Fantasy Football Today - Sleepers! Roethlisberger, Hardman, Cohen and More (06/16 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: June 16, 2020

It's time for an early look at 2020 sleepers! Heath, Ben and Jamey give you their favorites at the top of the show. We like Anthony Miller in the late rounds and Josh Reynolds in deeper leagues ... What can Ben Roethlisberger do without Antonio Brown? We look at Big Ben and Gardner Minshew as QB sleepers (9:23). Matt Breida and Ronald Jones are among the RBs we're looking at today (19:05). Do we like Jones more than his backfield mate Ke'Shawn Vaughn? ... Nyheim Hines and Tarik Cohen look like great value picks right now (25:30). And we discuss a number of WRs including the underrated Marvin Jones (37:40) ... Your emails at [e-mail]. We've got more fun league ideas! 'Fantasy Football Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox, and wherever else you listen to podcasts. Follow the new FFT Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/FFToday Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @YardsPerGretch, @BenSchragg Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCviK78rIWXhZdFzJ1Woi7Fg/videos Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports. Here we go! Email us at fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. Here we go! It's time to dominate your fantasy league. Let's go! Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. An early look at sleepers.

Welcome to the show, Fantasy Football Today. Here are Adam, Jamie, Heath, and Ben Gretsch. We are going to talk about our favorite sleepers for the 2020 season. This list will probably change a little bit, but this is the first edition as we launch the product this week. The product is live. Leagues are live. If you haven't played on CBS, you're missing out.

It's the best platform. We mostly talk PPR, at least today. We'll make some distinctions between the formats. I'm going to talk about Ben Roethlisberger, Gardner Minshew, Tariq Cohen, Nicole Hardman, Josh Reynolds. I haven't talked about him. He's a pretty deep sleeper. All right, here we go, guys. Let's start with your favorite 2020 sleeper, Ben Gretsch. Kick it off. Yeah. I mean, if we're talking about like legitimate true sleepers and we kind of always talk about how there's not really such a thing as a sleeper anymore but i think reynolds

might be it he's a guy you can get in the last round of all your drafts and obviously no brain cooks now yes they drafted van jefferson i you know there's definitely the possibility that gerald everett winds up being their fourth target after Robert Woods and Cooper Cup and Tyler Higbee, but it could very well be Josh Reynolds as well. And he was, you know, not amazing in the opportunity that he's got over the last couple of years, but he's basically played, he started 10 games over the past two years played in all 32 games, basically played close to what you'd think of a full season, 96 targets.

And he's had 50 catches and just over 700 yards. So not great, but something that he could build off. He was a decent prospect at Texas A&M where he played alongside Christian Kirk and outproduced him to one of the years that they played together. He was a year older, but led that team in receiving as a true freshman when he came in. So this is a guy that, you know, fourth-year breakout, former fourth-round pick. It's a little bit thin,

but somebody can get to the very end of your draft. If the Rams' whole offense bounce back this year, he could be a legitimate sleeper. Okay, but you haven't really drafted him, have you, in 12-team leagues? Not like in our box, no, because we don't go as deep. Right, okay, deeper formats.

Let's do the sleeperometer by the way i'm going to say someone what are you laughing at heath because i just like this is the worst sleepers breakouts and busts we've all come to a pretty good agreement on what a breakout is we all come to a pretty good agreement on what a bust is and this all the sleeper discussion just instantly turns into either yeah but you're not really going to draft him, or he's being drafted in the 10th round. He can't really be a sleeper. Everybody knows who that guy is, and it's just super frustrating.

Because I'm certain at least two of the guys that I'm going to call sleepers, someone's going to say, he's not really a sleeper, is he? I think this is a pretty good list. Okay, there's articles up on the website. I think like what we've run into in this industry. I mean, I think I've been doing it the most of our group. Dave's been doing it longer than me by year is there's so much information to Heath's point,

but there's also a, you know, I don't know if it's a, what percentage of our audience it is that they're hearing about these guys for the first time. Yep. So while it may seem like we seem we're giving maybe obvious names to us because we've talked about them for years. And in the case of 2020, since the end of the Superbowl, you know,

I think we just have to remember, like we have to satisfy what our audience is, not necessarily what we think our audience is. Our audience is very smart, but there is still a portion of them that are hearing about these guys for the first time. And so some people play in leagues that go 20 rounds or deeper,

or startup dynasty leagues that may want to hear about Josh Reynolds. So even though Ben may not be drafting them drafting him in in a 16 round mock draft there are plenty of people that probably will still well that's why i said that i was trying to clarify kind of league depth okay heath who's your favorite sleeper for 2020 uh my favorite sleeper is hayden hurst and i looked before oh he's not a sleeper what are you kidding me well it's funny that you say that because he's actually uh like i put him in a breakout category but that's you know you told the line with some of these guys right his his

average draft position in the national fantasy football championship right now is the 10th round um he's not being drafted amongst the top 10 tight ends he's never really done anything in his career we've talked about him on this podcast before. I liked him a lot coming out of college, and then he got hurt, and then Mark Andrews just outplayed him. Now he's going to Atlanta to replace Austin Hooper. That Dirk Cutter offense has averaged 125 targets per season, two tight ends, over the past three years.

They've got Julio Jones, Calvin Ridley, and then maybe Russell Gage. They're going to throw the ball 600 times. Should be easy if Hurst plays 16 games and he's had some injury problems. It should be easy, though, for him to be on that five to six target per game pace with a good quarterback and an efficient offense. And the reason he's my favorite is because on July 11th, I'll be taking part in the fantasy football face-off mental health podcast with Hayden Hurst.

Oh, I like that. Good stuff. So where can we hear that? Do you know? There will be more details coming. It's going to be on YouTube. It's going to be on a variety of places.

