Fantasy Football Today - Sleepers! Taysom, Lance, Trautman and More (06/15 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: June 15, 2021

We've got some early sleepers to discuss starting with a favorite from Dave and Heath (3:05). Adam Trautman could be a great pick late in drafts, but can Devin Singletary emerge as a reliable option in the Bills backfield? We also cover the latest news (12:32) as Jamison Crowder reworked his contract and Trevor Lawrence deals with an injury ... Need a sleeper QB? How about a couple of guys who are not currently the starter for their respective teams (14:10)? We're talking Trey Lance and Taysom Hill. And at TE, Heath makes the case for O.J. Howard (19:40) ... Sleeper RBs (22:40) include James Conner, Gus Edwards and Latavius Murray. None of these guys are being drafted in the Top 100. And at WR (32:10), can Antonio Brown actually be the best Bucs WR? Which rookie is Heath looking at with a late pick? And we've got two Colts WRs on the sleepers list! ... Your emails at [e-mail] Fantasy Football Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox, and wherever else you listen to podcasts. Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs, @BenSchragg Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday 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." 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. On his way to the end zone. I'll tell you what, that was a spectacular play. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. What a play. Off to the races. Touchdown. Oh, he's done it again. Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, Heath, and Ben. Taking a look at some 2021 sleepers.

Today on the show, we're going to talk about two quarterbacks, two tight ends, four running backs, four wide receivers. We've got three New Orleans Saints. We've got two, what, two Tampa Bay Bucs, two Indianapolis Colts, and one from various other teams. And we've got one Dave Richard and one Heath Cummings. Hey, Heath, second podcast of the day. This one, of course, airing on Tuesday, recording on Monday.

Did you change your shirt from the first one? Yeah, yeah. I've got a pretty good routine now where I shower in between pods on two pod days because I put in so much work for the first pod that I need a shower. TMI. No, that's all right.

I also showered but did not change. I just put the same clothes right back on. So I don't know. Is that gross? TMI. I don't think it's – like it's not gross to put like the same pants on, assuming that you wear something under your pants. I mean, I only had the shirt on for a few hours. So, yeah, I'm good with it.

Yeah, I'm good. I sweat shirts up pretty quick. Nah, not me. So anyway, I'm going to ask you guys for your favorite sleeper. However, I realized our intro needs a little work. You know, it's, you know, this is fantasy. It's good. I like it.

It's exciting. It's professional. But I think we need to skew younger. You know, we need to go for a younger demographic. So I had our youngest fan record an intro. I had it. Yeah, right. He just did it himself with his dad.

This is a kid named Luke. He is four years old, and he took a crack at our intro. So tell me what you guys think of the new intro for fantasy football today. This is a kid named Luke. He is four years old, and he took a crack at our intro. So tell me what you guys think of the new intro for Fantasy Football today. This is Fantasy Football Day from CBS4. Yeah! Pretty great. That's fantastic. It was so cool.

Hire that kid. His dad emailed me and said my four-year-old loves the show. I think he said that. And I want to give you a little bit of credit, Adam, because people think that your ego gets in the way sometimes. And the fact that you didn't change the octave of his voice to make it higher than yours was really impressive. You were okay with that four-year-old having a deeper voice than you. Yeah.

And good job. Thank you. Thank you very much. I set myself up for ridicule. impressive you were okay with that four-year-old having a deeper voice than you yeah and uh good job thank you thank you very much i set myself up for ridicule with my helium tweet the other day didn't even think about it i enjoyed the comments on that one i said do parents still let their kids inhale helium because that was a big part of my childhood and uh yeah i could tell oh you haven't stopped all those things all All right, guys. Who's your favorite sleeper? Dave, why don't you kick it off? My favorite sleeper as of right now is Adam Troutman.

Tight end of the New Orleans Saints. I think he's got a path to seeing some pretty good target share. The track record of touchdowns for tight ends in New Orleans has been really good over the last two seasons. 21 touchdowns to tight ends in new Orleans has been really good over the last two seasons, 21 touchdowns tight ends in 2019 and 2020. And I love the way that Troutman played last year as a rookie. And I really don't see how his role doesn't grow in his second season. Okay.

He only, he only played one game with Jared cook. Didn't have a catch. He may, I think he left with an injury, so nothing to go off of there. Jared Cook had 16 touchdown catches in the last two seasons,

so that's encouraging. Would you rather have Adam Troutman, you know I'm going to ask you this, or Irv Smith? I'd rather have Irv Smith, but there's a part of me that wants to draft both of them. And I know it's not ideal to draft two tight ends,

but if you're going to try and find a tight end that's got some serious upside, go for getting two of them. Your worst case scenario is you cut both and you stream the position. A good scenario is one of them pans out for your team. Actually, that would be a great scenario. But an all-star, mega, super duper scenario is that both of them take off and you can trade one of them for something else to help your team along the way. And both of them are going to come in draft picks around eight plus in the case of Irv Smith round 10 plus, if not 12 plus in the case of Troutman.

Yeah. Okay. And by the way, Schrager, you can go ahead and throw that tweet back up there. you're watching youtube.com slash fantasy football today yeah i'll get it back up in a second all right let's go to heath heath who's your favorite sleeper i think i'm gonna have to go with devin singletary and i think this is gonna become one of those guys that everybody gets tired of hearing heath make the same case over and over for, but I've just not really heard anyone refute it.

