Fantasy Football Today - 05/30: Opportunity Knocks ... (Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: May 30, 2019

Heath wrote about the 2019 Fantasy Football Opportunity Index to tell us which players are stepping into great situations with plenty of available targets or carries. We start with the KC (1:30) and NYJ (5:16) backfields and get into some conservative projections for Le'Veon Bell, which still look pretty good ... Answering your emails (14:00) including a fun WR comparison of two players who had similar numbers last year but much different projections this year. Plus news and notes (28:00) from around the NFL ... Diving into the Opportunity Index for RBs (35:00) as we look at JAC, CHI and ATL and then WR/TE (44:20) as we discuss OAK, TB and NE ... 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

This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports. Here we go! Email us at fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. Here we go! It's time to dominate your fantasy league. Let's go! Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. All right, welcome to the show.

Today's show is all about opportunity. Players with big-time fantasy opportunities in 2019. What's up is all about opportunity. Players with big time fantasy opportunities in 2019. What's up? Welcome to Fantasy Football Today. It is May 30th. We got mandatory mini camps coming up pretty soon. It'll be training camp and preseason, but we're getting there guys. It's almost June. How about that? Crazy. Yeah. This offseason has gone by faster than previous offseasons it's how it feels uh i agree yeah i don't know why but i do agree of course we still have you know another month plus before training camp really starts so we're still in the offseason almost two months what's an offseason yeah it's it's the period of time where we don't have to get in early and leave late.

Oh. We actually get in whenever we kind of feel like it. We do? For the people who don't cover baseball, maybe. For the Dave and Jamie's of the world. And then you leave when you feel like your work's done for the day. Well, Heath wrote a story about opportunities, and basically it's like vacated touches, essentially.

Is that the targets, touches? Yeah, not quite touches. It's basically for running backs, targets, plus rush attempts. For receivers and tight ends, it's targets. Okay. So what do you think, what's the one that really jumps out, the best fantasy opportunity that exists right now? I don't know if it jumps out, but I think the one that will be the most profitable in 2019

is definitely the Chiefs. They have 305 targets plus rush attempts to replace from last season. That was only tied for the most, but the other one's a little bit more easily explainable. And I think you have to view Damian Williams as the favorite, but it also just highlights like Andy Reid has a pretty long history of not being a committee guy. And if Carlos Hyde or Darwin Thompson end up in that role, they are going to be a massive, massive profit. Yeah. And honestly, if Damian Williams ends up in that role, even if he's a third-round pick, he could end up being a massive profit.

If he keeps the job, he's probably going to be a stud. If he plays 16 games and is the lead running back, then yes, I'd say he's worth a first-round pick. Right, and I think that goes for just about anyone. I mean, it's a system that's just going to make a player look great. Is that kind of what you're thinking? Yeah. Yes.

Okay. Damian Williams still has not had more than 50 carries or 23 catches in any season. I think he will go over that this season. I know Dave is super high on Damian Williams. Jamie is not. Heath, where would you be comfortable drafting him? I'm fine in the third round. Okay.

Would you take George Kittle or Damian Williams? Probably Kittle. Dave? You're Kittle, Kittle, Kittle. I like Damian Williams a lot. And I intend, he's one of maybe four or five players that i intend on doing a deep dive on via film and maybe even talking to one or two people before the season starts and i i like when you do those i really enjoy whatever you come away with i don't know how much it matters

on damian williams other than if this dive is going to tell you can he hold up to a heavy workload sure because other than that that's part of it. It doesn't his, his skill level. We know that he is above the baseline required to be a starting running back in the NFL. I'm not sure about that. We saw enough last year. I'm, I'd like to think that we saw enough last year, but I'm not sure about it. And I want to look and see, because there are plenty of running backs,

excuse me, who are just guys that get an opportunity and they end up putting up nice numbers with that opportunity. Right, but that's all he has to be. And I want to know if it's – but if he did well with the opportunity just because of where he was planted, then I don't know if that means he's going to get big opportunities. I need to know if he is truly a good enough running back to keep Carlos Hyde, because Carlos Hyde definitely didn't look great last year,

to keep him in a limited role, to keep Darwin Thompson in a limited role. I want to find that out for myself. It's just funny because there's just no way one year ago today that we would have said oh damian williams is better than carlos hyde right no exactly so and so much of it has to do with the situation and where you're planted right you know what i mean is just by where you're playing damian williams on um the if he were the starting running back for the Jets, we'd all be going, eww, but he's in Kansas City. There's an amazing track record there of running backs doing well.

That's all I'm going to say right now. I still don't want to let the beans out on the argument against Damian Williams. We are going to talk about the starting running back for the Jets because he, Le'Veon Bell, does have a big opportunity and a lot of touches, a lot of carries to get. It'll be interesting to see how many catches he gets. But I did, I think, a very modest projection for Le'Veon Bell and came away with a fantasy point projection.

I almost feel like it's not a worst-case scenario but not far from it. Would you like me to do it now or should we say it later? Let's hear it. I would like to know how close your worst case scenario is to my expectation. Agreed. Same with me. I've got it, too. Okay, okay. Conservative estimate is what I'm calling it. 250 carries. That is 11 more than I have projected. 4.3 yards per carry, which is his career average, but that includes 3.5 yards per carry as a rookie. I think he's probably a better running back than that, but 250 carries at 4.3 yards per carry plus 400 receiving yards, which is low for him. He averages 687 receiving yards per 16 games. With that, you are talking about 1,475 yards,

and I gave him, Le'Veon Bell, 10 total touchdowns, which is also pretty low. But he's not in the Steelers' offense anymore. If he had 1,500 yards, roughly, 1,475 yards, and 10 total touchdowns, that would make him number eight in non-PPR, number eight in non-PPR based on last year, number seven in non-PPR based on 2017. And then I guess I kind of screwed up with the projections here because I gave him 70 catches, but I can't see him getting 70 catches for only 400 yards.

