Fantasy Football Today - Beyond the Box Score: Saints, JSN, Kelce and More (09/16 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: September 16, 2024

Recapping Bears-Texans (2:15) and wondering if there is any hope for D.J. Moore, Caleb Williams, D'Andre Swift, Tank Dell and Stefon Diggs. Then we go through the news and notes (13:40) with too many injuries ... Advanced stats (22:55) on Malik Nabers, Rashid Shaheed, Jordan Mason and Brock Bowers who we are very excited about! ... Four Big Topics: How legit is the Saints offense (37:35)? How legit is Jaxon Smith-Njigba (47:10)? How bad are the Jaguars (52:10)? Are Travis Kelce and Sam LaPorta going to be busts, or is now the time to buy low (1:00:00)? ... Email us at [e-mail] Fantasy Football Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday SUBSCRIBE to FFT Express on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-express/id1528634304 Follow FFT Express on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6qyGWfETSBFaciPrtvoWCC?si=6529cbee20634da8 SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dynasty/id1696679179 FOLLOW FFT Dynasty on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2aHlmMJw1m8FareKybdNfG?si=8487e2f9611b4438&nd=1 SUBSCRIBE to FFT DFS on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dfs/id1579415837 FOLLOW FFT DFS on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5zU7pBvGK3KPhfb69Q1hNr?si=1c5030a3b1a64be2 Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr Follow the brand new FFT TikTok account: https://www.tiktok.com/@fftoday 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." Visit the betting arena on CBSSports.com for all the latest sportsbook reviews and sportsbook promos. 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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I had no idea. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. Off to the races, and he stays on his feet. He's just going to go the distance. Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Today on Beyond the Boxcore, what's going on with Sam Laporta and Travis Kelsey? Are we buying the Saints offense? Jackson Smith and Jigba with a huge day in week two.

More of that to come, plus a bunch of injury updates asba with a huge day in week two. More of that to come. Plus a bunch of injury updates as we have a bad one in Kansas City. And we welcome you to Fantasy Football Today. Presented by BetMGM, the sportsbook born in Vegas. It's Adam Azer with Dan Schneier and Jacob Gibbs on Beyond the Box. Score advanced stats from simple people. I'm going to take a breath now. What's going on, Dan Schneier?

How was your weekend? You have a U.S. Open shirt on. You're not that good, buddy. You're not that good. I know. I'm not to take a breath now. What's going on, Dan Schneier? How was your weekend? You have a U.S. Open shirt on. You're not that good, buddy. You're not that good. I know. I'm not that good, but I did enjoy going to the U.S. Open two years ago. I didn't get a chance this year. Weekend was good.

Adam got to do my favorite thing in the world, which is golf, but also got to watch some football. So I'm excited to break some of that down today. I will say this. You got the bet going. You have to grow that mustache out. And it's okay. It's coming in okay. I guess that's the best way to describe it.

A little bit patchy, more in the beard. But what I'm curious about is I see a little gray in that facial hair over there. Oh, a little bit. It's very gray. I'm wondering if that mustache is going to come in a little salt pepper. No, I don't think so. Just the beard. Just the beard. Jacob, what's your beard

growing ability? Not great. I wish I just didn't have any facial hair, to be honest. I just didn't even have to worry about it because I have to shave consistently. But yeah, it's patchy. It's annoying. He's got a goatee going. All right, so we got Houston and Chicago. Very good defense last night in this game.

We will recap it. It was really a tough week for injuries and isaiah pacheco is going to miss a decent chunk of time and we just saw jermaine johnson for the jets he's out for the season confirmed with an achilles tear but let's go to houston 19 and chicago 13 caleb williams has scored basically the same amount of points two straight weeks 7.4 uh fantasy points yesterday 7.2 fantasy points in week one. He has not thrown a touchdown pass yet. Dan, any major takeaways? Doesn't have to be about Caleb Williams. Major takeaways from this game. Yeah, my major takeaway starts with the Bears offense, which has been the only offense

as bad as the Carolina Panthers offense so far this season, which is hard to do. And my thought is it was right in front of my face. The off season, the time I spent wasting, uh, worrying about the Seattle Seahawks offensive line. It was in front of my face that the real issue was in my mind, at least Shane Waldron. I hate watching the Shane Waldron offense. I hate everything about it. I hate the personnel he uses.

I hate the, the, the lack of creativity in it. I hate where the run calls when they're obvious run calls last night, all night to DeAndre Smith. The same run so many times that outside zone that kept getting cut off because Houston was just sending a defender down through the line of scrimmage. I just hate watching that offense, and I don't really understand what's going to change because it looked this way with Seattle last year when he ran the Seahawks offense.

And Geno Smith had a breakout 2022 massively aggressed regressed in 2023 under Shane Waldron then has looked great again this year under Ryan Grubb and now we have Caleb Williams dealing with the Shane Waldron situation it'll get better when the receivers get healthier maybe uh but I don't know man when you see an offense that looks like this it's tough I feel like I'm seeing something similar with Doug Peterson too which we'll get to a little bit later. We are going to talk about the Jaguars and their struggles a little bit later, but you know, it's funny because Jacob, when we, you, I tweeted last week that I watched all of the snaps for the bear, all of Caleb Williams drop backs. And I actually was sort of encouraged from week one from week one, because there were some open receivers.

There were some plays to be made. Keenan Allen dropped a touchdown. Keenan Allen was wide open for a touchdown. DJ Moore was open for, and Caleb Williams overthrew him in week one. DJ Moore was open down the sideline and Williams didn't see him. But I was like, you know what? If Caleb Williams just shows some improvement going forward, they had chances, plays to be made there. So I came away encouraged from week one. I did not watch the all 22 from week two. Texans are a great defense. I think anyway. They weren't in week one, but they could be a great defense this year. So I kind of chalked

some of it up to that. But Dan's kind of singing a different tune about this offense. What do you think? See, I think Dan's right about Shane Waldron. And you're seeing that

pervasively throughout the Twitter streets. People are real frustrated, especially because these games have been magnified here with the Island game. And that's a real concern, right? I don't like what we've seen from waldron what we saw last year either it was really vanilla um the other thing is yeah the defenses he's faced uh caleb have been

very good i think houston's pass rush is legit uh caleb has been pressured on 36 percent of his drop back so far which is top 10 in the nfl And I don't know, I guess, enough about the coaching side of what goes into offensive line play to attribute that to Waldron necessarily. But maybe. I'm curious what... No, I think that's fair, though, Jacob. That's been a big factor, too. This offensive line has taken a big step back so far this year. Going up against Houston, though, Houston's going to get a lot of pressure.

I also, from learning from people on Twitter and watching Daniel Jones, I think quarterback play has a lot to do with with pass protection, too. I mean, there's no question about that. So you have to want you got to call out the right protections. You got to check into the right play. Caleb Williams probably isn't there yet. But obviously, if anybody watched the game last night, he was under duress a lot. He got beat up at the end of that. Those hits looked like they were taking a toll on him by the end of that game.

No one's starting Caleb Williams. I'm sure a lot of people are going to drop Caleb Williams. You could, but just DeAndre Swift, DJ Moore, Keenan Allen when he comes back, Roma Dunzey, is there optimism on your part for those guys? I feel pretty optimistic about all of them.

Even Swift, it's been terrible, but the role is there. I really thought Cleo Herbert might play a bigger play, and we did seem to get in the end zone. But Swift has had a massive percentage of the running back rushes. I think he's like top 10. Yeah, he's ninth in the NFL in the percentage of his backfields running attempts that he gets. So when the offense improves, which it almost has to from what we've seen these first two weeks in

terms of production, he's somebody who could benefit in a big way. I'm not I've never been a big Swift guy, but the role has been a lot better than I expected. Yeah, it was unfortunate that he lost. I'll throw to you for the Texans, Dan, but it was unfortunate that Swift lost the goal line carry to kill Khalil Herbert. But it wasn't like Khalil Herbert was exclusively in there near the goal line. Swift had his chances, too. You know, there was a fourth-and-one play earlier in the game,

and Khalil Herbert got that carry, so the roll is great, except maybe the short yardage is going to be split. Let's talk about the Texans here. Stroud is off to an okay start. He scored almost 23 points in week one. He scored 16.3 in week two. And the Bears have a good defense.

