Fantasy Football Today - FFT Dynasty - Updated Quarterback and Tight End Rankings Revealed! (05/31 Dynasty Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: May 31, 2024

Welcome to Fantasy Football Today Dynasty! In this episode, host Heath Cummings is joined by Dan Schneier for an exciting and insightful discussion. Heath reveals his QB and TE rankings, breaking them down into four segments: QB Rankings 1-12 (1:20), QB Rankings 13-24 (15:15), TE Rankings 1-12 (26:20), and TE Rankings 13-24 (36:30). Tune in for expert analysis, valuable insights, and actionable advice to help you dominate your dynasty leagues. Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs Follow the brand new FFT TikTok account: https://www.tiktok.com/@fftoday Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday Get 20% off Fantasy Football Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-football-today%20?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-football-collection Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter You can listen to Fantasy Football Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast." To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Miller Lite. The light beer brewed for people who love the taste of beer and the perfect pairing for your game time. When Miller Lite set out to brew a light beer. They had to choose great taste or 90 calories per can. They chose both because they knew the best part of beer is the beer. Your game time tastes like Miller time. Learn more at MillerLite.ca. Must be legal drinking age. Welcome to Fantasy Football Today, Dynasty. I am your host, Heath Cummings. I'm here with Dan Schneier.

Dan, welcome back to the show. We always miss you when you're gone for a few weeks. I'm glad to be back. I love talking Dynasty football with you. A few of my friends were like, when are you joining Dynasty again? I was like, actually today. They asked me today. I was like, actually today.

And I'm excited because I get to talk quarterbacks, tight ends. Quarterback's probably my favorite position to discuss in Dynasty, so I'm very excited to talk some football with you and get back in the mix. We are going to talk quarterback rankings 1 through 24. We'll talk tight end rankings 1 through 24. We'll do kind of the same thing we did at running back and wide receiver where Dan can tell us who he's higher on than me, Dan. I framed it as your guy in the rundown,

but we'll basically just show the top 12 and you say, you know what? I love this guy, especially at this cost. Or you can just say, man, Heath, you're an idiot. Why are you so low on this guy? And because we're going to go through two different positions, we're just going to jump right into it before the break here with qb 1 through 12 and we'll just make people mad right off the start because josh allen is not in my top two qb1 patrick mahomes qb2 jalen hertz then josh Jalen Hurts, then Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, CJ Stroud, Joe Burrow, Anthony Richardson,

Kyler Murray, Justin Herbert, Caleb Williams, Jaden Daniels, and Brock Purdy. Again, the top 12 quarterbacks for me in Dynasty, Mahomes, Hurts, Allen, Jackson, Stroud, Burrow, Richardson, Murray, Herbert, Williams, Daniels, Purdy. burrow richardson murray herbert williams daniels purdy i think i know the answer to this question dan but who's your guy in these rankings well i'm not sure you know the answer because i think you think you know the answer based on some of the rookie drafts we've done and he is one of my guys and my guy for sure but my real guy in this rankings based on where he's ranked and not just where you rank him heath but where i've been able to get him in some dynasty startups we've done. And even some redrafts is Justin Herbert.

That's my, my guy on this list, Justin Herbert. I, this is the, for me, prime time to buy Justin Herbert. And I think that a lot about Justin Herbert's rookie season.

When I think about why I want to buy him now and why I see him as such a value rookie season, didn't have her Sean Slater. Honestly, at the same time had about two, three injuries on the offensive line, if I can remember. They were ranked second or third worst offensive line in the entire NFL. And yet, Justin Herbert threw 31 touchdowns and 4,600 yards.

And he did so with guys like Tyler Guyton. I'm sorry, Jalen Guyton. Three touchdowns, 511 yards, Jalen Guyton, Tyron Johnson. So I was thinking of three touchdowns, three touchdowns at Donald Parham lit it up for 31 touchdowns. Now everyone's assuming that, Oh wait, Keenan Allen's gone. Mike Williams is gone. Yeah. Those were his two leading receivers that year, but no one topped a thousand yards that season. And what I'm looking at when I think of this draft class and how it impacts Justin Herbert is why are we so down on the decision to pass on a wide receiver? It's not like they went up and drafted an Aaron Donald type of defensive tackle. No, they drafted Joe Alt, who by all means is a better pass protector

than run blocker from what I've seen on film. In addition to being the 10th most athletic offensive tackle in the history of the combine, that's over a thousand people have ever tested at the combine. We could be looking at one of the best one, two offensive tackle tandems in the NFL with Joe Alt and Rashawn Slater heading into 2024. That's going to have an impact on the play action passing game. That's going to have impact on the offense overall. I think it's trending up for Justin Herbert, despite all the, you know, scared money when it comes to Jim Harbaugh joining that offense and what it's going to do for it.

I think there's going to be play action opportunities. I think his arm talent is undeniable. And if he's fully healthy for the first time in three years, Heath, we could see more of the running that we saw early in his career. Cause he is an athletic prospect as well, especially off play action with some bootleg action and some opportunities there to get out on the outside, use his legs zone, read in the red zone, things of that nature with Greg Roman in there.

