Footie Award Winners + Hot Takes for 2025! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/14

Welcome to the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your hosts, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Welcome in! Tuesday episode, January 14th, the Fantasy Footballers Podcast. Mike Wright is here, Jason Moore, I'm Andy Holloway, and we have the footy award winners on today's show.

Very excited. Thousands of you voted for the awards this year, and I am proud to say I don't know a single winner. I do not either. A lot of times, I'm going to be honest, I have cheated and looked. I have logged in, and I know who wins and by how much, and I don't have a clue. That is, it makes me very excited. Do any of the deucers? No? No. No? I mean, who pecked it? I put the envelopes together, but I did not look at any of the names. Impressive. Oh, man, I hope that everything's wrong inside. You know what I mean?

Let me open this up. Brooks does know. He sent me the list to print. I printed it and cut him up without looking at it. Okay, so this is all on Brooks if it comes crashing down. He's the only one that's gone through. I think if it goes crashing down, it would be on Jeremy. Performance of the year, Brooks. Yes. Yeah. So, we've got that. We've got a quick question. We've got some news, all of the games from the weekend. We'll talk about those briefly. We're recording this episode just before the Monday night football game between the Rams and the Vikings, so we'll be able to share our feedback on that game, our reactions to

that game out here in Arizona. Yeah, we finally get a home playoff game, boys. Oh, gosh. Congrats to us. Just took, you know, devastation. Just took, you know, destruction and chaos and terribleness. It is insane. Yeah, it will be a Rams home game out here in Phoenix, Glendale, actually. It will be interesting to see what the crowd is because Arizona is, there's a lot of Midwest transplants down here. Like, there's a lot of Minnesota people who are here, and I'm interested to see what it looks like. Yes. Not the way we would have wanted to get a home playoff game, certainly, with everything

going on in Los Angeles, which thoughts and prayers out to everybody out there. Quick question of the day from Brenton. If you had to make a hot take right now for next season, what would it be? Why do we like hot takes so much? Because they're fun. I mean, just, like... I don't know, Mr. Chargers are going to win the Super Bowl. Oh! I was bringing it up! Okay, sorry. I was going to say, I know this idiot who picked the Chargers to make it to the Super Bowl, but you beat me off at the pass. Dang it! I definitely beat you to it, yes.

Yeah. Yes. People like hot takes. People like... Because they're fun. Because when they actually happen... All right. Here's the hot take. Brian Thomas Jr. Is thought of alongside Chase and Jefferson. Yeah. Alongside Chase and Jefferson after next season. So, Brian Thomas Jr. is in the upper stratosphere for next season. That's my hot take. He looks like he's going to be there. Like... Just hopefully Trevor Lawrence and whoever, like, whatever this team looks like management-wise next year can make sure that we force-feed Brian Thomas the ball. But he looks the part. Brian Thomas had... Easy to force-feed when you're that open.

Yeah. I mean, the thing is, is going back, one of the big knocks on Brian Thomas now appears to be almost a feather in his cap, which was he only had, like, the one breakout year of production. Because he was later. I think he played basketball. So, it was like, you just didn't see enough in college to know for certain that, like, he is going to translate. He had neighbors with him. Right, right. Like, I mean, it's the... Did that open it up for him? Right. Is that what made it easy? But then, once you have rookie season in the bag where he dominated the way he did with

Mack Jones, you're like, this is the guy. So, I love that hot take. Just having him really be one of the elites of the elite. And I guess Chase and Jefferson and Brian Thomas, the LSU crew, could lead the NFL for years to come. Yeah. Wow. They're all LSU. Dude, LSU is... And look, neighbors is going to be right there, too. Well, speaking of LSU, Mike, why don't you hit them up with the next one? Oh. Because it's yours. Sure. So, I'm calling T. T. Higgins stays in Cincinnati. Joe Burrow will be the QB one. And both Jamar Chase and T. Higgins will be top 12 guys by the end of the year.

Well, I don't... Hot takes! Don't consider me surprised that you would take a T. Higgins take here. I can't. I can't stop, guys. No, you can't. He has destroyed me so many times. You know, they were... But he's so good. They were one game out of the playoffs, right? Yeah. And do you remember this team lost to New England in week one? Yep. They lost to New England in week one. Yeah, both teams wish they could swap that. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, that's true. The Broncos would be... Or the Bengals would be in the playoffs, and the Patriots would have the number one pick.

Yeah. But they won. Instead, the Broncos made the playoffs. And my hot take is that the Broncos next year win the division over the Chiefs on the back of a superstar rookie running back. This team is really good. I think Bo Nix is legit, and they have no running game whatsoever. They have... They really need an Elvin Kamara. Yes, exactly. Sean Payton has always had a group of really strong running backs, pass catchers, whether it was Ingram or Pierce Strong or Deuce McAllister. They need it all. They... He's always had a good running game. And that is so abhorrently absent from the Broncos.

