Fantasy Football Today - AFC and NFC West PROJECTIONS! (07/09 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: July 9, 2020

Before we get into the projections, would you rather have Austin Ekeler or Aaron Jones in a non-PPR league? Now, let's talk about the position battles in the AFC and NFC West (3:05) and why Clyde Edwards-Helaire owners should hope for more touches than Heath and Ben have him projected for (5:25) ... AFC West projections for KC (8:00), LV (19:14), DEN (26:55) and LAC (33:55). Can Patrick Mahomes surpass his 2018 passing yards total? The Raiders are a mess. Heath has a lot more carries for Melvin Gordon than Ben does. Which Chargers are we excited to draft? Any of them? ... NFC West projections for SF (42:35), SEA (49:30), LAR (55:00) and ARI (1:00:40). Jimmy Garoppolo's efficiency is worth noting. Is there a statistical basis for drafting D.K. Metcalf ahead of Tyler Lockett? How will the Rams replace Todd Gurley's touchdowns? How fast-paced will Arizona's offense be? ... Email us at [e-mail]  Nominate us on PodcastAwards! https://www.podcastawards.com/app/signup/ '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, @YardsPerGretch, @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/ 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 I did, it 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. New intro! Updated intro! It had to include, you know, we just had gone too long without it including Ben Schrager, so we had to make sure

Schraggy B was in there. Welcome, Ben Gretsch! Ben, you made the intro. Congratulations. It's about time. You told me yesterday you had something special for me today and to get excited or something like that. But yeah, I was still surprised. I mean, I knew that was coming too.

I didn't really know what the heck you were talking about. Heath didn't have any reaction at all. Heath had no idea it was coming. He was just like, didn't care. Not at all. Didn't mean anything for me. I don't know why I would. When does Heath ever show emotion about anything?

It's true. It's true. He doesn't get emotional. It's really strange. Oh, you guys, if you only knew. I would love to know. You have to let us know next time you get emotional. Maybe you'll get emotional about the controversial decision I made last night

regarding fantasy football. Today we are projecting the NFC and the AFC West. Kansas City Chiefs, they don't run a lot of plays, but man, they're good every time they do run a play. We'll talk about backfield battles with the Chargers, with the Seahawks, not so much there, I guess, but with the 49ers. Yeah, we'll get into it.

Let me ask you about this decision that nobody's talking about in the fantasy community. I said on Twitter, I said, I have to keep one player in a dynasty league only one year. Round doesn't matter. Non-PPR, Austin Eckler, or Aaron Jones? And I let Twitter

decide, and they decided 60-40. Aaron Jones. Despite the CBS rankings. How do you feel about that? You said non-PPR? Non-PPR. I would take Aaron Jones.

You would? It's weird about that. I don't know. I felt like the CBS people would be... I don't have your rankings in front of me. I just have the other three, you know? I thought... Heath, would you still take Eckler in that scenario?

Yeah, I think I have them as like a push, though. They're right in the same range. There's nothing about that surprising. I don't know why I was surprised it was so lopsided. 60-40? Yeah. Because you're talking about Dynasty, too. We're not super excited about Jones. No, it's one year.

Oh, you said one year. I just made a Scott Fishbowl pick. Jack Doyle in the 13th round as my third tight end. Nice. I still only have one tight end. I got to definitely change that. All right. Well, the start of the show wasn't nearly as hot,

as emotional as I thought it was going to be. So let's go to the projections. See if Heath wants to get start reacting, get emotional over something here. How about this? Well, actually, I'll throw it to you first. Heath, one thing from the projections of these eight teams, if you wanted to highlight one thing, what would it be?

Position battles? I guess, I don't know if it's quite the right way to say it, but there is so much uncertainty in role. I think you could have a pretty good debate in Seattle with Tyler Lockett or DK Metcalf, who's going to get the most targets. We've got the whole competition between Tevin Coleman and Raheem Mostert. We've got in Denver, the Melvin Gordon-Philip Lindsay split. And I think there's a decent chance that Jerry Judy could overtake Cortland Sutton by the end of the year with the Chargers.

It's who's the second running back with Austin Eckler and what percentage of the carries they're getting. A lot of these teams have unknowns in terms of the number of touches they're going to get, more so it seems like than the other divisions. And you didn't even talk about the Raiders, who I think have more than any team in the league. Every position, it's like a thing. Well, except for running back

in terms of carries right yeah but all of their backup running backs have pass catching chops so we don't know what the running back receiving role will be and i would even say at tight end i think people would would maybe disagree with me there too but they used foster moreau in the red zone a lot last year now they've brought in jason whitton and it's like well are those guys gonna play a little bit more than you know in a way that impacts Darren Waller? I don't know. Oh, you guys have a pretty significant statistical decline for Darren Waller, not surprisingly.

I thought that the projections... Oh, I'm sorry. I will give what stood out to me after I throw it over to Ben. Ben, was there one thing that you wanted to highlight? Didn't he just highlight the Raiders? I don't know. He thought I was kind of piggybacking off of yours. I was. I'll say I had both Cooper Cup and

Robert Woods as top 15 receivers. I didn't think I'd have them both that high. They both came out higher than where I have them ranked, and I moved them up my rankings accordingly. Wondering if you should be moving Jared Goff up your rankings then. Where is he?

I've liked him as a late round QB, pretty much all off season, right behind Stafford. If you ask me, another guy that I'm, that I think has been undervalued, it's been Goff frequently. And in six point,

I think he's, I think he came out as QB 11 for me. So, or no, I guess it's QB 14 and 4-point. Yeah, yeah. That's right. All right.

Well, here's something that stood out to me. You guys have about 190 touches projected for Clyde Edwards-Elair. The fewest touches for a top 12 running back last year in full PPR was Austin Eckler's 224. And Mark Ingram had 228. So that was two guys who were kind of low touches, but I just want to make sure I didn't do the math wrong, but I don't think you have 200 touches for Clyde Edwards-Elair, right?

No, you do not. I have 197. Yeah, so that's really low. And Ben has 188. And you don't have him projected as a top 12 running back, but you have him as 20 and 22, respectively, for Heath and Ben. But I just want people to kind of get an idea, at least last year, what it took.

The fewest amount of touches for any running back in the top 12 was 224. I'm not defending Clyde Edwards, Elias ADP, but this is where we can get into that discussion. We had where we went back and forth last week or whatever, whenever it was about players that can come on later in the season, because I don't think Clyde Edwards, Elias necessarily has to finish top 12 to justify, justify being drafted,

say RB 12. If he is a top five running back in the second half of the season and helps you win your league. Agreed. It's a good point. Okay. So then, with that being said, let's get into it after we tell

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They've been 23rd and 25th in plays the last two seasons, but it really hasn't mattered. They're obviously the premier offense in the NFL, I would think. Do you have projected? Do you project that out? Who's going to score the most points? Well, um,

last week when we were talking about the, or yesterday or two days ago, we were talking about a team scoring 41 touchdowns and Ben had them at 46. It was the Colts. I think I've got the chiefs at 51. I've got them at 53 and a half. That's how I look at them at, at it.

Adam is, is touchdowns. like he's saying. And I don't think I have anyone for more touchdowns than that. Okay, well, I'd like to know Heath's Harrison Butker projection. Do you have that? I do not have any kicker projections at all. 11 and a half wins for the Chiefs. What do you think?

