Fantasy Football Today - Beyond the Box Score: WRs to Trust, Film Review, 2024 QB Strategy (12/11 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: December 11, 2023

Fantasy Football Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and wherever else you listen to podcasts The Cowboys whooped the Eagles (2:55) and we'll tell you if we're worried about D'Andre Swift or anyone else from this game and if Jake Ferguson is officially a must-start tight end. Then we'll update you on the latest news (10:00) ... Advanced stats (12:45) on Jonathan Mingo, Odell Beckham and many more. Plus film review (22:26) on Easton Stick and Jake Browning ... Four Big Topics: League winning wide receivers (31:40); Keenan Allen's Week 15 outlooks (44:40); Struggling WRs including Ja'Marr Chase and Amon-Ra St. Brown (49:15); How to draft quarterbacks in 2024 (53:15) ... Email us at [e-mail] SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dynasty/id1696679179 SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2aHlmMJw1m8FareKybdNfG?si=8487e2f9611b4438&nd=1 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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No, I can't. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. This is going to go the distance. Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. It's time for Beyond the Box score. We only have two Beyond the Box scores left. Did you guys know that? I did not.

Yeah. It would be sad to not be able to break down tape with you boys. Because we have next Monday, and then we have the following Monday is Christmas, and the following Monday is New Year's Day. And I'm not going to make you guys – well, I'm not going to do it either. But no one's doing a show on those Mondays. So this is it. Penultimate episode of the season for Beyond the Box score. Advanced stats

from Simple People. We'll recap Dallas beating the Eagles by 20. They beat most teams by that much. We'll give you some injury updates, of course. Advanced stats. Our four big topics today are wide receivers who are currently outside the top 20 in points per game that could be league winners in the fantasy playoffs. That's a mouthful. Are we starting Keenan Allen this week? What about Jamar Chase? It's basically struggling wide receivers, I would say, is the general theme here. And Jacob

loves wide receivers, so this one is right up his alley. He's kind of a wide receiver guy. And then we'll talk about the quarterback position and whether or not you should wait on quarterback next year based on what we've seen this year. All right. We rooting for the Giants tonight, Dan, or we rooting against them? What's the deal?

Yeah, you know what? I hate to have to admit this because it's going to lose me some supporters. I always understand that. But I'm not the type of fan who roots for wins in these types of seasons. You know, I don't care about making the playoffs as a wildcard seven seed and losing by 30. I want a long-term solution. I want long-term success. And these types of wins tend to not lead to that. You've been told the lie your whole lives that these wins built culture, that culture never seems to carry over to the next season. So, you know, I just want the draft position. I want an ultimately, I want a shot at one of

these quarterbacks and then I want to have some fun and watch good quarterback film. I was watching Matthew Stafford today to watch Cooper cup for film breakdown. We have, and the guy's phenomenal on tape. I mean, the guy throws the anticipation consistently. His arm talent is through the roof. He processed information, pre and post nap, like nothing I've seen watching the giants for the last five years and nothing remotely even close to anything that Daniel Jones has done from a processing standpoint or from an arm talent standpoint. So at some point, you know, you want that as a fan. You want to have that hope that you can have the guy who can bring you through to a Super Bowl on a consistent basis.

Well, they will not be playing against Aaron Jones tonight. So we'll talk about the Packers running backs in a little bit. Let's start with Dallas 33 and Philadelphia 13. The Cowboys had the ball for more than 36 minutes in this game. So just not a lot of possession for the Eagles. They fumbled the ball three times in Cowboys had the ball for more than 36 minutes in this game, so just not a lot of possession for the Eagles. They fumbled the ball three times in Cowboys territory. They had a couple of almost touchdowns,

so Tony Pollard had an almost touchdown that ended up being a Rico Dowdle touchdown. That was annoying. Brandon Cooks had an almost touchdown that ended up in a Michael Gallup touchdown. Devontae Smith, he dropped a gorgeous pass. That should have

been a long touchdown, so it could have been a really good game for Devontae Smith. The Eagles have lost consecutive games for the first time in two years, October 2021, so more than two years. Brandon Aubrey, last thing here. Brandon Aubrey, the Cowboys kicker, league winner, he's

incredible. He just found this guy from the MLS, and you're like, here, let's make you a kicker. Now he's the best in the NFL, basically. He's the first kicker in NFL history to have two 59-plus-yard field goals in the same game, and he has not missed yet. One of those was good from like 75, by the way. I know. Crazy.

Jacob hasn't spoken yet. So, Jacob, what are your takeaways from the Cowboys-Eagles? Yeah, I think you hit it on the head where just not enough plays for Philadelphia. Only 52 plays and nine drives. Both were the lowest of any team this week. It was good to see Dallas Goddard back. 93% route participation for him right away, so no limitations. And then it was also good to see Devontae Smith still draw 10 targets,

even with Goddard back, because there have been pretty pronounced splits when Goddard has been on or off the field. limitations and then it was also good to see Devante Smith still uh draw 10 targets even with Goddard back because they've been pretty pronounced splits um when Goddard has been on or off the field so that's all good the bad was basically everything else um particularly with DeAndre Swift we have back-to-back games now without a single avoided tackle um he to me looks like he's worn down as the season has gone on. I'm not sure if that's what's actually happening or not. On the Dallas side of things, you mentioned Rico Daldo got a lot more involved than I would have expected, and it wasn't just the blowout thing. He had more first quarter, first half carries than Tony Pollard did.

So I thought that was definitely interesting. Then he got the touchdown. That was frustrating. The other thing to bring up is Brandon Cooks. I think people have kind of leaned on him for fantasy, for fantasy at that huge game against the giants. Then he had a couple other games where he scored touchdowns. Um, but I don't think he's somebody we can trust this past four target shares are 10%, 16%, 10%, and then 13% this past week. Um, and he's not seeing a ton of air yards either so he's been running pretty hot on um pretty thin usage and i just don't know if we can trust that going forward oh yeah no it's

all touchdowns for cooks and i thought he was worth a shot this weekend like i said he came up like a half a yard short if that of a touchdown i thought he was worth a shot because the eagles give up so many points to wide receivers and i thought this would be a shootout the cowboys held up their end of the bargain. Jake Ferguson actually led the team in receiving at 72 yards. Lamb had 71 yards and a touchdown. You know, it's funny. I know Pollard's numbers weren't great, 3.7 yards

per carry, but he did have seven catches that only went for 37 yards. I thought he looked pretty good, though. I don't know if anybody else felt that way. I thought this was maybe the best I'd seen Tony Pollard look all season. I can get on board with that. I feel like I test wise.

He did pass that that barometer of what we've been using, but there's still that lack of explosion. I feel like in his game right now. Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I can't know.

He ran well, though. He ran low, low center of gravity, like ran through contact. Well, I thought which was which was good. All right. And a pretty small role in the passing game for Dallas Goddard,

which was obviously something we were going to be paying attention to. What was Devante Smith's target share going to be like with Goddard back? And Smith and Brown had 27 targets out of, no, I'm sorry, 23 targets out of 27 passes from Jalen Hurts in this game. And that's pretty much it. I mean, I think Swift will be a difficult decision for fantasy managers. He did not have a target in this game. He had a pretty big role in the passing game last week, but that's been hit or miss for him. So you know what you're doing.

You're starting Brown. I think you're starting Swift. Goddard's got to be like a low-end starter at this point. And then for the Cowboys, I guess the only thing I'd say for the Cowboys is I wouldn't assume that Jake Ferguson is going to be a stud every week. There's been too many weeks where he hasn't been a stud. He's like most tight ends where he's going to, you know, he's going to be like Cole Komet.

