Fantasy Football Today - Beyond the Box Score: Mark Andrews, Cowboys RBs, Justin Herbert (12/05 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: December 5, 2022

The Cowboys keep cruising, and we recap their win over the Colts (2:10) wondering if both Tony Pollard and Ezekiel Elliott can keep this up. Meanwhile, what happened to Michael Pittman? And we've got your updated news and notes (8:55) ... Advanced stats from Jacob (12:00) on Cam Akers, Greg Dulcich and Amari Cooper among others. Plus we've got Dan's game film review (22:15) of Deshaun Watson, Drake London and D'Andre Swift and a quick Derrick Henry conversation (33:00) ... We debate 90's comedy legends (35:40)! Adam Sandler or Jim Carrey? Our producer Thomas Shafer drops a huge SNL hot take and then we get into our Four Big Topics: Mark Andrews (42:15), the 49ers offense (45:10), Justin Herbert vs. Joe Burrow (48:00) and tips for winning your 2023 Fantasy league (54:15) ... Email us at [e-mail] Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs Follow the brand new FFT TikTok account: https://www.tiktok.com/@fftoday Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday Get 20% off Fantasy Football Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-football-today%20?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-football-collection Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter You can listen to Fantasy Football Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast." 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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Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. We are going beyond the box score right now on Fantasy Football Today. Advanced stats from simple people. Adam Azer, Jacob Gibbs, and Dan Schneier. Way out in Arizona today. Traveling man, Dan Schneier. Hello, Dan Schneier. Hello.

How's Arizona? Doing well. I was actually trying hitting up Jacob, who also lives in Arizona this weekend. But I realized after looking at a map, he's like two hours away. So it would have been a big ask for him to be like, hey, come to Scottsdale. Hang out with us at night or hey, come to downtown Phoenix. Hang out with us at night. So there was a misconnection between Jacob and I.

But it is fun out here. It's sunny again. It was actually raining a little this weekend, but I got to see Sedona, which is incredible. I love seeing all those outdoor crazy sights. Did one hike up there that was just unbelievable. So I had a good time. Got out of the cold, rainy, nasty northeast. Okay.

Yeah, we've all been to Arizona. Jacob, have you ever been to New York or New Jersey? I've been to the Baseball Hall of Fame out in New York. We went through a lot of the natural side of the state, but I've never actually been to NYC. Oh, okay. Yeah, I mean, if you haven't been to New York City, then nothing else is actually New York.

Yeah, we don't count Cooperstown. Right, right. All right, today on the show, is Mark Andrews officially a bust? Can we trust Justin Herbert going forward? Who would you rather have in your real-life IRL NFL team, Justin Herbert or Joe Burrow? The answer has changed based on my Twitter feed over the last five months or so.

We'll recap Dallas and the Colts, tell you about the Cowboys' offense, which has been the best in football since Dak Prescott has returned, at least by one measure and probably more than that. And of course, we have the advanced stats for you. So let's get to it, guys. Cowboys 54, Colts 19. In the last six games with Dak Prescott, they are averaging 35 points per game on offense. So that's even removing two defensive touchdowns. They are fifth in yards per play. They are first in points per possession by a mile. Just crushing everyone in that stat, points per possession. And they have faced the Lions, the Bears, the Packers, the Vikings, so the four NFC North teams, plus the Giants who are beat up on defense.

And the Colts, they've embarrassed the Colts. The Colts have a better defense than that. But, you know, if you look at it, there's not a ton of pass volume. Can they continue to run the ball this frequently? Can they continue to have their running back score? If this were earlier in the year, I'd be making a sell-high case for the running backs for the Cowboys.

But, Dan, what do you think about Pollard and Zeke specifically? Zeke's been back for three games, and the last three games, they're both top seven running backs. So what they're doing right now is unprecedented. It's also a very small sample size, but what do you think going forward? Yeah,

I think what you're seeing is the Cowboys have gotten back to a lot of their old ways within this regime, not regime, but just the last five years, they had arguably one of the best offensive lines in football three, four years ago, it got injured, it got older and they've replenished it.

Drafting Tyler Smith was a huge move. He's played great at left tackle. And more importantly, when you have Zach Martin on the interior, it's really easy to run the football. And so a lot of the plays you see are like trap plays, wham blocks, things that give like that inside hole for Ezekiel Elliott. And Pollard, they use great on the exterior as an outside runner. So I don't think it's going to go away. It's kind of been their identity for a while, you know, especially when they've had those top offensive lines. And so why go away from something that works, especially because as you see, it opens up the play action passing game and opens up a little bit of that, you know, in breaking middle of the field now. So Zeke, over the last three games, Zeke and Pollard are averaging 31 carries per game combined, 16 for Zeke per game, 15 for Pollard.

And I just wonder, you know, like Pollard didn't score against the Giants. He scored eight and a half PPR fantasy points. They're not catching the ball a lot. I just went back. I looked at the last five years. Have there been any duos, any teammate running backs who have been top 15 per game?

And I found two examples. Kamara and Ingram were both top seven in 2017. Eckler and Melvin Gordon were RBs six and 14 in 2019. But that's what one of the, one of the guys in both of those, in fact, both of the, both of the running backs were catching a lot of passes. You had an 82 catch running back in Kamara. You had a 92 catch running back in Eckler. And then the other guys, 58 catches for Ingram, 42 for Gordon. So it's just different, you know, Jacob. It's just, you don't see this. You don't see two running backs running the ball this much, this well, scoring week after

week. And do you think they are must-start guys going into your fantasy playoffs pretty soon? Yeah, I think so for the next couple matchups. I mean, they've got Houston and then Jacksonville, both teams that could probably run on, probably be playing with a lead against,

but then they get the Eagles and then the Titans. The Titans are the best friend defense in the NFL. So I would honestly be selling Tony Pollard if you can still trade at this point in your league. That could definitely backfire if Zeke goes down, Pollard will be a league winner. But based on what we've seen lately, I'm pretty concerned. Zeke out- Pollard will be a league winner but based on what we've seen lately I'm pretty concerned Zeke out snapped him this week Zeke saw five red zone snaps to Pollard's three Pollard

only had one red zone touch Zeke had three Pollard's insane we see him you know be productive on limited volume that's what he's done but if you were like holding on to hope that he was going to continue to like play a larger split of the backfield because he played so well and because he kind of did the first couple games Zeke got eased in. That's not what we saw this week. And that could have been a game script thing, but it's also Dallas and we see them always do this and always go back to Zeke as the main guy. So yeah. All right. And then you got like Dalton Schultz, who is just, there's just not a lot of, I mean, they're not throwing a lot and Schultz has had two bad games in his last three. Low

yardage lately, but he's always targeted in the end zone. He had another end zone target this game. He had one that was at like the two yard line. Anyway, I think you know, the Cowboys are awesome. As far as the Colts go, Dan, a terrible game for them. Jonathan Taylor does have four straight games with 20 to 22 carries. Other

than the Raiders game, he's been kind of bleh with them. But he's a must start. Pittman got Trayvon Diggs in this game. What do you think about the Colts? Do you have any confidence in anyone other than Taylor? No, it's hard to have any confidence, even in Pittman. I know, look, you can look at this and be like, oh, throw it out. He was Trayvon Diggs.

