Fantasy Football Today - Favorite Stats for 2022! (07/06 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: July 6, 2022

Vote for us for Best Sports Podcast and Best Male-Hosted Podcast! http://podcastawards.com/app/signup/ Dave tells you how dominant Mike Evans was without Chris Godwin (1:30) and Heath tells you what kind of company Najee Harris is in. Then we've got your news and notes (6:35) with a positive report about Marquez Valdes-Scantling making us wonder if his ADP is too low ... Back to our favorite stats, we've got a lot on Cam Akers (19:15). What do the advanced metrics say and how often do the Rams throw to their running backs? Then Heath puts Josh Allen's 2021 season in perspective (26:15) while also giving Patrick Mahomes some love. Dave follows up with a discussion about touchdowns for quarterbacks and what you should be aiming for (29:50) ... What to know about WRs drafted in the 39-51 range (34:25) and what to know about D.J. Moore (38:40). How good could he be with a better QB? Finally we talk about the Jets RBs (45:15) and the Cowboys RBs (50:00) and stay tuned for a long Diontae Johnson discussion (1:03:00) after the emails ... Your emails 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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He's just going to go the distance. Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Najee Harris' historical comps. Which team has thrown the fewest passes to running backs over the last two seasons? Splits for CeeDee Lamb. Why passing touchdowns really matter for quarterbacks? It might seem obvious, but we actually have some good numbers there. And at what point in your draft you can find a top five tight end? These are just some of our favorite stats that we're going to be giving to you right now.

You've heard some of them before, but they're worth repeating on this episode of Fantasy Football today. We're getting statty. Adam Azer, Dave Richard, and Heath Cummings, who is coughing right now. I do appreciate him muting the mic. You all right there? I am going to be okay. I still, after 43 years,? I am going to be okay. I still, after 43 years, have not learned how to drink water.

It's probably some YouTube videos. It goes down the wrong hole. Yeah, yeah. Also, you haven't learned how to cough because now we cough into our elbows now, not in our hands. I appreciate that. Thank you. I cough into my left hand, and I don't ever shake hands with anybody with that one, so it's okay. Okay. Thank you. I cough into my left hand and I don't ever shake hands with anybody with that one. So it's okay.

Okay. Thank you very much, Dave. Why don't you, why don't you give us your favorite stat for 2022? I don't know if this is my favorite stat, but it's the one that I can explain in the shortest amount of time. I appreciate that.

I like that. Mike Evans had 14 or more PPR points in two of his final two games without Chris Godwin last year, 25 plus and two of his final two games without Chris Godwin last year. 25-plus in three of his final four without Godwin, including the playoffs. That does include two games, or not two, however many playoff games he had with 25-plus PPR points. He had 10 targets per game in his final four games,

including the playoffs. This is his future without Chris Godwin on the field, and it might even stay that way without Gronk on the field. And by the way, all those games also without Antonio Brown on the field, Mike Evans, stud receiver, don't be afraid to take him in round two. Heath, give me one of your favorite stats. Oh man. I love all these so much. And I'm going to give one that takes a little while to explain because Dave was so, so brief. Najee Harris. There's not a lot of rookie running backs or first year running backs who have seen as many touches as he did last year and been as inefficient as he was since 1992.

And the reason I use that date in case people are wondering is that's when we started keeping track of targets. So any target or yards per target, anything target target based we don't really know before 92 um somebody should probably go back and watch the film and figure it out eighth running back as in his first year in the nfl to earn at least 300 touches while averaging below four yards per carry and below six yards per target now the joke there would be did he really earn those touches if he was below four yards per carry and below six yards per target. Now the joke there would be, did he really earn those touches if he was below four yards per target or carry and six yards per target? I'm not sure.

Um, there are seven other running backs who have done this before and the range is spectacular. Yeah. LaDainian Tomlinson. Ooh. Curtis Martin. Ah,

Willis McGahee. Ooh. Curtis Martin. Ah. Willis McGahee. Eh, okay. Trent Richardson. Ugh. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Awesome basketball player. Rashan Salam. Oh, no.

And Eric Rett. Oh. Oh. Boy, you know, looking at Willis McGahee's pro football reference page i thought he was better than this look at his yards per carry the first five years of his career four 3.8 3.8 4.1 3.9 career four yards per carry Interesting. Yeah, so that's... Hopefully he's more Curtis Martin than LaDainian Tomlinson. It's just...

It'll be interesting to watch next year. I think... I am the low guy in Dynasty, I believe, on Najee because consensus-wise, I believe he would be RB2. He's top three or four for virtually everyone. And I've got him sixth or seventh right now. Man, this is a big year because we need to see him do some things

that make him look like a really good running back as opposed to a volume, low efficiency guy because I don't know if a volume low efficiency guy ever gets the second contract. And you're also the low guy in seasonal, or redraft rather, you know. You have like 12 fish. 13th overall.

Right. He's more like a top six, seven pick. I couldn't rank him 12th because then I wouldn't be able to do the hot take. You shouldn't draft Najee Harris in the first round. So I dropped him down to 13th. Good stuff. Remember last year you were second round Saquon and you were the low guy on

him and everybody was too high on him. So hopefully, hopefully, hopefully remembering that. Yeah. Second round Saquon. And are you second round Saquon again this year? I am currently second round Saquon.

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we need to become a finalist, get to the next round, so please vote for us at podcastawards.com. Please email us at fantasyfootballatcbsi, the letter I, dot com. fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. Let's do some news and notes, and we'll get into more of our favorite stats. ESPN article

about Patrick Mahomes and Marquez Valdez-Scantling, and they've really got a good thing going right now. They were hooking up in the mini camps. Off to a good start there. And interesting quote from Andy Reid. Marquez can do a lot of different things. He's got good start-stop abilities. He's a big target.

He can run your slant game. He He's a big target. He can run your slant game. He can run your deep throws. He can run the intermediate routes. He's got a good feel in space, so he gives us some flexibility in there. This is a guy who has had a very high ADOT in his career. He has been a deep threat. He said, we had rolls in Green Bay, and it worked, but that quote from Andy Reid suggesting that there's more to Marquez Valdez-Scantling than what we've seen in his four seasons as a Packer. So, Dave, what does that all mean to you? Oh, I think it means that he's showing off in OTAs

and he's got to be able to bring it in training camp and then again when the season starts. And we've seen Valdez-Scantling come through on those big plays from Aaron Rodgers in the past. We've seen him drop balls in the past. And we've seen Valdez-Scantling come through on those big plays from Aaron Rodgers in the past. We've seen him drop balls in the past. And we really haven't seen him. I shouldn't say this without actually backing it up with stats, but I don't know how many plays I remember him having inside of 10 yards.

So that role, it seemed like he had a defined role in Green Bay. Maybe he's proving that he can do some of the typical receiver work to just help move the chains and not necessarily be a deep ball threat. And I look at him as a predominant outside receiver. And you think about the other receivers that Kansas City has. Juju played a lot in the slot. We've talked about that for years. Sky Moore figures to be a slot receiver first before he's an outside receiver. what's the competition for that outside role in kansas city it's mickle hardman um and and i almost wonder if that's that's the biggest competition that mbs is going to have i've got him right out of sky more i think he's worth around 10 pick i think mbs is is worth taking a chance on and this this stuff that you just said doesn't

sway me one bit it makes me feel good about it. I just realized something, and I did the old Google News search to make sure I haven't missed anything. Has anybody on the Chiefs said anything nice about Juju this summer? We have. I have not seen it. Well, I think that what they say matters. You're using the term we loosely. Yeah. I'd like to see something nice about Juju.

