Footie Award Winners + Wild Card Reactions - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/17

On today's episode, we give our takes on the NFL playoff weekend. That was, it was sensational. I'll give you a little bit of a spoiler, but you're all here for one reason, the footy awards. Don't miss a moment. Make sure you subscribe to this channel, like the video, and leave us a comment if you think one of your votes got snubbed. Enjoy. To the Fantasy Footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. And apologies. I was a little louder than I meant to be. That was, I was going to say, I didn't know if you brought extra juice because it's the footy awards and you were just hyped. But I was, um, can I be sued if people careen off of the road? No, no, no, no, no. Podcast cannot be held responsible for sharp turns off the freeway. You need to, users, be responsible with your volume.

I'll be honest with you. I wasn't quite sure where the voice was. And so I aired on the side of like, you know, I'm going to need the extra gusto and it was fine. The thing is, we don't have five shows a week anymore. Oh, it's more rested. Yeah, so you store up. Wow. At least for today. You're going to need to dial it back just a touch knowing these new powers. You are in mid-season form. We need you in off-season form. Okay. Thank you, Mike. We need you announcing. Like the, what was that, the Chargers, Jaguars announcers. Oh my gosh. Who can't give two farts about the greatest comeback. Listen, Al Michaels and Tony Dungey were this single. That was the worst I have ever experienced in my life. It was two men who were on the precipice of a recliner nap. They had no. Yeah, those dudes already had ice cream. They had no.

comprehension of what was taking place. No volume was ever changed. Touchdown. I mean, look, I am the biggest Al Michaels fan in the world. Because he's great. But he was having a bad day. And his pick me up on the other side was not Chris Collinsworth. It was Tony Dungey who was reading a bedtime story. It was the bedtime story of the Jaguars comeback. They didn't know why the ball was closer to the goal line. When Trevor Lawrence went in on the two-point conversion, that call, if you can go back and look at it, it was like, and Lawrence scores, goes in, goes in for the two. I mean, it was one of the greatest comeback in the history of the NFL. And they were asleep. Third biggest playoff comeback. You wouldn't have known it. Nope. They called it like it was the 1,000th biggest comeback in history.

It was wild. But no, what a weekend of football. Welcome back into the show. Footy Awards today. The official winners will be announced. Footies will be in the mail. I am very excited. This is the first time we've done this where I have absolutely no idea. I didn't look along the process and cheat and look. I have no idea who the winners are. I'm very excited. It's going to be fun. I have no idea either. And we're just in a good mood. I have some ideas. I mean... You cheated. I know what you're saying. I'm looking. Someone's got to make sure that the votes are coming in and that they're voting for the correct things. Sometimes you have to sway votes. But those games, aside from the commentating that was not where it needed to be, those games...

were exactly where they needed to be. They were sensational playoff football is the freaking best. It's so unbeatable. Like I, all I thought this whole weekend was like how disadvantaged all the other sports are to football. Like in some ways, the consequence of the weekend was like hitting me hard. Like you have this now 17 week season, tooth and nail, Minnesota. They fight, they battle, they get to whatever it was. Not 12 and 4. 13 and 4. 13 and 4. And it's over. It's just done. It's just done in two seconds. When the one score game bounces the wrong way at the wrong time, you leave the playoffs. Yeah. Yeah. So lots to talk about today. We can get into it. Twitter at the FF ballers. Join the foot.coms or fantasy football community. As Mike said, two shows a week right now. You can get an extra show.

at join thefoot.com. A lot of premium perks, access to the community. It's a lot of fun during the offseason, which is also dynasty season. I mean, we don't, you know the NFL. They don't take a big break. We finish the Super Bowl, you blink, and you're in the combine and free agency, and we'll be here for you. So the quick question is just, what were your takeaways and reactions to Wild Card Week? And before we get into news, before we get into the Footie Award winners. I'm going to go game by game. Okay. And just throw stuff out there if there was anything that stuck out to you that would tie into fantasy. You know, the 49ers, it was a close game with Seattle for the first half of the game and it fell apart for Seattle over the back half. 41 points for San Francisco. Brock Purdy, to me, he is the kind of most interesting storyline in that game. What is his future now with this team? How far can they go with him?

