Fantasy Football Today - WR Prospect Profiles; Best Ball Strategies + Rookie ADP (04/17 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: April 17, 2020

With the NFL Draft in less than a week, we're breaking down everything you need to know about the wide receiver prospects! Starting with a fun hypothetical, if the Eagles move up to draft Ceedee Lamb, how early would we draft Lamb in 2020? (0:55) ... Does Lamb have the most long-term upside, or is Jeudy's Fantasy ceiling higher? (7:30) ... Comparing 2019 and 2020 rookie WRs (14:55): how does Lamb's value stack up against Metcalf? What about Ruggs vs. Hollywood Brown? ... News and notes (26:20) with the Bucs looking to trade O.J. Howard, Joe Mixon preparing to hold out and Texans weapons updates ... Best Ball segment (33:15)! We explain how to play Best Ball and basic strategies before analyzing early ADPs for the 2020 rookies ... Email us at [e-mail] tweet questions using #AskFFT. 'Fantasy Football Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox, and wherever else you listen to podcasts. Follow the new FFT Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/FFToday Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @YardsPerGretch, @BenSchragg Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCviK78rIWXhZdFzJ1Woi7Fg/videos Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Now, here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Can you believe we are less than one week away from the NFL Draft? That's right. Next week at this time, we'll be breaking down the first round, or maybe already have broken down the first round, and talking about actual players in the NFL, as opposed to previewing the NFL Draft like we're going to do here with the wide receivers. Welcome to Fantasy Football Today.

I'm Jamie Eisenberg with Dave Richard, Heath Cummings, and Ben Gretsch. Adam Azer is still on his sabbatical. We don't know when he's going to return, and probably some of us don't care. In any event, let's talk about the rookie wide receivers coming into the NFL. It's going to be one of our big topics for today, and I got a question for you guys. If the Eagles move up from number 21 in the first round to draft your favorite wide receiver prospect. Who is that player, and where would you be drafting them in 2020? Ben, I'll start with you. For me, it's CeeDee Lamb.

And in redraft, I'd probably be drafting him around the fifth or sixth round. There's a lot of good young receiver talent, so I don't know exactly how high i would get him right away and redraft in dynasty i'd be a lot more excited about it dave lamb i think i'd probably say round six i'm trying to like reconfigure my rankings in my mind to see yeah i think i would take them assuming that debo gets company in san francisco round six yeah i would like lamb i think is the best so i'll say him i was looking at my projections and like i've got aj brown at 22nd terry mcclure in 23rd michael gallup 24th i think he'd be right in that range behind brown for sure so borderline number two wide receiver it's possible he'd be in the top 24. I just wonder, though, if it's not Philadelphia and we see,

or maybe it's not Lamb, and we see Philadelphia take Henry Ruggs. Because you get a lot of buzz about Ruggs being maybe the first receiver off the board. And it seems as if, fantasy-wise, the consensus is Lamb or Judy. And Ruggs is the third option, and I wonder if Ruggs goes to Philadelphia, which could easily happen. And then we're like, uh-oh. Oh, okay. Well, yeah, all right.

Maybe. Sure. I'll take him. I mean, any receiver would have a chance in Philadelphia. Any one of them. But I don't think I'd be as excited to take Ruggs in six. I think it's just a matter of what they do with the rest of the guys there. That's the conversation we've been having for a few weeks now.

Is Jeffrey back? Is Deshaun healthy? What's Ward's role? What's Arcega-Whiteside's role? If it's Ruggs, Ben, would you be as excited? I wouldn't. I was going to say, and Jeffrey and Jackson both have so much dead money that they can't cut him, basically. They have to swing a trade somehow. So I'm kind of expecting that they won't be able to do that, that no one will take on those deals, and that those guys will be back, which means for me, if it's someone like Ruggs,

he probably winds up behind Jackson in that field stretcher role and playing when Jackson's hurt. And I don't know that he's necessarily a consistent producer because you probably do still have Jeffrey on the field in both tight ends. But whereas if it's someone like Lamb, who I think could be a higher target player, there's more potential for him to really put up good numbers. Right. And then we see Lamb or Judy maybe with the Raiders, maybe with the Jets, maybe with the 49ers, as Dave alluded to with Debo Samuel. Keith, if that's the case, would you be more excited about those guys as opposed to Ruggs and Philadelphia? Yeah, I mean,

and I think that we talked about it on a podcast last week. One of the problems with Judy and Lamb for redrafts specifically is we've seen them a lot of times mock two teams that are not the Eagles that either don't have as much opportunity or we wouldn't be as excited because of the quarterback or the offensive situation. On the Jets, on the Raiders, on the 49ers, those guys aren't getting anywhere close to my top 25 wide receivers.

Yeah, I'm so curious to see as much as those teams that need really, in some cases, a number one wide receiver with the teams at the back end of the first round or maybe what a team does in the second or third round to sort of get that second guy, like Green Bay, for example. Minnesota is going to be interesting. Baltimore is going to be interesting. It's going to be fun to see what some of those teams do at the end of round one, maybe as much so as some of these teams like the Jets, like the Raiders,

who don't exactly have great quarterback situations. Getting a number two guy for Aaron Rodgers might be better than the number one guy for the Jets, depending on who that wide receiver may or may not be. All right. So we got a lot of fun stuff coming up. Get ready for the debut of the FFT Twitch channel on Tuesday, April 21st at 7 p.m. Eastern. Myself, Dave, Heath, and Adam will be broadcasting live from our new Twitch channel.

