Fantasy Football Today - 01/22: TE Reflections and More 2019 Notes (Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: January 22, 2020

Was the TE position actually good in 2019? Will it be good again in 2020? We spend much of the show discussing TEs, marveling at Travis Kelce's greatness, wondering if it makes sense to take an elite TE early or wait and discussing the guys who could break out in 2020 (25:10). We also look at interesting splits for Hunter Henry, Jared Cook and Mark Andrews and discuss why Zach Ertz could be a bust ... Reacting to the latest news and notes (29:30) as JAC may have a new Offensive Coordinator and Saturday Night Live will have an NFL host! Which NFL player would be the best SNL host? ... 2019 notes (32:30) on Matt Ryan, Cooper Kupp and Chris Carson. Are they elite? ... Your emails at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. The tight end was not so bad in 2019. The big three were very good, though they weren't as good as they were in 2018. We had Mark Andrews and we had Darren Waller emerge. Austin Hooper had a career season. Tyler Higbee had 522 yards in his last five games. So is tight end good? All of a sudden, we will bring in Heath Cummings and Ben Gretsch to discuss.

I am Adam Azer. Welcome to Fantasy Football Today here on Wednesday. And good morning to Heath and Ben. Have you guys been, you're in the same room, Ben's in Fort Lauderdale in the same office. Have you been exchanging projections all morning? I've been bugging Ben like every 10 to 15 minutes with some random factoid that I discover during the process. And the most recent one was a lot of fun. I think you will enjoy it. There have been 23 running backs to have at least 18 rushing touchdowns in a single season.

Adam Gase's last three offenses have combined for 17 rushing touchdowns. Combined. Combined. You know what? The whole team. Not just one running back. The whole team. Three offenses have combined for 17 rushing touchdowns. Combined. Combined. You know what? The whole team. Not just one running back. The whole team. I think I can find another funny stat about Dolphins running backs,

which is partially Adam Gase. So I'm going to go ahead and find that while you guys chat. Go ahead. Well, I mean, he said he's been bugging me the last couple days, but I've been enjoying these little nuggets. I mean, he said he's been bugging me the last couple days, but I've been enjoying these little nuggets. I mean, that is an awesome one. They've averaged under six rushing touchdowns as a team per year over the last three years.

I mean, he's been on two different teams. But that is incredibly bad. Yeah. I mean, that's just really, really bad. And I think, like, Adam. I found it. Okay. Here we go.

So this is obviously about the Miami Hurricanes, who got a transfer quarterback, Derek King, who's a dual-threat quarterback from Houston. And this is from the Miami Herald. How elusive is King as a runner? Consider he forced eight missed tackles and a loss to Washington State last season. As perspective, Dolphins running back Kalen Balazs forced six missed tackles all season i'm surprised

you forced six yeah i question that number it's definitely less all right where were we so let's talk about tight ends here guys um that is the uh topic du jour but i did want to read a few emails first um just give me real quick do you think tight end is is better than ever going into 2020 i i don't think i i buy that i think i think it had a you know a resurgent year you noted that the top ones came back uh part of the reason they came back as 2018 was a was a pretty historic year for tight ends george kittle broke the all-time yardage record right and i think kelsey was right behind him and did urts also set the all-time receptions record for titans like yeah i think those are those are all correct stats all three of those guys had great years in 2018 they were destined to come back a little bit in 2019 they still were all very good and we got those new you know uh mark andrews and darren waller kind of coming up

from the the later rounds of fantasy drafts but i still don't know that i would say that it's the best it's ever been i don't we don't know yeah and that's one of the things about doing that going through the projections now it's too early to do it but you realize how much we don't know and we don't know where eric ebron's going to play this year who the colts if the colts only have jack doyle tied in that might make him interesting we don't know if austin hooper is going back to the atlanta falcons we don't know if greg olson delaney walker jimmy graham are going to come back or if they're going to open the door for young tight ends that are exciting we don't know how Greg Olson, Delaney Walker, Jimmy Graham are going to come back or if they're going to open the door for young tight ends that are exciting. We don't know how the Rams are going to measure or handle things with Everett and Tyler Higby.

So I do feel more comfortable with it. And I think that there is more upside coming for sure. I'm not sure that upside is quite going to be ready in 2020. It's not just that rookie tight ends are bad. Generally, like second year tight ends aren't very good. Sometimes third year tight ends aren't quite good. And then they have like a three year stretch and then they're too old to play tight end. Yeah, well, this is kind of amazing.

If you just think about this, Travis Kelsey has been the number one tight end in PPR four straight seasons. That's pretty remarkable. He's been number one in non-PPR in three of the last four seasons and number two in the other season behind Rob Gronkowski. So just think about that. And I, something else. And I like, I think I said earlier that I've pretty much decided Travis Kelsey is going to be in my first round whenever the rankings are done. You look at the last three seasons, it's, he's been a top 10 running back and a top 10 wide receiver each of the past three seasons as well. So when

you consider how bad the bottom of tight end has been worth, I think he's definitely been worth a first round pick. Okay. So let me, let me throw out a theory here, just something I was thinking of and, and tell me, tell me how you feel about this, right? So the league winners in fantasy, when you sit there and you say, oh, I won my league and people say, oh, you must've had Christian McCaffrey. You must've had Michael Thomas. You must've had Lamar Jackson. We pretty much never say that about a tight end. I mean, the absolute best that you're going to get from a tight end that wasn't Rob Gronkowski is probably like a running back eight wide receiver eight something like that so it's not to say you can't win if you draft Travis Kelsey but when you think about like the running backs that might go around Travis Kelsey they are all going to have you know a lead upside they're all going to have a lead upside. They're all going to have that ability to take that Dalvin

Cook leap, right? So, I could make a case that based on just upside, league winning, league dominating, unbelievable player upside, Travis Kelsey shouldn't be a first round pick and maybe he shouldn't even be a second round

pick because his best case scenario is worse than the best case scenario is worse than the best case scenario of a lot of guys that are going to go behind him that's just wrong so like maybe in 2019 there wasn't really league winning upside 2018 uh i don't have the numbers but of the vast majority of winning leagues had urts or kelsey or kittle they were well far and above and then if you go back a few years the great great Rob Gronkowski seasons, the great Jimmy Graham seasons, those were all very much league-winning tight end seasons.