They're putting up 35, 40 points a game with Brock Purdy. Yeah, I mean, he threw three touchdown passes in his first playoff game. And he has not lost a game yet as a starter, obviously surrounded by an extremely talented defense. He's surrounded by elite offensive weapons. Absolutely. I mean, but this looks like, this looks like the best team. Legitimately, this might be the best team in the NFL right now. And they are being led. by the last pick in this year's NFL draft. That's impossible is how it feels. So it's pretty cool to see. And I just love chaos. So the Trey Lance, Jimmy Garapolo, Brock Purdy, Saga. I mean, awesome. I'm here for this. I got my popcorn out and I can't wait to see. Like, what is Trey Lance's future? Dude, no idea. Like, we really have seen.

You've seen no Trey Lance. It's not like Kyler when he's hurt and he comes back and I've seen him for a while so you know he's your starter. You have no idea. You had week one against the Chicago Bears where they played it at full on monsoon and then he broke his ankle. Like you have not seen him play a real football game. So here's an interesting take on that. Maybe what we've seen now with San Francisco is that you don't need to see Trey Lance to know that he'll be successful. That's been my entire argument for him for fantasy. If Jimmy Garapolo and Nick Mullins and C.J. Bethard and Brock Purdy are all successful. Then I bet Trey Lance will be successful plus running. I mean, it's just. There are a few plays that Brock Purdy makes, though, that I think, wow, that was, that was pretty good. You know, very special. I thought you were giving me a bust. No. No. Sure. That's fine.

You know, it's like, I don't know, I'm not saying Tom Brady replacing Drew Bledsoe, but this is a situation where if he goes and wins a Super Bowl, you. Oh, he's the starter. Yeah. No question. But then you, like, how do you not trade? You would. Trade Lance. You would. And you're going to get a, you're not going to lose a lot on your investment. He'd be the backup. Oh, man. They've shown a willingness to do that with Jimmy G. And it paid off. They get hurt all the time. They need six, seven quarterbacks. The other storyline I would just mention is I think throughout the season we saw the kind of invincibility factor of D.K. McCaff. It was San Francisco. He went 10 for 136 and 2. He was great all season long. He's bigger, faster, stronger than everybody. Gino Smith says he wants to retire a Seahawk. Yeah. I mean, I think Gino will get a deal. The Chargers game. I mean, it was 27 to nothing.

Wow. And it was bad. I mean, there was four interceptions in the first half by Trevor Lawrence. It made me in that moment extremely regret my comments about like, I think in the office or maybe on the show, I was like, oh, Trevor Lawrence is probably like. It did play in my head. It was like, I'm like, this is probably quarterback five, six in the league of who you would want on your team right now at this stage of their career. Yeah. And then he looked awful. And there was, you know, there was a couple bad. One of them was it.

PI for sure. But the other three were a problem. Huge comeback. Impressive performance slash collapse. Yes. Lawrence in the second half was unstoppable. Justin Herbert in the second half was putrid. Like the fact that Keenan Allen, one of the best possession wide receivers in the NFL, one of the best route runners in the NFL got 13 targets. And he caught six of them. is egregious. Mike Williams didn't catch any, right? Yeah, well, yeah, there's the Mike Williams debacle of should they have played him. But I'm saying in this game, and we may have had a vested interest in Keenanown getting one more reception. And the fact that he had 13 targets, and I'm messaging you guys, because the whole second half of them, what are these targets to Keen and now? These are all garbage. These were not Keen and Allen dropping passes. It was.

It was an impossible catch. And it was what is happening to Justin Herbert here? Well, they fired Joe Lombardi. Yes, that is such great news for Brandon Staley keeping his job. which is great news for Sean Payton not going to the Chargers. Okay. But also, but no, now to be less selfish, Lombardi runs a terrible offense. I think Herbert is a great quarterback. I think the offensive system that they have run has been really, really bad. I am excited to see like, I mean, any offensive coordinator would want this job. If Herbert is your quarterback, you probably, if you're a good offensive coordinator,

you're two years away from being a head coach. 31st and average depth of target this year with Joe Lombardi. But it doesn't help Keenan Allen if there's no Mike Williams. And you had what, DeAndre Carter got hurt in the first half. You have Austin Eckler off the field too much, which is another product of offensive system issues. In my opinion, he was off the field too much. It's the playoffs. Like now is the time to play your best player who makes a difference. You know, Jacksonville is a wild team. They remind me a little bit of the barely made the playoffs Cardinals when obviously he's not Kurt Warner. I'm not saying that. But the Cardinals were not, it wasn't a great record when they made their Super Bowl run. But they had this defense that had some athletes. It wasn't a great defense, but they made plays. And Jacksonville has those players, Josh Allen and Walker.

