Fantasy Football Today - Courtland Sutton in Round 3??? Plus Rams RBs and Value-Based Drafting (08/03 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: August 3, 2022

Tim Patrick is out for the season with a torn ACL and that really stinks! We had high hopes for him. Now we turn our attention to the rest of the Broncos receiving corps (1:45). How high should Courtland Sutton and Jerry Jeudy be ranked? Any change to Russell Wilson's value (7:35)? Also, Sean McVay is suggesting a backfield by committee (11:40)! Yikes. What does this mean for Cam Akers and Darrell Henderson? ... More news items (19:50) as Kyle Pitts and Elijah Moore are standing out in training camp. Then we bring on R.J. White to discuss value-based drafting (25:35). Heath has been using VBD for years now and he and R.J. will tell you how to do it and why it's so helpful ... We talk Fantasy and NFL futures with R.J. (38:40) as we go through candidates for MVP, offensive rookie of the year and more. Plus, find out which teams R.J. likes to go over their win total (52:50) ... Email us at [e-mail] Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs, 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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Visit amex.ca slash business platinum. This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports. What a play! Can you believe this? Can I know I can? It's time to dominate your fantasy league. Off to the races! And he stays on his feet!

He's just going to go the distance! Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Welcome, everybody. Today we talk about value-based drafting. How do you do it? What is it? Why is it cool? Why do the cool kids do it?

Why can it help you win your fantasy league? Why don't I do it? Maybe I should. But Heath is going to help us out with that. And RJ White is going to come on as well, part of our CBS Sports staff, to tell you about value-based drafting. Plus, I'll look at some NFL futures if you want to dabble there. I'm Adam Azer. Good morning to Dave and Heath.

Yeah, that's it. Good morning, guys. Hi. Hi. Sup, foo. Hi. Sup, foo, to you. And hi, Heath.

How's it going? Hi. All right, great. So we had some big news from around the NFL yesterday. We're going to react to the Tim Patrick torn ACL. Bummer. And also, Sean McVay says the Rams, the way he looks at it, they have two starting running backs.

Bummer. Maybe. Depends on which one you get on draft day. I know. I think we're going to have some differing opinions here. And we will I don't know that we'll have time for your emails, but you can send them in at fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. So later this week, we'll have our

quarterback preview on Thursday, our tight ends preview on Friday, and then pretty sure, 90% sure, we're going to have a mailbag episode for you airing on Saturday that we're going to record on Friday. Don't worry, Dave and Heath, I'm going to try to get Dan Schneier for that. You're going to be off the hook.

Anyway, let's get to the big news here. Tim Patrick tore his ACL and he is out for the season. He had two straight, nearly identical seasons with 51 to 53 catches, 734 to 742 yards, five to six touchdowns, 79 to 85 targets. So that's what he's been about, 740 yards, five touchdowns, basically each of the last two years. And he has also led the team in green zone targets two straight seasons. That's inside the 10-yard line. And he's been right there with Noah Fant in red zone targets. He is a big outside receiver and a good player.

And this stinks for him. Dave, what's your reaction to this from the Broncos' perspective? Whose fantasy value changes the most? I was told during the offseason by an observer of the Broncos who I've known a long time and trust when it comes to Broncos stuff that Patrick was a dark horse to lead this team in receiving. Love the skill set, love the fit with Russell Wilson, the fact that he was a perimeter receiver who could separate, which is something that Cortland Sutton doesn't necessarily do with the same type of ease that Tim Patrick did in the past. It made me really excited to get Tim Patrick on my squad, and now it's not happening. It stinks. Here's what I think is going to happen. I think the Broncos are going to end up piecemealing how they replace Tim Patrick amongst their complementary players.

It'll be led by KJ Hamler. I suspect we'll see more two tight end sets. Wouldn't be surprised if we see a little bit more of Javante and Melvin Gordon or Javante and another running back on the field at the same time. But I do think what it does for fantasy managers is it builds confidence in both Cortland Sutton and Jerry Judy. Sutton was being drafted as a round four wide receiver. We've all pretty much landed on him being our favorite Broncos wide out because he's an outside receiver. He is a downfield threat. And although he doesn't have the speed that Tim Patrick has, he can make contested catches. He's got a big catch radius. He's a

big guy, kind of like DK Metcalf. So it would make sense that he could fill that role for Russell Wilson. I also think it's huge for Jerry Judy. The spotlight's going to be on him in a bigger way now, but now there's a path to him getting around 120 targets in this offense, especially if they throw as much as we think they're going to throw it. I read a report from Andrew Mason, who's been a Broncos beat reporter, that Judy had one bad day in camp. It was the first day, and since then, he's really stepped up and been better. He's separating from coverage. He's got some good speed.

We know he's a terrific route runner. He's going to be a much more stable pick in fantasy drafts. And I think you're going to end up seeing him go round six at the latest, maybe even into round five, because I think those targets that we're going to go to Tim Patrick, I think like 60% of them are going to get split to those other guys. I mentioned that when I first started yapping my gums, but I think the majority of them will fall into Jerry Judy's lap. So I think it's really good for Judy's value. I think it's fine for Sutton.

And Hamler's going to be the one that people are going to take late-round flyers on. Heath, yesterday we did a draft shortly after the Patrick news, and I'm not going to say what rounds these guys went in because it was a super flex draft. But Judy or Sutton was wide receiver 19. He was right around Terry McLaurin and Deontay Johnson. Then it was Brandon Cook. So I took Sutton, you took Cooks. I know you love Cooks.

Then it was Godwin, Mike Williams, Darnell Mooney, Allen Robinson. So Sutton going ahead of, I won't say Cooks. I know you like Cooks better. But Sutton going ahead of Godwin, Mike Williams, Darnell Mooney, Allen Robinson. What are your thoughts on that? I would take him ahead of Darnell Mooney, Allen Robinson. What are your thoughts on that? I would take him ahead of Darnell Mooney and Allen Robinson. I get the feeling that my stance on the Broncos receivers is probably going to remain the same,

that I'm not going to get them. I agree with pretty much everything Dave said, but I was a little behind everybody on them before this news. I bumped Sutton up into round four, but I wouldn't be surprised if he's a round three pick now. The end of round four is where I've got him. So yeah, wide receiver 22, I would definitely take Cooks or Williams, but he's in that range. He's a low end number two and Judy's a high end number three three. I think Hamler might take a little more of the Patrick role, if he can stay healthy.

