Mock Draft Episode! + Fantasy Freakouts - Fantasy Football Podcast for 8/1

But this draft fell in a way where I get to draft the player that I'm really wanting to draft right now. How dare you call Alexander Madison a reach in the middle of the fourth round? And sitting there is Dalton Kincaid, and I will never. I will never do that. I don't draft rookie tight ends. It's against who I am. To the Fantasy Footballers podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in.

Tuesday, August 1st, the fantasy footballers, Mike Wright, Jason Moore, Andy Holloway, the deucers in the building as well, and here we are, it's August. It's time. You gentlemen, excited for what is to come, the Hall of Fame game. Very much so. I don't care. I will, I think I'll watch it, I guess. I mean, I'll probably tune in and then be like, oh, this is not compared to. Oh, that's what this thing is. Yeah, now I remember. They tricked me again. uh we're into five shows a week we'll be here with you every single day and that will go through the end of the football season so we uh we kick it off today we have a mock draft show on today's episode yes or a mock draft on today's episode yeah to the to the person who recently uh messaged on twitter they said hey you guys are going to do any more mock draft shows

Yeah. Thank you, Mike. We are. We're answering the bell. A couple reminders here at the top. We have a lot of news to talk about as well. Some craziness took place over the weekend. But first, a reminder, the Ultimate Draft Kit available right now, Ultimate DraftKit.com. Your drafts are coming. Be prepared. Be ready to win. Set the foundation for your team at the draft with the Ultimate Draft kit. You don't win your league at the draft, but you set yourself up. for a lot of success. You can lose it at the draft. Right. You can make a lot of mistakes. And the nice thing is, I know a lot of people, they'll grab the UDK, the morning of the draft, and that can work. But right now, on August 1st, if we got a couple weeks, there's so much information in there, so much good toilet time that you can have to yourself for this month. Let's make August great. Agreed. So you can check that out, UltimateDraftKit.com. When you do draft, you can plug your team in or import your team.

get the draft analyzer to give you a grade, let you know where to take your team once the season begins. You'll find us on X. Oh, gosh. X marks the spot. I have to say it, right? Yeah, it is. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, at the FF baller. And don't mistake my sigh for carrying. I mean, it doesn't really matter in any way, shape, and form other than the annoyance of, like, I've got a good nine years now of saying, Follow us on Twitter at the FF ballers. Really, this impacts my routines. It does. But, yeah, we'll X, X going to give it to you over there. We'll give you our posts. Our posts. Yeah, at the FF ballers. Jason's at Jason FFL. You can follow Mike at FF Hitman. I'm at Andy Holloway, and we're on Instagram as well. You can watch the show on YouTube. YouTube.com slash the fantasy footballer, subscribe, click the bell. All right. Let's jump into the news.

News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. Well, the big news from the weekend was the Jonathan Taylor escapades. Oh, man. And let's catch you up here and then tell you what happened over the weekend. Jonathan Taylor is heading into the final year of his rookie contract. Jonathan Taylor said previously in the offseason, he's under contract. He put pen to paper. He's going to play. He proceeded to fire that agent, hire a new agent. All of this running back situation has proliferated throughout the league where there are J.K. Dobbins was very or is very upset. Josh Jacobs is not in training camp being on the franchise. Sequin just barely went from upset to content. And so we have this situation where now Jonathan Taylor is not happy with his contract.

That's where we stood. There was reports of Jonathan Taylor meeting with Jim Ursay, the magnificent owner of the Indianapolis Colts. Tremendous communicator, you know, just really easy to get along with. Definitely not in his own world. And so there was reports of him meeting with Jonathan Taylor for over an hour at training camp. Jonathan Taylor had been on the PUP and currently is. after that meeting, it became public that he had requested a trade days before. Then Jim Earsay came out and said, we're never trading him. Not even in October. We'll never trade him. Then the next chapter, the Colts are considering placing Jonathan Taylor on the non-football injury list as a bit of gamesmanship, it seems. Because if he's on that list, due to an injury suffered away from training camp and the team, his contract will not toll.

They could deny him any amount of money they want, and he would be under the team's control for another year. They're really taking good care of them, you know? Then he came out and said, and this is from his official Twitter account. X account. Sorry, X account. Number one, never had back pain. Number two, never reported back pain. Not sure who the sources are, but find new ones. Well, he's saying he's fine. And here we are. And if you have Jonathan Taylor in your leagues. You should be freaked out because there are pretty bad outcomes in play here for Jonathan Taylor. Now, the best outcome? Is it a trade? Is it just, hey, we're actually fine with each other because I threw some incentives in your deal and I'll let you go next year? I mean, because this is the final year of his rookie deal, but he could be franchised. They could play the Sequin card, Josh Jacobs card. I'm curious.