So we should say that. These are two good defenses, at least we think. And CJ Stroud's at Minnesota next week, and they look like they have a pretty good defense too. Now, Mixon got hurt. So I don't want to do

a whole waiver wire show today, but Cam Akers, I would assume is the guy to get because Pierce is also hurt. Akers had a bad fumble in this game, but I think he's probably the next in line in terms of digs and Dell and Collins. It's been pretty much all Colin so far.

Dick's had the two touchdowns in week one, but the yards, it's not even close. How much faith do you have Dan starting digs or Dell on a weekly basis? Yeah. I'm glad you asked that question. Cause I did not want to touch at all on Nico Collins. I want to save that for Jacob Gibbs because Jacob Gibbs, this is, he doesn't take victory laps ever, but if he was going to take one,

this would be his first victory lap of the season. It's so early. That's why I'm making that joke. By the way, I've made that joke before. There's no sting as a victory lap until week 17, uh, with the injuries that happened in the NFL. But with regards to the question you asked Adam, I'm not concerned, to be honest with you. This game meant, like, C.J. Stroud made two of the best throws I've seen all season by a quarterback in this game. One, which was caught when he's running

and sprinting to his right and hits Nico Collins. The other, which was a really good ball by him to tank Dell, and an unbelievable recognition from a spatial awareness standpoint. Most quarterbacks just don't see that opening up. And Dell's, you know, five foot eight with a low percentile catch radius. And so that wasn't really the pass that he's going to put, bring in. Um, but he has before he did it last week, last year, all the time on

those types of broken plays where, so I think that'll come. I think the big plays are coming for, for tanked out. So I'm not really worried about him. Diggs is the one I'm more concerned with. I feel like digs right now, most of his production has been schemed up, hasn't been hitting on those broken plays, not a lot of downfield targets. And this is not an offense. The role he's playing would be good if it was the type of offense where they're going to be opening it up a little bit more, but that's just not what Bobby Sloak offense is.

It's still Shanahan principles. It's still going to be established the run game. We're going to use some heavy personnel throughout the game. So Diggs is the one that concerns me the most. Yeah. Dale probably cost me a week by dropping that ball because he had a big, big play to be made there. And they gave him three carries and he just, they were just a little bit off, but not a

lot of targets. You can't deny that. It does seem like they want to get him involved. You got a whole big, I just, my fear. It does seem like they want to get him involved. My fear with Dell is that you're going to sit him when he has a 25-point game, and you're going to start him when he has a 6-point game. It's going to be like Tyler Lockett for so many years.

It's just extremely frustrating. In a three-receiver league, I'm probably not taking Dell out of my lineup because there's huge upside every week, but you have to acknowledge there's downside every week as well. All right. Anything you want to, Jacob, any final thoughts on this game? Nico Collins is the man. His per route data is better this year than it was last year, which is absolutely insane because it was like historically good last year. Yeah. Can I say something about Nico Collins just know an eye test standpoint this dude is the real deal from an eye he wins everywhere everything's so strong like i didn't

realize how strong he was too like he's obviously an explosive player who has credible straight line speed and just a long strider which is really important in the nfl and a lot of players are like that brian thomas you can name a bunch but he's stronger than a lot of players are like that. Brian Thomas, you can name a bunch, but he's stronger than a lot of these players at that, at the catch point after the catch. I mean, like he is a much, he was a fourth round pick or whatever it was, I think third or fourth round picks. A lot of people just assume he's not at that level and can't be one of the best receivers in the NFL. But the reality is he played at, he played at Michigan before McCarthy was there and nobody, it was one of the worst passing offenses ever. And then he dominated the senior bowl and has dominated every chance he's

gotten the NFL with competent quarterback play. So I think you're right, Jacob. And I think he could honestly ascend to being one of the five, six, seven best receivers in the NFL. He's already there. Our generations,

Andre, our generations, Andre Johnson, Percy. I'm fine saying Charles G in the chat, Nico equals Andre Johnson. I'll take that that. You and Charles G in the chat. Nico equals Andre Johnson. I'll take that. I think I like Jack Miller's best.

Jack Miller in the chat says, Nico reminds me of A.J. Brown. I would say more A.J. Brown than Andre Johnson for me, though obviously Andre Johnson played for the Texans. But yeah, man, either way, you're winning. Yeah, Andre Johnson, Miami Hurricane legend. Sorry. Dan, by the way, now I bet you missed Tyler Van Dyke, huh?

Yeah, that was ugly. Look, I didn't think we were going to cover that game. Obviously, we didn't even come close to covering, but when you lose your starting quarterback early, it's hard to win. That would be a Wisconsin Badgers moment there. All right, we're going to take a break in a minute here. I just want to remind you that we have all this great programming on CBS Sports Network. Someone want to remind me, I think we're at 1130 on Tuesday. So we usually were at one o'clock on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday on

CBS Sports Network for one hour. I want to say it's 1130 Tuesday, 1230 Wednesday, one o'clock Friday this week. So that's just this week, 1130 on Tuesday, 1230 on Wednesday, 1 o'clock Friday this week. So that's just this week, 11.30 on Tuesday, 12.30 on Wednesday, 1 o'clock on Friday, all times Eastern on CBS Sports Network. If you can't see that show, you can watch it on youtube.com slash fantasy football today. But typically we're 1 o'clock PM Eastern, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday. All right, quick break, come back and give you all the injury news. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football today. Did you know that across Ontario, utility damage happens 19 times a day? That's over 4,222 incidents a year. Don't let your next dig be one that causes costly delays or safety risks. Before you break ground, make it a point to

request a locate. It's not just the the law it's a step to keep your team and community safe visit ontarioonecall.ca and avoid unnecessary damages to get the job done right data sourced from the orcga 2023 dirt report okay so week two first i was calling it week poo because we had all these injuries going in the game then i was calling it week woohoo because it was pretty good week in terms of fantasy you know it's fun fantasy week but now calling it week poo because we had all these injuries going into the game. Then I was calling it week woohoo because it was a pretty good week in terms of fantasy. It was a fun fantasy week. But now it's week poo again. Just too many injuries. So here we go.

Quarterback, Justin Herbert, does have a leg injury. He was able to come back, but we're going to have to keep an eye on this one. Chargers at the Steelers is going to be a shootout in Pittsburgh in week three. But no, hopefully Justin Herbert is able to play. Malik Willis. Oh, how to play. Malik Willis. Oh, how about this? Malik Willis, it was really hot, apparently. And he didn't throw a ball on third down.

And Matt LaFleur asked him, why didn't you throw the ball? And he said his center, Josh Myers, threw up on the football. And that is why he didn't. I swear, I mean, it's like, this was in the AP recap of the of the game did anyone see a video yet of it i saw that video live it was awesome oh really i didn't know about

it immediately yeah it's disgusting oh man that's something that if that ever happened to you adam is or not that you ever be playing in an nfl game but any kind of game i don't know what you would do i don't know how you would react with your germ issues. I would have fumbled. Are you kidding? I would have given it to the other team. I don't even think you would have taken the snap. I asked Malik why he didn't throw the ball on that third down. And he told me that Josh threw up on the ball. Unreal. All right. More quarterback news. Dave Canales, Carolina head coach. He is sticking with Bryce Young. But if you're in a super flex league there, you know, I said two quarterbacks that could get benched. They both responded with good games in week

two, Daniel Jones and Deshaun Watson. But bad times will be ahead for Daniel Jones, I'm sure. So you can pick up Drew Locke. You can pick up I mentioned the investigation into Deshaun Watson. So you could pick up Jameis Winston. You could also pick up Andy Dalton. I think the big one to pick up is Stidham. That's the

one that I've been calling for all offseason. I think you really got to get if you're in a super flex league and you have quarterback issues pick up jared stidham now uh running back so joe mixon left with the ankle injury he came back but then he left again and you know it could be there was the hip drop tackle and mixon could miss time they're at minnesota this week isaiah pacheco has a fractured fibula and he's obviously going to miss time. He's going to go on IR. I'm pretty sure. Isaiah Pacheco. Quick, what do you think is going to happen with that Chiefs run game?