I mean, there's a lot of examples. But those are outliers. I mean, no, but all those examples are outliers. Breakout is an outlier. Like, you have to have an outlier to have a league-winning season. Otherwise, it wouldn't be a league-winning season. I guess so.

But 2018, those three tight ends did stuff that we just have never seen before, and we knew it wasn't going to happen again, and it didn't happen again. And then I don't know if you can really call anyone Rob Gronkowski. He's Rob Gronkowski. I was going to say that's kind of the point because tight end is a position where there's not always a lot of really consistent production because a lot of them aren't consistently receivers. And then when you do get a really great season, it is an outlier. And you get this huge positional advantage.

So I still think there's an argument for those top guys. I think for me, Kelsey and Kittle will both be in the discussion for first round. I don't know that I'll probably look at them more second round picks, but I think they're both pretty elite for fantasy. And I do think the positional thing really matters because even this year when Kelsey wasn't near as good as he was last year, he probably more than doubled the number 12 tight end, right? He had 256 points.

Number 12 had 138. Yeah, so outscored him by 118 fantasy points. I mean, it's probably not the advantage that christian mccaffrey had but it's it's a big advantage and that was you know i think it was larger in 2018 like we were talking about oh for sure um 118 fantasy points was uh the number 24 running back if you're comparing from dalvin cook who we're talking about okay uh yeah by the way that the fantasy points you know it depends what site you look at uh but the concept is the same. All right. You know what? Look, I'm not saying I believe that when I was thrown out there, when I was floating, but I just thought kind of an interesting talking point. later after we talk about tight ends. The emails are about an email that we read at the end of yesterday's show, that crazy concept of drafting team offenses

and only starting players from that team. And which team did we forget who should probably be the number one pick? We got called out via email, so we'll read some of those emails. FantasyFootball at CBSi.com. Remember, we have three episodes per week during the offseason. We also have a newsletter that will keep you up to date on all the latest fantasy football content all off season long go to cbssports.com slash newsletter and get your news of the day get our podcast content editorial pieces prospect profiles rankings and more cbssports.com slash

newsletter oh and league punishments. Remember to leave your best fantasy loser punishments in the Apple podcast reviews. We already have one from Neil. They have a fantasy loser varsity jacket and the loser is required to wear it in public whenever he's with another league member. Very clever.

I like that. So let us know the best league loser punishment that you've got and tell us in a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, and we'd really appreciate it. All right, so you talked about, Heath, the positional advantage. When you think about Kelsey or Kittle in round one or Ertz in round two or three or something or whoever, is Ertz going to be your number three tight end next year, guys?

I doubt it just because of concern i'm not sure who it will be but i'm probably going to downgrade at earth's at least at the beginning of the offseason more than most just because i don't think the sharing with dallas goddard's going away i think Goddard's going to at least get the share that he got this year and maybe a slight uptick. And I do think that they'll have better receiving options than they had at the end of last year. And you look at Earth's target numbers before almost literally all of the wide receivers got hurt. His target share was way down.

So I'll probably have Earth's like fourth or fifth. I wouldn't be surprised if Andrews or Henry is ahead of him. Yeah, so the numbers, eight games with Alshon Jeffrey, Ertz averaged 7.25 targets per game. Seven games without Jeffrey, and that includes two games in which he left early with an injury, he averaged 11 targets per game, almost four more targets per game for Ertz,

who had 135 targets in 15 games a year after having what do you have in 2018 156 targets so and i think like that matters for him because he's not he's awesome very very good but he's not kelsey or kittle in terms of what he produces for fantasy points or yards on a per target base yeah i mean Yeah, I mean, his average depth of target is way lower. He's way more of a possession receiver than those guys who are more big play guys, and they do a lot more after the catch typically. I mean, just because Kittle and Kelsey are so good at that, it's not really a knock on Ertz.

No, I agree. I mean, we were talking yesterday that Ertz and Goddard and the Eagles as a team last season or 2019 had the second most targets for tight ends on a team since 2000. And that's an astronomically high number. I think it was 250, you said? Right. So we know that the wide receiver injuries impacted that, and they went to a ton of two tight end sets.

They played Goddard a ton alongside Ertz because they needed both of them on the field the difference now going forward is goddard's not gonna just like what when they get better receivers and they are able to run more three wide receiver sets like they wanted to if deshaun jackson would have been healthy and they could have had a deep threat a third receiver out on the field or jeffrey healthy or even nelson hagel are who missed time i mean they're down to greg ward at the end of the season right so if they're healthy and they're able to run more three wide receiver sets do we really think that urts is going to continue to play 90 plus percent of the snaps and goddard's going to be the backup or like he said now that goddard has been so effective and

was very good on a per target basis right on par and i think even better than urts in some efficiency metrics yeah most tight ends were better than ur Ertz on yards per target last year. He was a 6.8. So if you think about it that way and you think, okay, three wide receiver sets, are they going to continue to just leave Ertz on there and take Goddard out of the lineup? Well, Goddard was a second round pick and he's,

he's proven everything that he could prove to this point. So why wouldn't they use him more in single tight end sets and, and rotate more and, and, and lessen Ertz's workload. And that's, and like, we And like we're all talking about, Adam, you just mentioned 156 targets in 2018, 135 more in 2019. I don't project him to get close to that in 2020. That 135 was in 15 games. But I guess my question is he's going to get more targets than Mark Andrews, right?

