Fantasy Football Today - Top 12 RBs for 2026! Plus Superlatives Winners and Coaching News (01/14 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: January 14, 2026

A stat you must know about Chase Brown and then your news and notes (4:40) with Mike Tomlin, Greg Roman and Kevin Patullo out. Plus, injury updates for the Divisional games ... We reveal our Top 12 running backs for 2026! We start with the Top 3 (18:15) which are Bijan Robinson, Jahmyr Gibbs and De'Von Achane in some order. How much should we care about the difference in offensive production between the Falcons and the Lions? Running backs 4-6 (22:00) include James Cook, Jonathan Taylor and Christian McCaffrey plus a surprise pick of Omarion Hampton ... On to RBs 7-9 (33:45) Did Ashton Jeanty make the cut? Did Saquon Barkley? And finally RBs 10-12 (40:40) with one of us having Derrick Henry on the list. What about RJ Harvey, Josh Jacobs and TreVeyon Henderson? And we finish the show with the results of the Superlatives vote (50:55)! Who is the Fantasy MVP? Who won the other awards? ... Email us at [e-mail] Fantasy Football Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts Watch FFT on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Shop our store: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠shop.cbssports.com/fantasy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  SUBSCRIBE to FFT Dynasty on Apple: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dynasty/id1696679179⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FOLLOW FFT Dynasty on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://open.spotify.com/show/2aHlmMJw1m8FareKybdNfG?si=8487e2f9611b4438&nd=1⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ SUBSCRIBE to FFT DFS on Apple: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-dfs/id1579415837⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 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. What a play! Can you believe this? It's a no idea. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. Off to the races and he stays on his feet. It's just going to go the distance. Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath.

Welcome, everybody. This is fantasy football today presented by BetMGM. Make it legendary. It's Wednesday, January 14th. And we are talking about the coaching news. Mike Tomlin is out. John Harbaugh is out. We knew that, but that's just kind of crazy to think in the AFC North. And we are talking about our top 12 running backs for 2026. And it's fantasy superlative

time. Who won MVP on Facebook? Who won comeback player of the year? All these things will tell you. Welcome, good morning, Dave Richard. John Harbaugh is out to the offices of the New York Giants today in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Should I drive by and see what's going on? I think you should go in and try and talk him into being the Giants head coach. Because if anybody could convince him on all the great things the Giants do, it's certainly you. Good morning, Jamie. Good morning.

Dave, you said I should go in. I want to tell you the worst place I ever went into, shouldn't have gone into. I'd never been there before. Didn't know the rules. Went to Sonic. They brought food to my car. You ever been to Sonic? I'm fat.

Of course I have. But we don't have them in South Florida. Yeah, we do. Oh, really? You could walk to one from my house. They figured out where they'd make the most money. Well, anyway, you're not supposed to go in there. So they brought me my food.

I think I needed some napkins or whatever. I got out of the car. I went in and they looked at me like, what are you doing? You freak. Oh, there's one near, not far from our office. That actually you could dine in. Really?

Yeah. Things are changing. Things are changing in the world. I can't keep up with it. Anyway, busy show today, so let's get to it here. I love about that's your example of things changing in the world. Yeah. Is a Sonic that has like a few tables and bar stools that you can sit at.

Like that's, wow, the world is really a different place. It's pretty deep stuff. I'm going to tell you the other thing that you all need to remember. Okay. I'll give you a bonus. Since we're talking about top 12 running backs. Okay, go back to 2024. After the Zach Moss injury, Chase Brown was the number three running back on a per game basis in the second half of the season in 2024.

That's why we liked him so much coming to this year. How about when Joe Burrow came back, week 13 this year, Chase Brown was the number two running back for the rest of the season. So that's two sample sizes of him as the lead running back. Now, P. Ryan did not play in a lot of those games. So that's a big thing. Well, if you go back to even before Burrow came back, like he. he was starting to take off much earlier in the season. It was actually really only, I feel like a couple games for him before Burrow came back.

No, you're right. You're absolutely right. It's four games before that. Then he hadn't had any, like, big rushing performances. Then he had 18 carries for 99 yards. But you're right. The four games before that, wow, you know what? I'm going to tell you, let's run it from week eight.

Let's see where he was from weeks eight through 18. Chase Brown was the number four running back in fantasy and number three. three per game and he averaged 21.2 PPR fantasy points per game. Good stuff. Sexy. Thank you, Jamie. All right. We'll get to that in a minute. Let's get to the news and notes. All right, we got Kevin Petulow, Philadelphia offensive coordinator. Not fired, but demoted. Might remain on the staff. Mike Tomlin stepping down. Adam Schefter said he's not expected to coach this season.

But there was a different report that said, oh, I'd be surprised if he didn't coach this season. so we'll see. Greg Roman, the offensive coordinator for the Chargers, and their offensive line coach, Mike Devlin. They've been fired. They finished 18th in scoring. But in the four healthy games with Joe Alt, they averaged 26.8 offensive points per game.

And they face the Chiefs, Raiders, Broncos, and Vikings in those games. And their lowest output was against the Raiders. How weird. Yeah. Herbert had 26.2 fantasy points per game in those. Yeah, I mean, it was, it was, It's interesting that Roman is taking the fall here, but I don't know. Well, he didn't have a counterpunch when their offensive line went to Duky. Yeah.

So that's probably why he and Devlin got the axe. But I think this is going to be the first time now where Jim Harbaugh doesn't have Roman as his OC. So we're headed towards some interesting times in L.A. And just the 26.2, that's just, that's like the little small sample size microcosm that you can remember when it comes to drafting Justin Herbert next August. Because if he's got to help the offensive line, that's his upside. That's top five QB upside. I've taken them in both of our of our mock so far.

I intend to keep doing it. Jamie, when you look at the Eagles news, Steelers news, Chargers News, what are your big fantasy reactions that are going to go viral, be seen by more than 2 million people and grow our audience? I mean, obviously the Steelers are going for a complete reset here, so we have no idea what this is going to look like. Quarterback is going to be different. Coaching staff is going to be different.

