Fantasy Football Today - 2020 Lessons, Statistical Outliers, Week 17 Tough Calls (12/30 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: December 30, 2020

A little bit of Week 17 and a lot of 2021 on today's show. We start with the news and notes (3:05) and update you on which teams are resting their starters before Heath reflects on 2020 with his lessons learned. Heath weighs in on the TE position (9:15), the greatness of this year's rookie WR class (13:00) and the Zero-RB approach (18:25) ... Week 17 tough calls (22:55)! Start Kyler Murray and Russell Wilson? Is Zeke an easy call now? What about Jamison Crowder? ... We read your Apple Podcast questions and emails (37:15) and then talk about some 2020 statistical outliers (53:00). We discuss Aaron Rodgers' TD rate, Miles Sanders' long runs and more ... Your emails at [e-mail] 'Fantasy Football Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox, and wherever else you listen to podcasts. Follow the new FFT Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/FFToday Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @BenSchragg Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCviK78rIWXhZdFzJ1Woi7Fg/videos Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Want winning picks each morning in under 10 minutes? Subscribe to 'The Early Edge: A Daily SportsLine Betting Podcast' on Apple, Spotify, Stitcher or wherever else you listen to podcasts. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports. On his way to the end zone. I'll tell you what, that was a spectacular play. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. What a play. Off to the races.

Touchdown. Oh, he's done it again. Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, Heath, and Ben. All right, it is almost New Year's Eve. It's festive time, holiday time, and we are getting a lot of really great emails and tweets, and I want to thank everybody for that. We'll get back to that in a moment.

Welcome to the show, everybody. It is Wednesday. Adam Azer, Dave Richard, and Heath Cummings. Heath, you've only got two shows left for a while. You better make them good. Yeah. Yeah. You ready for a big. You better make them good. Yeah, yeah. You ready for a big vacation? Sounds like a guy who's ready.

You ready for a month off? A what? A month off. You ready? It's not quite a month off, but it's close to a month off. And yes, I am 100% ready. And you want to just go and snooze through this one here, Heath? No, I'm going to be a full participant. I am a full participant in

practice today i'm ready to talk about week 17 tough calls um i've got something for you that's not a tough call in week 17 okay don't play your league championship in week 17 that's an easy call super easy yeah actually i have eight players on the week 17 tough calls list. And as I was doing the notes, I was like, this guy's not a tough call. This guy's not. So only six of them are actually tough calls, maybe. So we will get to them. But a lot of this is 2021.

So Heath is on today. He's on tomorrow for one of the starter sits. And the way we're going to do starter sit this week is we're going to do a game and we'll preview the game like normal and then i'll say all right here's a 2021 question from this game two players this guy or this guy and we'll we'll do it like that we'll always spin it forward to 2021 um and today we're going to look at hopefully we'll have time for like some some outlier stats some things that kind of didn't make sense this year like like aaron rogers having an 8.8 percent touchdown rate that kind of what it make sense this year, like Aaron Rodgers having an 8.8% touchdown rate, that kind of what it means for next year.

Yeah. Only three running backs this year scored more PPR fantasy points than Darren Waller. Yeah. It wasn't a good year for running back. It was one of the worst I can ever remember. So bad. Is it as bad as 2015?

No, I can't imagine. I don't think so either. Because at least we had studs. That year we had Devante Freeman and Danny Woodhead. It was Adrian Peterson, I think. It was bad. D'Angelo Williams. Alright, so we'll get into that. Let me thank everyone.

You know, I'm sure you guys have seen it in our inbox and on Twitter. A lot of thank you messages. Thank you to all of you for listening. The best. Yeah. We appreciate it very much. I'm trying my best to respond to all of your emails.

I've gotten to a lot of them, not all of them. All of your tweets, I've gotten to a lot of them, not all of them. I know Schrager's been helping out with that. If we don't get to it, very sorry, but we appreciate you listening, or you're listening, and we love you. Have a great new year. Put it that way. All right. News and notes.

Ronald Jones off the reserve COVID list, but his status is uncertain. He's got a finger injury, so that's the issue right now. And do you think that if Jones is out, do you think Leonard Fournette, Dave, has the big workload that we saw two weeks ago? Because Keyshawn Vaughn, look, obviously it was a blowout. But he looked good.

Did he? He looked good at the beginning. Vaughn? Yeah. I think he showed signs that he could be a serviceable player in the National Football League. Which is better than what we've seen from him up to this point. How much do you trust Leonard Fournette if Jones not out i you're hoping that he scores a touchdown and you'll be lucky if he gets you to 10 non-ppr 10 or 11 ppr points if jones is definitely out you're probably still going to start for net as a number two running back but not nearly as high as where he was last

week okay we know who's and that's's A, because of Fournette, and B, because of Atlanta. Falcons have been good against the run for the majority of the season. We know the Chiefs are sitting Mahomes and probably most of their best players. Interesting to see what happens with Kelsey since he could finish the lead in receiving yards.

But Ben Roethlisberger is going to sit. Mason Rudolph is going to start. So Heath, sit all Steelers? I would prefer to sit all Steelers, yes. I don't really want to start any of them. I don't really want to either. Mike Tomlin, though, made it clear that because of injuries to other players who just can't play in the game,

whether it was meaningful or not, they're going to rotate guys. And he also seemed to hint that it won't be Mason Rudolph for four quarters. other players who just can't play in the game, whether it was meaningful or not, they're going to rotate guys. And he also seemed to hint that it won't be Mason Rudolph for four quarters. So maybe we'll see a little bit of... Is Hodges still on the team? Is he still the third string quarterback? I think he is. So I think it's going to be a mess

where there's just going to be massive rotation all the way around. So probably a good week to stay away from your Steelers players. Yeah, I think the flip side is they're not going to necessarily play their studs on defense all game. So what does this do for Cleveland? Yeah, what does this do for Baker Mayfield?

Cleveland's going to play their guys all game long. Bad day for one of my buddies, Dolphins fan. I told him it's like Roethlisberger's sitting. He was really, really unhappy. Well, but the Bills might sit some guys too. They haven't decided what they're going to do. Yeah, so real quick, what does it mean for Baker Mayfield? Are you more confident starting him?

Yeah, but he still hasn't cracked my top 12 yet. I have to learn more about, you know, the Steelers can't sit everybody. Mike Tomlin, that's the point he made on Tuesday. They just can't. They can't play second stringers all game long. They're obviously using this week as a week to try and rest everybody up Roethlisberger being front and center on that. So the players that are banged up along with Roethlisberger, you're not going to see everybody who's healthy is going to get a limited workload. That's what I've inferred from Mike Tomlin. And so it'll probably mean, you know, maybe 50% of the snaps for the guys like Deontay

and Juju. Maybe Claypool plays a little bit more. James Washington will probably play a little bit more. Connor probably will play a lot less. And on defense, they've got a bunch of guys that are banged up and could use some limited playing time slash no playing time. Okay, so we'll see how

much you can trust the Steelers and we'll see how much you can trust the Steelers, and we'll see how much you can trust the Bills, because Sean McDermott is just very noncommittal. He says, I'm not ready to answer it yet. I've got to talk with Brandon. That's their GM, Brandon Bean, and we'll put our collective heads together and do the right thing by our team. Every team's different, and these are all

obviously tough decisions. No one has a crystal ball here, so just want to do right by our football team, and that's what we'll do. When's the last time the bills were in a situation where they could arrest players if they wanted to. Well, every year that they didn't make the playoffs. Yeah,

but that does. And then we don't think about it like that. I know. Yeah. I wouldn't be surprised if Josh Allen did not play a full game. Right. So tomorrow starter sit and yeah, sit week 17.

