Fantasy Football Today - 🚨 Jonathan Taylor in Round 6 Now??? (09/12 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: August 29, 2023

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Bonus Pod here. Welcome everybody everybody, on Fantasy Football Today. It looks like Jonathan Taylor is going to miss some time. He is expected to start the season on the PUP list, which means at least four games that he will be missing, and he's still with the Indianapolis Colts. I'm Adam Azer with Jamie Eisenberg, and what is your reaction to this, Jamie? Let's start with Jonathan Taylor.

We were thinking maybe late round two, early round three. Now that he's going to start out on public, he's going to miss a juicy matchup with the Texans in week two, by the way. At least four games. When are we drafting Jonathan Taylor? I think, Adam, you know, at this point, you have to treat him almost like a better version of Alvin Kamara, you know, where you know you're missing that much time.

So I don't know, man, it's like round four, round five. You have to even wonder what he's going to be when he comes back. And we don't know when he's going to come back because if he's really on the pop list and this ankle injury is lingering, that's a little scary,

isn't it? Well, again, you know, how much of this is posturing and how much of this is he's actually hurt because... To put him on the pup list? I feel like he's got to be hurt. But you're right.

Like, I don't know the ins and outs of it. He's definitely dealing with something, you know, so the ankle's probably not 100%, but... Oh, boy. Schaefer, let's get a YouTube poll. Let's see. Let's start with. I would say I would say at this point, like so when we when we look at the tiers of running backs, he's behind clearly the guys that he was in the range of, of, you know. I'll say past the Jacobs,Henry group. So behind Mixon, behind Gibbs, behind Stevenson, behind ETN, behind Pierce, behind Aaron Jones.

You're getting now into – You have Dobbins. Behind Dobbins. You're getting now into Madison, Conner, Sanders range. And so when you start to think like big picture, who's better? I think those guys are at this point, right? Madison, Conner, who's better? I think those guys are at this point, right? Madison, Connor, who? Miles Sanders.

I mean, I definitely take Sanders. Madison and Connor, you just don't know if they're any good at this point. So if you can— We're getting to like running back 20. I know. I mean, I think Brees Hall is probably the big comparison here, right? Because you're expecting Brees Hall to have the bigger impact in the second half of the season, which you're hoping for from Taylor.

I would take Sanders over Taylor. I don't think I'd take Madison or Connor. Well, I mean, let me ask you this because I think I have him right like 20. I know where you're going. Ken Walker or Jonathan Taylor? I think. I think Taylor. but it's really risky I could see this just being a terrible

season for Jonathan Taylor who knows when he's coming back didn't Schefter tweet that they could tag him again he's not even tagged I'm sorry they could tag him next year yeah I'm sure they can why wouldn't they be able to yeah um right it's contentious right now and you know what honestly it sounds like i'm hemming and hawing but i really don't know i think it's really hard to know how to

draft him i guess i'd say taylor yeah in round five is where i'm thinking after sanders before the running backs that i feel like are just going to have a lot of work, but aren't very good. That's, that's the, where I that's Connor and Madison. I like those guys. Don't get me wrong, but he is still Jonathan Taylor at the end of the day. Well, I mean, he's still Jonathan Taylor, but you know, he, he's, he's going to have to have a little bit of a ramp up period. He's going to have to have, you know, some acclimation with a new quarterback that he's never been on the field with

and Anthony Richardson. And by the way, he's never played with a new quarterback that he's never been on the field with and Anthony Richardson. And by the way, he's never played with a running quarterback. I mean, he started his career with, was his rookie year with Phillip rivers. He went, no Wentz. He went Wentz,

uh, Wentz and no, yeah, he did go rivers, right. Rivers Wentz, right. Right.

Uh, whatever. Yeah. That was the order rivers Wentz Ryan. Yeah. Yeah. So, so this is your forefront. So he's never had a running quarterback. You know, Wentz is the closest to order. Rivers, Wentz, Ryan. Yeah, so this is year four for him.

So he's never had a running quarterback. Wentz is the closest to that. Yeah, I mean, the earliest for me would be round four. The earliest. I think you're right. Brees Hall is the better comp. So, okay. How about Ken Walker, Brees Hall, James Conner, Alexander Madison? I would take all those guys over Taylor right now.

Wow, okay. And you know how I feel about Brees Hall. I'd probably take Brees Hall over him. I don't think he'll be a top 24 running back for me. I think I feel the same way now that I'm thinking about it. I just, well, it's such a, you know, here's the thing. How important is that round five pick, right? I mean, are these league winners we're talking about?

They might be, especially because Dobbins is going round five. I know how much you love him. I think that's what you have to ask yourself. That's why I like Ken Walker. I still think he has major upside. What kind of player are you drafting? Are you drafting a league winner or are you drafting a starter? Because if you think you're just

drafting a starter, a worthwhile starter, then maybe you take a shot at Jonathan Taylor. Let's put it this way. If you are not taking a quarterback or tight end in the first five rounds, so you go with your first four picks in a three receiver league, whether it's two receivers in a flex or three receivers PPR, you're probably going to go three. Let's say you go three receivers and a running back.

