AFC North Breakdown + TD Scorers - Fantasy Football Podcast for 7/6

Today we're going through the AFC North, one of the best divisions in the NFL. We're going to break down each team, all the opportunities, and talk about some positive touchdown regression for all you positive regression nerds out there. Leave a comment, like the show, and enjoy. Your mission should you choose to accept it is to crush, humiliate, and totally destroy your competition in your fantasy football draft. It's incredibly simple, so let me just break it down for you. Ultimate Draft Kit. The Ultimate Draft Kit from the Fantasy Footballers is hands down the best fantasy tool in existence. I mean, come on. It's got sleepers. It's got bus. Injury updates, full projections. This thing's even got full dynasty rankings. Don't overthink this. It's the only wingman you'll meet this year. Head over to Ultimate DraftCat.com and grab your copy right away. To the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your host, Andy Holloway.

Jason Moore and Mike Wright. Welcome in. Thursday, July 6th. Happy to be with you, the Fantasy Footballers podcast, Mike Wright, Jason Moore. I'm Andy Holloway. Deucer's Alley. It's full. It's all happening, man. Al is here, the judge is here, and the Rapscallion back again. And somewhere there's a Borgogan. Just in the mist, in the darkness. Where he belongs. Floating around. I think he's on the microphone. Say hi, Kyle. Hi, Kyle. Oh, come on. Yeah. Busted. Oh, man. Half the audience drops off. Yeah. I don't blame him. You know, it's like you're, you're free to leave now. Dork alert. You're okay. You can take off.

Nothing to see here. Oh, boy. Kyle, I made the joke in my head before you did. Yeah, but that's where it stayed. Because sometimes there's thoughts and it's okay to have them. We have intrusive bad thoughts, but you leave him at thoughts. Throw the mute on him there, Al, and we're good to go. You don't have to take action. We have a great show for you today. AFC North Breakdown. This is how you know. That football is around the corner. It's true. When the, when the divisional series hits on the fantasy footballers, you know you're going to get good, hard hitting, deep analysis of these divisions and all these teams. And it means that training camp is mere moments away. Which is so exciting and wild that we're already there. AFC North today got such good feedback. If you didn't get a chance to listen to the Saturday episode last week.

Mayhem. Thank you, Mike. Thank you. If you got you a little PTSD. Yeah, a little bit. Madison flashed before my eyes. But the mock draft mayhem episode on Saturday, check that out. It was a lot of fun. Mike threw Jason and I for a loop throughout the draft. We had to react to it. And it was a lot of fun. And we're going to do some more of those down the line. We'll probably do quite a few mock drafts over the next month as we get things going. This week on the Dynasty Podcast, which released yesterday, the top 10 wide receiver rankings, and Mike made a big dynasty trade. He talked about it on the Dynasty podcast. So big name player, regressive, go check it out. I walk you through the entire process of how the trade went down. Which honestly, a lot of people ask about details on our leagues. And so we didn't have a show that released on the 4th of July. Hopefully everybody out there had a very.

Fun, relaxing, exciting, whatever. Safe. Safe. Yeah. Fourth of July. I mean, it was loud. It's always loud out here. And hot. Hot and loud. Happy fourth, everyone. But no episode on Tuesday. Why are you relaxing? So we had the Dynasty show yesterday. And then today we've got the AFC North breakdown. Lots to talk about there. The ultimate draft kit, you heard it at the top. It is available now, including with the UDK Plus, we have the draft analyzer available. So what's the ultimate draft kit? It is the singular resource that you can use to prepare for your drafts. It has our tier-based rankings inside of them, premium stat projections, player profile videos, something we haven't talked a lot about. It has custom cheat sheet, a custom cheat sheet creator that lets you import your scoring settings.

All of our sleepers breakouts, bust values, really neat tools to mark players, right? Players that you want to stay away from in the draft, players that you want to target. We added the upside meters to the rankings this year. You've got the consistency charts, which lets you look at players' performances week over week, trying to determine how you kind of build that roster, the nuance of drafting, reliable players, high upside players. Yeah, you have to check it out. UltimateDraftKit.com. A lot of effort from the entire team is put into that product. And it updates all offseason long. So it is not like the magazines arriving in stores these days where it's printed. And then if something changes, well, you're kind of stuck there. We update it all the time. So UltimateDraftKit.com for that. Let's talk news. News and notes from around the league. Let's start with some great news. Yeah. Saints tied in.