Yeah, not a lot of Juju buzz. I agree. Not a lot of Juju buzz. None that I can find actually. Some Juju talking about how fun it is to catch passes from Patrick Mahomes. But didn't see anything about anybody saying nice about Juju. I didn't check TikTok though. Their ADP, it's almost double, right? So Juju. I didn't check that. Their ADP is almost double, right?

So Juju's at 66, and Marcos Valdez-Scantling is at 133. Oh, you can get them after round 10. Yeah, so that's into round 12. Who would you rather have at their values? Round 6 for Juju, round 12 for MVS? I will say MVS. Yeah, I would still go Juju, round 12 for MVS. I will say MVS. Yeah, I would still go Juju.

I think it's worth noting there's a reason for that. We do believe that targets are earned, and Marquez Valdez-Scantling's never earned a playable number of targets. No, he's never had 40 catches. He's never had a 700-yard season. He has 13 career touchdowns in four seasons. Quick fun fact for you.

Over the past four seasons, that's the MVS era officially in Green Bay. Over the past four seasons and the Mahomes era in Kansas City, the Chiefs have thrown for 2,287 more yards than the Packers. That is 572 more yards per season. And over the course of 65 games,

because one season was 17 games, 35 more yards per game for the Chiefs than the Packers. Based on MVS's general target share, that should be about 3.5 more yards per game for him. All right, let's go to our next news item here. Ian Rappaport says that the Seahawks have never really been that interested in Baker Mayfield, but our Josina Anderson said that is inaccurate. So we'll see how that one plays out. Mark Cabali of the Athletic does not think that the Steelers will offer Deontay Johnson anything close to what Terry

McLaurin just got, which was three years, $71 million with a $28 million signing bonus. I did think this was pretty interesting, Dave. I don't know that I can say this means they don't see Deontay Johnson as Terry McLaurin. Maybe it's salary cap situation. I don't know. But the thought was Deontay Johnson will play this year out and then be able to find more money somewhere else.

This is a team that does a good job of recognizing wide receiver talent and rewarding it. I remember back when Mike Wallace and Antonio Brown were both on the Steelers. Wallace was the more popular Steeler in fantasy at the time, and he got into a contract squabble with the Steelers, and they said, you know what? We're just going to pay Antonio Brown. And they looked like geniuses for doing it. Antonio Brown broke out. Mike Wallace left the team and Wallace went on to be okay, but he wasn't great. Juju, two off seasons ago, was a free agent. Steelers did not try to sign him to a lucrative deal. He came back on a one-year

deal and now he's off to Kansas City. They didn't even give him a chance, or maybe he didn't want the chance. We don't know. Resigning with Pittsburgh for a long time. So Deontay's got to play his cards right here, and the fact that the Steelers aren't bending over backwards to pay him tells me that they like him. They don't necessarily love him. If you want to talk about some long-term upside,

like the prospect of George Pickens being the wide receiver one in Pittsburgh next year. That's your name. Maybe with a top three quarterback from the 2022 class at the same time. Or 2023. Right, so maybe they draft another one or maybe Pickett's just good. Pickett, I think they're going to have to give Pickett

more than one year. He's in a different boat than all the other rookie quarterbacks this year because he was a first-round pick. Yeah, unless you make the same decision the Cardinals made, right? You're right. If he totally stinks, then yes, Pittsburgh's back in the quarterback market. But I think he'll be solid. And final note I have here

is from The Athletic. Baltimore wide receiver James Prochet was a minicamp standout, according to The Athletic. And Prochet, 80% catch rate last year, Heath. Five targets? 20 targets. All right.

Caught 16 out of 20. Average 12.6 yards per catch. I mean, these are great numbers. 10.6 yards per game. These are great numbers. 10.1 yards per target. These are great numbers here. It sounds like they want to get a slot receiver going. And Prochet and Devin DuVernay are kind of competing

for that job. I would expect Devin DuVernay to win that. But Prochet did have some really incredible seasons at smu and somebody asked where am i getting this adp from so i keep bouncing around i'm now using uh the last two weeks of drafts on nfc i'm also using fantasy. I don't know when the data from Fantasy Pros starts, but I'll try to use both as much as possible. Over the last two weeks, you've got 42 drafts,

since June 22nd. So 42 drafts on NFC. I'll use both. I'll try to tell you what I'm using here, but try to give you some different ADP. I'll tell you what his average draft position is on Fantasy Pros. 148th. So, it's 133rd on NFC over the last couple of weeks, since June 22nd anyway, and it's 148th on Fantasy Pros. He does not get drafted very often on our drafts. Yeah, I think that might have to change.

I don't draft him. I'm going to put him in my queue. Every time I see Kadarius Tony get drafted, I go, oh, man, I should have put him in my queue. And now MVS is going to be in that group, and there was one other player. Tony's got to be ahead of MVS, though. You tell me.

Yeah. Right? Tony at least has some pedigree the difference in offense is just so extreme that's true I guess MVS yeah which one is most likely to

become a weekly wide receiver three or a flex in PPR I would lean Tony yeah just because I think the volume can be there I think he can be utilized properly receiver three or a flex in PPR. I would lean Tony. Yeah. Okay. Just because I think the volume can be there. I think he can be utilized properly. And look,

he had that oversaturation of targets for like a two or three week period last year proved he could do it. Small sample size. They will, should be able to find a role for him. That's not the traditional, you know, X receiver

or something like that in the offense. I don't think he's going to do that. Just get him out in space. Let him make plays after the catch. He makes a guy miss every time he touches the ball. Is it weird that Kenny Galladay's fantasy career is just apparently over? What a fall from grace,

the way he's being treated right now. Well, I mean, he kind of chose that. He got the bag and went to play with Daniel Jones. It's like Bradley Beal. Everybody's like, free Bradley Beal. And then he accepts a $400 million deal to stay on the Washington Wizards. But why Tony over Galladay?

Tony's never done anything like what Galladay's done. Galladay's never done anything like what Tony did. That's not true. He's had a game as good as Tony's best game? I don't know if he's had a 190-yard game. His first NFL game was two touchdowns. But I wouldn't say that he's never done anything like what Kadarius Toney's done. I mean, he was really good with David Blau as his quarterback.

Toney had like 200 yards in a game or something. 189, I think. I'll look up Kenny Galladay's career high. All right, we're going to take a quick break here. When we come back, I'll tell you Kenny Galladay's career high in yardage. Is it higher than 189? He's old. He's not that old. Is he 28?

He'll be 29 in November. Alright, we'll be right back with more awesome stats 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 We'll be right back. platinum that's the powerful backing of american express terms and conditions apply visit amex.ca

slash business platinum we are back all right i want to guess anybody closest you can go over closest to kenny all day's career high wins a prize do you want to go down first dave sure i'll 131. 158. You're cheating. Yeah, I did. 158 yards is Kenny Allday's career high. So not quite Canary's Tony territory. All right, let's get to our favorite stats. Heath told us that Najee Harris was the eighth rookie running back since 1992 to earn 300-plus touches earned with a question mark.

