Fantasy Football Today - League-Winning Mid-Round RBs! (06/30 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: June 30, 2025

Need a home run pick in the middle of your draft? We'll tell you which running backs we like in Rounds 5-8. First, an email about the Lions and what more outdoor games could mean for them (4:00), plus some news and notes (8:15) ... Before we analyze these mid-round RBs, let's have a brief history lesson of what this range of RBs has looked like in previous seasons (9:30). Who are the success stories? Who are the busts and what lessons can we learn? Then we take a look at the RBs being drafted in Round 5 (19:30) such as Ken Walker, Omarion Hampton and Alvin Kamara. You could make the case they should all be going in Round 4 ... Dave and Heath discuss the rookies (25:45) in this range. It's a great rookie class, but maybe R.J. Harvey is going too early? We then discuss the veterans like D'Andre Swift and David Montgomery (30:30). What about the Round 7 veterans (41:30) Tony Pollard, Aaron Jones and Isiah Pacheco? And the Round 8 guys (53:40) are Brian Robinson Jr., Jaylen Warren and Jordan Mason ... Your emails at [e-mail] Fantasy Football Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts Watch FFT on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Shop our store: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠shop.cbssports.com/fantasy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  SUBSCRIBE to FFT Express on Apple: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-express/id1528634304⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow FFT Express on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://open.spotify.com/show/6qyGWfETSBFaciPrtvoWCC?si=6529cbee20634da8⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Apple: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dynasty/id1696679179⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FOLLOW FFT Dynasty on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://open.spotify.com/show/2aHlmMJw1m8FareKybdNfG?si=8487e2f9611b4438&nd=1⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ SUBSCRIBE to FFT DFS on Apple: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dfs/id1579415837⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FOLLOW FFT DFS on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://open.spotify.com/show/5zU7pBvGK3KPhfb69Q1hNr?si=1c5030a3b1a64be2⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow our FFT team on Twitter:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @FFToday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @AdamAizer⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @JameyEisenberg⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @daverichard⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @heathcummingssr⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow the brand new FFT TikTok account: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@fftoday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 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 Fan 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

This episode is brought to you by Dazon. For the first time ever, the 32 best soccer clubs from across the world are coming together to decide who the undisputed champions of the world are in the FIFA Club World Cup. The world's best players, Messi, Holland, Kane and more are all taking part. And you can watch every match for free on Dazon, starting on June 14th and running until July 13th. Sign up now at done.com slash FIFA. That's D-A-Z-N.com slash FIFA. Now streaming. When people go missing, I get hired to help find them.

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No, I can't. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. Off to the races and he stays on his feet. This is gonna go the distance. Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie and Heath. Welcome in everybody. It is Monday, June 30th. We are almost into July. July is training

camp month and it's draft-a-thon month. We'll tell you more about that tomorrow. And I'm Adam Azer with Dave Richard and Heath Cummings. This is a holiday week getting ready for the 4th of July on Friday. We have episodes for you Monday through Thursday. Today we're talking about mid-round running backs. And right now I look, I consider mid round to be rounds five through eight in a 12 team league. So that begins with pick 49 goes to pick 96. Right now fantasy pros ADP has 18 running backs in that range, which is more than usual.

Usually it's closer to 14 and 15. So it starts with a Marion Hampton goes all the way to Jaylen Warren. Hello, Dave, how are we doing today? How was your all the way to Jalen Warren. Hello, Dave. Uh, how are we doing today? How was your weekend? I had a good weekend. Had a nice time.

You mentioned that July is around the corner. It is a big month in the Richard house. Uh, it's my son's birthday. It's my birthday. It's my annual pilgrimage. I can say that word to Las Vegas. Uh, it is, it is the last month that we can really recharge our batteries before we cannonball into training camp and the preseason and a lot of stuff coming our way.

I am looking forward to that. I am ready for this season to get rolling. Fired up. Heath, I can't remember. Was Dave on the show last week? I feel like he was briefly. Well, I had some things come up in my life last week that kept me from being on the show. I couldn't remember if last week was the week you were away

or the week before. I was away for parts of both weeks. The answer is yes. Dave needs to recharge his battery after taking the last two weeks off. Hold on, I had a personal family issue. Oh, I'm sorry. Last week that changed my schedule dramatically. In unrelated news, I need a car.

I'm just glad my daughter survived. Yes. Oh, wow. Really? Geez, I didn't know that. Yeah. We. We can talk about it at the end of the show if you really want to. Oh, good, good. I don't know if I can. I think I can, but. Well, I'm sorry to hear that. Yeah, so go ahead and chuckle away, Adam.

Oh, Adam, big host. I didn't laugh. David's never here. Boy, he's always out and about because he's such a cool dude. He can't be too big for the crew. Oh, they're laughing at you. Okay, all right, email of the day.

Why don't you go eat some oatmeal, huh? What a ridiculous, that thing got so ridiculous. Email of the day, if you give me one second, it is from. Eric! From somewhere west of Windsor, Canada. West of Windsor, Canada. Let's go with Allen Park, Michigan. Okay.

And subject line was, I agree with Heath. Sounds like a great email. Great email, email of the year. I keep hearing the pros and cons of the Lions offense heading into the 2025 season, but I haven't heard anyone bring up golfs, home road and indoor outdoor splits. The league gave the Lions a gift

of all those indoor games last year. He was indoor 14 games last year and this year only 10. Is that being factored into any regression? And the whole I agree with Heath sentiment is Heath is a little bit lower on the Lions, not low on the Lions, but a little bit lower. New offensive coordinator lost their superstar center and so forth. So yeah, Heath, did you factor in the indoor outdoor stuff for golf? I didn't, but I will now steal this from Eric and use it in future arguments against the Lions. Funny thing, and just to promote some content that's coming out on the site this week, I'm doing version 2.0 of my sleepers and I'm using Dave's only fans mocked after ADP. I mean,

fans only ADP to kind of look at where people are being drafted early in drafts and found something really interesting because I am the low guy on almost all the Lions. But Jared Goff, who finished his QB six last year, I have ranked as QB 12 is being drafted as QB 19. Yeah. So it seems like everybody is terrified of regression for Jared Goff. That scaredness though, doesn't show up in the ADP of literally any other lion. Like we're expecting the lions to mostly have career