Foster Moreau, formerly of the Raiders, signed a contract this off season. He has announced that he is in full remission from Hodgkin's lymphoma. This was a, I mean, the fact that he had Hodgkin's lymphoma was a news, that breaking news story just months ago. And we didn't know if he'd signed with a team, if he'd be back in a year or two. So, I mean, he's a good tight-in. He really is. Yeah, he is. And so along with, John Johnson. John Johnson. Another bit of news that Tassam Hill hopes his role evolves into more receptions. We all hope. Yeah. Hope for things. It's not going to. Yeah, I mean, but some, I mean, some is going, some is going to hurt Joanne Johnson and Foster Moreau. Like that sounds like a tight end room that you're not going to know where the receptions go week to week. Yeah. But coming in, I thought Joanne Johnson was one of those late round tight ends that I wanted to target. He showed flashes, was great around the goal line.

But Foster Monroe is no slouch. You know, he's a really competent tight end that this team went out and signed for a decent chunk of money. So they will share that workload. And unfortunately, that means for fantasy, I think both will be mostly irrelevant. Don't forget the connection, right? Because Derek Carr, Foster Monroe. Sure. That's obviously one of the reasons they pursued him is the familiarity. And, you know, 30 plus receptions the last couple of years. Probably not fantasy relevant, but like you said, it's going to hurt the other players. I guess we have a little bit of. It's hype season. Yeah, it's hype season. I'm not, but it's not like. No, it's not train worthy. It's not hype train worthy. Kevin O'Connell talking about KJ. Osborne, I bring it up because all the discussion around the Vikings has been either Dalvin Cook leaving or Jordan Addison arriving or Justin Jefferson just being himself. KJ. Osborne had some very, very big games last year.

Head coach saying he's a real standout during offseason practices, also as a leader on the field. You had games where he had 10 for 157 last year, 7 for 59 and a touchdown. Three of the last four weeks, he was in the top 13. I wonder if there's some sleeper relevance here for Osborne. Yeah, I personally doubt it a little bit. Not that he won't have decent games or is irrelevant for like if you're doing an underdog. best ball league that's going 18 rounds. You know, he's been a standout at camp. It's worth noting that Jordan Addison has not been to camp. So everything that's being run right now, KJ. Osborne is the two. He's getting the opportunity to run in that role. So it's good to hear that he's doing well. It's just rare for a year four wide receiver to really beat, you know, it can happen, Devante Parker.

but it's not common for a player who hasn't really broken out through three years in his career to take a leap forward in his fourth year. I would imagine it's more likely that Jordan Addison, their first round rookie pick, is the two. And KJ. Osborne plays the same role he played last year. He's just doing well in Addison's absence right now. Yeah, I think it's a big question mark until Addison's on the field improves something to us. Undisclosed injury. We don't know what Addison's injury is right now. And let's not forget. Justin Jefferson didn't get playing time at the very beginning of his rookie season and you know who he is. So what I'm saying is like maybe the first three or four weeks of the year, you've got a player you could play in KJ Osborne. It would be unlikely to me that Addison comes out week one with more targets than KJ Osborne personally. But we'll see what camp looks like. Yep. Terrace Marshall Jr. I don't know why I bring him up. Because Kyle put it in here. I love Teres Marshall. I mean, do I read the quotes? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Frank Reich saying he's been shown, he shows the capacity to kind of be a big play guy. You know, that's some glowing. Thank you, Brooks. Who is this, Brooksie? Panthers 30 year wide receiver in case you've never heard of Terrace Marshall. You, if you listen to this show, I mean, he locked job. It's so funny because I brought up Adam Thielen, you guys won't have no interest. We bring up Jonathan Mingo. You pretty much have no interest because. the rookie quarterback, and here we are with Terrace Marshall, year three. Oh, I have, I have a negative interest. Yeah, to be fair. Yeah. I have, I also have no interest in Terrace Marshall, who last year, when it looked like there was a path forward for him to be the one. Because they traded DJ Moore. Exactly. Or no, no, they did that in the office. Yeah. But I traded a second rounder for Terrace Marshall. I was just going to call my shot. Maybe he'll take that step forward. And then this off season, they're like,

Terrace Marshalls are one. We got a draft zone. We got a signage Adam Thielen. We can't just stay here. And yeah, he's going into year three. He's still a baby boy, 23 years old, just turned 23. So he's a very young wide receiver, but it's not going to happen for him. KJ. Osborne and Terrace Marshall, Jr. I'll take Terrace Marshall. I'm just not because I think he's better. KJ. Osborne's. better, but there's still hope to me that Terrace Marshall can be something special as opposed to just have more total. What do you think KJ. Osborne did less here? That's a great question. I would guess he had 750 yards and five or six touchdowns. Okay. You actually gave him more than what he had. Okay. Well, six, 50 and five had seven touchdowns a year before. 60 receptions. I was, I had a lot over under 70 receptions for KJ. Osborne. Under. Really? Yeah. That's okay. You don't like him.

