Fantasy Football Podcast 2016 - The Fantasy MVP Episode w/Expert Picks

yeah, you will win your fantasy, your championship. That's why people like Andrew Luck, because in 2014, that's right around where they were getting him in the fourth or the fifth, and then he went absolutely bananas. It's still too rich for my blood, because when you're taking him in the fourth, you are essentially saying, that's the season that I'm going to get when you're counting on the 40 touchdowns, the 4,000 yards from Andrew Luck. So to count on...

another one of those just monster outlier career type years, I'm not going to do it with my fourth. Well, it's hard, it's hard to know whether or not that was an outlier year. That's fair. That's fair. We point out the fact that, you know, he, he had like 23 touchdowns rookie or 23 touchdowns the next year, then 40.

And then we came into this last year where it was like, oh, well, clearly Andrew Luck is he has taken that step forward. He was drafted to be a 40 touchdown type of quarterback. And so, but then last year he got injured. So we don't know for sure that it was an outlier. Sure. I lean towards that it was probably a slight outlier. I don't expect him to go for 40 plus touchdowns this year. But I agree. If he did where you're getting him in the draft this year as opposed to last year is, uh,

MVP, you know, yeah, potential. I love his weapons, so. I agree. I'm going to say it right now. I'll officially side with Azer. I think Frank Gore's washed up. Really? I do. I do think Frank Gore's washed up. I think they have to find another weapon there. He'll still be used, but I don't, I don't think he's going to give you. So it kind of my Philip Rivers.

defense of what they're going to have no choice but to throw the ball. It is much more comforting to draft a guy like Breeze or Luck who will have volume in attempts in the passing game than it is to say Russell Wilson, you're going to go and you're going to be efficient with their touchdown throws like he was last year. That's the scary part about putting Wilson up high. 42 attempts per game. That's what he averaged. All right, let's move on.

Hello, Foot Clan. This is Brandon Marianne Lee of Pro Football Focus, Bleacher Report Radio, and her fantasy football, which is also on Sirius XM on the Fantasy Channel. All right. I don't understand life right now because no one is into Devante Freeman. It makes zero sense to me. The guy was third in targets among running backs, just behind Danny Woodhead and Theo Riddick. By the way, he had 92 targets. That's right, 92. The next guy?

seventy five now he is fourth in carries last year as well so even if he loses some carries he's still probably going to be in the top ten he had two hundred and sixty five last year but more important than that it's going to be more productive they added alex mac to that offensive line and supposedly at practice he's been killing it since he got there so i am all about him consider him the new mat forte and mat forte just

was amazing for fantasy owners, so I'm not quite sure why we're not all grabbing a hold of this guy. He is a great hard worker. Everybody loves him. He's someone that is always there early and late. He's even good in past protection. There are zero reasons to not believe in this guy. The running backs drop way off. Go for Devante Freeman. You will not regret it.

I'm starting this one. I say it sounds like Andy's defense over there. Thank you. Thank you. That's exactly what I was going to say. They love him. He's a hard worker. What you say about Kevin Coleman and, oh, he's going to be worked in. In the minds of Atlanta, they do not see some inefficient rushing games at the end of the year. They see a superstar go-to.

slot wide receiver with the ability to perform out of the backfield. I'm telling you, Devante Freeman, I completely buy into this argument. I love hearing the news about Mac. I hadn't seen that news. He is another piece of that offensive line. I love it all. You have forgotten that Mac was there? No, I knew Mac was there. I didn't hear that Mac was killing it in camp. Oh, Alex Mac is...

Yeah, that's what he does. Yeah, he's tremendous. But I'm just saying you add that component to the argument. I just really, I agree with that. I think that the value's there for him. My fantasy MVP has similar arguments to why I like him, but the value for Freeman is there. So I'll back off and let you guys tear him down. If Freeman does.

even near what he did last year, right? I mean, I don't think anybody expects him to replicate that because there were some of those crazy games where everything fell in perfect order for him. But if he gets near that and doesn't regress too much, he's going to be a gigantic value right now because, you know, he's not the first running back taken. He's not the second running back taken. He's like the eighth or ninth running back taken off the board right now. Beautiful.

And so... In half point and full point leagues, that is beautiful. Yeah, you're looking for value in fantasy football when you draft. So he's there. And I agree with almost everything Brandon Marion Lee is saying about Freeman. And the argument against him is pretty much Mike's argument that he stinks. Yeah, so save your breath, Mike. We're going to save... I will. You get to speak on the next guy here.

This is Jake Sealy from RotoExperts.com and the Fantasy Sports Network. And for your 2016 fantasy MVP, that is, well, me. How else are you going to win? Oh, come on. Because that's what you really want to know. And I can throw out a bunch of them for you. I can throw out Sammy Coates and Jalen Strong and Travis Benjamin and Michael Floyd and Duke Johnson and Giovanni Bernard, who I think has a better year than Jeremy Hill. But if you want one specific player, hey, hit the repeat button from last year, guys. It's coming again.

You know I haven't backed off. CJ Anderson will be your fantasy MVP. Not only will he be an RB1 like we hoped and believed he would be last year, but he will be a top 10 running back and you're getting him in the third round, likely fourth in PPR leagues. Don't lose to faith. This is the year. CJ Anderson, your fantasy MVP, huge value, top 10 running back, lock it in. This quote here.

is so perfect Jake Seeley. It's all around everything of the of the excellent shameless self promotion. Ooh. The, uh, and you know how we talked about? I'm not drafting him of, uh, well, I'll get into why I love C.J. Anderson. I'm, I'm just tearing down Jake. No, I was talking about Jake Sealy. Oh. Oh.