Over. I'm going to say over. Pretty easily, yeah. Okay. Number to know is 114. That's how many points the Chiefs fell off from their league-leading mark in 2018. And it might sound... This is just, I think, a quote from the article

we wrote in the team preview, but it might sound like a lot, but it's pretty comparable to what happened with the Broncos coming off their historic 2013. They only fell from first to second in scoring. It was a 124-point drop-off. Chiefs were something like seventh in scoring last year. Obviously, Tyreek Hill got hurt.

Patrick Mahomes got hurt, right? Right. Yeah. All right. So what do you guys want to highlight with the projections here? How about Mahomes? Do you have him for 5,000 passing yards? Not quite, right?

48-12 for me. Yeah, and I got him at 48-89, but that's a league-leading number for me. I didn't project anyone for 5,000 this year. I think I did project Jameis last year, but yeah, typically you don't project 5,000 passing yard seasons, and the volume

is a big reason why, and Adam, you noted it, and it ties into project 5,000 passing yard seasons. And the volume is a big reason why. And Adam, you noted it, and it ties into the Titans point I made yesterday. Their own efficiency slows down their volume. They score so quick, they don't run a lot of plays. Mahomes, though, he threw for 5,100 yards two years ago. And before his injury, his first six games, he was on pace for 5,600 passing yards. So there's a lot of potential for even better than for 5,600 passing yards. So there's, there's a lot of potential for even better than these projections,

which are great. Yeah. I mean, I think that's an interesting point and it's probably a fault of mine. I would say in my projection that I probably regressed his outlandish passing efficiency back a little, but if that happens, they'd probably have to run more plays,

but I probably didn't regress their play volume up. And, and so now I have this like still slow offense, But if that happens, they probably have to run more plays, but I probably didn't regress their play volume up. And so now I have this still slow offense, but that kind of would require him to still have outlandish efficiency. It might mean that I'm missing something. Well, okay, Mahomes is great, and he's the second quarterback off the board. He'll be first or second in your drafts. Now, Damian Williams, Clyde Edwards, Eliar Heath, how did you go about chopping these guys up?

This is about as close as I have it for the rookie running backs in terms of total carries. I've got 152 for Clyde, 148 for Damian, and then like 20 or 30 for somebody else. And I do have Clyde Edwards, Eliar, with quite a bit more work in the passing game. I'm not sure that I feel comfortable with that projections. Like he was really good at that in college. It's also something that most rookies have to work their

way into. And then much like the Colts, even though I have more carries for Edwards E layer than I do Williams, I've got them at a push on touchdowns. And I think if I'm devaluing anyone there, I'm probably devaluing Williams. I think he's more likely to score the touchdowns early in the year at least. Ben, I want you to comment on that, but I also want to ask you about the Clyde Edwards-Elair catches in college because 55 catches is like an enormous number for a running back, but he had 14 catches in his first two seasons. I'll skip his freshman year. He barely played, it seems, but he had 11 catches as a sophomore, and then everyone's numbers were so inflated

in 2019. They just had the greatest offense ever, maybe? I don't... Probably. They're one of the most prolific teams ever. So, you talk about college stats a lot, and I just wanted to know what you thought

about the number of 55 catches for Clyde Edwards-Z ziller but in the context of what lsu did last year is that a number that really pops at you it still pops yeah it's the highest uh for a running back in the sec for a ton of years um and then it's not the other thing i would say is it's not uncommon at all for running backs to not be used in the passing game early in their college careers, or even throughout their entire college careers in college, you see a lot more offenses, just line up and give really good talents handoffs and not throw them the football.

So we have seen a lot of players who don't catch passes in college, then start to show that ability in the pros. I mean, Melvin Gordon's one that I mentioned on yesterday's show, and we'll talk about him today. He, he caught almost no passes at wisconsin it's just such a run heavy offense and then and then he's been able to do it pretty well at the nfl level so i'm not worried about the fact that he didn't catch many before last year and i am really impressed by how many caught in his final season all right so why don't you talk about

how you split up the backfield you have clyde edwards ziller as rb22 and damian williams is rb37 whereas heath has williams as rb, getting 28 more carries than you have him for. You only have 120 carries for Damian Williams. Yeah. And I'm not really sure why, because it looks like we have a similar overall runs and I'm not giving a ton of work to, I guess maybe I give some work to Deandre Washington and maybe I'm

allocating more work to like Daryl Williams and Darwin Thompson and I'm giving everybody a few touches because I think they might just rotate those guys in a little bit too still um but I yeah I don't think I'm down on Williams pretty much everything he said I'll agree with and I also think I'm probably wrong to have Edward Solaire for more touchdowns because I agree with that point from Heath as well I have I have Edward Solaire comfortably ahead in touchdowns and I think he's probably right that Williams will be trusted more near the goal line. He's been so prolific

at scoring touchdowns for the Chiefs. Should people listen to this podcast and feel kind of down on Clyde Edwards-Ziller? Because his ADP right now is RB14 between Josh Jacobs and Todd Gurley. I tried to say this during the Twitch on Tuesday night.

And I don't want people to get down. I think that Clyde Edwards either is not good or he doesn't have enormous boom potential. I just think we should draft him a round and a half later. And then everybody can talk about how awesome he is and how much upside he is. There's nothing wrong with drafting a rookie running back with a ton of upside in the third round.

That's what we generally do with rookie running backs. Let's just do that, and then we can all talk positively about him. Let's talk about the passing game here. If you look at teams, I like that, by the way. If you look at teams that have had multiple wide receivers finish top 24, top 25, in the case of the Lions last year, Marvin Jones was just outside of top 24. They are tied very closely to prolific passing offenses in terms of passing yards.

So you would think the Chiefs would be a great candidate for that. You don't have any secondary wide receivers other than Tyreek Hill, obviously, projected as a top 50 guy, Hardman or Watkins or Robinson. And, of course, the difference between the Chiefs and those other teams is Travis Kelsey, obviously cuts in. But, yeah, go ahead.

But Heath has both Hardman and Watkins for the same amount of targets. I have Hardman seeing four more targets. And I think this is similar to the running back discussion and where should you take him and this and that. The reality is, if either of these receivers winds up being the clear number two they will smash their adp that's part of why cloud awards hilaire gets bumped up as well but these two are really cheap and i think they're

too cheap uh because the the overarching point and the similarity between the positions the chiefs are going to score a ton of touchdowns that's what we just talked about at the top right like they're going to score if you have a guy who's in a full-time role in this offense at any point in Clyde Edwards, Hillier's, you know, situation if Damian Williams gets banged up again and he gets to be the lead back or, you know, in, in Hardman situation, if he just beats out Watkins or if Watkins plays and Hardman still in kind of a bit role.

I mean, these are guys I like taking shots on late in drafts for sure. Who do you like better? I like Hardbin better. I think he's got more, more upside generally. But I have a really good Tyree kill stat too, that I uncovered in the projections. Sure.