They've not started the, uh, too much of the promotional stuff yet. Hey, we're on YouTube. Uh, that's right. YouTube.com slash fantasy football today.

We had Heath's biceps, which I was pretty impressed with. You know, just saying. He's pretty cut this morning. And today we have his chest hair, which also very impressive. Won a contest on a cruise ship one time with that chest hair.

Hayden Hurst actually, on Fantasy Football Calculator, is the eighth tight end off the board. It's goes like Kelsey Kittle, Andrews, Ertz, Waller,

Gronk, Ingram, Hurst, Higby, Henry, but Ingram, Hurst, Higby,

Henry are all within 15 picks of each other. But yeah, last pick of the seventh round or second, last pick of the seventh round for Hayden Hurst. All right, Jamie, who's your favorite sleeper? I don't know if he's my favorite,

but I tend to draft a lot of Anthony Miller. I just think, you know, you look at what his situation is with the Bears. They didn't really replace Taylor Gabriel. I don't think Ted Ginn counts, in my book at least, as a replacement option for what Gabriel was doing. You know, when Gabriel was out last year, Miller's numbers popped.

Three of the five games, he scored at least 13 PPR points, two of them over 23 points. I think the quarterback play will be better if it's Nick Foles, but he did that with Trubisky. So this is a receiving core that needs some help. Miller has done some good things in his first two years, but I think when we talk about third year breakouts, this is the type of player that you look for because he does have the chance

to have his best year yet in his third season. So a lot of the things that I look for with late round picks as a fifth receiver, he's the type of guy that I will draft and I have been drafting him and most of our mocks, which are 15, 16 year old. We shall see if Jamie will be mocking.

We'll be picking Anthony Miller tonight, Tuesday night on our Twitch stream. We're recording this on Monday, so I got the dates mixed up a little bit, but we're recording this on Monday. You're hearing it on Tuesday. Tuesday, 7 p.m. Eastern on Twitch. Live instant reaction to our draft picks

from Jamie, Dave, Heath, me, Ben, Gretch. Are you doing this tonight, Tuesday night? I don't think I'm going to be live. Oh, Gretch, are you doing this tonight, Tuesday night? I don't think I'm going to be live. So you guys all get to talk about how I overdrafted all the good players. That's fine. Get your fantasy questions answered, too. We answer your fantasy questions. Join us, twitch.com slash

FFtoday. The link is also in the episode description. We have a bunch of other podcasts you need to be listening to. It's cbssports.com slash podcasts, MMA, golf, to. It's CBSSports.com slash podcasts. MMA, golf, golf podcast, very relevant right now. NFL, fantasy

baseball, nothing personal with David Sampson. It's great stuff. CBSSports.com slash podcast. I do have one... We have another fun draft this week too, Adam. The five of us, uh, which would be the four of us here in Dave are going to be drafting with, uh, Mike Wright of the fantasy footballers, Jake Sealy, who was on our show a few weeks ago as well with, uh, the athletic,

um, Liz Loza of Yahoo, Mike Taglieri of fantasy pros, Chris Harris of the Chris Harris podcast, I guess what do you call it Harris podcast Harris fantasy football who am I forgetting how many people was it oh Scott Fish oh can't forget Scott Fish no can't forget Scott Fish so we're going to do that Thursday and the results will be live on

our CBS Sports HQ Twitter feed excellent alright we got a big week here alright let's do some sleepers by the way last year last week rather Twitter feed. Excellent. All right. We got a big week here. All right. Let's do some sleepers. By the way, last year, last week,

rather on Friday, we did a show on, on league ideas, ways to spice up your league, make things more fun. We have some emails, some followups to that fantasy football at cbsi.com. And I hope to get to that later on in the show.

All right. So I'm going to say a sleeper and then we're going to go on sleeperometer. Zero to 10. You guys tell me how good of a sleeper is this on a scale of zero to 10? Let's start with one of Jamie's. Ben Roethlisberger. He's the 16th quarterback off the board after Drew Locke and before Daniel Jones. Strange ADP on Fantasy Football Calculator. Ben Roethlisberger, 123rd overall, QB 16, scale of 0 to 10 on the sleeperometer. Jamie, how good of a sleeper is Ben Roethlisberger if he's the 16th quarterback off the board? 10.

Heath? 9. Ben? I'm consulting my rankings currently, but my initial inclination is pretty high. I don't think he's a 10 or a nine. There's a, there's a lot of reasonable quarterbacks in that range,

but I'd say like a seven or so I have, I guess 14 QB 14. All right, Jamie. So he was the number three quarterback in fantasy. The last time we saw him really in 2018 for five straight seasons before last year, he was no worse than eighth per game

in four-point-per-pass in touchdown leagues and ninth per game in six-point. That's impressive. But we don't have any answers, really, on how he's going to do without Antonio Brown. So why is Roethlisberger a really good sleeper for you? Well, I mean, you listed the big reason why is based on his track record.

And so you're getting him for nothing. And that's the thing you like about what the upside is for a player of his caliber. I think they're going to be a very competitive team. I think the run game is probably the most suspect part of this entire team, to be honest with you. I think their defense is great. I think their offensive line is still very good. You can maybe make a case the receiving core is questionable,

just without Antonio Brown there. And Juju being the number one guy, can Deontay Johnson sort of fill that outside role, chase Claypool, Eric Ebron, there's some new faces, you know,

especially dealing with Roethlisberger. But you know, if you're talking about just waiting on quarterback and you know, I mean, we we've said this time and again, Stafford should be ahead of him. I would put Daniel Jones slightly ahead of him, but I would take him over in Rodgers just to give you a comparison of somebody who's being drafted as a starter. I just think there's more upside with Roethlisberger if everything goes right for him

based on what we've seen. So I'm excited about him. The fact that he's healthy. He seems to be in good shape from the video that we saw. So if he plays 16 games, I think he's going to be a top 12 quarterback, if not top 10. Guys, the quarterback is so crazy deep, as usual. But if you just look at pocket passers, who aren't going to give you much running the ball, but veteran pocket passers, so you could get, maybe as your number two quarterback, or if you just want to keep waiting.

