Fantasy Football Today - 06/14: Beckham Analysis; Big Ben's Big Value; Luck Throws (Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: June 14, 2018

Covering a lot on today's show as we hear from our listeners about Lamar Miller (1:50) and Randall Cobb (5:30). We also compare the upside and downside for QBs (9:25) Kirk Cousins/Ben Roethlisberger/Jimmy Garoppolo and TEs (14:45) Evan Engram/Jimmy Graham/Trey Burton ... NFL news on Andrew Luck (19:05) and a host of rookie RBs (21:38). Are we buying the backfield competition that the coaches say exist? ... Putting Odell Beckham under a microscope (32:03), we discuss if he is an obvious first round pick or if an improved NYG running game and more competition for targets could lead to some Fantasy disappointment ... 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, what's up, people?

Getting ready for the weekend. Happy Father's Day to everybody out there. Since we won't talk to you before then. It is Thursday afternoon. It is June 14th. If you're listening on Friday, happy Friday. I'm in a good mood, Jamie. I think you're in a good mood, too. I feel it. I sense it. I'm in a great mood, buddy. Yeah, I can tell. I can tell by the mic check.

You're all fired up. Yeah. Ready to rock and roll. Actually, I am pretty mad about something. Can I tell you what I'm mad about? What are you mad about? Oh, my Twitter followers. I gave them a Twitter poll, and I think they failed it miserably. I think they're just so wrong about something.

It was what? The Die Harder Christmas movie? No, it was about quarterbacks. It was fantasy related. It was relevant. We'll get to that. Today is a quasi-mailbag. We're going to read some emails.

FantasyFootball at CBSi.com. Right now it's just Adam and Jamie. We expect Dave to be on in about 20 minutes or so. So, you know, get ready for that. We're going to do more upside versus downside with a group of three quarterbacks and a group of three tight ends. We have a lot of news coming out about, like, rookie running backs. Andrew Luck throwing the duck.

And we're going to put a first-round pick, yeah, under the microscope. And that first-round pick. Which first-round pick would you like to put under the microscope today? Odell Beckham? Yeah, that's who it is. Way to go. Odell Beckham is getting put under the microscope today. He's never finished higher than fourth at wide receiver.

So why is he a first-round pick? We'll talk about it. Let's start with a few emails. Email of the day number one is from Julian from a town in the Gulf of Mexico. Okay. Hey, Otto, Reggie, Squid, and Twister. No idea. Yeah, me either.

We'll look it up. Why is no one talking about Lamar Miller? He finished as the RB16 in PPR leagues last year I think I had him as 14 No, he was 16 He was 14th in non-PPR, 16th in PPR Lamar Miller seemed to do extremely well with Deshaun Watson Deontay Foreman will probably start on the pup

list given his injury and the Texans didn't draft a running back. Lamar Miller is a lock as an RB2 with RB1 upside. What are your thoughts from a Dynasty perspective? A lot of questions there. Dynasty, I don't like Lamar Miller as so much because I do think that as he continues to get older, he's not going to get better. He's going to get worse, and he's not exactly coming off a great couple of seasons since joining the Texans. So Dynasty, I think he's at best a number three running back. If you want to make the argument that he's a number two guy, and probably Heath would be the one to make the strongest argument for him, I could certainly see it happening.

I think he's going to be in that group of guys that gets drafted or or finishes 20 to 30 and that group is you know several of the young rookies um several rookies um guys like marlon mack older guys older guys like marshawn lynch um there'll be some you know we had it's like almost what we talked about with isaiah corral Older guys like Marshawn Lynch. It's like almost what we talked about with Isaiah Crowell with Heath Sleepers. I think Lamar Miller is in a similar situation. It's just a matter of can he hold off Deontay Foreman if he's 100% healthy come week one? And will he fall out of favor like we saw last year?

Remember, they started using Alfred Blue toward the end of the season. It was very frustrating. Yeah, so here's the thing about Miller. He has a chance to be a number two running back because he hasn't been very good either of the last two seasons with the Texans. And both years he finished as a number two running back. He was, as I mentioned, last year 14th in non-PPR, 16th in PPR. The year before he only played 14 games, and he was 18th in non-PPR and 20th in PPR.

So, I mean, it's just a matter of workload and touches. But he just wasn't very good at all last year. Lamar Miller did not have a carry of longer than 21 yards, and he had 238 carries. Deontay Foreman had 78 carries, and he had three carries of 25 or more yards. So he was just better. And just one thing to go back to Julian's email.

By the way, Otto, Reggie, Squid, and Twister is a cartoon called Rocket Power. You should know that, Jamie. You have kids. Sure. Happy Father's Day by the way. Thank you. The Marmiler wasn't any better with Deshaun Watson. In fact, oddly enough, he was worse. He averaged 3.54 yards

per carry with Watson. He just doesn't really make any plays. He needs a ton of work. So that's the risk, Jamie. If he falls out of favor and doesn't get the work, he's not going to be an RB2. Let me throw something else at you. So Fantasy Football Calculator does a good job with their average draft position. How do you feel about Lamar Miller in the fourth round? No, I don't like it. It's too early. How do you feel about him as the 22nd running back off the board?

No way. So here's the guys he's going ahead of. Rashad Penny, Mark Ingram, Sonny Michel, Ronald Jones, Royce Freeman, Carlos Hyde, Marshawn Lynch, Tevin Coleman, Deion Lewis. I mean, there's probably five guys easily I would take over Lamar Miller there. Now, if you tell me he's going 25 to 30, I'm okay with that. But in the top 24, I think it's just a little too soon. Email of the day number two is from Wade.

I just heard Eisenberg say Tyler Lockett is a great flyer this season. Why haven't I heard similar sentiments about Randall Cobb? Oh, I think Cobb's in a better situation than Tyler Lockett. I have Randall Cobb in my top 60. I don't have Tyler Lockett in that spot. He's in a very good situation. You look at what the Packers receiving core is in not necessarily upgrading so much over Jordy Nelson.