Put it that way. Cooper Cupp is on the reserve COVID list. Hopefully he's okay. He might still be able to play. We don't know if he's a close contact or not, but who's starting him anyway with a backup quarterback in there? Cam Newton seems like he's likely to start against the Jets, and

the Eagles have a lot of injuries. Their left tackle, Jordan, I hope I'm pronouncing this right, Maialata, he's in the concussion protocol. Deshaun Jackson didn't realize this at the time, but he left with a sore foot. He didn't play much. And it looks like on defense, I doubt they're going to have Fletcher Cox,

and they might not have defensive end Derek Barnett. So it's a much better looking matchup for Washington. Heath, your trust level for Antonio Gibson after a kind of bleh return last week? Seven? I'm probably just going right back to him. This Philadelphia defense was awful last week and they're banged up.

They don't have very many healthy starting bodies. And so I would expect a bounce back performance. If there's no Fletcher Cox, then I think you could look at Gibson as a strong number two running back, if not a low end number one. Cool. Especially with Alex Smith, not at 100% or Taylor Heineke at 100%.

Okay. And we got a great matchup for Irv Smith as I think was eight games in a row. 50 yards or a touchdown to a tight end. Detroit is allowed something like that. I probably said those words in the wrong order. Detroit is allowed 50 or more PPR points

to four straight tight ends. Okay. And I think it's 50 or more yards or a touchdown in eight straight games. It's something like that. But Kyle Rudolph is out this week. So Irv Smith, he's been put on IR. It is. Season has been over. I don't know why they waited this long to put him on IR. They're trying to get him back.

Well, they got eliminated last week, right? Join our Facebook group. If you're just dying to talk to fantasy football fans out there, join our Facebook group, Fantasy Football Today. You can just search for Fantasy Football Today on Facebook, or you can click the link in the episode description,

chat with other fantasy fans. You can ask 2021 keeper questions, join some Q&As, talk trade values, whatever it is. Very fun stuff in the Facebook group. All right, Heath, we're featuring you on today's show since you're going on vacation for three months. What did you learn in 2021? on today's show since you're going on vacation for three months. Let's let's hear, what did you learn in 2021?

You want to look, they want to reflect some of the good, some of the bad, what happened? Well, I think like one easy one is we learned that Darren Waller belongs for sure in the elite tier, not at the top of the second tier of tight ends.

And he's not Travis Kelsey, but no one is. But he top of the second tier of tight ends. And he's not Travis Kelsey, but no one is. But he belongs in the elite tier. One of the responses I got when I tweeted that stat out was, are we going to get three tight ends in the top 24 next year? And I don't know. I don't think ADP will reflect that because ADP didn't have the tight ends quite as high as I thought they should have been going into this year. But I do expect that we will definitely have three tight ends in the first three rounds. I would not be surprised if we have three tight ends

in the first 30 picks. Tight end continues to be a... I don't know what I would call it. There's always guys at the back end that we could have hope for, but they mostly are terrible, and they just take turns being good. But if you can get one of those top three of Kittle, Kelsey, or Waller, and obviously Kittle got hurt this year, but he came right back and put up 92 yards in his first game back.

He's still George Kittle. If you can get one of those top three, it is a big advantage in your league. They have demonstrated studliness. That's what makes them different, and that's what will make fantasy managers... I don't even think the word is reach anymore. I think it's what will make fantasy managers

take them at appropriate spots on draft day. Did we all have Travis Kelsey in our first round? Oh, yeah. I think I had him fifth or sixth. If I didn't have him in our first round? Oh yeah, I think I had him fifth or sixth. If I didn't have him in the first round, he was very close to it. I have to go back. I'm sorry. Are you talking about a year ago? Are you talking about this year

or no for 2021? I had him fifth or sixth right there with Devante Adams. I had him 10th, but he obviously, you know, over perform this year, right? I mean, he's not going to be sure he might leave the NFLformed this year. He's not going to be as good next year. Sure, he might lead the NFL in receiving yards. He's having the best tight end season ever.

He set the record for, I don't know about fantasy points, but he had set the record for receiving yards with a game to go. So, yeah, I mean, I don't know. Maybe is six too high? Well, he has definitely overperformed, but he currently has 16 more fantasy points than he scored in 2018. Yeah, in 2018, he had 10 touchdowns.

He has been worth a first-round pick three years in a row. Yeah, I don't agree about last year. I think last year, he was probably a second-round pick, but two years ago for sure. But I don't think I'm necessarily right about that. That's probably just second round pick. But two years ago for sure. But I don't think I'm necessarily right about that. That's probably just difference of opinion.

Let's say he's swing pick last year. Because I was pretty disappointed in him last year, to be quite honest. I've had this conversation before with you. I think it was like he got off to a slow start and then he finished really strong. So it's probably just... He didn't score as many touchdowns.

Yeah, he didn't. It's probably just the narrative of your season. If he buried you in the first however many weeks where you struggled, then you were probably disappointed. If you were able to overcome it, then he might have won you your championship and you were like, oh, he's a great pick. Right.

But he probably still gave you numbers that were better than the streaming tight ends. And that's the whole point, is that there's going to be a large percentage of the fantasy population that stream tight ends, bounce around with tight ends. And those fantasy managers are going to give some serious thought to taking one of these three tight ends early next year just so they don't have to go through with it. They'd rather try and bounce around to find another receiver or running back or quarterback than a tight end. And I dig that.

I think that that's okay. Okay. Heath, next topic next thought um the i've been trying to figure out how to process this rookie class because the running backs for the first half of the season kind of went how i thought it was going to go the receivers just blew us out of the water. Like, I don't ever, I'm sure there could be maybe a rookie class that's had a fantasy season like this one.

But we were talking about last year how it was a historic rookie class. And this one made last year's look like poo-poo. Well, what about, okay, so the Beckham, Watkins, Evans year, was that 2015? That's the last time we've had anything. What?

No. 14. It wasn't. I think it was either 13 or 14. It wasn't. It was 14, 14, 14.

That's the last time we had anything like this. We have not had good rookie wide receivers. Cause last year, AJ Brown was the only one who finished top 20 in PPR. I want to say, uh, I'm not even sure if he did finish top 20 in PPR. He definitely did a in PPR, I want to say. I'm not even sure if he did finish top 20 in PPR. He definitely did in non-PPR.

