Fantasy Football Daily - 2024 NFL Draft Discussion with Scott Barrett and Sigmund Bloom

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

Scott Barrett (@ScottBarrettDFB) sits down with one of the best analysts in the business for this Fantasy Points Podcast. It's the co-owner of Footballguys, Sigmund Bloom (@Sigmundbloom). With so much NFL draft content out there, Scott and Sigmund put their years of fantasy football experience together for a breakdown of their favourite prospects and a look into the process they use to sift through piles and piles of fantasy football data. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's time to the Fantasy Points podcast brought to you by FantasyPoints.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. Ladies and gentlemen, you are listening to or watching live the Fantasy Points podcast. Very special guest today, the one and only Sigma Bloom. I think I've told this story on your. show a few times, Sig, but I want to hit it here. So I was like a baseball diehard. I started in the industry as a fantasy baseball writer, obsessed with that. And I didn't like really fall in love with

football, fantasy football in particular until right out of college, I was working the soul-sucking nine to five job that I was just so miserable at the only benefit was you could just listen to podcast while you did your work or have your headphones in while you're working all day. And I found your podcast and I just became obsessed. I listened to every single episode you did. Really caused me to fall in love with fantasy football. I just didn't hear anyone thinking about things on your level. I've always said you're fantasy football's best philosopher. It's just like kind of how your mind works, very outside the box thinker. And yeah, I don't think I would be here where I am if it wasn't for you and your podcast. And whenever I do your show, it's the only show I still get really nervous for,

because like that's how much your show means to me. But hopefully, hopefully now that I'm on my home turf, now you're on my couch. Right. Things are a little different. We'll see. Yeah.

Yeah. Thanks for that. And, you know, like so many other people, roll sandbox, your work as far as past anything that I've done, to dedicate with depth and breath,

chatting last week considerably. Well, that's more reassing for me. It's what a lot of this in the fantasy football world at large, is that in a time, in an era, whenever we have a lot of worries, we're all traumatized,

we're all struggling. We're all trying to reconstitute things that have been broken or never even activated in our lives that are supposed to nourish our spirits, our souls. We have created this space, a safe space, if you will, where we get to gather around a fire of not football, not professional football, but the complete commitment of all the people involved in professional and what it creates. And then we can hang out and enjoy it together. And so many people are doing it in so many ways that I feel like we're at a golden age of be fluent and conversant. These topics, we can have just the most amazing conversations about them. Yeah, yeah, I agree.

It's crazy. Like, you go back and you watch a draft from eight years ago, the level of discourse versus what it is today. It's at such a higher level, elevated consciousness, if you will. At the end of every show, you always ask me some off the wall, non-football questions. I know we talked about Alan Watts one time. And so I'll have to come up with. something good for you at the end of this show. You always have good answers. But yeah, so you brought up

the Sigmund Bloom, pre-draft 100, always been one of my favorite articles to read. And I said this to you in DMs is like, it feels like I'm saying this every year, but we are very aligned. And like your article dropped before my wide receiver article and very, very similar with these wide receivers. And so I kind of just want to dig into this article and kind of ask your question, some questions, see where we're aligned, maybe the few instances where we're not. But I'm looking at at the top, the Superflex top 25, right? And so you see Caleb Williams, Jaden Daniels, Marvin Harrison Jr., Malik Neighbors, Romo Dunzei, Brock Bowers. Nothing surprising at all to me there. I know it's different for some other people, but that feels just about perfect to me. The question I have for you is how

tight was it in between Caleb Williams and Jaden Daniels? Because this is something that's been keeping me up at night is, should Jaden Daniels be the QB1 in this class? I know that's crazy because everyone's like, oh, Caleb Williams is this generational talent. He is DJ Moore. He is Keenan Allen. It's impossible to fail. Caleb Williams is not Brett Whitefield, our preeminent film mind director of charting and fantasy points, not his QB1, had a lot of concerns. But more importantly, it's just Jaden Daniels, the element he brings as a runner that Konami code upside that cheat code upside and you hear people talk about him it's like well maybe he's Lamar jackson he might even be a better thrower than Lamarja or um or rich man's RG3 and then the floor is Justin Fields and it's like I mean that's great

Justin Fields was a mid-range QB1 every time he was on the field and like he was not good and like I think this guy's way better and to just have that Konami code sheet code upside is just like so massive in fantasy. So my question to you, how tight was it between these two names? And like, do you see any, do you find that argument at all compelling that he could be the QB1? Oh, I think that it's certainly within the range of possibilities. And they're tight enough, I'll say this, Scott. They're tight enough that, that we know Caleb Williams, Shane Waldron, an offensive line that is jelling, Keenan Allen, DJ Moore, Cole Komet, Gerald Everett, and it's not simply those. It's the commitment by the organization.

as Matt Williamson put it on my, build a nest. This is what makes Caleb Williams so different than every other quarterback that has gone number one. Because they're usually rescuing a franchise at the trough, at the bottom of their curve. And he is joining a franchise going up. And when we look at

Jayden Daniels' most likely scenario, it is going to Washington. We've already seen Cliff Kingsbury and Kyler Murray and how that won't. Not great. Even though it was his handpicked guy. It was a guy he's been looking at across the room for five, six years. He yet didn't create an atmosphere. You know, that's the interesting thing about Cliff Kingsbury and Air Raid.

And I guess as we're at the cliffhanger here, some folks might be watching this after the draft. You know, is it Drake May? Isn't Drake May actually more of the air raid quarterback than Janiels? Now, where does Jada and Janiels go if he's not number two? New England? Don't love that. Not fan. I mean, I don't want, New England does not seem like a place that fosters the best possible development of players.

And then, well, would the Raiders trade up? I think if he gets the three, the Raiders, not Minnesota. I think the Raiders are they have to look at it. That's not, I'm not loving that. Luke Getsy, this is the guy we're talking about what he didn't do with Justin Fields. Now he gets Jay and Daniels. So when I run through these scenarios, that's actually the gap. Because Jaden Daniels from a fantasy perspective, a deal.

It's just a question of three, four, five years down the line. Are we still going to be able to count on him? I feel more confident about that with Luke Williams, even though he doesn't have for fantasy quite as high of a ceiling. Now, if Daniels ends up in Minnesota, Scott, we might flip that right. I think that was perfectly put. I think that's really important added context and nuance that I, you know, I just wasn't thinking about.

