Fantasy Football 2018 - The TRUTH About Fantasy WRs in 2017, Part 2

I'm going to put some of that blame on to Mr. Andrew Dalton, but AJ Green felt the effects that he wasn't just simply a plug and play. This was a guy you felt was a start your stud, yet if you were, if you had played the matchups with him, you probably would have been a better outcome for your team. He hurt fantasy owners in the playoffs, the fantasy playoffs, weeks 14, 15, 16, 48, 61st, and 21st. Adam Thielen style. Yeah, this was not good.

The previous 13 weeks, never really, you know, he had a couple of busts in there. Weird year for AJ Green. Weird year for him. Weird year for Mike Evans. Would you take Green over Evans in the draft next year? I would, yes. Okay. Do you have confidence that this was just kind of a, AJ Green's the same player, but the targets weren't there? You know, he had 30 less targets than a guy like DeAndre Hopkins, less receptions than we're used to singing.

Yeah, I mean... Injury wasn't an issue.

injury was not an issue. And if you look at the bust rate, he is higher. He's above average busting compared to the other top 24 wide receivers. So yes, that hurts you. But AJ Green has always had some of those disappearing games. And like Mike brought up, because you can actually tell when some of those are going to happen, you know, it's easier to be able to go away from AJ Green. But you didn't draft him like that. No, no, no. Nobody benches AJ Green.

This has been the refrain of the year. So nobody ever went away from AJ Green. So next year, do you change that? Do you have those weeks where you say, okay, he's going up against Jacksonville, you know, I'm going to sit up. No, the answer is no again because you have to draft him at a certain position. There's no option to go away from AJ Green with where you have to pay draft capital. His draft price isn't going to drop because he finished 10th. I mean, is AJ Green, right? And here's hopefully.

These are some numbers where he can say, okay, maybe it was an outlier year for AJ Green. This was the fewest yards per game that he's ever had. I mean, you're talking even lower than his rookie season, only 67 yards a game. His catch percentage was down to 52.4, coming off of seasons of 66%, 65.2, and 59%. So that's a monster drop in catch percentage, which...

And that's also, I mean, you're still counting those awful targets that are just, they're not even catchable for AJ Green. So if it's AJ Green, his elite performance is going to be linked to Andy Dalton if he can perform at least as a medium level quarterback in the NFL. I don't know that AJ Green at this point in his career can overcome Bad Andy. How have you guys done?

I was really curious. I was thinking this was a bad Andy Holloway thing. That's what I said. Have you guys done overcoming bad Andy before? You're great all the time, Andrew Holloway. Oh, so nice. Best host of west of the Mississippi. I was trying to think of something really west, but. Okay. Well, let's talk about another player that consistency is not his forte. Brandon Cook's the 12th rank. Look, he fits the mold with AJ Green almost exactly.

Even from a yardage touchdown reception, all that. Even from a playoff week's problem. Yeah. Brandon Cooks ended up the 23rd most consistent fantasy wide receiver. And the 12th in terms of rank, he busted 38% of the time, even more than AJ Green, an extra week. But he was in that good category, one extra week than Agent Green as well. Look, it's difficult. Brandon Cook has shown through two seasons that he can do two things. He can give you a big play. He can struggle.

against good coverage. Where should we be thinking about Brandon Cooks? Because look, we're not bringing these consistency numbers up because we're trying to say that they, you know, they finish 12 and they should really be ranked 23. That's not the narrative here. Because you may need a number 23 consistency guy because of the big weak potential. Right. So Brandon Cook's free agent.

That's the big question is did New England, they gave up a first round pick to get Brandon Cooks, are they just renting him? Are they going to let him go and get a free draft pick? Does that change based on how the season ends for them? You win a Super Bowl. It's a strong possibility. You probably bring them back. I mean, and they have Malcolm Mitchell coming back who was flashing. It's, and what's hard for, for fantasy players.

Through week 12, the game against Miami, he was actually chugging along at a pretty solid rate. He'd only really hurt your team three times to that point. And then it was just three out of the next five games were really rough. I think when you compare, so like AJ Green, Brandon Cooks, both were, you know, drafted near the same spot. AJ a little bit ahead, certainly. But coming into next year, depending on how the playoffs finish out, if they're going anywhere near the same,

Brandon Cook's what he didn't give you this year, which you kind of expected. You knew going in, he's a little bit more boom-bust, but I don't think he gave you enough of the carry-my team weeks. Oh, completely agree. You know, he only had two times on the season that he scored more than 20 points. If you're going to be a boom-bust guy for Tom Brady and the Patriots, you would expect those booms to be much larger. You know, you compare that to twice as many with AJ Green. I'd much rather...

you know, have to deal with the duds with a guy that can win you a week single-handedly. And that was not what Brandon Cooks was. And let's be honest, this last year was pretty much as good as things could have worked out for Brandon Cooks due to everyone else. So I think, I think this was peak Brandon Cooks. And I think most people were, if he remains a Patriot. Yes. The Saints got Latimore with the pick they got from the Patriots. Is that true or no?

I would have to... I guess that's probably... They have two first round picks, but the Patriots was the later pick. Yes, I don't think that is... I mean, it's just interesting. The Saints go from being a non-playoff team to a great team this year. Sands Brandon Cooks in that offense. It's just interesting that they didn't need him. We see the numbers. He fulfills a role, but his consistency is not there. I want to move on to this next player because...