I think they fix it this year. It's wild what we've seen happen. You know, the Eagles... We'll get into the news momentarily. But, like, Saquon Barkley's team, clearly. I mean, Jalen Hurts, I think, completed 11 passes or something. And then you see what Baltimore did. Derrick Henry almost 200 yards rushing again. Like, it is not an exaggeration to say that all 32 teams should have been in on Derrick Henry and all 32 teams should have been in on Saquon Barkley. And yet, both of them... Like, the Saquon sweepstakes, more high profile. But the prediction of the demise of Derrick Henry or the lack of courage by Dallas, by any

of these teams... I mean, how about the Chargers? You tell me the Chargers with Derrick Henry aren't a different football team. Sure. Denver with Derrick Henry. Like, every single team should have been in on those guys. Yeah. I mean, at the very least, every single competing team. Every team that had aspirations to make a playoff run, you know, should have been in. And it'll be interesting for fantasy purposes because I think we'll hit year five next year of saying, well, Derrick Henry's probably too old. I mean, this has been most of our entire career. Exactly. So, at what point... I mean, I think we really did transition a handful of years ago to just saying he's different.

I'm not betting against him. But it still hasn't been a strong enough bet for him. I think the last two years our advice has been, just go down with the ship. Because it's not worth trying to get out early because the ship is real nice right now. It's such a nice ship. Yeah. There was... Someone had released numbers of... For Derrick Henry. It's like his, you know, his speed... That's all that. When he hits the line of scrimmage and then his top speed, you know. And, yeah, it's the same. At least, like, he has literally not slowed down yet. Now, I mean, I'll bet on him again next year for sure.

But Derrick Henry, it feels like when it goes, it's going to be immediate. But I mean... I'm not going to bet on it happening. But when we get to the end, you'll go, yep, that was... What a great run, Derrick Henry. But you're toast now. Yeah. Age will come for us all. But Frank Gore, Fred Jackson. I mean, he's Emmitt Smith. You're entering that category of running back at this point. Let's talk some more news. News and notes from around the league. Presented by USAA Insurance. So, apparently, the Chargers lost. In pretty large fashion. Yeah. 32 to 12. It wasn't that egregious through the beginning of the game.

Who thought that they could get through a divisional game where they were favored? Yeah. I was going to say, who thought the Chargers were going to win? Vegas. The majority of people who are making a prediction on this game. Career high four interceptions for Herbert. And the Texans took that very personally. Will Disley didn't do anything to help. No. I'm just throwing that out there. No, we did not. The Steelers got thromped. That's a new word. I like it. By the Ravens. I do like thromped. They got thromped. Like throttled and whomped. Nice. Thromped. Yeah, I mean, we all know exactly what you mean.

Because a lot of us watched that game. Yeah, I saw that game. That was a thromping. That was a pure thromping. Oh, please don't be a bad word. It was. Oh, gosh. Yeah. This is. I don't even bother looking it up. I'm looking. Just plead ignorance. It's bad? No, no. No. Okay. Oh, Kyle. I got from the AI overlords. They have said it's an informal verb. That means to trample or move heavily and clumsily. That is. They were clumsy. Yes, Kyle. Everything on Urban Dictionary is bad. Every word on that website is bad. Yeah, you can say any word and go there and you'll find something.

But 28 to 14, Ravens manhandled them. It was not close. Mike Tomlin has not won a playoff game in eight years. Mike Tomlin, that's a stretch that surpasses all of their previous coaches, Chuck Knoll, Bill Cowher, all of those guys. You know, Jason, you're the Tomlin truther for life. Hasn't figured out how to win a playoff game in eight years. I also don't think he's had. Six consecutive games to end the season, which I think is more the story, I think, that might resonate with fans. They didn't get better. They got worse. I would say one of my bold predictions was almost going to be that next year

will be Mike Tomlin's final year as the Steelers head coach because it looked bad down the stretch. I think that that city is getting sick of not winning. I don't believe it will get better when Tomlin leaves. No. I don't think Tomlin has had the personnel over the last eight years, post Ben Roethlisberger, to really make a run in the playoffs. He hasn't really had the quarterbacks there. Yeah. And I guess you can point fingers wherever you want. I mean, Tomlin has a lot of power in the organization. He's the one that's going to be fine going ahead with the Najee Harris, fine going ahead with

retreads at quarterback. Like, there are choices that were made. Well, but the quarterback. I mean, they tried Kenny Pickett. The quarterback situation. What would you have done? The quarterback situation is one of those where it really, to a large degree, it's kind of like, where are you drafting in a fantasy football first round draft? Yes. I don't get Jamar Chase. Yes, they are. Yeah, because they are stuck. They're stuck because Tomlin's good. Exactly. Which is why you need to. Yeah, you might need to clean house. You might need to be bad to be good. Yep. He is not willing to tank.

And he could take a team of hodgepodge guys and get the most out of them. I think if you asked him to tank, he'd punch you square in the face. I think he would look at you so hard that you'd punch yourself in the face. He would give you a look and you'd say, I'm sorry, Mr. Tomlin. That's on me. Boom, boom, boom. But they are. They're in purgatory because they will always be a competitive team. You have to be in retread land then. You have to be in the. Or you have to hit on Kirk Cousins. Or Kenny Pickett had to hit, right?