You're right. Like the gap between a Chicago landing spot and the other three is massive. And where it's like, hey, probably not, but like, hey, if Justin Fields went to, you know, a better O.C with a better supporting cast, you know, maybe he wouldn't have been just recently traded for a, what, round five pick. So I think that's super important. And like, that's something I kind of neglect. Like, I just wrote half the length of catcher in the rock.

based on like the analytics of all these rookie players where it's so much of it is landing spot dependent where two guys they're clones one goes to the right OC who knows how to use them either goes to a donkey OC or a regime that's about to get turned over the following season one's a pro bowl or the other's a bust and like that that absolutely can be the case uh uh you know i was just to say dj more is a terrific you know he wasn't even he's not even in an ideal situation. He was with Justin Fields and Lou Geatsy. But that's when we finally got to what DJ Moore could do. How long did it take? So, but I think what you're doing is valuable, though, because what you're doing makes sense in this part of the process because you're talking

about what we know. We don't know destination yet. So I like idle chatter. So I don't know if you have anything to add on this. I just remember we were talking about this. So you have Brockbauer six within the tier, uh, the, the big crucial tier and then at the end of it. And I think that's, I think that's right. Like, looking at his analytics profile, like, I can nitpick some things, like, very screen dependent, but just like his production relative to, uh, Ladd-McConkey, around two-pick, Adonai Mitchell, around one, but Jermaine, but just smashing them, uh, looks, I said, like, no worse than the second best tight end prospect in at least a decade. Right. And so the, uh, mock draft industrial complex, we hear them saying, uh,

Yeah, but like he's not going to go so early in the draft because, you know, he's a tight end. And you look at the contracts these wide receivers are getting and the contracts that tight ends are getting. It just doesn't really make sense. And my counter was just, well, look at that second contract. Because like if you're drafting a guy here, you're expecting to get them on a second contract. And not just that, but it's like, I've always maintained that high, like in the aggregate, tight ends aren't very valuable. But highest end tight ends are among the most valuable players. in all of football.

Rob Grancowski was the most valuable non-quarterback of his era when he was on the field. When he was missing games, Vegas shaved, what was it, like 4.5 points off of their total, which was more than any other non-quarterback by a landslide and more than a lot of good quarterbacks. And like Steve Buzzard, who worked for you guys at football guys basically does this, his own model. He was saying the exact same thing as like, no, no, no, Gronk is the non-quarterback goat of his era, elite blocker, best, you know, per target efficiency of any receiver.

And it's just so valuable to an offense. And so I know we communicate a little bit about this. I don't remember exactly what you said. But what are your thoughts on Brock Bowers as a prospect, maybe for fantasy, but also in terms of NFL value to a team? And I've been quoting you. I mean, I've been quoting you a lot, a lot in this cycle because a couple of things that you do, did, well, first of all, because even though you're working from a model

and you're inputting a lot of numbers. You still understand the story that those numbers tell. So when you make that, and I was just doing, I just quoted you on our show today about this idea that, well, let's just assume that Georgia is at, or especially in those few years, the top of college football was the best program in college. And then you look at all of the future NFL talent that was with Brock Bowers

at an early point in his career. And that they looked at these guys and they said, that guy is a guy that's going to be central. in our offense. That's meaningful. That's really meaning. We got about breakout age and market share. That's meaningful. You know, and it makes me think that another wrinkle, and we can only do this backwards looking at how much NFL talent was a player playing with. And that makes market share a little bit different because I think we're getting into this where it's skewing, say, like, control and worthy and things like that, yards per route run and so on. But I think you pointed out

as important. And then the other thing, and I love how, you know, you and I are, birds of a feather like this, where when everybody is saying something, examine the other side, just look at the other side. I'm not even saying you have to truck with the other side and say everyone's wrong, but at least consider it. And if the problem is, you're not banking, and I just quoted you on this this morning too, if you're not banking all this surplus value, oh, you know, wide receiver tops out at 30 million, quarterback 45 million, an offensive tackle, 30 million, whatever. And a rookie contract, you're not banking this extra money, right? Because tight end only makes $12 million or $14.

If you're right about the player and why are you drafting them if you don't think you're right, then you're going to make that back on the second contract because you're talking about a player that's impactful as a wide receiver on your passing game, but you only have to pay half the amount. And the NFL PA has allowed the teams to control this. Well, how they're listed on the depth chart. Brock Bowers could line up 100% of the snaps detached from the formation. And if they put him at tight end on the depth chart, then he's going to be a tight end when

comes to figuring out what is with your option, et cetera, et cetera. So I think you put all that stuff together, and then you're saying, well, maybe a smart organization is the one looking at Brock Bowers, who everybody has as a top five overall prospect. Nobody argues about that. They just argue about where he should go in the draft because they're overthinking. And then we get into possibilities again. Jets at number 10 is where we start. Oh, that would be.

I would not be. Denver at number 12. I think they don't take a quarterback. It will probably be Brock Bowers. Then we're looking at Indianapolis. I don't feel about that. I don't know. I mean, I want to like it.

I want to. I mean, really, what we're hoping for is that enough teams buy into this tight end, the value argument, and he falls all the way to Cincinnati. They then parties on. You just said a few things that I think were great. You kind of like cut through the noise. Like, yeah, I could riddle off yards for route run market share stats all day on Brock Bowers. But at the end of the day, he was the best offensive player at 18 and 19 on two incredibly

stacked national championship winning teams with a quarterback who was alternate. drafted day three. Like, that is just insane. And it circles back to what we were just saying about the importance of a highest end, tight end. And then you also said how, like, I love picking your brain on process. I just like love the way you think. You're such a unique thinker in this space. You have to look at the other side of the argument. And that's like the most important thing. And like, that's what I do in my evaluations. Like my rookie articles, it's basically here is the upside argument, here is the downside argument, and here's most likely. Like, that's the way to think. But like in fantasy, just like on Wall Street, right, like all the best investors ever, Warren Buffett,

Charlie Munger, Seth Clarman, they all call themselves contrarian investors, because that's where all the money is. You buy low, you sell high. And in fantasy, it's the same thing. All my best calls were the ones where I was going against the wisdom of the crowd and I fell in love with the contrarian argument. It's, you know, Lamar Jackson sucked as a rookie. He's going to be a bus. And I'm like, I'm actually going to bet him to win MVP and lo and behold. Or Christian McAfrevee, like sophomore season. He's, he's too small. He was inefficient. And it's like, well, you know what? Levianne and Bell was inefficient. Ledean Thomas him was inefficient. And there's all these other things. So, yeah, I think I would quantify you as a contrarian as well as myself.

And I think that's where all the value is in this, this market. Well, it is. It is. because this is something I try to touch on once a couple of years. Well, first, actually, since you said bilose, all high, and I, that's one of the columns I write at football guys, it's called by low sell high, and I've been writing it longer than some of the people that's probably even a lot. But now, Scott, a lot of what I write up in that column is buy high, sell low, because the actual, like the information is so good and it's so, it's disseminated so quickly and so, it's so, so thoroughly that you can't find by-lows and sell highs any. It's actually you have to sort through the buy-lows and figure out which ones are the Fugazi so you can take advantage

of that. And actually you should be, when people are saying buy-low, it's really a cell low to figure out which ones are the cell low. Likewise with the buy highs, right? We bought C.J. Stroud, when everyone was starting to wake up to how good he was six, eight weeks in last year, you won. You won that trade. I don't even care what you gave up. You won that trade at a time when he was a high, a player on the rise. So I think because, of that contrarian view it's i mean this is one of the weird things about doing what we do is you have to on some level be aware of what other that's where that's through api other people's articles or twitter or even just fielding question even just fielding trade questions and start sit question

you start okay this is what people actually thinking because it isn't just being right it's understanding where the biggest gaps the most arbitrages is what we think is likely to happen and what people are projecting so you know i do think you have to look at what if everyone's wrong and then And the other thing I like to say is the true buy, low, sell high or getting the inflection. I always talk about it in terms of inflection. You're trying to jump in at the inflection point and occur either where it's topped out and it's about to come down or it's trough and it's about to come up again. It might, it should feel scary, right? Like the best buy low, sell high deals you make at the time that you probably are doubting yourself.