No, I've got him at 78 catches and 624 yards. Yeah, so if he has 624 receiving yards, I can't see Le'Veon Bell not being, if he plays 16 games, not being top five or top seven. I don't think the projection you just made is is a bad one at all i've got them for fewer rushing yards but not a lot um and similar number of catches i haven't for 10 total touchdowns exactly i just think that's a projection it's nowhere close to his four i've got him for nine total touchdowns over 1600 total over 1,600 total yards, 73 catches, and that's in 14 games.

So, say it again, sorry. Over 1,600 total yards, 73 catches, nine total touchdowns in 14 games. That's a good year. I agree. Oh, that's phenomenal.

That's really, because I've got him at 1,600 yards in 16 games. I think it's impossible to project him without just being a curmudgeon for bad numbers if he's going to play 16 games. The thing that is just a little concerning, and the reason I say I don't think it's anywhere close to his floor, the Jets' Adam Gase is obviously a ruiner of all good things

in life, fantasy, and football he destroys hopes and dreams the ruiner they have 269 opportunities not carries available from last year's team can you go into that

hold on sorry can you explain that number that is the number of rush attempts plus targets given to running backs that are no longer on the team they're vacated okay now you would think well yeah but they have levy on bell now so he is going to get all of the touches that That's not what Adam Gase has talked like. He has talked like he wants to use him heavily in the passing game, but possibly divvy up some of the work in the running game. And Gase, over the past couple of years, has run one of the slowest or lowest play total offenses in the NFL.

And so I do think there's a little bit of a risk that they run 950 plays. They're behind a lot. He only gets 225 rush attempts and maybe isn't quite as efficient. They don't score a bunch of touchdowns. And I might go, I might veer from that when it comes to Gase because I kind of like the Jets defense. I like what they've done with it. And I think that they're going to be in more competitive games than we're giving them credit for. The Dolphins were in a lot of competitive games and ran almost no plays at all.

Their defense was brutal though. Like toward the end of last year, for most of Gase's time, like their defense was all like name recognition and no it just felt like they were never a dominant defense with him well I don't know I don't think they were dominant but I don't think they were ever I bet he can find a thousand plays and and and I think that there should be mild concern about Bell not getting every single touch like there's gonna be times

like in the middle of the second quarter where you'll see Ty Montgomery out there, and you're going to be like, what the hell is he doing there? Or Elijah McGuire. Oh, yeah. There's too many. But I think Le'Veon is going to get a lot of touches. The thing that worries me the most about Le'Veon is the offensive line. They traded for Osemaly, right?

He is now their best offensive lineman. He might be their only best offensive lineman i i think that the jets offense will be pretty interesting because i i think you could make a case that it could actually be above average i don't think it's gonna be like top five you want you wanted to say good i don't think it's gonna be good i think i think it might be top 24 i think it could be top six i think it could definitely be top 16. I mean, the Giants were top 16 last year. Maybe they were 17th. The Jets could be better than that

for sure. So, you know, yes, they can. They don't have an Odell Beckham. I'm not sure they have a Sterling Shepard. They probably don't have an Evan Ingram. They, but they have a quarterback.

Probably isn't as good as Saquon Barkley. It's going to be about Darnold. Yeah. Right? And he might be better than Eli. Maybe. Does Robbie Anderson scare defensive coordinators enough to stack the box? And by the end of last year, I might argue that he did.

All right. Well, that'll be an interesting one. That's your Le'Veon Bell projection. We have some emails that I want to read at fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. A couple things to promote. Okay, tomorrow we are going to air our very fun interview with Steven D'Souza,

who wrote Die Hard. He also wrote Commando and Running Man, and we asked him about some of the lines in those movies those arnold one-liners he had to split uh i dave and jamie and i unfortunately he wasn't on but dave oh at one point he asked us if we had a bank if we all were involved in a bank heist who of me dave and jamie would double cross the others and we said me but the answer is definitely heath i just wasn't thinking straight because Heath wasn't on the show. So when you hear that,

the answer is Heath. Sorry, Heath. Anyway, the interview was great. I'm going to air it tomorrow. It's about 40, 45 minutes. I don't know. The Christmas stuff actually wasn't even close

to the best part of the interview. Just hearing this guy who has been in Hollywood for so long, tell all these great stories, talk about writing for these megastars. You're going on too much. You gotta save some of it. Don't tell him about how you tried to convince him that Commando is not an action movie.

We got into all the debates. I think it's something that everybody will enjoy. Everybody will enjoy. If you like movies, you will like it. And if you're a long-time fan of the podcast, you'll like it. There is some foul language in there, and I plan on leaving it in as of now. But don't listen to it with your kids, I guess. I can't believe you curse that much.

But the guy was just, Stephen was just so interesting. And, you know, it was so fun. Okay. The other thing I want to tell you about is poker. It's that time of year again. The World Series of Poker is here, the 50th year of the most popular poker tournament in the world. And you can have a front row seat to the bracelet events with CBS All Access.

Just go to cbs.com slash poker, or you can use the CBS app. But this is CBS All Access. Starting now until July 16th, you can live stream the final tables of 33 of the WSOP bracelet events, including 25 events that you cannot watch anywhere else. The bracelet events include the $100,000 high roller and the $100,000 six max. And there's going to be a showdown of some of the biggest names in the game. The stakes are high. The tension is palpable. The winnings are huge. You can watch all the events online or through the CBS app. Just visit cbs.com slash poker. That's cbs.com, not cbssports.com. cbs.com

slash poker or download the CBS app on your phone or streaming device. And you, by the way, can get a free trial. So start watching today. Don't miss any of the action. Emails, here we go. Dear, from Danny in Utah, Dear Valerie, Boris, and Ulana, I don't know, What combination is better in a 12-team PPR draft? You take Hopkins in round one.