Because I think it's really important. Yeah, Jacob, what do you think, Chiefs guy? That's what I was... Yeah, Jacob, what do you got? Carson Steele, man. They gave him a lot more than I thought. He fumbled and they just kept giving him the ball afterwards. They were giving him important carries at the end of the game, even after he had fumbled.

Like they needed to run a few times to set up a field goal and they gave it to him. Yeah. I mean, he looked like an absolute monster this preseason. He is the all time leader in yards after contact, total yards after contact at the collegiate level. Did not all time,

but dating back to 2017, the time that I have the data available, he's a monster. I'm pretty psyched. I mean, P Ron will mix in on passing downs but i think steel i think it'll be mostly steel okay i think so yeah i think we could see him get double digit carries every kind of what kind of waiver budget would you put on that's a quick question just give me one answer um i think you go like 30 or something yeah i think it'd be pretty good and they're really playing heavy they're using way more two and three tight end sets than they have in the past and running.

I think, yeah, I think it's pretty good pickup. Boy, Jared Wiley got a catch. I was so excited. Yeah, and- Jared Wiley out there with number 12. It's like, who is that? I know. It's a tight end.

The other guy to think about is Clyde Edwards-Vilaire, who's out at least two more games. And I have no idea when he's coming back. He has PTSD. So it's a mental thing here that he obviously will hopefully be able to overcome,

but there's no timeline for it. But Clyde is rostered in 15% of leagues. Also, you know, is this going to benefit Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelsey and even Rasheed Rice

and Xavier Worthy? Rice is obviously a lost start. But Patrick Mahomes has thrown fewer than 30 passes in two straight games. That is the first time that has happened since 2021. Travis Kelsey, because we're going to talk about Kelsey, so this is a spoiler alert for one of our big topics. Travis Kelsey has seven targets in two games.

That is the first time he has had seven or fewer targets in a two-game stretch since 2016. Wow. The Chiefs have been top 11 in pass rate for six straight seasons with Patrick Mahomes as their starting quarterback. Right now they're 22nd, I believe, in pass rate, something like that. So we do want them to throw the ball more. I'm not as impressed with Carson Steele.

I mean, I think he basically has one skill, and that is to just run straight and bury people, and he's really good at it. But I don't know that he's a very versatile running back. He's kind of like a fullback playing tailback, but maybe Jacob is right. Maybe he's better than I'm giving him credit for. I just don't think they're going to have

that good of a run game. I think whether this matters at all, even if Pacheco were healthy, they're going to throw more than 26 times per game, obviously. They are, but I also wonder how much of this is like, just dependent on where the league is headed. I saw stats from retriever today that were unbelievable that showed touchdown passes across the NFL over the first two weeks of the season,

significant drop off from a hundred plus for the last four or five years before 2023, 80, 80 something in 2023, and then 60 something the first two weeks these passes. It's dropped by 40 passing touchdowns. Passing yardage followed the same suit, dropping from the mid 250s all throughout from 2017 through 2021, 2022, I mean, and then 2023, it dropped into the 217, 218 range. And then these first two weeks were like not even eclipsing the 200 passing yard mark average across the NFL teams are just going to run into these two high looks because like every coach in the NFL out there is like, it's a chess match. It's a schematic game. If I'm getting a box that looks like this, I have to run. That's the best strategy,

but a running is still not that great of an option just based on epa and b you still have to kind of block up front and create that that push um so we'll see what happens there but i think you're right they should be more pass heavy the chiefs i hope they are we have i don't even know this that i'm looking it up now we have 16 quarterbacks in week two that have thrown for 200 or more yards and that's going going into Monday night football. Yeah. Last week we had... Crazy. How many quarterbacks threw for 200 yards?

15. That's terrible. I mean, that's 200 yards. We're not even talking about 250. That's a really low bar. 250. We had eight quarterbacks do it last week in week one. And we did have nine quarterbacks so far this week with two more to go.

But that was the league average for six, seven years in a row. So it went from 16 to nine. All right. Running back, more running back news here. Jonathan Taylor, I still haven't seen an update on that. He didn't play in the fourth quarter. I think he's okay. Aaron Jones got a little dinged up.

Sometimes guys go back into the game, then they show up on the injury. He'll be on the injury report. Hopefully it's nothing serious. They have Houston, a brutal matchup in week three. Tajay Spears, ankle. Pierre Strong left with an injury. Tank Bigsby got hurt on special teams. And Marshawn Lloyd left with an ankle injury.

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Deposit at least $10 and place your first wager on any game. You'll receive up to $1,500 in bonus bets if your bet loses. Just make sure you're using the bonus code FANTASY when you sign up on the BetMGM app. Okay, wide receiver news. Amon Ross St. Brown left in the third quarter. He apparently has avoided major injury here. I think St. Brown's going to be okay. Cooper Cup, though, seems more serious.

So he's got the ankle injury. Dan Schneier's team's toilet flush sound. Actually, the good news is despite being so high on him i didn't get him in many leagues one league i think it was total just because everybody else was apparently high on him too in my auctions yeah i feel like anyone who has a lot of leagues has one of those teams like my my fft league my first round pick was aj brown my second round pick was puka nakua my fourth fourth round pick was Joe Mixon. And my third round pick was Jalen Hurts. So I think we know what's coming tonight.

But everybody's got one of those teams right now that's underwater with injuries. Justin Jefferson, a bruised quad. We'll see about that. It doesn't seem too bad. Adonai Mitchell had a bad drop and he had a bad penalty. And then he may have lost playing time after that, according to ESPN.

And DeAndre Hopkins says he has a sprained knee, but he didn't tear anything in his knee. And again, he didn't play that much. He played about 44% of the snaps, DeAndre Hopkins. Higher than week one, but it seems like they're working him in gradually. Taysom Hill, tight end, he left with an injury. These are your tight end notes, but he seems fine.

Well, I don't know about fine, but it doesn't seem to have a serious injury. Taysom Hill, uh, Tampa Bay. If we look at the offensive line news, they were playing without their starting right tackle Luke get a key. And it really showed because they got crushed on the line. Green Bay lost offensive guard, Jordan Morgan to a shoulder injury and the big defensive news. I would say Vita Vaya for the bucks as they get Denver next week. He's obviously a huge run stuffer. Two defensive linemen, DeForest Buckner and Leatu Latu for the Colts.

They left with injuries. They get the Bears next week. Seattle linebacker Jerome Baker, Detroit linebacker Alex Anzalone. Those guys left with injuries. And the Bengals lost two defensive tackles, BJ Hill and Sheldon Rankins as they get Washington in week three. All right, advanced stats and other stuff. Jacob, you are on the clock. Go for it.

Let's do it. Malik Neighbors became just the second wide receiver since 2010, under the age of 22, to finish a game with 15 targets or more and 200 or more air yards. The only other one is Odell Beckham Jr. And I just want to get a heat check on you guys as Giants fans. How are you feeling about that? Well, I mean, as Giants fans, it was hard for me to get out of bed this morning. Season's over. Yeah, I thought he would do more with 18 targets. But how I'm feeling about it is this, honestly, it was Washington

and you might just want to sell anyone after they play Washington or the Giants or the Panthers, some of these absolutely horrible defenses. So I don't know. I mean, like Daniel Jones had a really good game, but he only plays well against Washington. We're going to go back to him being horrible soon.