years except Jared Goff takes a huge step back. So Jared Goff is definitely in my sleepers column. There will probably be a couple of lions in my busts. Yeah. Just goes to show you how big of a factor ADP is when we talk about sleepers and breakouts and busts. It's rare when we come across a player and we go, I just don't want to draft them. And I don't care what round it's in. I don't want to draft them. But this is Tahith's point. If the value on a player is so good that you just, you can't help yourself, you could say, All right, look, I know Jared Goff's not going to be as good as he was last year. Then yeah, if you can get him in the double-dig, I love that. And I'm taking Jared golf as, as my QB one, if need be with a double digit

round pick last thing, Adam, two of the last three road games this year are indoors and that last game that is outdoors at Chicago, tough weather in January, but it's in week 18. So there's a chance that golf a could throw more this year and B could finish the season quite nicely because he's got a lot of indoor games down the fantasy playoff stretch. He doesn't have a cold weather game unless Washington and Philadelphia in November, November 9th and November 16th could be cool. But after those games home home home at the Rams, at the Rams, home, at Minnesota.

So, and then you mentioned at Chicago. Also, for Jared Goff, because I thought this was a great email and a good point. But his three outdoor games, he only played three outdoor games last year. He scored 11.6 fantasy points, six points per pass in touchdown leagues, on 22 pass attempts at Green Bay.

But then weeks 16 and 17 were both outdoors. He scored 31.3 points at Chicago, 31.8 fantasy points at San Francisco. It didn't matter last year and his his passer rating in three outdoor games was 129.2. So it just didn't matter for Jared golf last year. He was so hot at the end of the year. All right, stuff to keep in mind. Heath, what do we got on FFT dynasty this year, this week? This year, we've got all kinds of good shows.

We only got one show this week because we are taking the 4th of July off. So we will be talking tomorrow. We're gonna do a little march through the positions in July and just kind of look at the state of the position in dynasty. We'll have Jeff Blaylock on tomorrow to help me kick that off from football guys. All right. Thank you very much. We will be tuning into that. You can watch FFT Dynasty at youtube.com

slash fantasy football today. You can listen to it in this feed in the FFT dynasty feed. But here we go with our news and notes. Not a lot. San Francisco cornerback, De'Amedore Lenore, very good cornerback. He was arrested for obstruction. Free agent kicker, Justin Tucker, suspended 10 games. And Tennessee cornerback, Ligeria Snead. Two years ago with the Chiefs, he was amazing. Last year he was a complete injury bust. He had a number of injuries last year.

He says he is healthy. That's good news for the Titans. All right, mid-round running backs. So what I wanna do is just take a look at the last three years of running backs in this range. This would be rounds five through eight in a 12-team league. But before I do that, I have to find the document.

So how's it going over there, guys? How have the last eight minutes of your life been? Four of them were annoying because you thought I was like taking extra vacation last week and the other four we learned a little bit about Jared Goff. And that's been the recap of the first 10 minutes of this show. Thanks. I'm good now. All right, so I looked at these picks according to Fantasy Pros ADP over the last three years, PPR ADP. 2022 we had 16 running backs, 2023 14 running backs,

2024 14 running backs in this range. And again, right now we have 18 for this year. So it's a lot. But who are the best mid-round picks on a per game basis? Like the home runs. 2022, it was Josh Jacobs. He was the first one drafted in this range, okay? He was RB 20 in ADP, finished his RB three.

Breece Hall as a rookie, seven games he played, he was amazing. And Tony Pollard, that was a year he and Zeke were both very good for fantasy. Pollard had that huge second half. They were both, they were all top 10 per game. So Jacob's, Breeze Hall, Tony Pollard. 2023, the best ones were Kamara and Rashad White.

They were the only ones who finished top 10 per game, but also James Connor, Isaiah Pacheco and David Montgomery. They were all top 16 per game, but also James Connor, Isaiah Pacheco, and David Montgomery. They were all top 16 per game. So Connor, Camara, Rashad White, Pacheco, Montgomery. We're cool with the running back that finishes top 16 per game with around five plus pick. Absolutely. Yeah. Great. 2024 the best guys were Connor again, Aaron Jones and David Montgomery again. By the way, James Connor and David Montgomery are in the ADP in this range again. They have been two of the best picks in this range

two years in a row. I don't know if I found really any commonality or anything, you know, any thread here. It may just be, you know, random. But if we look at the busts, Clyde Edwards Zillayer, Kareem Hunt, Chase Edmonds, Miles Sanders two years ago, Alexander Madison, Dalvin Cook, the year he signed with the Jets on August 14th. Breeze Hall was coming off the ACL injury. People got excited about Dalvin Cook.

Yeah, that was one of the easiest fades ever. Cam Akers, AJ Dillon. These were the busts. Raheem Mostert, Zamir White. These are last year. Zamir White. Raheem Mostert, Zamir White, these are last year. Zamir White, Raheem Mostert, Javante Williams, Jalen Warren, Devin Singletary, these are non-injury busts. I think maybe the only thing I found was the busts, I think were a lot of guys that maybe they were day three picks. Maybe we were more enticed by the role,

guys like Zamir White, Devin Singletary last year. Who did I say the year before Alexander Madison, Dalvin Cook, Cam Akers. I don't know. I felt like the only thing I could really find here was the seem like the busts were guys that maybe we didn't believe in the talent as much. We were just kind of hoping for the circumstances. I think that's probably right. I thought it was interesting. You're going through all of those big hits and those busts.

You never said the name DeAndre Swift, did you? No, I guess he wasn't in that range. I guess there were a couple of years he wasn't. And there were a couple of years he was and he just finished in the middle. So he wasn't a bust or a huge hit. You know what? I think that's exactly what it was.

