Week 17 Matchups + Wheel of Shame, Win or Go Home - Fantasy Football Podcast for 12/31

This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Every football fan is different. Some won't wash their lucky mustard-stained jersey until the season's over. Some insist they can't sit down on third downs and some pick their favorite team because, I don't know, just like football fandom, nobody's life is exactly the same. And that's why State Farm gets to know you, not as a policy number, but as an actual person.

so they can help personalize a coverage plan that's just for you. Whether it's game day or just another Tuesday, State Farm has you covered. This is the story of the one. As a shipping manager, he's running the dock, stocking supplies, and making sure every order goes out on time. And Granger helps him stay prepared. From shipping supplies to PPE to hand tools, he counts on Granger to keep products moving and trucks rolling. So his operation runs smoothly.

no matter the shift. Call 1-800 Granger. Click Granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done. Foot Clan, while you sort out your 22 budget, think about this. You can save 72% on restaurant quality meals with HelloFresh. And you don't even need to hit the grocery store. Get 16 free meals plus three gifts with code Footballer 16 at hellofresh.com slash footballer 16.

This is Al-Lazard, aka the Lazard King, wide receiver for the Green Bay Packers, and you're listening to Fantasy Footballers Podcasts. To the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. It's title time, fellas. Oh, yeah. Get that high tea. Someone just pointed out to me something very interesting. It was probably me.

I said interesting. Yeah. Friday, December 31st, by the way. Is that what's interesting? Welcome into the fantasy football. No, it's been brought up. Like Sony Michelle and Rashad Penny are like super hyper-relevant this week, right? Championship week. Right. But then Ronald Jones is that same draft class. Yes. Hmm. Right? Yeah. I mean, that draft class, uh, they just, they were like a wine.

They were not ready yet to be drank. They needed some time to... They were just grapes. Exactly. Exactly. And now these grapes are turning into a fine... A fine wine to drink on championship weekend. Man. And you may only get a drink at once. I mean, the likelihood of those three being relevant on the same weekend ever again. Yeah, that's fun. Not to mention, I mean, is that the same draft class as Treadwell and Perryman? Oh.

Andy had a cough or a sneeze or something over there. That sounds like, did you inhale some spit? No comment. Maybe it was too hard for me to comprehend all these relevant superstars. Got choked up, thinking about Ronald Jones? The problem was trying to push through. That was the, I thought I could get the word Perryman out. I don't remember. Was that the Perryman draft?

I can tell you. Well, now you, because you've got news now that Antonio Brown is, he's got the old downgrade. Yeah. Oh, boy. Just when you're feeling maybe more confident in Tom Brady. You get a little. Oh, boy. Get a little surprise. There's a lot. It was not the Perman here. Oh, okay. All right. Well, Treadwell is relevant and Perryman's relevant this week. So we got news what Mike Evans might be.

Back out there? Yeah, we do have a news section, though. I feel like we're getting ahead of ourselves. Mike, it's Friday. Okay. Loosen up a little bit. All right. You said it's title time. Yeah, I didn't know it was casual Friday. That's why I coughed on air. Oh, what is that? You said loosen up. And that's too loose. That's on you, man. That's too loose. Most of the time giving them button control over there is okay. Oh, no. You know who else? Another running back drafted in that same draft class?

Chase Edmonds. Okay. No, that's not good, Mike. We're playing against Chase Edmonds. Oh, do you feel like there is a power growing in the, what is it, 2018? The 2018 running back room is, this is their week to shine in 2021. If this was the news section, I'd bring up Connor getting downgraded to not practicing, but I won't wait for it. I'm not going to do that because it's, well, it's Friday and Fridays for something else. Put Clan Friday.

If I do ever cough to death, I want it to be on air. I just wanted that. Oh, yeah. You got to do it for the Graham. Every, this whole week, if I glanced to the right, man, the yellow, the yellow Jason hits me fresh. Yeah, because it's not just on camera. It's the light. Yeah, this is real life. This is just who I am now in this seat. Well, we're going to give away a jersey right now for Ronald Jones. Ronald Jones signed jersey in celebration of this draft class. Very timely. The winner on Patreon is.

El Capo de Soldati. Congratulations. You know, it's to the point where I think the producers are picking people with the most difficult names. Oh, no. You know what you just did? You just made everyone go change their name to something awful and impossible to read. Congratulations. You win a Ronald Jones signed jersey from pristineauction.com. If you would like to bid on something over there, go to pristine auction.com. Use the code ballers.

News and Notes from Around the League. Presented by Sleeper. It's our daily COVID boogie. Mike Williams, Tyler Huntley, Leviska, Chanel, Brian Edwards, Marlon Mack, off the COVID list. Congratulations, guys. And Tevin Coleman, Darius Slayton, Khalif Raymond. On to the COVID list. AJ Brown didn't practice. It was just precautionary. He's on track to play. Antonio Brown didn't practice.

That is probably not precautionary. Yeah, probably not. And that's he did. So remember the tale of Antonio Brown? He's returning. He just returned this past weekend from a lengthy absence, a major injury, played a whole bunch of snaps, had a limited practice on Wednesday, and then was downgraded. Yeah, it's really not good. It's not a good sign.

Obviously, that was my start of the week yesterday. Nice job. Thank you. Thank you. I should have seen him getting downgraded in practice. Twitter thinks you should have. So, yeah, I mean, pay attention. If all of a sudden he's back to a full practice, then I'm fine with him as a start of the week. I think he's great. But if it takes him a little bit to get back and you have a good pivot option, I would look to pivot. And when people get downgraded, it's...

