Fantasy Football Daily - Week 15 Fantasy Playoff Review "Requiem for Henry/Barkley Teams" | Fantasy Points Podcast

Episode Date: December 16, 2024

"The Guru" John Hansen and Brian Drake get you set with an NFL Week 15 fantasy football review.#FFPodcast Where to find us: httpp//twitter.com/Fantasy_Guru http://twitter.com/DrakeFantasy http://twitter.com/FantasyPts 0:00 - Intro 1:02 - Week 15 Recap 2:42 - Cowboys vs. Panthers 5:00 - Adam Thielen's Performance 6:11 - Chiefs and Browns Analysis 8:41 - Mahomes' Ankle Injury 10:27 - Jerome Ford's Fantasy Potential 12:02 - Dolphins vs. Texans 14:15 - Jets vs. Jaguars 16:20 - Commanders vs. Saints 18:49 - Ravens vs. Giants 26:14 - Giants vs. Titans 28:50 - Bengals vs. Titans 32:46 - Cardinals vs. Patriots 36:21 - Broncos vs. Colts 42:26 - Bills vs. Lions 47:14 - Buccaneers vs. Chargers 51:40 - Eagles vs. Steelers Use promo code - SCOREMORE for 10% off your subscription Subscribe to FantasyPoints for FREE - https://www.fantasypoints.com/plans#/ Listen to the podcast here - https://www.fantasypoints.com/media/podcasts FantasyPoints Website - https://www.fantasypoints.com NEW! Data Suite - https://data.fantasypoints.com Twitter - https://twitter.com/FantasyPts Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/FantasyPts Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/FantasyPts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, what's up? Week 15 is almost in the books. And Brian Drake and I are back with another edition of the Fantasy Points podcast, the Week 15 review, other than the two Monday night football games. We've come to the conclusion that half the NFL sucks. We compare a lot of the rosters in the receiving corps to out there in the NFL to scab level players. So other than that, it was a lot more positive. We talked about. the bonanza in Detroit, how awesome the bucks and Baker Mayfield are. I lament a couple of prop losses, and yet somehow I hit nine of ten touchdown props. Go figure. But thanks a lot for listening, liking and subscribing. And as always, you're welcome. All across the fantasy universe, we're recapping week 15, the first weekend of the fantasy football playoffs.

I'm Brian Drake alongside the guru John Hansen. So glad you guys are with us for the Fantasy Points podcast. hopefully you got that W this weekend. You're ready to go into the fantasy semifinals. And if you didn't, well, maybe you just love fantasy football or the sound of our voice. We're happy to have you here. John, this was a wacky and wild week. There were injuries we'll get into with guys like Patrick Mahomes and T.J. Watt.

And then there was a million turnovers in games. And it was just wild. It was everything that you want the fantasy playoffs to be, as long as you're not a Derek Henry or Saquan Barclay owner. How you doing? Yeah, I'm all right. It wasn't the greatest week. We'll get into it all.

We'll break it all down. We'll kind of compare my Sunday column to the actual results. Certainly on the right track in a lot of cases, but, you know, it's week 15. This is what we do. We do, we try every week to do the impossible, which is predict the National Fake You Out League. And this week, there was, boy, the first games, the early games. absolutely sucked. I mean, they were brutal. That was some of the most, that was one of the

most boring three-hour segments of time I've ever seen watching the NFL. Late games picked it up a little bit. Obviously, the bonanza in Detroit. Oh, my God. Unbelievable. Yet a couple of guys came up a little small. I guess, well, yeah, you got to get the ball to Ty Johnson. You know what I'm saying? But yeah, we'll get into it all. We'll get into all the right here. And we'd base the show off John's Hansen's Hintz articles. Go over to FantasyPoints.com and sign up. Check it out for the remainder of the season. Hey, we get into the playoffs. We got props. We got betting. Fantasy doesn't end when your home league ends, folks. We got a lot of weeks of making money and winning bets ahead of us. So let's start off with the Cowboys victory in Carolina

over the Panthers, 30 to 14. Now, John, this was the first time the Panthers had been favored in a game in like 30 plus games. And they got their asses kicked. I mean, They turned the ball over four times. They didn't even look competitive out there. Bryce Young throws one touchdown, two interceptions. You were all over in the article, though. You said it was a great matchup for Uncle Rico. You loved C.D. Lamb.

And what do you know? Rico with 149 yards rushing. CD comes through with 9 for 116 and a touch. Great call on your part. Yeah. And what I actually said, too, was after trying out a couple of props on secondary guys, I'm like, you know what, guys? Mike McCarthy is just going to run the damn ball and it's going to be CD.

So forget everyone else. Now, Tolbert scored. Brooks scored like literally no one in the world, including all members of his family. No one started the man and he scored. But that's it. I mean, Cooper Rush played a little bit better than we thought. But, you know, there's a lot of mediocrity. So it's week to week.

You know, last week I'm like, man, Cooper Rush. this week he was kind of bawling out who knew but yeah lamb did have a very good schematic matchup now also it was a good matchup for hubbard not to throw anyone under the bus but our site projections i thought were going a little crazy on hubbard ranked a little high a little too high i think i had doubtle higher actually but i had him pinched together um but yeah he he came up really small so he's frustrating, man, because he's just so boom or bust. A lot of the analysis was about them being favorites because his splits and wins were so great. You know, so basically, they, they're in control of the game and he gets volume, he'll kill. Otherwise, forget it. That's pretty much Chuba Hubbard.

You know, he caught four balls, but he only got you totally what? You got like eight points, but that's, that's not great at all. No, not a guy who last week had like 30-something touches in their big, big win. So, you know, we can move on with those guys. You know, Rico, he's an every week starter, Lam, someone you're always going to have in your lineup, these ancillary, secondary guys, forget about it.