He's definitely in that range again this year. Like there are some guys that you draft in this range and they just finish RB 18 through 24. And they're just like, okay. Yep, you're absolutely right. He was last year, he was in this range and he finished his RB 24, which he basically does every year. We'll talk about him more because I know he's one of your favorites. But who worries you in this range? I gave you the

list of who's in it. I guess I should probably give it to the audience, right? This year it's a lot of rookies which I think is exciting. Amarion Hampton starts it off. He's 48th and ADP. So he's barely in the on the list. But here it is. You're watching on YouTube. You can see it. Hampton, Ken Walker, Chuba Hubbard, Alvin Camara, Joe Mixon. You know, right there, those are guys in Walker, Hubbard, Mixon, Camara that I wouldn't be surprised if they're some of them or all of them are fourth round picks by the end of it. And they're not in this range, but for now they are.

RJ Harvey, James Connor, Trevion Henderson, DeAndre Swift, David Montgomery, Caleb Johnson, Quinshawn Judkins, Tony Pollard, Isaiah Pacheco, Aaron Jones, Brian Robinson Jr., Jordan Mason, Jalen Warren. Those last three feel a little bit different. They're the round eight guys, Brian Robinson Jr., Jordan Mason, Jalen Warren, those last three feel a little bit different. They're the round eight guys, Brian Robinson Jr, Jordan Mason, Jalen Warren. But I don't know. I didn't say a lot of names or I'm going, I don't know about their talents. You know, I don't see a lot of Alexander Madison's and

Zamir whites in here personally. I worry the most probably. I mean, I think the most obvious is Jordan Mason. Um, and his teammate, Aaron Jones, I would draft quite a bit higher, but you gotta worry about him because of age. I think the second lowest guy, Mason definitely ranked the lowest. I think he's the only one that I have ranked outside of the top 96, which would be round eight.

Um, my second lowest, which is in round eight is Isaiah Pacheco. I know we had a comment in the chat that they just hate all of the chiefs running backs right now. And I kind of feel the same, but Pacheco worries me a lot just because we, I know we're hopeful that he recovers from the leg injury and returns to the form and gets the workload that he, that he had for about 18 games. But there's a lot of things that could go wrong with Pacheco. Kyle Siversky A lot of things that can go wrong with the rookies as well. And there's a lot of

uncertainty when it comes to those Vikings running backs. I think there's a lack of hope for upside. In the case of Brian Robinson Jr., he just feels kind of safe-ish. And thinking back to the names of the guys who didn't perform to expectations that you gave 5 minutes ago, Adam, I feel like their, their draft value was based on hope and not based on facts. Like, the guys that did well, the mid-round running backs that did well. You mentioned James Connors name a couple of times, David Montgomery's name a couple of times, established running backs. We've seen them play well before. They got the opportunity to keep doing what they did. They scored a lot of touchdowns. I think that's maybe where the focus should go. To quote the legendary poet's TLC, don't go chasing waterfalls.

Oh, I thought you were going to say you don't want no scrubs. Please stick to the rivers and the lakes that you're used to. So when maybe that's the first lesson that we can take away here is the running backs that are tried and true. You kind of know what their roles, you don't kind of know, you definitely know what their roles are going to be. You've got a good expectation for them. They're veterans. They've done this before. Those are the rivers and the lakes.

We're used to them. Stick to. Yeah. Um, that was beautiful Dave. Yeah. I, um, I think also it's, it's worth saying, like, I understand why we're grouping all of these guys together and mid-round running backs, but we probably need to differentiate between hopes and concerns in

round five versus round eight. Yeah. Yeah. Cause those feel like massively different parts of the draft. Absolutely. I was going to make that point. I'm glad you did. I mean, there's a huge difference between Ken Walker and Brian Robinson Jr Jr. Yeah, so we'll talk about that as we go through it. I you know what I really think I could be missing something. But I think over the last three years, Breeze Hall was actually I think Damien Damien, Pearson, Breeze Hall have the same rookie year. I think so. Who is this Damien Pearson and Breeze Hall have the same rookie year? I think so. Who is this?

Damian Pierce and Breeze Hall. I want to say yes. Let me double check. Damian Pierce, yes. I think those are the only two rookies that have been in this range, according to Fantasy Pros ADP. So that's why this year is so different.

You've got five, you got Hampton. Well, normally we either get so excited about the rookies that they're not in round five. And I'd be really surprised when we get to draft day if Hampton is actually in round five. I think he'll probably be round four. But the others will be in this range, right? And that'll be four guys.

That'll be Harvey Henderson, Johnson, Judkins. Yeah, and I think how you feel about those guys is probably highly dependent on your format. Like, I don't have a lot of I'm much more confident in Henderson in this range in full PPR and pretty worried about him and none. And I'm much more confident in Caleb Johnson and non PPR. I'm pretty worried about him in full. All right, let's take a break here and let's talk about these guys,

starting with the round five players. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football Today. Now streaming. When people go missing, I get hired to help find them. When lives are on the line. Coulter, please find my daughter. He is the man for the job. I'm gonna do everything I can.

Don't miss a moment. Coulter's in trouble, I can feel it. Of TV's number one show. These people are dangerous. I'm doing this alone. Not at all. Every bad man gotta have their router. Coulter! Justin Hartley stars. I made a promise. I would never a poll, but which song should Dave have quoted, Waterfalls or Scrubs? Ooh, man, they both work. We gotta get, is there another TLC song we can get going here? All right, let's start with Omarion Hampton,

Ken Walker, Chuba Hubbard, Joe Mixon, Alvin Camara. I think there's, you know, an obvious reason why Walker, Hubbard, Mixon, Camara Mix and Kamara all belong in this same conversation. Three of them are quite proven. Hubbard's coming off a great year. And then you've got Amarian Hampton, the rookie. So Dave, how do you view these five guys? Do you think Hampton, Ken Walker, Chuba Hubbard, Joe Mixon and Alvin Kamara, how many of them

do you think should go before round five? Should be top 48 picks? I think all of them should be. I don't think that any of, if any of these guys are sitting in round five in a full PPR league, someone's gifting you some help in fantasy football. I honestly, you could talk me into Chuba Hubbard,