We love Jake's season. I've just given him a hard time. I love the hedging. He's like, I could give you all these names just in case they're the fantasy MVP. But look, I'm all in on C.J. Anderson as well. You're getting him in the back of the third. The guy, the last nine games, once the ankle was finally healthy, he was rushing at 5.9 yards a carry. That's absurd. He was a monster. And you think, well, maybe that's just the season. Look at the playoff record. He had an.

excellent, excellent playoff running. That's against the top teams in the league. He rushed for more than 10 yards on 21 of his 152 carries. What if I want to arbitrarily not believe in him? Is this a burn me once? Yeah, that's all it is to me. Shame on you. Shame on me. Probably. And that's what it is. I think that it's also the beginning of the season, and you said it was injury. Yes. But it's seared in my brain that when I watched him, look, we're not talking Monte ball levels, but we're talking like, I just.

I didn't see anything special in the beginning of the year, and I realized the numbers are there. So I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying, like, somehow those two things are seared in where I'm just, I have a little bit of a lost confidence. I like Devante Booker. I don't, that's my hesitancy, but I understand that. You and Jake are on the same page. Yeah, and I can get it, but I'm telling you, the first half of the season.

was the bad ankle and there was there's plenty of watching him in the second half where you go oh yeah there's c j anderson well c j anderson's going to be drafting uh right near andy's MVP so we'll we'll see uh all right let's move on matt harmon is contributing his fantasy MVP for 2016 hey guys this is matt harmon from nflbl dot com and my fantasy football MVP this year is 49ers receiver bruce ellington i think he of all the potential late round players has the

safest floor, but also a pretty high ceiling. He's a guy that I think will get a ton of targets in the slot.

in Chip Kelly's offense. We saw Jordan Matthews be productive there. And if you watch some of the game film and look at his reception from a brief standpoint in his first few years, you see that this is a player that's ready to break out. He's the ultimate drumbeat candidate from the offseason and building steady momentum. I like him to be a super late round sleeper, a guy that you can start several weeks and that you're going to be happy that you drafted. He's my MVP this season. All right. That's, I mean, that's bold. It's always nice if you can just.

arbitrarily grab somebody's MVP candidate with your last pick in the draft. Yeah. This isn't, I mean, there's different types of MVPs in fantasy football. You got the guy that finishes as the number one running back or the number one wide receiver. But then you have those guys that you took late in your draft and don't you know it by the end of the year. He was a, don't you know? By the end of the year. He's from that town in Wisconsin we had on the show yesterday. Oh, yeah. Oga-Nagabaka. Yeah. Nailed it.

Nailed it. No, the, you know, those players that you grab at the end of the draft that end up being a startable, you know, that wide receiver two or a flex week in, week out, all of a sudden it gives your entire roster of flexibility for trades through the year. It buys you victories. And so.

Harmon is giving us a gold nugget here at the end of our drafts. Mike, I mean, let me ask you this. Do you buy in? I mean, you've got a guy who hasn't scored a touchdown since 2014. He's got like 19 total catches in his career, all the potential in the world at 24 years old in the Chip Kelly offense. But do, let me just ask you plainly, do you agree with that? I can buy in. Part of it I'll agree is, or I will concede is that.

Matt Harmon knows wide receivers. He breaks these down. I believe in his reception method. And when he talks about a guy beating coverage, eventually if a player is very successful beating coverage, he's going to get the ball. And then you toss in the success of Jordan Matthews in the slot for Chip Kelly last year. And the high volume of passing.

The plays are going to be there. The offense will be there. Even if they have a terrible defense, great. They have to throw the ball even more. Does the quarterback situation make a difference? If it's Kaepernick or it's Gabbert, does it matter to you? It does not matter to me. It matters to me. I feel like Gabbert will be able to get him the ball better than. Yeah, I would say I prefer it to be Gabbert, but I think that even Kaepernick can get it done. All right. Bruce Ellington, I think he's going in the 14th round. So if you want to take a shot on him, backed by...

Matt Harmon himself. You can do that. So here's, let's move on to Chris Harris. Hey, guys, this is Chris Harris from Harris football. I guess fantasy MVP can mean a few different things, like the guy who actually winds up scoring the most relative points above replacement level. I think in a standard league, I would predict that's Adrian Peterson. I saw nothing in his film to indicate a slowdown last year. I'm willing to buy one more year. In a PPR league, I probably say Antonio Brown.

But then there's the value part of the equation, that's sort of the biggest bang for your draft buck. I'll take a wild swing on another old guy, Steve Smith. No clue if he can come back from a double torn Achilles. But if he's the same guy, he will come at a huge discount and was still mighty good before he got hurt last year. Thanks, guys. All right, Steve Smith, didn't he just come off the pup? Did he?

I had not seen that news. You can, you can verify that real quick. Yeah, I might be wrong. So, and Harris is, he's, he's not fibbing here between week one and eight when Steve Smith had a working Achilles. He was the wide receiver 11. Here's old man Smith, just putting up wide receiver one numbers again. The, the problem for me is, is not Steve Smith at all. It's just where you have to take him. You can, it's, it's very late.