We'll see with some of the young guys and how they perform. But Cobb should be in line for a good year. The question will become, I think, which is what we've seen from him, is he's been mostly touchdown dependent, and I think that will clearly favor Jimmy Graham joining the team. But, yeah, if you have to choose between Cobb and Tyler Lockett, I would take Cobb. It's very little to go by, but if you want to be encouraged by Randall Cobb,

which I am, week two at Atlanta, Jordy Nelson got hurt almost immediately, missed basically the entire game. And Randall Cobb had six catches for 60 yards on nine targets, and I think he missed the fourth quarter. He left with an injury. So that's a good game in PPR, and it was a shortened game. It's six catches for 60 yards on nine targets. And then Aaron Rodgers missed a lot of the year.

Week 15, he comes back, Aaron Rodgers, and in that game, Randall Cobb had seven catches for 84 yards and a touchdown. So, you know, I don't know if I'm going to get him anymore, but it seems like I've always been the guy drafting Randall Cobb in like the 10th round of a 12-team league in our drafts. And we'll see if there's any more momentum for him. All right, email of the day number three is – oh, no name. You going to give me a name?

Chris. And he says, dear Walt, Jesse, Gus, and Saul. Breaking Bad. Breaking Bad. I'm in a brand-new league that will include two keepers starting in 2019. I'm thinking of an Auburn draft strategy and grabbing Cam Newton at quarterback and carry on Johnson as one of my running backs. I will keep both no matter what for 2019.

And by next summer, I can call my team, keep Cam and carry on. Bada boom, he says. Yes, thank you. Great email from Chris, which is not really his name. All right, so I got some Twitter polls to go through. But, Jamie, we have a draft tomorrow? We have a draft tomorrow. Oh, crap.

I can't make it. I'm sorry. You hate me. You have to make it. It's for our magazine, my friend. No. Oh, this is a problem. I'll see what I can do.

Anyway. You already agreed to do it. Yeah. Well, I forgot I had an obligation. You've seen these new newsletters we have out. Yes. Yes. Very cool stuff.

We have an FFT newsletter. And if you want to subscribe to it, it's obviously free. Go to CBSSports.com slash FFT Daily. FFT Daily. CBSSports.com slash fftdaily. FFT Daily. cbssports.com slash fftdaily. You can subscribe to it in less than a minute. So you're going to get all the latest draft advice from Dave, from Jamie, from Heath. If you have missed the podcast, there's links to the podcast.

There's going to be links to video. This is a way to stay ahead of your competition. We'll help you out. We'll give you the Fantasy Football Today newsletter. Very cool. Right in your inbox. CBSSports.com slash FFT Daily. CBSSports.com slash FFT Daily.

We also have a lot of podcasts you want to listen to. You can hear me and Jamie. You can hear Dave on the Pick 6 podcast all this past week. And the content is pretty evergreen as of right now. So enjoy it. Dave's got a pretty good guest lined up for tomorrow, so that should be great on the Pick Six podcast. You want to know more about our podcast, go to cbssports.com slash podcast, singular. All righty, let's do some Twitter polls. So of this group, who has the most upside

and who has the most downside? So the three quarterbacks I put up there, Jamie, were Kirk Cousins, Ben Roethlisberger, and Jimmy Garoppolo. And this is the one I'm really mad about. Which quarterback has the most upside? I think you people are crazy. Who do you think has the most upside? Kirk Cousins, Ben Roethlisberger, or Jimmy Garoppolo? Roethlisberger. That's what I think, too. That's not what the listeners think. They overwhelmingly have selected Jimmy Garoppolo. 49% of the vote.

Cousins and Roethlisberger almost split. Cousins, 27%. Roethlisberger, 24%. I was surprised that Garoppolo won this. But he's the popular guy now. But are people drafting him ahead of Roethlisberger? I don't know that they are. I don't think they are, but

I would... See, I wonder if people read it as who has more upside from where they're coming from. They just said who's got more upside, and they picked Garoppolo. So yeah, again, fantasy football calculator.

Garoppolo is the 8th quarterback off the board football calculator. Garoppolo is the eighth quarterback off the board. Roethlisberger, the 16th quarterback off the board. I think it's crazy. Boy, Ben Roethlisberger right now looks like unbelievable draft value. Yeah, if that's the case in most drafts. Yeah, for sure. And I'll just give you the numbers. So the problem with Roethlisberger

Is that he misses some games But it's not so bad So he played 15 games last year But he sat in week 17 He played 14 games the year before He played 12 the year before that So if you just take his fantasy points Divide by games played

Multiply by 16 Ben Roethlisberger would have been sixth last year, fifth the year before, and seventh the year before that. In 2014, he did play 16 games, and he was third. So, I mean, if the guy plays 16 games, it's four years in a row of being a top seven quarterback. That's upside to me. And he's got the weapons

So that's really good Now Okay alright So then let's go to the downside right Who's got the most downside of this group A harder question I figured Roethlisberger would win this Probably because of injury

And he did 48% Roethlisberger 33% Garoppolo And Cousins had 19% of the vote For the most downside. So Roethlisberger wins that in a landslide. What's your reaction to that? I think, again, the public perception is going to be Roethlisberger getting older,

maybe the retirement talk. You wonder how many people of these were voting dynasty-wise, if that was their mindset. Did you stress that? I don't think they were. You never know. I didn't say that, but if you saw that question

and the question was which player has the most downside, Cousins, Roethlisberger, or Garoppolo, how would you vote? I'd vote Garoppolo. Has the most downside? Yeah. How come? Just because we're talking about a five-game sample size. As we've seen a lot

with this league, once you get figured out, that could be a problem. I don't think he's going to get figured out, but Cousins is kind of steady Eddie. And Roethlisberger, I think, again, he has the highest ceiling, but I don't know if he has the lowest floor. I think still Garoppolo has the lowest floor. So how do you rank them? In that order, Roethlisberger, Cousins, Garoppolo. Roethlisberger, Cousins, Garoppolo. Roethlisberger, Cousins, Garoppolo.

Now Cousins, his last three years, he's been 9th, 5th, and 8th in fantasy points among quarterbacks. Now he has played 16 games. And you know what's interesting when you look at Kirk Cousins, Jamie? You don't get blown away by the yards. Except he had 4,900 yards in 2016. That was amazing. 2015 and 17, about 4,100. Not so great.