Really, I think, and Kenneth Gainwell is a free agent. So really, I think the only thing you're looking at at this point is where you'll take D.K. Mekaff, where you'll take Jalen Warren and then sort of figure out the rest. But yeah, there's just so many questions to be answered in regards to the Steelers. For the Eagles, if the personnel is the same, you know, we've gone through this already twice, you know, when they lose Shane Steichen and then replace him eventually with Kellynne Moore and how that looked and how great it was for the Eagles. And so now hopefully they get the offense coordinator situation right. My guess, unless he gets a head coaching job, is Mike McDaniel's going to have his choice of Detroit or Philadelphia, which I think are probably the two best offensive coordinator jobs available with head coaching. coaches in place.

That's a pretty good opportunity for both of those offenses to get a creative play caller in there that could hopefully help those playmakers and be great for fantasy. What was the other one you mentioned? Well, the Chargers would also be one of those places that would be attractive. I don't think McDaniel makes sense for the Chargers personally, but it would be fun. You know, I think the best case for McDaniel would probably be Detroit, just knowing that there's so many options from a speed standpoint. point, which is what he's had so much success with.

So I would love to see him go there. Again, if he's not going to be a head coach. But look, obviously anywhere he goes, he's going to inject life into that offense. I'd be very surprised, though, if Jim Harbaugh and Mike McDaniel are on the same staff. Would you be surprised if Jim Harbaugh and Greg Roman are on the same staff? Because they have been, right? Yes. And then, but his brother just fired him.

So awkward. But I mean John Harbaugh. Yeah, sorry, John Harbaugh, yeah. I'm sitting here, you know, obviously very invested in this coaching stuff thinking, man, I really want them to get John Harbaugh, but I don't really want Greg Roman to be the offensive coordinator under. Yeah, I'd be surprised. I'd be surprised if Roman and the other Harbaugh, the longer tenured Harbaugh, where was, like I said, Jim now, right? Because John just lost his gig.

Yeah. I'd be surprised if Roman was with a Harbaugh brother this coming year. It's pretty funny that Zach Taylor is the now longest 10 year. You're right, right. Yeah. AFC North.

Do you know the longest tenured coach in pro sports in the United States? I think it's pro sports in the United States. I heard it this morning. I saw it, yes. I saw it yesterday on Twitter.

What did you say, Dave? Spolstra? Yeah. Yep. How long? Oh, God. It's got to be two decades. I believe he took over

right before the big three. So that was 2016. I've got a mirror 2008. Only there was an internet. Oh, 2008's when they... It wasn't Van Gundy's... 06 was when they beat the Mavericks. Did Stan Van Gundy win a championship with them?

I always confused this. No, Stan was... Well, Stan, I think, won... No, Stan was fired midway through when they got check. Oh, midway through, okay. All right, well... Welcome back to football. I don't remember what it was.

But Riley took over. Yeah, the thing... Okay. I mean, this is such a fascinating coaching cycle now. We've got great coaches out there. Nine jobs. Nine jobs. And, you know, offensive coordinator positions and good offenses like we talked about.

And honestly, as much as I just said, I don't really want Greg Roman to be the Giants offensive coordinator. He's been, he has coached 12 seasons as an offensive coordinator and top 12 in scoring in eight of those 12 seasons. I just think he's typically been too conservative to, you know, he's had some great offenses like with Omar Jackson. But a little bit too conservative. Like, I don't really want that.

But he would make sense, though, with the Giants personnel because you have a running quarterback. And you have playmakers that can still make explosive plays in the right situations. Yeah, I don't think people will be excited about it, though, from Malik neighbors or Dart standpoint. I'm going to guess if you get horrible, everybody's going to be excited about the Giants. As a winner, yeah, as a fantasy, that's a thing. Is it good for fantasy? I don't know. It depends on the coordinator.

I think those players are good for fantasy. But you know what? You already hate Malik neighbors anyway, so that's wise a minute. He went in the first round again yesterday. I just cannot see a justification for Malik neighbors right now in drafts that we are certainly not going to play out. But right now, being a first round pick, it's madness. It's madness. I'm not going to say anything bad about anyone because I don't want Jamie to rat on me

and then me get a text message about me saying something bad about someone for drafting Malik neighbors. That would be bad. It would be bad for you to say anything disrespectful about a coworker. What do you mean? What am I missing? Nothing. What did I do now? Nothing.

All right. More news and notes. Fred Warner, 49ers, linebacker. He could play if the 49ers advance to the NFC championship game. So maybe one week away. Did you see Sean Payton get mad at the reporter for asking about Dre Greenlaw, downhill tackling? No. So unnecessary.

What the heck? So mean. All right, Buffalo. Guys, Buffalo's going to lose. Very injured. They're favored at Denver. They're going to lose. Running back, Ty Johnson, he missed practice.

So did cornerback Maxwell Harrison listed as missing practice. Safety Jordan Poirer is out this week. I thought his replacement struggled last week. So that's a concerning one. And wide receivers, Gabe Davis and Tyrell Shavers, toward their ACL. Josh Palmer is on IR. Are these great game-changing players?

No, but they have three healthy wide receivers right now. They play at Denver on Saturday. This was the genius of the bills. They knew that they would run into the Broncos eventually and say, you know, Patrick Sturtan is just going to shut down our best receiver. We don't have one. Who you guys think is going to win that game? I mean, I have Buffalo in the Super Bowl, so I expected this.

I guess Buffalo, but I haven't decided yet. I am surprised that they are favored. You don't see one seeds as underdogs at home ever, basically. Yeah, this is like the third one. I actually have that note somewhere. I'll try to find it. But more news? Seattle, good news for them.

Left tackle Charles Cross. Tide and Elijah O'Royle. They practiced in full. They play the Niners on Saturday. Denver defensive tackle John Franklin Myers practiced in full. They get the bills on Saturday. Carolina picked up Bryce Young's fifth-year option, but they have not committed to him long-term.

You have to pick up a player's fifth-year option before his four. fourth year. So that's basically two years left of Bryce Young, unless they sign him to a long-term deal. I heard this also on the radio the day that he would be like the 20-something by cost quarterback in 2026. And by the time his fifth year option kicks in, he'll probably be like the 24th to 26 quarterback in terms of cost. Like it just makes so much sense to do it. And Minnesota head coach Kevin O'Connell wants competition at the quarterback position. And Jordan Addison was arrested for trespassing. Hopefully that's nothing too serious there. Okay, I said there were like two things

I was going to give you to know. I only said one of them, the Chase Brown thing. I got a bonus thing for you in just a moment, but right now it's playoff time. It's time for football at BetMGM. When you register with BetMGM, you'll get instant access to a variety of parlay selection features,

live betting options, boosts tokens, and the best daily promotions in the business. And when you huddle up with BetMGM at your fingertips, every pass, every catch and every game matter more than ever. So football's here. Don't miss out on any of the hard hitting action. Place your money line, prop, and parlay bets with BetMGM today.