As soon as this week, I mean, he's got the Browns and the Cowboys this next two games. He's going to be awful. What's Malik neighbors going to do? I don't know. I think it could be more like five for 60. So I like neighbors. I'm not saying he's going to be bad. I think he's my guess. I've been thinking a lot about this, Dan. I think Malik neighbor is going to end up around wide receiver 20. That's my guess. Okay. So I'm definitely a lot higher than you are on this Adam. And the reason being, uh, he leads the NFL in 20 plus yard plays right now, Malik neighbors, and almost none of those have been on the quarterback. Like none of those have been like throws downfield that he's caught. Almost everyone has been him after the catch and this game specifically 64% of his yards in this game came after the catch. He accounted for 71% of the team's receptions and 64% of the team's

passing yards in this game. It is clear to me as debt clear as day to me that the giants are just designing a game plan to get him the football. They're running two man routes, more max protect. The idea is just get neighbors, the ball in space. He will do the rest. And that's what he did. And that's what he does. He also led college football last year by a wide margin in 20 plus yard plays. A lot of those again, coming after the catch, though, some more slot fades from Jaden Daniels last year at LSU. I think wide receiver 20 is almost impossible at this point with the target volume. He's going to get the cut, the air yardage share and the overall presented share.

Yes. It's a terrible offense. Yes. Daniel Jones is not going to play like that against everyone. It's Washington. It always happens terrible offense. Yes, Daniel Jones is not going to play like that against everyone. It's Washington. It always happens like that. But the worst case scenario to me, Adam, feels like what it was in week one, which was still what, five for 68 from league neighbors?

So I just don't think there's enough good receivers or good enough passing games in the NFL for that to be a wide receiver 20 type finish. I think he's a locked in wide receiver one. I'll amend it to wide receiver 15. I can't say he's a wide receiver one. I'll amend it to wide receiver 15. I can't say he's a wide receiver one. I can do with 15. I think it'll be between 12 and 15.

18 targets is just nuts. Him and Pukanukua are the only two to ever have that type of a target total in the first two games. And I'm just excited to see that because in week one, it was Wanda and they were turning down, Daniel Jones was turning down neighbors a lot. They didn't design as much stuff for neighbors as I would have liked. But this week we saw him use more,

increase that motion, use more in intentional ways, like Dan said, to get the ball in his hands. And he's so good after the catch. Thoughts on this comment, Jacob? The way Dan is sitting makes him look like he's nervously waiting to ask you

something. I don't get it. What, how am I, does you guys have that same read? Am I sitting weird didn't think so but i'm gonna keep an eye on it now i gotta keep an eye on it does look like dan is like just yeah he's like waiting to pounce almost i don't know what i'm just sitting for i'm sitting comfortably back in my chair he's a weird sitter you know saying this for years i'm a weird guy okay that we know it's been already

established on this show multiple times. But with that said, like, can I get this right? I got out of the bathroom. I changed the whole outlook on this. And now I can't. Now it's something else. I'm not sitting right. What is that to your right?

Is that a closet? No, this to my right, it's just a wall. That's a wall, but it looks like there's a thing. It's just a weird wall. This house is weird, okay? This is what happened to my old setup. It looked like we were in a bathroom and I never was. I don't get this room at all. There's a weird bar just going across that. All right. What else you got Jacob? Okay. So since 2000, there have been 39 instances of a wide receiver that was 23 years

old or younger that finished a game with 15 or more targets and 100 or more receiving yards obviously one of those was malik neighbors this week we get about one or two of these per season on average we got two this week jackson smith and jigba was the other one very very exciting we're going to get to him in more detail later rashid shaheed leads the nfl in yards per outrun we're going to get to the Saints offense later, too. Since entering the NFL as an undrafted free agent, Shahid ranks 15th at wide receiver in yards per outrun. He's sandwiched right in between Cooper Cup and Debo Samuel during that time. So that's 2022 to 2024. Chris Alave's rate is even higher than Shahid's. I'm just so, so excited

about New Orleans. We're going to get to them in more detail. I don't want to slow down now. Brock Bowers caught 15 of 17 targets. He has 156 receiving yards through two games. That's the most receiving yards through an initial two games of a PPR point per route run. That would have ranked first at tight end last year. He hasn't even scored a touchdown. And that's what his fantasy point total per route run is. If you look at the best fantasy tight end seasons in recent memory, Travis Kelsey 2020, Mark Andrews 2021, Travis Kelsey 2022. Those are the three instances we have of 300 or more PPR points in the tight end position. Andrews averaged 0.48 PPR points per route. Kelsey averaged 0.53, 0.55. Bowers is a 0.52 and he hasn't even got a touchdown. On that note, guess who leads the NFL in pass rate? The Raiders. Wow. The freaking Las Vegas Raiders. First in pass rate. No one saw that coming.

Second in first down pass rate. Third in situation neutral pass rate. So when the game is close, they're still passing a lot. They're passing on first down. Everybody thought this was going to be a grinded out Zemir White team. And Zemir White did play more this week. But yeah, this has

been a much, much more pass heavy team than anybody could have expected, I think. Passing game leaders, Jalen hurts is number one. He only played one game. Number two, Brock Purdy, number three, Gardner Minshew and Matthew Stafford are tied. And if you look at it, their run blocking has been really, really poor. And I think that's playing a factor. The good coaches won't just keep running when they're not able to scheme it up and run well. And that's what you, if you look at some of the numbers here, the Raiders, after losing Carmen Brasillo, their offensive line coach, have really fallen off from run blocking standpoint.

So why not pass the football? And I watched the Bowers tape this week. Oh my God, he's a fun watch. Like he legitimately might be, I don't know how many tight ends are better to watch on tape. That's just all I'm going to say right there. He looks like the best tight end in the NFL. You got to put your money where your mouth is now and tell

me, would you take him over Kelsey? Would you take him over Andrews? Would you take him over Laporta? I think I would take him over everyone except for Trey McBride. I'm a little bit worried about the role because he hasn't run a route on more than 70% of the dropbacks in either of the first two games. I'm also a little bit worried that we see the Raiders pass less.

Just looking at the guy, it's like he can do stuff that it doesn't feel like anybody else can do right now at tight end. two games i'm also a little bit worried that we see the raiders pass less um but yeah just looking at the guy it's like he can do stuff that it doesn't feel like anybody else can do right now a tight end and why not why not build the offense around him it seems like they're going to like he's so good so they've said they'll build the offense around him the entire time the way he can uncover himself the way he creates that separation with the loose hips and his ability to kind of get in and out of his breaks it's like a wide receiver but he's not a wide receiver. And I know in a lot of ways, people talked about him like that, but if you watch him on tape at Georgia, you saw all this, the difference was like that offense was not always funneled and focused through Bowers.

Now forgetting the situation where a you're on a team where he is getting the offense funneled through him. B you're on a team that has the third most passing yards in the league so far, like you said, Adam. And like you said,acob they're throwing in neutral spots they're throwing all the time like that is the recipe for potentially being the tight end one uh this is against the freaking ravens too nine for nine every defense cut every target super efficient against the ravens man heavy defense they've got any everything you would need to stop tight ends, and he doesn't care. He's so good. All right, let's move on here.

Good stuff on Brock Bowers off to a terrific start. What else we got, Jacob? Yeah, this one's not so fun. Bryce Young was pressured at the lowest rate of any quarterback last week. Ugh. And still, that's what we got. Yeah, I saw Brinson tweet about his historically bad start, and then he retweeted he quote treated jacob talking about the pressure and he's like and then there's this i watched a little i watched a brief breakdown i didn't get to see that tape but i did see him

bailing a lot of pockets he shouldn't bail from it's a big problem with quarterbacks when they don't understand how to manage a pocket and they're bailing and they're keeping the offense off time and off schedule because they're not staying in the pocket and resetting it. And, and that's what you see. You see a lot of bad passing offense, which is what Caroline has been. It's sad. And then I've got one usage note that I think is really important. And that's that Quinton Johnston led the chargers in routes, targets, air yards, and receiving in week two. It wasn't just the thing this year. It's crazy. It wasn't just the touchdown. He's going to be a thing this year. It's crazy. It wasn't just the touchdown. So in week one, he led the team in designed targets.