I don't know. Why wouldn't you want these Broncos? You're saying you're going to be low on them, so you're not going to end up with them. But why not? Get in on this here. This is Russell Wilson, and these are his clear-cut top two receivers. At least it looks that way.

And Sutton's... Oh, come on. I'm sorry. I'm stammering a little bit because it's not so much a statistical argument. I'm not going to say, well, in this, he did this, this. It's just the opportunity. Come on, let's do it.

Let's get in there. I'm less certain that Sutton and Judy are as close to DK and Lockett as you are, I think. I'm not asking them necessarily to be DK and Lockett. Metcalf was a round two pick last year. Lockett outperforms his ADP every year, basically. But I think they could put up... I don't know about the yards for sudden

compared to mecca i think judy could be lockett uh yeah i don't yeah i think i think they're great i think they're gonna be great i do i'm i'm very obvious yeah and that's i think that's where the difference is it's just like they've got both of those wide receivers have a lot of upside, and both of those wide receivers have a lot to prove. And you're talking about taking them over guys who I have projected as surefire top 15 wide receivers. So are you downgrading Wilson? Maybe just a slight thing. That's the weirdest thing about all this. Dave was talking about all the ways that things are going to change now. I think it's good to remember that all those things that are going

to change were just ideas in our head in the first place. It's a new coach, a new quarterback. We have no idea what their game plan actually was, and we don't necessarily know what it is. We're projecting changes based off our original projections. I do think that Javante and Melvin might be more involved in the passing game than what we were originally projecting or maybe what they were going to be before Patrick. I mean, we've seen how heavily the running backs have been involved in the Green Bay passing game.

I'm sorry, I want to go back to Judy here just to put him in some context. He was wide receiver 28 in the draft we did last night. This was after the Patrick ACL injury. He went after Marquise Brown. He went after Juju Smith-Schuster. In fact, there were three wide receivers taken to start round eight, and it was Juju, Jerry, Judy, Gabriel Davis. Dave, you took Davis when Juju and Judy were off the board,

and then Bateman was the next wide receiver drafted. Then Thielen, then Lazard. What do you think about Judy in that range of Juju, Judy, Gabriel Davis, Bateman, Thielen, Lazard? That's the range. Although I would imagine that the breakout hype that we're all hearing for Davis and Bateman could push both of them ahead of Judy pretty consistently in drafts. But Judy's going to start getting some breakout hype again, too.

The problem is that we've seen Judy get that hype. I've been guilty of it. I loved Jerry Judy last year, and then he had a high ankle sprain in week one. He missed six games, and then he really wasn't very good the rest of the way. Speaking of those six games that Judy missed, do you remember how Cortland Sutton performed when there was one man missing in this Broncos offense? He was great. He was on pace for 105 catches, 1,488 yards, six touchdowns on 156 targets. So those yardage numbers seem really surprising to me.

All I know is he averaged almost 17 ppr points per game and that's the stuff that can make you a number one wide receiver and we know that he's without one of those big receivers for the remainder of the 2022 calendar yeah so i what i was going to suggest heath do you know, start doing side-by-side comparisons of Sutton versus Terry McLaurin, Sutton versus Godwin. Who's got that upside now. And I wonder if son can pull ahead. Well,

if Godwin's, if Godwin is right, there's no question, especially in PPR, but we don't know if Godwin's right. And we don't know when he's actually going to be back and ready to go. There's optimistic reports. But I think Adam might be on to something about being excited about Sutton.

I think there is such a thing as being too excited about Cortland Sutton, but he might be one of those fallback receivers that isn't quite a top 15 guy but could be, and you can kind of see a path to it happening. And then you won't mind drafting him if you wait a little bit on receivers with your early picks, and he kind of falls into your lap in late round three, early round four. I'm going to end this discussion here. RJ is waiting to come on and talk about value-based drafting. We have a lot to get to today. So let me just summarize. Let me just get quick thoughts on this are you drafting Alberto now

is he a priority for you not me he's going to have to win the starting job first I think that's basically it Wilson or Dak Prescott Dak still Russ but it's closer now than it was before it was always Dak for me

so okay i will say just yeah because i've been even more low on judy than i have been on sutton what you told me about the guys judy was drafted around and the guys sutton was drafted around i may actually draft judy no okay uh we'll see how it plays out that was only one draft but based on that adp uh all right sean mcveigh says it looks as if the Rams have two starting running backs. Heath, what did you make of those comments? I made a slight adjustment, but not much. It's just so difficult when coaches say things that go against what they've done

for most of their coaching career. Even last year when they lost their starting running back at the beginning of the year, they had 14 different games where their starting running back had at least 16 touches. That doesn't sound like a coach. And we remember before that,

it was even more workhorse focused. Well, not 2020, though. Okay, so there was one year that Sean McVay's been a coach where there was a bit of a committee. And that was the only year where Akers and Henderson were both healthy. And Akers was not relatively healthy.

Akers wasn't really that healthy. Yeah, Akers wasn't really that healthy. Go ahead. The odds of Akers and Henderson both being healthy for 17 games are pretty low anyway, so this probably won't do that bad either. And Akers really fell in this draft. Akers, he was a round seven pick, but again, this was

super flex. But RJ actually took him. And it was a great, I mean, to me it was a crazy value based on where we had seen him go. So he went after Travis Etienne, he went after J.K. Dobbins. There were a lot of wide receivers

drafted in this range. He went after Zeke, he went after J.K. Dobbins. There were a lot of wide receivers drafted in this range. He went after Zeke. He went after Brees Hall. And he went almost two full rounds after those two guys. And then the next running back was A.J. Dillon. So you're not... Oh, no, no, I'm sorry. Josh Jacobs and then A.J. Dillon. So we're used to seeing him going, at least in our drafts, earlier.

Because, you know, Dave was the low guy. But I think there was a lot of enthusiasm for Akers on this show, and it was not evident last night when we did that draft. And then, Dave, you took Daryl Henderson late. So I can't give you a range. I can't give you an ADP because the news was yesterday.