Some weeks you're going to go, oh, am I starting Ferguson? He just had such a bad game. And then the next week he's going to have 70 yards or whatever. But any final thoughts from you, Dan? Yeah. One final thought would just be that I don't know if I agree with you on Ferguson. I really like his role in this game. I feel like he's used intermediate and on the underneath stuff.

And he came really close to a touchdown too. That would have really changed his box score. I know he's had a couple misses at him, but if we look back at it, yeah. Versus the tight ends. I almost feel like he, to me,

he profiles as an every week starter, especially given his role and the system and how functional this past game is versus the rest of the NFL's past games. But my final word, Adam would be, you know, breaking, breaking a little bit here. This, the season, right? It's the season for, my final word, Adam, would be, you know, breaking, breaking a little bit here.

This the season, right? It's the season for and by just the season, I mean the season for Festivus, right? And in the season of Festivus, there are some airing of grievances. So I'll limit it to one right now. Oh, my gosh, we have grievances. Oh, I have a grievance. I have a grievance. I'll limit it to one.

OK, I'll limit it to one. You know, before the show started started i asked adam for a little bit of an extension today because i wanted a little bit more time to watch some drake london day you know sometimes we do that on the show we start at one sometimes we start a little bit later adam responded by saying okay fine but i hate you and he spelled the word hate h8 you no y no o H8U No Y, no O No A, no T, no E This is from the guy who says I hate breakout season using the S-C-N

You have to spell out season Every time, why are people using season You gotta spell it out And now this is the guy who comes back with a hate H8, so I just want to bring that up Call out the hypocrisy of Adam And again, it's festive season so we got to air some grievances that's fine i just i think when i said h8 you i think

it it gave a sort of a giddy nature to it you know i didn't want you to think i actually want to say season that's not the same no just i don't what is that i thankfully that's gone nobody says scn anymore you know i i always know when these things are not going to last like that one wasn't going to last you know i didn't think lol was going to last. That one wasn't going to last. I didn't think LOL was going to last, though. I got to tell you. LOL's not going anywhere. Adam Azer, the barometer of what trends will last, what will die.

All right. I didn't mean to imply that Jake Ferguson isn't a must-start option. He's number two in targets on the Dallas Cowboys. That's exactly what you're looking for. I'm just saying he's not going to be immune to bad games. The last two games, 72 and 77 yards. The three games before that, 26 yards, 32 yards, 35 yards.

He did catch a touchdown in one of those three games. Sportsline's awesome. You want to gamble? We got great gambling advice on Sportsline. We got models, simulations, and also experts who do this for a living, telling you which games they like. We've got fantasy advice on Sportsline all over the place on Sportsline from many, many different people, including a Beyond the Box score article from Jacob. And if you want 60% off a quarterly plan, use the promo code EKWINS, EKWINS at sportsline.com slash join.

EKWINS for 60% off a quarterly plan. All right, a lot of news and notes tonight. So a lot of news and notes right now, but one for tonight is that Aaron Jones is not expected to play at the Giants. So we have two games tonight. You might have some options if you either had Aaron Jones or A.J. Dillon.

But I mean, I kind of like A.J. Dillon now in a good matchup, and hopefully he can finally score. Someone asked me earlier, Dillon or Dobbs in PPR, what would you guys do there? Dillon or Dobbs, PPR. I'm going to go Dillon tonight without

Aaron Jones. I think the game script will be really good for him against the Giants. I personally don't think the Giants are covering this spread or keeping it that close. Yeah, I'd lean towards Dylan too. Right. I said last week when we talked about Dylan because they played on, was that Monday? It was Monday night, right?

Sunday night. Yeah. Obviously Sunday night. That he keeps scoring about 11 points a game without a touchdown. So it's all he needs to do. And he came so close last week. If you get in the end zone from Dylan, you're probably going to have a pretty good game from him.

Justin Herbert is not going to play this week. They play Thursday against the Raiders. And we don't know the extent of the injury. We just know that he's not going to play this week. And he's going to have more tests. Justin Jefferson, apparently encouraging news on Justin Jefferson. CJ Stroud's in the concussion protocol. Nico Collins has the calf injury.

Josh Jacobs, knee injury. Alexander Madison, ankle. Jerome Ford, x-rays were negative on, I believe, his wrist. And that's the big stuff there. Bucs secondary got pretty beat up yesterday. They play the Packers in week 15.

I forgot what week we were in. Texans got pretty beat up on defense yesterday. They play the Titans next week. Kyle Hamilton, Baltimore starting safety. He has a sprained MCL. They're facing the Jaguars in Jacksonville in week 15. Charverius Ward.

Oh, yeah. The Niners got really beat up. Charverius Ward, their top corner. And Javon Hargrave left with injuries. And they were already playing without Eric Armstead. They got Arizona next week. Jonathan Hankins, pretty big deal for the Cowboys. Jonathan Hankins left with a sprained ankle. He's a defensive tackle who's been around a long time.

And they lose a lot in run defense when he's not there. So Buffalo is their next opponent. And safety, Reed Blankenship for the Eagles. Really good player. He left with a concussion. You could look at Sidney Jones, I believe his name is. I don't know why I'm blanking on that. The backup safety in IDP.

He's kind of an exciting young player for the Eagles. All right. Let's do some advanced stats and some snap counts and stuff like that. And Jacob, the floor is yours. All right. Let's do some advanced stats and some snap counts and stuff like that. And Jacob, the floor is yours. All right. So Jonathan Mingo we brought up last week finally saw a spike in usage. We've been waiting for all year. This week he saw nine targets and 159 prairie yards.

I don't know how many of those are catchable because I didn't put myself through. Wait a sec. Did you just call them prairie yards? I never heard that before. I love that. Is that when Bryce Young throws you a pass? They're sec did you just call them prairie yards i never heard that before i love that when bryce young throws you a pass they're not air yards they're prairie yards you better you better be praying for that you should coin that because i'm going to start stealing that for like 90 of the nfl quarterbacks i watch on a daily on a weekly basis i love that yeah so i don't know on mango but it's at least cool to see him you know doing some stuff

involved in the offense um getting more you knowsnap motion, that kind of stuff. So not a great schedule the rest of the way. Probably not going to be fantasy relevant, but maybe for deeper leagues. Rasheed Rice, we've been tracking his route participation all year long. His previous high was 69%. It was up to 83% this week. So we finally saw Rasheed Rice as clear cut wide receiver one, um, only ran three fewer routes than Travis Kelsey for the team lead tied Kelsey with 10 targets, still not

running a downfield nuanced route tree. His average route depth was below five yards, which is extremely low. Um, part of that is cause he ran a lot of screens and that drags that way down. Um, but yeah, even beyond that, he's just not working down the field very much um but i mean that that's fine that it's working you know for fantasy yeah it is especially for pbr leagues um odell beckham we've talked about him quite a bit as well his you know big game this week mostly that one catch um only 57 percent rap participation so that's up from what we had seen prior to the buy where it was around 33 percent for three straight weeks um but still nelson agalor ran more routes than him so he's he's playing extremely well beckham is but that's gonna be tough to trust

um the usage if it doesn't tick up which it kind of seems like he's just not a full-time player at this point yeah i noticed that one too uh odell beckham 53 of the snaps and i i thought i thought it was the shoulder two weeks ago but now i'm much less certain he still had didn't he have 10 targets in this game so he must be among the leaders and target for a run rate recently yeah on a per route basis he's just been absolutely insane this year yeah um more baltimore we've got just this hill yeah leading the ravens backfield and snaps which you hate to see um didn't have a single rush attempt um so it's not you know he's not relevant for fantasy it's just a negative note for the other two guys there um and then

on the bills even with dawson knocks back we still saw dalton kinkade lead buffalo in routes run which was really encouraging uh 22 percent target share for kinkade lead buffalo in routes run which was really encouraging uh 22 percent target share for kinkade i thought he looked good i thought he was open a lot um i obviously watched that whole chiefs game that was not fun um but yeah good to see for kinkade because i thought he might be you know kind of falling out of that top eight tight end range if he fell back to the usage he had when nox was healthy earlier in the year but that's not what we saw legerereus Sneed All-Pro. I want more people on this.