He was shadowed, like you said. But at the same time, it's such a low volume pass offense. And you have quarterback play that bad. I can't think of maybe two, three. I can't think of more than a handful of quarterbacks playing worse than Matt Ryan on an individual quarterback level right now. So what is the ceiling then for somebody like Pittman? You need a massive amount of volume, which he's not going to get. It's still like you mentioned a very run heavy offense. Jonathan Taylor gets a ton of touches. Jonathan Taylor doesn't come off the field. So I just don't see a ceiling anymore with Pittman if you're talking about maybe like a back-end flex based on volume when he has easier matchups sure maybe

but outside of Pittman and Taylor there's not really much to talk about on this offense either we thought maybe like two weeks ago we thought maybe a Paris Campbell be that like underneath option for Matt Ryan and just a constant PPR like a Curtis Samuel type. But the problem is that pass offense is just so inept and you're not it doesn't matter. Like there's no volume to be had because they can't move the ball through the air. So it's hard for me to get excited about anyone there. And they might make a quarterback change as Jeff Saturday did not commit to Matt Ryan going forward. It wouldn't I don't think it would be Ellinger, but we will see going forward. Start Taylor, Pittman.

We'll have better days than this because, like I said, Trayvon Diggs basically followed him around the field, but not the best, not an upside option, a floor option. No.

All right. Schaefer, I don't even know. What are we promoting today? Anything fun to promote today? Schneier? You know what? Sportsline, Jacob. Tell everybody about Sportsline.

Go for it. Yeah, I actually was going to pump Sportsline as one of the answers to the later questions, like what do you need to do this offseason to get ready for next year? Subscribe to Sportsline. We've got so much cool stuff coming. I'm super excited to dig into the data we have

from this season, have more time for that, especially the rook rookies i think we're going to talk about the rookie receiver class a lot on this episode um we've just got this what we're seeing from gary wilson and christian watson lately is so freaking exciting um i know dan's gonna want to talk about christian watson so yeah sub to sportsline super cheap super informative we got a lot of great stuff yeah and it's gambling it's not just fantasy it's gambling content as well and you you know So yeah, Subdiv Sports Line, super cheap, super informative. We've got a lot of great stuff. Yeah, and it's gambling. It's not just fantasy. It's gambling content as well.

And, you know, what is it, still $10 a month? I mean, it's so inexpensive for the product that you get. You know, what people pay for gambling advice is insane. This is $10 a month, and we have incredible handicappers and experts in the field. All right, your news and notes. Jimmy Garoppolo is out for the season. We're going to talk about their offense in a little bit. Lamar Jackson, day-to-day, week-to-week, we're not really sure.

He has maybe just a mild knee sprain. He could play this week, but we'll keep an eye on that. Tua Tungabailoa hurt his ankle, but he says he's okay. Trevor Lawrence hurt his foot. He didn't miss any time, but he is a question mark for week 14, unfortunately, at Tennessee. The Panthers are expected to release Baker Mayfield. Meanwhile, Deontay Foreman has a foot injury.

He hopes to play this week. He expects to play, but we're not sure about that for Foreman. Chuba Hubbard got a lot of work in Week 12 and could be a good option at Seattle, which is also dealing with a running back injury, a jammed foot or something like that for some weird injury that Pete Carroll basically had no experience with for Ken Walker.

DJ Dallas is also beat up. We don't know about Travis Homer. So that is an ugly backfield, Carolina and Seattle with some running back injuries going into their week 14 game. Traylon Burke's concussion protocol. Jalen Waddle got the foot injury. Cortland Sutton left with a hamstring injury.

As Jacob pointed out, we were emailing before the show, Jerry Judy barely played. He played 38% of the snaps, and he had four catches for 65 yards on four targets. In fact, Cortland Sutton left the game in the third quarter, and he played more snaps than Jerry Judy. So as long as it was just a maintenance thing for Judy and he can get back to a more full snap share,

wow, that could be actually the one thing to be excited about in the Broncos' offense. Aaron Jones has the shin injury. Hopefully he's okay after their bye. Aaron Rodgers said that he's optimistic, basically, that the thumb and the ribs won't really be an issue after the bye week. So fingers crossed on that. Giants defensive tackle Leonard Williams left with a neck injury.

Baltimore linebacker Patrick Queen was carted off the field. The commanders had two offensive linemen leave with injuries. They have a bye. Hayden Hurst calf injury. Dallas cornerback Anthony Brown may be out for the season. We're waiting

word on that. And Seattle safety Ryan Neal keeps getting hurt. He hurt his knee. That's basically it. Patrick Mahomes hurt his foot, but should be okay. That Mahomes guy. And Tyron Smith could come back this week for the Cowboys, their left tackle.

And that could be a big boost for them against the Texans. Maybe they'll save him for the week after that. All right, let's get to the stats that we like, the advanced stats. Let's get to my two simple people over there dragging the show down. Jacob, you can start. Jacob, give me some fun stats. What do you got for us this week?

Calling us simple people. We're both traveling. Dan's out in Arizona having a good time. I was in Cancun, so I wouldn't have been able to hang out with him anyway, Dan. Destination wedding this weekend. Is that right? Wow. And Dan, you didn't know that?

You didn't ask like, hey, how did that not come up? How did you not know that he was in Cancun? Or did you know? Probably because I didn't reply because I was in Cancun. That's basically what happened. That's awesome. All right. Well, you look like you got a little color, so good job.

That's good. Wow us with some stats, PartyAnimal. 72% snap rate for Kmakers. That was really surprising. The week prior, we saw Kyron Williams really dominate the usage, but 72% snap rate in his route involvement rate was actually one of the highest of the RB position. I think it was 52%. The Rams suck. It might not matter. and cam makers has not been good this year but this is the first

encouraging data point we have them all season really um 51 snap right for deandre swift 22 routes on 43 dropbacks those are both by far the best that we've seen since he's been back so really exciting stuff there um he was second in the n and red zone touches as well, had five red zone touches for Deandre Swift. And we've seen Jamal Williams dominating the red zone work, of course. Yeah. Can I just read a Swift quote real quick? A Campbell quote? Uh, I would say this is the best he's looked in practice. We could tell on Wednesday that he had a spring in his step. He was feeling better. Just some of the things, the way he moved everything. And then just every day he looked better, felt better better we have said all along the better he feels and where he feels like he can open it up and go then he's going to get more that was dan campbell on deandre swift so it might be

deandre swift szn going forward everybody fingers crossed so 43 percent target share and 57 percent area to share for amari cooper um which there's been some fluidity in how the targets have been distributed between him and Donovan Peoples-Jones this year. It was good to see if you're an Amari Cooper manager, it's good to see him so heavily involved in Watson's first game. But on that note, Deshaun Watson was terrible. He had the third highest off-target rate of any quarterback in week 13, and that was on just a 6.2-yard average depth of target, which was the third highest off target rate of any quarterback in week 13 and that was

on just a 6.2 yard average depth of target which was the third lowest so like the quarterbacks who had worse rates both had you know 16 yard average depth of target 11 yard average depth of target watson's only six yards and he's facing one of the worst defenses in the nfl um he just sucked and so i don't know i don't know how much it really is going to help cooper i don't know if this is going to be much better than Brissette, but the volume was great. Oh boy. Did we have fun watching some Deshaun Watson tape?