Which combination is better after Hopkins? Hilton and Kittle or Kelsey and Diggs? As of now, I would say that it's the Kelsey and Diggs because we're not expecting Tyreek Hill to play. That means Kelsey could even see more targets and more catches than he had last year. Oh. I don't know that he can see more. I think that there's a bigger difference

between Kelsey and Kittle than Hilton and Dix. Squeaky chair, by the way. I'm so upset right now. What's the matter? Dear Valerie, Boris, and Ulana, that's Chernobyl. I just Googled it, and I sort of saw a spoiler.

So I'm kind of mad because I really want to watch Chernobyl. I've heard it's great. Fits in a suburb southeast of detroit suburb southeast of detroit southeast of detroit let's go with berea ohio you know al melchior former c CBS. I have heard the name, yes. Yeah, former CBS baseball writer. He, I believe, has an issue with Don't Stop Believin' because apparently there's no such thing as South Detroit. South Detroit is Canada, I believe.

He took the midnight train going anywhere. Okay. Dear TY, Alshon, Muhammad, and Marvin, Hilton, Jeffrey, Sanu, and Jones, that would be the 2012 wide receiver draft class. Okay. Dear TY, Alshon, Muhammad, and Marvin, Hilton, Jeffrey, Sanu, and Jones. Oh,

that would be the 2012 wide receiver draft class. Okay. Last year in my keeper league, pay attention here. It's a good email, but there's a lot of moving parts. Last year in my keeper league,

I kept three running backs and two wide receivers. With my first pick, I drafted a 29-year-old that would be 30 during the season, and I passed on Juju Smith-Schuster,

hoping to get him in my second round of the keeper draft. That 29-year-old receiver was Doug Baldwin, and he was mostly useless. He had injury issues going into the season, but I'm a conservative player. I had five good keepers, so I took Doug Baldwin over Juju. This year, I'm again keeping three running backs and two wide receivers,

and again, I'm looking at another 29-year-old wide receiver that's had a history of injuries, T.Y. Hilton. I really like Chris Godwin this season, and I think he has the potential to do something similar to what Juju Smith-Schuster did. I know every year is different. I don't want to get burned again, though, for being too conservative. But I also don't want to reach for a, quote, potential star. So I guess my question is, how do you treat every season differently, but stay true to the same style that you draft and play? And this is really about T.Y. Hilton versus Chris Godwin, comparing that to Doug Baldwin versus Juju last year. And I see the comparisons. I obviously would have taken Baldwin over Juju last year, too. And I would certainly take Hilton over Godwin. We all would. Yeah, so what do you make of this kind of philosophical question here?

Well, first, I think it's important to learn from the mistake of taking Doug Baldwin. You knew he wasn't at 100%. He even said as much before the season. And he clearly was not right. And so anytime a player has some significant injuries, especially when they come out and say, yeah, I'm at 85%. Usually players are full of bravado

and they say, I'm at 110%. So when a player doesn't say that, and especially when they're older, it's almost like they're trying to tell you, keep expectations low for me. Don't expect me to be myself. Maybe next year I'll be better.

So learn from that mistake. But going back in time, would you have taken Juju over Baldwin? I wasn't taking Baldwin, so sure. Yeah, I think I – and we don't know when he had to make his decision. Like in June, no, I don't think any of us would have taken Juju over Baldwin. In August, I think most of us would have. Sure. I was the high guy.

But we didn't know how serious the injury was for Baldwin until he spoke about it. That was in August, if I recall. Right. Okay. So what was the other part you wanted to get to? The other part I wanted to get to is I've learned to veer toward youth, especially at running back. In this case, I would almost lean toward consistency and quarterback. And in the case of T.Y. Hilton, not that he's been the most consistent fantasy player on a week-in, week-out basis,

but he's certainly delivered the numbers that you've come to like, maybe not love. And his quarterback is awesome. Godwin has never had a monster season. His quarterback is not as good as T.Y. Hilton's. I know T.Y. is 29 and has an injury history. He's played through it most of the time. He's been good most of the time. So I'm taking T.Y. before the time so i'm taking ty before godwin

i'm taking ty2 i the biggest thing i would say for me is don't try to like this is kind of similar to the no i drafted this guy two years ago and he was bad for me so i'm not going to draft him anymore and i you can't take it personally like you've just got to evaluate things with a fresh clear mind. Yeah, Hilton is someone that I could see myself drafting a lot of just based on where he goes, like late round two, early round three. But I do see the injury concerns. He's only missed four games in his career, I believe.

But it kind of reminds me a little bit of Demarius Thomas. I felt like Demarius Thomas led the league in, hobbled off the field for five plays before coming back in, and it just felt like he was breaking down, and it played out that way. So I could see that concern with TY, but yeah, I think we'll all take Godwin. It'd be different maybe if it were a dynasty league,

but look, you're only keeping five players, and you have good ones, so whatever. Anyway, next email. Last email for now. A guy in the Midwest city named Nowthen. N-O-W-T-H-E-N. Can Dave guess the state? Where's Nowthen?

That's in Minnesota. It's got to be, right? I mean, this sounds so Minnesotian. Okay. He's got a wide receiver comparison. Here are nearly identical 2018 stats for two wide receivers and their 2019 Fantasy

Pros rankings. Who are they? Why are they projected so far apart? Why is one projected to rise almost 10 spots while the other projected to fall 10 spots? In 2018, they ranked 19th and 21st respectively why don't you do player a player b because this sounds like a blind taste test well because the numbers are so similar they both had about a thousand receiving yards 75 or 76 catches and seven touchdowns on the exact same amount of targets, 108. One of them is ranked 29th in Fantasy Pros.

One of them is ranked 12th. So now, caveat, the one who's ranked 29th actually missed two games and still put up basically the same numbers as the other guys. 75 catches, a little more than 1,000 yards, seven touchdowns on 108 targets. Who could that be?