I didn't see any indication last year that Zach Moss is better than Devin Singletary at really anything. The team trusted him more in short yardage, so that was something. But Singletary has now played two years in the NFL. He's averaged 4.8 yards per carry, YPC for life. He was more involved in the passing game than Zach Moss was. And he was by just about any measurement better in terms of

on a per carry and per reception and per target and per game basis. And Moss gets drafted in round eight or round nine of a lot of our drafts. And Devin Singletary is there in round 11 or round 12. I think his ADP right now is at the very end of round 11. It's pretty sweet if you get a guy that's like worst case scenario, 40% chance of being the starting running back in round 11 or round 12. 1.1 PPR points per game better than Zach Moss was last year. And I think that that's just kind of proof of everything that you were saying about how Singletary was better by pretty much every measure.

I think the one thing that turns off fantasy managers is that the bills don't seem to be a team that's ready to run the football, even 350 times a year. It's going to be Josh Allen, or at least with the running backs anyway. Josh Allen's still going to have a big chunk of this offense, as he should. And so you're drafting a running back

who's going to split a limited amount of touches and may not get much work near the goal line reflected in his final stats. So I get why there's hesitancy to draft Singletary, but I think Moss kind of falls into the same argument. Like it's hard to make an argument for Moss. So why should Moscow several rounds out of Singletary? Singletary seems to be the better value. And if Moss gets hurt, which he's been known to do, then Singletary figures to be the primary back and fantasy managers would absolutely be happy to draft Devin Singletary or to have him in their lineups anyway

if there's no Zach Moss on the field. All right, I'll take the bait, Heath. I've got some... Good. I've got some comments here in favor of Zach Moss. But first of all, who do you take first? Who do you rank higher? Well, I don't ever draft Devin Singletary

until after Zach Moss has been drafted, because why would I? Well, who do you like better? Who do you draft Devin Singletary until after Zach Moss has been drafted. Because why would I? Well, who do you like better? Who do you rank higher? Singletary. Singletary. Okay. So it just comes down to this.

I didn't really notice this until this afternoon while I was getting ready for the show. In week 13, they gave Devin Singletary 18 carries. He had 61 yards. He had a bad game in that respect at San Francisco. The last four regular season games... They gave him 18 carries. Yeah, 18 for 61. In the last four regular season games,

he had 28 catches, Singletary. 28 carries and seven catches. Moss had 41 carries. And then in the first game of the playoffs, Moss had seven carries and four catches before he left with an injury. Devin Singletary, up to that point, had two carries and one catch.

So I think they may have been tipping their hand there that they like Moss better. They were using him down the stretch and in the playoffs in the one game that Moss was healthy and Moss hurt his ankle. And he had two like Dave already said, he had two injuries last year. So that stinks for him. The other thing is, it's two years in a row now

where they won't use Singletary inside the five-yard line. Two years ago, it was Gore who led the team. And then last year, it was Allen with Allen, right? No, it was Gore who picked up the slack for Gore when Gore couldn't get the job done. Yeah, but it was Gore with 11 inside the five, 11 carries. Allen with five, Singletary with two.

And then last year it was Allen with nine, Moss with eight, Singletary with five. And I would bet that some of those five came when Moss wasn't playing. Right, weeks three, four, and five. Which two of those games Singletary did very well in. Yeah, so that's why I think it's justified to take Moss over Singletary. I would say in those last four games

that Zach Moss took over as the lead back, he also had two catches in the regular season. I don't really think either of them are going to have a ton of catches. It's not really part of their game. Yeah, I don't know. Singletary had 38 last year. That's not really part of their game. Yeah, I don't know.

I mean, Singletary had 38 last year. That's not nothing. He had 16 of them in the first four games of the season. And two of those games, Zach Moss didn't play, and he had like nine catches in those games. They both were pretty uninvolved in the passing game, I'd say. Each two years in a row, the running backs have had, what, 65, 70 catches? I don't like saying they were both pretty uninvolved in the passing game.

They were. As like a thing against Devin Singletary, when Singletary had almost like three times as many targets. Yeah, but there was 38 catches. Like there's a big difference between three and a half targets a game and one target a game. If you're not going to score any Russian touchdowns, you're going to have a lot more than 38 catches.

Like I said, 16 of them came in the first four games. Two of those games without Zach Moss. There were plenty of opportunities to play without Zach Moss because he couldn't stay on the field. Hey, don't take this out on Zach Moss, Heath. I understand

you're doing a good job playing devil's advocate and you got me a little bit. Well, I wasn't trying to get you. I was just... No, I'm saying you got me riled up a little bit. Oh, okay. Well, I was trying to do that. Right. I just like, maybe that three yards per carry that Zach Moss

was giving them down the stretch is what they're looking for. All right. For the season, don't even with that, because for the season, they had the same yards per carry 4.3 to 4.4. That's not the same. Okay. It's basically the same. Okay. And what Devin Singletary did the year before just doesn't really

matter. But well, Zach Moss wasn't on the team that year. I don't know what Moss would have done in that situation. I would bet that this is going to end up being a who's available from week to week and who's playing well from game to game thing, where if Moss gets out of the gate in the first half and plays well, okay, he's going to finish the game leading the way for Buffalo in touches. Vice versa, if it's Singletary. I don't think they're committed to either back in most ways, shapes, or forms. All right. Well, look, it took me about six minutes to get Heath riled up, so I consider that a win.

Bad faith arguments really get under my skin. Bad faith? I thought those were very valid points. All right, Strager, let's see some of our favorite replies to the tweet. Can we do that now? YouTube.com slash fantasy football today. I'm fantasy football today.

I'm killing time here. I'll promote a few things. We're going to be live tonight, Tuesday night, 7 p.m. Eastern with Ben Gretsch. YouTube.com slash fantasy football today. We're doing a PPR mock draft, 7 p.m. Eastern, Tuesday night. Come and join us. Subscribe to the channel, and you'll know when we're live. You'll get the notification.