He was horrible, you know, through some of the worst passes you're going to see. And it's excusable. You'd think, I mean, God, there's definitely some rust there,

but it was even worse than you would have imagined. Dan, you want to get into the tape a little bit or some stats or what? Oh, no, Jacob. Jacob's not done. I've got a few more, and one of them is good. I'm definitely going to throw it to Dan, so I think it'll be a great segue. Let Jacob cook, Adam.

Hey, you know what? Let Schaefer cook. Schaefer, get us a YouTube poll. Come on. I think he's feeling a little self-conscious because I've been all over him for some substandard YouTube polls. He had a great one on Sunday morning, but he ruined it. He had, what's your favorite gangster movie?

And he put Scarface, Casino, no, Scarface, Goodfellas, Other was the last one. The third one was where he ruined it. It ruined everyone's day. He put The Godfather and he put parentheses trilogy. And that was a real cop-out because nobody likes the third one. You can't include the third.

You don't put the trilogy. You just put the Godfather. It was obvious to everyone, but I was hard on him. I apologize. So I'm giving him the chance to bounce back today. Get a good YouTube poll up there. Now Jacob is cooking go ahead so you said jerry judy might be the only positive note for the broncos um greg dolch is like this

was a really really encouraging game for him he had a 38 target share 42 air yardage share so he is just the second tight end under the age of 23 to record a target share above 35% in a game over the past 10 years. Kyle Pitts is the only one who's done it. Other than Dolch, of course, it came on a low-volume game in Denver. It might not matter that much this year, but it's really encouraging, I think, long-term. It's just cool to see him demand this type of volume. His per-route rates were not very good prior to Week 13. He'd had three or four disappointing games in a row.

So that was exciting. I just want to look up, you know, I'll try to do it now, but this is a game where Sutton and Judy both played less than half the snaps. Yeah. So how much does that matter? I can look up what he did with and without Sutton. It definitely matters, but at the same time, like young Titans just don't do this. 40% of the targets, like that almost never happens.

It's happened once. Okay. Okay. Okay. Um, Christian Watson, 33% of the first down targets this week, 28% of the first down targets over the past month, uh, which is top 15. That's just behind Chris Godwin, Amonra St. Brown, um, 24% target share, 44% area to share during that time. That's a fifth highest area to share in the NFL over the past month. So it's not just the touchdowns the underlying volume is really really encouraging

for a rookie um and then you know who is one of the four players with a higher area to chair then christian watson over the past month uh who also has also has the second highest first down target share over the past month darius slayton the third highest aerated share of the past month 37 percent of new york's first down targets over the past month which is tied with deandre hopkins just behind davante adams at 38 and like that's nuts i never would have expected to see slayton able to demand targets at a deandre hopkins davante adams type of rate just because of the routes that he runs. He has the highest average route depth of any player in the NFL on the year. So like for him to demand targets this way, it's really like Chris Alave is the only thing that we've seen like it.

Historically, there really are not very many comparisons. And of course, it's coming a Giants team that has no one to throw to. But if you look at players who run these type of routes so 10 yards or deeper average route depth the target per route run rate is 16.5 percent only four players are above 20 it's slayton justin jefferson chris alave and nico collins another guy who has really had an encouraging year from an underlying data standpoint um but yeah normally when you have players who run such deep routes and draw targets at this high of a rate they're really good for fantasies.

Justin Jefferson, Calvin Ridley, Julio Jones in the past. Slayton probably doesn't belong on that list. Probably not. But the fact that we're even talking about it is pretty nuts to me. And I know, Dan, I've seen you tweeting about him a lot. He's playing really well. He's getting open. He is, and I'll let Dan talk about that,

but I'll just give you some numbers here. Darius Slayton has scored 13.6 or more PPR fantasy points in three of his last four games and four of his last six games. He's got 86 or more yards in three of his last four games. He's a little big play dependent. If he doesn't come down with one of those deep balls, then you're in trouble. And then I don't really like him against the Eagles in week 14,

but I, I think I'm going to like him quite a bit after that. But yeah. All right, Dan, is that, is that the cue for Dan? Yeah,

for sure. Let's go Schneier. Yeah, we can start with Slayton. So Slayton, one thing that we've noticed with Slayton over the last, you know, however many weeks since he took over this role is cornerbacks are

respecting him more than they ever have in the past. They're playing 10 to 12 yards off coverage a lot of time. What we saw this week, and we're hoping the Giants will do more of, is they took a little advantage of that. They threw a deep little comeback route toward the sideline. Use that leverage the corner's giving you. Threaten deep and then come back. I want to see more of that, a little bit more of the intermediate range game with Slayton, because then you can be talking about every week fantasy guy guy right now adam's right he is big play dependent

and he's got a little you know he gave giants fans a little bit of a sour taste because he had that drop at the end of the game but besides that he's done an excellent job creating separation i think just two weeks ago he was third best in the nfl in seth walters open rate i think it's an espn stat and it just shows the kind of separation he's creating. His speed is evident on the field. He is the go-to guy when they run, when they dial up those shot plays, those shots down the field, he's the only one that they really even attempt to throw the ball to. And since they run the ball so much and there's such a run first offense, those plays are often facing, you know, one safety middle of the field. So he really has an opportunity on that outside with a ton of space to create a

big play. And he's been given them. I mean, when they needed him last game, they went back to back deep shots in the fourth quarter. So I think you're right. You're onto something here. He may not be at that level. He's obviously not at that level of those players. Like you could see it on his big drop yesterday. He mischimed his jump and he cut off his route when he shouldn't have cut off his route. He still has trouble adjusting to the ball in the air. He still has trouble with, you know, hands and issues. He has like a 15.9% drop rate, which is top, uh, top five in the NFL. But as far as just creating vertical separation and being targeted on those, he's the guy. And like you said, Jacob, there's not many teams that are dialing up these plays week after week for one guy in the deep vertical

game. So I'm with you. If you see the Eagles probably sit him out, but otherwise he's definitely worth playing as worse to flex. All right, so we're going to look at this. This is like Dan's film room here. And yeah, I already told you what I watched. Sean Watson was awful. What else did I watch? I watched the Chiefs.

I watched Juju. I wanted to talk about Juju a little bit. But what did you notice in the film? You know what? Let's take a break. We'll take a quick break here. Let's let Dan catch his breath for the one second that we're actually going to take a break on the live broadcast. And we'll be right back with some more stats and some observations after this.