We'll have NFL draft preview segments, breaking down each position group throughout the entire hour. We'll be answering your chat questions as well. Go to twitch.tv slash FFToday or search FFToday on Twitch to follow us ahead of time. We'll also put the Twitch link in the description of this episode. You can also join our Facebook group. Search Fantasy Football Today on Facebook or click the link in the description to chat with the FFT team and other fantasy fans. Plenty of talk about Keeper's Dynasty now, and our buddy Adam Azer is giving away a spot in the Podcast Listener League next week.

So you want to check out our Facebook group now. We also have pre-draft and NFL draft coverage coming up next week, all week, on CBS Sports HQ. Tuesday and Wednesday at 3 p.m. Eastern, and Thursday and Friday at 4 p.m. Eastern. Tuesday, we're going to break down the running backs. We're going to talk to Boston College running back A.J. Dillon. Wednesday, we're going to look at the wide receivers.

Thursday, we're going to look at the quarterbacks and preview round one. And then on Friday, we're going to react to the first round and also look ahead to the rest of the week. So check out CBS Sports HQ. All the best sports coverage you could find on CBS Sports HQ. All right, so we're talking about the rookie wide receivers here. I think we're going to break down the startup dynasty mock draft that we did yesterday. That'll be up to Adam which mock draft we review for Mock Draft Monday. But I took a look at the wide receivers in that draft, and they basically went what you can probably consider as the top 10 rookies coming into the NFL draft. I thought that's kind of the

order that they went. You had CeeDee Lamb in round five, Jerry Judy in round six, Henry Ruggs in round eight, Justin Jefferson in round nine, Jalen Rager round nine as well, Denzel Mims round 10, T. Higgins round 11, Chenault in round 11 as well. Ben took him. He's the only one of the top 10 rookie wide receivers that was drafted to any of us. I'm sorry i take that back he was the first one i took brandon iuk in round 12 and then michael pitman jr went in round 13 so those are correct me if i'm wrong is there anybody outside of that group you think that is going to be looked at right now as the top 10 wide receivers nope no i don't i don't think uh brian Brian Edwards is one guy that possibly could. Edwards is one.

KJ Hamler, if he lands in the right spot, would be another. I'm talking right now. Obviously, it will change when we get past the draft. I think that's a good top ten. Right. Yeah, maybe Claypool. Maybe Brian Edwards. Tyler Johnson is another one.

There's a few guys that I think, depending on what rank list you look at now, but I think those are the top ten. Forget about the order. Those seem to be the top ten. So when you're looking at this group, Dave, I'll start with you. Who has the most long-term upside of these rookie wide receivers? Is it just Lamb and we move on, or is there anybody else? I think Judy has long-term upside as well.

I think that both of those guys can be anywhere from top 24 to top 10 fantasy receivers in any given year. I don't think that either one can necessarily be consistent. It really depends where they end up. You know, a C.B. Lamb in Philadelphia playing with Carson Wentz for the next eight years could be really good for fantasy. And maybe Jerry Judy if the Raiders hang on to John Gruden. I do like the idea of Judy playing in that style of West Coast offense. I think he'd be really good. I'd rather see Judy in Vegas than C.D. Lamb in Vegas as an example.

I think that he's a better fit for what John Gruden likes to do with his offense. I think those guys are really the only two guys. You can make the case for Jefferson. If he's just going to be a polished slot receiver for his entire career and he gets the Edelman treatment and a ton of targets every single year, then you can make the case for him as well. But it comes down to a team actually using him that way. To me, it really feels like it's a deep class of receivers, but it's not necessarily top heavy. I guess the question, Heath, I'll ask you this because I know we talked about rugs a little bit.

You're getting a lot of Tyreek Hill comparisons. Do you see that? I think it's possible. Like we said the same thing we said about Meikle Hartman last year, partially because he went to the Chiefs, but also because he could do some of those things and had that incredible speed. And it's just a good reminder that guys that need to fix a lot of things but have the blazing speed don't often turn into Tyree Kill. They turn into other things sometimes. Sometimes they turn into Ted Ginn. Sometimes they flame out. And I think Ruggs could have upside. There's one guy Dave didn't mention that I don't think he has the same upside as Lamb probably, but the more that I look at him,

the more that I'm falling in love with him is Denzel Mims. And part of it's because I just got Matt Waldman's draft guide and he likes him quite a bit. Part of it, I mean, you look at the player profiler, his best comp is Chris Godwin. It's a guy who was awesome as a 20-year-old sophomore and has continued to be good. He's big. He's really, really fast. I would not be that surprised if Denzel Mims was the best rookie this year and the best rookie for the next five years. He could end up in Green Bay. And that's a fun pairing of him and Devontae Adams if, in fact, that does come to fruition. And he could be a guy that the Eagles maybe look at at 21.

I think there's a pretty consensus if you talk to people around the NFL. And I've been spending some time reaching out to some guys that cover the league, and there's a pretty consensus group that think the first four receivers are locked into the first round, the three that we always talk about in Jefferson. And then it's after that, it's going to depend on what the team needs are, who's looking at it, who has early picks in the second round, who's going to look to maybe trade up into the early part of the second round. But those four guys are locked into the first round,

and then it's can you get two or three other guys in the back end of the first round and that's where mims were rager where t higgins you know some of these guys come in and who you're falling in love with but uh i i think you're gonna see the same thing ben i'll ask you the same one who has the most long-term upside give me somebody outside of the the top three who has the most long or top four long-term upside yeah my favorite from that that next group is probably lavisca chanel who did a lot of things at Colorado, wasn't just a really productive receiver at a young age, but also they started lining him up in the wildcat a ton. He had, I think, something like seven rushing touchdowns this final season. Really productive guy with the ball in his hands.