But who are you more likely to draft right now, guys? Akers at what you think his value will be or Henderson at what you think his value will be or Henderson at what you think his value will be for me it's Henderson and there's there's no question about it first a general statement about coaches uh and how they feel about their running backs in this era of NFL football I believe that most coaches if not all coaches are only going to go to a workhorse guy if they've got a guy they believe can be that workhorse. You heard Mike Tomlin talk about it during the offseason podcast on The Pivot

about how Najee is a workhorse guy. When these coaches believe that they can feed a running back and they can lean on a running back, they're going to do it. When they get to a point where a running back either starts to break down or isn't effective, isn't efficient, isn't explosive, I think they change their minds and they revert back to, well, let's just use multiple running backs, especially because teams that have led the NFL in rushing have used multiple running backs. In some cases, they even use their quarterback along with their running backs to help lead the team in rushing, and it is an absolute tenet of coaching

that running the ball is a key to success. Even now, when teams are throwing the ball like crazy, every coach will tell you that they need to be able to run the ball and stop the run. Running the ball, however they can do it, they want to do it. It's smart for the Rams to not lean on Cam Akers and to use him and Daryl Henderson and to lean on Henderson in a role that he can handle, which is as a passing downs guy. As for McVay, over the last week, every time someone's tried to tee him up on Cam Akers, he ends up mentioning Akers and

Henderson together. It's almost like subconsciously, or maybe it is conscious, he's naming them both together. And I mentioned this on the live stream. He was asked a question on SiriusXM radio about improving the efficiency of the run game, and he ended the answer. First, he barely mentioned Akers in his answer. And at the end of the answer, he said, we really need to improve our efficiency in the pass game.

And I just feel like it's in his mind that he won the Super Bowl because of Matthew Stafford, because of Cooper Cup. And they just got Alan Robinson, and Robinson's exciting. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if the Rams went 60% pass again this year, and then they utilize multiple running backs. I'm out on Cam Akers unless we're talking round six, round seven. He's never going to make it there for me. Someone will always take him ahead of that range. And I'm in on Daryl Henderson as a guy I throw on my bench to begin the year and I see what happens and I can get him in round nine, 10, 11. I'm absolutely in on that. Okay. So question for both of you, we'll end it here. Would you take

any of these guys who were going behind Ak at least in our drafts uh ahead of acres now they also have workload concerns i'm gonna say yes to all these i don't know about that antonio gibson josh jacobs aj dylan yep all three no chance on dylan i don't understand that all right i would love to get into that we will do that later but heath you would also take a later date you would also take antonio gibson j also take Antonio Gibson and Josh Jacobs ahead of Cam Akers? Well, Jacobs is another guy who has fallen for me since the start of camp. I mean, you talk about a team where reports are coming out that they just don't really like him very much.

I would take Akers over Jacobs. Okay. All right, you should be, if you're listening right now and you haven't watched us on YouTube, please do..com slash fantasy football today. You can see all of our podcasts there. You can also see our YouTube exclusive content live streams on Tuesday nights with mock drafts. Um, the draft-a-thon will be on YouTube. Excited for that. We'll tell you more about that as we get closer to that date to benefit St. Jude. And we've got three YouTube exclusive shows every week during the season. Tuesday night, Waver Wire.

Thursday afternoon, Starter Sit. Sunday morning, Starter Sit. YouTube.com slash Fantasy Football Today. Dave, I had dinner with Heath last night. Did you know that? What? Yeah. You're in town?

No, I was making dinner last night and I decided to turn on CBS Sports HQ. And there was Heath talking about Tim Patrick and all the Broncos. Yeah. Okay, so it wasn't actually. No, but it was Heath. You were like sitting down with Heath. Because Heath is a great guy to have deep conversations with. No, he was having a deep conversation while I was cooking dinner. Yeah, he was talking at you

not to you. Which, yeah, it's usually how it is. But no, I also, I told you all how to watch CBS Sports HQ on the CBS Sports app. Another way you can do it is on Paramount+. That's what I was doing last night. Paramount is a freaking awesome subscription service. You should check it out.

And HQ is on there, so you can always see that. Now I want to talk to you about something a little bit more important. It is Grammarly, a great way to become a better writer and better at communicating. It's great for work. It's great for work. It's great for school. If you're in school, presentations, whatever it is, go to Grammarly.com slash FFT to sign up for a free account. And when you're ready to upgrade to Grammarly Premium, get 20% off for being an FFT listener. Grammarly.com slash FFT. So Grammarly makes professional writing fast and simple. It's an all-in-one writing tool that helps you churn out clear, concise communication quicker than ever. I'm about to write a couple of, I don't know if

they're articles, but recaps for our pick-by-pick series. And I have to write about the two teams that I drafted. And I'm going to use Grammarly, Grammarly Premium specifically, for this. So I'll write it up. I'll upload it right into Grammarly. Grammarly is going to give me some suggestions, how to make it sound better, how to make the vocabulary better, the grammar better, any spelling mistakes, obviously, those types of things. But really, it's about the clear, concise messaging and communicating better and more succinctly. So it's going to be very helpful. I use Grammarly when I write, which isn't that often, but that's why I need Grammarly. And you should use it as well. You can even use Grammarly when I write, which isn't that often, but that's why I need Grammarly.

And you should use it as well. You can even use Grammarly's free tone detector to make sure you're making the right impression. Get to the point faster and accomplish more with Grammarly. Go to grammarly.com slash FFT to sign up for a free account. And when you're ready to upgrade to Grammarly Premium, get 20% off for being our listener. That is 20% off at Grammarly, G-R-A-M-M-A-R-L-Y dot com slash FFT. I did have more news to get to, and RJ, I know you can hear me,

so I apologize for the delay, but we will go fast here. Two players who are camp standouts right now, that would be Kyle Pitts and Elijah Moore. A couple second-year players. Michael Rothstein of ESPN said, the Falcons have a lot of questions this year, but Pitts is not one of them. Through a week, he's been the most dominant player Atlanta has.

It might not be close. And then The Athletic said this about Elijah Moore. He has firmly established himself as the number one wide receiver. He seems to make at least one big play every practice. He's in line for a big year. Heath, are you feeling any juice for Elijah Moore or Kyle Pitts to move them up or to make them more of a priority? Yeah, I made a little adjustment to the target share between Elijah Moore and Garrett Wilson. I just kind of assumed the number 10 pick would be the best wide receiver. And so I've got them, I think I have more slight,

like 1% higher target share and moved him up to the round six-ish range. Have not moved Pitts yet, but not surprised that he's their best player. Okay. Bar is pretty low. Okay, yeah, you're the low guy on Pitts. All right, Miami's going gonna lose a 2023 first round pick and a 2024 third round pick plus their owner stephen ross has been fined and suspended their vice chairman has been fined so they tampered they tried to get tom brady and sean payton when they were under contract that's's a no-no. The craziest thing of all that, though,

has to be that, like, in the report, they confirmed that Stephen Ross did make reference to $100,000 per loss during the tanking season, but he was just joking, so he's not going to be penalized for that. Like, when is I was just joking in okay defense? I don't know, but I'm definitely going to start using that.