Right. You have to have the late round pick. The Bills scored 31 unanswered after the Broncos and Troy Franklin came out and got the first score, which, look, when I saw that, I wasn't. Aw. When I saw the Broncos got on the board first, I hadn't been watching yet. I was following it on my phone. That throw was insane. I was like, oh, maybe they can do it. And then I checked back. Yeah. The game was really, really, really close the entire first half. They went into the half. It should have been tied 10 to 10. They missed the walk-off field goal at the end of the half.

This was whatever second-half adjustments were made. The Bills were much, much better. And then they, you know, that was a second-half thromping. The whole game wasn't. I was, like, I was kind of proud of the Bills or of the Broncos. I was kind of proud of them. Like, you put up a real nice fight in that first half. No one saw you winning this game. First half. Right. No, just the first half. They're still – they're a ways away. They're a ways away. It feels like the Broncos and the Chargers are a few missing pieces away. Yeah. Well-coached. Quarterback situation's figured out.

Need some more elite talent. And just, like, time together. Right? Yeah, for sure. That's what the Bills have. The Packers lost to the Eagles 22-10. I believe the Packers lost three wide receivers in this game. They lost. Or two of them, and then they were already missing. Yeah, they were down Watson. And then Dobbs got a hospital ball. And they lost a lot more players than just those wide receivers. It was not a fun game for Packers fans who feel like they were jobbed. We know that from Al Borland. How are you feeling about your Packers? Everything would have been different if one of the plays went your way?

If it had gone – we don't need to get in there. We've talked about it enough. I didn't set them up. The refs made the wrong call. Okay. First drive. Other than that, the Packers played like garbage. The Eagles are the better team. Their defense is outstanding. Well, they just had a major injury. Yeah, my comparisons agrees with you, Al. They were just – as long as those big plays by the Eagles didn't happen, the Packers were right in there. It does feel like we are on a collision course for Eagles-Lions. Yeah. That's the way it feels. But was it –

Kobe Dean was Torres-Patella tendon. That's so sad. The Eagles – the Eagles offense needs to – let's get cooking here. Find their inner excellence. The Commanders – So weird. 23, Buccaneers 20. Great game. Fun game. Very much so. Wish I could watch those two quarterbacks play some more in the playoffs, but Baker's gone. Going home, the doink off of the inside of the upright. Yep. After Zin Gonzalez finally figured out how to put his helmet on. That was so weird. That's one of those things that you watch it and you see it and you kind of laugh to yourself. But then you don't know that it got like everybody else.

At first, I thought, is this a guy who's trying to get FaceTime and like he thought the camera wasn't on him yet, so I'm going to try to do it early. He does have OCD. Does he really? Okay. That explains it. I'm not – Well, now I feel bad. Yeah. Good. You should. It was just an interesting – like you're watching it and you're going, oh, that's odd. But now you get it. I'm guessing he needed it to be even because he missed the kick. So that's how that works. Well, you know, nice doink, as I always say. It was one of the hardest doinks I can remember.

Okay. All righty. We've got footy awards momentarily. We've got Vikings-Rams tonight, so we'll react to that on the Thursday show. We also got news. Mike Vrabel, the new head coach of the Patriots. Perfect. What? I mean, it's where he should have been all along. Mike McCarthy will not be remaining as head coach of the Cowboys. Dude. Cowboys. Jerry Jones has announced he is indeed the head coach. Oh, that makes a lot of sense. That part's a lie. Thankfully for Mike McCarthy, the man, like the Bears were trying to interview him the other week, and Jerry Jones is like, no. No.

And then you just hold on to this, and then you're not the coach of the Cowboys. So the Bears haven't figured it out yet. So I'm sure Mike McCarthy will get a shot there. I think McCarthy will go straight to another head coaching job. I don't know. Maybe. The reason I don't think it'll happen has nothing to do with what I think happened here. I think what happened here is that Jerry Jones actually wanted Mike McCarthy back. That's why this dragged out. I think what happened is we've seen Mike McCarthy in the press conference. We know what Mark McCarthy believes about himself.

What does he believe? Oh, he's a winner. He's a winner. He has won a championship. And I think it came down to dollars and cents in those negotiations. Maybe. And I think that's maybe why he won't get a job right away is because he has a value that he has imparted, and he's convinced Jerry Jones to give him that at one point in time. Wanted it again. There was the reports out of New Orleans, at least, are... McCarthy? Yeah. They're like, no, they're going to be very interested. All right. A lot of times when you want the money going somewhere new, people will shell out more for

you than just renewing your contract. That used to be the place that the Cardinals always spent their lives. They'll pay big for Buddy Ryan before he was... Paying four coaches at the time. Paying Dennis Green, right? The retread back to Arizona to fail. I saw a cut-up of... It was Magic Johnson and whoever the other owner. Oh, for Washington? Yeah. Then they're being asked, like, how did you guys... I mean, they're celebrating the win. How'd you turn it around? They're like, whoa, whoa. We don't get a ton of credit here. We just... We identify we got the right people and the culture, and then we got out of the way, and