And then you have an offense that has these weapons that if they turn it on, they look unstoppable sometimes. Like the whole second half, they basically had to score every drive, you know, and they pretty much did. And look, Evan Schman. Ingram is his name. Oh, there it is. Best draft day value at the tight in position of all draft picks at, you know, impressive. Evan Ingram has. really been good. I mean, the rookie year Evan Ingram, if you don't remember, if you weren't playing fantasy at that point, he pretty much has the best rookie tight end season for fantasy football of all time. I think maybe shocky was better. Yeah, but it's way up there. Yeah, it's absolutely fantastic. He was drafted as an elite athletic prospect, and then he was disappointed for several years. And now that he's got a system that uses the tight end, a quarterback,

that is competent. All he needs now is just a contract since he was on a one-year deal, and he'll be an important fantasy asset next year. The bills defeated the Dolphins 34-31. This game was... A few. This game... Brackets almost annihilated. Yeah, that was wild. I mean, you could throw that one in the Ravens bangles into the mix together where, you know, defense... made some plays for Miami, obviously. Skyler Thompson, I think he completed about 30-something percent of his passes. He was not as good as Brock Purdy. They had 31 points despite 231 total yard. So they made defensive plays. The bills almost imploded. Josh Allen committed turnovers, which was something that was an issue all year long. I mean, he was near the top of the league in interceptions, but yeah, the bills and Bengals survive. Yeah, and it came down to, if you happen to miss the game, just,

absolute ineptitude of play calling there. We've praised the Dolphins coaching staff for when they've gotten it right. The end of the game, it was fourth and one. They're driving down. They're down three points. So they just, all they use the field goal to tie to send us overtime or they can even score. It gets to fourth and one. The clock is ticking down the play clock. Something happens. I don't remember exactly what was in the play. They reset the game clock. They reset it. So he had 22 more seconds or whatever. And they still got a delay of game on a fourth and one. It was a Cliff Kingsbury type of thing. Very much. Like I'm not, I have no horse in the race, so to speak. Like I'm not a Dolphins fan. The bills are fun to watch. But it was like, okay, the upset is really fun right now. I got so mad on my couch for Dolphins fans of it's fourth and one. Make your decision.

And go do it. What are you, you don't need 50 seconds to get the play call in. Go do it. Yep. Yep. Was that the drive where on third down they threw it instead of ran it as well? I can't recall. Yeah, it was a little bit of a mess. They, they had lots of near delay of games in that one. The Bengals survive after stopping a goal line. I mean, I've watched that play over and over again. If you haven't seen it, Tyler Huntley decides to try to go Trevor Lawrence. Try to jump over the top of the pile. It doesn't really get that close. Does Trevor Lawrence have the longest arms in the entire world? That was pretty cool. Like, he, that was, that was, that was stretched Armstrong, Go Go Gadget. That thing was halfway into the end zone. Yeah, it was, it was, well, you wouldn't have known it was a good play if you asked Al Michaels, but it was pretty cool.

And they scored. And then what, Sam Hubbard ran it back 98 yards? Yeah, the play was unbelievable. At that point, it was what, 17 to 17, Baltimore is on the goal line, about to take the lead. The Bengals finished the game with 24 points. They didn't score on offense again. So if that one yard play, just if they ended a field goal. Or punching the- They did score after that because it was 1717 in the Bengal. Oh, you're right, because that play scored. Right. Gotcha. Yeah. So, I mean, it was one of those like that game should have been the Ravens to have. And if you listen to J.K. Dobbins. Oh, man. Dude, he's pissed. He's so angry. He was so upset. He didn't mince his words or hide them. He's like, I'm sick of not being the guy. I want the ball. Why didn't you get me the ball? I would have scored another touchdown. Like, you know, he-