You know, that's okay. That's okay. You don't have to like him. Full disclosure. I don't know what. I think that there is always, you know, the personal experience. You know, we play fantasy. We love fantasy football. It's not just our job. And I had a lot of shares of KJ. Osborne last year. I saw a path for Adam feeling stepping away and KJ. Osborne in year three to take that step forward. I watched him a lot in those games and rooted for it to happen. And while he had a few big games. It just felt like he didn't have what it takes to step forward. So it might just be my scars of disappointment from last year that is kind of influencing my negativity towards. It happens. I mean, certainly no guarantee for him to take a step forward. I don't know what that offense is going to look like exactly without. I mean, Adam Thielen's been there so long and Dalvin Cook's been there so long. And we still don't have an answer on the aged Zeke and Hopkins and Dalvin and they are waiting.

to skip training camp. Yeah, they are. They are waiting to take it slow. Any other news, Brooksie? Any other third, fourth, fifth string wide receivers you want to talk about? We can talk about Romeo Dobbs if you want. There's some hype around him taking the next step. It keeps happening, man. But that's offseason Romeo Dobbs, right? Last offseason two. Well, he's been in the league for one year. Yeah. Well, I just mean like this is the time of year that he has predominantly been talked about. He had some really good games last year. As far as how he started, he started pretty strong. Yeah. I mean, four for 37 and two for 27 is strong. Eight for 73 after that, five for 47 and touchdown both weeks. That was his best game. So I mean, he was a rookie, but he is getting the hype right now. He's being rumored that he's established the number one target connection. I previous to that had him as the target leader here. I still don't think he's the best.

fantasy asset. Christian Watson is far more explosive. But I, you know, I think Dobbs is a decent player. The question is just can the quarterback support him. On another piece of news with a quarterback that can support someone, have you guys seen the Sky Moore hype? Oh, no. Now he's getting a little bit of love from Andy Reid, who is coming out saying that he was very good. He might be the, he might have been the target leader through what they've done so far. And so he could see him taking a big step forward. But again, this is just hype, fluff piece from your head coach. I mean, what do you want him to say? No, it's good. But it's part of the, the narrative of the off season. Like, it's hearing it now, you just, okay, I'm going to tune my ear in. Do you hear more in a couple weeks about Skymore or Romeo Dobbs. Like, it's the steady drumbeat of the off season. And like, if it keeps going.

then that reaches a volume that you should not ignore and that these players are worth your time, worth a late round draft pick. Yeah, I think that's cool to hear. Skymore is a player that has tons of potential and just didn't have tons of opportunity last year and then didn't do a lot with the opportunity he had. Well, he, I mean, he fumbled a bunch. I do like him more than the first year rice situation. I agree. Not high. This doesn't change you. No, no. No, I don't think. Did we already bet on this? I think we might have already bet on this. If we didn't, we have in our hearts. Yes, I suppose we have. All right, moving on. Let's get divisional. Well, Mike said it. Here we go. The divisional breakdown shows. We're ready for an NFL season. We go through every division. It's kind of a general overview of the teams. We look at offseason changes from 2022 to this year, 2023.

Maybe we discuss the ways that the offense could function. And eventually we will weigh in on who we think will take this division down. Last year, the Bengals won the division at 12 and 4, 12 and 4 because they didn't play. They had one fewer game than everybody else. Baltimore, 10 and 7, Pittsburgh, 9 and 8, the Browns at 7 and 10. Fun fact of the division, all four teams went 3 and 3 in the division last year. So when playing one another, they all have the same record. Interesting. And they are the only division this upcoming year where all four teams are projected for over eight and a half wins. It makes sense. This is probably the best division in the NFL. I mean, I think there's like three divisions you could argue for. But to me, if Baltimore can step up and we'll get to the Browns here in a minute, then it's just four really, really well-run teams.

