Fantasy Football Today - Kenneth Walker SIGNS with Chiefs | Fantasy Football Impact & RB Value in Kansas City! (FFT Express)

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Starting point is 00:01:01 We'll break it down right now on Fantasy Football Today Express. All right, Ken Walker, going to a team that has been searching for a running back for a very long time. Since the Patrick Mahomes era began in 2018, they've basically had two good running backs for fantasy purposes. Kareem Hunt in 2018 and Isaiah Pacheco a few years ago. They have tried Levi-on-Bell. They have tried Clyde Edwards-Elair. They have tried Lishon McCoy. They have not had a lot of success running the ball.

Starting point is 00:01:34 They are hoping that changes now with Ken Walker, three-year deal worth up to $45 million. All right, give me, as of right now, give me a round. Where are you drafting Ken Walker, Heath? I am going to say it's likely round three. Oh. I think I'll have him.

Starting point is 00:01:52 I mean, I'm sure there will be some round two discussion on him, and the rest of the chief's offense, offseason will inform this take a little bit more. but I think borderline RB1, probably at the two to three turn. I think he'll end up being a high end RB2. I would assume that the chiefs will not make Walker their only running back and they will split work. But I think he could be pretty good. I'm mildly optimistic, cautiously optimistic that he'll have top 10 upside and you can draft him at a RB 1415 price tag.

Starting point is 00:02:29 That's a round three pick. It's funny. You know, it feels like Ken Walker's coming off this great season. He won Super Bowl MVP. He was amazing in the playoffs without Zach Charbonnet. He was running back 28 per game. And in his career, he's been 17th per game, 21st per game, 12th per game, and 28th per game. When he was 12th per game in 2024, he averaged over four catches per game.

Starting point is 00:02:51 Every other season of his career, he's averaged less than two catches per game. The good news is the chiefs typically throw to their running backs more than the Seahawks do, except for that one year of 2024. but they don't run the ball a lot. They've been toward the bottom. They've been 25th or worse in running back carries in seven of the last eight seasons. Now, again, they just haven't had good running backs for the most part. But, yeah, I mean, I guess I felt like maybe people would be thinking first round, not me, but.

Starting point is 00:03:20 Well, I think, like, as you talked about, Walker's upside has kind of remained the case for him for most of his career. Like, yeah, it's not actually as good as it could be, but think of what it could be. And then we saw what it could be in the fantasy play or in the NFL playoffs and in the Super Bowl. The problem with pushing him into round one consideration is you have to ignore the fact that multiple coaches have seen him as more of a part-time back and not a true workhorse. And the fact that the chiefs in recent years have not really had. any sort of workhorse running back. It's been a committee approach. And so if both of those things change,

Starting point is 00:04:09 the chiefs decide now we want a feature back and we're going to feature this guy who hasn't been used as a featureback by other teams or other coaches, then, yeah, Walker could return first round value. And he's been used in a feature back role only in partial seasons, you know, a stretch.

Starting point is 00:04:26 But actually his rookie year was really encouraging. he was a top 10 running back per game in his last 11 games. He started the year with Rashad Penny as a starting running back. Penny got hurt. And after that, Ken Walker was really good in 2022. Then he averaged 17.4 points per game in his first six game to 2020. But he's just never been able to do it really for a full season. So I don't know how much more we have to get into it, Dave.

Starting point is 00:04:50 Any more thoughts on this? He's a good fit for what they want to do offensively, at least running the football. The Chiefs ran more than twice. as many zone runs than gap runs last year. Walker can do both, but he's better at outside zone types of runs. That's a good fit for him there. And I think he's a better pass catcher than the Seahawks allowed him to be. We've seen him do well catching the ball. I can think back to a play last year. It was like third and 17. I think it was against the Rams where he caught a pass and weaved his way for a first down. It might have been a run. Don't hold it against me if it wasn't a pass.

Starting point is 00:05:25 but I think this is Kansas City attempting to greatly improve their run game, which they have to do given the status of Patrick Mahomes, coming off of the major knee injury. They can't just throw them back there and expect them to be Patrick Mahomes again. I think they're going to want to run the football, and they need to protect Mahomes. Half of that equation is solved when Walker's healthy. They can run the ball with Walker.

