Fantasy Football Today - 2025 Dynasty Rookie Wide Receiver Preview | Which Wideouts Are Must-Draft Fantasy Gems (05/13 Fantasy Football Dynasty Podcast)
Episode Date: May 13, 2025Heath Cummings is joined by Scott Boulanger to breakdown the 2025 crop of rookie wide receivers. Which new wideouts have the best "UN Score" and how should that effect where they go in drafts? Don't p...ick a WR before you give this episode a listen. Intro (0:00) 3 Questions (1:25) Emeka Egbuka's Landing Spot (7:30) Jayden Higgins' Fit (13:15) RBs Before Hunter and McMillan (18:17) Jack Bech's Story (24:47) Top 12 Rookie WRs (28:09) Rookie WR Questions (41:00) 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
Transcript
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Welcome to Fantasy Football Today Dynasty.
I am your host, Heath Cummings.
Joined today by my good friend,
repeat guest, Scott Blanchard, AKA
Jack's Falcone. Thank you for being here today. I always enjoy
our conversations right here at the very top. I want you to tell
everybody what you've been working on. And of course, where
they can find your work.
Yeah, absolutely. Well, we've been working on rookie drafts.
You know, being a dynasty, you know, outfit first, I suppose a
dynasty, you know, website and things of thats. You know, being a dynasty, you know, outfit first, I suppose, a dynasty, you know, website and
things of that nature. You know, the, the, the, the rookie drafts
are flying off the boards right now. But, you know, the biggest
thing we've been doing is the UN score, which is our wide
receiver model. I think that's fun to sort of share with the
public. We get excited about it every year, we wait with bated
breath for it to release and when it finally
does, it's a really cool thing. It's a really, really cool
model. Love to share it with you. All that and more at the
undropables.com.
Thank you very much. Excellent program. So like he said on
today's show, we will be talking about the UN score, what it is,
and what it says about some of the top wide receivers in this
class. Most certainly, we will talk about Emeka Ibuka and
Travis Hunter and more. As always, we will start with three
questions for our guests. And I'm sure there's at least one
person in the chat who has heard us say UN score twice on this
show. And they're thinking, what is the UN score?
Yeah, well, I you know, the UN score is a wide receiver model, put simply,
right? So ultimately, you know, as dynasty, the one of the cool things
about dynasty is football is 365 days a year for those of us who love football.
And for those of us that play fantasy, we've got to find a way to fill that
urge 365. And that's what dynasty
football is. One of the best parts about dynasty football is your rookie drafts, is rookie scouting season, the NFL
draft, all that. Well, over the years of doing this and scouting players and trying to get it right, you often get it
wrong. If you've never gotten it wrong, you've never tried to get it right. Let me just tell you that for sure. And so, you know, in
the pursuit of getting better at prospect analysis and prospect,
you know, grading and things of that nature, you know, I always
wanted a model, but I'm no genius. So with the help of J
Wood, Dan Wisner, Travis Seal, Joe Kuvatakis, Chalk, all my,
you know, friends and, and partners at the UnDropables, we
came out with, especially J Wood, we came out with a model that
performed so damn well, we were kind of shocked. And so we released it to the public last year. This year is year two of the model.
Fantastic stuff. And I will say this throughout the show. First, thank you to everybody who's here on YouTube early in the show. At the end of the show, we will be answering
some of your rookie wide receiver questions
if you have them.
So go ahead and put those in the chat.
We will star those and we will discuss those
after the second break.
Question number two, through the lens of the UN score,
does this class look like,
and I don't know if mediocre is the right word, but the mediocre wide receiver class that some people perceive it to be?
Yes and no. There isn't any high level prospects. There isn't a Jamar Chase, there isn't a Justin Jefferson. You know, the model basically will score, you know, 90 and up as, you know, in general, you know, that elite
prospect, you know, in the 80s is a very, very surefire. But
70, 72, 69-ish and up is actually a really strong
signal. There's a ton of guys that fell in the 70s. Not ton,
you know, a good portion. I don't remember the exact
number, but, you know, probably more than normal, scored in
that really, that sweet spot, you know. You know, in the 70s is where we had Tankdell and Pukinakua and players like
that that didn't even have the draft capital. So to score in there, you're, you're, you're definitely going to have a
pretty good opportunity, a pretty good chance, a probability of hitting. So it's a little bit more flat, which I thought it was going in, which the model sort of helped
reinforce that opinion. I know we'll get there.
I've heard some people say, and I think what you said goes well
with this, that there may not be an alpha number one wide
receiver in this class. But there might be more number two
wide receivers than we normally get from a draft class, which I think makes you feel pretty good.
Listen, we had some running backs.
We were hoping it would be round two running backs and rookie drafts that didn't get the
draft capital or the landing spot we were hoping for.
And so now you're more comfortable with them in round three.
We've got a round one that probably has five or six running backs in it.
I think knowing or hoping that we have a lot of wide receiver twos in this class makes
you feel
better about filling that void between the running backs who are in excellent spots and the ones that
land that lasted until day three in the NFL draft. These are a lot of guys we'll talk about today
maybe early round two type options. Now I always kind of like to do this when somebody has a model
or a way of evaluating players
and you do a good job within like I was reading up on the UN score the last couple of days and you
do a good job within that piece of kind of highlighting this is not like the end all be
all of analyze it you shouldn't look you should not rank rookie wide receivers based solely based on
this model so I want to know like people get the UN score and they're looking through it and
they're crushed by how low one of their guys is.
I'm going to talk about one of those guys in a little bit, a little bit later.
Is there a player in this class that you're willing to kind of just throw the
UN score out for that guy because of context or because of some other reason
and still draft him at or above cost?
Probably not. Um, you know, this guy answer, but I don't think so.
I think a lot of times it does the opposite. It puts the brakes on. Probably that guy, you know,
there's always a guy. Last year would have been Brian Thomas Jr. And, you know, we had, you know, there's always a guy. Last year would have been Brian Thomas Jr.
And you know, we had, you know,
numerous conversations about Brian Thomas Jr.
because of the type of profile he had.
So, you know, that would have been
the right answer last year.
