The TRUTH: RBs Part 2 + Late Round Hits - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/28

You know, he's just been so consistent. And he is very much in the Derek Henry category, I think, in people's minds and fantasy now where it's like, well, you know it won't last forever. But do you just, do you just keep enjoying this and ride it right into the ground? Because he doesn't really have to do a lot to give you a lot in fantasy with the receiving work. Yeah. And that kind of stretch there, you know, so like week seven through 14 where he's still giving you, you know, pretty much top 15 type numbers. But because of the Saints, where the team was at that time, they just, they weren't scoring. And Alvin Camero wasn't scoring. So for him to be able to do all of those, to give you that level of fantasy when he's not getting the ridiculous touchdowns, I think it's a good sign for next year. His ADP will be fascinating.

to me. I don't think it'll be that high. He's not going to move up much. I'm with you. Does he just chill out in the fifth round? Because then, yeah, sure. He'll be fourth. I definitely think he'll be fifth or later. I mean, he was the fifth round this year. And he was great this season prior on a per game basis. Got injured at the end of the year. It was very similar to this year. And I think next year going, he's going to be 30. I think he's in the fifth. And I'll draft him a lot. He is just fun fact. He is a few months younger than Austin Echler. So, you know, there,

The nice thing is his contract situation. He's under contract for a couple more years. And they made an effort to bring him back to make him the, you know, workforce. The way that the Saints operate, I assume they'll have to give him a contract extension soon and kick that money further down. James Connor, I just mentioned him. He comes in at number 10. Consistency rank was 13. I'll be honest. He felt more consistent than that. As someone who had him on my roster. He did have a couple just absolute disappearing games. But first half consistency rank was 14, second half, 15, better against bad defenses, much better at home. Six points better at home. 13% great games. 69% good games, 25% busts. I didn't give you those numbers for Camara. Camara was 21% great, 71% good, 7% busts.

So they're very similar. The bus games were really frustrating for James Connor because it never looked like his fault. And it probably wasn't. Yeah, I mean, there were games where it was really frustrating watching where it's like this is the locomotive to your team. Do you count a week 17? Week 17 is in this data. Which he got hurt on the first play didn't play anymore. Correct. So that's one of the. But you would have played him. And honestly, if you had him and you were in the championship. You know that Week 17 counted. If for context, you just... Yeah, take that one out for some. We're curious what it would be like without that. Maybe that's why it felt that way to me is that he was a little bit better than 13. He would be consistent to rank of running back 10. Okay. He felt much more like 10. Yeah. So what do you think about James Connor? He signed a two-year extension in late November to stay with Arizona. Very much the identity of the team. We talk about Philadelphia. Yes. And the transition to being Sequin's team.

I felt like that happened this year in Arizona. It went from Kyler's team to Connor's team in some ways. You saw the commitment from the team in signing him again. This really is. He is the heart of this offense. So you can make a strong argument that the way he played down the stretch was incredible. He should be drafted highly with confidence. However, he's not the, he doesn't have like, you know, we're just talking about Camara. Camara had. 89 targets and missed three games. If you compare that to James Connor, his receiving work, he can be a good receiver, but he's not to that level. So I worry if you lose a step, like if both of these guys lose a step, Camara and Connor, I think Camara will be fine for fantasy and Connor will turn to dust. So I'm a little bit more worried. I saw nothing on film to make me worry that he will turn to dust, but that's what happens with these, you know,

Sean Alexander's who go from being one of the best running backs in the entire league to the next year just, you know, just one step too slow is too slow in the NFL. And I think he'll be, he's going to be another great value pick to me next year. I think that he has at least one year. Dynasty-wise, does he have two? I don't know. But I'm going to put the chips on him having at least one more really strong. season. He stayed so many games over 100 yards. Mostly healthy, scored eight times on the ground, had one receiving touchdown, but 414 receiving yards. So, yeah, I mean, he's definitely going to be in that category of guys that just doesn't move up in fantasy dreams. Right. It just won't happen at his age and with Arizona and no excitement of any kind.

