Early Top 10 RB Rankings, McVay Cologne, Dinner Bells

But then you saw what they needed from CJ. So maybe it was? Yeah. I mean, I see what you're saying. Mike, I think the reason they signed Malcolm Brown's offer sheet was because it wasn't that expensive. They're like, oh, all right. We can afford this. Could have probably given Anderson less, though. It was my point. Joe Mixing at number seven. He's Mike's number one from what I understand. From April 2nd. He's our consensus seven.

Go 7-8-9 here in the studio. Jason at 7. I have him at 8. Mike has him at 9. In 14 games last season, 237 for over 1,100 yards and 8 touchdowns, 43 receptions. His stat line to me and the way he performed, it kind of reads kind of like a watered-down superback.

in the sense that and the watering down happened by way of a bad offense and bad coaching and a bad quarterback and injuries. And so people are saying, hey, can you take the, what do you put on like a go cart to make it not go fast enough? What are they called? A governor. Now, can the new head coach take the governor off of Joe Mixing? No, no, that's the governornator, mine. Oh, wait. That's different. They don't put those on the golf cart. Don't drive me. No, no, stop.

Stop. Third most rushing yards per game last year, despite all of those encumbrances, okay? And is he ready to take the next step? Yeah, he is. I mean... You know. Jason hasn't figured out. 100%. Joe Nixon is ready to take the next step. The next step is to be a back that touches the ball over 300 times. That's the next step. And you've got Zach Taylor coming in as the new head coach.

from the Sean McVeigh breathed on him tree. And so you've got mixing out there saying he's preparing. He needs to make a cologne. Oh, totally. I would buy it. I would, I would 100% buy it. The offensive spritz. Oh, my gosh. The toilet. Sean McVeigh. Yeah, I can just see somebody in Detroit is spraying the heck out of Matt Patricia. They put it up in the bra planes. Turn.

Can we get the aerosol version? Did you just say a crop plane? Yeah, a prop play. You're hitting the crops. Oh my goodness. We're going to supercharge the city with the scent of McVeigh. McVey by Calvin Klein. The point is that Marvin Lewis is out of the way. And they've brought in a coach who wants to go with the newer styles of offense. And they came from having a Todd Gurley. And there are very few players in football that you could even attempt.

to say, okay, we've got a girly type player. But, and I don't know if people realize how good, forget the stats, how good Joe Mixon is as a running back. When he was coming out of the unbelievable draft class that had, you know, six superstar running backs in it, he was a lot of people's number one. He was my number one as far as just talent goes. He was.

so good in college in all phases of the game. And so I think he has the talent. And if they will give him the 300 plus touches, which I think they will, he is one of the only guys that's outside the top five that I think I could make a legit argument that he could finish as the number one back. Last year was so encouraging. Because you've had a picture of him in the corner of your mirror for a long time. Yes. And to see the...

talent and, you know, the opportunity go up and to see him take advantage of that opportunity. I think there's a lot of optimism surrounding Joe Mixon and for good reason. The problem is the Bengals. I mean, that's, that's a big problem. The problem for me is just his burst games where it wins you the week. He's going to be steady. He'll be an RB one by the end of the season. But I think it's, you'll have Mixing and you'll be peeking over the hedges at.

teams that have guys like Melvin Gord and Todd Gurley going, man, I wish Joe Mixing will give me 30 points. All right, James Connor comes in at number eight. Mike, you've got him up at seven. Jason has him at eight. I have him at 10. I have lost confidence in James Connor going into, well, his first season as really being the guy. Now, last year he was the guy. First preseason being the guy. What do you mean?

Because he ended up being the guy last year. Well, yeah, but he's looking over his shoulder the whole year. Or for a large... Every week, a large part of it. Love Bell's coming back. I'm not saying he wasn't the guy on the field. I'm saying that there wasn't a... The team hadn't put all their chips on him from day one. And that's the case this year. I mean, they're saying to James Connor, you're not a stand-in. You're not a fill-in. You're not Lev Bell Light. We're not asking you to go do what he did. We're asking you to be you and be the starter.

And he was great. He was dominant. 2.15, 9.73 and 12. 55 catches. How many is that? Don't do that again. That was rough. It was sensual. Yeah, it was troubling. I hope that was not. This morning, it was 55 degrees out. The 7 and the 10-year-old, they both gave me their best rendition. When they asked Siri. Siri, unfortunately, has not been programmed to say. Siri can't see him?

What is going on? I don't know. It's a good one. Okay. So talk to me about James Connor. Where do you see his ceiling? Where do you see his floor? So James Connor's ceiling is the history of Mike Tomlin. That's his ceiling. The ceiling is we have a large enough body of work to say that whoever the running back is for Pittsburgh. They've got a great offensive line, great offensive system is going to dominate for fantasy. They're not going to share the load. They're not going to seed carries to the

Back number two. When LeBel goes down and, you know, an old DeAngelo Williams comes in is just, it's your show. When DeWill went down, I forget who the back was at that point. Is that when we got the Fitzgerald-Chryld? Yes, I think it was Fitzgerald Tucson. It comes in like, you're the guy. You're the guy completely. So that is what makes us go, okay, James Connor should be an absolute one, should be drafted with full confidence.