You know, I don't know what the right answer is this year,
but I would say that if you feel that way,
then you should be not just only listening to this one data way, then you should be not just
only listening to this one data point and you should be drafting
that player at or above. You know, you said it perfectly on
the outset that it's only a tool, not a guide to say, Oh,
this is my rankings now. Absolutely.
Robert's already got a great, great question in the chat about
a wide receiver I've not talked enough about on this show. So
I'm looking forward to that in segment three.
Please go ahead and get your other questions in about wide receivers.
We will answer them later in the show.
Right now, we'll take our first break,
and then we'll jump into the UN score
and what it says about some of our favorite wide receivers in this class.
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We are back and one of the first guys I was so,
was the first guy that I saw,
and you'll hear about that why in a second,
but one of the guys I was so happy to see
that really crushed it based on the other guys
in this class was a Mac Egg Boop.
And this,
this is a guy who I loved coming into the process.
I actually thought that there was a pretty strong case to make that he might be
the most ready to help a team and help a fantasy football team in his rookie
season. Very polished wide receiver.
I think Matt Harmon loves him too if you're talking about looking at the film,
he has the top UN score in this class.
Is that enough to make us just forget about the fact that he got drafted to a
team that already had Mike Evans, Chris Godwin and Jaylen McMillan?
Yes. Excuse me. Yes, absolutely. Because the same,
he scores less but similarly to JS, who landed in a very similar situation, who comes
up from the same school, who, you know, all these
similarities between JSN, primarily slot player, all the
rest of it, you know, we're learning now that NFL teams as
well as many scouts believe that Emeka Buka can play more
outside flanker role than just slot only. We certainly felt like his path to being on the field was going to be right
through the slot. I sort of comped him, you know, not
stylistically, but you know, into the NFL as CD Lamb, you
know, come in through the slot and then branch out from there.
You know, we're seeing that with JSN. What's interesting, of
course, is that he lands on a team with one of the best
slot receivers in the NFL, and Chris
Godwin. So maybe it does force him to be a little bit of multiple. I don't know. Is Godwin going to be ready? Like, you
know, both Godwin and Edvins are injury risks, if there ever were at the wide receiver position, at their age and, you
know, their injury history. So I think Emeka is going to have opportunity in Year 1. And, you know, maybe he doesn't
crush, but I think he's going to be very good.
I think a lot of people, the way they look at the wide receivers in this class is Travis Hunter and Tet McMillan, and we'll talk about them in just a moment, should be the clear 1-2 in terms of rookie ADP.
And then there's a lot of debate between Emeka, between Matthew Golden.
There are definitely some Luther Burden type guys.
And so is this a situation where you're saying no, Ibuka is the clear wide receiver three in rookie drafts?
Or would you even consider him higher than that?
No, I think he's my wide receiver three.
I'm fine.
You know, I always think, too, like, you know, guides like this, or
your opinions only really matter insofar as it references to ADP.
In other words, if I say, you know, I remember someone once,
you know, we were arguing about JT, Jonathan Taylor and his, in
his rookie year, and they were like, Dude, I love JT, don't get
it wrong. I remember I had him as RB3. I said, Then you got 0JT. Because
in order to get him, you had to have him at RB1 and believe in him as the RB1. So to like him at RB3 or to like him
at RB53 didn't really matter, you know what I mean? So I think the same thing is true here. And as we see Emeka, I
am totally happy taking him at the wide receiver 3 spot in rookie drafts. I just did it again today, actually. So yeah,
a mecca at that sort of mid to late first is such great value.
And, and I do technically have Tet McMillan as my wide receiver
1, but so loosely held that I have him really close to a mecca
in the same sort of tier. I'd rather have Tet, but I don't want
to pay the 102 to get Tet when I could pay the 108 to get a Mecca. Whatever it takes me, if I'm drafting only once, and
I have one pick in a first round, and I have the 102, and I'm convinced I'm going to take Tet, I'd rather trade
whatever I got to do to get to the 108 to get a Mecca and take all that value. In other words, a Mecca plus
versus Ted alone, I'll take. Does that make sense? No, I agree with that completely. I think,
and I've heard people frame it this way, and it's kind of how I view the guys. I think the floor
for a Mecca is as good as anybody's in this class in terms of the next five to 10 years.
Not looking at Hunter, not looking at Tett. The guy that I hear
kind of contrasted to that is a Luther Burton because he has a certain set of skills that if
used in the exact right way, my goodness, he might just have a top five wide receiver scene
in that season and now he's got Ben Johnson. Now he's got a little bit of target competition as well. But
you think it's fair to look at them that way that if you're
searching for floor, a mecca is the better option. If you're
searching for burden, he might be the better option.
1000% and I actually make that same comp to Travis Hunter and
Tet Macmillan. I think if you're, you know, in that early
part, and you believe that you know, you're looking for a
little bit more variance, you take Hunter, who might have a
higher upside than Tet, I suppose potentially again, you're looking for a little bit more variance. You take Hunter, who might have a higher upside than Tet, I suppose
potentially. Again, you know, this is all theoretical anyway, right? But yeah, I do think Burden has that sort of supernova
upside because of his athleticism and tackle breaking. And, you know, you if you turn around in three years, and you're
like, turned out Luther Burden was closer to Malik neighbors than anybody else. You'd be like, wow, that
makes sense. Nobody's going to tell you that a Mecca is, you know, is Malik neighbors. Although what if he's Amon
Ra? You know, so sometimes is Mercurial. We didn't really see that ceiling with Amon Ra yet. Here it is.
Now, generally speaking, we're going to save the questions for the end of the show, but I appreciate you, Zed, for just providing the absolute perfect transition. Am I an idiot
for moving Higgins ahead of Golden? That's Jaden Higgins ahead of Matthew Golden. I think,
I know the UN score would say you are certainly not an idiot. It is very, very, very positive
for Jaden Higgins. He is called in in the in the
write up the arbitrage play of the class. Yeah, and he has the
second highest UN score in the class. Kind of tell me what you
think that arbitrage play aspect means. I know you didn't, you
didn't necessarily write all of these words. But I think you
probably agree with a lot of them. And then how do you think
he fits next to a Nico Collins?
I think he fits great.
Let me answer that question first, how he fits,
because here's the thing.