Heath, just tell me real quick who you like better than we'll get the Tyree kill stat. Yeah. Hardman. I mean, we've seen Sammy Watkins as the number two with Hardman just playing a little bit,

at least when Tyree kill is healthy and Sammy hasn't delivered on that upside that I think is still there. So Hardman, I'm a little bit more excited about what Tyreek Hill is healthy. And Sammy hasn't delivered on that upside that I think is still there. So Hardman, I'm a little bit more excited about what he could do if he gets the chance. Dare I say, maybe you should draft them both? See what happens? I did that. Friendship strategy.

It's not really the friendship strategy, but it's... I think it's the best example of the friendship strategy. Well, that's because you don't know what the original friendship strategy was. What was the original? Because, no, it was that if you had two guys and if one of them got hurt, he'd turn into a star, and that's exactly what this is. M.

I think it was more like – That was a Heath Cy for Adam. M. A top 20 guy and, like, a top 40 guy was the way it started. I think it was Mari Cooper and Michael Crabtree was the original. What's your Tyreek Hill stat. So we talk about how like his 2019 wasn't quite as good as 2018 was so much better. And I've,

I've mentioned on some shows that he had a couple of games that he got hurt. Right. So he had two games where he played sub 20% snaps. He played 19 total snaps, four targets, two catches, 16 yards, barely played in those games. Week one where he broke his collarbone and the Mexico city game against the chargers is like week 10 or something. He got hurt really quickly in that game. 19 total snaps in those games. We remove those games, take his other 10 games and pace them for 16 games.

He has 136 targets on that pace is 2018. He had 137 targets, 90 catches. He had 87 in 2018, 1,350 yards. He had 1,479 in 2018, and he would pace for 11 touchdowns. He had 12 in 2018, basically the exact same line with about a hundred fewer yards, but almost everywhere else across the board, the exact same line. I actually would argue we have two years now of Tyreek Hill showing that 2018 season, which was the number one non-PPR season, and I believe it was number two or number three in PPR. Number three.

I think we, number three? I think we have two seasons in a row now showing that, and it's hard to project that. I'm projecting him lower across the board, but I still have him, I believe, I have a wide receiver three behind Adams who you have to project for a ton of targets, but I don't know.

I think Hill goes too low right now. He's right on par with Adams for me. And I would also say he wasn't very good in the last five games of the year after he got hurt against the Chargers. He was 55 to 72 yards in every game, and he had one game with two touchdowns, and that was it. And so, I don't know.

And he wasn't that good in the playoffs either. I think he had a good Super Bowl, but I don't think Tyreek Hill was himself after that second injury. Okay, spent a lot of time in the Chiefs, so let's go to our second team. The Raiders? Really? They're projected to be second place in the division.

It's very close. Oh, it looks like we have three teams with the total at William Hill at seven and a half wins. How about that? Okay, the Raiders are up next. Seven and a half wins for the Raiders. Under. Yeah.

Under, okay. 43.4%. That's the number. Just 43.4% of the Raiders' pass attempts went to wide receivers in 2019. Third lowest mark in the league. I hope they got some new wide receivers. Okay, let's see.

Josh Jacobs is round two in between Austin Eckler and Clyde Edwards-Elair. Henry Ruggs is wide receiver 46. Darren Waller's tight end five. He's going 12 picks after Zach Ertz, 10 picks before Tyler Higbee, and he's around six pick right now in ADP. Heath, let's talk about the running back splits here

with the Las Vegas Raiders, and it's all Jacobs, but not in the passing game. You give almost all the carries to Josh Jacobs, and you hope that he actually holds up to it for 16 games and gets close to 300 attempts. I think I've got him at 283, but I wouldn't surprise me at all. If he got to 300, really, really struggle with the number of targets to give him because J. I still have him with 28 catches. It feels like it might, I don't have any idea what a ceiling is, but that feels like it might be a little bit high looking at it right now. I've got Richard with 35 and then 23 more from the rest of the group. I still don't know,

like even with the addition of these wide receivers, like last year or 2018, they were amongst the lowest in the league in terms of the number of the targets that went to their wide receivers. They went out and added Antonio Brown, which obviously didn't work out. They added Tyrell Williams. They added Hunter Renfro and they were amongst the worst in terms of

targets that went to wide receivers. So I, I have downgraded Darren Waller more than it feels like I probably should have. I felt the same way down on Waller all off season, but I dropped him down to 92 targets. And I felt while doing this projection, like I would want that number to go up higher than I would want it to

continue to go down. Like, I feel like he's still a pretty good, pretty good bet for 90 targets. And that puts him right at number five or number six in my projection so it probably means that i've been a little unfair to him kind of throughout the offseason just want to look at the pure stats darren waller last year had 1145 yards on 117 targets only three touchdowns you guys have him projected 845 yards for Heath,

747 yards for Ben, and less than 70 catches. But more touchdowns, that's good, four to five touchdowns. And for me, like I said, yeah, it came out at tight end six. But across the board in this projection, and he's probably right about Josh Jacobs'

rushes, and I'm probably low on that, but there's probably nothing else on this that I can take anything actionable from I just guessed at Henry Ruggs Tyrell Williams Hunter Renfro and Brian Edwards roles and I didn't know whether to project those that's who I wound up as a top four but Nelson Aguilar could play Zay Jones got like 30 targets last year and could play I just guessed at the backup running back splits with Jalen Rashard and Lynn Bowden and Devante Booker. No idea there, no idea what kind of role Jason Whitten is going to play. None of this is something that I feel is actionable for like what their

upsides are. Like if rugs is a little legitimate number one, or if one of those backup running backs is the clear passing down back, there's value. But right now I just have it all split out and none of it seems actionable to me. Agree, Heath? Probably.

I can't make a valid argument for any of those things. I've got Ruggs, Renfro, and Williams within 16 targets of each other. Like 87, 76, 71. Waller, I dropped all the way to 93 targets and he's still leading the team. And that's like somebody's probably going to get a hundred targets if they all play 16

games, but I don't know. They may not. I don't, I don't have a good, I know how I wish they would use Henry rugs. I'd like to see them play Brian Edwards and nothing against Hunter and fro.

I'd like to see them play Brian Edwards and Tyrell Williams outside more play rugs in the slot more and and use them more on gadget plays, and then I'd be a little more excited about him. I don't get very excited about an outside wide receiver for Derek Carr running deep and making plays. Well, people like Renfro. We get a lot of questions about him. He had a good rookie year.

We talked about him on Twitch on Tuesday night, and Ben pointed out he had two really long catch-and-run plays. But still, in the middle of the season, he was looking like a fairly solid PPR flex option and doing well for a rookie. And just, you know, 605 yards and four touchdowns in 13 games, not so bad. But over 100 of those yards on those two plays.

Well, okay. But it's not like he's not gonna have any big plays and maybe actually maybe he won't it's kind of a slot receipt yeah i mean that's the part that i think it's harder to buy into the you know the like a big play on a guy who caught these slants and took them to the house as opposed to being like a you know a deep threat who made a play well that i might think could happen again next year. But maybe the easier way to just like put a bow on the whole Raiders is like draft. Jacob is an elite running back draft. Waller is a mid range tight end.

And maybe you throw a dart at rugs. Yep. Do you see top five potential for, uh, for Josh Jacobs? And actually, why don't you tell me where he is in your non PPR projections? If you have that,

or just in your rankings, I can grab that. I do believe there is top five non PPR upside. Undoubtedly. I have him ninth right now in non PPR and I got, he's right behind mile Sanders. I wouldn't be all that surprised if he was better than mile Sanders and non PPR.