Geez, I really might be like stepping in it right now and cleaning off my shoes for a while because if you're going contrarian, it's going to be scary. You're going to see the weight, including of people that you trust, saying this is not the right move to make. But that's what makes this fun in the end. And why people are still winning, money, so on, is great. But having it be your team with your decisions. Isn't that why we started doing this, GMs? Play around, have some fun, do some things that seem crazy because the other thing they think that people underestimate about fantasy football or just the fortunes rising and falling. And this could go back to MLB, too.

You talk about baseball. All kinds of things. sound insane. Three months later, become the conventional wisdom. Three months later, that's all it takes. Sometimes one month late. So don't get stuck on what everybody thinks. Yeah, I loved your point on buying high and then just like selling even higher. I was just thinking about like imagine it imagine like being in a dynasty league in 2001, right? You're you're selling high on Tom Brady with a second round rookie pick, right? Or 2003, you're selling. high on Tom Brady two rookie pick. In 2006, five rookie pick. I guess what? All those are wins for you.

You just sold 10 first round picks and held on Tom Brady. Like that could have been the value you were getting to Superflex roster. But you also mentioned Arbitrage plays. And when I look at Brian Thomas, who's you have at eight, this is like one of our big disagreements, I think, except like we're aligned with rankings. Like that's exactly where I have him. It's just like I kept coming up with arbitrage plays. I liked more. The big concern I had with him, he looked,

and I think you hit on this in your write-up, is he looked pretty one-dimensional to me. Or like, he was a late breakout with like only one good year, and his quarterback won the Heisman in that year, and he didn't really sniff Malik neighbors, and then 50% of his yards came on just one route, the go route.

It was an elite season by, it was the best ever season in PFF college history by yards per deep target. But it's like, That's kind of really all he showed you. And so I liked Jermaine Burton as an arbitrage play, another guy who was like really only a deep threat, but graded it. And there are a few other names like that. But when I look at that, I see, and again, this is my wide receiver four, but I look at that and I see a player who's probably better in real life than fantasy.

Because like think about Will Fuller, think about Tori Smith, even Deshawn Jackson. Who are those guys? They were frustratingly volatile on a week-to-week basis, better in real football than fantasy football. And then I also think about, like, maybe this archetype is even worth less in today's day and age with the rise of too high coverage, you know, designed to stop the deep ball. So I don't know. Did you struggle with him as much as I did? To me, I love the big three. I think they're all guaranteed wide receiver ones, all worst case scenario, Drake London.

and then a massive tier littered with wide receiver twos and threes who are going to be landing spot dependent beyond that. Yeah, I think that I put them in an order. And look, Brian Thomas is first because he's likely to be drafted first. And he's likely to be a first round pick. And I mean, think that draft capital, it still, it matters. It matters. I'm going to quote Ryan Riddle for the second time today.

Early draft picks have to prove they can't play. Late graphics have to prove they can. So first round draft picks are going to get a lot of change. chances a lot. And Brian Thomas is likely to be fourth wide receiver off the board, probably in the middle of the first round. But if he goes to Indianapolis, right, he may fall behind five or six guys that are ahead of him, that he's ahead of right now. Like, who's Buffalo take, right? That's what everybody wants. Everybody wants Buffalo to come up for Brian Thomas. That solidifies him number four. Because now you have a quarterback and you have a role where he doesn't have to really grow.

But to your larger point, which I think is important, bead wide receivers present value in ways that don't necessarily show up on their statistics. So Xavier Worthy, and why did Henry Ruggs go as the first wide receiver in a class with? It's because it distorts the defense. And you mentioned too high safeties. You mentioned that as you're taking away the big play down for you. And you have to play too high safety when one of those guys is on the field.

So that might diminish their stats. But now what do you have? You have the running game. And that's going to have lighter boxes for the running game. And otherwise, the spacing of the defense is going to open up more. So a player, I don't know if it was you or Thor, that compared Brian Thomas, Dickson Watson. Probably Thor, but that's a good one.

That's a good one. Yeah, I thought that was really good. Because what is Christian, now hamstring aside, what is Christian Watson going to be worth in fantasy? Because you have all these complimentary pieces that can play different roles. And it's not just, okay, some weeks Christian Watson is going to have three catches for 150 yards and two touchdown. Some weeks he might only have 15 yards.

But everybody else, because the defense has devoted more attention and resources to making sure he doesn't beat them at the top. And so now where it gets really fun with someone like Brian Thomas is if he does start to develop those other parts of the route tree, and you think of something, really? I mean, D.K. Metcalf has been a hit, but not because he's learned all the other nuances of the route tree. It's just because he's so dominant as well. And I think that's the other thing about this class that's really confounding, but also

hopeful is that the wide receiver position is segmented really out in the three role. And it's a WR position, but teams are smart and understand that we're going to only use this player in, like another good example is releases, right? I can't even tell you. I think Aaron Kelly comes to mind a long receiver with some buildups from Clemson. Remember watching at the Shrine game practices. And he never even saw the field because he couldn't, he could not solve press coverage. He could not figure out how to get released. Teams are understanding now how to get those guys free, right? Teams, and we have so many of these little guy, you know, forget about the next Devo Samuel, who's the next tank dell, right? We have so many of these.

little mighty mite types in this class, Scott, where you'd say, oh, boy, they're going to get manhandled by press coverage. How many snaps in the slot can you free up for it like this? But teams are getting better at setting up the receivers to do what they know they already do well in the context of their scheme. So that makes a circle all the way back to where does he land? Is this team that develops players well that puts them in roles that they're going to win? Does he have a good quarterback?

Is the offense going to function well, the offensive coordinator, et cetera, et cetera. and that means whatever this the second tier, four to whatever. It's going to get totally shuffled. If you're not shuffling it based on what happens in the draft, then you're not being honest about how important that is to their eventual outcome. Yeah, so you just mentioned this. And I think you retweeted a thread I did about this, particularly that Xavier Worthy and Troy Franklin,

the low BMI speedsters, are going to be the most landing spot dependent wide receivers in this class. It was based around this quote from Greg Kassell who was saying, yeah, Tank Dell wouldn't have been drafted five years ago. But now in today's day and age with forward-thinking OCs, they're getting players like this free access off the ball where their route isn't impeded by press or physical, bigger cornerbacks, allowing them to show their strengths with like lateral agility and explosiveness and things like that. And that's so massively important. And so for Franklin and Worthy, I'm like very, very landing spot dependent. where do you want them to go? You want them to go to a motion-heavy team. Right.