While averaging fewer than four yards per carry and six yards per target, the others were Tomlinson, Curtis Martin, and then Willis McGahee, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Trent Richardson, Rashaan Salam, and Eric Rett. Loved Abdul-Jabbar in Airplane. Yes, he was great. Okay, and Dave told us that Mike Evans is basically an unstoppable force without Chris Godwin on the field. So Dave, I'll let you go next. What's your favorite,

another one of your favorite stats you'd like to share with the group? Let me give you some numbers on Cam Akers, ladies and gentlemen. His rush EPA, negative 0.28. That was 125th among all running backs. He had seven runs of 12 plus yards over 145 carries. That's a 4.8 explosive rate. That's bad. He had an 18.6% avoided tackle rate. That was 84th among running backs. He had 27 carries for zero yards or worse. That's almost 20% of all of his carries. And he had one fumble lost six goal to go carries from inside the four and one touchdown, one touchdown. Wait a minute. Cam Akers didn't score a touchdown last year. That's right. He didn't. Those were his numbers from 2020 before he tore his Achilles. And then in 2021, all the numbers I said, as ugly as they were, these are efficiency metrics,

they were worse when he came back from the Achilles. Wait a second, hold on, hold on, hold on. Crazy red flag on Cam Akers going into next year. You're telling me all these stats you gave were from 2020? Okay, because I was about to say, all right, well, yeah, but he tore his Achilles. You really set it up there. That was very impressive.

He was worse than Daryl Henderson as rookier. Yeah. You're using yards per carry, right? He just used a variety of statistics. I mean, he was 125th in rush EPA. I'm pretty sure Daryl Henderson was better than 125th in rush EPA. There weren't that many more than 125 running backs. He had one. So he didn't play all that much as a rookie and cam acres had one game week 17 of his rookie season where he should not have been playing.

He hurt his ankle, I believe the week before, and he was absolutely dreadful. And it was a decent amount of carries too. it was 21 carries for 34 yards and i wonder you know before that the overall numbers were 4.8 yards per carry uh 124 carries for 591 yards and two touchdowns 10 yards per catch on only seven catches but that i just i don't know dave i mean i wonder how much that one game, 21 carries, could have dragged it down. How much does the one game where he ran for 84 yards on nine carries matter? It matters.

Because he averaged 9.3 yards per carry in a week 12 loss to the 49ers. He had nine carries for 84 yards. The week before that, 5 for 15. The week after that, 5 for 15. The week after that, 21 for 72. Okay, if we throw out that game, week 17. So weeks 1 through 16,

his rush EPA improves to negative.2. From what? From negative.24. What was Daryl Henderson's? Can you see that year? I can see it from his EPA was.02 through week 16 so he was positive no negative i'm sorry negative 0.02

but better than here it's like everybody was right that's pretty it's pretty interesting stuff here because this was a if you just want to use yards per carry, his college yards per carry were very, very low. And everyone just said, well, it's his offensive line. But I guess the point is, Dave, that Cam Akers has never shown us that he's a special running back.

Is that fair? That's what I think. If you took out all of Cam Akers' terribly inefficient games, you'd have like five games left. He had that huge game against the Patriots. I think that sticks out to everyone. National TV.

Sure. Huge game. What I remember about Cam Akers coming out is that he was just, I called him the cutback king because he was really good at just cutting and making guys miss. But it feels like, it felt like that was the only tool in his in his toolbox and now if the achilles is still an issue that's going to impact his uh mobility his elusiveness his agility etc i'm telling you guys until i see and read reports that cam makers looks like better than

he was his rookie year i I'm not drafting him. And I'm going to tell everybody not to draft him. I might lower him because I had an anti-Cam Akers stat as well. So we just go to that one next, Adam? Yeah, do that. Do that. You don't even need Adam's permission. Just go. The Rams last year threw 12.6% of their passes to running backs. That ranked 32nd in the nfl out of 32 teams they threw 12.7 percent of

their passes to running backs the year before which ranked 30th for reference league median's been right around 19.9 20 percent for just a normal team some teams might throw as many of a third of their passes to running backs. Just barely more than 10% of their passes to not have gone to their lead running back. That's not, I wouldn't even say that's what's been available to cam acres. Cause no running back. It's all of this team's running back targets.

We're talking about a ceiling unless that changes of like 60 targets. Well, and that's probably not realistic here's my last ram stat then just to add on and it's just daryl henderson he got hurt after 10 games so in his 11th game of the season he got hurt in his first 10 games he was the number 14 running back per game and that was a 17-game pace of not an overwhelming amount of carries. 241 carries, 14.2

per game, and 46 catches. So he did, you know, Sonny Michel wasn't really involved in the passing game, so he really got probably the big bulk of the running back catches there, and he was on pace for 46, which is very respectable for a guy that,

you know, if this were acres, you're going to take in the third or fourth round. So yeah, what do you think about that? Cause it's not, it's not like Daryl Henderson is some star and it's a good player, but he's not a star.

And he was as a feature back last year, splitting a little bit with Sony Michelle who averaged just six yards, six carries per game in those 10 games. Henderson was the number 14 running back per game. Not surprising, honestly. But that's the appeal of Akers, right? He doesn't have to be great to be a must start. No, but at the very least, I think Henderson's got some juice to him

that Akers might not have anymore and may have never really had. And the best part about Henderson is that you can wait to draft him. He's going to be a round nine, round ten pick as long as Akers is healthy. And he's going to evolve into a big time lottery ticket, but

a lottery ticket that could fade quickly could have a nice pocket of four or five games where he delivers for your fantasy team. That's a great player to target in the middle of late rounds okay heath give me your combat your combo stat here we're gonna do your josh allen stat and your patrick mahomes stat oh these are fantastic because everybody already thinks i'm a homer who hates josh allen so let's just lean into that josh allen's 27.2 fantasy points per game last year was the lowest for a QB1 since 2017. Unless you count

Deshaun Watson's seven games that year, then it's the lowest since 2016. Okay, so Josh Allen, lowest point for QB1 since 2017. And this one's just fun. Patrick Mahomes has not finished as QB1 overall once in the past three

seasons but patrick mahomes leads all quarterbacks in fantasy points per game over the last three seasons that's very surprising however i'd be shocked he can't possibly in the last two seasons right that's gotta be josh allen right that wasn't the stat i know but josh allen wasn't the stat. I know, but Josh Allen wasn't good until two seasons ago. Yeah, Josh Allen wasn't very good throwing last year. He was. Remember the Azers stat. He was if you count the playoffs

and remove the Patriots game with the bad weather. Then he was. All right. So what is the Josh Allen stat? Lowest fantasy points per game for QB1 since 2017? Does that mean that I think the point is less about Josh Allen and more about QB scoring was way down from 2020. And we kind of wondered was 2020 just an aberration, but it was also just down from the past couple

of years before that. So maybe we expect a little bounce back in quarterback scoring. I know Chris has become a little bit more interested in taking a quarterback early because of how hard it's been to find top 10 production on the waiver wire. If this is a trend and quarterback scoring continues to go down, then that won't necessarily be the case. We've seen it ebb and flow. The top 12 average, that's the number that I always like to look at, is you take the 12 highest scoring quarterbacks over the course of a season.