You're not blown away by the touchdowns. He hasn't had a 30-touchdown season yet. Interceptions are fine, about 12 a year. He rushes for four touchdowns every year, four or five touchdowns. It makes a big difference. Can you rely on four extra touchdowns on the ground for Kirk Cousins? No, but probably two. He's very interesting because I certainly see the point of

the defense being better, the run game being better, things that haven't really been the case for him consistently over the last three seasons. But I also think the receiving core is the best he's ever going to play with. Diggs, I think, is poised for a huge year. Thielen's kind of proven himself

to be very reliable over the last year plus. And Rudolph is clearly very safe at the tight end spot, plus what Cook will give them out of the backfield. So I think Cousins will be right in that 8 to 10 range. I don't think he's going to kill you. He may not have a lot of 30-plus point games, but Keenum was certainly serviceable,

and I would imagine Cousins is an upgrade over Keenum. At least that's the way I approach it. In the four years in which Mike Zimmer has been the head coach of the Vikings, the Redskins have thrown more passes than the Vikings every single year. So, look, the coordinator has changed. Things could change. Maybe the Vikings pass a little bit more. But the Redskins have thrown more passes than the Vikings every single year

since Mike Zimmer has become the head coach. It's been kind of close in three of those four years. But, yes, I see what you're saying. It's like the situation is worse in some respects, and it's better in some respects for Kirk Cousins, who you call them Steady Eddie, and he's been top nine three years in a row. All righty, Jamie, let's talk about tight ends. Upside and downside in this group of three tight ends. Who has the most upside, Evan Ingram, Jimmy Graham, or Trey Burton?

And I used your rankings to pick three guys who are fairly similarly ranked. Evan Ingram, Jimmy Graham, Trey Burton. Who has the most upside to you? Burton. Oh, he's last in the Twitter poll. 21% Jimmy Graham at 32%. Evan Ingram, 47% of the respondents say Ingram has the most upside. I get it.

I mean, he was awesome last year, but circumstances have certainly changed. And I think if you look at it, if Evan Ingram does what he showed last year, let's just say that's replicable. And Odell Beckham does what he showed last year, let's just say that's replicable, and Odell Beckham does what he usually does, and you get average to slightly above average from Sterling Shepard plus Saquon Barkley, Eli Manning's got to be a top ten quarterback if not top five. Yeah, I know. It's crazy. I mean, it's impossible. You're right.

It's impossible. You can't have it both ways. So whoever's voting Evan Ingram is either gung-ho about the entire Giants offense or is downgrading somebody else. So I find myself, and this is one of the problems when you're doing rankings versus what you feel about how a player is. I don't know how much lower I could put Evan Ingram. I think I have him sixth or seventh. The Hunter Henry injury kind of threw things out of whack.

I think at this point I'd rather have Trey Burton than Evan Ingram just because I think that Burton is going to be more viable and more reliable than Ingram will. And pliable. Burton, Ingram, how about Graham? How would you rank all three of them? I think the way I would rank them, at least the way I have it right now, is Ingram, Graham, Burton.

But I almost feel like I need to switch. Or no, I have Graham, Ingram, Burton. Yeah, you go Graham, Ingram, Burton. So you think you're going to go Graham, Burton, Ingram? I think so. Evan Ingram, I think he's a good player. I think he was great last year. But the circumstances, last year, no Beckham from week six on. Sterling

Shepard missed a handful of games because he was in and out of the lineup. Eli Manning had nowhere else to go. Now you have what should be an upgrade as a pass catcher in the backfield. You have the dominant receiver back by far. The complementary guy is still pretty good too.

The way that I would view it is Ingram is fourth for touches by far and maybe even fourth for targets. See, taking Trey Burton over Evan Ingram would be bold, I think, based on ADP. And you can tell me on your little calculator. But I don't imagine that many people are going to be there. Not that I disagree or anything. I'm just – I think, especially based on this Twitter poll,

I think people are going to favor Evan Ingram over Trey Burton. And, you know, it's a very unproven player in Trey Burton. He's even less proven than Jimmy Garoppolo. So Ingram is the sixth tight end coming off the board in round five. So he's behind Graham. He's two rounds ahead of Burton. And then, you know, the guys that are in between him, which, again, you know, if you're not buying Evan Ingram repeating his performance, you take the steady guys of Rudolph and Walker.

They're so boring. They're boring, but, you know, Cousins could make Rudolph, you know, where he was two years ago again. Of this group who has the most downside, Evan Ingram, Jimmy Graham, or Trey Burton, Evan Ingram? I think you know where I go. You think it's Ingram? Yeah. Yeah or Trey Burton. I think you know where I go. You think it's Ingram? Yeah. I love him as a player.

I just wonder if the – again, you seem to be like a player that you're chasing stats from just his performance from last year. That's a tougher one for me, who has the most downside because we haven't talked about Graham yet. It's possible Graham's just done. He just might be way past his prime. But he could be 500 yards and 10 touchdowns. Yeah. The Twitter poll has Trey Burton, number one, with 45% of the vote for the most downside. Jimmy Graham close behind 41% of the vote.

And Evan Ingram only got 14% for the most downside. But I do agree that Evan Ingram has a lot of downside. You know, it's kind of like Hunter Henry. We were hoping in Henry's second year that he would take a step up, but there were just too many mouths to feed. Yeah. It's not about how good or bad of a player he is. All right.

So there you have it. That's how people are feeling about those three quarterbacks and those three tight ends. And Jamie, Andrew Luck making progress. So he insists he will play in week one. You know, the fact that it's even a question has to tell you something. You currently have Luck 14th. How high do you realistically think you could move Andrew Luck? I think before he missed the last round of OTAs. This was minicamp. Before he missed the last round of OTAs.

This was minicamp. Before he missed the last round of OTAs. Prior to that, and I could see because we did it for our magazine. I think I had him ranked maybe eighth. So I don't think I'll put him back in the top five if he's 100% healthy. I don't think I'll put him even back in the top ten. At this point, I would rather chase Garoppolo

and Mahomes than rely on what Andrew Luck could be. Yep. I would love for him to be my number two quarterback if I can get him. You have him 14th. If he's going, it's the 14th quarterback. I'll tell you.