So many people were thinking that Jaden Higgins
is gonna be this ex-receiver
and that he's behind Nico Collins now.
But if you read Matt Harmon's work
and if you just turn on the film
or anything of any
substance into Jayden Higgins, you learn that he's a better sort of slot flanker than he is
an outside X. He does have enough speed. He ran under a 4.540, but he's more of a technician.
And the fact that Nico is there to sort of push him into the middle is great. And the fact that Nico's there to sort of prevent the Texans from feeling
the need to move him to X is splendid. So it is perfect for
Jayden Higgins, actually. Now the target share, you could
argue, is going to be a little bit of a squeeze. But every
wide receiver room can can generally hold two, you know,
alphas. I mean, we've seen it. Evans and Godwin, Chase and Higgins, you can go all the way down. I mean,
there's plenty of high-power passing attacks that can feed
2 wide receiver 1-2 types, right? So that's that. Number 2,
are you crazy for moving Higgins above gold? And we've had
Higgins above gold the whole time. The draft capital did not
change that. I say first round, I say second round, OK, that's a
big difference. But one was drafted
like 21 was drafted at 30. It's not a big difference in draft
capital. So we do believe that Higgins is the better bet. Now
here's the thing. It does stand to reason that Golden is a first
round pick, landed, you know, with an open runway to
opportunity. So if you like Golden, you're not gonna hear me
say, Oh, you're an idiot. But I but I, I do have Higgins ahead.
I draft Higgins ahead of golden every single time.
The only time I'll ever take golden is if I'm in that mid second and he falls
to me and I really can't move away.
But you know, getting golden that mid second is fair, but Higgins for
sure is the better bet analytically.
So here's the thing.
Cause I think you actually see either a burden or golden one of the two often
go right around
that one to turn Higgins usually I have seen them at 202 but 204 somewhere in there.
We talked about that opportunity to trade back from where you would take Tet to instead
taking a Guga.
Does this also provide another opportunity to trade back from maybe that 11 or 12 pick
into the 203 204 range and take Jeden Higgins and pick up extra draft
capital?
How about how about trading from whatever pick you're about to
pick Ted at? You know, that's the one. That's probably another
first next year.
Bingo. There's the route. There you go. So early first this
year, the 1314, right when Ted's on the board to the 2223, you
can you can leave the draft with that wide receiver
plus a, yeah, absolutely need a first to go along with it.
I'm not trading an early first for an early second
and not getting another first round pick.
For sure, Heath, that has to happen.
But if you do that, think about what you've done.
You've literally re-rolled your first round pick
to next year and you get a
player. I'm not saying they're
the same, but they're a whole
lot closer than last year's
early second round picks were
to Malik neighbors. You're not
trading away Malik neighbors to
get to Kian Coleman, right?
Right. And I think so when you
when you think about Higgins
and like obviously starts next
to Nico in year one, it's
pretty good fit. According to how you think their skill
sets fit together, but probably not going to be a must start
fantasy option as a rookie next to Nico. Like maybe Scott's not
even gonna rule that out. I would say most people are
looking at him like, man, it'd be great if he could be a wide
receiver three for me this year. That'd be fantastic. What type
of upside do you think he has say in the next five years? Is this a guy who could be a
regular top 20 fantasy producer?
Yeah, T Higgins. Okay, I heard a lot of people you know, I
think Matt Waldman and others compared him to T Higgins and
Nico Collins, which is kind of ironic. But you know, I thought
he was a little bit more of an inside player than that, or at
least could tend to be that. I
know he did play enough outside, especially with Jalen DeWell on the team, etc. But, you know, I felt like he had a lot of
those, those routes that can be a flanker in the NFL, not necessarily only an X. So, yeah, man, let's go. I think, I
think, you know, that, that, that classic high-end wide receiver, teams wide receiver, too, whatever that is, you know, that T Higgins type.
Absolutely. That's where you can go.
I think we had one more question. It was just a perfect transition.
And Choff asks, does the model have Hunter in it? And I think that's the question people hear when he's not number one.
Is it because you're afraid he's going to play corner?
He is in the model.
I'm not going to tell you exactly where every wide receiver is because I'd like
for you guys to go support the un-dropables and go by the UN score benefit
from everything that's in it.
And we'll tell you how to do that a little bit later in the show, but I do
want to talk about the fact that while I'm not going to tell you where Hunter
and Tet necessarily are, they're obviously not in the top two. We just talked about the top two. So
they're going to most likely be the first two wide receivers drafted though. So how
many rookie, how many of these rookie running backs are you taking before you take a wide
receiver in a rookie draft?
Well, it seems like everybody's willing to take two. I may be willing to take three.
Trevion Henderson, let me start. Wasn't this supposed to be the running back class, right?
You know what I mean? Like, so we come out here, we've been mentioning this running back
class for literally years. The RB1 from last year's class stays in this class, and even makes it a better class. And here we are. And we're taking, you know, good
wide receiver prospects over great running back prospects. I
don't know if that's right or not. I really don't. I'm just
saying I'm, I'm leaning towards allowing myself to take Travion
ahead of those two wide receivers, Travis Hunter and
Tet Macmillan. I'll talk out of two sides of my mouth because the other thing
that I don't like doing is really building my team around
running backs. I don't want to do that. I want to build out of
strong wide receivers. So especially the deeper that your
starting lineup is, the more so you need these anchor wide
receivers to hold your your roster for a long period of time.
That being said, if I'm a Rebuilder, yeah man,
Tet sounds like a really good pick at 103
or something like that, where I'm hopeful to just hit a guy
who's good for 10 years or something like that,
whereas all these running backs, including Gentie,
unlikely to last 10 years.
I mean, the running back shelf life generally shorter,
more things can happen.
Anyway, long story short, I think
Trevion is that player, pass catching upside, explosiveness.
They really love him. A lot of great, you know, things coming
out of New England in terms of how they intend to use him. To
new coaching staff, new front office, to that, that brought
in Ramandre. I'm not worried about Ramandre. Matter of fact,
there has to be someone like him or Ramandre to sort of shield
Trevion from too heavy a workload. We really want him seeing all the sort of high leverage pass targets in the pass game and then some big plays along the way, maybe 10, 15 carries. That would be perfect. The Jameer Gibbs like role.
me on taking Henderson ahead of these wide receivers in full PPR leagues. I kind of want to take Henderson ahead of Hampton.
