great pass catching wide receivers. Is Joe Mixen going to see a huge uptick in receptions? So you're Evans. Jason? Are you Evans? I am, well, if this is at ADP, because Mixon is going a full round later, I would actually be on the Joe Mixin side here. I know that. If I have to give up my pick, like if you're saying, okay, I take Evans for a third or I take Mixen for a fourth. then it becomes harder. Yeah, I take a little bit of contention. Obviously, you talked about how mixing coming in might allow for more receptions, but even Singletary, you know, at the end of the year, the last seven games played where he was the guy, he was on pace for 55 targets. That's not like a ton, but that's a, that is. That's how many it is. Just saying on the, on the year.

They were 30th and then the NFL targets to the running back. Yeah, because the first half of the year they were trying to do the Damien Pierce thing. If you're looking at it with the average drop position, you guys are both on the mixing side? I am. I think I'm still going to go Evans. And Falcon? Oh, my. Oh, did he find the third bathroom? No more French dips, buddy. Good thought, good thought. French dumps? French dumps. Titch swish. Oh, he does not get paid enough to undergo what he's undergone. And never will. Oh, the Deucer's alley is just cracking up over there. They know. Hey, as long as the heats on him, we're good. They love not getting dunked on. As long as the heat's on. I'm still not here. All right. Heat doesn't turn off. It just changes where it's pointing. Oh, yeah, which burner is on.

The oven's always on. It's just which burner. He can't be here, Andy. He had lunch today and coffee. So, like, eventually, you just can't work. Eventually, you need to. Poor guy. I love you. You brought this. I did nothing. No, I did everything. I'm just going to pile on when it's here. Um, Instagram Hamish Dowell says, why don't you guys, uh, why don't you record your league of record draft? Oh, because you will be so bored. It's kind of true. We will be so bored. We've recorded parts of it before. We have done a little highlight video on YouTube. A little highlight video when Traeger came out and helped sponsor. And it was pretty cool to see some. We'll throw some pictures and maybe a little clip or two on socials. But really, like, you know, it's a long draft. You know, we're not, we're not in a, we're not in the sleeper ESPN platform drafting in there. This is an offline, local, you know, everyone's here.

We've got a lot of pages that have been printed. And by that, I mean, Andy does. And then all of us have iPads. But, you know, it's a slow, arduous draft that's a lot of fun if you're in it. And I don't think it's a good viewing experience. Yeah, I mean, I feel like most people are going to be like, oh, just record it. You think? They'd want to see it. Yeah. All right. I don't think telling them it's boring is going to make sense. I'd say give us our one day. Give us our one day, not under the. microscope i want to be under the microscope if they'd enjoy it i just i don't it would be so boring man that's that i lead that way all right um this question comes in from x in dynasty how do you manage your aging out veterans what uh what are those uh what are you willing to take in trade for example i have keenan allen when do you think to have the most trade value i actually have a great tip for this okay well when do i think keenan ellen will have the most trade value

I traded him this off season. A year ago? No, no, I traded in this offseason. I did that. You don't trade old for young. That doesn't work. That's a bad philosophy. You will never get that. You trade old for old. That's what you do. That's how your team has states old. Yes. Okay. Yeah, you trade old for old. You just go like one year? Yes. I trade Keenan Allen and I got Amari Cooper. Okay. That was my trade. Yeah, that's great. Amari Cooper is younger. Amari Cooper is not quite as. aged, but he's not young, and he's looked at as an older player. You will never successfully convince somebody to take a, you will rarely successfully convince somebody to take an older, proficient, great, you know, like last year, Ken and Allen still would have been a hard player to trade while he was doing well. Yeah. But I could trade him.

For Amari Cooper this off season, that's what I did. I will say that you are right when you're talking about examples that have already aged past the age cliff where they've lost a ton of value. Eventually, you're not going to be able to trade old for young. However, I think my answer to this question, which you have personally done, I have done many, many times in our league. I think it's one of the most important dynasty tips is knowing where that age range is and when they are still holding really, really good value. So for instance, at the end of this season when a j brown i believe has an awesome season he is not seen as an old aging right player he's going to be a top if he has a great season he's going to be a top five six dynasty wide receiver that is when i will trade him he'll be 28 years old he'll still have plenty of real legitimate value to offer someone and i'll trade them for a young up and coming player and a first that's what i look for

You know, we've done that several times across many leagues. So I think both are good ideas. If you want to get out a year early, you can get a lot for your future. If you wait and you want the production that comes from that, you know, age 29 year old awesome season, then trade old for a little less old. That's not bad. Old for a little less old. Yeah, that's, I think it's a good way to go about it. That way you can keep your team as old as mine. You have done an. Excellent job at that. I posted the fact that I had gotten all my old guys' contracts this off season. It's unbelievable. I mean, it's almost everybody. It is literally every single person on your starting roster other than your quarterback who's already locked in forever and that doesn't count. McCaffrey, Stevenson, Evans, Cooper, Kelsey, Mostard, lock it. Yeah, so there's just off Alvin Camer. That's it. Yeah, and I posted that and then I got a lot of snapback. Ah, your team's so old. Your team's so old. What are you, your team's going to die.