Fantasy Football Daily - Projecting Trendy Fantasy Teams with Rich Hribar | 2Barz Podcast

Episode Date: August 25, 2023

@GrahamBarfield and Scott Barrett (@ScottBarrettDFB) sit down with Rich Hribar (@LordReebs) of Sharp Football to discuss some of the trendiest teams in 2023 fantasy football -- Chargers, Cowboys, Jets, Chiefs, and Saints. READ DR. EDWIN PORRAS' INJURY [PRO]NE GUIDE WITH CODE INJURYPRONE25: https://injuryproneguide.myshopify.com/ Want to join a high-stakes dynasty league -- or any other high-stakes league? All new FFPC users get $25 off their first FFPC league of $35 or more, including dynasty orphans, using our affiliate link: ⁠https://myffpc.com/cms/public?affid=fantasypoints⁠ ⁠FANTASY POINTS PROJECTIONS ARE LIVE⁠ FOR ALL STANDARD AND PREMIUM SUBSCRIBERS! Interested in playing Best Ball in 2023? There's no better place than Underdog Fantasy. ⁠Use our code FANTASYPTS⁠ to sign up for a new account at Underdog, and not only will you get a 100% deposit match up to $100... but you'll get a Fantasy Points Standard subscription for only $5! ⁠https://www.fantasypoints.com/underdog --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/fantasy-points-podcast/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. It's the third annual, I think it's the third annual edition of the three-ball. Bars podcast. You usually get two bars. You get Scott and I. This week you have a third bar. It's Mr. Rich Rebar. You can follow him on Twitter at Lord Reeves.

He does fantastic work over at Sharp Football. You know him from his in-season worksheet. We were just talking about the end-season grind and Rich. I read your worksheet religiously every week in season. I know we're coming up on the cusp of it, man. It's a good time to talk to you. Good time to talk ball. I mean, biggest draft week of the season is right around the corner.

who better to talk to than Rich. How's it going, man? What's going on, guys? Yeah, I always love catching up with you guys. I'm sorry I missed you guys in person. You know, Graham, I finally got to meet Graham in person last year for the first time. Didn't see you guys at the Expo. And like you said, it's just one of those things.

It's the Jesse Spano gift, right? You're so excited. You're so scared that the season is starting. I've started to have already put together the week one worksheet. And I'm just like, oh, boy, it's here. Oh, boy. It's a good time of year. Good time of year. Scott is feeling a little under the weather, but he's grinding through it.

He's over here in his red room. He's got cigarettes in the ashtray. He's got spoon blasting in the background. But Scott's chilling. How's going, man? Yeah, yeah. Suffering had, I don't know, 72 hours of migraines still ongoing, but excited, you know, excited for Rich Reeve-Bard. This is always, you know, one of our best shows. Love talking with Reeves, who's like, I don't know, a sort of savant when it comes to, you know, I need like a Google Doc up when I'm reading my dang stats. But rebar, it's all off the top of the dome. It's a thing to behold. That's why Rich is the man.

Scott, I'm just getting a kick out of your fat head in the back. It just makes me laugh every single time. Just like floating over your shoulder. It's so funny. There's nothing else on the wall. It's actually incredible. Well, it's perfect. John told me to go ahead and buy a giant fat head of that.

And I was like, all right, yeah, you know, that's kind of funny. And so I was expecting it to be like life-sized and hang it in the back. And I guess I just, it was in centimeters and not inches or something like that. And now I just have this very tiny me in the background. It's hilarious. No, it's seriously perfect. It looks like a woody doll, just like floating above your shoulder. I always get a kick out of it.

All right, today we got Rich on, he's the master of top-down projections. I seriously, I do read pretty much everything Rich writes, and I'm always fascinated to see how Rich views teams. So today we're going to talk about four, maybe five, if we have time, we're going to talk about four big fantasy teams. And I'll just get it started here. Let's kick it off with the Chargers. Obviously, Kellyn Moore, new offensive coordinators in town.

Justin Herbert just got the new contract. We've got a new receiver in town, Quentin Johnston. So let's start at the top. What are you expecting to be different from this Chargers offense? How can we expect this offense to be different under Kelvin Moore? And what are your thoughts on Justin Herbert and all of these receivers? Yeah, it's always interesting when you talk about, like, you know, I started doing, you know, projections, man. I mean, it's crazy because, like I just told someone the Konami Code actually is about to be 10 years old next month.

Wow. It's like, that's how long, like I've been fortunate that, like, said, but I'm aged in this game. And, you know, when I started to do, like, projections, I was one of these people that, like, would go back and look like a lot of coordinator stuff, right? And, like, you know, try to, like, incorporate that into, like, my projections. And it took me a couple of years to kind of realize a lot of that's kind of garbage. You know, you see people, like, kind of, like, talk about, like, well, this coordinator has done this for this position. Though, like, doing projections for, like, a decade plus has literally gone back and seen, like, the ball goes to the best players, right? Like you can have schemes like schemes that players like coaches want to run and stuff like that and you can incorporate that.

