Fantasy Football Today - Breakouts! Bateman, Pittman, Sutton, Pollard and More (06/15 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: June 15, 2022

We've got a couple of quick stats on James Cook and Dak Prescott before we get into the meat of the show. Dave and Heath give you their favorite breakouts for 2022 (3:25)! Dave loves Gabriel Davis and Heath loves Jalen Hurts. Are we taking Hurts over Kyler Murray? Also, Dave and Heath call out a breakout candidate on each other's lists (9:30) as we discuss Rashod Bateman and Pat Freiermuth ... Courtland Sutton is a shared breakout candidate, so should he easily be the first Broncos wide receiver drafted (18:00)? We've also got some news and notes (23:30) and a long discussion on breakout running backs (28:50) including Breece Hall, J.K. Dobbins, Travis Etienne, Tony Pollard and A.J. Dillon (38:30) ... Breakout wide receivers (44:00) include Michael Pittman and Tim Patrick. How much upside does Pittman really have and why do we think Fantasy managers won't quite be on board with him as a potential star? ... Email us at [e-mail] Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs, @BenSchragg 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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He's just going to go the distance. Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Hello, audience members. Hello, YouTube. Hello, listeners. Welcome to the show. It is time to talk about some breakouts here on Fantasy Football today. I'm Adam with Dave and Heath.

We've got some training camp news, some interesting nuggets on the Broncos right now and what's being reported out of training camp. Dak Prescott hoping to run a little bit more. He was about about half his yards per game last year than what we usually see. And breakouts, including some young running backs and these guys can obviously make your season. They can win you your league. So, what's up guys?

How's it going? How are we? Heath, how are we doing? Have you finished Stranger Things yet? No, I have one more episode. Oh. Or do I have two? How are we? Heath, how are we doing? Have you finished Stranger Things yet? No, I have one more episode. Oh. Or do I have two? You've finished Heath? I cannot wait.

Maybe two. So I'm assuming you've finished Heath. Well, I've finished the current part of the season. Sure. Yeah, I'm only three episodes in. Oh, Dave watched another yesterday. Man, I have so many things I want to say. I can't say anything.

I have a question for you. Are you still watching watching it with your youngest son or were you ever uh yeah it's kind of a horror horror show now isn't it um it's kind of scary he's not he's almost 13 now it's too scary for him don't let him watch it anymore he watched the first three seasons i think three or four times like whenever he'd get done watching it he wouldn't watch any other show he'd just start watching stranger things again yeah but the first three were kid friendly this one's too scary you're a terrible parent he's grown up with this series yeah i don't know how kid friendly they were bad parenting bad parenting i'd say but bad parenting yeah yeah okay i want to give a few quick uh few quick stats before we get into breakouts here.

Jacob Gibbs had a breakdown of James Cook over the weekend. I hope you heard that in this podcast or on FFT in five. And he said, stat of the day number one from Jacob Gibbs, Devin Singletary ran the fourth most routes among running backs in 2021. That is amazing. He just barely got targeted. He didn't do anything with those routes, but that was part of the Bill's offense last year. It will be part of the Bill's offense this year. So just- He didn't do anything with those routes, but that was part of the Bills offense last year. It will be part of the Bills offense this year. He didn't do anything with the targets he got either. As much as I have been a Devin Singletary supporter, he has been one of the worst pass-catching running backs in the NFL over

the last couple of years. Makes you realize there's opportunity there for Cook if he has that role, if he locks that role down. He was so bad at catching passes, they tried to play Zach Moss. And they tried to sign Jarek McKinnon and draft James Cook. Stat of the day number two, Dak Prescott.

J.D. McKissick. They're the same. Come on. With the initials, everything's the same. They're not the same. J.D. McKinnon doesn't have initials. J.D. McKissick has knee ligaments still. Stat of the day number two,

Dak Prescott played 16 games in 2019, played 16 games in 2021. He threw exactly 596 passes both seasons. Cowboys were 10th and 6th respectively in pass attempts those two years. They also were top 12 in rush attempts, luckily. But I bring this up because we are going to talk about Tony Pollard,

and it's going to be part of my question. Can Pollard really be a breakout if Ezekiel Elliott stays healthy? And we'll talk about that a little bit later. Let's get into our favorite breakouts. Dave, who's your favorite breakout? My favorite breakout is a guy I've already talked a lot about, and it's Gabriel Davis in Buffalo. Just a great opportunity for him to be the, I guess he's the number two receiver all year long for Buffalo. There really isn't another player there that can take him off the field, at least in the early part of the season. Amazing finish to last year. The last time we saw him play four touchdowns in one game, he's not going to do that again, but I think he's going to continue to be a downfield target for

Josh Allen and a red zone target for Josh Allen. And that's a good thing to be because the bills are going to throw the ball a lot. When you say he's locked in as the number two wide receiver in Buffalo, I would agree with that in terms of like fantasy production. What do you, do you think it's how guaranteed you think it is that he's number two on the team in targets? Because that slot position historically has been second behind stuff. Stefan digs and targets. I think he'll end up being second among the receivers. It wouldn't surprise me if, if Crowder between injuries and Khalil Shakir doesn't quite get close to any hoop to Davis really is what it would be.

Yeah. Gabriel Davis is wide receiver 28 right now. He's going in between Brandon Cook, so I know you guys like a lot better than him, and Darnell Mooney. So would you rather have Gabriel Davis, the number two guy in theory, or Darnell Mooney, the number one guy?