I know who they are. It's not Alan Robinson, is is it no alan robinson didn't have a thousand yards and i think digs had more than seven touchdowns and i think brandon cooks might be one of these guys no no also i haven't double checked these stats by the way awesome oh. Who knows? They're right. This is accurate. Is Amari Cooper one of them? Amari Cooper is one of them. He's the guy who's 12th right now in the Fantasy Pros rankings. Who had the same amount of stats as Amari Cooper?

Same stats as Amari Cooper last year in two fewer games and is 19 spots lower in the Fantasy Pros rankings. He is entering his third year, I believe. Is it Tyler Boyd? It is. Tyler Boyd. Okay.

How about that? That makes sense then. Why? Well, because Tyler Boyd played a third or a half of a season without AJ Green. I feel like his production was pretty consistent, though. It was with Green. Earlier in the year.

With Green, he was very good. Without Green, he was not nearly as good. I don't think that's true. I'm looking right at it. Okay. He had three, five games with double-digit fantasy points with A.J. Green and one game, double-digit fantasy points without A.J. Green. That's a non-PPR. If we kick it over to full PPR, Tyler Boyd had one, two, three, four, five games

with 20-plus points with A.J. Green and one game with more than 15 points, full PPR, without Adriel Jeremiah Green. That's not his name. Yeah, that is not the recollection that I had at all. Also, he was very similar to A.J. Green when Green was healthy, in those eight healthy games that Green played. I think Green ended up playing like nine or ten games,

but he only had like eight healthy games, nine games total. They had very similar stats, Green versus Boyd. So, yeah, but back to the question. I mean, I think actually the more interesting thing is like it's Cooper with Dallas. You know, like Cooper, you got to throw out the Raiders stuff. He was terrible with the Raiders. He was reborn with Dallas, although he was inconsistent with Dallas, but he had some

huge games. You almost can't tell when the Dallas games started and when the Raiders games ended. Really? You can't. So I'm on the same spreadsheet that I was looking at before Tyler Boyd where I've got the measurements of how many fantasy points they had. He had two games with 20-plus fantasy points in Oakland.

And he had two with 20-plus with Dallas. See, that's the difference. But they were 30-plus games. Exactly. They were 30-plus in Oakland. And he had two with 20-plus with Dallas. But they were 30-plus. Exactly. They were 30-plus. He was still... He had four games with less than 20 yards with Oakland. He didn't suck as bad. He was considerably better

with Dallas. With Oakland, he averaged 47 yards per game and scored one touchdown in six games. And with Dallas? With Dallas, he averaged 80 yards per game and scored six touchdowns in nine games. I'm going to go back to what I say pretty much every time we talk about the Cowboys offense. So you're going to hear me talk about Kellen Moore a lot.

It's the same playbook because Kellen Moore was rooted in this playbook when he was a backup quarterback in the NFL, but they are going to run different plays out of similar looks, and they're going to be creative, especially in the red zone. And I think we're going to see Amari Cooper take a nice step forward, saw the Cowboys lean on him a little bit more, certainly more than the Raiders did, and I think they're going to continue to do it. And I think they're going to be able to get away

with it because teams have to account for their other weapons. They've got Ezekiel Elliott, who's proven now to be a good pass catcher out of the backfield. They also have to account for both Zeke and Dak running. They've got Randall Cobb in the slot. I don't care what you think about Randall Cobb, and I don't think you're going to draft Randall Cobb, but he's going to be a slot option for them. Gallop on the other side of the field is going to deserve a little bit of attention, and they're going to use their tight ends. They're going to have at least one tight end on the field all the time. If you can play action, that tight end is going to be out and moving around, and it's going to be hard for defenses to double team Amari Cooper, and I think the Cow be hard for defenses to double-team Amari Cooper.

And I think the Cowboys will use that to their advantage. As long as he's just what he was with the Cowboys last year, he's a top-five wide receiver. He would have finished as a top-five wide receiver based on those averages? Is that what you're saying? Yes. And that's not even fact. That's incredible. But the thing is, there's so many things. He's so interesting.

Because with the Cowboys, what did he play? Nine regular season games? Yeah, 11 games total. With the Cowboys, nine regular season games, he was 36 or fewer yards in four of them without a touchdown. So, like, 30 points against Washington, 38 in PPR, 39 against Philadelphia, 49 in PPR. He made his mark on those two games.

But then you throw in the postseason, and he had two good playoff games. He had seven catches for 106 yards against Seattle and six for 65 in a touchdown at the Rams. So, look, he's been a confusing player. But just to sum it up, does Amari Cooper deserve to be ranked well ahead of Tyler Boyd? Yes. Absolutely 100% yes.

I've got them seven spots to support. We're going to take a break on fantasy football today. When we come back, news and notes, and then Heath gets into the opportunities for some relevant fantasy players right after this. Kick off an exciting football season with BetMGM, an official sportsbook partner of the National Football League. Yard after yard, down after down, the sportsbook born in Vegas gives you the chance to take action

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Visit BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older. Ontario only. Please gamble responsibly. Gambling problem? For free assistance, call the Connex Ontario helpline at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Some news. Charles Robinson of Yahoo reports the NFL will likely review Ezekiel Elliott's Las Vegas incident. And I was actually wondering

if Heath wouldn't mind telling us why he was handcuffed and not arrested. You mentioned that that had happened, but I never asked for the story. Would you like the full story? How long is it? Do you know the full story? Oh, no, why I was handcuffed and not arrested.

Oh, I thought you meant why Zeke was at the Electric days i thought you were at the electric daisy carnival um i was uh 16 17 and um it was mostly not that big a deal i was going 93 miles an hour in a 55 mile an hour zone. Jeez. I've done that. The police officer pulled me over and was very upset with me and took me behind the vehicle and handcuffed me. And I started crying. And he thought I was crying because I was getting arrested. And I said, no, that's not it. The young female that's in the vehicle with me, her dad is the president of a local motorcycle gang. Is that true?