But like the ball goes to the best players and your personnel grouping almost always gets weeded out to of the course of the season like who your best players are. There used to be like all these narratives and we were coming up like Bruce Ariens doesn't use his tight end. Kyle Shanahan doesn't use his tight end. You got to have a Kyle Shanahan X receiver. It would like it all just goes back to the personnel like those guys had like during those periods. You know when Bruce Ariens had Heath Miller it was fine. And when Bruce Ariens had Rob Grunkowski, Rob Rancowski was good. You know, when Shanahan got George Kittle, George Kittle is a good player.

The ball finds him sometimes, not as much as we all would like to. But I always try to, at least for a starting block, you know, try to remind people like, when you look at coordinator stuff, always go back and you have to, like, adjust for personnel. You have to look at personnel. That's like literally one of the biggest, like, policies you can do is just go down like these things and start projecting like position targets out, like based on. you know, what coaches have done in the past. And you see this a little bit with the Chargers a little bit.

Because a lot of people talk about how the Cowboys use their tight ends and with Gerald Everett. But when you look at the Chargers from like a top down stance, like, how does Gerald ever get targets, right? Like he's not going to, he's not going to draw earned targets over Keenan Allen. He's not going to earn targets over Austin Echler. He's not going to earn targets over Mike Williams. He's probably not going to earn targets over whoever the wide receiver three is.

So like you already see some like where we try to retrofit some things that like Kellan Moore is in his past for. certain players and try to retrofit that into another player. And anytime you try to do that, that's like a real slippery slope with projections. And I know that was long-winded. I'd even answer your damn question to start off. But like, I'll at least kick it back to you guys to kind of roll with the conversation here.

No, no, I think you're right. I didn't mean to like, I'm 100% with you. Like I think in general, there's like five or six play callers that like really matter and really make a difference. And then every single year, there's like, like you said, you know, based a large part teams, you know, format their scheme based on the players they have. You know, we were not going to talk about the Cardinals today, but I think they're going to be a lot more 12 personnel with Ertz and McBride,

and then obviously Hollywood Brown and Michael Wilson. So, yeah, I'm with you. But in general, like, I think with the Chargers, it kind of matters, right? Like Joe Lombardi was not very sharp at all last year. This Chargers' offense did not throw past the sticks. In fact, on early downs, Herbert had the second lowest average depth of target in the entire NFL, only behind Colt McCoy. So I guess that was kind of my start.

point with more is like what can we expect this offense how can we expect this offense to be different vis-a-vis last year and then you know how again how can we project out keenan and mike williams from that stance well i think when you look at it it's when you look at like the a dot stuff and i don't want to give jo lombardi any type of hall pass because schematically what the types of plays he is calling were just you know dated anyways but when you had the injuries to mike Williams and the injuries to Keenan Allen that the Chargers had and your top three players in terms of routes and targets end up being your running back who led the team in targets, Austin Eccler, then Josh Palmer is second.

And then DeAndre Carter is third on team in route thrown. Your ADDOT's going to suck. It doesn't matter. Because when you're talking about like the top down targets where they go, depth of target is a wide receiver stat, right? Like it's not a quarterback stat. So if you're projecting Justin Herbert to make this huge jump in ADOT, right? and a lot of people are, who are the targets going to?

Like, it has to be Mike Williams or you're betting on Quentin Johnson because if the top two targets on the team are Austin Echler and Keenan Allen again, your ADOT's not going to make a seismic jump. It just can't, right? Like, that's where those players earn targets. And if those are your top two target earners on the team, your ADDOT's not going to go crazy, right? Like, it can go up a little bit, but like, it's not going to go wild

where you see Justin Herbert, like, being this mad bomber. Like, we want him to be Dan Reno, right? Like, we do. We want that to happen. And so you have to, if you're betting on a big, big, a dot jump for Justin Herbert, you have to be betting on Mike Williams or Quentin Johnston to be significant target earners.

That's where I'm at with Mike Williams. I'm a lot higher than most on Williams this year because like you mentioned, if we're going to expect a more aggressive passing game and we've kind of read a little bit about that out of Chargers camp, that Williams has been more involved specifically out of the slot. And I think that matters. Like I'm still expecting Keenan to be.

60%, 65% in the slot, but getting Mike in the slot, like 30% of the time would actually be huge for his stock and fantasy because over the last few years, he's only been like 11, 12% in the slot. So yeah, I've been higher on Mike Williams than I think most. I still have Keenhan higher in my rankings. And Scott, I know you've been really high on Keenan this offseason. Yeah, I think what's blowing my mind here is that Justin Herbert led the league in dropbacks. last year, his 699 pass attempts ranks fourth most by any quarterback all time.

It was almost twice as much as Chicago's 377. And Chargers player is just end coaches keep talking about how their mind is being blown by how much faster, how much more pass heavy and aggressive this offense is. And so it's like I was talking to was it Pace God, Pat Thorpe. about this, but it's like they already were at the fastest pace in the league. So imagine them with like taking that up two extra notches with Kellyn Moore. Like should the median projection for Justin Herbert be like the most past attempts by any quarterback in NFL history? What do you think?