Davis for me. Yeah, it's Mooney by probably 10 spots. All right, Gabriel Davis does come up a lot on our shows. I don't know how much we want to get into it. Maybe we can get into a little bit more later, but great opportunity for him on a great offense. Okay, Heath, who's your favorite breakout? I'll just stick

with the same theme because he is my favorite breakout. When you ask for a favorite, it must be someone we talk a lot about. Probably. And it's Jalen Hurts. Dave and I, i obviously in complete agreement on both gabriel davis and jaylen hertz we both like them both exactly the same amount um no i just i think the addition of aj brown gives him passing upside that to when combined with the rushing production he's already shown us gives him as much upside as any quarterback in fantasy football i think i took both jalen hertz and gabriel davis in a draft yesterday

right you also took julio jones over will fuller again yeah you did it before you said it on the podcast yesterday and then yesterday on the podcast you said will fuller has the most upside and then drafted julio jones over him again first all, it took me about 30 seconds to say Will Fuller. I thought about it for a very long time when I was asked who has more upside, Will Fuller, Odell Beckham, Julio Jones. And I don't only draft on upside. I think their upside is close. But you were talking about one of the best wide receivers in football history and a guy who's had one great year. So could I just suggest that when we're talking about wide receivers in the round 10, 11,

12, 13, 14 range who are, do not currently have a job that upside should probably be our only consideration. No, with, with those guys,

because none of them have any floor, not with the job, not with the upside being close. It's very close to me me it's not a clear cut here okay uh so julio just julio's floor was too much for you to ignore i'm just trying to see who i took i i would take gabriel davis over tyler lockett i would take him over mooney and i'm just i can't find oh here's the here's the draft see Let's see who I took Gabriel Davis over. I thought we were talking about Jalen Hurts.

I took them back-to-back. I took Gabriel Davis 72nd and Jalen Hurts 73rd. This was a team with the first overall pick. Those are my round six and seven picks. I took him over Amonra St. Brown, Traylon Burks, Tyler Lockett.

You took him over Kyler Murray. I did take Hurts over Kyler Murray. Would you guys do that? 100%. I would not. I've got him a round ahead. Okay. I'm warming up to Jalen Hurts, but I'm not warming up to him

as a top five fantasy quarterback. The schedule is great for him. A.J. Brown, like Keith said, and I think Devontae Smith could take a step forward too. It all comes down to how Hurts is as a passer. Reports have been good so far during the offseason. I would not take him over. I could see myself buying in more and more as this rolls on. I would not have taken him over Kyler Murray if DeAndre Hopkins were not suspended for

six games. That was the deciding factor for me. I don't know about you, Heath. If there had been no suspension for DeAndre Hopkins, who would you take, Kyler Murray or Jalen Hurts? I don't remember how much I dropped Murray. I have Hurts 14 points ahead of Murray in my projections, so not quite

a point per game. It would have been very, very close. Okay. All right. Gabriel Davis for Dave, Jalen Hurts for Heath. Those are a couple of our favorite breakouts this year and more coming up later. So fantasy cops, you know, you love that segment.

I'll play the music for you. If you have any league disputes, send them in. It's the fantasy cops are here to solve your problems. Fantasy football at cbsi.com. That is the letter I, and please put fantasy cops in the subject line. Also, please leave us a five-star review on Apple Podcast.

Again, a five-star review on Apple Podcast. And with a question in there, and we will read them on the show. We have another episode tomorrow, and I plan on reading a lot of those Apple Podcast questions. All right, here's a segment that didn't really work yesterday. Let's hope it works today. Dave and Heath call out a breakout from the other person's breakout list. So, Dave, I'm going to give you Heath's breakouts.

You tell me one that you want. I already know them. If you want to write them down for listeners, go ahead. Sure. Jalen Hurts, J.K. Dobbins, Brees Hall. Great pick there, Heath. I do think Hall will have his best season. Michael Pittman, rashad bateman

and courtland sutton jalen hurts jk dobbins breeze hall michael pitman rashad bateman and courtland sutton dave you want to call one of them out you want to ask for more explanation you want to phone a friend i want to i want to have a conversation about rashad bateman because i'm not there yet i know a lot of people are excited about Bateman taking over as the top receiver in Baltimore. I'd like to hear a little rationale because I need to be sold. I wrote about Bateman and Judy this morning and how those two guys in terms of dynasty, it's time for them to prove they belong where we're ranking them. For the most part, it's a first round pick whose team just traded away the number

one wide receiver and made zero effort to replace the number one wide receiver. That tells me that Jim Harbaugh and company are comfortable for Rashad Bateman as their number one wide receiver. And if he's a former first round pick who gets to be the number one wide receiver and offense that we think is well above average, then it's a clear breakout for a guy who had what 600 yards last year how have number one receivers in baltimore typically done i will tell you so marquise brown on a per game basis in 2019 he was his rookie season he finished outside the top 50. In 2020, he was number 40 in non-PPR, number 47 in full PPR. In 2021, he was number 31 in non-PPR

and number 25 in full PPR with 91 catches, 1,008 yards, 6 touchdowns in 16 games. If you want to be really optimistic, he was on pace for 100 catches, 1,275 yards, 9 touchdowns on 153 targets with Lamar Jackson.

So if you don't want to penalize Brown for the non-Lamar Jackson games, then he would have been probably a top 12 wide receiver. But his highest finish in PPR was 25th per game. His highest finish in non-PPR was 31st per game, both last year. And Rashad Bateman did not have 600 yards last year. He had 515, buddy. Yeah, so if a guy who had 515 yards finishes at 25th to 30th in PPR this year, that was a breakout, right?

Yes. Okay. You think that's where he'll finish? I've got him 27th, I think, right now. Maybe a bigger number is that Marquise Brown had 99 targets in 16 games in 2020. He had 145 targets in 16 games in 2021. And I think every time we talk about the Ravens, we're going to talk about their offensive philosophy.