And we've seen that all with Lamar Jackson as well. So if there's even a little uptick in the rushing yards and the red zone, things of that nature with Greg Roman in there. And we've seen that all with Lamar Jackson as well. So if there's even a little uptick in the rushing yards and the red zone rushing, in addition to what I think we're going to get from him, just from an efficiency standpoint, I think we're going to be talking about him next year in the top five of the quarterbacks again. And yet right now you can buy him really low. So he's my, if we're talking about my guy, that's my guy. I love it. Now, Miguel says in the chat concern,

Herbert will have a few dud games with an easy schedule. They might gain a lead and run the ball to death. Mr. Popinski says, fade Greg Roman. It's simple. What about with Lamar? Well, is Justin Herbert going to run for 1,000 yards? Probably not. That is the thing.

And it has, for me, way less to do with the passing on a wide receiver in round one although i do think he has one of the definitely the worst set of pass catchers he's ever had in his career and a bottom 10 in the nfl uh maybe bottom five like it's it's really bad um unless lad mcconkey just shows up and is immediately a good number one wide receiver otherwise the best pass catcher is josh palmer or will disley or like maybe quentin johnston is going to turn into but like it's a really terrible receiving core and that's not even the thing that scares me the most it's that when you look at greg roman's offenses there's one year out of 10 where he did not finish 28th or worse in team pass attempts. And you compare that to Justin Herbert, who over the last two seasons has

averaged 39.5 pass attempts per game. Now you mentioned the efficiency, and I think that's where the room is. We've seen Brock Purdy in the 49ers offense be just like eight and a half, nine yards per attempt. He can be a good fantasy starter even without throwing the ball 35 times a game. Herbert's efficiency as a passer is just flat out mediocre. Career 7.1 yards per pass attempt, 4.7% touchdown rate. Just very, very close to average. Now, maybe that's because he threw so many passes to Austin Eckler and that hurt the efficiency numbers because he does have a high completion rate. I do think there's a hope that the play action stuff,

they run the ball so effectively that he can just have a wildly efficient season. And that's maybe not priced into my rankings, but I also think he, like if he throws the ball 580 times, I think I'll be surprised. Yeah. I don't think that any of that was unfair heath i think

one thing that you brought up though that i didn't want to touch on is the efficiency aspect because i do think there's a different level of efficiency coming from that offense that lombardi offense where everything was checked down to austin eckler versus this type of offense which i think i don't know but i think it's going to be when i mean efficiency it's going to be a lot of running play action and vertical shots off the play action and that gets back to a little bit well that's the question has to be josh palmer who has to be utilized in a different way and he was a vertical receiver at tennessee that's what i really liked about him is deep ball tracking and then quinton johnson who was supposed to be a vertical receiver

has not proven so yet but was a vertical receiver at tcu could potentially get back to that level but the idea is that there will be vertical op. There will be opportunities in the vertical game based off of the run game and the play action and the way that the system is set up. And a lot of ways it reminds me kind of what I, at least I'm hoping for what we saw his rookie season. It was a different system before Lombardi got there was better for him. He was taking those vertical shots downfield. He was utilizing that rare arm talent that he has. And I know he has, I still think when I watch him play football, he, if I look at this list of quarterbacks, if I'm taking, starting an NFL franchise, there's, there's really only four or five guys that I would take over him to start

an NFL franchise right now for what I'm trying to build an NFL franchise around, which is that kind of arm talent, that ability to fit tight windows, to make throws all levels of the field. That may be a problem for dynasty, at least for year one, but I think ultimately they're going to shape this offense around Herbert. I know that's a big debate right now. Will they shape it around Harbaugh's image and Roman's image and how they've done it in the past, or will they shape it around the quarterback they have?

I just tend to believe, and maybe this is too much cautious optimism or just bias, I don't know, but I believe that he went there, there harbaugh because of herbert and i don't think they're going to neuter his skill set but we'll see what happens there all right so we do have a rankings debate involving maybe a quarterback that actually has a worse receiving core than justin herbert now yeah it's jalen hertz versus josh allen. And I know that after Joe Brady took over the offense, Josh Allen was still awesome for fantasy. He also ran for 15 touchdown passes last year, or 15 rushing touchdowns last year.

We don't expect that to happen. He lost Diggs. He lost Gabe Davis. They've replaced him with Keon Coleman and MVS and Curtis Samuel. That's basically it, right? Not exactly exciting. And I do expect, I think first off, like, where are you on Allen versus Hertz? And then these guys are 28 and 26 for a, or will be week one for a pocket passer, true pocket passer, that age doesn't really

matter that much to me that two year difference probably doesn't matter, but does it matter when so much of their production has come on the ground? That's a great question. And I think you have to look at each individual sometimes because there's, it's always been the debate, at least in my mind with Derrick Henry, right? Derrick Henry should have been done by now by a long time from now. I mean, he's had the workload, he's had the hits, but he's kind of that athletic freak. And I almost view Josh Allen in that sense, six foot five, just an absolute freak of an athlete. I'm not so sure I'd view Jalen hurts in that sense, to be completely honest, based on his frame and based on his

athleticism, he's done a good job converting to rushing touchdowns, a lot to do with, you know, the way the Eagles have found a way to kind of game the system in some ways. And maybe that will still be there. Maybe that won't with Jason Kelsey retired. We don't know yet. We, that remains to be seen, but I think I have to look at that individually based on the player. And I have a little bit more confidence in, in kind of betting on that outlier. Like we got with Derek Henry Josh Allen. That, again, feels risky even to just say out loud, Heath. But I will say this. In the debate, Josh Allen versus Jalen Hurts, for me, it is no debate. I have Josh Allen considerably higher than Hurts.