And when we look at seven rushing touchdowns over his career, he had five in his sophomore year, two more in his junior year, and also caught 10 touchdowns. But when we look at things like market share and how productive, what share of his offense he accounted for, Chenault really pops, and he was a guy who broke out at a young age and looks really good in a lot of models. He's kind of the comparable to, there's not really a great one this year, but he's kind of the comparable to the A.J. Brown of last year.

Yeah, he's a fun comp, and shocking that you're the one that would bring that up. I'm very surprised to hear that. He's also one of those not too tall but definitely big receivers, kind of built like a thicker running back. He's over 220 pounds. He's just over six foot, six and a half feet. Ben, before we move on, tell us some of the things you look for when you're looking at a wide receiver and how they translate some of their college numbers or college scenarios

to NFL production? Yeah, so there's like three main things when I'm looking at the numbers side of it. And I totally get the film side of it. I'm going to be more of a numbers guy. I'm looking for early production. I talk about that a lot with guys like A.J. Brown and D.J. Moore. And then I'm looking at to define that production, it's going to be in the context of the team. So there's a lot of different ways you can do that. You can look at receiving yards per team pass attempt.

You can look at just what percentage of the receiving yards. We talk about it as we call it market share or share of the yardage. One good example of why you would do that is Justin Jefferson this year. He had 850 yards in his sophomore year. He had 1,500 in his junior year. But because LSU threw for under 3,000 yards in his sophomore year and then threw for over 6,000, they more than doubled their team passing yardage in one year.

He actually had a higher percentage of the team's offense in his sophomore year. And I think that's, you know, it doesn't mean that he wasn't as good as junior year. He was amazing at 111 catches, 1,500 yards, 18 touchdowns. But it does mean, I think it's a good case that that sophomore year was a little underrated. He had 850 yards in a poor passing offense. And it showed that if he was in a better situation like he was a junior year, he had that kind of upside. And so that's why I like Chenault.

And he's a really good example of that market share metric his sophomore year at colorado they didn't throw for a ton yards he had 46 of their yards almost half of their receiving yardage with a 1011 yard season it wasn't a uh an eye-popping season uh but for a 20 year old sophomore to dominate the production for his team in a Power 5 conference, I know the Pac-12 isn't the SEC or anything, but it speaks really well to his long-term production. So you want to see that production early. You want to see it as a measure of the team's offense, because some of these offenses can just put up such gaudy numbers in college.

And the third thing you want to look at is a little bit just completely off the wall, but it's were they an early declarer or not? And there's a lot of hypotheses about why that would be helpful, but the reality is the data shows that guys that declare early before their eligibility is up have a much higher hit rate. And the way I think about it is it probably is an indication that they're getting good feedback from scouts and they're guys the NFL is going to like. And they're coming in a year younger.

I was going to say there's also an age factor to it. They may not stand out as their rookie year, but by the time they hit their third year, which is when typically you see the best out of wide receivers to start to blossom in their careers, they're a little bit younger than some of the elder guys. It may give you a little bit of trepidation, potentially, with somebody like Van Jefferson, who's a little bit older. I like him, but he's on the older side of things for some of the prospects, so it could be an interesting comparison there. All right, so I want to read a tweet from somebody who I respect and enjoy talking to a lot. This was about an hour ago. Haven't even settled on top five yet, but pretty sure it includes A.J. Brown, Terry McLaurin, D.K.

Metcalf, and C.D. Lamb. And that's from Keith Cummings saying he's trying to rank the wide receivers from the past two classes for dynasty purposes. So last year's rookie class, we had a lot of great wide receivers. It wasn't the two we were expecting at this point. Last year, we were talking about Marquise Brown and Nikhil Harry. They were the first two receivers off the board.

And then we saw Terry McLaurin, A.J. Brown, Debo Samuel, D.K. Metcalf. You know, it was a fun rookie season for some of the guys that were, we thought, had a chance, but maybe not to the level of the first round guys. So when you look at Lamb, you look at Judy, you look at Ruggs, you look at Jefferson. Again, I'll run down the top 10 quickly of those guys, that being the top four, Mims, T. Higgins, Jalen Rager, Chennault, Ayoub, Pittman, you know, there's Brian Edwards, you want to throw him in there as well, Hamler, you know, some of the guys that are at the top. But how do the rookies now compare to the incoming rookies now compared to the 2019 class, Heath? What do you see from these guys in terms of, you know of where they could stack up fantasy-wise?

Yeah, I mean, I think looking at it from the fantasy perspective, I would have to put all of them for now behind the top three from last year's class because, like what you said about who we thought the top guy was going into last year, the top two guys going into last year, and where their value would fall right now, it's crushed. And so, at least for Harry, maybe not quite as much for Marquise Brown, but still I wouldn't put him in the top three, so that's a fall. So I would not put any of this year's class of receivers ahead of A.J. Brown, D.K. Metcalf, or Terry McCorin.

