Fantasy Football Today - NFL Draft Prep: A Loaded RB Class! Emory Hunt Gives His Favorite RBs (04/17 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: April 17, 2025

We've got Emory Hunt here to preview the running back class, and it's absolutely loaded! This one could rival the 2017 class (Christian McCaffrey, Alvin Kamara, Dalvin Cook, Aaron Jones, Leonard Fournette, etc.), and let's start at the top with Ashton Jeanty (4:40). Just how good is he? And let's get a Top 5 (9:05) from Emory and from Dave with some surprises from Emory ... Getting into Cam Skattebo and RJ Harvey. Is Skattebo too slow? Then let's talk about Omarion Hampton (23:55) and TreVeyon Henderson (33:00) who could be first round picks ... Emory gives us RBs 6-10 in his rankings (40:00) and then we get expert analysis on Quinshon Judkins (41:00), Kaleb Johnson (47:10), Devin Neal (51:40) and many more. Plus, some sleepers (1:03:00) and how many Fantasy stars we might have in this class ... Email us 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 Fantasy Football Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today podcast." Visit the betting arena on CBSSports.com for all the latest sportsbook reviews and sportsbook 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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Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie and Heath. What's up everybody? Welcome to Fantasy Football Today. Oh, I am so excited for today's show. We have saved the best for last, which is probably my favorite Vanessa Williams song, guys, if we want to get into that. But we're talking running backs, the best position, at least of the skill positions in the NFL draft. And we've got Emre Hunt, arguably our best guest

and a former running back here to break it down. Emre, what's going on? Follow him at FBallGameplan on X or Twitter. And what have you been up to the last few months? Putting together this massive scouting guide. Well, and here's the funny part, man, we talked about running backs, I've graded 145 running backs, I have a sickness. It's insane.

104. I was just saying for the show, I scouted 12 or 14 or whatever it was your 145. Dave, where you at 144? Oh, no, I'm at 273. I saw a guy running through the grocery store park and I find him at four or five, five pretty decent contact balance, had a gallon of milk in each hand. I think he might be able to be a good backup in the league. Was contact balance something we were saying 10 years ago? No, absolutely not. You just call it break tackle ability.

Yeah, I see. I hear it all the time now. But anyway, I want to want to welcome you all to the show. Jamie's here as well. We are really excited about this position. But also, you know, Jamie, Emory was saying before the show, he might not he wouldn't be surprised if some teams double up on running back in the draft. So it's like we're excited for this class, but it also could create some confusion in fantasy drafts in terms of good running backs,

sharing a backfield with a veteran and there's a lot to be sorted out and determined. But a week from now, well, I guess nine days from now, the NFL fantasy landscape will look very different at this position You know, you're all over the place when Adam says in the email about our notes. We have no notes today We're just gonna wing it. That's how you can tell the way he's talking First off you can't call him our best guest if he's going to ruin our fantasy landscape like that by saying teams are gonna take multiple running backs

Yeah, I would not surprise me at all if we see, you know, a team, let's say like Dallas or Denver or, you know, any of these running back needy teams that, you know, go early and then, you know, find someone that they like, that they scouted, that they get great value on, you know, on day three and now we have a whole new backfield essentially, you know. So, it's definitely there. And then there's the 49ers who always take a running back. So maybe they take two also.

So there will be probably a team or two that does that. And then we have to just sort of say, OK, that as we said yesterday, the Jalen Warren love, the I forget who some of the other guys, but Najee Harris, the signing there the, the signing there and, and, and the chargers taking, you know, a guy or two to upgrade their backfield, you know, so those guys may not, they don't, they won't become irrelevant clearly, but they'll become problematic for, for what we like to talk about.

All right. Let's get into, to the show. So let's start with this. Emory, how good is Ashton Gentey? I think he's a solid back man. And he's definitely first round back. If I was to say, is he better than, you know, Jameer Gibbs or Bijon Robinson, I wouldn't go that far, but you can't knock what he has done productivity wise.

And listen, here's how I compare the whole thing. I compare it to the Barry Sanders, Emmett Smith comparison. When we all, you know, coming of age and we're watching the whole Emmett Smith, Barry Sanders debate take place, you're like, well, I see why Barry Sanders is good. Like he has a wiggle, he has speed, explosiveness, he's exciting.

Why is Emmett Smith this good? Cause he does nothing flashy. Even Michael Irvin said it when they traded Hersha Walker for Emmett Smith, essentially. He was like, we got rid of Hersha Walker for Emmett Smith, essentially he was like, we got rid of Hersha Walker for this dude, like the slow dude. But when you look at Jinty, it's a lot of that.

But at the end of the day, there is value in his ability to have the stamina, the ability to break tackles, and not just regular tackles where he's just sliding through tackles, but the fact that he looks dead in the water, you really can't bring him down. Elvin Kamara had that same type of lower body strength is able just to plow through guys.

So I just feel like Genti's consistency in, uh, you know, functional power is really good. And we haven't really tapped into his, uh, receiving ability. I have in my notes, he has excellent hands as a receiver. You, you can tell right away if a has excellent hands as a receiver you you can tell right away if a guy is natural as a pass catcher or if he's you know kind of like just hoping to catch the football he's very much natural so that's something that's going to be unlocked as he gets to the pros. I've said this before Adam it's one of my favorite little nuggets on Ashton Gentry is in his first year playing high school football in America.

It was in Lone Star High School in the Dallas area. He was first team all district at wide receiver. Yeah. Lone Star! He said he would be a first round pick at wide receiver. Who said that? Genti. I think it was on K Adams show that he would be a first round pick at wide receiver. Who said that? Gentie. I think it was on K Adam stuff that he would be a first round pick at wide receiver. Yeah. He had 43 catches in 2023, only 23 catches last year. All right. So he tried to get on the record in 2024. That's why he didn't catch as much. He, uh, yeah. And he almost did get the record. Second most rushing yards in a single season in college football history behind Barry Sanders. He had 2,601 rushing yards and 29 touchdowns in 14 games. Unbelievable.

And how, okay, how good is this running back class in general, Emory? I said this, and we talked about this off air. This rivals a 2017 class that had Christian McCaffrey, Linda Fournette, Alvin Kamara, Joe Mixon, Samaj P. Ryan, to Rick Cohen was in that class, Jamal Williams, Delvin Cook, Aaron Jones, that was a running back class. This class reminds me a lot of that one. Samaj P. Ryan gets a mention.

He's still in the league, man, you know, he's had a good career. But yeah, no, that was obviously an amazing class. How many first round picks do you think we have, two? You know what? Honestly, looking at it, I think we may see three because the wild card in this first round is Sean Payton. And we've seen Sean Payton not be afraid to take a back in the first round.