maybe running backs are flying off the board and you gotta have one. The very, very end of Round 3, like if you had to do it, you could do that. Same thing with Kamara. To me, they're, they're both right there on that fringe. Early Round 4, I'm fine with those guys. Nixon will be in that group if not even a shade higher. If he shows up at training camp, he's fine. There's no issues with his, with his ankle or his foot, and he's running like he did at the end of last year. I think everybody would take that guy who finished strong for Houston back in their fantasy lineups. And then Walker has upside, is a good fit for what Seattle is going to do this year. They're changing their rushing scheme. They're going to do a lot more zone running. They're going to use their running backs in the passing game. Walker proved that he could do that last year. He's got two big question marks. Can he stay healthy, which is a question mark that we have for pretty much every running back? And will he be able to have a grip on the majority of the touches? Because we know that Zach Charbonne is there. Last year, it looked like Charbonne was the better fit for Seattle's offense. Is it going to be that way this year to

be determined? But those, all these running backs, I don't know about Chuba, but the other three running backs, they've got potential to finish as top 10 guys. And we've seen it before from Mixon. We've seen it in spurts from Walker. We saw it last year from Chuba. These guys have proven it before. Not as much hope as part of the argument. We can look back and see, factually, they've performed for fantasy managers. Makes me feel good about taking them with a Top 50 pick. Jim Collison And to your point, Adam, I think it's a very good chance that these guys that are showing in Round 5 will

creep, yeah, into Round 4 by the time we get to August. I'm really disappointed. I didn't get to see Adam's live reaction. I stunned him, Dave. He cannot respond. Dave Korsunsky He looks frozen by it, Heath, whatever your name is. Adam Foss You said Chuba Hubbard, you're not sure that he has top 10 upside. Is that because you think that Rico Dowdell and or Trevor Etienne will have a bigger role? Do you think, do you think that Chuba's just, wasn't Chuba pretty close to Top 10 last year? Jim Collison, MD, MPH, CHP, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPH, CHP, MPbard, you go, OK, he can probably be good for about 14 PPR points per game. I think he's a good running back. And I think he'll lead the way for, for the Panthers. I think he earned it. The contract that he earned last year, the extension that he earned, dude, they're paying him a lot. So they obviously believe in him. They're not

paying Rico that much. Trevor Etienne was a Day 3 pick. I think Chuba Hubbard's going to be the lead running back on an ascending offense. That's a guy I'd like to get. But I don't think he's got the same type of upside as the other 3 running backs that Adam brought up. Mixon, Walker, Alvin Camara, like, those guys, certainly they've done it longer than Chuba. Chuba has like really like one good year of consistent fantasy production. And so I think it's easier to buy into those other veterans rather than to say, All right, Chuba is going to be the best one of the bunch. Maybe he's the safest one of the bunch, because other than Walker, he's, he's young, and he's got the opportunity and all that stuff you can kind of buy into a little bit more. He finished 13th in PPR points per game last year. Could he finish that high again this year? I wouldn't be surprised

by that. But I think Walker, I think the other 3 guys have more upside, provided that they, they play a lot. I don't think any of their roles are really changing. Jim Collison So I've got another question, because we talk about Mixon and Walker together. They're back-to-back on this list. Seems like it's usually around later, and it's a couple of players later on the list Adam gave us, that we get to the name of James Connor. What's the difference between Kamara and Mixon and Connor? Because Connor's been incredible when he's been healthy. Kamara was hurt last year, Mixon's in a walking boot right now. Is Connor a bigger risk than those guys? Is Conor a bigger risk than those guys? I don't think we can count on him for the same type of receiving production as Kamara. I don't have to say think. I can say I know that Kamara has much more upside and full PPR. Kamara averaged 19 PPR points per game last year. That's wicked good, everybody. So I'm totally fine with Kamara ahead of Conor. People of the same age.

Conor might score a few more touchdowns. That's a non PPR issue, not a full PPR issue. And so Camara is there. Mixon can fall behind Connor if he's slow to recover from his injuries. Maybe he doesn't start training camp on time. What if he starts training camp on the pup list? He that'll make me a lot more nervous about taking Joe Mixon, especially if that creeps into mid August, late August.

We just don't know. And so that's why we've got to be a little bit flexible when it comes to mixing. And certainly there's a world where Connor finishes well ahead of mixing and PPR points per game, but Connor is that running back. You can tell me if you agree with this or not. He's the running back that no one is like super excited about, but everyone would still be happy, satisfied to draft as a good number two fantasy RB. Yeah, I've got him at the, I guess at the five, six turn. So I do have him about a round behind Camara and I've got Camara about a round behind Mixon. I haven't discounted Mixon for the injury yet

because they've acted like it's not a big deal, but that's enough about the old guys. Let's talk about the rookies. I don't think Adam should have even put Amariah Hampton on this show. I was making a joke about him creeping into round four and I see in the notes that he's 48th in ADP right now. That is round four, but Amariah Hampton,

and there's a pretty big gap and then rj harvey And then a little gap and then henderson and then a decent gap and then johnson and judkins. Yeah It is that how you see it or is harvey still up in that place? It seems like in in the adp here. He's still up in the place where he was before the daub and signing I wonder how, let's forget about Hampton for a second, because I think most, I don't have him second, but most people do amongst the rookies. When you get to Harvey Henderson and Johnson and Judkins, do you have a strong preference? Should they all be in

the same range? Or is it right that Johnson and Judkins are around or two later than the other guys? I've got Henderson and Judkins ahead of Johnson and Harvey. Harvey is last on that list. I bet, I bet if we did a bunch of mock drafts, Harvey would be the last rookie running back off the board because of the Dobbins arrival in Denver. So I would be a lot less excited about drafting him than the other running backs on this list. And that might, listen, this is a dip. This might be actually an incentive for fantasy managers to go after R.J. Harvey, because instead of getting him, dude, we were taking him in like round five in some of our early mocks after the draft. And I remember saying on the show, this

wasn't one of our favorite prospects. Like, I was at the Senior Bowl, and I watched him practice, and he was good, but he didn't like blow me away. I didn't think that he was like the greatest running back in the world, but who cares about my opinion when Sean Payton drafts them in round two and the entire front office says, yeah, this was our kind of our pet project going into the draft. Clearly they had some designs on RJ Harvey. And then after their first OTAs, they bring in JK Dobbins. And so like that's, that's a, that's an alert in my mind that something

isn't perfect in Denver where they thought, okay, RJ Harvey is going to be our guy, no questions asked star running back. Well, then why are they signing JK Dobbins? And to me, I would say that they just wanted to have an insurance policy and maybe somebody who could work passing downs. And I don't necessarily want to invest too much in a running back, especially a rookie, that's not going to be on 3rd down. That's not going to have the chance to catch some extra check-down passes. Maybe somebody who doesn't work at the goal line as

much as an established veteran like J.K. Dobbins. Harvey, to me, right now, he's last on this list of running backs. I'd put Henderson first. This is full PPR. I think he's got a chance to get 50 receptions this year. I worry about his touchdowns, but I think the receptions and the fact that he could eventually grow into a really good role. I've done the research on on Patriots, not Patriots running backs, excuse me, Josh McDaniels running backs. Most of the time, the best running backs under McDaniels average around 14 touches per game. I think Henderson can get there. I think if we're getting him in round five, maybe even early round six,