Um, I'm pretty much on board with the Henderson thing, but I think that's
a good counter argument is if you look historically top 10 drafted, right?
Wide receivers drafted in the first 10 picks are generally a better bet
than running backs drafted on day two.
There are exceptions to that rule.
I think Henderson could be an exception,
but I think we need to talk about the elephant in the room
and Travis Hunter because I do,
I'm absolutely intoxicated with the upside that I see.
He's just the best football player in the draft,
in my opinion, and that shows in all the different things
that he can do.
Now he has to specialize those skills into a way that turns him into a top five wide receiver
for him to for sure be worth the 102, which some people argue for.
Yes.
Do you, I, I'm getting less and less concerned with the things on the defensive side of the
ball. So let's just talk on offense. He lands in an offense with Trevor Lawrence and Brian Thomas Jr. A
lot of people saying, well, obviously, Brian Thomas is
there. He can't ever be a number one. I'm not going to put that
outside of his range of possibilities. Do you have any
sort of downside or concern about Hunter?
Sure, that the height there's more hype than, than, you know,
real, you know, you know what I'm saying? The hype exceeds
the whatever happens on the field. That being said, I agree
with you that he that he could be the number one wide receiver
there. I think that the model likes Travis Hunter. It really
does. It's a it's a positive score. You're free to draft
him. It's just not an elite score. It's not a, he's not a CD lamb, Jamar
Chase, Justin Jefferson. Now there's reasons, quote unquote, for that. He was playing defense. So that's one,
right?
All the time. Like, not just every once in a while. All the time.
That's a real thing now. So, but the model does a lot of this stuff on a route per route run basis rather than raw number, which of course, takes some of that away.
You know, it's like, Well, that's where we found Puka
Nakua. Puko didn't play as much. He was hurt. He was in and out
of the lineup, the low volume offense, but his EPA was great.
His, you know, yards per outrun, his first downs per outrun, all
these things were just like, off the charts. You know, so that
that's where we try to let the model tell us the charts. You know, so that that's where we
try to let the model tell us the story. There's also he played in
a in an offense, I've heard JJ Zacharyson mentioned this, he
played in an offense where they started a lot of wide receivers,
which necessarily limits your your targets, you know, in your
per route run stuff, because there's more pass catchers
available. Those pass catchers were pretty good. He played
primarily X in his final year, almost 95% of the X did
Travis Hunter, and there wasn't much protection. So the routes
that sort of go to the X can be longer developing routes.
There's a lot of things that we can contextualize and say, at
the end of the day, I'm with you that he could very well be. As
a matter of fact, for all those reasons, I could have, and
maybe should have answered Travis
Hunter to your earlier question, is there a player despite the,
right, the despite the score that you would draft at or above
and Travis Hunter is a damn good answer, but I saved it for this
moment.
Yeah, I think if, listen, if you're like us, and you're
degenerates, and you have 15 rookie drafts in the next couple
of months, or more, or maybe
10, but whatever. You don't want to walk out of all of those with no Travis Hunter. If
you were playing in one dynasty league, then there's some risk to consider and you're going
to have to just be a little bit more discerning in your choice. But I'm definitely going to
draft Travis Hunter on a couple of teams. I'm not sure I'll get him quite as many just because how much I like the running backs.
Let's get to my disappointment. I was very sad. I'm not disappointed in the UN score.
Right. Yeah. I'm just, I'm just sad. It's, it was really sad to see Jack Besh's score.
Yeah.
Now, obviously his story is a unique one. He started out at LSU as a tight end, playing with an
extremely talented cast of characters. We've got the transfer, we've got some
injuries. How do you, I guess how do you balance the narrative and the story that
goes along with the numbers that go into the model? Yeah, this is a great one. This
was the other, you know, it's funny, I saw these two guys on the show sheet, and I didn't
want to answer either of these two guys with the first
question. Jack best is the other one. You know, I've said, I've
sort of argued that, you know, you shouldn't be drafting Jack
Bash at ADP, because, you know, the UN score, right. But I will
say that, yeah, he was a friggin tight end. The model doesn't know that he was really a tight
end. I mean, it doesn't, what there isn't any input that we
can put in there go Oh, no, when the guy played tight end, you
know, that's not possible to calculate. So and in that tight
end season, he did outperform both Malik neighbors, and Brian
Thomas Jr. So he's you
know, yeah, I think it was only like 400 yards or something was
pretty pathetic. Nonetheless, he did outperform them. But I
think for those reasons that Jack Bash, you know, would be a
player that you would want to ignore the model for those
reasons. Ignore at your own risk.
That's exactly right. Like you can tell your that there's two
sides of this. You can tell
a story about almost every player in this draft and convince yourself to to target or fade them.
That's right. And so you just kind of have to validate that story on your own and whether you
think it's acceptable. And it's a good reason. I again, BESH is another guy that I'm going to
make sure I've got a little bit of Jack BESess on my dynasty rosters. I'm probably not going
to be too overexposed that I may have to reach for him in a spot
or two to make sure I get him.
You know what else the the model provides is it provides was it
like 2018 or 16 whatever through 2025 and it puts all those
players scores together at the bottom so that you can go to Jack Besh in the overall of all the
prospects over the last 7, 8, 9, 10 years, however old the
model is, and you can see other players that scored similarly.
Perhaps you can go there and find a player that you think
scored similar to Jack Besh that had a similar story that
succeeded despite the score.
Or you may not find that player.
That, you know, I'd like, you could have just left it on the encouraging note.
Listen, we've got a lot of great questions, so let's just go ahead and take our second break.
When we come back, we're going to do something kind of fun.
I've never done this before, but Scott and I are going to rank the top 12 wide receivers in this class, but he's going to rank it odd. I'm going to rank it
even. So you'll get kind of a composite ranking from the two of us. We'll agree on some of
those and we'll disagree.
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We are back.
Let's rank our top 12 rookie wide receivers and I will let you go first.
Go.
Tett McMillan.
Okay.
Tett McMillan goes with wide receiver one.
I think everybody knows I'm going to take Travis Hunter.