I think you can make a pretty good case for Lamb and maybe Judy as well in the top five. I would put Mims, Jefferson, and Ruggs as borderline top ten guys or right towards the end of the top ten. I think if you're doing a top 20, there are probably more guys from this class than there are from last year's class. But the top five is going to be mostly are from last year's class but the top five is going to be mostly guys from last year's class davis cd lamb goes to the jets and the 49ers do not draft a wide receiver who would you rather have cd lamb with the jets or debo samuel with the 49ers

in a dynasty i think i'd probably take lamb still what about reject debo because i i think lamb does have good long-term potential. I figure the Jets at some point will get rid of Adam Gase, and they'll get back on track offensively where they're good. And Lamb could be a target hog even as soon as this year if he ends up with the Jets. It's possible because who else is going to – Crowder will get his, and after that, I don't know. I think that you could see Lamb get close to 105 targets with the Jets. What he does with them is a different story.

I don't know if Deebo can get to 105 if he's the main target in San Fran. Ben, if Jerry Judy goes to the Raiders, would you rather have Jerry Judy with the Raiders or DK Metcalf with the Seahawks? Same thing, Dynasty and then Redraft. I'd probably have them close. I think I'd have Metcalf higher just because we've already seen Metcalf with the Seahawks same thing Dynasty and then Reja I'd probably have him close I think I'd have Metcalf higher just because we've already seen Metcalf hit and and I feel pretty confident that he's going to be productive with Russell Wilson for the next several seasons and we don't necessarily know for Judy Judy has a couple of red flags you know I was talking about the team

production metrics and it's uh it's hard to control for teammates being really good that's one of the things that those types of models will miss and Judyy played with rugs and he played with devonta smith who's still at alabama and he never really had a really high percentage of their team's receiving value but he is a young prospect he is an early to clear he has some of those things going for him i still think very highly of him i think you have to give him a little boost against his numbers, knowing that he was playing with some really good players. But I think there are just enough question marks that I'd rather have a guy that I've already seen do it in DK.

All right, same question, Heath. Henry Ruggs goes to the Eagles, and they trade up to get him, take him first. Would you rather have Ruggs, or it's probably too easy but i'll say mcclure i'm gonna stick with mcclure and like i in my initial ranking of these two classes i think i had rugs 10th um actually like the one that would be difficult for me would be with marquise brown all right so let's do that one marquise brown or rugs i if rugs was if the eagles traded up for him and took him as the first wide receiver i'd probably move rugs ahead of marquise brown right now i've got marquise brown just a But if the Eagles traded up for him and took him as a first wide receiver, I'd probably move Ruggs ahead of Marquise Brown. Right now I've got Marquise Brown just a little bit ahead of Ruggs.

There's obviously a lot of similarities there. I think Marquise Brown is going to be better than he was as a rookie, but if the Eagles put that type of investment in Ruggs, then he'd probably be ahead of Brown for me. I'm so curious to see if there's going to be a team that surprises us. You heard Steve Kime got asked a lot, the Cardinals general manager, about would they take a wide receiver at eight because they were rumored to be looking at wide receiver before the Hopkins trade. And he was still asked about it. Would they consider adding to their arsenal? I

think it'd be dumb just what they need at the offensive line. Some defensive issues as well, but man, that'd be crazy if they were to take a receiver at eight. And then you have the Jaguars at nine. That's certainly a position they could look at with two picks in the first round. Again, it would be a surprise. But everybody kind of thinks the draft run starts at 11 with the Jets, and that's where we're going to kind of see some teams. But, you know, if the Eagles do move up, maybe the Packers,

you know, they fall in love with somebody, they move up. It's going to be really interesting to see who does make that move, maybe aggressively, to target one of those wide receivers. We do hope it's Philadelphia. I think we're all consensus-wise thinking we hope it's CeeDee Lamb, but that'll be a fun look. As you talk about it, I think you alluded to this, Ben, with Chenault, the slot guys. Jefferson clearly is the best.

He had 200 snaps in the slot for lsu last year uh chanel who are some of the other slot guys that we're looking at ben go ahead oh um i mean i i like both chanel and jefferson are guys who played outside in in the slot jefferson played outside in that sophomore year that I referenced and then kicked into the slot. And I believe Chenault did the same. I think he played on the outside as a sophomore and kicked in. He lined up everywhere. Yeah, Chenault went everywhere. Yeah, and I think there's just like one of the things with this class

is I think there's a lot of versatility, and it's one of the things I think we're seeing with the future of the NFL is just that wide receivers need to be able to play in multiple spots. I'm glad you said that. I want to stop you right there. Because I spoke to Devontae Adams last year at the Pro Bowl, and I was talking about Julian Edelman, because I was doing a story previewing the Super Bowl between the Patriots

and the Rams about Edelman. It was a forgettable Super Bowl. It was. And I said to him, is Edelman kind It was a forgettable Super Bowl. It was. And I said to him, like, you know, is Edelman kind of considered the best slot guy? And he's like, I guess. He's like, but I play in the slot. Hopkins plays in the slot.

You know, Julio will line up in the slot sometimes. You know, he was kind of, you know, looking at it. And then when I spoke to Chris Harris, the same thing. He's like, you know, everybody talks about me playing the best guys in the slot. It's because the best guys go in the slot. You know, it's not like I'm just lining up in the slot and playing those guys. And so I'm glad you brought that up, that we're going to see more and more teams move guys around. Yeah, Michael Thomas is considered the top receiver in the league,

and he wouldn't have been considered a slot receiver coming out, but that's where he plays. I mean, that's what he does. Lamb and Judy play a bunch in the slot. Right. The guys that I looked at, you know, just based on some of the snap counts and where they have lined up in college, mostly in 2019. Jefferson, K.J. Hamler, Chennault, and Lynn Bowden from Kentucky, who I think is in the underrated sleeper.