Reggie Bush was taking a second overall. We saw him take Mark Ingram in the first round. Sean Payton does not shy away from taking backs. He also doesn't shy away from taking the high backs and refusing to give him the football. So we still may see him take the first round back and give, you know, every other back on the roster some opportunity. We saw this with Ingram, we saw this with Bush. Like, why are you just not leaving Bush in the game? So that's the wild card. I think Denver would be that third team. Chicago and Dallas, I think are the other two

that could end up taking backs. And so Gentie, Hampton and- Henderson. Henderson would be the guy off the board. I love Cheviot Henderson, Emery. What's gonna get him on the field early is his elite trait of pass pro. So if you're on the field, now you,

hey, we kind of get, got to give him the ball. We give him the ball like, oh, he's actually pretty doggone explosive. So he is the, the underrated complete back in the class. Yeah. He's five, 10, 202 pounds, ran a four, four, three, 40, five star recruit, Trayvon Henderson shared the backfield with Quincheon Judkins at Ohio State. All right, let's get a top five from, from Emory and from Dave. Top five running backs, Emory. All right, so we talked about

Gentie Hampton. I have a half point grade higher for Gentie. So Hampton and Gentie are right there for me. Then the Henderson. And then here's where it gets interesting, guys, because I am a big fan of his vision. I think he has the best vision in the draft class. And that's Trevor Etienne out of Georgia and rounding out number five, the explosive game breaker. Very Chris Johnson like to borrow that comp from our colleague, Brian McFadden, Jaden Blue. Oh, wow. Okay. So Dave, how about you?

We got Gentie Hampton, Trevion Henderson, Trevor Etienne, and Jaden Blue for Emory. How about you, Dave? I see it with Jaden Blue. I don't have him in my top five just yet. Genti is going to be number one. I've got Henderson second, Hampton's third, Quinshaw Juggins fourth. Don't really have a fifth. I'm not blown away by the Sampson's, the Caleb Johnson's, the Scatabows. I'm a little bit worried about which one of those guys could actually end up making a difference in the NFL. So I don't have a fifth yet, but those are my top four.

And so you're basically gonna let the NFL draft figure that out for you and look at the landing spot, Dave, and go from there? That makes sense. That's kinda how I felt, you know, just, like I said to Emery before this, I don't I mean, I don't really know. That's just why we have Emory on, right?

I don't know if DJ Giddens is going to be better than R.J. Harvey and whatnot. So we'll see what the NFL draft has to say about it. Tell me about Trevor Etienne and Jaden Blue, Emory. Kareem Hunt was also in that draft class too in 2017. It's crazy. It's easier to tell us who wasn't in that draft class. Big go. For ETN, it's funny watching his tape

because the vision I compare to, it's like if we're all sitting atop in the upper decks of the stadium and we're seeing the run play play out and we're saying, oh, the hole is over here. And he hits it, right? So he's seeing it real time while being field level as opposed to us to having that 10,000 foot view level of the play.

So it's always in conjunction with the run, with the blocking. So it shows who he understands offense. He understands how to, you know, be slow too fast through that whole running back situation of, you know, how to be patient and really explode through the whole accelerate. And I like how he finishes runs. Like he finds a way to fall forward. And especially when he gets near the goal line, he really has a good sense for putting the ball in the

paint. So the vision combined with the patience and the footwork, he may not be the most explosive like his brother, but he definitely has a vision and the balance and the finishing ability near the goal line Do you see him as a tigey spears type of back emery? I see him more along the lines of Um, not spears spears has a little bit more juice. I would say etn is more along the lines of And I don't think he has the juice of this guy But kind of the same sees it the same way, Josh Jacobs, like they got good vision.

Speed kind of tops out a little bit. Pass Pro, I would say both guys are a work in progress, but they do attack a half man, you know, better and just kind of get in the way, which is all you can ask for is the back. But I would say he's more Josh Jacobsy than Tajay Spears. And give me a scouting report on Jaden Blue out of Texas. If you blink, you missed him. That's how explosive and his acceleration is. So he's one of those guys that you can see in a San Francisco 49ers outside zone scheme where

he presses that edge. And if you slow play him, he's going to beat you around a corner. He's going gonna go. He's also very good at catching the ball out of the backfield, but because of his acceleration and in speed, you can get him involved in the downfield passing game. Very much on that Jeff Wilson type of ability where he has like tremendous like quickness and twitch.

The problem is, you know, with some fast guys like that, they tend to go down so easily. So he has to be stronger through contact, still has room to kind of add mass to his body. And PassPro, he's a liability. So let's just, you know, we'll say that. So he definitely has to get better there. But in terms of the playmaking ability, we saw that a lot when he was given the opportunity, but he has to be able to break tackles a little bit better or run through contact a little bit better in order to be that sustained guy. So right now he's probably gonna end up being

that compliment to someone's feature back. So what's the difference between Jade and Blue, who you have fifth and let's say, Rashard Smith out of SMU who's got similar build and one year's running back was very good at SMU. And Tooten out of Virginia Tech is another small guy that a lot of people like. What separates Jade and Blue from those guys?

Blue is more of a natural runner. And that's a great question, because Blue to me has, you could tell Blue was a running back by trade, as opposed to converting from another position to running back. And that's what you see with Smith. So obviously that tells you Smith has some upside because he's still learning the position.

Kelly Joyner out of South Florida is another one of those guys that played receiver and then moved to running back. And I feel like Joyner has a little bit more of the edge there because he's done it a little bit longer than Smith. But also when you think about Tutin, Tutin was at North Carolina ANT, was outstanding there, and we know he has to kick off returnability. So when you are a kickoff returner,

that tells you about your speed and your ability to see a lane and just accelerate through it. There's not much creation that's involved. So for Tooten, he has to be a little bit more cognitive of, you know, how to be patient, how to find the right lane, how to press the hole, and all of those things that come with time. But a lot of times in these offenses, we're seeing guys with the zone read, the holes are kind of already there for him.

So you can't just, you can't blame them for doing what's there and just exploiting through. But if it's clogged up, he won't be able to create in my opinion. All right, Jamie, any takes on the running backs and when you want to bring up? Oh, I have a lot of questions for Emory. I don't want to step on your toes. All right, we'll take a break and come back.

We'll let Jamie ask Emory a question. I want to get some more running back rank. And we can talk about a lot of guys today too. And I think what fantasy managers want to know is who has fantasy starter potential. So, you know, they don't want the guys who are going to be getting 10 touches a game. They want the guys who are going to emerge as stars. So we'll find that out as well. All right, we'll be right back on fantasy football today. My parents have had a lot of time on their hands lately. At first, it was nice.

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Please play responsibly. 19 plus and physically located in Ontario. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or the gambling of someone close to you, please go to connectsontario.ca. All right, Jamie, you have questions. Emry has answers, go ahead. Two guys that really intrigued me,

Kam Skadavu and RJ Harvey. Your thoughts on those two guys and maybe a comp and a fit that you think makes sense in the NFL. RJ Harvey, now here's the comp I have for Harvey. There's two comps, I'm looking at my notes here. For Harvey, it is mostly a stylistic comp, body-wise. Kind of reminds me of Leon Washington,

who started with the Jets in Seattle. I love his elusiveness, and I love his explosiveness once he hits the open lane. So he's able to make the guy miss, and then boom, he's going, and pull away from defenders. I think he is criminally underrated in this draft class. And I love the fact that we're talking about a guy in Ashen Gentile being RB one at five eight, two 15, because Harvey at five eight, two Oh five is right there.

