NFC West Breakdown + Annoying Players

A lot of breakdown of the Broncos and that whole division. Speaking Wednesday, Emmanuel Sanders says he's definitely not going to be full go from the jump in training camp. He's going to be a monitor situation. I don't think anybody expects him to be 100% when camp begins. Jason, you brought this up. It's going to be a process. But he says he's not going to be ready to go from the jump.

And then the Denver Post suggested that Philip Lindsay and Royce Freeman will form a 50-50 timeshare this season, noting that Lindsay hasn't run a single play in front of the new coaching staff. We already knew that. And that Freeman, Royce Freeman, has hogged first-team reps because, of course, if Lindsay's not there, who would. But this is the whole point of the conversation this last six months with Philip Lindsay. And it's just the nature of humanity. The coaches can go back and watch what Philip Lindsay did on tape last year.

This is happening right in front of them right now. It's their scheme. If Lindsay doesn't get in there soon, how is it not anything but a 50-50 times? As an undrafted player who doesn't have the draft capital, the money being paid to him, forcing the issue to get the carries. It was last off season. It was last training camp where Philip Lindsay really showed the coaching step. Wow. There's something special here. So, yeah. Wow.

Wow. Awesome. Wow. So if, you know, if that's not happening, I'm not even sure it was being referenced right now. I think I was going walking. You were where I was going. That was walking? I thought you were doing the room. If you go back to, I switch it to Hamilton. First of all, I'm not doing it again. Second of all, if you go back to the original tape.

You'll hear him. I thought it was walking. Thank you. I thought it was Tommy Woozo or whatever. You guys just followed up so fast. It distorted how great the first one. Oh, hi, Mark. Wow. You see? That's what I thought you were doing. All right. We'll monitor. We'll see what happens. We'll monitor Andy's impersonations. Again, any of these conversations around Lindsay are not an indictment on the talent, the ability, and what he brings to the table. This is a fantasy football show.

The breakdown for this team, it's going to be better off with Freeman and Lindsay both being involved. And if we thought Freeman was a bum, we would be fine with Lindsay just stealing every snap away. I don't think Freeman's a bum. So 50-50 is what I'm expecting. Lindsay's probably going to keep dropping, though. Yesterday his ADP was 408. Okay. If you think he's going to score more fantasy points than Royce Freeman, 408 versus 801 or whatever Freeman's going at, Lindsay's still a steal there.

Yeah, if it is 50-50, that doesn't mean that they have the same fantasy points, just the same opportunity. Good point. Philip Lindsay is the more explosive player we saw last year. He's going to, on a per touch basis, outscore Royce. All right, check out the Sleeper app, not just the best breaking news, but the best platform for modern fantasy players in general. Download the Sleeper app today. We thank them for sponsoring our news segment. And let's go ahead and get into it. Let's get divisional.

All right, we're talking through the NFC West. We're breaking it down last year. The Rams 13 and 3. The Seahawks battled their way to 10 and 6. The 49ers were 4 and 12. The Cardinals were 3 and 13. Cardinals did the mirror of the Rams record last year. We're very proud of it out here in the desert. Yes, the black mirror. It's no good. No. So let's go ahead and get into this office.

It's my new best friend. Oh, that's right. Jared Garf. Mike, you had a chance to snap a photo on the red carpet at the SB's. I did. With your pink outfit? Yeah, my pink outfit was sensational. Jared Goff was very impressed with it. Who were you wearing again? Amazon. So. And look.

I had to take the opportunity. I'm talking to Jared Goff. I'm talking to the quarterback of Todd Gurley's team. And I took that chance to ask me about Todd Gurley. I said, all right, Jared, how's the knee doing? There's nothing more. Hold on. There's nothing.

more condescending than him not being the quarterback of the Rams, but being the quarterback of Todd Gurley's team as his like moniker. He's the quarterback of the Rams, but I'm saying, no, I know what you meant. He is, he should be good friends with Todd Gurley. And I said, how's the knee, Jared? And he kind of had a sheepish smile in his face. And he said, he said, it's good, man. I just took him fifth overall in my fantasy draft.

And I said, yeah, but Jared, how is his knee doing? And he just kept saying good. His answer to a lot of things was good. And then I asked about Daryl Henderson, how is the rookie acclimated to the system? Good. I said, okay. Well, how is Daryl Henderson's pass protection? That's when his face broke. That's when the smile kind of grew to the, from sheepish, you know, I'm just answering questions to an uncomfortable. I got to maintain, it's good.

followed up quickly by him saying, I got to get out of here before I say something I'm not allowed to say. So take that for what you will. Firsthand account of me speaking with Mr. Garf, with King Gaffrey. Now, King Gaffrey took Gurley at five, he said. Now, was that a Rams only draft? Would he have gone at five in a Rams only draft? But I did ask, I said, I said, how much money is on the line for this one? And he said it's actually none, which.

counterintuitally actually spoke more to me that maybe he does believe Gurley's going to be okay because Jared Goff doesn't need to win money. If he's in a league with his friends and this is pride on the line, it's tough. Look, this team, one of the best in football on offense last year, third and rushing yards per game, fifth and passing yards per game, brought it up earlier. They scored a touchdown every 3.3 drives.

This is one of the only teams in football where we ask the question, can they sustain three top 20 wide receivers and an elite running back and an elite quarterback? This offense isn't really changing at all. We've talked about the charges being kind of a stabilizing force in the AFC West, in the NFC West. Look.