scored the first one on an unbelievably incredible, just athletic. It was a reception, though, right? Yeah. And it was a, what are they throwing near the goal line so much? You got the Gus Busset and you got J.K. Dobbins. And this is your identity. It was so bizarre. That would have, I mean, Bengals lose there. That blows up. Yes. A bracket as well. So, uh, they survived the biggest, uh, I think upset was the Giants over the Vikings where, you know, they kind of controlled the game. They played well. Daniel Jones. So good. Sequin Barclay. It was 24 for 35, 300 passing yards of two touchdowns, no interceptions. Daniel Jones was so good. Brian Dayball, man. Seriously. I've been as skeptical as I could be the whole year. Just like, how is this keep happening? And it just, I mean, they are so well prepared. And.

I'm a full believer because they have so little talent. They shouldn't be in the second round of the playoffs. And they are. And they deserve to be. It's not lucky fluke plays. It's they're coming out and just playing as a team outrageously good. And for the talent, I mean, Hodges. Isaiah Hodges is like your main. Hodges. See? This is my point. Exactly. I couldn't have said it better. No, I apologize to the man, but my point is like, Kenny Goladay and ever, you know, and Sterling Shepard and whatever weapons you thought you had, they're gone. And did start the year with Cadarius Tony as well. So you had to make the courageous decision to bench the money in Goladay to trade Tony, the talent. The future. Yeah. And then just go out of it with Richie James and company.

and get it done. So you're right. I mean, the difference, hope for all the teams that struggled this past year that are looking for a coach can be found in what Brian Dable was able to do in New York because their house money at this point, right? His first year there, it's just gravy. Like they got there. It's a successful season and a lot of credit is due. The Vikings, they, you know, Kirk collapsed. They couldn't get it done. And their defense is bad. I mean, the defense is just. awful. I don't think this is an offensive problem. You know, obviously there's a lot made of that last play where, you know, they throw it short of the sticks, whatever. They give up 31 points to Isaiah Hodgins and Derry Slay and, or Dary Slayton. You don't know none of the Giants names. The Vikings defense has been one that we've targeted for fantasy the last two months. They're.

Putrid. They're just awful. And in the Monday night game, Cowboys 31, Buccaneers 14, it was a romp. Uh, Cowboys only, only mistake was not being able to make an extra point. It was awesome. Dude. That was, it's impossible. I've never seen a kicker meltdown when I, uh, like that. Yeah, I was, I was doing some stuff with the family. I didn't watch the first half of the game, but I was following it on my phone. And I see these scores pile up and I'm like, okay, 12, 12, nothing. Well, they obviously missed one extra point and then they missed a two point conversion. So I look and it's like missed extra point, mixed extra point. All right. Then I see 18 nothing. I'm like, oh, they went for the two there. They tried to get too bad. They just got two. They just got two field goals. They just missed the extra point again. And then they did it one more time for fun. This game wasn't close. This was the culmination of a Buccaneers season that looked exactly like this game in every way, shape, and form. They kind of.

I'm trying to think of the best way to describe their season, but asleep is a little bit a part of it. Just like not a lot of positive energy, momentum, couldn't put four quarters together over the course of the year. And, you know, you had the scary play with Russell Gage at the end of the game. Cowboys dominated, what, five touchdowns for Dak between. He had four passing. And one rushing. Yep. So I don't know if there were any big takeaways here other than. you know, what the future is for Tom Brady and then the byproduct of that is Godwin and Evans and what their passing game looks like if he were to depart. Yeah, that's a big question and the Tony Pollard question. I mean, that guy is, he is outrageously good. I mean, there was a play or one singular play where I believe he broke five tackles and it looked like there would be nothing there and it turned to a 10 plus yard play. He is.

so much better than Ezekiel Elliott at this point. Zeke can still play. Like, he still has his purpose in an offense. But what do the, what do the Cowboys do? When you have all of that money in Zeke, how do you possibly pay enough to Tony Pollard to retain him when he's going to be looking for the bag? If Zieg didn't have the contract he had, I would almost guarantee the Cowboys would be bringing Pollard back. Sure. Spare no expense. But it is complicated now with the Zeke situation. And you wonder, what options they have. Which this is exactly why you don't give running backs that type of a contract because it never works out. A few years into it, they start breaking down and then the person, the player behind them, they look so much better. Kansas City will host Jacksonville, Philadelphia will host New York. That's a fun one. Buffalo will host Cincinnati, San Francisco will host Dallas. So looking forward to it. It should be a lot of fun. Let's take a quick break and come back with some news.