Did you know 66% of utility damage is caused by not requesting a locate? Don't let your project become part of this statistic a quick locate request can save you from unexpected downtime financial penalties and keep you safe don't let avoidable damage cost you time and money click before you dig ensure your next project is safe visit ontario onecall.ca it's free it's easy it's the law data sourced from the orcga 2023 dirt report okay dan you're all ready yes i am okay let's do dan's film room what do you got i leave it to jacob for the stats i'm happy to be transitioning over to the film stuff that's what i feel more comfortable with anyway um and so i have a chance the all 22 film which is no you know it's a big jargon in the community

all 22 it just means you get to see it from the sideline angle, which is that overhead angle. If you've seen on Twitter where it's all 22 on the field and the end zone angle. So you can see the quarterback's viewpoint or more importantly, the offensive line and the running back in the run game. That's what I think is really most important from the end zone angle. And so it drops in the, in the early AM, I think on Monday. So I've had a chance to watch three players extensively. One was the Sean Watson. One was Deandre Swift. And one was a player who Jacob picked Drake London. And so I'll start with Deshaun Watson. Cause you hinted at him earlier. I think with Watson watching the game tape, a lot of the issues that I thought would happen with this Cleveland passing game were evident

right away. When you don't have the kind of chemistry between those receivers, you're going to see a lot of routes where the ball's being thrown to a spot where you weren't expecting it to be thrown to either behind the receiver or ahead of the receiver. And the timing is off. We saw that a ton. We also saw what Adam, if you haven't mentioned, but you talked about with us off the pod, there were some low throws that bounced into receivers that can't even be blamed on timing that can't even be blamed on chemistry. Those are just off target throws by a, probably a quarterback who, like you said, doesn't have a lot of reps. It's been almost, it's been what over two years since he's played in an NFL game. That's a long

extensive break from playing. And I also thought watching the film, like they really dialed back their plan of attack. That was the one thing that stood out the most to me. It was, they're running a lot of the same past concepts, a lot of the same route combinations, really nothing that was too extensive or too expansive. And so I think that could be the case at least for another week or two, as far as, you know, dialing back the game plan. But as far as the chemistry goes, that's going to take some time. Like he hasn't played with Amari Cooper. He hasn't played with Donovan people's Jones or any of these weapons in the past game. And he hasn't played in a system, anything like Kevin Stefanski says that's

not anything like the bill Brian system he ran in Houston or anything else he's played in. So that is going to take time. It's going to take game reps. You can't just expect him to come in. So I'm, uh, you know, going into this week, I wasn't huge on starting him anyway, but right now I can't imagine starting him in any one quarterback leagues because that Houston defense, while it hasn't been terrible against fantasy quarterbacks, it hasn't been great. I mean, it's not a great defense overall, and they were without Derek Stingley, their best corner. So that's deshaun watson take the two other players i watched i want to start with drake london a jacob gibbs request and i'm so happy you requested him jacob because that was honestly one of the best film i've seen from a receiver in a long time

the first play that yeah it really was and the first and i'll and i'll explain why because you'll see in a moment what the common denominator was for why London didn't have a much bigger game. So the first play of the game, it was an out route. He ran from the flanker position. And I thought London, London did just such an excellent job selling that out route with his inside left foot. He's lined up on the right side with the inside left foot planting, and then uses that left foot to drive into the ground plant.

And they create so much space with a speed turn to his right to run the out. One thing I've noticed from London, he's a big receiver. Obviously, that's what he came out as. He's known as a jump ball 50-50 guy, but he does a really good job with his speed turns. And that shows lateral agility for his size, kind of like that, almost like the power forward. You know how Antonio Gates would do an excellent job planting and then doing a speed turn and getting himself open. And he has such a big frame that he shows off, you know, that he allows the quarterback a massive catch radius. Now he ran a comeback stop route that I thought he did an excellent job selling the vertical

on. He throttled down, but this is one example of Mariota woefully overthrowing him. That was a 12 yard gain taken off the board. His best route by far was a deep post. He ran in the second quarter. He tempoed it really well off the line of scrimmage, made it look kind of like it was going to heat. And by tempoing, I mean, he kind of comes off slow off the line of scrimmage. It looks like he's kind of running some kind of in breaker or something in the five to 10 yard range. And then just bam accelerated into the post. And he was wide open with at least four

yards of space between the safety. And there was only one middle of the field, close safety. That means just one safety in the middle of the field and the corner who he beat. And there was a massive throwing window. And once again, Mariota just woefully off target later in the game, another speed turn, create outside of separation overthrow in the red zone on a third and 10. This was the big one for fantasy purposes. He sells the out route cuts back in on this inside breaker slant past the goal line presents himself the big catch radius. And he has

a step and what happens? Mariota throws it about four yards over his head. So if you want to see just one play that I think encompasses Mariota, look at the last play of the game where he throws a pick six. It's one of the worst throws I've seen in the NFL besides the Sean Watson oneatson one that adam brought up earlier but you look at four plays there one on the in the red zone and that was the sean yeah that was a little bit early but one in the red zone that should have been a touchdown the deep post that could have been either a touchdown i'm looking at the deep post right now he he was he was under a lot of pressure i just want to i just want to give he's under pressure but there's so much separation yeah it, he's got to make that throw. The main point is that London's getting open, right?

We're talking about London just being that good. London is getting open at a high rate. Yeah. London looks so much better than I thought because the main thing is two things here. The acceleration is better than I expected for his size, and I really haven't watched much film on him this year. I watched a bunch at USC and those speed turns, man, that ability, that lateral agility, that soft, you know, the soft feet, the footwork for a guy of his size. It's really impressive when you combine that with the catch radius.

So I was extremely impressed. This could have been a monster game with better quarterback play or even just average quarterback. Right. But that's never going away. We've been talking about that with Kyle Pitts all year. That's the problem. Like, how many times has Pitts been wide open? But if they go to Desmond Ritter, things could potentially get better.

Not definitely, but potentially. Maybe. Anything else on that? At this point, they really should go with Desmond Ritter. Probably. Yeah. Well, we'll see what happens tonight. But they're still right in the thick of this NFC South race.

And I'm thinking Mariota still gives them the best chance to win. I mean, we're not talking about a first-round pick quarterback here. I don't know. It's hard to... I know. I'm not really super high on Ritter, but it's hard to watch that film and think that Mariota gives them the best chance to win. That was really, really, really bad quarterback play. You don't see quarterback play

at least... I mean, I watch Daniel Jones every week, right? He's not the best quarterback in the nfl but he doesn't have that many off-target throws or anywhere near that many off-target throws in a game um it's like night and day and he's not even like i said one of the best so just something i noted i was really impressed i'm happy you called him out jacob so that was a great suggestion then i want to talk about deandre swift because we talked about him earlier jacob brought up some great stats that show promise Adam brought up a great quote from the coach that shows promise. And so I wanted to see what he looked like on film. And I still think what I see, like you could see it on the first run, the first run of the game that he has, he gets an outside run with a pulling tackle. That's Penny

soul coming from the right side as the right tackle across the left side. He has an obvious hole vertically. He needs to plant and get behind the butt of Penny Sewell behind the right side of him and just get vertical. But he tries to break it outside. It turns into a three yard game, which should have been a 10. That's kind of, you know, the story of Deandre Swift, why he hasn't played as much as people expected him to the Lions coaches have made that. But then you see, as the game goes on, you start to see what the coaches were talking about. There's a run in this, I believe it was a nine yard run where he gets vertical in the red zone, takes it from the 10 to the one yard line. He scores a couple of plays later and you could

see the burst. I mean, he sees the cutback lane. He does this later to noticing that realizing the cutback lane and then just bursting. That's what I wanted to see was the burst back. And the burst is definitely back because he's always been a burst player. And even later in the game, there was a first and 10 with four 16 to go in the fourth quarter that I put in my notes where he does what I don't love. He takes, tries to take the edge and win the edge, but it worked because he does have that burst back and that lateral Jilly. And because he had at right tackle, who just gives him a good chance to win the edge because he holds up for so long on his blocks. He's really one of the better tackles I've seen this year on film. And so

what I want to see from Swift was there, the burst is back. Do I think he's going to be a Nick Chubb like processing in between tackles and picking the right lanes? No, he's going to still have some really negative runs that the coaches are going to look at and film and be like, come on, man, you, you know, you have to get vertical here. You know, you have to cut this back inside, but for fantasy purposes, what we want is the burst back and he, and he's got that. So I'm very enthused about what he could be moving forward from a health standpoint and just from a talent standpoint. This is fun because Dan starts talking, I start watching the film and then I can jump in with my backseat driver, you know, well actually, but no, I'm not going to do that. Now