And I kind of feel like you guys are far apart on that. I'm right where the Ravens are. I see what they typically do. Last year was an outlier year. Their run game was blasted by injuries, and they had to throw the ball more. I think it was like 62% or 63% pass last year. Usually, they're pretty close to 50-50. That's especially been the case in the Lamar Jackson years.

It's a much bigger gap than even Dave indicated. 2019, they had 596 rush attempts and 440 pass attempts. How many sacks did they have? 28. That should be included in the pass attempts. So you're right. That's definitely worse than 50 in the past attempts. So you're right. That's definitely worse.

Right. So if we want to include sex, then it'd be five 55 and four 38 and 20. They're the, they're the lowest pass volume team in the NFL in previous iterations of the Ravens. Just looking at actual past attempts, the past attempts over the last three years have been four 40,

four Oh six and six11 for the Ravens. I have them projected at 526. I think Bateman's going to have to have more pass volume. Guess who froze? Bateman's going to have to have more pass volume than what we saw in 2019 and 2020 to be a breakout. For sure. Right? Yeah.

Yes. And that's the thing. If you think they're going to throw the ball 430 times, then Rashad Bateman is not a good pick to finish as a top 30 wide receiver. And the health of Dobbins and Edwards are so important here. To me, anyway. How do you feel about that?

Dave is working through an issue yeah i mean it's i'm a little yes but i think really more the intentions of harbaugh matter more to me because i don't think dobbins and edwards are going to just not play this year like maybe it's a month before we see the real them, or maybe it's even six weeks. It seems really unlikely for both of them to be out that long. But they've got other running backs that they can hand the ball to if they really want to go run heavy.

But they can't really go run heavy if they don't have Dobbins and Edwards, I don't think. If those guys start the season on the pup list, then I thought that way last year. After Edwards tore his ACLs, I was much more interested in Mark Andrews. If those guys start the season on the Pup List, then I mean, I felt that way last year. You know, right after Edwards towards ACLs, I was much more interested in Mark Andrews. If those guys start the year on the Pup List, which is not out of the question, I'm going to be much more interested in Rashad Bateman. Do you feel that way, Dave?

I do. But I'm expecting at least one of those guys to be ready to go. We talked about that earlier this week. And even if both of them are out, the Ravens might feel okay with Mike Davis and Tyler Beatty. Not enough to say that they're going to stick to the 50-50 doctrine, but enough to say maybe it's like 56% or 57% pass, which would help Bateman. All right, let's call out a day of breakout. Travis Etienne, AJ Dillon, Tony Pollard, Kenneth Gainwell, Cortland Sutton, Gabe Davis, Alan Lazard, Russell Gage.

We're not going to talk about Lazard and Gage. We talked about them as sleepers yesterday. Tim Patrick and Pat Fryermuth. Heath, who do you want to call out? Man, we've both got Cortland Sutton, so I don't think I can call him out. Why didn't we do the shared breakout, like the shared sleeper? No, the one that I disagree with the most is pat fryer muth because i think

this team might throw the ball a hundred times fewer than times they did last year i'm not sure fryer muth's targets go up and if his targets are exactly the same he's probably not going to be useful in fantasy football no there's definitely a chance of that happening, but I also believe that he will, I don't know if he can be second on the team in targets, but I think he can make up for it with his work in the red zone. I expect the Steelers to be more diverse this season. I think that they want to get Friar Muth to be a little bit more of a downfield threat.

And when I say downfield for him, that probably means like 10 or 12 yards downfield and not like 15 plus yards downfield. And I think that they're still going to rely on him in the red zone. I think they learned last year, and maybe they were taught this from Roethlisberger, that he can be a factor in the red zone. So when you're looking at tight ends that you draft late, you're pretty much looking for guys that you're hoping can score a touchdown. It would be great if they could do it every other week, but close to that rate would be fine. I think he can do that and still pick up in the neighborhood of five targets per game.

Now, he can also be better than that if Chase Claypool falls out of favor, the rookie receivers that they drafted don't step up and they just need a reliable guy to move the chains on third down, then the targets could get to seven or eight. That's when you're talking about a really good tight end. The value that you have to take to draft him isn't very much. I don't think he finishes as a top five tight end, but I think he does better than he did last year in terms of catches and yards. Okay. Friar Muth. So where do you have Friar Muth ranked? And Dave, would you take him over some trendy names like David Njoku or Cole Komet? I would. I would take him over both of those guys. I currently have him ranked 10th behind Goddard, Urch, behind Hawkinson, ahead of Gronk. That would probably change once I was convinced

that Gronk was going to play this year. Please take the word probably out of that. You have to rank Gronk ahead of Fryermuth, right? Yes, of course. I'd take Irv and Komet over Fryermuth. Fryermuth is actually going ahead of Rob

Gronkowski right now. He is tight end 11 as of May 1st on NFC. Gronk is tight end 12. And then it's Gasicki, Irv Smith, Hunter Henry, Cole Komet. One name going right ahead of Friar Muth is Dawson Knox. I don't think you guys love Dawson Knox. Would you take Friar... I know Dave would take Friar Muth.

Heath, would you take Friar Muth or Knox? Friar Muth. Yeah, Knox is not in my top 20 tight ends. Okay. Let's talk about the shared breakout then. The shared sleeper was naeem hines between heath and jamie the shared breakout is courtland sutton should he be the first broncos wide receiver drafted and we can also kind of get into what's being said around broncos camp right now uh i i'll tell you we've done two drafts in the last two days in our half ppr draft I took Sutton as the first Broncos guy.