But on the other side are, it's not as, you know, the empirical evidence of Tomlin's history says James Connor will be the guy. But you also have to take into account Jalen Samuels last year was really good. And he is a better pass catcher. I mean, he was, I think classified as a tight end in college. And so, and now they've got this situation where they shockingly fired their running backs coach.

who has been great for a long time. Well, he told him Levi-on-Bel was coming back. Yes, you're gone. He had to pay. And they replaced him with the college coach from Jalen Samuels school in part because of how prepared Jalen Samuels was. They thought he's a good coach because Jalen Samuels was completely prepped. He had a good teacher. And so that's part of why they brought him on. So now they've got a team.

kind of doing a little bit of investment in Jalen Samuels. So there is worry. So you've got the empirical evidence versus the speculative evidence. And two elephants are out of the room. I mean, that needs to be mentioned. Last year, Big Ben, I think 5,000 plus yards, 5,1, 129 yards. They led the league in pass attempts by 45. No more Antonio Brown. That'll come down. No more Lev Bell. That'll come down. And so I think what happens is I think you see efficiency decline.

for James Connor this year. Possibly. And I think you hope that the reliance on the running game, the offensive line, I think you hope that the volume can compensate for the efficiency. He played 13 games last year, and he had 12 touchdowns. Everything to me. Do that again on that kind of a pace. Sorry. Everything to me comes down to Jalen Samuels, what Jason was talking about. James Connor is the better runner, the better running back. But Jalen Samuels.

He might have an edge on him when it comes to past catching, but Connor still saw that Levi-on-Bell target here, 71 targets. I mean, that's serious business when you are going to be a workhorse running back. And that's why James Connor, for me, is number seven. If we knew for sure that it was just James Connor inheriting everything and going right into full-time Levy on Bell roll, like I talk about with the Colts, I just want.

the Pittsburgh Steeler running back. He would actually be higher in my rankings. That's why he's down at seven for me. All right. You know who I want? I want the Minnesota Vikings running back. Dalvin Cook comes in at number nine on our consensus. I have him at seven. Mike has him at eight. Jason has him at 11 from weeks 12 through 16 last year. He was the RB6. And my goodness, fellas, there is no one else in Minnesota. Dalvin Cook is the guy. Amir Abdullah says, how dare you?

Mike, I rest my case. What do we think of Dalvin Cook? I mean, this team, their identity changed over the back half of the year. Obviously, Cook was injured. He was hurt. But he saw almost 17 touches a game when he was healthy. Look, he could be another, like Dalvin Cook, Joe Mix, those are two guys I see that could take the next step this season if someone else falters. 100% agree. Dalvin Cook out of college was.

you know, a superstar coming out of college was drafted to be that and has dominated in the NFL when healthy. The whole issue with him is health. He's dealt with several knee issues and now he has the whole backfield to himself on a team that really wants to get back to running the ball. I mean, if Dalvin Cook is healthy, I love him, but he scares me a lot.

You know, these top running backs, I just said a minute ago, I'm more risk adverse when I'm looking at the top guys. He carries a much larger risk to me than some of the others. He doesn't have any history like Todd Gurley is dealing with injury risk in his knee and the arthritis and all that. But he has a history of complete and utter domination. He's, you know, an MVP candidate last year. We haven't seen that type of stuff yet from...

Cook. So this is one of those, like, if you're going to draft Cook, you're taking your shot that this is the year where he takes that leap and starts doing that. Maybe you get a better draft value on draft day, but it's risky. That's what I was going to say. I think Dalvin Cook is the best combination of upside and draft value available for the entire season. I think Dalvin Cook can finish the year as a top three back. I think he can be a top three fantasy football running back with what Minnesota wants to do with what he's been as a pro. He's 23 years old.

He's a 4.7 a carry guy in his career. Both of the seasons that he's played, he was 4.8, 4.7. So the combination, you're always looking for that in fantasy. You're the combination of draft value and upside. And he is a pass catcher. He is a very versatile player. You're not wrong, Jason. He has to say healthy. But you presume health at a guy at this age, I think, the way he finished the season. And you presume it in part because of the team's confidence in him. They did not go out so far.

We've got the draft, but they didn't bring in somebody to compete with him for carries. They practically did the opposite. They let Tavis Murray go, and they replaced him with Amir Abdullah's. It's not Amir. Amir Abdullah is a special teams player. Right now, the backup for Delamook as of April 2nd would be Mike Boone because it's Mike Boone and Rock Thomas. Rock Thomas has gotten himself into legal trouble. Both of those guys are preseason warriors.

but they're also undrafted, so we'll see what Minnesota actually does. They have to bring in other running this. Literally, it's Dalvin Cook and nobody. That sounds great to me. No, no, you're right. You're right. I don't draft handcuffs in my redraft leagues, but if I draft Dalvin Cook with my last positional pick, I might take a shot on whoever looks like the best backup for Dalvin. In 2017, this was super season for the Vikings, right? They were...

13 and 3 one game from the Super Bowl. They were second in rushing attempts in the league. That was the recipe for their success. The 2018 team, they had a better rushing average than in 2017. They just didn't lean on it until the last part of the season. Chicken egg, I think because they were winning, they were able to actually run. In 2017? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, there is a bit of that. But when you look at it from kind of a step back and what Mike Zimmer sees, right?

Yeah, Zimmer wants to run. Chicken or egg. He took the chicken approach because he eventually changed the team. Yeah, thank you. That's not Isaiah Crewell. That was not Isaiah. No, it was not. That's totally different. But let's go ahead and talk about our last guy here as we close out today's episode. Levion Bell. He made the top ten. Hey, we can play the bell. Do we have the bell sound? He's actually going to play. That's pretty ominous, though.

Yeah, well, it's just rightly so. I mean, he's number 10. I mean, you wouldn't want that, like, let's say he was walking into a restaurant to eat dinner. No, here he comes. After week one, if he comes out and has a great week, we'll find a good dinner bell. You know what I mean? A dinner bell? Oh, heck yeah, like ringing the dinner bell. Like, come and eat. Come on, everybody. It's dinner time. Isn't it usually a triangle? Sure, that's great.