Here's your bonus thing to know. You guys going to ever take my advice. Please commit right now to taking my advice. Oh, gosh. No. No, no, no. Don't go into Sonic is one. But also...

Well, why would you ever? I needed napkins. What was I supposed to do? That's fine. For napkins, that's a... okay. Yeah. Were you by yourself?

No, I was with two other people. Yeah, it was embarrassing. Okay. Fern Abkins, it's okay. My first Sonic. The other thing is, Mayor of Kingston is unbelievable. I just finished season four.

It's a Paramount Plus plug to boot here. But even if it weren't, I would tell you, Mayor of Kingston is amazing. Watch that show. Talk about it with me. I freaking love it. It's so good.

It's so addicting. Quick. You don't have to, it's not two and a half hour episodes like stranger things. they're an hour, just go through them, you're going to love it. Great show.

You weren't this excited about a show since Stranger Things. Yeah, I know. I love Stranger Things. But at the end, I was like, oh, my God. You know, I start watching at like 11 p.m. Like, I can't be up to one. This is ridiculous. So it's a little too long.

Mayor of Kingston doesn't have that problem. All right, let's take a break. Top 12 running backs and superlative winners when we come back on fantasy football today. Welcome back, everybody. Okay. Top 12. at the running back position.

Now, this is, if you want to talk about maybe Bejohn Robinson, is it going to be one, is it going to be two, just consider Jemir Gibbs was on the second best offense in the NFL. Bejohn Robinson was on the 22nd best offense in the NFL. Got a whole lot of notes on finishing top five on bad offenses and whatnot, but might just be like Bijon Robinson scored 12 touchdowns, I think. 11 touchdown?

He scored 11. He scored 11 touchdowns. There were actually two running backs in full PPR that finished top five on bad offenses. You want to call them bad, below average, whatever. Falcons were 22nd in scoring. Dolphins were 25th in scoring. Those two guys scored 11 or 12 touchdowns.

A Chan scored 12 and 16 games, but they had a ton of catches. So that's super important for these running backs that may not score the same amount of touchdowns. They need to have the catches. Bijon and A. Chan almost certainly will. The other three guys in the top five, there were five elite running backs who were just more than 20 points per game.

The other three guys were McCaffrey, Gibbs, and Jonathan Taylor, and they all scored, I want to say 17 or 18, say 18 or more touchdowns. So that's the benefit, obviously, of being on these great offenses, more touchdown opportunities. All right, let's go with our top three. Jamie, who's the top three? Bejohn is one. Jemir Gibbs is two. Devon 8-H-H-Ns-3

Okay, Dave. I have a totally different order. I've got Robinson 1. That's what he has. Gibbs 2 and Devon 3. All right, well, I guess just to be different, I have Bijan Robinson 1, Jemir Gibbs 2, and 8-10 3. But it is interesting, right, that we have two running backs in the top 3

who were not on top 20 offenses. We've got the dolphins obviously in flux a little bit. For what it's worth, Quinn E. Chon gave Devon A. Chan only three targets in both of the games that A. Chan played with him. So should we be reconsidering those guys as Bejohn number one, A Chan number three, when, I mean, the Lions just finished second in the NFL in scoring and fire their offensive coordinator. That's how good their offense is. You know what I mean? like how much Dave should that be a factor here? It's definitely something to keep in mind when it comes to Gibbs.

He absolutely has the potential to move up to number one. What would it take? It would take a nice splash at offensive coordinator. We've already talked about how cool it would be of Mike McDaniel was the, the offensive coordinator for the Detroit Lions. It would also, I would be more encouraged if the Lions moved on from David Montgomery, which is possible, and they don't really replace him. with somebody who's a legit threat to take 10 to 12 touches away from Jemir Gibbs from game to game.

And so if that were to happen, if we go into the year where we know Jemir Gibbs is far and away, the lead back, the stud, everything in Detroit's offense, yeah, I think you could absolutely look at him as the number one running back and he would leapfrog Bijon. And Montgomery. The irony would be as if they move on from Montgomery and sign Alger. Right. That wouldn't be something that that wouldn't excite me. me. That would not make me want to move Gibbs over Bijan. We're nitpicking between these two,

but that's the type of thing that would hold me back from putting Gibbs one and Bijon, too. Yeah. And Gibbs, so the first eight games of the season, he averaged 14.2 carries per game. The second nine games of the season, sorry, he averaged 14.4 carries per game. Same exact thing. However, the difference is David Montgomery's role shrunk. So Gibbs, the percentage of running back carries actually went way up in the second half of the year. What happened, their defense once again fell apart. It was one of the worst in the NFL in the second half of the year, and they just didn't run the ball as much.

But if they can get back to what they won't have a decent defense run the ball, you could see a career high and carries easily for Jemir Gibbs. And Gibbs just did what he did. It was 21.6 ppr points per game on 320 touches. That's it. Like everybody else that had huge fantasy averages way north. of 350 touches. The one exception being A-chan.

Johnny Airport says, I'm going to go out on a limb, and I'm going to say one Bijan, two Gibbs, three, A-chan. I appreciate that. We need the- We've got a consensus. All right, let's do four, five, and six here. And this is where things will be different for sure. Jamie, go ahead, four, five, six.

Yeah, Christian McCaffrey's at four. Jonathan Taylor is at five, and James Cook is at six. McCaffrey, Taylor, Cook. Dave? Yeah, same name's different order. Jonathan Taylor is fourth for me. I've got James Cook fifth, and Christian McCaffrey is sixth. And then I'm the moron who has Hampton for McAfree 5, Cook, 6.

Okay, first of all, McAfree's RB1, which is no, you know, he's no stranger to that spot. Dave, why isn't he higher than fourth or fifth for anyone? I'm worried about the workload catching up with him. We already know that he's sitting at 434 touches with at least one more game to play. He'll turn 30 years old next year. I did the study on Saquan last year and running backs that had a lot of work and what happens the year after. This will sound familiar, but here we go. Over the last 16 years, Christian McCaffrey is now the 18th running back to get 400 plus touches in the season.

of the 17 running backs before him that had 400 or more touches in a season, and this includes Saquan last year. Only three outperformed their 400-plus touch year. Four more were close enough to their 400-plus touch year. And the other 10 running backs who fell short, they either sat out, which is what Levion did in 2018. Thanks a lot for that, Levyon. Got hurt.