I think, yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is a team that when you look at them how they're structurally built, like they're built to throw because I've thought like forever. the chargers were one of these teams that should have signed one of these like dusty guys that were floating around right like maybe dalvin was too much money but like the zeeks the four nets the cream hunts like one of those guys made so much sense for this team because when you look at the non austin eclare rushing attempts this team had last year and it was absolutely abysmal the the carries from these other running backs and ecler's already a guy that they want to alleviate workloads for anyways it's like they don't really have anything else behind him and like these guys aren't They shouldn't run the ball with these guys. Like any of these other guys, they shouldn't hand the ball off to any of these other players. So, like, they're built to throw the ball around. And then they're going to play in the right kind of, you know, conference to have to be forced to throw the ball as well. Yeah, I appreciated how the Chargers didn't spend a third or fourth round, or sorry, waste a third or fourth round pick on a shitty running back this year.

They're just like, yeah, we don't need another one of those. They tried that a few times. And they're like, yeah, we've been burned on these dudes before. I was with you. I thought they should have signed Kareem Hunt or Fournette. I guess they still could. Next week, rosters go down from 90 to 53 on, I think it's Tuesday or Wednesday. There's going to be some running back movement.

Maybe the charge rolls will be a part of that. Flipping the page here, easily back over to Dallas. Rich, obviously, you know, Kellamore's gone. There is a lot of speculation about what this offense is going to look like, pass versus run. I'm with you. I look at personnel first. And if we look at Dallas as personnel, they're going to be a pass-heavy team. I know Mike McCarthy's come out and said, I want to run the damn ball to rest my defense.

Whatever. Boomer McCarthy can say whatever the hell he wants. You look at his history. I mean, he was a past heavy offense coordinator. This is a West Coast offense. They've got three great receivers. Michael Gal was back healthy. So vibe check.

Vib check on Dallas. What's the rebar? What's the rebar projection on Dallas, Dak, Pollard, all these dudes. Yeah, I'm the same way. I mean, when you look at it from a personnel grouping, and I know everyone's excited about Jake Ferguson, and I listen, I'm not going to yuck anyone's Yum of taking a shot on Jake Ferguson in these best ball drafts is where he goes. But to expect him to get like Dalton Schultz's target share again, that doesn't like that's

not transit of property. They add a guy like Brandon Cooks, who's already been a guy that's been a productive player. Brandon Cooks himself, I mean, he's been, I think he's one of the better values out there. I think at worst, he's a miss small pick where he's going. And at best, you're getting an absolute viable wide receiver two. And then probably the apex outcome, if something were to happen. the CD Lamb, you get that massive contingency value out of him as well. Because when you look at Dallas, like they don't have this team that you remove Zeeke,

you remove Dalton Schultz, like the two succubists from this offense last year in terms of snaps and usage and you replace them with Brandon Cooks. You get Tony Pollard in there. Like there's really not a lot behind Tony Pollard. We'll probably see Deuce Fawn. It would be like a four to eight touch guy probably, which I think is really fun, right? Like if something were to happen in Tony Pallor, Duce Fawn would never be like the, the, the contingency bet, but like they probably use more of like a committee, but like getting him

on the field for 48 touches per game, it looks pretty fun for this team. And I think they're going to throw the ball. What you're worried about with Dallas is just how good the defense is and like the schedule, right? Like is there going to be a period here where like they're just suffocating teams in the second half of games and like they're able to kind of slow things down just based on like the Eagles did this a lot last year, right? Because like Eagles in the first half of games last year were a really aggressive offense.

They were top eight, you know, and drop. back rate and then like they just kind of flooded teams and they didn't have to do shit in the second half of games like it does that happen to this dallas team i think there is potential for that to happen a lot on the schedule because his defense is so good the pass rush is so good their secondary so good uh that you run into like these second half game scripts maybe they slow things down but this team when you look at it like this is an 11 personnel team because you get you said gallop is never like a really good like kind of anchor wide receiver two but he's like a really solid wide receiver three that can get vertical cedy lamb

is one of the most versatile wide receivers. He absolutely smoked in the slot and out wide last year as one of only three wide receivers that was in the top 15 and yards per out run and earning targets out of both areas, the middle of the field and out wide. And they just don't have Noah Brown has their wide receiver too anymore, right?

Like it's really, when you look at this team for the top down stance, like they're made to play 11 personnel this year. Yeah, absolutely. I've been taking shots on Jake Ferguson. like one of my favorite last round tight ends in best ball too obviously a lot to get excited about hype wise but i'm with you i mean at the end of the day i mean we're looking at cd lamb minimum 25% target share then like you mentioned i think it'll be cooks 20 to 22 then like gallops always in that 18 to 20 range and then what's left for ferguson i i got to i'll flip it right back to you rich

where do you have pollard in your rankings because he's a guy i think he's i mean i've been drafting him a ton in the second round i think he projects like a first round pick but where do you have him kind of in a loaded, honestly now, top six, top seven. Yeah, I have an eighth overall RB3. I actually think that there's a case to be made that he's a better pick than Austin Echler. We didn't really talk about Echler a little bit with the Chargers, but like Echler had like really weird kind of splits last year based on like who was on the field, you know, with the Chargers, you know, and when they had Mike Williams and Keenan out