Justin Jefferson's like number five or something like that right now. It's amazing how good they've been. So I'm sorry to cut you off, Heath. No, you didn't cut me off. I didn't have a... I don't know that I necessarily learned a lesson. It's a great question because my lesson had really been to avoid rookie wide receivers because even when they have great years, they don't have huge fantasy impacts typically.

I'm just like, damn, they were really good for a rookie. But this year was completely different. And obviously, offense was way up. And it's so strange that we didn't have an offseason. They didn't even have preseason games. They didn't have mini camps. Well, there was no tackling. What do you mean?

Both in the preseason and throughout most of this season, there was no tackling. I think that can be responsible for a lot of the offense that we saw, and that can possibly be responsible for some of the outlier stuff that we saw. But you are right. The 2015 rookie wide receiver class was much better than this year's class. I would argue that the 2020 running backs,

while they were a lot or 2015 running backs, while they were a lot better at the top, they were actually worse than this or this year's running, but running backs may be actually worse because of the context of how much better everybody else was in 2020 than they were in 2015. Was 15 better than this year? The rookies? Was Allen Robinson a rookie that year?

I think we've only got one rookie that's going to finish in the top 20 wide receivers. Oh, is that right? That's interesting. C.D. Lamb might crack it in overall points. He won't get there in points. I mean, it's possible Higgins could as well, but as of right now, there's only one rookie in the top 20.

Okay. And that's really... Okay, so that's very interesting because you could say, all right, well, still, even when they have good rookie years, they don't really have that great of fantasy seasons. But it's not fair

because CeeDee Lamb was on his way. Tee Higgins was on his way. Right? Brandon Ayuk probably was playing like it. These guys were terrific. And next year's class is supposed to be great too, isn't it? They are. Ayuk may be top 20 on a per-game basis.

Probably. Devontae Smith just won Player of the Year in college football. I would assume quarterbacks usually win that. Where is Ayuk? in college football yeah yeah which is a i would assume quarterbacks usually win that so where is i you can but like the craziest thing about it still is that like everything we're saying about the rookie wide receiver class and the first two drafted didn't finish him on the top 40 oh do you feel like mike mayock's legacy is going to be the schmuck who took Henry Ruggs over five Hall of Famers? I don't think Henry Ruggs got enough opportunity this year to really know.

Maybe. I think his speed is demonstrated, but everything else you don't know. And one of the things I was worried about with him was size. And I think if he just gets banged around too much, forget about just not forget about just running around and dealing with contact there, but taking hits. I don't know if he can handle 16 games. Like, I think it's important also, and this is not a lesson, but guys like rugs and Judy who didn't have, who got lost in the shuffle of all these rookie wide receivers being better than we expected. Those are the guys I'm trying to go out and offer second round picks for in dynasty good luck getting it for either one of them but especially judy like i i can't believe the year

that judy has had because he i thought he was the most ready receiver out of everyone that came out how could he not be um just a young breakout i don't think he was unbelievable skills and i think he i said i still think he's got a great future. If you can trade for him, I might give up a first, a late first in Dynasty to get Jerry Judy at this point. Because A, his route running is still incredible. If you go and watch, watch a Broncos game, he's ditching cornerbacks one out of every four plays.

He's got bad quarterback play. His hands were terrible. I can't understand that because they were never that bad in college. He had to drop here and there. I think he's still got some great talent. And next year, he won't be the de facto number one receiver

because Cortland Sutton will be back. That'll be an interesting offense. That's going to be one to watch because I don't know if they keep Drew Locke. Yeah, maybe more than 60% of Drew Locke's passes will be one to watch because I don't know if they keep Drew Locke. Yeah, maybe more than 60% of Drew Locke's passes will be catchable. And then the final lesson that I think we all learned is that zero running back is not dead.

It's alive and well. Depends on the year, right? It depends on the team. It's going to be a strategy every year no matter what. And once you win with it as a fantasy manager, you're going to be a strategy every year, no matter what. And once you win with it as a fantasy manager, you're going to be willing to do it year after year after year, whether you win or not.

And also, like another thing, Chris Towers had tweeted yesterday about how one of the lessons he learned was that this whole running back dead zone thing, he's really buying into not drafting those running backs rounds three through eight. The only league that I won this year, all of my running backs came from rounds three through eight. Who are they? It's all circumstantial.

Jonathan Taylor, Kareem Hunt, DeAndre Swift. I don't really three through eight feels okay. I'm sorry. That feels kind of big. Yeah, I don't know. I thought it was like three through eight feels okay wait i'm sorry that feels kind of big yeah i don't know um three through i i thought it was like three through six but no it is three through eight but i always view it as like three through six could have easily been swift taylor hunt sure um you got the right ones right um and And it was like, I was looking,

cause I was looking at Todd Gurley and I think we need to go back and do this. Probably go to week nine or week eight and look at the leaderboard. Who was leading the Todd Gurley was the number six running back in fantasy through week nine. Fantasy. Yeah. Well, he was scoring so many touchdowns and you in particular,

but our show was really hammering sell high, sell high, sell high on Todd Gurley. That ended up being a good one. And I think when it comes to a guy like DeAndre Swift, is he going to finish at his ADP? Probably not. But I don't know, maybe. But it's really about, you know, could you withstand the weeks where you had to keep him on your bench

for the payoff at the end? Was the payoff that good with him, though? He averaged 13.7 PPR points per game. That's pretty good. That ranks, it's going to be close to 24th. I can count it out here. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Through week 8, Tyler Lockett was the number one wide receiver in fantasy.

He got hurt. I'm sorry, I think that was 2019 you're talking about now. Yes, it was. Swift currently is 17th in fantasy points per game so that's better than his adp that's uh yeah i think so i don't think he was rb 17 i think he was i think there were 17 running backs going in the first three rounds and he wasn't one of them he was right after that so he beat adp by a little bit all right you want to see also you know you have to throw in how other running backs just underperformed okay let's look at halfway through weeks one through eight.

Here are your top five at each position. Wilson, Mahomes, Kyler, Josh Allen, Tom Brady. That surprises me that Brady was there. Tom Brady was number five. Running backs, Kamara, Cook, Derrick Henry, Zeke, James Robinson. Pretty similar. Wide receiver, Tyler Lockett, Calvin Ridley, DK Metcalf, DeAndre Hopkins, Tyreek Hill. Pretty similar. Wide receiver, Tyler Lockett, Calvin Ridley, DK Metcalf, DeAndre Hopkins, Tyreek Hill. Pretty similar.

Tight end. Well, except like the best wide receiver, the guy who finished number one wasn't in the top five. And Lockett and DK just fell off the face of the earth after that point. Yeah. Yeah. Certainly Lockett more than DK, i think but then it's wilson

it's all tied to wilson right i mean it's russell wilson's fault uh kelsey waller's fault depending on your perspective kelsey waller kittle hawkinson tunyon really tunyon was top eight at that point or top five through week eight he had that that, what, three, four-touchdown game? He did have a three-touchdown game against Atlanta. Yeah. And then in week eight, he had 79 yards. Interesting. He had five touchdowns without Devontae Adams, basically,

in weeks two through four. And tight end sucks. All right. Heath, thank you for the lessons learned. Good stuff, man. You're welcome. Week 17. Do you want me to say something?