Yeah, 100%, 100% true. And this guy was well known by the police department And I told him his name And he went up and asked her if it was true And he let me go Because he was afraid of what would happen Wow Her dad found out that I was going that fast with her in the car

Oh my god Oh, he was afraid for you Yeah Oh, I thought he was afraid for himself. No, I got the ticket still. I had to, yeah. I had to go through several things, but yeah. That was why.

Oh, my God. That is a good... You have great stories, man. Okay, don't ever drive that fast, people. No, it was really dumb. You shouldn't do that. But Heath, yeah. Heath has very scary stories. There are lessons of what not to do.

Detroit offensive coordinator Darrell Bevel said, quote, will always be about running the football. Did that get you excited? No. Did we have a discussion last year on the podcast about how the Lions were talking about wanting to be run heavy and they always talk about wanting to be run heavy? I'm sure we did. I believe we did. Sounds familiar. to be run heavy and they always talk about wanting to be run heavy? I'm sure we did.

I believe we did. Sounds familiar. Were they run heavy? I don't have it in front of me. My guess would be no. I can tell you. Let's race. Okay, I'm clicking.

Oh, I clicked the wrong thing. This is bad. Next news item. You're going 93 in a 55. Next news item. Deontay Foreman says he's healthy and he has something to prove. The man is motivated. Good.

He's becoming a good back half of the draft pick to speculate on. Come on. Why is this taking so long? You still don't have it? Attempts per game. I'm going by run percentage. The Lions were at 44%, which is relatively. That's pretty low.

That's 56 pass. They were 18th in rush attempts. What's that? 18th in rush attempts. In terms of run heavy, they were 14th, so right at league average. That's above league average. Well, okay.

New Orleans signed Javoris Allen. Does he factor in? No. Okay. Marcus Mariota plans to play at a heavier weight than last year. Does that factor in? No. New England tight end Ben Watson is facing a four-game suspension.

Does that factor in? I'm looking up something on Corey Davis, and according to Sports Info Solutions, 74% of the targets headed Corey Davis' way were uncatchable last year. That does not seem normal. That's bad. Yeah, that's trouble. Does the suspension for Ben Watson make you more excited about Austin Zafarian Jenkins?

No. No, we'll talk about why in just a little bit. Oakland signed Richie Incognito, offensive guard Richie Incognito, to a one-year deal. I don't see how Oakland could have any problems this year in their locker room. If you could overlook it for a second, their offensive line is actually pretty good.

Because Incognito, if he's still the same football player, if he's allowed to play football, there's so many things, qualifiers, when it comes to Incognito. But if he's allowed to play football there's so many like things qualifiers when it comes to incognito but if he's still the same type of blocker that he was when he last played it's a good get for the raiders and it's a good get for josh jacobs yeah they're gonna have perfect locker room chemistry for sure san francisco pass rusher nick bosa second pick of the draft he hurt his hamstring

he was injured last year so jacksonville signed terrell prior is he automatically the best wide receiver and quarterback on the team neither no yeah that joke would have been better last year baltimore owner steve basciotti said wide receiver chris moore could be a breakout candidate. He's like the third Ravens person who matters who's talked up Chris Moore. Harbaugh did. Harbaugh did, and maybe no one else did. But the owner counts for two people. He's one to watch in training camp. All right, Chris Moore.

Trey Burton had surgery for a sports hernia. He's expected to be watch in training camp. All right, Chris Moore. Trey Burton had surgery for a sports hernia. He's expected to be ready for training camp. Can I give you an ex-Ravens player to keep an eye on in training camp? Yeah. Current Raiders tight end Darren Waller. It's right there on my notes. Darren Waller is currently the starter. Sorry.

Well done. That's usually my job is to steal things from Adam right before he says them. I swear to God I didn't see it. I apologize to you, Adam. That's all right. We're always looking for late-round tight ends. I will add Darren Waller to the list of Raiders tight ends who I don't think are good enough to throw the football to.

Okay, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to look at my Dynasty team, which is currently active. I can do add drops right now. And I'm going to drop someone for Darren Waller. We're going to decide who it's going to be. Probably Todd Gurley. Because he sucks now, as we all know. Also, it's time for Adam's annual, I do this every time, right around this

time of year, every year, right around this time of year, annual random sports take from Adam. And here it is. When it comes to athletes, broadcasters, writers, anyone in sports, you cannot find someone better at his or her job than NHL broadcaster Doc Emrick.

The man is the most legendary broadcaster that I have ever heard. And I enjoyed watching the Stanley Cup finals last night. I can drop, ooh, I can drop a lot of guys. I can drop Isaiah McKenzie, Blake Jarwin, Hayden Hurst, and I won't drop him.

Josh Adams, Jeff Wilson. I could drop Jeff Wilson. You could drop Jeff Wilson. Is that who I should drop for Darren Waller? Yeah, I guess. He believed this team went to the finals last year. My starters are actually good, I promise.

All right, here we go. You guys, you're not watching enough hockey if you didn't react to what I said, by the way. No, you're just not reading what I sent you on Gchat. Okay, let's see what David said. Yes, Doc Ebrick is better than everyone, Dave. He is better than everyone. He is the best broadcaster I've ever heard, by far.

Not by far. And now the best I've never heard. He makes hockey great. I don't even like hockey, and he's amazing. All right, Heath's Opportunity article. We talked about the Chiefs. We talked about the Jets. What else would you like to talk about?

I think we've talked about the Bears plenty, right? I should mention that the team that's tied with the Chiefs for the most opportunities available is the Jacksonville Jaguars because of the time that Leonard Fournette missed and because of the absence of TJ Yeldon in the passing game. The funny thing is I don't feel like they brought anyone in that's going to beeldon in the passing game. The funny thing is, I don't feel like they brought anyone in that's going to be very good in the passing game. And I think that creates an opportunity,

and there's plenty of risk with Fournette. But if he were to stay healthy and not be a jerk face, I do think there's an opportunity that he has an enormous breakout. Yeah, we actually talked about this on our previous show. I said five things that I could see happening. One of them was Leonard Fournette leads the NFL in carries. So, yeah, we'd have to stay healthy

and stay behaved. I don't necessarily believe the carries part because I don't think Jacksonville is going to be one of the most run-heavy teams this year. But we've talked about and argued about that plenty. Well, that would probably just depend on how good they are, right? Defensively and whatnot.