Last week, we talked about ADP, and Ben, you mentioned Jared Goff. I know you like Matthew Stafford. So you look at Roethlisberger, you look at golf, you look at staff, or you look at Philip rivers, let's say, you know, is there anything that makes one of these guys really jump out ahead of the pack? I mean, I think the thing with Roethlisberger that we don't know is how much we're going to see the past volume. Cause in the past and ivy used to

make the jokes about how he was the offensive coordinator a couple years ago and and i would anticipate that he's kind of going to be in that role again now that he's back and so i would expect there's going to be a lot of more pass plays than we saw last year that would be the thing if you don't run at all that can be okay if you throw it 600 times and you're pretty efficient because you might throw for 4,700 yards. And that can make up for some of that loss of rush yards. If you throw it 600 times, you might throw 30 pass touchdowns. So you kind of have to be that guy. The same thing could apply, I think, to Jared Goff. I don't really think that same, I don't think Phillip Rivers is a good guy to put in the same category with them because I fully expect that the Colts are going to try to be pretty run

heavy when they're ahead. That's what they've shown us in the past. And Rivers was really pretty, not very good last year. Yeah. I agree that Roethlisberger and golf should kind of be bucketed together for the reasons he said. You asked for something that kind of differentiates one of them for me.

It would be Stafford being QB three and in the half season last year in points per game um he's gonna deal with some regression and td rate and probably yards per attempt but we've talked about that uh average throw depth spike he led the nfl last year he's got his top targets back he's got daryl bevel back as the opposite coordinator who was in his first year last year um and kind of oversaw that that change and becoming a more vertical passer so for me it's it's just what stafford year last year and kind of oversaw that change in becoming a more vertical passer. So for me, it's just what Stafford did last year would be the reason to believe that he could be top five. But couldn't you make that same argument

the last time we saw Roethlisberger? Because he was there for an entire season. Yeah. Right, but he had Brown. Just saying. By the way, he threw like 65 passes last year, Roethlisberger, and did not throw a touchdown. Going into the season, he had gone 26 straight games with a touchdown pass.

Not so good without Antonio Brown. I think the combination, though, of what he has, the receiving core as a whole may be better. Oh, give me a break. That is ridiculous. Antonio Brown is 10 times better than Deontay Johnson plus James Washington. Yes. Antonio Brown is like one of the five best receivers in NFL history.

Fair point. I'm just thinking. Come on, Jamie. No. He's one of the top 10. Okay. Okay. Let's stay on quarterbacks.

Let's do another sleeper here. Gardner Bidshew is so disrespected, Heath. He's going after Tua Tagovailoa, Derek Carr, and Teddy Bridgewater. So what is he, a 15 on the sleeperometer? Sounds like a 100 to me. Ben, zero to 10 for Minshew. The easy 10. Yeah.

Jamie, 10s across the board? Of course. All right. So nos across the board? Of course. All right. So no respect there for Gardner Minshew. Make your case. He was, for most of last year, a borderline number one, high-end number two quarterback in his rookie season in kind of a mess of a situation.

It's not going to be a very good team this year. They will have to throw the ball a bunch once again. Jay Gruden has, I think, produced three or four straight top six fantasy seasons for Andy Dalton and Kirk Cousins combined. Gardner Minshew can be just as good as those guys. He has a good number one wide receiver in DJ Chark. He has some really exciting weapons peripherally. He's going to run the ball just enough. I do think the rush production probably comes down from last year,

but that scrambling ability is there. The creativity is there. So he'll give you a little bit with his legs. And most importantly, what you said, Gardner Minshew is, in my opinion, a sleeper in a one quarterback league and someone that if you're drafting two quarterbacks, you can start against the right matchups. But you could view Gardner Minshew right now as a sleeper in a sleeper in a one quarterback league and someone that if you're drafting two quarterbacks, you can start against the right matchups, but you could view Gardner Minshew right now as a sleeper in a super flex or two quarterback league. He's not even being drafted as a starter in that format. He was, his ADP was set when we thought he would lose his job and, or could, and even through the draft, there was the possibility that they would draft someone to compete with him. All they did was sign the least threatening backup imaginable

in Mike Glennon. I don't understand how his ADP is still where it is. It makes no sense. There's quarterbacks just so deep that do I really have to get to the point where I draft Gardner Minshew? I guess that's my only question. I get everything you're saying,

but is he even... He's in your top 20 or no? I have him 14th. Jamie, Ben, where do you have Minshew? I think 18th. I think I have him 21 right now, but I'm not proud of that. I mean, so he's mentioned they added some talent.

I'll just say they improved all three of their position groups. Leonard Fournette was a really inefficient pass catcher as a running back last year with 100 targets. We've talked about that. Chris Thompson adds some more explosiveness as a pass catcher. He was good the last time he was healthy. He's a little older. Tyler Eifert definitely improves their tight end situation. And Josh Oliver could take a step forward in year two.