So a modified hero RB approach, because we're going to make the decision around five. So now you're in round five and you're staring at Trevor Lawrence, right? That's where his ADP is, I think. Yeah. Trevor Lawrence, Darren, no, yeah, Darren Waller, and the running backs that we're talking about here are, yeah, I mean, I guess Dobbins is still there in this scenario.

But, I mean, we say that, though, but I think Brees Hall's ADP is still ahead of Dobbins. I think that's the range. This is the range. All right. First of all, if you have a two running back, two receiver, one flex league, it's easier to take Taylor. If you have to start three receivers and you've got to build your lineup a little bit more and you still have to start the flex, it's a little bit harder to to i have i have a draft tonight where i have the first pick i'm

taking jefferson obviously i'm hoping for it's it's two receivers two running backs in the flex i i would have no problem taking three receivers you know i like that strategy but if i don't take three receivers let's say i decide to go a different route and i go one receiver one running back i come back on the four or five turn. That's where I would consider Taylor. Yeah. I was going to say that feels like a little early based on what we were just saying. So if you have the first pick,

you're probably not getting Taylor. I feel like he's going to end up going, you know, after your fifth pick and before your six pick, but, um, yeah, that's winning the poll results right now is round two,

round three, round four, round five or later. Round five or later is 70%. I don't know if you want to update it, Schaefer, to start at round four, round five, round six, round seven or later. I'd be curious to see what the results of that poll would be. Yeah, it's like the more I

think about it, yeah, round five at the earliest and I'm like backtracking here. It's like, I know we sound a little wishy-washy. I apologize, but it's like, we're, we're processing this as it's happening. So, but if we talk this out,

right, like if it's, especially if it's two, two running back to receiver flex league. Okay. Let's say you start your team with a stud receiver and a stud running back. Let's say you go receiver in round two. And let's say you take,

uh, Justin Fields in round four. So you've got Fields,ley garrett wilson and calvin ridley okay that's your team right now which is a terrific start now you're up in round five and you probably have like the eighth ninth tenth pick in the draft um can you take taylor there that would give you fields, Barkley, Taylor, Ridley, and who did I say in round two, Garrett Wilson? Yes. Okay.

I mean, your team's pretty loaded at that point. You're not going to be great at tight end unless maybe in the next round you could even take Kyle Pitts or Darren Waller or Goddard, you know, based on ADP. And then in round seven, you might be able to get a Cam Akers or a Rashad White or DeAndre Swift if you want to go that route.

If you like Gibson or Brian Robinson or A.J. Dillon, if you think Samaj P. Ryan or Jalen Warren, I think that you could pull this off. I do think you can pull this off by taking Taylor in round five

if you really crush it with your first four picks and you feel great about your team. What do you think? I mean, you certainly could. It's just a matter of when does he come back and what kind of player are you getting? You know, it's like I'm looking at the chat right here.

Like I think somebody mentioned Montgomery. Like how do you justify like David Montgomery, Taylor over David Montgomery? Like I'm thinking how I feel about Jermonte Williams that I'm concerned about him. Let's not forget, Taylor's still going to be on a bad offense. The lack of touchdowns may not be there.

The lack of receptions may not be there, too. We were counting on him to be him and overcome some of these things. Now, if he's not him... That's exactly right. If you could tell me we're getting... I think I'm just out. I'll update you on the poll so far. The new poll round, we have 105, 106 votes.

Round four, 14%. Round five, 24%. Round six, 26%. Round seven or later, 36%. All right, it's interesting. Now, what about the other running backs? We have Zach Moss. Well, I was just about to say, you know,

they have Zach Moss who's's dealing with a broken arm. I don't know what his status is. I didn't see anything updated as of 4 o'clock. But I looked at his player page, and he had surgery maybe August 1st, and the timeline was six weeks. Okay. So they have Moss who, last year when Taylor got hurt in the Minnesota game, Moss and Deion Jackson split carries pretty evenly in that game.

And then they just went all out on Zach Moss. Yeah. But he barely caught passes. He caught four balls in four games at the end of the season. Dion Jackson had four games last year with four more catches. In fact, he had two games with eight or more catches. Well, I think, again, you're looking at the at at the time a more quarterback friendly offense more running back from the offense from from yes a passing standpoint yeah now you have

shane steichen who we know didn't really throw the ball their offense didn't throw the ball in philadelphia lowest targets for running backs in that system and with anthony ridgerton you just don't expect it so if they stay with what they are right now I would take a late round flyer on basically all three guys depending on how deep your league is Deion Jackson would be my first one then probably Evan Hall and then probably Zach Moss just because of health but don't forget they entertain Kareem Hunt and if they feel like Jonathan Taylor is not going to be a significant contributor for them at all, at least in the beginning part of the season, that may be a transaction that we hear after we won. And so just take that into account. So your best bet is to find the right landing spot