I mean, so Hunter Henry, like let's be honest here with Hunter Henry now. It's three years where he can't stay healthy, plus he missed the season, and he really struggled at the end. You know, Hunter Henry hasn't really had that season yet that we're hoping for. He's still young. He's still early in his career. And the one time that he did score a lot of touchdowns, Keenan Allen played only one game that season. So so like i i see the downgrade in earths but i have a hard time figuring out who

to put ahead of him uh andrews is the one that i have projected and currently project for more fantasy points i haven't got to the chargers yet so i won't really talk about henry too much i will say the big difference for their careers zach Zach Ertz has averaged 7.5 yards per target, which is fine for a tight end. Mark Andrews is at 9.5 yards per target. Last year, Ertz fell to 6.8. Andrews was at 8.7, and Ertz is going to be 30, which is generally when we start seeing tight ends slow down

in terms of production just a little bit. So I will have Andrews ahead of Ertz going into next year. Okay, so how many rounds behind kelsey and kiddo who are let's say top 15 picks or so uh would mark andrews or zackerts whoever your number three tight end would be uh where would they fall how many rounds how far behind the top two i think the top two are at the one two turn or at least between picks nine and 18 so maybe not quite the one two turn um i i haven't done it yet but i'm leaning towards the three four turn for andrews and arts yeah i might even go later i i will still have hurts probably as my tight end three i think just

because the track record and adam i do agree with some some of your pushback there where it's hard to figure out who you'd put ahead and there are concerns that andrews could keep up that efficiency it's really high um he's almost like this year's oj howard oj howard last year ton of efficiency not enough targets we were hoping for for more except for you know doesn't have the competition that howard had so there's i think there's more reason for optimism for andrews he just had a better season than howard's ever had right sure probably and and but i i still think that Ertz what he's done I'll probably still have him tied in three but I probably won't draft him until round four around five yeah so I'm looking at the PPR draft that we did and it was kind of funky I

mean no no love for the tight ends Travis Kelsey went with the sixth pick in round two this is a 12 team league George Kittle went with the third pick of round three to ben gretch zach ertz first pick of round four austin hooper went two picks after that i'm i think i'm missing mark andrews where's and i think austin hooper deserves to be in that discussion no if we knew for sure he was on the falcons mark andrews went around five and you know PPR, Mark Andrews had really interesting splits. His first seven games before the bye, he was the number three tight end in non, number four tight end in PPR. He had 36 catches, 449 yards, three touchdowns, 55 targets.

He had the third most targets among tight ends. Last eight games, he only played 15 games. He was, once again, number four in PPR. He was number two in non-PPR, but it changed. He didn't have as many targets. He didn't have as many catches. Didn't have as many yards. Not a huge drop, but he had four more touchdowns in those eight games.

But Lamar Jackson went, before the bye, Lamar Jackson threw 31 passes per game. After the bye, he threw 23 passes per game. So kind of interesting there. I don't know that you can expect the top five tight end if Lamar Jackson's throwing, I don't know, 25 passes per game, but I don't know what he's going to do next year, you know? Yeah, I would just... I don't know what to make of.

I'm pretty much... This isn't going to be surprising. I expect Lamar Jackson's going to throw a few more passes. That's what generally happens with run-heavy quarterbacks as they develop through their career we've seen it with the sean watson the last couple of years we saw it with russell wilson we saw it with cam newton so i think it's more likely he throws the number of times he did in the first half of the season or a little bit more than what he did in the second half okay so it sounds like you guys still think there's a pretty big gap between the top two now and the rest, which would make those top two very valuable.

Right. Yeah. I mean, I think it was kind of a top three going into this year. Ertz was kind of on par with Kittle, and everyone had Kelsey as the clear number one. The way I'm looking at 2020 is Kelsey and Kittle are kind of neck and neck at that top tier, and then there's a huge gap after two. And Er's wasn't bad like he was good he was top five um he was fourth and non-ppr he was fifth in ppr almost every like earth's had six touchdowns kelsey had what five touchdowns weird so the

touchdowns just weren't there kittle had five for the second straight season had multiple called back in one game early in the year and I think in third throughout the season as well. But the thing you did with Mark Andrews' splits, you can do with Zach Ertz's splits, and it's much scarier. Yeah. The targets, yeah. Ertz was good in 2019. It's just that everything, when you look forward to 2020,

it's not promising. I mean, they should be and almost certainly will be healthier at wide receiver, and Goddard, the other tight end on his team, has now shown in extended playing time that he's very, very good. And he's younger. Ertz is not going to be a 130, 140 target guy. You just don't see that. I'll tell you, we want to do some splits, though.

How about Jared Cook? With Drew Brees, he was, I believe, the number one tight end in fantasy. Well, week one, he had a bad game, two catches, 37 yards. Then Brees got hurt in week two. But the last eight games of the season, he was the number one tight end in non-PPR, number two in PPR, and it was touchdown heavy. But 28 catches. This is in eight games, so just double everything.