Yeah, kind of. Week 17, tough calls. Let's do this. At least give us a sigh or something. There you go. Thank you. So Russell Wilson and Kyler Murray are basically the defaults in this category. Russell Wilson at San Francisco. Kyler Murray at the Rams.

And are they starts this week? Kyler's ahead of Wilson for me on the assumption that he plays, but I don't have a whole lot of faith in either of them. Certainly don't see them finishing his top five fantasy options. I think that they can get you right around 20 points. Matchup's going to be really tough for Kyler. And if he's not 100%

and his legs are hurting him, then running could be out of the question for him. Why are his legs hurting him? Oh, because he has a leg injury. Because he got hurt late last week. That's right. I forgot. Do you know Jalen Hurts

ahead of them? Yeah. Which makes me nervous, but I am. Right. And Russ just, I think the track record's pretty clear

that he's just not he he also doesn't he's not playing like he did earlier this season i don't think it's a combination of well lockett's hurt and they want to run the ball more there might be more to it than that i wonder if there's something up with russ because he's just not on point like he was earlier this season well heath you have wilson fifth right now yeah i'm probably going to start russell wilson um i don't feel i feel less confident in kyler like he's a question mark to play at this point and he's facing the rams um that scares me a lot and i'm a little bit worried about Jalen Hurts as well, but I'm probably,

I think it's really tough to sit anybody who has been a top 12 quarterback this year when they've played and we expect them to play the full game. Okay. So would you sit Wilson and or Murray for Ryan Tannehill? Definitely Murray, maybe Wilson.

David? Tannehill is going to be ahead of both those guys. Is that what you asked? Yes. One other thing about all of this. This week, more than any other week, check back on Sunday, on saturday the information that we have

on wednesday about week 17 like i know that we need to discuss the rankings and and put together a show but it's going it's going to look a lot like it changes every week but this week especially i i think yeah well it already has once with the Steelers news. Yeah, and I cannot see you all having Josh Allen third in two days or three days, which is what you have him right now. Okay, how about Justin Herbert or Kyler Murray? Or Russell Wilson?

Herbert. Wilson, Herbert, Murray. Is Kansas City going to play their starting defenders all game long? Once you start pulling guys on offense, eventually someone taps the coach on the shoulder and says, hey, what about the defense?

Justin Herbert's had one good game since week 11. I understand. But if he's going up against second stringers for most of the game, then I've got pretty good faith that he could be a usable fantasy quarterback. We know Russell Wilson's going up against second stringers. That's all San Francisco has healthy. Okay.

Russ is playing like a second stringer. Let's go to some running backs here. Tell me if these guys are tough calls for you. Ezekiel Elliott at the Giants. Giovanni Bernard against Baltimore, JD McKissick at Philadelphia. So Zeke at the Giants, Gio against Baltimore,

McKissick at Philadelphia. Are they tough calls? Yeah. Well, Gio's tough because I think it's a tough matchup for him. But you saw what he did last week in an easy matchup, and the receiving numbers were just major eyes fall out of your head. That was incredible.

Yeah, which is weird. But you know that Samadji Pirine's going to take work away. You knew that going into last week, too. You just didn't think it would be that much work. No, but you didn't know that because was Piran not active two weeks ago? Two weeks ago, not only was he active against Pittsburgh, he was taking full series for himself. Give me a break.

Geo had 25 carries in that game. Still, there were, and believe it or not, there were times in the first and second half where Piran got a series with the offense and Travion Williams had a series with the offense. Like a possession or a set of downs? Possession. It might have ended up being one set of downs on the possession.

A lot of the Bengals have been. I'm just saying that it's hard. How can you even predict the workload right now? Because the seven catches kind of came out of nowhere. Yep. And he still got 16 carries last week. Piran's two touchdowns came out of nowhere yep and he still got 16 carries last week two touchdowns came out of nowhere right if baltimore has not been as good against the run in the last like six or seven

games but they're not bad i think i'm probably too low on geo um i was just looking at it like if we just forget about the ups and the downs and all that and just look at what he's been since mixing went down he's the number 14 running back in fantasy. And not that good on a per game basis, probably 20th or something. He should be a borderline number two. I think though, when you look at his game log, it's very matchup dependent.

The one exception would be the Steelers. Well, the Cowboys game, he fumbled, right? That was a good matchup, and he fumbled, and he basically got benched. The Steelers game, he just got a ton of work. 25 carries, 83 yards, and a touchdown. One catch for a touchdown. So that's why I think we need to know how good this Baltimore run defense is, and I'm not really

sure right now. I think personnel-wise, they should be great, but they've been so up and down. They've had COVID. They've had Calais Campbell out. They've had Brandon Williams out. They've had line should be great, but they've been so up and down. They've had COVID. They've had Calais Campbell out. They've had Brandon Williams out. They've had linebackers out, but they're pretty healthy now, so I would expect them to be good.

And they dominate time of possession, you know, when they're right, and they're right right now. So I'm sure you're all nervous to start them. That's why he's, would you say, borderline number two? Yeah. All right, what about Zeke? Let me bring something up on Zeke.

So the last time he had a really good fantasy game before week 16 was the Minnesota game. That was like five weeks ago. They were coming off a bye. This time, he was coming off a week off. I wonder if that matters to you at all. He was

rested. He has not been healthy, really, for much of the second half. Fully healthy. The Giants obviously have a good, not amazing solid run defense. He's has not been healthy really for much of the second half, fully healthy. You know, the giants obviously have a good, not amazing, solid run defense and Tony Pollard still has a role. He has,

you know, he gets about 10 carries or so. So is, is Heath is Zeke a tough call. He's not a tough call, but he's not where he was. He's a high end number two running back for me this week. So I'm like, if. If I actually thought that

Zeke was all the way back, he would obviously be a top five option because the Giants are a good defense, but not the type of defense that matters for me in terms of projections. I'm sorry. I think you meant to say they were a good team, right? I think I had a typo

in that article. You changed it. I meant to write good defense, and apparently it a good team, right? I think I had a typo in that article, or you changed it. I meant to write good defense, and apparently it said good team. They're obviously not a good team. They could win the division. Watch it. It means nothing. Right. But, no, he's a high-end number two running back. This week, amidst everything else, you were starting Ezekiel.