Well, they're going to be good defensively. Okay, well, I, but I think if Jacksonville's good, they're going to do it by running the ball. They, I just don't understand why they would go hire an offensive coordinator who got fired in the middle of the year last year on a playoff contending team because he refused to run the ball as much as the head coach wanted to. I know exactly why they hired him. Because they want to throw the ball more. They wanted to get a coordinator that would assimilate easily with the quarterback that they were going to get in free agency.

They knew that they had a good chance of getting Nick Foles. They wanted a coordinator that could run an offense that Foles already is familiar with. I don't think you hire that coach if your plan is to run the ball 55% of the time. I don't even know if they thought that much of it other than Tom Coughlin getting his nose in DeFilippo's face and saying, listen, you're going to run that ball a lot. And DiFilippo say, yeah, sure. Whatever you say. Mike Zimmer tried that last year. It didn't work. And they were not really one of the most run-heavy

teams last year. No, they weren't because they were bad. They couldn't. But the year before, they led the NFL in rush attempts. Does it bother you that in 2017, Fournette was averaging 20 carries a game and last year when he played, it was down to 16.6. No, because we went through this...

No, Dave, to me it doesn't, because when we went through this yesterday, I think the story that I see, personally, is that when he came back from injury, they ran the hell out of him three straight games. In one of those games, he got ejected, and he still had 18 carries. But he was probably going to be 24 carries per game in those three games. Then he got ejected and he still had 18 carries. But he was probably going to be like 24 carries per game in those three games.

Then he got ejected. Then he fell out of favor and the carries went down. But there's no doubt in my mind that when they were trying to make their push, they were obviously having a terrible season. They rode Leonard Fournette. It's all they could do. And then they changed quarterbacks and they went away from Fournette because they were down on him.

But they were good in 2017, and the Jaguars led the NFL in rush attempts. I just don't see how they can be good without being a run-heavy team. I don't think they have the passing game for it. What if they were 56 pass, 44 run? That's probably not enough. I have trouble with the...

I mean, could you tell me what they were pass run in 2017? If there's 1,000 plays, then it's 560 pass plays and 440 run plays. They ran 527 times in 2017. Last year they had 571 and 408, I believe. Yeah, I think they're – okay, so how many plays did they run in 2017? Is this interesting to anyone? What did I say? 571 rushing and they had 527 passing.

So like 52, 53%, something like that. 52. I think they run the ball as much or more than they throw if they're good. If they can, you know. If they're trailing, then they can't do that. Okay, sorry. He's worth that third-round risk. Heath, let's talk about the Bears.

Because in your story, you mentioned that based on what you've read, you don't see Tariq Cohen picking up a lot of the slack on the ground, right? No, I don't think he's going to increase his workload on the ground. I do think they may throw it to him a little bit more. Maybe he has five or ten more carries, but not significantly. And so there's 280 running back opportunities vacated by Jordan Howard. Um, and it's basically going to come down to Mike Davis and Dave Montgomery. I think Montgomery should be the guy to take that. I'm a little bit gun shy just because of what we saw with Rashad Penny last year. So Montgomery is going to have to show in camp that he's ready to play in the NFL. Assuming that he does,

we've seen Jordan Howard be a top 15 running back in this offense with Tariq Cohen there. I think that there's absolutely top 12 possibility because I think Montgomery's better than Howard. Howard had 1,000 total yards and nine touchdowns last year. That was Matt Nagy's first year calling plays in Chicago. And they liked Howard so much they traded him for a sixth-round pick. If you got that out of David Montgomery, and even 90% of that out of David Montgomery,

I think you'd be a pretty happy fantasy owner. Let's go to the Falcons. Skip the Ravens. We've talked about that a lot. Please read the story because there are a lot of teams that we won't get to today. The Falcons with Tevin Coleman gone.

They have 234 running back opportunities. Do you think Devontae Freeman... Well, how many carries a game do you think he gets? Because they obviously have Ido Smith. They also drafted Kadri Alisson. How many carries a game do you think freeman gets

somewhere between 12 and 15 oh that's not a lot i was gonna go a little higher 14.1 is what i haven't projected for i think that's safe i think that that could be right around where he lives with a couple of weeks mixed in where he's higher than that because they're winning and he's fresh enough and they're comfortable giving him close to 20 touches. But I don't think he's going to get 20 touches on the regular. So over 16 games, what did you say?

I've got him at 226 over 16 games. All right. Well, that's exactly it. I mean at 227. You've got him for 16 games. I don't project injuries. I might lower somebody in my rankings because I think they're more likely to get injured, but I don't know how in the world I would go about projecting injuries.

Okay. So 226. Freeman had 227 carries in 2016, and he had a great year. I want to say he was maybe the number eight running back or something like that. Or is that the year he was the number one running back, actually? It might have been. He was an animal that year. But he also had 54 catches.

No, I think the year before he was the number one. But he had two great years in a row. Yeah, so how many catches do you project him for? 34. See, that how many catches do you project him for? 34. See, that would be a little disappointing. I bet he could do a little bit. If he plays 16 games, he's going to beat that for sure. I bet he averages around 2.5 per game.

You know what? Actually, 226 carries and 45 catches, whatever. 40, whatever. For where he's going, round four, yes. If he hits those numbers, he's going to be great, I would think. Yeah, I think he'll be a fine number two running back. I don't see anything other than injury holding Devontae Freeman back. I might agree with that.