28 catches, 537 yards, seven touchdownss on 38 targets it's not a lot of targets it's not a lot of catches but it's 1074 yards and 14 touchdowns that's the pace for jared cook with drew breeze kind of interesting what do you think i think he's gonna turn 33 years old in april um they don't have a long history of elite tight end production from 33 year old or older especially guys that have had careers as spotty as jared cook assuming that he comes back assuming they don't add a really good option as the number a number two because they don't really have a number two right now they're going to add a couple of guys probably um he's going to be in for me in the area where like i missed out on the guys I really want.

Yeah, I agree. The age is a big thing for me. I had a concussion this year. I don't really know his history, but you start to get concerned about that. I do more with tight ends because they're blocking so much on the line. We know that, you know, that can lead to more concussion issues. We've seen it with like Jordan Reed, for instance. I probably will be out on Cook because he you just mentioned

from a statistical standpoint was very touchdown dependent very much like Eric Ebron in 2018 and everybody really wanted to draft Eric Ebron after his 14 touchdowns in 2018 and he just wasn't nearly as good this year the lack of targets and receptions for me at that at that age it's it's not something I want to get back into this year. Who are you going to prefer next year? It might be format dependent. I don't know. Darren Waller, who was fourth in non-PPR, second in PPR,

had only three touchdowns on 117 targets and 90 catches. Or Jared Cook. Darren Waller or Cook? Waller for me. It's almost certainly going to be Waller, like if there's a team that we don't know what's going to happen with it next year it's the raiders we i'm not sure that we know who the quarterback's going to be for the raiders yeah and and he waller struggled when when wenfro uh came on late in the year right there was all those splits about when renfro was on the field

waller's gonna have a lot more target competition next year they wanted to bring in antonio brown that didn't work i think tyrell william Williams as the number one wasn't really great. But if they do bring in a legitimate number one, whether they draft one or they try to sign an A.J. Green or whatever, they obviously showed an interest in trying to get that caliber of a player last offseason. Then they'll have Williams as a deep threat, Renfro and Waller as the underneath targets, their slot guy and their tight end. That would really hamper Waller's ability to have 117 targets again next season and it it's also very notable that it took till he was 27 for him to break out he's not a young guy i mean he's a new guy on the fantasy landscape but he's definitely older in in his career as well i still like him but yeah to the

to answer your question i would take wall over cook largely because i'm just that far down on cook right do you want to talk more about 2019 and maybe what worked or what didn't work or you should we just spin it ahead to 2020 which we've been mostly doing but i guess i guess if we if we put a bow on it ben you know like how would you sum up tight end in 2019 well i i think obviously the the top three guys all did really well and they were the top three guys in drafts and then we saw tight ends four five six who we haven't really talked about yet ingram oj howard hunter henry did not do very well right and i think if one of kelsey kittle or earth say maybe got hurt this year we'd have a little bit of a different um feel for for how things went but

right now i think we feel really confident that like these early round tight end picks they didn't bust but a lot of times they do. And I, so I, I'm a little hesitant to overreact to just this one data point. There's a reason that people are wary of early tight end picks. And so actually the, the flip side of it is my biggest takeaway is that once again, we had some late round tight ends kind of come out of nowhere and really do

well. And it's not just Mark Andrews and Darren Waller. It's also guys who had short spurts in season tyler higby late in the year right and and we saw that um with i guess i'm thinking two years ago eric ebron with the lions had a nice little run late in in the year but then you also had like will disley early in the season was a guy you could grab and then later jacob hollister in that same role for seattle there's there's often guys so for me that the biggest thing that i i took back was you don't have to invest high at tight end which to adam's point earlier in the show you can i think but i i

kind of think next year i'll be looking to to wait later trying to find this next year's darren waller or mark andrews or eric ebron from 2018 when he was a late round pick and with the colts um or or finding the tyler higby off the off the waiver wire if I don't hit in the draft. Because I think those opportunities are available at this position. Yeah, I mean, the top two guys or two of the top three hit, and Zach Ertz kind of hit. And we basically universally agreed that then we're going to wait, and then there was another tier of Ingram, Howard, and Henry,

and they just all were terrible for one reason or another. I view still this year Kelsey and Kittle are pretty much bulletproof unless they get hurt, and they have no more injury risk than the other wide receivers and running backs in that range. So I'm still going to draft them like the elite options they are. I do think I'm going to be more likely to wait other than those guys except for maybe Mark Andrews um I think his role is pretty secure in that offense and I do think they're going to throw more to be fair to the you know middle group of tight ends Howard was truly awful Hunter Henry had a great stretch I

mean he he got hurt after week one and he was fine in week one. Four catches for 60 yards on five targets, played almost the entire game. Weeks six through 11, he was the number one tight end of fantasy. He looked like he was truly breaking out. 35 catches, 427 yards, three touchdowns in six games, 49 targets. He led all tight ends in targets. He had one more than Travis Kelsey. He was a stud. And then, I don't know what happened. It's hard for me to figure out what happened to Hunter Henry in the final five weeks of the season. It was after their bye. I looked at

Phillip River's pass attempts. Some low games, but he had that during this great stretch for Henry. Keenan Allen, Mike Williams, were they more involved? I haven't looked at the rushing totals for Gordon and Eckler yet, but I can't figure it out. But he really stunk down the stretch, Hunter Henry. But he gave you some great production,

and you probably picked him up off waivers in a lot of cases because people dropped him after he missed so much time. And Evan Ingram was a top-10 tight end. He was ninth on a per-game basis in non-PPR. He was seventh in PPR. He had seven or more targets in seven of eight games. And, of course course his one horrible game was against the Arizona Cardinals

when Red Ellison had a good game but they were okay yeah so like okay Ben you said you're going to look for the guys later in the draft that's your initial thought in 2020 you're going to look for the next Mark Andrews the next Darren Waller

who could it be? And it doesn't have to be necessarily a new name. It could be a bounce-back candidate. Maybe it is Evan Ingram. Maybe he falls. Maybe O.J. Howard bounces back. Who do you think could be that guy in 2020? Yeah, I think in one of those drafts that we already did,

I think I took Ingram after a while. I mean, there's so many guys that have risen up now that you're probably going to get value on Ingram. You're definitely going to get value on O.J. Howard. He's more of a double-digit round guy. I think what's interesting with Andrews and Waller is they were hyped guys. Right. But they were top 10 tight ends in most drafts.