Heath, of those four guys, which one stands out? Throw out Jefferson. Of Hamler, Chennault, and Bowden, which of those going to mention as well. Heath, of those four guys, which one stands out? Throw out Jefferson. Of Hamler, Chenault, and Bowden, which of those three guys stand out to you if they do get an opportunity to be slot receivers next year? Yeah, I think Chenault would be the one. I agree with most of the things Ben said about him earlier, and I don't really love Hamler. I think Bowden's more interesting depending on where he goes,

but Chenault would be the one. I think Hamler's going to get a little bit of a bad rap until we see where he ends up. Just because he didn't run at the combine, people think maybe he's hurt. He did some things with the virtual pro days that teams seem to like, but he's another one of those guys. He's fast, and we'll see if he can do some different things. All right, so I'm going to give you the second group of receivers that were drafted in that Dynasty Startup mock draft,

and I want to get your favorite of this group. So we had after Michael Pittman in round 13. I'll run down the first 10 guys real quickly. So it was Lamb, Judy Ruggs, Jefferson, Rager, Mims, Hagen, Chenault, Ayuk, and Pittman. The next group of guys. Here we go. Brian Edwards, Tyler Johnson, Chase Claypool, Van Jefferson, Antonio Gandy-Golden, K.J. Hamler, Devin DuVernay, Donovan Peoples-Jones, Lynn Bowden, and Isaiah Hodgins.

I think it's Hodgins. And I'm sorry if I mispronounce any of those names. I'll give you them again. Edwards, Johnson, Claypool, Van Jefferson, Gandy-Golden, Hamler, DuVernay, Peoples-Jones, Bowden, and Hodgins. Who's your favorite of that group, Dave? I think my favorite is Claypool, but it's more so as a prospect than anything else because there are a handful of big guys in this draft class, but he's a giant. He's over 6'4". He's 229.

He runs a great 40. He has huge hands. All reports say he's got high character. He's definitely raw he's definitely not a great route runner but it's that size that makes him unique and it's a close call for me between him and brian edwards because i really like edwards a lot too uh he how about you um i'll go with brian edwards and again another one of the guys kind of like what ben talked about that maybe wasn't on a team that threw the ball a ton, but when you look at his dominator score, he absolutely dominated targets at South Carolina and was good pretty much from the very get-go in his college career.

So I'll say Edwards. Ben? Yeah, I'll go to the last guy you named, Isaiah Hodgins from Oregon State. He's 6'4", not the greatest athlete, but productive. Again, in terms of team volume, was productive early, is an early declare. He's kind of one of my favorite underrated sleepers in the class. And, you know, one of the biggest things on top of all of these other metrics is just draft position, draft capital, whether teams are willing to invest a high pick on the guy because they're the teams that then decide whether these guys actually get a real chance and play um so Hodgins is a guy you know he he goes in the fifth or sixth round I'm gonna probably have to just give up on that love but if someone's willing to take him in

the third you know that's he starts to look a little bit like Kenny Galladay who was a similar like fifth or sixth projection who the Lions jumped all the way to the third and surprised some people and then it's like oh because this guy's numbers are good now that somebody gave him a third round pick I really like this guy. Yeah, I'm excited about Antonio Gandy-Golden. I took him in that draft. I took him in our rookie draft as well. I'm looking forward to see what the receiver from Liberty does.

I think it's going to be really interesting to see what team gives him a shot. I think we can see him maybe go in the third round. You're hearing some buzz about him, so he's somebody I'm really excited about, but we're going to find out a lot more about these guys once we get, obviously, to next week in the NFL draft. We'll have a full breakdown of the NFL draft. I think we're going to do it for the first time ever right after the first round on Thursday. We'll have our podcast, obviously, get you ready Thursday and Friday for what's happened in the draft and what will happen for the rest of the week, I think maybe Friday night as well.

Some news and notes around the NFL. The Buccaneers are looking to trade O.J. Howard. That's a report. We'll see if it comes to fruition. Well, we heard it during the season last year. Bruce Arians, not the most fond coach of his tight ends. Give me a one-word answer. Best landing spot for O.J. Howard.

Heath. Indianapolis. Dave. Green Bay. Sorry, that was two words. me a one-word answer best landing spot for oj howard heath indianapolis dave green bay sorry that was two words uh ben uh patriots even without a quarterback right now yeah i think so i i trust belichick's ability to to scheme talent dalton's been good throwing to his tight ends before yeah they can they could afford dalton. I traded Dalton. We've been doing these mock draft Mondays on CBS Sports HQ, and I traded a third-round pick for the Patriots for Andy Dalton,

and then I got yelled at post-draft by Pete Prisco saying they don't have the cap room right now to trade for Andy Dalton. I was like, Pete, it's a fake mock. You could always find the cap space. I'm with Dave. I'd like to see Green Bay maybe make a move to get O.J. Howard. Joe Mixon is prepared for a holdout if he and the Bengals can't agree to a long-term deal. Heath, you're already the low guy on Joe Mixon.