I'm excited about Swift. Do it. No, I got nothing except, except the Mariota thing. He was like, he had guys at his legs on that post throw. So maybe it wasn't his fault. But like, yeah, I think that was a good call. The first carry. But I will say this about that, about that throw. I will say this about that throw. So one thing, and this is so true with all NFL quarterback play, is the best quarterbacks by far are the ones who can throw with anticipation

on a consistent basis. So you have to be able to kind of read the leverage of that cornerback and throw that ball way earlier than he even tempted by then when he throws it and that's been a problem with a lot of quarterbacks marion is one of them he doesn't throw with great anticipation on any kind of consistent level but i do know what you mean there is it's a muddy pocket for sure yeah marcus mariotta was the second pick of the draft right behind goth Goff. Is that right? Yep. Yeah. There are almost no good quarterbacks who have been the second pick in the NFL draft.

It is the QB dead zone. It is unbelievable. Sam Darnold, right? Or no, not Darnold. He was third. Zach Wilson, though. Was Zach Wilson two or three? Zach Wilson was two.

Wilson was two, right? For sure. Because Barkley was two and then Darnold was three. Yeah, the number two pick on a quarterback is almost always bad. It's the weirdest thing. I think Donovan McNabb was one of the good ones, but yeah, it's odd.

Okay, just some quick stuff here to put a bow on this segment here. I don't know what happened with the Steelers, but Pat Frymuth played 55% of the snaps. That was pretty low. George Pickens played 68%, which was a season low. I'm not sure if they were nursing a lead and just running the ball more, but that was weird. Jahan Dotson played 79% of the snaps. That was way up from his previous three games, and he was much better. They were, of course, trailing. That has not been the case much for them. I will say that this is the most I watched Taylor Heineke.

He is absolutely dreadful, but he does have the knack of making huge plays when it counts, and he did it again on a fourth down. He saved their game and potentially their season with a great throw to Curtis Samuel, but he is bad, and that is relevant for all of the pass catchers there. Derek Henry, in his last four games,

he's averaging 2.8 yards per carry. Out of 66 running backs with 10 or more carries in the last, since week 10, the last four weeks, and I meant to make that 40 or more carries, but I had a typo there, so that's why there are, so I put the search in wrong. So out of the 66 running backs with 10 or more carries in the last four weeks,

he is 61st in yards before contact per carry. He's 42nd in yards after contact per carry. He is toward the bottom in every stat, basically. He's just been awful. And he hasn't really had the toughest matchups. I mean, three of the four teams he's faced, Denver, Green Bay, and the Eagles, have trouble stopping the run. So I don't know how you guys feel about Derrick Henry.

He is certainly slumping right now. His schedule could not be much better. He's got Jacksonville, Houston, Jacksonville, the Chargers, and Houston in his next three games. I think he's going to be amazing. But I don't know how you guys feel about Derrick Henry. He is older, and he is slumping. I have full confidence in him.

Jacob, do you have full confidence in Derrick Henry? What's your 0-10 on the faith-o-meter? Yeah, like 8 or 9. I'm kind of with you. I wouldn't worry, especially with his schedule and teams that they're probably going to be able to just keep running against. I think he's probably going to be fine. Faith-o-meter, Dan, 0-10?

Yeah, also a 9. I think for me it comes down to two factors. The schedule is incredible, which you went over, and the game script should be a lot better, which Jacob touched on. I mean, look, you're getting blown out by the Eagles early on. It's not going to be a good game script for Derek Henry. We've known that for a while with Henry. He's not that type of back.

That is true. He usually really struggles in blowouts, actually. I should have brought that stat back. I brought that stat up for a game earlier this year. I thought they were going to get killed. I think it was the Chiefs game. And they ended up, you know, going to go to overtime. It was a great game.

It was very close. They were toe-to-toe with them for a while. That was a good game. So he's actually almost always bad in blowouts. That's a great point. Yeah, they're not going to get blown out, at least for the next three weeks. I think they have Dallas after that. Okay, great job by Schaefer.

He needed this one. There's a bounce-back YouTube poll here. He needed it. He needed it. It's his confidence. His job is about confidence here. I'm still reeling over the last poll we had on our Tuesday night stream where it's not even Schaefer's fault.

I don't love that he included Battleship as an option for the best board game, but the fact that the fans and the viewers viewed Battleship as the greatest board game of all time. No, they put Monopoly. They put Monopoly. No, Battleship was winning that poll the last you told me about it. I don't think so.

Schaefer, let's... At first you're like, Battleship's running away with it. I don't think so. Monopoly was running away with it. Nobody likes Battleship., Battleship's running away with it. I don't think so. Monopoly was running away with it. Nobody likes Battleship. I think Monopoly was running away with it. Definitely not Battleship. No, I'm telling you. I really don't think so.

Battleship's like the worst board game I've ever played. Yeah, that's why. You're right. Monopoly is a classic. Battleship's terrible. Favorite comedy actor of the 1990s? Adam Sandler. Oh, that's a great one.

Yeah. Adam Sandler, Jim... That's a great one. Adam Sandler, Jim Carrey, Martin Lawrence or Mike Myers? I do think we probably should have had Farley on here, but I'm not going to... It's okay. I'm going to go for Sandler. Unfortunately, he only lived up until 1997.

I think he still could have been on there because Tommy Boy is – Tommy Boy in his appearance in Billy Madison is the only thing that carries him really. Like Beverly Hills Ninja is awful. Yeah. Terrible movie. Black Sheep is not great, but it's – Black Sheep isn't very good either.

But what about SNL? I mean you're getting rid of SNL. SNL is awful. It's always been terrible. Wow. Worst show ever. It's always been terrible. Whoa. Wow. Worst show ever. It's not funny.

Wow. That is so interesting. Oh, my God. Because people usually – The only sketch comedy I've ever found funny was the Chappelle show. Yeah. And sketch comedy is extremely hit or miss. It is the most hit or miss thing.

What about I Think You Should Leave? Have you watched that, Sha that shaver yes that's what i was gonna ask never heard of it oh you gotta watch it the best skits on i think i love i think you should leave but it's the one show that has the biggest bus rate among friends i've tried to show it to like at least four or five people are like this is not funny at all dan why do you find this funny and i'm like how is this not funny it's hilarious there can't be expectations if people were like, this is not funny at all, Dan. Why do you find this funny? And I'm like, how is this not funny? It's hilarious. There can't be expectations. If people are trying to figure out why it's funny, it's already lost on you.

Sorry. You're already lost. Well, season one's not that good. So if you recommend I think you should leave, you should start with season two. It's much, much better. I do think I think you should leave as generally hit or miss. No, I think you should leave is hit or miss, by the way.