They weren't like you had to wait until the very end of the draft. Another name that I think will probably be in that back of the top 10 that has shown some signs that could be the next breakout would be Mike Gusecki. I mean, his second season this year, he was in the top five in tight end air yards, was that vertical athletic tight end and was pretty efficient with Ryan Fitzpatrick. He's a guy that I think could definitely

take a step forward in 2020. I think there are two obvious choices here, and I'll have them ranked similarly to Gusecki. I'm not sure if i'll have them above or behind but noah fant and tj hawkinson are not going to be in the top eight tight ends by adp this year we should not have really expected them to be much better than they were last year on a per game basis and we should expect them to get better so if you're going to wait i think hawkinson and fans for the kind of the two obvious guys that you target how about hawkinson fan versus evan ingram i'll probably have ingram yeah i'll have ingram higher

as well you're i mean you're right ingram was very good when he was healthy he just got hurt yeah i don't think he's unless unless something else happens over the off season that surprises us i don't think you're gonna see ingram fall out of the top eight tight ends i think he'll be probably six six seven three in the draft that i was just looking at that we did a few weeks ago he went not long after just a few spots after but ingram went after tyler higby what do you think about that no no that that will not happen um in drafts that i'm participating in i don't believe yeah i agree okay well where were you Heath? Could have used you back then. I think I was in the Everglades.

Oh, all right. That's a pretty good excuse. Any busts for next season? Any busts on top of your head? Besides Jared Cook? Yeah, Cook. Don't be so quick on that, guys. Don't be so quick.

Like, look, age is whatever. He has not played with great quarterbacks for most of his career. And, like, Drew Brees is doing things at an age we never thought were possible. Tom Brady, same thing. I mean, guys do in sports in general. Guys do things at ages that we didn't think they could do. It happens all the time. You probably doubt Nelson Cruz every year, Heath.

How many catches did you say he had last year, Jared Cook? 43, I think. He missed some time. What did he do? He just scored a few touchdowns. Yeah, well, that's going to happen. He averaged 16 yards per catch. I mean, he was a 10 yards per target guy. He had an elite season. But when a guy has a career season

at age 32, I'm generally going to bet against him at age 33. Yeah, but he had a career season at age 31. A better bust pick would be Zekers. Yeah. I would also throw Higby in there because the Rams changed their offense so much. There was all that talk early in the season about the Patriots having figured out their 11 personnel heavy offense.

And they did some rearranging of things and clearly made Higby a focal point. But maybe over the offseason, Sean Pinkfay goes back to the drawing board and tries to tweak his old offense that got him to the Super Bowl as opposed to sticking with what you know I just think scheme wise it could end up being a thing where they get back to those receivers being ahead of the tight ends in that offense it's a possibility I mean I I still think what Higby did is very notable but I don't think I'd feel comfortable taking him as a top 10 tight end no no so he's another one that I think will go too high. All right. Coming up on the show, we got some news and notes. The Jaguars are about to have a new offensive coordinator.

Green Bay's offensive line might take a hit with Brian Bulaga, free agent. And we've got some 2019 notes and a few of your emails at fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. Let's take a quick break here on FFT, and we'll be right back. Metro Lynx and Cross Lyninks are reminding everyone to be careful as Eglinton Crosstown LRT train testing is in progress. Please be alert, as trains can pass at any time on the tracks. Remember to follow all traffic signals. Be careful along our tracks, and only make left turns where it's safe to do so.

Be alert, be aware, and stay safe. Here are your news and notes. Jay Gruden looks like going to be the offensive coordinator for the Jacksonville Jaguars. Guys, you like it or dislike it or what? I don't know. I lukewarm on it at this time not not negative on it oh i'll note that he's always used a passing back i mean he did with the bangles with geo bernard and then he did with chris thompson and a big part of leonard fournette's value this year was that he

didn't come off the field i think he had the second highest average snapshot behind only christian mccaffrey fournette obviously didn't score a lot of touchdowns and wasn't an amazing fantasy player but if we're hoping that his touchdowns and wasn't an amazing fantasy player, but if we're hoping that his touchdowns bounce back next year, we also might need to be a little bit concerned about his receptions dropping if they go to a receiving back. And, you know, not a bad track record for Jay Gruden. Three seasons as offensive coordinator for the Bengals.

18th in scoring in 2011. That was Andy Dalton and A.J. Green's rookie season. Then 12th, then 6th. So, did pretty well. But he also called plays the whole time he was the head coach in Washington, right? Yes. I think so. I don't know about that. I don't know.

They had McVay, right? I don't know. McVay was just the— Yeah, I'll verify and correct myself at a later date. I know I won't. But I think he's called plays for most, if not all, of his time in Washington. Okay. I mean, you would think so.

And McVay, just his mere presence, I think, makes everybody better, as we've found out. Right tackle Brian Bulaga, not sure if he's going to re-sign with the Packers. Odell Beckham had core muscle surgery. Julian Edelman had shoulder surgery. He's expected to be ready for off-season workouts. Oh, another Antonio Brown headline. He allegedly beat up the driver of a moving truck. And Stephen Jones, the Cowboys VP, said extending Dak Prescott is a top priority.