That's not per game. That's total points scored. You divide that by the number of games they play. That's 17. Divide that by 12. There's 12 quarterbacks. You get an average. The top 12 average for quarterbacks last year was 22.8.

It's two and a half points lower than it was in 2020, but it's still a point, 1.2 points higher than it was in 2019. I would also add that the average QB one score, you know, there's gotta be one quarterback that scores more than anybody else in 2021. It was 39.6 in 2020. It was 40.4. So really close year over year. Here's where I think Chris's point is valid. Last year, the average number of quarterbacks with at least 22 fantasy points, remember, six points per passing touchdown, in a given week was 11.1. In 2020, it was 13.3. In 2019, it was 13.5. That number's been fading a little bit. What is that number? What is that number? In last year, it was 22 fantasy points.

Oh, the amount of quarterbacks who get that? The amount of quarterbacks that scored 22 or more, the average last year, was 11.1, which means getting a top 12 quarterback last year wasn't as easy to do as it was in 2020 and 2019 by two quarterbacks a week. Oh, interesting.

Okay, let's talk about quarterbacks then, Dave. I think we can transition into your touchdown passes stat. This is such a generic-sounding basic stat that I almost thought that it didn't belong. But touchdowns kind of matter. So I'm adding it in here. I'd love everybody's reaction. If you think that this is just caveman fantasy, you can just let me know. The top eight quarterbacks in passing touchdowns

made the top nine in fantasy points per game. Not a surprise. Quarterbacks score a lot of touchdowns. They get a lot of fantasy points. Nine quarterbacks threw 30 touchdowns last year. All of them finished top 10 in fantasy points per game. Makes kind of a lot of sense if you're throwing 30 touchdowns or totaling 30 touchdowns, I should say. That means you're playing in a lot of games and you're getting all those points. What about the 10th quarterback? There was one quarterback missing from that top 10. It was Kyler Murray. He totaled 29 touchdowns in 14 games, which means that if he had played three more games, I think he would have scored at least one more touchdown in those games,

and he would have been good. What about some quarterbacks that came close to scoring 30 touchdowns? Where did they finish? Tannehill and Wentz, they were 17th in fantasy points per game. They had 28 touchdowns each. Russell Wilson, 27 touchdowns. I'm sorry. They didn't finish fourth.

They didn't finish. I'm sorry. Start it back. Go ahead. Run it back. Yeah. Tannehill and Wentz, they were close. They were just outside of the top 10.

They had 28 touchdowns. Russell Wilson, 27 touchdowns. He played in 14 games. Jalen Hurts had 26 touchdowns. He played in 15 games. That wasn't their finish. Point of clarification real quick. Go ahead.

We're talking about passing plus rushing touchdowns. Correct. This is total touchdowns. Not passing touchdowns. correct this is total it's really a simple point i'm sorry for tripping over myself on tannehill and wentz and russell wilson and jalen hurts two of those guys you're going to love drafting two of them you're not you know which two i'm talking about if you look at a quarterback and you say all right this guy's got 30 touchdown potential uh yeah you're going to start him and And that's easy to say with Josh Allen and Mahomes and Herbert and go all the way down Brady, Russell Wilson. But the guy that I really was kind of targeting with the stat was Derek Carr.

Can Derek Carr find 30 touchdowns this year now that he's got Devontae Adams on top of Darren Waller and Hunter Renfro? And I think the answer to that is yes, I think he can. And if he can, that means he's got a great shot to be a top 10 quarterback. Well, I think we've got to boost it to 32 touchdowns, I would say, since we're now in a 17. That's so annoying, the 17 games. But let me give you this stat.

Well, the stats from last year are from 17 games. Yeah, I guess so. So you're talking about just finishing top 10? Yeah. All right, how about this? In six point per passing touchdown leagues, in 10 of the last 12 seasons, at least four of the top five quarterbacks through 30 or more touchdowns. I'll say it again.

Six point per passing touchdown leagues, 10 of the last 12 seasons, at least four of the, of the top five quarterbacks had 30 or more passing touchdowns. 80% of the top five quarterbacks and 80% of the last 12 seasons have had at least 30 touchdowns. It's more than 80%.

It's at least, it is hard, the summary is this, it is hard to be a top five quarterback without 30 touchdown passes the thing that drives me crazy about this and it's i don't think there's anything caveman about it dave it's just that when you're trying to project touchdowns are probably the hardest thing to project of course the big one is jalen hurts they are it's the worst part about fantasy football for

me but also the best part because it's what makes it more competitive between people that have differing levels of try. The most important thing in fantasy football is also the hardest to predict. But you apply touchdown rate to your projections, which I think is probably the smartest way to try and come up with a touchdown projection for quarterbacks. Right, that's what I do. It's still not. I mean,

no, of course not as good as it can get. Right. Right. Because you have these self-imposed limits on what the touchdown rate is. Well, and it's like rushing touchdowns like Dak three or four years in a row would have six rushing touchdowns on 45 or 50 attempts, which is an insane rush touchdown rate.

And then last year, I think he had one. All right. I'm going to give a stat now. 45 or 50 attempts, which is an insane rush touchdown rate. And then last year, I think he had one. I'm going to give a stat now. It's my turn. Good. Let's talk about, I mean, I don't want to give the stats that I always give. Here's one. There has been a top five PPR wide receiver drafted between 39th and 51st in seven of the last 10 seasons.

And there have been four such examples in the last three seasons. So again, in the last three seasons, we have had four wide receivers drafted between 39 and 51 finish as a top five wide receiver. They were Chris Godwin and Cooper Cup in 2019, Calvin Ridley in 2020, and again, Cooper Cup in 2021. But that range, 39 through 51, has given us a top five PPR wide receiver, at least one in seven of the last 10 seasons. And most of them were in year three, four, or five. Almost all of them were in year three, four, and five. The two exceptions were Brandon Marshall who went to the Jets, his first year with the Jets, and Ryan Fitzpatrick in 1,500 yards

in his 10th season. And Larry Fitzgerald had a stupid 100 catch year where he finished top five in a terrible year for wide receivers in his 14th season. It wasn't a stupid year. He was one of the best wide receivers of all time. He didn't deserve to be a top five wide receiver. It was a terrible year for wide receivers. I think I was all in on Larry Fischier that year,

if I remember right. Probably. 39 through 51 is a range that gives us a top five wide receiver most years. It's essentially round four. Yeah, yeah. Look, if it's 12 picks, I wish it had been 37 to 49,

or roughly like that. Well, I'm just trying to think of comparing it to what the actual stat was. But yeah, 37 to 48 would have been great, but it's 13 picks actually, 39 through 51. But yeah, you should definitely be looking at wide receiver in that range. If they're in their third, fourth, or fifth year.

Mostly, yeah. If I'm trying to do the math on this, because I think it's like the way you present it is good for a segment of the audience and their brains. And then there's, it would be accurate to say, since you said there's generally four wide receivers drafted between those picks, right? I didn't say that. Okay. But that actually seems a little low i'm thinking more like six maybe six so you've got somewhere around a 15 percent chance 70 of the time of drafting a top five wide receiver in round four you look at recent trends though though. Just those last four years.