I mean, number one, I'll start with this, because Jonathan Taylor, you know, he said he's good with his contract. Then the guy got really hurt last year and, I mean, is still dealing with some stuff for the ankle. And I think he's realizing, oh, crap, what if I get hurt again? And I can't get a contract. So I think he's realizing the situation that he's really in, which is, it's an unfortunate situation to be in. I think he's going to play. I think he will be on the Colts. And we've kind of discussed Jonathan Taylor of, He's an incredible running back. He's up against it with a rookie and a mobile quarterback who will be at the helm for the Colts. So he might be a little bit overpriced for his ADP. Still think he'll be really good for fantasy football, but maybe a little bit drafted a little too high. I'm wondering if he's doing all this right now, then plays out the season. This is like the, well, he's hoping to get a contract extension, but this could be the, if you,

are thinking about franchising me after this year, I'm going to raise hell. So do not do this. I'm doing this right now. I'm letting you know a year in advance. Do not franchise me. And I don't know if that will work. Or I don't even know if that's the case. But that's what it seems like to me trying to be a psychologist and a detective. I don't think you want to play chicken with Jimmy or say. Like, I, like, no, he's the one that's like, he will crash. He will go straight. He'll go eat the chicken raw. Absolutely. You know, he's, he's not. Not to be trifled with. Here's what I'll say. I think it's a lot like the Josh Jacobs and Raiders situation in so fact is both parties are responsible for their circumstance. I don't think it's all Josh Jacobs fault. I don't think it's all the Raiders fault. I don't think it's all Jonathan Taylor's fault. I don't think it's all Jim Erse's fault.

To his credit, this was the guy who paid Andrew Luck his full $24 million after he suddenly retired. Didn't hold that money back. But he also doesn't want to be played chick. He doesn't want to be pushed up against the wall like this. And so you're having these budding heads. And historically, the Colts and running backs, they don't pay them. They don't pay them. Yeah. And they've offered no contract, to be clear. That's another thing that came out publicly. They have made zero contract offers of any kind to Jonathan Taylor. And so for whatever reason, and obviously he has a new agent with a different game plan, right? Because that's how a lot of these situations are. It's a gamesmanship to get. It's posturing. Yeah, you want to posture. You know, he requested a trade three or four days early. Then we bring it public after this meeting. So a lot of that, you know, I don't think this NFI thing would hold up if he's really not hurt. Yeah. So it's more another posturing publicity move to make Jonathan Taylor look that. So.

We don't know where Jonathan Taylor is playing. And what's crazy to me is, and I don't know if you guys have spent the time thinking about it, if they trade Jonathan Taylor or he's held out for a part of the season, where are we in that backfield in Indianapolis? Well, we have another update to that as Zach Moss, who would, they had traded for it last year. They acquired him from the Buffalo Bills, sending Naim Hines over there. He would have presumed to be the starter. It should. should Jonathan Taylor miss any amount of time? Well, he broke his forearm. So he is expected to miss, you know, about six weeks. I mean, as long as it's just a clean break, you miss the time and you come back. But that's still, I mean, now we're right up against the season for a, and a guy who's now going to miss all of training camp, all of preseason, and you're looking at the roster behind those guys.

Dion Jackson, who got some play last year. He can catch the ball a little bit. Evan Hole is currently listed behind Zach Moss as the third running back. And Evan Hole has a pass catching profile. He's a rookie. Jake Funk in the house? Is Jake Funk? Jake Funk is there? Oh, man. We want the Funk. I don't know if we want the Funk, man. It is. Evan Hole was a fifth rounder this year. It's... It's not good. Losing Zach Moss is like if you were just talking posturing, this is a something that went right for Jonathan Taylor, at least to maybe flex some leverage. Are we sure that Jonathan Taylor was not involved in the accident with Zach Moss? Yes, we are of course sure because if Jonathan Taylor missed time, he would want Zach Moss on the field. He would want.

him out there going, do you see what you got? Jason, the guy just broke his arm. Oh, look, I'm so sorry about that, but this is good news for the Colts is what I'm saying. Oh, my gosh. That's all my point was. No, we got the point. Because Zach Moss is bad at football. You're saying he's better with a broken arm. He's better off the field. It's just, you know, it's a ditching by subtraction. What is this? I don't know. When the news came and it was like, oh, you broke his arm. At Jason FFL. At Jason FFL. I'm so sorry, Mr. Moss. Here is why the Seahawks always draft running backs every single year. Kenneth Walker and Zach Charbonnet both dealing with injuries. Kenneth Walker is dealing with the first groin injury of the year. Groin Index.com. It is up to date. It's always up to date, Mike. So they're waiting on that and then Zach Charbonnet. It's just him. Yeah. It's just Kenneth Walker on groin index. Yeah. Zach Charbonnet is dealing with a shoulder injury. He's out indefinitely.