I have him 12th in non, which is within a couple points of 9th. They're all really close, right behind Mixon and Aaron Jones and Kenyon Drake. They're all within 3 points. But I don't have him as high as I thought, and he didn't come out as high in PPR as I thought.

RB16, and he was actually like a whole tier below the Mixon and Jones and Drake guys because I didn't project them for nearly. Are you going to draft them that way? Well, yeah, this made me, this projection made me more concerned about his upside personally to answer your question. You know, you, you referenced the rush attempts.

I wonder what you have the Raiders at in terms of run pass, because last year they ran more than you would expect for a bad team. And I still view them as a bad team, but they're like, they're closer to an average team. I think they went seven to nine last year they ran more than you would expect for a bad team. And I still view them as a bad team, but they're closer to an average team. They went 7-9 last year. They got a 7.5 over-under. I've got them at 411 rush attempts this year. Ben has them at 420.

I have their run percentage coming back toward league average, about two percentage points. But you have them for nine more rushes than I do. Yeah. Yeah, I think I'm just splitting out the runs more than I should. But I don't know how many, like our rushing yards and rushing touchdowns aren't far. I got to tell you, Ben, Devontae Booker's not getting 71 carries.

Yeah, maybe that's wrong. Yeah. All right, let's fix that. Okay, let's go to our next question. But I think that's instructive to people because, especially non-ppr if you gave josh jacobs i think 25 more carries he probably moves up three spots in your non-ppr rankings or in mine he would he certainly would yeah all right let's go to our next team here it is the the Denver Broncos. Seven and a half wins. What do you think? Under.

I'm going under. Pick under for all the AFC West teams that are not the Chiefs. Yeah, they're going 0-6 in those games against the Chiefs, right? Yeah. You'll get two of them right. One of them will win seven or eight games. Yeah. We'll debate the last one.

The number to know for Denver is 23.1. Pat Shermer, who's now their offensive coordinator, 23.1 total touches per game for his running backs last year with the Giants. And that was a three-year low. His running backs hit 27.4 touches per game in 2018, 33.2 touches per game in 2019.

So that was one year with the Vikings, two years with the Giants. Pat Shermer, Pat Shermer's good for fantasy, I would have to say. And I think the thing that stood out in the projections here was Melvin Gordon and Phillip Lindsey.

Melvin Gordon's going in round three between Todd Gurley and Leonard Fournette. Phillip Lindsey is the 44th running back off the board. Cortland Sutton, by the way, is wide receiver 20 between DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett, between the Seahawks guys.

But yeah, let me just get those projections up because I think it was Heath. Yeah, Heath, you have 203 carries for Melvin Gordon and 56 catches. Ben has only 175 carries and only 43 catches. So just a big gap. RB 16 for Heath, RB 23 for Ben. So Heath, I'll call you the optimist here on Melvin Gordon. Yeah. I don't know how optimistic I am. I have him at 3.8 yards per

carry. So it's not like, wow, how could that, that's pretty low. Well, I think he's got one season, his career over four, right? I, yeah, but he's usually like right at four, isn't he? 3.9, four? So I should definitely have him a tenth of a yard higher. Yeah, I think the fact that they went out and added him, they didn't, in my opinion, really have much of a need at running back with Philip Lindsay and Royce Freeman, and they made the decision to go out and get him and pay him some money. So I'm anticipating that they are going to give him,

I've got him at 50% of the team's rush attempts. I may just have a lot more rushes than Ben, too. Well, I think it's close on rushes, but I have a lot fewer passes, and so that includes... I have him at Gordon at 43.5%.

I have Lindsey at 35%. So I just have a bigger split for Lindsey. And you have them running 37 fewer plays, Ben. Yeah. So I think there's a legitimate possibility this team is outright bad for fantasy. And it all goes back to the quarterback. I think Drew Locke could be good, but I was trying to talk about this on Twitch a little last night and we had some big hands that kind of cut in. They chose after Joe Fleckle got hurt to start Brandon Allen for three games while he put up a 46% completion percentage so that they could tailor Drew Locke starts

to favorable matchups. They did not bring Locke back, even when there was a buy in that span. I don't know that a lot of people remember this, but there was always talk about like, why aren't we seeing Drew Locke? Brandon Allen was not playing good football. And then they let him play three home games

in his final five games. They were against the Chargers, the Lions. I can't remember who. I don't have their schedule in front of me, but not good teams. He played two road games. One of them was also against a not very good team, and then the other was against the Chiefs, and they got crushed against the Chiefs.

Yes, he went 4-1 or whatever it was in those games, but he wasn't particularly great. Now they have a lot of talent around him, but I'm not convinced that Drew Locke can start 16 games and be very good. And I don't even think that they thought that last year. I think they just kind of tailored it to make it look

really good. I don't know. I'm not that optimistic on this offense. And I think if you look at his past attempts in those five starts, 28, 27, 40, 33 and 28, the 40 was the

game at the Chiefs that Ben just mentioned where I'll take your word for it, they got blown out. I don't have the schedule. But other than that, they did not let him throw the ball. And most of his throws were underneath. His average throw-up was very shallow. It was a bunch of design screens

and things. Everything you're saying sounds pretty good for Melvin Gordon. Under-D throws, a lot of running, right? Sure. In regards to the pass running, right? Sure. In regards to the pass attempts, that is low, but the games that were not the 40 attempts, the other four games,

they all won. We all just said we think they're going to win fewer than seven games. I think they're going to be forced into more. The thing I struggle with, I had them more run heavy before the draft. And they spent almost their entire draft capital on improving their passing game.

I don't think a team that just wants to run the ball 30 times a game would have drafted like that, but I could be wrong. Did you guys find enough targets for Noah Fant? Heath, you have him as tight end 13, Ben tight end 20, and definitely not a breakout year based on these projections. Yep. I mean, I'm

down the whole offense, like I said, and I love Corlin Sutton. I have him at wide receiver 33. Before the draft and they added all this extra talent, I was targeting him, especially in dynasty formats. I'm pretty much staying away from all these past catchers it's just they're not going to have good projections because

i don't i think it's really hard to to be this optimistic they didn't even invest in a veteran backup so if lock struggles they can't go to anyone else they like i don't even know their backup is they still brandon allen who was terrible last year i'm not going to remember who brandon allen is in like two years. Yeah. I have no idea. I didn't remember until I, until I did this projection. So with the Raiders and the Broncos.

Oh, it's Jeff Driscoll who played for the lions. It was actually kind of good. Yeah. Yeah. And I clear to be clear, I've got drew lock at like 7.2 yards per attempt, which was 5%,

10% worse or 5% worse than league average last year. And one of my lower numbers projected for a quarterback. I don't know that he's particularly good. I just, I don't think they're going to be that run heavy and maybe they just can't run very many plays at all. Um, I've got them slightly below league median, right at league average. I just think they're kind of a meh team with some really good weapons. And you guys have pretty different projections for Jerry Judy. Heath has 19 more targets, 109

targets, 65 catches, 881 yards, five and a half touchdowns. That's pretty damn good for a rookie. The target number pretty high. That'd be a really good year. Ben has 90 targets, wide receiver, 54, 701 yards and four touchdowns for Jerry Judy.

