Breakout Picks + Player Questions, SOS

that there will be a breakout from Aaron Jones. If I have to put my money on whether or not he's going to have a great season and be a valuable fantasy asset or whether he's going to flame out and be in a timeshare that doesn't work and not get the job and disappoint people at his ADP, I'm definitely taking the Aaron Jones side. When I'm on the clock at his ADP, it is very difficult to pass a guy who could be a top.

five top 10 fantasy back this is where if he does break out it's not just a oh you get to you get to play him every now and then you get to have him be a regular you know contributor to your fantasy team this is a guy who could help win you a title aaron jones running back for the green bay packers you could argue he already broke out right because if you look at last year a little bit he got

You got like an arm and a leg through. Right. I'm picturing Jurassic Park, yes. The velociraptor coming out of the egg. Exactly. Yes. Exactly what I meant. Thank you guys. It's kind of a velociraptor on the field. Yeah, I mean. Colleagues have said. So he missed the first couple weeks last year. This is a little history lesson here.

He missed the first couple weeks, and then he got in about week three, but he didn't really take the starting job over until week seven. From that point... Thanks, Mike McCarthy. Yeah, I know. It was ridiculous. But from that point forward from week seven until he was out the end of the year, which is seven games, he was the running back 10. He was an RB1 during that stretch. And that was for the team with the fewest carries in the National Football League, the Green Bay Packers with the absolute lowest total in their history.

of their storied franchise at running the ball. He is an unbelievably effective, efficient, talented running back. He averaged 5.5 yards per carry last year, which is probably unsustainable, despite the fact that his rookie year, he also averaged 5.5 yards of carry. He's great in the passing game, and that's something they want to get him more involved with. So we've seen it on the field already that Aaron Jones is electric.

He's great. He's been a top 10 running back for a stretch of seven weeks. But now you enter in Matt LaFleur, the new head coach coming over from Tennessee. The last two years, he's been in charge of two different offenses. Both offenses were top 10 in rushing attempts, top 10 in rushing yards. And so now it's like, oh, if you just take, I went back and I looked at every single box score the whole year that Aaron Jones was in there, whether he was a starter, whether he wasn't. And I looked at.

How did that break down on the carries? Were they giving him the ball? Were they giving it to Jamal Williams? Was Aaron Rogers rushing the ball? If he got the exact same rate that everybody was upset with last year, and you tell them, you tell me that they're going to finish as the 16th most rushing attempts, you just take the number from last year. That would be 224 carries.

that would end up going specifically to Aaron Jones. He is an Alvin Camara type of player. He's not getting 224 carries. No, but my point is that would just be his workload last year, that percentage of market share in that backfield. If they weren't dead last in the NFL and rushing attempts, and they were just 16th in the NFL, I'm saying that that would be 225 rushing attempts. And if you gave him that kind of volume.

he would be a breakout. You know, Alvin Cameras never had 200 rushing attempts, and he's that type of a player. Plus, a lot of the story from preseason training camp was wanting to get him involved in the passing game. We talk about it a lot in fantasy, a pass, a target is worth a whole lot more than a rushing attempt. So you've got the talent, you've got the quarterback, you've got the team, you've got a head coach coming in that wants to run the ball more. If his hamstrings were fine, I think you'd be seeing him at the, like, two, three turn in fantasy.

Well, I think the question marks is that it's not necessarily an asset to repeat the fact that they were dead last in rushing. Because Aaron Rogers' team, this is what, I mean, Aaron Jones was written on my board as one of my guys for about four months on the board. I got a little hesitant. Now, it's a strong counterpoint to say, hey, when Matt LaFour has been involved in an offense, they generally are in that upper echelon of rushing attempts. But you still have to hope that that team gets there. It's not like imbuing.

you know, the Seahawks, and they're, what they've already proven, they'd have to go do it. Derek Henry was only, he had 215 attempts last year. He's been there. He was on the Tennessee Titans, the O.C for two years, and they were split backfields the entire time. My confidence is, like, lower on Jones than it was. I love the talent, but if push comes a shove, I know for a fact, Aaron Rogers will throw the football. That's...

He will take over the team. And so that gave me a little bit of pause about declaring a breakup. But I want to have some fun with this. Let's go back through the first guys. I want to get a percentage chance of that. A percentage chance that they give you a season that fantasy owners will look at and say, that was a breakout season. And then I'll let you do that with Aaron Jones too. But Godwin, what percentage chance do you think that fantasy owners will look back after the year and say, Chris Godwin was a breakout? I'm going to say a 66% chance. Okay.

Two thirds. Mike, you brought up the name, D.D. Westbrook. What percentage chance do you want to attribute? I was going to say 65. Much different, much different. I'm more confident than you, Mike. My first one was Miles Sanders. Mine's less expensive if I'm wrong. I'm about 75% with Miles Sanders. I thought that was going to end up low because I thought you guys were more confident in your picks, but whatever. I'm just leaving margin for error, my man. And that's your prerogative.

Aaron Jones, Jason, based on what you're saying, and we've all seen the talent, what is your confidence level in Aaron Jones having a breakout season? It is more than 50%, it is less than 60%. I would go ahead and say... See, that's a proper... Brooks, how are you doing? Excellent. Okay, that was a proper... He gave me the time to find the button. He didn't just throw the Josh Stallion thing out there, and then I'm scrambling. I just want you to learn. I do what I can. Okay.

All right, so anything you want to add to Aaron Jones? I know that we both shed a little bit of doubt on there. Well, the only thing I would add as a counterpoint to your argument about, you know, them not running the ball. They've always, Green Bay with Aaron Rogers has always been fine at running the ball. Last year was this weird aberrition where they just decided I'm.