Very athletic, young tight end. And then they added LaVisca Chenault, who we all know I love, but is another playmaker at the receiver position, and they brought back everyone else. So they only improved there as well. Like he has more – I understand if you don't think Chenault, Eifert, and Chris Thompson are like amazing names, but they all add a little bit more playmaking ability

at each of those positions than he had last year. And like he said, he was basically a borderline qb1 last year i they're gonna throw a million times i don't get it it's kind of crazy when you go back you look at just fantasy points per game how similar the three rookies you know who started a lot last year daniel jones kyler murray and gardner minchu how similar they were in fantasy points per game. All right, let's get one of Ben's. What was that? Minshew was two. Minshew was what? He was number two in that group?

Yeah, Kyler was one. Minshew was two. Jones was three. I have it as Jones was two in points per game, you're saying? I would guess, Adam, that you're not counting the partial game that Daniel Jones played, but you are counting the two partial games that Werner Minshew played. I'm not counting.

No. That would be my guess. I'm simply going on CBSSports.com to one of our fantasy leagues and looking at points per game, and it's Kyler 1, Jones 2, and Minshew 3. That's all. Plus, didn't I win that bet? Didn't we have that specific bet that we established that I won? Pretty sure I won that bet.

No, I won that bet just like I won in poker. Because it started from a certain point in the season. I'm pretty sure I won that bet and you just never paid off. No, I won that bet just like I won in poker. Let's get one of Ben's sleepers here. Ronald Jones. All right, Ronald Jones. Let's see where he Ben's sleepers here. Ronald Jones. All right, Ronald Jones. Let's see where he's going in ADP.

83rd overall, end of round seven, just after Keyshawn Vaughn and J.K. Dobbins. But he is basically back-to-back with Keyshawn Vaughn in that Tampa Bay backfield. Maybe you can get both of them, round seven and eight, let's say. Late round seven, beginning round eight. All right, zero to ten, Ben Ben at the end of round seven, 83rd overall Ronald Jones on the sleeperometer.

Uh, five. Jamie, you said around seven end of round seven. Yeah. Two. Um, five.

Yeah. Six, maybe five and a half. Okay. Ben still, uh, have faith. Well. Six, maybe five and a half. Okay. Ben still have faith. Well, yeah. I mean, I haven't talked about it much at all this off season. Anyone who was listening last year knows that I was talking them up a bunch and kept talking about how he was the youngest, uh, back in that class a year before and only got 30 touches and we didn't know

that he was bad and everyone thought he was bad. And then last year he wasn't really productive for fantasy. He got pulled out of some games for pass blocking issues. And I think all of that underscored or kind of kept things a little bit confusing in terms of how good he really was. He was very productive last year. 4.2 yards per carry isn't like elite and it's only slightly above average, but it was more than a full yard, better than Peyton Barber.

Not necessarily a great offense for production, and he was good in it. And then he was a lot more explosive in the receiving game. I just think that we saw enough last year to feel pretty confident that this guy's a good NFL player. Maybe not great, but good. And I think there's still upside that he could be a really good runner if the offense continues to improve, if Tom Brady puts him in more running situations um we know that they drafted quichon vaughn and and we all kind of expect the quichon vato play more on passing downs because arians hated ronald jones pass blocking but there's a

possibility that he can it could improve there uh but that is something that vaughn was good at as a prospect but i think ronald jones is pretty clearly going to be their lead runner. And yes, that, that might not be a huge, um, dual workload if he's not playing enough on passing downs, but I think he's going to be very good. Uh, we've talked a lot, you know, it's become kind of a fancy football meme at this point that Jones is younger than Keyshawn Vaughn, even though he's in his third season. So there's still room for this guy to grow into a big role. And I, I just, I don't really see how he's not at least a usable running back in that

range. Why do you say pretty clearly he's going to be their lead runner? Cause he's a better runner than Keyshawn by a lot. I wonder if the car, if the Cardinals, if, if Arians and the bucks will see the same way. Yeah,

they might not. I think he is. I should say, I think he is. I think it's kind of like, I don't, I don't buy scratchers, but I noticed at the gas station, the scratchers,

they've got the $1 scratchers, and those are the guys that we can get in the 14th round, but he's like a $10 scratcher, because the 7th round is not where you're really thinking he's a lottery ticket. I do think he could lose his job to Keyshawn Vaughn and just be useless this year, but I also think it's likely, most of these situations that he's going to start week one.

And there's a chance that he pops week one and really just kind of takes that job and runs with it. Even if he's mostly a first and second down guy. So I like him in the seventh round. I would, I do have him one spot ahead of Keyshawn Vaughn. I like taking both those guys, but then the reports about Devontae Freeman scare me to death with that approach. Jamie, I think that's a fair question, by the way. But I do want to add one more small note that Jones also,

and I just saw this on Twitter last week. I don't know who it was, but it reminded me of this point last year that he had a couple long runs called back by holding penalties. Maybe those sprung him, but, um, part of his, his rushing efficiency just being kind of seeming sort of average is he had a lot of, uh, yards taken away by penalty. And I was trying to look that up. I don't have the exact stat in front of me, but I know it's a high number. Oh, I think he's better than what he showed us last year. And I,

I think he's getting a little bit undervalued for what he did last year i mean you know for him to get a thousand total yards was you know i don't think people realize that not that that's a huge number but it's good enough for given the fact that he didn't play a lot on uh you know some key situations but it just feels he just feels like one of these guys like the coach's staff is just trying to replace time and time again. And I don't know if the investment in Vaughn is enough that they're going to kick, kick them off the field completely, but it just feels for me around seven,

just feels a little bit too expensive for what it is. Like maybe a round or two later, I'd be more, more comfortable with it. But I just, for a guy that could be in a part-time situation that could get benched at any moment, I feel like round seven is a little bit too soon.

Hoping to get more work near the goal line. Peyton Barber had eight carries inside the five. Ronald Jones had only two last year. So, you know, you hope with Barber gone, maybe Jones has another crack at getting some of those goal line touches. And he had six rushing touchdowns last year. So did Peyton Barber.