That includes McCaffrey in 2020, Derek Henry in 2021, or saw at least a 20% drop in their per game. average, and that includes Sequin in 2025. It's worrisome, especially for a running back who's about to turn 30 behind an offensive line that's got a left tackle who's basically the linchpin of their offense, who's also way older and might not be there next year. And one of their best blockers who may not be there at the start of the season either

with George Kittle. I think in the case of McCaffrey, it's probably the most fascinating player at this point to discuss because of the six of us who submitted rankings that are on the site from the story, so you can't see them in their ranking list. So that includes Keith, Dan, and Jacob. They all have McCaffrey higher than the three of us do. So Heath has him as the third running back. Jacob has him as the second running back.

And Dan has him as the first running back. So you can imagine when you see the story of our top 24 players, McCaffrey's first-old. overall for Dan and in the top five or excuse me top three for for Jacob and Heath I believe oh no I'm sorry Heath has all three wide receivers first so relatively high in any event so that's just a sample size of six people ranking players and where McCaffrey's going to go now in the drafts that we've only done to one PPR one half PPR McCaffrey is not gone uh in the top three I believe so there's still some trepidation from people drafting him now again those three people who

him that high and not had the chance to draft him so that might have changed things. So I think just where he comes out, it's very similar to the Barkley conversation from a year ago. Exactly like the the people who are going to be bullish on him are going to draft him high, understandably so. And look, for what it's worth, Berkeley stayed healthy, which was the best thing. You know, so at least you still got good production from him. You just did not get the return on investment that you were expecting because he dropped by almost eight PPR points per game. I think the thing with McCaffrey, if he stays healthy, the thing that saves him is he's not getting all of his production as a rush.

He is getting a ton of his production as a receiver. And hopefully the 49ers are smart enough to manage that a little bit differently. Going into, he's like turning 30 this year in June is when he turns 30. So, you know, we'll see how he comes off the playoffs, how far they go, what the offseason is like. But we dealt with this two years ago already. 2023, he was awesome, long playoff run, came back 2024. only played four games.

So the history with McCaffrey is just not favorable. It's a matter of when you want to buy into drafting. Okay. Well, it's, yeah, the fact that he has all those catches is what's going to make it much harder for me, certainly. And I think what makes him more challenging than Barclay from last year. But, yeah, McCaffrey, I look forward to getting into some good debates about that for the next six months and beyond eight months. Okay. So it's a recap.

I've got Bejohn Gibbs, A. Chan, Hampton, McCaffrey, Cook. Jamie has Bejohn Gibbs, A. Chan, McCaffrey, Taylor, Cook. Dave has Bejohn, H.N., Taylor, Cook, McCaffrey. So I guess we can talk about Amari and Hampton here. He only had four games all year where he played more than 62% of the snaps. He played nine games for the season. And he still had 32 catches. So I think we're all in agreement.

Like, they get both of their tackles back next year. year healthy, Alton Slater. They could have a phenomenal offense. They drafted him in the first round. You know, I definitely want to see what they do if they sign another running back, whatever, but there's a lot of potential here. You can all agree there's a lot of potential for the offense for the Chargers. So it is a little bit bold for me to put an unproven Omarian Hampton who

averaged four and a half yards per carry, but only 3.7 yards per carry if you remove his game against the Giants who had a historically bad run defense. And quite frankly, sometimes it just didn't look that good. But very involved in the passing game. If he's there every down back, if he's playing 80% of the snaps, he's a guy who has, I think, RB1 potential. And he did that in four of his nine games. So it's a leap of faith right now.

I don't know that it'll stay at four for Hampton, but he's got that potential. I mean, he's definitely a top 12 running back, top 10 running back, I think, for almost everybody. You know, you see what the upside could be. You hope that there's not going to be an injury. scenario that follows him. So, you know, let's just say it was a fluke situation this year with the foot,

ankle injury that he dealt with. But yeah, and this is kind of a little bit why I'm somewhat hesitant on Herbert because we know what Harbaugh wants to do and this guy is as good as advertised, then this could be a very run-heavy offense. And they limit what Herbert's ceiling can get to. Still, you know, worth taking as a borderline number one quarterback. But, you know, will we ever see the heights of Herbert? Because when Herbert was at his best during this season, they were, you know, tentative

with Hampton. They were still going with Hampton and Aji. And then really once Hampton started to get going a little bit is when the offensive line started to break down, then Hampton gets hurt. So the thing that I love about Hampton, you brought this up, I think when we previewed the playoffs, was what he started to do as a pass catcher when he came back. And so I think

that's the thing that's encouraging. So do they bring in a guy that's going to play on obvious passing downs? They bring in a guy that's going to supplement him on passing down situations. You know, that would be more of the concern for me because if he's just the first and second down guy, then I don't think he should definitely not be a top five overall running back.

But if he's going to be in every down three, three down running back, you know, can do everything that we look for, work at the goal line, work on passing downs, all those things, then the upside is huge, especially if the offensive line stays healthy. So yeah, borderline first round pick. I think he's better in the second round, at least at the moment, but certainly some of you should consider as a top 10 running back this year. All right. Last thing here on this group, then we'll get to 7 through 12.

Dave, Jonathan Taylor. Let me just give a quick stat on James Cook because he's in the top six for everyone. He's fifth for Dave, six for Jamie and me. James Cook was the number six running back per game this year. He was number 11 in 2024 per game per game, and he went from 16.7 points per game in PPR

to 18.1. What changed? They finally gave him more carries. He had 309 carries. Last year, he was on pace for 223 carries if you remove Week 18 when he barely played to play 22% of the snap. So just the catches didn't change.

They basically stayed the same, but the carries went way up. And he averages over five yards per carry every year, basically. So that was cook. For Taylor, Dave, does it bother you? You have him fourth. Does it bother you that he was the number 23 running back per game after the byweek? In their last seven games, he averaged 3.3 yards per carry. He really struggled after that huge 50-ish point game against Atlanta.