100%. Jerry Jones indicated that Dallas will not be looking for a veteran wide receiver as of now. He said, let's see what the young guys can do. Buffalo's got some injuries in the secondary, but they do have time to heal. Safety Jordan Poyer, hyperextended elbow, cornerback Tredavious White still on the pup list. He tore his ACL last year and safety Micah Hyde is dealing with a hip injury. Hopefully all of them ready for week one. Dave, what do you make of Minnesota tight end Irv Smith having thumb surgery still could be ready

for week one? Is this a needle mover at all? No, I mean, I'm not in on Irv Smith as a late round tight end grab anyway. I don't think he's got a chance to be the number two target getter in Minnesota, even if his hands were in good shape. But it's another injury that he's picked up along the way. I don't have a problem with people who take Irv Smith with a late pick. I'd have to double check this schedule to see who they've got early on in the year. Maybe he does have a good schedule. Maybe he is worth it. But for now, he's not practicing. And it's going to give even more opportunity to K.J. Osborne to have himself a couple of chances in those first few games,

potentially, to step up and be a contributor to Minnesota's offense. Marquise Brown is back practicing. Ron Rivera has some concern over Curtis Samuel's conditioning. Shocker. Michael Carter has a minor ankle injury. Pittsburgh and Deontay Johnson are far apart in contract talks, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Now, this is something we have to keep an eye on here.

He's a bust. Okay, would you take Sutton over Deontay? Oh, yes. Heath? In non-PPR, yes. In full PPR, no. I mean, I think I might be at the point here where I'm ready to take Judy over Deontay Johnson.

Wow. I'm just not excited about Deontay Johnson. Deebo Samuel said he had no problems with his role in the running game. He said that was not reported accurately. And Chiefs rookie wide receiver Sky Moore hurt his hip. Does not seem serious.

Okay, I tell a guy to get here at 9.50. 15 minutes later, I'm bringing him on the show. I am sorry. The first thing I have to say, R.J. White, I am sorry. I'm so disappointed in you, Adam. You're wasting my time. No, I've been listening to you guys. I enjoy the content, and I'm happy to wait around.

Thank you very much. So, R.J., tell us what you do at CBSSports.com. You were on last year for this very same subject, and it was a great episode do at CBS sports.com. Uh, you were on last year for this very same subject and it was a great episode. We'll do it again here. Cause, uh, you know, it's still, I'm sure a lot of people would love to know about value-based drafting, but tell us, tell us about yourself, RJ. Yeah. I'm the managing editor for fantasy and betting content that covers the CBS fantasy guys like Heath and Dave, and also the sports line side where we do picks, we do future stuff, we do odds, We do future stuff. We do odds.

We do all sorts of things over there. So, you know, it's kind of split my time doing those two things. You'll see me a lot more on the sports line side doing shows like The Early Edge with Jonathan Coachman, doing picks for NFL, you know, spread picks week to week. I typically enter 10 to 12 spread picks every week. I share my super contest plays, which is my five best bets every week based on the contest that happened in Vegas. So a lot more betting side than fantasy side, but you know, I came up doing fantasy stuff, reading these guys and, you know, getting into

value-based drafting back in the nineties when it started over at football guys. So, so I'm kind of steeped in both sides of it, but a little more focused on the betting side. Now that's what most people that, that follow me know me for at this point. I like to place $5 bets on basketball teams that are down by like 20 points with plus 400 odds. And how dumb am I for doing that on a consistent basis? Do you win? No, not really. Not so much.

Then I think you have your answer. All right. But I do like playing those types of odds in football games where I feel like I know I can guess the outcome a little bit more. But anyway, yeah, we have great gambling content, Sportsline.com and the Early Edge podcast. Now, value-based drafting. Give us a little primer. Tell us about it. Well, I feel kind of weird doing that with Heath sitting here. Heath comes from football guys, and they're the guys that created that back when I was a young pup in this game, trying to figure out ways to get advantages.

So I think I should probably defer to Heath on this topic because he would probably speak a little bit more eloquently than I. Yeah, I think it can be a joint effort. The easiest way, and I just like to use Joe Bryant's words sometimes when we're explaining this since he did create it, I think back in like the 90s, like the mid-90s. But the guiding principle is the value of a player is determined not by the number of points he scores. His value is determined by how much he outscores his peers at a particular position. And so as a really, RJ can add some details that I gloss over, but as like a 10,000 foot view, and I use this in my, in setting my top 200, and then I'll move things around based on my personal preference, but you would look at the top 100 picks by ADP, or some people would say the top 120 that may depend on your format and how many positions you start and see how many quarterbacks how many running backs how

many wide receivers how many tight ends are taken in those top 100 or 120 picks another way to think of it is who's the best player available at each position at this certain point in the draft and then you will use their projected point total as the baseline for that position. And each player at the position, their value is how many more points they're projected to score than that value. Does that make sense? So to use just an actual example from my projections, and I've got, so for running back, I have the baseline is at, should have had this a little more ready.

Mm-hmm, RJ does. RJ can probably tell us exactly what it is, but I use this especially for salary cap values 149 points and that looks like that is right about our running back 44 and so jonathan 149 points is the number of points that the number 44 running back is projected to score this season. And that's the last running back in your top 100? Or top one, not mine, by ADP. Oh, okay. Because my running back in the top 100 is not particularly relevant.

It's what running back is projected to be available at a certain point. Okay. Replacement cost is another word you might use for that. All right. So that number, 145, is that word you might use for that all right so that that number 145 that you would take every running backs projected points and subtract that from it and that is their value-based drafting number and then you do the same thing for tight end the number would

obviously be different it'd be like tight end 10 because there's tight end 11 is available at that point and then wide receivers probably right around wide receiver 40 quarterback is where it gets messy because in our leagues at pick 100 you're probably at qb7 so quarterback's not worth very much in a regular cbs league at pick, you're maybe at QB 14. And so Josh Allen's worth a second round pick for sure. Because he's so much more valuable than that quarterback. What's that? He's so much more valuable than QB 14.

Well, right. Because his value is much greater if the replacement cost of quarterback in your league is much lower. Right. Okay. Let me just see based on fantasy pros. QB 14 is pick 105. QB 13 is pick 103. So it looks like 12 quarterbacks in the top 100.