I think that's good value in full PPR. But this is an example of drafting somebody based more on hope than actual facts, stats, et cetera. This is the type of running back, at least based on the profile that Adam put out there earlier on the show, that could burn us. So you don't want to reach for players like that. Have we ever made mention of the fact

that this is not the first skill position player that Sean Payton has drafted in round two since he joined the Broncos? No. No. You took Marvin Mims in round two. Yeah. Who has seen 85 targets in his Marvin Mims in round two. Yeah. Who has seen 85 targets in his first two seasons in the league.

Sure. Yeah. That's fair. Round two running backs are different, I think, than round two receivers though. Um, but it's a good point. Uh, I didn't like the Mims pick. I remember arguing on draft night about the Mims pick. Uh, by the way, my power went out earlier. So thank you guys for filling in.

Well, show was really good. The last it sounded good. I mean, I, what I heard sounded good. Yeah. No, it's a good point. So we're in, we're talking about the round six guys now. Well, basically what we did was we talked about the old guys, Kamara, Mixon and Connor.

We just talked about the rookies. We were getting ready to transition to those guys in the middle that DeAndre Swift, David Montgomery, Tony Pollard range. Well, you didn't go in order. You kind of skipped around here. Or what? Group them by kind of like types.

All right. Types of runbacks. I guess they're all in the same range. So then, so we're up to Montgomery. Yeah. Yeah. That's what the host just said. We have talked about everyone before David Montgomery.

Okay. So the only guys we've talked about after David Montgomery are rookies. Okay. Fair enough. Um, so how many, so would you take David Montgomery? All right. Better question. How many rookies are you taking over David Montgomery?

One Ashton Gentry. In full PPR? You're not taking Hampton over Montgomery? Yeah, full PPR. Only Henderson for me, but Hampton's not my second rookie running back in full PPR. Who is? Henderson. Oh, okay. I'm sorry.

Yeah, that makes sense. So you're taking Genty and Henderson over Montgomery. Correct. Montgomery again, two years in a row. He's been such a great value, a great value. He was the number 11 running back per game in his first 14 games. And he did catch the ball. He had 36 catches in 14 games.

That's not nothing. So, all right. He just no respect for him in ADP, where's he going? He's going in round six. Okay, so then what about your boy DeAndre Swift? Let's talk about him. I was prepared for this.

I did a lot of DeAndre Swift research. This is where he's finished per game in full PPR in five seasons. DeAndre Swift, RB 17 per game, 10 per game, 17 per game, 24 and 24. In half PPR, there's only two standout years. Then the last three years in half PPR, Swift's been 23, 24 and 24 per game.

Basically the same in non PPR. He's actually never finished higher than 20th per game in non PPR. So, what do you think? Do you think he's going to be around RB 24 this year? I think this guy and Dave, I think has made the point that Swift could be the guy who's being drafted too high because of projected volume. It seems though that everyone's already drafted Swift too high too many times to do that.

So he's currently being drafted in the middle of round six or often in round seven or later in our mocks. And I don't think the narrative that Ben Johnson hates DeAndre Swift holds any water at all anymore. Agreed. Partially because of the way Johnson's talked, partially because of the way the Bears have behaved this entire off season. They have had all kinds of opportunities to add all kinds of running backs and they just passed and passed and passed. So I project DeAndre Swift as RB 17. I think he absolutely in Ben Johnson's offense has top 12 upside. And the risk other than him getting hurt and missing a lot of games, the risk in my opinion

is that, Oh no, he finishes at RB 24 again, which is better than his ADP. I think he's one of the few running backs available who has top 12 upside and a floor that is higher than his ADP. The last time he was top 12 was 2021 Adam. Per game? Yes, and that was when he had 62 catches in 13 games. And was that with Ben Johnson?

No, Ben Johnson was 2022, I believe. Okay, Johnson was there. He just wasn't in charge of the offense. Correct. So you're right, Heath. All off season long, the Bears could have signed any free agent running back. They could have drafted anyone except Genty.

They would have had to trade up to get Genty on their team. And I think they would have taken Genty if he had fallen to them in the draft. Just didn't happen that way. And I thought there would, I still feel like there's another shoe to drop here when it comes to the Bears running game, but it hasn't happened yet. That's facts.

And Deandre Swift looks like he's in position to be the lead guy in an offense with an improved offensive line and improved scheme. And I thought about this Heath, we've seen this before. We saw it two years ago when Deandre Swift went to Philadelphia. He was the lead running back there. He averaged 12.5 PPR points per game. Half the year he was awesome. He started the year great, 15 PPR points per game, just an absolute stud.

And then the second half of the season, be it because of injuries, didn't work as much. He didn't even average 10 PPR points per game in the second half of the year. I just, I don't want to spend a lot of draft capital on Deandre Swift, even though I know that as of now, he's the main running back in Chicago's offense. What does that mean though? A lot of draft capital. You don't have to. Well, what's the ADP is what round six?

Yes. Late round. Soon for me. I don't, I think I can find other running backs. I would rather take a chance on a lot of these other rookies. I'll take the hope over. I'll take the whole go chase the waterfalls, Dave. Stick to the stick to the RB twos you're used to.