This is the same offense, the same players. It's Brandon Cooks, Robert Woods, Cooper Cup, Josh Reynolds, Gerald Everett, and Higby. Gurley, right? You lose C.G. Anderson. You draft Daryl Henderson. And it's all the same. There's no absence of the same players that made this offense great a year ago. That stability generally lends itself towards expectation, a certainty that that production will happen again, right?

Yeah, it does. And when you combine that with a great offensive mind like Sean McVeigh, I think we can confident, you know, most people look at this season and say the Rams are going to have a really good offense. I think that that's, you know, an obvious bet. They will have a great offense. I think they're going to have a great running back production.

Regardless of who it is, I mean, a la C.J. Anderson, week 14 and 15 or 15 and 16 last year, winning people championships rolling off 20 carries, 233 carries for 167, 132 yards. Whoever the running back is is going to be great. The question is, is it going to be Todd Gurley with Todd Gurley or without Todd Gurley? The Rams are going to be great. Like, I don't have fears of, okay, if Todd Gurley...

His knee starts acting up, and they can only get him, you know, 10 carries a game if that. Is this going to hurt the Rams offense? No, we've seen it. We saw them. I mean, here's their points when Gurley was out. They scored 31, 48, 30, 23. Like, they're putting up points. So that means the wide receiver cores and Gough himself, to me, are where the real value is on this team. There are some question marks. If you look at last season like a.

boxing match. The majority of the season, the Rams were just smooth, moving around the ring. Everything came easy to them. But what the fans got to see last was a punch in the mouth. Three points. Was them getting caught by Belichick in the Super Bowl. I think we understand that that was, look, it's one game. Gurley, on the sideline a lot towards the end of the season. Cooper Cup wasn't.

a part of the active roster at that point in the season. I still don't know if I believe that this team is the same without Gurley that it is with Gurley over the course of an entire season. It's one thing to say, hey, a guy with fresh lace can come in into an offense that's moving and doing what it's doing. I obviously expect them to be a great offense. They also, those three wide receivers, they're out on the field all the time together. Right. They're never.

They're pretty much out there 70 plus percent of the time. They run 11 personnel more than anybody in football. So you're not really having to pick and choose who's going to be the starter and who's not going to be out on the field, right? Yeah, and I believe all three are of value right now. As crazy as that sounds, I want any one of those three wide receivers. So can I give you their ADP? Yes. As you continue, Cooks is 406, Woods 409, Cup 503. That's just awesome. I mean, that's awesome. Those are...

three consistent, high-producing wide receivers. It's weird that they're on the same team. People are worried about the girly and the effects of what that happens to the Rams. I'm worried about the ACL. Talk to me about Cooper Cup. Are you really thinking him at 503? In the fifth round, I've seen him drop way later than that as well. In the fifth round, I think it's an interesting conversation because there's other guys in that round that are also valuable. But he's, I mean, he was the number one.

Right. When healthy, Cooper Cup. Because he's the touchdown guy. Exactly. He is the big red zone threat for them. He's got a great rapport with Goff. And a small caveat, they're like, he's not the number one by design in their offense. You're talking from a fantasy perspective. From a fantasy perspective because of the red zone work, golf was the guy who was going to lead the way. Who would you say is the number one? Would you say that's Cooks or Woods? Because I would say Woods. It's Brandon Cooks to me, for sure.

By the way, Cup was the wide receiver 2 in fantasy through the first five weeks of last year, speaking to your point from a fantasy production standpoint. From the ultimate draft kit, Matthew Betts, who gives the injury notes for the ultimate draft kit, says once training camp kicks off, Cup will be nine months from surgery. So he has a chance to be ready for week one. He doesn't expect him to be able to produce at that level until halfway through the year. At the kind of level you saw last year. Right.

You know, when you talk about Brandon Cooks, I mean, he's been Mr. Consistent. He's not going to be a top five finisher, but I don't think any of these three are going to be a top five finisher. Yeah, and I'm not sure which way I lean between Brandon Cooks and Robert Woods. Who's the one of the team? I don't even think the team looks at it that way. They're just, they play different roles in the offense, but.

Between the two of them, I would rather have Robert Woods. I want the more consistent guy. I know Cooks has the ceiling that Robert Woods doesn't have every once in a while to explode. But Robert Woods is just, he is reliable, man. He will not let your team down. On an individual game, if they were both going to have just a month, their best game, Cook's ceiling is higher. But on the season, I don't think Cook's ceiling is any higher than Woods.

And Woods is so much more consistent. In an offense like that, you want the targets, right? I mean, last year both played 16 games. You had 130 targets to Robert Woods, 117 targets to Brandon Cooks. The consistency rating of Robert Woods is a guy who you don't draft as your number one. Even your number two wide receiver, you could get him as your third if you started with a stud back and went three wide receivers. And he is as consistent as they come. They're both, I mean.

It's kind of a weird situation. You're not playing the value game with them. They're drafted about the same spot. No, you're picking which one you want unless you are picking up the scraps. Even like total, end of season production is almost identical. 80 receptions versus 86. 1204 versus 1219. 5 and 6 touchdowns. So you are, is there any situation where you want cooks over Woods? In your mind, Jason, because of the, you always want the consistency, but you're not going to get the top in games from Woods as often? Right. If, if.

If you look at there to, you know, go to the ultimate draft kit, look at the 2018 consistency charts on a week-and-week basis. It's a really easy way to visualize these players. You go, okay, they both finished about the same, similar stat lines, both great players. But one was just every single week helping your team, and the other had his big weeks and then had his bad weeks. Ask yourself, do you want Amari Cooper?