Meanwhile, Cincinnati head coach Zach Taylor said re-signing A.J. Green is a priority. And J.J. Watt is going to host Saturday Night Live. I don't know. It's not a good show anyway, so I'm not sure he's going to make it better. It's a pretty good show on certain occasions. And I would say only this, that I would anticipate him. I think he's one of the better football players that could do it. Okay, pick one football player that you would like.

One football player that I would like to host Saturday Night Live. Can we do X players? I think Chad Oshasinka would be pretty entertaining. He would be fantastic at it. Steve Smith would probably be pretty good at it. I'm thinking of former players that are, you know. Steve Smith would be amazing at it. It's got to be a wide receiver i mean who are the most colorful widers pretty much has to be a wide receiver they're all the most entertaining uh we must be missing somebody

so obvious right now i know i'm blanking well you know what we'll we'll figure like somebody's gonna show off at the pro Bowl or something like that. Juju would be really good at it. Juju. Juju would be really good at it. Yeah, he's a funny guy. All right, 2019 notes. Just a few things to throw out.

Just tell me how you feel about these splits. Matt Ryan, first six games of the season before he left week seven with an injury. He was the number five quarterback in fantasy, but he was pretty close to number one. I mean, there was a group of five that were absolutely elite. They averaged 27 or more fantasy points per game. He was part of that. The next best averaged 24.7 points per game and six points for passing touchdown leagues. And Ryan led the NFL in passing touchdowns in those games,

and he had 2,000 yards in five games. So he was crushing it. He got hurt. I think it was his ankle. Missed a full game and part of the Rams game. Came back, and in his last eight games, Matt Ryan was only the number 13 quarterback in fantasy. He had 11 touchdowns.

He had 15 touchdowns his first five games, and he had 11 in his last eight. But he did have the fourth most passing yards in those eight games. So elite first six games, number 13 quarterback last eight games. What do you make of it? It's just the last five years of Matt Ryan in one season. It's been all about the touchdown rate for him for the most part, except for that MVP year.

But you look at his last five years, 3.4% touchdown rate. He was a fantasy disaster. 7.1, he was the best player in fantasy and totally unsustainable. 3.8 again the year after that, which is way lower than a quarterback as good as Matt Ryan should ever be at. Then 5.8 the year after that. Well, that's slightly, that's above average for an elite quarterback. Last year it fell down to 4.2 and he wasn't quite as good it's frustrating because i don't know where to put him for the upcoming season but he's gonna throw for around 4,500 yards probably i would expect he's gonna be somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 to 30 touchdowns and he's gonna be a low end starting quarterback in fantasy i think with those splits you're you'd probably find that they were trailing more and they were throwing more because i know atlanta

uh led the nfl and pass attempts by like 50 over any other team they were this year like the steelers did that in 2018 and obviously ben roethlisberger got hurt but we we see a lot of regression with those big outlier numbers they threw 684 times The next team was the Panthers at 633. So 51 attempts more than any other team in the league this year. I think that's going to impact Ryan as well. I agree completely with Heath. The touchdown rate is a huge part of Matt Ryan. But also, we should expect probably that his pass times will come down a little bit next year.

One last thing about those splits, though. Those first five games, he had everybody. He had Muhammad Sanu. He had Austin Hooper. He had Calvin Ridley. And, of course, he had everybody he had muhammad sanu he had austin hooper he had calvin ridley and of course he had julio jones those last eight games uh the hooper played the first game and then he got hurt i think he missed three games then he comes back he plays one game with everybody except sanu and then calvin ridley gets hurt and he misses three games so does that matter to you that he just didn't have the full arsenal? Well, he's not going to have the full arsenal.

Mohamed Sanu's not going to be there. No, but he'll have Ridley and Hooper and Jones. Possibly Hooper. Hooper's a free agent. Ridley is a guy who, because he missed three games, I think we've talked about it in recent weeks, but I think it took a step forward, and his stats don't really show it because he missed three games. He basically put up the same numbers in 13 games

that he put up in 16 games as a rookie. I think Julio and Ridley are a really good one-two punch. I think he'll have plenty of weaponry, whether they bring back Hooper or not. I mean, obviously Hooper would help, but if they don't bring him back, I would expect they'll add either a third receiver or a pass-catching tight end.

But they should have plenty of weaponry with those two guys at the top for Julio. Yeah, you're not going to get any Calvin Ridley unless I adjust my initial projections. You're gonna be my first my first run uh had him just ahead of odell beckham adam thielen and kenny okay so uh yeah i'm probably gonna adjust him down a little bit from there but i agree with 100 with ben that he is like the so far my favorite breakout wide receiver candidate all right next uh 2019 note chris carson you know we put out our top 10 running back lists i don't think anybody had chris carson on there he tore

his achilles and that is a big deal but his injury doesn't appear to be as bad as rashad penny's injury he didn't tear his achilles oh what did he do fractured his hip fractured his hip fractured his hip fractured his hip sorry which is also. Yeah, neither of those are really good. All right, fractured his hip. Somebody in today's notes tore their Achilles. Was it a tight end? No, Penny was an ACL, but yeah. Okay, good.

I'm glad he didn't tear his Achilles. First 14 games before he fractured his hip in Week 16, he was the number nine running back in both formats. He had 270 carries. That was the second most in the NFL, only one behind Derrick Henry at that point. He had 270 carries. That was the second most in the NFL. Only one behind Derrick Henry at that point. He had 36 catches. So, you know, the reports have been so far positive. He should be ready for week one, hopefully for training camp.