I failed to mention that the DFS pass is still free throughout the whole playoff. So if you want to play, I played some, I played quite a bit of showdown this past weekend. How'd you do? Very well. Nice. Very well. I don't know what it is about that format, but. It's just the one you're good at. I know. It's just, that's the only one that I can play worth of darn. Double digit losses on. I say, which is why the committee has been. So stout in our opposition of moving to that format. I was going to say, can we change Friday format? Oh, heavens no. I vote nay. Yeah, nay. All right. All right, into the news. News and notes from around the league. All right. To a Tongavailoa, expected a return as the Dolphin starting quarterback for the 2023 season. Struggle with the concussions this year. The team was not the same without him. Yeah.

You hope that he can stay healthy, but that's going to be a back of your mind situation moving forward, and the team will have to, you know, Teddy Bridgewater, I believe is a free agent. Scholar Thompson's probably not the answer at the backup. So I would consider them like contenders for a Dalton level backup. Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, a Bridgewater level backup. Yeah. If he leaves. They'll need someone else. I wouldn't be surprised if they re-signed Bridgewater. But with an entire offseason for Tua, he should be good to go. Yeah, I mean, if you're Teddy Bridgewater, that's a pretty good place to be, like a really strong team and a quarterback whose future is very uncertain. It's just crazy because I think every time Bridgewater had the opportunity this year, he also got hurt. So Matthew Stafford expected to have his 2023 option and 2024 salary picked up. Sean McVeigh is coming back.

So McVeigh and Stafford reunited for another year. I don't know if you saw the Aaron Donald. Yes, I did. He briefly had his Twitter profile changed to former defensive linemen. Oh my. But then he changed it real quick. He changed it once the Sean McVeigh news came out that he's coming back. He's like, oh, okay. All right. I'm still around. Chargers fired Joe Lombardi. Like I said, they'll have a new offensive coordinator. Brandon Cooks. does not want to be part of the rebuilding process in Houston. He is a candidate to be moved and then would be an interesting player to look at in the, he just always produces. And even after he came back from, you know, his absence at the end of the year, he kind of produced. And then Cliff Kingsbury took a one way trip to Thailand. And that's not a joke. That sounds like a joke, but it's so true.

Cardinals season comes to an end. If I told you, their GM would step down and their head coach would take a one way trip to Thailand. I would say, sounds about Cardinals. So they, uh, they're moving on. I think Cliff's having the last laugh here. Oh, for sure. I mean, like, just loaded and you're like, eh, yeah. I'm done. I'm going to go to Thailand. I'm going to be on the beach. You guys want to buy his house out here, the one that became famous? Yeah, NFL head coaching contracts usually have offset language to where when they're fired, even though their contract is fully guaranteed, the ownership group is recouped from whatever their new job is. So they go and they go to college and they get a big contract.

They don't get both of those contracts usually. The new contract overtakes the old one. Or there's offsets of some amount. Yes, they pay the difference over the top. This is like Cliff going, you're paying. He's apparently not taking any calls for coaching opportunities. He wants all that money coming from the Cardinals. Calls for my ties. Yeah, one way. That's it. One way trip where all the coaches go to take a break. Any other news, Brooksie? How's Deucer's Alley? Keep on deusin. Okay. All right. We're going to move on and get into these very illustrious, incredible, respected awards. Oh, we got lights this year. Oh, welcome into the footage. We do have lights. My goodness, it's a.

festive atmosphere. Well, it's the most sought after award in the universe. It's been quite the year, Mike. We have to dole out the hardware. The worst part of the footies is we're ineligible. We would win them. We would definitely would. Performance of the year, that has us written all over it. And it would be the honor of all honors. But it's our award. Yeah, that's the trouble with making awards. All right, the performance of the year, and everybody, thank you for voting over the last week. The performance of the year was won by Jamar Chase last season with his 50-point playoff performance. Which was fair. Championship week, 50 points, you get the, you get the footy. This week's, or this year's, candidates, Tua from week two, Justin Fields, 42 fancy points in week nine. Joe Mixen had 53 in week nine.