And I'm not the biggest Freeman guy for fantasy. I'm probably not going to draft him in a lot of my leagues. Because I am worried about the injury. I'm not too worried about Ito or Ollison playing well enough to take him off the starting job. No, I don't think he's going to lose the starting job. It's just that the upside isn't probably as high as it was. I don't think he could actually be the number one running back again. Correct.

I'm more comfortable taking Fournette in round three than I am Freeman in round three. I don't know if that's any big shakes. There's a part of me that wants to take Kevin Coleman ahead of Devontae Freeman. Wow. Because I think that he's the best running back in San Francisco. I think it's the same situation, though. I don't think he's as injury-prone as Freeman.

I think he's got to worry about Breida and McKinnon taking work away from him, and that's definitely going to happen. But I could see Coleman scoring lots of touchdowns. Freeman might, too. He's got to stay healthy. Yeah, well, I assume he will. I assume that because they've always consistently used him very much in the red zone and inside the 10-yard line,

Devontae Freeman. Heath, when you look at wide receiver opportunities, who are some players or some situations that really could be big for fantasy? I think you start with the Raiders because it encompasses both wide receiver and tight end. They threw the ball on a percentage basis to their receivers less than just about any team in football last year. I think they may have been the only team that was below or the Eagles were the only team below 50 percent of their targets going to wide receivers. The Raiders were the second lowest.

And that's because Jared Cook and Jalen Rashard got all the targets. Rashard's still there. I thinkalen Rashard got all the targets. Rashard's still there, and I think he's still going to be involved. But I kind of think there's only 228 wide receiver opportunities for Antonio Brown and Tyrell Williams, but I'd expect they're going to take a lot of those tight end targets as well. So I think there's enough room here, if things go right, for Brown to be a number one wide receiver and Williams to be a high-end number three. Okay. And then let's skip around to Tampa Bay. For Tampa Bay, there are a lot of wide receiver opportunities, but I think the player that I'm... Everybody's on Chris Goblin,

I get that. I think O.J. Howard needs more targets than he got last year per game. He was too good for the amount of targets he had like he was lucky but without humphries and jackson there to me it feels like there's a big opportunity for oj howard and chris godwin obviously to really step it up 100 yeah it's probably one of the best situations because we've got a clear answer as to who should get those targets it's those two guys the key will be that they don't go to a more running back heavy targets with Bruce Arians there. The other flip side is I think Arians and company are trying to figure out how to use OJ Howard

best. I read that in OTAs, he spent one day working out with the tight ends and one day working out with the receivers. I think they know exactly what to do with Chris Godwin. And that's why I think you heard Bruce Arians say that he's got a chance to be a 100-catch guy. He's not going to leave the field. He's going to play in the slot. And when it's a two-receiver set, he'll be out there with Mike Evans. And I think he's going to be a good red zone target as well,

especially against teams that decide to double-team Evans down in the red zone but what'll be real interesting is how how teams deal with this tampa bay offense when it's godwin howard and evans on the field defending that's hard to do because you're talking about three guys that have height they can all jump they've all got big old mitts they could all really be great options for jamis winston to throw to so i'm i imagine that i don't think any one of the three will have more than eight touchdowns i don't think you'll have a 10 touchdown guy in tampa bay this year what not mike might not mike evans nope nope i think he'll

have eight okay so the other angle here i don't know if you wrote about this, I'm sorry, Heath, but the elite wide receivers, some of them, you know, 160, 170 targets, maybe more in like a, you know, in some outlier year. Mike Evans got 138 targets in 16 games last year. His career high did have 175 in 2016, but he's usually around 140, I guess. So do you think Mike Evans could get to that 160 to 170 range? I think he could. And I think what I wrote in the article was there was been one time that he had 150 targets in his career, and he was the best receiver in fantasy. Right. So, yeah, I think that opportunity is certainly there for him.

He also, of course, scored double-digit touchdowns that year. That'll be part of it as well. But, yeah, I would expect his target rate to go up just because there aren't as many weapons and because Arian's offense is generally a little bit more concentrated as far as where the targets go. Okay. Other, you want to talk more wide receivers here, tight ends?

I think the only other one maybe because we've talked about a lot of them the patriots you referenced austin safarian jenkins and they do have i think the second most tight end targets available of all teams they also were one of three or four teams that threw the ball their tight ends less than 15 of their targets last year. I don't think New England tight end matters if it's not Gronk at all. There's 81 targets available. All of their tight ends are gone. Right.

So let's say Austin Safarian Jenkins shows up, wins the job, no other tight end on the team gets a target, and they do what they did last year. Well, they're not going to throw it to Safarian Jenkins more than they threw it to Gronk. 80 targets for Austin Safarian Jenkins with his efficiency is not

enough to make him fantasy relevant. I think the question is, do we know what Austin Safarian Jenkins' efficiency is? He's about to play with Tom Brady. Couldn't we see a much more efficient season than we've ever seen from him? I think you have to be Gronk-level efficient to be good with this amount of targets.

Remember, we used to call him almost Safarian Jenkins. Right. There's a reason for it. No, the reason was because he had so many almost touchdowns that year with the Jets. But it's not like he caught the pass and was tackled at the one. There were times where he had a touchdown and it was called back by penalty.

But he also had his fair share of mistakes. He did have almost 81 targets in a season once. He had 74 in 2017. What were his numbers? He had like five touchdowns that year, right? 50 catches for 357 yards and three touchdowns. Three touchdowns. Yeah.

No, look, I don't think any of us are drafting Austin Safarian Jenkins right now. It's always like if a tight end goes to New England people get excited about him and I think it's time to stop that probably is I remember getting excited about Dwayne Allen was it two years ago when Gronk didn't play

against Tampa Bay he got suspended and I don't think Dwayne Allen had a target in that game I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure that's what happened. All right. You got some time for emails, guys? You got a few minutes to spare? Sure.

Okay. Let's do it. I have to go through my inbox. I didn't put them in my notes. Okay. Fantasyfootball at CBSi.com. Here's an email. Kyle Rudolph is the subject line.