It's not that tough of a call. It's really not. And I've got him a little bit higher than that. The Giants have allowed a touchdown to a running back in four straight games. And I'm I was a little surprised that Zeke only played 53% of the snaps last week. Pollard got more

work coming off of his big game without Zeke and he didn't do a lot with it. So I wonder if his, if that goodwill gesture dies a little bit and Zeke gets he didn't do a lot with it. So I wonder if his, if that goodwill gesture dies a little bit and Zeke gets more run. I actually think JD McKissick is a very tough call for several reasons. One, Antonio Gibson was back last week, but was he really back? We don't know. But prior to that, McKissick's role in the passing game had really had diminished and Antonio Gibson had been picking up more. And also, I think Washington's going to win, but I can't say that with total confidence.

They were trailing the entire game. They were playing in catch-up mode, and that's when McKissick's really been at his best, when they've had to throw a lot. But when they win, you could get 25 passes from Alex Smith if Alex Smith is the quarterback, and this Eagles run defense could be pretty bad without Fletcher Cox. when they win, you could get 25 passes from Alex Smith if Alex Smith is the quarterback. And this Eagles run defense could be pretty bad without Fletcher Cox. So there's some things working against him. Obviously, it's only a PPR start, obviously,

because it's back to four carries last week. But, you know, eight catches for 77 yards and a touchdown last week from McKissick. I mean, it's hard to rely on that. If you're saying he's not a tough call, I'm wondering if that just means he's a sit. Well, he's given you, let's give credit where it's due.

Over the past three weeks, he's been running the ball a little bit more effectively. Last week wasn't so much. Because Gibson came back, so I don't think it matters what he did without Gibson. What percentage of the snaps

do you think Gibson played last week? It was just about to look that up. I'm guessing about 45. It was less than that, or at about 45. It was less than that. Or at least I think it was less than that. McKissick played 69% of the snaps. Sure. It was out there.

They were trailing. He was, it was first game back. They were trailing the entire game. How did Gibson look in the game? Did, are the coaches comfortable giving him more work this week than last? And if the,

even if they're, even if they're not trailing, I've got the sense that they are starting to trust McKissick a little bit more as a running back, and they're not just going to shove every single carry right onto Antonio Gibson's plate and say, eat up, son. It's going to be more of splitting between the two of them,

and McKissick has looked pretty good as a runner the past couple of weeks. So the coaches will have a little bit more confidence in him there. And if Alex Smith is the quarterback and he can't move, then of course he's going to dink and dunk with McKissick. So I don't have a problem with him in PPR. He's a number two running back. Is he ahead of Gio?

Yes. I've got him ahead of Gio, but he's a borderline number two. And I do think he's a little bit of a tough call. Because I do think if their defense plays really of a tough call um because i do think if they if their defense plays really well and jalen hurts doesn't then you may not get many points from jd mckissick in the second half 30 of the snaps last week for antonio gibson right three catches too like i i think that does help prove your point adam is that he did he he is continuing to stay involved in the passing game.

Yeah. All right. Jamison Crowder, three wide receivers. Tell me if they're tough calls. Two of them, I realized during the note, I was like, no, these are not tough calls. Jamison Crowder at New England, T.Y. Hilton against Jacksonville, and D.J. Moore against New Orleans. Are they tough

calls? I think Crowder is a tough call. He probably leans a little closer to not tough, meaning that I think he's probably a high end flex at worst in PPR, but I could see the, the Patriots are going to do their best to take him away in certain downs in the distances. I have all three currently in my top 20, I think. So in terms of projections,

so in PPR, and I'm probably starting all three. Yeah, for me, it was Hilton and Moore. I was like, okay, these are must-start guys. Hilton's going up against Jacksonville. So now it's 13 of the last 14 wide receivers with six or more targets

against the Jaguars have had 98 yards or a touchdown. And Hilton has gotten six or more targets against the Jaguars have had 98 yards or a touchdown. And Hilton has gotten six or more targets in four straight games. So he's usually around six or seven, but that's, that should be good enough against Jacksonville DJ more. I mean, the saints are another team. You get seven targets, seven or more targets, 16 of 17 wide receivers with seven or more targets have had 73 yards or a touchdown. It's a good strategy. It's a good formula for a wide receiver,

and DJ Moore should get seven or more targets. He always does, basically. Crowder, I think, is a tough call, though, I think, as we've indicated. Except he hasn't missed top 20. But, you know, the Patriots are obviously not as good without Stephon Gilmore. But, you know, the Jets stink, and Crowder's been so up and down.

So I don't think he's ever an easy call, I guess. And I don't know how you approach a guy like that. Right now, Mims and Perryman are doing nothing. That's changed. Midseason, they were performing better. Most of that was with joe flacco right like there was a game of that yeah maybe maybe a game and a half with sam darnold where he really got courageous and threw the ball like 15 yards downfield but uh they they went back to to

who i guess adam gay said we got to win some games at the end here we can't have this trevor lawrence guy coming in and taking Sam Darnold's job. Let's get back to the basics. How good of a running back is LaMichael Pirine? And throw Ty Johnson in there. Better than Frank Gore. Okay. Well, then that means that they should be able to run the ball

pretty effectively against the Patriots front. But if they can't, because I would argue that Pirine is a solid running back at best, that's when Crowder could end up being a factor for the Jets on those short second and third downs. But the Patriots have been okay at taking away slot receivers. I know Crowder scored on them earlier this year, but he didn't have a lot of catches in the game. But I think that's one area where New England is still doing well, is just containing those short area guys.

Cole Beasley is proof of that last week. I don't know why they didn't flex this game, to be honest with you. All right, let's take a break here. When we come back, we got your Apple podcast questions, we got your emails, and we got statistical outliers from the 2020 season. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football today.

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So if you're leaving us Apple Podcast reviews and they are not populating or not seeing them on the Fantasy Football Today feed, we have a third-party kind of app deal where we can see them. So you can continue to leave your reviews and your questions. We will see them even if you don't and the general public doesn't. So we still appreciate those five-star reviews. They're very helpful for us. And good way to get your question read. Like Greg from the UK.

Dear Danny, Joey, Jordan, Jonathan, and Donnie. Danny, Joey, Jordan, Jonathan. N-K-O-T-B. I have no idea what that is. Oh, my gosh. Oh, new kids on the block. Whoa. I cannot believe that Heath knows what that is.

I had a new kids on the block t-shirt. Oh, my gosh. Every girl that I went to junior high school with. A little before my time, Dave. Say that. Well, I was in elementary school then, Dave. Okay, okay. That's true. And I was probably in kindergarten.

Alright, so the question is... Ben wasn't born yet. Ben, do you know who New Kids on the Block are? I know who they are, but yes, I was not born yet. Can you name a song by New Kids on the Block? Can you? I can name... Hangin' Tough. Write Stuff. Do they have two songs? So Hangin' Tough Write Stuff Do they have two songs?

So Hangin' Tough goes Oh Right? Yeah right He just did it Hangin' Tough But the Write Stuff I think we've got a But the Write Stuff also goes

Oh Oh Oh So all their songs Just have O in them Is that just their thing? That's pretty weird That's like pretty, actually. Okay.

My question relates to my Dynasty League. Do you think the value of draft picks is different in 2021 due to COVID related changes? With less football being played by colleges and scouts seeing less of the players they are recommending to be drafted, has this created more uncertainty around the rookies coming into the league?