I think some of the sketches make me laugh a lot. Some, I don't find that funny, but that's the interesting part. It's, this is a high ceiling, low floor show for me. That is sketch comedy.

They get a nutshell. I mean, to say that SNL at the best SNL years with a will foul, but will federal years, that was like consistently great. Like, you don't like celebrity jeopardy shaver. I've never seen that.

Honestly, I think, I think, cause I never grew up watching honestly. I think because I never grew up watching it, the jokes, it just doesn't hold up if you've never seen it. It will hold up for somebody that grew up

watching it and they'll go back and laugh, but if it's you drop a 21-year-old and you're like, hey, do you think this is funny? They're probably not going to think it's funny, honestly. I could see that. I think that's going to be the case with almost any sketch comedy i think it's really topical and like comedy changes so much yeah yeah with time like yeah i think but i can see how it was funnier back then because they had stars like you became before you became a star you're on on snl now that doesn happen. There's no movie stars coming off SNL anymore.

Sudeikis did. Tim Robinson from, I think, what did you say? One out of the last 15 years, it used to be mega stars coming out. It's true. It's true. But I also think that's because movies have changed and we're living in a TV show era

and a Netflix era. Nobody cares about movies anymore. So Schneier's seen like three movies in his life. But anyway, the poll. Favorite comedy actor of the 90s right now, Adam Sandler has 48% of the vote. Jim Carrey, 37%. Martin Lawrence, 11%. Mike Myers, 3%.

It's a runaway Adam Sandler for me. Really? Runaway Sandler for me. It's Jim Carrey for me. The only one who would compete for me really run away sandler for me it's jim yeah the only one who would compete for me would be mike myers just because i love the awesome power series but adam sandler was my entire childhood my brother and i watched billy madison abby gilmore a combined a thousand times it feels like my parents would just throw that movie on for us and go leave the room it's jim carrey for me well he and Dumber and The Truman Show those are two of my favorite movies

yeah but I mean you can't talk about The Truman Show in this conversation The Truman Show is not a comedy it is The Truman Show? are you thinking of Ace Ventura? there's comedic parts of that movie well but it's not a comedy

it's not a comedy Ace Ventura is better than Dumb and Dumber. I'm really appreciating this extended appearance from Thomas today because I didn't realize he had this many hot takes. These are some hot takes. I'm going to take credit for this. I fired him up. This is what I was doing.

I was trying to inspire you, Thomas. It's like any great coach. I was trying to inspire you to Come on and drop those hot takes. Oh, I've got so many hot takes. If we worked in an office together and not remotely, you guys couldn't stand me, honestly. I got a hot take. I got a hot take. I got something in the mail today.

I think one of the worst things in America, thank you cards. Thank you cards are the worst. Can we get rid of thank you cards? Once you have thrown the event, you should be done. I hate thank you cards. We should start sending thank yous back to people for the thank you card. It's a stupid concept. We don't need it. It's an implied thank you. Of course, you're thankful for the gift. I almost didn't want to have a wedding because I didn't want to write the thank you cards. So I think we should need to get rid of them. I want to be on record for saying that. Okay? Yeah, this is one of my favorite Azertakes. I'm happy you're on record. I support this fully. I also think that one of my friends

recently did people like, oh, it's not right. No, it is right. They did wedding invitations online. Great move. Great freaking move. Why does it have to be these fancy wedding invitations that cost you thousands of dollars? You're wasting. I don't care if I get invited to a wedding. I don't need the fancy invitation. Give me a link online.

I'll RSVP there. It's actually probably better because sometimes I just like text a friend like, oh, I'm coming to the wedding. So the RSVP. Because I don't love having to find a mailbox, take the letter back, RSVP. If you get an Evite, though, if you get an Evite, it's easy. You just, you RSVP

right there. That's what I mean. Evite's perfect. That's good. I think your parents would disagree. The traditionalists would disagree with that. Yeah, the traditionalists would disagree, but it's 2022, Adam. Jacob is going to get married in the next couple years i would think so you you know have you thought about invitations yet yeah evites for sure i haven't thought about it no not you dad jacob i would say jacob is gonna get married soon yeah uh it's a little choppy here i couldn't hear you

oh okay jacob is definitely an evite kind of guy. All right. We got, let's, let's do our four big topics now. We've left about four minutes for them. So first one is from Pashy. Are we ready to call Mark Andrews a bust? Yes, he's tight end too. And was great four weeks at the beginning of the season, but he's been awful since and not worth the second round price tag. So, uh, Jacob, you can have the first word. Are we ready to call Mark Andrews a bust? I think so. I mean, I was super, super excited for Andrews this year, but it's been really, really rough in Baltimore. That's the thing is I don't know if I blame him necessarily, but from just a production standpoint, he has been a bust.

But, yeah, 17% off target rate for Mark Andrews. That's the worst of his career. And then I actually tweeted today, things could get better with Huntley. He's over the past three years, his numbers have been better with Huntley. He's been targeted at higher rates, slightly higher. Um, his yard per run rate with Huntley is 2.36 compared to 1.99 with Lamar. His off target rate is down from 15% with Lamar to 10% with Huntley and his catch rate is up from 65% to 77%. So maybe things will get better.

Yeah, I would say he's a bust at this point. The first six games of the season, he was anything but. He was a top five running back and a top five wide receiver, and he was the number two tight end, but he and Kelsey were both just putting up astronomical numbers. For the season, though, he's outside the top 20 at wide receiver, and I think he's number 19 at running back. So that is not worth a second-round price tag, not even close.

The weird thing is, unless he's had more than eight targets in a game, he just hasn't come through. He's got four massive games this year. They're the only four games he's caught a touchdown. He's had 11 or more targets in all four of those games. When he's been at eight or fewer targets, he's really been like, at best, I think, 13 points.

So that's weird. He's not scoring unless he gets a ton of targets. And I don't know. Look, honestly, it kind of just mirrors Lamar Jackson's season. Jackson was off

to an incredible start. Andrews was off to an incredible start. Jackson's been slumping. Andrews has been slumping. So maybe Huntley can be better. I'll leave it at that, Dan. Do you think Huntley

will be better for Mark Andrews? I think he could be better for Mark Andrews, but I still don't think that means he has a higher ceiling than he had last season or that ceiling or where we drafted him at. Because one thing you'll notice, and I'll make this quick, but one thing you'll notice is the drop-off for Lamar, the drop-off for Andrews is at least somewhat tied to the Rashad Bateman injury. And last year they had Marquise Brown. This year they have nothing left at receiver. There is nothing for defenses to respect at that receiver position. And that makes things a lot more difficult for the entire passing game and Andrews.