In our full PPR draft, I took Judy. I was then told that was a mistake. But what do you guys think? Should Courtland Sutton be the first, in a blanket, be the first Broncos wide receiver drafted now? I mean, you might be cutting Jerry Judy the way the reports are about him right now um no i i've had sutton ahead of judy all summer but just very thinly based on the fact that courtland sutton's the only one of the two that's ever actually been good in the nfl

and now reports are the and sutton's been more of a high aOT guy, and Russell Wilson loves his big ADOT. Now, the reports coming out from OTAs are just like, it is clear Cortland Sutton is Russell Wilson's guy. Cecil Lammy has actually tweeted, I think it was last night or the night before, that Tim Patrick easily over Jerry Judy right now. You're not going to draft Patrick over Judy, but Sutton should be, I think, probably two rounds ahead of Judy right now. If he really is, Dave, if he really is the clear-cut number one,

to me, third-round pick. I've got no issue with it at all. I mean, we could be looking back saying, wow, why didn't we take Cortland Sutton in the second round? You know, Russell Wilson's number one wide receiver and whatnot. I'm not there yet, but I'm obviously quite high on him. And so are you guys. But what do you think?

When's the right time for Sutton? I think when we're seeing him go in that round four range is fine. And it could end up being round three by the time we get to late august and early september if the preseason checks out the right way what would he have to do to break out well in 2019 on 124 targets he caught 72 passes for 1 112 yards and six touchdowns i think everybody could look at something and say six touchdowns is the floor. And maybe if things just break absolutely right for him, could be in that nine, 10, 11 touchdown range. He could just absolutely be dominant. And if that's happening, then the

yardage and the catches should be there too. It depends. It's going to come down to how impactful the other receivers are compared to Sutton. Cause I think Sutton is a good perimeter receiver, but not necessarily one who's going to earn the type of target volume that Devontae Adams has had or that we think that CeeDee Lamb has. I'm a little worried about him getting much farther than 130 targets, but I think he can be more efficient on that. Right.

And I think he could be more efficient on them, and I think he can be more efficient on that. Right. That's like, well, I think he could be, I think he could be more efficient on them. And I think he could get more end zone targets. Yeah, man. Six touchdowns. I'll, I'll take the offer for sure. Right. At the floor. All right.

Anything else? I think the more interesting thing, like with one of Dave's breakouts with the reports, if like, if these reports about Judy being that number two or number three in this offense, um, does he go before Gabriel Davis what do you think I I'm I've bumped Sutton a little dropped Judy a little I've got Sutton I think 21 or 22 now and I actually have Judy one spot behind Gabriel Davis in the 30s well you know I'm crazy about gabriel davis so you shouldn't be surprised to know that judy's behind gabriel davis for me but he judy like

last year's gabriel davis was jerry judy you love them both yeah and then jerry judy had a high ankle sprain after having like what was it a target every seven routes run something like that in his very first game oh he was great he was amazing and a half every seven routes run, something like that, in his very first game? Oh, he was great. He played a half. He was amazing in a half. I was kicking back on the couch in our green room going, yep, this call is going to be right. And then he limped off, and the call went wrong really, really quick.

If he doesn't get hurt, Judy could end up having a sensational year. I'm hoping that Gabriel Davis does not get hurt and that he has a very good year. Hopefully I don't put the jinx on him also worth noting Jerry Judy had 856 receiving yards as a rookie in 2020

and Gabriel Davis has not had 600 yet in his career yeah if Judy could have just caught one of those 44 yard passes he'd be a lot better player now no I'm just saying. Because of 900? Yeah, but...

You know that 72-yard game you guys are referencing where he only played a half? That was Jerry Judy's second-highest yardage total in a game last year. Well, it was before his injury. So, obviously, that must be it. Okay, let go do some news and notes here we got

more breakouts to talk about a little bit later definitely looking forward to talking about tony pollard and aj dylan for example and michael pitman who he might be i don't know i took him off my breakout list oh okay i would say he might be in a tier of his own. I want to get your thoughts on that a little bit. Okay. Rams COO Kevin something. Demoff? Demoff.

Demoff. Said the team is optimistic about signing Odell Beckham. We've heard that a lot. Detroit signed Devin Funchess, but they're going to use him as a tight end. Dak Prescott slimmed down, and Mike McCarthy is hoping for more rushing opportunities for Dak Prescott. Remember, obviously, this time last year, he's still recovering from that horrible injury he suffered in 2020. It was a long recovery. This is a normal offseason for Dak Prescott, and he only averaged nine rushing yards per game in 2021, and he's usually around 18.

So you can expect, hopefully hopefully more rushing from Prescott. It would be nice. Mark Cabali of The Athletic thinks Mitchell Trubisky is the clear favorite to be the starting quarterback for the Steelers, which is the second time we've heard something like that in a couple of weeks. It's probably going to turn out that way. I was going to ask you about the reports out of Denver.

You talked about the wide receivers, Heath, but what about the running backs? What are we hearing out of Denver about the running backs? Yeah, I believe it was Lamy again that had said that he had talked to some people who think that it may not be quite as much of a 1A, 1B split as it was last year that Javante Williams, because he was one of the guys last year who was constantly banging the drum against Javante Williams week that Melvin Gordon was doing nothing to lose the job and melvin gordon was the starting running back which is the way it stayed pretty much the entire year um he he is not not saying that this year he expects that

giovante to have a bigger share of the workload early and for that share to increase as the season goes on okay so when are you comfortable taking giovante williams he keeps going later in our drafts than his ADP would suggest, or even his maximum pick. Remember, we did that segment a week ago. Javante Williams went about 31st overall, I think, in the draft we did yesterday. Is that a steal?

It's close to it. I think he's an early third-round pick. I think that's when you can feel okay you might feel a little icky taking him in late round two at this point okay okay and i think that's about it for the news and notes i had one more item cordaro patterson is not practicing at minicamp what's the deal there they're just ramping him up cordaro patterson yeah Do they do kick returns at minicamp?