And then for Sutton, just final question here. He's going in between the two Seahawks receivers. How would you rank them? Those three Lockett is the clear one for me. And then I'll take Sutton over Metcalf still because I'm not very high on Metcalf either.

Lockett, big gap, Sutton, then Metcalf. All right. Let's go to the Chargers here. I mean, this team, to me, would be the most fun projection or depressing projection. What's the over-under? Seven and a half.

That's my favorite bet so far. Over. The over? Really? All right. Look, that probably... I'll tell that. I'll say over two.

I trust you. That probably means Tyrod Taylor is going to keep playing, right? I mean, I feel like the more they win, the more they stick with Tyrod. Does that make sense? And does that factor into your projections? Makes sense. Makes sense. And I think their schedule starts pretty favorably, right?

Well, let's take a look. I think that they do have the Chiefs in the first couple weeks, so they're going to lose that one. But besides that, I think it starts pretty favorably. Okay, I love the Chiefs. The Chiefs are going 16-0, by the way. That should be your favorite over under 11.5. 19.

Cincinnati, Kansas City, Carolina. They'll be 2-1, most likely. Cincinnati, Kansas City, Carolina. And then at Tampa Bay, at New Orleans, then the Jets and the Dolphins and the Jaguars and the Raiders. That's a good October-November stretch. 6-3 going into their bye week seems pretty good. Yeah, I like that. All right, anyway. October, November stretch. Six and three going into their bye week seems pretty good.

Yeah, I like that. All right, anyway. Why they're so fascinating. Tyrod Taylor and Phillip Rivers are so different. And I just, how did you tackle this team? We tackled it very differently. I have 40 fewer plays, only 20 fewer rushes, but closer to 40 fewer passes. Excuse me, 50 fewer plays.

So I have a little bit more of a run lean. I have this shifting a lot more to like how Tyrod Taylor's teams were in Buffalo. But I also have Justin Herbert projected for about 40% of the snaps. So I didn't go all the way there. I still projected them for 499 passes, which is very low, but in Tyrod Taylor's time in Buffalo, this was a team that threw about 450, that was a team that threw about 450, 460 passes per game per year, which is incredibly low.

Yeah. which is incredibly low. Yeah, and I lowered it when Ben sent that note that we had a 40-play difference. I looked and saw that I had them slightly above league median, and I lowered them to league median. It was interesting. They were really slow with Wisenhunt as the offensive coordinator, really like the last three years. When they fired him last year, the new offensive coordinator,

and I can't say his name the right way his first name shane um last name stichen i think it's stichen stichen okay they they got super fast i don't know i don't think they probably will be this year but they they played a lot faster after he took over for wiz and hunt um i got him i'm just trying to put him at league average i think i had a typo and typed a nine instead of a zero at the end of their play numbers before it doesn't make much difference in any of the projections. Um, I do think like I've got them at 530 pass attempts. That would obviously be a career high for Taylor. I don't know.

I don't think we know. Yeah. It's a tough team to project for sure. I thought what was interesting is Heath and I talked about Eckler a lot this offseason. I have Eckler projected for a lot more rush attempts than Heath. Yeah, well, look at Heath's projections for Justin Jackson and Josh Kelly. You have both of them over 100 carries. Yeah, I don't have Eckler having a huge increase in role.

But you do have his reception still very high, and I think they're going to fall even more than you have. I have him for 12 fewer receptions than you. And so even though you have high-value touches and all those things, I have him projected for, what is that, 34 more rush attempts, and he still hasn't projected for 21 more fantasy points. So that's how valuable the receiving role is. Okay, to give the numbers, Heath has 77 catches for Eckler.

Ben has 65 for Eckler. Heath's brought this up a lot. LeSean McCoy was very involved in the passing game in Buffalo when Tyrod Taylor was the quarterback. Yeah, but who were their receivers? I mean, we talked about this. Sammy Watkins and Robert Woods? Robert Woods was another. They were really good.

No, but Robert Woods was... Robert Woods is the reason why... Not the year that LeSean McCoy led the team in targets. That was not who they had. But Robert Woods is the reason... One of the reasons why I'm just... I'm not excited about drafting anybody on this team.

Maybe Eckler. Eckler and PPR, sure. But, like, look at how good Robert Woods is now. And he was nothing on Buffalo. I really don't like Tyrod Taylor for fantasy. I just don't like it at all. And I'm certainly not going to like Justin Herbert. I will say, like, the

biggest thing for me about the Chargers, because I understand what you're saying about his effect on Keenan Allen and Mike Williams, for sure. Maybe even Hunter Henry, I'm not sure. But I do like Taylor if he plays those first nine games we just said as the starting quarterback with Austin Eckler, Keenan Allen, Mike Williams, Hunter Henry, and running the ball eight times a game or six times a game, five times a game. No, it's ironic that he could be probably bad for the receivers, but he himself could end up being maybe the best value on the team.

Well, and he's a super safe quarterback. He will take some deep shots if it's wide open. But the reason that Bills fans would email us and say, well, you guys like him. The reason we don't like him is he won't ever throw into coverage and he takes too many sacks and he takes off running and won't throw the ball. I do think he, he doesn't mind dumping the ball off short and just getting it to the guy it's supposed to go to as quick as possible. So do you want to talk about the wide receivers quickly here? The only one I'm interested in is Mike Williams at cost.

Keenan Allen is going to look too much like, like, what people think Jarvis Landry is, even though Jarvis Landry is better than that, but it's going to be too much like what people think Jarvis Landry is, even though Jarvis Landry is better than that. But he doesn't have enough efficiency, and he needs targets, and he needs receptions, and it's going to be tough to come by. Mike Williams has a chance as a downfield guy. What do you have for the targets for Allen and Williams? 130 for Allen, 92 for Williams.

You have 134 and 86, it looks like, on this sheet? Okay, so we're close. I have a little bit more going towards Williams. And Henry, if he falls. I just took him in Scott Fishbowl, which is a tight end premium league. He was falling in that league. Yeah, Keenan Allen is going 23rd wide receiver. He's between DJ Chark and Terry McLaurin.

I would way rather take those young guys. I would rather have the young guys in non-PPR. I think in PPR, I'd probably still rather have Allen than Chark. We've got the NFC West really, really loaded division this year. Super fun for fantasy. That's coming up next on Fantasy Football Today. Stick around. Whether in the game or in life,

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time tastes like Miller time. Learn more at MillerLite.ca. Must be legal drinking age. All right, welcome back to the show, everybody. Remember, we have a mailbag coming up on Friday, so email us at fantasyfootball at cbsi.com and please leave us a nice review on Apple Podcast Review. And what happened? Did something just happen in the Scott Fish Bowl? Yes.

Oh, what happened? I wanted Tariq Cohen at the end of the 12th and he went one pick before me. I took Tariq Cohen at the end of the 12th, and he went one pick before me. I took Tariq Cohen in the 11th. I wanted Jerry Judy, and he went one pick before me, so I hope that makes you feel better. I want a new team in the Scott Fish Bowl. Your team's fine.