And no surprise, the top six motion-heavy teams are all the best offenses in football. It's one Mike McDaniel far and away, and then it's Chiefs, Lions, Rams, all the best ones. And so for those two players, you're really looking for that. And that was another knock on worthy as well, or just like a weird concern was that his OC, or no, his head coach was Devontas-Smith's OC and his head. Heisman winning season where it's like, okay, maybe he knew how to mitigate the size concerns. But if you put him with like a Jeff Fisher in the NFL, like, all right, I'm really worried

about Xavier Worthy. You give him a Sean McVeigh, and I'm like, this is going to be fun. But I wanted to circle back. What was the quote on the importance of draft capital? What was the quote you just listed off? Ryan Riddle, who wrote some tremendous stuff to report back in the date from the player. Early round picks have to precant and late round picks have to. So in the end, it may not matter because if you're an early round

pick and you get multiple opportunities, if you don't have it, then you don't have it. You don't have it on the fourth time and the fifth time in the time either. But I do think that draft capital represents how long the leash is going to be, how patient a team is going to be the player. It may not actually change the long-term outcome, but you know, player like Devante Adams. I mean, he wasn't a first round pick, but still he was a player that they had envisioned a lot for, so they march up to move on from him. Go well earlier in his career. So I think that matters. And I think it also, on the flip side means we have to be patient with some of the later round. picks, you know, and then we can play these what if games. Like if Isaiah Pacheco got drafted to a different

team, would we even be talking about him? So opportunity is important, but obviously what they do with the opportunity is what determines in the... Yeah, draft capital is so predictive and so important, in part because you and I talk about the assumption of rational coaching. Well, what about the correct assumption of self-interested GMs, right? And so I always, I always think back on Adam Thielen, who was competing against Cordorrell Patterson, a round one pick. Greg Jennings, who signed a big contract. And the beatwriters at the time, like, rookie sophomore season are like, this is the best wide receiver on the field.

He's blowing our minds. And it took him so long to break out. And then I also think about Steve Kime. I forget who the wide received, Trent Sherfield, I think he was interviewed after he left the organization. And he was like, yeah, I was told by a coach, you're like, deserved to be a starter. but the GM doesn't want to see you play. He wants to see the drafted guys play.

It makes him look bad when the UDFAs are out playing his second round pick. I said, like, what about Greg Dorch? Like I've been saying for years, Greg Dorch is just a better Ron Dale Moore, but he's a UDFA, so you're not going to see him play. And so, yeah, I have all these concerns with Brian Thomas, but ultimately wide receiver four and a big reason why is because of that projected draft capital. I will tell you, if we could have a little therapy session for a second,

is there was a point during this process, because I don't remember a year with the wide receivers where the film versus the analytics were so misaligned where like Adonai Mitchell, it's like, it's only red flags. There's not a single green flag in there. And for a lot of these got older players, not very productive, but supposedly a top six,

top 10 wide receiver in the class, where I had this moment of nihilism where I was just like, it's really draft capital all that matters and like where it's just you could have a clone of two players, one goes round two, the other goes round six. The round six guys out of the league in a year.

The round two guys, great. He's a good fantasy player, but it's just you're not invested in his success as a GM. You give them more opportunities to succeed. If you fail, you get excuses made. And yeah,

and like we don't have say over, you know, how to use a player. We're like, I think worthy is a guy who needs motion and all this other stuff. He's great on screens and then use his deep, deep speed.

But it's like, you give him a Jeff Fisher and it's just like, oh, this guy's a bus. Or necessity. Quentin Johnson, I think, is a terrific example. It's where just misfortune for his team, right? And this is where I think that the film watching and the analytics and all of the work that is done by people like you to set the scene. Here's the landscape of this player based on what we know for they get drafted.

Here's where they struggle. Here's where they're strong and so on. Quentin Johnson was a player that you could see going the first round. I mean, well, first of all, just as a quick aside, where does Quentin Johnson rank in this class? Oh, right. Like 9th? Yeah. 11th, right?

Quinn Johnston, I mean, geez, you're actually looking at like Xavier Leggett and you're like Quentin Johnson or Xavier Leggett. You know what I mean? In this class, in last year's class, some people have number one on their board because he's big, because he's fast, and because he does know what to do once he has the ball in his hand. Now, that kind of slot. And that's the other thing about the slot, when I say that's segmented into three positions, well, geez, even slot is segmented into big slot.

and Little Slot. So it's not even, you know, you can subclassified these guys based on roles within roles. But Quentin Johnston, everybody who was being honest about him said he's not ready to be an outside receiver yet. You're drafting him in the first round on a projection. And if you're using him as a rookie, here's what he's proven he can do now. Well, because Williams gets hurt, because Josh Palmer gets hurt, the chargers have to use him outside and he looks terrible.

Well, guess what? He still can't do what he couldn't do, you know? He's still not a contested catch guy. He's still not a guy. Yeah, he's fast. Yeah, he's big. That hasn't changed. But yeah, in the NFL, no, he's not ready for NFL competition at corner.

Then you, confidence. So this is another thing about a player's trajectory of their career. It's confident and how much of a role that plays. And whether you're given too much too early or whether you're doing like Puka Nakuwa. Puka Nukua, if you were paying attention last year, Jordan Rodriguez told us, wow, it looks like they plan on him doing a lot this year from rookie minicamp and OTAs he was saying that and at every

point he met their expectations so then they added more and then he met the expectations they added more I don't care what Pooka Nakua was in your B draft rankings or even after he got taken that's where you actually win in your diet and that's where you buy high right oh someone took him in the third round

maybe if I give you a future second right now so that that's where you can win but playing all these counterfactual scenarios I mean I when you said clone a player. I think that's it, right? I mean, I like to say, now we're going to really on the couch. You want to talk about therapy. I mean, I, one of the things I like to say myself is thank the heavens that we don't have another version of ourselves, that we can try the other in our lives, right? It's actually a great burden lifted that you don't have to worry about whether

you made the right choice or not, because for all you know, if you had made the other choice, it'd be even worse. You would be even worse off. So just keep looking forward and keep living your life like these teams. But I think that's the scenario. The one that I always bring up is, is Bryce Young and C.J. Stroud. Bryce Young had gone Texan. C.J. Stroud had gone to the Panthers. How different are the stories we're telling about. How different of the stories we're telling about these franchises?

I don't know, but I think it highlights how important. No, I love that. You know, I always live by everything happens for a reason or like the best outcomes or we live in the best of all possible worlds. The best outcome is always, you know, whatever you ultimately chose. Because like, you might as well just think that way, right? You're just better off. Yeah.