available, his actual like route participation was way down. So I'm really curious to see if like that's something that's sticky with Kellan Moore or not. It's hard to take that as transit of property because all the changes they have and the Chargers still have nobody back there. But I think Pollard's like in contention because he's one of those types of players. I'm curious Scott's take like, is this what like the new like running back and fantasy looks like these guys? Like when you look at McCaffrey, Echler, Pollard, because like we're losing these like true traditional like Belkow guys, these three down running backs. Like it's continually getting siphoned in the NFL. We only had

what, four running backs last year, average 20 touches per game. It was like the fewest in like a decade. Like is it these guys, like these 210 pound guys that like can just catch and play all three downs, but like don't get 350 touches? Like I'm real curious to see like what you think because you obviously are like the bell cow dude. Right. Yeah, I think it goes back to the work I've done in weighted opportunity where targets and PPR leagues are worth 2.5 times.

as much as a carry for running back. So like you don't need those. And like outside of the red zone, that's, I don't know, three point two five times as much. So it's like, yeah, why don't you just, you know, spare this guy, the wear and tear.

Don't give him the, he can take, you know, 40 to 50% of the in between the 20s carries and then just give him all of the rest, you know, high value target, high value touches. and that's what's going to really move the needle. And especially for a guy like Chris McCaffrey who, you know, was,

would have been drafted in round one if he was like, I refuse to play running back. I'm a slot wide receiver and Echler who, you know, is breaking, receiving records as well. So, yeah, that definitely, definitely could be the case. I mean, I think you're right. I think those are, yeah, easily the top two running backs. And then Pollard, I don't know that.

I have a M. B3, but I definitely see the case for that. It's a unique thing. And it's funny as I wrote about the running quarterbacks, you know, a decade ago as we talked about. And it's funny to see how the running quarterbacks are manipulating fantasy football in different ways now because they are reducing running back touches, especially if you look at like share of running back touches inside the five-yard line. And then they're also reducing throws to running backs because targets per game for running

backs have dropped five consecutive years now in the NFL. And it's like literally everything lines up with like the increase of the mobile quarterback. And it's just really crazy how it's impacting now the running back position and not just the top of the quarterback position. Yeah. I mean, these elite quarterbacks like Hertz, Allen, we'll put Lamar in that category this year. I certainly do. Like these guys are pinball machines. Like literally like any type of scoring that they're going to get it. Like they're just going to bounce off the walls and score. Like I think that's that's kind of, we didn't get a chance to talk about this. in our last projection show, but like, real quick, Rich, what's your read on the elite

quarterbacks going in the late second, early third round? Like, is that market efficiency? Is that chasing upside? Is that an overreaction? Like, what's, what's your read side? Yeah, it is. I mean, when you look at our history of drafting fantasy football and it's gotten better, right? Like, I do an ADP series for the site and we've consistently gotten better at drafting players because we kind of honed in on like what archetypes the draft right like that's one thing you see more in fantasy football more than ever it used to be you get a lot of player analysis so we do still do a lot of player analysis and people talk about that but like a lot of people will know what to identify like when you talk about like scott doing like the bell cow like when you draft running back you want them to check these boxes

when you draft a quarterback you're going to check these boxes and a lot of people have gotten great at identifying that quarterback archetype uh that used to be you know when i talked about the original comic code it was like the guys like terrell prior like justin fields last year's like a traditional Army code guy. But like when you have the guys like Josh Allen or Jalen Hurts or like 2019 Lamar Jackson, like when you get the passing upside season with the rushing season, like people have identified like you can't really combat those guys, right? Like, you know, 2015 Cam Newton. Like those guys are just jail break kind of cheat codes, right? Like and so like people know like, hey, we have to do. That's why field is getting still drafted where he is right now, right? Because we're baking in like, well, what if he does have a great passing season? Like what are we going to do? We have to take him there. And when you look at a sub tier of like Burrow, Herbert and Trevor Lawrence, like those guys give you a little bit of rushing. But those guys to even compete with being the QB1, which I think is pretty thin, that any of those guys can actually be the QB1 overall, like they have to throw 40 passing touchdowns.

There's like really no other outcome. Like they have to throw 40 passing touchdowns. And just banking on that is is really fragile to begin with. Like look what happened to Herbert last year. It's not Herbert's fault. But like that's the slope you fall on if some things fall apart. You run into just either a catty wampas. touchdown rate or like some skill players get hurt around you and you're that archetype that

doesn't have that like full rushing to fall on like the bottom falls out like if you spent a high draft pick on justin herbert last year like you probably weren't very good your team probably wasn't wasn't very good at all and that's the fragility you have even with guys like that in that sub tier that's why i think you have to treat lamar and fields even if they maybe aren't as safe as those guys you have to treat them as just uh you know better at ADP because of that the apex range of outcome versus those guys. They are just drawing more live with a higher percent odds to be the QB one overall than those three guys. Yeah, I mean, I've got Lamar at QB4, but it's not too far behind the top three. Like, it's like he's right there in terms of ceiling, I think, with the top three.