I'd argue that he struggled once Daniel Jones got hurt. And once Daniel Jones got hurt, that whole offense went from bad to worse. And I say bad to worse because midway through the year, they were great. And then things started to slide as Daniel Jones did what Daniel Jones does. Here's where I'm very encouraged by Jonathan Taylor is that in 12 full games with Daniel Jones, throwout week 14 when Jones got hurt, he averaged 24.8 ppr points per game and 3.3 targets per game. And that's kind of new for him. That was exciting.

And if Jonathan Taylor is going to stay fairly involved in the passing game, and we know what he's capable of doing as a rusher, he's coming off of a year where he scored 20 touchdowns, had almost 2,000 total yards, 369 touches. I can't help myself. He's one of these running backs that you look at, and you can pencil in for 20 plus ppr points per game. Those are the guys that belong at the top of a fantasy draft.

I think I'm just really worried about what Daniel Jones is going to be. next year. I think he was already... If he's the quarterback. Yeah, exactly. I think he was already starting to slip. Now he's coming off of torn Achilles. He's not even under contract, right? It was a one-year deal. It's true. Yep. So they could have somebody completely different. I'll be encouraged

as long as it's not Anthony Richardson, or somebody like Anthony Richardson, who will clearly take some touchdown opportunities away from Taylor and someone who will change the way defenses play against the Colts. Okay. All right. Let's go to

let's go to commercial break. And when we come back 7 through 12 in our 2026 running back rankings after this. Hey, this is Richard Deich, the host of the sports media podcast. If you're interested in what's happening

with all the places where you consume sports, the sports media podcast has you covered. I've been turning down interviews all week. Hoda Copy, reached out, Oprah, George Stephanopoulos. So I said no.

I was booked on the Deich podcast before the Taylor Swift phenomenon, I must live up to my responsibility. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, let's reveal 7 through 12. For Dave, it's Chase Brown, Ashton Genty, and Omari and Hampton. We'll go 7 through 9 here.

Chase Brown, Ashton Genty, and Omari and Hampton. Jamie has Hampton 7, Chase Brown 8, and Josh Jacobs at 9. Dave, you do not have Jacobs in your top 20. I'm seeing. I don't. Interesting. And I have Taylor 7.

So I was a low guy on Taylor. Jacobs 8 and Chase Brown 9. I can't believe I'm the low guy on Chase Brown. I'm always the high guy on Chase Brown. I have him 9th. Dave has him 7th. Jamie has him 8th. So you see Chase Brown from 7 through 9 for all of us.

You see Josh Jacobs for 2 of us. No Jacobs in the top 12 for Dave. You see Hampton here for Jamie and Dave. I had Hampton 4th. and then you have Gentie, which is, I guess, not that crazy. Jamie has him 10th. Dave has him 8th. I have him 12th.

So we're hoping for a bounce back there, you know, improvement there. But anyway, Jamie, what do you want to say about Hampton, Brown, and Jacobs, 7, 8, and 9? I think we already talked about Hampton enough. I think in the case of Brown, you know, we sort of noted this to how he finished the season after a slow start. Really, the question will be is who do they bring in, if anybody, to play alongside him and do they decide to take a little bit of the work off of him, which was a concern coming into this year. And I think they tried to do that and then realize they need him on the field as much as possible.

But you know what? I mean, Samaday, P. Ryan, give him credit, he was doing some nice things before the injury. And then I don't think he was fully healthy when he came back. So just nitpicking with somebody who's got so much upside and so much potential. He's going to be a second round pick. You could probably argue that he should be a borderline first round pick, depending on how many running backs come off the board. but there's just a lot to love about Chase Brown

when there's a healthy Joe Burrow and just how that offense continues to click. Okay. And Jacobs. So Dave, I have Jacobs 8th, Jamie has him 9th. What do you have? 13th, maybe?

13th. Okay. And honestly, like, I don't have a lot of conviction once I get past Hampton at 9. So, you know, don't hate on it because I don't have Jacobs at 10 when it's Harvey,

Barclay, Trevion, and then Jacobs. So I'm still working through it, and I want to make sure that Jacobs, A, is a Packer, and B is in that exact same role that we're used to seeing them in before I push him up higher in my draft. It could happen. What month is it? It's January. We got time for these things to get hashed out.

Sure, sure. I think in the case of, you know, and you can make the argument when you're talking about Gibbs versus Bejohn, you know, we get recency bias, which is understandable. And so Bejohn's playoff performance was amazing. Jemir Gibbs was not. Josh Jacobs fantasy playoffs, excuse me, Josh Jacobs' fantasy performance in the playoffs and even the NFL playoffs were horrible.

And so how much of that was the knee injury, how much of that was no Jordan Love, how much of that was all of that factored into one. Prior to the last three games, he was still one of the best fantasy running backs. He's still going to be on an offense, assuming LaFleur is there that's going to, my guess would be still run-centric.

And so, yes, he's going to be, old, or we talked about this, you know, previously, 28 years old. He's starting to maybe get to a point where you have to worry about a breakdown for somebody that's, you know, taking on a lot of work recently. But there aren't many guys, and you look at this list, that you can say, okay, should they dominate their backfield, he checks that box. And so that's hard to overlook for the offense that he plays on, the coach that he plays for, and the type of player that he's been to coming to Green Bay.

So in comparing him, you know, just to two guys on Dave's list, like, I can't see a situation barring injury where Trevionn Henderson is not in a 50-50 split with Ramandre Stevenson, who's looked fantastic to close the season. And RJ Harvey most likely is going to be in a shared situation based on how they used him when everybody was healthy there. So if it's Jacobs versus those two guys, I'm taking Jacobs. Okay. Jacobs, yeah, I think I mentioned this on our last show.

But week 16, he was horrible. 12 carries, 36 yards, two catches, 12 yards. He was horrible ever since his knee injury. Right, right. And that happened against the Giants. It was like week 11. And before then, he was awesome. He was Josh Jacobs.

But even if you go just to week 15, through week 15, he averaged 17.8 PPR fantasy points per game, Josh Jacobs. That's just under what James Cook averaged this year, right? So he was terrific. And then his last two games, he scored 6.1 PPR fantasy points combined in his last two games wasn't healthy. And it really hurt where he. finished. All right. Gentie. You had Zach Tom dealing with injuries. You had lost the center.