You think? I don't know if it is. I don't know. Yeah, I think it's fine. You only have one receiver still and one running back? Yeah, through seven picks for me. Yeah. No, I have picks for me. Yeah. No, I have three running backs. I took two running backs. I did an interesting thing that maybe could work in redraft.

You want to dip into the exciting rookie and then the veteran who might be replaced. You don't know which way to go. I took DeAndre Swift and Damian Williams to get a little bit of both sides of that coin. I just took Kerryon Johnson in the 12th round. That's a great, I love it. I'll be looking for him later.

He just went right before Cohen and I was looking at him too, but I'm going to take Philip Lindsay. 49ers here, 10.5 wins. Interestingly low. You're going under too? I'll take 10. Yeah. It wants you to bet the over,

considering they won 13 times last year, right? I don't know. I don't know. I don't got to bet. I'm going to change the number to no. I understood they've taken the out when it was the number right on. Like, if it was 10,

you would just say 10, so you didn't have to. It was 10 and a half. You got to pick one. I've taken on the number on a half number multiple times. It's true. He does not like this game. He just doesn't.

You're out of the intro. No, come on. If you're giving betting advice, there's got to be times when you say that there's not a bet that you would take. And that's where I'm at. I don't think we're giving betting advice. Okay, I know. I would say that. We're think we're giving betting advice. Okay. I know. I'd say that we're just giving opinion. All right.

Numbers to know is in here. I have five. The amount of times Jimmy Garoppolo scored at least 20 fantasy points in 2019, but that's not good enough. Here's the number you need to know. In 2019, Jimmy Garoppolo was third in the NFL in yards per attempt.

In 2018, Nick Mullins was fifth. And in 2017, Jimmy Garoppolo led the NFL in yards per attempt. In 2018, Nick Mullins was fifth. And in 2017, Jimmy Garoppolo led the NFL, but he didn't qualify. He only had 178 passes, but 8.8 yards per attempt led the NFL. You've got George Kittle, who's a yak monster, and maybe Debo Samuel, Brandon Ayuk,

and they have just been an incredibly efficient offense throwing the ball in terms of yards per attempt. That stands out to me. And your projections for Jimmy Garoppolo really are quite different, even though it's QB 23 for Heath, QB 24 for Ben, but Heath has 4,276 passing yards. Ben has 3,854.

We're talking more than 400. And look at our play splits. They're almost identical. So I obviously have Garoppolo being a lot less efficient. I have Garoppolo as the second most efficient quarterback behind Patrick Mahomes because he's kind of been the second most efficient quarterback for a year and a half.

It's not very long. Yeah, no, it's interesting. A lot of it is yards after catch, obviously, but it's an interesting stat to me because it just makes me think if their defense takes a step back. By the way, they weren't that good of a defense in 2017 and 2018.

They're going to throw more and we never talk about Garoppolo as a sleeper or rarely. Is he a sleeper? It's just not going to throw enough. Holy crap. You have some like really high efficiency on these young receivers too. I kind of like it.

I got to get, I got to give this another look for sure. 9.4 yards for target for Debo 8.95 for, for IU. And I probably just regressed these guys under like eight yards per attempt because they're young guys and they see shallower targets. But I'm going to need to readjust that. Yeah, I'm probably too high.

I thought the number to know was 14. And that is? Including the playoffs, Raheem Mostert only had two games last year with more than 14 carries. That was a good number to know. Because he also doesn't catch any passes, which people don't realize.

I hope people realize that. Tell me how you broke down the backfield. It's pretty close to even for me. I have Mostert with 19 more carries than Tevin Coleman. I have Coleman with 11 more catches than Raheem Mostert. I've got Jarek McKinnon with 92 touches, which some of those could go to Jeff Wilson,

but I expect there like, well, it'll be a San Francisco backfield situation as it usually is. You know what? I don't like, Let me call you out. I don't like 70 carries for Jarek McKinnon. I feel like that's too much. Ben is 35.

How many does he have for Jeff Wilson? That's a good question. I have 33 for Jeff Wilson. So 68 for the two of them. I don't have Jeff Wilson listed, so there you go. Take 35 of those to Jeff Wilson and Jeff Wilson, and we're good. Fine, fine.

I don't know. How many times did they really use three running backs in the running game without one of them leaving with an injury? I kind of feel like they were a two-back system mostly. Well, we both have Mostert our right around 170 and colman for around 150 rushes and then we have the other backs combining for 70 yeah that's really not much yeah okay so do you have anything else you basically have most certain coleman projected extremely similarly in terms of where they end up because you have more catches for Coleman.

That's why I draft a ton of Tevin Coleman and I haven't drafted Raheem Moser yet. I might take Tevin Coleman along with Phillip Lindsay right now in the Scott Fish Bowl. How did you guys factor in the Deebo Samuel injury? What do you do about that? I made him and Ayuk basically equal in terms of targets, and they won't be. If Debo Samuel's ready week one, I think he'll get more targets than Iyuk.

But if Samuel's on the pup list, then Iyuk has a chance to break out and be a low-end No. 2, high-end No. 3 receiver. That's the thing I don't know, though. Even if one of these two is not involved, I have a hard time seeing a 49ers wide receiver being better than 20th or

24th, in that range. Ben, you have seven and a half touchdowns for George Kittle. I don't remember if it's five or six, but nobody in the last three years under Shanahan has caught more than five or six touchdowns in San Francisco.

Does that matter to you? Cause it doesn't matter to me for the record. It maybe should kill had two or three touchdowns called back by a penalty last year. And he scored five times in 14 games. I bumped up as, as TD rate a little bit because I remembered that penalty stat maybe a little high,

but it would not surprise me at all. If he has a seven rate touchdown season plus, I think he was close to it last year. If, if some of those penalties didn't happen, he would have hit it. You know what I'm going to say? He missed the game against the Cardinals,

Jimmy Garoppolo through 45 passes. If I tell you Jimmy Garoppolo through 45 passes against the Cardinals, give me your projected line for George Kittle. 12, 397. Yeah, basically 397 touchdowns. Although if George Kittle had played,

Jimmy Garoppolo probably wouldn't have needed to throw 45. That's a very good point. Ross Dwell. He scored twice last year. Were those in those games against the Cardinals? Probably. Probably started. He started when Cardinals? Probably. Probably. He started when Kittle was out.