Perhaps more in the future for Ronald Jones. So, just a show of verbal hands. Who's taking Ronald Jones ahead of Keyshawn Vaughn? I. Not me. It's back-to-back for me. I think I have Jones like a couple,

one or two spots ahead of my running back rankings. All righty. So we got some pass-catching running backs to talk about. We've got a wide receiver who just really doesn't get any respect. And four straight seasons he's been, well, three straight seasons he's been at worst top 30, you know, number 29 per game.

And he, you know, you can get a good value on him. And let's see, we got a young wide receiver entering his second season, a young wide receiver entering his third season. So we'll come back. We'll take a quick break here. We'll talk about some of these sleepers on Fantasy Football today

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Scott, Tariq Cohen, end of round nine. So round nine, round 10. For a guy who was RB11 in PPR in 2018, fell to RB27 in 2019. One of Jamie's sleepers is Hines. One of Heath's is Tariq Cohen. So let's lump these guys together, even though Cohen going 50 picks ahead of, 45 picks ahead of Naeem Hines.

No, 55 picks, excuse me, ahead of Naeem Hines. Okay, so let's start with this. Tariq Cohen, 107th overall, end of round nine, just after Tevin Coleman and Kerryon Johnson. On the sleeper-o-meter, Heath, where's Tariq Cohen if you can get him 107th overall? I'd take two points off the fact that he's going in the first nine rounds, so I'll say an eight.

Ben. It depends what you need. I have these guys both ranked a lot higher than where they go, and yet I still don't take them where I have them ranked sometimes, depending on my roster build, because they don't have elite upside, but they're both going to be better than their ADPs for sure. I think he's at least a 6 or an 8, depending on what type of build you have. Jamie, 0-10 on Tariq Cohen at 107th overall.

7. Okay. What happened with Tariq Cohen at 107th overall. Seven. Okay. What happened with Tariq Cohen last year, Heath? He was not good. The Bears were terrible. They were really, really bad. Cohen was basically less efficient than he had ever been in almost every imaginable way.

His yards per carry went down. His yards per reception just cratered. His touchdown rate went down. Everything went wrong. And maybe the Bears still won't be very good, but the addition of Nick Foles gives them a little bit higher floor because if Trubisky is as bad as he was last year or if in camp even, and Foles just starts the year, he won't be as bad as Trubisky was last year, I don't think.

So that helps a little bit. There will be some natural regression for him. And like you said, like, yes, if you finish RB 27 and 16 games, you should not be drafted RB 27, if that's what we're expecting. But I looked on three or four different sites and he was running back 40 or worse on every single site in the PPR scoring format. This is a guy who's caught more than 70 passes each of the past two seasons. You should expect somewhere around 900 total yards is like a floor. I,

I think he's probably the, he's likely to be a top 24 back in PPR. If he plays 16 games and he doesn't Ben's right. He doesn't have top five upside. He does have top 12 upside in this format. Jamie with Naeem Hines going 167th overall, 14th round. For the Chargers, obviously he's got Phil Pervers now. For the Chargers, for the last five years,

a running back has been second on the team, first or second on the team in catches. So Ben's hammered that point home. Phil Pervers has a great history of throwing to running backs. What do you think about Naeem Hines? How do you compare him to Tariq Cohen? Oh, Cohen's got a higher ceiling for sure. I mean, I think Hines, if one of Taylor or Marlon Mack were to miss time

and he's getting a few more carries, that would certainly help his situation. But he's going to mostly be used as a pass catcher there. Now, the thing that you like is in two seasons, he's basically averaged right around 55 catches per season. And that was with, you know, one season of Andrew Luck and one season of Jacoby Brissett. I think Rivers, you know, just based on his track record. Now this is a player versus scenario. Like we were talking about on Monday show, you know, was Brady not throwing to guys on the outside of by-product of the

offense or by-product of him, you know, his rivers throwing to the running backs of by-product of the chargers offense, or is it him? I think, you know, when you look at him and his lack of mobility, it probably speaks to him using his running backs as pass catchers more so than not. So I just think that in, in passing situations, he's going to be on the field in terms of Heinz. I think he's got the chance to be 70 plus catches with Rivers.

If he stays healthy, will he score touchdowns? I don't know. I couldn't tell you, you know, he's he's averaged touchdown a season over two years. But this is more of a PPR than non PPR thing. Three Cohen has proven that he can, he can be successful. As a potential starting fancy running back. He said, if things go well for him, he could be a top 24 guy.

He's shown us that already, but I think for Heinz, you know, you look at back, he said, if things go well for him, he could be a top 24 guy. He's shown us that already. But I think for Heinz, you know, you look at rivers, he's got one, two, three, four, five, six guys in his career that have had 75 plus targets at running back, you know, can, can Heinz get that? And last year, you know, the combination of Gordon and Eckler again, better players than that he minds by a lot. They combined for 134 catches, 1289289 yards, and nine touchdowns.

You know, so he throws to his back. Yeah, the only thing I don't know, and I think that everything Jamie said is right, and I do think he has 70 catch upside with Rivers. The thing that gives me a little bit of hope about Jonathan Taylor maybe getting some pass-catching work in the second half is I don't really, like, I know Naheem Hines has been used as the Colts pass catching back. I don't know if he's actually good at that. He's got two straight years below six yards per target, which is generally a sign of being bad. Now it could have just been all because of quarterback play both those years, or maybe the first year was a rookie thing. And the second thing was

quarterback play. But I do wonder if they go through the first half of this season and he's getting four or five targets per game which i think is what the expectation should be and he's still turning in those into 25 yards per game if they don't start throwing the ball to somebody else in that position a little bit more heath i i think you're you're on to something there but i don't think it'd be taylor i think it'd actually be mac because mac could be a He could catch the ball, and I think he did that in college as well. So I wouldn't be surprised if they were to make that switch, if it would be Mack to get him more involved and keep him in a significant role. So that is something to be concerned about with Hines.