No. Do you guys have any idea what to expect of the Falcons backfield? I would not expect a lot. That just makes it easy to pass on Patterson and Algier. I expect Algier to lead them in rush attempts and rushing um cordial

cordial to steal short yardage and passing downs but i've got algier projected for 225 carries wow that's a lot of carries. That's more than I thought you'd project him for. I'd almost project him for like 75 fewer than that. I don't know how much running they're going to actually do. And I'm surprised that you think that they'll put Patterson in in short yardage instead of Algier, because Algier is a big dude. He's a power back.

I don't know if they'll trust a rookie inside the 10-yard line. Yeah, I guess he's got to earn it, but he's got the profile to be that guy. To be the hammer. For all those touchdowns, the Falcons are going to score, baby. Woo! By the way, the Packers

had 20 team carries inside the 5-yard line, which was a lot. Jonathan Taylor had 26. And as bad as the Falcons were last year, they still ran the ball 393 times. And I can tell you how many they had inside the five-yard line,

if you're so interested. Runs? I'm going to guess a lot, because they don't let Matt Ryan throw inside the five. How often were they inside the five? Atlanta had 11. Only 11. 11?

11 carries inside the five-yard line. That's fun. That's the lowest I saw. I only did about 10 teams. And Atlanta was the lowest of those 10-ish. All right, we're going to take a quick break here. When we come back, we're talking breakouts. We're talking Dobbins, Pittman, Gainwell.

Interesting names here on the breakout lists. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football today. What does possible sound like for your business? It's having the spend that powers your scale with no preset spending limit. More cash on hand to grow your business with up to 55 interest-free days. And the ability to reach further with access to over 1,400 airport lounges worldwide. Redefine possible with Business Platinum. That's the powerful backing of american express terms

and conditions apply visit amex.ca slash business platinum so we don't have any quarterbacks to talk about because the only one that you guys provided me was jalen hertz we already talked about him so let's go right to the breakout running backs here and for heath it's jk dobbins and breeze hall for dave for running backs travis etn aj dylan tony pollard and kenneth gainwell feel safe saying that kenneth game will be the last one picked out of this group of six but who will be the first one picked jk dobbins breeze hall travis etn aj dylan tony pollard and kenny gamewell well i'll tell you i can tell you who i would tell you who i would draft first and that's breese hall i think he's got the most upside of all these running backs i know that dobbins is a talented running back but i'm pretty sure he'll split work and he'd have to score a ton

of touchdowns if he's going to replicate anything close to what he did back in 2020 when he was on the field and he scored a lot of touchdowns i think hall is a better package overall i'm nervous about how he'll i'm nervous about his usage with the jets a because those jets coaches like to use multiple running backs. B, the Jets quarterback does not have a tendency to lean on his running back out of the backfield. Will the Jets coaches dial up passing plays for Brees Hall and kind of force him targets from game to game? I don't know if I can count on that for him, but I do think he can break away on a bunch of runs and have a lot of big plays. And so I'm willing to bank on that, even though he's on a team that's probably not going to score a ton of runs and have a lot of big plays. And so I'm willing to bank on that, even though he's on a team that's probably not going to score a ton of

points. At least he won't have a quarterback stealing a ton of opportunities away from him. Like Dobbins will in Baltimore. Yeah. I think, I think Hall and Dobbins, like I've got them three picks apart,

so I don't know which one will go first, but both of them in round four, ETN in the round five six range and then i guess dylan in round seven um like it's it's interesting because all etn and dobbins i think don't need any help to have a breakout I think the other three probably do. Well, what do you make of James Robinson? Can ETN have a breakout if James Robinson is healthy? I think it's possible because new coaching staff and he's been there all off season that ETN could, I mean, listen, it's not hard to break out off of zero yards. Well, I guess a real impactful season.

I think he can carve out a role independent of James Robinson more easily than you could see with Dylan Pollard or Gainwell. Can you think of a player who, other than Alvin Kamara, I mean, Kamara was the best, right? And they actually, remember, they cut Adrian Peterson after four games or they traded him or whatever the hell it was. And in Kamara's rookie year.

Can you think of a player that would have an ETN-like role and has been successful in it? So I'm thinking not the primary ball carrier. That's how Eckler started. But was he really, but was Eckler really ever fantasy relevant until the year that Melvin Gordon No, the last year he and Melvin were together. Maybe the last two years he and Melvin were together. Well, one year Melvin Gordon missed the first four games, I think. And then he was still very relevant. Yeah. But

I don't know. It's hard for me to just get excited about this, this sort of random role or, Oh, we're going to use them here and there and all that. That means I don't like that. I like a guy who has a defined role. And if ETN doesn't have a defined role, I'm going to be a little nervous about that.

Did he both Samuel? Has he got, no, I don't think so. Cordero Patterson yeah the role is finding opportunities to get this guy the ball in his hands by whatever means necessary so if it's throwing him passes in the flat or off of screens or having him run a slant maybe lines up as a slot receiver runs a slant they'll do it all with him it's almost like what he does as a rusher will be a

bonus and that's where i think the upside really lies with etn if robinson is either off the field or on the field but not his old self because that'll provide some extra opportunities and some extra touches for travis etn but i could easily see him getting dialed up seven times a game through the air because look at the rest of that offense the rest of the offense in jacksonville is it's kind of suspect i'm not sure how they're going to use those guys etn could be the guy where the coaches so all right let's bake in what he's going to do each week because defenses are going to have an impossible time trying

to defend him. And then we can put in some plays for the other receivers that we have on top of them. Seven sounds high to me. That's 119 targets in 17 games, 112 in 16 games. And yeah, if you could guarantee me that, then I think we're taking him too low. And it, if you could guarantee me that,

then I think... We're taking him too low. I'd take him in... And it's also a PPR versus half a non-PPR conversation. I guess... I can't be as excited about ETN if those catches don't count. Let me ask it like this.