Maybe one more buzzkill from this game. Adam Feelein, 5 for 51, John. I know a lot of people had him in their lineups. They were looking to, you know, have him, kind of bring him to the promise land in the fantasy playoffs, but, you know, 5 from 51, not exactly setting the world on fire. Yeah, I did point out,

in the article that Cowboys are underneath funnel, which is good for Thielen, but they run single high, 56% of the time, and he gets a drop off there. So I did kind of paint him as not great in that article. And yeah,

Xavier Leggett, I wish I had the time that I spent on his write-up back. I'll never get that back. Two grabs for seven. So, yeah, these are not, these are not the times to dip into these

skanky waters, if you will, with some of these low-end teams and bad offenses. Oh, you're talking about bad offenses. Do you mean the Cleveland Brown? It's segue. No, I mean the Kansas City Chiefs, too. We talked both of these guys here. Kansas City wins 21-7. I look at this game and I said, this is Kansas City. That's who they are. You're going to get touchdowns from, you know, Noah Gray and Jujo Smith's Schuster. You get a rushing touchdown from Xavier Worthy. But look from this game is you can't.

can't trust James Winston. You know, like, people want to get behind him. The guy got benched in this game for Dorian Thompson Robinson. Like, this is why James Winston's a backup. And lucky for us, Jerry Judy came through. But, I mean, everybody else totally failed that you might have put in your lineup. We got a broken foot now for Nick Chub, John. He's out.

So Jerome Ford, who's available in like 60% of Yahoo leagues, could be a league winner going forward. He's got a couple of pretty nice matches. I think you've got Cincinnati coming up in a week or two, so get ready for that. But what do you think of the Chiefs offense this week? And it's just, you know, it's a mixed bag of garbage. Kareem Hunt is the leading rusher here. Yeah, absolute brutality. I can't take it anymore.

I am absolutely sick and tired of watching this offense, quite frankly. I'd like to blame Matt Nagy. I don't have specifics. It's just a gut feel. I just look at that man. I'm like, that guy stinks. He just has a look about him that he's only there due to cronyism at this point. And Andy Reed, you know, liking the dude or whatever.

It is awful. It is just, it's just like, you know, it reminds me of like if the team, like, if there's like a strike, it's like there's a player. Yes, these are all scab players. And then Mahomes broke the line. and it's like Mahomes thrown to a bunch of scabs. That's the Chiefs. Plus Kelsey. I did lose a Kelsey prop.

I thought he'd do a little bit better. Well, actually second than targets. But they just spread it around. There's just no continuity. It's just all individual play after individual play. And not all. I've seen worse, but it's a lot of individual plays. I like to Pacheco to hit his prop.

I mean, you got to be kidding me, dude. 2.5 yards of carry? I know the Browns are a pretty good defense, but wow. I mean, I'm just sick of it. I am sick of the chief offense. I cannot take it anymore. Please, someone knock these guys out of the playoffs early. I'm praying for it.

You know what else we saw in this game? Samajai P. Ryan played 25% of the running back snaps for the chiefs. 15 of the 18 third downs in this game for the chief. Samajai Piron was on the field. So you mentioned in the article, you know, the numbers and terms of snapage weren't great for Pacheco. If he's not going to play on third downs, maybe they're trying to save his leg or whatever it is.

I mean, that really takes a knock against his fantasy value going forward. Yeah, I mean, I think my feeling is it's probably a little bit fluid and he just wasn't very effective for whatever reason. You know, he did have a 15-yard catch. The main narrative with him in the preseason and the off-season was that he was actually honing his receiving chops to become more of a three-down player. So I thought in game three, I'm like, well, you know, he didn't make the one play, but geez, yeah.

But again, there's just no continuity to it. It's, there's been a randomness with this team for a while. It's like Jerich McKinnon. It's out of football for two years. Plot them in here. Oh, it was league winner. Scored like 10 touchdowns. You know, and at this point, it's, it's a little.

annoying for for people like us who try and figure this stuff out because again there's is there a plan is there continuity or is there cohesiveness or is it just mohomes back there just just making some plays here speaking of mohams he left this game with an ankle sprain they said he's got a high ankle he's had these in the past i've seen this guy get folded up like a cheap freaking table at a barbecue john and he comes back in the next game or the next drive and he looks like a freaking world beater. Nothing stops this guy. Always. Yeah. So I don't know. I don't worry about.

You know, watch and see. But at this point, that's what I called him today with my son watching again. I go, the guy's freaking Gumby out here. He's Gumby. He's Gumby, damn it. By the way, I actually started Jerome Ford in the Fantasy Points of Dynasty League, which is, I believe, yeah, the only thing I'm freaking still alive in against Adam Kaplan to finish off his season.

So I do believe I made the playoffs in that one. And you can start a four running back. So he'll be my fourth running back. Let's take a quick time out on the other side. We've got to talk about this Dolphins Texans game where the dolphins turn the ball over four times and lose to the Texans and also a wide receiver for the dolphins comes up small and gets hurt.

I'll talk about that on the other side. It's a fantasy points podcast. All right, Guru, the Dolphins, I had high hopes for this game. In DFS, I had some lineups with a bunch of dolphins and I'm bringing it back with Texans. Well, that just went up in smoke. Tua throws for a buck 96 and a touchdown in a losing effort. And our guy, Jalen Waddle, leaves the game with a knee injury. So that puts in doubt his, you know, playing status going forward.

And really just a dud all around. Tyreek, two for 36. Devon Aitian runs for 41 yards. God bless America. He caught seven passes for 35, but we got back to what we thought we were away from, John. And it was John Hsu Smith, Bogart, and other targets. The guy got 11 freaking targets, John, 9 for 48 in the score.

A lot of that was kind of late. He just started to come on and was somewhat unstoppable. Probably after that waddle injury, yeah. If you read the article, I didn't really give anyone a big endorsement of no. Yeah, you didn't have anybody better of note, worse than note. No, no, it's just like a middling matchup here. I did mention that Tyree could see a lot of Derek Stingley, who was quite good, and that was the case.