But he's another one of these guys, like, you know, you just kind of take a flyer on, and, you know, if you want to say take a lottery ticket and I'll throw Madison out of the equation at this point because of the Dalvin cook holdout, but you know, guys like Evans or Edmonds or Pollard or whoever the case may be. Those guys make a lot more sense because those could be league winners. But if you're talking about guys that have a week to week role,

higher floor, potentially without an injury, I have no problem taking a flyer on Heinz and holding on him for a couple of weeks just to see what his role is and how many passes he actually might catch playing with River. Ben, I'm going to lump two of your sleepers together here. They're going basically back-to-back. Mecole Hardman and Christian Kirk. About 112th overall according to Fantasy Football Calculator.

So it's Hardman and then it's Kirk. And both of them are going ahead of Sammy Watkins, which I find interesting because Watkins really he had a great postseason um Hardman really didn't do anything last year except a little bit when Tyreek Hill was out I know we want we want a number two receiver in that Chiefs offense totally but who do you like better Hardman or Kirk and and to Jamie and Heath you know getting these guys in the 10th round Cole Hardman or Kirk, and to Jamie and Heath, getting these guys in the 10th round, Cole Hardman and Christian Kirk, is that good sleeper appeal?

Ben, you can start. Who do you like better? I have Kirk, hi. Jamie, Heath, do you like these guys in the 10th round? Love Kirk in the 10th round. Hardman is weird because to take a receiver as a lottery ticket, it's weird to say, but he could be one of those guys.

If Watkins missed his time, or certainly if Tyreek Hill missed his time, I think in his second year he'll be a lot better. I think he'll be one of the primary weapons for Mahomes, but I think it's unfortunately going to take an injury for that to happen. I kind of feel like also this is one of those situations. I don't think Mikko Hardman has gone in the 10th round in most of our drafts like kirk that sounds about right i'm i like hardman this year as a boomer bust guy at the end of the draft but i i'm not spending a 10th round pick on him so if that's

the cost and i would guess if we looked at some other places where people are playing for money that wouldn't be his adp um i i'm worried about kirk Kirk just because I know Hopkins should help him to be more efficient because it's going to take coverage away. I just don't know that he can get to even 120 targets. The other thing is he was really bad last year. Yeah, Kirk, we talked a little bit about a couple of weeks ago, but one of the big things for him, if you look at depth was just, he didn't catch too many downfield targets last year. It's been as a rookie year.

And if you average the two seasons, he's basically right around the league average, but he was way above average as a rookie. He was way below as a second year player. Those kinds of things can fluctuate year to year. The particular, the downfield targets, it's usually not a huge sample and it can have a pretty outsized impact on

receiver efficiency. And I think that's kind of what he's alluding to. I still think Kirk's a very good player. He was a very good prospect profile coming in was better in his rookie season. Wasn't very good last year. Do you think his targets are probably capped, but also think Arizona is going to throw a lot more and run a lot more plays. We talked about that when we talked about pace and play volume, they were the fourth fastest team in terms of situation,

situation neutral pace. And they were in the bottom half and plays run which is something that should be indicative of them running more plays and throwing more passes this coming season so i think hopkins actually helps kirk in a way that it will uh create more one-on-one simple situations and i'm hopeful that he can have a little bit of an efficiency spike similar to will fuller alongside hopkins in houston i think kirk is not that much worse of a player, frankly. I think Fuller is very good too, but I think Kirk can have that type of production. As far as Hardman's concerned, almost exactly what Jamie said, and the injury is something that I'm actually considering. Hardman is this weird handcuffed receiver because he was so efficient last year and he was so explosive and you know, he's going to be on a top one offense, top three. I mean,

they're going to be so good. He's going to be tied to the best deep ball thrower in the league. And he's a speedster. So there's a couple of things that could happen. One, he could just beat out to Marcus Robinson or play over Sammy Watkins or two somebody gets hurt and he gets on the field you're drafting him at a point where he's a bench receiver and you're almost just kind of waiting and hoping that he gets snaps because he did early in the year but it was the first few games of his career when Tyree Kill went down and then he didn't really the whole rest of the year but when he did get on the field he had explosive play after explosive play long touchdown after long touchdown was very very good, really high yards per target.

Not something he can sustain over a huge number of targets, but somebody that when you step back and look big picture, you're like, this guy is a speedster tied to Patrick Mahomes in a high-scoring offense, was very explosive and successful in the limited opportunity last year. There's a lot of upside there if he's an every-down player or something. He's somebody that for anyone that's doing startup dynasty leagues, he's got to be a priority.

Got to be a priority. Now, not top five round priority, but maybe top eight round. Which would you be talking about starting wide receiver for the Chiefs next year? Would you take Michael Gallup or Nicole Hardman in a dynasty startup? Hardman.

Gallup. I would say Gallup still, but not by a ton. For this year, why Hardman over... Well, first of all, Hardman over Watkins? And then if the answer is yes, see question two. Why Hardman over Watkins? I've gone back and forth. I think Jamie pointed it out at one of our mocks because I was taking Hardman in like the ninth or tenth round

early in the offseason, hoping that one of Demarcus Robinson or Watkins wasn't back because they were both free agents. They're both back. And then right after that, I started taking Watkins around that point. I think that's when Jamie noticed. He's like, you usually take Hardman there. But I think I'm back to Hardman as kind of the more upside play. I think you can certainly take Watkins too.

