Fantasy Football Daily - 2022 Preseason Week 2 Review

Episode Date: August 23, 2022

Graham Barfield (@GrahamBarfield) recaps recent preseason action. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fantasy-points-podcast/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's time to the Fantasy Points podcast brought to you by FantasyPoint.com. Top level fantasy football and NFL betting analysis from every perspective and angle, from numbers to the film room with a single goal to help you score more fantasy points. Hope you guys had a good weekend, watching football sitting on your couch, like I did watching some preseason football. Listen, it's that time of year, guys. I mean, it's good to have football back, man. Tons of drafts coming up this weekend next. I've got a bunch of big leads I'm drafting for.

This is the most exciting time of the fantasy offseason, where we're grinding through preseason, finalizing ranks, shit-talking our buddies before our drafts. It's a beautiful time of year. Yeah, it's that all weekend on the sofa, much to my wife's chagrin, watching preseason games, grinding out. You know, who's playing with the first team, who's coming on in the field, the second team. Try to play a little DFS, got shoved on Friday night.

Had a decent day on Saturday. I tried to hit a couple of prize picks and a couple bad injuries, kind of ruined those. But, yeah, it's a good weekend, man. I wanted to come on here and talk through some of the biggest storylines from this past weekend. Look, I'm one to think that preseason matters and matters quite a bit, but probably not for the same reasons that a lot of people think it does. I'm a big fan of using preseason to finally determine depth charts. And I think it's extremely important when it comes to running back depth charts. Seeing who comes on in the field and when, and for what rhyme or reason, if they're used on early

downs, if they're used exclusively on third downs. And I get it. It's a small sample, but it's really the only sample we have these days. You know, we can try to sift through Beat writer news as best we can. We can try to sift through all of the camp reports as best we can. But at the end of the day, coaches tell us exactly how they feel about players by the way they use them on the field. Coach speak is meaningless. Usage is predictive. And I have an article up on fantasy points.com. Fantasypoints.com.

Free article. You can check it out. I went game by game. Last week, my guy Scott Barrett, went game by game. You should check that out too. I got to give Scott a weekend off. He did everything last weekend. So we switched this weekend.

And I had the review for week two. So I wanted to come through and kind of talk through some of the storylines that we saw this weekend. Really not much happened in the first couple games. Bear Seahawks, Justin Fields only played a few plays. But Bears production was really, really bad. You know, I get it. They're kind of figuring out their offensive line right now. They're trying to trade Kevin Jenkins.

But, you know, I think at least early in the year, man, we got to ding Fields just a little bit. They start with the Packers and Niners, their first two games. Actually, I think they play the Niners first. But still, you know, their front seven, those two front sevens are going to feast against the Bears. I'm kind of, I'm in on Justin Fields for sure as like a late round kind of guy in best ball with a ton of upside. But I'm not drafting much fields.

It's like a one quarterback start sitly because I think, man, like their first two games are going to be rough for them. Patriots Panthers. I would not pay too much attention to the Patriots backfield bro. Bill Belichick have a set plan in place for these guys. Damien Harris got the start, took the first drive in the fourth, then Ramandre came on, got the second, fifth drive, and then Thai Montgomery took the third and six. I think if anything, we learned that Montgomery is going to be maybe a little more involved than we expected. That being said, I think this is

truly like Harris-Stevenson getting 80 to 90% of the work, with Harris probably getting 60% to 70% near the goal line at Stevenson being involved in passing downs. Stevenson is completely usurped Damien Harrison, ADP, by the way. It's like not even close anymore. Stevenson goes seventh, eighth round, ninth round. Harris is, you know, kind of falling back into that like back half of eighth, early ninth, sometimes even in the 10th. I think Harris is now at a point where he's an ADP value.