Would this make you even more concerned about drafting him if we're drafting right now? Yeah, because they've already got Gio Bernard, so they can afford to just let him hold out yeah no i think absolutely i was under the impression and i i don't know how i got this impression maybe you guys can correct me that the new uh cba makes holdouts much more painful for players and much less likely to drag into the season so i've never seen we've never seen a running back shy away from making things painful for a holdup. Right, right. So, yeah, I mean, if he makes that type of decision, it would be worrisome. I think you're right, Heath.

I don't know exactly what the new rule is. Yeah, it does make – I'm with you, too. I don't know exactly what the penalty is, but it makes it worse. That's a homework assignment for me. Anybody downgrading Joe Mixon yet? Me, me. I've been taking him in a lot of our mocks um i i think if he's playing he's a little bit underrated i mean he hasn't been very good on the touchdown front but back-to-back 1400 total yard seasons is you know really impressive in a bad offense and if his offense gets better he could be

really good if he's playing isn't he like a borderline trap back? He is a little bit, but he has enough receiving production, I think, that I don't know. I see some upside there in a different offense with a different quarterback. You know, Zach Taylor's offense wasn't really great last year, and we saw a lot of Ryan Finley on top of Dalton struggling. But I think, you know, new offense, Joe Burrow in there, things could dramatically improve for Mixon in terms of his touch splits and his touchdown potential.

But obviously this holdout talk now, I'm going to be moving him back again. Well, I think you wait to see what happens. You know, I mean, if we get the training camp and he's a holdout, then it's a totally different conversation. You know what I mean? if, you know, we get the training camp and he's a holdout, then it's a totally different conversation. You know what I mean? I'm still drafting him in the same spot I would be right now. Yeah, I would take it in, like, early second. So I can't take him there now.

Yeah, and it's funny because, you know, we'll see what they do with their draft overall, but they're really getting two first-round picks for the first time. They're going to get the quarterback, and they're going to get Jonah Williams, who they didn't have. You know, and that's going to be a big piece of this offensive line. They're getting not a Hall of Fame wide receiver, but a guy who is in that two tiers now.

A.J. Greenback is certainly going to help having him back on the field. So yeah, this offense should get a boost. And a flip of the podcast you guys did earlier this week, second half performers. Joe Mixon's second half was a lot better than his first half. He really picked things up in the second half, maybe taking hold of that Zach Taylor offense. The greatest general manager ever in the NFL, Bill O'Brien,

says that David Johnson is a three-down back. I wish we had Chris Towers on this podcast because he takes David Johnson in every single one of our mock drafts. I don't think it's a surprise to hear David Johnson's three-down back. Adam Mazur talks all the time about how the Texans don't throw to their running backs to the level that we would like. Does this excite you anymore about David Johnson? I thought that they just left two letters out.

I thought he said he was a third down back because he hasn't been very good running the ball for like three years. No, listen, my concern about David Johnson is they already have Duke Johnson there. Who's really good at pass catching. And if David Johnson didn't have pass catching, he wasn't going to be a top 25 running back. Now it makes me a little more interested in him and PPR, but it kind of sucks for Duke Johnson. I'm getting, I'm getting less interested in David Johnson. Uh, I wrote about him this week.

Texans have Texans running backs have averaged 54 catches per season With Deshaun Watson under center Heath mentioned it, Duke is still there I went back and watched David Johnson He is slow to gather himself When he stops his momentum running the ball So when the offensive line

Makes a lane for him He can hit that lane solidly I don't think he's necessarily a burner anymore But if he's necessarily a burner anymore. But if he's got to stop, he is a big, fat target. And not really fat. He's a big, strong target. But it's a big target that defenders can hit and knock down.

And it's a big reason why his rushing average has been what it's been. It's going to be really interesting to see what they do, how they use him, and how this receiving floor sort of factors in as well. I don't know if they have brandon cooks and maybe in the market to move on from kenny stills o'brien also said during his meeting with the media that will fuller is doing great from his core muscle surgery um ben you took fuller in that dynasty startup draft you like will fuller still i think with the brandon cooks trade i mean another health question once again. Yeah, yeah. Well, I think Heath could tell you just by never actually talking about Will Fuller

but comparing him to other underrated players that Fuller is not as good as I like him because he'll compare him to Kenny Stills and Brandon Cooks who are sneaky productive. But Fuller is good. That's just the bottom line. He had the best single-game fantasy total of any player in a game last year, which isn't the only positive note on his profile. But he's been productive since he came in. He's got to stay healthy.

That's the whole story. Oof. Got to stay healthy. I think he has two games over 70 yards in his last 16. But he gets those chances every week. You just have to hope he catches in on those deep ball chances. That's the whole... Until we see his target volume consistently stay up,

you've got to look at him as a big play receiver who's going to be better for best ball than for anything else. Matt Rule also says he wants to avoid having Christian McCaffrey on the field for every snap. I'll believe it when I see it. And Matt Breida has signed his one-year tender offer, meaning he's going to be with the 49ers, barring trade. Yay, four running backs for the 49ers going into 2020. All right, let's talk a little best ball. So, Heath, tell us what best ball is.

Tell the people what best ball is for those of us who do not play in best ball. I'm not saying me, but for the people who do not play in best ball leagues. Best ball is generally something right around a 20-round draft where you draft your team and forget it. I believe it's been called draft masters in some places in the past. But basically, you're going to draft two or three quarterbacks, probably five to six running backs, five to six receivers, two or three tight ends, sometimes defenses, but really shouldn't be, and never kickers. Hashtag never kickers. And then you don't have to set your lineup. You don't make any adds or drops for the entire year.

