Week 15 Studs & Stinkers + Along Came Pollard, Hurts So Good - Fantasy Football Podcast for 12/21

at least a nine for my personal happiness with David Montgomery, but factored into that was we've got to go all the way back to win my groin. When David Montgomery went down in training camp with what was talked about, there was whispers, it was a non-contact injury, David Montgomery may have gone down for the season. And it turned out it was just a really bad groin injury and his ADP plummeted.

So people who drafted David Montgomery, I mean, he was a seventh or eighth round draft pick. And that turning into a top 10 running back, you should be ecstatic with that. Yeah, that's how I view. I think he's a 10. And he's a 10. He's looked great. He got off to a slow start in the beginning of the year. Two of his first three games were outside the top 36 running backs. And so you were disappointed. And a lot of times that factors in.

But oh my goodness gracious, he has just been on fire unstoppable. He's the running back six on the season right now. And I think people are outlandishly excited. Well, Jason was bringing up that he was close to being a my guy. Like he was on the board. He was on the board as a my guy. He was going to be an Andy my guy until he went down with the injury. And the groin injury happened. And.

courtesy of Matthew Berry, first running back with four straight games of 24.5 fantasy points this season. So four straight weeks. If you paced out his last four games, he's on 284 for 17, 36, and 20. And we said four weeks ago, what if he starts scoring? Because that's been the thing. David Montgomery has always been kind of stuck behind the battle line. The word to describe him before these four games was unspectacular. Right. Was he consistent? Sure.

But you never got spectacular from David Montgomery, and now you did. And he might win you a league. He might. And through those first 10 weeks, he had one rushing touchdown. That's, it was crazy. And now he has, what, five in the last three games. And do you have to, you have to give a side hat tip to Mitchell Tribisky? Absolutely. This offense is so much better with Mitchell Tribusky. 30 points in three straight games.

30 plus. All right, Tony Pollard, 12 carry 69 yards, two touchdowns, nine targets for 63 through the air. Yep. Is he, I don't want to, I don't want to get like too crazy here. But is he better for the Dallas Cowboys offense than Ezekiel Elliott right now? The people are talking, Jason. Brooks, you're a Cowboys fan. Is he better for your, is your offense better focusing on him versus Zika?

You sure looked like it, right? I think the answer is definitively no. I don't think it's definitive. I do. I watch Chase Edmonds do this for a couple of games in the middle of this season with Kenyon Drake's injury. Zika wasn't 100%. He has no DAC. Like to move the offense on a consistent fashion. Did Dak play yesterday? No. No, he did. I'm just saying, but I'm saying he fits into an offense with Dak better than he does trying to carry the load when the entire defense. Sure.

You know, he's not as good in the passing game, plain and simple. Tony Pollard's a better pass catcher, much like Chase Edmonds is a much better pass catcher than Kenyon Drake. That's fair. Yeah, I mean, you can take it definitively away if you want to, but I think that this is a very similar situation to what we've seen elsewhere, and I don't know. I mean, 12 for 69 on the ground is a good performance. And one of those was a 40-yard.

scant at the end of the game. The hard part for Tony Pollard is that Ezekiel Elliott is, what, a $90 million man? And Tony Pollard needs to get more touches when Zeke is playing. But you've committed $90 million to Ezekiel Elliott at the running back position so that it puts you in a bit of a pickle. And this will be a huge monitor situation for championship week? I mean, will Zeke be back?

They were saying they expected him to play this. This was a very last minute scratch. So I would, unfortunately, for Tony Pollard being on my team, I would unfortunately predict that Zeke will be back. All right. It almost feels like remember when David Johnson, the big contract in Arizona, and we saw some Chase Edmonds back behind David Johnson. Dalvin Cook is great. 24 for 132 and 1. Derek Henry is great.

24 for 147 and 1. Those are both exactly what you expected, and you're excited about that. Aaron Jones, 241 and 1. You're actually not. Like Dalvin Cook and Derek Henry are so good that these games where they just literally had 130 to 147 yards and touchdowns, I think you're a little disappointed. That's how good they are. I could tell you, I played Daven Cook and watching him on a drive.

I think they gave it to him like three straight times and he didn't get in from the five. That was pretty disappointing. Yeah. And Derek Henry not hitting 200 yards is now the expectation against Detroit, right? Melvin Gordon gets to play the revenge game next week. He was 11 for 61 and 2. Yeah. I mean, we said play him this week and it was fine. Yeah, you can play him, but this is, I mean, that's the Mike Davis line from two weeks ago.

Where, yeah, on paper for fantasy, it looks fantastic, but you take away those two touchdowns and it's just blah. Here was a huge game. Savon Ahmed, 23 for 1, 22, and 1. These dolphins, man. I was shocked at this. We're watching the games. We've got, you know, we're in the studio. We've got all the games up watching the whole thing. And at one point, I turned to Andy. I said, did you realize?

that Ahmed had 122 rushing yards. We were both blown away. I guess, you know, you just, when you get the ball 23 times. Well, that was the story for Miles Gaskin before Ahmed, and it's working out. But that's huge. And we'll see who's active next week in the backfield. I would imagine it'll be Gaskin, but we'll see. All right. J.D. McKissick, 10 targets, 9 for 56 and 1. Okay. It was good to see.

I was still pretty confident despite the Haskins problem. Yeah, I was not. I will take a big fat L on the McKissick, Logan Thomas. Just my view of the Dwayne Haskins-led Washington football team was, I don't want any part. Goodness, it's now the goal. Did you push that, Andy? I did. It's now the goal to have the McKissick drop.

Just take you by surprise. That's why I did it. It has to come in the most inappropriate time. Yeah, you were making some good point over there. Oh, man. Pepper needs new shorts. But, uh, I mean, I, I, you know, kudos to the Washington football team office for being able to. They almost beat Seattle, man. Yeah. Crazy world.