Here is Pete Carroll's direct quote about the rookie. We'll take some time to figure it out. It just kind of crept up on him, really. He didn't get hit or anything. Just all of a sudden he started feeling something. So we're checking him out and being really cautious. I don't love that. Neither of these injuries, this is not great. Yeah, you don't like these soft tissue issues that linger, especially, and this has been brought up this off season as to why they added Zach Charbonnet. So many downs last year for this team. It was DJ Dallas, and it was Travis Homer, and you went into the season with a sports hernia issue for Kenneth Walker, and then he was out with an ankle injury, and here we are with a groin injury. This is why they draft a new one every year. They drafted a few. Mackintosh, right? Yeah, Kenny McIntosh is there. I would assume that DJ Dallas is now the acting won, but Kenny McIntosh, he was an interesting prospect, and now he's going to get.

Plenty of time to show who he is. Yeah, he's been running with the ones. Looks really good. Yeah, I mean, he was more of a pass catching back in college, McIntosh was. So I don't know how that, you know, fits here as a replacement for either Walker or Charbonnet. But the Charbonnet news to me is something that whenever you use the word indefinitely, it makes me hold my, it's like, don't say that. Just say we're not sure yet. Don't scare me like that. So do you like Kenny McIntosh? Or are you more of a Tank Dell man? Uh, Tank Dell. Okay. Yeah, that was, I was going really back in time there, but nobody really picked up on that. No. You don't remember those old commercials? The Mac versus Dale commercials that we have for years and years and years. Okay. Go ahead. You have the cricket? No, no, I don't have it. I mean, what? Bust it. I don't know what else. That's all you have? I didn't.

I didn't realize you were going. Do another one. I didn't know you were going Dell. I was trying to figure out my. That's what the commercials were. Yes. Yes. Like for years. Oh, no, no. No, it was Mac versus PC. It wasn't a Dell. No. That was dude you're getting a Dell. Hold on. There's any buttons I can push for my own. I need a tight machine. I thought the joke's not funny then. I mean, it wasn't funny anyways. I wasn't following it. I thought it was a, you were talking about how big. Because Kenny McIntosh was like, he's six foot, 204. Jason just answered. Yes. He just answered like wide receiver versus running back. You're trying to pick up your friend here. Thanks. It's a computer joke. Welcome to the show. Oh, man. It's bad. Dalvin Cook didn't sign yet. I don't know if he does. Was in New York crowd chanting his name, meet and greet.

watched a practice, hung out, had all the hard knocks film crew following him around for the day. So he'll be on the show. You think Seattle's going to give him a call now? Seattle? Yeah. Oh, I don't know. New England, that was a team that's going to meet with him as well. I still think he wants to play in Miami. I really do. I think that's where he wants, he wants them to come forward and give him a contract. And Mike McDaniel spent about two minutes too long dancing around the question of whether Delvin Cook. would be added to the team. It's like we love our running back room. It's really good. But Dalvin Cook's really great. But I think that's where Dalvin wants to play. But we don't have a contract yet. We also don't have a contract for Ezekiel Elliott who met with the Patriots. Another running back. It seems inevitable that Ramandre will have a running mate at some point. Yes. All right. It's just how high.

of a status of a player. Yeah. Do we have like a sad song here somewhere? Do you have anything back there, Al? Here we go. I mean, I, can a fireball burn too bright? Yes, it can't. A stark and supernova and then turn into a black hole. I mean, it didn't even get to. Yeah, this wasn't not a super. This just went into the water. It illuminated nothing. Tim Patrick. Hey. Tim Patrick is, uh, he left practice feared. to be an Achilles injury. He's not going to play. Yeah, we don't have the official confirmation as of right now, but an Achilles injury, they usually know pretty quick if it is actually torn. It was non-contact. The video's bad. Yeah, it's, I mean, this is the second year in a row now for Tim Patrick for a training camp preseason leg injury. The guy was already a bit older. It's real unfortunate.