What's it going to take for you to make Chris Carson a top 10 running back? Is it possible? A lot of injuries. Why? um a lot of injuries why um like i he did have a good stretch at where he produced that type of production but i would still anticipate it's going to be a two-back system especially after like they were pretty hesitant to give him that full workload he'd had some injury concerns in the past they did pretty much give him the full workload and he got hurt again. So I would not expect him to have the same number of touches that he had through the first 13 or 14 games over a full season.

Yeah. And, you know, Penny, they, I think it was more an indication that they weren't comfortable with Penny yet. And then Penny throughout the season, there were positive reports that he was taking his training more seriously, had lost some weight, was in better condition. And then after the buy, he played his first two games with over 40% of the snaps all season

and then tore his ACL in the third game back. But it went to a committee. And part of the reason it went to a committee was Carson had the fumble issues all year too, right? So I'm looking at this going into the offseason as the Seahawks are always about open competition and this and that, that Penny, if he rehabs and is back and is healthy,

has just as much of a chance to be the starter as Carson does. So for me, Carson's not going to be a top 10 back. Last note from 2019 wide receiver, Cooper Cup. He did end up as the number four receiver in fantasy in both formats. 94 catches, 1,161 yards, 10 touchdowns on 134 targets in 16 games per cup he caught a touchdown in each of his last five games but his splits are really interesting as well kind of like mark andrews uh first eight games he was the number well yes and no like mark andrews uh in terms of targets uh not so much production last first eight games, he was the number three wide receiver in fantasy,

number three in non-PPR, number two in PPR. He had the second most targets. He had the second most receiving yards among wide receivers. He had 792 yards in eight games, 58 catches. The last eight games, he was not even a top 20 wide receiver Cooper Cup. He had 36 catches, down from 58 in his first eight games to 36 in his next eight. The yards went from 792 in his first eight games

to 369 in his next eight, but he still caught five touchdowns in both sets of eight games. The targets dropped 40. 87 targets in his first eight games, 47 targets in his last eight games. So he was still a touchdown producer but that is it

what did you think about that with cooper cup he's been in the league now for three years and so at that point i think it's not a bad time to take a look at 16 game paces and where they're at he's at 80 for 1065 and nine that includes two games his second year where he left early and basically produced nothing that includes his rookie year production where obviously we wouldn't expect that to be as productive as his second or third year so i think that's kind of like a floor of what i would expect for him maybe not the nine touchdowns maybe he only scores seven but i would anticipate it i'm going to project him for something around 85 catches 1200 yards and eight touchdowns yeah probably a high end number two low end number

one wide receiver yeah i'm pretty optimistic about him going forward as well he's only really produced and we can look at these splits but um to your point adam he was just outside the top 20 receivers in the second half of the season that's where he was drafted but that was mostly because he was doing jared cook things just scoring touchdowns yeah not catching sure sure but part of that was the higby stuff the change in the offense they they actually dropped his snaps very significantly in certain games where they went with more tight ends because he's a slot receiver a lot of times slot receivers and tight ends are going to have um snaps that go different directions when teams are using more tight ends they're not using the third receiver as much but what i think is interesting is he

basically went around when his production was down, he basically was producing around where we would have drafted him in the twenties last year. So it's almost like if these were flipped, if he started with that, the last eight games in the first eight games, and then finished with the first eight games in the last eight games.

And I know they weren't, but if they were, we'd be talking about him as a top 10 receiver because of how good that first eight game stretch was. If he closed the season that they were we'd be talking about him as a top 10 receiver because of how good that first eight game stretch was if he closed the season that way we'd be so high on him so i don't want to overreact to the fact that um he was so good early and probably we raised our expectations and then he failed to live up to them in the second half is essentially where i'm at on him okay that's cooper cup now let some emails. Fantasyfootball at cbsi.com. Heath, you missed it.

This was a fun one yesterday. We got this email from Randy in York, Pennsylvania. He said, what do you think about this format? Ten-team league, you draft three rounds. Each manager would draft an entire NFL team each round, and the manager can only fill their roster spots from players on the three teams they have drafted. So we got some feedback.

Jim in Boston said, I really liked that discussion about drafting the entire team's roster. Bucks, such an interesting choice. Cause I think I said they'd be number one for me, but we were doing that off the cuff. I plan to do a draft like this with my league mates. Okay.

So that's Jim. He liked it. Justin pointed out and he said, dear happy. I'm going to make sure Ben knows this reference. Dear happy, Billy, Bobby, and he said, dear Happy, I'm going to make sure Ben knows this reference. Dear Happy, Billy, Bobby, and Nicky. You need to make sure that I know that reference. Happy and Billy give it away, but those were like two of my favorite movies as a kid.

I mean, Adam Sandler, Bobby Boucher, and Little Nicky, I guess. Where is the devil? Yeah. I don't think I've ever seen Little Nicky, or I don't care. I don't know if I have either, but Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison were, you know, we were watching those as kids. Come on.

Which one do you like better? I loved Happy Gilmore. I pretty much know every quote to that movie. Not a lot you can say in the air, though. I don't think he likes Happy Gilmore.

It's my guess. What do you mean? It's one of my favorite sports movies. Look at that guy. He shouldn't have been standing there. Oh, his favorite sports movie. It is more of a sports movie than Jerry Maguire for sure. The whole thing is based around sports.