Yeah, but in round six, if I'm drafting a guy with the expectation of 12 and a half PPR points per game, I'm, I'm probably not drafting at that position. I will probably look for a wide receiver. That's got a chance to do better than that. I will probably take a quarterback that's got 22 fantasy point per game upside over a running back like Swift. I need to see a path where he can get back to that 15 point per game range. Heath, you might see that path, but there's in Philadelphia,

12 and a half points per game. He was great for half the year. He sucked for half the year. Last year in Chicago, he was the lead running back in Chicago, 12 and a half PPR points per game. I think that the, the thing that you would say, if you're wanting to talk about Swift, especially in PPR is upside is the fact that that year in Philadelphia you're talking about was his lowest catch total of his career and the reasons

quite obvious he played with Jalen hurts. It basically had the same skin catch total in Chicago though. He played one extra game and he had three more catches. So 39, 30 targets per game last year. Yeah. So, so can he be a top 12? What has been Johnson's offense generally been for running back targets? Yeah, quite good. Good. Right. It's been good for everyone, including Swift, two years in a row, or one year. If we

don't count the other year, Ben Johnson was there at Swin. Yeah. Yep. 2022 with Ben Johnson. He had 48 catches in 14 games. That's terrific. But even if he had 42 catches in 17 games, he still could, could be a top 15, 12 ish running back because it happens all the time, but he's got to score more touchdowns. He has career high as eight rushing touchdowns. That was as a rookie. He's one of the worst short yardage running backs in the NFL. His third, his third and one and fourth and one conversion rate since he came into the NFL is, is among the lowest of all running backs. So yeah. So there's that. There's that's, that's if he's going to be a top 12 running back,

but we've seen four years in a row now it's five, five, five, six in terms of the rushing touchdowns and he still finishes higher than he's being drafted. Here's the takeaway that I want to give on that. 2023, the lie, he was the lead running back for the lions. Ben Johnson was the OC. That was a good offense. It was a great offensive line. That was the year Jamal Williams scored like 17 touchdowns. Yeah. I let's keep the name Roshan Johnson in mind. Everybody.

Yeah, for sure. Race sleeper, dart throw. And like the round 10 range, I got a feeling that if Chicago's not adding any other running backs, they've got a guy ready to take that Jamal Williams role and it's not going to be Deandre Swift. We know what what we just got done talking about the swift is not a short yardage guy. Yeah. And last thing on Swift, he's top 24 every year per game

in his career five straight years. That is with four of the first five years, leaving one game super early with an injury and having terrible stats because of it. So it's even better than, well, you know, you have to do that to every, for every running back. I know that, but he has been victimized a little bit by leaving games early with injuries. Okay. And it's worth saying that like of those finishes that we gave from Swift, the year that Jamal Williams scored 17 touchdowns. DeAndre Swift

was RB 16 per game. In full PPR. Right. Half PPR, I think it was 23rd. Both are better than where he's been going. You talk about Jamal Williams scoring 17. It's not that different than Jaylen Hertz scoring 15 in 2023. DeAndre Swift had the six carries that ended at the one yard line that year. All of them followed by Jaylen Hertz touchdowns in 2023, DeAndre Swift had the six carries that ended at the one yard line that year, all of them followed by Jalen Hurts touchdowns in 2023.

All right, we should take a break, but let's get Tony Pollard and Isaiah Pacheco in this discussion as well. How do they compare with DeAndre Swift and David Montgomery? And we'll be right back on FFT. A quick recap exercise here for those of us who maybe lost power and missed a big chunk of the show.

Uh, you just tell me I'm going to give you the player and the round and you give me a yes or no. Are you comfortable taking this guy in this round in a 12 team PPR league? Omarion Hampton, four or five turn. I'm good with that. Really. I don't really want to. Ken Walker around five.

Really good with that. Love it. Chuba Hubbard round five. Yes. Love it. Joe Mixon and Alvin Kamara around five. Kamara more so, but yes. Love Mixon there, Kamara's fine. Round six, RJ Harvey. Too rich.

No. That's where I have them. James Connor. Love No, that's where I have them. James Connor. Love it. That's where I have them. Trevion Henderson. Well, that's fine. Deandre Swift. Love it. I'd rather I'm going to let Heath draft them in round six.

David Montgomery. Good. Appropriate. Round seven, Caleb Johnson and Quinshawn Judkins. Fine with it. Like Judkins, fine with Johnson. Okay, then let's get to these three guys, Tony Pollard, Isaiah Pacheco, and Aaron Jones. They're going in round seven. Veteran running backs going right after two rookies, Caleb Johnson and Quinn John Judkins, Tony Pollard,

Isaiah Pacheco and Aaron Jones. How do you rank them, Dave? I've got Pacheco ahead of Pollard. I've got Jones ahead of both those guys. I don't know how much I love that. These are all running backs that I'm looking at round six plus prefer to get in around seven. I like Pollard in round six.

I, I could deal with Jones in round six and I'm going to let Dave draft Isaiah Pacheco and these guys are all going around seven by the way, according to early ADP, right. Oh, good values for all three. I yeah, I've got Pacheco in round eight. Pacheco is my favorite. He's my fave. Um, he's, he's probably my favorite. He's my fave.

He's probably my favorite sleeper right now. I'll call him a sleeper and it's not a super late round pick, but I think people were sleeping on him. It just obviously one we're gonna have to watch the health reports and all that. But there's there's there's probably two really key things to watch. And I don't know how much of an indication we get in training camp. But is Isaiah Pacheco back to what he was? Exactly.

And then the second one is, is this a workhorse Andy Reid running back role, which we've seen many times throughout Andy Reid's career and has worked out great for fantasy, or is this a big mess where Rashard Smith matters on passing downs and Kareem Hunt is handling carries inside the five? I think that the inside the five might be a bigger concern than the passing downs. A hundred percent agree. Yeah. Just because Hunt's pretty good at getting you two yards if you need two yards.

And Pacheco's had struggles getting that role throughout most of his career. Yeah. I mean, the passing downs thing, you're gonna be running backs in this range that are coming off the field, either on passing downs or for Tony Pollard, he's gonna come off the field on some running downs. So we're not looking at workhorses necessarily here, but Pacheco, just remember where we were at this time

last year, talk about him as somewhere between mid-round two and mid round three. And the only thing that changed that he was off to the start that we wanted, right? The role looked great. The only thing that changed was the injury he came back and he was absolutely horrible. So if I think if he's healthy, he's by far the best running back in this backfield and ready for a big bounce back season. But I feel like he's got to earn that again. Sure. But in round eight, you know, or round seven, pardon me.