Sneed is so good, yeah. Yeah, okay, that's great to know. I love that stat on Kincaid. Where do you stand on the crybaby end of the game between Andy Reid and Mahomes crybaby? Yeah, that's a big question we need to know here. Yeah, I mean, I said it last week. I think it's kind of silly the way that Chiefs fans

and now even those two are getting their feathers ruffled by the officiating. It's like, man, you guys have had so many. If you go on Twitter, I'm sure you'll find a thread somewhere of well-documented instances of the Chiefs benefiting from calls, especially late in games. And it's just, I don't know. My other thing is like, it's not about you. It's not. This isn't, you know, them picking on you. It's just i don't my other thing is like it's not about you it's not this isn't you know them picking on you it's just that the product sucks the nfl misses calls all the time and like

is inconsistent with stuff all the time and i don't know i think it's honestly really silly that cheese fans get so upset about i'm surprised that mahomes and reed or mahomes especially haven't come out yet and been like frustration. I was frustrated after a game, but like clearly he was offside. Cause like, there's no like debate or anything. The dude was clearly offside. Right. But yeah,

I know if they, their argument is that usually get a warning and they didn't get one. Right. But the referees were like, he was so offside. We couldn't even see the ball. And the official on the broadcast, I forgot,

uh, said, um, that it was the right call. It was egregious, basically, that you want to give them. You want to help them out if it's a little bit. But that Tony was so offside that it was had to be called. Kedaris Tony has had so many horrific moments. I mean, he had to win the Super Bowl, which, by the way, as a Giants fan, is just like a super sweet bonus because it was against the Eagles.

It's like it was just great to see that is one good moment, but like so many of the most boneheaded mistakes have come from good areas. Tony on this chiefs team. It's like wild. That one person who plays no snaps can have that man plays like no snaps can have that many boneheaded game deciding mistakes. But I, for one,

I'm not feeling bad about it because he handled his time with the Giants horrifically and has handled this post time after the Giants horrifically. And yes, I am a little bitter. You hate him. I hate him. I got a bone to pick with this comment here from Victor. The product does suck. Jacob speaking facts.

No, we hold this product to such a high standard. Yes. But if it sucked, we wouldn't be wrapped up in it every single week. It is the absolute. Go watch baseball. I know. Right? Like, football is by far the best sport.

By far. People complaining about the product are the same people, just like us three, who ground through Patriot Steelers on Thursday night and pretended like, oh, we're not going to watch this. And then we watched it. Well, we have to watch it. I didn't watch it. You didn't watch it. So many people didn't have to. Basketball is better than football.

They say. The NBA is better. No, I don't agree. I mean, you want to talk about missed calls. I'm sure you don't. They missed calls. They missed calls every possession in the NBA. The officiating is outrageously bad in the NBA.

Oh, my God. And not only that, they stopped to review everything in the last two minutes. That's unbearable. I just wish they would fix pass interference. It's so easy to fix. Is it though they tried to do it that year for the Saints debacle and then they had to go back on it? They didn't try hard enough. Just use common sense. Everyone with eyes knew that MVS was interfered with. So when it's that obvious, just overturn it. And also, I say this every time,

don't make it a spot foul. You have two different types of pass interferences. You have a 15-yard, which works really well in college, by the way. Nobody complains about it in college. And if it's really super egregious and you want to make it like the personal foul variety, basically, then you can make it a spot foul.

If someone just gets beat and tackles the guy, fine. But a regular run of the ball. I don't mind this idea of yours in theory, Adam, but now you're putting more on the plate of these refs who are already struggling to call the game as is. this is not passive. It's so easy. And they make it so difficult and they don't use technology to help them. And pass interference becomes the most consequential play in the game because it's a spot. Yeah, I know.

And because it's going to fix all this in a few years, 10 years from now, we'll have AI arrest. Yeah. It's yeah. Anyway, the NFL is the best and we know it. We just have such high standards for it,

but the NFL is great. And if you thought that. We just have such high standards for it, but the NFL is great. And if you thought that we weren't excited for last Thursday's game, we've got the Raiders and the Herbert-less Chargers. Oh, no. Oh, no. This week's game. That's this Thursday? Yeah.

In a game that means nothing, basically. All right, we're going to take a break and go through some more stats. I don't know if Jacob has any more. We'll find out. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football today. What does possible sound like for your business? It's having the spend to powers your scale with no preset spending limit.

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Did you guys ever see Good Burger, the first one? Yeah. I love that. It was great, right? Oh, what a great movie that was. It looks like they recaptured it in that preview we just saw on Paramount. That's going to be a good one. Yeah, yeah.

All right. Khalil Herbert played 12 snaps. Chris Olave played only 65% of the snaps. I have to believe that was because he had the flu. Yep. And Noah Brown played only 66% of the snaps, which I thought was disappointing considering Nico Collins was out

for basically the entire game, but Brown was on the injury report. But we'll have to figure out, you know, if there's a world where we have C Stroud and no Nico Collins, are we going to buy into the two good games basically of the entire career of Noah Brown? Not to be mean here, but when Noah Brown had those back-to-back monster games, it certainly came as a surprise based on a pretty nondescript career. He's done nothing the last two weeks, so it's going to be kind of hard to buy into anyone, but somebody's going to have to catch passes there. Maybe it'll be Dalton Schultz. Hopefully

he'll be back. I tried to take a look at the Houston running backs and what the heck is going on there, and Damian Pierce is back for three games, and in the middle game of those three, they basically split series, and Pierce had a better game than Singletary, and he scored a touchdown, but

the other two games, the Jacksonville game in Week 12 and the Jets game in Week 14, he barely played. He played less than 20% of the snaps. And Devin Singletary looked like a guy that you could maybe start as a flex. So the one thing I can say confidently is I don't have any faith in Pierce. And if they keep this usage up, then Singletary, you know, he could be good against Tennesseeletary, you know, he could be good against Tennessee next week,

you know, probably without Jeffrey Simmons. Something to look at, but I'm trying to figure out what the heck's going on there, and basically two of the three games since Pierce has gone back, he's been almost completely uninvolved, and he doesn't catch any passes. Obviously, Darryl Gumbawale plays a lot on third down.

Anything else from you, Jacob? Are you good? No, I don't have anything else. All right. Let's talk about some film review, I guess. Then we'll get into our big topics here. What did you watch today, Dan? I got to watch three players specifically. I watched Easton Stick

and his snaps against Los Angeles with Los Angeles because I wanted to kind of see where they're going to move forward as an offense there. I watched Cooper Cup because he had his nice big game after some bad weeks, and then I watched Drake London because he's a phenomenal watch on film, and Jacob threw it out there,

and I was excited to watch that. So those are my three guys this week. All right, let's talk about Easton Stick first. I also was able to watch him, and the numbers actually, 13 of 24 for 179 yards against the Broncos pretty good. I got to be honest. I mean, I think he's going to turn the ball

over. He's obviously going to make some mistakes. He fumbled two times. I think he had another fumble overturned. He threw a couple passes. I think that could have been intercepted, but he was better. He was better than I thought when I went back and watched it. It kind of gave me a semblance of confidence for Keenan Allen in Week 15 against the Bears.