And it makes you can't not call it for his size. If you're parading Ashen Gentile is RB one, you know? So I like that. So that shows you Harvey and Harvey has done well every time he's faced a bigger team or better defense or whatnot. He has, he was the most consistent piece on offense at UCF. And then when you think about someone like Scadaboo,

we saw him, two things gonna hurt Scadaboo. People gonna be concerned about his age because you know, he was a star at Sacramento State. then you look at what he did Arizona State and then you also come his style like he takes on a lot of contact and you can't even though he has a little bit more elusiveness From a lateral agility standpoint than Ashton Gentry does but at the end of the day He is still a bullish runner like he looks to looks for the contact in the open field that's going to yield itself to him being more of an RB2 on a team more of a closer or four-minute guy as opposed to a lead-off guy but I do like the fact that in the playoffs we saw

Scataboos receiving skills downfield capability be a little bit more highlighted as opposed to just your meat expectations, swings, greens, flares and flats. So I see more of a RB2 for Scataboo, but I also see more of a pathway for RB1 for a guy like RJ Harvey. You got a comment in the chat. Scataboo is CMC meets Mike Allstott.

He's a tough dude. I mean, I think of all the runs I've watched. Yesterday and today, it was the first time I watched the running back. So yesterday and today, I probably watched six hours of running backs in this class. He has my favorite run. It's first in goal from the one, or something in goal from the one. He gets a carry against Cincinnati. He's immediately met by two defenders in the backfield. They've got him at about the five yard line. He somehow gets away from both of them. He scores a touchdown and on his way in, he trucks a third defender, runs him over.

This is Cam Scataboo out of Arizona State. I mean, you can't help but love watching him play, right? But he ran a four, six, five at his pro day. Reportedly, he ran about a 4.55 in a private workout for scouts. There's a huge difference there. And you just don't like 4.65. He talked about Kareem Hunt. That's an example of a guy who ran something like that. I think he ran a 4.63. 4.65 is really slow. So I do think people are going to be worried about that. And you mentioned his age. Just want to mention RJ Harvey is also, RJ Harvey is 24. I think he's one of the oldest guys we're going to talk

about. So, um, Scataboo is 23. Uh, Dave, what do you think about those guys, Scataboo and Harvey? Dave Korsunsky I tend to agree with Emory on Scataboo being like a, a one B type of back where he's the thunder and a thunder and lightning, but he can catch and, and he can do all kinds of other things, like pass protection, for example. I think he's good at that. I think he could get even better. I think he can get better at everything. But the one thing he'll never get better at is being fast. And so not having that long speed, that's, that's going to be an issue that defenses will be able to key in on him and they'll just try and tee off on him. I think Harvey's got a little bit more of that speed to go along with his size. I mean, it's kind of obvious when you watch him play and you know that he's got that gear. I like that he's got those two last two years at UCF just absolutely dominated.

And he's got to get better on passing downs. Maybe these two together would be an interesting duo in the league where Harvey's your leadoff guy, right? Emory kind of thinking like that. And then you use scataboo as a grinder, short yardage, maybe third downs. It kind of makes sense that those are the roles that those guys go into. But I agree with Emory. RJ Harvey is the one that has the better path to being a full-time back in the league.

Jamie, when you look at a guy like Scadaboo, right, takes on some contact, not going to run away from guys, maybe Caleb Johnson, who did make a lot of big plays. We had a four, five, seven, 40. He's six, one, he's 224. Damian Martinez out of Miami, more of a bruiser. So let's call them the David Montgomery or something like that, right? Where do you wanna see a guy like that go? And how about Chicago, right?

I mean, to Ben Johnson's offense, where they could use a guy like that, but think about a guy that would be a first and second down type of player, take on a lot of contact. And I don't wanna pigeonhole Skataboom to not playing on third downs, but I'm just saying one of those bigger types of running backs, where do you want to see somebody like that go for fantasy purposes?

I mean, the three teams that make some sense, I think would be Chicago would be one, you know, could be a good compliment with the Andre Swift. And like you said, Ben Johnson sort of had that one to punch clearly much different, but had that one to punch in Detroit. I think of the Raiders, clearly there's a need for anybody there to come into play, but you know where sort of the jumping off point came for Pete Carroll was when he had Marshawn Lynch and that physical style runner with the Seahawks. Once he got that, the ball rolling in terms of making them a perennial playoff contender, it was the beast mode run in the playoffs, and then Russell Wilson came and made them a playoff contender. It was the beast mode run in the playoffs,

and then Russell Wilson came and made them a Super Bowl contender. And then I think you look at Pittsburgh, obviously, with the whole of Najee Harris being gone, and what Jalen Warren may or may not be as a lead guy. But certainly, we've seen him have a lot of success as the second guy. And I think we're all excited to see maybe what he can do in that role.

But right now, they're top two running backs for Jalen Warren and Kenneth Gainwell. And you could talk all about they're both very good in pass protection, but can they replace Najee Harris as that physical runner? And I know you, Adam, for example, obviously have talked a lot about the drawbacks of Najee and the lack of big plays, but he does have the ability to fall forward as opposed to necessarily falling backward more times than not. So for a guy like Mike Tomlin and Arthur Smith and what they're probably looking for, so it's kind of why I mentioned yesterday that if they go past the draft because of their lack of draft capital, you still have a Nick Chubb out there, you still have a J.K.

Dobbins out there, those two guys make a lot of sense. If they are unable to necessarily get a premiere back in this class as opposed to just maybe settling for somebody later in the in the date day two date excuse me day three range of you know someone who can Fill a role not necessarily step into a role Emory how good is a Marion Hampton who seems to be close to the consensus number two running back in this class Two straight years with over 1500 rushing yards and 15 rushing touchdowns, 5.9 yards per carry both seasons. He's six foot, 220 and he ran a 446. He had a terrific combine. What do you think about Hampton? How good is he?

I think he's really good, man. I feel like everyone got on board with Hampton when they were studying Drake Maytape because you started to see the back like man who's this dude like 28 nice and you know you watched him be a good piece of that offense that was searching for playmakers right he was the playmaker then this year you saw him just continue to elevate his game sort of the Marco Murray like with a little bit more fluidity but one cut downhill explosiveness and go he has nice smooth stride, so he's able to pick up those yards and chunks. And I think that's the kind of guy that coaches as much as we love to give

coaches and coordinators credit for being, you know, evolved, you know, in terms of how they view things, they still view things from a meat and potatoes perspective, right? They'll always view a guy like Amari and Hampton as that's the feature back, right? So that's why those guys you talked about like the Caleb Johnson's, the Damon Martinez, even down to someone like a Jaquinden Jackson, Olly Gorton, they'll look at those guys and be like, okay,

this is my feature back and we'll let these other guys, these other shorter guys and smaller guys be our scat back change the pace satellite guys, right? Even though sometimes it should be inverse. Uh, but when you think about Hampton and he has a contact balance, he bounces off a lot of tackles, he also has the body lane. That's why he's able to run through arm tackles and also not lose acceleration. So I think he is closer to RB one than many people are giving him credit for.