Then like you mentioned the safety with Lamar. By the way, you mentioned like a good passing season for Justin Fields. You know, his first two years, he's averaged like 150 yards per start. A good passing season would be like 180 yards. Like that would honestly kind of take him to that next like 180, 190 yards per game. I don't think it's totally out of the realm of possibilities. But yeah, I did want to bring that up with you. We'll get back to projections talk. Got to talk Jets.

Got to talk hard knocks team. Do you guys watch Hard Knocks? Is Hard Knocks like a thing for you guys? I watched the last two last night, actually. It's okay. Yeah. I think it's been boring. There's no way Scott watches Hard Knocks, right?

Yeah, it's been boring for a number of years. No, Scott does not. There's no way. I haven't watched it in a long time. Actually, I made my girlfriend by HBO Go so I could watch it. I watched the first two episodes as well. Nice. Yeah.

It's Max now, not HBO Go. You got to get it right. That's whatever it is. I'm getting Ant Man. Like I don't know that I'm super excited to draft Aaron Rogers, but like I don't know, probably the MVP odds are nice. Probably Jets to win the Super Bowl is. nice or am I, you know, just one of these, you know, people from New York City who is getting a little

too, uh, too excited or maybe, you know, it's, it's to show brainwashing and propagandizing me. What do you think, Rebar? I think if you want to bet the Jets, you do it in season, uh, because obviously they're the hype team. You're, they're everywhere in front of us, right? Like they're on HBO. They're on hard knocks. But they're pre-buy schedule.

is a nightmare. Like they open, they open versus the bills, the Cowboys, the Patriots, the Chiefs, the Broncos, and the Eagles, and then they have a buy.

And then things get a lot better. So like, let's say this team is like two and four or three and three. Everyone's going to be like, oh, it's the, you know,

everyone told us to get hype about these guys. It's the next dream team. None of these teams work out. But then you look at them coming out of the buy. Things get a lot better. So I think they're like that Buccaneers team with Brady, you know,

there's a lot of, similarities between like this Rogers transition and like Brady's transition a couple years ago. Remember the Bucks, I think I think the Bucks at that season were like seven and five halfway through the year. And then they just won their last eight straight games. I think we could see something similar that because like this defense is that good. It allows you the front of the season for them to kind of figure things out on offense, what they want to do, get this offensive line kind of settled versus that really rough schedule. And then you come back and you look at that second half schedule and you're like,

yeah, there's a lot of winnable games there. So I think if you want to bet the Jets to win the super, Super Bowl, you're going to get a lot better odds, like in week four, five, and six than you probably are getting right now. Yeah, I'm with you on that. I mean, the front half of their schedule is just brutal. I mean, and the two games that they're favored, they get a home game against the Patriots. The other game they're favored is on the road against the Broncos. And I mean, the Broncos still have a pretty good defense.

Next week, they play the Eagles and they have their buy. I mean, it's a really rough stretch. I guess. The Broncos game's going to be fun because that's the Sean Payton, like, I know. I know. I hope Garrett Wilson. comes back out in his bucket hat and his shades. I hope there's a lot of shade.

But Rich, got to talk to this backfield. I mean, obviously, game script, we were just talking about it. I mean, game script won't be great out of the gates. Breece Hall versus Dalvin Cook. Obviously, it's been a lot of debate on fantasy Twitter. Breece Hall is back in practice. He's looking good. All the Jets beats say he's cutting and looking great.

Aaron Rogers has even hype him up. How do you view this backfield? yeah this is interesting because this is like a lot of things like projections can't capture right like you know how like when will brees hall be at 100% workload will he ever be at 100% workload then you factor in like the rogers stuff right like it's one thing to factor in the breese hall injury stuff and trying to gauge on that and you guys have a great you know person at your guys's website and edwin that can kind of diagnose and lead us on their right path of like hey breeze hall checks all these boxes but then you add dalvin cook and gm roger

Rogers, right? Like, what if Rogers just wants Dalvin Cook in the game? Like, that's like a range of outcome. Like that could just exist, right? Like, that could be a thing. I've been taking shots on Breece Hall, like when he gets like past like that like firewall of like no man's land and wide receiver, especially if I saw a wide receiver heavy. But there's definitely some risk here because like we talk about that front half schedule, which could be really good for Breez Hall because even if he starts off slow, he gets that like really kind of reduced workload through like the toughest part of the season. And if he comes out of the buy in week eight and he's getting that back for that like big workload that he had before he got injured, like then you're cooking with cooking with something

because the schedule ends up. But also in fantasy, you've played seven weeks, half your regular season. Like what if your team isn't like in a position? So he's kind of a tricky kind of fantasy Gamble. I had already had the, like, non-Gets, non-Breece Hall running back to the Jets projected for like 210 carries anyways before the Dalvin-Cook signing. So like Dalvin-Cook taking up like a huge chunk of that, like didn't really injure like my Breece Hall projection. But like I said, there's so many things projections can't capture in this scenario that

are really wildcard. So I think Breece Hall for me is one of these guys that like fits like a specific team structure. You know, how strong am I? Is it like a zero R-B team? is this a situation where I already have an anchor running back and like I don't need to chase like Brise Hall being that alpha like him just coming back because I already have a Tony Powell

or one of these guys we viewed early and then I can have it be more of a luxury because I think that zero RB teams are being in more trouble with Brise Hall, right? Like counting on him to deliver because you're probably not going to get that front of the season delivery out of him. So you could be buried by week eight by the time he comes back and you just can't get out of that hole.