And there's no head-to-head batch ups but after week 16 the team that has scored the most points and points are basically determined by the guys each week that score the most points are your starters for that week at each position most of them are one quarterback leagues with two running backs three receivers a tight end and a. Maybe you have two flexes. I really, really enjoy it. And it's like if you get frustrated by, oh, I'm always the highest scoring team that doesn't make the playoffs,

you don't have to worry about that here. The whole point is just scoring points. What is your strategy for best ball, Ben? Yeah, I think you, like Heath just described it, you don't have to make lineup decisions. So consistency not only becomes overrated, it becomes kind of something I look to actively fade because you have the depth. You're looking for peak weeks.

You're looking for the Will Fuller types. That receiver, I want downfield receivers that can have big plays and big weeks, spike weeks, because every time they do, they're going to be in my lineup, and every time they don't, I'll likely have someone else who's producing. John Ross is another one we've talked about. He's a great best ball guy this year in later rounds. It's a format where you definitely want to wait at quarterback too

because one of the best things about the top quarterbacks is their consistency. But later quarterbacks can have spike weeks where they throw four or five touchdowns. And if you have three and you have to choose which one you're starting, it's really easy to get similar production, not easy, but similar production to some of the higher end quarterbacks by taking the top week out of each of those three over the course of a season. So you want to think about that. You want to think about the positions that have spike week potential and build a group on your roster that gives you that upside every week without having to pay for it. In basketball, I'm more likely to take the stud running backs early and then be deep at receiver and wait for quarterbacks and also kind of wait on tight ends and get multiple options there i was going to say like basically all of the things you heard

from ben last year during the season about his strategy and redraft i would presume that his best ball strategy is just that on steroids because a lot of times when he's talking about how your floor doesn't matter and it's all about upside, I'm thinking, yeah, I agree with that in best ball, but a little bit different in redraft. So, yeah, a lot of things he said throughout last year are exactly the way I feel about best ball. So let's take a look at some of the average draft position for the rookies so far. And, again, this will change in a week, but right now the best ball ADP, Jonathan Taylor is going first in the fourth round, 47th overall. so far and again this will change in a week but right now the best ball adp john and taylor is

going first in the fourth round 47th overall deandre swift in the seventh round 79th overall jk dobbins ninth round 100th overall cam acres 10th round quite over to layer in the 10th round as well acres is at 117 and edwards hilaire is at 119 dave are you surprised right now given the fact that we don't know which of these teams are going to take any of these running backs, and Dobbins could be in a better spot than Taylor? Akers could be in the best spot, or Edwards-Alaire could be in the best spot. Are you surprised that there's a three-round gap between Taylor and Swift and a five-round gap between Taylor and Dobbins?

I'm stunned Taylor's going as a top 50 pick because there's a chance he's not even a first round pick are we sure he's going to end up in a spot where he's going to be uh a feature back a potential three down he could still be that in the second round i mean that's not out of their own possibility i know but usually i i guess i guess to a degree you're right that if he were if he was going to be a consensus top ten pick in the NFL draft, he'd go a lot sooner than round four here. So I'm just a little bit surprised by it. Maybe it's just more about seeing Dobbins in round nine, Edwards-Hilaire in round ten.

I think those are fantastic values. You're not going to find those guys there. I don't care what teams they go on. You're not going to find them there in best balls after the NFL draft. They're going to go at least one round higher. And I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor goes one round later if he ends up in a bad situation. My thought process with basically every rookie on here, I was kind of shocked, and that's kind of why I wasn't planning on writing about the rookie ADP.

But my thing is I think everybody amongst these rookies has the upside to be drafted a lot higher than their downside from where they're being drafted. Dave's right. Jonathan Taylor could land in a terrible spot and go one round later. He could also go to the Buccaneers or the Chiefs and be a second-round pick, maybe a first-round pick. So I think every single rookie that we talk about here except for maybe jaylen rager i think could go a lot a lot higher and isn't likely to go much lower than this after the draft do you think the separate conversation from best ball but

do you really think the chiefs are going to take a running back in the first round i don't really well and the deandre Washington signing makes it, I think, less likely. That's the thing. It's like I keep seeing a running back, like, you know, Swift mocked to the Chiefs in the first round. It doesn't make any sense to me. No, I wouldn't mock it that way, but I have seen it a lot. The only way it makes sense is if Washington is there as a safety blanket

in case they don't get their guy. But they have Darrell Williams and they have Darwin Thompson returning. So they now have four running backs with at least some NFL experience. Darwin Thompson's is limited, but Darrell Williams played well last year before he got hurt. It's a deep group already. I kind of thought the Washington thing made me think they don't think very much of Darwin Thompson. They played Darryl Williams over him last year. He was not very productive the few times he touched the ball, and then they go sign DeAndre Washington.

He was a sixth-round pick. He might barely even be on a roster by this time. He might not be on a roster this time next year. But we could almost say the same thing about every running back on the Chiefs roster right now. Two years from now, they might all be gone. Williams is a free agent after this season. Damian Williams is a free agent after this season. He's also 28.