Yeah, it stinks for him. It stinks for the organization. He signed a three-year, very large contract, and he's probably never. This is your two of it, right? Yes, he's probably never going to play a single snap on that contract. I'm happy he got the money because he, you know, he was a lower drafted older player. So, yeah, real shame. We've updated the UDK. Yep, that was updated immediately. I think Greg Dulcich is one of the players that is. Yeah. Going to get the biggest bump in this situation. And it's not good for Russell Wilson. No, and like Marvin Mims is just coming back into training camp. It's going to be hard to trust him early in the season. KJ. Hamler. Yeah, they're waving him. Oh, he was waived. Yes. Non-football injury designation, a heart issue. Yeah, I don't paracardi. I.

Paracarditis. Yeah, yeah, I'm not going to try it. Nailed it. Hey, I did my best, but yeah, he's... Tank Dell. Nice. But it's like, Hamlers, unfortunately, got his stuff going on, but they were willing to waive him. So, and, I mean, he hasn't been able to stay on the field regardless. The condition he's suffering with is not considered serious. He would miss weeks, not months. Sterling Shepard, back off of the PUP. Hey. Hey. There you go. What if Zeke ended up in New England? What do you think of Zeke in New England? Where would he end up in your rankings? Not very high. I mean, even if Zeke, no matter... Would you look at him like Damien Harris last year? Or worse? Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a pretty solid comp. No matter what, Romandre is the number one for the New England Patriots. It's just how annoying is the number two going to be. And Zeke...

would probably get in there. He'd steal some goal line and things, but I think they'd keep Ramandre as the pass catcher over Zeke. That was today's news and notes presented by USAA Insurance. You can learn more at USAA.com slash insurance. You guys ready to mock? Let's go. Wait, are you ready to mock a lock a ding dong? Still yes. I think that's the first time I've actually hit the drop. People have been upset. Yeah, I was about, I was about hit my. Verbal drop. Maka, lock a ding-dong, let's go, baby. The fantasy footballers mock draft. Also known just as speaking. That's my verbal drop, Mike. Thought you did all the drop. That was a verbal drop too, though. Well, that's fair. I was about to hit my own button. My verbal drop sounds like this. All right, mock draft. Here we go.

The deucers are involved. They're going to be drafting their own team. One team for team ducers. So that would be three guys, one bad team. You guys ready for this? Oh, yeah. All right. 12 team half PPR. Draft spots were randomly determined. I have the number two spot. Mike at five, Jason at 10, and the deucers are at pick six. So it'll be fun seeing them and Mike battle it out, steal from one another. The mock draft settings, 12 team half PPR, like I said, one quarterback, two running back, two wide receivers, one tight end, one flex, four bench. We have had this question, and I'm going to throw it to you two, before we get it going. The question of just like, what's the utility of mock drafting? Where do you find the greatest benefits of going through the exercise? I know these episodes are obviously very popular, so people want the information of where players are going. What about you individually?

For me individually, I think there's two main takeaways. There's places in the draft. Like, am I drafting from early, you know, near the one-two turn? Am I in the middle of the draft? Am I at the end of the round? Because it really changes, like, especially in the first few rounds, you're pretty much drafting very close to ADP. The players are all kind of correct in the order. And so it gives you... good strategy of here's what to do if I'm at this spot. But the other thing, and it's all about positions. It's all about when to take what position. What rounds do I hate the running backs? What rounds do I love the wide receivers? Prepare for what you know is coming earlier. And you go, oh, I love the wide receivers in this area. So I really want to have running backs early. And you can only find that out by mock drafting. All right. Let's kick this thing off. First pick.

Justin Jefferson, which means I will take the layup. I'm going to go Christian McCaffrey. I know I could choose anyone in the world, but Christian McCaffrey is where I'm going to go. The running back position when you know you can get guaranteed production, still my favorite position to draft. But I don't blame anybody going Jefferson at 101. He is a, he is guaranteed to make a huge impact on your team as well. So after McCaffrey, Jamar Chase goes 103. Then Echler. So because of the back and forth between wide out and running back, Mike, you are obligated to take a wide receiver. Oh, well, perfect, because I was going to do that anyways. I'm not thinking about Travis Kelsey here. It's with the elite wide receiver still on the board. And it's going to be Cooper Cup for me. Tyree Kill is perfectly fine there for me. But Cooper Cup, just remember what he was doing. Justin Jefferson.