And Travis Hunter was probably the right answer at one, but who knows?
I don't know that one's a coin flip.
Uh, Mecca Ibuka.
We both would have been in agreement on that.
I have gone back.
I'm not going to say Jayden Higgins, so we can just go ahead and know who I'm
going to say for four and six and probably who you're going to say for five.
But man, have I gone back on Matthew Golden and Luther Burden. And again, I, I,
I really do believe that the signal from Green Bay of never taking a wide
receiver in the first round and then all the noise basically starting in the
post game locker room from Josh Jacobs and moving forward about the team
needing a wide receiver one,
and then them drafting Matthew Golden in the first round is that there's going to be an opportunity. I don't know if
Golden has the complete skill set to do it, but there's going to be an opportunity for
him to actually be a wide receiver one in this offense. But as of late, I've been too
influenced by Luther Burden and Ben Johnson's offense. And you're not helping any beat writers
when you're telling me that all he's doing is playing in the slot because that's what you told me about ARSB a few years ago.
And that worked out fantastic. So I'm going to go ahead and go with Luther Burden here as wide
receiver for I think that's great. Um, I'll go Jayden Higgins, uh, for sure. So we've got Tet
Hunter at Boca. We've got Burden, we've got Higgins, and I don't know that Scott would agree with this,
but I'm going to go ahead and put Golden at wide receiver six.
And this is probably where it gets really interesting.
Like I, no matter what order you put them in,
these are definitely my top six wide receivers in the class.
I have hold a lot less strong convictions after wide receiver six.
I would agree, but with different players, I have Trey Harris as head of Matthew Golden.
I know that's probably going to be a hot take. The model does like him a bit better.
You know, I think, you know, Harris, in other words, in that 70s, you know, he falls into a range that we're really happy to see him crest. So I'm, I've been getting a lot of Trey Harris. And the great thing is I've, I just got Trey Harris at
the 2.08 in a 14-team league. Yeah, I mean, I can't be more
happy. So, you know, Trey Harris is consistently falling to me
with that sort of extra pick. Sometimes I'm trading, I actually
traded up a couple of spots. I used Ben Sinnett plus my pick to move up to get Trey Harris
I mean, I can't be happier about having Trey Harris in that spot. So for me, it's it's Trey Harris no doubt about it and
Thankfully the UN score is not a late able to talk trash about my picks if we were doing this in a way where I was
Trying to get over on you
I'd probably wait a little while to take Jack Besh because you got to know your
competition if they're not going to take that anyway. No, you've
got to take you got to stick to your guns. We might as well let
him slide but I'm trying to help the people. So I'm going to go
ahead and take Jack Besh here at wide receiver eight.
And my new favorite player in this spot right after the right
after the top seven after the Matthew Golden Trey Harris, but before Jack Besh is Kyle
Williams. Kyle Williams scored okay in the model is fine. You
know, nothing crazy there. This is a culmination of a lot of
things. Draft capital is okay. It was before Jalen Newell, who I
liked better than Kyle Williams coming in. But Jalen Noel falls behind a lot of players in
Houston, including Christian Kirk in year one and then who
knows about Tank Del probably not but still there. Technically,
I mean, who knows and then still Higgins and Nico but in New
England where Kyle Williams lands. My goodness. I mean,
there's a lot of, you know, if we're playing
man, there's a lot of 62 ranked guys, right? You know, just
everybody's black. He has a pathway to be literally the
number one target on that team only really needs to beat out
Steph Diggs. So give me Kyle Williams.
Now you went ahead and helped us answer one of our chat
questions. We will answer the rest of the chat questions when
we finish this exercise. But let's go ahead and talk a little
more about Kyle Williams.
Before we get to the last, what, three wide receivers in our top 12 rankings.
Why don't you all ever talk about Kyle Williams? Should definitely be in the convo for early round two picks.
I think Jamie took him late in round two of our 14 team, or I've drafted him late in round two of one of my rookie drafts.
I think that there's probably a little bit of penalizing New England sins of the past at the wide receiver position in the draft.
And it was a different group of guys kind of Josh McDaniels is still there or back there. again, I, this is probably wrong. But I honestly think that
Trevion Henderson might catch more passes as a rookie than
Kyle Williams does.
Very possible. It's also possible that it's a it's a
flat, muted, right? You know, everybody gets 50 targets type
of thing. That's also in the range of outcomes for sure. But
if there's someone who can emerge, Kyle Williams
could be that. And here's the here's the, the hack in sleeper.
Kyle Williams, ADP is like buried. So if you're playing in
novice leagues, a lot of people won't draft that far ahead of
ADP just because they can't, you know, do it. Whereas I'm taking
that right after that 208 ish, you know, I'm happy to take them right
after the Bayshel tootin cam scatabow area right alongside
Jalen Millrow, you know, right that so late second, I'm ready
to do it. Especially if it's a full PPR league, no tight end
premium, because sometimes those other tight ends, maybe long
story short, Kyle Williams belongs there. Absolutely. I'm
I'm sure of it. Just for the for the off chance that he does get that he could be a hundred target player in
year one also possible here. So,
and he is my number 10 wide receiver. He just went number nine here for us.
I think he might've been seven or eight for Scott, but so he's, he's at nine.
I'm going to go ahead and take Jalen oil. I think like all the things you say
about Higgins and the positivity that the UN score reflects about Higgins
does give me concern because there's obviously already a great Nico Collins there. But
these guys have played together and both been extremely successful in the past. And I think
when you get to this part of the wide receiver rankings, it's hard to elevate anyone else over
him. We have a later question about sleepers at the wide receiver position. And
a lot of times, my cue, when you get past the first three rounds,
is just running backs. So there's not a lot of those. So I
think even though you took Williams there, and he would
have been right after Noel for me, I'll take Noel. We've got
two left. We've got 10. Let's think wide receiver 11 and 12.
I'm gonna snipe you. Because you should have taken them. You
should have taken them here. I probably would go would have
gone a different way if you did take your guy but I'm taking
Jalen Royals. Because how dare you not take Kansas City
player that is that is not right. I took my my Patriot I
took Kyle Williams. But yeah, Jalen Royals absolutely right here.