Would Stingley get a couple of picks? Yeah, but one off late, kind of sealed the game with an interception down the right side line. Right, on Tyreek. Yep. Moster was out there, muddying up the waters. You know, we got to get Malik Washington, the leading receiver really smith craigraft you know too was hot you know the matchup wasn't great but it wasn't scary so again i think both of these teams are two more examples of pretty much

week to week like untrustworthy for sure stroud and we didn't get much there either i mean joe mixon one point nine yard to carry jeez i know he got a little banged up at some point uh in the article you mentioned how Garrett Wilson and Devante Adams had pretty good outings against this Texans against this Dolphins defense, excuse me, and Nico Collins kind of picked up at least from the touchdown perspective where those guys left off. But Nico only catches four balls for 17. Thank God two of them were touchdowns. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So it was a good call by us with the Jaylon Ramsey's shadow because that was absolutely the case from, well, from what I saw. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was not, it's just hard at this point. It's week 15. Like, oh, I'm really feeling it with Stroud this week. Really? Or I'm really feeling it with Tank Dell. Let's harken back to what I said in the preseason. Oh, the new head coach, the rookie Stroud. I mean, they were unbelievable. Now you get Joe Mixing and Diggs. Oh, my God, it's too good to be true. Guess what? It is. It's too good to be true.

in your article Hansen's hints you mentioned how the Jets receivers had a pretty good chance this week to do something special and Devante Adams went out and had his second highest career yardage game in his illustrious career. He went nine for 198 and two. Garrett Wilson only catches three balls for 56, but he does get in the end zone. So we're happy about that. So nice call there. This was a struggle for the Jets though, who just, you know, The Jets only convert four third downs on the whole game. They need kind of a miracle at the end.

And if you had Brees Hall, he did nothing the entire game and then gets a gift of a touchdown at the end from the one yard line to really save his day. But if you're the Jets, I'm pissed because now I'm just knocking myself down the draft board. Yeah, well, they wanted to win. This was one of the easier games to predict. I was very high on Rogers Adams, Wilson. Unfortunately, I lost the damn Wilson prop. I thought he'd get a little bit more of the action here. Probably didn't hurt that Conklin was.

I didn't know what to do at Breece Hall. You know, up until the touchdown, it was probably a good idea to avoid him. So I guess in the future, let's be careful when we have a quagmire type of backfield with multiple people and an injury. Did get Michael Thomas very, very correct. I actually had Parker Washington. as a reach and he got eight and a half points it's not too horrible ETN showed some signs of left you know they're playing a little takeaway early in the

half first half they dominated the time of possession they were running the ball and jats had a couple shorter drives I'm like oh wow but yeah yeah Brian Thomas man there's a guy that you know I don't think anybody who thought he would be like this good right away he ran a limited route tree he was a little bit of one trick pony it's unbelievable how how good he's been so this guy is he's the number one pick next year yeah he'll he'll probably be a guy at the end of the first round that people are looking to take a reach on he'd be a nice guy at the one two turn you know you snag him and maybe you grab a running back at that point too that's a that's a nice year Gibbs yeah and you mentioned how the the jets are kind of a deep funnel and you know the jaguars took

advantage of that today. How about Brenton Strange? If you lost your tight end, maybe you had Evan Ingram, Strange comes in, gets 12 targets, goes 11 for 73. Ingram's done for the year. So if you're still playing out there, or maybe you're just looking in DFS, Brenton Strange, a name to look at because he did it earlier in the season too. Remember John when Ingram, you know, one of his many times, he just decides not to play. So maybe a name to know for the waiver wire coming up. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I told someone today on a live stream, I, I, opted for Stone Smart for his upside to make a big play. He did have five catches for 50.

It's pretty good. Sure. But strange out there. I want to look up here. So it was touch and go with Brees and the if he was even going to play. And all of a sudden, Breece plays 49% of the snaps. Our guy Isaiah Davis plays 42% of the snaps. He gets seven to 10 third down snaps.

Braylon. Braylon, uh, Braylon, Alan missed most of the second. in the third quarter. You know, shout-outs to our guy, Dave Richard from CBS for putting these snap stats out. So, like, I kind of hope Brice just doesn't play anymore at this point. I'm done with him. I don't need you anymore, Breece.

But at this point, you'd have to go Davis over Allen. Yeah. Oh, I love him because he plays in the past game. He's a third down guy. I'm all for it. Every time I looked around my TV, I saw Jaden Daniels basically doing whatever he wanted. And he was throwing the ball deep to Terry. McClorin. Terry McClureen goes seven for 73 and two touchdowns. John, he really should

have four touchdowns in this game. Jane Daniels throws for 226 and a pair of touchdowns, also run for 66 yards. Commanders get a 20 to 19 win over the Saints. Saints miss a two-point conversion with no time left on the clock. It would have won the game for the New Orleans Saints. So let's start right there with the Commandos, you know, Brian Robinson, down day for I thought he was going to do better today. 65 yards rushing on 21 carries. I told my son to start him in a league and he was pretty pissed off at me that he he didn't find the box.

Well, I mean, he actually did get three for 22 in the passing game. It's actually he got like 11, he got like 12 points, but you got to be kidding me, dude, because I went in on this prop.

I knew he was going to get the ball. Dude got 21 carries. You've got to be kidding me. And also it was a good schematic matchup. I figured they'd be in control. They were. Saints came back, but they had to lead the whole game. Thus, the 21 carries.

It was unbelievable. I mean, he could not find any space whatsoever. I did point out, you know, with McLaurin, hey, no Noah Brown, like you said, there is huge. Didn't love hurts. I think he got hurt. He did. And I did write in the article, by the way, Noah Brown is out. back up, Dammy Brown would like his step into his role.

And what if I told you that Jameson Crowder was still in the NFL and didn't retire six years ago? Because the average fan is like, what? James and Crowder still a good Arnold Schwarzenegger name. And since he did play today in week 15, for those who have used to listen to me on Sirius, I'll do this for you. James and Crowder, three grabs for 27. Boom. Still a good Arnold name.

Of course. Of course. Yeah. On the other side for the Saints, they pulled Jake Hainer, who was just awful. He is not an NFL player. How he's on a roster. He must have photos of somebody. Four for 10 for 49 yards and a pick. They end up going to Spencer Rattler in the second half.