Hurts would not even be my QB3. Personally, I have some reservations with Hurts. And, you know, we all do things differently in the fantasy industry. I have different ways of evaluating. You have different ways of evaluating. One way I evaluate is based on the tape. That's the main way I lean on. And there are big concerns. I have that. I think Jalen hurts. We'll be able to answer this year, Heath, but I'm not certain he'll be able to answer. And I know that with Josh Allen,

I don't have those concerns and I don't have any questions to answer. So here's the questions I'm going to need Jalen hurts to answer. What I'm going to need to answer is this around the midpoint season. Last week, we heard Bosa, uh, not Joey, Nick Bosa, the 49ers say, look, there's a way to beat Jalen Hurts. Watch the tape of what we just did against the Eagles. This game, what you do is you don't rush him the way you rush every other passer. You rush them in a certain way that doesn't open up the B gap and the a gap for this quarterback to run through the middle and take that A gap or that B gap. And after that, from that point on, we saw Jalen Hurts struggle a lot. We saw the Eagles often struggle a lot against teams that weren't very good, like the Giants and some of these other teams that found a way to completely shut down their offense. Because when you don't, when you

rush the passer in a certain way that doesn't allow for the A gap or the B gap to be run through. And this is a problem that Justin Fields has had. Daniel Jones has had now Jalen hurts as well. What it does is it requires the quarterback to win from the pocket as a true pocket passer, utilizing the middle of the field because you're taking away the outs. That's where Jalen hurts does his best work outside the numbers. Now he has to win in the middle of the field with timing based precision and velocity and accuracy, or his other option is because there's no a gap or B gap anymore, the way they're rushing the passer to roll out to his right. And we saw that a lot with Jalen Hertz. And what does that do? It cuts off half the field and it makes it really difficult to

keep an offense moving. So I need that question answered personally, Heath. And I want to see that answered on tape this year. I think he will answer that. My guess is he will answer that, but I don't have that question with Josh Allen. I don't have the question with a couple other guys on this list. So I'm a little bit scared of Jalen Hurts moving forward. I am not as high on him as other people are. I know the points have been there. The production has been there. The fantasy production is there. We can look at history and say, why would we not have him two or three based on what he's done? But I want to see what he's going to do moving forward. And that's where I'm a little less concerned. I do like that they have the receivers locked up the offensive line. It does scare me a little bit because Jason Kelsey retired and Lane Johnson is very close

to retirement there. And at some point, the salary cap bubble has to break that. I don't know how heavy Roseman does what he does. Heath, I don't really understand it. But at some point when you're loading up across the board on the roster with all these new contracts, at some point, someone's going to have to get cut. We saw this happen with Dallas when they had to move on from Amari Cooper as well. So we'll see what happens there, Heath,

but I have my concerns with Hertz. Let's take a short break and we'll get into QB 13 through 24. I am so dreading groceries this week. Why? You can skip it. Oh, what? Just like that?

Just like that. How about dinner with my third cousin? Skip it. Prince Fluffy's favorite treats? Skable midnight snacks skip my neighbor's nightly saxophone practices uh nope you're on your own there could have skipped it should have skipped it skip to the good part and get groceries meals and more delivered right to your door on skip. Metrolinks and Crosslinks are reminding everyone to be careful as Eglinton Crosstown LRT train testing is in progress. Please be alert as trains can pass at any time on the tracks.

Remember to follow all traffic signals. Be careful along our tracks and only make left turns where it's safe to do so. Be alert, be aware, and stay safe. Two more days and I get to watch Mayor of Kingstown. I can't wait. It's going to be fantastic. Oh my gosh, you got to get caught up

so you're ready for the next season. It's spectacular. Alright, QB 13 through 24. Do you share any concerns on Hertz, or is that not a possibility for you? No, I also have, like I said, I have concerns about him and Alan. Alan Moore receiving goal based? What? Is Alan Moore, yeah.

And, I mean, a lot of his production last year was rushing touchdowns right i i'm not sure that he has basically one season as a truly elite passer um and he's got some really good passing seasons with 600 yards rushing i think the argument that you made about alan's body and being able to just handle the beating that he's taken, at this age, you could still make about Cam Newton. And that deteriorated very quickly. So I guess I don't have as much concern about C.J. Stroud. I have concerns about Lamar, too, and how his game's going to age. But Stroud just doesn't have the upside of Hertz or Allen or Jackson.

So they go higher in the rankings. I mostly think that blip in the second half last year for the Eagles, which you described very well, is something they will address. And I'm not that concerned about it. I think they had some pretty bad coaching last year. Yeah, the coordinator situation was not good. So I will give that. Let's get to QB 13 through 24.

Now, this is the point where i expect some wild disagreements especially from the chat once you get out of the top 12 at all it's happened at every position so far it'll definitely happen at tight end because who cares after top 12 but qb 13 through 24 to a tongue of ioloa trevor lawrence jj mccarthy jordan love bryce young dac prescott drake may Bryce Young, Dak Prescott, Drake May, Will Levis, Jared Goff, Justin Fields, Deshaun Watson, Aaron Rodgers. Again, that's QB 13 through 24. We've got Tua, Lawrence McCarthy, Love, Young, Prescott, May, Levis, Goff, Fields, Watson, Rodgers. Who's your guy in this section, Dan? I have some major disagreements as well. Do we want to do my guy first or my major disagreement?