We're not going to run the ball at all. We're going to throw it all the time. There were games last year where I was tracking this data. Let me see if I can find it real quick where I think they had like 11 or 13 carries. Whole game. Like they just didn't. That's what freaks me out. But that was different regime. If that's in the realm of possibilities for a team, it just gives you less confidence in consistency. Maybe the breakout games are there, but wouldn't that make you?

That's never going to happen in Seattle, ever. If McCarthy were the coach, then you could bring that up and say this. I'm concerned about this. The time at which something like that happens, yeah, 13 carries in a game. Those are so incredibly rare for an NFL franchise that a guy coming in who's been top 10 in Russia could tips the last two years, I can't fathom him going, yeah, we're going to do the same thing. All right, Mike, who's your next breakout? All right. Give me your percentage. I will give you my percentage.

Look, well, whatever. We'll just start with the percentage. It's 85%. Because I'm taking Vance McDonald! It's... Oh, it's happening, people. We are going to be doing the Vance dance. 80P, be darned. This thing is happening. You struggle with this. I did. In the studio, you're just like, eventually you wrote the name down. Because the average opposition, it's been a...

has been bothering you. Yes. It's been troubling. It's made you not want to lean in, not get behind it all the way, even though you know in the deep parts of your soul. It doesn't matter. This is happening. Vance McDonald is finally breaking out. The Pittsburgh Steelers have lost over 35% of their targets between Antonio Brown and the largest competition, just positionally speaking, tight end Jesse James. He is no longer there. Yes.

People, we want to point out the Pittsburgh Steelers probably have some regression coming to their passing attempts. Ben is not going to throw the ball 675 times. I agree. In 2017, Big Ben was on a pace for 598 attempts. The year before that, 582. The year before that, 625. They're still going to throw the ball a ton, even if it's not at 675 times. Pittsburgh has been incredibly patient, more patient than I could imagine.

with Vance McDonald when they traded for him. His contract was bloated. That's why San Francisco wanted to get rid of him. His injury history. But they have sat and they have waited. We have seen. We have already seen Vance McDonald take over a game for the Pittsburgh Steelers in the highest possible time. A playoff game against Jacksonville two years ago, 16 targets, 10 receptions, 112 yards. 16 targets. Yeah, it's just one game. I get it. But my point is, we've seen him.

take over a game. Heath Miller, when Big Ben actually had a pass catching tied in, it was Heath Miller. This was a while ago. He regularly saw excellent target shares, including Jason. Funny enough, the year you brought up when all three of them had over 100 targets, Antonio Brown, Mike Wallace, and Heath Miller.

You realize Jesse James started last year with the week one. He was the number eight tight in. Week two is the number two tight end? Yes. Look, because Big Ben utilizes the tight end. And now that position belongs to Vance McDonald. Over the last two years, only Travis Kelsey has more broken tackles at the position. Travis Kelsey is a full-time tight end. Vance McDonald has not been. Over the last two years, only George Kittle has a better yards after catch. Last year.

12 most receptions at the tight end, 11th most yards at the tight end position. He was the tight end 10 and half point PPR scoring as a part-time player. What do I mean? Andy, by a part-time player, he averaged 55% of the snaps. It didn't look like he... That's not enough. Right. But tight-in 10 with 55% of the snaps. He's not playing no 55% of Pittsburgh snaps at the position this year. Can he stay healthy?

I maybe, whatever. Everyone can get hurt. That's the 15% off the 85. If he's playing, he's going to break out. It's going to happen. All right, 85%. That's our highest thus far. I'm at about 80% on my pick. So I think Vance wins the day in terms of certainty factor. And it's Curtis Samuel. You've heard a lot about Curtis Samuel. It all comes down to one thing for Curtis Samuel.

this season, which is to stay healthy. He's 23 years old. He's poised to make the leap. He's the talk of camp. He's an athletic freak that had transitioned from being kind of a running back hybrid guy into the wide receiver position. But he missed 10 games through the first two seasons due to injury. So his health is the key to him actually paying off for you. But right now what I love about Curtis Samuel, in part for the fantasy side, is you've got to pay two more rounds to get DJ more.

And I think much like, you know, we've talked a little bit about Golodea and Marvin Jones and like the round gap is so significant between the two that there's going to be Jones weeks. And I don't dislike DJ Moore at all. I think DJ Moore has a great ceiling in the offense as well. But you have a healthy Cam Newton. And his main target is going to be DJ Moore and Curtis Samuel on this offense along with Christian McCaffrey, obviously. So you look at.

Where does Curtis Samuel win on the football field? And this is apart from the preseason height. This is apart from him being arguably the best player in camp. He wins at every single level in every single route. If you look at reception, 74.6% success rate against man coverage. That's the 94th percentile. He's a player that you can get the ball to him downfield. You can get it to him in the screen game and he can joystick his way.

through the defense. And he converted 73% of his contested catches as well. I just think what you're paying for Curtis Samuel in the seventh round is going to more than return the value on Curtis Samuel in 2019. This has been the offseason of Curtis Samuel. He really has been. He's won. I don't think any player from front to back from the very beginning to right now has had more buzz and more just people going.

Gugu Bananas over his performance in camp, performance on the field. He's just been outstanding. It is sad that he's all of a sudden, I mean, we were looking at ADP the other day, and, you know, I'm still a believer that Dante Pettus can break out. And Curtis Samuel was going ahead of Dante Pettus now in these drafts. He has skyrocketed because for the longest time, he was still...