They were going out of their way to get the ball in his hands, but a lot of it was just short manufactured stuff, catch and run stuff, which makes sense that they would want to get him involved that way. But it's also kind of gimmicky. It's not something that you necessarily expect to maintain over the course of the full season. This week, there was more diversity in the way that they were getting in the ball,

and he was winning. I'm really excited to go back and watch every route and see what I think. You watched Quinton Johnson you're talking about? Yep. I watched pretty much all of his routes. Okay. Swoop, whatever. There were a couple good ones.

The touchdown was good. I think he beat another guy in almost the same exact the same exact situation end zone target and it was not complete um that's what i'm really curious about is how well he's keeping people from getting into his routes especially like two touchdowns and like last year and in college it was so he was so bad at using his size and his hands and his physicality like he was just getting people were getting into his route so easily and i really want to watch that. That's on this comment. Jacob Gibbs looks like Justin Timberlake's brother,

Dustin Timberlake. That's not a bad comp. That's good. Justin Timberlake comp is not a bad comp. Like Dan looks like Jason Alexander. No, I don't. A young Jason Alexander. No, I do not look like a young Jason Alexander. Yes, you do.

He's a very handsome guy. And Jacob looks like Dustin Timberlake. I don't look like a young Jason Alexander. Yes, you do. He's a very handsome guy. And Jacob looks like Dustin. I don't look like a young Jason Alexander. Let me make that clear. Exactly like him. But yeah. You could bring up all the other comps that people have given me that were much more nice and much more. Josh Allen.

You look like Josh Allen. Someone gave me Josh Allen. What was the other one? The Orlando Bloom or whatever. Orlando Bloom. That was ridiculous. That was unbelievable. You might as well have said you look like Fabio.

You look nothing like Orlando Bloom. I'm not delus Bloom. That was ridiculous. That was unbelievable. You might as well have said you look like Fabio. You look nothing like Lando Bloom. Like, I'm not delusional. I'm not the best looking guy. But Jason Alexander, give me a break. Jason Alexander, young Jason Alexander, good looking guy. All right. I'm sorry I keep interrupting you, Jacob. But for more.

No, that's all. If you want all the Week 2 usage notes that I found important, go to my Twitter account. My pinned tweet is a thread with tons of Week 2 information. And then, of course, subscribe to the free FFT newsletter. I'll give you all the information there as well. All right. And I'll tell you that Jordan Mason has a 4.2% target per out run rate. That is unbelievably low in 2023, the lowest target per out run rate among starting running backs. Raheem Mostert was at 12 and a half percent. Gus Edwards was 7.9%. So I hope Mason could just be like 10%.

Maybe give me two catches a game, you know? He's obviously been so good. I think it's hurting the whole San Francisco offense, too, to not have a running back be a part of their passing game. That's the issue that I'm having, too, watching a little bit of that 49ers offense. I think it's going to hurt Purdy. I think it hurts the whole offense besides Debo, essentially.

They talked about that. They're really missing the versatility of Christian McCaffrey. Zach Moss and Jameer Gibbs led all running backs with 10 third down routes in week two. Zach, like I got into it a little bit with Dave because he's he's basically saying Zach Moss isn't that good. Chase Brown is going to start, you know, is going to eventually be the best guy in that backfield. He might be right. It's not a bad take. But right now, Zach Moss is clearly the guy in the backfield. He's the goal linebacker.

He's the third down back. It's really good usage for Zach Moss. Ramondre Stevenson played 11 third down snaps, including five on third and six or longer. So he kind of split third down with Antonio Gibson. That's good. Christian Watson played around 60% of the snaps. That is a Star Trek joke.

Christian Watson played around 60% of the snaps. That's for the second straight game. It doesn't really matter now with Malik Willis, but it's still not a good thing. And Amari Cooper had another drop, another, you know, 20 plus yard play, chunk play, we'll call it. He dropped the pass.

We got four big topics. Start with the Saints. When we come back. Did you put that up? Get out of here, Dan. You're going to lose your privileges. All right, we'll be right back after this commercial. Oh, yeah, Dan looks like a young Harvey Fierstein.

That's not the sign, I think. That's not the first time that's been said. That's the guy from Mrs. Doubtfire. Oh, I don't know. I don't think I have the strength for that. It's that guy. I hope my voice doesn't sound that much like that. No, not going to.

All right. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football today. And it's time for four big topics. Okay, this one is from Beast. Derek Carr and the Saints' performance, especially their offense. All right, Jacob. Very excited about what we're seeing out of New Orleans, right? Yeah, for sure.

So the Saints are using shotgun less than any team in the NFL, which is, I think, a good place to start. They're very multiple in the way that they can attack you. They're using a ton of under center stuff and big packages um with it involves like fewer receivers running routes and so that makes defenses really have to like get up and key on the run and they've actually been running the ball pretty effectively i saw a really awesome stat from scott barrett that uh gary kubiak had a top 12 rushing offense every time he was an offensive coordinator, which was like 10 years, at least, I think. We've seen Clint Kubiak, the offensive coordinator for the Saints, manufacture a really strong run game so far. And then obviously what is catching everybody's eyes

is the pass game explosives that are coming, I think, kind of like as a result of that, or at least benefiting from the threat of the run. And so obviously the exciting thing that we've been talking about in the FFT newsletter and everything all off season is the increase in motion and the increase in play action. Last year, the Saints ranked dead last in both of those. And those are truly cheat codes for passing efficiency. It doesn't, it seems like it shouldn't be so easy. And we do have the Jaguars who we're going to talk about later is like maybe an example of it not being so easy to just plug these into your office and then execute it and, and churn out,

um, efficient passing game. But that's what we've seen in New Orleans is that they've been way, way more efficient with this. They've increased both of those in a dramatic way. So last year, play action passes, the passer rating on play action passes was 100, up from 86 on non-play action passes. EPA per play was up from negative 0.06 on non-play action passes to positive 0.09. Fantasy points per dropback was up from 0.41

on non-play action passes to 0.57. These are pretty significant increases, similar type of stuff with pre-snap motion, not quite as impactful as play action for the passing game, but definitely boosts things in a big way. And then if you look at passes that involve both pre-snap motion and play action, it's insane. The passer rating is up to 104. EPA per play is positive 0.13, which is massive. That's so much higher than on non-play action and pre-snap motion plays. And we've seen the Saints be willing to use both of those things in a truly unique way. So 42% of the Saints passing plays have involved both pre-snap motion and play action this season. No other team has even used play action, just play action, on more than 40% of their plays,

on more than 40% of the passes. The Saints are using both motion and play action on 42% of their dropbacks. For reference, the highest season-long rate in NFL history is 32%, the Miami Dolphins. So we're seeing something here that we've really never seen before in terms of the way that Clint Kubiak, offensive coordinator, is testing the boundaries to see how far he can really push things here with these two pass game efficiency boosters. And obviously, the results are 40-plus points in each of the two games, including against the Dallas Cowboys.

Yeah, it's unbelievable to watch. Obviously I saw the tape this week and it was probably some of the most fun tape I watched this week. And I'll say this, you know, one of the edges that we look for on this show, and I think in generally speaking us three as, as analysts is the coordinator edge, because a lot of the times the play caller can give you an edge that a lot

of fantasy managers aren't seeing. This is a perfect example that, you know, some people looked at Clint Kubiak is not like the newest name or not like the freshest, like most buzzy guy, but the reality is he might be one of the better coordinators in the NFL. Did you hear what Micah Parsons said? This is unrelated in some ways, but Micah Parsons talk about, talked about how creative Clint Kubiak was in dealing with him, essentially creating a way to stop Micah Parsons that no one else. Micah Parsons has gone up against in his career. No coordinator has figured out most coordinators will just use an extra lineman to chip or, you know,

bring in motion in somebody like a tight end or it's bright receiver to chip. But Kubiak was designing different unique ways through motion to kind of take Micah Parsons out of this game entirely. And as Jacob said, it's just unbelievable to watch. They run toss crack so well. They had tight splits from the wide receivers. I wrote down to create space on the outside and with Derek, that's perfect for Derek Carr because he has the arm talent to hit those outside throws.