around the franchise ever again? Because it's like James Connor will not be a ceiling pick where you're like, oh, this is the year that he can have an outlier season to give me 1,300 rushing yards and 14 rushing touchdowns. Like that seems that seems impossible. Yeah, that's why he's going to be a dead zone running back. And what you're hoping for is that he just has another season like this one where he's consistent, has enough touchdowns around the goal line. you know, is still breaking tackles next year. He's a lunch pail guy for your fantasy team. Yeah. At 11, Chase Brown, 24 years old. Drafted in the 10th round is the RB 41. Here's a diamond in the rough. Consistency rate of 10 and even more impressive. Go look at that second half where he was the third most consistent running back in football. And it's pretty fair to look at the second half alone because he was sharing time with Zach Moss.

Was not the guy to start the year in the first couple games. Ends up 25% great games despite that. 63% good, 19% bust. Great at home and on the road. Great against top and bottom defenses. And you just needed the Zach Moss injury to get him going and the team to trust him. Zach Moss played the first eight games. So this is a true split here. The first eight and the rest through 17. You know, the first half consistency rank of running back 29. He was good on a per touch basis. We watched the games and we said he looks better than Zach Moss. Yeah, he had more juice. It took that injury for the team to be forced to just say, okay, we're giving it to you. And their offense got so much better. Chase Brown was... He's just so much more versatile. So explosive and made plays that Zach Moss just couldn't and didn't make. Now the question becomes, do they commit to him? Did they see that down the stretch and say,

that's the replacement for our Joe Mixin that we lost. We're going to commit to him going forward because it was so successful for us. Or do they go, we can't rely on that. We wanted two backs. You know, and I think it's transactions that will tell us. I think they'll stick with him. He's at that perfect age to me and the way he played for this team to enter his Echler era for Cincinnati. I would believe that. They saw his improvement and his versatility and his past catching. Everything improved over the course of the year. So I don't know what you would want in Cincinnati beyond, you know, a 24-year-old running back that gave you that kind of production. Yes, they might draft somebody. But look, this is a team that has a lot of needs, too. The defensive side of the football betrayed Burrow. And if they do happen to invest in T. Higgins, that's even more of a reason I think that you don't go.

and find anything other than a Khalil Herbert style running back. So to me, a 10th round pick last year, this is a guy I would take ahead of Connor. Oh, he will skyrocket. Third, fourth round. So Zach Moss signed a two-year deal. He should be back. I mean, so that's really, my expectation is that they're going to come back into next year with the same core that they came into this season. And we won't know for sure what the commitment is on a workload split. Obviously, when Zach Moss was healthy? He was, it was pretty 50-50. So it was scary. We'll just have to decide do they want to waste a down or not. Right. You know. But a lot of teams decide to waste downs. I don't get it. You call him the Tyler Johnson downs. But he's not expensive next year. Talking about Zach Moss for the year two of his contract. But the cap hit is 4.8 million. So just under five. Dead cap would be one and a half. Yeah. They'd have to.

They'd have to spend money to replace him and add that dead cap. But just saying like if they feel like, oh, this was. Yeah, if they feel like Herbert was, we can try and bring him back. I don't remember if he's a free agent or not, but down the stretch those last eight games to give context to how good Chase Brown was. He was on pace for 320 carries and 93 targets, if that was a 17 game span. 1,300 rushing yards, 650 in the passing game. So. an exceptional fantasy asset and you'll have to call your shot next year. I agree. He didn't just fill in. No, he didn't. He was in addition. Yes. All right, Chuba Hubbard. Where's the respect for Chuba Hubbard? I still don't have it. I still, I can't get myself to have it. I tried multiple times to give you the end of the season of Chuba Hubbard with Carolina and the eye test and tell you, I tried to say this guy's a baller.