has all the headlines and everything because Cooper Cup got hurt halfway through the season. But through that point when Cooper Cup was not injured, I mean, he was dominating even Justin Jefferson at that point in a points per game. So Cooper Cup still great. Matthew Stafford, they're going to run it back at least one more time. So I still have full confidence that Cooper Cup is that guy. Yeah, I mean, when you're getting headlines right now at a training camp about the performance of, you know, DeMarcus Robinson. earning snaps in the offense and Tutu Outwell and Puka Nakua. And yeah, that just means Cooper Cubs is going to get 100,000 targets. He's locked in. He might hit 200 targets, like legitimately. I mean, again, this is a fragile situation, I believe, in Los Angeles because you have a bad O line and you have a quarterback that's got chronic injury problems. Sure. But as of now.

There's no reason Cooper Cup couldn't be the best pick in this draft at 105. The Deucers! Who is going to be officially making picks over there? I know you're working together with your all one mind. Yeah, Kyle gets the final save, but I'll be announcing our picks for us. Okay. Well, 106, Cooper Cup just went. What's the pick going to be? And with Pick 106, this is the Deucer Select. Tyreek Hill. Oh, mercy. How many more picks do they have? That's a first round thing, I think. What is we give you a team and this is what happens? That's exactly what happens. They received feedback from YouTube and from the listeners that make them puffed up. Oh, yeah. They're like, oh, we love the deucers. Stop empowering the deucers. Both for hashtag team deusers on socials. Oh, my goodness gracious. Oh, no. This is.

This is getting ugly. Oh, my goodness. Wow. Okay, I didn't realize this was going to happen. Tyreek Hill is the pick, huh? Yeah, it's good. I like it. Travis Kelsey went next. Saquan, Bejan, Jason. Oh, Jason. You almost got Bejohn. I would have taken him had he been there at 110. I, you know, I've spent most of this offseason bypassing Bijon because he's so high. He's being drafted, you know, at. A ceiling. Like you can't be much better than the running back four. Yeah, but have he seen the videos of him in one-on-one drills against linebackers hitting him with like triple and quadruple moves? And then shocking, shocking. The linebackers in 1V-1s can't keep up. Yeah, the nice thing though is that's who he's going to be matched up against in the NFL game. And so it's going to be so beautiful. That being said right now, I would like to get Nick Chubb.

I believe he will come back to me based on ADP. So I'm going to play the ADP game here being near the turn. And I'm going Stefan Diggs. I don't like that. All right, Diggs, Lamb and Mahomes ran out the first round. Keep the suspense. We'll be back in a minute. Okay. All right, Diggs, C.D. Lamb, Patrick Mahomes, round out the first round. Then Johnny Taylor still going at 201 there, which look, he was the RB4 off the board. I think he goes RB5 here. Derek Henry. Second round pick. Back to Jason, played the ADP game, won the ADP game. I will select Nick Chubb. Which would not have been the case had you gone Chubb at 110, and you would not have ended up with Stefan Diggs. A run of wideouts after Nick Chubb, Garrett Wilson, A.J. Brown, Jalen Wattle. Is that surprising? Garrett Wilson going ahead of A.J. Brown to you? A little bit, but I get it. All the...

All the messaging, oh, I guess he has a low ankle sprain now. But before that, we were getting just nonstop highlights out of Jets camp. The Jets publicity team is going to drive ADPs to an unhealthy place. They're working overtime over there, which they should. Good for you. But I mean, hard knocks will produce a bump in people's interests on certain players. So Wilson had a Brown is probably going to be the norm. Unfortunately, we're back to the Deucers now who took Tyree Kill in the first round and having another selection ahead of Mike. I can't wait. I can't wait either. Let's find out the pick. All right. Team Deucers is going with Josh Jacobs here. We're going to take the chance. Josh Jacobs at 207, Mike. Interesting. Would that have been a threat to you where you're picking? It would have been in consideration for my pick.

Very disappointed that the bit only lasted one round. I mean, that's, guys. That being said, that's disappointing. I am also disappointed equally thrilled. You know, it's a real battle in my heart. Understandable. So I'm going to, all the mock drafts that we have done, I don't know that I've gotten this player or not, but I, he, Josh Jacobs would have been in consideration for me. I do have him. actually ranked a couple spots ahead of Tony Pollard. But with everything going on for training camp, I mean, the risk of Josh Jacobs to me, it will rise. We're still not 100% sure that Josh Jacobs is going to show up for week one. I think you will, but we don't know as of the recording of this show. So I'm going to go with Tony Pollard, who the Dallas Cowboys, new starting running back. I have him.