So I just think they don't feel – I could see them taking a running back at some point. But round one just seems like a huge leap. I don't expect that to happen, though. I think sometimes – and I don't want to speculate too though yeah i think sometimes and i don't know i don't want to speculate too much but when people are doing mocks you're like deandre swift feels like a back end of the first round guy and where does he make the most sense and you kind of work backwards as opposed to thinking about the team's motivations and i i think everything we're saying is true as well so if you look at the chiefs they don't look like a team that's going to do that

we just don't know who is right does anybody think there's a surefire first-round running back in this draft class? No. I would echo everything you said, actually, at the top there. I've been taking Jonathan Taylor in a lot of our mocks. I think he's a phenomenal prospect, but a lot of the buzz is making it sound like he might be the third running back off the board. And at that point, I'll be wrong on all these mocks. Right. I think the concern is the workload. You know, people look at the workload that he had at Wisconsin and, you know, also the fumbles and a couple of the drop situations.

You know, there are some things that make you a little bit concerned. I did speak to, biasly, a Wisconsin running back, Dario Gumbawale. I think we'll air that interview at some point on our podcast. And I asked him, you know, I said, put on your analyst hat and tell me about Taylor. And he's like, he's going to be the next great running back in the NFL. So take that for what it's worth, you know, a Wisconsin guy talking about a Wisconsin guy. But I don't have to listen to Agumbo Wally say it. I can listen to Heath Cummings say it.

Heath's a huge Jonathan Taylor fan, which makes me look closely at Taylor, to be honest with you. Oh, I agree with Heath. I love Taylor. It sounds like Ben does as well. Right. He's my favorite one of this group, but I don't know if he's a first-round talent. I think he's better than Josh Jacobs, who was like a top-ten pick last year, right? I think he was a little later, but, yeah, I agree.

He's better than Josh Jacobs. Yeah, we'll see, again, which team looks at him. The rookie, wide receiver, average draft position and best ball, Jerry Judy is going in round 11 at 132 overall. C.D. Lamb, 12th round, 138. Henry henry ruggs the third 15th round at 169 jalen rieger 16th round 192 justin jefferson in the 17th round 193 so he sort of alludes this rieger is probably the odd man out of these uh of these four guys um he tells us about the values here for these guys. Well, I think people that don't play basketball might be hearing this and saying, why are these receivers so low? Well, by pick 150, most people

in these drafts have taken at least two quarterbacks and maybe three and at least two tight ends. So these types of players get pushed down just a little bit. But I would expect, even with bad landing spots in San Francisco or with the Jets or whatever, I would expect judy and lamb are easily going to go in the seventh eighth ninth maybe ninth round of these types

of drafts so i think there is definitely an opportunity over the last week before the draft happens here to get those guys cheap if you want to have some best ball exposure i expect there and jefferson could if he goes to the, his, his value could absolutely skyrocket. Yeah. This, this makes me want to go sign up for about 20 best ball drafts before the NFL draft, because I think all these guys are going to go up at least one, if not four rounds, not in the case of Judy and lamb, but I don't mind rigor. I like them a lot. And I think if his landing spot is good, he could be,

he could be impactful as a rookie, but Jefferson, if it's a PPR best ball, I almost don't care where he lands as long as he gets that playing time. He's got a chance to make an impact right away. And I just want to echo what you guys are saying about their values going up. There's been a lot of research done on this. It's true every year. Best ball has been a very popular thing for the last five or six years. Rookie ADPs as a whole rise substantially after the NFL draft.

People don't do well with uncertainty. They don't know where these guys are going to play. But then anyone who has even a marginally good landing spot, once we have more information about where they're playing, they start going higher. And really, the only guys that don't go higher is the ones that land in really horrible spots. A.J. Brown's an example. Last year, once he landed in Tennessee, everyone said, oh,

they don't throw enough. And he actually started falling post-draft. But the majority of guys rise. And as a group, they rise. So Dave's right. If you want to draft some rookies, now's the time to do it. You got a week. Go get it.

Ben, please post a picture of your mustache. Ben is rocking the best mustache ever right now. It is just, it's like, I'm not going to use the description I should use, but it's like police officer sitting at a donut shop mustache. Like, just perfect. Grown-up man's mustache. Grown-up man's mustache. How long have you been growing that thing?

I mean, I just did shave for the first, like, couple weeks of quarantine, and then I just, you know, shaved everything else and left the stash. So it's been over a month now, probably. It's fantastic. Yeah. Thank you.

Heath has rocked a very good mustache before. I've failed miserably. Dave's got a good, like, Sergeant Slaughter mustache when he had to do it once upon a time when he lost a bet. I think if we had a mustache contest, it would be a runaway between Ben and Heath, and then we'd have to just let the audience decide. I don't think Adam can grow a good mustache.

He can draw one, though. He can draw one very nicely on his face. He can probably draw one. Well, this is fun, guys. Hope everybody has a good weekend. We'll be on monday with another mock draft monday i'm again i'm not sure which draft we will review probably the dynasty startup whenever adam is not in a mock draft you never know which direction he's going to go and choosing which mock we're going to review but uh we'll probably just let ben tracker decide that and make it easy for all of us so thank you guys for a great show thanks everybody for listening and uh gotta go bye deep in the ocean an orca pod is on the hunt these aren't your

average orcas these guys are organized marketing team did you get those social media posts scheduled for the seal migration? Aye, aye, Captain. We even have an automated notification for all pod managers when they go live. They use Monday.com to keep their teamwork sharp, their communication clear, and their goals in sight. Monday.com. For whatever you run, even orcas. Go to Monday.com to dive deeper.