So is there any, I know that your process is much deeper than this, so I don't want this to sound insulting.
But is there any like strong case you can make for Jalen Royals that doesn't include the words chiefs or mohomes?
Yeah, yeah, for sure. This. I mean, what's ironic is that, you
know, I kept comping him to Rashi Rice. But like a tough one.
Like, this kid is just he's built like a, I can't say what
he's built, like a brick, you know, what house? Yeah, I'm
editing myself. I'm growing, I'm becoming a better, a better CBS
analyst. Here we go. But um, he, he's just a real
tough player. And so you know, he was hurt at the at the Senior
Bowl. So he wasn't able to really show out. He still kind
of gritted through it. Like this kid's a real tough player, comes
from a small school, the model takes that into consideration,
which is a good thing. Because his performance, you know, kind
of makes him a little bit more Sky more than it
does Rashi Rice, which, you know, not to use two kids in
city players there. But, you know, we're kind of hoping for
Rashi Rice, but we're scared he's Sky more. Again, not the
same type of player, but you know what I mean, outcome
related. I really like Jalen Royals. And he's also all I
know it's early, but a lot of positive things come out of camp
already. I think he's going to be a really tough kid and he's going to be a tough kid to get off
the field, you know, over the long, over the long term.
One real negative I thought from mini camp was his number selection.
Oh no.
Sounds like he's going to be number 11.
And I think it's a real missed opportunity because if people had the opportunity to buy
a chief's jersey that said Royals 85 when they won the World Series against the Cardinals
or Royals 15 when they won the World Series against the Mets.
I like this.
Then that would have been one of the most popular selling jerseys in Kansas City.
Royals 11, I'm not sure that's going to do things.
He's got to actually do things in the football field.
Where were you for this number selection?
This is absolutely 100% correct.
And by the way, another reason why Matthew Golden very,
very dubious on this number.
What are these select 2022?
Yeah, yeah, 22 that that's a lot of bad numbers.
Hopefully, I think some of these numbers will change when we get to August.
Oh my God, I hope so.
Shades of Skymores 24 choice, which was like, dude, you want to play
cornerback? I didn't know that. Yeah, absolutely. No good at all. Wide receiver 12. I will.
Let's just go ahead and get another chat question out of the way. Does Pat Michael Thomas 2.0 Bryant
have a chance to lead the Broncos in targets by next season.
If you mean by next season, 2026, I think you could make that argument.
If you saying 2025 with Cortland Sutton there, I don't think he has a very good chance,
but I kind of talk a little bit of what you thought about Bryant coming into the process
and then how like we've kind of saw this twice now and
we have to determine how to value Sean Payton's opinion and Sean Payton's press conferences
when it comes to RJ Harvey, a guy that was overdrafted based on projections, but a lot
of people really love him.
I'm not saying anything bad about him.
We just didn't need to go that early.
And then Pat Bryant, another guy who's overdrafted and somehow Sean Payton thinks it's a good idea to bring up Michael Thomas
when talking about him. What do you think about Bryant and how much are you
buying into the Sean Payton talk?
You know, it's funny, I have this, you had this last pick and there were two
players I wanted to make sure we mentioned if you took one or the other.
One of them was Pat Bryant. If you took the other, we'll talk about the other in a moment. But I think Pat Bryant, you know, I was kind of like
Luke warm before I didn't watch any film. I didn't really scout him very much. I knew of him and
thought he'd be a late round player. And then he kind of got drafted higher than we thought to a
situation that we kind of like. And then the model kind of likes him. And I'm like, I have to like
this Pat Bryant. And of course, I was all in on Marvin Mims. That was the year before we had the model. The model liked
Troy Franklin quite a bit. And then that's one of the model's misses if, well, if he misses, which it looks like he's a
miss. And so I'm two years in a row, you know, getting, you know, hoodwinked by this, uh, Denver Broncos wide receiver selection and Sean Payton,
I'm just going to make it three for three, be all in on Pat Bryant.
So I can just have one, two, three strikes and just get absolutely crushed.
Uh, three years in a row by Denver Bronco wide receiver prospects.
Never, never gone wrong for anyone that wraps up our top 12 wide receivers.
It goes Tet Hunter, Agbuka, Burden, Higgins, Golden, Harris,
Besh, Kyle Williams, Jalen Noll, Jalen Royals, Pat Bryant.
Let's get to you.
And Alec Iyamanor, I think, has to be mentioned here.
Do you have him as your next guy?
I just feel like he is directly behind Pat Bryant.
And I've got another name there that is solely just giving credit to the
Detroit lions. Um, it's that one hurts even worse than the Jack Bess one.
Doesn't it? When you saw maybe the, I'm not even going to say his name.
Just know that if you, if you go, uh, purchase the UN score and scroll to the
very bottom, like look for the lowest possible ranking you could possibly get.
You'll find a player and you'll find a player that was drafted by the lions.
You know who it is.
So let's get to a couple of these questions that we do still have leftover from the chat.
We didn't use them all.
And we got one here, 12 team dynasty league, any late round wide receiver flyers. I've got four 12 and five
12. My first like just off the cuff answer is no. Yeah, but
that's right. Like I think that's right. But at the same
time, I, the other thing I always say is once you get past
the first 36, maybe 40 picks, we have
absolutely no idea what order they're going to be drafted in or who's going to take who.
You might get a running back run.
It's possible that Tesla or I'll manner or maybe no, that's probably pretty much it.
Is there anybody else that you kind of like that's really just almost going unnoticed
on draft day at the wide receiver position. Yeah, I let me let me preface this by saying if the top 20 to 22 or 3 running backs have not been selected,
I'm talking down to Jacory Kroski, Merritt, Jordan James, even maybe Manangai, you know, all those guys.
And certainly Olly Gordon, Damian Martinez,
Trevor Etienne, Taj Brooks, Woody Marks.
If any of those guys are on the board,
do not draft a late wide receiver period.