What side are you using, Jamie? Giving a lot of pub to another publication. He is going right now as the 11th quarterback. I guess it doesn't really matter because whoever you take at 14th is probably – Roethlisberger and Luck would be a fine combo for me to start my team, to have on my team. If you're going to take two quarterbacks, it could go any way you decide. If you want to take Luck first, you could still get Rivers later,

Ryan later, Derek Carr later, Eli Manning later. They're going to be a handful of guys you can still pair Andrew Luck with. Conversely, if you take one of the young or injured guys, and by injured I mean Deshaun Watson or Carson Wentz coming off of injury,

which they're in a little bit better standing right now than Andrew Luck is, you compare those guys with Luck and still have hopefully a standout number one, if not two number one quarterbacks. And you mentioned a lot of quarterbacks. You mentioned Matt Ryan, Derek Carr, Eli Manning. I'm not sure if you said Dak Prescott, but he'll be in that range. Dak Prescott, yep, sure. They all are in the rankings. They're not even close you said Dak Prescott, but he'll be in that ranking. They all are in the rankings.

They're not even close to Ben Roethlisberger. In fact, Heath has Ben Roethlisberger fourth. So this is basically just becoming the Ben Roethlisberger hour with Adam and Jamie. Some more quarterback news. Lamar Jackson's been lining up all over the field, and Jets offensive

coordinator Jeremy Bates said Sam Darnold could start in week one, and Deshaun Watson is pleased with his rehab from knee surgery. You have Watson fourth, so I can't imagine you're going to be moving him any higher. No. All right, running back news. Getting interesting. The Tampa Bay Times expects Ronald Jones and Peyton Barber to share the load. Your reaction, Jamie?

Not surprising given the veteran versus rookie situation. I think we're going to find out. Look, we're all very excited about this rookie running back class. There were eight guys taken in the first two rounds, and you're getting different reports on basically all of them. You know Barkley's locked into his role. I mean, Seattle, there was a report that Chris Carson looks good. You have this report in Tampa Bay.

Denver, you have the report that Devontae Booker is going to be the starter going into training camp. Kerryon Johnson sharing the workload with LeGarrette Blount in Theoretic. It's going to be all over the place until these guys really get serious with what happens in camp. And I don't think any of them has mastered the playbook, mastered the blocking, mastered what they have to do through OTAs and minicamps. So not surprised at all. I think if you sort of view it as the way the Chiefs were probably going to handle Kareem Hunt pre-Spencer Ware injury, work him along.

He's going to have a big role as the season unfolded. That's he's going to have a a big role as the season unfolded that's what's going to happen with a lot of these guys you just have to remember you have to be patient in some cases yeah okay so you know what that's going to cut down a lot of the news and notes because the denver post expects davante booker to get get a heavy workload we should probably talk about that one it doesn't really make any sense to me but but i remember not long before the 2017 season started we were reacting to to a Leonard Fournette is going to share carries, I think with Chris Ivory report. And it's just head coaches are reluctant to go out and say,

this rookie running back is going to be our workhorse. So we're going to have to decide what we believe and what we don't believe. Do you believe that Devontae Booker is going to get a heavy workload this season? Heavy? No. Workload? Yes. I mean, I heard from somebody who talked to the Broncos that they're really in love with

Royce Freeman, and that's why they drafted him where they did, and they expect him to be their guy. John Elway came out and said in a report, a bell cow. Does he still have to prove it? Absolutely. I's just the nature of what it is. I don't think it should change the way you draft these guys if you're drafting them now. But it's not a bad idea to invest in a Peyton Barber or invest in a Devontae Booker because there still could be an opportunity for them. As we've seen, sometimes these rookies just don't pan out. So how many of the rookie running backs do you like more than Lamar Miller?

To bring it full circle here. Barkley, let's go down the list. Penny. I like all of them better than Miller if Devontae Foreman's healthy. If we get to training camp and Foreman's put on the pup list, I'll move Miller up ahead of a lot of them. Probably, I like Geis better for sure. That won't change.

I like Penny better for sure. I like Jones better for sure. He'd be in the Freeman range. In the Freeman range. All right. So you'd put him ahead of Kerryon Johnson, Nick Chubb? He's already ahead of Chubb. I don't really have a lot of faith in Nick Chubb going into the season right now.

Just based on the other two guys ahead of him. Sonny Michel? They'd be about the same. You know, Michel is another report, which, again, this one is a little bit more telling, is that Rex Burkhead and James White are getting more work than Sonny Michel. You know, given what the Patriots tend to do, that's not a big surprise. Oh, my gosh. Could you imagine if they, like, don't really use Sonny Michel?

They use a first-round pick on him, and Rex Burkhead ends up being the best fantasy running back there? Would that really surprise you? I don't know. Kind of. No, no, it wouldn't. It would in year two. But in year one for him, I guess it really wouldn't surprise me that much.

What do you make of Robert Turbin and Jordan Wilkins getting some first-team reps, Marlon Mack rehabbing a shoulder injury? Yeah, again, I think they're just trying to figure out what they have. This is a brand new backfield for them outside of Marlon Mack. Turbin is the one that would be annoying. I like Jordan Wilkins. He's my favorite of the two guys that they drafted. And in terms of sleepers, I tend to draft Jordan Wilkins wherever I could possibly get him. Just to give you a little peek behind the curtain, we just did our pick-by-pick. It's something that we do all offseason, the pick-by-pick series. We just did the first one, which is for our magazine, which is coming out.

The second edition of our magazine is coming out in July. And I took all three Colts running backs with one team. It's a PPR, Jordan Wilkins. I took Naheem Hines first because I think he's better in PPR, at least as of now. But I'm excited that Jordan Wilkins is I took Naheem Hines first because I think he's better in PPR, at least as of now. I'm excited that Jordan Wilkins is getting some run there. Him and Turbin are different. Mack is kind of a smaller guy, as we've seen.