Okay. I think intuitively it makes sense too because we know quarterbacks score the most points, but people don't draft them first. And that's because they know they can get somebody that also scores a ton of points later in the draft. Whereas you can't do that for the top running backs. You know, Jonathan Taylor's going to outscore the last, even if you want to just use starters, you know, you say the top 24 running backs and two running back league, he's going to outscore the number 24 running back by a lot more than, than Josh Allen's going to outscore the number 24 running back by a lot more than Josh Allen's going to outscore the number 12 quarterback. So that's why you prioritize Jonathan Taylor at the top of drafts rather than Josh Allen. And this is just putting a number to that idea and being specific about it with projections. So give me an example. I'm in round five and I've got two running backs and two wide receivers. How would I use value-based drafting at this point in the draft to decide? Well, that, and that is another part of the equation that really is probably not going to translate very well into a podcast,

but that would be determined by when is your next pick and how many wide receivers do you think were running backs? Do you think we will go before them? But the way you would use it would be to say, I have to start two running backs. I have one. I have to start three wide receivers. I have zero.

What is the replacement cost of the wide receiver I'm going to get at pick 100, and how does that compare to the replacement cost of the running bug you'll draft the player that has the adam does not i think i mean i'm pretty sure i get it but you why do what i would like to know because it does seem like you've kind of pushed what what is your distaste for absolutely nothing i just nothing it I just... Nothing. It's not the... It's just not the way my brain works. Well, it has to... I think and that's part of it is it has to start with a projection. Right. You have to have a projection that you

are using to start with. I think this is very useful. So, we do so many drafts that I think we just have a very good sense of who's going to be available later in the draft and what our teams could look like, right? You know, I can kind of plan out my draft to a degree

and say, all right, I know I'm going to take Isaiah Spiller and I'm going to do this in round eight. This guy's going to be there. But it sounds like this could be really helpful for people who don't do a lot of drafts. I mean, does that make any sense? Like everybody else. Yeah, well, I mean, some of our listeners do more than I do.

But it sounds like this is very helpful for people who might not be able to predict how the rest of the draft is going to go. I don't know. Is that accurate? No, it's kind of based around predicting how the rest of the draft is going to go. Yes. I guess, but if you don't have a basic idea of, oh, I'm going to take this guy in this round, this guy. I use this during drafts, so I don't know that it's necessarily for people who don't draft as much. I guess I didn't mean it quite like that. But, okay.

I think it's very useful for leagues that have different scoring systems if you have projections that you can alter for those. Because it's difficult to know where the runs are going to happen maybe in that situation or who's going to be available at a certain point. I used it a lot more like during the Scott fish bowl than I might during one of our drafts.

And RJ, you actively use these while you're drafting? Use this? At this point, no. I mean, I used to a lot, but I've kind of embraced the, it's really more of a baseball thing with, with baseball forecaster where with their uh mayberry method scores where um things are you you tier things more and you don't get as specific with your your projections because i couldn't tell you you know whether dalvin cook's going to rush for 1150 yards and 1200 yards so i i don't know that or you know

really splicing it out and putting super confidence in my number to hit it exactly is going to be correct. So I'm thinking of these guys more in range. So I prefer just at this point to go with tiers and then use a value-based drafting thing, just judging by tiers and saying, okay, well how comfortable will I be if I skip this position and just pick it up, you know, in the sixth, seventh round, like he's saying, once you get near that pick 100 range, rather than forcing to go, okay, I don't have

a running back in round after two rounds, I have to take one here. Maybe not, maybe the value just isn't there. And so I'll just say, I'll skip it and go with a more valuable position that if I were to apply his projections to this, I'm, I'm confident, you know, this X receiver would be, would be higher than any running back on the board. And I say this every year, but I will say like, we are not going to do the best job of fully describing this on a podcast yeah it's because there's there's math um like do go search it out um football guys has an article on it every year should we just should we do a nurdle on the podcast a nurdle yeah didn't you used to do the nurdle that's the math thing i did all the i gave up

on the nurdle the first time i tried it for a couple of i i don't think i ever missed a nurdle then why did you not know what i was talking about just i haven't done any of those for probably two months isn't that weird i mean i would not miss a wordle and now i yeah i don't do them anymore who saw that coming uh that's kind of the way it works yeah yeah everything right i think so except for fantasy football that never goes away that figures crossed all right is there anything else you want to add heath i mean what about that whole tears versus kind of what rj was saying that he uses his tears more is there a combination of the two yes for sure like i said i use this as the baseline for setting my top 200 but i do think you have to also apply other other

factors and and tear drops and upside or and risk are probably three of the biggest things that I would kind of add into it. But I like to have that list of, okay, this is who the numbers say the best pick is. And this is how much it shows I'm going to miss if I don't do this. Because then I have to justify in my head with reasoning. Like, is there a reason that I want to pass up on what the numbers say the best pick is? Man, can't you just have some fun and not worry about reasoning? That's what it is. It's numbers. Can't you just go for it, Heath?

Just take a leap. I would like, you know. But having such a complete knowledge of what's going on in the draft board is fun for people, too. It's a lot of fun. Yeah, you're missing out on quite a bit of fun if you don't have this complete knowledge of, okay, if I am going to pass it, I'm kind of taking a risk, but I've trusted myself to do this, even though the numbers say that, whereas you're just kind of throwing darts otherwise. It's really less about fantasy football.

RJ, I just want Heath to enjoy life more. I just feel like he's shackled. I do not think you... What do you think Heath does when he's not on the show? He barbecues. Yeah, that's enjoying life. He barbecues, he camps,

he gives back to the community, he drinks beer. I'm pretty sure he's good. It's ironic coming from me, who is the most boring life in the world. You sit at home and raise your kids. Basically, yeah. Which is fun. Which you should be enjoying, by the way.

It's very fun. So let's take a break. When we come back, we'll gamble. Talk about some of RJ's favorite futures and players who might win MVP and things like that. That could actually be fantasy relevant as well here. We'll be right back. If anybody has a question, we can take them on YouTube as well. And RJ is going to talk fantasy.

I mean, RJ is obviously a big fantasy guy. So we'll be right back on fantasy football today. Okay, RJ, let's give the people what they want before we get right into the NFL futures and that stuff, like who's going to win the Super Bowl, who's going to win Coach of the Year. Give me some fantasy guys that you find yourself drafting a lot or are fond of. Well, you guys already covered Judy. I was a big fan of him.