And you know what? I say I still don't have it. But I definitely... He'll wipe his tears with all his money. Down the... I mean, the film on Chuba was excellent. Outstanding. Yeah, I mean, 1195 yards, 10 touchdowns, despite missing the last two weeks of the year. And despite playing for the Panthers. One of his least valuable traits. They were very bad. Yeah, I mean, he did a lot. You know, it's hard to remember going back, I believe. He was a five-star recruit out of high school and a superstar track athlete. Yeah, I think he had a 2,000-yard rushing season in college. And so to start his NFL career, he kind of dropped in the draft. I don't remember the context as to why. Maybe Kyle can come in there. He had the huge year, and then the next year it was in college. It was not nearly as good. He profiled a couple years ago as somebody that would be that career backup, career second-tier committee back.

and transformed, really over the back half of 2023 and then into 2024. I mean, the numbers that I just read out, he put them up with the second fewest total offensive plays in football in Carolina, the third fewest offensive plays with the lead, which we like running backs with the lead. Yeah, we do. And 20% great, 60% good, 20% bus games didn't. You know, he finishes at 12 with a consistency rank of 12. Not a lot of receiving production. 43 catches, that's good. 171 yards. That's not good. No. That's wildly low. And they give them a four-year $33 million contract in November, and all the Jonathan Brooks truthers are going, oh, my gosh. And then Jonathan Brooks re-tears his ACL. You get the Miles Sanders Week 18. And, you know, Chuba was just so.

He reminded me the most of what Connor was for Arizona this year, those two players. Every down, Connor ran as hard as he could run. Every down Chuba Hubbard ran as hard as he could run. And a lot of tackle breaking. I don't know. Maybe it's the underdog story of being a Carolina Panther and having production that also adds to the lore of Chuba Hubbard. Or the fact that it was just a player that no one wanted to draft because he went in the 12th round. No one wanted him, which process-wise, it makes sense. You don't want the, you don't want a perceived grinder. Or a perceived expiring asset. Yes. Yeah, yeah, the rookie's going to come in and take over for a bad team. It's not like, hey, I'm going to have the starting running back for the Kansas City Chiefs for six weeks and then the rookie's going to take over.

I'll take that bet. I'll take that starting running back. You certainly would have taken the bet that the starting running back for, say, the Chargers, a team that profiled to be good that was going to run a lot would perform better than Chuba Hubbard. And he bucked the trend. He's the outline. So is the lesson here to learn nothing? I mean, genuinely, like, like that it's just a little bit. He was better than we thought he was. I mean, that was kind of just the truth as an actual running back. Yeah, or maybe the lesson if you want to take one is to have trusted what we saw in the field during the back half of last year and not count that as a kind of an outlier performance. And I don't know if that translates to. No, that's fair for you. You really, you did talk about that. You believed it. You said it was really, really good down the stretch past the eye test. So believe in yourself. We had a very clean narrative coming into the year as to why Chuba could be not good.

It was very like vanilla, right? Like it was going to be obvious. It was like, okay, Chuba last year of the contract, we get Jonathan Brooks. Maybe he's a bridge. The team sucks. Everything was very lined up for that to be the truth. And maybe that's the lesson too is that, you know, it's very circumstance specific. And Chuba was just a better player. There was also, like, it took a while. You know, like the first couple of weeks, they were still time sharing with Chuba. And week one was a disaster. Juba was six for 14. with no catches in week one. And it was, well, there's the 11th round pick. Was it Dalton that took over in week three? Yes. That made a difference. Yeah, it certainly did. But also his snaps going up. You know, week one and week two and week three, 58% of the snaps, but then you start going north and you're in like an 80% player. I mean, that's when things really were turning around. Like he was getting, you know, he would get you chunk plays, but.

then other guys would come on the field and you're like, yeah, give me somebody else. Or once Chuba is on there, worked out. Yeah, Andy, you're going to need to convince me next year and remind me that I should be more in on Chuba because I still feel like I'm not going to be. Because it's still the Panthers. He was so inefficient in the passing game. He needs that giant workload to be great, but he got it. So, yeah, just work on me. Yeah, no, no, no, we'll do it again. We'll run it back. 13 is Joe Mixing. What a, what a season for Joe Mixing because.