No, it's not the Bears. I'm sorry. Raiders. Raiders, yeah. Thursday night. Yeah, of course. Right. Thursday night at the Raiders. Yeah. Go ahead. Yeah, so I think we maybe had a little bit of a different interpretation of the of what i saw at least on the tape adam um and that's not to say like you know one person is right one person is wrong i am there were some things that are are good i think the good thing is the first most important part is from the very first snap he took and that just includes all the game not just

because it was a two-minute drill the chargers ran kellen moore's offense with him they didn't have to go into like you know under center heavy personnel run run run you know roll out he knows this offense he's been here he understands it he'd been winning for the whole offseason and he just is looked like a professional backup if that makes sense now that's the good thing the bad thing is a lot i thought on this tape first of all almost everything was designed for quick game stick routes. And for just to provide a little bit of explanation on that, that what that means is like the design of a route is to be breaking back toward the quarterback. So stick routes are essentially like curls and anything in breaking like that. Um, and so, you know, that's going to

be, as you saw in this game, Broncos are starting to sit on that. They were starting to drive on it and there were multiple passes that should have been intercepted third and four with 15 minutes left in the third quarter uh near interception the right he just didn't read the underneath linebacker a third and four in the in the with 512 in the third quarter easy outbreaking pass from the slot to alex erickson and the throw is just wildly off target and we're you know we're talking about a pass that's only 10 yards in the air traveled to be that off target. And we're, you know, we're talking about a pass. It's only 10 yards in the air traveled to be that off targets. Not great. He didn't process the in breaker and through to a check down on first and 10 with one 36 and Q3, it's just bad processing. I did a good job in, with, uh, you know, in first and 10 with, in the third quarter with 47 seconds left coming off the

quick game, look to his right, working through his progression to find Keenan Allen. That was nice. I like that. Then, you know, 14-37 quarter four. This is just what's going to hurt with a player like this. You know, he's forced off his landmark in the pocket. He looks for the check down to Austin Eckler. It's just a four-yard throw and he's off platform and it just falls two yards short. The arm talent is simply not

there. The boundary skinny post to Quinnen Johnson is best throw of the game, I guess, if you want to call it that, with 11-48 in the fourth quarter. The long ball? The deep ball? That was really nice. Not, I guess, to me. What's wrong with it? He had two hitches into the throw. I'm not asking him to be a Hall of Famer.

I'm not even asking him to be start-worthy. I'm asking him to be competent. That's all. I know, but to me, it's like that skinny post, which is supposedly his best throw. And you can look at it yourselves if you want to make your own judgment. 11-48, quarter four. He needs two hitches, so he hitch it's like that skinny post, which is supposedly his best throw. And you can look at it yourselves. You want to make your own judgment. 1148 quarter four. He hit, he needs two hitches. So he hit just twice into that throw.

And then the ball still hangs up in the air there. And then it's not horrible, but it's just like, that's the limitations of a player like this, the arm talent. Like, and when defenses start to, you know, scheme around that quarterback, it's like everything starts to shorten. They, they condense the entire field. They're going to bring the safeties up. They're going to have their corners and linebackers drive on all the stick routes. They're going to, you know, force him to kind of do things more outside of structure that aren't going to really work for a player like him. He doesn't have much mobility.

He has some mobility. Not great. He doesn't throw well off platform at all. The only good throws I saw for him when it was when he had, you know, balanced base and then squared shoulders. And that's just going to be tough to come by. I think it's going to limit the entire offense. I think Keenan Allen might be able to, you know, fight through this potentially, but I don't see much of a ceiling with him. Austin Eckler is the one guy I think who could maybe not benefit from this. Cause he'll be scoring less, but like get a lot of these like grindy six, seven reception games out of this. Cause I think he's going to dump down to him a lot.

And they're going to also just mix in plays that are designed to clear out everyone and have Eckler come underneath on a drag just to kind of get the ball out to somebody. But I don't have much hope at all for this offense, to be completely honest. All right. Well, we'll talk about Keenan Allen a little bit later.

And we'll talk about Cooper Cup. Yeah, we can get into that when we get into our four big topics. I just want to give my quick thoughts on Jake Browning because I think a lot of you are going to be looking at Jake Browning. He's coming off two straight games with 27.7 or more points and six points for passing touchdown leagues. Can we trust him against Minnesota? You know, it's hard to trust anyone.

His air yards per attempt in the last three games, 5.1, 4.5, and 4.5. But he definitely, and by the way, put that in perspective, four and a half air yards per attempt each of the last two games. The NFL low is 6.3 among qualified quarterbacks. And that quarterback is Joe Burrow.

So it's just part of their offense. But Patrick Mahomes is 6.8. Jared Goff is 6.8. They're the second and third lowest. So you can be a good quarterback without a lot of air yards, but 4.5 is ridiculous. But it was like 7.5 in the second half. And the second half, he looked like a different quarterback.

He was throwing the ball downfield. I thought he actually played pretty well, Jake Browning. First half was like kind of gimmicky. The two long screen passes. I think it was a 56 yard touchdown, 54 yards. Chase Brown mix and had a long one. But in the second half, it was better. And his numbers would have been better.

T Higgins had two drops in this game. And, you know, I, I don't think I want to start him against Minnesota because Minnesota is actually pretty good on defense now. But I do have more faith in Chase and Higgins, perhaps. Yeah. Because I think Browning has passed the test a little bit. He was really bad. What's the injury situation now with Browning?

Oh, he's fine. He had a cramp in his hand. He's fine. He's just going to be okay. Okay. He was bad against the Steelers, but I think other than that, he's been pretty good against kind of bad defenses

the last two weeks in Jacksonville and Indianapolis. So Minnesota will be harder for him, but I was happy with what I saw. Again, just want a guy who can distribute the ball and not kill the offense and keep them in their rhythm. Lowest off-target rate in the NFL among qualifiers is Jake Browning at 3.9%. Next is Kirk Cousins in the homes in the seven to 8% range. Right. And a lot of that has to do with the low average depth of target.

Exactly. Yeah. All right. On the other end of that, we have Easton stick with a 21% rate off target rate. That's bad. That's not good. No.

All right. Let's get to our big topics then. So this one's from Scott. Which wide receivers outside the top 20 in points per game can be a league winner in the fantasy playoffs? Which wide receiver outside the top 20 in points per game can be a league winner in the fantasy playoffs? Let's just open this up by talking about Drake London

and what Dan saw from him because my god i watched every route and it was insane he obviously had all the targets caught almost all of them but he was also open a lot outside of that where i thought he got missed um and some of the catches he made were just bananas dude like the it like cap it off with the last one on the hail mary where he just gets drilled and like comes down with it among three defenders. That's what he was doing all game. It was nuts. Before your analysis, I'm just going to say no. He's not going to be a league winner.

He's not getting any better. He's always been great. He was the first receiver taken for a reason. That's not the issue. Desmond Ritter threw over 40 passes and threw for a career high, I think, in yards. He was over 300 yards. We see this all the time. Tampa Bay sucks against wide receivers, so it was a good matchup. What does he have? He has two touchdowns this year.

So it's just not possible. It's not possible for Drake London, in my opinion, to be a league winner. Everything would have to fall into place perfectly for him. We know they're super run heavy. We know Ritter's not good enough. It has nothing to do with Drake London. It has everything to do with everything we've seen the past two years from Drake London and Kyle Pitts. I cannot buy that anyone in the Falcons passing game could possibly be a league winner. I think that's totally fair.

I have been a little bit worried about what we've seen from london up to this point not only just the offensive environment that he's in but like i don't think he's looked like the same player as last year at times i think he's been consistent i don't know if he's been injured or it's an effort thing or what it is just like it sucks playing in atlanta um but but like to me it was really good like long-term note to see him come out and just completely dominate a game, even against Tampa Bay. Yeah, and I think that's exactly – sorry, go ahead, Adam. No, no, no, I said go ahead, Dan.