I love the talent, love his quarterback upgrade, and now he's going to get more targets. He's going to be on the field more with not having to come off the field and two receivers set sometimes when you have those two outside guys. So Judy is a guy I was really happy to get where I got him in our draft last night. Um, I think Elijah Mitchell is a decent, decent, um, value. Um, he's not really talked about in that tier with the guys, like, I know you're going over acres and those types of guys there, but I think he could really be in that tier considering how effective, you know,

Kyle Shanahan is at scheming those guys, um, to, to be effective in the run game and, um, how good he was, you know, when healthy last year. And, you know, with Trey Lance taking over the offense, more of a threat to run will open up more running lanes for Mitchell anyway. So I think that we're not talking as much about him as we should be. So I like those two guys, quarterbacks. You're going to kind of get a tip on my MVP pick. I think Trevor Lawrence has a lot of upside having a legitimate NFL coach in his corner at this point

and running a legitimate offense, they upgraded the weapons. And they'll still have to throw a lot. They're not going to win a ton of games. I think they can have a decent season. But with him throwing a lot and actually having a full offseason with a Super Bowl-winning coach that actually took Carson Wentz and turned him into an MVP candidate, whereas he hasn't been any good, you know, since then. And we've, we've been kind of dogging how,

how his performance has been since leaving that leaving town there. But, you know, he does that with Carson Wentz. Then he goes out and wins a Superbowl with Nick Foles, a journeyman back of quarterback. So that speaks a lot to, to Doug Peterson's, you know, ability to maximize quarterbacks. And now he's getting a guy that was the number one pick, the certain number one pick since he was a freshman.

Everybody knew that was going to be the guy. There was no question, even in a draft where five quarterbacks went in the top 15, there was no question Lawrence was going number one. And we didn't see any of that talent on display last year because of his terrible situation, but that talent is still there. And now he has a guy that knows how to maximize talent. So I think he could have a big season.

I love getting him as a QB2 later in the draft, especially if you're waiting, you're not getting one of those top guys. So I would love to do a quarterback platoon of him and Fields or him and Carr, him and Tua, those two guys thinking that Lawrence is going to have a breakthrough year. We'll talk more about Trevor Lawrence on the quarterback

preview tomorrow. And if you want to fall in love with someone, if you're lonely out there, just go watch Trevor Lawrence in week 18. An absolutely intoxicating performance against the Indianapolis Colts. Or watch any of his games in college or high school. Yeah, yes. But my god,

he was so good in week 18. It was crazy. Alright. Thank you, RJ, for that. So some of the futures that you're betting. Let's start with the player-specific ones. And Lawrence, you have an MVP bet out there with some pretty nice odds. Yeah, 125 to 1, I found on him at one place. And it's just that thing of the talent.

We know the talent is there. As long as he didn't forget how to play football last year, I think he has a chance to maximize that talent with Peterson. The Jaguars could be surprising to teams. They're in a division that is right for the taking. Everybody expects Indy to win it. I'm not going to talk on that

or go against that. I think they definitely deserve to be the favorites, but it's easy besides that. We expect Tennessee might have a down year after trading away A.J. Brown. Houston, obviously, people don't project to be good. I think the Jaguars could sneak in it's kind of easy besides that we expect Tennessee might have a down year after trading away AJ Brown, um, Houston, obviously people don't project to be good.

I mean, Jaguar could sneak in when eight, nine games. And if they challenge for a playoff spot and it gets a 10 games with that turnaround, people are going to be talking about Peterson as an, as a coach of the year candidate and Lawrence, if he's putting up those stats as an MVP candidate. Uh,

another MVP candidate, uh, Trey Lance at, uh, what are the odds on that one? 60 to one? 60 to one. This is actually my favorite one. You know, I talked to Florence at this point, but everybody expects Trey Lance to be good. Everybody has him in their top 10 quarterbacks at this point. You know, he's going to be the starter. He's going to do all these things for a team that is, their win total is 10, you know, with even odds. So we expect them to be good. We expect them to make the playoffs.

And this is a this is a situation like Patrick Mahomes a few years back. This was a guy that was not, you know, destined for greatness, was not, you know, a surefire thing. He went 10th in the draft. But a team traded up for him with one of the best offensive minds, you know, in the game in Andy Reid. It made him they sat him for a year. Mostly they, you know, built the offense around him and he came out and he just, you know, blew us game in Andy Reed and made him, they sat him for a year. Mostly they, you know, built the offense around him and he came out and he just, you know, blew us all away that first year.

It was 55 to one MVP in that year. And I pegged him as a pick on pick six podcast and on some CBS sports articles, go and take that because just the situation is so good. And I feel a lot of that is at play with Lance. We don't know if the talent's going to be the same. Obviously you just can't predict everyone's going to be, anyone's going to be as good as Patrick Mahomes,

but he has all the situation in place. He has great supporting cast, great offense, Kyle Shanahan, one of the best offense and minds in the game, a team that traded a ton to go up and get them. So they believe in him. And I just think that that,

that at play as him being a starter this year, you're not going to get 60 to one any other year. So this is the year to jump on him and see if he can have that breakthrough year and, and cash that ticket. That's Trey Lance. I am curious about your offensive rookie of the year pick here. I'm not saying you're only one, but one that you provided to me. So you must like it a little bit offensive rookie of the year. This was about finding value. I found this at 25 to one at some spots where it was 16 to one and others. And I wanted to play it at 25 to one. It'sames cook to win offensive regular year and that's because the bills are you know

they got rid of brian dayball very pass happy very we expect they're going to continue to be pass happy but we don't know you know sean mcdermott con wants to run the ball more i think and if the defense is playing well which they should they're one of the best defense in the game he could rely a little bit more on the run game in the second half rather than pass, pass, pass. And that could be James Cook. You know, I'm not saying he wins the job over Singletary right away, but if you're happy with your running back situation, you don't spend a second round pick on a running back. And maybe that's for Cook to come in and be a compliment, but he does.

I think he does have untapped talent that we didn't see in college. And if he can come out, have a good camp and win the job, he can be the guy grinding out stats in the second half of games for that team if they decide to make him the feature back. So at 25 to one, I just thought there was a lot of value there as opposed to some of the other guys. That's a down quarterback here. Typically you'd like quarterbacks, but we don't even know if there's going to be a starter, you know, pick it's fighting for the job. And then so you're just kind of playing, you know, roulette with the receivers to see which one has a good year. But a lot of those receivers that we expect to have big roles

are on bad teams. Now we're talking about a guy that might be on the team that is the number one seed in the AFC and helping to lead a Super Bowl charge. So that's why I kind of feel good about 25-1 for Cook if you could find that. I wouldn't play it lower than that. And Dave and Heath, people do feel that way.