I'm looking back at these rankings. You're pretty bullish on Jonathan Brooks in comparison to the, to the consensus. Yes. And I completely agree. Like in this class, like far and away the best three down potential,

which is just massive for fans. In a PPR league, targets are worth 2.5 times as much as a carry and no other running back in this class has that upside. I also think, I also think like his ADP

is going to skyrocket because he's going to be the first or second running back off the board. And there are some good landing spot. So why don't you tell me a little bit about Jonathan Brooks and what you're envisioning in terms of draft capital,

and ideal landing spot. Yeah. And I think that the important thing here is that he's the only back in his class. You can comfortably project as a, right, unless he doesn't get all the way back from it. He has the well-rounded skill set of a three-down back. The other backs, I mean, Trey Benson has the makins of a three-down back, but he hasn't been this one yet. So I think that it could make us wonder.

But, and he'll go a little higher than Damien Pierce. But, you know, I think we're saying sort of similar things about, well, if Damien Pierce, maybe he was in a committee in college, but he wasn't. He didn't need, and we'll find that out. Well, I'm not comparing them directly except to say that when a player, you know, again, what's meaningful? You mentioned players that had low efficiency in the rookie year, like Christian McCaffrey and LaDania Thompson.

Well, what was meaning, Levyon Bell? What was meaningful? Was it meaningful they had low efficiency? Or was it meaningful that as a rookie, their teams trusted them that much to handle that much of the offense? Well, in hindsight, we can see for all three of those guys, it was the volume and the trust as a rookie that was more not what they were able to do with it to get opportunity to refine their game.

I think Jonathan Brooks, he projects. as a three down back, comfortably as a three down back. And then what I really like about Brooks when you watch him, Scott, he looks like a veteran running back. He makes decisions like a veteran running back, right? The way he engages with contact. And he's not the strongest back in his class, but he can get yards after contact. He's not the most elusive. He doesn't have the most, but he can force mistackle. He's not the fastest, but he can break long run. So he's not the superlative of anybody, any of these particular things, but when you put them all together, you have a foundational running back. and I think that he's the only one in this class,

and even if he goes to Carolina, I think Dallas or Carolina, even if he goes to Dallas or Carolina, if he goes to Carolina, I'm not going to move him out of that number one. I mean, I think my next player, running back, I think I have him six at one quarterback league

and my next running back. So it would take something pretty astounding. Because the thing about Jonathan Brooks also is, I don't even necessarily care where he land. Even if he lands somewhere he's blocked this year or this year next year. I mean, running back's a young man's position. It's going to turn. You know, the Texans draft him.

He's behind Joe Mixon. I mean, by the middle of next to that backfield, that might actually be the best case scenario, because he's going to converge with an offense that's ascending instead of an offense like Carolina, where maybe he'll overtake Tuba Hubbard really quickly, overtake him in terms of the lion's share of the backfield touches, but in a bottom half, even bottom quarter of the league offense. When you're flying Emirates business class, dining on a world-class menu at 40,000 feet, you'll see that your vacation isn't really over until your flight.

is over. Fly Emirates. Fly better. That's partly why I liked Brooks so much is like I don't see him as landing spot dependent. Like you throw Blake Corum to the Panthers, that sucks. They're trailing every game. He's not getting carries. He's not getting targets. But you put Brooks there. It's like, okay, they're trailing in every game. He's not getting a lot of carries. But now they're peppering him with targets, right? And so volume, far and away, the most important, it's just about everything when it comes to fantasy running backs. And so I project him to be a volume running back. One running back who, it surprised me how high you were on him, I actually didn't write him up. And this is the one player who, you know, if I can find the time, maybe I'll add him before the draft is Kamani Vidal.

Yeah. I just, my model has a strong bias against group of five running backs and he wasn't projected to go earlier than round five. So I never got around him. So why don't you tell me why I should add him to my article and get excited about him? So many people have him as their favorite. And I'm on the Matt Walden RSP. He will, you will see that Waldman thinks he can play.

And he is a proven volume back. Now you're right. You have to devalue that a little bit because of Troy. But still, I mean, there's a durability question that comes up there. And also he had a three down skill set. But as I know, I mean, he's only 40th overall. Highly likely to be a third day. And he's going to have to be one of those guys that prove he can play.

And again, Isaiah Pacheco is a good example where, you know, if Isaiah Pacheco had landed somewhere else, we might not be talking about him yet. I mean, even Chuba Hubbard, but it took a while for us to even talk about Chuba Hubbard. But I think there are, but it's, there are others. I think that you have a sleeper running back tier. I know Blake Watson just meet general Jeremiah's top one. He's another one. Dylan Johnson, I know, is a favorite of Matt Waldman. He's another one.

So, you know, we have these running backs that are not going to go in the top 10 running. backs off board or it would surprise if they go in the top 10 off the board. But they've, they've shown more skills and more things that translate as compared to. So here's somebody guys that have below vidal, like Isaac Garando or Raylon Allen. These are guys that have the physical trait that the NFL really love, but they haven't necessarily shown to unlock them with skills consistently. It ain't going to be easier to do that in the NFL than it was in college. Bucky Irving is another guy, I think, that is a little bit polarizing. You know, Bucky Irving could be another

Kyron Williams he'd be another guy don't tell me about the measurables tell me what he did with the ball in his hands

and show me how much of his game is based skill or Bucky Irving could be like another Chiquis Rogers who I liked I'd like

to quiz Rogers lot but you know his limitations limited his upside so you know there's a lot of this

where glass half full glass half empty and I think that if we're being honest as analysts we're just trying to tell a story where we say

if this player succeeds, it will be because this, this, and this are the determinative factors in their outcome. And if he fails, it'll probably be because of this, this, and this. And then as you track their career, you start to see, okay, which path are beyond? And you can maybe act before you get all the evidence, because I think that's the number one thing you can take advantage of Tennessee footballs. There's so many people that are like, no, I want more evidence. I want more evidence. Can I just have one more piece of evidence before I buy into this? And if you're an early adopter, because you've massaged your brain with Scott's work, with Matt Waldman's work, with Dane Brugler's. There's so many people doing. So absorb it all. And then as you are reading and watching football, the path illuminate, you're like, oh, okay, this guy, Isaac Pacheco, Isaiah Pacheco, right? What did Isaiah Pacheco have going for? Effort. Oh my gosh. Effort, effort, effort, effort, effort. He ran the ball, like his life depended on it. Every, like he had to get the message through enemy lines or his country was going to lose the war. So once you put him next to the other options in Kansas City,

yeah, he's going to stand out. Yeah, he's that and there's going to be enough for him to stand out and then take hold of that. So you want to understand what the strengths and uses are. So you understand what's coming next. And I think with this running back class, three or four or five of them other than Brooks are going to have at least some periods of fantasy relevance. I can't say which guys, those guys, not yet. Yeah, I just want to say shout out to Matt Waldman and the RSP. I've been a reader since Amir Abdullah. I was going to war for Amir Doolin. I know he was high on him that year. Yeah, so we just talked about Vidal, I think, is like one of your favorites. Who are some of your favorites? Like, you're in a rookie draft. I don't want to leave the rookie draft about him. I love this guy. I'm going to keep up for him. One of my guys, Jehine Bell, I appreciate. I saw the, I saw the shout out in the article. He would be on my list. Who are some of the players on your list? Well, I'll say at tight end Benson, and I know a lot of people were on the bench, but this is a guy that I know Matt was talking about him in O' Plow game. He's on the snow.