No, I want you. I want to, I want to hear who you like. Okay. My positive. Start positive here. My two, my guys, according to a verse, consents are versus the rankings here. I'll start with the bottom of the list.

It's Drake May. This is a quarterback who I had a conviction on in his draft class. I watched so much of his tape at UNC, not just the the 2023 but the 2022 as well as a true freshman at at unc where he was just phenomenal when he actually had a good coordinator and he actually didn't lose 180 of his decent targets that he didn't have last season and his arm talent's phenomenal drake may but really it's his playmaking ability and don't don't sleep on his ability to impact fantasy football as a rusher he had 700 plus rushing yards and seven rushing touchdowns in 2022 as a freshman while going on a streak of 300 yard games from 300 yard games and five touchdowns for four games in

a row, breaking the ACC record. I think he's been kind of beaten down a little bit because of the footwork issues, but those are the things that were also kind of knocked for Josh Allen coming into the NFL. And that's the easiest thing to fix. What you can't fix is arm talent. Is the Patriots situation the best in the NFL? No, it's probably the worst he could have joined. But this is dynasty I'm talking about.

And I believe in the talent. And I believe that he's one of the best quarterback prospects that I've personally studied in recent classes. That doesn't mean he's at the level of a Trevor Lawrence or some of these great guys we've had, Joe Burrow. But compared to the guys like Bryce Young and some of those guys, I really think he's a step above. So he'd be my first. The other two I'm going to quickly touch on are Jordan Love. Love his situation around him. They've built so well around him.

I mean, no team drafts in the middle rounds at wide receiver like the Green Bay Packers can draft in the middle to late rounds at wide receiver. It's phenomenal. And then they also do things like draft Zach Tom out of Wake Forest in the fourth round. He's now one of the better right tackles in the NFL, especially in pass production. So I love the situation and I love some of the arm talent I saw from Jordan Love on tape last year, the ability to get the football out on time with velocity. Then finally, I'm not going to quit Trevor Lawrence yet, Heath. I just can't do it, especially when you give him a first round talent at wide receiver.

Again, like i just i the evaluation i had on him coming out of clemson it's still stuck in my mind maybe i have to get it out of my mind but i also remember two years ago not last year the year before this torrid stretchy had the raven it was like four good games in a row four great games who has never done that yeah exactly and two that was qb qb4 eight into last year, like half of a season as QB for pretty amazing. That is the guy I get the most hatred about is why do you have to so high? You shouldn't get the hatred for having to so high, especially with the weapons that

he has around him. My two issues are always when it comes to fantasy playoffs time and the weather turns, but that's one thing. But yeah, those would be the three guys. And then one guy I would say I have ranked a little bit higher than you have is jared goff especially after the contract extension so i immediately i get why the jordan love hatred heath and i'd probably try to get love and dac inside the top 12 um i am just i don't have anything against Jordan Love. I am a little bit skeptical of the way he did what he did last year. It was pretty touchdown rate based in terms of the fantasy production.

He had a 5.5% touchdown rate, which was much higher than you would have expected. He scored four rushing touchdowns and I think 50 rush attempts. Again, much higher than what you would have expected. And we've seen, like we've got what now, 24 games of it from Brock Birdie? Yes. Where he surprised

us with how good he was. We've got like 16 from Jordan Love. 17 maybe from Jordan Love. So I just need to see just a little bit more. And I think that Tua Lawrence Love Group is going, first off, I would say the difference between, even go up one more to Purdy, Purdy to Love is they're in a tier and it's a very tight tier. I wouldn't argue that strongly for anybody within that tier for me over the other one. But I'm not 100% sure that Tua, Trevor Lawrence, and Jordan Love are all just going to get these mega contracts and be starters. a little bit of risk still and i think it's especially for love if he doesn't start the first month of this next season the way that he did last year um and then i don't know you talked about how good they are at getting wide receivers and they've got a bunch of them like they've got

a bunch of guys that are at least wide receiver threes in an nfl offense i don't know that they have a number one and i'm not sure who i'm sure is a number two i have a i have a little bit higher i feel like they're all at the level of number two from what i've seen on at least from just my evaluation of what you're saying jayden reed christian watson and wicks and dobs like you're on tape was good at getting open that's two level for me now that it's not like the high end too it's not the Higgins of the world but it's the I can get open for you consistently within your offense help you stay on time as a quarterback let you get the ball out on time within the system and that will lead to yards yeah so yeah and then

as far as the Drake May stuff you were higher on him than I was before the draft. I was pretty clear that whoever, whatever quarterback landed with the Patriots, I was probably going to be out on, because we've seen situations destroy quarterback prospects, and we've seen few quarterbacks fall into a worse situation than this one. Just complete unproven offensive staff, absolutely no help at wide receiver, and probably going to lose 14 games.