Some people may have them as RB one and I'm not disputing that, but also I can understand why if some people do have him that as the starter back, even some teams may view him as RB1. While we're on Hampton, just because it seems like he's the one getting mocked the most to the Broncos at 20. And you said three guys and Peyton being sort of the wild card there. So do you think that Gentie and Hampton are off the board before 20

in just how you're viewing the players in the class and the team's needs? I think so, Jamie. What makes me feel that way is because of how you kind of perceive the draft to fall. And Chicago, because of what they did in free agency, they really have the luxury of going up and targeting a specific guy. There's no immediate holes on Chicago's team because they invested so much in their holes

in free agency with starters, especially on the O line and D line. So it's like, okay, we can take pick 10 and go up to pick whoever we think. Let's say that you think the Raiders are going to take Ash and Genty, right? But let's go up to five with Jacksonville and get Genty because we have essentially the luxury of doing that with the pick with the 10th pick in Jacksonville. Let's say they want to take Mason Graham, probably could get Mason Graham, Mason Graham at 10 as opposed to spend a top five pick on it. So if you're Chicago you have that luxury so if that's the case let's say Chicago moves up and takes Jinty

Dallas is like well we got to get they took the best back We got to get the next best back you may see them move up to go get Hampton You know and so that kind of pushes that that run on on backs which could open up the door for a team like Denver to either take them at 20 or maybe they trade back into the first. So I can see a scenario like that where someone takes the first back early and then the other team that needs a back, although Dallas could use a wide out as well, I can see that happening to where the Broncos say, well, why not?

Let's just grab a guy right here that we kind of like Make sense All right. I've got a question about Hampton for you Emory. Mm-hmm Processing and pad level. Do you see issues with either of those things with Hampton? I Don't I think the knock I have on him is that he takes on far too much contact, right? And sometimes it's like, it's, I know Jerome Bettis talked about this before, where the running back he was with the Rams, he had to change when he became a Steeler. It's like, I can't keep taking on every piece of contact. I'm not going, I'm beat up after my second

year. He goes to Pittsburgh, he'm beat up after my second year. He goes to Pittsburgh, he has a little wiggle, but it helps him sustain his durability. And I feel like Hampton, OK, we got to do you prove the point. Make that first guy miss, bro. Like there's no need to run through them. You know what I'm saying? There's no more 19 year olds out there in the NFL, you know, in the NFL, like try to make a guy miss or give him a half a body to, uh, to, to, to tack or to hit as opposed to taking on full contact. Um, and a little bit of more patience he needs to have.

I, you know, I, I'm not worried about his pad level. I think that's what helps him, but the, uh, take it on too much contact, being a little bit more judicious in that regard is where I feel like he has to grow. OK, because what I see with him is there are far too many plays where after he gets the ball, he's got that Leveon Bell style pause in the backfield. And I don't know if that's like, you know, purposely trying to be patient and judiciously waiting for Elaine to open up or if he's just not sure about what he's seeing. And that combined with the fact that he's a big target, he's

a big guy, it makes me nervous that he'll take on a lot of contact in the backfield and not have a lot of runs of like plus three and four yards. Those runs turn into zero, one, two yard gains. But there are also plays on his film where he doesn't have that hesitation and he just takes off and he's just seeing it. It's so clear. It's so evident. And that's the guy that I wonder if teams can try and just work on with him so that he can be a lot more fluid.

Once he gets the ball, things are more defined for him. And he doesn't have to take that little, that little half step, that hesitation that I've seen a lot of when he gets the ball. I'm wondering if you had seen that too. And I just want to cut in and just add one more player to this discussion, Dave, because I was, I was actually going to bring this up with RJ Harvey. I also saw the same thing from Harvey, a lot of stutter step and then go. And he made a lot of big plays out of it. He averaged 6.7 yards per carry for UCF. But yeah, I did want Embry's take on that. Cause then I looked at Ashton Gentey

and I don't really see that. Ashton Gentey gets the ball, he goes, he runs over people, runs around. What do you, do you like that? I mean, is that a good thing when a running back is taking that little stutter step in the backfield? What is going on there? There's a fine line to skate there

because when you think about Breshawn Smith, he does it in an extreme case where he literally like stops his feet to try to, but that's a case of a wide receiver trying to play running back. With Hampton and with Gentie, you kind of peek behind the curtain a little bit and say, okay, maybe we're asking them to do something that doesn't jive with their skill set. Some back to better gap runners, like, you know, hey, 34 dive, boom, three back, four hole, I'm gone, right? Or more inside zone where you're only reading a gap to a gap or a, you know, slightly B to backside B. That's about it. Outside zone. Right. You got a little bit more options and that process of analysis creates like, man, it's too much to, I can

go here, here, here. Now you guys, you find out your feet are stopping. Right. Um, so I feel like I think Gentie would be best in, uh, you know, between the tackles, inside zone or gap. Getting these guys to go outside that don't really have that patience or that fluidity within their decision, which is why I'm a big fan of Trevor Etienne and what he does from a vision perspective, because he's able to do both,

but he's also able to tie it up with the patience as well. So I think it's more along the lines of having these guys in the right scheme, run game scheme. And you hope that these dudes making these decisions and drafting these guys and putting them on their team is not trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Cause we've seen that a lot at the NFL level too. Yeah. I'm glad you brought that update because I do notice that for some running backs and I wonder if it's going to translate to the next level. Dave Korsunsky And it's something where landing spot will matter and obviously it matters across the board, but who's going to be coaching these

running backs? Is it a coach who has gotten a running back to change his style and been successful with it in the past? You know, it doesn't have to be Bobby Turner or anything like that. But it's got to be a coach that has gotten a running back and made him a better player. And that's why I think that's, that's the key to Hampton for me. Like, he's got the skills. But if he can really refine his game, he could, he could be almost as good as Gentie. I'm crazy about Gentie. So I think he could be almost as good as Gentie. But right now, I think there's some things that he's got to work on.

Emory, if I did, you know, if I entered the scouting world and I put out my rankings for the first time ever, and I had Trevion Henderson out of Ohio State as my number one running back, would the industry laugh at me? Probably, because, listen, I've been on that side where I had Gentie one, I Gentie one, Gibbs one, one year I had Ja'Shawn Corbin one, one year I had who I had one. In my top five, I had

Tariq Cohen. But sometimes you got to let things play out. And so but you could make a legitimate case for Henderson being RB one. So Bill, the people laugh at you because it will be abnormal. But if you look at it, it'll be like, it won't be that bad of a take when we let things play out, right?

Cause you talk about someone that has home run hitting speed, right? Check. You talk about someone that has home run hitting speed, right? Check. You talk about someone that has gotten better with his vision. He put it all together this year because last year he was missing a lot of opportunities and he didn't see it properly. But this year we saw him tie in his agility with his footwork and his vision. And then the pass pro.