Sure, he doesn't have the upside of Stevenson because Stevenson should be involved on passing downs. But yeah, I think Harris's ADP fall is just a little too much for right now. I wanted to make a note finally on the Panthers or excuse me on the Patriots. One final note on then is Tyco on Thornton apparently hurt his collarbone. He's going to be out like six to eight weeks. He was getting some pretty big burn with the first team offense, which to me means he had already earned the trust of the coaches to have a week one role. But unfortunately that that injury is going to take him out at least until the end of September, maybe into October.

So for any final bestball drafts, if you're doing any Patriot stacks, I would bump up Nelson Agblur just a little bit. On the Panther side of that game, didn't learn too much. Chuba Hubbard, Deonté Forman, split first team reps. Look, if McAfriam, this is time, those two guys are going to be in some sort of gross time share. You're not going to want either one of those guys. Guys, the biggest story this weekend was Damien Pierce, not playing at all.

He's already getting starter treatment. Fourth round rookie, he was a yards-created favorite. Finished third in this class and yards created a attempt. He was really strong and this tackle's force for attempt. I have no idea what that old Florida staff is doing, not playing Damien Pierce more often. But listen, this Texas coaching staff has already identified the talent. He is their week one starter. His ADP is going to explode this week.

but I would still be aggressive on him. I have, you know, I was taking Pierce in the 12th, 13th round all summer, and I will happily be aggressive on him if I have to be in rounds eight and nine. Now, that whole round eight through nine ADP bucket is really interesting. You know, we just talked a little bit about the Patriots backs, they're in that mix, put Chase Edmunds in that mix, Damien Pierce is in that mix, Cream Hunt goes in that range. Clyde Edwards Aller goes around before.

So this year, and I mentioned this, you know, a couple months ago, the way ADP is set up this year, I think it makes a lot of sense to get at least one running back in your first two rounds and then potentially take two in the first three. And then after that, you just don't touch the position until like round seven, eight, nine because there's so many fun players going in that ADP bucket. Damien Pierce is at the top of that ADP bucket in rounds eight and nine, along with Ramondry Stevenson and Chase Evans for me right now. Bill's game, well, look, the bills just came out an absolutely pile drive for Broncos.

Josh Allen played one drive. It was dominant. Ended in just a completely vintage Josh Allen-type touchdown. Scramble drill to Gabe Davis. By the way, if you like touchdowns, you should probably draft Gabe Davis. He's going to score a bunch of them this year. I think the biggest thing we learned about the bill is beyond that this weekend is two things, really. Isaiah McKenzie is they're locked-in slot receiver.

Stefan Diggs, Gabe Davis, and McKenzie were the only. bills receivers to play on that first drive with Alan. Then James and Crowder came on with his second team, and Crowder played well into the second quarter. And honestly, it looked really good. I think Crowder is still going to have a role here, especially when the bill is going to four wide receiver sets. But right now, McKenzie is the PPR play in this receiver room.

Their back field is interesting because Zach Moss is like a zombie. He is back from the dead. It seemed like after they drafted James Cook that, um, that, you know, it would be a Singletary Cook backfield. I don't know if that's the case, at least early in the year. Moss has apparently had a really good camp. He came in as the primary backup for Singletary in the, with the second team offense. Once Keenham came onto the field and Cook was the third man in rotation.

Now, that being said, James Cook looked awesome. He was ripping off big gains left and right. He looks a little bulked up to me. He's still really skinny in the legs, but I think he's put on maybe five to ten pounds of muscle, which is good for him because he was really skinny at George. Georgia. That was my biggest concern with him. You know, the explosive plays, the athleticism, all of that pops on tape. But the biggest concern for him for me was just whether or not he could, you know,

kind of withstand an NFL workload. It's good to see Cook bulked up. But for right now, he is probably like the 2A, I would bet. I think he ends up being, you know, more of like a passing down ace early in the year. But I think we've got to ding Cook's week one role just a little bit based on. on Moss's involvement, especially if Moss is going to be involved near the goal line. Second biggest news this week behind the Damien Pierce situation in Houston is this Washington backfield man is a freaking mess.