Obviously, it's a sports movie. Yeah, it's a sports movie. When you and the analysts were discussing the format of the three rounds where you choose a full team. How could you leave out the Saints? You guys are making the cases for the Giants and the 49ers and you left out the Saints. Well, that was a bad

job by you guys. I think the Saints are in the discussion for the number two choice. And the number one choice is pretty obvious. But I think the Saints could be right there in the discussion for number two because they're so consolidated. You're talking about the chiefs yeah we all said the chiefs right away we shouldn't have forgot the saints obviously we talked about a lot of teams another team i i realized i don't think we mentioned was the cowboys yeah also very i mean they could be right

there with the saints yeah and uh scott from right right patterson air force base in dayton ohio um said i've been a longtime listener and your help guided me to another championship this year. However, I found that while your advice is the best in town, there are sure to be some stinkers every week. When Randy in Pennsylvania mentioned the draft of a whole NFL roster league, how do the Saints not get selected first overall? Then he goes on, he says, this kind of league sounds like a lot of fun. I think there should be a listener league like this next year. Adam and Heath can be co-commissioners.

Well, I mean, Heath will be commissioner and Adam will have the password to the commissioner login. It wasn't just the password for the commissioner login. Literally, whenever you were logged into the league, you had access to everything that I did from a commissioner standpoint. And literally, you have that same access in the podcast league, and I've never once considered you the commissioner.

I'm the commissioner. I'm going to make some changes next year. We already did this all season. No, you're not. I will change you some stuff next year just to prove it. It's going to be really weird when we go into the draft and you see it's super flex. No, it's not going to be.

Who are our top? Oh, you know what? Before you do it, I better get in that league and knock out your commissioner accent. Who are our top five teams? I want to add a little context to this, too. We can draft them or list our top fives, but one of the things I pulled up was skill position,

PPR points from 2019 as a team, totals. Obviously, the quarterback is an important additional piece but dallas actually led the league and then it goes atlanta number two tampa bay san francisco the rams the chiefs are down at six uh eagles chargers saints and seahawks i believe that rounds at the top 10 those are the guys that just total skill position points now for a team like the saints the argument would be they're very concentrated in their scoring. You get a lot from Michael Thomas and a lot from Alvin Kamara. They're going to be better than their total sum.

But I think that was an interesting note as well on this conversation. I'd probably go Chiefs, Saints, Ravens, Cowboys, Buccaneers. Okay, but we're starting quarterback, two running backs, two wide receivers, and a tight end, let's say. Is there a flex, too? Yeah, flex, too. Yeah, so. I wouldn't take the Ravens that high. Well, you hate Mark Ingram.

Yeah, I do hate Mark Ingram. That's true. I would take the Chiefs uh definitely i think i would probably take the cowboys because i think michael gallup is another guy that's like calvin redley that we're probably going to be overlooking a little bit at least early in the off season um so they have two really good receivers in my view plus uh ezekiel elliott obviously um i i think the bucks for me would be as well especially if we knew that jamis was back because we just know that they're going to throw downfield so much

and there's so much downfield uh volume even after evans got hurt brashad perriman led the nfl and air yards from that point on so and was productive so you know you know that there's going to be receiver production there that would be a top five team for me i don't know how i'd close the top of chargers i think would be a top five team for me as well and then saints did i not say the top. Chargers, I think, would be a top five team for me as well. And then Saints. Did I not say the Saints? Yeah, that would be my top five. I don't even know who's on the Chargers right now.

Yeah, but Austin Eckler is. Austin Eckler is. The 49ers are interesting, though, because you could have two running backs to start. You got your tight end. They were the second highest scoring team in the NFL. That does include defensive points. But how would you know which running backs to start?

You start them both. You start include defensive points. But how would you know which running backs to start? You start them both. You start two every week. Which two? Look, we'll know. You know going in which two to start. It's never been like, gosh, there's three of them. Oh, yes. This season it was. Rarely. Rarely. Rarely. Really four, because for a while we thought Jeff Wilson was a goal

at bat. Jeff Wilson had like a three touchdown game. Yeah, but was that with Tevin Coleman Hurd at that More, because for a while we thought Jeff Wilson was a goal-up back. Jeff Wilson had like a three-touchdown game. Yeah, but was that with Tevin Coleman Hurd at that point? It would be Coleman and Mostert right now, obviously, pending Coleman's health. But I don't think you're going to have, in this situation, I'm envisioning I've taken three teams. One of those other two teams should have a running back better than the second San Francisco running back.

Which teams? I get three teams in this draft. Yeah. So I'm graphing the 49ers. Oh, right. Okay. Okay. So I don't think having two of their running backs is that exciting.

And that adds strategy to it. So if you take the Chiefs, you probably don't need to worry about a team that has an elite tight end or an elite quarterback because you already locked up Mahomes and Kelsey. I mean, it would be interesting to do a draft like this. It would be. I don't know why I was trying to fill every roster spot from one team. So my apologies. Yeah.

Okay, then screw that. We don't want the 49ers. Yeah, the Chiefs are the obvious one, I think. Or are they? Chiefs, Cowboys, Bucks would be the best combination. Yeah, that's what I really think. Chiefs, Cowboys, Bucks would be the best combination. Yeah, that's what I really think. Chiefs, Cowboys, Bucks. And then, yeah, Saints.

The readers are right. The Saints are up there. Okay, good stuff. Guys, thank you. Good show. And tomorrow we're going to take a look at 2020 rankings. Well, that'll be fun. Who's excited?

Yeah. I'm excited. All right. Well, you've been doing all your projections, so we get to show them off. I'll be ready for two-thirds of the league. Okay. We're only going to talk about those two-thirds then.

The next third we'll talk about next week. Thanks for listening, everyone. For Heath, for Ben, I'm Adam. Talk to you tomorrow on Fantasy Football Today.