And so I think it's tied to that. And because of that, I don't see much of a ceiling. All right. Next topic here is the 49ers offense. This is from Chris Pudsey, and he says Brock Purdy and the 49ers going forward. Jacob, how good will they be? What do you think about the

49ers weapons with Brock Purdy under center? Yeah, it was a good game, but I'm, I don't know, I'm not getting too excited about it. He had the eighth worst off target rate, which is really concerning considering his average depth of target was only 5.4 yards, which is the lowest of any quarterback um and he just he really he leaned on the short yardage guys and so maybe Christian McCaffrey especially with the injury to

Elijah Mitchell um his snap rate was up around Valmarie was up this week and then also maybe it gets more targets with Purdy not wanting to pass downfield um maybe Depot Samuel you know has a little bit of redemption here because things were looking pretty rough for him going into this week. And then probably not as good for Brandon Ayuk. Purdy was off target on four of nine targets to Brandon Ayuk, which is pretty rough. It seems like maybe they'll just be focused on the short yardage

guys and Ayuk's going to be tough to trust. Well, this is going to really fire up Schaefer, by the way, but now it is a two-team race, potentially, in the NFC. Not the Vikings, sorry. No, I don't know. I don't know if I should count out the 49ers that quickly, but this could be a lot worse than Nick Mullins.

Nick Mullins averaged like 286 passing yards per game in his starts a couple of years ago. He was bad with touchdowns and interceptions. His touchdown interception rate was terrible, but he threw for a lot of yards. We've seen them throw in C.J. Beathard and Nick Mullins and do okay. I'm nervous, though.

I'm more nervous about Purdy, Dan. And the other problem is there's just so many mouths to feed. So I honestly think that I go into each week now with hoping to find ways to sit Debo, Kittle, and Ayuk. Definitely not McCaffrey. But I would like to be able to avoid them. That's my immediate reaction to this.

Yeah, I think this is potentially really good news for only one player, and that's Christian McCaffrey. We saw in this game, what's a young quarterback's best friend? Easy, quick design routes to the running back. Just high percentage passes. And that's what we saw a lot of in this game, what's a quarter, what's a, you know, young quarterback's best friend, easy, quick design routes to the running back, just high percentage passes. And that's what we saw a lot of in this game. I think that's going to continue with McCaffrey. I will say this though, Adam, I'm not huge on Purdy, but I've said throughout the last four years that this is quite literally the most quarterback friendly offensive system

I've ever watched on film in San Francisco. And that was made even more possible when they maximize the weapons like they have by adding Christian McCaffrey. So I have to stand by that. You brought up some great numbers. Mullins has had some success. Beathard has had some success. Yeah. Those were short lived successes. Like those guys fizzled out after a certain point with the 49ers, but I personally don't find Jimmy Garoppolo to be a good quarterback. I think he's one of the worst quarterbacks on tape, quite frankly, but that system makes him look decent sometimes. And so I don't know how much worse Brock birdie is the deep vertical game.

It's going to be worse. That's obvious. But as far as just getting the ball out to those playmakers, he can operate that. It's not a hard task to ask of him. So I'm not totally hitting the panic button just yet. And I'm higher on McCaffrey than I have been, but I think I should just stick with like my gut, my gut here, which is Kyle Shanahan can maximize any quarterback. Yeah. But even with Garoppolo, I mean, it's not like

kid, a lie. You can, and Debo were frustrating with Garoppolo. They're going to be even more frustrating with Purdy. Uh, this is from Trenton. Oh yeah., Schaefer, can you pop on here for a second? I want to ask you a question. How are you at searching for old tweets? Because I am terrible at it. Depends on what are we trying to dig up. I need to find a Twitter poll that I did, I want to say over the summer,

where I asked people if they thought Burrow or Herbert was a better quarterback. I'll try my best. It's easy to do to do type in i'll tell you the trick let's see let's see if we can teach me teach me okay from in the search bar type in the word from and then type in the semicolon that's the one with the two dots i think that's a semi that's a colon that's a colon two dots is a colon that's a colon the regular you know i'm'm bad with those. I call a backspace a forward space. So from colon space and then no at, just Adam Azer NFL or whatever. Is it just Adam Azer? Yeah.

So just colon Adam Azer. From space colon Adam Azer and then type in the word or type in like Herbert Burrow or something like that. And it should come up. I found the poll. Okay, good. There you go. Alright, so you can let me know what the old results were. I asked on Twitter today, if you were starting an NFL

franchise today and only had these two options, which quarterback would you pick? 803 votes so far. Joe Burrow has 76% of the votes. I think this is a big turnaround from over the summer or whenever I did it, Jacob.

Yeah, July 24th, 75% Justin Herbert. Wow, a complete flip. A complete flip. Yep. And I don't know. I mean, I think it's a little unfair to judge Justin Herbert this year. But Trenton says,

Joe Burrow continues to prove he's in a different league than Justin Herbert in real life and in fantasy. So I'll get your takes on that. Dan, you have the first word. Are they in the same class? Who's better? And really, obviously, Burrow is a no doubt about it. Slam dunk start. Justin Herbert is QB 10 this year. And how do you feel about him going forward starting this week against the Dolphins? Yeah, so last night, late night, editor-in-chief, resident Bengals fan, Adi shouted me out and said, I still can't believe you told me before the season you would take Justin Herbert over Gerber.

He's enraged by this take. And I told him, look, I still might do it because I think Justin Herbert still has the higher ceiling. He's got better arm talent. I think he's just as good a processor. He may not have the same touch and the same it factor. That's what it comes down to with Burrow. If you believe in the it factor, and I do believe in the it factor, and I do love Joe Burrow. This is not a knock on Joe Burrow.

I just see more upside with Justin Herbert. If he had Jamar chase and T Higgins, or if he had any semblance of an offensive line right now, that offense line is a total disaster. And the Bengals offense line, while bad beginning of the season has really improved in the second half, given where it was now, the fair point that he made was Bengals offense line was miserable last year and Burrow was still good, but he did have those receivers. So it's a close one for me, Adam, but I'm giving the slight edge to Herbert. And as far as Ken Herbert turned things around fantasy wise that I don't personally see, I just don't feel like that offense has what they need to really turn it around that would be a vertical stretcher like if they had a Jalen Waddle or Tyrico in this offense with a arm talent like

Justin Herbert that could be amazing because even on Herbert's fourth and 11 touchdown he threw there was literally no separation from Keenan Allen it's been yeah that was one of the most draped plays I've ever seen from defense back and Herbert just put an absolute dime rolling to his right in the perfect spot. So what if, what if, what if, uh, Mike Williams comes back? Would he be the tonic? It's not what I think he needs in this offense right now. I think they need, especially given the issues on the offensive line,

I just feel like they need a little more vertical speed to take the safeties off. Hmm. Yeah, I would agree with everything Dan said. the issues on the offensive line. I just feel like they need a little more vertical speed to take the safeties off. Yeah, I would agree with everything Dan said. Um, Herbert is really, really good. He has,

so Burrow has this third lowest off target rate, 7.4% of his throws have been off target. Herbert's just behind him at 9%. Um, and on deep throws, Herbert's actually been more accurate. He's been one of the most accurate in the league, but he doesn't get to throw deep because he doesn't have anyone who's getting open deep and because Joe Lombardi's offense is really really annoying and because the offensive line

is a problem um Justin Herbert's insane man like I yeah Joe Burrow is also really good so like if you are just set on him being the pick that's fine but I would pick Herbert I I like one of the things I look for is like can the guy make throws that no one else can make or almost no one else can make. And I think Herbert probably wins in that category. He makes more wow throws, but maybe that shouldn't be the judgment here. Burrow might just be more consistent.