I'm willing to take that risk. The only thing I would say is like we, in terms of by far the best running back in this range. No, on the team, on the team, on the team. Sure. Yeah. But like, I just have. On the team, sure. Yeah. But like, I just have a lot of reasons to doubt.

Like we are talking about a 26 year old former seventh round pick who's never had a thousand yard rushing season or scored more than seven rushing touchdowns or had 300 receiving yards in a year. He had a stretch between the end of year two and the beginning of year three, where you could either stat together a 17 game season that looks like, oh yeah. He was RB 14 per game in 2023.

Yep. That's all I have to say. He missed three games, but he was on pace for 1135 yards, 53 catches plus 11 total touchdowns, nine rushing. That was his pace. So yeah, he's had trouble staying healthy. There are certainly risks with Pacheco, but he was RB 14 per game in 2023. He had an injury riddled horrible season in 2024.

I'm just hoping for the bounce back there. It's really that simple. I don't even think we have to get that, right? It's that simple. So how about we talk about Aaron Jones and Tony Pollard here because I think they're more complex, especially Tony Pollard with the presence of Tajay Spears who did eat into a big chunk of Tony Pollard's role

when they were both healthy. And you got Brian Callahan and maybe the offensive coordinator, I don't even remember. Some talking, two people talking about how want to get multiple running backs involved. So yeah, what do you guys think about Pollard here? Dave, good pick in round seven. Dave Korsunsky I think it's fine. I'd rather Aaron Jones. Actually, I have Jones ahead of both Pollard and Pacheco. It's mostly because of track record and the offense that he's in. I'm not ready to believe that he's going to lose a lot of work to Jordan Mason.

It could be a split. He shared carries last year too, still averaged over 14 PPR points per game. And he's always been the type of running back. This is Aaron Jones. When he's had decent volume, he's come through for fantasy managers. I think Pollard needs to have that volume in order to come through on the same level around 14 PPR points per game. And I bet there's going to be some games this year where Pollard doesn't get that workload.

I think we're going to see more of Tai-Jay Spears working closer to a 50-50 split. And I think we'll see a lot of games where the Titans have more confidence in their passing game. I think there were games last year where Brian Callahan did not want to call a ton of passing plays because of what they had at quarterback. I think that's going to flip this year because Cam Ward seems like he's already ascending to being a capable starter who won't throw the ball five yards over somebody's head or make bonehead decisions, won't fumble the ball when he's getting sacked, won't do dumb stuff. And it just, it makes me wonder, okay, does that mean the Titans score more? And if they do score more, that would theoretically help Pollard. But I don't know if that's going to end up being the case. So I'm going to take Jones, who's done it before, has the longer track record. I know he's older, that part sucks. But it's the Minnesota offense. And I think they're going to have to run just a little bit more in Minnesota anyway, because J.J. McCarthy is the quarterback there. So close call, great value for all three. But

give me Jones first. John Wallenspuner My real hesitance with Jones is partially the age and partially a concern that Jordan Mason is the guy inside the red zone and Jordan Mason proves to be a better rusher this year. So yeah, do we feel like we really have seen enough of Jordan Mason to? Right. I didn't say I'm not predicting that. I'm not projecting that, but that's one, that's one of my concerns with like Jones is going to be 31. Yup. He turns 31 in December. So 30, but still like that's risky. And he's kind of like Swift. I mean, in terms of touchdowns lately, he has 13 rushing touchdowns in his last four seasons combined. Yeah. And and Jones had 255 carries in 17 games. He did leave one game early with an injury,

but they've talked about wanting to reduce that workload. And 51 catches is really good for him as well. These two guys, Pollard and Jones and Deandre Swift, they have a lot in common. These are three guys who had 250 or more carries and five or six rushing touchdowns. The other one who had that was Najee Harris, but you could say Pollard, Jones and Swift. I don't know if you want to call it luck, but touchdown rate.

Sure they were at the very bottom of touchdown rate. I don't think they are three of the best short yardage running backs in the NFL by any stretch of the imagination. I think the question also when you're looking, if you want to put those three together instead of Pacheco, cause it's kind of a different argument, which of those offenses are we all expecting to be a lot better than they were last year? No, it's certainly Tennessee. Tennessee should be better. Well, I was in Chicago.

Oh, I'm sorry. I, Chicago is the one that everyone is just expecting to be a lot. I didn't, I wasn't concluding Swift there. My bad. Yeah. Yeah. Now Chicago is the one that everyone is just expecting to be a lot. I didn't, I wasn't concluding Swift there. My bad. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so, and I think.

Pollard's going to have TaiJay Spears, hopefully for more of the year than he did last year, hopefully for TaiJay Spears staying healthy. And Jordan Mason's probably a bigger risk to Jones than the guys they had, they were splitting work with with Jones last year. Agreed. And they had a lot of different- Whereas Swift's added no running back competition unless you wanna count Kyle Madungay.

You know what I find amazing about Swift? I love this about him. He is such a home run hitter, but for a guy, he had three rushing touchdowns of 35 or more yards last year. Only Saquon Barkley and James Cook had more three long rushing touchdowns. And somehow he only had six rushing touchdowns for the year and average 3.8 yards per carry. Since entering the league five years ago, he's 16th in carries among running backs, but he has the fourth most carries of 35 or more yards. This is DeAndre

Swift. Sorry, he was Ken Walker before Ken Walker was Ken Walker. Yeah, a little bit. Yeah, with more pass catching chops. So there's that exciting profile of the Andre Swift. He can still hit the home run. Yeah, Pollard, Pollard can to Pollard, you know, Jamie's brought this up about Pollard, and he had the one year where his advanced metrics in terms of like after contact weren't good. And it was the year where he's coming off the broken ankle. Other than that, he's one of the true elites

in after, you know, yards after contact. So he can make big plays. You want these guys, are you okay with maybe waiting and waiting on running back, going hero RB and taking around six and round seven running back? I'm RB and taking around six and around seven running back. I'm sorry if you already said that earlier. We didn't talk about this and we absolutely should. Everybody should rewind to the beginning of our running back discussion. You listed a lot of names

Adam. It's up to you if you want to list those names again, you should do a count in your head how many of those names you'd be comfortable starting on your fantasy team. And the bigger the number you come up with, the more excited you should be about Hero or Zero RB, especially considering what we've talked about with wide receivers this offseason, how it's so top-heavy. And once you get to like the middle of the wide receiver 2 range, they all kind of look the same as you go down into the wide receiver 3 range. This, this depth at running back excites me. And it's, it's the fact that we're able to get some veteran running backs at a good price. We just got done talking about 3 other veteran running backs that you're getting at a great price. They've got upside to be awesome. I think the draft really helped us restock the running back position in fantasy for a good while.