So and we always talk about what gets you on the field first. It's the pass pro as a rookie and the skillset. So it's like, I can see him being RB one. And so it's not that wild of a take, but people will, because it's not the consensus that everyone puts out what everyone else is thinking type of rankings in mocks, right. Right. It'll, it'll, it'll ruffle some feathers, but when you're right, nobody will bring

up the fact that you had Henderson RB one. And isn't it more of like Henderson that he never had more than 16 carries in a game? This is a, and that's a good question. I was in the studio the other day, uh, yesterday with, with Beanie Wells, former Ohio state great hour colleague over here at CBS. And we was talking about how when Henderson came to Ohio state, he was billed as the next great. And he tried to give him that role early in his career, he just couldn't seize it, right?

And then you saw other backs like Mike Webber, you saw Mayon Williams, then you see them go out and grab a Quincy Juckens to go and, so it was like, he couldn't really kind of push forward as the guy. So maybe we saw to your question, maybe we saw him as potentially, hey, maybe he is just a complimentary guy. Maybe he is a one B or one eight, somebody's one B or one B to somebody's one A and not be the feature guy. I think his case might specifically have to go to a certain team.

I think his is more the Shanahan McVay tree, as opposed to saying he's going to go to Dan Quinn offense or Cliff Kingsbury offense and, and, and be good on his own there. So that's where we was funny because we were just having that discussion yesterday about, you know, how he came into Ohio state. And he was a five star, highly touted. This is the next great Ohio state back and just never materialized that. But he also became a very good runner. I don't know how many examples there are of this, but I wonder if that will raise any

red flags if let's just say he falls around two and Judkins falls around two and the Raiders pass on both if they don't take a running back in round one knowing that Chip Kelly had them. That's interesting. And you know, does he say, okay, I had enough or not a good fit or P Carroll, you know, and front office there say, you know, okay, we like them, but no, but that those things are always interesting to me about, you know, whenever there's a college coach coming into the league and they're like, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm good.

Sure. But it could also be like, what are the Raiders really need? And they, I don't know. I'm sorry, let me let me retract. If they take a different running back. Ah, yeah, that would be a red flag. All right, let's take a quick break. I want to talk more about talking around to obviously if they have a chance to take gente, they're taking gente. Right. But okay, so you're saying in round two, they take anybody but those two, right?

They're both on the board. And they say, you know anybody but those two, right. They're both on the board and they say, you know what they opt for somebody else. Right. Yeah. Okay. Then that would be very interesting. I've got to take a quick break. I want to talk more about Judkins, some statistics on him. Uh, and we'll be right back. There's so many more guys discussed still in Samson and, uh, DJ, Giddens, Caleb Johnson, etc. We'll be right back. And Emory, the Hurricanes guy hates Martina's butt. Uh, not hate, but I want to talk about him too. We'll be right back. I've just been to Specsavers and upgraded my lenses to extra thin and light with 50% off.

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Get the RBC Ion Plus Visa. Three times the points. Conditions apply. Visit rbc.com slash ion cards. All right, so Dave, you have Judkins fourth. Emre, you did not have him in your top five. I'll get six through 10. Why don't we get six through 10

and then we'll talk more about Judkins here. Judkins, six foot, 221 pounds, ran a four, four, eight, 40. That's really good. Had a very good 10 yard split. Kind of gets me is like he averaged what? 5.7 yards per carry and Trevion Henderson averaged 7.1. No, sorry. He averaged 5.5 yards per carry.

Trevion Henderson averaged 7.1. In the big 10, this is what really gets me. In the big 10, Quinchon Judkins averaged 4.2 yards per carry. So he's obviously beaten up on the inferior opponents. In the big 10, Trevion Henderson averaged 6.5 yards per carry. So kind of a hard case to make for Judkins. I mean, he's a lot bigger than Henderson, but much less efficient. And by the way, I just want to go Henderson, Jamie, you said he never had more than 16 carries. He did in previous seasons.

In 2024, he actually never had more than 12 carries in a game, but I think he has five career games, Henderson, with 20 or more carries. But you're right to point out that they did reduce his workload. All right, so before I get to Judkins, your thoughts on him, give me six through 10 in your rankings.

Emory. Number six is Devin Neal. Number seven is R.J. Harvey. Number eight, we have Damian Martinez. Number nine, Kam Skadabu. Number 10 is Quenshon Judkins. Wow. Okay. Dave, you have six through 10? I don't have a six through 10. That makes sense. So top 10 for Emry. I don't have a five, but I got six through 22. I mean, I just don't like that much. Yeah, you guys have the same top three of Gentie, Hampton, Henderson, and then four Judkens for Dave, 10 Judkens for Emry. Emry has Trevor Etienne, Jaden Blue at four or five, and then Devin Neal, RJ Harvey, Damian Martinez, Cam Scadaboo, and Quinchon Judkins at six through 10. All right, so now let's talk about Judkins here,

and Dave, you're the hire on him, so you like him? I do, I think he can be a 1A back. I think he can work in any type of scheme. I think he's patient, I think he's strong, I think he's well-balanced. There's strong. I think he's well balanced. There's room for development as far as receiving goes, but he's capable there. I think that he just, I don't, for whatever reason, I don't think he chose to use his agility as much in college and especially last year than he should have. He tried to be a little bit more of a physical back. Overall

speed is really what's going to slow him down and keep him from being, I don't think he's going to get picked ahead of Henderson. I don't think he's going to get picked out of Hampton. Wouldn't surprise me if a couple of other running backs got picked up out of him, because he doesn't have that long speed. I think that that's going to be an issue that teams are going to be turned off by when it comes to Judkins. But three years of good productivity with two different programs, two years at Ole Miss, one year at Ohio State. And I think that what teams might not like about his speed, they'll like his character, they'll like his versatility, they'll like his, his strength. And I think he can be can be a capable serviceable back as like I said, like a one day back, like I'd rather have him than scataboo. If I'm looking for someone to handle first and second downs.

And. Just to give full disclosure. So he's number 10 and my number one back has a 80.5 grade. Number 10 has 77. So you think about the, that's why when we talked early about the depth of this class, this is still a very good back. What I want to see Jukens improve on is his patience. There's a lot of times where he is hitting the hole before it opens and he's crashing into his blockers or crashing unnecessarily into the fenders.

And just a half second more of waiting until, especially when you see it more prevalent when he has pulling linemen. You kind of want to let those guys get around and then you hop in their hip pocket, you ride the wave as we call it, let those guys get outside and you ride that. You can either cut it back inside where the screaming linebackers have already scraped

over top or they've cleared out two additional defenders. Now you could accelerate past them and then use your speed. But I feel like the patience to the whole is it has to get better. That could happen with either taking a step back, maybe getting your depth to seven and a half as opposed to seven or six and a half, just so you could see it a little bit earlier. Therefore, you could then time it up perfectly or just work on slowing down and not being as aggressive to hit the hole. The speed part is interesting because we saw him rip off of a 90-something yard

run against Marshall. And then we saw him do the big run against him in the playoff game. And so it was like, all right, so he's there. But he could probably rip off more long runs if the patience is there as well. Yeah. Henry, as a, uh, as a former running back in a running back guru, how would you define a long run? Listen, I would say a long run is. That's a good question.