You said his rushing might just be a bonus. Do you think that ETN could actually be a must-start running back if his rushing totals are just a bonus or do you think he needs to have really do you think he needs to be a running back first and his receiving needs to be the bonus does that make sense the way i'm framing no i think he's he's the type of player that you look at in the same vein of the guys that we have already talked about the ones that get a lot of targets and is an airback, as Pete Prisco likes to say.

Like who? Who other than Kamara? Like Kamara. He has to be Kamara, but who else? Kamara is one of a kind, I think. Who else is that? Well, the idea is that ETN is one of those one-of-a-kind types of running backs as well.

You watched him play in college. His speed was amazing. Because he can't be JD McKissick and James White. He's not going to be worth a fifth-round pick. He's got to be a rusher, right? So what do you think, Heath? He's got to run the ball close to 10 times a game. I was going to say, Camara, even before last year,

when he just was a different player and averaged 18 carries a game, three prior years to that, he was between 12.2 and 12.9 rush attempts per game. If he's Kamara, that's awesome. I just can't expect anyone to be Kamara. Kamara's been in, before this year, he's been in a top five offense every year. He's one of the most efficient running backs ever, basically. He's incredible. If Travis Etienne's going to be alvin camara i get it but

most people couldn't take the touches of alvin camara and and make it into a fantasy stardom no i don't i don't think that's like they couldn't be as good as he has i think 12 to 13 carries with five or six targets a game is plenty good yeah that'd be the problem of if it's eight to ten carries it's more difficult right but what do we talk about with running backs like that mark where they start to be appealing as must starts in fantasy is 15 touches can he get to 15 touches a week maybe not at the beginning or maybe he does at the beginning and then he fades a little bit once robinson proves that he's back but this is a team that I think is still going to be trailing a lot that doesn't have a lot of explosive playmakers

on offense, but they do have a great quarterback who knows how to manipulate defenses and throw the ball in the right place. Dobbins in Dobbins, the last six games of 2020, obviously he missed all of 2021. He was on a per game basis, the number six running back and non PPR, the last six games of 2020, obviously he missed all of 2021. He was, on a per-game basis, the number six running back in non-PPR, the number 11 running back in full PPR. This is J.K. Dobbins. He was on pace for 218 carries and only eight catches,

but he was on pace for 20 touchdowns in 17 games, 1,493 total yards. In those games, he averaged 6.4 yards per carry. For the season, he averaged 6 yards per carry. I find Dobbins and all Ravens running backs in a full PPR league to be some of the most difficult players to know when to pull the trigger on. I think, like, for me, the case that J.K. Dobbins, it doesn't even include him getting a huge share of the rush

attempts it's that he's nick chubb um like just wildly efficient scores touchdowns i think he might catch a few more passes than chubb because i also think like this whole don't get any wide receivers well last year they threw the running backs not just more because they threw more passes but as a higher percentage of their passes than they have in the past. They were dumping the ball off to Tyson Williams and Devontae Freeman. And Dobbins, if you'll remember, last offseason, they spent so many video reels on showing us highlight catches that J.K. Dobbins is making in OTAs and at practice. So I do think once he's right, he could be Nick Chubb with a few more catches.

That's the upside. Devontae Freeman had 34 catches in 16 games last year. Obviously, they threw a lot more, but yeah, he was involved. Okay, so who else did we... We talked about Dobbins, Breeze Hall, Travis Etienne, A.J. Dillon. So A.J. Dillon, we don't even...

Where's Tony Pollard? Wasn't Tony Pollard in this? Yeah, oh yeah. A.J. Dillon and Tony PollardJ. Dillon, we don't even... Where's Tony Pollard? Wasn't Tony Pollard in this? Yeah, oh yeah. A.J. Dillon and Tony Pollard. So we don't even have to say it. If there's an injury to Zeke or Aaron Jones, you're going to love the value you got on Tony Pollard and A.J. Dillon.

I'll just ask this. If there are injuries to both of them, who's got more upside? Who would you rank higher? If Aaron Jones and Ezekiel Elliott won the lottery and retired, who would you rank higher, A.J. Dillon or Tony Pollard? I would rank Dillon higher.

Yep. Okay. So, who do you like better, Dillon or Pollard, with the healthy running backs? Dillon. Still Dillon. And do you think they can be true breakouts without an injury to the starters, the presumptive

starters? I think there's a lot better chance for Dylan because you could see Aaron Jones just play the wide receiver role and AJ Dylan still gets 15 touches a game playing with Aaron Jones. There were four games last year where Jones played under 50% of the snaps for the Packers. This does not include the games that Jones was out for. Strictly games under 50%, Dillon had 15 plus PPR points, three of those four games. He averaged 17.2 PPR points in those games. So if there is a situation where A.J. Dillon starts to get real close, like maybe they pull a Broncos in Green Bay and they use both of those

running backs at the same pace, I think A.J. Dillon could be an absolute league winner for fantasy managers. Now Pollard's a different story unless they really get to a point where he is playing 50-50 with Ezekiel Elliott, but that's an offense that does like to throw downfield a little bit more. I think that without Gallup healthy, maybe they lean on Tony Pollard a little bit more at the beginning of the year and maybe use both running backs quite a bit. Zeke's caught a fair share of passes in the past. I wonder if some of that goes to Tony Pollard moving forward. And Pollard's also capable of being a good running back. This is something that we, I'm not as comfortable saying about etn anyway but that

pollard can work as a traditional type of a running back as well we saw it in the games that he's played without zeke we've seen it in spurts in the games he's played with zeke he's a good player and he's got explosiveness on his side there is almost no case to be made that zeke is better than pollard at this point now i'm not talking about fantasy. I'm talking about IRL. Not unless Zeke was truly, truly just hampered by the corn piece. It's the same case to be made that Jerry Judy's better than Tim Patrick.