but if you have a Tony Pollard or Chris McCaffrey and Austin Eccler and you grab a Breece Hall in round five or six if he slides, now you've got that anchor running back, right? And now you've got a chance to maybe have two of those Belcal backs for the back half of the season. And you probably have already tread enough water because you have one of those guys of the front half of the season as well. So I think if it's those builds more than the guy just tap typically grabbing him,

like kind of where I did in that Super Flex League were in altogether. I'm probably at a lot more risk, you know, taking him there than those teams. And then auction formats, right? Just because you mitigate opportunity costs more in auction formats, you can get Breece Hall and still not have to forego a lot of players that go around him typically in ADP. So that's kind of how I like see it. I think it's going to be a really rough opening six weeks and he's got a week seven

by. So like if you're counting on production out of him for a roster spot, like that's, you could be dead halfway through the season. Yeah. I mean, I could see it the other way with Breece. Like, there's still a ton of running backs that I love in the mid-round. And I know Scott would agree. There's three or four that I've been drafting.

So you could get Breece in rounds four and five, then just take a shotgun in rounds five, six, and seven. And it's like, okay, you know, maybe I won't use Breast in the first couple weeks. But like, like, I feel great with Rashad White and David Montgomery or Rashad White and, you know, James Connor or something like that. I can find ways to stop gap that production. and Breece is someone I wasn't drafting at all in the third round. I just thought the risk profile was way too much against the cost of, you know,

the opportunity cost of the receivers in that pocket like D.K. Metcalf, Calvin Ridley, Debo Samuel. But now, I mean, he's going in a pocket behind Mike Williams and like Christian Kirk. And it's like, all right, I can definitely buy in to Breece in that pocket compared to the, previous wide receiver pocket. Scott, what's your take on Bruce? I don't think you and I've talked about Bruce since the news house. happened with Dalvin. Have you changed your rankings at all? Have you changed your opinion at all?

Yeah, I was kind of really down on him. And then this happened and I pushed him down even more. I just think Dalvin is definitely the least cooked of these free agent running backs. And, you know, the contract kind of hinted in that direction. He, um, he's been dealing with his shoulder injury for a really long time. But he, he said in interviews that it like really bothered him last year. It sapped him of his typical physicality and it showed up on the on the field and yeah i just think he has more juice than you know like a zeke elliott or fernet by by a significant margin and then it's just the jets kept saying that you know they don't want a belcow running back um the OC was never a bel cow guy the head coach uh was never a bel cow guy i mean like breeze saw a really good volume last season but

I don't think he cleared like a 65% snaps here in any single game. Michael Carter was still getting significant work. And then when he got hurt, you know, it was a committee between the other two backs. And then there were the reports that they were trying to draft Jemir Gibbs at Pick 15 overall. So like every indication to me just like I don't think that there's, you know, league winning upside here. It seems like they clearly want a committee. backfield.

And they're going to be slow. Like this team's, they have a great defense and Rogers is a selfish lover, man. Like he, he's going to play slow. Like this team's going to be a really, it's going to be a slog. Yeah. Well, that's what I was going to ask you is like, you know, is that a floor thing or you think that's a Rogers thing? I think it's more of a Rogers thing.

I think it's a Rogers comfort thing, right? Like, unless you got 12 men on the field, like he's bleeding that thing out. Yeah. True. Because the only time that he snaps the ball early, if he counts, he's got that 12th man. Yeah, fair enough. Yeah, fair enough. Real quick, before we move on, final team, Corey Davis retired unexpectedly yesterday.

Does that do anything for your Garrett Wilson projection, Alan Lazard, Tyler Conklin? How did you kind of redistribute targets there? Yeah, I didn't have Corey Davis projected for a lot. He was a guy I was like taking 18th round swings on just because, you know, I thought he was, you know, still like a decent, decent enough player and was going to play with a good quarterback. Hey, like, what if he luckboxed into six to eight touchdowns, right? But that's not happening now. You know, there's definitely a place in the multiverse where Corey Davis smashed, you

didn't have all those early career injuries, kind of played in more aggressive offenses. But unfortunately not, not for us. There's a lot of, because he was like the Consensus 101 that year. It was like him and Fournette. And that was the McCaffrey draft too, which is funny, like in hindsight, looking back on it. It's like a lot of people got McCaffrey at three. and that worked out pretty well.

Scott and I had McCaffrey at one that year, and we had Fournet at two, and then Davis at three. So it was a good year for Scott and I with McCaffrey at one. But yeah, Scott was on that. You know what? It's a really bummer that Derry Sanders never caught on.