It's why, and I'm sure Tomlin will spend the year proving me wrong, but it's why I'm really not enthusiastic about the Steelers taking a big step forward is because they have a monumental quarterback gap compared to the other three teams in the division. Lamar, Burrow, Watson, proven established elite quarterback play. a step up for Kenny Pickett, even to the point where we're like, yeah, not so bad, would still be so far below it that. But Tomlin proves us strong every year, so we'll see what happens. I'm curious where you guys will have the division in terms of top to bottom. We might all have the same winner. I don't know. But let's start with Cincinnati. Last year had a preseason win total of 10. This year, it is 11 and a half. Ended the year on an eight game winning streak. It was another great year.

And they, you know, they have such consistency on that offense. You know what to expect. When you talk about fantasy football and projecting things, I really like when I have to talk about Joe Burrow and T. Higgins and Jamar Chase and the expectations there. They added Irv Smith at tight end. They lost Hayden Hearst at tight end. They lost Samaj Pirine. And so a couple of the question marks on this team are going to be, could you find fantasy value at the tight end position this year? It was intermittent two years ago with C.J. Uzama. It was intermittent last year with Hayden Hurst. I imagine that's where we're headed with Irv Smith. Yeah, I'd agree. I won't go crazy with it. Let Irv swerve when the, we'll see if that gets going there on Twitter again this year.

It will, there's just, I don't know that there's enough to go around. Because you have such a high concentration of the targets to Higgins and Chase. Last year we're talking, they vacated 86 targets to the tight end position for the possibility of versus Smith. And Tyler Boyd is still there. And then the running backs. I mean, I think they're just, they can, they play cleanup duty for the tight end position over there. So. Should you find yourself in a really juicy matchup, then you can be willing to go in. But it's hard to see a world where Irv Smith is like a weekly plug and play type of a sleeper at the tight end position. No, I would agree with you. I don't think he's going to be a locked and loaded guy. Anyone outside of the top.

three or four tight ends aren't really locked and loaded where you just ignore the position. But I do think that there will be weeks. I mean, you know, Andy, you just mentioned CJ Uzama. He won people a lot of money on the right weeks when you play the DFS lineup and you get that double touchdown game. You want a quarterback like Joe Burrough, someone that, you know, 34 touchdowns two years ago, 35 touchdowns this last year. And the narrative that we were talking about with Joe Burrow last year was. Will they allow him to truly take the team over? And it feels almost silly now to remember those questions because they did. He went from 400 passing attempts his rookie year to 520 to 606 passing attempts this last year. It's his team. This is a pass-first team. And with their weapons, they're going to be outstanding. I know we have kind of grouped him together with Justin Herbert a little bit for fantasy purposes. Those mostly pocket.

quarterbacks that are going to throw, you know, 5,000 yards and can throw 40 touchdowns. But also you have to throw 35 plus touchdowns to really pay off on the on the fantasy value. You know, he's done it the last two years. Yeah, I mean, it reminds me of Stafford in Detroit with Calvin Johnson. When you have kind of a top five wide receiver physical force touchdown maker. in Jamar Chase and then a very good wide receiver in T. Higgins, it assures a pretty good baseline. I mean, we trusted before last year, obviously, the age caught up to him. But we trusted Tom Brady in Tampa, pocket passer, elite weapons in Godwin and Evans. Feels similar to me. Zach Taylor's fifth year, he's gone from two wins to four wins to 10 wins to 12 wins. Oh, 14 wins. Could have easily been fired after a...

two or four wins season. They stuck with him. And like you said, he got out of the way. He let Joe Burrow take this team over. Second and pass rate over expectation. Second and expected points per play. Burrow last year, he was great. Second and passing touchdowns, fourth and fancy points per game, fifth and passing yards. Is the third round too rich for him in terms of fantasy decision making? Yep. Have you drafted him anywhere? I don't think so. I don't think I have. I mean, I'd love to have Joe Burrow on my team, but the investment of a third rounder, that's too much for me. How are you guys handling the backup running situation, or running back situation? Smaji P. Ryan gone. We don't know exactly who it will be. They did take Chase Brown in the fifth round, I believe, this year, and Trayvion Williams just keeps an NFL career going. He has done very, very.

Very little in his career. We're heading into year five here. And he has seen 57 opportunities in his career. But he is back yet again. And there's, there's room on the Bengals for a backup, for the backup running back to do something. For sure. I mean, you saw Somaget P. Rhine be very relevant last year. And Somaget is gone. So someone here matters. And they've talked up Trevion Williams quite a bit, but I am personally ignoring that. They've had all the opportunity in the world to allow him to do something. They had games where Joe Mix and missed last year. And Trevion was on the roster and healthy and active. He had six total carries. I don't think that he is the...

