Fantasy Football Podcast 2016 - Regress or Impress? CBS Sports Jamey Eisenberg, News

Okay, then he has to regress. He has to regress from last year. All right. I'm going to go with regress. And it'll be a unanimous regress. All right. So let's talk about another guy here that we have not given enough attention to that there are question marks about. And that's Jarvis Landry. Let's stay at the wide receiver position. A guy who, look, 111 receptions last year for almost 1,200 yards, four touchdowns. The safety valve for Ryan Tanahill.

But you have so many new variables in Miami. Richard Matthews is gone. You have Devante Parker's second season, actually going to get some playing time. You have Adam Gase coming in. You have this overall malaise that sets upon you when you think about Miami's offense last year and what they did. So Jarvis Landry, impress or regress? So Jarvis Landry, 110 yards and four touchdowns. And I think that...

What we need to discuss here is, will the change of offense be greater than the chemistry and connection that Ryan Tannenhill has looking for Jarvis Landry? Like Andy was saying, he was the safety valve. He's the underneath guy. His yards per catch are quite low for someone who produced so well for fantasy purposes, and he only scored four touchdowns. So it's...

very difficult to see him impressing upon those numbers. Actually, I feel like the yards will come down, but there's a possibility that touchdowns go up, so it could be a canceling effect. Here's the thing about Jarvis Landry. I have moved him up a couple of times in my rankings, and he never climbs very high. And so the problem is, is he's 42nd in the league in touchdowns.

Yeah. Those numbers, the PPR numbers are great. And so if you're in a full PPR, he obviously has more value than the half in standard leagues. But in a half point league, even when I move him up to very generous numbers, because I think he's being dismissed a little too much, he still doesn't end up very high in my rankings. I need to go look and see exactly where he is for us. But Jason, what do you think about Landry?

I like Landry. I have, I immediately was down on Landry entering into the off season because of Gays coming in and my love for Devante Parker looking at.

how Devante Parker, starting in week 12 last week, really took over that outside receiver slot. I thought, you know, this is going to be something where he's, the ball's going to shift, and it's going to go away from Landry, and it's going to go to Parker. But the more that I've thought about this, I think that Gaze is there and going to be good for the offense, good for the wide receivers, and it doesn't just mean that...

It has to be bad for Landry in order to be good for Parker. Both of these guys can take a step forward, and I don't expect Landry to have more receptions than the 111 he grabbed last year. But if you look at Weeks 12 on, when Parker took over, Parker replaced Rashad Matthews. He didn't replace any production from Jarvis Landry. Jarvis Landry had games with 156 yards and 99 yards and another one over 100. He had multiple...

double-digit reception games from week 12 on only. So I actually think that the passing game for Ryan Tannahill and the Miami Dolphins could take an overall step forward. And I love the fact that Jarvis Landry is kind of slipping. If you're in a PPR league, I think Jarvis Landry is going to be a decent value. Now, I agree with the point that you made, Andy. He can't go too high. Like Jarvis Landry is not ever going to be a guy that's just a dominant.

top 12 wide receiver, I don't see. But I think he is a really, really solid guy that you can get at a place in the draft right now where I am very comfortable with his consistency in his production. And I hope that the touchdowns take a little step up. I'm going to read some names here. I'm looking at average draft position. And right now in standard, Jarvis Landry is going close to the beginning of the fourth as the 20th.

overall wide receiver. So I'm going to read off some names behind him and see if you would rather have them over Jarvis Landry. All right. Randall Cobb. No, I'd take Landry. Landry. Doug Baldwin. I would take Landry. And I'm the Doug Baldwin lover. Golden Tate. I would take Tate. I would take Tate. I would take Tate as well. Jeremy Macklin. Macklin. I would take Landry. I'll get two more for you. Alan Hearns. Landry. I have them sat at almost identically. I think.

What kind of league are we talking? We're in standard. In a standard, I take Carnes. And Michael Floyd. I would take Floyd. I would take Landry. So just to back up the numbers, I said, I have him for 92 and 1,000 and 5 touchdowns. So I guess I'm a regression. That's my official stance based on that. He might move up a little bit more, but it's hard for me to see him getting the touchdown. Yeah, and the way that I see this is not so much like you have to regress or you have to get better.

You know, the regressor. Play the game, Jason. No, it's regressor impress. I am. I think he's going to impress you with the same number. He can impress you. It's positive regression. No, that would, no. That would be impressive to me if he put up the same numbers. So there you go. Exactly. All right. Next guy. Let's talk about Kirk Cousins. Captain Kirk himself. Yes. His phasers were set to fantasy championship. They absolutely weren't. That was an impressive end of the year.

We got the You Like That Scream, which is always good for radio. Over 4,100 yards. 29 touchdowns. Five rushing TDs, which, you know, is impressive. Cousins had an overall, when you look at his final numbers, a very strong year. The five rushing touchdown certainly helps that.