I got to talk about Dane Bruegler's Beast again because it always starts with biological information. One of the things about him in the beat, he didn't play tackle, he didn't play football until he was in fourth grade because he didn't want to play flag football. He wanted to hit people because he was a hockey player since he was three years old. Imagine the hockey team with him and J.J. McCarthy. He was a hockey player three years old. And he played something like six or seven sports school, I want to say. But I really love about Benson and it. And sometimes Scott, I mean, I'm an emotional fantasy football player.

I'm an emotional GM. Yeah, I go on hunches. Yeah, I go on gut feeling. I mean, I have to live my life coloring between my fantasy teams. I'm fun. And he just has that joyful warrior. Rob Grancowski, George Kittle, kind of approach to his game, where he likes it. He likes how brutal the tight end is.

He thrives on it. I think that Ben's in it. And this is a really interesting tight end class because you could make an argument from a fantasy perspective. For any number of, I don't know, four or five, six guys to be the number two tight end after Brock Bowers. And we can see with some of these guys on the rise now, a Trey McBride, a Sam Leporta, you know, McBride was the first to tighten off the board in his class, but he wasn't this generational prospect. It was a second round pick. And he was a somewhat limited second round. He wasn't always going to be a do everything tight end. Now look how

valuable he got really quickly. Look how valuable Sam Laporta. These are number one and number two dynasty tight ends, where were they at the beginning of the season? Were they even in the top 10? And now they're one and two in most rankings, if not one and two, very close to. And I think the one of these guys, again, Bell, I think is a good example. I love the case you lay out for him in terms of analytics. Sanders has more of the prospect traits profile that will translate. And he held his own with Worthy and with Mitchell as a viable prospect.

Eric all is interesting. We don't scout based on helmets, but at some point you have to say, this program knows how to identify talent and develop it, right? And Eric All has the medicals that you have to worry about. But again, if a team is willing to take him in the third round, you should probably be willing to take him in the- I love it.

I think one thing you're going to do way better than I can do, although I have to get started on my mock draft tonight if I'm going to do one. Best or ideal landing spots or like worst, possible landing spots, just like any landing spots you're directly rooting for, you know, Ladd-McConkie the chiefs, does his ADP just go nuclear? Is there any landing spot for the big three wide receivers where you would get nervous? Just any thoughts on these landing spots? Yeah, I want the receiver that's paired with Kyler Merck. I think it's going to be him. It should be because we saw what he did with DeAndre Haas. Kyler is not, I think Kyler's a great by-low right now,

especially in terrific, terrific by-lo. And part of it is because he's going to get paired up with somebody, one of the top. And if it's not one of the top three, that means they just got a boatload. Okay. So then they're still going to take wide receivers. I think you're looking at a draft, not the Andy Isabella Hakeem Butler draft, but, you know, hopefully better picks than Andy Isabella Hakeem Butler. But I think you're going to see the Cardinals go to the well more than once at wide receiver. But I think you also see Kyler Murray not necessarily playing with a lot of subtleteans.

It's like, hey, Marvin Harrison here gets open on every play. And he's not open. He's open. He's open. The play, I'm going to throw to Marvin Harrison, Jr. the same way I threw Andre Hopkins. The worrisome one, I think, and in a general sense, Scott, I think Seekwan Barclay said, right? How do you feel about Seekwan Barclay now that he's?

Because you're going from a situation that was almost impossible to a situation that's iree, right? So, or I'll give you another example. I've seen Malik neighbors compared to Garrett Will, you know, I mean, in terms of like the kinds of the abilities he brings to the field, right? Now, maybe this is a reason to not be too scared of taking Malik neighbors the giant. because Garrett Wilson, the jet, even through all of his struggles, is still very, very valuable because everybody can see he can play. Get a quarterback and get the ball to him consistently for one of these years and stay healthy. I think that you might be looking at that as the neighbors first three or four years of his influence. So two things I want to say.

Cardinals are in like, this is what they desperately need. They need an outside wide receiver one. And so they are in the perfect spot. I've heard rumors per sources. they really like O'Donzee. I don't know if that's true. You never know what these sources, sources stuff,

but I mean like Marv or O'Donzee on the outside is so crucial. Last year, Trey McBride, I think ranked 15th among all players and yards per route run against zone, second among tight end. So like feasting against zone. And then against Mann,

Arizona was a bottom three team. Michael Wilson just about basically average 0.00 yards. but route run against man and rondo more ranked bottom five of like 125 qualifiers so that is what they desperately need i love that i will say and maybe it's just because i'm a giants fan and i want them to draft neighbors so badly i kind of like the spot like i think there's a higher floor than people are giving credit for where like i'd be a buyer um just because like i think he can do brian dable a former wide receiver coach uh coach some great slots in new england i think he could do a lot

Wondell Robinson stuff, at a bare minimum and do it at a much higher level. And then could also be their wide receiver one where, you know, maybe the quarterback play is brutal, but like they have no one else anyway. And so volume is enough to overcome that. But that could just be my, go ahead. Yeah, you know, and you make it really simple. Like you set up some structure around Jones, kind of like what was set up around Chris, where it's like, we're not, we don't want you think.

That's the last thing we want. Like Colin Kaepernick, maybe that's a better comparison. Like Colin Kaepernick was never going to. sit back there and should have won the Super Bowl. I mean, it didn't last, but I think you can do that with Dan. And kind of like what we saw with Gardner Minchu and Michael Pittman, like just neighbors is the read. Neighbors is the guy you're going to throw it. You know, it absolutely could work. There's a lot of uncertainty. And again, that all comes back to why this is so difficult, because I'll tell you, you know, I'll, I'll wear my L's. I don't want them. I don't

care. There's plenty of them. You're not saying anything interesting to big L's. Probably one of my least favorite landing spots ever for a player. A player that I liked was A.J. Brown landed. I think I moved him down to 17th or 18th in my ranking. Like how is he going to get it done in Tennessee? Sometimes a player is just so good that all the things that seem to apply their situation before they showed up don't apply anymore because they're that influential on the offense and neighbors absolutely.