YouTube.com slash fantasyfootball today. All right. I'm having trouble seeing here. It stayed with you apparently. Okay, you're right. So I said, do parents still let their kids inhale helium and get the high-pitched voice? That was a big part of my childhood. Just your childhood?

I like that. What else we got, Schrager? I really can't see. Any more DJ Chark stories? All right, fine. This segment didn't work. News and notes. Jamison Crowder reworked his contract.

He's back with the Jets. So does this dampen any enthusiasm you may have had for Elijah Moore? It hurts. And really what it does is it hurts the entire Jets passing game because there's a lot of interesting talent that they've got on the team. And I don't know if there's any one guy that you can point to and say, that's the best one.

That's the guy who's going to get 70 catches. It sounds like it'd be the case for so many of them couldn't you couldn't you make the case for literally at least three i think the one that it's difficult to make a case for after the past couple weeks is denzel mims um he was a guy who i was pretty i'm still intrigued about but it sounds like keelan cole is uh playing ahead of denzel mims in ogas and um like obviously they just gave cory davis money and they just spent a draft pick on elijah moore and they just decided not to cut james and crowder i denzel mims might just be a backup wide receiver i just feel like there's some pun that we can do with his name, like a Heath pun, like more like Denzel slims.

I just, I know there's something there. We'll, we'll get it. Um, okay. Cam Newton, Cam Newton is back from his hand injury.

More like can Newton and, uh, Trevor Lawrence has a hamstring injury. So they're trying to avoid a serious injury for Trevor Lawrence. And they're taking it very slowly with him, and you want him to get as many reps as possible. So hopefully he'll be good to go for training camp

in July, but right now rookie quarterback Trevor Lawrence dealing with a hammy. Alright, more sleepers. So Dave, you gave us Adam Troutman, and how about a quarterback? Trevor or Trey Lance? Trevor Lance.

Trevor Lance. Trey Lance, 169th overall right now. Do you think there's more than just like a long shot chance that he's realistic? Is there a realistic chance that he's the week one starter? I think there's a realistic chance.

I wouldn't say it's like 50%, but they just traded up a ton of picks to go and get this guy. I'm sure they'd love to use him as an every down player for their offense once they're comfortable giving it to him. And it's just a matter of how soon they get comfortable. It's a matter of how soon he's comfortable. This is a guy who was tearing apart defenses for a year at the FCS level. He won their version of the Heisman as a freshman.

And he's got a strong arm, good working knowledge of what a pro offense is. And I'm pretty sure he's adapted nicely to what the 49ers are doing, or at least I think he will. And he runs. He can run like the wind. He can put up plenty of yards. He had, what, 150 yards and two touchdowns in his only game in 2020? They only played him in one game because, you know, hashtag COVID.

But he can run, and he's big, and he's got a strong arm. Accuracy isn't perfect, but it's something that can be improved upon. Josh Allen proved that. And I think the 49ers are going to try and work on that with Lance. At the very least, they can scheme him up. And he's kind of savvy too when he's got to play. There was a play in college. He did this multiple times. He's running out of the pocket and he like pump fakes to get the defender to roll off of his coverage and to attack Lance because they think Lance is going to run the ball. And then Lance just flicks it over the defender's head and into the wide open hands of a receiver

downfield for a big play. He's got that type of dynamic ability to him. And I think for a game like fantasy football where stats matter, he can give you a lot. So if it's a matter of just getting this guy and putting him on my bench and seeing how the season begins, or if I've got deep benches and I can carry him all year, more than happy to do it. I think he could end up being a difference maker if given the opportunity as soon as 2021. Okay. I think it's interesting to contrast him with Taysom Hill.

Heath's sleeper at quarterback. And I like this call, too, by the way. Taysom Hill is going like 60 picks later or 50 picks later. They're both athletic quarterbacks who I think we can be equally uncertain about how ready they are to currently be NFL quarterbacks.

Both of them, their coaching staffs absolutely love them. And we've already seen from Taysom hill over a three or four game stretch what he can do as the starting quarterback now he's got to beat out james winston trey lance got to beat out jimmy garoppolo but hill has shown us that he can be a top 12 quarterback pretty easy and he's being drafted as if that's not really even a possibility so let me ask you like james winston's already been named the starter.

Yes. It's a little strange. And by the way, if you read Jason Lock and Forer's latest column, he is... I'm trying to get the exact quote, but he's basically just assuming that... He wrote all about Jameis Winston. And his assumption is that Jameis Winston

is going to be the starting quarterback. So it's weird. I think to put a quarterback on your bench who just doesn't play, right? We haven't had a ton of situations like that. I feel where we're just stashing a quarterback in the hopes that he will play. And I'm wondering if you're willing to do that.

You know, Dave, you talked about that with Lance, but Heath, are you willing to do that with Taysom Hill if he doesn't win the job and you're just waiting for Jameis Winston to implode? I don't, well, I mean, when we're talking about June sleepers,

we're not talking about that scenario. Oh, I'm asking you about that scenario. Let's say Winston wins the job. He will not be on my sleeper list if he's a backup quarterback, no. Okay. Because, you know, Winston could easily lose the job. Oh, for sure.

And then I would pick, then it'd be a waiver wire claim. But no, I'm not, I'm not probably going to roster him in a one quarterback league. I'll roster a backup that's playing. How many bench spots do you have? If it's a one quarterback league and you've got seven, eight more bench spots, maybe it's a keeper league that's a one quarterback league. Well, if it's a keeper league, obviously that changes the dynamic. But if you've got deep bench spots, and maybe with leagues starting to use IR spots more often,

maybe one opens up that way. These quarterbacks are exactly the type of players that you wouldn't mind stashing just for the short term to see what happens. Garoppolo gets hurt all the time. Jameis, if he has a three-interception game, that could be the end of it. I can't imagine either quarterback, Garoppolo or Winston, have long leashes that keep Lance at bay,

but Taysom Hill is going to take snaps away from Jameis Winston. If he took snaps away from Drew Brees, he's going to take snaps away from Jameis Winston. If he took snaps away from Drew Brees, he's going to take snaps away from Jameis Winston. I'm rooting for Winston. So much more. I mean, I'm rooting for Taysom Hill. He's so much more fun. I'm so intrigued by him.