I believe he was the only quarterback in the league to throw at least one touchdown in every single game last year. Also number one completion percentage, just under 70%. Also the only quarterback to take a knee on the goal line. He should have spiked it before the half. In the final three games of the season, he threw four touchdowns, four touchdowns, three touchdowns, including that final game where it was the ultimate inefficiency. I believe he threw the ball about...

four times, and then they pulled him out because they didn't really need to play, but he still crushed. He was on this high. Now, he didn't really impress in the playoff game, so that was a bit of a downer. However, I am really rising on the Washington offense as a whole. You know, you kind of thought, well, it's Jordan Reed. Jordan Reed or bust for me, but like I said, the value of Deshawn Jackson is...

is ridiculous. You throw in Josh Doxon, who I think is a talent that can come in and make an immediate impact, and it's, I think, very possible that he can come in right away and take over for Pierre Garcone. You got Matt Jones, who at least the team likes, and he had flashes of just huge things. So I think overall, the Washington offense, maybe you don't consider, like, when you think high power offense, you don't think of Washington. But I am starting to feel that way. I am.

uh when i initially ranked out cousins i thought oh he'll be a quarterback one for sure the stats didn't come out that way and i thought oh well apparently i'm down on cousins but in the last few weeks of just when i'm diving back in i am i am growing warmer and warmer on kirk cousins of being a solid quarterback for the entire gear for fantasy yeah i i have uh

When it comes to the quarterback to me, I really look at the weapons. That's something that I've always been high on is do they have the weapons to help them produce? And we saw that change in Kirk Cousins last year. He's been one of the biggest enigmas to me is who is he, right? Because you can watch tape and be sure that he is the worst quarterback you've ever seen. And you can watch tape and think this guy is a Pro Bowl quarterback. And that's taking the same game. Yeah.

But with him, you saw a change after that week eight by last year. And we can't forget that that is the exact time that Deshaun Jackson came back from the injury. And so he was back for the second half of the year where all of a sudden a lot less interceptions being thrown, maybe taking the top off the back off the defense and allowing him some more work to.

some more room to work. I want to go back and kind of study a little bit more film on Cousins because I'm still a little unsure. But the fact that they seem healthy right now, they've re-signed Reed, and they've added Josh Doxon says to me that there's just more weapons to be able to have Kirk Cousins replicate what he was able to do the second half of the year. I'm still viewing him as a streamer. Not a guy I want to draft.

Let me ask you this question, because this is a fair one. Because when I look at Cousins, he's top 10 in every category. And that doesn't always tell the whole story, consistency. You know, you can end in that category. But you guys just said these things that impress you. What impresses me is 11 interceptions. Yeah. Blake Bortles, who's everybody's fantasy darling, or a lot of people's, led the league. You know, Cousins was outside the top 10 in interceptions. Why would you not draft Cousins based on how he finished the year over Bortles?

Well, the weird thing about what Cousins did, and this is where I was speaking to maybe it was Deshaun Jackson really making that difference. But in the first six games of last year, Kirk Cousins had eight interceptions. He was among the league leaders in interceptions. And then all of a sudden, the rest of the year... Bortles was like, I can do it all year long. Bortles really showed who's boss. But...

Yeah, I mean, it's really a question of which Kirk Cousins is the Kirk Cousins because while he ended that way, you have the tale of two completely different players in Kirk Cousins. So the question is, is he going to regress from his top 10 in all those categories, or is he going to impress next year? And I am for the first time in my life. Yes!

saying, I think Kirk Cousins is going to impress next year. We did it, America. So if he's going to impress, then I'll take him every day at his value compared to where Bortles is going to. So, all right, we're going to bring in. He's impressed for me as well. Yeah, we're going to bring in Jamie Eisenberg of CBS, CBS Sports, bring up some more names, talk through these guys, see where his mind is at when it comes to some of these. Oh, that mind, Duke, Jamie Eisenberg. That's right. You talking to me?

The fantasy footballers are pleased to bring on the one Jamie Eisenberg from CBS Sports. How are you doing today, Jamie? Oh, I'm doing great. How are you guys? We are doing very well, my friend, and we want to continue the game that we've been playing on the show where we are going to talk about will guys regress or will they impress. And the guy I want to start this whole thing out was the RB1 last year a pretty big surprise for the fantasy football.

community, Devante Freeman wield his way to being the top running back through catching the ball, through scoring just a boatload of touchdowns. So how are you feeling about Freeman coming into this season? Well, first of all, boatload is one of my favorite words, so I appreciate you phrasing it that way. I think he's going to regress. To what level, you know, I think we'll have to find out how good Kevin Coleman could potentially be.

I get a chance every year, which I'm thankful for, to go to the first owners meetings, which is where all the coaches are there, and they have a breakfast, an annual breakfast of each league, AFC and NFC. And so I go to that every year. I talk to Dan Quinn this season about his running back, and I asked him, and it was kind of telling what he said in that, you know, we feel we have a unique combination of the two guys of Kevin Coleman and Devante Freeman.

And he kept referencing how Devante Freeman's so good catching the ball in the backfield and how they want to get Kevin Coleman and his explosiveness on the field more for his, you know, carries. So I think you'll see Freeman's touches come down. He's still going to be a great PPR running back. He's still worth drafting, I think, as a, you know, back end number one running back, certainly, you know, a starter depending on how you want to, you know, build your team. But I think anybody that probably reaches for him in the first round, maybe the first 15 to 20 picks.

might be a little bit disappointed because I don't think he's going to return the same level of success like we saw last year. Yeah, I think that's the difficulty is the value for fantasy owners. And this is Andy, by the way. Let me ask you this. Does that make Kevin Coleman, based on how you're feeling about that backfield, a value for fantasy owners? I mean, do you think that if he produces early, if he controls the fumbles, he can be that, you know, first and second down back and make some big plays? Yeah, I think his value is amazing. You know, I mean, you're talking about a guy that,