He throws for a buck 35 and a touchdown. They also had Cedric Wilson. A wide receivers threw a touchdown pass in this game. I think he threw the one to Alvin, Tomorrow, right? Yeah. Before Camara got hurt. That was a great catch by Camaro.

Oh, my God. What a grab. Tough part here is so Camara gets hurt, John. And now going forward, if you're in a league and you got Kendra Miller available, you got to pick Kendra Miller up. They didn't really specify at the time of our recording what Kamara's injury is. But, I mean, hit five carries for 12 yards here. It's obvious to anybody with eyeballs, like, you know, they don't want to run the ball up

the gut and just put more wear and tear and pounding on Elman Kumar at this point. Yeah, I think he's going to have to go the way of like a Marshall Falk. You know, remember when Stephen Jackson was drafted, Falk hung on there for at least one year, where he was like a complimentary guy, third down guy. You know, Kendri Miller does show a lot more ability to make guys miss, a lot more juice. He ran pretty well today. Don't know what we're going to get in the passing game, but they are kind of a mess. We might get car back, though.

And Scantling, MVS, man, 64 yards. He made another big play. I don't know how we could trust anyone else. Please people stop asking me about Joanne Johnson. No one ever asked me about, the answer is no. If you're going to ask me in the future about Joe, and I like Joanne Johnson, but it's not all his fault. But if you have to ask me about Joanne Johnson, the answer is no.

It's what I wrote up on this game is you've got bad quarterback play between Hainer and if they went to Rattler, and they're not going to be able to sustain drives. And that's exactly what happened. They only converted three third downs on the day. They have 245 total yards here. This is a bad team. They had the ball for less than 20 minutes, John.

Like, how does that happen in an NFL game? The commanders had the ball for 40 minutes and 50 seconds. And yet, Brian Robinson still average 3.1 year olds of carry. I'll give the Saints D credit. They still play hard. They're still playing hard, man. They still are just a win. They convert a two-point conversion.

They win the damn game. I know. Incredible. The Ravens do whatever they want. 35-14 win over the New York football giants here. A lot of stuff going on. So I got a buddy of mine, John, that text me right before the game. Drake, who should I start today?

Jared Gough or Lamar Jackson. And I go, you always start Lamar Jackson. Always. And I know Goff had a great game, you know, whatever. Lamar Jackson, 290 yards passing. and five touchdowns today. Oh, by the way, he runs for 65 yards. Found our guy Bateman.

Boy, is anybody starting Rashad Bateman in the lineup out there, John? Two touchdowns for him, 80 yards. Because I came up with a term. You've heard of anti-climactic. This one was anti-schematic because a lot of the schematics did not line up. I mean, the schematics were very good on Zay Flowers. And look, he caught six balls for 53, underwhelming. But he did lead the team in targets, probably for that reason.

Yet Bateman's data against single high looks is not good. Then again, you know, that does leave you, which is weird because he's a vulnerable, big play. And single high leaves you vulnerable to the big play. Yet, you know, his data was not good on 177 routes against single high. So I was like, no. So that's what I mean when it was anti-schematic. And, you know, I thought that they would be in full control.

Derek Henry would roll and just time ran out. Lamar, you know, they forgot to play defense on a Justice Hill play. It was pretty bad. You had a great snatch, John, in your article. Derek Henry averages 0.69 fantasy points per snap while leading over the past three seasons. This is the second most, okay? Now, they're winning the entire game here. Derek Henry just crushed fantasy owners who were playing him.

Probably got eliminated today. The guy with 67 yards. So you got 6.7 yards from Derek Henry today. And you probably just got your ass eliminated from a guy who carried you all season. And, you know, the sad thing is all he probably needed was those carries that Ali got in the end of the game, the eight carries. Yeah. Probably would have hit his prop. Right.

I got you another five, six points. Totally. What are you going to do? That's very unfortunate. Now, also unfortunate was the unpredictability of like, how are we supposed to handicap the giants when it's DeVito, but didn't expect much and we didn't get much? And then all of a sudden, oh, you know what? Let's go with Boyle.

And Boyle was like balling out there a little bit. Like, who the hell saw that coming? So it was that 25 yard at a Wondel. like really? I'm like, okay. You noted in the article that it was not a great matchup for Tyrone Tracy in this. So Tyrone Tracy, I got a million guys asking me this week. Tyrone Tracy starts at questions. And they're like, yeah, but look at all the targets he got last week. And I said, guys, that was with Drew Locke. Okay. Drew Locke was checked down Charlie to Tyrone Tracy. That's not Tommy DeVito. Look at any of the starts Tommy DeVito had. He does not target Tyrone Tracy that much. And now you look today,

between Boyle and DeVito, oh, Tyrone Tracy falls back to Earth, one catch for four yards. So Tyrone Tracy really let people down, 31 yards rushing. At least we got 10 for 82 and a score on your boy neighbors. Yeah, that was a hell of a performance there. But again, like it was trending toward another like six for 63 until Boyle came in. I think the real problem, by the way, where Tracy was freaking Singletary. Yes. kind of usurped them there again, which we didn't think was going to happen.

So again, when you're dealing with these crappy teams, and let's face it, most of them are. I hate to say it. I mean, let's look at the board here. Dallas, Carolina, that's two. Cleveland, that's three. Hell, the chiefs are kind of four. Miami, Houston, that's at least five. Jets, Jags, now we're up to seven.

Saints, D.C. eight, Giants, nine. We already got nine craptastic teams here. Tennessee, there's 10. New England's 11. Indies 12. And the league sucks. The Raiders, that's 13.

Bears are 14. Yeah. So we're about half the league absolutely stinks. And it's week to week. Yeah, they do. I can't wait to see Dion Sanders coaching Malik neighbors next year. That'll be fun on the sidelines. Well, hey, that you would want that, though, if you're, if you have Malik neighbors. What do you want? Dion Sanders, some old

cramudgeon, some old, some white old head, some old white guy. Tom, it Tom Coughlin out of retirement. Oh, I know. Every old guy, whoever coach the Jets is trying to position for that job. We'll see, yeah, maybe Coughlin or, you know, maybe Parcells can come back. Coach the team here. All right, let's take a timeout on the other side. Hey, Joe Burrow, just keeps doing Joe Burrow things. I needed him in the FBI. We'll talk about how many touchdowns he got me on their side.