for Jonathan Taylor in your draft, wherever you're willing to take the chance on him. And that's probably the only Colts running back I would draft. And then what I would do is I would look to be aggressive on waivers. Remember, once you draft, depending on you have an IR spot, you can stash Taylor on an IR spot. You can make a transaction following that. And then you could try and pick up one of these guys. They got the Jaguars and the Texans to start the season. So the Texans have just year after year been an absolute sieve against the run. They are terrible. And in fact, in week 18, Zach Moss had 18 carries, 114 yards and a touchdown against the Tex. They are terrible. And in fact, in week 18, Zach Moss had 18 carries, 114 yards,

and a touchdown against the Texans. Unfortunately, he didn't win you weeks 15, 16, or 17, but he won you week 18 if you played. Jacksonville was 20th

against running backs last year. I don't think they've made major upgrades to their run defense, but I could be wrong. I haven't done my week one research yet. But I actually, yeah,

you know what, Jamie? I think I might take a shot on Kareem Hunt. And look, maybe it's Fournette or something, but I think I'd take a shot on Kareem Hunt before those guys. Would you? In your Dynasty League, it was my last pick. And it was right at the time of the news that happened

when he left New Orleans, Kareem Hunt did, and went to visit Indianapolis. And I was like, Oh, what am I going to get in this round? You know, it was 27, 20, 24,

whatever it is. Three. Yeah. So I was like, yeah, I'll take a flyer on that. So yeah, I think those are the, those are the type of moves you want to,

you want to make at this point, but man, it's just, it's just hard to say one of these guys stands out because the rushing production is going to come from the quarterback. Right. It's, you're not getting a high endend player here so um speaking of the quarterback how does this change your evaluation if at all of anthony richardson and let's say michael pitman as well it doesn't really i mean i've been ranking it as if he was gone for taylor you know that they were going to trade him you know know, he's, he's going to be the offense.

He's going to run the ball. He's going to, you know, have, it's basically like if you, if you look at Justin Fields from a year ago, you know, he's going to have to do so much.

Yeah. You know, um, they could still trade him by the way. Like they had a self-imposed deadline of 4 PM on Tuesday because that's when roster cut down was. But he could still, I don't see any reason why he couldn't be traded. So just to throw that out there,

maybe now we know why he wasn't traded. Teams didn't want to take a shot maybe on a guy who was going to be on PUP. So yeah, I think that's basically it. I mean, Michael Pittman, does he benefit? No change. I will say this, the regret I have over the last several days of doing quite a few drafts that's basically it i mean michael michael pittman does he benefit no change i will say this the the

regret i have over the last several days of doing quite a few drafts is passing on the dolphins running backs because that was the biggest concern was that he was going to miami and how one of those guys if not both would be irrelevant completely completely relevant you know not just handcuffed or anything like just completely irrelevant and i know, not just handcuffed or anything, like just completely irrelevant. And I did a radio show earlier today, and the question was, you know, what happened to the Dolphins guys? And, you know, there was still a chance maybe one of those guys would get sent back to Indianapolis as part of a package. So it was worth, you know, holding on to it.

But, yeah, the winners coming out of this, I think, are Jeff Wilson and Raheem Mostert. And, you know, if you drafted them at an even bigger discount over the weekend because of the potential of Miami acquiring Jonathan Taylor, you're pretty happy about that. Yeah, and two guys I drafted yesterday in our Podcast League draft, 14 teams, Jeff Wilson

and Jerry Judy, who's not going on short-term IR, baby. Would you take Jerry Judy or Jonathan Taylor? Who's going to be higher in your overall rankings wow uh probably judy like i said as we're talking about i just feel like i'm out he is oh man i'm getting some uh white men can't jump vibes right now he's out he is out and then i won't say the next line anyway um, thanks for listening and watching, everybody.

Tomorrow's Draftathon! Woo-hoo! And we'll get Heath. Oh, I'm going to make fun of Heath so bad tomorrow morning. Because if you watch the CBS Sports Network show... I want to look. Let me see. He just crushed me. The podcast league was Heath, right?

Yeah, he has him in the podcast league. He has him in the Dynasty League. So we did a draft for Draftathon. You, unfortunately, are not in this draft. But it's a lot of the analysts that are going to be on the show right i wouldn't say unfortunately but yeah that's why i didn't bother asking you uh let's see where he went in that draft so he went in round two two can you guess he He went to Heath? No, the other one. Chris? Dave.

Dave, oh man, round two. All right. Dave's drafted a lot of Taylor recently. I'm sorry. You know, look. Do you have any Jonathan Taylor shares? No, zero. I've done 20 drafts so far.

No, I'm sorry, 17 drafts so far. Zero Jonathan Taylor. I haven't looked at all of them, but it's possible Scott Fishbowl five months ago it feels like, but I don't think so. I'm going to say no. Wow. Congratulations, David. But hey, look, it's not over.

Some guys pay off in the end. That's what we're hoping for for Jonathan Taylor. Yeah, obviously. And we'll see if we change our mind tomorrow morning because sometimes a little bit of distance helps and we'll keep thinking about it. We'll update you tomorrow morning and we'll have another podcast for you then and we'll talk if we change our mind tomorrow morning because sometimes a little bit of distance helps and we'll keep thinking about it so we'll update you tomorrow morning and we'll have another podcast for you then and we'll talk to you later on Fantasy Football Today