It did. It did. That's one of the greatest nicknames of all time. I forget the name of the company, but the big, you know, fantasy football apparel company, they did make a Dairy Sanders shirt. So was it Roto Ware?

Yeah, Roto Ware. There you go. It was a great nickname. That's a bummer that that one never caught on because that was great. Yeah. Yeah. Dary Sandersman. We can call him into our hearts. Let me ask you guys how you're handling it.

Like obviously Garrett Wilson has climbed all summer. And like is there like a path? Obviously he's getting more efficient targets. But is there like a path for him to really compete from a target count of some of the guys he goes around in ADP? and I also want to ping pong that off of you guys, because I don't know if we'll get there, about the Chris Olavé ADP even more. Like, what if these guys end up being like 125 target players,

like where they're going? Like, a lot of people want to take Garrett Wilson over Alman Ross St. Brown, right? Like, Amman Raul St. Brown could have 45 more targets than this dude. I'm not taking Garrett Wilson over Amman Ron. I'm not taking Garrett Wilson over Devonte Adams. I mean, Adams is still like the premier target owner. I think that's a little closer between him and Amon Ra, but I'm with you. Wilson has been my wide receiver 10 pretty much all offseason behind Adams.

And when it comes to Alave, I've been lower on Alave too, man. I've gotten below Ridley in my rankings. And similar concern. It's like, you know, I don't think the Saints are going to be all that pass heavy. They're not going to be super fast. And Michael Thomas is back healthy. And I know I know it's Michael Thomas, blah, blah, blah, but like that kind of does matter. And they actually have some decent secondary targets now with Rashid Shehid and Joanne Johnson.

Alvin Kamar will be back. So, yeah, as much as I love OLAV as a player, I'm with you. Projecting out his targets is, it's difficult, especially compared to the players he goes in the same range. Like, I'm definitely taking Jalen Wadolet. How about you, Scott? I want to know. I know what you're doing with these guys. Yeah, I've got Amun Rossi-Brown wide receiver 6, Garrett Wilson, wide receiver 8, Chris Olave, wide receiver 15.

Yeah. Nice. Yeah, I like it. You know, Alavi is one of these guys. The more I've gotten to, like, this point, like, I'm hard. I have a harder time seeing him get that, like, compete with those guys from, like, a target stance. It's like, he's a great player, right?

And, like, I think Drake London's a really good player. But, like, where are we getting the target counts from these guys? You know, we don't know, like, if, like, Derek Carr is going to be, like, that much for an upgrade. The Saints have, like, a really soft schedule. We were kind of talking about the embassy south before the show. And you look at, like, the back half of last year, like, the Saints, ran they were the they were like the slowest team in the NFL they ran the fewest amount of

plays in the NFL weeks 8 to 18 they had were 27th and drop back right over that span and like over that span chris elabe had just two top 20 scoring weeks he had one game where he ran 30 pass routes over that entire span yeah and like is that something that happens again like this is a great a really good player i'm not trying to pull away from that but like we have to make hard decisions at the front of drafts right like we're selecting good players versus good players we know that these guys are inherently good players. So, like, does he really have that target count, like that target outcome? Because I want my guy to have that, like, insulation of, like, what if they, he's not the

most efficient player, right? Because we know efficiency is more cattywampus than volume. So I want the guy that's going to maybe get 170 targets, right? Like, I want that guy on my roster. Yeah. I just don't think that's in Olavé's range of outcomes unless Michael Thomas gets hurt again and Rashid Sheed gets hurt again. Because right now, I mean, I've got Alave for 130.

and I don't think there's a range where he gets to 150 unless the Saints absolutely stink this year, which we're talking about before the show. Like the NFC South is wide open. I think you can easily say the Saints are a favorite. And even if you hate their car, he like objectively is probably right now for this season in a vacuum,

the best quarterback in that division. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely he is. And yeah, I don't think that's even a question. Yeah, I mean, I saved Saints for last. I'm glad we did bring it up because, you know, Alave has been a guy that I've been a little lower. on and I where do rich did you say where you have a lave in your rankings yeah I haven't at 13 but

I was like you know he's in an area where like I've never never really comfortable taking him there either yeah I've got him I've got him at 17 um I've got him behind waddle higgins and ridley yeah actually 16 sorry uh all right final team rich this has been great so far but we got to get out here before before we get out here we got to talk Kansas city chiefs we got to talk to wide receivers, just how you're projecting out this wide receiver group. Will there be a guy this year we can actually rely on in fantasy? Yeah, he plays tight end. Damn it.