Like, why can't we take three receivers from the best offense in the league? I mean, I know they have a good tight end, but... Well, if you take two of them and hopefully you get some clarity early in the season and maybe one of them emerges and you roll with one and you drop the other. Yeah, here's your friendship. Wide receiver friendship strategy poster boys. Watkins and

Hardman. Alright, so we've gotten through... I got 12 sleepers from you guys. We've gotten through 10 of them. All four for Ben, which is Ronald Jones, McCall Hardman, Christian Kirk, and Josh Reynolds. Three for Jamie, Ben Roethlisberger, Naeem Hines, and Anthony Miller. And three from Heath, Gardner Minshew, Tariq Cohen, and Hayden Hurst. That leaves us with two more.

Marvin Jones for Heath, 103rd overall. That's the seventh pick of the ninth round. I did some quick math on him earlier. I hope this is right. I'm going to roll with it anyway. Just looking at his 16-game pace, each of his four seasons in Detroit, he's been on pace for between 108 and 112 targets. That's pretty cool. And then the other one is Matt Breida, who's 89th overall, eighth round, fifth pick, and that's Jamie's sleep sleeper going just ahead of james white and just ahead of jordan howard in ppr's backfield friend all right ben who's a better

value matt brita in the eighth round or marvin jones in the ninth round i'll take brita in the eighth jamie who's a better value breeding in the eighth or marvin jones in the ninth i like both these guys a lot value, Breida in the eighth or Marvin Jones in the ninth? I like both these guys a lot. Jones is another one of the sleepers that I like a lot. So this comes down to, I think, you know, Ben said it earlier, roster construction. If you need a back, it's Breida. If you need a receiver, it's Jones. They're very similar because they

both could be excellent. The one thing would be is I think position scarcity is you want to take the running back in that spot because if Breida does hit, and as we saw in 2018, you he could be explosive um but you know jones is a better track record in the offense that he plays in and the quarterback because he's definitely taking marvin jones well that's like i think even this discussion is kind of showing how underrated marvin jones still is uh yeah well i think if you're asking matt brida a round earlier than Marvin Jones or Marvin Jones, considering their careers and their situations going into this season,

I think that shows how underrated Jones still is. But that's a position scarcity though. Keith, we run into this a lot about beating ADP value and upside. And I want to know what you think Marvin Jones' upside is because I'm taking these guys as backup receivers. I would take Meikle Hardman over Marvin Jones because Meikle Hardman has the potential to be a starter for me, and Marvin Jones, especially for someone like me

who's a relatively wide receiver, heavy early in drafts and wants high-powered wide receivers in my lineup, Marvin Jones will never start for me. I've drafted him before. He just won't. He was a top 10 wide receiver just two years ago. You say that about Hardman. At one point, you give up on Hardman when you have to make a move

to get... In what universe does Marvin Jones... You could never start on the year he was a top 10 receiver. He was a top 10 receiver? It was a weak receiving year, but yes, 2017, 61 catches, 1,100 yards,

nine touchdowns. That's only in Adam's world where you take out week six and then you add in two extra catches if you would have played. What are you talking about? The full season, 16 games, 61 catches, 1,100 yards, nine touchdowns. He's usually around 1,000 yards per 16 games. He's good. He's underrated. That's the year where everyone got hurt,

and he had the three-game stretch where he went absolutely nuts. And unlike Matt Brita, who's quite clearly someone you're going to start all often and feel great about it. No, Jones is a little inconsistent. I mean, he's inconsistent that I think that is,

which is another way to say that he has huge weekly upside. Yes, he does. He does. And downside. I think, I think the thing that surprises me the most is Ben being down on Matt Jones, given how much he likes to effort.

Matt Marvin Jones, yeah. I just think he's a career wide receiver, too. He's never been anything more. Go all the way back to Cal. Keenan Allen came into Cal and was two years younger than him, and as a freshman, immediately matched his production. Even when Jones stayed through his senior year, Keenan Allen was way out producing him in Keenan Allen's sophomore year.

He went to the Bengals. He was good as a role player, a secondary player. And then he went to the Lions. Same thing. He did have this one three-game stretch in 2017 where Golden Tate got hurt and Eric Ebron and everyone got hurt. And he got 10-plus targets, three straight games and commanded targets. I do remember the season now vividly. And it was just Stafford chucking up deep balls to him, and he was great for three games. But he's never commanded number one targets, and that to me is a skill at the receiver position. He doesn't have that skill. He and Kenny Galladay were on pace for the same number

of targets before Matthew Stafford got hurt last year. Small sample size would be my... Are you sure about that? No, it's okay. Okay. It's not true. It's not true, but it's close. The way I have it is Galladay was on pace for 124 targets. Jones was on pace for 114 targets, which is, yeah, I think there was a game where, uh, I just left early. I'm not counting.

I think he has big weekly upside. That's why I asked you at the outset, what is his upside? And you said top 10. I don't think he'd be a top 10 with Galladay. You don't think that for 2020, do you? Could he be a top 10 wide receiver this year? Yes.

With Galladay. He could be, sure. With Galladay. Galladay healthy. If he gets 120 targets and scores 10 touchdowns, then yes, he could be a non-ppr top 10 wide receiver wow that was out of level of qualifications right there what the hell what did i do god whip a guy's ass in poker one time and i just pay for it forever all right well those are some of

your sleepers um yeah fun stuff uh rothlisberger, Brita, Hines, Miller for Jamie. And there are many more on the website. Check it out. CBS sports.com slash fantasy Minshew, Cohen, Marvin Jones, Hayden Hearst for day for he's sorry for Ben. It's Ronald Jones, McCall Harbin, Christian Kirk, and Josh Reynolds. It's email time. We had a lot of fun talking about ways to make your league better.