I mean, you know, I think that that line's healthy. There's a lot to love about Josh Jacob's here. It's true. And especially if they don't do anything to add to their running back room, I'm going to guess that they restructure Jacob's contract, so he doesn't hurt them as much against the cap. We need some

cap space. And so he'll be back. 28 years old, featured role. Yeah, I probably am a little too low, to be honest. Okay. But Gentie, you have 8th, which is interesting. I have him 12th. Jamie has him 10th. Why did you put Ashton Genti 8th? I just can't

help but think that the Raiders will not be the same as they were last year. I think they'll have a better offensive line. I think they'll have a better play caller. I think they'll have an exciting young quarterback that can energize that passing game and make it much more of a threat than where it was at the end of the season.

The metrics on Ashton Genty are also impressive based on everything that he had to deal with in that offense. 0.6 yards before contact per rush. That was 47th out of 48 qualifying running backs. And he still had a 22.9% avoided tackle rate. That was eighth best. I'm counting on his talent to shine brighter and stronger

while still having a huge workload in what should be an improved Vegas offense. So betting on that upside on a 23-year-old running back is the type of thing that fantasy manager should be doing. Okay. All right. So that's 7, 8, 9. For me, it's Taylor, Jacobs, Chase Brown. For Jamie, it's Hampton. Chase Brown Jacobs. For Dave, it's Brown, Gentie Hampton. Let's go to 10 through 12. Dave's got R.J. Harvey, Sequin Barclay and Trevion Henderson. Jamie has Ash and Genty. Derek Henry. You're the only one of the three of us who has Henry in your top 12. And Saquan Barclay. So Gentie, Hentie. Henry Barkley, and for me it's Barclay, Harvey, Gentie. I mean, Derek Henry was RB 7 this year per game in full, in full PPR with only 15 catches. And I haven't done it yet, but if you take out the games Lamar missed, you know,

he's probably like RB5, something like that. Or, nah, he's probably not at the 20 point per game, but he's not far, would be my guess. All right. So, again, for Dave, it's Harvey, Barkley Henderson. 10, 11, 12. For Jamie, it's Gentie Henry Barkley. For me, it's,

my day, for Adam, it's Barkley, Harvey, Gentie. All right, Jamie, Gentie, Henry Barkley for you. I think you know what Dave said about Genti makes sense. You know,

you're hoping that the talent shines through, that the new coach, plus a hopeful better quarterback and improved offensive line. Like, everything's got to be better for the Raiders than it was this year.

And that's just the, you know, upside that you're banking on for a guy that was expected to, you know, hit the ground running, and we probably ranked him too high in his rookie season. I'm expecting a better sophomore season. It's just a matter of, you know, where you want to slot him in.

So, you know, can see him still as a borderline first round pick. If everything is, you know, looking great in Las Vegas, I could see him slipping to the back end around two. You know, if it's a, you know, heavy receiver run, the tight ends go ahead of him, et cetera. But he's got still just too much potential to overlook. And I think, you know, Dave sort of hit on, this is kind of the spot where you start to get a little bit like, okay, who belongs in this range, which kind of tells you, like, there's going to be, I think, a pretty good group of number two running backs, but, you know, who belongs in that upper echelon, you know, that second or third tier, depending on where you're breaking down the running

back list. And so for me, once I got past Genty, and again, that's more of a hope. It's, okay, who can still deliver on being a top tier guy? And I'm just tired of betting against Derek Henry at this point. Like, if the coaches is not somebody that's going to say, okay, we have to open up the passing game and get away from this. You know, clearly, at least for me, I didn't change my rank. This was done before Harbaugh was let go. I can't imagine, and you said this, Adam, you know, if it's still the same core of players in place, Lamar Jackson and Derek Henry together have been pretty good the last two years.

So I know he'll be, he just turned 32. It's hard to continue to bank on this, but, I mean, he keeps himself in such great shape. he seems to do a great job of avoiding injuries. He had one significant injury in his career, and it was a broken foot. You know, again, Father Time is undefeated. At some point, it will catch up to him. But if he's back and still the featured guy

and still doing what he does, the touchdowns save him from the lack of receptions, really the one that makes me the most nervous, honestly, is Barclay. You know, so that's kind of where Harvey and Scataboo coming to play for me in terms of, like, the next player, probably Scataboo ahead of Harvey if he's healthy.

But at this point, point like until Derek Henry says he's done, I'm probably just going to continue to, you know, go the opposite direction of what I went when he was 28 through 31, you know, just like, or 28 to 30. I was on board last year, 28 to 30 and just be like, I'm done betting against him. Okay. Yeah, it's tough. I think one of the toughest questions for fantasy managers, so we all have Barclay in this range. I have him 10th, Jamie has him 12th, Dave has him 11th, is are the Eagles, what we saw from the Eagles this year, was it a blip because of the coordinator or some other factor?

A lot of injuries on the offensive line, even when the guys were playing, a lot of them were playing hurt. Or was this the beginning of something bigger, you know, a downward trend. Not having Kelsey is, Jason Kelsey is a big deal for them. And Lane Johnson is older and has trouble staying healthy.

And there's a lot of people that just don't really think that highly of Jalen Hertz, you know. So this factors in with Barclay. I mean, we all saw there were times when Barclay would get in the open field and he'd look amazing, right? He looked like Sequin. Saw it on over the weekend. Absolutely, right? So the talent was still there.

The efficiency was horrible. I wonder if people will dock him for that. I don't think people are docking Christian McCaffrey at all for his yards per carry. Will they do it with Sequin Berkeley? But yeah, it's a tough question to answer. And then R.J. Harvey, I think that, you know, what happens in the fantasy postseason, Dave might impact how he gets drafted. obviously the offseason and what they do. But I think the fact, like, I'm pretty bullish on him.

I'm 11th. You have him 10th. Jamie, you probably have them right outside the top 10th. He's the top 15. You know, again, I just think that this is going to be a backfield that's going to be split to who he's sharing with and what role he has that will determine, I think, how high he goes. And I do think, you know, to, again, bring back, you know, what Dave said about this. Like, we could see a handful of guys jump into this range.

You know, if the Jets get things right and keep Breeze Hall or Hall leaves, he's in, easy potential top 12 guy. We talked about this when we reviewed the first mock draft. If Zach Charbonnet is the guy for the Seahawks and the only guy for the Seahawks with minimal competition, I know I'll be bullish on him. And that's somebody that I'll be looking to target. And then we'll see sort of how the free agent slash draft shakes out and do the chiefs get somebody of significance, you know, specifically love, for example.

You know, so there's a lot of ways that this can go. I don't think that we're close to being what it was. Sure. But what it looks like now. Right, right. Yeah. Okay. Let me ask you this about Genti.