I don't think they really actually like him. I would put my money more on the incoming rookie. That's assuming that Joe Mixon is in tow. And that's why I don't agree with the contention that someone's going to matter. I don't think somebody has to matter here out of that group because Samajapirine's influence was trust. I mean, third down, high value situations. I don't know what their trust level is with a rookie on third down. And I certainly have seen Trayvion Williams for a couple of years. This is a prime destination for a late. training camp, preseason, trustworthy back to come in. And right now, you know, there was some news over the past weekend. Both sides, Mixing and the Bengals won a resolution to his situation soon. All signs point to him being coming back at this point and being the running back. They've made no effort to secure somebody else for that situation. So if you took a shot on him in best ball,

this offseason i think your odds of it hitting is going to be very high and look if he he can catch the football there's nothing wrong with joe mixon catching the football so if they don't trust those other two guys to pass block the way i mean p rind has always scored very high in that in that area so i was a little surprised they didn't bring them back but i think it's possible joe mixon just like nick chub this year where they had tremendous trust in uh kareem hunt Hunt's gone, and you don't know who the next guy is and whether you trust him on third down. So Chubb might get more targets, and I think mixing could surprise. Yeah, I mean, what you want for fantasy is you want depth charts that look like this. You want a dude and then just complete unknowns that have done nothing in the NFL and have no draft capital or investment there. That's two of the teams in this division. So, yeah, you know, it's still a volatile pick to look at mixing right now because...

You know, the quote is they want a resolution soon. Well, the other side of that is that means it's unresolved currently. So it's still a little bit of risk, but this isn't like an injury risk where you know a player is incapable in this moment and you're buying a dip. This is a situation where you're taking an educated gamble that the resolution will come. I believe it will. And then it should play off because. He's just his opportunity for scoring on this offense with this depth chart is outstanding. Yeah, there are a lot of backup running back situations that don't play out like Somagia P Ryan. And they play out like, you know, Arizona last year where it's James Connor. And then it's just, okay, here, Corey Clement gets some carries. Kiante Ingram gets some carries. Oh, you know, Benjamin, we're going to give you 70 and then cut you. And then, you know, it's just kind of a mess. And if Trayvion.

Didn't have so much time in the league. I guess it'd be easier to get behind it. Jamar Chase and T. Higgins? Yes. That's just your analysis is yes. Yeah, I don't think we need to dive too deep into that. Tyler Boyd, contract year. Charlie Jones added to the roster. I don't think, I think Tyler Boyd is exactly the same category as you would have with like Irv Smith, which is the matchups right, an injury to the... the players ahead of him and maybe you roll them in there and hope you get one of those deep throws. Sure. Is that fair? Yeah. And their first four matchups, Cleveland, Baltimore. So two divisional matchups to start the year, including on the road in Cleveland. That'll probably be a pretty interesting game there where Cleveland has Watson coming into really his first year with an offseason program. All right, quick break and back with the Ravens. Let's talk about...

Baltimore. This team had so much unknown to begin the offseason. Last year, the preseason win total was 9.5. They went 10 and 7. And they finished the year with Tyler Huntley and Anthony Brown starting games of quarterback. That has been kind of how they choose to end the year the last couple of years. We're talking about Tyler Huntley, a pro bowler, too much at the end of these years. This year, the win total is the same, nine and a half. But when we began this offseason, we didn't know if Lamar would be back. We also didn't have really any wide receiver core to speak of. And, you know, most of our discussion was, what are they going to do? And is JK two-leg Dobbins going to be important? Lamar's back. Five year 190 guaranteed. Mike, you have them the highest in our rankings right now at three.

He's ranked at five when you look at our consensus rankings. He's being drafted at five. I don't have any problem taking the shot at him at three. I do think it is very risky with the last couple of years. And even though the wide receiver room looks better with names, I'm not sure exactly what they have right now because I know we've talked about, hey, we're kind of excited about Zay Flowers, but that's a rookie. Yeah. Rashad Bateman has had. many flashes, but many M-A-N-Y injuries. And then you have O'Dowell Beckham with the big contract. And then there's been video. I don't know if you've seen that of Beckham and looking like vintage Beckham in camp. He's got some good Alan Robinson video. Actually, it was the wide receiver coach watching him do a couple one-handed catches.