Sig, this was amazing. This is beautiful. I promised you a non-football question to cap it off. I'm going to ask you, what is like some piece of media you've consumed over the past several months, whether it's a book, music, TV show, movie that you've fallen in love with or you can't stop thinking about? Yeah. I will go actually, I'll do two answers. One, I'll go back to, it actually goes back to football. And we've both been listening when I say we, I mean, the love of my life, we've been listening to across the river, which is the Kent Bab, standing sports.

writer, outstanding writer, wrote when he was embedded with the Edna Carr football team here across the river on the West Bank in New Orleans. And they won four straight state champion as a public school majority African Americans, which is if you know about the highest levels of high school football, I mean, Louisiana, this is a football hotbed. Southeast Louisiana is right there with Miami is like the football hotbed in America. And they won four straight state champion. How could they possibly do it? And they let Kent Babb have complete access. They even told like we want you to write everything like we don't want you to filter it uh it is it is eye opening to say what goes on and especially in a place where we hear these kids saying like i feel safe when i'm at the

football program what might have when i'm not there's a lot of stories about that too so the book is across the river and then hulu did a series called algiers america which kicks in the next year after across the river um it's a little more cinematic it's a little more overture operatic than all of the amazing and you are there you get from across the river they're both incredible Edna Carr

you know Patrick Sartan went to Edna Car I think we were the latest players to come out at Nicar was free anyway so check out if that sounds interesting the Edna Car program

across the river Algear's America but not so much media because I'm going to bring in live music I might love live music more than football I did get to see a concert about three months ago

Lucinda Williams and Lucinda Williams is not that like her stomping grounds was like you know Lake Charles Charles triangle, but just like down I-10 from you.

And then Austin, Outlaw Country, and she's still doing it. She's still out there, even after she had a stroke. And we got to go see her at a little place here called Chicky Wawa that was a really small room

for Lucinda Williams. And I was just in awe because it's somebody that was actually there. Somebody had, like when she sings a song about Tom Petty, with Tom, I mean, you know, she sings a song about Blaze Foley. Look it up, folks,

Blaze Foley, Austin. She really lived it. And her music, the best way I can put it, There's a lot of gospel music about being found. There's a lot of gospel about when you're saved. But there's another side. The other side is how does it feel when you're lost?

How does it feel when you want to be saved? We don't know if you deserve to be saved or something when you're off. And Lucinda Williams music is such a wonderful companion to those time in your life. And it really came through getting to see her. So I recommend to check. There's an album she did called I think Gravel Wheels on a Dirt Road or something like that that she did in the 90 incredible stuff. So yeah, those are some things that have stuck with me.

Well, the theme you're describing right now that she's uncovering with her work reminds me of my favorite writer, Dennis Johnson. Oh, yeah. I've gifted over and over again Jesus's Son. Oh, yeah, that's a classic. That makes me think of Drugstore Cowboy. Have you ever seen Drugstore Cowboy? No. Oh, man.

I'll check it out. The Drugstore Cowboy is set like in Oregon. It's 70s. It's a tremendous film. I think Gus may be wrong. Put that on your list. Next time I talk to you, you better have seen drugstore cowboy.

If you love Jesus, son, you know, all I just added all these to my list. I'm going to be selfish and try and sneak in one more question. Okay, just in case you have one,

if you don't have an answer, that's all right. What is like a burning football topic that you haven't really talked about, but you want to talk about? For some reason, I kind of want to ask you about Belichick and like,

to me, it's just so weird that he's not hired, so that's a possibility. Sure, sure. Well, I mean, I think that, I mean, Belich kind of intersect

of what I was going to say. Here's the burning football topic. So let's talk real quickly about Bellichick. Everyone should check out that Seth Wickersham. I can't remember the other writer that did it. Yeah, he's so good. Well, because people talk to him. People tell him stuff that they pull, right? So a lot of really embarrassing stuff for Belichick, right? Not exactly painting Belichick, not even just Belichick, the entity as a football coach, but how he's, or how he's thought of it. The question I ask when I read that article is, why is this getting out there? Who's putting this out here and why? It still is a Tom Brady. There's still some sort of like feud.

I mean, you also have this documentary series that everybody was, players were coming to Belichick's defense, right? And saying, why are they only portraying the negative? Even the Kraft family was like, oh, if we would have known that was what it was going to be, we might not have even contributed to even though there's a craft name on there. And there was some quotes about what the craft said, like Robert Kraft called Arthur Blank and said, don't hire Bill Belichick. You won't have a warm conversation.

Now I'm also going to add in here, Hunter, Henry. I don't know if you saw what Hunter Henry said about Jared Mayo, not about Bill, but they did say, ask him, how has it, how has it changed with Mayo? Or a player, you are, he's standing. His energy lights up a room. And the other one, he said, and even the way he said it, he said something that's back to Scott of like, you know, just listen to us sometime. You know, try that. Try listening. So that, and that was in response to how it's changed. So I think that this Belichick story intersects with the William's story. What's the thing that you can hear? gosh, it's painful, Scott, when you're anonymous scouts and stuff like that on Caleb Williams.

They just don't understand young people. They just don't understand young. But they frame it as like, I don't know about this guy. He's hiding something. I don't know how the locker room's going to react. I don't know how the fans. Well, how is he going to do if he faces adversity? You're just saying, he makes me uncomfortable.

I don't know how to process. And that may be why Belichick didn't really get it. Because there's this sense of old dog and new tricks. And, you know, it's one thing to be a figurehead like Mechum. McCarthy where the team's already used to running itself. And that's not the Belichick program. Belichick's not going to be a figure hit. And I think that while he has something that worked at one time,

I don't know if he can this coming generation of players, like a former player, like a Jared May. And I do think you're going to see the cocoon of old school, like stuck in the past in the NFL. The franchises that hold onto that mentality are just going to fall farther and farther. Yeah, you said something about this makes them uncons. comfortable because they don't understand, you know, this generation. And I'm thinking about there are scattering reports from 15 years ago where it's like, this player has tattoos and like that's a red flag.

Right. It really could just boil down to that. But circling back to Belichick, and you have to understand, I'm biased. I'm like a huge Belichick Homer. Sure. Because he's given the Giants so many Super Bowls. And I just, I just think he's hilarious. You're saying like there's all these negative reports in that article, and that's true. The Falcons sources, were like a little bit more generous. They were like, yeah, he's, he's comfortable working with the GM. He doesn't need total control. And then there's all these other negative sources.

And it's like, my favorite quote, Charlie Munger, show me the incentive and I'll show you the outcome. And it's like, who has the incentive to be bad mouthing Belichick to such a degree? And it has to be craft, right? Because like, how bad do you look? If you let Brady walk, he wins a super low, you let Belichick walk, he crushes. Then you look like an absolute idiot. So they're like incentivized to see him fail.