Starting point is 00:05:49 The offense the blind is going to have to be better than it was last year, too. These are all reasons to not get overly excited about, Kenneth Walker and push him into round one and call him a top 20 fantasy running back. I think I think that's too much at this point. I think Kansas City, like he said, will add another running back, probably somebody who's good in past protection. And that'll be who Walker splits with. Walker should see definitely more than his fair share of carries between him and the other

Starting point is 00:06:17 running back. And it's a good fit for him. So I'm, I said at the top of the show, cautiously optimistic that Walker can have a good year. He should be worth that round three price tag, easily ready to take him out of names like Breece Hall, DeAndre Swift, R.J. Harvey, for now, Trayvion Henderson, for now, Quinn, Schott, Judkins. He's in that group for me with Derek Henry and Kyron Williams. Running backs that you look at and you go, yeah, they can be RB-1s, but I'd rather draft them as high-end RB-2s. I think one of the keys in projecting Walker is going to be who that second running back is. One thing Seattle

Starting point is 00:06:55 did not want to do with Kenneth Walker was given the ball inside the five-yard line. So do the chiefs have Walker playing with a hammer that fills that role? Or do the chiefs have Walker playing with someone who's, I mean, the best case scenario, obviously, and something that might push him up into high round two RB1 territory is if we hear from Kansas City that,

Starting point is 00:07:15 you know, we think brush yard Smith can handle the passing downs. And he's going to, it's just going to be Walker and Smith. Then we're looking at maybe a round one selection for Walker. And they've been, you know, this last angle of this year, as I've mentioned, in the Mahomes era, they just haven't run the ball well. His first year, they had Kareem Hunt and he had a solid year. And then I think Hunt was good the next year, too. Or no, actually, I think that was the year where he had played the 11 games, right?

Starting point is 00:07:40 And then, anyway, they just haven't had a good run game. The Chiefs have been top nine in past attempts in seven of the last eight seasons with Mahomes. You know, do you think that that changes? Do you think that this maybe hurts Mahomes or Rishi Rice or Cali L.C. who's back with the team apparently, you know, does this change that outlook at Heath? I lowered the Chiefs Pass volume just a little bit to 573 attempts for next year. I think the combination of not now the thing that could be different is some, like they've been a high pass attempt team where Mahomes is still scrambling at a high rate. Mahomes is probably not going to scramble at anywhere close to the same rate coming off the injury.

Starting point is 00:08:26 So it could be that the dropbacks maybe go down a little bit, but the past attempts don't go down as much because more of those dropbacks are Mahomes getting the ball out quicker and not running around. I'm going to give you two free agent running backs that had good pass blocking grades from pro football focus last year. I'm going to tell you their names and you're already going to know which one you'd prefer lands in Kansas City. Kareem Hunt, Tyler Algier. Obviously, we'd rather have to go back to Kansas City, but there's a chance that even Kareem Hunt could be that hammer that you talked about. I think almost certainly if Kareem Hunt's back that we have to expect that he's handling the short yardage rule. Yeah, that would suck for Walker.

Starting point is 00:09:08 One other angle here with Mahomes and what this could mean is I remember one of the beat reporters saying that the chiefs felt like their lack of run game really hurt their play action passing. And I just looked at Mahomes' play action yards per attempt. They were the same as his overall season yards per attempt, but typically they're much higher than his overall yards per attempt. So it could just be that they get a better running game. It opens up a lot of things in this offense that has been about when, you know, I took out the last three games of last year when Mahomes didn't play. They've been about 12th or 13th in scoring three straight years.

Starting point is 00:09:41 And honestly, I probably should have taken out a couple of week 18 games, but I didn't. But bottom line is they've been above average, but not great, three straight years. this could be something that elevates this offense back to a level that we have seen in the past. Maybe they need more talent at wide receiver. I don't know. But open up that play action passing game and maybe get some downfield. That's what I've been talking about. They've been so bad downfield.

Starting point is 00:10:02 Maybe Ken Walker actually helps this. All right, guys, listen, we got Pittman to the Steelers. We got Pierce back with the Colts. That's huge for everyone. It's huge for Tyler Warren. And we've got Malik Willis to the Dolphins. We've got a busy show for you at 4 o'clock is what we've got. 4 p.m. Eastern, we will talk to you then and on Fantasy Football today.

Starting point is 00:10:26 Thanks a lot. We'll talk to you soon.

Fantasy Football Today - Kenneth Walker SIGNS with Chiefs | Fantasy Football Impact & RB Value in Kansas City! (FFT Express)

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