I think ultimately – I watch his tape, and I think ultimately what my main takeaway was for this show is screaming buy in Dynasty. He's personally my favorite player to buy in Dynasty right now. It was even better to buy five, six weeks ago, I think. And this is not maybe you want to wait for a bad game statistically to buy back in. But, I mean, at some point, the quarterback play will improve. And I will say this about Ritter, Adam. You look at the end run for London and Ritter at the end of last season.

He had a really big target share from Ritter in that run. And I say this about Ritter. He's not a good quarterback. But I like that he throws the ball up for London. And this is something I've always thought that someone would talk about Michael Penix out of Washington. I just like the quarterbacks. We'll just give those receivers a chance on the outside and just throw the ball up instead of being like, Oh, the coverage isn't there. It's not perfect. I don't really want to take this. I'll just go to the check down on throw the underneath track and just throw it up and see

what these guys can do. And there's such phenomenal players that they can often make plays. And I'm reminded of the game we watched for beyond the box score last year in like week 12 Falcons versus Steelers where on tape, it was the best game I saw by any receiver all year, Drake London and Mariota Mariota to him. And he should add like 220 yards of Mariota was God awful in that game. One of the worst games I've seen on tape by a quarterback, not named, you know, a New York giants quarterback. Cause I watched a lot of those games, but Drake London's ability is just crazy. Like it's, if you want to see some examples of it, I put three on Twitter. Um, you can find them on my account, but I'll throw a couple in there now for the people listening on the show. If you guys have game pass from the NFL or any way to access the all 22 first quarter, seven 38, just that ability

to, that he displays on that, to stop on a dime at the top of his route, then break outside. You watch the defender, there's three yards of separation and his ankles are broken. Then he extends away from his frame on an off target throw and pulls it in. And he has that same exact rep. I think, you know, every time I watch London guys, it's like two to five reps a game. I'll watch a defensive back, just falling off balance, completely ankles broken 13, 11 quarter tw is another one. He fakes the in cut, uh, running a dig and then goes outside. And then obviously, you know, the, the play of the game, which is like, uh, you know, the last play where he extends away or that, that bomb, not the last place, his second, the last catcher extends away from his frame,

makes the phenomenal catch, just crazy stuff to show that kind of body control, concentration, ability to adjust in the air. And then obviously at the catch point, everything he did there. He also does things that go unnoticed sometimes. Second quarter, 40 seconds left in the half, a contested catch where he's running a route where Ritter just has a lot of trust in him, but he throws him into a hit. He has two defenders converging on him, comes up with the catch anyway. So I just think his ability to move the way that he does at 6, four to 15 is special. It's rare at the NFL level. It makes him in my mind, one of the five,

you know, five most receivers I'd most want to trade for in dynasty. I honestly, I feel like there's still so much on that potential. Now, can he be a league winner rest of season? Like Jacob said, I actually think he can be based on one, what I said about Ritter's, you know, consistency as far as throwing the ball up and contestant catches reason to what we what I said about Ritter's, you know, consistency as far as throwing the ball up in contestant catchers, which in two, what we saw from him in Ritter down the stretch run from a fantasy standpoint last season, Adam, I think that does play a role here too. So I I'm with Jacob on this. I have a couple of names I throw out as league winners, but this is one I can, I can go on

Jacob's side with. Yeah, you can throw out your other names. I just, it's so hard for me to, they never throw touchdowns. So just again, two touchdown catches for him. I just don't see it. And he doesn't have good matchups either going forward. Um, like the bears are pretty good against wide receivers, believe it or not. Actually, they're really good. The Panthers are a tough matchup. The Colts is, that's a good matchup in week 16, but go ahead, Dan, who are your other league winners that are not currently top 20 in points per game? So not currently top 20.

That's going to leave very few options. But I'm going to throw Garrett Wilson out there because he's not currently top 20. And that target share he had this week was Zach Wilson was phenomenal type stuff. I mean, I think that's how it's going to be rest of the season for him. I think they're just going to be ripping targets to him. And you could still win with volume even if you don't score that many touchdowns. He's so phenomenal. He could score touchdowns.

So Garrett Wilson for me, Rasheed Rice, who we talked about a bunch on the show. We're big fans. Maybe just maybe we see a little bit of an extension of that target share. And just like, like Jacob said, a different expansion of his routes, maybe toward the end of the season. I'm not so sure. Andy Reid's offense is really hard to pick up, but it's worth considering to say the least for me.

That's my second one. The last one for me would be if he can get healthy. And that's a big F obviously Christian Watson for the Packers. Because like I said, last two games on tape, the film's been phenomenal. He looked, he looked before the injury looks special.

The rapport with Jordan love looked like it was starting to be special. So those would be my big three. I had two of those three Garrett Wilson and Rishi Rice decent schedules for those guys uh the other one was Zay Flowers which I maybe he's played well enough that he's basically in this top 20 range most of his minds um but last two games he's been I think pretty great um and he plays the Jags and the Niners these next two games and those are the first and second highest teams in um situation neutral opponent pass rate and so i think we're going to see a ton of attempts again just like we did this past week

baltimore has kind of come around to the todd monken offense that we thought we're going to get and so like we're getting huge volume like even when flowers didn't draw a ton of targets on a per route basis he ran 53 routes this past week. So that's just insane volume. In a rainy game, too. They still ripped the ball. Yeah. And then Miami is with, like, the Fantasy Championship game.

So all three of those are potentially high-scoring games. Yeah, there's not much else outside of the top 20 that stood out to me. The first guy outside the top 20 per game is Chris Olave. And I think, for sure, he's got the potential

to be a league winner. He's got the Giants, the Rams, and the Bucs. And yeah, I think Olave is going to have a big finish. Again, a touchdown problem when Taysom Hill is there. He had a short yardage touchdown in this game. But I think most of these guys have touchdown problems, which is why they are not in the top 20. And it makes a big difference when you think about the wide receivers that get in the end zone pretty consistently. Devontae Adams has done that three times. Devontae Adams is a guy who's outside the top 20.

Can he be a league winner? Well, I don't know. He's got the Chargers this week, which should be fine. They've been better lately, but that's a fine matchup. The Chiefs in week 16 is going to get Sneed. He had a decent game against the Chiefs. He had

12.3 points against the Chiefs, and then the Colts in the Fantasy Championship. But again, Aiden O'Connell, Aiden O'Connell's thrown three touchdowns in his five starts since taking over for Garoppolo. So they're just, they scored 30 points against the Giants since then. I don't think they've scored more than 17 points in any game.

So, like, Adams is a must start. Is he a league then. I don't think they've scored more than 17 points in any game. Adams is a must start. Is he a league winner? I don't know. Garrett Wilson, I feel kind of the same way. I think I'd rather have Wilson in full PPR than Adams. He gets so many targets from Zach Wilson. Now in four of the last six games with Zach Wilson, he's got 12 to 14

targets, seven or more catches, 80 or more yards. That's in five of the last six, pardon me. All these guys are going to have trouble scoring. Jalen Waddell, I'm hopeful, is going to have to start tonight because he's got a tough playoff schedule. Then there's Cooper Cupp, which is another guy you looked at, Dan.

Cooper Cupp, can he be a league winner? He had eight catches for 115 yards and a touchdown at Baltimore. Gets Washington the Saints and the Giants. He basically has a very similar schedule to Chris Olave. Washington Giants is phenomenal. Giants. Well, no, I'm sorry.