Look, he deserves this from me. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. And no, you didn't have a thousand yards. But you did catch the ball 74 times, 10 touchdowns. And you just got paid to be the number one, probably, for Aaron Rogers. And I got to apologize to Devante Adams. I got to do it in front of my friend Jason Moore, who has vehemently supported Devante Adams. And look, I haven't. I've doubted.

turned elsewhere. You've more than doubted him. You've disparaged the man. The man without a thousand yards, yes. Oh, you're doing it again. This is a terrible apology. I'm sorry, the man without 900 yards. The man with 22 touchdowns in the past two years. Man who played with Brett Hundley. I'm apologizing to you on behalf of Brett Humley. Kind of. Now, Devante Adams, at the end of the day.

13th ranked fantasy wide receiver outside the top 12 wide receiver 2. But Devante Adams. What's his consistency number, Andy? His consistency rank was number seven, very similar to a guy like Larry Fitzgerald this year, where you could count on him regardless of the quarterback situation. Now, he had a strange home road split. He was much. Tyreek Hill. It happened again. It did. Devonte Adams.

One touchdown at home. But 10 on this season, which is two straight years of double digits. And he only busted 21% of the time, despite not having Aaron Rogers. I think, you know, Green Bay saw what Jason saw, which is a really good wide receiver who's especially good after the catch, who they can pair with Aaron Rogers for the next four years. And that's all it comes down to. I mean, Devante Adams might very well be the best value at wide receiver in next year's draft.

Yeah, I see, I, that, that was exactly what I was thinking early on. And then I realized, Jordi will go ahead of Dante Adams. Maybe. Something's going to happen. Yeah. Jordy or Cobb, someone's either taking a really big pay cut or someone's getting shipped out of town. I, you know, it's selfish here. I don't want to talk about Devante Adams because I think Devante Adams next year is a locked and loaded wider, top 10 wide receiver. Like, without a doubt, I'll draft him extraordinarily high. The problem is.

I think we're going to talk about him enough in the offseason where he'll be drafted high. I would really like to get some Devante Adams in the third round. Would you just take the lowest of Adams and Jordy? No. No, I... You'd rather have Adams. I would much rather have Adams than Jordy at this point. There is far more risk, you know, take injury out. There is far more risk with the age of Jordan Nelson. Yes. There is risk that Jordy's just lost it. I mean, he's 32 years old.

And even if he is still good, which Dordy is a great wide receiver in general, they're going to play towards the future. And I think this becomes the year of Devante Adams. Well, and here's the thing. Aaron Rogers is massively underpaid. Now, the team doesn't technically have to do anything about it. He's under contract for two more years. But the number two and number three largest cap hits.

for the Green Bay Packers next year. Randall Cobb, number two, and Jordy Nelson, number three. And Devante Adams is down at seven. So three of your seven highest players are wide receivers. You just, you can't succeed in the NFL with a payroll like that. Jordy Nelson would, this is the last year of his deal. They can cut him for a $2.3 million dead cap. But it clears. Yeah, but he would be paid around.

It would clear $10 million in cash. Randall Cobb is a 3.25 dead cap he would carry if he was cut and you'd free up a little over $9 million. So I think it's going to be Jordy. It's tough, tough decision for the incoming GM. Brand new GM that is going to want to make his mark on this roster in some capacity. So it's going to be interesting. This is all to say Devante Adams is the player to count on there. I'll be shocked if they go status quo.

That's what I'll say for now. Doug Baldwin. These numbers are shocking. Really? The consistency range. 75 receptions for 991 yards, about 100 more than Devante Adams. And eight touchdowns on 117 targets in an up and down odd year for Seattle ended up as the 10th most consistent wide receiver. That's the number that's confusing to me. How do you mean that you...

Because you feel like he was very much worse than that. Yeah, one, it didn't feel like that. It felt like Doug Baldwin, I mean, he's giving you big games 19% of the time. But it just, it felt like he was not giving you those consistently. And just saying, finishing was 75 for under 1,000 and 8 touchdowns to be, to only be busting 19% of the time. I mean, that's, thank you, Doug Baldwin for spreading out your production.

Part of it. Is that correct, though? So here's the reality. Because he finished outside the top. Yes. So here's what happened with Doug Baldwin and why it feels that way is Doug Baldwin was one of those players who had several games where he's, he's an enigma here. He had a threshold where he was above seven points.

barely. And that was kind of our threshold for where you didn't necessarily bust. He's living on the edge. But he was living on the edge and it was a dirty foul edge. So I get... It's like Stephen Tyler. You know, if we had to criticize one number of our consistency ranking here, it would be Doug Baldwin at number 10. The first half of the year, and this was first Seattle Seahawks and Russell Wilson and Doug Baldwin. It didn't get off to a good first half. But from that point on...

He was pretty much a force in fantasy football. So, yeah, I mean. Four out of the first five weeks, he was real bad, and then he had the buy. So you had the first six weeks, the feeling, the taste in your mouth, it was bitter from Doug Baldwin. You wasted a draft pick. Finally, they spent some money, so to speak. They spent that draft capital on Doug Baldwin for the first time, and he didn't give you special numbers.

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