Did so to a lot of a multiple times. I feel like there's so much eye candy in this offense. Jacob went over it and I can't, he's just like the priest that motion getting so many different guys moving in different directions. Like when they ran that toss crack, they had, uh, Taysom Hill lined up as the H back and they had all the, the, the entire play looked like it was going toward the right. And then they ran toss crack back to the left. It was so pretty to watch the screen touchdown to come here was one of the most fun screen calls I've seen the route

combinations to create space on that screen were perfect. He had timely play calls throughout the game, run calls when the defense was guessing pass, pass calls when the defense was guessing run. Really a masterclass against somebody who knew, and I had a lot of respect for Mike Zimmer. I still do. Great coordinator, but Kubiak beat him that day. He won the chess match.

And one final thing I'll say, Adam, about this offense is Rashid Shahid is a big part of this offense. He is going to be here all year as long as he stays healthy, and he's going to be a fantasy factor all year long. He's somebody I would buy now in fantasy leagues. It's not obviously a goodbye low scenario because he's been so good from a scoring standpoint, but I'm sure some people still do not believe in Shahid, but watching this offense, he's a big part of why it goes. Well, Shahid so he's only run 35 routes in two games i think jsn ran like like 44 routes yesterday so they've barely thrown the ball but his a dot is 17.6 yards that's a career high that's

too high but shaheed does have a 25.7 target per route run rate which is great it's been around 18 percent and i think part of that first stat adam i'm sorry to cut you off i just want to make this clear part of that first stat, Adam, and I'm sorry to cut you off, but I just want to make this clear, part of that first stat is that they've blown out their first two opponents, and they haven't had to use him at all in the second half of games. Yeah, they haven't really had to use anybody. But the thing is,

if Shahid's really going to be a 17-yard ADOT guy, that's not good. He probably won't be that high. The ADOT is such a small sample size that it gets really inflated by those big shots. His route depth, that's like the last thing that true media updates. So I didn't have his route depth from,

from week two, but it was a little bit lower in week one than what we typically saw from him. But anyway, you know, is he running different routes? That's I guess what I want to know. I didn't see like that.

He was running much different routes. In the beginning of the game, he was running in breakers over the middle of the field. And he was a big part of that, like moving the football in the beginning of the game. Obviously it tailed off in the second second half but i do think that there's a scenario where he's going to be a part of this offense all year long so how would you compare rashid shaheed to jameson williams that's a good question that's a great question yeah i would take

jmo i think he's somebody we believe in the talent a little bit more i love shaheed and we also believe in the offense more and i'm really excited about new orleans but like detroit's about as good as it gets i I'm with that. Right. Like them both, though. So if J-Mo's number one, who would be ahead, JSN or Rashid Shahid?

I think I got to take JSN over him as well, but we're talking about all players who I like a lot this year. There's other guys who we could even throw in the mix that we had ranked way higher than Shahid right now that I would preseason that I would definitely take Shahid over. So i'm looking at rishi jaheed's route

information his average route depth was low in week one it raised this past week they used him on more goes and deep posts and corners this past week he was used on some slants and stuff like that in week one that he didn't get this week but they did use him on some slants and some hitches and some ins and outs in week one and that's interesting to me that we might see that be a bigger part of his game this year because last year rashid i think was top three in go route rate i think almost 30 of his routes were goes this year it's at 23 of his routes or go routes i said yesterday i would trade alvin camara for garrett wilson but because i think wilson's a really good buy low. You know, you got the Jerry Sneed.

This week, you might get Christian Gonzalez, who did not get torched by DK Metcalf. I mean, mentally, he may have because there was a breakdown, but not like Metcalf was abusing him. But I don't know if I would anymore. I don't really see why Kamara can't be a first-round caliber player.

He was last year. He was the number four running back per game last year. It's not a much better offense. It seems this year. Yeah. But this is strictly full PPR. Half PPR, I would trade him for Garrett Wilson. But can I say one more thing too about that offense?

Like, I don't think anyone expected this. The offensive line looked pretty damn good. What'd you guys think about that? Watching them on tape? Like they were expected to be one of, if not the worst offensive lines in the NFL, the saints, they have not been able to add talent.

They have a cap issues, all sorts of things. They look pretty good in this game. Yeah. And that's something I'm actually a little bit worried about is like, if the offensive line doesn't play well, then some of these deep shots, they're going to have a tougher time connecting on.

I'm getting crushed. Someone says I'm on crack for saying that I would trade Camara for Garrett Wilson. I'm not really down on Garrett Wilson. I think he got the same thing that happened to almost every elite receiver that went up against LeJarrius Sneed last year. The guy is unbelievable. I think better times are ahead. Camara's 29 years old.

Yep. I would worry about injuries at some point for Kamara. I would trade him for Gary Wilson. Maybe I'm on crack, but I would do it pretty easy. It's a long season. We're not playing for week two, week three. Right. It's great.

It's great that he got 40 points this week. If he stays healthy. He did look good, though. He did look so much better than last year. Oh, yeah. He's awesome. And he got the goal line work two weeks in a row. So that's huge.

But that's not to say that it'll never be Taysom Hill. But okay, anyway. Lock it up is our next big topic. Lock it up says, will you be continuing to call JSN? Just say no moving forward. To be fair, that's an Adam thing. Let's make that clear.

Oh, really? Oh, is that to be fair? To be fair, that's an Adam thing? Yeah. I didn't say. Who's he talking to? You're just assuming it's me. Oh, really? Is that to be fair? To be fair, that's an Adam thing? Yeah. Why? I didn't say. Who's he talking to? You're just assuming it's me? Well, who else could he be talking to?

It was Heath. Jacob and I have never said that before in our lives. Neither did I. It was Heath. Heath said it. Okay. Okay. To be fair.

You're not fair at all. It's not fair. Why is it addressed to you? It was addressed to FFT. Okay. The answer is no. Just say yes to Jackson Smith and Jigba. His wrap participation through two games is 92%.

It was 64% last year. So this is a significant change. He's also being used down the field. We're really excited about what Ryan Greb's offense has looked like. Jason had 172 air yards in week two. His previous high was 119. He only had two games above 50 last year. And so it's a huge deviation from what we saw last year in terms of role. The other note I'd

bring up is Gino Smith looks awesome. Just like we thought he had the past two years. He looks awesome. He was charted as not having a single off target throw this past week. And he had over 40 dropbacks. His average depth of target was over eight yards. He didn't have a single off target throw according to PFF. Yeah, I'm in on Jason. I'm with it. I'm totally bought in now. I said, look, in fantasy, you have to take your L's sometimes. I was skeptical of the Seattle offense because I thought the offensive line would hold back this offense and hold back Grubb from running the system in the scheme that I know he wants to run and did run at Washington because he had a good old protection there for Michael Benix.

But I was wrong. The O line has been healthy. The O line has held up and looking at Gino Smith's passing chart was phenomenal. That's the best I've seen. I honestly feel like Ryan Grubb understands space and he understands how to attack defenses through the air in the NFL, looking at Gino Smith's pass chart. And I see so few coordinators calling a game like Ryan Grubb is calling. It was so much aggression, so much using all areas of the field. This makes it so difficult for a defense to stop you when you're willing to challenge every single inch and every blade of grass,

which I think what Ryan Grubb is doing right now. So I'm all in basically on this passing game. There was a play in this game. So if you saw the Metcalf touchdown, he just went by two defenders who didn't know which one was supposed to cover him. And he got a 56-yard touchdown, I think. There was a play in the game where the same exact thing happened.