Let's see what happens. Go Taysom. Okay, let's get some more sleepers here. How about Heath? How about your tight end? Dave gave us Adam Troutman. Your tight end sleeper is? Yeah, this is another one where i think i've tweeted about it a lot this offseason but oj howard uh another guy with an adp on nfc outside of the top 200 it sounds like he's getting back to full

health and he was pretty um strongly outperforming rob gronkowski until he was injured last year. And you look at where these two players are at their stage, the stage of their career and what Howard's incredible efficiency has been whenever he's gotten targets. And I just think that like, there's no guarantee at all that Rob Gronkowski is the best tight end for the Buccaneers. In fact, if you told me at the start of camp that Howard was 100% healthy, I would bet on Howard. He had at least seven PPR points in three of his first four games. He had one game with 14 PPR points, another one with 13 PPR points.

So he was getting some good action in that offense. Put it in context, though. Let's say Howard is the best tight end. Is there any chance he's actually good enough to be a starter you know anything more than just okay top 12 whatever but an impactful player because just with godwin and evans and and antonio brown it's hard right and well it's and it's not easy but that those four games last year, week four, and I don't know what point of the game he left, but he only played 37% of the snaps.

And in those first four games, he had 19 targets already. If you're telling me that O.J. Howard's getting five targets a game in that offense? But that was before Antonio Brown. And Godwin might have been hurt in that fourth game. Well, Howard was hurt in that fourth game as well. I'm not sure if Godwin played

in week four. I have to go back and look. I mean, they threw the ball to Rob Gronkowski and Cameron Brait quite a bit in the second half last year. Godwin missed weeks two and four and five. And not eight. I would bet one of Mike Evans, Antonio Brown, Chrisris godwin and rob gronkowski missed time this year as well right okay and it may be howard but yeah he's one of the most

efficient tight ends we've ever seen in the nfl so the target bar for him is much lower than everyone else you said efficient or talented efficient oh okay yeah because i would agree with both of them i think you at one time said he was the most talented tight end in football, which I don't think I said that. I definitely did not say that. Very, very wrong. I did not say that. Show me a route for a trade here.

Not that the Bucs have any reason to do it, unless they get a crazy offer for OJ Howard. Now I think a team's going to bang down their door for him, but maybe he just falls out of favor a little bit in camp and a team that needs a tight end desperately steps up for OJ Howard. Now I think a team's going to bang down their door for him, but maybe he just falls out of favor a little bit in camp and a team that needs a tight end desperately steps up for OJ Howard. And then he's in an opportunity where we can feel a lot

better about his target share from week to week. Okay. Trey would be fun for sure. And running backs. All right. Let's get some running back sleepers. Dave, who you got? I've got James Connor and I've got Gus Edwards. And I'm just, I'm kind of lukewarm on Gus

because he's never been, especially in PPR, he's never been great on a consistent basis. He's just an efficient running back that's going to get you right around nine to 10 carries a week. And, you know, maybe that leads to 40, 50 yards. He can be a placeholder for you at running back. He's an okay zero RB target

and someone that you can just grab in those later rounds just to have his bench depth and use in a pinch. And if he finds his way into the end zone, look, he was actually great in short yardage situations last year, but J.K. Dobbins didn't miss from three yards or closer. He was 100% when it came to scoring short yardage touchdowns. So I'm not sure if Gus is going to claim that role. They're going to split it.

And I just, I feel like when it comes to just getting a running back that carries nominal value as a bench running back and has crazy high upside in the event that the starter in front of him misses time he fits that he can do that and it won't cost you much in a pick connor is probably in line to see maybe around a dozen carries a game but if he's replacing kenyon drake that means he's the north south runner in this offense should be in line for short yardage situations he's also been good in short yardage and goal line carries over the balance of his career. He can catch the ball a little bit too.

He's got a few seasons with over 30 receptions. But I think that role will go to Chase Edmonds. There's a lot of talk about Chase Edmonds being the feature back in this offense. I think there's a reason why he hasn't really had that opportunity other than in spot starts over the last couple of seasons he he will probably be i think it's going to end up being most weeks like maybe 55 45 in favor of edmunds but there will probably be some weeks where arizona's got a lead and they'll hammer it with connor they seem to really like connor for his downhill physical rushing style and there will be touchdowns available to him and And you can get him in the late rounds.

Another good zero RB target. I'd see his ADP at 108th overall. It just surprises me for James Conner. But yeah, that hasn't been the case in our drafts. I've been drafting him, but I know that he wouldn't last to round nine. At least I don't think he would. Would you guys rather have a Bills running back

or James Conner? Conner. I think I'd feel better with Conner. I might have Moss ranked like one or two spots ahead of him right now. If there's a Bills running back that I feel comfortable with for the long term, obviously I'll take him ahead of Conner.

But if I can't tell them between heads and tails, then maybe Conner's the right answer. Okay. How about in a PPR league? Would you rather have James White or James Connor? Connor. I currently have White ahead. Let's compare Gus Edwards, who was one of Dave's running back sleepers to Latavius Murray,

who was one of Heath's running back sleepers. They had right around the same amount of carries last year. Murray had 146. Edwards had 144. Murray had 23 catches. Edwards had not even close to that, nine. But Edwards was better. He scored.