It's from Matt in Wisconsin. Are there any new rumors or whispers about Kyle Rudolph possibly being traded to the Patriots? Nothing new. All the same stuff. Although I think I did read that they're coming closer on an extension in Minnesota. Yeah, like a five-year extension. Yeah. Yeah.

Great. Which is the opposite of what everyone wants to hear. Right. Everybody wants to see him go to New England to be the next Gronk. I would be intrigued by that. I'm not intrigued by him staying in Minnesota where he's been a touchdown or bust tight end

for pretty much his entire career. All right, late first round is the subject line of this email from John. He says, hey, Bart, Brett, Aaron, and Don. Those are quarterbacks with a certain team. Yes, sir. I've been doing mocks around the ninth overall pick. I always

find myself in a tough decision in PPR. Trying to decide between two of these three, how would you rank them? Michael Thomas, Melvin Gordon, Julio Jones. I'd go Gordon first, Julio second, and Michael Thomas third.

He said PPR? Yeah. I'd go Julio, Gordon, Thomas. So we have helped you not all. I thought Thomas

would be first for you. I've got him 11th overall. Oh, I thought he'd be much higher. And let's read a typical Todd Gurley email. This is from Matt.

I frequently see Todd Gurley slip late to the first round, even to the second in drafts. Obviously, if he's healthy and getting two-thirds of the work in LA, he's a surefire top five running back. How do you guys like the strategy of... I love this strategy, by the way. How do you like the strategy of drafting Gurley and Henderson to lock up that backfield?

I feel like I'm drafting... You have to. Yeah, if I'm drafting later than seven or eight, I'd rather take Gurley and Henderson to lock up that backfield. I feel like I'm drafting... You have to. Yeah, if I'm drafting later than 7 or 8, I'd rather take Gurley and get that stud RB rather than one of the wide receivers. It's fine. It's the right way to do it if you're going to draft Todd Gurley

in the first round. I don't think you're definitively locking up the backfield. Because you think that if Gurley in the first round. I don't think you're definitively locking up the backfield. Because you think that if Gurley goes down, it'll be a split between Henderson and Malcolm Brown? Or it could just be Malcolm Brown. The only way it's going to be Malcolm Brown is if Daryl Henderson is crapola.

If he pulls a Ronald Jones and he just looks bad in camp, can't get anything going in the preseason. Or Rashad Penny. Sure. There's plenty of examples out there, but at least Penny had some good games. and he just looks bad in camp, can't get anything going in the preseason. Or Rashad Penny. Or Rashad, sure. I mean, there's plenty of examples out there, but at least Penny had some good games. Ronald Jones looked like he was playing football

for the first time in his life. It was horrible. What were you doing, Ronald? Not that I'm bitter or anything. It's a good point that he makes, because I remember the year with Zeke, right? We didn't know. McFadden or Rod Smith, right?

He was facing the suspension. We didn't know who it was going to be, and it ended up being a mess. And last year with the Chiefs, I don't think we expected Damian. We liked Spencer Ware. Now, Spencer Ware did get hurt, so there's that. What else? Justin Jackson versus Austin Eckler. Eckler wasn't really that good. That game in London

where he filled in for Melvin Gordon. And Anthony Lynn told you we like Eckler in his specific role. That was it. And there's a lot of teams that feel that way. And that might be how the Rams end up feeling about Henderson. He might get a role where, okay, 10 times a game, you're going to get the ball.

You'll play 20 times a game. And you'll try and make some plays out in space 10 times a game. And it might not change when Todd Gurley gets hurt or when they decide to arrest Todd Gurley. But if Henderson ends up doing well on those 10 plays and then Gurley misses time or it's a blowout in the game, they'll give Henderson some opportunities then, I bet. They'll see what he can do.

Every situation is different. This is why football is awesome. Because every team, every player, every situation, every season is different from the last. It's hard to just cookie-cutter them in one way or the other. But to answer the question, yes, if you're drafting Todd Gurley, I think you've got to go to round eight to get Henderson. I don't think you can wait until round nine.

Reach if you have to. I think you have to. I just think I would rather draft one of the elite wide receivers than dedicate a first-round pick and an eighth-round pick to the situation. Well, we are. But then you risk not getting Gurley. Yeah, I'm fine with that. We're fine with that. But if you want to have girly on your team the the real thing here is to try and get girly on

your team at a depressed value and then go after henderson yeah and like you're not gonna be the value for him you shouldn't want to get him in the top five and i think most people listening that will agree with me that unless things change and he's out there running around in training camp, we're not going to really want him until middle of round two? Late round two? I don't know. I don't know. I feel like I'm going to be the high guy, but

I'm not sure. We'll see. A lot of ball game left, Adam, to see how he ends up faring this July in camp. I mentioned this on HQ. You can almost see it coming. You know you're not going to see Gur he ends up faring this July in camp. I mentioned this on HQ. You can almost see it coming. You know you're not going to see Gurley in the preseason. You're not going to see him play in a preseason

game. No chance. I don't care if his knees are brand spanking new right off the assembly line. You're not going to see him in a preseason game. The Rams just won't do that. How much are we going to see him in training camp or if they have a joint practice with somebody else, how much are we going to see him in a preseason game. The Rams just won't do that. How much are we going to see him in training camp or if they have a joint practice with somebody else, how much are we

going to see him in that? I think there's a chance we might not see him much at all if his knees are an issue. That will determine where he goes in fantasy drafts. I have gone to end the show several times. It hasn't worked, so I'm going to try again.

All right, we're out of here. Everybody, please enjoy the amazing interview with Stephen D'Souza that will air on Friday. And please enjoy your wonderful weekend. I assume it will be wonderful. We'll talk to you five episodes next week. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. Counting down the top 150

players in fantasy football. Yes. Na, na, na, na, na, na, na. 50 players in fantasy football. Yes.