It's these young wide receivers busting out. Cup a little bit older. A young wide receiver going in round four is someone you should be very interested in. I think that's the takeaway. We've got some candidates for this year. Pittman and Indy. We've got a quarterback upgrade. Clear number one receiver going into his third season.

Is Marquise Brown going into his fifth season? Or sixth? Fifth. Fifth season. New team. New offense. Completely different game plan than what he had before. New quarterback. Terry McLaurin. New quarterback. Going into his fourth year.

Marquise Brown's going into his fourth season. Okay. even better. DJ Moore. Don't know who his quarterback's going to be. I'm a little nervous about that one. Should be the number one receiver on his team. DK Metcalf. See DJ Moore.

Mike Williams. Staying with his quarterback in a good offense. Kind of trailing the pack here, in my opinion, but someone who's going to go right in this range yeah mike williams is probably my favorite of those guys because i think really all he needs is for the team to decide that keenan allen is washed um if they treat him like they did the first month of the season or the last two months of the season he is a top five wide receiver washed up not washed i thought you're gonna get more mad at me for including the last two

months of the season. I just think the analysis is, is just too Heath's daddy. Um, I don't think I have a heat. I have this. Well, that's just the heat side.

Travis Kelsey. He's way too high. I don't have a Heath stat quote there, but I do have the Heath side. I'm going to give one more. It's about DJ Moore then. We'll just transition to this. So if you said to an average fantasy player,

hey, what do you think about DJ Moore? What do you think they'd say? Never scores touchdowns. Doesn't finish as a top 12 receiver in fantasy. Okay, that's not what I was hoping you were going to say. I was hoping you were going to say great receiver, always on a bad offense. Is that kind of a fair assessment

of what I think the general public feels about, what you think the general public feels about DJ Moore? Sure. Okay. Could go that way. I guess I didn't realize just how much worse Carolina's offense was last year than what it had been the previous two years.

They have been 31st, 28th, and 31st in touchdown passes over the last three seasons. So that has... They haven't thrown more than 17 touchdown passes three straight seasons. That's just unbelievable. But in terms of passing yards, they have finished 20th, 18th, and 29th in passing yards. When they finished 20th and 18th in passing yards, DJ Moore

was top 11 in yards per game among qualified players. Last year, he was 17th because Sam Darnold was so much worse. And the rest of the five games that Darnold missed, the P.J. Walkers, Cam Newtons, they were so much worse than what D.J. Moore had in the previous two seasons. So he had a pretty bad year, I think. I mean, he was wide receiver 26 per game. Pretty disappointing year. The touchdowns are always a problem. But I just wanted to point out, the yards, the passing offense was so much worse for Carolina last year than it was the previous two seasons. It wasn't just, oh, he's been on a bad offense. He was on a dreadful offense last year. So I don't know what that all means to you.

There's so many more DJ Moore stats I could give, but last year was his worst environment by far. He finished 14 touchdown passes. So we talk about target share a lot. Sometimes, to college players, we might talk about receiving yardage share. Last year, DJ Moore had a 28% touchdown share. The year before, he had a 25% touchdown share. You give a guy a 28% or a 25% touchdown share on an offense that throws 30 touchdown passes,

and he's a top five wide receiver. I've been saying that for a few years. Maybe I started probably last year, but he's had a 25.5% touchdown percentage of his total touchdowns over the last three seasons. I did say last year that if he doesn't score more than four touchdowns this year, I'm not going to call him a regression candidate ever again, because clearly there's no regression. This is just who he is, but it does make me feel different about him than someone like Keenan Allen, who was playing on a team that was throwing 30 touchdown passes and could never score more

than six or TY Hilton most years. Totally. Let me make you even feel better about it. Ready? He had, there's a stat on Pro Football Reference. You can sort their red zone stats, and I say green zone for inside the 10-yard line. You can sort their green zone stats by the percentage of targets that a player got on his own team.

There were only four players who had a higher percentage of his team's green zone targets than DJ Moore. He was tied with Cooper Cup. They both had about 35% of their team's green zone targets. So that went way up, by the way. He used to be not involved there at all. But last year, we did see DJ Moore very involved,

more than almost any other player on a percentage basis, in his team's green zone targets. And he still could only catch four damn touchdowns. But I think there's so much potential for him. That's a career high as far as red zone. You want to get more excited. Yeah.

The Panthers last year attempted 599 passes. Baker Mayfield has a career 4.8% touchdown rate. If you give him 599 pass attempts, that's 28.7 passing touchdowns that you would expect for Baker Mayfield at that volume, at his career pass touchdown rate.

Let's go with DJ Moore's lowest number over the last four years, which would be 25% share. That would get him to seven touchdowns this year. If Baker Mayfield, if Baker Mayfield is quarterback, I'm projecting him for seven touchdowns. Yes. And if he projected for seven touchdowns, he would be a top 12 wide receiver.

Now, do it for Jimmy Garoppolo, just in case Garoppolo is that guy. I think his is maybe even better. Garoppolo's been insanely efficient, and we've mostly just given all that credit to Kyle Shanahan. He has an exactly 5% touchdown rate for his career. So that would be 30 touchdowns. Well, these are the two quarterbacks that I think are in line to potentially move on to Carolina. We've talked about how their offensive line quietly got better this offseason.

Christian McCaffrey's healthy to begin the year. There could be some serious unlocking here if the Panthers give DJ Moore. I guess it's more about them giving their passing game more opportunities in the red zone. It's not more opportunities. They're throwing 600 passes. They just need to throw the ball somewhere within 15 yards of the wide receiver. They need to get into the green zone.

The only concern I would have is that I know Matt Rule really wants to, not the only concern, but a concern. Matt Rule is a run-first coach. I think he fired his offensive coordinator last year because they wanted to be more run-heavy. So I'm not sure if we can give them the same amount of pass attempts. No, but I would be way more excited about DJ Moore if he had a competent quarterback. They did throw 550 times in 16 games in 2020.

So if you wanted to say 550, we're still looking at 27 touchdowns. If I projected DJ Moore, if all I did was change his touchdowns to seven, and I've got him at five, which seems stupid. He's never scored more than four. At seven touchdowns next year, changing nothing else,

he would be my wide receiver nine between Mike Evans and Debo Samuel. He also has six catches in his career of 50 or more yards. In that same stretch the last four years, Cooper Cup has eight catches of 50 or more yards. So I bring this up because sometimes catches, you know, touchdowns is not just about the quarterback. It's about can you make an explosive play to get into the end zone.

DJ Moore has shown that he can be an explosive receiver, especially two years ago. His catch rate was low, but his yards per catch was super high. His ADOT was higher. So I think people love DJ Moore. If he can just get a good quarterback, there's a ton of potential. All right, guys. I'm sorry for taking time with my stats there.

