Fantasy Football Podcast 2015 - Top 20 Quarterbacks, Numberfire's JJ Zachariason, News

Mike on that one. The bad news. All right, let's talk quarterbacks. Quarterbacks. All right. So right after we tell you how possibly an important quarterback selection will be, we're going to go through our top 20, so you have a good perspective on which guys you can wait on, which guys we really like. Number one, maybe you've heard of him, Aaron Rogers. Yeah. Deal with it, people. The discount double check himself. It doesn't get better than Aaron Rogers. Uh,

We've been on a lot of shows. People are like, luck, Rogers, luck, Rogers. Easy decision for me. For us, it's been easy. Do, I mean, what's the other story? Because Andrew Lux are number two, spoiler alert. Yeah, so clearly those two are cut above everybody else. But Aaron Rogers, in my rankings, is even a cut above luck. Aaron Rogers is one of the most efficient quarterbacks of all time. You don't need a certain type of game or a certain type of game flow for him to be great.

And in addition to how good he has always been, he has always performed as pretty much a top two quarterback, in addition to that, they're trying to speed up the offense, run more offensive plays, and put up more points. I want a piece of that Aaron Rogers pie. I don't think that there's a reason to kind of overly split hairs on them either. We like Rogers for a few reasons more than luck, which is kind of like track record.

in history and efficiency and not throwing interceptions. It's called, since starting in 2008, he's been a top two fantasy quarterback every year except when he got hurt. Since 2008? Yeah. And he's being drafted behind luck, which is just why I love him even more, just because the value is there. Madness. All right, so number two is Andrew Luck. He threw the ball last year. Obviously, Rogers was banged up.

He threw the ball about 100 times more than Rogers last year. They brought him Philip Dorset. They brought him Frank Gore. He has gotten better every single year. He's been a professional quarterback, and that team should be very good, and they're playing in a division with a lot of winnable games. So Andrew Luck has a lot of things going for him. He's great if you're in a dynasty league, if you can lock him down.

He's one of the two difference-making quarterbacks. Would you agree? There's a huge tier for me, a drop off on points. After these two guys. No Sean Moreno sized. Yeah, no Sean Moreno sized gap. Tears. Tears. Tears. Tears. You don't remember the Noshon-Shane Tiers? No, I've never seen the Noshon Tires. Oh, come on, man.

Come on. It looks like the Kool-Aid man is falling out of his face. These tears are gigantic. It's in the middle of a national anthem. The man was moved. I'm not knocking the man for being moved. No, no, no. He just has bigger tears than all of us. Yeah, America. Combined. Now you understand the joke.

All right. Go on. The No Sean Moreno size tier is right here. People, if you are one of those guys that has to draft QB, you're like, look, QBs win every year when I look back. No, I know, but I'm just saying the most common thing I always hear is. We like them, but that's how they talk, Mike. That is how they talk. I mean, I used to be the, the most common thing I always hear is I look back at my league and the guy with the best quarterback has won. Like, that's what they say. And the reason is because.

The other people in the league, generally speaking, aren't doing what we talked about. It aren't streaming. Streaming doesn't just say, okay, now we get a quarterback. It's playing a better matchup every week. So, yeah, if nobody's streaming in a league, then the better quarterbacks win. But the point here is that if you have to take a quarterback, go after one of these two guys. Take them in the second round and have them. That's my opinion. If you're a quarterback player, grab one of these guys. My one quick warning on Andrew Luck, his first two years, 23 touchdowns each year.

He had 40 last year. Now, I'm not saying he can't do it again, but if those touchdowns go down, you're going to be really, really upset you spent the first or second round pick on Andrew Luck. Yeah, I mean, you think about going into the season last year and what you thought of Andrew Luck. And why he was so great last year is because he was a fourth round pick.

So for a fourth-round pick, you got the best quarterback. Yeah, I think he is pretty special, but you're right. I mean, even in years where Peyton Manning had huge touchdown years, there's always a regression. It's hard to keep those numbers up. I mean, Stafford had a 40 touchdown year. Yep. The year after. That's exactly what I'm thinking about. All of those. There's very common for guys to have that huge year, and then the next year. Which is exactly why Roger's finishing first or second for like seven straight years is why we like him more. Yep. So, all right, three, four, five is Matt Ryan, Peyton Manning, and Russell Wilson.

We talked about the fact that we're exceptionally high on Matt Ryan with JJ, so I think we've exhausted Ryan quite a bit. But Peyton, Wilson, what do we think? Wilson has a lot of value in four-point touchdown, passing touchdown leagues. Because just like Kaepernick, he gets a lot of yards in the ground, just like Newton. He accumulates a lot of yards on the ground. And so it's a difference to make it for him. And he was the number three.

Overall, fantasy quarterback class. And you have him three. You have Russell Wilson three. In standard leagues, I do. Yeah, we're actually very differed because I have him at nine. I'm not completely buying in that he will repeat the running performance of last year. And I think he has to come at least very close to repeating last year if he wants to be highly. You don't think touchdowns go up with Jimmy Graham. They may, but he needs to run for 600 yards. Yeah.

Yeah, if he... I think he'll run. If he dips on the running at all and then just increases in the passing, it's a wash. He's pretty safe is what I think. I think Wilson's pretty safe. I think he is, too. I've got him at five on my board. One thing I think people need to realize when they're drafting, because I've heard some confusion here, is they know that six-point touchdown leagues, quarterbacks are more important. I don't know that that's true, but that's what they hear. And...