You can't really look at the stats over the last two years. I don't see any stats that suggest Herbert is better. That doesn't mean Herbert's worse, but Burrow definitely hasn't beat in terms of, you know, yards per attempt completion rate. And the fact that Burrow has thrown the ball downfield on average more, has a higher ADOT than Herbert each of the last two years and has still beat him in completion rate,

that's pretty good. I don't know how much of that is just like Jamar Chase and Tee Higgins are amazing, making contested catches, that could be it. But Herbert, Burrow's got him beat statistically. As far as fantasy goes, it's weird. I know Herbert is QB 10. I just can't imagine treating him like that. They throw so much. And he's been running more lately,

which is another part of the reason why he struggled this year. He hurt his ribs early and he wasn't running at all. He's doing a little bit more of that lately. He's got the Dolphins. I mean, I'll take it week by week, but I'm pretty much considering a must-start, but maybe more like he'd be 7 or 8 rather than top 5. I think he was a top 5 guy this week with the matchup at the Raiders,

and he, just like almost every other quarterback this week, did not come through. I'll tell you what, though. I think I'd take Geno Smith over him the rest of the season. I don't know how you guys feel about that, but I think this can walk right through. I would definitely take Geno Smith over him. Yeah, Walker injury could be a really big deal.

Even if he's just not as effective. Anyway, last question here is from Brock. How do you win your fantasy championship next year? What have we learned this year that we don't want to forget? We will get some iteration of this question many times over the next few weeks and months, which is fine. It's always a fun conversation to have. Thank you, Brock.

And Jacob, other than subscribing to Sportsline, how do we win our fantasy championship next year? Yeah, so I was going to segue my subscribe to Sportsline sale where I talked about all the exciting stuff we're doing and the rookie wide receivers and everything to my actual real point, which is prioritize rookie wide receivers. We're seeing again, league winning wide receivers emerging down the stretch,

Christian Watson, Garrett Wilson so far among this class. And these guys were not expensive at all in draft season, especially Watson. So I think if you you know do your homework subscribe to sportsline uh watch listen to fft this summer like and feel really good about your understanding of the incoming rookie class and which guys you want to be aggressive in targeting in the mid to late rounds you can really get values at wide receiver

and if you can be patient with them we we keep seeing year after year late in the year these rookie wide receivers stepping into a larger role and emerging and there's been studies done on this jj zechariahson um from later on qb.com uh dwayne mcfarland has done it as well they get better throughout the year rookie wide receivers get better throughout the year every single year and by the end of the year they're like the best value at any position and And it just continues to be proven. And we have another exciting rookie class. So that's what I would say. That's a good one, Dan.

Well, believe it or not, Jacob just stole mine because I was thinking that exact same thing. But I think it can be, you know, expanded to make sure you prioritize your bench with upside plays. Don't be trying to draft the guys who are expected volume type players. You don't want any of those guys. I think Cordell Patterson was a good example. People were like, Oh my God, he's going so cheap.

And even someone like Alan Lazard, who's not really a very talented wide receiver, but everyone expected volume to be there. Those are the type of players that tend to fizzle out toward this part of the season. And now it depends on your league size, even for what Jacob's advice wasn't for mine would be if you're in a shallow league, it may not be as important to draft those wide receivers, rookie receivers who end up league winners. And it may be more important to try to pick the week where you start to want to target them. Maybe week five, week six, week seven, you make sure you stashed them on your bench or you make the trades for them around that exact same time in a deeper league though, you should definitely be looking to fill your bench

with those players. So I think targeting upside in the late rounds is something I've learned. Another thing I've learned is, you know, there may not be that tight end advantage. I thought with anyone, but Travis Kelsey really right now, because look, we see this bus season from Andrews total bus season from Kyle pits and no other kind of breakouts at the tight end position. And so it's the position I'm going to probably start approach very differently next year in the sense that I'm probably be, if I get Kelsey cool and I'll be looking to do that. But if not, I'll be looking to just, you know, punt the position completely until the late rounds and then play the waiver wire and try to stream it.

So that's kind of, cause that was one thing that's that, you know, I would guess stopped me up. I should say like, um, prevented me from doing my best in some leagues. I have a lot of Kyle pitch shares and I love a lot of Mark Andrew shares. And I look back at those leagues and those are some of the leagues I'm struggling, not struggling, but doing my best in some leagues. I have a lot of Kyle Pitt shares and I have a lot of Mark Andrew shares. And I look back at those leagues and those are some of the leagues I'm struggling, not struggling, but doing my worst in. Yeah, there's so many things that I could say. Seems like year two receivers, uh, you know, a thing that I was sort of obsessed with. Um, if you had a good rookie wide receiver, the year two breakout was just so obvious. Not really happening as much lately, I think.

And rookie wide receivers seem like maybe they're of better value. But I feel like there's very few circumstances where I'm going running back, running back to start my draft. I guess most of you are still in two receiver leagues, so things are different.

But if you're in a three receiverreceiver league and it's PPR, running back, running back is such a trap. So I would say that's probably not going to happen, and I didn't really do that this year. Gee, I wonder if anyone said that to you about two or three years ago over and over again. Oh, well, you were wrong back then. Let's talk about anti-fragility.

You know what? I don't even want to have to look it up again. I think I'm more interested in talking about Schaefer thinking. Have you seen Ace Ventura, Schaefer? How do you rank it with Dumb and Dumber and the rest? I mean, probably as a kid, it would be higher. But now watching it, you know, I was messaging Jacob. I like The Cable Guy better than Ace Ventura.

The Cable Guy is hilarious. The Cable Guy is a smart movie. The Cable Guy is very underrated. The Cable Guy is like eating glass. I hate The Cable Guy. Whoa. You watch The Cable Guy? I hate The Cable Guy. It's one of the worst movies.

I don't know about that, but it's so bad. I can't withstand it. It's funny. I don't know if you know The Welsh. He's been on our Fantasy Baseball podcast. He's like a big fantasy guy, specifically baseball. He's a prospect guy, friend of the program. Every time I would come on the show, they would make Cable Guy jokes because they love it and they knew I hate it. It's such a bad movie um but i was quoting it the other day

uh one of like one of my kids said center and i went into like the porto password scene i was like center so i do respect that scene that was very funny but no ace ventura is the best man ace ventura is one of the best comedies ever made it's better than dumb and dumber it's uh it's the it's the goat jim carrey i would say that's your take you can have that one i'll go with dumb and dumber but you know you can't go wrong you can't go wrong as a kid of course i love that movie uh which one ace ventura but that's the thing like ace ventura isn't really that childy movie it's it's actually a very adult movie but scene i knew he was gonna bring up the talking but i think i like nature's call better though oh come on we have discredited

everything that you said you've had some great points on today's show you like the second ace ventura better come on the raccoon scene in the beginning you know the it's like from cliffhanger the spoof from cliffhanger you know i don't remember oh go on youtube and watch it okay all right everybody thanks for watching and listening always fun to have you here this is what we do on Beyond the Box score. We review movies. We'll talk to you tomorrow with The Waiver Wire, which will be headlined by, I have no idea,

Michael Gallup, Chuba Hubbard, DJ Dallas. We'll see. Maybe we'll sit The Waiver Wire. No, we'll find somebody good for you. Tyler Huntley is a great call. We'll talk to you tomorrow on Fantasy Football.