I think he was better. They were close, but I'm pretty sure he was a little bit better. In PPR points per game, Latavius was better. Latavius was at 8.1, gus was 7.4 okay uh non-ppr i believe gus edwards was better but um either way uh heath so yeah gus edwards or latavius murray and do you basically consider them to be the same no because i think that uh difference in catches is a difference in value in a ppr league so i prefer latavius murray because he's going to catch 15 or 20 more passes than gus edwards and i think it's more likely if something happens to alvin camara that latavius murray gets a workhorse role

than it is for gus edwards i think if something happens to jk dobbins then gus edwards is probably sharing with justice hill or Todd Gurley. We'll see how that turns out. Please don't even speak that into existence. Well, you know, we had the big DeAndre Swift freakout over Todd Gurley. We should have an equal one with J.K. Dobbins. Everything Dave said about Gus Edwards is basically true about Latavius Murray. He's slightly less efficient as a runner,

but he's going to catch 20 to 30 passes. He's a little bit better in that regard. And we saw him run for 124 yards and two touchdowns without Kamara once last week. I mean, if something happens to Alvin Kamara in the first quarter of the season, Latavius Murray may have the highest win rate for any player in fantasy football this year.

If these guys, if the starting running backs don't get hurt, I struggle with Murray. I mean, I think you probably would disagree, but I feel like they're kind of useless. I really feel like Edwards and Murray are just handcuffs. Well, if you were stuck

one week, say you're running back, you've got Christian McCaffrey and he misses a game. Birth of a child, something like that. These are the two running backs on your bench. Say they both have solid matchups. Which one do you go with in a half PPR? You might lean Latavius just because of the

receiving. But the reason I'd go Edwards is something that you don't know if it's going to translate, but you know, from year to year, but last year he had more than seven PPR fantasy points, which is not good.

Gus Edwards had more than seven PPR fantasy points in nine games. And Latavious Murray had more than seven PPR fantasy points in five games. I mean, that's awful. You don't need somebody on your team who's got five games all year with more than seven PPR fantasy points in five games. I mean, that's awful. You don't need somebody on your team who's got five games all year with more than seven PPR fantasy points. You're just...

He's a handcuff, and a really good one at that. That's how I see it. Sure, they both are. At the very least, Gus should be able to give you 50 yards a week. Yeah, but no catch is maybe one catch. He's averaged a half target per game over his career.

And while Edwards did have a number of games with more than seven, he had almost none with more than nine. And you definitely want... Look, if you're in a 14-team league and you're struggling at running back, you just want to throw someone in there to get you seven, eight points, it's not the worst thing in the world. Right. Who's more likely

to score a touchdown in a given week i would say edwards but they both had about the same amount of touchdown look i think it's a gross percentage i think it's going to be unlikely that they do it but i think edwards is probably a little more likely to score than latavius latavius is a league winner if Alvin Kamara misses time Gus doesn't quite have that type of upside if J.K. Dobbins missed time Gus would be pretty darn good

are we just saying that because Drew Brees is gone so the Saints aren't going to score as many touchdowns you think that Gus Edwards the Gus Edwards versus Latavius touchdown thing? just my assumption is and I don't know how many touchdowns, I mean, I'm looking right now. My assumption is that Latavius has scored at a higher rate than Gus Edwards. Not last year.

Edwards had six and Murray had four. Well, that's rushing. I'm not even sure if Latavius Murray had enough short yardage carries to compare with Gus. Well, two years ago, Latavius had six and Gus had two. What, short yardage carries? Touchdowns. Touchdowns. But two years ago...

Latavius has 11 and Gus has eight. Last year, Gus was four for six from a yard out. But I think two years ago, that was the year that Kamara got banged up and missed some time. So I think you'd have to look at how many he scored when Kamara was playing and Edwards has never really had that opportunity. He did a little bit, right?

He had one or two games this past year where he was the guy. Or am I wrong about that? No, I think that's right. And he had 2018 when Lamar Jackson was the starter. He had like eight games as the guy, basically. And he scored two touchdowns.

So there you go. Look, these guys aren't great, but these are the types of running backs that are going to be staring you in the face when the James Connors of the world are off the board. These are the running backs in rounds nine plus. Let's see who else is in

these rounds. I think all of mine were after round 10. Okay. All right. So let's go to pick 120. We're looking at Jamal Williams,

Gus Edwards, Devin Singletary, Madison, McKissick, Latavius, Kenneth Gainwell, Daryl Henderson, Phillip Lindsey, Tariq Cohen.

That's interesting. Rashad Penny, Chuba Hubbard, James White. You can make the case for a handful of guys in that list. Bernard, Damian Williams, Ramondre Stevenson, Daryl Williams, Tevin Coleman. Tevin Coleman maybe has the best chance of being a starter. Yeah, he's a zero RB target for sure.

Okay. Good stuff. All right, we got to get to our wide receivers. It's also US Open week, and the First Cut Golf Podcast has all your needs covered as the world's best golfers travel to Torrey Pines. They are on the scene in California all week to give you daily fantasy advice,

the best picks and props, and round-by-round analysis. So listen to The First Cut wherever podcasts are found, or you can stream every episode of The First Cut on YouTube. Fun. Wide receivers.

Heath, who are your wide receiver sleepers? My wide receiver sleepers are T.Y. Hilton and Munro St. Brown. So just two guys in exactly the same situation and stage of their career. Hilton's current ADP is the end of round 12. And I would like to see Michael Pittman take a step forward and be the number one wide receiver on the Colts. But again, I don't think that should be a foregone conclusion. Their ADP is not particularly close.