Yeah, he had two TDs against Arizona. So there you go. Kittle should have scored seven touchdowns or maybe 10 last year. Seattle, the other game that Kittle missed last year. Nine and a half wins for Seattle. Oh, that's a tough one too. Seattle's one of the hardest teams. I live up here and somebody,

a buddy of mine asked how good they're going to be. And I was like, if you rank them in the top five, I wouldn't have that hard of a time disagreeing because Russell Wilson is, I think the second best

quarterback in the league. And if you rank them middle of the pack because their coaching staff holds back Russell Wilson and they don't have really enough talent around him I wouldn't disagree with that either it's like

how much value do you put on Russell Wilson over yeah he puts a lot of value on Russell Wilson very different approaches to that well the number to know oh my gosh Ben your projection for Russell Wilson is so

part of this word but it's very sexy makes me very excited to draft him 4,400 passing yards which would be a career high 35 passing touchdowns plus another 360 rushing yards and two touchdowns you both have them QB4 QB3 but Ben has a much more aggressive projection for Wilson so the number to know is 31 four times in the past five years Russell Wilson has thrown at least 31

touchdowns, and he's done that despite finishing the top 10 in past attempts just once in those five seasons. And when I say that, so he throws a lot of touchdowns. He's got a great touchdown rate, right? Does that make you think that there's hidden downside with Russell Wilson? That if

his normal touchdown rate, that he might throw like 26 touchdowns? No, his touchdown rate is just like Aaron Rodgers peak when he kept doing it every year which is because he's so efficient throwing the ball because his completion percentage is so high because he throws touchdowns on first downs he doesn't have to throw passes on second and third down so he doesn't throw a lot of passes because of that. Rodgers never got near 600 passes back in the day. My only argument against that would be that 2016 Russell Wilson and the past two years of Aaron Rodgers would say, yeah, there's some hidden downside. Because those three years, Wilson and Rodgers were well below

their career norm and touchdown rate and closer to league average, and they weren't near as good in fantasy because of it. 2016. He was real. Wilson was like QB eight, but that was the year he hurt his ankle week one. Pretty sure that was the year. And he just,

I was just looking at that. I think it might've been actually the year after. Cause that's the year, the year after is the year he, he had the really slow rushing yardage total. Oh yeah. Yeah. 2016. He was good as a passer. His yards per attempt were right there at his career average.

He threw for 4,200 yards. No, 2016 is the year he had the low rushing yards. I was looking at the wrong thing. Sorry. I think that is the year he hurt his ankle. But it didn't affect any of his passing except for the touchdowns. All right, you guys, you have Carson as RB12 for Heath, RB17 for Ben, even though the numbers are not all that dissimilar, but 18 more carries for Heath and more than 100 more rushing

yards, but the receiving number is very similar. But I think Lockett versus Metcalf is really the interesting thing here. They go very close to each other in drafts. Is there a statistical justification for drafting Metcalf over Lockett? No. It's a really thin one. I have a hard time with it. I mean, I think it's that second year breakout thing that rookie receivers who are very efficient in year one tend to see an increase in volume.

And there's, you can make cases in that regard, but I think it would be pretty thin because you'd have to really justify downgrading Lockett in a way that I don't think there's anything in Lockett's profile that defends that. So it's just, you have to think,

you have to love DK Metcalf, I think, and just look at him and say he's got potential to do such great things. The thing is, like, even if, for me at least, even if Metcalf got 10 more targets than Lockett, Lockett's tied with Tyreek Hill for the most efficient wide receiver since they've been measuring those types of things.

So I think Lockett would still be better, even if Metcalf got slightly... Like, I've got Lockett with only five more targets than DK Metcalf, but 150 more yards. Yeah, I've got Lockett with only five more targets than DK Metcalf but 150 more yards yeah I mean last year he had 10 more targets but he caught 24 more passes that's how much better his catch rate was he had a lower average depth of target but he also sees downfield play targets and makes plays on them he had 157 more yards as well with only 10 fewer targets so he's projecting makes perfect sense yeah well you Well, you both have quite a gap.

Like Ben has locket wide receiver 13 and Metcalf wide receiver 27. And he says locket wide receiver 15 and Metcalf wide receiver 31. The tight ends don't factor in all that much. Is there anything else you want to add about this team? I think the volume is really interesting. I have, we have the same amount of plays. I have them throwing.

I can't do math in my head right now. 27 more passes and, and running 27 fewer times. He's probably closer to their, their typical rates. I took Russell Wilson's comments at the super bowl to be pretty interesting. This guy's never,

he's kind of always followed the, the team line, never really spoken out about specific stuff like that. And he came out and said he wants to play more up-tempo, wants to be in control of the offense more, likes what they do in the two-minute drill. I think they're going to pass more this year by design. He'll still be efficient, I think,

and that's why I have such a monster projection for him. To the Rams, eight and a half wins for the Rams. Over. Over. They were still 9-7 last year, weren't they? Yes. Even though we all think it was a huge disappointing year, they were still over that.

So that feels like a good bet. Wait, were they? Yeah, they were 9-7, third place. Okay. 15.9% is the number to know. Just 15.9% of the Rams' targets went to tight ends in 2017 and 18. And then in the last five games, Higby and Woods accounted for 53% of Jared Goff's pass attempts.

So they just changed as an offense in the second half of the season. And that is probably where we should start. Just a quick ADp review jared golf is qb 17 between rothlisberger and burrow cam acres round five daryl henderson rb 49 much later malcolm brown rb 67 cooper cup and robert woods uh round four picks cooper cups like end of round three round four robert woods is in this wide receiver run in round four. It goes Amari Cooper, then Cooper Cup, and then DJ Moore, and it goes AJ

Brown, Robert Woods, DK Metcalf, and Tyler Higbee is the sixth tight end off the board. Okay, but is this going to be a team that features the tight end like they did toward the end of last year, or are they going to go back to featuring the three receivers? What are they going to look like this year? We're almost at the end of projections week, Adam.

I think that we've done this with these types of things enough times that you can guess what the answer from Ben and I is going to be. And maybe Ben's answer won't be the same as mine, but I'm going to guess that it is. What do you think our answer is going to be? I think Ben is going to have more

tight end love than Heathath my answer would be we're hedging okay they threw the ball to their tight ends 85 times in 2018 88 times in 2017 156 times last year i have them for 126 targets to the tight ends. I wrote all pass options have upside. Could be very pass heavy. Again, that was like my number one note on this team. I'm hedging as well. He's right. I would

just like to see them, now that they don't have Todd Gurley, who has had 54 touchdowns in the last three seasons. I would just like to see them share the touchdowns a little bit more. Let's talk about that. It almost felt like they were just deferring to Todd Gurley, like,

here, go get your numbers. 54 touchdowns in three seasons, 12 of them receiving. Do you think that that means more touchdown passes for Jared Goff? Do you think Robert Woods finally becomes a touchdown guy? You know, does that stat mean anything to you? Oh, it certainly means something.

There's a lot of touchdowns that are available, whether it's the running backs that get it. And then that would mean, well, whoever gets the majority of them in the backfield is going to be good. Or if it shifts to the passing, then that means, yeah, somebody is going to catch a lot of touchdowns in the passing game. Like, yeah, it means something. I have it pretty much that the running backs are going to the passing, then that means, yeah, somebody's going to catch a lot of touchdowns in the passing game. Like, yeah, it means something. I have it pretty much that the running backs are going to get it,

but that's just chopped up because of the way they've talked. Like Gurley was getting most of the rushing and the receiving touchdowns. I've got the three running backs combining for 16 touchdowns. I don't know. There was not very much at all for this group in the passing game last year, just 62 targets for all the running backs combined. I lean towards Henderson being the guy in the passing game for Cam Akers. And I've got Malcolm Brown with four and a half touchdowns, which is too high of a touchdown rate, but it sounds like at least early in the year, they want to use him as their short yardage guy.