So that's what worries me with him. You don't have much hope for a year to bounce back from Bryce Young? So, yeah, I don't have much hope for a year to bounce. I shouldn't say that. I have a little bit of hope for Bryce Young. I'm not that down on that Bryce Young ranking. I would have may ahead of him just because I like his talent more and don't think the situation is that it's different right now. It's just kind of like the Panthers are a year ahead of where the Patriots are right now, but I'm not going to use

that fully against him. I just more of the evaluation I had on them before the draft. And it's only a year out outside of that. I don't, they didn't think he had special arm talent like Drake may had on the vertical passing game. And I didn't love his rushing ability at the NFL level. And his size is the real factor there with Bryce Young that kills me from a dynasty standpoint. That frame is just really hard to imagine it holding up over the course of an NFL career and being a true starter. The only guys we've had, and this goes for McCarthy too, there's three guys that fit into this billing. One that is not on this, and Jaden Daniels, but there's Jaden Daniels, JJ McCarthy, and Bryce Young, all three of them fit into the billing. Now I know

at the combine, they had fake weight on that. You could see it in McCarthy's face. It wasn't real weight, same thing for James Daniels, but reality is they're all going to play at two or five or under. And the only quarterbacks to ever have success at the NFL level at two or five or under are three seasons from Kirk cousins and one one season from jeff garcia those are the only successful seasons we've ever had from a quarterback 205 or under uh did cousins come off of that list because he gained weight he might have yeah that's what i'm saying like i would expect especially mccarthy like young's a couple years older now so maybe not jayden's 24. I don't think. Yeah, Jaden may not add it either.

McCarthy doesn't have his man strength yet. That's hopefully the case because he's so young, but that frame doesn't. I don't see. I worry about that frame being able to put on weight as well, personally, but he should be able to. He should be able to. So my rankings dilemma, and I could have just put brock purdy versus tua versus lawrence versus mccarthy versus love but i went with mccarthy versus love because they were the closest within that i know how much you've already said that love's too low so how do you view mccarthy versus maybe like bryce young yeah i'm not a mccarthy guy at all for dynasty personally i i saw moment. I had to study him a lot because the Giants were interested. I saw some moments that are interesting from him. He can really rip the ball in the intermediate level of the field. Good timing there. There was a good anticipation there, but that deep throwing. I mean, it's a real issue for him and throwing to his left is another real issue for him. And I'm not sold that that's going to fix itself at the NFL level. And

you know, he really seemed to have to use his whole body to throw until three hitches, whole body into a lot of throws. That scares me as well. When you get to the NFL level, it's going to be even harder to throw the football down the field and outside the numbers because the field is condensed. The players are faster, everything like that. It's not the big 10 anymore. So I just have major concerns about McCarthy as an overall quarterback prospect the same would go for levis these are two quarterbacks that just i don't know how where i would rank them but i know i wouldn't rank them uh probably within my top 24 i do think that like the mccarthy may thing is a great test of how much does coaching matter yeah how much does the fact that he's going to be throwing to guys who are wide open matter. Like J.J. McCarthy's job is much easier.

His path to fantasy relevance is much, much smoother. He's probably going to get to throw the ball if they both start week one. I would guess he throws the ball 150 more times than Drake May this year. Probably scores. Yeah, and everything's easier for him. If May overcomes this, it will be very, very impressive. And Levis is another example. He has an amazing situation around him now, too,

after they added Calvin Ridley and another offensive lineman in the first round, like back-to-back first-round picks on offensive line. I mean, how much better of a situation could he have? But you know what, Heath? I know you're the biggest believer in this, and trust me, it's not that I've come around. I've always kind of believed it, but i had to hold out a little hope daniel jones can't throw a football well he can't move an offense in the passing game you want to

see someone who really struggles even more to keep a passing game on time watch will levis try to throw a football and this dates back to his time at kentucky where he's throwing for like 150 yards a game in his last season at uh in the sec we're gonna say because he now has the best situation around him that he could even possibly imagine. We'll see what happens there, but I have no faith in Will Levis' throw of football. Let's switch over to the tight end position,

and we go back to a top 12. So I probably won't get a whole lot of pushback, except for at the bottom of this list, because there are a couple of guys who I'm still holding on to that Dan, I'm sure, not but he might one of them he might like so top my top 12 tight ends I have Sam Laporta, Trey McBride, Mark Andrews, Dalton Kincaid, Kyle Pitts, Brock Bowers, TJ Hawkinson, Travis Kelsey, Pat Firemouth, George Kittle,

David Njoku, and Dallas Goddard that's Laporta, McBride, Andrews, Kincaid, Pitts, Bowers, Hawkinson, Kelsey, Muth, Kittle, Njoku, Goddard. And I don't want you to tell me which of these guys at the bottom of the top 12 you don't think should be there. Who's your guy on this list? Okay, first of all, I want to say I can't believe you think there's anything you could do in the fantasy analysis world that will will not get pushed back that's funny to me you think that there's that because we've been through this for so long we know no matter what we say we're going

to get pushed back but i will say this my guys on this list we'll start with my number one guy on this list it's dalton kincaid who you have ranked at tight end four just loved him coming out watching his tape at utah just that ability to win in the intermediate level then Then thinking back to some of the film I watched last year with the Bills, I love what they did toward the end of the season. Why does that stand out to me? Well, that's when Joe Brady was there as offensive coordinator. And they started using more on wheel routes and in the intermediate levels and started to get him going in the vertical game.

Things that Utah did that actually saw work for him on tape translates to the Bills offense that I didn't really see at the beginning of the season. Maybe that's because there was a different coordinator calling the plays for the bills, the beginning of season, or maybe that's because he was a rookie and he needed to get, you know, more custom with the system and with Josh Allen. But now they have a full off season to work together. I just love the upside for Dalton Ginkade as a prospect. He's a little bit older and he came out a little bit older. That does scare me a tiny bit, Heath. But I'm not even sure. He might be older than Kyle Pitts.