Just new fantasy ideas, new formats. Here are some follow-ups. This is from Will in a small town in northern Minnesota. Okay, what are your thoughts on point per pass interference for wide receivers? I've tossed this idea around in my league, and it's got mixed results. Maybe you could discuss it.

So you get a point if you draw a pass interference penalty. I like it. You do or don't mind. You do or don't? I do. What do you do about the yards? Do you factor in the yards at all? Wait, you get one point?

Yep. Oh, yeah, I like that idea. One point instead of the yards. Because the deep bombs, it's like, yeah, do we really give them 50 yards for it? But yeah, you should get something for it when you set up your team for a touchdown because you drew a pass interference because you turned the DB around. I mean, yeah, I 50 yards for it. But yeah, you should get something for it when you set up your team for a touchdown because you drew a pass interference

because you turned the DB around. I mean, yeah, I'm all for it. It's like in the NBA where they should actually give assists to fouls that should be made baskets. Yeah, I like that too. But only if the guy makes both free throws, right? No.

That's a serious question. No. You shouldn't get an assist for one point. What do you mean? He got him into the position to score a basket. It's not his fault the guy missed a free throw. What if he misses both free throws? Okay, fine.

What if he misses both free throws? You should get assists for no points? Yes. No. Okay. By the way, should the quarterback get a point for pass interference? No. No. Okay. By the way, should the quarterback get a point for pass interference? No. No.

Half a point. From Frank. What do you think of pirate leagues? Yar, you win a week and you get to steal a player from your opponent unless you have some protected players. Sounds fun. Yeah. I've never played it, but whatever. I would try it.

Yeah. No. That would really suck. You have to have some protected players, I think. It seems like it would just make the early season winners just stack up rosters, right? Yeah.

Even when they lose some games and get players plucked, they'd still have good teams. All right, from Curtis. Rules changes. All right, reminded me of one I've been wanting to ask you about for years. Win for one. If the player's team wins the game, the player

gets an extra point. Same goes for DST and kickers. I think this gets you more invested in the outcomes of the games. It may also come into play when you're deciding who to start. Seems like a fun wrinkle and a no-brainer and a nine-point potential swing each week. Hate it.

I like it. I like it. Okay, we've had three emails so far. What's the best idea we've heard? The pass interference, the wins, or the Pirate League? Pass interference. Pass interference.

I like the wins too. I'm going to put them on par. What do you have against the wins, Heath? This is a good idea. It's going to make Gardner Minshew terrible. Yeah. Oh, no. Ronald Jones too. Actually, the Bucs might be good. Yeah, they're terrible. Yeah. Oh, no. Ronald Jones, too.

Actually, the Bucs might be good. Yeah, they're going to be good. Come on. Hey, Adam, Dave, Jamie, Ben, and Heath's Meat. All right. I heard the podcast where you talked about the league rules, and there was one about kicker scoring. My league has scoring where it's standard scoring for kickers

with points awarded for yardage of 40-plus yards. But to make it interesting, we made it so that a shorter missed field goal is minus more points. So minus three points for a miss of 30 yards or under, but a miss 50 yarder is only minus one. Do you like that tiered scoring for missed field goals? I just got this new scoring system for kickers where you just don't play them. One of the issues I have with missed field goal negative points is the whole thing where bigger-legged kickers try more 50-plus yardage, and they're still hard to make. Even if you have the leg, you've got to be accurate.

Guys like Adam Benetary, well, actually, he has some length, but there's certain guys that don't have a ton of length that um they can be like that deadly accurate from inside 45 but they never try anything deep and then they have these great kicking percentages i don't know that that's a function of them being a better kicker it's just that they don't try anything long what so what what if somebody misses a block a block and your kick gets blocked you're getting way too complicated if you're changing kicker scoring. Stop. I do think that you should not have kicker scoring

where it's like three points for every made field goal. You were so close. Okay, I'm going to read a few more since we have time. I'm on team get rid of kickers for the record. I'm just answering the listeners. I am definitely not. If anything, I'm on team get rid of Ders for the record. I'm just answering the listeners. I am definitely not. If anything, I'm on team get rid of DST. I'd rather have a kicker than a DST.

Why am I saying that? I don't believe that at all. Like, why am I even... I don't believe that. I don't know why I was trying to be all controversial. Okay, this is from Bill in a town in Detroit. Or north of Detroit, rather. All right, so he has an interesting idea

for how to play fantasy football. The premise of the rules. The objective is to correctly or closely quantify the top 20 players for each position for that particular week by who will score first through 20th in fantasy points. Essentially, each team in the league will create a week-to-week list

predicting the top fantasy scorers by position, similar to what most analysts already provide in the industry. Points for your team will be accumulated based on basically how accurate you are. So what do you think about that? You don't play any head-to-head matchups. You just make rankings 1 through 20 at each position each week, and the most accurate teams get the most points and therefore win. Sounds like work. I think you need to learn to use an optimizer and go play DFS. If you're going to rank

all the players, just go make some DFS lines. Cool. All right, everybody. Thanks so much for the emails. They can do my rankings for me if they want. I'll kick them a few bucks if they really want to do that. Good stuff today. We got breakouts on Wednesday.

We got busts on Friday. We've got Twitch on Tuesday night. Come hang out with us and watch our mock draft. Ask us some questions. We'll answer your questions in real time. Twitch.com slash FF today. Check us out on YouTube. Thanks a lot to Heath, to Jamie, to Ben, to Ben Schrager.

Come back and talk to you with some breakouts on Wednesday. Na, na, na, na, na, na, na!