When you look at the guys who were, you know, top 10 picks over the last 10 years or so. So am I missing anyone? We had Bejohn Robinson, who actually was RB 17 per game as a rookie. He had that one game with the migraine where he had like three touches or whatever. But he still had a disappointing rookie season. and for fantasy. You had Zeeke. Not even 15

PPR points per game. You had Zique, who was amazing. You have Genty. You have Leonard Fournett, who had an interesting rookie season. He had a lot of touches.

He averaged 3.9 yards per carry. He kind of, I think he finished like RB8 or something like that per game. You had Christian McCaffrey. McCaffrey wasn't that good as a rookie. He was not their main guy. I think they had Jonathan Stewart,

maybe, for one more year. Yes, that's who was. And he only averaged 3.7 yards per carry, Christian McCaffrey. I am a little worry that Ashton Jenty is trending toward Leonard Farnett.

I just don't think we saw much and he's on such a bad team, like bad franchise, to be quite honest. I don't know, I'm not that worried about it. I'm 12th, but are you guys, how easy is it to just dismiss this really bad year for Ashton Jente? Jamie?

It's going to be, oh, sorry. No, go ahead. My fault. My fault. It's, it's just, it's going to be really easy to dismiss if the Raiders have a home run at head coach, an offensive coordinator, and we're already penciling in Mendoza to be their quarterback. And I think any coach that goes to Vegas and doesn't improve their offensive line might have a similar fate as Pete Carroll. So of course they're going to go and try and improve that offensive line, especially with a rookie quarterback. Are you kidding?

They have to do that. And all those things will improve the surroundings for Gentie and give him the opportunity to not get smashed in the backfield one out of every two carries that he has. So as long as that's the case and that's the assumption that I'm working off of is that things will be better for him, then I would expect his talent to shine through. And that's it's betting on things happening that haven't happened yet when it comes to a rookie running back. now going into their second year. And I think he's talented enough to prove it. Plus, he's good in the passing game. Over the course of the year,

he averaged 4.3 targets per game. That's pretty high for a running back. If it's the right offensive coordinator, that number can go up. You can have more targets per game. And so to me, he could be very easily a running back that could finish top three in fantasy next year. I think the better confident for net is probably Bijan,

you know, just with, because he still had a good rookie season, Genti did. just didn't live up to expectations, you know. And so you hope that comes back year two, Bijon was obviously on a bad team. They tried to fix some things. He got much better.

And I'm not trying to compare them from a talent standpoint, just scenario standpoint. Well, you should compare them from a talent standpoint, right? I mean, that's kind of how he's built. Well, I don't know if he's as good a receiver. So, you know, I don't want to put that. He was supposed to be, right? He was a wide receiver.

Yeah, but I don't think it's the same. Sure, sure. I think Bijon is just on a different level. But sure, not far right. But that that's the hope is that year two is, is a big step forward. I hope so. And I don't, by the way, it's not wrong if you're, if you're going to doubt Ash and Gentie now

because nothing has changed yet for Las Vegas. Well, yes, you're open to changing your mind. Well, yeah, okay, that's fair. Yeah. Okay, so already some good things are happening in Las Vegas. But wait, let the offseason play out and then decide. Don't, don't, don't write in ink now that you're just not going to draft Ashton Genty. Just a quick note here.

In full PPR leagues, we usually get, looking at the last 10 seasons, we usually get about three running backs per year that finish top 12 overall, not per game, finished top 12 overall on offenses that are 20th or lower in scoring. So over the last 10 years, 24.2% of the running backs who have finished top 12 overall in PPR have been on offenses that are 20th or lower in scoring. So it's right around three per year. Compare that to wide receiver. Only 18.3% of wide receivers over the last 10 years have finished top 12 in PPR on offenses that rank 20th or lower in scoring. But that is changing because half of the wide receivers who have done that in the last 10 years, it's happened in the last three years, 11 of the 22.

We're seeing more wide receivers on kind of bad offenses finished top 12. I don't know what that's all about. But my argument used to be that offense matters more at wide receivers. receiver than it does it running back. The 10-year trends support that. The three-year trends do not. Okay. Superlatives. Thank you very much for your top 12 lists, guys. Good stuff. They're on the website, if you want to see them from everyone. Let's get to the superlatives. We asked you on Facebook. We came up with the finalists in four or five categories last week, and then we asked you on Facebook. So let's take a look at our results. Let's get to Fantasy MVP. Shafy T. Throw it up there.

do we got? We had McCaffrey, Puka, JSN, and McBride. That's the order in which they finished. 48% of the vote is Christian McCaffrey. I think I vote. Let me go to Facebook. I think I voted for JSN. You didn't vote for McAfree?

You? I don't remember. Because J.S.N. was a third round pick. After you championed McCaffrey in the offseason? I'm a big on the draft value factor. I am. Yeah. And I don't, I don't, I'm not going to ding you for that, but he had you on his fantasy tennis team.

He told you that before your tennis met with Dan. I forgot. Adam, you turned your back on Christian McCaffrey. I can't be an absolute jerk. I totally forgot. I am going to play tennis today later, though, so I'll be thinking of him. Yeah, well, McCaffrey is not going to be in your corner anymore. All right, well, McCaffrey is our fantasy.

He's trading you for whoever you're playing. You know, he's trading you for Dan. Oh, that's no good. McCaffrey's our MVP. What's next, Shaver? We've got the best waiver wire pickup. And our winner, this was one where we debated a long time. I definitely voted for Stafford on this.

And Michael Wilson, 55% of the vote for Wilson, 38% for Stafford, Brissette, 5%. Wondale Robinson, 2%. Way to go, Wondale. Way to get in there. I told you no one was going to vote for Brissette if Stafford was on the same list. And I told you that this was one of the most meaningful things for Jacoby Brissette. And don't you deprive him of being,

one of our finalists for this award. But we needed to put him on there anyway because he earned it. He earned it. But Wilson, Jamie, this is, I think this was wrong. I think it should be Stafford. QB2? A QB, was he QB1?

You picked him up off waivers? No, Josh Allen was QB1. I think, look, when Wilson was starting for Marvin Harrison, he was unstoppable. And so as great as Stafford was for his body of work, Wilson's games were just, Fantastic. Just must start wide receiver. And as I told you, we were debating who should be on the first team quarterback.