I knew you were going to say that. I mean, so you look at the Chiefs, like, they're in the same boat as they were last year. Like, they're going to play a lot of guys at wide receiver. And this is a team that doesn't run a lot of 11 personnel because their tight end is the wide receiver. He doesn't play in line. So this is, you look at the Chief. were third and dropback rate last year, but they were 23rd and 11 personnel rate because

Travis Kelsey is their de facto wide receiver. Marcus Val de Stantling is going to play way more snaps than anyone wants them to. I know people want Rishie Rice to be a thing and Sky Moore to be a thing and he who does not be named a thing. But like, you know, like they're going, like Markisvall Scantling is going to be out there playing snaps. Look at it in the preseason again. Who's the wide receiver that's played the most snaps with. Patrick Wilms in the field. It's MVS by a gap again. And so like even I want to say like Skymore's

ADP is fine, right? Like I have no problem with like taking Skymore where he goes. But like what if Skymore doesn't play in two wide receiver sets and he only plays in three wide receiver sets? Like what kind of value are we squeezing out there? And we just have to try to get lucky on the weeks. We get a touchdown from him like because this is a team that's just not going to run a lot of 11 personnel. So they're going to rotate guys in. I see Rishie Rice a lot like Skymore last year or Skymore is the inevitable juju replacement. Rishie Rice is the inevitable MVS replacement. Maybe in season there's like something in the over the course of time that adjust

that. And he's like a back half of the season kind of lid lifter for teams. Like, you know, Scott's written about like rookies and how they perform the back half of here. Maybe that's what you're looking for out of Rishie Rice. But you're probably going to be a, he's probably going to be a guy that's on a lot waiver wires like come week five, week six of seasons, I believe. And then you still have like when Tony comes back.

He's the other wildcard because what the chiefs do consistently is when the chiefs get in the red zone, they run more jet motion than any team in the NFL. They use motion and jet motion inside the red zone more than anyone in the NFL. And that's Tony's role. Like, right? Like that's his, like when Hardman got hurt and they acquired Tony, Tony was that dude. All the jet motion stuff was his inside the red zone. So he's still going to be like that dude as like a thorn.

Like even if he never becomes like a full like route tree receiver, the chiefs are going to use him in that role because he's good at that. You can hand the ball off to him. You can use him in that capacity where he runs like the half jet motion and runs back. We saw them in the Super Bowl, get two touchdowns off of that play with Tony and Skymore. It's like it's going to be a sum of parts unit again. I know nobody wants to hear that, but I absolutely am betting on to be a sum of parts unit. Unless Travis Kelsey gets hurt, which he is on a God's tier run of never getting hurt, which is absolutely kind of like one of the things that's crazy about Kelsey's career.

Yeah, yeah. Both Kelsey's. They don't miss games. Dude, it's something in the water, something in their genetics, their parents gave them. You know, you mentioned MVS is going to play more than anybody wants. It's true. He's going to be their guy in one wide receiver sets. I did, I've watched all the chiefs preseason snaps.

I've noticed Skies played a couple of times in 12 personnel, especially when they have like a stacked formation or reduced splits. So Sky's gotten a few snaps in 12, but yeah, I mean, it's mainly been MVS. I think that'll change though. Like, I think ideally they wanted juju to kind of be the full-time player in like 90, or maybe not even 90, but like 85, 90% route shares snapped player last year, but he couldn't because his knee couldn't hold up. If there's one guy on the team that can do that, it's probably Sky. But I'm with you.

It'll probably be some sort of gross rotation once again. And when Scott and I were first talking through projections in like May after the draft, that was like the first thing I said about Cadarius. I'm like, dude, you know what he's going to be, right? He's going to be like they're souped up Miko Hardman. Like I don't really even care about the downfield stuff too much. he's going to get all like the schemed inside 10 targets and i still think he could but obviously two knee surgeries this offseason i was kind of in on tony when he was going to like the seventh

and eighth round in may and like i've not drafted him at all i'm sorry scott but i've been completely out on tony yeah he's he's still must draft for me i know it doesn't feel good but yeah that's the i mean he's cheaper now i mean it ninth 10th round i mean you can get him as your wide receiver four or five and just, you know, realize that you're going to be taking zero is probably week one and two. In these best balls, you should, I still think he's like palatable where he's going.

I even more so than like where Graham said, like I wasn't drafting him really then, but now like everyone's ejected. Like everyone's fully out. And I'm like, this dude still could probably score five to eight touchdowns because that's how they use hit. That's how they use,

uh, that role in the red zone. Yeah. Yeah. He certainly could. He'll score five to eight touchdown or five to six touchdowns in five to six games played. It's going to be great. You'll never know when they're coming. Yeah, that's the problem. That's why that's the redraft conundrum. There you go. Rich, this has been

great, man. Solid 40 minutes going around the horn talking through some high level team level projections, just talking through the markets this year. This has been great, Rich. I really appreciate it. Anything you want to plug? Obviously, we were talking about your worksheet in season, but anything you got coming up, anything you're excited about. Yeah, I mean, I, I mean, I, I put together an actual draft kit this year. It's kind of like the first time. We're kind of marketed as a draft kit, so you can go check that out at the site.

If anyone does listen to this, you can use the code Sharp 50, and you can get 50% off of it for these last two weeks in the heavy draft season. Nice, very nice. Definitely should check that out. Always check out Rich's work. Rich really does some of the best work in the industry.

Follow them on Twitter at Lord Rebes. For Rich, for Scott. This was a third annual, three bars projection show. Thank you guys for listening. We will catch you next week.