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Shop now at IKEA.ca.ca slash Black Friday. IKEA, bring home to life. John, I'm scratching and clawing. Trying to get a win to get to the division finals of the FPI in our Sirius XM League. And I got Joe Burrow as my quarterback, T. Higgins as my wide receiver won. Joey came through for me. 271, three touchdowns found T. Higgins. for one of them today.

I don't think it's going to be enough. I'm going to get bounced because the guy I was playing against has Chase Freaking Brown. Man, this kid's unbelievable, John. 25 carries, 97 yards and a touchdown. Catches three balls and another touchdown. I can't get away from this guy. Everywhere he turned, it's Chase Brown doing me in.

I don't own own him in any goddamn leagues. I didn't get him enough myself. And I actually was very high on him this summer. if you read my stuff, he was, I drafted him a shit ton in the, in the draft plan article. I'm going to look it up right now actually to see where I was on the cheat sheet. But man, awesome dude, as I've mentioned a lot, had a massive workload in college. And I always bring up, he's jacked up. I mean, so he can handle it.

Yeah, he's just getting better and better and better. It's been, it's been awesome. Yeah, his ADP was 118. and I had him at 93 on our cheat sheets. That's a pretty good endorsement right there. So now you're 25, that's two rounds over his 80p. Boom. That's a win.

And I had him as a target and all that good. Yeah. I had him right above Khalil Shakir, our other guy, whose ADP was 143, by the way, and I had him at 94. Yeah, he's awesome. Like I said, great player, great dude. You love the versatility. I mean, it's unbelievable.

But it's like this is, this is basically like you got McCaffrey. Yeah. You know what's nice for Cincinnati is now you don't have to go in free agency and spend any money on another big back. You don't have to go get anybody high up in the draft. You got your guy with Chase Brown. Now you get an ancillary piece. You know, you got Zach Moss, who knows if he's going to come back or not.

But, you know, that's good. They found their guy. And for fantasy, let me ask you this. Where do you think Chase Brown goes next year for fantasy? Where are you going to draft him? Second round pick. Wow, yeah. There's your turn. How about right there? Brian Thomas Jr.

Oh, yeah. Chase Brown. There's your one-two turn. Young upside guys. How about on the way back to get my boy, Tajay Spears, who out of nowhere went off in the passing game? What a craziness. Will Levis benched, pulled a Conquo. Like, you kidding me? All of a sudden, Calvin Riddley is like just one of many. Once again, bad team. And now we got to spread around to nine dudes. Jeez, good luck. Yeah, we got a ton of spears in the fourth quarter with Pollard going out. So that's why he got all that work.

And he caught six balls, 387 and a touch. How about the Bengals defense? I do the defensive streaming article over at FantasyPoints.com. And I wrote this week, I'm contractually obligated to tell you who Will Levis is playing against. The Cincinnati defense got 19 fantasy points, John, four intersteads. exceptions only one sack two fumble recoveries they scored a touchdown and they would have had another touchdown if the dope didn't fumble the ball at the one inch line out of the back of the end zone for a touchdown they would have had 25 fantasy points would have the bangles well you're on fire with

these this is your specialty man and and like you should send will love us a christmas card he's really made your job it's doing it for you it's so easy uh man next week heads up to be Browns, if they're on your waiver wire, they're going to play Cincinnati. Who are the Bengals or the Titans play next week? Let's if I can find them already. It's just. Oh, it's going to be Mason Rudolph. They got the Colts who balled the F out today on defense, by the way, which we'll get

to. Like what the hell is that? Absolutely. All right. Enough of that game. We know. If you got a Bengals receiver, you play them. If you got anybody on the Titans, your team's already eliminated.

All right, let's go on Cardinals Patriots. Cardinals defense. I had them listed in the column as well. you want to pick them up and, you know, they came through for you today as well. How about James Connor, Johnny? The ageless one, the guy's 58 years old, gets a contract extension, 110 yards and two touchdowns today. Oh, and he caught five passes. Like, there's no team out there.

I'm like, oh, I wish I had James Connor, you know, on draft day. And now week 15, I look back, I go, God, I wish I had James Connor. Yeah, I mean, like, I wrote him up positively and I'm thinking, like, you know, he's going to do it again, you know, because he's, crushes at the end of the year. And the difference this year is he hasn't missed time yet for the first time ever. Like this guy keeps going. Like I know if I, I know two things. One, if I back him next year, he'll get hurt and fall apart. Two, if I don't back him, he'll do this again. That I know. So I'm going to leave it alone, but I did like him today in this spot. But it wasn't much else to get excited about. I resisted painting Marvin Howe.

Harrison in a in a positive light um what the hell i really love anyone here i didn't like hunter henry what do you do four for 25 okay yeah i wasn't feeling that there's there's hooper you know again bad bad bad bad offense patriots oh we we got to have two tight ends involved and one two actually didn't well i did like douglas and luckily he scored yep but they still spread the damn ball around a 10 receiver It's still too much. The Patriots were 0 of 6 on third down today. This offense is so, so bad.

At least next year when they have Travis Hunter, like he'll play wide receiver, he'll play corner. Like, Patriots need all the help they can get. It looks like they're going to keep their head coach, which I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but they've got to find some skill players here, John. This might be one of the most untalented offensive units in the NFL. Yeah.

I mean, Douglas is just journeyman type. Booty is talented but had all kinds of issues. Born is like an undrafted guy or like a sixth rounder. Everybody in their team is like a wide receiver four or five. Yeah, yeah. Was Kendrick Bourne drafted? That's a good question. I'm going to say no.

I remember him on the 49ers for a bit. Yeah, he was definitely on the 49ers. Was he drafted? Um, looks like he was not drafted. Uh, bu, nope, wasn't even drafted. That's your best, that's your best wide receiver out there. I do like them, but yeah, to your point, I've been, you know, you know, when the year I did a show with Charlie Weiss, we talked a lot of Patriots.