Brian Robinson was the 1A, actually not even the 1A. He was the clear one this past weekend. He had 11 snaps on first and second downs with the first team while Gibson had just five. Robinson has been displaying this all preseason man, but like he's a bigger back, but for being 6-2, 225, 230, he's got great feet, excellent vision. He's a really strong inside runner at Alabama with better burst than you might expect for a player of his size. I think he's also a really good pass protector and he's got good hands. I don't think it's a shock at all that Robinson has already used certain Gibson. Look, Gibson is a fun player, but it's been three years,

guys. And we haven't seen Gibson get a whole lot better in that span. I think Robinson is the clear cut 1A to Gibson's 1B. J.D. McKissick did not play this past week. They're just, you know, kind of being precaution with a minor injury for him. But look, if Robinson is already the early down guy, McKissick, we know what his role is, is, you know, a third down, obvious passing situation, plus, you know, hurry up, two-minute stuff. He's going to be on the field then. What are we left with Gibson. I've been fading him all year. He was my top RB fade and my best ball tiers that came out in June. And I see no reason to take Antonio Gibson really, honestly, unless it's like 13th, 14th round and you're just stashed him as a five and maybe Brian Robinson gets hurt. But really,

there's just not much upside left with Gibson at cost. Moving on here, I want to talk a little bit about the bucks. Tom Brady's going to be back this week. Everybody's been speculating on why he's missed. Maybe Gazelle's divorcing him. Maybe he's getting investigated by the IRS. I don't care about that. Brady's going to be back.

It was good to see Leonard Fournett on the field Saturday night. He looks spelled, man. You could tell, he put on a little wait in July. He was maybe hitting up a little, you know, man. He got a nice contract this off season. He was eating well, but he looked good. Saturday night. To my eye, Fornet, had the same bursts as usual.

He came on, played the first three drives, got seven touches. Didn't rip off any big games, but like I said, he looked like Leonard Fortnight. The big news for the bucks this weekend was Rashad White was the second back in their rotation. He was the fourth back in the rotation of their first preseason game. Gio Bernard did not play this weekend. You know, Gio dealt with a slew of injuries last year and just really couldn't get on the field. I actually think Gio's going to play a little bit this year. Brady recruited him and seemingly loves him.

I get it. Gio's old. He was like a part of the 2012, 2013 draft class. I can remember Gio Bernard getting hyped during Hard Knocks way back in the day. That being said, White, it was good to see White be there, be there too. At the end of the day, if anything were to happen to Fortinab White would end up with a pretty big role, but I do think there's a little smoke to Gio Bernard's usage from two weeks ago. And the fact that Brady just seemingly likes him. Gio played a bunch. I was rewatching the Buc's first couple of games last year. And Geo play a lot before he got hurt, a lot more than you would probably remember. Rashad White looked good to my eye.

He had a 15, 16-year-old game called back to holding. I looked explosive on that play. He fumbled on a play where, like, Kyle Trass kind of had to, like, elude the pocket, and he just, like, flipped the ball or shot White, like, right in front of him. White had a nice run and catch after that, was fighting through extra yards, and the ball got punched out by a titant defender. but it was good to see the buck staff not really like hold that against him. White came back out on the ensuing drive. So, you know, it looked a little dicey after last weekend, but we'll get

to get to Isaiah Spiller in a little bit. It was at least good to see Rashad White get some serious burn with the, you know, air quotes. I'm flicking my two fingers here, the air quotes second team, sorry, first team offense. Tight inside, man, I don't know what's what the deal. is with Traylon Burks. Like I'm not going to sit here and put my scouting hat on. I stay in my lane. I'm a running back guy. I'm not a receiver guy.

