Fantasy Football Podcast 2016 - Allen Robinson Interview, Fantasy News, Mailbag

We were up in arms emotionally. We hated that Mike had gotten this great trade. We did not for a minute talk about vetoing that trade in the league. Because more often than not, if you've played fantasy for a long enough time, you know the ball can bounce another direction. A player can get hurt. And unless the trade is specifically collusion, or I would say taking advantage of some sort of, or having an advantage in some sort of unfair way. And I don't necessarily know what that could be. That could be like,

one player just heard that somebody tore his ACL. Right. And then the other player hasn't heard it yet. That's just not taking advantage. I mean, that's not a good trade for the league integrity. That's ridiculous. So other than that, I think that what you do, I think what you set up is okay in the first league. I think that's fine. I think it's fine in both leagues, but you need to set that precedent. If people don't understand that,

then that's your problem. It's understanding the league rules. I like the idea of having the kind of deputy trade commissioner who, they just kind of decide for the league is this fine. And then if it's not, I would then put it to a vote. If you're in a good league, right, with close friends, you've been in a long time, like our league of record, we've shared this before. But a couple of years ago, we got rid of the trade approval process. And it is...

way cooler than I thought it would be. I've done that in every league I'm in. Oh, from here on now. It's gone in every league. Get rid of it because you can always go and undo a trade. You can veto a trade, yeah. Afterwards, if everybody's up in arms over something on your Facebook channel or whatever you're using to communicate, then you put it to a vote and you undo the trade if it happens. But it lets you do trades. You can make a trade Sunday before the game. Get it done. Right.

No, absolutely. All right, Jeff and Columbus, Georgia has a question in a $400 cap auction draft. What is the maximum amount I should bid on a number one overall player in the first round? Hmm. 400 cap. 400. Well, normally I would say, you know, I try to stick somewhere around 60. You know, if it's, if I'm looking for Antonio Brown, in a 200. So, you know, you double that 120, 130. Yeah, so would you say you spend about.

50 to 60% of your budget on two studs? Is that a strategy you like? If you're going after studs, that's a strategy I like. I think that's the right budget is what I mean. Would you prefer the stud scrubs where you do that, you go all in on these two or three guys, you're spending 60, 70% of your money, or go after that second tier of guys, so you're going to get a discount compared to the elite? I take the studs.

Because I'm going to lock in a couple of players that I feel like are as guaranteed as it comes in fantasy football. And then I want to take advantage of values. Because I feel like the well-educated player in an auction league, they know, you know, the one that listens to this show and does their research and knows the level of value. I think that's when you steal the guys later on. And so I put myself in the boat to do that and have a couple of horses. Next question. All right.

Oh, sorry. I thought Jason was going to add something, but... Nope. Next question. Drew in Columbia, I'm coming off of a last place finish, and I'm in dire need to redeem myself. I will be drafting 10 of 12 this season, and I'm trying to decide if I should go running back or wide receiver for the first round, assuming Gronk has already taken. What position should I prioritize first, and it is a full point PPR? With two running back, two wide receivers starting.

You know, the only thing I was thinking about adding to the last question, I will add now because it actually goes with this question, which is be water. We talk about that. Be willing to change. Mike posed the question of, do we do studs and scrubs? And for me, I go in with maybe that.

as an idea first, but if the chips don't fall right on those first guys... If the price goes up too high, then I change, and I adapt. And so it's the same thing's going to happen here. It really depends. If you're drafting 10th of 12th, that is the exact position where you cannot predetermine what you're picking, because there's nine players picked ahead of you. And if...

If it's all wide receivers being picked ahead of you or all running backs picked ahead of you, it changes who drops to you, it changes how many people are left in the draft tier at that spot. It's really difficult to give you any kind of advice that we could take to the bank and say it is the right call to draft a running back or a wide receiver at that spot. There was a really high level of busting for running backs last year. It's generally, when you're talking those first round,

Top 12 guys, it's about a 50% bust rate. Last year was extremely high. But I'm just going to read through the wide receivers real quick. These are the top wide receivers taken who are considered safe. No matter what, I'm safe if I take a wide receiver. From last year? From last year. This is based off of last year's average draft position. Antonio Brown, great. Des Bryant, bust. Julio Jones, great. Demaris Thomas. Disappointing.

Odell Beckham, great. Calvin Johnson, pretty much a bust. He had a couple of good weeks here. Very disappointing. Randall Cobb, bust. A.J. Green. Okay. Okay to good. Then T.Y. Hilton, not his fault. And then Brandon Cooks was a bus for half of the year and then great for the second half. In other words, the perception that wide receivers are so safe is carried along.

by the foundational player like Antonio Brown, Odell Beckham Jr. and Julio Jones. It's because there's three names there. And then the big names on the other side didn't produce last year, the Eddie Lacey's, the Levion Bell with the injury. Charles got hurt. I think you're on to something there. Here's what I would say. You're drafting 10th. If Levian Bell, Todd Gurley, Adrian Peterson, David Johnson, Odell Beckham, Antonio Brown, and Julio Jones. Those are a lot of names. No, I know, but those eight guys. You're at 10.

If any of those guys falls to you at 10, you know, to me. You've got to be able to take any of them. Any of them. Not Zechial. I wouldn't put him in that group. I would consider him at 10. Personally, I would not end up drafting him by just the way I draft. All right. Too many rookies. Question from Josh in, ooh, Matamita.