Stafford wasn't universally started. When Wilson was the guy, he was universally started. Right. He averaged more PPR points per game than McCaffrey, Wilson did, in the five games with Percet and no Marvin Harrison, Jr. That's ridiculous. That's only five games. By the way, Stafford, we're both right. Stafford was QB1 this year, but that's because Alan barely played a week 18. Right. He took one snap in week 18. Yeah. So QB. through a week 17. Actually, I don't know. He scored Allen by 30 points. So I think he probably was QB1.

Oh, no, he had a huge week 18, didn't he? It doesn't. Wilson was better, right? Next, go ahead. Oh, he wasn't better. People are wrong here. It should have been Stafford. Next up.

I love getting the last word in. Oh, this one's a blowout. Comeback player of the year. We had two Jaguars on there, Lawrence and E. Javante Williams and Chris Olave. Javante Williams, 59% of the vote. Congratulations. Cool.

All right. Next up, I think our last one. Biggest bust. Was it Justin Jefferson? Sequin Barclay, Ashton Genty, or Brian Thomas Jr.

Is this the biggest margin here? 61%. Justin Jefferson is your biggest bust. Yeah. Hard to disagree. We didn't even need to put this on Facebook. Brian Thomas Jr., 31%.

And then Barclay and Genti both got 4%. It just, man, He's another one that's going to be very fascinating to break down. But I do wonder. So Adam, let me ask this question. Would you take Jefferson or neighbors right now? Right now I take Jefferson. I wouldn't take neighbors in the second round right now.

You wouldn't take neighbors in the second round right now. Okay. So just to rehash your feelings on the league neighbors, you really, really were upset that he was drafted in the first round in both drafts, right? Yeah, I mean, it wasn't really that upset about it. But I- Well, you were so upset that you, you critiqued one of our coworkers. Yeah. And let's just, Thomas, do you have that?

Do you have the critique of Adam making fun of it? You are a bumbling moron who shouldn't even be invited into a league if you take Malik neighbors in round one. So there you have it. That's what you said about our friend, Merron Berks. So Thomas is literally the nicest guy in our building, by the way. Really? And joins us all the time in our drafts. and, you know, just very, very challenging and disappointing that you said that.

Oh, no. So here he is, bumbling Maron. Oh. That's up, guys. Hey, Maron. How's it gone? Maron, as you know, we really appreciate all the work that you do behind the scenes and making CBS Sports HQ fantastic. And when you join us on our drafts, you make our drafts better because you are one of our

more talented fantasy managers. We appreciate that. And then just to get slandered like that. By somebody who is a fellow University of Miami alum. And a Giants fan. And a Giants fan. I mean, just amazing that he would call you a bumbling. I can't even go on.

So I'm going to, you called you a BM. It's really good. If you could see my screen here to a little score in the playoffs where I defeated this bumbling moron defeated at amazing. A little bitter about that. Yeah, I was shocked. I was shocked. Probably most surprised I've been in a very long time to hear.

but we'll get through it and hopefully the Keynes can win and bring us back together again. Yeah, I agree. Listen, you're producer, Morone. So I think you understand that sometimes a host has to feel the show out and go, this is a moment to really like to really, you know, shake things up, right? I said it earlier. Go viral. We're getting two million views out of this.

We're getting 200,000 more subscribers out of this bumbling moron segment. So I didn't mean anything I said. I was only doing it for the. audience. I know. I know you're very edgy. I think, Marone, you should show how great your team was in that draft by taking Malik members in one.

So here was the BBR draft that he did. He did. Look, stacking the Giants, Jackson Dart and Malik neighbors, got Chris Olive as well, Colston Loven. Like, this is just an unbelievable team, especially if Genti and Camara live up to what could be for Genti, what once was for Camara. But this team, to me, is fantastic. Even with taking the big risk, the big leap of taking Malik neighbors and

round one. Yeah. Yeah, I didn't even think it was that crazy because, you know, he should be back for the beginning of the season and he was amazing before he got hurt. DART, second year, he's confident. He didn't even play with DART really at last year. So they're going to develop that chemistry. He has high hopes for him. So I'm excited about neighbors potential next year. I think he could be a late first round pick. I was thinking about Gentie, too, in that late first round as well. So I was happy he came back to me. I like Gentie a lot next year as well. It's a small sample size, Marone, but neighbors played one game with Jackson Dart and he tore his ACL.

So it's not a good track record here. Well, is there anything, any other surprises you want to throw up me, Jamie? No, no, no. This was just one. I wanted to give him their own. Very good friend of mine, very good friend of all of ours, you know, and certainly a friend to the fantasy community because when he drafts, everybody should follow what he does. And for you to just slander him like that.

Let's run the clip one more time, Thomas, if he had. Just so everybody knows exactly what he said. You are a bumbling moron who shouldn't even be invited into a league if you take Malik neighbors in round one. Wow. Well, and I think in the mock that we did yesterday, somebody took neighbors, I think, at the end of round one, too. Didn't hear any slander there, you know.

It might be personal. I was watching dodge ball. I was not paying attention. The movie, you know, wasn't really paying attention to the drama. You guys are all canes, guys. Very excited for all three of you. Hopefully it works out in your favor. How excited are you for the game Monday night?

Very excited. I'm trying to get tickets, but it's a little difficult, so I think I'll be watching the comfort of my own home. But very excited. It's been a while. Biggest game of our adult lives here, I think, guys. I was very young when the last championship happened. Speak for yourself.

You're the young one. We witnessed some other pretty big games. But it's the biggest games game in 23 years. So it's pretty exciting. And as a Dolphins fan, I've never seen a meaningful football game really too much. So very excited for this. Yeah. Listen, maybe you and I, like, we do like a lottery where one of us sells a kidney.

And then we can afford tickets to the game. The most expensive game, I think it's the most expensive game in college football history. It's definitely the most expensive playoff game in college football history. And then you saw parking now is like $800 just to park. It's really wrong. They got to fix that. That's just wrong. It's disgusting.

I know. Yeah, I'm excited. I'm nervous. I don't see how you could possibly pick Miami. But I like that. We could kick people's ass up front. You can always win, but you can win up front, right?

Yep. There's one thing I know. Thank you, Marone. All right. Thanks for having me, guys. Appreciate it. Thanks for seeing you. Thanks, Jamie.

What a nice surprise. All right, we'll talk to you tomorrow on fantasy football today. Thank you all for watching. I think, have a great day. See you.