I listen to guys like Scott Barrett, West Huber, Brett Whitefield when it comes to receivers. And Scott Barrett and his rookie model article, which is fantastic, mentioned that Traylon Burks had fraudulent production. Most of his production came on, you know, throws close to the line of scrimmage. Brett Whitefield was mentioned to me a couple months ago that he

hated Berks as a prospect, was shocked that he went as early as he did in the draft. He kind of said his tongue in cheek, but he said Kyle Phillips will earn snaps before Traylon Burks did. And lo and behold, our guy Brett Whitefield is right. Kyle Phillips ran more routes in Trail on Berks this past week. And honestly, I don't know if Berks ends up, Berks will end up being ahead of Phillips at the end of the day, I think, this year. But it's a conversation, man.

This is not like Jamar Chase's drops last year or any other preseason discounts we've had with rookie receivers that were drafted early and maybe it's had back camps. Berks has simply been a non-factor. I watched all of his routes in week one. The preseason watched all of the game last week and he's just, there's just an effort level that isn't there with Berks's routes. And it's easy to see why Mike Brayble is peeved and pissed off. man it's it's tough out here for burks i just keep plumbing him down our ranks he's a guy we've been bearing for a couple weeks in our projections and honestly outside of a you know just a total home run swing and like 12 14 teams start sit leagues burks is pretty much off of my radar uh the third

biggest thing outside of damien pierce and brian robinson's usage that i noticed this weekend was just how damn good can he picket looks man um I've watched every throw, every drop back he's had these last two weeks, and he's been legitimately impressive. Now, granted, week one, it was against, you know, the third string defense. But Pickett, man, he's just got this, like, poise in the pocket. And I mean this in a good way. He's got this, like, de-gaff about him where, like, it doesn't matter if he's getting pressured.

It doesn't matter if he's got a clean pocket. Like, he's going to sling it. Jags' front seven, which I'm a Jags fan, by the way, much of my mind, Jags fan. their front seven's been getting after a little bit this preseason. Arden Key's been a nice pickup for him, but picket man just looked fantastic. He had a touchdown ball to Deontay Johnson where Deontay kind of had to come back and jump up for the ball, but it got called back due to the penalty. The next play hit Benny Stone on the flat for a touchdown,

but it was like one of the most crisp two-minute drills. You'll see it for a quarterback in the preseason. If you've been watching much preseason football this year, you know how bad the quarterback play has been. So we kind of got a great on a curve, Pickett has been really high up that curve. He's played well enough for the Steelers to be, you know, very comfortable with him as their week one starter.

I still think they might give some, like, veteran preference to Trubisky. But, man, Trubisky's, excuse me, Pickett has certainly played well enough to earn the starting role week one. There's a lot to note, actually, on the Steelers side from this past week. Deontay Johnson looked freaking amazing. The juice was there. Trubisky missed him on a couple throws early in the game. game, but Johnson legitimately could have had like 6-150 and 2 in that game. He is, man, I have

been drafting a ton of Tonté in the fourth, fifth round, especially in PPR, best ball leagues. I made this note in our discord, but Deontay Johnson is massively, massively underranked on Yahoo fantasy leagues. So if you have a draft on Yahoo coming up in the next, call it six, six, seven days before ADP changes and before that rank changes, Deontay Johnson is like locked in. Just go get him as your as your number two or number three. Because if Pickett is as good as he's kind of selling here in this preseason, look out, man.

Because I don't think people really realize how bad Big Ben was these last couple years. It kind of started all falling apart for Big Ben at the end of 2020. Johnson was ultimately fine because he's, you know, so good in the short intermediate area after the catch. He's so explosive. But if Pickett can really drive the ball downfield and throw. the ball with accuracy. Deontes just set up so well, and so is George Pickens, guys.

Scott Barrett was all over this as Pickens with Pickens is like one of the best 14th, 15th round picks and best ball this summer. You ain't getting that anymore. Pickens is going to go 10th, 11th round in all of your drafts this week. He didn't have any highlight real plays. He didn't hit a post corner like he did in the first game, but the usage was amazing. Not only did he run more routes than Chase Claypool with the first team offense in that first quarter, Pickens had 17 routes to Claypool's 10.