Is it more likely for top round picks to be flops in the NFL? And if so, should I be trading away rookie picks for more tested talent? No, I think that the scouts have a pretty good idea of what's going on with a lot of these college players. I think there might be some frustrations with the ones that opted out of the 2020 season, but step-by-step, they're going to be able to put together

the right kind of picture on these guys so that they can evaluate them properly. out of the 2020 season, but step by step, they're going to be able to put together the right kind of picture on these guys so that they can evaluate them properly. And there's enough film. I think it would have been, I think this question would have had some real concern. The concept would be concerning if there was no college football in 2020. And like you had to evaluate guys like Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields just based off of what you saw before. So I think it'll be okay. I don't think there's going to be that much of a drop-off or any concern or changes just because of a

shortened college football season. There's no way that the top two receivers taken are going to be much worse than guys taken in the third round because NFL teams don't know who the best receivers are. Oh, but I will say, let me see if I can tell you. I was saying because that's what happened this year. What? They don't know who the best receivers are?

What I'm saying is like, yes, I do think it's more. There's more uncertainty, but there's always uncertainty. So let me go back. I have a history here of where has the number one fantasy rookie wide receiver been selected in the NFL draft in the last 10 seasons? 2010, it was Mike Williams.

He was a fourth round pick. 2011, it was Victor Cruz. He was an undrafted free agent. Then after that, well, no, not quite. T.Y. Hilton in 2012 was the third round pick. He was the 13th wide receiver drafted, but that was in non-PPR. In PPR, it was actually Justin Blackman,

and he was the number one wide receiver. Follow along, I'm almost done here. Keenan Allen in 2013 was the best. He was a third round pick. However, since then, since 2013, the number one wide receiver in fantasy of all rookies has been one of the first six selected in the NFL draft. That narrows it down.

That did narrow it down to all of the first round picks. I think there were six taken in the first round in 2020. And it holds true again with Justin Jefferson being one of those six. So if you're looking for who's going to finish number one, it will be one of the top six drafted in all likelihood. All right. And by the way, I was going to say

I think Justin Fields would have preferred no college football this season in terms of his drafts. I think another interesting question for Dynasty, and I don't know the answer to this, but it would be I'd like to go back and see um like if you how often is the number one rookie wide receiver the best receiver in that class two years later no i would say it's probably not all that often right uh yeah i i would i would say it's probably not all that often but i would say it's one those top six, and I would say it's a first or second rounder. Yeah, the guy that's the number one rookie receiver

does stick around for a while in fantasy. I don't think that they fade away. Sometimes they do. Like, I'm thinking of old school Mike Williams in Tampa Bay. Tampa Mike and Blackman. Yeah. Yeah, Blackman certainly was not. 2017, who was to well remember we had a run of pretty bad first round picks we had like cory davis and we had uh davis is awesome adam yeah well

um he might be and uh are you his agent john ross um anyway it's worth exploring all right let's go to the emails let's do these kind of quickly so we can do our outlier stats. Is Henry Ruggs John Ross? Like, is that who he is now? Is that how we're going to look at him? I hope not. I hope not either. It's too early to say.

All right, this is from KB, where GW... I love his toys. KB, where GW spent a winter. I don't know. That's something I feel like I should know. Where did George Washington spend a winter? Or George W. Bush? I have no idea.

Okay. Dear Nick, Chad, Peanut, SA, and Tim. Nick, Chad, Peanut, SA, and Tim. Okay, I don't know. I just finished off winning two of my three fantasy leagues. Yay. Okay, what are you going to do with the extra NFL game next year?

Here are some possibilities. Keep as is and end two weeks early. Add extra regular season week. Keep regular season same. Playoffs same. But championship goes two weeks what would you do with the extra week i'm i'm having another week of regular season fantasy so instead of it ending in week 13 and the playoffs starting week 14 we will end the regular season in week 14

and the playoffs will start in week 15 they will end end in week 17. And week 18 will be the new week 17, where you should not play into week 18. Okay. I think we can sign off on that. This is from Reed in a city outside of Detroit. Dave? Why am I having so much trouble with Michigan lately? Yeah, well, we got a lot of Michigan

trying to find new cities. Louisville, Kentucky is outside of Michigan. By the way, Nick, Chad, Peanut got a lot of Michigan trying to find new cities. Louisville, Kentucky is outside of Michigan. By the way, Nick, Chad, Peanut, SA, and Tim is 311. 311. Interesting band. We're having some throwback bands in today's pod. All right, Reid's question is

half PPR Keeper League. Keep two. Austin Eckler, second or third round. I can't remember. Very helpful. Jonathan Taylor in the fourth. Swift in the fifth. Diggs in the sixth.

Dobbins in the seventh. Oh, man. And James Robinson in the 16th round. Half PPR, keep two. My goodness. I think it's pretty easy, actually. Robinson. Yeah. He has to be think it's pretty easy, actually. Robinson. Yeah. He has to be one of them. And Diggs.

Does Robinson... Diggs has to be one of them. Does Robinson have to be one of them? As of now, Robinson has to be one of them. But I think Jonathan Taylor has got to be the other. Yeah, that's... Oh, over Diggs? I might have had Diggs ahead of Taylor in my top 12. I was going to keep Diggs and Taylor. i'm ready to take taylor in round one oh me too you're taking digs ahead of taylor in round one

half ppr in this particular case i had digs at number 10 and taylor at number 12 now again i don't know how relevant that is to anything, but you have a few months to work that out. But I mean, he's my number three wide receiver. I'm definitely going to have at least three receivers in the first round. There's a chance I might have zero receivers in the first round. You know me. You know who I am. You're not going to have Devontae Adams in there? I do right now.

What does Devontae Adams have to do? No, but it's just trying to get those running backs. For now, of course, they're in there. But if they're just an overload of running backs that have that huge upside. You can find running backs on the waiver wire, Dave. I can find wide receivers on the waiver wire, too. Not like Devontae Adams. Of course not. But I can start on the waiver wire, Dave. I can find wide receivers on the waiver wire, too. Not like Devontae Adams, of course not. But I can start on the waiver wire at receiver.

It's harder to do it at running back. Adam, I had an Apple podcast question from Keith in a city near Coral Springs. Uh-huh. Okay. Margate. How do you feel about the second-year wide receiver strategy? Do you think that that worked this year? And do you, with as good as this rookie class was, are you going to use it next year?

Yeah, I think it worked this year. I mean, it didn't work for Marquise Brown and Darius Slayton. We don't know if it would have worked for Debo Samuel, but yeah, Metcalf. It was, it was working. Metcalf, McLaurin, and Deontay Johnson were huge breakouts. So I would say it worked well. And oh my God, I'm going to be all over it next year,

except their costs are going to be really high. But another guy that I think it honestly could have worked for was Paris Campbell. He did well in one game, well enough, and he was one of my last picks in every league. So I'll be looking for Jerry Judy, I think will be a popular pick for me for everything you guys said

and because he'll be one of the cheaper ones. LaVisca Chenault, maybe. Yeah, I think the second year wide receiver strategy worked out pretty well as long as you got Metcalf, I would say. Probably the key there. No love for A.J. Brown? Oh God, of course.