It's just one team in common there. But both have easy schedules going forward. So do you think that Cooper Cup. And by the way, my sleeper would be Zay Jones. Okay. That would be my sleeper would be Zay Jones. Okay. That'd be my sleeper. Probably not this week, but because they have Baltimore,

but after that, I could see Zay Jones having a big finish. Do you think Cooper Cup can be a league winner, Dan? Yeah. I missed this one. I didn't realize he qualified and he does, and he would probably, he would definitely move top of my list.

Now, Cooper Cup, it was an interesting watch on film. I would say this, and this would make it seem like the opposite of what I'm about to say, which is by Cooper cup, which is, it's probably the least explosive I've ever seen him look on tape. I think it's very clear he's playing through an injury right now and he's not at a hundred percent. And yet I don't think it actually matters because Cooper cup has never really won with explosion.

And there were multiple plays where he destroyed his assignment. For example, the third and four with 504 in the third quarter, he runs a slot vert and just absolutely destroys the slot corner by driving with the inside step and then the outside release. It's so smooth. It's so technical. It's so Cooper Cup and it works and it creates separation. He had the out and up with 106 left in the fourth quarter.

I mean, this dude looks like he's running a four, seven, five on that. And yet he creates like two, five, two to three yard, 2.5 to three yards of separation on it because he sells the out so well. He's just so technically, technically sound and smooth as a route runner. And that's the good thing from just the, you know, I test film standpoint, but the fantasy standpoint, what I really love is so much scheme production in this game, pre-snap motions, free releases. Now there's anyone who's watched Sean McVay over the years knows the constants of his offense are pre-snap motion to create free releases and also tight, you know, condensed look. So he doesn't have the typical

one outside boundary receiver, two outside boundary receiver. A lot of the times he'll just bring those receivers in and he'll have two guys around the line of scrimmage. And he does this so he can create free releases off the line of scrimmage for easier throws and for easier, you know, receptions. And there were a lot of that Cooper cup was in motion a lot and had a ton of free releases. You know, there was a 27 yard gain. I wrote down in my notes, uh, 1355 quarter to busted coverage by Baltimore, but you take out that and a lot of the other, and all the other production was, was on him and, you know, on the scheme. And so if they're going to keep doing that, and I don't see any reason why they wouldn't scheme up that production for him. Now, maybe they need to face a certain style of defense to do it

to this extent, like they did, uh, against Baltimore, but you know, if they're going to do that for him, he's going to be a big asset down the stretch in fantasy. And I'm kind of disappointed because I had an offer for Cooper Cup. I was bouncing back and forth two, three weeks ago, and I was just like, eh, I'll turn it down. But now I kind of wish he was on my team for the fantasy playoffs. All right. One more guy, Amari Cooper, another one who just cannot score touchdowns. But in eight games, eight healthy games that he's played without Dorian thompson robinson he has uh let's see 89 or more yards in five of those eight games 77 or more yards in six of those eight games so

whenever he's playing with flacco or watson or even pj walker for the most part amari cooper's been a guy that you want to start i don't know that we're talking league winner for him but we're definitely talking to the schedule is brutal i wanted to include amari but he's got chicago who you mentioned has been much, much better, and then Houston, who really takes away perimeter receivers, and then the Jets. Yeah.

That's really tough. That's a good point. All right, let's take a break. When we come back, we got a few more questions about wide receivers, and we'll talk quarterbacks after this on Fantasy Football today. This question is from TheDynastyDeegan.

Are we benching Keenan Allen this coming week against the Raiders on Thursday night? That's surely Dynasty Deegan, right? What did he say? Deegan. What's D-E-G-A-N?

Oh, is it an A? Was there definitely an A in there? No, I'm looking at the thing. I don't know the difference between an E and an A. Yeah, is it an A? Is it an A? Was there definitely an A in there? Or was there an E? Oh, no, no. I'm looking at the thing. I don't know the difference between an E and an A. Yeah, it's a freaking A, definitely. Thank you. Now, I may have written it wrong. That's possible. Let me see if he wrote that wrong. I may have written it wrong.

I think he read that as Deegan in his mind, even though it was E-N and then wrote it wrong on the notes on the show. I'll go ahead and look. Are you starting Do you know what a D-Gen is, Adam? Yeah, I think I have a on the show. I'll go ahead and look. Are you starting? Do you know what a degen is, Adam? Yeah, I think I have a pretty good idea. I think it's short for degen. I stare at two of them every Monday, yeah.

Oh, shoot, you were right. It's degen. Well, I read it right from my notes, but I wrote it wrong in the notes. All right. Anyway. Look, I'll start Keenan Allen, and I think he's going to still be heavy target flow, but I don't see ceiling for him anymore with Easton stick in the offense. The vertical stuff's gone. The red zone stuff's going to be far and few in between.

They're not going to have too many trips down there. I don't think to the red zone, even against the Raiders. This game probably going to be I actually should rush after the show to bet the under for this Raiders, uh, chargers game before it drops even lower. But, um, I'm sure based on the Raiders scoring three, being in a three point total game, it's probably already too low, but yeah, maybe as a flex, but such a Deegan, such a Deegan, maybe as a flex, such a Deegan rushing right to the, to the sports betting apps, but you know, maybe as a flex, but I don't have much faith in any kind of ceiling freaking now. Definitely PPR. I'd be more willing to play.

I do like the matchup. It's super soft. The Raiders employ a lot of the umbrella, you know, just like real hands off, let you beat us with, you know, short passing. And we've seen Rishi Rice, a lot of, you know, guys who play similar type of role to Keenan Allen. I'm on our St. Brown, even kindred born back when he was like feeling that kind of a role, have really productive games against this defense. So like from that side of things is stick is in a total disaster and could just make layup throws. And I think we could see a lot of production for Keenan here, even in a gross game. You know, you might have told me there because of the Patrick Graham defense for the Raiders. It is just so hands-off zone. But yeah, go ahead, Adam. Well, the Raiders actually give up the second fewest catches of 20 more yards in the NFL.

They don't give up big plays. There was a receiver that's a lot like Keenan Allen that had a really bad game against them, and it was Keenan Allen. He had three catches for 32 yards and a touchdown. He did have that touchdown on only five targets. They've held Diggs, Keenan Allen, DJ Moore with Bajent, and Jalen Waddell in check this year. They're not bad.

It's not an easy matchup, even though you think about it. You think the Raiders, they're terrible. It's actually not. They don't give up big, big plays. But it could be a good matchup for a guy like Keenan Allen. All right, next topic is from bread and butter. And I had some of that this morning. In fact, I had a lot of bread and butter.

I had different types of bread with butter. Why? Can you explain why? It's grocery day, and I didn't have a lot, so I had a bagel with butter. Okay. Well, no. First, I had a bagel with cream cheese. Are you the type of guy who has the store-bought bagels?

I hope not. Oh, good God. What are you talking about? Okay, you have a good bagel place that you go to? I'm a bagel deegan for sure. Okay, good, good, good. So you had a bagel with God. What are you talking about? You have a good bagel place that you go. I'm a bagel deegan for sure. Okay, good, good, good. So you had a bagel with butter. What else?

No, first I had a bagel with cream cheese, and then I ate my son's bagel with butter, and then I ate my daughter's bagel with butter. And then I had challah with butter. Yeah, that's about to go stale. So I had to get that in there. That's way too much bread for one day. I'm not done, baby.

I got more left in me. Maybe I'll have some pasta tonight. How do you stay 138 pounds when you eat like that? I'm sick all the time. Yeah, I guess that plays a factor in it. Yeah, sure. Are Devante Smith, Jamar Chase, and Amonra St. Brown still solid wide receiver one or twos?