I'll give you guys each one more. Dave, give me one last stat. Let's talk about the Jets running back because everybody's excited about Brees Hall going there. Last jets had the second highest pass run ratio rate for passing they threw the ball 63.3 percent of the time while also also excuse me fifth lowest in plays per game at 60.9 plays per game jets running backs totaled 14 carries from inside the three all year that was better than league average but their conversion rate rate would rank 22nd. They only scored six touchdowns from inside the three. The Jets running backs had 130 total targets last year, but 60 of them,

nearly half of them, came from quarterbacks other than Zach Wilson. Last year, Wilson averaged 5.4 targets per game just to running backs. That was 24th among passers, nearly a full target per game below average, and yet it was the highest for him on a per-game basis over his last three seasons playing football. At BYU, he threw targets to his running backs even more sparingly than this. Case in point being, I'm worried about Brees Hall's upside as a receiver out of the back

field we know that he can catch I'm not sure if Zach Wilson's the guy who's going to look for him time after time after time interest yeah that's that's a huge one I just all those catches came with other quarterbacks so many of those catches came with other quarterbacks I do want to point out the Jets were 13th in situation neutral pace so they were not I do want to point out the Jets were 13th in situation neutral pace. So they were not a slow team, even though they ran the fifth fewest plays, as Dave mentioned.

I think that's just because they sucked so much. They weren't a slow team. But Heath, what's your reaction to all those stats from Dave? Yeah, I don't know what to make of the Jets in terms of of run pass rate i would expect they'll throw a little bit more it's not that unusual with a young quarterback especially and the fact that they had those injuries to be a lower pass rate i think that comes up no they were a high pass rate he they threw the ball hot three percent of the time i would guess that'll come down then anything that's that extreme is going to come to the middle a little bit. But Wilson's, from what I remember, and this could be wrong,

didn't his running back target rate go up a little bit when he came back from the injury? I don't know. I don't remember. Not in a significant way. Right. It's not like they said, wow, Michael Carter was an amazing receiver last year. Let's bake that into the game plan.

And Zach Wilson's like, yeah, I'll do it. It didn't happen with Mike Wade and Joe Flacco. When you say not in a significant way, he was one target below average last year per game. So if it went up half a target per game, that would be significant, right? Not in a significant way that really changed the PPR value of the running backs, I'd say. You know, I mean, when you look at Michael, I'll look now, because this is obviously, I don't remember,

but if you look at Michael Carter and Ty Johnson, so when Zach Wilson came back, I mean, last four games of the year for Michael Carter after his return from an injury, he had nine targets. It's possible. Do we know the week? Do you have the week that Zach Wilson came back? Yeah, because you can look it up easily.

He came back. That's right. I'm asking you to do my work for me. Week 12. All right, so week 12 at the end of the year. Yeah, there were two games where, there were three games where Ty Johnson had four or more targets, including a seven target game against the Saints. So maybe it was just that it was divvied up.

But yeah, there were some, I guess, encouraging signs for Ty Johnson. It was weird, though, late as well, because there were one, two, three, four different games where Zach Wilson threw 24 or fewer passes when he came back. So I'd be more interested in the target rate than the total number of targets. But anyway, targets are a concern for Brees Hall because Michael Carter, that's probably the only place he gets to play. Ty Johnson too, right?

I mean, good fact. I swear, if Ty Johnson is touching the ball on offensive plays when they have Brees Hall and Michael Carter... Would you rather have Brees Hall or Cam Akers? Hall. I'm probably going to go Hall. I think I have Akers slightly ahead,

but Dave convinced me that Cam Akers is terrible. Kids in the Brees Hall or Ezekiel Elliott Zeke what do you think about the team name kids in the Brees Hall yeah kids in the hall like what you could do better than that what do you how many touches a

game do you think Zeke is getting if because they told us that OTAs they clocked him at 21 miles an hour 22 miles an hour or whatever. He was really, really fast. They're talking about how good he looks. Let's say they go through training camp and everybody on the Cowboys continues to think, Zeke is back.

How many touches per game is he getting until he shows that he's not back? What's his role if everybody on the team through training camp thinks that? 16 touches per game until he's not back like what's his role if if everybody on the team through training camp 16 16 touches per game until he's not back and if they think he's not back and that could be by week four that'll get dialed down to 10 to 12 we'll call it 11 oh wow like he was

trent richardson bad down the stretch last year and he was getting 16 right i don't know if it was 16 i think it was a little lower than that i can double check i do have that Trent Richardson bad down the stretch last year and he was getting 16, right? I don't know if it was 16. I think it was a little lower than that. I can double check. I do have that. I also have the Jets target numbers from week 12 on last year. They were third worst in the NFL.

They're running backs and targets with 21. They caught all 21 of them. 21 targets. I would like to. I'm sorry. I don't know if they caught all. Wait a minute. Yeah, it looks like 21 targets. I would like to... I'm sorry, I don't know if they caught all. Wait a minute. Yeah, it looks like 21 targets. I think Zeke's getting 20 touches a game

if they think he's back. Well, he's got to prove it. Weeks one, two, three, I bet he gets to 20 if he's feeling it in a game. Third quarter of a game, and he's had a bunch of explosive runs. Hell yeah, he's going to get to 20 touches. I'd like to point out he had 12 catches in the two games that Amari Cooper missed, with CeeDee Lamb missing half of one of those games, too.

You said from week 12 through 18, they only had 21 targets? They were 21 catches. It must be 21 catches. I'm looking at True Media, and they've got the same number of targets and catches for every team, as if to say that every running back had a 100% catch rate from Week 12 on last year. So let's call it 21 catches. You've got a higher target number? No. I was just – that seemed – I don't have a target number yet. I was trying to find a target percentage, and he threw 202 passes.

If it was really 21 targets, then that would be a terrible, even worse than the Rams last year, target rate. It's not. There are definitely more targets than that. I just told you what Ty Johnson did. But anyway, Ezekiel Elliott, I think, has a chance for more catches this year just told you what Ty Johnson did. But anyway, Ezekiel Elliott, I think, has a chance. Why would it be like that?

For more catches this year, because when Cooper was out, he had 14 targets in those two games, and one of them went to overtime, but 12 catches on 14 targets. Also, I forgot to say the results of this, but I did look up the pass-blocking grades for Zeke and Pollard.

We brought this up on yesterday's show and I forgot to say, Pollard actually had a higher grade than Ezekiel Elliott. Both of them were outside the top 100 in pass-blocking last year, according to PFF, among just halfbacks, but Zeke was not a good pass-blocker. I really don't know what to make of that.

Pollard's metrics were better than Zeke's across the board. Almost every single metric was better than Zeke's last year. Right. But this specifically, when we're talking about pass blocking grade, the Cowboys coaching staff obviously believed to the very end that Zeke was doing a much better job than Pollard in pass blocking. They continued to play him a lot more in those situations.