St. Brown is still, I think, the best route running wide receiver that the Lions have. And the only one who's equipped to run the types of short area routes that Jared Goff has historically targeted. So he's not going to go deep like Tyrell Williams or Quintez Cephas or Brashad Perryman, but he can do something that those guys don't do. And it's the only thing that Jared Goff's really done well in the NFL. You know how I've told you before that negative reports out of minicamp are never a good thing? Yeah. know how i i've told you before that negative reports out of minicamp are never a good thing yeah apparently brashad perryman has been not good at lions camp which is a shocker to anybody that's ever had brashad perryman in a fantasy lineup save for the last four games of next thing you're gonna tell me is he dropped passes i i don't know i don't know if i read that about

him but uh your boy tyrell, better call him. He's been playing well in camp, and St. Brown has been playing well in camp. They've said that he's fitting in. Those guys and Cephas. Cephas has also been making plays. That might be your three-receiver set with Hawkinson at tight end. I'm with you on St. Brown, and I'm with you on T.Y. as well. I think getting him as a late pick to be on your bench and use him as a fill-in replacement, as a flex, or as a wide receiver,

I think you do a hell of a lot worse than that. Well, the last six games of the year for Hilton, he was a top 12 wide receiver. In fact, he was 6th in non-PPR. He was 11th in PPR. He had five touchdowns, was on pace for 72 catches, 1,160 yards, and 13 touchdowns on 115 targets.

That was his last six games of the year. So who would you rather have, Hilton or St. Brown? Hilton. I feel much more confident that Hilton's going to be someone that I might plug him in as a flex week one. St. Brown, I'm going to need to see something before I'm going to be someone that I might plug him in as a as a flex

week one St. Brown I'm going to need to see something before I'm going to trust him in my lineup all right let's go back to conversation we had earlier would you rather have a Jets wide receiver or St. Brown I asked the tough question I think I think no I don't think anybody wants to admit to taking a Jets receiver under any circumstances, but I've got to take Crowder ahead of him at this point. No Corey Davis? Are you saying you'd take Crowder over Davis? Yeah, I think I probably would.

I've got Crowder over Davis currently. Yeah, I'm not a fan, especially if Corey Davis has to share targets with all these other receivers. I really want to take Elijah Moore, man. But I'm nervous about just how many targets he'll get. How dumb am I, to be honest? Very.

For going with Amari Rogers over Amonra St. Brown. I don't know if that's necessarily dumb. No, it isn't. It's quite genius. Well, they're kind of the same guy, right? We're talking about rookie slot receivers who are good route runners and have good hands coming into the league.

One is going to theoretically catch passes from Aaron Rogers, and the other one's going to catch passes from Jared Goff. Very similar. Yeah, right. If you took Devontae Adams out of the equation, does Rodgers still have more

competition for targets? No. Alan Lazard's far more accomplished than Quintez Cephas. I guess Tyrell's more accomplished than MVS, but they're basically the same guy, but you've got Hawkinson.

Like if you took Adams, okay. If you take the two teams, I think Adams obviously gets the most targets. And I think Hawkinson gets the next most, and then maybe Swift Swift will be up there. Jones might be up there. I was going to say the Packers throw 150 times a year to their running

backs. So my only concern withgers is I'm just not sure, especially if he goes in offseason without ever meeting his new quarterback. I'm just not sure how he's going to beat out Lazard and MVS in Aaron Rodgers' mind. Well, just because he has a different role. Is the three-receiver set for

Green Bay involving Rodgers? It's been involving putting Adams in the slot, right? Right. So if the three-receiver set is Adams for sure, and when they're healthy, Lazard and MBS, how often are we going to see Rodgers on the field? Not week one. I think it's hopefully week four or five

he starts getting more playing time. And if that's the case, then I'd rather spend the draft capital on somebody who I would hope to hit pay dirt with before week four or five. There's nothing worse than drafting a rookie wide receiver and then cutting them early in the season

only to see them go on and post a 1400 yard season in their rookie year. Hey, when Peyton Barber is on the waiver wire, you pick up Peyton Barber, okay? Dave, let's get your wide receiver sleepers here. And they are, did we talk about Paris Campbell? No, we did not.

Antonio Brown and Paris Campbell. Antonio Brown going 110th, Paris Campbell 191st. So, Antonio Brown, how realistic do you think it would be for him to be the best wide receiver on the Bucs? On a per-game basis, I don't think it's going to happen. Not unless there's an injury.

But I think he can work as a great number three receiver for a fantasy squad. I think you should draft him to be that. He averaged 14.1 PPR points per game. That was 23rd best among all wide receivers last year. If you include the playoffs, he had 13 or more PPR points. Again, not 15, but 13 in 7 of 11 games with Brady.

I think that's a pretty good jumping off point. He had at least six targets in five of his last eight or five of his eight regular season games. He's lining up wide. I wonder if he adds the slot role to what he does a little bit more. And teams are just in a massive bind defensively when they take on Tampa Bay.

Because you can't double Evans. You can't double Godwin. You can't double Brown. If you do, you're leaving one of those other guys wide open. And it's going to be a nightmare situation. And he proved that he wasn't like a shell of himself at all once he got rolling last year. Right.

Let's see the wide receivers going around. Antonio Brown, that would be Jalen Waddell, Michael Pittman. Yeah, I'll take Brown over those guys. Yeah, Brown would have been on my sleeper list if I didn't let Dave go first. How about Jarvis Landry or Antonio Brown? Yeah, I'll take

everybody we've talked about so far, I think, over Jarvis Landry. I would take T.Y. over Landry. Okay. I'm sorry, I would not take a Monroe St. Brown over Landry. That's a bridge too far t y hilton or antonio brown brown same all right michael pitman what do you think nope nope what i don't think he's on the sleepers list what do you mean i thought you were talking

about dave sleepers i am oh wait we can talk about Pittman if you want, but he's, I don't know why I said Colts that I would pick. I said, Michael Pittman. I meant Paris Campbell. They're both on the Colts. You could draft them both.