That's how young Kyle Pitts was coming out. I don't have that for sure. I could look that up in a second. But here's my problem. I hear what you're saying about Kincaid and I believe you. And how does that work with the fact that once the offensive coordinator change was made his receiving yards went down 46 38 21 0 7 and then 87 and 84 at the end of the season yeah well that's also an issue yeah obviously that the end of season was good but that's also an issue with when they changed

to brady they became more run heavy they had had Dawson Knox came back. He was, he was injured during some of the time when, when Kincaid was getting all those targets. That's an issue, but I feel like that evolution will happen within the system, within the game, within his target totem pole, essentially with Stefan Diggs gone and with Gabe Davis gone. That's really what I'm banking more on kind of the evolution. Cause if we're just thinking about last year, yeah, that wasn't, it wasn't good for him that changed yet but it's kind of just for me more i'm focusing more on the routes that he ran after they changed that and how that can be utilized this year as they as he gets more targets on those routes so would you rank kincaid over laporta mcbride or andrews the one i have trouble with is laporta i would definitely rank him over mcbride i'm much lower on mcbride than consensus personally

um and i would rank him over andrews It's Laporta is the questionable one because man, Laporta, I like, I like, I, I'm disappointed in myself because I love what I saw from him in college. And I was like, and then I looked back at last season. I'm like, this should have been obvious that he was going to do this based on the fact that he really just didn't get a lot of volume at the college level, playing in the worst offense in college football and the most kind of like run heavy, pathetic offense. And now he finally got something good with a good corner. So I don't think I would, I would rank him ahead of Laporta, but I would have him as my tight end too. And then who's your, you said you had a second guy. So who is it? Well, the other guys for me are Brock Bowers and Kyle Pitts. Those are, those

are kind of the big three for me within dynasty at tight end. Those are the three I would want to buy right now. Those are the three I want on all my rosters and i would have all three of those guys ahead of trey mcbride and andrews so that's your top four basically the laporta kakade pits and bowers yes this but you're going to make kyle pits like actually do something this year or we're gonna have we're gonna change that right like i know you you're the film guy and we don't we can ignore some of the numbers but he does at some point have to score fantasy points to remain inside your top three titans right no it could be a sharp fall for him like this he has kirk cousins he's supposed to be now fully healthy last year he was playing hurt off the knee

scope whatever but i still remember what i saw at florida and it was just unbelievable to watch that type of talent it was kind of in a lot of ways it's better than kincaid on tape better than laporta better than mcbride for sure and bowers is the only one it wouldn't be better than so yeah with cut this has to be it though if it's it's a sharp fall off after this maybe even outside the top 12 if you can't produce this year and we did have a uh comment here because you ruined the uh the rankings dilemma because it's kincaid pitts and bowers goddard's going to be 30 this year tough to have him in this tier well like there's multiple 30 year olds ahead of him um it will be i think it's that probably comes right back to the jalen hurts question is do the eagles get this

offense fixed? And there are some guys in Tier 2 that I think people would make the argument for over Goddard. But I don't have any questions about his talent. I expect the Eagles offense to be a lot better. The one that actually makes me the most nervous is David Njoku. Yeah. Because so much of his great finish was without Deshaun Watson. Exactly exactly and flacco who just perfectly fits his skill set right we we've seen kevin stefanski's offense is basically over a 25 target share for tight ends when anyone is playing quarterback except for deshaun watson

and then it falls to 21 22 because watson just hasn't thrown to his tight ends quite as often who is dan that before we switch over we'll take another break but before we switch over like who's the tight end whose name you don't see here that you think you should oh interesting the tight end kind of gonna steal one of your guys from the next graphic probably okay i'm gonna it's gonna be uh it's guy you have ranked very low but i was gonna take him for the next graphic and talk about him then but i'll talk about a little bit now it's luke musgrave the tight end from the packers it's a tight end who just now issue with luke musgrave is the same issue that pops up his rookie year injuries that was what happened to him at oregon state he didn't play a lot of games but assuming he can find a way

to get over that and that's a big assumption but but if I'm going to make that assumption, the way he moves at his size, it is rare. I said that when he was coming out, and he made an impact early in the season, not just with the stats on tape. I remember breaking him down for beyond the box or with Adam and Jacob, and we were showing some of the routes on the show, and we were talking about him. He was open in the vertical middle, and Jordan Love at that point was not playing good football at the beginning of the season. He was sailing passes. He was missing him. He missed him on a couple deep route. Must've missed him on three deep touchdowns last year in the early part of the season by this kind of just based on my memory, but I do remember breaking it down. And that's because he's able to get open in the intermediate

middle and the vertical because of how well he can move at his size. And if you look at the, you know, combine numbers and just the athletic athletic testing he's just what absolute freak of an athlete one of the highest uh ras scores of any tight end in the history of the nfl combine showed it last year in the beginning part of the season that's why i like him so much i look at this top 12 list and i think who are the most talented tight ends that's what i like to bank on in dynasty i would put him right up there with a lot of the names on this list, especially in that back half of the top 12. So he would be my guy.