Yeah, they both had a decent amount of blocks. So I powert had 61 pass blocks is that the right column here yeah and zeke had a lot more 117 but 61 is not an insignificant number so they both were on the field in those situations but zeke had a lot yeah 117 is a lot in their last 11 games where they play together this is week 6 through 13 weeks 15 17, and the playoff game where they both played, this is after Zeke hurt his knee in week 5. That's what we've been led to believe. Zeke averaged 15.5 touches per game. Pollard averaged 11.1. Zeke averaged 60.3 total yards per game. Pollard averaged 60.4 total yards per game. Zeke had five more touchdowns. And look, if Zeke's efficiency fail last year was because of the torn PCL, if it really was because of that, and he's healed up and he's as good as new, then he's going to prove to be one of the better bargains on draft day. But it has to be because of that exact reason. It can't be because of anything else. And he's got of anything else and he's got to prove it

he's got to prove it to everybody right now i would take obviously i'm taking him at pollard i'll take him one spot ahead of breeze hall speaking of breeze hall it was 38 targets for the jets and they only caught 21 passes last year from week 12 on 38 targets 38 targets still below league average league average was 40 well yes but i what i would say and that's this is where i think um share and versus total number that really leans on that slow pace that you talked about and their low number of offensive plays because 38 divided by the 202 passes they threw 18.8 percent 19.9 percent was league median. So it's right below that. Just, yeah,

right there in the range. It's just, and that's something I've talked about. Like, when we have first-year play callers, slow teams, really slow teams

often happen. We saw it with San Jose. They weren't slow, though. They weren't slow. They were 13th in situation-neutral pace. They just ran a very few amount of plays

because they stunk. The situation became un-neutral. And last thing, sorry to keep because they stunk. The situation became unneutral. And last thing, sorry to keep going back to this. You're trying to figure out, did Zach Wilson, when he came back from injury, did he throw to his running backs more? It seems like he did, but Elijah

Moore and Corey Davis missed all of those games. So that's right. Elijah Moore and Corey Davis missed every game from week 12 to 18? Week 12. Corey Davis played once and Elijah Moore played I think missed every game from week 12, 13 week 12. Corey Davis played once and Elijah Moore played, I think twice. Sorry.

I thought it was week 14. Uh, Elijah Moore, they all, they missed every game from week 14 on. So they played a combined three games, uh, you know,

two for more one for Davis from week 12 on. So it's just, you know, there's just too many factors here. There's too many factors. It's hard to come away with something concrete. All right. And we got into a lot of Dallas running back talk there too.

So I'm sorry, Heath, going to just read the emails here and we'll finish the show. Well, they're much more important than my fantastic Doug Peterson tight end stat. Nobody needs to know that. It's pro Evan Ingram. I can't believe you'd cut that out. You really? I'm pretty much done with him. All right.

This is from Jay. 10 team. Finally get out of purgatory. 10 team. Yeah. 10 team non PPR league. By the way, I mentioned the Panthers were 31st and passing touchdowns last year.

Can you guess the team that was 32nd? Jacksonville Giants. Jacksonville. 10 team non PPR league. Iville. Giants. Jacksonville. 10-team non-PPR league. I have the fourth pick. We have keepers, so all of the good running backs always get kept. But this year, I have Dalvin Cook, who I can keep,

or I can try going for Mixon. I'm torn because I like Mixon, but I just don't know what to think about Dalvin Cook. So would you keep Dalvin, or basically throw him back, have the fourth pick, and hope to get Mixon. It's a two running back, two wide receiver league. It is non-PPR. Doug Peterson's Eagles targeted tight ends at a 34% rate

his last three years in Philadelphia. No team last year was over 30%. And remember, Doug Peterson, before those three years, was the reason we all thought we should draft Trey Burton. And we were wrong. Right. No, when he left Doug Peterson, we drafted those three years was the reason we all thought we should draft Trey Burton. And we were wrong, right? No,

when he left Doug Peterson, we've drafted Trey Burton because he got away from Zach hurts. He went to the Colts. Remember he was going to be a thing. Oh, okay. Yeah. So I do.

I remember the bears first before the Colts. Would you keep, would you just keep Dalvin cook or would you take a shot at getting Joe Mixon? I'd keep Dalvin. I would rather have Joe Mixon than Dalvin Cook or would you take a shot at getting Joe Mixon? I'd keep Dalvin. I would rather have Joe Mixon than Dalvin Cook. But you're not guaranteed to get him. Right.

Well, if you throw Dalvin Cook back, then that's two of the four players that could be drafted. Yeah, I guess I'd want to know who the other two players who could be there. All right, so here's the deal. These are the types of questions that really apply to everyone. They rank Mixon ahead of Cook. Yes. But if you don't feel like you can definitely get Mixon,

then just play it safe and keep Cook. This is from Matt Z in Wisconsin. I'm in an offline dynasty startup league. I have Tyree Kill, DK Metcalf, and Cortland Sutton. Here is a list of a few guys I'm considering for my next wide receiver. What are your thoughts? Now, this is fun. We get to pick for him. Amari Cooper, Brandon Cooks, Darnell Mooney, Gabe Davis, Chris Olave,

Jameson Williams, Jahan Dotson, and Christian Watson in a startup dynasty league. If it's an offline dynasty league, that means you keep track of it with newspapers and pencil and paper, phone calls between everybody. Hey, congrats, you won this week. According to USA Today. All right. It's got to be the Tuesday paper.

Who are you going to go with here? I like the receivers that you have already with Hill, Metcalf, and Sutton. I don't think you need another veteran-wide receiver if it's a dynasty league. I'm kind of cuckoo for Gabriel Davis, so I might lean that way. But if you wanted to go with a rookie, I wouldn't blame you one bit for taking Jamison Williams, putting him on your bench, and then adding him to this group of receivers late this year slash next year. Mooney is my highest ranked in Dynasty,

so I'll take Mooney. This is from Ryan, longtime listener of FFT from all the way from England. This year, we're doing a twist to our salary cap. Three-team league. Three teams. Six quarterbacks. This is how many you have to start.

Six quarterbacks, eight running backs, 10 wide receivers, and you have to start seven tight ends, and you have 30 players on the bench. Any tips for such a weird, low-team, deep league? I would make it best ball. I sound like the perfect league for best ball. Well, either way, I i mean how do you draft you've got to go after the superstars at each position but there are probably prioritized tight ends you got to start seven tight ends but here's the

thing right so keep in mind you there are only 24 starting running backs right eight per team there are only 30 starting wide receivers. That's not that deep into the pool, but there are 18 starting quarterbacks and 21 starting tight ends. That's much deeper into those pools. So, you know, how do you adjust? Seems like tight end

really needs to be a priority. Yes. Yeah. Okay. But also, keep in mind with tight end that once you get to a certain point of the rankings they're kind of all the same they're all the same that's when you pivot back to every other position i don't know what you're laughing at and you know what i'm not even going to give you the satisfaction of telling us what you're laughing at i'll tell you when you hit stop on that okay i Okay, I'll accept that. Juju Smith-Schuster had 648

yards after catch in 2018. He has 706 in the three years since. How does that help the people who are in three-team salary cap leagues? This is from... I don't have a name, Dave. Where's he from? Telling listeners where they're at. Bill from Delaware! That's just Dave Richard's Dave. Where's he from? Telling listeners where they're at.

Bill from Delaware. That's just Dave Richard Stats. Where's he from? It's Stan from Effingham, Illinois. Dear Terry, Kevin, Scott, and Randy. NWO, Dave. I just get very upset when you don't know wrestling stuff sure terry we just decided one brother our draft order in our 12 team super flex league i have the 11th pick super flex all my mocks are

showing that naji harris derrick henry dalvin cook jefferson chase and kelsey are there so are dak prescott russell wilson and jalen Out of these players, who would you pick? The quarterbacks would be Prescott, Wilson, and Hurts. The running backs are Najee, Derrick Henry, Dalvin Cook. And then you have Jefferson, Chase, and Kelsey. Pick two players out of that group in a super flex league. In PPR, I would go Jefferson and Hurts. In non-PPR, I would go Jefferson and Hurts. In non-PPR, I would go Henry and Hurts.