Pickens also mixed in as a starter in two wide receiver sets. That's right. It'll be Pickens and Deontay in their two wide receiver sets the majority of the time, I think. Claypool, interestingly, I think he's their kind of big slot player. Shout out to whomever is running the underdog NFL fantasy account these days. I'm sorry, I don't know, but they've been really good with some of their notes for the preseason. But they made a great note on Chase Claypool. He lined up in the slot on 14 of 16 preseason snaps this past, excuse me, this past week, 14 of 16 snaps he lined up in the slot.

Pickens, like I said, was their outside guy. The Steelers man, between Deonté, between Pickens on the outside, you put Claypool as a big slot. You got Friamuth who had a very nice catch and run. and a beautiful ball from Pickett where he was pressured. Najee Harris is obviously the bell cow. There is a lot of skill talent with the steward's offense. You know, it all comes down to their offensive line and whether or not they can protect Pickett consistently.

But at the end of the day, if Pickett is as accurate and is poised as I've seen from him this preseason, all of these Steelers guys are massive discounts. Like even Pickens at his, you know, skyrocketing ADP. I still think there's value there. Jags side. If you're going to watch one game this weekend, make it the Steelers Jaggs game. We rewatched it on NFL Plus, recorded on NFL Network. It's that time of year. You've got to have NFL Network on 24-7. It's been on my office 24-7 these last couple weeks. But if you can, definitely re-watch Steelers Jaggs. Probably was the most noteworthy game this past weekend. Start at the top. Doug Peterson stayed true to his word. Jags played their starters for the entire first half. And I thought Trevor Lawrence looks fine.

He looked decently sharp. It was night and day difference watching Pickett and the ball placement and the poids. I think Lawrence just plays a little too frenetic. He's got to find a way to regain some of his confidence at Clemson. And I don't mean this as a slight to Lawrence. I say this is an objective Jaguars fan who's watched a lot of shitty football in my life. Trevor Lawrence kind of reminds me of Jared Gough. And I truly don't mean that in a bad way.

He just reminds me of a taller Jared Gough who's got a little bit more arm talent. He had a beautiful ball. He dipped over a Steelers receiver to Marvin Jones on the sidelines. That was a nice game. There's flashes with him there. Lawrence can still throw seeds, but it just feels programmed with him still. I'm really interested to see what he looks like this season. I have no idea where this Jags offense is going to be, but I do know Doug Peterson is,

and look, I'm not breaking any. ground by saying this, but Doug Peterson is going to be huge for T law. The big thing I noticed this past weekend on the Jack side is just how involved Christian Kirk was. Trevor Lawrence threw the ball 28 times. Eight of those looks went to Christian Kirk. That's a 38% target share in one quarter. No, Christian Kirk is not going to have a 38% target chair for the entire year, but I do project him for around 25 to 26%.

And on this Jags team, it's going to have to throw a lot, Kirk is a very, very solid. wide receiver three in ppr leagues i'm less into him and half ppr like on sites like underdog yahu standard is half ppr so i'm a little less into him just because i worry about his touchdown upside in this offense but the volume will certainly be there uh travis ctian is like the number one guy i wanted to watch this uh this preseason i thought in the first game against the browns he tried to bounce too many runs he missed a wide open inside lane where he just like got stuck uh to the front side. It was an inside zone run. You've got to find a lane and the ETM just couldn't do it. This was different, though. I think they really are getting ETN to work on his eye discipline,

work on, you know, just going for the first read, first cut and exploding. Jaguar's offensive one really struggled. Most of ETN's yards came after contact. I didn't chart it. I didn't look into the numbers. I just watched the game. But ETN got contacted at or near the line of scrimmage. basically on all of his carries. But he ran freaking hard, man. He didn't try to bounce runs. Didn't get any pass targets. I think Peterson is just hiding that.