I say probably 40 yards, right? Oh wow. Cause anything outside of that is endurance and angles, You know, now how quickly you get to the 40 yards, that's the difference between the game breaker, game breaking speed and someone that just has good speed. Because there was this, and I used to use this, I used to spend before Twitter became a thing, message boards used to be a thing.

And I remember as a- You're dating yourself, you're dating yourself now. Very much so diehard Saints fan, uh, growing up and in my earlier years of professional world in this business, I'm arguing back and forth with Saints fans on the message board. This before football game plan, I started in Oh seven. So I'm arguing with them because it's like Reggie Bush can't, you know, break long run. So like, listen, man, he can. There's, I said, if you look at Jerome Bettis, right, Jerome Bettis has had, at that time,

the longer runs than Reggie Bush. His longest run was 65 yards. Bush's longest run at that time was like 22. I was like, we can all see that Reggie Bush is faster than Jerome Bettis, right? I like, so it shows you that the long runs happen when you work a little bit more patient within the run game. And so that's the thing with long runs. Sometimes it's about patience more so than it is about raw speed.

Well, the reason I ask, because Adam defines long runs about like 12 and a half yards. So, you know. What are you talking about? It's a matter of like, you know, whenever he's deciding to Azerstad it, you know, if he likes the guy and he goes like, you know, 13 yards, he's like, oh, he's got such good, you know, long speed.

And then if he goes like, you know, 11 yards, he's like, he never breaks any long runs. No, I actually for these running backs, I looked at runs of 20 or more yards. And I looked at not all the guys that you heard in Emory's top 10, but one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 12 running backs. And the guys who had the best rate of caries of 20 or more yards, Caleb Johnson. I didn't say this on the air. Did I? I said it off the air. I don't think I said this yet, right?

Just say it again. Okay. Caleb Johnson had the highest rate. DJ Giddens was second. They both had a carry of 20 or more yards on more than 8% of their carries. R.J. Harvey was third. Trevion Henderson, fourth. Ashton Genty, fifth. I would say the worst two were Kam Skattaboo and this one really stands out. By far the worst, Quincheon Judkins. Yes. The best in terms of runs of 20 or more yards were Caleb Johnson, DJ Giddens, Quincheon Judkins. Yes. Mm-hmm. So the best were, the best in terms of runs of 20 or more yards

were Caleb Johnson, DJ Giddens, and I would say RJ Harvey were the three like real standouts followed closely by Trevon Henderson, Ashton Gentey, maybe one or two other guys. The worst was Quincheon Judkins and also Cam Scadaboo was pretty bad here too. And I was disappointed in Dylan Sampson, 4.7%. I feel like Sampson at his build should be ripping off bigger runs than that

out of Tennessee. I wanna get to him. I had a question here in the chat about Caleb Johnson. Interesting guy. I was pretty high on him last time we talked about running backs like a month and a half ago, but I don't know. He had the worst 10 yard split of all running backs, not a great 40 time, like four, five, seven or something.

He's big, right? He's like over 220 pounds. So this question from Ricky, between Quinchon Judkins and Caleb Johnson, who's more likely to fall into the fourth round? I did find it interesting that Johnson, a much better home run hitter than Quinchon Judkins. But I don't see anybody who has Johnson ranked higher than Judkins, including you, Emory. What do you think about Caleb Johnson?

I think Johnson is the one more likely to fall to the fourth round. And this is, I always tell the story because this was pretty interesting. So during the season, you're seeing tweets about, oh, Caleb Johnson, Caleb Johnson, I ain't no back. I saw like, I hadn't watched him yet because I'm covering NFL, also covering college football, but also preparing for a broadcast. So I had a broadcast this Saturday and it just so happened that I'm in the hotel, just so happened that that Friday night was this nine o'clock kickoff for Iowa and UCLA. Like, all right, cool. Let me watch this, this Iowa back.

Everybody talk about probably the worst game I could have picked to watch live for kill. I'm like, this is the dude they talking about. Like they, like, they stuff him in the backfield. And so I'm like, man, like either, but also that's when I became a big fan of sweats and drugs. Like what was wearing his ugly 49 on defense is a monster. You know what I'm saying? So I was like, man, this, this is a guy that they're talking about. So now I earmarked that. And then, so when I go study him, I see why certain things happen. So what I do like about him, he is someone that he, if the hole is there, he will find

it, whether it's an entire zone, whether it's outside zone gap, crack toss, whatever it is. So he's not going to go broke making a profit, right? He's going to always fall for, always get those yards. What happens is, and this is the issue I had with Brian Thomas, Thompson in Washington is, if you beat him to the spot, it's over. So he's not going to be able to hit the cutback. He's not going to be able to bounce back across the formation and hit the backside, A gap or B gap, right?

He's a primarily front side runner and beating him to the spot bottles him up in the backfield and he's going to have to make a physical decision to plow through some defenders to get positive yards. And when you look at some of these big runs that he's had, you talk about whiteboard execution where we draw up my ex blocks, you're, oh, here, he's going to kick him out here. It's perfectly, I graded the game. I was grading the Illinois State edge rusher and the Illinois State safety. So obviously I'm gonna watch their

game versus Iowa. He had a long run in that game. I'm like, wow, this is the most beautifully blocked. It was almost like a seal here and a seal here. You're running the ball. It was like that. It was like, man, they blocked this thing perfectly. So he was on a constant from the, he got touched in a huddle. And then after that, no one touched him on, in routes like a 40 yard touchdown run. I was like, so this is some of those type of runs where it can skew the perception of him being a game breaker in terms of that.

But when you go and watch the UCLA game, obviously that's a big, that's the extreme opposite of the end. I was like, okay, there's some concern here. Good back, but he'll be somebody that's gonna be a tandem guy. Okay, I got to do a little bit of business here. Was the draft contest already mentioned?

Question from the FF dads. No, it wasn't. I'm sorry about that. Follow Thomas Schaefer on Twitter. What is it? Just at Thomas Schaefer? Is that what it is? Or the FFT account? What are we doing? Thomas, you want to help me out here?

Yeah, we'll post it on the FFT account. Okay, once the Google forms up. Yeah, so he's gonna do a Google form. And you'll just fill out that what you think will be the top 10 picks I would wait is, you know, wait till next week, let's have more information come in. But it's got to be obviously before the draft happens. And the first 10 picks, you don't have to tell us the team, just the player and you gotta get the order right.

Just because you got a guy going in the top 10, you know, if you had him fourth and he went eighth, that's wrong. So whoever gets the most right is in the podcast league. Thank you for the question. Your number six guy is Devin Neal. All right, all right, I'm gonna be the, I'm going to be the guy. I'm going to be the jerk who's mean to his guests here. This is what I

wrote in my notes. I have now watched 12 running backs. Devin Neal is clearly the least athletic of them. I'm not a Devin Neal guy too slow. It doesn't avoid enough tackles. Why am I wrong about Devin Neal? Well, I think he's more elusive, but the problem with Devin Neal, it was shocking. There's some things that are shocking in a positive way and some things that are shocking in a negative way.