I've heard that before about James Cook. He didn't have a ton of work in college, but that, you know, he could be a much better runner than people give him credit for. And I wonder what happens if Singletary gets hurt in your mind? You know, what does the backfield look like, Dave? I think you're going to see Cook and Moss if Singletary were to get hurt. And I think you might see Cook and Moss even if Singletary is healthy, because it sounds like Zach Moss is doing enough in the early days of training camp to warrant some kind of a role. That's been what's really been pushing Singletary down for me. And I was a big fan of his this off season, getting James Cook there, not good. Seeing Zach Moss get involved when Moss can do a lot of the same things that Singletary can do that Cook necessarily doesn't have a proven track record of.

That hurts me a lot. We've talked before about the ceiling for James Cook being Alvin Kamara. And if you remember, Kamara, I don't know if he shined bright in the preseason, and I know he got off to a slow start the first couple of games for New Orleans. That was before the Peterson trade. I think it was four games and they traded Adrian Peterson. I think they recognized. Wasn't there a game where he had a lot I think it was four games and they traded Adrian Peterson. I think they recognized, wasn't there a game

where he had a lot of receptions and then they got rid of Adrian Peterson? Very possible. It's almost like they realized, hey, we're better off going with the kid than we are with the veteran.

And they jettisoned Peterson and they started using Alvin Kamara a lot more in the offense. And he took off and they took off. Something similar could happen here. I agree with RJ.

I think there is untapped potential in James Cook where he can be used as a runner. I also disagree with RJ because I don't think the Bills want to necessarily run the ball a lot more when they've got a league MVP candidate of their own in Josh Allen. I think what they want to do is start utilizing the running backs more in the passing game, and that way they're taking advantage of Allen's strength while trying to keep defenses off guard and then find more mismatches. That's what they were missing a lot of last year. We're

finding mismatches down the field and now they've got a bunch of them that they could potentially have. And James Cook is a huge one of them. So I like the odds too, a 25 to one. And I disagree. I think if you could find it at 20 to one, I think it's worth it, too, because it's going to be a wide-open race for Offensive Player of the Year. Or Rookie of the Year, I should say. Offensive Rookie of the Year. I don't think James Cook is going to be the Offensive Player of the Year. I think he's just good enough to be maybe the Offensive Rookie of the Year. Who else do you think could, you know, not one of the heavy favorites,

but I'm trying to look up the odds. What would be like Christian Watson's odds or something like that? I think they'll probably get longer every single day. 10-1 for Watson. There are a lot of interesting names here. Yeah, I'm looking at some now. What are Romeo Dub's odds? Let's see. I don't even know if he's on. He might christian watson's right now he's at 50 to 1 christian christian

watson at 10 to 1 is is not good but i thought maybe he'd be much lower than that like 15 to 20 to 1 but uh you know it's a similar situation right rookie on a great team they could be the number one seed i don't know if they will be, but... Yeah, I think that, like, the difference for me with Cook is that I don't... I don't know that he has to earn as much as Christian Watson does. Like, not that Alan Lazard and Randall Cobb

are great players that he has to overtake, but they have the trust of Aaron Rogers. And we like, we don't have much of a history of Rogers with rookie wide receivers. I don't know that Buffalo really likes Devin Singletary or Zach Moss all that much.

How about Jahan Dotson at 20 to one? Love it. There's a ton. There are literally not. What's Pickens at? 40-1. Yeah, 40-1. I like Pickens a lot, too.

Pickens is absolutely in play. And if you think the Jets bounce back this year, even Brees Hall at 8-1 isn't that bad because he could be a reason why the Jets are competitive this year. But I think part of the formula for having the offensive rookie of the year this year is he's got to play on a winning team, which is what RJ talked about and one of the reasons why he liked James Cook. I don't know if we can say that about Pickens.

I don't know if we can say that about Brees Hall. We might be able to say that about Romeo Dubs or Christian Watson. But this is a fun one to look at, and it's also interesting because it gives us, and this is with all odds, Adam, it gives us a peek inside what the folks, the odds makers are thinking. And I don't mind saying that I think they're smarter than we are. They know stuff that no one knows. And so when we see things that look a little strange or look a little off or you know it's it's hard to find edges here against odds makers but when you can read the tea leaves of what they're saying

that's when it helps you for fantasy but they're trying to balance odds as well right like they're trying to balance they want to get as much money as they possibly can on as many different players being at 10 to 1 as they've they've already got all the money on christian watson that they want right now. Could be. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I agree that... I mean, I don't know what Christian Watson was a month ago.

During the season, they do know... I know that they have sources. They know things, right? But right now, am I supposed to look at these future odds and think that they're better at ranking a player than you are? I don't see it that way. Better at ranking a player than the are? I don't see it that way. Better at

ranking a player than the average better, yes. And they also might have more insight into the plans for players this season. We think that Mariota was named the starter right away, but Desmond Ritter's 20-1 to win offense rookie of the year.

Malik Willis is 40-1. Those two guys drafted around the same time, they obviously think that Ritter is 20 to one to win offense rookie there. Malik Willis is 40 to one. So those two guys drafted around the same time, they're obviously think that Ritter has a lot better chance of playing. And that could be something that because of what they're hearing with their sources is that even though Mariota is named the starter, he might not be the starter for longer than four or five games, giving Ritter a time to chance to come in and, uh, and, you know, put up enough stats to, to be in this race. whereas Malik Willis, they're thinking there's no chance that he plays this year. Meanwhile, Kenny Pickett has the lowest odds of any rookie at 6-1.

The training camp reports have been terrible on Kenny Pickett, and yet he's still got the lowest odds. It almost makes you realize that he is going to play at some point this year, and they're anticipating that he does well when he does get on the field eventually and that what's happening now in training camp doesn't necessarily reflect on what's going to happen later oh can i get tell you my favorite player prop is the first one i saw dj moore that's my favorite dj moore over four and a half touchdown catches that's a great one it'll be a career high. Brandon cooks is at 950 yards.

What's up with that? He's never that low. Well, I, the problem with playing overs RJ is, you know, there's always injury. So are you more likely to play unders than overs for that reason?

Well, these injuries are also baked into the numbers. When you see numbers like, why is this number so low? It's like, you're saying seven okay he's playing 17 games he's going to hit that obviously but you always have to factor in the chance for for um injuries so when you look at these numbers and you might compare like a quarterback and say why is he only at you know 38 50 and a half when he went for 4200 last year it's like well you have to maybe he misses a game or two and you always have to factor that in.