Hines is definitely a small guy. Turbin and Wilkins bring a little bit more bulk. Behind that offensive line, which would be better, those two guys could be interesting. I just hope it's Wilkins and not Turbin. Which picks did you use on those running backs? They were both leagues.

So I took Mack, and this is picking from the sixth spot. Again, PPR. I took Mack in round 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Is that right? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Yep, Mack in round 6. I took Hines in round 11, and I took Wilkins one round later in round 12. I love that.

I mean, Andrew Luck comes back. I think you're going to have hopefully one good player and two players that you don't need. We don't want them to share. We just want, like, one great guy. Yeah, and I know there were some very positive reports on Hines, and he's going to be, I think, like a Darren Sproles type of guy where he'll catch passes, he'll be used on special teams, he'll do a variety of things.

Again, Wilkins, to me, is a little bit more of a thumper, somebody who can be the physical guy there. Score some touchdowns. The Saints signed Terrence West. Do you think Terrence West has any value in the first four weeks of the season? He does if he makes the team. There's no guarantee. The kid that they drafted, Boston Scott, they have Jonathan Williams from somebody they picked up off the scrap people last year. I think those three guys are going to compete for that role to open the season. But I would

imagine once Mark Ingram is back, those guys are irrelevant. Who will miss more time, Mark Ingram or Dave Richard? Definitely Mark Ingram. He's suspended. Yeah, Mark Ingram out for a long time. We won't see him until week five. Dave, on the other hand, is here. I made it.

David Richard Richard, where on earth were you? And that is his middle name, folks. It's David Richard Richard, where on earth were you? And that is his middle name, folks. It's David Richard Richard. Yeah, my parents are kind of crazy. I was just shooting a segment for CBS Sports HQ. CBS Sports HQ, you say? Yes, have you heard of it? I have.

I watch it on my Roku, in fact, R-O-K-U.com. Yeah, CBS Sports HQ, it's live. It's free. It's 24-7. It's awesome. And it's great throwback sports content, sports news and highlights, and of course, fantasy analysis. So, yes. All right,

Dave, I'm going to give you the next group of notes. It's wide receiver notes. You've been saying, can I please talk about wide receiver news and notes on the show? Yes, you can. Juju Smith Schuster is limited with a knee injury. He's frustrated by it. Dave, are you frustrated? You know, you never like seeing guys hurt now,

but I'd rather have Juju hurt now than in July or August. Let's get him ready to go for training camp and have him contribute to the Steelers' offense regardless of Antonio Brown's status. That's ideally what I'd like to see from him because I love him as a player. I'm worried that he won't be able to give much consistency as long as Brown and Bell are doing their thing. All right, that's Juju. We've got Zay Jones expected to be ready for training camp after knee surgery.

He had also shoulder surgery in January. Is Zay Jones a top 60 wide receiver for anybody? No, I don't think so. I can't recommend drafting many Buffalo Bills. There's two? Two. Kelvin and McCoy? Yes.

And Robbie Anderson says that he has grown up and he has turned his life around. And we don't know how long he'll be suspended, but he is a number three wide receiver. Low end number three wide receiver for Dave, Jamie, and Heath. All right. Tight end news. Tyler Eifert may not be ready for training camp due to a back injury. It's brutal, isn't it? Yeah.

Do you know that over the past two seasons, he's scored five touchdowns and missed 22 games? That's tough. Yeah, those are not good stats. Is there any fantasy impact here? Helps A.J. Green, maybe? Hurts A.J. Green? I mean, A.J. Green's kind of been the same. It just hurts Andy Dalton.

I think they're going to use Tyler Croft a lot anyway. All right. I think they might too, but if Eifert's ready to go, then they probably won't hesitate to use him a decent amount. I think Marvin Lewis has had it, though. It makes me wonder why they brought him back even on a one-year deal. Well, he's got a back injury, and let's hope Tyler Eifert can get back. Sure.

He could be a good final round pick if he's healthy at training camp. Chargers GM Tom Telesco says he has spoken to Antonio Gates. So how about making something happen, Tom? And John Gruden likes Jared Cook. Do any fantasy analysts like Jared Cook? Seems like a nice guy. Sure. He could probably beat me up in a fight.

He'll be a streaming option during the season. Do any of you think that you could throw a ball farther than Andrew Luck right now? Yes. I think if Andrew had to throw a ball farther than me, he could do it. What about farther than Jamie? Jamie's got a pretty strong arm. No, there's

no way. No way what? That I could throw a football farther than him. Right now? He doesn't want to. He's nervous. It doesn't matter. Give him a regulation football. He's afraid to throw it. No, no, no. He's done it.

He said he's thrown a regulation ball already. I want to see it. I want to see with my own eyes. I want to see that duck get chucked. And the Cowboys signed Zach Martin to a big old contract, six years, $84 million, $40 million guaranteed. They have the richest offensive line in the NFL, if I read correctly. Highest paid left tackle, highest paid left guard, highest paid center.

They should have the richest offensive line. I can't wait to draft Zeke. Let's be scientists and put a first-round pick under the microscope, and then we will finish with a lot of your emails on this mailbag show. The first-round pick today is Odell Beckham Jr. He is entering his fifth season. Played just four games last year. He has played 12 games, 15 games due to suspension, 16 games, and four games in four seasons.

And Beckham finished in 2016 as the number four wide receiver in both formats. In 2015, Beckham was the number five wide receiver. 2014 was his best year. 91 catches, 1,300 yards, 12 touchdowns, and only 12 games. So he finished sixth in non-PPR, eighth in PPR, but that was in only 12 games as a rookie. All right. Is there any reason to be concerned about Odell Beckham Jr. that he might not return first-round value? Well, that he has a setback with his injury. That would be the biggest concern, I think. The other part would be twofold, like what we were talking about with Evan Ingram,

that there are more mouths to feed, better mouths to feed around him. You know, he's never had this level of talent on the field with him. I mean, Victor Cruz got hurt his rookie season. Sterling Shepard had, you know, a lot of touchdowns two years ago. But, you know, that was it. And now you're talking about the best running back he's ever played with, at least in theory, and best tight end. You know, he really didn't – those two guys never on the same page last year, Ingram and Beckham.