Of course, yeah. I was going to say, A.J. Brown? Oh, God, of course. Of course, yeah. I was going to say, A.J. Brown and Metcalf were obviously the two big breakouts. Not McLaurin? I think McLaurin's going to finish very close on a per-game basis to where he did last year.

Well, he was really good. I don't know. It seemed like he was great. I have no regrets drafting McLaurin. Deontay Johnson, I think you have to put in that breakout category too. I agree. Absolutely belongs. Oh, yeah.

Almost 15 PPR points per game. He was strong at the end and he missed some time. Yeah, Deontay Johnson is a breakout if you play in a PPR league. In a non-PPR league, he's not as much. No. Here we go. Back to the questions.

Let's go faster. From Nicholas. 14-team PPR, four-point-per-passing touchdown. What's a good startup approach? So he's doing a startup Dynasty League. Two wide receivers, two running backs,

three flexes. Give me a good general startup approach for a Dynasty League. Really, and this will irritate people because i say it about redraft too but it's going to depend on how your league like you don't know going in how many teams you're going to have that are going to be going for win it immediately and disregard age and how many teams you're going to have that are going to go rookie, rookie, second year, rookie, rookie, second year, and just toss your one. So I think it's important to stay flexible. I prefer to target wide receivers, which would come as no surprise. I do think that someone like Patrick Mahomes is more valuable in a dynasty league than he is in a redraft league because we've seen it now. If you could have 10 years

of a top three fantasy quarterback, that sounds pretty great. And guys like Travis Kelsey are much less valuable in a dynasty league. I think I agree with every single thing you said, but especially the wide receiver comment, because not drafting wide receivers. When we started up our dynasty league, set me back. All right. I'm going to give only one person that gets to answer a question now from Joe

in Canada. Okay. Help keep two in a standard scoring league. Is it keep four? No, no, keep two more. Okay. So he's keeping Metcalf and Ridley. Two more, Dave.

Swift, Dobbins, Galladay, Dillon. Keep two. Swift, Dobbins, Galladay, Dillon. I would assume that Galladay stays in Detroit. It might be on the franchise tag, but he stays in Detroit. I don't know if Stafford's staying in Detroit. So I will tentatively say that Galladay is one of them that you're keeping. It might be on the franchise tag, but he stays in Detroit. I don't know if Stafford's staying in Detroit. So I will tentatively say that Galladay is one of them that you're keeping.

And Dobbins is one of my favorite running back youngsters in the league. Galladay and Dobbins. All right. Heath, this is from Nick in Washington State. 12-team PPR Keeper League. It's going from regular to super flex. All right, so keep any up to two. It can be zero to two. Kyler Murray in the second.

Remember, it's super flex now. Darren Waller in the fourth. Dobbins in the fifth. Burrow in the eighth. Kyler in the second. Waller in the fourth. Dobbins in the fifth. Burrow in the eighth.

You can keep two? Up to two. I think I'm keeping... Wow. Aren't you tempted to keep both the quarterbacks? I am tempted to keep both the quarterbacks, but I'm really not sure that I'd rather have Kyler over Dobbins for a three-round difference in Superflex.

Well, if you get Kyler Murray at what we've seen, I don't think there's any question. Well, when we get to the outlier stats, I think the 11 rushing touchdowns for Kyler is one of the outliers that we need to discuss. Sure, but he could still get six or seven, and he's clearly going to have running as part of his game for

several years. I thought I laid down some ground rules here. Yeah, we're breaking them. Waller, not Waller on the fourth? They're all tough. Yeah, it's really tough. I don't think Waller is enough of a discount, so I'm going to go Dobbins and Burrow. Oh, okay.

All right, Dave, this one is from MG from the capital of Silicon Valley. It's like San Jose, right? I don't know. They're out that way. Yeah, somewhere out there. Dear Tyson, Amari, Steve, and Jeremy. Those are Knicks.

Good stuff. Non-PPR standard scoring format. I need a wide receiver and a flex for week 17. So give me a wide receiver. Amari Cooper, T.Y. Hilton, or Brandon Cooks? I believe I would go with Hilton. And a flex. Amari Cooper, Brandon Cooks, Kareem Hunt, Malcolm Brown,

Giovanni Bernard. Standard scoring. Cooper. Okay. And there you Bernard. Standard scoring. Cooper. Okay. And there you go. Statistical outliers. Heath, you wanted to start with Kyler Murray? Yeah, he's got 11 rushing touchdowns this year

on 131 attempts. He's about 100 yards behind Lamar Jackson, 17 attempts behind Lamar Jackson, and four more touchdowns. And that matters because in a lot of leagues, he's been a top two quarterback this year. In CBS leagues, he's more of a top five, I think, four or five, depending on your scoring system,

on a per-game basis. I don't think he's shown me enough yet and we had the debate on monday i believe with our quarterback rankings i know a lot of people had him number two um i don't think he's shown enough yet as a passer that i can put him number two so the good news is that he's he improved in 2020 over 2019 i'm just not sure that he's improved dramatically. He certainly didn't do what Josh Allen did. But his completion rate is up. His yards per attempt is up a tiny bit.

His interception rate was flat. His touchdown rate was up. So the things that they wanted to accomplish with Kyler Murray as a passer, they started to do. I think getting hurt late in the season significantly affected that, and maybe if he hadn't have gotten hurt, he would have been a lot more efficient of a passer. And I think the rushing that he did was beyond our expectations.

I agree. Those numbers should come down. And when he's in his fifth and sixth season, I'm not sure he's going to run much, if at all, which could make him a real curious case for dynasty purposes that maybe a year or two from now, we're looking to move on from Kyler Murray. But that's besides the point. That's something that we're kicking way down the road. I think he's still got that tremendous upside to be amazing. One of the things that I will be watching this off season is what they do at running back because Drake is a free agent. Edmonds is still going to be there for another year,

but I think we've seen enough that the coaches won't trust them. If they go and spend big on a running back in the draft, could that take a lot of rushing work away from Kyler Murray? It's something to watch and it's something that could greatly impact those rushing numbers where we're already expecting them to go down some from 11 touchdowns. He's got nowhere to go, but down, it could go go way down it can go below what he did his rookie year that would make him a bust last year he scored once every 23 rush attempts this year he's scored once every 12 so about twice as often yeah it's gonna it's gonna revert back closer to his rookie year

all right so i'm not gonna i think he can still beat what he had his rookie year. I'm looking right at it. It's four touchdowns. He could have six rushing touchdowns, even if they had a running back. It's a little bit strange that he ran like 50% more than he did in his rookie year. It's strange. I don't know. I just think it was,

I just think it was a guy coming into his own. I, you know, I talk about second year wide receivers, but I think it's, to me, it's second year players running backs, you know, go off in their first year,

but every other position, I mean, second year just seems to be the breakout year. So he, but right. But this is not a, a, a play thing.