Pretty common they just missed that week. Jeff Wilson and Darrell Williams, both from that draft class. No. Yeah. This is the 2018 time to shine. 2018 running backs. Does that mean Sequin can have a good week? Ooh. Because he is the leader of that draft class. Does he play for the Giants? Yeah. Sorry. Maybe. That is interesting. Mike's like, mill. I'll buy it. The science. Um.

And part of the Antonio Brown News for bucks, Mike Evans cleared the COVID list and was apparently at a limited practice as well. Saw some video of that. Looked all right. He is trying to hit that 1,000 yard mark. Needs 101 more yards, I believe. 101? Something like that. Yeah, some 100. I thought it was 160. I don't know. I thought it was 110. Look, the thing about it is there's no way to find out.

Yeah, thank you, Mike. That's a good point. He's at 899 on the year, so I'm obviously really correct here. Two games to do it. We think, like, we view it as. But wouldn't he think it's like one, like in his head? He's like, I've got to do this in 16. For a championship week. No, not for championship week just because the season's longer. No, I don't think so. Nobody cares that old records used to be 14 games when it moved to 16. All he cares about is getting a thousand.

in the season. And so if he gets 50 and 51 in the next two games, he gets there. Lamar Jackson didn't practice. He's not going to play. No. Hollywood Brown didn't practice due to an illness? Yeah, he was probably on that field. What is going on there? The level of illness reports from the Ravens is preposterous. If you are in the Baltimore area. The cafeteria staff, what is going on here? I would recommend you move because there is

A plague upon that area. If you walk into that cafeteria and you like tap on the shoulder of the head cook, does Mike Tallman turn around? Like get some zinc, fellas? I don't know. Have a smoothie. I know you don't control it, but it just seems crazy. Yeah. Antonio Gibson sidelined on Thursday's practice. I don't think that's trending the right direction. With a hip. This was not the toe. This is a different injury. That is.

concerning. He already missed, like, you can't play him. You can't, right? I mean, he missed half the game last game. Well, he was benched because of the blowout. Not benched because he was terrible, but because there's... Or because of the hip. I mean, we don't know. But I'm saying that he's banged up and the team is, this game is done. Why play Antonio Gibson anymore? Yeah, I think that there are plenty of teams that will...

really have to play Antonio Gibson. And he's a, he's a tough. Daria Gumbulli with Ford or Antonio Gibson. I would play Antonio Gibson. Yeah, I would too. Oh, man. I hope he's my. Assuming that. Flex or something in that situation. Assuming that we see some more practice from him. All right. Don't forget join the foot.com for the injury blitz podcast for more injury updates from Matthew Betts, the game day alerts, and the community of listeners to this show.

That was today's news notes brought to you by Sleeper, the leader in breaking news alerts. You can grab the channel there and get alerts as well. I just realized something. This is the first time that, like, you know, since it happened. Ooh, I don't know what it is, but. I think I do. That Al and I have been in the same room together. Oh, oh, yeah. Boom, Shakalaka. And if I told Al that I bought a canvas print of the interception, would he believe me?

Oh, yes. I would believe you. I'd be proud of you, to be honest. It's on the way. Good for you. Yeah. That's on the way. You doing well? I'm doing better. Okay. Now, I know you're not doing well because this morning you decided to submit all the projections for this week into our Slack channel about how your team's projected for more points than all the remaining teams in our league. Yeah.

So you are still in the rationale. Is that the denial stage, the rationality stage? It makes me feel better. I'll go with anger. There's some anger mixed in, but I also, I'm still proud of my squad. Well, here's a philosophical question. They lost. Here's a question, though, for all of us. If you lose, like if you lost in the semifinals, which I know a lot of you out there did, is it better that the person that beat you wins the championship or not?

100% yes it is it just because you went down to the champ i mean i don't get me wrong i hate them and i want them to lose but at the end when they win i know that i lost to the champ the best team beat me and then you can feel like your second place follow follow up yeah i know where you're going if you have more points than both of the teams in the title game is that better or worse that's worse why you don't

Check. No, it's better. You don't. It's way worse. Check. I'm rooting for Andy to win and me to have the most points this week. If that's the case then, then Ian Book's interception single-handedly cost you a championship. Yeah. Okay. And that's better for you. Just confirmation that my squad was the best in the league. You're still playing. But it wasn't because you lost. You're still playing for bronze. Oh, yeah. What's bronze? Exactly. There's gold and there's nothing.

All right. Let's jump into the forecast. Fantasy forecast. It's real nice throwing in that there's golden. There's nothing for me if I dropped this week. Don't screw up. My silver's not going to look any better than your bronze, is it? All right. We covered a bunch of games yesterday. The Falcons, Bills, Giants, Bears, Chiefs, Bengals, Titans, Raiders, Colts, Jags, Patriots, Buccaneers, Eagles, Washington. You made it. Eight games left. So if you wanted to hear the breakdowns of those games,

Click on yesterday's show. Let's start with the Rams, 11 and 4 taking on the 8 and 7 Baltimore Ravens. You know, the Ravens got their butts kicked last week. Thoroughly. They were at a disadvantage on offense, you know, third string quarterback, but it was the defense that gave it up. They're giving up 37 points a game to wide receivers right now. That's 31st over the last six weeks. They're one of the worst on the year. So, I mean, on the surface, this game looks like a, not just Matthew Stafford, but.

all the receiving options look like a really strong place. Yeah, I mean, the Baltimore Ravens defense has wanted to target right now through the air. They absolutely just, it's not that they, obviously, they're well-coached team. They're going to do everything they can to scheme their way out of it. But when you lose a certain amount of personnel, there's just nothing you can do. And that's what's happened. Now, there's a little bit rain. Little bit rain. Are you the weatherman today?