So if everything is working the way it should be for the Giants, there's going to have to be something, you know, losing again. Otherwise, Eli Manning is going to be, we all have him really undervalued. So I think Beckham is still in line for a great season, still in line to put up monster numbers, playing for a contract I think is going to help him. Yeah. But I don't know if he has the same ceiling that he's had. And, again, like you said, Adam, he's finished fourth.

That's why I have him ranked as fourth, but I don't know if he gets there. I think the way you approach first-round picks is where's the floor? Because the ceiling obviously could be one if you're taking the first round. Where's the floor with Beckham? To me, the floor with Beckham is probably finishing about the 10th best wide receiver, which is not going to really crush your fantasy. Who do you have ranked ahead of Odell?

Brown, Hopkins, and Julio. I think Julio has a big bounce-back season. I hope so. I'm a little peeved that he didn't participate in minicamp, which is another note, unless we talked about it already and I just missed it, but that's a wide receiver note. No, we didn't. Okay. I'm not going to dock Julio Jones for that,

but Dan Quinn told me at the owner's meeting that he couldn't wait to see Julio healthy and taking part in all of their offseason activities. And for him to miss minicamp... Of course he's going to say that. He wasn't there. Well, yeah, yeah, yeah. He wasn't going to be there. I think it stinks a little bit.

Hopefully he doesn't hold out of training camp. That's something that I would hold against Julio. Ryan said today that he expects him to do the off-season work that they do away from the team. Perfect. Which is why we shouldn't discount him at all for missing minicamp. Because it's not that important.

I mean, technically Odell didn't take part in any. Let's focus on Beckham here. Let's focus on Beckham. That's where I was going. Okay, go ahead. Is that Beckham, I love that he was at minicamp and he did a bunch of drills and he even stayed late to work with Eli,

but he didn't take part in any of the 11-on-11s, which is like the most intense that things get during a minicamp practice, is okay it's fine i i think the better saquon looks the harder it is to see odell finish as a top five fantasy receiver but for now we don't know just how good saquon is going to be we think he's going to be pretty damn good we're taking him with a late first round pick so odell Odell gets the benefit of the doubt for right now. Beckham is a touchdown machine. He's a double-digit touchdown guy every single year except for obviously last year.

12, 13, 10 touchdowns in his first three seasons. But here's an interesting stat. Here's where the Giants finished in pass attempts per game in Beckham's four years. Ninth, sixth, eighth, and first. They led the league in pass attempts per game in Beckham's four years. Ninth, sixth, eighth, and first. They led the league in pass attempts per game last year. Why? They haven't had a running game. So, yeah, Barkley is interesting.

One thing that works in Beckham's favor, I went back, I tried to look at percentage of team targets that the elite wide receivers have had. And Beckham, in games, a season in which he played 15 or 16 games, he had 25.5% in 2015. He had 28.2% of the team's targets in 2016. I know these are kind of a lot of numbers. It's pretty low. It's lower than what a lot of the other guys get. Like Julio Jones in 2015 had 33% of his team's targets. Antonio Brown in 2015 had 33% of his team's targets. Antonio Brown in 2015 had 33% of his team's targets. So Beckham has not been a guy that has thrived simply because of targets.

That works in his favor. But the Giants have thrown a lot, and they don't want to throw the ball as much. They want to run the ball. They spent their first two picks on a running back and an offensive lineman, and a guard. So, yeah, is Beckham an obvious first round pick? Because if he fell to the second round,

I wouldn't be like, whoa, crazy value here. So again, just looking at the pick-by-pick thing that we just did without giving away too much. He went eighth. And again, this is PPR. So the guys who went after him, him again nitpick it all you want uh alvin camara at nine saquon barkley at 10 keenan allen at 11 and then julio jones fell to 12

so um i'm not going to explain the keenan allen pick i'll let uh the the story do that itself and we'll explain that when our we'll talk it more when the magazine comes out. I don't think you can necessarily fault Julio over him. There are going to be people that might like A.J. Green better, Michael Thomas better, and now with the Hunter Henry injury, Keenan Allen as well. To me, Beckham is still a first-round pick. It's hard to get to the back end of the first round when you start to get past these running backs and say he's not in there. All right, let's read some emails.

FantasyFootball at CBSi.com. Thanks to everybody for writing in. We're getting a lot of emails. You can also call us and leave a voicemail, and we'll be listening to those next week. What if I just read the transcript of the voicemail? That wouldn't really help. 954-689-3199 is that number.

954-689-3199. Please number. 954-689-3199. Please leave your name, and if you want to leave a greeting, that is totally fine. FantasyFootball at CBSi.com is the email address. I'd like to take just one second to tell you, please, it would help us if you spread the word. You know, we're a popular podcast. We appreciate that. We've been around. This might be our 10th year, which is kind of crazy.

But we're always looking to grow. So don't be afraid to tell your friends and don't be afraid to leave us a nice comment in iTunes, five stars, and that'd be great. It would really help us out. And we would straight up love you for it. All right, here's an email from Zach. Where's he from, Dave? He's from Bessemer, Alabama. Why is Alan Hearn's projections so low? Dak has to throw to someone. I think we're all scared to plant a flag on a Cowboys wide receiver and say, this is going to be the guy. I'm not scared.

I take Michael Gallup. Yeah, I felt that way after the draft, but after seeing and reading kind of how the team's been running i'm not sure if that's gonna last i almost wonder if gallop doesn't do much to begin the year and then finally gets into a role where he's playing a little more often i feel like hearns is the most established of those guys but he's not exciting he went relatively early in our pick-by-pick that we just did. I think he's more of like a round 11-plus type of a guy. I don't see a lot of upside with any Cowboys wide receiver. It's funny because I'm just looking.