I think Cam Akers could eventually take that away. You have 214 carries. I'm sorry, Ben. 214 carries for Akers. Why don't we stay on the running backs here? Because that's a big number from Heath compared to just 161 for Ben. Yeah, I want to talk about the running backs receiving uh because he just made a really good point and i i also kept the running backs receiving low i'm just not going to listen to whatever he says uh i also kept their receiving low like he said and i think for a lot of teams it's it's either the running backs or the tight ends

especially when the team has receivers that they use and The Rams do. The Rams are an over 60% target team to their receivers. They have been each of the last several seasons. I'm expecting that again, even though Brandon Cooks is not going to be there. That means it's either the tight ends or the backs. If you're projecting something for Higby, you're probably not expecting a lot of targets to the backs.

Okay, now can you talk about 214 carries for Heath, 161 for uh for ben yeah it looks like i have a lot more for henderson um and i have a way more way more of a pass lean than heath uh i kind of i kind of think that that commentary about the deference to to girly like now that he's gone and they have some uncertainty in the backfield i kind of think that means that they will rely more on Jared Goff and they will be a little bit more pass heavy,

like I said. And I think these past weapons are going to have upside because it should be fairly concentrated. I think there's a little bit of sleeper potential for Josh Reynolds, who I think will probably start over van Jefferson early in the year. I think Gerald Everett could easily be their fourth best weapon. Actually, they could be a team that winds up with two valuable tight ends.

But yeah, that's kind of the way I'm looking at that. Okay, and then the wide receivers, Cooper Cup, wide receiver nine for Heath, wide receiver 12 for Ben, and Robert Woods is wide receiver 19 for Heath and wide receiver 14 for Ben. Both these guys, 85 or more catches in the projections. So that's wonderful. And let's go. And Tyler Higbee.

Actually, you guys are a little low on Tyler Higbee. 11th for Heath and 9th for Ben in the projections. Do you rank it that way? I rank him 9th or 10th. I have him 10th in PPR and 9th in my projections of PPR.

So I actually have, yeah, I have a spot behind in my rankings. And part of that's because I still have 40 targets going to Gerald Everett. Okay. Yeah. Cause he's tied in seven. He's tied in seven in,

uh, in ADP. And finally we, uh, we conclude with the Arizona Cardinals seven wins for the Cardinals. Under. Right on the nose. Excellent.

Okay, this is not a good red zone team. 38.8% is the number to know. They scored on 38.8% of their drives in 2019. That was the ninth highest rate in the NFL, but 21.3% ended in touchdowns, 20th in the league. Kyler Murray, just bad luck. I don't know, bad production, which wasn't there in the red zone.

Heard his numbers. He's the third quarterback off the board. Kenyon Drake is the ninth running back. He's a round one pick. DeAndre Hopkins. DeAndre Hopkins ADP third overall at wide receiver. Anyway, 16th overall, sorry, and third wide receiver. And then Christian Kirk is wide receiver. Anyway, 16th overall, sorry, and third wide receiver. And then Christian Kirk is wide receiver 39.

Let's look at Kyler Murray's rushing yards. Heath, what the heck, man? Like 120 yards less than he had last year. Well, I've got him with like 30 more pass attempts. If he throws the ball more, he's probably going to run the

ball less. And I regressed his yards per carry for sure. He was at 5.8 last year. I think I've probably got him at five. So a little bit less efficiency and a few fewer carries. Let me see. I've got him at 80 rushes at 5.3. So, yeah, you have 425 rushing yards for Murray, and you have Miss QB6. Ben has 531 rushing yards and QB4. Correct me if I'm wrong. I have a few more attempts, but

I also have them at 5.5 yards per carry, so that's kind of interesting. It's a little bit more volume, a little bit more efficiency. We're not that far off. Last year, this was a fast-paced team in terms of snap time, but didn't

run a lot of plays. I think they were like 21st or something in plays. Is that right? Yep. Fourth in time to snap in situation-neutral situations. God, I say that backwards every time. 21st in plays or whatever. I'm expecting their play volume to increase quite a bit. I think I have their play volume increasing a little bit.

Well, Ben has 28 more plays. So they're probably one of his fastest teams and they're still closer to average for me. Kenyon Drake not getting quite to the 50 catch mark. 49 for Heath, 47 for Ben, but getting over 220 carries. And you both have him as RB10. What else do you want to highlight here? We know, I had a feeling that Ben would be a little higher on Christian Kirk.

10 spots higher. 42 for wide receiver, 42 for Heath wide receiver, 32 for Ben. Despite just six more targets. You have, I guess, a lot more efficiency for Christian Kirk yeah I have more efficiency for Kyler Murray um only had a 2.4 percent pass TD rate in the first half that's when that stat about them settling for field goals was that it's worse there was that one game where they kicked like three field goals inside the five yard line in the same game wouldn't go for it on a fourth down. I, you know, he's a rookie quarterback starting from week one,

second half of the season, his pass CD rate jumps to 5.2%. Now I don't think he's going to, he's going to sit at 5.2%, but I think there's reason to believe that he got a lot better throughout the season at, you know, finishing those drives and just natural maturation. And now he's got a whole off season to get better. I think this guy's actually really good. He had a really good completion percentage underrated for for a rookie i think that's going to take a little step forward i got his tv percentage taking a step forward and then

i have them throwing a lot more passes and if that all happens it's good for christian kirk because larry fitzgerald's going to be there on the field but he's not going to be like a big of a big play guy hopkins is going to obviously be very good as well but kirk has the you know chris godwin type upside i really do believe that i said that before this offseason whoa um yeah and i i just want to be clear like with the kyler murray thing because i'm always the anti kyler murray guy he was 3.7 touchdown rate last year i've got him projected at 4.6 so a pretty massive leap there he was 6.9 yards per attempt last year. I've got him projected at 4.6. So a pretty massive leap there. He was 6.9 yards per attempt last year.

I've got him projected at 7.5. So like what all these things, what's that? I haven't 5% TD rate and I have him at 7.4 yards per attempt. So yeah. So for all the me, like, I think he's going to be better.

I think he's going to be better. I think he's going to break out. I just think that like him at QB three is drafting him more at his ceiling than it is at what you should expect. Well, what's his floor? Because that's where, like, I keep seeing people compare him to Baker Mayfield last year where everyone was expecting Baker to take this year to jump, but Murray's floor because of the rushing has to be higher than baker's was last year oh yeah for sure i don't think he's probably like i think his floor's close to what he did last year which was like what qb 14 or 15 on a per game basis um in six point past touchdown leagues and even better in four point um i don't think he's going to be as awful as baker was but i think there is a there's a real risk of taking him in the fifth round as the third quarterback, and he's just not somebody

that's... He's not bad, but he's just not really a help. By the way, I never got to say this when we did the NFC East, and since Ben won't be on the show tomorrow, I don't think you should be so high on Evan Ingram. I know you like to draft him. Do you know who the Giants tight ends coach is?

No. Freddie Kitchens. Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. I'm sorry to ruin Evan Ingram for you, man. Oh, God.

You just ruined him for me. Yeah, yeah. He's definitely going to be starting Caden Smith. All right. ruined him for me. He's definitely going to be starting Caden Smith. Alright. Here comes Tyler Higbee and all these guys rising up my ranks as Everett Ingram starts the free fall.

Alright, hey guys, thank you. You put in so much work for this show. Projections, I appreciate it. It was easy for me, but it was a tough hard-working week for you guys. So thank you for pulling the weight. Much appreciated. Thanks to all of you all for listening and for sending us your questions, which we'll read on tomorrow's show. Ben's in the intro.

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