They think Russell Wilson is even better than he finished three last year. But in six-point passing quarterback leagues, Russell Wilson, Colin Kaepernick, Cam Newton, those guys take a hit. They're not that great. Because their touchdown numbers.

are not the prolific 30 plus. On throwing, right. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, and passing touchdown. So we have Wilson at 5. We have Peyton at 4, still believing that Peyton's going to get it done there. I agree. I don't think we're going to see him just drop off the map and the ball go to C.J. Anderson every play of the season. Before he heard his leg through 11 games, he was on pace for over 5,000 yards and almost 50 touchdowns. Don't forget that because he got hurt.

I've won a couple championships with Peyton Manning as my quarterback with big gaps between the years, just because he can carry you when he's on. Ben Rothesberger at six, Drew Brees at seven, and Ryan Tannehill at eight. I want to hear Jason talk about Big Ben. Yeah, and I want to hear me talk about Drew Brees as well. Big Ben is where on his rankings? Four. He moved up from five to four, went over Russell Wilson. Well, let me lay some stats for Jason to talk about.

The second best offense last year, second best passing offense, seventh best scoring offense, but obviously two humongous games. Six touchdown games, two six touchdowns. Two humongous games, but eight games of one or less touchdowns. And I don't think that that part of it is going to repeat. I think that he threw, did he throw over 5,000 yards last year? Right there, I think he was basically at 5,000. Yeah, he was, I actually think he tied Drew Brees. Him and Drew Brees, I believe, had the most passing yards in the league.

4952. Yeah, and if I look at these offenses and say, you know, you take Drew Brees on one hand and Ben Rothensberger on the other, because I am kind of polar on those guys. And I say, which offense is trending up?

for the passing game, which offense looks like things are clicking more, that new weapons are coming into fruition. Marty McBride, Martavis Bryant, is just looking beastly. Everything is clicking there, and that offense that took a couple years to kind of get going under the new OC a couple years ago is full steam ahead, whereas Drew Brees, I've got him pretty low, I've talked about this before, I'm off, there's just no way he could be on any of my teams for where I've got him ranked.

I mean, the first thing that comes to mind is clearly a big bin, Drew Breeze water bet. Oh. Because for me, I mean, it's simple for me. Drew Breeze is the pick between the two. I think the analyst's overreaction of Drew Breeze is what you're suffering from, which we can get you some medicine for that. But I'm not ready to throw Drew Breeze away just because Jimmy Graham and Kenny Stills, who I don't think is a premier talent, is gone from the team.

You're sleeping on Stills, man. Of course I will. Just like everybody else. That's why he's not on the Saints anymore. Well, CJ Spiller hurt right now is not going to help him. You know, presumably he's going to come back, and I'm sure he's going to come back strong, but he's dropping a little bit. Let me tell you a little bit about Drew Breeze, just so you know. Drew Breeze has not always been a super... His favorite color is blue. His eyes are gorgeous. Car is green. Uh...

He's not always been a touchdown guy. He has always been a very, very good quarterback. But, you know, a couple of years ago, he went, so on the Saints, he threw 34 touchdowns, 33 touchdowns, 33 touchdowns, 26 touchdowns, 26, that was all on the Saints. Then all of a sudden he exploded as their offense changed its philosophy, and he went from 33 to 46. If since that time, he's trended down 46, 43, 39,

33 last year, and now he lost Jimmy Graham, who he threw 10 touchdowns to. He is older, and the offense is wanting to run more. So, look, it could be analyst overreaction, because he's a Hall of Fame quarterback. He's fantastic. I would take him on any of my NFL teams. But I think that there's a regression here, and his name is what's carrying him, not his...

performance. Last year, he didn't always look good. It wasn't a matter of just stats. On film, he wasn't the same Drew Breeze. So I think that that is a problem. His deep ball wasn't the famous Drew Breeze deep ball. So yeah, I'll take that water bet. All right. Well, I feel like... Waterbeds. I gotta say something. Hold on, hold on. Because I need to counter one of those points for him because you have your trajectory. He's got seven straight 30 plus touchdown years. Big Ben has one year.

In the last eight where he threw 30 touchdowns. They've been a defensive team. Now their defense stinks. You know, I will go with what I see from Drew Breeze on the field. So we got a big Ben versus Drew Breeze. Okay, this is what I say. That was incredibly passionate and moving and did not sway my opinion at all. I can see you going there. See you're Drew Breeze. Yes.

All right. Well, get in on that. So six. No, no, no, you can't say that. All right. Yeah, I'll gladly lock on. I just didn't want you to have to deal with two cups of water. I'll take them. Fair enough. Ryan Tannehill at eight, Cam Newton at nine. I think we put these consensus together before the Benjamin News. Is that correct? Yeah. So Newton's probably coming down for me. Really? Yeah, because he just doesn't. I mean, Benjamin was a touchdown machine for them. I don't know what Funches is. He's a bunches of Funches. That's good.

All right, so we'll get it back down. So let's talk Tannahill first. Yes. One of the big headlines for Ryan Tannehill is the fact that he has improved every year in the NFL in completions, completion percentage, yards, yards thrown, touchdowns rushing yards. Pretty good. Pretty good. That's what you look for. Is that bad? Is that bad? Does that stop at some point? Well, yeah, it's going to stop at some point. Is it this year? No way. No, this is the...

going to be the best offense he's ever been a part of. I mean, I think Kenny Stills is a good wide receiver, or is at least comparable to where Mike Wallace is in his career now. Jarvis Landry, the connection with Tannenhill and Jarvis Landry is automatic. It also helps that Jarvis Landry only catches four-year passes. But you add in Greg Jennings, who, he had his times on Minnesota last year. They like him, he's a strong veteran presence.

miraculously is off of the pup, so maybe he gets some time, and maybe he is ready for the season. And my man, Jordan Cameron, is also there, and Ryan Tannenhill likes him some tight end. I just think that, and Lamar Miller, I mean, this team is fully loaded, locked and loaded. They have an uptempo offense. I like Tannenhill very much.