That was so disappointing, by the way, before you get into this question. I threw that out there for hoping before you get into this question. I threw that out there for hoping I would get the Adam Azer. No, I'm 154. I am not 154. If I were 154, that would be a big problem. No, I'm 148 or whatever you're playing today. I'm about 148, yeah.

Which is too high for me. I should be lower like 145. Oh, my God. Yeah, no, it's bad. I got to exercise. This is the kind of guy who thinks he's going to beat me in any kind of athletic event this summer. Sitting at 5'7 or 8", 148.

I mean, I'm not 5'7. No, you're actually tall. As I admitted, you were taller than I expected. I'm Devontae Smith. I'm faster. I'm small and fast. Okay. Speaking of him,

are Devante Smith, Jamar Chase, and St. Brown still solid wide receiver one or two, one slash two. And who is more consistent, David Montgomery or Jameer Gibbs? So a two part question here.

Jacob, answer the wide receiver question. Devante, Jamar Chase, and Amandra St. Brown. So, yeah, I, what we've seen from them lately is you know frustrating like we already talked about jake browning like he's not pushing the

ball down the field and so we've seen the targets get distributed like really evenly like tanner hudson and people like x are getting a ton of targets and that's hurt jamar chase it's really hurt t higgins um next up is Minnesota. That's not a good matchup. But after that is Pittsburgh. Although honestly, Joey Porter Jr. and those guys have been playing a lot better. And then the Chiefs.

So I don't really like any of those matchups for Chase. I don't know if you really can trust him. I think he's probably going to rank outside the top 12 for me in each of those weeks, honestly. Right, outside the top 12, but not outside the top 20 or anything like that. He's still...

I think, yeah, you have to rank him inside the top 20, but it wouldn't be any surprise if he finishes outside the top 20 each week. Do you guys have any takes on Amon or St. Brown? I don't really know what's going on there. I have a big take on Amon or St. Brown. I have zero concerns about Amon or St. Brown. And if I'm wrong, I am willing to be wrong about it,

but I am not even going to think twice about Amon or St. Brown. I mean, it's just timing, right? I mean, he's had his two worst games of the season. This one was particularly bad. Jared Goff is just not playing very well right now, but I think the guys mentioned he'll be indoors going forward. He gets Denver at home.

I mean, Denver's tough at Minnesota and at Dallas. It's not an easy schedule, but I just think Amon or St. Brown has put himself in that class where I'm working, I mean, it's the same as Stefan Diggs. There's really no difference to me, except there's only two bad games in a row for St. Brown, and one of them wasn't even that bad.

So to me, I just, look, there could be a lot to say here about St. Brown. I think he had some drops in this game that were a little uncharacteristic. I don't care. I wouldn't even think twice about it. And if I'm wrong, I will die on that hill.

Amonra St. Brown for life. I'm Amonra St. Brown Deegan right here. Deegan. I'm with you on Amonra St. Brown. That's the one I'm least concerned with. I'm also not concerned with Devontae Smith. I think we saw it last night. The Dallas got a return.

Didn't impact him that much. He should have had that touchdown. I had him mentioned. I'd have mentioned. Um, I feel like he's also been used a lot underneath when they use, uh, you know, when, when teams are,

are using bracket coverage or umbrella coverage over AJ Brown, which helps a lot. The one I'm concerned with is Jamar chase though. I'll be honest. I, I've been concerned since the start. I know one Browning game was amazing, but it kind of required like a really phenomenal

individual play by Jamar chase on a pretty underthrown ball. And I also don't necessarily think you're going to see that many more looks that chase had on that play against Jacksonville or is one-on-one windows safety help over the top. That's just not something teams do a lot against Jamar chase. Maybe they thought they could cause Browning was in the game at the time. And then they learned they couldn't and they won't do it again based on that tape. So chase is the one that concerns me the most of this three. I would agree. I think so too.

I think I would agree. I like the matchups for Devante too. Outside of Seattle. I like the next two a lot. Yeah. It's just going to take one game where Dallas Goddard has 10 targets and Smith has six and then everyone's going to get it again. Yep.

But these guys are starts. Uh, and then Montgomery or Gibbs, who's more consistent? That's tough. I'd have to say Montgomery's more consistent. It feels like Montgomery has been more consistent, but his snap rates when they get down are really concerning. Two of the past three games he's been below 40%,

and one of them it was like 28% snap rate or something. Just insane to me that it could even get that low. But yeah, from a production standpoint, he has been more consistent. It's tough. I think they're the kind of guys that you pretty much have to start in most leagues, and you should start them against Denver,

and we'll go from there. Next question is from Sam Moore. Most top eight quarterbacks in ADP have been busts. Is it time to go back to waiting until round 12 for quarterbacks? This is the beauty of fantasy football. There are some things that you can hold true. Some things are not dependent on the trends that happen in the NFL. So we've always talked about, oh, so you're the running back, you're the zero running back, wide receiver. A lot of trends change those things. But one thing that's always going to be true is that if you play in a 10 or 12 team league, that's only starts one quarterback, 24 to 20 to 24 of

the, or whatever it is, 20 to 24 of those quarterbacks will not be started every week. Some will be on benches. Some will be on the waiver wire. And that in itself gives value to the original strategy coined by JJ Zachary, you send up late round quarterback. You wait for quarterback, you take him in the late rounds, maybe you double up and you take upside and swing on two, but you wait and you want to make sure that 10 or, you know, 90% or 95% of the teams in your league, take a quarterback for you, take one, then you can really wait even longer. And there was value to that for a while. And then over the past two years, research showed that that was not the case because the top tier had really separated themselves. And now we're seeing a fallback.

Now, the question is how much of that is due to unforeseen circumstances that won't really repeat themselves, AKA variants, AKA injury luck. Now that I can't really, um, determine, but I'll say this, like you look at some of the outlooks of some of these players, Patrick Mahomes, like where are the chiefs going to find the receivers he needs in one off season without any free agent, without any salary cap space to, to really help that. I mean, you're gonna have to see a big evolution from Sky Moore and Rishi Rice. In my opinion, they're two big investments. I don't know if anyone sees that coming from Sky Moore, maybe for she rice, I guess, um, Travis Kelsey is getting older there too. So that can't help.

So you're looking at some of these guys, Joe Burrow coming off the injury. I don't know, Justin Herbert now coming off the injury. And again, no explosive playmakers in that offense, really. And an older Keenan Allen starting to think like, I don't know if there's these top end guys that we want to invest in anymore because of the injuries, the quarterback position have been piling up again. Maybe it's the recency bias though, with so many injuries this year, quarterback, I'm curious to hear what you guys think about all that. I do think we are maybe giving it to recency bias here a little bit. There were a few guys who stood out as, I thought, bad picks. I think we pushed quarterbacks up the board a lot because of last year.

And that makes sense when it comes to Jalen Hurts and Josh Allen and, I guess, Mahomes. But I didn't love Mahomes, where he was going. And also, Joe like Joe Burrow this I don't think is just like a response to what happened I thought that was a terrible pick like I didn't see the upside for that for me if I'm going you know like I think if I'm going if I'm going early at quarterback I want it I need a difference right yeah I'm so like for me I was going after people like Justin Fields Lamar Jackson and like it's been kind of a frustrating year for those guys. But I do think that's somewhat variance. The touchdown rate for Lamar Jackson is much lower than normal. And we've seen so many of those short yardage touchdowns go to Gus Edwards. I think it could easily been a much better year for him. And feels have been phenomenal since he's come back. His last like six games, he's been like one of the best fantasy quarterbacks. So yeah, I don't know. I think I'm still willing to take a chance early on a quarterback if there is upside for a truly difference-making season. But I do think we're kind of running out of those types of guys.