They do yield friendship strategy between the two of them. And the pessimist might say, well, why would you bother drafting them both when you can just draft Pittman and not even bother with Campbell because he doesn't play that much. Anyway, Campbell's had a lot of injuries that he's had to come back from and uh I just I love the talent still I love the slot role I went back and I checked how often Carson went through to his receivers in the slot over the past four seasons the targets went to

the slot receiver 30.5 percent of the time at the least. Some of the seasons were over a third of the time. So you balance it about three of every 10 throws that Wentz makes going into the slot. I'll take that for somebody like Paris Campbell, who gets a bunch of short area targets and he's explosive, or at least he was before the injuries. And I think the reports out of camp are mostly positive and you can get him for free on draft day. He's literally one of your last three picks. You could probably take some DSTs ahead of Paris Campbell and still find Paris Campbell available to take in your leagues.

Well, those are some sleepers for you. We've got your emails, fantasyfootballatcbsi.com. And we've got the live show tonight. Don't forget about that. Live show tonight on YouTube, youtube.com slash fantasyfootballtodayi.com. And we've got the live show tonight. Don't forget about that. Live show tonight on YouTube, youtube.com slash fantasyfootballtoday. Stick around for the end of it. Maybe we'll see if Paris Campbell gets drafted. It is, in fact, a PPR league with three wide receivers and a flex.

Right now, we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, we'll read your emails. Kick off an exciting football season with BetMGM, an official sportsbook partner of the National Football League. Yard after yard, down after down, the sportsbook born in Vegas gives you the chance to take action to the end zone and celebrate every highlight reel play. And as an official sportsbook partner of the NFL, BetMGM is the best place to fuel your football fandom on every game day. With a variety of exciting features, BetMGM offers you plenty of seamless ways to jump straight onto the gridiron and to embrace peak sports action. Ready for another season of gridiron glory? What are you waiting for?

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Again, it's FantasyFootball at CBSi.com. That is the letter I. This is from Scott. Hey, Evans, Hemsworth, Pine, and Pratt. Sound like Marvel men, no? Chris's. Or Chris's. Oh, they're Chris's? Okay.

Isn't Chris Hemsworth and Chris Pratt, aren't they both superheroes? Yes. Okay. Chris Evans is too. I don't know who Chris Evans is. Who's that? I don't know who Chris Pine is.

Chris Evans, Bengals running running back it's definitely not captain america captain america is chris chris pine i i don't believe is any more in a marvel movie who is he he's um oh chris pine is Pine is the voice of Spider-Man in Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse. These are all Chris's and they're all superheroes. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Well, they play superheroes.

I don't think they are actually. No. Well, at least three of them are. This must be a question about Chris Carson. It's about Chris Godwin. A superhero fantasy running back. I've been thinking a lot about Chris Godwin, says Scott. He's currently wide receiver 15 in Fantasy Pro's ADP.

He's six spots behind Mike Evans. Mike Evans is top 10 in ADP? I don't believe you. I haven't heard him receive much love or excitement from the group on this podcast. I decided to do a little bit of a deep dive because he was all the rage going into last season after a top two finish in 2019.

Here's what I found. His 17-game pace using 2020 stats would be 92 catches, just under 1,200 yards and 10 touchdowns. His 17-game pace using his 2020 stats from week 10 on, when Antonio Brown was in the fold, 90 catches, 1,262 yards, and 12 touchdowns. That really?

That doesn't seem... Oh, maybe because week 17 he had a huge game. He was heavily targeted in the red zone, scored the last three weeks of the season. General consensus is that the Bucs offense will be even better in year two with Tom Brady. I understand there are a lot of mouths to feed on this team, but are we just overlooking the reasons we were so excited about Goblin going

into 2020? Why isn't he mostly the same guy? Isn't he a steal right now as a wide receiver too? I think he can return value as, as a wide receiver too, with upside to be top 12. He finished in PPR points per game as wide receiver 15. That's pretty good. But when it came to targets, he was wide receiver 34, seven targets per game. I think we're looking

for a little bit more than that to put him in the top 12 solidly. But I like him and I think a lot of people like him and I think a lot of people are happy to draft him as a quality number two receiver. Or if you go heavy on other positions early you get them to be your wide receiver one i this um this is a challenge when you project on a team basis a situation like this and i actually pulled back on some of the efficiency basically across the board for the bucks. Because if I projected them all for their typical efficiency, Tom Brady might be QB one. Sure.

Because I'd have to have him at like 6,000 yards passing. So I don't know, like, I don't, I don't necessarily disagree with anything he said. And I have Godwin projected even lower than I think where the consensus is. And I don't like it. But we just talked about Antonio Brown as a great sleeper, and we think he's a number three wide receiver. And I think Mike Evans is a borderline number two

or a number three wide receiver. And I don't think they're going to stop throwing the ball to O.J. Howard and Rob Gronkowski. And Tom Brady still threw it to his running backs last year when most of his running backs couldn't catch. So maybe they'll throw 700 passes and Tom Brady will be QB one, but it's hard to project it that way. Yeah.

And, and one of the issues with the numbers that were given in the email is one, it doesn't include week nine when Antonio Brown did play and, and, and Chris Godwin had three catches for 41 yards. And then for what it's worth, you know, week 17,

Mike Evans left early with an injury and you're looking at five catches, 133 yards and two touchdowns. That was by far the best game that Chris Godwin had in the eight regular season games with Antonio Brown. It was the one where Evans was out. So you gotta, you gotta factor. I think you have to factor those things in.