And I think this was his second, that was his first target of the game. His second target of the game was going to be a 45-yard touchdown, but Smith was sort of hit as he threw and the ball didn't get to Metcalf. And I don't understand how that doesn't count as an off-target throw. I guess if he gets pressured, because I'm looking at true media,

and it also says he has zero off-target throws. But if he gets pressured and gets hit, I guess they don't count that. So fair enough. It wasn't really. Even if he had won, it's unbelievable. Yeah. But it was amazing. I mean, the Patriots with two miscommunication plays

where they let DK Metcalf run completely untouched. Metcalf should have had 10 more fantasy points, basically, but there was pressure that got to Gino right before the throw. All right, yeah, I mean, here's the thing.

If you think JSN is going to be good every week, no. This is going to be annoying, I think. I mean, Lockett got nothing this week, and he got everything last week. I think this is going to be annoying. This is why I mean, Lockett got nothing this week, and he got everything last week. I think this is going to be annoying.

This is why we drafted him where we drafted him. He's going to perform, probably going to outperform his ADP, I think. But I don't know. Unless there's an injury, I do think there are going to be some frustrating weeks, which you just simply have to deal with in fantasy. You cannot get around that.

You guys disagree? Do you think he's going to be more consistent than I'm giving him credit for? I think he could be because the the role is so much different than last year not only in the fact that he's playing way more he was only playing two-thirds of the snaps last year now he's playing almost all of them that the routes are different the route yeah he looks so much different last year he's just running drags over and over you you guys watch chicago last night you get frustrated about the offense that's who was calling the plays for him last year now he has a legitimately like ingenuitive pass creator here that's like attacking every blade of grass um and using dk metcalf on horizontal routes and

stuff like i wouldn't have even thought to do that like he's doing he's testing stuff out and there might be some inconsistent weeks because of that because he is is new, the play caller in Ryan Grubb. But man, I think the chance of him exceeding expectations relative to his draft capital is really, really high at this point. I'm with Jacob on that, Adam, to answer your question. I think when I watched Jason's tape at college and I had him as a wide receiver one in that class, it was not because he could run a drag route or a slant route. Well, it was because of what I thought he could do at the intermediate level of the field. Ryan Grubb's tapping into his ability to separate at the intermediate level right now.

So I almost kind of feel like sky's the limit there. Obviously there will be frustrating weeks. It's not a guarantee, but I really like him in fantasy moving forward. And you know, you mentioned using DK Metcalf horizontally actually did notice that they did a good job getting him away from Christian Gonzalez and, uh,

you know, creatively using Metcalf to get him the ball. So that was, that was cool to see. All right. Number three is from Ryan shave. What do you think? S C H A V E.

Is that a relative of Thomas? That's a horrible joke. It's a completely different last name. There's a C in there. Yeah. I was really disappointed when I found out Thomas's last name was not S-C-H-A-F-E-R. I don't know if I ever told you that on the show, Adam. It was a sad moment for me. I really thought he was one of the S-C-H brothers. Yeah. I mean, I'm disappointed every day. Every time I have to type his name in an email, I just feel like there should be a C there. What went behind that decision to drop the C? It was actually a completely different last name.

Whoa. Was it in an LSI? Yeah, it was Chaffetz. Chaffetz. You know they weren't bringing that over. There was no way they were bringing that one over. Schaefer was an upgrade. That was good.

All right. Well, we got a nickname for him. Okay, Ryan Schaefer's email or question is, the Jaguars have been dreadful, especially Christian Kirk. Yes, they have. A couple notes here. They are 28th in time of possession. They are 13th in yards per play, but 21st in yards per game

because they're not running that many plays. The Jaguars are the fifth worst team on third down. They're 20th in red zone conversion rate, converting red zone trips into touchdowns. And they suck, as Trevor Lawrence, in his own words, they suck. I grew so frustrated with this team last year. They left so many points on the board almost week after week, and they're doing it again. I can go through one sequence late in the game. They got the ball back.

They were down by seven, I think. No, they're down 16 to 10. Christian Kirk catches a go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter, but Dearness Johnson was called for an illegal shift. Not their first illegal shift of the game. On the next play, Travis Etienne slipped in the end zone. I feel pretty comfortable he was going to catch a touchdown pass on the next play, but he slipped in the end zone, and then they had to settle for a field goal. I'm pretty sure they missed a fairly easy field goal earlier in the game. The week before, they fumbled going into the end zone. They lose games.

They find ways to lose. It is so frustrating. How great was Trevor Lawrence's touchdown throw to Brian Thomas in week one? He made a throw to Brenton Strange in this game that was really good. He can make great throws, but this team cannot get out of its own way.

It was that way last year, and through two games, it's that way this year, and it is really bothering me, guys through two games it's that way this year and it is really bothering me guys yeah it's been frustrating and for fantasy purposes it's like gabe davis is the guy who's out there on the field the most um i'm pretty sure the team targets this week too it seems impossible but like yeah i i say just let brian thomas jr be your wide receiver one does that that make sense to me let him him be the X. Let him dominate. I'm with you.

I mean, I watched this game. There was a route that Brian Thomas should have scored on in the red zone. Oh, who told you about that one? You did? Adam, good job by you. I get credit for the bad things that Heath says, but not the good things that I say. I see how this works.

I do give Adam credit for that. I did kind of come to it independently, but then I did see Adam's text after, but he deserves it. That was the first I saw it, Adam. You're doing great work. Thank you. First of all, he knows I always think he's doing great work.

I have complimented Adam off pod plenty of times. One of the best hosts, I think in the history of fantasy football, I think he just understands the host job better than anybody else. So let me make sure that you get your flowers, Adam. It seems like you're kind of in that mood today where you need some, where you need some positive reinforcement.

And here it is. That's the switch release play in the red zone, a little bit of a rub route, but the timing was off. Trevor Lawrence didn't anticipate it. He didn't put the ball into that spot for an easy touchdown. And I feel like in general, watching this offense, it's really stale from Doug Peterson, who in a lot of ways was overrated to begin with, in my opinion.

But there's just a lot of these untimely play calls. He's calling screens into defenses with middle-of-field close safety looks, playing at minimal depth, so they're attacking downhill. The Browns, of course, then just blow it up for a minus two. You just see so many of these examples of this. There was an easy, perfectly clean third and seven go route to Gabe Davis who barely creates any separation. And it's just the ball's off target from Trevor Lawrence kind of, but it's also just like Gabe Davis isn't creating

any separation. I don't really understand Gabe Davis to be completely honest with either of you. I don't know. I know he had some stats with the bills because he has Josh Allen. Great run blocker, great blocker. He just doesn't look like he creates any separation out there. And their connection is really a problem. Like the timing and the ball placement between them is way off and he's playing all these snaps. There's just a lot of weird stuff.

A PA boot slide call against the blitz. Like that has no chance to work. And I just think the anticipation is a little off, but you're right. He does have moments Trevor Lawrence, where he puts a ball out there and it's like, this is the elite arm talent. This is the reason why he was the prospect. He was, it's just not consistent with Trevor Lawrence. I don't know that ever really has been besides that four game stretch two years ago that started with that Ravens game. Um, that was the only time I've ever really seen it for a consistent stretch. So are we buying low on Christian Kirk or, or Brian Thomas?

Yes. On Thomas. Cause he's so fricking good. Yeah, I would, I'd buy that on Thomas. So I haven't been able to watch the Jags game yet. I'm curious.

They, they popped up as using more motion and using more play action than they have in the past. And also I've looked into the run game stats a little bit and they're, they're getting outside a little bit more often. They're not doing as much of the just straight inside zone, straight man gap, just like up the middle over and over with Travis Etienne,

which is something I've been hoping they would do. But you guys still feel like it's kind of the same thing here with Doug Peterson. Well, I thought that there was a few plays where I was like, oh, okay, look, they're trying to get their best weapons out in space. They're throwing a screen pass to Travis Etienne. They're doing this.