What was shocking in a negative way was when I found out he was 215 because he at times plays like he's 173. You go down way too easily, man, like for a guy that's 215. I want to see him be a little bit more active in terms of breaking tackles through contact, running through contact, especially when this draft class where contact balance is the Pee Wee Herman's word where everybody goes screaming. Shout out to CBS. I used to watch that growing up. But yeah, so in this draft class, where contact balance is the thing,

your contact balance better be up to par with everyone else. But what I love about Neil, he was the playmaker, the most consistent playmaker on their offense. Because as much as we like Jalen Daniels, very much inconsistent game to game. But Neil, as a receiver, as an elusive runner, was more so the consistent guy. So he is someone that could probably be that Deandre Swift role for a team in the backfield.

Your thoughts on R.J. Harvey. Love it. Love it. I tweeted out about him during the season as I'm watching the game live. I'm sorry. I forgot we already did our J Harvey. I'm so sorry about that. I was just going through your rankings. Jamie asked you about our J Harvey earlier. Your thoughts on Damien Martinez out of Miami. He's one of those foundational backs, those feature backs.

He was great at Oregon State, was not used enough at Miami, just five. So you got, you know, you know, highest man candidate, number one overall pick type guy at quarterback, we're going to toss the ball around the yard. But he was able to do well with the carries he got. And that type of ability to operate without volume, despite looking like a volume back is is that's gonna yield itself positively when he gets to the pros. He's very much good without the ball in his hands. He's, you know, wants to block.

He wants to be a, you know, go out there and block for the other runner. So he's someone that's gonna be on the field very much. So as a starter, a 1A to a 1B behind him. Another big guy. You don't see him catching a lot of passes, right? I don't think Martina is going to be on the field on third down. 32 in his career.

Yeah. How about Dylan Sampson? We had Mike Renner on a few weeks ago, and he mentioned Sampson as a guy who's very young, which is definitely he's going to be 21 years old in September. And he felt like he could fill out a little bit, put weight on because he out a little bit, put weight on, because he's a little small, 5'8", 200 pounds.

What do you think about Sampson? I see him in a lot of top 10 lists. He's out of Tennessee, and he's had 22 rushing touchdowns. Yeah, he has good acceleration. He's able to get an NFL corner with ease. So outside zone, knock yourself out. He's going to turn the corner. He's going to help you get the extra point team ready

because he can score. The problem is the vision is just okay. And that is regard to interior running for me, where a lot of the big plays happen. We tend to think of terms of guys with speed hitting the outside and that's how you get a guy with speed, the ball and space. Like you get a guy with speed, the ball and space.

No, a lot of the big runs come right down Main Street and then you make a cut and then you accelerate. So for Sampson, it's about getting to that point where he's making that cut to accelerate, which means your pre-line of scrimmage stuff has to be on point, has to be consistent. I think that's why I don't like the Tennessee offense from a rushing perspective. Because it doesn't, it stymies the development of the vision component that a running back needs to be successful. And Jamie, I want to be the knock on Jaylen Wright last year. I was going to, I wanted to get Jaylen right up with you because like you talk about Dylan

Sampson, some people are very high on him. Dylan Sampson, five eight, two, these are just combined measurements, right? Five eight, 200 200 pounds, ran a 4'4", 240 at his pro day. So it was combined 5'8", 200 pounds, 4'4", 240 at his pro day. Jalen Wright, 5'10", 210 pounds. So he's two inches bigger, he's 10 pounds bigger. He ran a better 40, 4.38. He shared a backfield with Sampson last year in 2023, And he averaged 7.4 yards per carry and Sampson averaged 5.7 that year. This past year, Sampson averaged 5.8. It's just kind of interesting,

just cause a guy didn't really explode in his first year, Jamie, we shouldn't forget about them going forward. Cause I think you could look at Jalen Wright and say it was a better prospect than Dylan Sampson in some ways, if not in many ways. I will say- Sorry, go ahead, Amir. No, I'm sorry. I was about to say, I will say this.

Sampson excels in pass pro, like from a recognition and getting there to, so he could be one of those guys that coaches trust to get them on the field. I do think, you know, going back to Emory's, you know, point at the beginning about teams doubling up on running backs, like, you know, these are the type of guys, the Jalen Wrights, the Trey Benson's, the Blake Corm Corms you know the guys from this somewhat disappointing class last year and we've mentioned this a few times like you know which of these guys are gonna become irrelevant quickly because the team goes back into the draft pool again and says okay that guy didn't get on the field that guy didn't

excel that I didn't do whatever we needed him to do you know and the Dolphins may have already told us that by signing Alexander Madison you know losing Raheem most certain then going on again in another veteran because they don't trust Jaylen Wright to be that 1A or second running back. So it's going to be fascinating to see what some of these teams do specifically for the guys from a year ago. So Marshawn Lloyd, for example, I think a lot of people liked him going in last year, liked the landing spot to be the second guy in Green Bay. Getzert doesn't play and now maybe replaced if the Packers feel like they need to go get somebody else so a lot of these guys are gonna become you know I think irrelevant the ones I think that escaped

the draft and and have the chance to you know so Benson and Wright and some of these guys and especially you know in the case of some of these guys playing behind the older running backs you know those are the ones that are gonna be very interesting for what our audience likes. So, as you said, Adam, you don't want to see the Cardinals go get anybody else from the Benson side of things. You'd like to see it maybe long-term in case Benson's just not legit and James Connors is going to be 30. So dynasty purposes, he could be really good. But that's to me the fascinating part of this draft. It's not necessarily the prospects. I think there's so many great players here. The fit is going to be really interesting. It's which of these teams tell us we don't like our guys, you know, whether it's the back backup, whether it's the starter, you know,

whether it's, you know, looking at it two years from now. I think it's why, you know, Kyle Shanahan prior to McCaffrey in last year, you know, he always convinces John Lynch to drop the running back every year, no matter what. We're getting the guy. Emory, your thoughts on- Hold on, hold on. When it comes to Sam, I've got two questions for Emory. This is about Sampson's paths to playing in the league. Did you find Sampson's power to be so weak? I hate to use the term weak, but not great, that it's a detriment? And then what did you think of him as a pass catcher? This is Dylan Sampson. Yeah. I feel like he has to get stronger. He has to get stronger through contact. So there's

that part, you know, the functional strengths where I tend to focus on like guys is go down too easily by one defender. That can't happen if you're trying to be a feature guy. Receiving skills are a plus. I don't have a problem with his receiving skills and also because he's a good pass protector, that's going to get him on the field too. So he can catch and block and they'll figure out the run game part of it as well. Your thoughts on DJ Giddens out of Kansas state, six foot, 212 pounds, ran a four, four, three, 40 average 6.6 yards per carry. 4, 3, 40 average 6.6 yards per carry. Love his agility. And it's tied a good portion of it with his elusiveness. So he's able to make a defender miss

both in the hole and out in space. Kind of runs a little bit too upright, like a little bit stiff athletically, but has good agility. So sometimes it just works out weird that way where guys can be a little stiff, but still also athletic. We see that with the Titan Harold Fanning, who visually looks stiff, little stiff but still also athletic. We see that with

the Titan Harold Fanon who visually looks stiff but somehow is still considered athletic. We've seen that a lot, you know, and guys are able to have David Njokwu is another one that is clearly stiff but he's also athletic. So Giddens is that that guy. Good receiver. I think Giddens receiving skills is underrated. Like he's able to catch over his shoulder able to catch passes deeper downfield So it can be a good value in your passing game There are two guys I feel like are criminally underrated and one key is stuck in my make mine because jail and Warren keeps coming not jail and Warren The kid for Pittsburgh is that you? Warren, the kid for Pittsburgh. Is that Jalen Warren? Yep. Yep.