This is from Alexander, 12 team PPR league. We need to keep three players, but you can only keep two in the same position. Who should I keep? Mixon, Edward Ziller, Akers,

James Robinson, Deontay Johnson, Julio Jones, Mark Andrews, and Russell Wilson. So again, we can keep three, but no more than two of any position. I'm going to say the names again.

Mixon, Edward Ziller, Akers, Robinson, James Robinson, Deontay Johnson, Julio Jones, Mark Andrews, Russell Wilson. PPR. I would keep Mixon, Akers, and Andrews. I think Akers is a must. And if you are thinking of just this year,

or maybe you can only keep them for a year, Mixon over Edwards-Hilaire makes sense. If you're thinking long-term, maybe a throwback Mixon. To go with Edwards-Hilaire, it depends on the rules of the league and how long you can keep guys for. If it's for their entire careers, the prospect of keeping Edwards-Hilaire with acres as your two running back keepers for ever and ever. That looks good to me. That seems good to me.

And it would be cool to have that tight end advantage with Andrews. And I think maybe along those same lines, just thinking long-term with your keepers. If you can go long-term, he makes sense over Julio in that regard. And Deontay Johnson's probably not going to match what he did last year. Okay. This is a don't have a name, no name or city, Dave.

It is Barbara from Glenview, Illinois, 10 team dynasty league, half PPR. I'm a young team with picks 101 and 103. I have McCaffrey, Dobbins, Lamb, Dak, Kittle, Lockett, and Fuller. Nice. Yeah, and 101 and 103.

Would you trade McCaffrey for Antonio Gibson, pick 104, pick 310, and T. Higgins. Or am I good enough to win now? I actually responded to this email, which I don't do very often. I probably wouldn't, because I think if you have this team and you have a chance to have Dak, McC mccaffrey dobbins and either harris or etn um lamb chase lockett and fuller and kittle um like i think that is a contender this year okay yeah i can't pass up the trade i think i think the offer is fantastic and And I love Christian McCaffrey, but aren't you getting future Christian McCaffrey with Antonio Gibson?

First, another thing I think that matters is it's a 10-team league. It's not difficult in a 10-team league to drive yourself insane by having six No. 2 running backs and six No. two wide receivers and starting the wrong one every week it's a very good point studs are more valuable in a 10 team league than they are in a 12 team league all right this is from bruce where's bruce from

bruce is from syracuse new york am i okay to believe in zach earths and aj green at their adp you can basically get earths and green for nothing next to nothing excellent players that you could draft with one of your last picks and kick to the curb if they're doing nothing by week three can i just take one word out of what dave said excellent excellent can we just say these are players that you can take with one of your last picks um I like Hurts more than Green. Okay. Same. I think Dave influenced me a little bit with his stat about A.J. Green,

that he had the lowest on-target percentage of pass, whatever. What would you say? Lowest percentage of catchable targets. Catchable targets. Of any receiver with 100-plus targets last year. Basically was set up for failure. So it made me think a little bit. Yeah, that

would influence me more if it wasn't for the fact that he played nine games in two years before that. And his yards per catch, which isn't affected by catch rate at all, fell all the way to 11.1. Can I tell

you how it affected me? It made me it it made me go with digs over hopkins because digs has had basically zero added competition and hopkins has had i mean that's kind of true yeah i mean i don't know that at this point we should say AJ Green is more competition than Emmanuel Sanders. No, but there's Rondell Moore, too. That's true. It's a little bit more competition there. From Kyle. Kyle is from?

Boulder, Colorado. You guys discuss volume versus being in a committee. For example, we don't think Akers, Mixon, or Najee Harris will be splitting much of the touches with their backups. However, we think J.K. Dobbins, DeAndre Swift, and Jonathan Taylor will be splitting carries somewhat with their backups. So give some advice to drafters. Do we go with the volume or the running back

who's going to get 15 touches but split work? Generally volume. The difference is with Dobbins and Jacobs and Chubb, and Dobbins probably more than the other two, you can deal with the splits work guy more if he's going to catch 60-plus passes. It's hard to be a splits work guy with 20 catches now chubb's done it but you have to be like score once every 10 touches and average

five and a half yards per or six yards per carry to get that done you want to have efficiency you want to have the goal line roll i think those are two things that jonathan taylor will have that sets him apart and dobbins would have it if he didn't have a russian quarterback to play off of but then again i don't know if he'd be as efficient if he didn't have a russian quarterback to play off of but even taylor is going to catch probably twice as many passes as dobbins oh yeah yeah and they run the ball so much. So Kyle from Boulder said Taylor's going to be splitting carries somewhat. I'm not sure. Do we feel that way? Somewhat is a very vague term, but in a meaningful way?

ADP does not feel that way at all. Who that? Who? ADP. One more time? Average draft position. Oh, ADP. Sorry, it was cutting out a little.

That's okay. Yeah, right. I don't know how much of a threat we think marlin mack is we don't think naeem hines is a threat to his carries taylor's carries though i don't i wouldn't put him in the same group as jk dobbins you know sure not right correct and like that another, it matters how many opportunity, total opportunities we think the running backs are going to get. Like, even though Baltimore is a run heavy team, they, they're not going to have as many running back carries plus targets as the Colts or the 49ers or hopefully the lions.

Good show guys. Thank you very much. Good sleepers. Make sure you're checking out fft and five by the way a little five minute preview of what's to come and not to mention we do have some shows that aren't tied to our full-length episodes like we'll have jacob gibbs back on to give some awesome advanced stats on a couple of players this week i think we've got uh i think we've got davante smith as one of them it might be a couple of rookie wide receivers that we're going

a little deep dive on on on FFT and five. So just check out fantasy football today in five. We will see you Tuesday night, 7 p.m. Eastern youtube.com slash fantasy football today. Bye.