And you know what happened? They played the Browns, and the Browns were all over it. And Miles Garrett was a real problem in this game, you know, like not surprisingly. And there was some bad weather at the end too. So there were some things working against them. But yeah, I don't know. Like Trevor Lawrence drops back to pass,

and I just have no expectations for it anymore unless he's throwing to Brian Thomas. It's like they have no chance to make a big play, and Thomas isn't getting targeted enough. So I do think the Browns had something to do with it if that makes things a little bit better here. Can I say one quick thing about last final note on this? We have to wrap this up, yeah.

Quick wrap. Brian Thomas, a few shows ago jacob you said maybe he kind of has giving you a little bit of josh gordon vibes i played it off as maybe more of martavius brian i take it all back because i thought back to some of those red zone routes he wanted lsu and i thought and then i watched that route he won on that deep pass this game my god was he so good from a play strike standpoint on that route he used his body to create that separation at the top of the route and i was super impressed like i am equally as high as you are these days i'm brian thomas jr moving forward and he's only going to keep getting stronger he's 21

years old yeah right i don't really know how christian kirk could continue to be so uninvolved after what we've seen for two straight years it does feel like sort of obvious by low i i i know things aren't great for Jacksonville. They weren't great last year and they barely possessed the ball. Like that's going to improve, you know, is Kirk going to win you your league? No, but can he still be like wide receiver 20 per game? Like he was two years ago. I don't really see why he can't, that would be in full PPR. I don't think he's gonna score a lot of touchdowns. Can I just say one final thing? Great comment here for Mr. B he said they need Lawrence running. His scrambling is so underrated.

I think that Doug Peterson has not used Lawrence's running ability at all throughout his career, and it's been a big detriment. He has not worked into the offense at all. Doug Peterson had one great year where he won the Super Bowl, and he has done very little. His offenses have done very little since. Kevin Cronin has our last big topic. I'm going to give you guys four minutes on this.

Are Travis Kelsey and Sam Laporta total busts? It's not been good. 14% target share for Travis Kelsey, 10% target share for Sam Laporta. It hasn't been good, but when you see that, you go, there's no way it's going to continue, right? It sure seems like it, but Jameson Williams, they did keep very involved in week two,

and if Laporta's the one who loses out, It sure seems like it, but Jameson Williams, they did keep very involved in week two. And if Laporta is the one who loses out, there's a limited number of targets that can go around. The Lions, from an offensive environment standpoint, it's been about as good as you could get. They're running a ton of plays these first two games. They're not scoring a ton of points, but they are running a ton of plays, creating a lot of targets. And just like none of it is going to Laporta. Yeah, I'm with you guys on this one. The Kelseysey one's a little more interesting now that the chat goes out i think that could lead to potentially like you said adam a shift in the offense i hope

but ultimately like it doesn't feel like they're running the offense the same way they had uh in the past i think you said last week jacob uh that kelsey snaps were fine it was it was yeah he was second in route participation among all the Titans this week. It's not like they're like limiting him to keep him out of the playoffs. They're just not throwing him the ball. Right.

So maybe that will lead to bigger games. I don't know. I'd be more inclined to buy him. I had zero shares of Laporta anywhere across 23 leagues anyway. I never really understood his price. Yeah, but right. But at the same time, you know,

you could buy low now right he may not he may not live up to third round value but you also could be getting sam laporta at his lowest value golf is not playing well golf is off to a bad start right he's not throwing that's a factor now if you go watch uh go watch the play where mahomes threw a touchdown to the backup offensive tackle travis kelsey was wide open in the back of the end zone. Yeah. Kelsey had a couple 15, 20-yard catches get called back too. Yep.

But you know they're giving that to the O-linemen if they can, every time. Fine, but I actually... Given his age and the decline in production last year, I don't really want to go say, oh, go buy low on Travis Kelsey. But I can think of several good reasons

to buy low on Travis Kelsey. It starts with a Pacheco injury. Yep. It start it's add to it. The fact that he was open for a touchdown and didn't throw to him. And he had a couple, as Jacob said, big plays called back. He's got his lowest target total in a two game stretch since 2016, because, because they've thrown fewer than 30 passes partially, but It also has a low target share. But fewer than 30 passes, he may not live up to round 3 ADP. But again, this could be your opportunity to have a top five tight end who's going to catch seven touchdowns or something like that,

and it's a hell of a lot better than the guy you're streaming. So if you lower your expectations for these guys, and I think lower your expectations for just about every tight end. Yeah, the problem is there's probably not much you can afford to give up to get him at this point. Other than McBride, I cannot say I am confident in any tight end to outperform Travis Kelsey rest of season.

It doesn't mean I think he's going to be tight end two, but I think he has as good a chance to be tight end two as anyone else in football. Yeah, that's fair. I mean, put Brock Bowers in that mix, though. But Laporte in there, too. Yeah. You know, I don't know about Andrews.

Like, who do you think are the real contenders? I don't think we should just... Oh, for tight end one? We shouldn't just anoint McBride as tight end one. But if we were doing our rankings again, he's probably tight end one right now. So who are the contenders to be tight end one or two? Bowers. Bowers and Kelsey.

I will put Kelsey in that because I think that he could still get a lot of touchdowns this year. I'll put Laporta in there too. Especially with the Pacheco thing. Like to me, it more so means a lot in the red zone because Pacheco is really effective in the red zone. I don't know that, you know, Sam Pirine or Carson Steele will be. They might be, but I don't know how effective they will effective in the red zone. I don't know that Sam Pirine or Carson Steele will be. They might be, but I don't know how effective they will be in the red zone. We've got a Kosicki for tight end one coming after one week with nine targets. His route participation is like 50%.

And Eric Aul, their rookie tight end, I love this guy. And he's coming. He played a lot more this week. He had four targets. Yeah, he did look good. You know, the Chiefs might just be this team. I'm thinking no,'s, he played a lot more this week. Four targets. Yeah, he did look good. Uh, you know, the chiefs might just be this team.

I'm thinking now, cause they obviously have a good defense, but they might just be the team to stream tight ends against. You think about Isaiah likely and Mike, a sickie so far having those days. Oh, we got a picture to end the show. Let's go throw it up there.

Yeah. That's not me. He's not a bad picture. That's a bad picture, but that's not me. I've a bad picture that's a bad picture but that's not me i've never like no offense to jason alexander amazing actor um first of all he went to livingston high school by the way which is i grew up 10 minutes away and i'm telling you guys like you have a lot in common okay we don't have a lot in common first of all look he's funny i'm not gonna get into the details of why this is not but just look at how much rounder his face is. Okay, Adam?

Please. I get that. He's in shape in this picture. That's not shape. I've never been in a shape that looks like that. That's never been my shape. Short and stocky. This is a good picture. I wouldn't mind looking like that guy.

That's a good looking guy. This is so frustrating. You know, I had to listen to a podcast last week where Adam called me a slob. He's like, you know, I was surprised. Adam didn't look like the slob I thought he was going to be at tennis. That was me after I whooped at him. 6-2-6-0. I embarrassed him on the court. He was throwing his racket,

slamming it on the ground, cursing. I never heard the guy curse. I did that at the clinic this weekend. I did it at the clinic this weekend. I was so embarrassed. You cursed again? I threw the racket. I cursed. You're building a habit. You're really throwing the racket like a baby. We got a comment earlier that said,

Dana's been to the gym more in the past month than Jason Alexander in his whole life. Just wanted to give you that, Dan. Yeah, that's true. All right. Thanks, everybody, for watching and for listening. And we will talk to you tomorrow with the waiver wire on fantasy football. Always make sure you get cash back from Rakuten. And it's not just clothing and shoes. You can get cash back from over 750 stores on electronics, holiday travel, home decor, and more. It's super easy. And before you buy anything, always go to Rakuten first.

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