This is not a, an efficiency thing. This is not a, him doing something better thing it's just a choice that he ran six times just under six times per game as a rookie and he has run eight times per game nine times per game this year and that's a like it doesn't sound like a big difference that's a pretty big difference at six yards per attempt especially when you're scoring twice as often. And the same thing that I said about the passing,

we could apply to rushing too, because he didn't run nearly as much in those three games when he hurt his shoulder. He was taking care of his body, and the numbers fell for fantasy, and the numbers fell statistically, obviously. I think he was getting like five carries per game, something like that. What's a bigger concern for you going into 2021?

Aaron Rodgers' ridiculous touchdown rate, 8.8, I believe, or Kyler Murray's statistical outlier season? I think both had statistical outliers. That's the silliest thing to say about Rodgers. Yeah, but what's a bigger concern? It is. I mean, what's a bigger concern? It is.

I mean, it's... I'll always lean toward the older player being concerning. I would say Kyler's is a bigger concern. Okay. But only because Rodgers, and I don't know if that's the case now because Patrick Mahomes has crossed the threshold, but Rodgers has been, for the past five years, the active leader in touchdown rate. His career touchdown rate is 6.2%, which is remarkable and well above average. But he doesn't have as far to fall off. I don't believe. Okay. Any other statistical outliers things you want to talk about?

I have some, if you don't go. Okay. Just kind of found this interesting. JK Dobbins had seven rushing touchdowns. All of them were from five yards out or closer. So all within either inside the five or at the five, five of his seven touchdowns were one or two yard touchdowns.

That's just a lot for someone who didn't really have that many carries. He had seven carries from inside the five. He scored on six of them. There were five other running backs who had seven carries from inside the five and none of them scored more than four touchdowns. So I don't know. I mean, I think that was more interesting than anything. Not necessarily relevant, but just J.K. Dobbins.

I just wonder if people look at his game log and he doesn't score a touchdown in five straight games, maybe scores in three of those five, if they're feeling as good about him right now. You know, that's kind of what the Ravens do, right? They score a lot of touchdowns. And how about Miles Sanders? Three carries of 74 or more yards.

That is one. Miles Sanders' season is one that I think is going to be really interesting to dissect. Because he just wasn't really that good other than those three carries. But who can do that? Who can break off three carries? Especially one against the Steelers, one against the Ravens, one against the Saints. That's amazing. Yeah. won against the saints that's amazing yeah and that's where you get into the thing of like how

much of that was a skill that is unique to miles sanders and how much of that was fluky i don't know right i have no idea like you know who could do that probably doug martin maybe but good but doug martin used to be really good. Doug Martin had two seasons, not back-to-back, but two seasons where he was either really good or he had some fluky long runs. Yeah, well, I don't really know how to look at that. I mean, Saquon Barkley had three carries of 68 or more yards in his rookie season, and then he had two more of 50 yards.

But he had a lot more carries. He had about 100 more carries at about a hundred more carries than Sanders has this year. So, yeah, I don't, I mean, I just don't know.

I think it's encouraging because I think it shows that if he had a good offensive line, which we expected, which wouldn't play out, Sanders probably could be a monster, but I don't know. How do you guys view him right now? Number two,

running back, but a good one. Because I fully expect Philadelphia's offensive line to get restocked. It'll be a combination of the guys who got hurt last year coming back and draft picks, maybe some free agent additions. And if Hurts is the quarterback, and I think that's what we're all expecting at this point, that'll help Miles Sanders. I think we've seen evidence of that over the past three weeks. Why has Jordan Howard been touching the football? I don't know.

And one other thing, and this might be the biggest thing of all, is that, and we've already talked about it on the podcast, is he still going to get the same type of workhorse lip service and then the Eagles deliver on that? And that might come down to who's coaching the team next year because i don't know if doug peterson is surviving this mess yeah well also sanders i think you got to say he's got some injury history he's gotten hurt two straight pre-seasons you don't remember that necessarily but two straight training camps plus uh an injury mid midseason this year.

I don't know if he can handle the work. I hope he can. All right, that's pretty much it. I just want to mention that do you know the running back that finished last in the NFL in carries per broken tackle? It took him the most carries to break tackles, to break a tackle.

Todd Gurley. Joe Mixon. Joe Mixon, dead last on the list. Didn't have a ton of carries, but also didn't break a ton. Todd Gurley. Joe Mixon. Joe Mixon dead last on the list. Didn't have a ton of carries, but also didn't break a ton of tackles. Do you happen to know what he did the year before? I know he wasn't top five or bottom five. That's all I know. Okay. So.

Yeah. It'll be an interesting one, too. Number one. I think there's going to be a lot of people who just do not want anything to do with Joe Mixon and fantasy. Well, what's his cost? Can we stop calling him a first-round pick and just treat him like... Oh, I don't think it'll even be a second-round pick.

Well, then I'm going to want to draft a lot of Joe Mixon probably. Right, but then, hold on, is he going to be in the running back dead zone? Is that somebody who's not going to get the type of valuable touches that you're looking for? Is there too much downside with him now? There's a lot of questions that have to be answered about Cincinnati, but we can't give the offensive line the benefit of the doubt anymore.

In 2019, Joe Mixon broke a tackle every 11.6 attempts. That was better than Dalvin Cook, Ezekiel Elliott, Saquon Barkley. Let me tell you, this stat sucks. It is useless. Well, then why didn't you bring it up? better than Dalvin Cook, Ezekiel Elliott, Saquon Barkley. Let me tell you, this stat sucks. It is useless. Well, then why didn't you bring it up? I was going to bring it up just to tell you how useless it is. And I don't think it necessarily sucks. Number one in 2019 was Alvin Kamara.

Number three was Aaron Jones. Yeah, number five was Devin Singletary. He makes a lot of big plays. He's slippery. Number two this year is Mike Davis. David Montgomery is one. Mike Davis, two. Zach Moss, three.

Austin Eckler, four. Antonio Gibson, five. I think this is, I don't know. Looking back, I just think it's not a predictive stat. I think it's a stupid stat. I think it's a good trait if you're a running back that can break out of tackles or create missed. I do too,

but I also wonder after contact is one that bugs me. Help point to the David Montgomery breakout. Yeah, maybe. Yeah. But I also think when you're getting tackled in the backfield a lot, like you probably are going to break some more tackles. Like just that's my guess.

And that was the case. We've all seen the plays where a running back gets the handoff. He breaks the first tackle. Right. And then he doesn't break the second tackle, and it's a one-yard gain, but he gets credit with a broken tackle. And yeah, Dave, you're right. Yards after contact is all so skewed by one long run, like Ronald Jones. Okay, we've got to go. We're out of here.

Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you tomorrow. Start or sit. Plus, as always, this week, spinning it ahead to 2021. See you then.