I'm like, they should draft Jerry Judy. That's why I kept screaming. Judy, Judy, Judy, get Jerry, Judy. That's, that's perfect for the run after the catch inside. outside. What the hell? What the hell do I know? They don't listen to me. Should have traded for Jerry Judy. I know. Now Jerry Judy is like one of the top five receivers in the league. Every week the guy's going bananas out here. Let's move on to this fun 425 Eastern slate. This is where the points start piling up here. Let's roll on to Denver. This is a big game for Denver. As they're trying to move towards the playoffs.

They get a 31-13 win over the Colts. But it was a struggle for a while. They were down 10-0 in this game. as Anthony Richardson came out, had a big run to get things going early. And then finally the Broncos turned it around here. They got a fumble recovery from Nick Benito. It really was a backwards laterally intercepted and returned. Cortland Sutton gets on the board late. Really saves his day, John, as he only goes three for 32. But kind of a struggle for a guy, Bo Nix.

He does throw three touchdowns today, but also three interceptions and just 130 yards passing. That was another anti-schematic performance because there was so much data that was looking really good as I outlined. I don't even know. You got to give credit to the defense. But man, it was weird. It was absolutely weird. I thought Sutton would have a really good game.

Once again, he scored. Yeah. And here we go again, though. Still not a great, you know what? It almost felt like today watching it like this was. his sophomore season started today, Bo Nix. That might be a little dramatic, but, you know, I am curious about like sample size increasing next year if Bo Nix can maintain this level of play.

But overall, to his defense, they still have crappy receivers. And like, you know, look at all these dudes, man. Adkins, the freaking fullback. Troy Franklin, the rookie, crawl out there, a little Jordan, try the veil. I mean, 11 different receivers for God's sakes. But how about this? This is crazy. I mentioned I had a really horrible day on props.

So I do this Veson show. So I had an open segment. So I'm like, you know what? My fantasy spidey sense is pointing me in the right direction on these guys to freaking score and not hitting the prop. So I said, let me put together 10 touchdowns. 10 touchdown plays. Okay.

And we'll presume that I'm going to bet $100 on all 10 of them. Well, wouldn't you freaking know it? I want to call it up right now. I lost the Sutton. I didn't realize Sutton freaking scored. I got nine of the 10 guys scored. Dwyer the guru. That's ridiculous.

But if I pump it up and then next week I'll be like 50-50. But oh my God. I had, let's see here, I had Sutton. Well, I had, okay, I had Kelsey, that failed. Devante Adams, A.J. Brown, Cortland Sutton, Josh Allen, Quentin, Johnston. He scored. I had Aaron Rogers with two or more touchdowns. Got him.

I had Justin Herbert with two or more touchdowns. Pat Fryermuth, plus 260. And, and Shakir. Freakant night of the 10. So if you bet $100 on all those from the show, you're up like $1,400 bucks right. Oh my God. You got my phone number. Just send them to me on the side.

I mean, use the cash. Yeah, but if you would have played my other props, you would have been pissed because you had a bunch of just misses like Garrett Wilson. I went with his yardage because it was a lot lower, not a lot, but it was lower than Devante Adams. So wow, that's crazy.

So well, there you go. Now I got a new thing here. I missed a touchdown guy now. There you go. You know who just missed out on a touchdown? And this was crazy. And you had in your article.

I wasn't an ideal matchup for Johnny Taylor. You talk anti-schematics here. 22 carries for Jonathan Taylor, 107 yards, and he, like the guy on the Bengals, drops the ball at the one-inch line, and it goes out of bounds for a touchback. Johnny Taylor, like someone's fantasy season

ended on that play. And Johnny Taylor, of all people, not a showboaty guy at all. Why do you guys do this, John? Like, if I was a coach, I would say, you hold that ball and run it out of the back of the damn end zone and throw it at the wall. Like literally hand it to somebody in the first row.

I want you to do it with every touchdown to know you cross the line. Hand it to some kid in the front row. Like why are we dropping the ball at the one yard line? Showboating. Just YouTube in it. You know, everyone trying to look slick out there, I guess. Another, another ugly performance for Richardson. Antisclamatically.

Pittman does well somehow, a lot of it garbage. Downs comes out, catches a quick ball. For 22, you're like, oh, okay, nothing else, really. And once again, we only throw for 172 yards, but we're also going to divide that up among nine different dudes. Yeah, this game saw eight turnovers. Just incredible, just an ugly, ugly game. You know, Johnny Taylor loses one.

Pitman loses one. D. Mitchell loses one here. And I mean, just bad news all around in this one. It was ugly. So let's move on to something after the break that wasn't ugly. Fantasy Bonanza in Detroit, the bills stake their claim to be the best team in the NFL. We'll talk about all the points scored in that one. After this timeout, it's a fantasy points podcast.

I got to tell you, there's nothing I hate more in life than NFL power rankings. my son who's in seventh grade. You know, all his buddies, they're just getting into football and they're talking about, I live in upstate New York, so there's a lot of, you know, Bill's fans. And one of his buddies just, it's nonstop. The bills are the best team. We just beat the lions. We're the best.

And I'm like, and he loses his mind, my son on this. And I go, dude, the NFL, none of these power rankings matter. It's played on the field. Whoever hoists the Lombardi trophy is the best team. It doesn't matter who the best team in week 15 is. A week ago, everyone's saying, what's wrong with the bills? They just lost to the Rams. Now, oh, tomorrow, you know, when you guys are listening to this podcast, everyone's jerking

off to the bills because they just went to Motown and beat the lions. Like, let it play out, okay? Let it play out. And the bills did let it play out. And this game wasn't really that close, John. I know they only win by six, 48, 42, but the bills were in control of this game, literally from the jump. And I don't know if Josh Allen had just locked up the MVP, but he might have two hands on

at this point, John. 362 yards passing two touchdowns. Also ran for 68 yards and two more scores. Like this kid's the MVP. Ballin. I mean, he had to keep it going with Lamar Jackson, by the way, breathing up his neck with a huge game in the early game. But yeah, figured he would run.