There's a story right now. Michael Gallup looks like the real deal to teammates. The Cowboys are clearly excited about him. So second-year defensive back Chidobe Awuze said Gallup said he's the real deal. The stuff he's doing now, he wasn't really doing when I faced him at Colorado State. Awuze also talked about Gallup's preparation

effort, saying he's a very cerebral guy. He knows how to get off the ball. Not a lot of receivers know how to get off press consistently. It's funny. There's a lot of teammate, praising teammate stuff going on at OTAs and minicamp um you're hearing like leshawn mccoy talk about josh allen um jarvis lander talk about ryan tan jarvis lander talk about ryan tannell um i like this stuff more so than i do coach says x about

player or beat writer says x about player um because these guys have to go against each other all the time yeah but obviously what's he gonna say yeah he's not that good Because these guys have to go against each other all the time. Yeah. But obviously, what's he going to say? Yeah, he's not that good. Well, he doesn't have to offer it up at all. Sure. Right. Owusi could have been asked about it, and he could have said,

all of our wide receivers are doing great. Stuff means nothing to me. You know, which is, if you know how to read coach speak, that tells you that the guy isn't any good. But he didn't do that. He talked up Gallup. I just look at it this way. Alan Hearns had one great season.

He scored a lot of touchdowns in that year where it was just fourth quarter after fourth quarter for Blake Bortles. To me, he was overpaid. I said that from the beginning. I don't think he's a number one guy. I don't think anybody they have is really a number one guy, but who has the most upside? To me, it's the one that's the youngest and the one that they invested in. I know it was only a third round pick, but I'll take my chances with that. I think Alan Hearns will be fine. I think he'll give you some good moments. Yes, his projections are probably low, but to me, he's just another retread.

All right, so Dak Prescott actually finished as his number 12 quarterback last year. His leading receiver was Dez Bryant, who had just 69 catches for 838 yards and six touchdowns. So that's a cool little Dak stat. Jordan is in a suburb of New Haven. Can we just say he's from New Haven? Okay. Dear Nagy, Peterson, Harbaugh, and McDermott.

Andy Reid disciples. Ah, all righty. I have the number one pick in a non-PPR draft. In mocks. Oh, what'd you do? I knocked over the mic. Jamie's destroying the podcast studio. All right, he's got the number one pick in a non-PPR draft.

In mocks, I've been expect... All right, let me just cut. Let me just stay here. This is a terrible idea from Jordan. Jordan, I'm sorry, terrible idea. I've been experimenting with taking either Gurley or Bell number one and then taking two tight ends at the 2-3 turn. And then he says after that, however, wide receivers are scarce at 4-5.

Don't do it. Don't ever take two tight ends. Never, never. No, no, no. Unless there's special scoring for tight ends, like, say, a point and a half per catch. Yeah. Just for them. And you can start two of them.

But no, don't ever do it. Now, there's a good pizza place in New Haven that everybody always tells me about. I hope that's where you're from. Keith is from Santa Clara, California. I love Jamie's idea about leftover auction money going to FAB. What do you think of extending this? Combine auction budget and FAB budget, or FAB, before the auction.

So you can, if you want, blow your entire budget of auction dollars and FAB dollars in the auction. More likely to spend all auction and some FAB in the, yeah, okay, I get it. So let's say you have 100 auction dollars and 100 FAB. Well, now you've got

200 to spend on both your draft and your free agency and that's kind of neat i think it is too and i think you'll see people extend well past 100 on the auction you'll probably see them go as high as 130 in the auction and 70 left over for the season, which I heartily endorse. I don't know how I feel about that. I wouldn't do it that way. You wouldn't do it what way? You wouldn't overspend on the auction? No, no, no. I wouldn't allow you to spend more than $100 in the auction. Okay.

But whatever you save can be carried over to FAP. But what if you could, Jamie? How much do you think out of $200 total bucks, how much would you spend in the auction? So we're going off of what would be a $100 budget, but you're getting $200 spent? Yes. Yeah. So the big name guys. I think Dave had it right.

Yeah, about $130. $130. Yeah, I mean if I'm in a shallower league, like a 10-team league, I'm going to probably want more fab. Just because I think free agency is going to be better. But wouldn't you want more fab for the deeper leagues so that you could – I don't know. You're not going to make as much of an impact with free agents, I feel. No, but the ones that you really want, you're going to need your fab dollars for.

Yeah, maybe. That's tough. All right. Here's one from Patrick, and he is from? Where does Patrick live on SpongeBob? It's like a big dude's head, right? They're all in a pineapple under the sea. No, only SpongeBob lives in the pineapple.

Hey, SpongeBob. How was that? Hey, Patrick. Hey, Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Could you discuss drafting out of the fourth and seventh slot in a PPR 12-team snake draft? We're only going to do one. Pick four or seven. Well, why doesn't Jamie do four and I'll do seven?

Because we won't get to enough emails. We take 10 minutes on every email. We'll be really fast. Fine. Look, I'll do four because I just did it in the round-by-round. You're guaranteed a stud running back there if you want one. Hold on. Quiet, you. Here's the email.

12-team PPR. In the fourth slot, I'm always torn between Zeke and Antonio Brown. What do you do? I took Zeke. I want the stud running back, and I think he'll catch more passes than he ever has before. I would have taken Antonio Brown in a heartbeat. Okay, in the seventh slot, it's between Beckham and a running back,

either Barkley, Hunt, or Kamara. I took Hunt because I think he'll continue to pile on numbers. Yeah, give me Kamara. Based on what he did last year with the expected workload bump, I think he's going to be better than Hunt. Now he says, Patrick from a pineapple or a cantaloupe under the sea,

says that when he picks seventh, mock drafts usually have Christian McCaffrey or Devante Freeman available in round two. So, I mean, I'm a big McCaffrey fan of PPR. If you knew you could get McCaffrey, you know, kind of middle of round two, would that make you more or less likely to take a wide receiver in round one? Or not any more or less likely at all? If I would have taken Antonio Brown, I would have taken McCaffrey around too at pick four. No, he's talking about pick seven.

No, I think there's just better players in that spot receiver-wise. I agree. Okay. By the way, I was wrong. I want to apologize to everybody, especially Patrick. It appears he lives under a rock, and it is a different Spongebob character that lives in the giant head. It's almost like a robot.