Minnesota. I had one of those once. It was delicious. Sounds good. The NFL draft has got me watching NFL football, so I've always had a bias towards drafting rookie players. Last year he took Abdullah, David Johnson, and Devante Parker. The problem is he's in a redraft. How many rookies is too many to have on a redraft roster? Look, you're in the wrong kind of league if you like drafting rookies. Yeah, getting that dynasty. More than two is usually a bad idea. I think, and really,

It's not a number so much as where you grab them. If you're investing middle and high picks in them, that's a really scary proposition. If at the very end of your draft, you spend your last two picks on them, this year specifically, which is really if you're in a redraft league, the only thing that matters, I don't believe in a lot of the rookies. Every year, by the end of next year, there will be several rookies who produced because there always are a few. But so often those guys are guys that...

weren't even drafted. You didn't know whether, you know, they came out of nowhere. They came out of an injury ahead of them. And so as far as going into this year's draft, I am really not high on a lot of rookies. So, I don't know, target your favorite or maybe two. But don't worry so much about that as drafting the best value at every round through the draft. This year, I would lean my later rookie picks to running backs as well. I mean, like the Kenneth Dixon, Devante Booker.

Kenyon Drake. I mean, these guys are... These are guys who can get... If an injury happens, they will have a huge workload. I just don't see the high-level rookie wide receivers that were taken. I'm not seeing a huge fantasy year from any of them. And let's be honest. It's May. And so if there's any... It's got to be May. It's got to be May. It's the month of May, thank goodness. And if there's anybody that...

And, you know, drafting as late as you can in your leagues matters to. These rookies are who you get to see in training camp and in preseason that might, that should be the indicator of these guys you might take a flyer on. I mean, look, you've got a new stable of 47 wide receivers in Cleveland. There could be somebody that takes.

you know, a leap in the preseason and you go, wow, that guy's going to have an impact on the team. And that's when you can make those kind of split decisions on, you know, don't necessarily determine now, at least I'm not going to, which of the two wide receiver flyers I'm going to take. That's going to happen as late as possible for me. But just don't overload. Correct. And I would say this just as another PSA, another public service announcement. If you're planning your drafts, a lot of leagues right now are like, when are we doing our draft? We've got to find the date. Do it late.

Do it as late as possible. Do it after the, at least the third preseason game. Maybe do it after the fourth preseason game. I know it's hard to do that, but it's best for your league. And one final thought there. The other thing that's challenging about rookies is you might make the right picks, but they're rookies. So I might take six weeks for them to come into their own, and you'll probably have dropped them by then, which makes it frustrating. So time share question from Shane in Sudbury. I'm going to pretend that's out of the country, Mike. Bonjour.

I kept Yeldon at the end of last season. And with the acquisition of Ivory, I was wondering if I should risk it and hope Yeldon holds onto the number one spot or try to get Ivory or try to trade him and let someone else deal with it. If I did trade him, what are some names and levels I should be looking to get in return? Thanks and keep up the, quote, hard work. Just kidding. Great job, guys. Enjoys listening. How dare you, Shane? How dare you? Look, uh...

I think we have a difference of opinion on this topic in the studio. I have come even further to the side that believes that T.J. Yeldon will carry the load for this team and that Ivy will be a short yardage and supplemental running back. And so I have the workload at 6040 Yelden.

I would say right now. So then you would advise, just hold on to him and don't. Well, look, what about ivory? Should he try to acquire ivory? I think the price for ivory is too high. So no. This is one where, this is like Hill and Bernard. You know, I'm going to pick the one I believe in, and I'm not going to try to stable both and try to figure out which week to start him. Because there will be weeks that ivory will outscore Yeldon.

but there will be weeks when Yeldon outscores Ivory, and I think there'll be more of those. Jason obviously disagree, so I want to give him a floor to be. I very much disagree. I don't think Yelden is going to...

carry the load there. He wasn't able to get the short yards away. They want, obviously didn't get touchdowns on the ground. And so they bring in Chris Ivory to be that first and second down type of back. Use Yeldon as a compliment piece. I would rather have Yeldon because he's younger and because he is the past catcher. Generally speaking, as the year goes on, those guys become more valuable. So I'm not high on Yelden. That being said,

I agree with Andy from the standpoint of if you've got him, I don't think you go after Chris Ivory. I don't think you try to trade him now because his value is low. I think the best thing you can do is hold on to him and hope that Andy is right or hope that something happens to Chris Ivory ahead. Chris Ivory has been notoriously injury prone. So in that sense, you know, T.J. Yeldon could be fine coming later. But if you're saying like that's your plan to keep him,

And you have not yet kept him. It says in the special notes that you've only got three keepers. I would hope that you could have a better keeper than T.J. Yeldon. It's interesting because I feel like you and I are probably going to get, you know, this would be one of our mono-e-mano battles for the year of seeing how these guys perform? We'll have some water bets surrounding Yield. Yeah, no doubt about it. Question for, so for Andy. Would you roll the dice? So you're holding on to Yeldon and see what it shakes out to. Let's say two to three weeks go by.

Ivory, it seems like what you are talking about, where he's a complimentary guy. Do you consider him a high enough level of handcuff that you would then, once the market has gone down on him, would you try and acquire him to have the Jacksonville backfield locked up? Yeah, if the market goes down on him, I would have the same philosophy I did last year with acquiring Bilal Powell to back up ivory so that I had the Jets backfield.