Good on him for hiding it. Why show anybody what you're going to do with ETN in the passing game in the preseason? But that being said, I think ETN took a big and meaningful leap forward this past week. One, I'd say this is probably like the fourth or fifth most important storyline from this past weekend. but listen, I've been lower on Isaiah Spiller. If you've been reading the yards created or listening this offseason, I've been lower on Isaiah Spiller's talent for this entire summer. He was my RB9 pre-draft.

I had him below Tyler Outger out of year. I'm below Brian Robinson. I'm way below Damian Pierce. Look, Isaiah Spiller was not the best running back on that Texas A&M team last year. And we'll talk a little bit more about it this off season with the, the A&M backs, but Spiller, I was third percentile in yards created per attempt, really struggled in terms of his mistackles force per attempt. He's a fine pass catcher, but I think the Chargers have already found out, like, this is what they do every year. They drafted Larry

Roundtree in the fourth, fifth round. They drafted Joshua Kelly on day three. Didn't work out. Spiller is just another guy. They draft on day three, and look, through two preseason games, the Chargers have run 42 plays with their, air quotes, first-team offense out there. Obviously, Justin Herbert hasn't played yet. Atters King and Allen, neither is Mike Williams. That first-team offense has ran 42 snaps. Isaiah Spiller's been on the field for two of them. I don't know why or how people were drafting him in the 11th or 12th round.

That's not up for me to decide. But based on his talent and based on the way this backfield shakes out, I said it, you know, In my article, I've said in a best ball, my best ball tiers article, that like, Roundtree and Kelly are legitimate competition for Spiller. And lo and behold, not only the legitimate competition, Spiller's way behind those guys. Roundtree and Kelly have split for a steam snows. They've gotten 20 apiece while Spiller has two. Please don't draft any of these guys. Just don't do it.

Just draft Austin Echler. It's six overall, fifth overall on PPR, whatever you want to do. Just don't even mess around with his charge's backfield. Because if Echler were to miss time, I have a feeling that it's going to be some sort of just disgusting. three-man rotation. And shout out to Curtis Patrick, a super nice guy. I met of this a couple weekends ago, actually, at the expo. But he mentioned this when I brought up Spiller's usage on Twitter that if the chargers do lose Eckler for any significant amount of time, Justin Herbert's going to throw like for 6,000 yards. And you know what? That's

just the right take. Like, that's just the right take. Like, they'll just go 70% pass heavy, chuck it all over the field and let Herbert do his thing and just kind of use some sort of rotation between Roundtree, Kelly, and Spiller as their main backs. One other note on the Chargers, and I mentioned this to the guys in our group chat with all of our guys. Joshua Palmer's got a little dog in him. He played really well on their first drive. He had a really nice, like kind of a deep shot down the sideline where he had to adjust. His touchdown was on a screen where he had to, you know, kind of wade through traffic. he had to wade through traffic, make a couple defenders miss.

Look, last year, you know, Joshua Palmer didn't really get on the field. But if the charger, if, you know, one of Keenan Allen or Mike Williams misses time, there's some significant opportunity for Palmer. He's going to be a starter in their three wide receiver sets. I think, you know, for redraft and start sit one, you know, start sit leagues, I don't think Palmer is going to give you a number. enough consistent target volume to really crack your lineup unless it's a deep, you know, 14 team league or you've got a lot of flex spots.

Let's say if you've got three receivers and two or three flex spots, then Palmer becomes a good target. And your typical like one quarterback starts sit leagues where you have two running backs, three receivers and a flex. I don't know. You know, Palmer's probably a good depth piece, but I don't think he's going to be a consistent starter. But that being said, man, he's one injury away from having a huge role.

And the three games, Palmer played 60% of the snaps as a rookie. He had five for 66 and one. He had five for 43 and one and four for 45 and one. And again, I was him as a rookie. I think Palmer looked fantastic this past weekend. And I think he's going to be a really underrated part of this offense. His ADP has been screaming up in sharp underdog drafts all summer. But you can still get him as your wide receiver five or wide receiver six.