Here's the thing that I struggle with for both redraft and for Dynasty. And it's the same thing I struggle with the Packers wide receivers. But you look at last season, Luke Musgrave had 46 targets in this offense. He was hurt, missed six games. Tucker Kraft had 40 targets in the same offense playing with the same quarterback six fewer targets tucker craft had more receiving yards he had more touchdowns his success rate was much higher his catch rate was higher he averaged more yards per target more yards per reception i'm not 100 sure luke musgrave is better than

tucker craft well i really like tucker craft as well i just want to make that clear it's difficult more yards per reception. I'm not 100% sure Luke Musgrave is better than Tucker Kraft. Well, I really like Tucker Kraft as well. So I just want to make that clear. It's difficult when I have two talents I really like, and his tape was phenomenal as well, just watching him against a lower level, but just the way he moves after the catch. They're totally different kind of tight ends.

I think the Packers draft them for that reason. Tucker Kraft being more of the after the catch short guy and Musgrave is more as the stretch the field guy. And that's an issue for kind of maybe a short term term but I'm just looking at this thing more long term and I think the rarity of what Musgrave offers is a little bit more than what than what Kraft can offer to an NFL team if of course it's it's a big if like if they can find a way to maximize that talent and utilize it in NFL offense which we've seen teams do like with some of these tight ends over the years that have been really successful as intermediate and vertical weapons at the NFL level. Rob Gronkowski type comes to mind. Like that's kind of where I can see minus the blocking where I can see Luke

Musgrave really, if he hits the ceiling. So I'm just more of a ceiling play for me, for sure. There's boom bust there. There's immediate fantasy success. I have to worry about, like you said, so many targets, but it's a long-term thing for me. And it may even be better to buy him next year at this time, right? Like that type of thing. Cause he's still really young. I believe he came out at 21 years old with Musgrave. So just more of a bet on talent kind of guy for me. Let's take one more break and then we'll get into the, I've got to argue with the chat about Evan Ingram. With Smartwater's pure crisp taste, there's nothing to overthink. So while you may be spiraling over double texting your crush, whether your skincare routine

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And Andrew is really not happy that Evan ingram was not on the first graphic let's show the second graphic so we can see evan ingram i've got jake ferguson cole commit evan ingram chigo conkwo dalton schultz ben senate jatavian sanders noah fant luke musgrave theo johnson michael mayer and why not go with the guy the Chiefs just drafted, Jared Wiley at number 24. No Evan Ingram on the first graphic. Evan Ingram does make the second graphic. He is also turning 30 years old this year, so there is a bit of an age concern. Andrew brings up the point, didn't he have 20 more receptions in the number two? And now Calvin Ridley's gone.

Well, yes, but you have to look at what happened after Christian Kirk got hurt last year. Because Calvin Ridley, Brian Thomas, Zay Jones, those guys are not impacting Evan Ingram's targets. But Christian Kirk and Evan Ingram work in a very similar part of the field. And we saw, but he was very involved before the kirk injury i don't want to minimize that i believe he was on pace for something like 99 catches he had a 10 target game in week eight he had four straight eight target games before that very good but after kirk went down it was nine catches on nine targets 11 catches on 12 targets four on six 10 on 15 10 on 13 like his full season statistics from last year are heavily impacted by the fact that when christian kirk went down Ingram became the guy over the middle to a larger extent. And I don't think we should expect that this year. And if he's just a mid tight end seven or eight

at 30 years old, then it's tougher to get him into the top 12. I'm with you on Evan Ingram, Heath. I don't have him. I wouldn't have him in my top 12. And I think the age factor is being underrated here. Like you mentioned, he's an older prospect for this position. Also, you know, earlier in his career with the giants, he had an injury history. He's been able to avoid that lately, but if we're to assume that Brian Thomas is going to be a big part of this offense moving forward at some point, if not in 2024, which I think is very fair to assume based on the draft capital used on him. And based on some of the early reports we've already seen from camp and some of the glowing reports we've heard from some of the coaches

there that is going to be a detract attractor for evan ingram overall and i love what you talked about with kristin kirk last year when he was in verse he was out when he was out with the injury we're not going to expect him to be injured every year so yeah i'm with you and maybe it's redraft i'll have him higher sure but oh for sure redraft he is a top eight tight end for him and that's fine but dynasty it's it's it's a little scarier than people are giving it credit for who is your guy on this list if not after i already took luke musgrave away from yeah well it would be luke musgrave i'm gonna pick another guy from this list um it would probably be ben senate uh ben senate is a guy who almost identically from an athletic standpoint,

relative athletic score profiles to Sam Laporta. His game doesn't look exactly like Laporta's on film. I mean, Laporta after the catch at Iowa was just absolutely phenomenal. Ben Sinit has that, but not to that level. He's not that same level, just, you know, bull in a cage type after the catch guy. But what he does have is really good change of direction skills after the catch and that's the type of stuff that excites me from a fantasy standpoint because that's how you create yardage and that's how you become a featured part of your offense has a new quarterback

who's really exciting as well that has to help as well uh obviously not i'm not as sold on and i don't really understand why um why am i forgetting his name the former arizona cardinals coach who's now their offensive coordinator i don't know why i'm blanking why am I forgetting his name? The, the former Arizona Cardinals coaches now their offensive coordinator. I don't know why I'm blanking on his name. Kingsbury. I'm not as, I'm not really understanding why Kingsbury got another job in the NFL. I thought he did a terrible job in Arizona, a terrible job in the homes of Texas tech, among other things.