You hit all those buttons first
because the asymmetrical upside of a running back
who's thrust into a starting role
is he could be sold like Carson Steele,
who nobody even knew who he was
for a second or first round pick. Whereas if a wide receiver gets thrust into the lineup
like Jacob Cowling did for the Niners, nobody even knows he played. Okay, so generally speaking,
the wide receivers, even if they get their shot, don't pan out. To that end, though, there are a couple players later that I do like. And, you know, as we
affectionately call them on the, on the Underground, which is our other podcast, which I'll mention on the out, is
Mr. Ricardo Blanco, which is Ricky White, out in, in Seattle. You know, he was a, you know, one of the best
Returners and special teams players. So he's got a special
teams avenue to stay on the team. So when you're talking about a late-round player, you don't want them to be cut. So
Ricky White is going to probably make the team as a special teamer. And if he's any good, could find a role in the
offense, especially on a shallow depth chart like Seattle. So Ricky White's a good one. There's others. I don't know if
you have any. I like Ty Felton and Tori Horton. They're a little bit earlier, but sometimes because of that running back run,
and maybe tight end and quarterback, sometimes one of those two guys, Ty Felton or Tori Horton, which are priority late
round ads for me. So if I'm in that fourth round, and all of a sudden the running backs have gone rat-a-tat-tat, and one of those two guys is
still there, I'm absolutely smashing on either Ty Felton or Torrey Horton for the same reasons. Ty Felton could be the
wide receiver 3 in Minnesota. And, you know, if he's any good, the model thinks he's pretty good, then he could have an
opportunity to actually get some targets in that offense. Torrie Horton plays where, my goodness,
there could be ample opportunity, same sort of story for Ricky White. But I think Torrie Horton is going to actually
play almost out the gate as a deep threat in that Seattle offense.
We had one more name that got thrown in there while we were talking. And it is the man who hopefully serves as a future example for years and
years to come of prospects.
If you have an ankle that is swollen to the size of a softball, maybe
don't run the 40 that is Restrepo.
And I'm kind of open to this idea just because like obviously crushed his draft capital
with the combine performance, but there's probably a reason for that.
Like he wasn't healthy.
Maybe we can look back and laugh in two years about remember when he
fell because he tried to run the 40 on a broken, he wasn't broken, but on a,
on a badly sprained ankle, uh, any, any appeal there at like, I mean, I think probably at 5'12", yes, for sure. Even as early as late fourth?
Sure, because he's also with his quarterback. They're in love symmetry there, you know, camaraderie. You know, he knows how he
plays, right? I mean, there's, there's that. He does play a slot role, which is an easy role to access in the NFL. In
other words, you don't have to have some sort of athleticism off the charts. You really just need to be productive. We've
seen it in New England with Phil and White Guy X, whether it's's Amandola Welker, you know, all these guys that have played there that
haven't been exactly, um, you know, that athletic, uh, so yeah, there's
a path for him to get tech targets and to be successful, um, which is the
same reason I like Alec Imanor, uh, who also scores very well in the model.
I have taken a few, a little heat over the years about my mocking of, uh,
Duvall
and the Jacksonville Jaguars, which in fairness to me, they've given us a lot
of reasons to mock, but we're going to be nice.
And we're going to finish with three questions about the Jacksonville Jaguars.
We will start with who is the Mike Evans in Duvall.
We're talking about this, this system that was in Tampa Bay coming
to Jacksonville this season, I've heard talk about how man Travis Hunter is going to
get that Chris Godwin role, but I've also heard talk about how, Oh no, Brian
Thomas is going to have that Chris Godwin role.
Do you think that just because they have the head coach that designed that
offense last year, they are going to have a Mike Evans and a Chris Godwin role,
or are these guys just different players?
Well, I know it certainly won't be Gabe Davis that much. It will not be Gabe Davis
Unfortunately, and we can probably rule out Parker Washington playing the Chris Godwin role. Yeah
Look, yeah, I think you know to whatever extent you want to say that it is
I mean Brian Thomas will be playing the Brian Thomas role,
which is dude runs downfield and beats everybody. He's faster
than everybody, bigger, stronger, super athletic, great
at the catch point. I don't know, is that the Mike Evans
role? I mean, I guess. I think, you know, the cool thing about,
you know, Travis Hunter is, as I mentioned, he played about 94%
out wide last year. Year before that, he played about 94% out wide last year.
Year before that, he played about 70% in the slot. So he can
play slot or outside. You know, he's proven he can play
anywhere. So I think in two wide receiver sets, it's going to be
Hunter and, and Thomas, it'll be interesting to see how they sort
of deploy. I don't know if you ever watch games, you ever do
this, Heath, you're watching a game. And I'll look over at the people I'm with, like, they're
gonna run here. And then they'll run the ball. And they go, how
did you know that? It's just because like, CD lamb came off
the field, or Steph digs used to do this. He'd come off the
field. I'm like, they're running the football here. This is a
running play. Like literally, they didn't announce it. I
wonder if they'll do that with Hunter where it's like, they're
gonna run the ball. They're just like, he comes off the field.
They're gonna run the football here They're just like, he comes off. They're gonna run
the football here. This is like age old thing where they'll try
to save snaps for premier wide receivers so that they don't
have to, you know, endure more physical contact by blocking. I
think that's probably what they'll do with Travis Hunter,
by the way. But anyway, I'm digressing.
Okay, question number two from Jacksonville.
Will Trevor Lawrence finally break out with the new coach and getting Travis
Hunter if I, again, I've taken a little bit of heat for being the skeptic on
Trevor Lawrence, but if it was ever going to happen, I mean, it happened for
Sam Darnold way too late.
Gino Smith had a career year after 30.
Trevor Lawrence isn't that old.
Is it time?
I've been the biggest Trevor Lawrence excuse maker on the
internet, and it's pathetic because I don't even like him
that much, but it's like I've just been sort of betting
against, you know, Trevor the whole time.
Like even as a rookie, I was like, I don't know if he's a
generational player, so I bet against that. That was a rookie, I was like, I don't know if he's a generational player.
So I bet against that. That was a win. But I've been betting
against the sort of the opposite of that for so many years now.
And it just has not happened. I feel like he's a really good
football player, really good player. He's gotten hurt. He
got his head smashed on the ground. Like that was rough to
watch. Like he's had a couple of really tough injuries that
have slowed him down. The offense hasn't been
good. The organization is always a mess. Yeah, you'd like to think this year things can come together. He's got two great
weapons. I don't know, man. I'm unqualified to answer this question. Emotional damage.