Squidworth? Squidworth? I don't know. I don't know it. All right, this guy gave no name or city. So it's going to be Ray from Bloomington, Illinois. Dear Thanos' Thor's brother, the villain in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, IHOP, and Adam.

More than anything, I just wanted to use those characters for an email, but here's a keeper question. Ten-team half PPR, two keepers can be kept as long as you want. You lose a round each year. Ten-team half PPR, two keepers, keep forever, lose a round each year. Dalvin Cook in the fourth, Derek Henry in the tenth, Devontae Adams in the fifth, Corey Davis

in the twelfth, and Marvin Jones in the fifteenth. Can we get rid of Corey Davis and Marvin Jones? Yes. What's the keeper thing again? You can keep two of these guys in a half-point PPR. Forever? In those spots? Nope. They move up a round each year.

So why are we throwing out Marvin Jones at that late? Because how many years are you going to keep him? This one in the 15th round. Really? You can keep Marvin Jones. Because you have Dalvin Cook in the 4th, Devontae Adams in the 5th, and Derrick Henry in the 10th. Yeah, those guys are better.

Even with fewer, less value. Alright, so pick two. This is tough. Very, very difficult. I'll take Cook and Henry. I'm going to lean the same way. Cook and Henry.

I can't get past Henry's value in round 10 because I think he's got some staying power. And, of course, I think Dalvin Cook does too. In a 10-team league, you should be able to find some good wide receivers. You just start wide receiver heavy. If there's enough left. Maybe Adams is who you take in round one. From Adam.

Subject, band name. DJ Milk and the Scrubs. Nah, I don't like it. That's that's mean Yeah why would they call you DJ Milk Aren't we over that already Yeah because I had that one sip of whiskey That almost burned my mouth This is from You were supposed to enjoy and savor that

There was nothing enjoyable about that It was just awful I'm sorry Georgios from a little town in Greece. I'm sorry to everybody listening. Dear Kareem, Akeem, Ethan, Bonnie, and Helen. I don't have a clue who that is. Six-keeper Dynasty League.

No round penalties. No rookie draft. Non-PPR, but explosive play bonus and first down bonus. So, whatever. Keeping Wilson, Winston, Hunt, Bell, A.J. Green, is his last keeper going to be Derek Henry or Adam Thielen in a non-PPR league? I'm going to go Henry. Now, wait. Here's one thing.

A first down bonus i mean that heavily favors wide receivers right because pretty much every catch they make is what is the receiver average about 12 yards per catch right yeah so that's typically enough to get a first down so why would you keep both quarterbacks i i don't know. Maybe it's just – It's Dynasty. So what? You're right. Why would you keep Winston when you can keep Henry and Thielen?

Yes, throwback Winston. Okay. Good stuff. I think this is our last email. Buck from a small town in California north of L.A. Fresno. Dear Tom, Jimmy, and Barry Oh, those are Cowboys coaches

Yeah I got it first You did by like a nanosecond Every year there are players that are supposed to be good And probably will be But somehow they disappoint owners on a personal level Who are those players for you and the guys? For me, I'm thinking it's Shady McCoy and Joe Mixon.

So, yeah, we call these busts. Who are a couple of busts for you guys? I agree with him on McCoy. I'm very nervous to draft him. I'm nervous to draft Mark Ingram. We're going to go back and forth on this all summer long. But I just don't want to wait for him. I don't know how effective he'll be when he comes back in week five.

I know I can't use him in week six when the Saints are on by. So am I really taking him with the top 60 pick to just sit and wait to use him in week seven? That alone makes me nervous. The other fact that Kamara could jump out with this four-week head start and be amazing could further limit Ingram and his workload. That's a guy that I'm very nervous about drafting. Or Terrence West.

Oh, come on. Terrence West. Jamie, you want to give a couple of busts? Sure. We talked about two at least already, Evan Ingram and Andrew Luck. Brandon Cooks is somebody I'm not drafting. I think he's going to really struggle going to the Rams. Jay Ajayi I think is going to be overdrafted.

Dion Lewis is going to be overdrafted. Sonny Michel is going to be overdrafted. You're not a fan of Alshon, if I recall. I'm not a fan of Alshon. Jarvis Landry is going to be overdrafted. I like the Joe Mixon call. I think it's funny. There is – and I don't want to talk about this now.

I want to save this for a different show. But it occurred to me when we were talking about Mixon on our previous episode. There is absolutely nothing to like about Mixon except for pedigree. He gave us nothing last year to hang on to. He was okay down the stretch. He aver to. He was okay down the stretch. He averaged five yards per carry down the stretch. And they're going to move to a zone-blocking scheme. Yeah, the offensive line will be much better.

It's not just the line, though. It's the coaching of the line. They're getting Dallas' former offensive line coach. But I feel like he's going ahead of guys who were so much better than him last year. Because everybody was better than him last year. So why take him ahead of these guys? Why take him ahead of Alex Collins? Why take him ahead of Kenyon Drake?

All right, we'll talk about it on another show. Kareem, Akeem, Ethan, Bonnie, and Helen are hunts. Hunts. Although I don't think I know who Bonnie Hunt is. She's an actress. Oh, I know i know her yeah what was she in oh she was in uh jerry mcguire that non-football movie that that you know well of course all of a sudden you know her so uh you guys have fun weekend plans or what i am driving to my son's camp to drop him off for the summer oh that's the same reason you missed my wedding last year yes oh is your anniversary coming up well you'd

think so but this is odd it's happening no no no no two weeks earlier no no no i had to pick him up from camp okay you got married in july right i did yeah right so that was. I had to pick him up from camp. Okay. You got married in July, right? I did, yeah. Right, so that was when I had to pick him up. The story's coming out now. No, no, no. I didn't drop him off. I had to pick him up. But he only has a two-week camp? No, it was a four-week camp. All right. All right, Dave. We'll see. Do you think I really would have ditched your wedding?

I kind of don't think you wanted to go. Yeah, that's such a nice gift. You did. You did. All right, that's it. Everybody enjoy your weekend. Have a great Father's Day. And we'll talk to you on Monday

with another edition of the Fantasy Football Today podcast. Bye. Na-na-na-na-na-na.