He was better before, and he just played hurt last year, and so we shouldn't hold that against him. Fine, but I mean, if you just look at Pollard's career, he has a 40 plus yard carry in all three seasons. Zeke does not in that stretch. He's had he has had as many or more 20 plus yard carries in each of the last three seasons as Zeke, despite having four hundred and sixty five fewer carries than Zeke in that span. The advanced metrics love Tony Pollard. The yards

per carry loves Tony Pollard there. I mean, gosh, the potential is through the roof. Plus, they had the number one run-blocking offensive line according to PFF last year. Okay, so the only problem for Pollard is near the goal line, it is all Zeke. He had 12 carries inside the five-yard line. Tony Pollard had two. Zeke had five targets inside the 10-yard line.

Pollard had zero. So you're going to have to hope things change a little bit. The only problem is that he's not the lead running back. He's going to touch the ball 10 times a game. Yeah, but he's going to need some touchdowns to come through with mid-round value. Because you could still use them as a flex, right? You know,

if he scores a touchdown more frequently, then you get lucky and you started him that week and he got to 13 points and you're happy. But if he gets you six points or seven points, cause he didn't score the touchdown. That's an issue. Like Dylan has a much better chance for touchdowns and Pollard. Would you say, would you say that for sure?

Right? Yes. Okay. Dylan has a much better chance at 15 touches a game without an injury than pollard what about gainwell what's the case there dave the case there is that this is the running back that the current coaching staff drafted not the one they inherited in miles sanders sanders has been he's been, but they haven't given him like the full autonomy like other coaches before have. And he struggled when given that.

So that's another team where I think there could be a 50-50 split among the running backs. Problem being that there's a quarterback that's also going to do a fair share of running. But in a PPR league, I could see Gainwell doing a decent enough job to finish maybe on the cusp of a low-end number two running back. You remember the one year that Naheem Hines had where he finished, I don't know if he finished 24th in PPR points per game. He might have been right underneath it. But I think Gainwell has that kind of upside. I think he can end up being, A, the best running back there,

maybe because of injury to Miles Sanders. But more importantly um a running back who can be helpful in fantasy play so we should have the same debate we had yesterday dave why is kenneth gainwell a breakout and not a sleeper he could he classifies as both maybe he's more of a sleeper than a breakout oh he definitely is because sleepers when you weeks and breakouts when you leaks tm sleepers are being drafted outside the first 10 rounds. Breakouts are not. Okay.

You can't trademark that. Nobody cares about that. So let's talk about our wide receivers. We had a lot of running backs. Wide receiver breakouts. Michael. Pittman for Heath and Rashad. Baitman for Heath and Cortland Sutman for both of you

and Gabriel Davis for Dave. So really, is it just Pittman? Is that the only one that we haven't spoken about? That's the only one. Oh, and Tim Patrick. We can talk a little bit more about him. Okay, so let's talk about Michael Pittman Heath. And I was saying a tier of...

We had this conversation a few weeks ago and kind of thought about it again yesterday when we were doing our draft. A tier of his own because you get to this point where you got a bunch of guys who aren't necessarily the clear-cut number one receivers on their team. And he's grouped in with them,

but he is the clear-cut number one wide receiver on the team. So I guess I'm looking at Sutton. Allen Robinson, he's obviously number two. Brandon Cooks is number one. Is Pittman being drafted around Allen Robinson? I don't know. I think he's behind him,

but not too far behind. You know what? Forget it. Forget that train of thought. I'll look at his ADP right now. What's the best case scenario for Michael Pittman? How good could he be? He could be a top 12 wide receiver, and it wouldn't take very much change at all.

It would just take Frank Reich deciding to throw the ball 10% more because he trusts Matt Ryan more than Carson Wentz he this guy absolutely dominated targets last year he had 129 targets the next closest guy had 69 the only reason he wasn't more of a star is because the Colts threw 521 passes which is just a terribly low level. I think even if Carson Wentz was coming back as the quarterback, I would have projected them to regress towards the league mean on pass attempts, just because most of the time, not always, but most of the time when a team throws that little compared to everyone else, they throw it more in the following season.

So just based on volume alone, but also like he's a third year wide receiver who just took a huge step forward in his second year. And now it's going to have presumably even more opportunity. And for just for reference sake, when I say regress towards the mean league, mean number of pass attempts last year was five 93. They threw 72 fewer times than the median team. Would you rather have Corlin Sutton or Michael Pittman? I have Sutton higher.

Pittman. And he is going well ahead of Allen Robinson. He's going with, he's 15th off the board right now in NFC ADP since May 1st. Michael Pittman is, then it's McLaurin,

then DJ Moore. So those are the clear-cut number one guys. What's that? Pittman is... I'm not sure by the time we get to the end of this week's OTAs that Terry McLaurin will be viewed as a clear-cut number one guy anymore. But Pittman is

one of those guys, I think, whose ADP may go backwards once non-experts, non-doing-this-for-money type drafts are the predominant thing. He has a lot of fans within the industry. Matt Harmon just came out a week or two ago with a charting of Pittman's route running, and it was just falling all over himself praising pitman because he's outstanding in that area as well um he's going to be very popular with the high stakes players with the analysts with the industry leagues i think he will go lower when we get to leagues that um don't involve us so much why because it's michael pitman, I kind of feel that way too. I think that's part of it. He's not sexy.