Here's what I can tell you. If we finally get the Trevor Lawrence breakout, I can tell you with near certainty what it's going to look like.
And it's going to look like he figure things out in the red zone. As a rookie, he had a disastrous
2% touchdown rate. You don't make too much of that because he was a rookie and he had Urban
Meyer. And that's something rookie quarterbacks often struggle with. Year two, it jumped up to
4.3%.
We thought, okay, he's looking like a normal NFL quarterback.
The sky's the limit.
The last two years, 3.7 and 3.9% touchdown rates.
He owns a career 3.4% touchdown rate on 2034 pass attempts.
I'd say that's historic,
not because there haven't been people worse,
but almost everybody who throws 2,000 passes with a touchdown rate that low gets
replaced. Right. He is getting so many more opportunities than anybody else
rightfully should and that's that will be the place is we'll see I think early
on if you see him finding success with Hunter and Thomas in the red zone I'm
probably gonna buy priorly.
If he has a couple of 350 yard pass games where he throws two touchdowns on 45
attempts,
I'm not going to be quite as certain that it's actually happening.
We've got one more Jacksonville question.
And I think we kind of answered the first part of this.
How high is your Travis Hunter faith compared to last year's elite
wide outs?
And the ques- the answer is not as high.
Like we, we would view him more of a second tier wide receiver at best in the last couple
of draft classes, but he got offered Jamar Chase for Travis Hunter plus Devon Hain.
Now I'm higher on Hunter than I think consensus is in terms
of the wide receiver rankings and maybe even in terms of dynasty values. And so I look
at my trade chart and this is a case where the two player side definitely is worth more
value as I talk about all the time. If you're giving away the best player in the league,
you have to get at least a 10% premium in value.
What I hadn't thought of until this moment is what if you're trading the best player,
not just in the trade, but in your entire fantasy football league, which you might be
if you trade Jamar Chase away, I probably have to get an even bigger surplus.
What do you think of this offer?
Somebody offers, you just took Travis Hunter on a rookie draft.
They were right behind you and desperately wanted him.
And they said, you know what?
I'll give you Chase and Travis,
or Chase for Hunter and HN.
In almost all situations I'm taking Chase here.
So, I mean, there's maybe some roster situations
where I wouldn't, hey, by the way,
we're talking about Travis Hunter.
So if you go back and look at Trevor Lawrence, so if you remember, Brian Thomas Jr. played with Trevor Lawrence
and he played with Mac Jones, he was more efficient. He was
more efficient with Trevor Lawrence, but he saw a much
higher target share with Mac Jones. Mac Jones was locked
onto him. But when Brian Thomas Jr. played
with other receivers with Trevor Lawrence, his target share was lower than
it was with Mac Jones. In college, Travis Hunter had a higher targets per route
run than Brian Thomas Jr. As a matter of fact, Brian Thomas Jr., one of the lower
targets per route run amongst elite receivers as a college player.
It's very very possible that Travis Hunter out targets Brian Thomas Jr. I would expect Brian Thomas Jr. to make more big plays, be more involved in the red zone, have more touchdowns, things of that nature,
but it's very very possible we're looking at a situation where I'll just make it up here that we see Travis Hunter with
140 targets and you know Brian Thomas Jr Thomas, you know, 110, 120 type
of thing. Maybe not in year one. I don't really know how year
one plays out. But you know, especially out the gate, but
sort of where it's where the water settles, it could be that
we just see a couple of more targets per game going to Travis
Hunter with the bigger plays going to Brian Thomas. I think
that's actually, I'm not predicting that I have Brian Thomas ahead of Travis Hunter. But when we talk about the ways that Travis
Hunter can get there, even despite Brian Thomas Jr. being there, that's kind of the story
you have to tell. But yeah, give me chase, please.
Yeah, I don't think at the very least, I think we're probably in agreement that the fact
that Brian Thomas Jr. is there should not make you shy away from believing in Travis Hunter's upside. If he delivers on everything
that's possible for him, I think he's probably going to be the best wide receiver in Jacksonville
personally, especially in a full PPR league. Scott, fantastic work. Really appreciate everything that
you bring to the show. Always enjoy having conversations with you. Tell everybody once more where they can find your work and more specifically where they can find the UN score.
Yeah, absolutely. So the UN score, one key point to make mention about the UN score is that all the proceeds that we get from this go to the creators of it. Jay Wood, who developed it. It's a really slick, you know, product, I guess. I mean, graphically, it's really cool. Dukes obviously
does amazing work on that. We just give that all to them. They
deserve it. They worked hard. It's their labor of love. So
that's number one. Number two, so you can find that at
undropables.shop, whatever, you know, in our shop on
theundropables.com. It's 20 bucks. It's nothing. And you have all the historical stuff.
Awesome. And if you have it this year, we usually give you a deal
on next year when you add to it, whatever. Anyway, that is
number one. Number two, we've been doing a new show myself
Travis Seale and Joe Kuvatakis, the dynasty underground. Dude,
this show is fun. Those guys are great. I'm having such a blast.
It is so much fun. We are really unearthing our processes and having a ton of fun.
If you're a Dynasty guy and you're not watching and or listening to the Dynasty Underground, man, you're missing out.
It's a lot of fun. We're getting a lot of great feedback. So if you're going to check anything out, go check that
out. Of course, I do the undrafted. I'll have JJ Zacharyson on this week. And that's been a lot of fun as well. So check
it out.
this week. And that's been a lot of fun as well. So check it out.
And you know, I've just been perusing the very bottom of the
last seven years of the UN score as I was trying to validate my
love for Jack Besh. And I'm just going to go ahead and make the
bold prediction. I'm not going to say any names. There is a
player who had a worse UN score than Jack Besh that is going to
be a top 24 wide receiver in fantasy football this
season.
You guys can go go buy the product, go peruse the rankings, figure out who you think it
is.
You know what, if you can figure out who you think it is and you send me an email, I might
just let you in the podcast league.
I'm going to quiz Scott as soon as we get done and see if he's already figured out who
it is.
But thank you all for listening.
Thank you for being here, Scott.
Thank you, Harry, for making everything work like it's supposed to.
We will talk to you on Friday.