That's why he was one of my touchdown props. Should have played his rushing. I don't know what the hell I was thinking there. You know, I told some people to start a good number of people. People start James Cook. And I said today on our live stream, like, yeah, I understand there's maybe a wide range of possible outcomes. But, geez, like, he's had a really good year.

We're tied to a massive point total here. Like, let's just roll with the guy. And he comes through here massively. But the thing that pissed me off. And my guy, Shakir scored again, lost a prop. I mean, Ty Johnson, really. Like, they saw something with the line. They don't cover very well, which by the way was part of the analysis on Shakir because they're not really good underneath and things like that.

Freaking Ty Johnson leads the team like that's rough. And where was Amari Cooper? What's the hell of point zero. What happened? Nothing. I don't think you got a target John. Did you even see him out there? He was walking around.

He was waving to the fans. jeez that's that's just he is someone that you got to get him going early but that's ridiculous that that is just absolutely absurd yeah he started oh my god it was out there he was out there and oh my god yeah but it's tough with this bill's offense because they do spread it around so much so oh yeah you know like we're talking tie johnson keon coleman's back he catches a 64 yarder can kane He caught four for 53. Thanks for nothing all season, Dalton Kincaid. Jackass.

Oh, and you got to get Dawson Knox out there too. Got to. And Dawson Knox had a touchdown called back in the fourth quarter. So he would have had a big day for you people in, you know, 38 tight end leagues. But it's interesting with these bills. They keep cruising. For the Lions, Jemir Gibbs, two touchdowns on the day. Big day is a receiver, 83 yards.

And that score, Jameson Williams gets in the box late is a receiver. Tim Patrick keeps it going, four for 30 and a touchdown. And it wouldn't be a Lions game if we didn't get a tackle eligible touchdown as Dan Skipper scores for Lions here. It's Jared Goff, 494 and 5. So I guess the guy who was asking between Goff and Lamar, the difference was just Lamar's rushing, I guess. But what a day for Jared Goff.

Yeah, yeah. I was high on Amon Ra and golf. and Gibbs and Montgomery and Shakir and Cooper that and I did reach Coleman I had a little middling take on Laporte and he went off but yeah it was kind of starting if you got him game but you know they do the problem is these guys got got got a lot you know what I mean they've got well the lines have well two running backs now they've got three receivers wide outs with Patrick I think Patrick can play every week in fantasy going forward. Hit eight targets again this week.

Yeah, yeah. Of course, I do it. Then, you know, that'll be the week they run for 290 and he gets two catches for 12. But yeah, I mean, we thought it would be a bananza. It was not everyone's going to go off. But this was probably as close as it comes. But I got to put an APB on Amari Cooper because that was ugly. He was hanging out with David Montgomery, who averaged 0.8 yards of carry.

John, four yards rushing today for your boy Stonewall. Weird. That's weird wild stuff. He did hit his receiving prop, though, I believe. As did Gibbs. Let's move it on to the Bucks and the Chargers. And I talk about every time I look over at the TV, I got two basement TVs down here.

One I just had in the Eagles game, the other one I got on Red Zone. Sometimes my kid puts the quad box up. Don't ask. But Mike Evans, every time I look over, John, was making a big play. 11 targets, he catches 9 for 159 and 2 touchdowns today from Baker Mayfield, who tosses four touchdowns himself.

Like, I got to give it up any of you guys out there who either drafted or picked up Mayfield off the wire and we're going with him. What a season for Baker Mayfield. And even through all the injuries has kept this Tampa Bay team afloat. They improved now to 8 and 6. And they're right in the thick of it trying to fight their way into this NFC South. championship picture. Yeah, he was one of the final quarterbacks that I pushed in the trade article, by the way, the last couple of weeks of the article, because he was in a little bit of a funk there.

Part of that was Evans being out. Part of that was a buy, and part of that was some bad matchups. But I saw that it was clearing up. But yeah, Mike Evans was freaking everywhere. Absolutely amazing. And, you know, if you listen to me over the last three, four weeks, I did give a good amount of love to Jalen McMillan. I'm like, you know what, let's get behind this kid in case we kept capture lightning in a jar. I think I said it with you one day, two weeks ago on Sears XM. You know, like this is what you look for. A guy with a nice pedigree with a nice future who they need them now. You know what I mean?

And guess what? Liam Cohen, man, Tampa Bay fans hit the lottery with this guy because you had Dave Canales. Oh, boohoo, we lost Dave Canales. Guess what? Liam Cohen is better. I'm all ready to say it. Like, this offense is freaking good every, almost every week. Very, very impressed with the Liam Cohn.

If I own the Tampa Bay Bucks, I'm like, dude, you're not leaving this team. Like, if Todd Bowles, you know, doesn't work out for him or he wants to retire, you're our new head coach. That's a good call. How about Bucky Irving? All week, we're like, oh, is Bucky going to play? You know, should we pick up our guy Sean Tucker? And is he going to get some work here because of the back issue with Bucky Irving? issues or not.

Bucky Irving ran for 117 yards today on 15 carries. Rashad also got 15. He goes for 64 yards. So really the Bucks would do whatever they wanted today against the L.A. Chargers. So shout out to you guys. You've got any the Bucks on your team.

Let's go over to the Chargers though, John. And Ladd-McConkey, we're glad to see him back in the lineup. He does score 5 for 58. If you went to that Stone Smart route, 5 for 50 for him, Quentin Johnson, you mentioned earlier, you liked him scoring a touchdown, and he did.

But at the end of the day, this team just doesn't have a lot of talent on offense. I mean, you have no running game to speak of at all between Edwards and Vidal. And Herbert's just getting crushed back there. Every time he drops back, somebody's hitting him. So, I mean, it'll be a good offseason. They've got to go get T. Higgins or somebody to help push the ball down the field. Yeah, I mean, Ladd is just so small and frail looking. You know, I keep, I was harking back to what I asked him, was like, dude, you got to build up a little bit, you know, I, you know, I don't know, I think he's got to like hit the gym, quite frankly.