It kind of seemed like with Brady falling off, with Rodgers falling off last year, it kind of seemed like the quarterback play was just a lot worse and it made sense to get an elite quarterback this year, or at least one that you'd feel comfortable starting every week. So I bought into it big time. And the two quarterbacks that I had on most teams were Burrow and Lawrence. So I feel like I drafted pretty well except for quarterback and I got killed,

killed by those guys. And you know, Burrow, obviously I think Burrow would have had a perfectly fine year. I got killed by those guys. And, you know, Burrow, obviously. I think Burrow would have had a perfectly fine year. I don't see any reason why he wouldn't have, but he got hurt, you know, had the calf injury and just was not healthy. And then when he finally got healthy, he got hurt again. Lawrence, you know, big disappointment, finally coming around,

probably too little too late for most of those guys. Joe Burrow, his 17-game pace last year with Chase and Higgins both healthy and not leaving the game early, because remember, T. Higgins kept doing that, played three games where he barely played. When he had both of them on the field, he was on pace for 4,945 yards, 42 touchdowns, and

six interceptions, and another 223 rushing yards with four more touchdowns. But that was almost like a ceiling-type season from a fantasy standpoint. That's almost QB1 ceiling. I know, but the rest of his career hasn't been at that rate. Well, it was pretty good. From a fantasy standpoint, I mean, just from a fantasy point standpoint.

2022, he was number four per game. Oh, no, sorry. That was last year, right? That was last year, yeah. 2021, he was number nine per game, but he got real hot late. So I just thought, you know, and I forgot when Jamar Chase got hurt. I think it says that was last year. Anyway, I think, you know, Purdy and Prescott and Cousins when he was healthy.

Anthony Richardson even was looking like he was going to be. Those guys were ranked outside the top 12 for the most part. Yes. Not Richardson. Yeah, that was my point. It's not necessarily that you can't run into that kind of upside without rushing. It's not that predictable. And it requires an outlier, and so you don't want to invest super high in it.

Yeah. It requires a totally MVP outlier kind of season for an only passing stats quarterback to get that kind of upside. And I'm looking at my tiers now. And I, I did have the, that I had Alan, I'm sorry, Alan Mahomes and Hertz is just a tier of their own. And for the most part that's worked out besides my homes. And I don't know if anyone could have really seen my homes coming. Cause he was good last year without receivers. So it's kind of dependent in my opinion on Kelsey, not looking that healthy to me. And that's kind of in fact affected their whole season. In my opinion,

maybe it's age factor there too. Who knows? So maybe you could, it's on that coming, but like it's net, it's really that second tier that I think you should be weary of when, when we push up the guys into that, you know,

ranked four or five, six, seven, eight QB range. Do you want to invest that early pick there or that big investment in an auction league? Or do you want to maybe try to not do that? And then you may have to make such

a smaller investment in the guys like purdy and dac and those guys it's just such a drop off in the investment that you have to that has to be made because we pushed up those guys like jacob said like burrow and you know whoever to round four round five you know round six where you could be getting these receivers or running backs i have no problem with it you know and i think for all the talk about Dak and Purdy, Purdy wasn't even really in this discussion. He was probably QB 20 or so in ADP, right?

I mean, what if you drafted Gino Smith and Daniel Jones and, and there's always, right. It was a lot of, a lot of bad picks in there too. Um, I think Burrow,

you know, Burrow to me was all about the injury. Jackson's been so weird. I mean, he's just so weird. He 17 points against the Chargers one week and then comes back with like 37 points yesterday. So he's so hit or miss on a weekly basis. Herbert for a while

was the number two or three quarterback in fantasy, but he lost Mike Williams and then he lost Josh Palmer. I just think both of those had a huge impact on him. So I don't know that those were bad picks necessarily. And then he lost Josh Palmer. I just think both of those had a huge impact on him. So I don't know that those were bad picks necessarily. And then Fields has been fine. You said he's been great since he came

back or whatever, but he's been kind of up and down. He started off the season looking like almost people were asking if they could drop Justin Fields. Yeah. I'm not going to shy away from grabbing a great quarterback next year. If the chips fall that way, we'll see.

I'm not going to shy away from drafting the top guys. I'm probably going to shy away from tier two. Yeah. All right. That's it for today's show. And I wonder, who do you think the top six quarterbacks will be or top eight next year? I was going to say, it's going to be all Anthony Richardson for me.

I assume he'll be in that tier two that dan mentioned um but unless he like gets pushed up into the top five i think i'm just gonna be way way overweight on richardson wow yeah no i think he's gonna be very popular i worry about the injuries but other than that i like him a lot absolutely you gotta be worried about the injuries you gotta be worried about him changing his style of play all All those things. But I just, I love the offense. I love Shane Steichen.

I think it, I mean, the injury is concerned is real. But yeah, if we're just talking about upside, Shane Steichen deserves to be in the mixer coach of the year, in my opinion, given what he's done. I wonder where Purdy is going to go.

I think it'd be a top eight guy. He should be high. All he's done is produce for fantasy yeah he should be really high but all the stat people are going to look at at this season and say it's the most unsustainable season in like nfl history and they're probably right you know i mean he's basically and then we'll go into next year and he'll be just as good because he still has all those weapons back i've never seen depot samuel was the most player. He's so good when healthy. He's incredible. I was so high on him ranks-wise

this year, and it looked bad for a while. Now he could be the guy that carries me through to these playoff runs, potentially, if he doesn't get hurt. Okay. I think that's it. Someone's bringing up my Anthony Richardson take. Yeah, I was... What do you want me to say? I was wrong. Well, it's not

as bad as his most recent take, which is the Detroit Lions would be one of the four teams if I did an NFL playoff today. Yeah, I was... What do you want me to say? I was wrong. It's not as bad as his most recent take, which is the Detroit Lions would be one of the four teams if I did an NFL playoff today. Again, this is a misinterpretation. And I couldn't wait to bring that up. I never felt that the Lions were actually the fourth best team, but the whole point was to eliminate bias

and go on resume. That's not the whole point. The Chiefs, the team that they beat? That Chiefs was a bad call. Right, exactly. All the Chiefs people look like idiots right now. The Lions beat the Chiefs and had a better record. It still stands, by the way.

They still have a one-game better record than the Chiefs and a win in Arrowhead. The Dolphins? The Dolphins haven't beaten anyone. I can't believe you're standing by this take. There's four teams in the NFL playoff. You still want to put the Lions in there? No, the Cowboys have earned it now.

The Cowboys have earned it. The Cowboys hadn't been a good team all year until this year, unless you count Seattle. They're fine. But this was finally the Cowboys' signature moment. So now it's very easy. Very easy. The Dolphins are out.

It's the Ravens. In some order, it's the Niners, the Ravens, the Cowboys, and the Eagles. Yes, I'm fair with that. I'm fine with that. I thought the more interesting comment was Adam will put Dan on a poster, which I assume means like dunk on him, which is just so funny putting that visual in my head. Yeah, I mean, I have in my basement,

I have a little trampoline and a little Tykes basketball hoop. So with those two things, I might be able to posterize you. I mean, I'm just at this point concerned if this game's even going to happen. Adam Azar has been literally sick for two straight months now. We're going on like eight weeks if this guy isn't cold. It's true. I can't say anything. We asked him before the show if he was going to do anything about it. The answer is no. He's just grinding through it.

Miami is better than Baltimore, says Clonk. We'll see. They'll get to prove it in a few. Yeah, I think I think Miami's been outclassed when they face the Eagles, the Chiefs and the Bills so far. So I just can't quite get there with the Dolphins. All right. We're out of here, everybody. Thanks.

Thanks for watching. And we'll talk to you tomorrow.