First half of the season, he was the number three most consistent running back. And it really took a nosedive in the second half, 19th in consistency, dealt with an ankle injury, dealt with one from weeks three to five, then came out of that and delivered six consecutive top 12 performances, despite Bobby Slowick's play calling. Joe Mixum was a revelation in the first half. This was like week to week he was in the Sequin Henry tier. If you had them, you felt like you could compete with those other players on a weekly basis. So really a neat resurgence, considering their offensive line, was ranked 29th. And you saw that a little bit in the playoffs. What do you make of the end of the season? Well, I mean. Yeah, it doesn't happen. We all watched it. And you're like, dude, that guy's, that's Cincinnati Bengals, Joe Mixing. That guy's not very good. Yeah, I mean, I think you have to find a balance point here.

This is one of the few cases where you look at this show and you go, well, we're trying to tell you the truth. The fantasy finish versus the reality. Well, I think the fantasy finish is the reality for Joe Mix. And I think he is a fringe RB1 in Houston. He will, he has the ability to give you the big games. This is a team that has offensive line issues. Stefan Diggs, Nico Collins issues. The team's identity on offense changed a lot and it's going to change again with a new offensive coordinator. So. I think that's where I'll probably have him slotted in, not first half Joe Mixon, not second half, probably somewhere in 12 to 15. I think that's fair. And even though he didn't miss the games later on when it was worse, he was dealing with some injury concerns. I remember we had some fears that he would miss games, played through it. Obviously not that great. Yeah, I mean, Andy, you had the experience, right? He was on your League of Record team, so you felt the...

confidence going towards the playoffs and the letdown in them. Yeah, and part of it was like you could see it coming in the fantasy playoffs pretty plainly, at least the first and second week. It was Kansas City on the road. Okay, you weren't, you didn't expect a lot, especially that was a game where they were like, he, he wasn't practicing. So Kansas City, he goes to Kansas City off an injury, you could see it coming, plays Baltimore, you could kind of see that coming to. dealing with the ankle injury. He scored more points in week one than he did in the entirety of the fantasy playoffs. Yeah, yeah, he ran out of the mojo and the age and the injuries. I mean, it was a lot like James Connor's finished to the season. He played and he shouldn't have played. I also think that we've got to give a little bit of, you know, the second half for the Texans was just harder. Once you lose Tank Dell and Stefan Diggs,

Your offense is far more one-dimensional, and it's easier to play defense against that. And he, you know, to his credit, 38% great games, higher number than anybody who we've talked about today by a wide margin. 23% bus, 62% good. You know, when you look at Mixin or Connor next year, I'm probably going to. I'll be on the mix inside. I'll be on the mixing side. Not by tons, but by some. Anything else about mixing you guys want to touch on? Mm-mm. He was better against bad defenses. He was much better on the road. We talked about that late in the year. He had a weird home road. Way better. Like double the points. Better on the road, which is not usual. But two more years under contract. Age will probably keep him in the third to fourth round. I think so. I think he'll be in the third. Jonathan Taylor. We'll talk about him in a minute. Quick break. Then back with some more truth.

All right, Jonathan Taylor did more than meets the hard. I apologize. Jay Taylor. First half consistency was sixth, missed three games in that stretch. He actually didn't have the super top-tier finishes in that stretch. He had the number one, number one back-to-back performances in the fantasy playoffs. You just had to survive the great fumble. Which I did not. Better at home. You know, this year's tough because, like, I think the truth of Jonathan Taylor is a little bit like the Sequin Barclay's story. Like Jonathan Taylor is just a tremendous, tremendous running back. Yes. You're going to have ebbs and flows with quarterback changes and offensive changes, which happened in New York for Sequan, and they've happened in Indianapolis for Taylor over the years. But if you just give him like somewhat of an even playing field, he'll be great. I talked about this on the last dynasty podcast. We had some.

trade for trade away targets he was mentioned i won't tell you in which side thank you but um i i i'd be wanting the next contract i'm wanting the next contract like where can he go after what seguan did after what derrick henry did because i love how you kicked it off it's my belief as well that jonathan taylor is a tremendous running back he is not your average player. He's not your average athlete or even your above average athlete. He's a superstar. He's playing in a situation where you can get vultured touchdowns. You can not get dump-offs. Anthony Richardson does not check it down. We need dump-offs. Can I read? Yeah, the target totals for Mr. Taylor since coming in the league. 36, 40, then 28, then 19. It's past year 18. Yeah, it's gross. But.