We've seen it all. We always see it. Like, these guys do get a little bigger, you know, like A, B. Wasn't that big, you know, as he was jacked up right away. I don't know. I could be wrong there. Maybe he could lose some quickness there. But I actually.

Somebody like that. He's not a foundational piece on the outside. I mean, that's part of the reason the Chargers didn't convert a third down today. They got nobody to throw the ball to. Yeah, yeah, because Quentin Johnson isn't very good. And Palmer's just a rotational guy. He's a good one, but maybe not every week. Yeah, yeah.

And, you know, they do have presumably a good old line, too. They should be good to go there. But you're right. Herbert is a little under siege. But, yeah, the lack of running game. Like, if you had optimal and peak J.K. Dobbins, running well with Will Disley at tight end and McConkey and Johnston and Palm. Okay, now maybe, but you're right.

This is absolutely a lacking offense right now, and they're just doing the best they can, and right now it's not very good. No, and they're eight and six. They're still in the mix for the playoffs, but I don't trust the Chargers very much. I'm pushing for that T. Higgins to the L.A. charges. here. I'm driving the bandwagon for that, John. That's a perfect fit in the offseason. All right. Let's see. The final game we're going to talk about here on the show, save the best for last, as the birds knock off the Steelers in the battle for Pennsylvania, 27 to 13. Now, in this one,

John, this was, you know, a lot of people, hey, Sequan Barclay, they're carrying me to a fantasy championship. He gets nicked up in this one. 65 yards rushing, doesn't get in to the end zone, catch us two balls there. So big letdown for Barclay today. Yeah. Yeah. Well, how about Skinny Batman? I mean, we all thought, we all thought A.J. Brown would crush. He did it. He is so awesome. He really is incredible. But glad Skinny B came back. I kept pushing him as I got a trade for him. I'm like, I'm just going to do it again. Why? Because that's why. Because his values in the shitter right now. And it's going to, it's going to rise. And wow. Of course, I love. lost his prop last week, but now he scored two weeks in a row. It seemed like Hertz had a better game

from what I saw. Yeah, this was a game where they needed to throw the football because, listen, the Steelers defense is very good. And the Eagles should have ran away with this game. And there's a couple of fluky turnovers and things that kept him in it early. But they came out throwing the football and they got the ball early and often to A.J. Brown. He finishes eight for one, 10 in the score. as you mentioned Skinny Batman, 11 for 109, and his score. And Kenny Gainwell was heavily involved, as we said, Barclay got banged up here. You know, it was the interesting thing for you guys who love this sort of thing. There's a Twitter account called the Surrender Index.

And Pittsburgh punted to Philadelphia from the Philadelphia 46. It was a fourth and seven with 1040 to go in the fourth quarter. Remember that number, 1040 to go in the game. They were down 2713. This surrender index ranked that as the 98th percentile of cowardly punts for 2024 and 95th percentile of all punts since 1999. 1040 to go, they punted away to the Eagles. They never saw the ball again, John.

Philadelphia ran the final 10 minutes and 40 seconds off the clock. That is incredible, just imposing your will on your opponent. Yeah. By the way, if Sequin, God forbid, I know we don't have a lot of time left in the season, but if he missed two weeks, would you think that my guy Will Shipley would be worth picking up? Probably not. I mean, he would play. He would play for sure.

You know, the Eagles have the commanders and the Giants in their final two games. So if they wanted to sit Sequin down again, the Eagles already locked up into the playoffs. I doubt there's not really a way the commanders can catch them for the division. But, you know, I'm telling you right now, mark my words, Will Shipley is going to have a moment in the end of That guy is good and I almost regret leaving the area because I, you know, because I interviewed him and I'm like, I could just see this guy in the Philadelphia area. I don't know why. And here he is. And he's, he's really good.

I'm telling you, I got a really good vibe on him. He'll be their number two next year because it really, the Berkeley deal is essentially a two-year deal. So they'll have Berkeley this year next year. And then Gainwell, this is the final year. His deal. He'll be gone. But we'll say if you want more in-depth. stuff go see mr caplin's uh podcast inside the birds uh lastly here on the steelers john this

the team just doesn't have any talent on offense you know russell wilson is limited in what he can do they don't have any receivers without george pickens uh they couldn't run on this good eagles team i mean naji harris ran for 14 yards he was a leading rusher too they just they don't have any talent on offense i don't know how this team at 10 and four they're going to probably win their division if they beat baltimore on saturday uh i think when they play again but there's no way this team advances in the playoffs with this offense. You know, the way they play is they're going to keep it close, play great defense, hopefully commit to the run, wear you down a little bit. And, you know, Najee's had plenty of games like that this year, but not lately and not against a great

defense. You know, I do love Calvin Austin. He's a damn good player. But, you know, you can't truly count on him, although he stepped up today. I like Fryer Muth to score. But once again, you don't have a ton of continuity out there spreading it around scaronic big mike williams van down by the river you know they they're lost without george pickets and a running game that's it like they'll play defense good they got to run the ball and they got to have george if they do now of a sudden everything looks considerably better because yeah it just looked like what are we doing here I mean, what do we have? Like, are these scabs?

Basically, they're scabs. That's a theme today. A bunch of scabs out there. Ben Scebronic. It also helps, like we said, they had the ball for just a few minutes in the fourth quarter. The Eagles ran nearly 11 minutes off. Eagles end with 3952 time of possession on this one.

So, all right, Johnny, we're on to the fantasy semifinals. We're just trying to get things right. We're trying to hit props. We're trying to advance teams. to stay alive and fight for one more week. We got a couple of Monday nighters this week, too. So a little bit of a shorter show for us this week. I'm ready for Kyle Pitts to have a blow-up game on Monday night football.

Oh, yeah, baby. Oh, yeah. I'm going to manifest this puppy. Kyle Pitts, baby. Oh, no. Oh, boy. All right. Well, because of that, I need to go drink.

Luckily, we record this on Sunday night. If you're listening to this at, you know, 8 a.m. in your car driving to work, I'm not drinking. at this point. All right. For the guru, I'm Drake. We'll see you next time for the Fantasy Points Podcast.