And I don't think there's really going to be a price where I'm out on Palm. in best ball leagues. Moving on here, Eagles running back situation is always a fun quagmire to try to figure out. Miles Sanders is nursing a hamstring injury, and I think the team's just being wisely precocious with him. That's why they held him out this past weekend. But Boston Scott and Kenneth Gainwell both looked really good.

Scott got the start, got the entire first drive, had 11 touches for 45 yards, and he plunged into the end zone. And Kenny Gainwell came on the field at the second drive. And he did the same exact thing. He had 11 carries 4, 6 yards, and the score. Nice little goal line plunge for him as well. Both of them look good. Our guy Greg Cosell told us that Gainwell is trying to bulk up a little bit this

off season. He's put on like 10, 15 pounds, try to play in a bigger role. I noticed that too, and he still has the same explosiveness in burst. This is a true three-man backfield. Miles Sanders has been a power fade of mine all offseason. It's just one of those things in Vesbo, man. And like, sure, Sanders might have a couple weeks where he goes off, but there's an opportunity cost in drafting him in the eighth round. Like, there's receivers I like there. There's quarterbacks I like there.

And, you know, I just don't think you're going to get enough return on Sanders at ADP to really pay that off in baseball just because of the opportunity costs, especially in redraft leagues, man. Like, I would much rather just take a shot on game well on 12th or Scott super, super late than figure out what to do with Miles Sanders. because look, I mean, not only is Scott and Gamewell going to be involved on early downs, Jalen Hertz is their goal line runner. He led the team in goal line carries last year. I see no reason for them to go away from that this year as well. A couple final notes here, wanted to get through the Giants, and their first team offense played three drives on Sunday.

Daniel Jones' box score looked ne' but watching the game, man, he looked sharp. ball placement was really good. More importantly, Giants protection was really good. Not only they keep Jones clean, but they opened up lanes in a run game, which was good to see. I have no freaking idea what Daniel Johnson is going to do this year.

I don't know. I've got them in that, like, QB2 bucket, like QB18, QB19. That's where we've had him in projections all offseason. I don't think you can really count on him in one quarterback's leagues, but I do know Brian Daibble is already making his light. easier. The receiver room, man.

Kedaris Tony has been milking a hamstring injury. He had a knee scope this offseason. When Tony's on the field, he is electric. He was in top five in targets per route run last year. Every time he was on the field, he got the ball. But that's the problem, is him getting on the field. Tony did not play this weekend. So, Kenny Gallaudet led their wide receiver group in snaps.

And to be honest with you, I've the effort level just isn't there from callback. I'll just put it there. We'll just leave it at that. It's a nightmare. Juan Dale Robinson was there two in the rotation, but they didn't really give him any downfield targets. All three of his targets were Addernerner,

the line of scrimmage. His average of the target was actually negative one and a half. That's because he took one of those, you know, orbit motion, kind of handoff dumps, bobbed it. I don't know if it was a bad toss by Jones. It looked a little high and tight. But that being said, Juan Dale didn't do very much.

He did run some deeper route progressions when I was watching the game on replay. He looked really quick and out of his breaks, but he just really wasn't a big part of their progressions. I think Wondale is the best bet by far of this Giants receiver room right now. Darius Slayton has an undisclosed injury. Same with Ricky Seale as Jones, so we didn't see those guys. So Daniel Bellinger continues to be their number one. He played on 12 of 17 pass plays with Jones on the field. He is their locked in, tight in one come.