I think that's just the beginning. There's a lack of sexiness, I think. And because we look at it and say 521 pass attempts, it's really important to me that he had 60 more targets than anyone else on his team. I don't know that the average person looking at it will make that distinction. I'm worried that the unsexiness stems from matt

ryan and not from michael pitman because i i think pitman's good the reason why i wouldn't put him on a breakout list is because i think i think he could be better than what he was last year but not a lot better he was 27th in ppr points per game he should be able to be much better than that but it could still be in the 20s. He was 21st in targets per game, even though he had this amazing target share of 25.7. And even with that amazing target share, he only had eight games with 15 plus PPR points. I would expect more than that from Pittman. And the reason why that he wasn't much better was because he didn't have a lot of touchdowns. He had 129 targets. He only scored six touchdowns. You could say, well, that's going to go the other way now, but look who the quarterback is and think about how receivers have done with this quarterback over the course

of the quarterback's career. And I also think that there's going to be an edict from the coaching staff to Matt Ryan to spread the ball around. I don't think the Colts liked it that they had Michael Pittman with a 26% target share. And they added Alec Pierce. They drafted Jelani Woods as well. There's talk that Mo Alley-Cox is going to end up being a bigger factor, and we've already talked about how Naheem Hines is going to get more targets. I'm wondering if the Colts are going to try and spread it around even more

when they're not in the red zone. And then when they are in the red zone, I think teams are going to try and obviously focus on Jonathan Taylor when they're inside the five. But Pittman's an obvious target too. And Matt Ryan has made it clear over the course of his career when he's in the red zone, throwing to the number one receiver

isn't something he's willing to do when they're double covered. And I think Pittman's going to still draw that double coverage. So I'm nervous about the touchdowns for him. I want to see him get more of a target share. I'm not sure if that's going to happen either. I'm comfortable taking Pittman as a low end number two fantasy wide receiver in that round four to five range. Okay. Give me your case for Tim Patrick. That Jerry Judy is never going to be what we thought he was going to be. And Patrick is more profiles, more of the type of downfield receiver who has speed on top of size and can be, make himself available when a

play breaks down. And that's where Tyler Lockett really had a huge edge because he and Wilson were just on the same page. And if DK Metcalf is going to be Cortland Sutton or if Sutton's going to be Metcalf, then I wonder if it's going to be more of Patrick being Tyler Lockett rather than Jerry Judy being Tyler Lockett. Yeah. Also with Patrick, surprisingly, he led the team in targets inside the 10 yard line two years in a row.

And he's been pretty close to that in, in red zone targets inside the 20 yard line. He was barely behind i think no offense in uh in 2020 but yeah he's he's been their guy near the end zone which is surprising to me but uh yeah that's i don't know if that'll hold up but it has been the case and we've talked about this before like he's it's not like he's been way behind the lead in other categories like he was eight tenths of a yard behind jerry judy in yards per game last year he led them in yards per target last year it's not just a red zone thing there were areas where he was just legitimately the

most efficient wide receiver on the broncos each of the past two seasons. Okay. Tim Patrick, great late round value. He is going, I'm going to guess. Round nine. Wide receiver, round nine. Pick 140. 160, 159.

Wide receiver, 62, Tim Patrick. Tim Patrick or Devontae Parker? We'll be on my sleepers list. Tim Patrick or Devante Parker will be on my sleepers list Tim Patrick or Devante Parker do you like Patrick Parker Tim Patrick or hard man

Patrick Patrick Dave I'd like for you to weigh in on something because we don't have any tight ends to talk about we already talked about Fryermuth I don't know if you voted in the Twitter poll but if someone emails you on Thursday

and tells you he needs something by quote next Monday when do you think that assignment is due four days from Thursday or 11 days from Thursday I took it to mean 11 days from Thursday I don't understand how we got it was such a small time it wasn't a problem Thursday. I took it to mean 11 days from Thursday.

I don't understand how we got slaughtered in the Twitter poll. It wasn't a problem to get it done. And you understand now that you were wrong. No, I don't. I've got so much support from people, but the Twitter poll was 63% four days, 36% 11 days.

Okay. Dave, if I told you today that I really think that Jerry Judy is going to prove you wrong next season, when is he going to prove you wrong? That's a good way of putting it. No, it's not. Because Heath would never say that.

Here's the difference. The season that's upcoming hasn't started yet. So I think it's still fair to say that the 2022 season is the next season. No, it's this season. The week that's upcoming hasn't started yet. It's this season. I think Heath, you always have a good way of making points. No, he doesn't. He always

has a bogus way. Don't give him credit for this. I'm giving him credit. Because Heath would never do that. Heath would never say next season about this upcoming season he would say this season so his hypothetical is completely asinine and i reject it on premise are you done i'm done yeah yeah i'm done okay is there a game tonight heath or is it tomorrow it is tomorrow night and then game seven's on Sunday. Did we talk about Mitchell Trubisky being your favorite to be a starter

for Pittsburgh? Yeah. The basketball game is next Thursday? Exactly, right? It's the stupidest thing. It's on Thursday. It's not next Thursday. It's this Thursday. It's the first Thursday. It's not the next one. Heath's right on

this one, Adam. Dave, I'm wrong on it, too, because I thought it was the first thursday it's not the next one he's right on this one adam he dave i'm wrong on it too because i thought it was the next monday no we were right dave stick i don't think to your guns no there's no i i will always change my mind in the face of what's honest and realistic and he's got this one okay there i'm not wearing a cap heath but i'm tipping it toward you derrick richard is reminding me not to drop justin jefferson you're really kind dave yeah he is really kind good guy kind of lame so i'm gonna end the show there and tomorrow we'll talk about some busts for this season i can't tell you about busts for next season yet because 2023 is such a long time away thank you for watching and listening

everybody we will talk to you tomorrow have a great day and we'll be doing fft in five in a second if you want to hop over to that stream talk to you then see ya