So tell me about some of the teams that you like this year to outperform or maybe underperform their Vegas expectations. Yeah, so I'm on San Francisco. I was talking about Traylan. I was able to get them over 9.5 at minus 140 as one of my over plays on win totals. I also sprinkled a little bit on them to win the division. I think that they have just as good a chance as the Rams coming into the year.

And they are, I was able to get them at plus 200 in one place, which is obviously a lot, a lot higher than what you're going to find the Rams at. So I thought that was a good value. And then also 20 to one to win the Superbowl I found at one spot. And I think that's, that was the best Superbowl value I saw on the board.

So high on San Francisco this year, also high on Baltimore. I didn't play their over. I wanted to get it at 9.5, but by the time I was into the market, I always saw 10s. So I just played them to win the division at plus 155. I think it'll be a little bit more competitive with Cincinnati in there. So I thought 155 was a good value on them to be an over team.

Like the Chargers as well, over 9 and a half minus 145 was a play for me when the division sprinkled on that plus 230. I think they have just as good a shot. So in the division as anybody there, I think we're getting good value there. A few of the teams I was down on, I went under on eight and a half on Cleveland before the Watson news came out, thinking the suspension would be longer and maybe it still will be, you know, we don't know what the NFL is going to do, but I thought eight and a half on Cleveland before the Watson news came out, thinking the suspension would be longer and maybe it still will be, you know, we don't know what the NFL is going to do, but I thought eight and a half was aggressive for them considering the middle of their schedule. They have a really tough schedule when he comes back. And this is a guy that's not going to have been playing quarterback for, you know, two years at that point, two calendar years.

Knowing what you know now, would you still go under eight and a half if Watson suspended six games for Cleveland? Well, we saw them repost at nine and a half and it was minus 130 i would definitely take that oh okay okay um yeah go ahead so yeah another under team pittsburgh under seven and a half the quarterback situation who knows how that's going to look um tough division for them um chicago under six and a half and minus 140 probably going to be a rough year for them um you know considering they're they're rebooting essentially, and they didn't really surround Justin Fields with too much talent in the offseason. So that offensive line could also be an issue.

So I like that under as well. And I see Detroit plus 400 to make the playoffs. That's fun. Yeah, I wanted to get a better value because earlier in the offseason, you can see like 450s and 500s, but I'm willing to take 400. I think they were very unlucky with a lot of their games last year. You can tell the team really played hard for Dan Campbell. Dan Campbell watching him and how he coaches his team.

Now he talks to the media. He's a guy you want to root for. So I think that he's going to get the most out of his guys. They are going to play hard for him. It's not going to be a situation like Jacksonville where, where, you know, they're just giving up on the season, like the talent they brought in. They're going to be better later in the year when Jameson Williams comes, but comes back on offense, left pretty, pretty good offensive guys in place and an underrated offensive line for Jared Goff. So it doesn't necessarily have

his supporting cast in with that, that he did with the Rams, but it's solid. It's not like some of these Lions teams in the past. So I think that there's a decent chance if some of the other teams are down, the NFC is seen as a little bit weaker than the AFC with all the talent that came into the AFC this year, that the Lions could sneak in with that seven seed. And it wouldn't be crazy to me. Heath, who's more likely to surprise us, the Lions or your favorite team in the world, the Texans? I was just going to ask RJ if I could do a parlay on the Lions and the Texans both hitting their over and or both making the playoffs.

Well, it depends on the book. A lot of books typically don't allow parlays on futures because they're afraid of correlated situations. But with that one where it's not clear that it's correlated, maybe some books will let you do it. But you certainly can't do things like I want to take the Saints over and the Falcons under because they directly affect each other. Right. Makes sense. No, I think both of those teams are going to be better than the consensus expectations. I love the Lions pick. And I think the Jacksonville pick to win the division, I like that. I think the Texans might win the division.

Dave, give me a dark horse MVP. Well, Lawrence is it. And I really wanted to talk about that. When RJ mentioned Trevor Lawrence to be the MVP of the league. He's a great talent. The upgrades that they've made on both sides of the ball are perfect for Trevor Lawrence. And the fact that, think about their run game. Travis Etienne, we think he's going to be okay as a runner.

We think he's going to be phenomenal as a pass catcher. That's why his PPR value is going through the roof and goodness by the time we get to late august he might end up being a top 40 pick he's top 50 right now he could he could really climb up and james robinson video from from camp looks okay but we know that he's coming back from an achilles that's tough injury to come back from they might end up being forced to throw a lot this year. And if Lawrence is good and his receiving core is better than it was last year, then he can absolutely make a case to be the MVP if Jacksonville ends up being very competitive this year and they're in the right division to do it. Indy is the favorite in that division, but I wonder how that defense is going to perform,

especially if Shaquille Leonard isn't in the middle of that defense. He's the straw that stirs the drink there. I disagree about Houston. I think they're still going to be kind of a meandering team, sub-500 team, and I think Tennessee has a chance to be right around 500. They've been a winning team for as long as Vrabel's been there. They could end up at 9-8 and still have... Henry could still have a good year. Traylon Burke's going to have a good year, but still not be where Jacksonville is.

Jacksonville can win nine games this year. They could sneak their way in the playoffs, and Trevor Lawrence could be that MVP guy. Lamar Jackson, plus 2,000. Yes. He's got the 11th shortest odds, Lamar Jackson plus 2000 yes he's got the 11th shortest odds Lamar Jackson such disrespect

for a former MVP that's a good one yeah by the way Shaquille Leonard is Darius Leonard changing his name going by his middle name

I said that you said that you just said Shaquille Leonard I said Shaquille Leonard used to be Darius Leonard you said used to be Darius Leonard thought I did

ooh Justin Jefferson plus 15,000. Where's Derek Henry? It's so hard to be the player of the year when you're not a quarterback. Yeah, unless you're Derek Henry. Yeah, if Cooper Cupp can't do it after last year.

True. Alright guys, thank you very much. RJ, great having you on. Appreciate it, man. Of course, thanks for having me. Thank you very much. RJ, great having you on. Appreciate it, man. Of course. Thanks for having me. And you can follow him at RJWhite1, at RJWhite1 on Twitter. Thanks, everybody.

We've got our position previews starting tomorrow. We'll talk to you with quarterbacks on Thursday on Fantasy Football Today.