week one. Final couple notes here in this Ravens Cardinals game. I had really just wanted to watch this game just to see what their both teams running back rotations were going to be. We got, we've got clarity, I think on the Ravens. I'm less certain on the Cardinals, so we'll start with the Ravens. Mike Davis was the starter. He played on 12, the first 16 snaps and the first two drives, and then Justin Hill, excuse me, Justice Hill, mixed in way more on the third and. fourth drive. So for right now, Mike Davis is there too. Gus Edwards is working back from knee surgery. I haven't seen anything on him. I've seen there's an ESPN NFL Nation report that Edwards was behind. Beyond that, man, I have not seen much more on Edwards. So he's full on fade,

especially in best ball. Like you just can't risk the take, you know, taking zeros, even with some of these late round running back picks like Edwards. So he's on my avoid list. J.K. Dobbins is knee was apparently tired. Shout out to Edwin Poritz, who's the injury goat, man. He puts in more work than anybody in the game when it comes to injury and injury news and just trying to find signal through the noise. But he found a great quote from Harbaugh about a week ago now that Dobbins is still kind of ramping up with his conditioning. His leg was tired. You know, he had an ACL plus. We really don't know what the additional damage was. It was never, haven't really seen a fully sourced report, but we do know it was an ACL plus, you know,

other damage elsewhere in that knee, which complicates his return. It complicates his return to full 100% form. There's a number of studies, like I said, that Edwin has put out there and sourced that, you know, really return to form off ACLs for backs is year two. It's not year one. Dobbins is somebody I am treading very, very lightly on because where he goes in the fifth, sixth round, like, I feel much better about the receivers. I feel better about the quarterbacks in that range. Like, I am not trying to take a dead zone running back when I can take Dave Davis in the fifth round. Like I'm, or Brandon Cook's in the fifth round and get those guys as my wide receiver three. Rishad Baton as my wide receiver three. I just can't do it. Cardinal side, I'm still not totally

certain on their backfield and who their two is. I'm totally reading the tea leaves here. I try to be as objective as possible with some of these first team snaps. So we do have to kind of read the tea leaves a little bit. Eno Benjamin got the start, but then played well into the second quarter. Dorel Williams played four snaps on the first two drives. He got one carry and then he was taken off the field. To me, this means Kingsbury was kind of protecting Williams and he wanted to see a little more out of Eno.

Regardless, I think Williams is kind of like the spell early down guy for Connor. Eno is going to mix in as like kind of a change of pace, third down back. They've got to protect James Connor, man. Like, I think they know Connor can't go out there and handle 80% of the workload and they can't expect him to hold up playing 80% of the workload. I mean, James Connor has got one of the longest injury histories of any running back that you'll see, especially, I bet you if you compared the injury history of all the running backs

they're going in the first three to four rounds. Like Connors is right up there among the worst. You know, he's played, you know, 14 or fewer games, basically every year of his career besides last year. And then, you know, it kind of fell apart due to an ankle injury. Late last year, just because the workload was so strong. So I think it's kind of my projection and I think our site's projection is spot on, you know. We've had Connor with like a 60% of the workload.

And then, you know, Eno and Connor splitting the final, you know, 2020. If Connor were to miss time, I think Williams is my preferred handcuffs just because he can handle goal line work. We've seen him do it. And he's a fairly good pass catcher, too. We saw him have a couple nice games with the Chiefs as a pass catcher. Whereas Eno's role, I think is Eno's role all year. Like he's just a change of pace guy. He'll mix in on some passing downs.

And that is just his role. Guys, we did it. 35 minutes of a ton of preseason reviews. I have an article up on the site. you can read way more detail. I try to put as many like highlights and film pieces as I could in there too. So you can get a look at how these guys are looking as well. Again, put on on Info Network this weekend.

We watch some of these games, see for yourself. If you were not subscribed to fantasy points.com, what the hell are you doing? We have so much content, man. It is unbelievable how much content we have between our franchise focus and team previews. I spent all offseason previews. the entire NFL with my stat pack series, went division by division, have a couple, a ton of great notes in there. Man, Hansen already has this draft plan up from two to three weeks ago. Scott Barrett's been putting out the best redraft work in the space. And I'm not just blowing that, you know,

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your go-to for DFS embedding content this season. Guys, thanks for listening. We will be back later this week. I'm going to try to get Scott on the horn for a couple quarterback, running back, receiver, and tight-in shows. We'll kind of preview the landscape after everything we've learned, grinding out. the preseason usage. And until then, I'm Graham.

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