I didn't like his offense at USC either, but hopefully he can figure it out now in his fourth go around with another quarterback. But regardless, that Senate talent is undeniable. So I'm just looking at this list. It would probably be Senate for me. I love Michael Mayer coming out, but it's so much harder to get excited about him. Fantasy wise, now that Brock Bowers is there. Yeah, I the Senate one, like we're probably going to be frustrated because Zacherts is

probably going to be the lead tight end for at least the first half of the year. But we don't expect a whole lot from rookie tight ends anyway i go i have a really hard time between sanders and senate and i'm basically just trying to like take one of them in one rookie draft and take the other one in the next one because i don't really want to make a bet there it almost seems like there's more immediate opportunity for sanders either one of those guys could end up in the top 12 by the end of this year, and I wouldn't be that surprised about it. Either one of those guys could be outside of the top 24 in the next year, and I wouldn't be that surprised about it. Let's talk about two guys who were almost in the top 12 for me, at least.

And I probably shouldn't even ask you about this rankings dilemma because one of them went to Wisconsin. And so that's probably the easy choice. But Jake Ferguson at number 13 versus Cole Komet at number 14. Surprisingly, very close in age. Ferguson was better last year. Komet has a whole bunch of more target competition coming in this year. But Komet's generally been viewed

as the better football player and the better prospect for the entirety of their lives. Who would you have ferguson or commit yeah despite i'm going against my own ties to wisconsin badgers i'm gonna go with cole commit here uh i'll first start with ferguson love i think always knew at wisconsin he was going to be an nfl player he was held back by bad quarterback play their bad system and he's proven at the nfl level my issues with ferguson moving forward are one they did draft luke

schoomaker in the second round last year, and they really liked him. And I don't, I know he was injured last year to start the year. People are now down on him. No one's thinking about him, but I don't think they use that kind of draft capital, the Cowboys for no reason. So that scares me too. They got massive salary cap concerns to the point where they're going to have to let go of either Micah Parsons, CD lamb, or Dak Prescott.

They cannot fit all three. And that might be Prescott at this point. So if we're just starting the quarterback cycle there, that scares me. On the other hand, Colt Comet gets one of my favorite quarterback prospects I've ever studied, literally ever studied in Caleb Williams. I am that high on Caleb Williams, which we didn't get to discuss earlier. I know you thought that would be my guy based on some drafts we've done

already, but there were other guys in that tier. So I'm going to take Colt Comet here withaleb blaine pairing him with caleb williams and i just kind of love that for him yeah i i think that the fit with him makes sense that the target crunch is really hard to figure out and i was surprised like jake ferguson's played two seasons in the nfl cole commits played four's actually still younger than Jake Ferguson. So no concerns there. It just might take a different, like it might have to wait until Keenan Allen's gone

because it's hard for me to figure out how Keenan Allen and Cole Komet really function within the same offense very well, unless Komet just scores the touchdowns. One more guy I wanted to hit on here for people who are contenders

and looking for a tight end. Do you think Dalton Schultz could be a top 12 tight end this year? Or again, because they added Stefan digs or too many mouths to feed in that offense. I mean, look,

Texans are really past heavy last year. And that was a little bit surprising to some, I think based on Bobby Sloic and the, and where he comes from with the 49ers. But I think when you have a quarterback at that level caliber, you kind of change maybe what you were planning to do going into the season. I think that's exactly what happened with CJ Stroud.

They're like, he's just too good. We got to go play action heavy, lean on the pass. So I still think they're going to be probably top six, top five in pass attempts, pass yardage, all of those things. So there is more of a pie to, you know, eat into, but you're right. You add Stefan Diggs to that mix. It makes it really difficult for me to see where Schultz stands out outside of the touchdowns and in the red zone. I still think there is opportunity for him to be in the top 12. That's kind of the state of the tight end.

But that does scare me a lot that they added Stefan Diggs. I'm going to be honest. That's going to do it for quarterback rankings and tight end rankings. Dan, thanks for coming back. Everybody always likes it when you're here. We got to hear about your guys. what do you got coming up next i love being here and got a lot of exciting things coming up next i'm going to be on we're doing a show next week on the cbs sports network i'm going to be on it so i'm very very excited for that for the first time i'll be on that we're going to be

talking i don't know yet we're going to be talking about it's a surprise so we'll see what happens there and we've got a lot of good content coming up on the site as well so check out that we're going to more mock drafts more dynasty content. Heath has been crushing it from that standpoint for us. So just keep it locked and loaded. I know it's a little bit of a dead time for fantasy football, but it's never dead. It's always fun to talk fantasy, always fun to talk NFL and for dynasty it's year round. So we're having a good time with that. Also one thing I want to shout out one more thing. Uh, we have a new writer for CBS slash sports. I'm Megan Choup and she is doing best ball content. We have been a little dry on the best ball front.

I feel like through the last couple of years, we're now finally starting to dip our toes into that. And she is a very exciting writer and she's had a lot of success in the best ball world. So check out her content. We have a teaser article out right now on CBS sports line with her rankings and on sports. I'm sorry,

CBS sports sports on, you can find all her rankings for best ball. So some things to look into so thanks for having me on again though heath i love being on here awesome awesome stuff thank you dan thank you everybody who was in the chat listening on the podcast may have a slightly altered schedule next week but follow us here on youtube follow me on twitter and uh we'll keep you abreast of what we'll be doing next week we will talk to you then thanks