I think Hurts is among the best. I still like Wilson. I'd take one of those quarterbacks and target Jefferson slash Henry if it's PPR or non-PPR. DJ Missile has a birthday today. Happy birthday. I'm not going to read your entire name there,

but DJ, DJ, did you know since the start of the 2019 season, 29 players have earned at least 300 targets and Deontay Johnson ranks 28th in yards per target, 26th in yards per catch and 23rd in yards per game. How about his catch rate is 63% and most of his throws are inside of 10 yards. And it is Johannes' birthday too.

I'm sorry, I can't pronounce your name. Happy birthday to everybody out there who's celebrating a birthday. You know, all those stats about Deontay Johnson. Who were we talking about yesterday? Gosh. And today it was DJ Moore. When you look at it, DJ Moore's catch rate last year was 57%.

It was 56% the year before. The year before, though, he had a very high ADOT. Last year it was much lower. That just tells me that quarterback play really matters in this um i think all these bad stats about deontay johnson might be a lot might have a lot to do with quarterback play unfortunately the catch rate one's a hard sell because ben the last two years has completed 65 percent of his passes um i don't know man i just feel like Deontay Johnson is much better than that. Whoever was I reading that he's one of the best at separating?

Somebody was saying he's one of the best. Yeah, there's definitely... I think PFF or somebody else really, every year has Deontay ranked really high in certain things. And it's possible at some point his statistics will start to bear it out um but i like where do we think he ranks like would you say he's as talented or as good as a wide receiver as dj moore or terry mcclern i have no idea no i'd say he's a little behind them but not

too far behind them that's kind of how i was meaning as well. DK Metcalf? No. I think DK is extraordinarily talented, but I've always been very high on him. Yeah. I think DK is more athlete than nuanced receiver. He's not as good a wide receiver as Amari Cooper for sure. He might be at this point, but not in his prime. No, I would agree. I would agree.

He might. I mean, Cooper's old or oldish. But no. Yeah, but those are all really good wide receivers. DJ, he's definitely better. He's better than his stats. Is he as good as Adam Thielen?

Adam Thielen now? I don't know how to answer that, honestly. He's better than Adam Thielen now now is he as good as darnell mooney i would think he's better i would think i think he's probably better we'll see like mooney mooney a lot of mooney is right place right i think he's better than marquise brown personally but i don't know is he better than mike williams i would say yes i would think yes but dave and i don't really love mike williams that much you guys hate him so much it's actually catching the football it's really hard to answer this alan robinson i would think it i've never been better than robinson right now i've never thought that alan robinson since towards acl basically has been

a special player. He is a possession receiver. He makes basically nothing after the catch. He just catches a lot of targets. He's good, but he's not special. His route running is good. He can make plays after the catch, but so can he.

No, not really, though. That's the thing. No, he can on a slant route or a dig route, something like that. He hasn't been very... You can see Alan Robinson gain some yards after the catch. Yeah.

But yeah, he's, he turns a lot of targets into contested catches because I have read that Deontay Johnson's really good after the catch, but I don't think that really shows up in the stats either. I would show up in the stats if he had, if he was playing with a really good quarterback. Do you know over? It's true. His first three years in the stats if he was playing with a really good quarterback. Do you know, over his first three years in the league,

do you think that he might break more tackles if he was playing with... See, I don't think Ben's problem was inaccuracy within five yards. It was just that he couldn't do anything besides throw at five yards. They're so easy to defend, though. He's playing on an offense that is so easy to defend. They have basically no vertical threat. They have a completely immobile quarterback. Right. So your linebackers do not have to honor Ben Roethlisberger at all. And that can't be good for somebody who's making a lot of plays in the short and intermediate areas. Right. It's not like it's not like there's a quarterback spy that frees up some space for the wide receiver. I don't really know if I even know what I'm talking about, but that's the thing about football. You're right. I don't know how this compares to any other wide receiver, but it's fun, especially when you're talking about bad Deontay Johnson stats.

Deontay Johnson has more drops than broken tackles in the NFL. So broken tackles, you look at Devontae Adams' broken tackles, at least on pro football reference, it's very low. Broken tackles are, to me, the most subjective stat. What really counts as a broken tackle? I don't know.

What's a drop? Well, a drop, remember he had, but he had that horrible stretch where he got benched. He got benched a couple years ago because he was dropping it. Did he have a lot of drops last year? I don't know. Did he have a lot of drops last year? I don't know.

Did he have a lot of drops last year? We weren't talking about it last year, so my guess is that he didn't have a lot of drops. Right. For him, that's really good. That's not so bad on his targets, is it? He does have more broken tackles than Devontae Adams.

Right. Again, these are stats that shouldn't necessarily make a difference for perimeter receivers. And the drop certainly for receivers that get, you know, a hundred plus targets over the course of a year. We have learned nothing in the last eight minutes, but it was fun.

Let me tell you one thing. If the one thing that Pickett and Trubisky can do that I already know they can do that Roethlisberger late, late era Roethlisberger couldn't do, is move. Those guys aren't necessarily threats to run, but they can escape a pocket. They can move outside the pocket. They can call more bootlegs out of the pocket.

That could buy an extra second of time, and Deontay Johnson can get a step on a defensive back. Yeah, it could work out if those guys can accurately throw to the exact right place where they need to to connect with Deontay Johnson. As a lifelong fan of Mitch Trubisky, let me tell you, he cannot. Right.

But Pickett showed that he was a little hot and cold in that area, too. He was okay throwing on the run. That both Trubisky and Pickett, while you're right, they will move and break outside of the pocket, that they won't see Deontay because their eyes are going to be looking

at where they're running. Well, Deontay could be to that side of the field. They're right-handed quarterbacks. Deontay could lines up to the right plenty. So I don't know if that's necessarily true, but they could be looking, they could be looking shorter. There's been a lot of the last 10 minutes that we're not sure is necessarily true.

There's a lot of uncertainty around him. And there's a lot to not like, even though he, you know, doused himself in the cologne of targets the last two years. Every year there's a new answer for who's the best wide receiver in football. So nobody really knows, right?

I mean, it's been Michael Thomas, it's been Devontae Adams, Cooper Cupp, you know, it could be Justin Jefferson, Jamarja, whoever. It's just so hard, it's been Devontae Adams, Cooper Kopp. It could be Justin Jefferson, Jamar Jett, whoever. It's just so hard to evaluate these guys. We'll see. Two of the best wide receivers in football have new quarterbacks this year, so we'll see what kind of impact that has. I will say that Terry McLaurin has more broken tackles than drops in his career.

Well, that's good. DJ Moore has one more broken tackle than drop. So those are definitely better. That's our new measurement. Broken tackle to drop ratio. My favorite stats next year are going to be the top 30 wide receivers in broken tackles divided by drops. Jamar Chase is definitely the best wide receiver in football.

If he wasn't last year, he will absolutely be this year and probably for the next five years. It is settled. He's really good. Yes. He's going to do things that no one else can do. Jamar Chase did have more drops than broken tackles last year. I stand corrected.

Jamar Chase is a borderline top 15 wide receiver based on that metric. All right. Thanks, everybody. We'll talk to you tomorrow on fantasy football today