Jalen Warren. The comp I have for him is a guy that no one's talking about is Ontario Brown out of Northern Illinois, who legitimately lit up Notre Dame. And he's built the same way. So that's one to keep an eye on. And Len Larison, I talked about him. You talk about San Francisco, the guy plays a lot like Christian McCaffrey and also nearly had a thousand a thousand this year had over a thousand yards rushing close to 1400 and like 890 something receiving we didn't see him in the all-star game circuit because he got hurt in the playoffs at UC Davis but he had his pro day lit it up but those guys are just names to file away if you see their names on draft day you're like well who the hell is that? Those are those type of guys.

I'll ask you specifically about one more guy and then we'll just kind of get like sleepers, busts. And also I don't think I asked you how many fantasy stars we have in this class, but Jarquez Hunter out of Auburn. I think he's gonna be a core special teamer and an RB three. You know, I see him as a solid back, as a decent back, as someone that's gonna not be as fantasy relevant, if that makes sense.

I don't think he's gonna log enough touches to where he's gonna be a guy that you kind of have to draft in fantasy. All right, so who, I think you may have just answered this, but who are some sleepers in this class? Well, those are two like deep sleepers, right? That you may see, like, why is this guy, who's, why is he being drafted? But that's why they got legitimate talent.

Marcus Yarns is out of Delaware, was at the senior bowl. But funny story about him, I was on the broadcast for the Mammoth Delaware game and they had a lot of scouts in the in the press box. But because you know, Delaware had, Delaware had the corner, Tyron Herring, Monmouth has the running back, Sony, into that had 24 Russian touchdowns this year at 5'11", 235, that's another sleeper. As a strictly goal lineback,

they use him as a Wildcat quarterback. He was from Harvard, transferred to Monmouth, but he scored 24 touchdowns this season, rushing touchdowns. So keep that under your hat. That's another sleeper. But obviously everybody's also there for yarns. And I'm like, this is the third quarter. I'm like, this is a tight game. I'm like, everybody talk about yarns. I, you know, like, then the next play coming out of commercial break, they threw him a little pop screen, 80 yards touchdown. I was like, okay, that's it. I see it. And so he put it in cruise control after 20.

That's how quickly he got out the blocks. I like, oh, so this is someone that could be as dominant as a receiver, not just because he caught a quick pop pass, but we saw him run routes down at the senior bowl, but you understand how that acceleration makes it a problem for people. And so that's another sleeper.

LaQuint Allen,ing is effort is there. Good footwork. I put in my scatting notes. He has old school typewriter type feet. This is a papapapapapap came out early. And so he, you know, kind of along that lines of how he could be this year's Bucky Irvin. You know, someone that goes into mid rounds and you're like, wow, this guy's their starter. So that's kind of another guy to keep an eye on.

And these Ole Miss guys, like so many people that transferred from Miami that went to Ole Miss that also just are Henry Parrish, explosive speed, Bentley, good elusiveness. Like there's a bunch of these types of guys that's going to end up starting as kick returners, um, that's going to find their way functioning within the offense and Ollie Gordon, somebody's going to draft Ollie Gordon, you just don't almost lead the country in rushing and be a dope Walker guy and

just go non-existent, right? So this could be someone for like Dallas. If they don't take a back early, Gordon could be their mid round guy and end up being their starter, which now should open the door for them to let, uh, you know, Deuce Vaughn play because you know, that's another untapped resource that they have on the roster. Ali Gordon out of Oklahoma state. He almost led the nation in rushing in 2023 at 1732 yards and 21 touchdowns. Pretty impressive. All right. How many, how many fantasy stars are we looking at? You mentioned that 2017 class, you mentioned some really good players

there. How many guys are going to be must start fantasy options? I would say based off 2017, if I just hyped up 2017 like that, and you know, I would say 12 guys. Whoa. I think, you know, out there 2017 class, let's say McCaffrey, Fournette was fantasy relevant for a minute. Yeah. Tariq Cohen had a spark. Kareem Hunt had some fantasy relevance early.

We know Mixx is still does. Aaron Jones, Delvin Cook, you know, so that's seven. Jamal Williams touched on, I know he had a little run. So I would say this class, let's say about 10 to 12, man. Wow. Okay. I think there's enough openings for that to happen. I don't think it'll happen like immediately,

but between all the teams and their needs, I think maybe almost half the league has a need for at least one running back to fill into the top two spots of their depth chart this year. Did you say Camara? You also had Camara and James Connor. Oh yeah, duh. And James Connor.

James Connor, like bro, so yes, 10 to 12, confidently 10 to 12. Oh, and Chris Carson too. Holy cow. Was there anybody who went undraft? 14 to 16, I'm calling it. 14 to 16, let's go. Oh man, undrafted, I don't know Dave, I'm not sure.

All right, Emery thank you. Any guys, any more questions for Emery? No, he covered it, that was awesome. Yeah, that was really great stuff. I think it's gonna be real interesting to see how people in dynasty leagues change their strategy. Because usually when, this is how I work in dynasty. If there's a stud running

back, I'm going to take them. But otherwise I know that longevity favors pass catchers and I kind of veer toward them. But there are just so many interesting running backs. And if they all end up in decent spots, it could push wide receivers down a little bit, especially since this year's draft class at wide receiver, not quite as deep or as good as the running back class. And the only favorite running backs in dynasty. Listen, so I said, it's good that you only favorite running backs in dynasty. Well, in the, in the rookie drafts.

Okay. You know, I like them everywhere. Yeah. Um, I, sorry. All right, Emory, thank you so much for coming on, man. Appreciate y'all for having me. Always a pleasure. All right. We will talk to you next week with Ryan Wilson to do a little mock drafting.

And then of course, we've got a show on Wednesday and then we've got a show Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night after round one, after rounds two and three, after rounds four through seven of the NFL draft. We will read Austin Eckler, Dario Gumbolale. And it was in that class. Eckler was in that class. Eckler was in that class.

17 to 20 fantasy relevant. Matt Bernina. Oh man. All right, just don't say contact balance anymore. We'll be, we'll talk to you on Monday. See you later everybody. On physical football tomorrow. You Paramount podcasts