And then you're reading this article and it's all these GMs or people talking about, well, he thinks he's smarter than you. And so that's a big concern. Guess what he is smarter than you. Like maybe he lost touch with like the younger generation or whatever. He's too much of a hard ass. He is undoubtedly like one of the top three smartest minds who have ever lived when it

comes to football. And like another big concern was from the Eagles and a couple other organizations was like, well, what if he just retires after he breaks the record? And then you only get three years from him. And then you're starting over. To me, if I were an owner, like, I don't care. Like, I am hiring him because in those three years, he's going to be, I'm going to be made so much better off for it. Everyone within my organization is going to become so much smarter that like three years of Belichick is worth more than anyone else. And like, you know, he probably just, yeah, my son's ready. And then you give the son a shot or something. But I could just be the world's biggest Belichick Homer, but that's what I got out of the

article. I don't, I mean, I don't think that that's outlandish. I think you have to have the right situation, though. I mean, I'm reminded of the Giants finally winning a Super Bowl with Kaufflin because that was the year that he let up, right? That was the report. Because in 2007 was finally the year that Kaufflin's like, all right, all you all have gotten better with my tough love, and I'm going to actually relax a little, you know, I'm going to let, I trust you. I'm going to let you spread your wings. And I think that if Belichick could be brought into a situation where a lot of that were there, but they needed, maybe the charger, you know, that you needed this discipline. You needed somebody like whatever, a group of kids because mom and dad were always gone,

we're kind of like raising themselves. And then at a certain point, that's great because it creates independence and self-reliance, but then maybe having a role model can help too, you know, and maybe coming into that kind of situation. But the other side of that, I think, that also was mentioned in the article is if you hire belichick you're installing belichick system you know you're not you're not going to half measure belichick you're not going to have i mean having belichick as part of a committee and i'm not saying you can make him an emperor but there's the belichick way you know do your job way and when you commit to that and i don't know if it's so much the two or three years down the line i would just come back to like is that going to be an approach that resonates now it's always one of

those eternal questions scott like winning is the great deodorant right i mean you tolerate all kinds the thing you're winning. And the very same things, you will not tolerate when. You know, who tried the Patriot system? Matt Patricia, Josh McDaniels, like seven other things. I think that Belichick himself said they were all better soldiers in general. Which is a great quote, by the way. So you just mentioned Tom Coughlin and I'm a Giants fan, like love Tom Coughlin. The one thing you hear is like even from the players who hated him at the time, like he was such a hard ass, but I love him so much. Like I would go to war for him. I would take a bullet. I love that man with all my heart. And I don't think you've ever heard that from Belichick. Like, I don't know that he can relate to people on an emotional level

where he's really just like a robot. Do your job. Do your job. And so like that could be holding him back. I wonder if you get to see like, well, he's doing this, this Pat McAfee show for the live stream, which is either going to be really entertaining or like not at all. But I'd like to see him kind of let his hair down a little bit and show some personality if he has. And he does. At Desjardin, we speak business. We speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans. We've mastered made-to-measure growth and expansion advice, and we can talk your ear-off about transferring your business when the time comes.

Because at Desjardin business, we speak the same language you do. Business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us, and contact Desjardin today. We'd love to talk, business. this time of year, right? It would always be at this time of year or before the drafty, like around the combine.

And someone would ask him a question about football. And he would go on this seven-minute story or full-backs or long snappers. Right, right. Something close to his heart. And then you would see, like, he actually has a lot of interest. And he actually, there are times that maybe he wouldn't light up a room,

but he lights up. There is emotion. There is sentiment. But when it came time to switch to football, he's like, you're right. I don't know that he was somebody that was touchy in any kind of way, not even like behind closed doors when you know because i think the other thing is scott and again

this i think is 21st century thinking is the right management style is to evaluate the person you work with and what works for them there is no one right and i don't know if if bill bellichick too late to really on that and that's okay because he is he's on the mount rushmore of coaches he's a football he's not even just a football encyclopedia or supercomputer he kind of has merged with capital f football He's kind of like Vince Lombardi. Like you think of like football personified, but he's football in the rear view modified. What he needs to be is like what Rich McKay is doing, the very guy that they thought was an obstacle to him being the head coach in Atlanta is a consultant. As someone you run things past, emeritus, who's sitting there to say, well, have you thought about this before you do that?

But not necessarily somebody that has the final say. But I look forward to seeing you. And, you know, I think that's, again, part of what makes the draft so much fun if you're New England. fans, finally, you're going to get to draft in a way that's not the Belichick way. That was the weakest part of all of his. I feel like when he was there, like, the GMs, I mean, the, the scouts must have, like, put so much effort into, like, is he a personality fit? Because, like, more than anyone else, like, he broke Mac Jones, or at least that's

the narrative. Is he just, like, mentally broke Mac Jones and ruined him? And, like, Tom Brady, like, okay, well, he coached, he turned a backup into the greatest of all time with his coaching. That's incredible. But it also wore Tom Brady thin and where he was trying to get out and go to Tampa Bay.

And so, yeah, that's an important factor. I don't think you ever really hear a lot. Yeah, he makes it tougher on them. And the word was, I was trying to talk now. Isn't it funny when there's like years and years when nobody's to say, well, check away.

And now people are talking. The word was, I can't remember who reported this or where it was anonymously quoted, that the coaches basically got to overrule the scouts. The scouts would do all this work all year and then so much would be based on and not just personality fit although I think you're right that's really just

fit in the scheme because the scheme was a little more rigid or for what they were looking for was more rigid this is why the Patriots reportedly always had the smallest board of any team they would always have a very 100 120 this year I heard it for Sam to say

like this many players are drafted on our board because you have all these filters all these knockout factors where you just don't look at certain players because they don't fit what you're looking. But I think, again, flexibility is so important NFL now. And, you know, so Patriots fans will see. That's a, that's in some ways where the real draft starts if Jane Daniels, like the good news is we won't be talking about ifs in a couple of days. Well, I'm excited for that. We definitely going to do a show together. Yes. Maybe on your home turf after the draft,

talk about some of these landing spots. SIG, thank you so much for having, for coming on. You want to tell the folks at home anything about what you're cooking up. your podcast, your home site, Footballguys.com, now home to Football Writer of the Year, Adam Harsstad. Shout out, Adam. Isn't that awesome?

It's great. So overdue. So overdue. Yeah, well, and what I love is, it gives me so much hope for our community that someone like Adam Harsstadt can be the football writer. Because he's even, he's,

I can never dream of esoteric, because he's as far as jumping between references, taking something out of psychology or something out of science, and applying it to football, to fantasy football. We're going to be live during the first round, Matt Waldman and I and a bunch of guests, just reacting. I mean, not whatever. We'll have plenty of time to comb through all this and do our work.

You're going to react to what happens in an actionable advice way. The fun thing during the draft is hanging out with people, experiencing all the ooze andaws that happen, the laughter, the tears, doing that. Cecil and I will be on the audible on our podcast going through Division by Division. The following week, Bloom 100 with post-draft rankings will come out probably Tuesday. If you want to hit me on Monday, if you have a draft conference, you have a draft It's fun. Maybe fly on instruments. I don't know. I don't know if you're not. But it's great, man. And I'm just glad that we get to spend this time together. And most importantly, like Adam Harsdad, like Matt Wald and like all these people we're talking about. The fantasy football world is really great. Letting us be us. Right. We aren't trying to all be like each other. In fact, we're trying to be more. We're not trying to be more. We're not trying to be like ourselves. What's makes each of us offer something we can offer. Oh, the audience. A lot of gratitude for that because there aren't many places to work and feel like you can just show up to work. and be yourself. I love that.

Folks at home, have to take away for you. Don't try and be anyone else. Just try and be more like yourself. SIG, this was a blast. You killed it. Thanks for coming on. See you guys all soon.

Thanks for tuning in to this edition of the Fantasy Points podcast. Remember to subscribe, rate, and review on your favorite platform. And come join the roster at FantasyPoints.com.