88% of snaps from McKissick was the story. He came out and was the first and second down running back to start the game, which really changed his outlook. They didn't lean on Peyton Barber, although Barber did vulture one touchdown. DeAndre Swift looked great. Jason, you brought this up. Rookie running back week, man. I mean, Cam Acres got hurt, unfortunately. If he hadn't got hurt, I think he would have had obviously a better game, but you had Swift. You had James Robinson.

You had Jonathan Taylor. You had J.K. Dobbins. Dobbins. I mean, this is at the end of the season, these rookie running backs. Foof. Making their mark. Yeah. Get them. Leonard Fournette, 14 for 49 and 2. Five targets. Okay. If you're starting running back on a good offense, that's all there is to it. Saturday game for Leonard, though. And we expect Ronald Jones back. Yes. Yeah, I would think so. Josh Jacobs against.

The Los Angeles Chargers, 26 and 1. We talked about that game. By the way, my reign is over for the CBS Experts League that I won last year. I was in the semi-final matchup. I got squashed like a bug. Yeah, I saw Jamie Eisenberg's team. 209 points. They hit. Every single player was incredible. David Johnson.

11 targets, 11 catches, 106 yards. This is kind of what we saw happening in Houston, like in the beginning, right? We said they're missing weapons. Now Will Fuller's gone. You lost Hopkins. David Johnson was the guy. There was also no Duke Johnson. Correct. So I'm sure that factored into it. But he wasn't great on the ground, but he was great through the air. And it helped. Because that's who David Johnson is now. Yeah, he's been good this year.

I think people don't realize how consistent and valuable he's been because he's missed some games and had a few choice bad performances. But I think David Johnson's reliable as a solid, solid RB2. I just remembered who we're going to talk about in the running back stinkers this week. And I can't wait because you made it, you made a prediction about it this week. It had to do with your grandmother. All right. The best call I've ever made. Do you remember what I'm talking about, Mike?

I don't remember the player, but Jason said he would start his grandmother over them. Yes. Who is deceased. Right. And I said that could be. She could have scored more points. She would be a positive for your lineup. If you make that decision, you will score more fantasy points. And you were right. And we'll get to it. Calvin Ridley, though, wide receiver studs. We're talking about Calvin Ridley. Happy birthday, Calvin Ridley. 10 for 163 and 1. It's all he does when there's no Julio. He is elite.

He also had another touchdown that was, did you see that, Mike? Just tipped. Oh, you must have died. Yes, I did. DeAndre Hopkins, 11 targets, 9 for 169 and 1. Nice. Leads the NFL in receiving yards. Surpassed 100 catches for the fourth time in his career. Kind of a good player. Kind of going to keep starting him. Yep. Zach Pascal, what? You rascal.

Stealing all my T.Y. Hilton points. I believe I called him a rascal, too. Did you? I did. I did. Seven for, or five for 79 and two. It almost rhymes. If you say his name, Pascal. Yeah. Paskell the rascal. The, the. Oh, Zach. That old rascal. The T. Y. Tilt.

in the studio was real. Because, you know, it was a start of the week. Yeah. Andy had him. You had him. We had him in our sleeper bowl. I mean, literally, we needed him everywhere. And he actually came through. He, he did, he's not a bad. Double digits in PPR. Yeah. I mean, he was fine by the end of the game. But that last bomb, it was inches. Drag down on the three. Oh, it was a bomb touchdown that wasn't a.

Touchdown. We were jumping around. But Zach Paskill, he didn't exist to help your fantasy team. He existed to hurt it this week. And yet we mentioned him as a stud. Oh, speaking of hurting, Marvin Jones had 12 targets, 10 receptions, 112 yards, a touchdown. And Andy, you had him in the dynasty league that you were trying to win. And still, did you start Marvin Jones?

That's a no. Oh, who did he start? I believe it was Robbie Anderson. Oh. And look, this is hindsight for sure. I would have done exactly what you did, Andy. When they announced Matthew Stafford was active and likely going to play, like that was breaking news, right? They thought he'd missed the game. I had the moment where I said, I need to play Marvin Jones over Robbie Anderson. And then I had the moment, like every fantasy player does, this is what we relate to you, okay? I made the wrong call.

Now, the reason I made the wrong call is because I didn't want to mess with my team. I literally said, well, who got me to the semi-final game? Well, Robbie Anderson did. He seems like he's guaranteed for a certain level of target share in this game. I brought up on the show I didn't like Jair Alexander matchup, but I also brought up like Jairson's to stay on one side. They moved on Robbie Anderson around. I almost did it. I actually did it in the lineup. And then I moved it back out of fear. Well, at least Robbie Anderson didn't scream, don't sit me to you.

Yeah, yeah, this was tough, though. I mean, Marvin was elite this week, 10 for 112. I was terrified to play any of the, I mean, Swift is fine, but I didn't want to play Stafford. I didn't want to play Marvin Jones, but Stafford is just an Ironman. I'm hurting. Thanks for bringing that up. Stefan Diggs is great, 11 for 147 this week. He's got to be in the running for best pick of the year. Stefan Diggs? Yeah, I mean, you got him in the middle rounds. He was not expensive.

And he's the wide receiver four. He's been so consistent. Doesn't Mike owe him an apology? I took the L on Stefan Diggs weeks ago, my man. Did you? Yes. And my apology was never anything to do with Stefan Diggs. I'm just trying to back him into it. The apology is to Josh Allen. Yeah. Because Stefan Diggs is an elite wide receiver. Never said otherwise. No, but we should connect the dots there, though, with Josh Allen. Like the reason, one of the reasons Josh Allen,