Target per outrun was 17.7, now it's 6.7. He did enough on the ground to show what a great athlete he is. And he has the chops to catch the ball. This is a situation where the quarterback is not and should not be throwing to the fair. You can make a strong argument. Bring back the wishbone. I mean, so considering all of that because I think we all would agree in a neutral situation. that you'd rather have Jonathan Taylor than like Joe Miction. But then you look at the quarterback, the playoff, the team level. The team is going to be better in Houston probably. Is that, you know, which one wins in that situation? I'm going to be on the Jonathan Taylor side because I'm looking for the highest upside I can get. And I think that Jonathan Taylor has the physical capabilities to be a top three back. We don't know who the quarterback's going to be in week three.

You know, it could change to a situation where now all of a sudden he adds to his repertoire, the past catching. And let's be, you know, fair about the end of season when he won people championships and was the back-to-back number one running back on the week. That was with Anthony Richardson. Yeah. Yeah, we forget that JT was the number one overall running back. Like we've gotten that out of him. Yeah, sophomore season, right? Yeah, I mean, so much like Sequin's had those years and then we see it happen again. That is in the cards where, you know, I don't think mixing can give you that in Houston probably. And he's the type of talent where, and I'm not, I mean, you can't draft based on this, but, you know, if a team that is Super Bowl contending or whatever loses a running back and the Colts are bad, you know, late in his contract, go trade, you know, people might trade for him. Christian McCaffrey was traded for. And if you're a great talent, your situation can change to where you can.

be a league winner for fantasy football 15 Aaron Jones consistency rank of 21 and just 6% great games 44% good 19% bust so that's 50% of the time he was in the good or great category 1138 yards on 255 carries five touchdowns on the ground caught 408 passes. I don't know how to think about Aaron Jones. I don't know. I'm out. I feel like... He was so good. I'm out. I don't know if we were wrong about him. I have no idea. I have no idea. Because he was on our bus list in the UDK. Aaron Jones, I believe he was, unless we audited that late. But for a good period of time, he was. The sentiment of the show was...

Negative. You and my... We were out. Jason was in. Okay. Okay. And I mean... And we were all right. He was drafted as the RB 18 and he finished as... As 15 with a consistency of 21. So that's 18 to me. That's a win. That's a good year? I think so. It's a good return on your ADP. It started well. I think that was part of the issue of... You don't know how to feel about Aaron Jones because a month in, it felt like, oh, Jason was very right, Aaron Jones with the Minnesota vikes. Yeah, I felt like that was a big L for me. You ate the crow, you took the L. And then from that point on, it was just mostly.

He's pretty irrelevant right now. We don't know where he's playing football next year. He looked good on a per touch. It was only one year? I think they have, you can bet that. I think they have like voidable years and I don't expect. I mean, they might bring him back. The truth is, but he's not currently on. It was a one year, yeah. He has been an erratic producer his entire career. Even in Green Bay, there were games when you're like, that might be the best running back in football. And then there were games and you're like, they either didn't use him.

I think that was more of the case. They didn't use him as much or like he gets banged up. They share time. I mean, even this year on the Vikings, you want to talk about drives that were stopped by taking Aaron Jones out? I feel like he was so far in a way their best running back. On a per touch basis, he's excellent. At 31 years old, currently without a team going into next year, he'll be 31. Yeah. It's very hard to do anything to have him be a late round pick that you hope gets opportunity. He could be entering his Delvin Cook era.

Yeah, I mean, you don't want the Dalvin Cook. No, you don't. Second era. No, you want to get to James Cook. So I don't know if Aaron Jones is a little brother. We got to get him up here. 17 games played, finished as the RB 15. So he's all right. But Jason's out now. You were in? Now you're out. Yep. He was great on a per touch basis. He's a phenomenal NFL player. For fantasy purposes, I'm going to let other people hold that bag. All right. It's time for Bucky and Dick. Bucky Irving at 16. Richard, Dick White at 20. Rashad. Rashad. Richard. You see how we get there. It's right there. I'm telling you when I just blindly read it, I was trying to remember how and why we call him Dick. I believe it was because you said Richard at one point.