But this year, especially with so many veteran running backs that we can look at and still say, okay, these guys can help us. They might be 29, 30 or 31 years old, but they can still help us in fantasy. There's real depth here that I think we should use as part of our strategy when we're talking about half and full PPR league. Head explosion emoji. John who Smith to the Steelers. Wow. Two big trades for the Steelers.

Yeah. Jalen Ramsey and John who Smith to the Steelers today. We kind of knew the John who one was coming in separate trades, separate. Were they separate trades? I mean, it looks like it from what the way I'm interpreting the tweet. Well, that really stinks for the tight end position. Oh, you know, you know, like, are you guys ready to start taking Tyree kill earlier now? Because I knew I knew eventually it catch up to me.

We're going to have to. I'll probably make a bigger boost to waddle than to Hill, but they will both move up in the rankings. And HN. Holy cow. You guys ready to join me with HN as a RB two. I'd be too. I think I've got them at RB three.

I've got them. I've got a B John Barkley HM that I may put a chain ahead of Berkeley now. You're forgetting McCaffrey Heath. What? You're forgetting McCaffrey. I know. I guess we have to finish this discussion of mid-round running backs. Maybe we'll do a bonus podcast later on this Johnnie trade.

But yeah, this is a big deal. Johnnie was a target hog down the stretch last year. Okay. He's a big loser, right? Shoot. Oh yeah. Yeah, that sucks. Okay, so then we have these last three guys in round eight, Brian Robinson Jr, Jordan Mason and Jalen Warren. And as much as I wanna be like,

I don't really believe in Brian Robinson Jr. He kind of feels like one of some of those other guys that were busts on this range. He's basically the last starting running back available. Maybe Javante Williams, maybe I'm missing someone, but this is, I think round eight for Brian Robinson Jr. Feels like pretty good value, even in PPR. I know he's not gonna catch passes.

Yes, he needs the score, but he probably will. You guys kind of feel along the same lines. And you're right. I use that dorky Muppet voice. Yeah, this was for Brian Robinson. Because listen, I'm more excited about him and non PPR because I think he can get you 10 non PPR points per game. Problem is, I think you can get you 10 PPR points per game too. He just doesn't catch the ball enough. He's touchdown dependent.

Don't ever see him being a, a huge breakout guy on a team that splits running back workload and has a great rushing quarterback. Yeah. I think round eight is exactly where Brian Robinson junior belongs. But earlier in, would you go earlier in half or none? None, yes. None for sure, because all the running backs are earlier. Right.

Half not really, right? I mean, he's still a liability, touchdown dependent. Okay, so he did leave two games early. They were both against Dallas, I believe. One of them was I believe. One of them was an injury. One was week 18 where he left, um, they watched him pull their starters and he would have averaged more than a full point per game more in PPR. If you remove weeks 12 and 18, Brian Robinson, and that would have put him in the top 24 per game.

So I think it's pretty clear he doesn't have huge upside in any format where catches count. But he's a solid pick here and Jordan Mason. I don't know that I want it like round eight for a handcuff. I don't know. I understand he's gonna have a role, but I don't know. Mason and Jalen Warren in round eight. I don't think I'd make those picks would you? Warren in full PPR, I'm fine with there. I like him more than I like Robinson in full PPR. Oh, I thought I really liked Jordan Mason, but no, not that round nine for Mason is okay. Does this Johnny? I'm sorry, Dave. Does this John Smith trade change how you feel about Jalen Warren? I got to think about that a little bit more.

I got to go back and look at how he was used with Arthur Smith before, because he's not going to be used the same way that he was in Miami, that that Steelers offense isn't going to try and get the ball out of Aaron Rodgers hands as fast as possible, they're going to want Rodgers to make reads and then deliver. And he's got good accuracy. So good accuracy. Dave, that John Smith will still be used in short area passing, just not to the same volume. I don't know if that really impacts Warren greatly, but I do need to double check that. Dave has made the good point that, um, a long time ago, and I, I just took it over that the running back targets and tight end targets are generally negatively

correlated that if you're going to throw to your tight ends more, you're going to throw your running backs less and vice versa that they're what proves rules Adam. Exceptions prove rules. Okay. And Arthur Smith is the exception to that rule over the last three years, just 44% of his team's targets have gone to wide receivers. They throw a ton to both their tight ends and their running backs. And I think that was always the plan.

They had 230 targets last year, which doesn't sound like a lot that went to those two positions, which is one more than they threw to their wide receivers. So I don't know that it necessarily, I think it, I mean, it, it really nukes Pat fire, fire me. And I don't think it has a big impact on Warren. All right. By the way, um, Miami was also an exception to that rule. They threw HN and John New Smith all the time with two. But here's my point about Mason and Warren,

last point here. The next two running backs off the board as we get into round nine, are Travis Etienne and Tyrone Tracy. Oh, and Najee Harris as well. Etienne, Harris and Tracy. Are you taking EtienneN Harris and Tracy, are you taking ETN Harris and or Tracy ahead of Jordan Mason and Jalen Warren?

Yep. In full PPR, I'm taking ETN ahead of, amongst guys we've talked about, Warren, Caleb Johnson, Isaiah Pacheco, and Brian Robinson. I checked that, I've got Warren. And he's head of ETN. You do. As of now, I got a factor in the John New trade before I stick with that.

But yeah, Jordan Mason is behind all those guys. All right. That's gonna do it for our show today. We will talk to you tomorrow, maybe later today with a John New Smith breakdown. I think we can probably cover that on tomorrow's show. Have a good one everybody. Talk to you soon on Fantasy Football Today.

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