Fantasy Footballers - Fantasy Football Podcast - Breakout Picks + Injury Anger, Mike Returns! - Fantasy Football Podcast for 8/17

Episode Date: August 17, 2026

Fantasy Football show for Aug 17, 2026. Breakouts for the 2026 fantasy football season! Andy, Mike, and Jason pick players who will take a big step forward in 2026. Find out which late round TE could be a fantasy football difference maker! Plus, a number of injury updates from training camp and Week 1 of preseason. Manage your redraft, keeper, and dynasty fantasy football teams with the #1 fantasy football podcast. 2026 ULTIMATE DRAFT KIT is available now at UltimateDraftKit.com Get MEGALASHOW tickets at BallersLive.com (00:00) Intro (06:05) Being a fantasy football podcast host (10:00) NFL News (25:05) Breakouts (25:45) Andy’s Breakout Pick (31:30) Mike’s Breakout Pick (37:40) Jason’s Breakout Pick (49:15) Mailbag (50:25) Locking in ‘My Guys’ (51:45) Strength of Schedule (52:55) Reaching in drafts (54:20) RB Dead Zone Connect with the show: Subscribe on YouTube Visit us on the Web Support the Show Follow on X Follow on Instagram Join our Discord Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

All right, it's almost that time of year. The time when I set the foundation for supreme and total dominance at my fantasy football draft. How can I be so confident? Because I use the ultimate draft kit from the fantasy footballers. Man, it updates all off-season, so I never worry about using old busted information. Consistency charts, auction value. Full projections. Oh, baby, this thing's got it all.

You want to keep it 100 for your draft. Head to Ultimate DraftKit.com and get your copy today. To the Fantasy Footballers Podcast with your host, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright. Oh, welcome in. Monday, August 17th, the Fantasy Footballers podcast. Jason Moore is here. Andy Holloway and guess what?

What? He's back. The Mucas King returns. Mike the Fantasy Hitman returns to the studio. No bear. Extraordinary in my chair. No.

We have the full crew back and it is a huge week. Breakouts, busts, values, sleepers, 10 tips and tricks episode, mock draft mayhem and too many injuries to talk about. Yeah. I'm so.

This was like, listen, this was a, this is a regular week in season amount of injuries to our guys. Every year, I've lived in Arizona my whole life and every year, the summer surprises me. Fresh.

Sure. And how much of an inferno it is, how hot it is, how horrible it is. Every year, I'm like, oh my gosh. Yeah.

And the same thing happens with injuries in fantasy football, because we have an offseason of anticipation and excitement and joy and the worst part is we have done work to try to decide on how something's going to happen and we never get to see for some players. It's unbelievable. We have a board that has our

my guys or maybe our MVPs or we've got breakouts today and it's like we've got all these players we're looking for and waiting and then all of a sudden behind the scenes we're excited to talk to you about so our guy my groin my offensive lineman my toe I don't have a knee anymore this game is brutal

I don't know if you guys knows football is a rough and tumble physical game but we must go on without knowing how some of these situations will turn out

and this is why we've had a hard time people have been asking us for our my guy picks and we kind of have to thread the needle a little bit like on the timeline on the timeline

line. Like I'll say this now. Like I really wanted to make Alec Pearson my guy for most of the offseason. I can't really do that right now. I can't go say invest on the draft pick and start them. I don't know when he's going to play. Maybe it'll be week one. I don't know. But those are coming next week as well, the my guy picks. Your drafts will get started. Ours is on Labor Day. So hopefully you've pushed yours back as far as you can because this is why we say draft is close to kickoff as possible. I think that's important because maybe people don't realize that kickoff is a week later this year than it usually is. So instead of doing it, like, if your league always does the second weekend in August, I guess you would be done, but, you know, whatever. If you time it that way, you should push it later.

And we always say every year, like, push your draft as late as possible towards kickoff. I would recommend having it be after the third and final week of preseason because there's no, there's no fun in like, you leave a draft, you're excited, and then before the first week, before the first fantasy point is scored, a guy you got in the second round is like done for the year in the week three of the preseason. That stinks, so push them like.

Yeah, push them as far back as you can. The exception being if you can get people together for in-person drafting, do that whenever you can. It's the best. But what else do we got going on? We got one week left in our UDK for Life giveaway. we're giving away the ultimate draft kit for the rest of your natural life and we have added the bequeathing capabilities to this gift is a if it's in writing if you have an unnatural life

it's really up in the air we won't really be able to apply anything this little it's too gray yeah it's like it's just us giving something way it's just us giving because I think right now everyone who's preparing for drafts they're they're getting an ultimate draft kit anyways it's like we're just also including the fact that you might get it forever for always yeah And maybe a signed Jamar Chase jersey as well. Ultimate draft kit.com. Winners will be selected during our live stream next Monday. It's for sure happening.

Yeah, it's definitely happening. But maybe for each individual, right? Maybe you will be the one to get it. Not every person is going to get it. That would be a bad business move. What it sounded like for a moment. If we gave everybody a free Utake forever. But if you've purchased it already, if you're an Ultimate Foot Clan member,

you're automatically in it to win. The community is over. right join thefoot.com. You can follow us on Instagram, Instagram.com slash fantasy footballers. We had another Just the Tips episode. Hit YouTube. YouTube.com slash the fantasy footballers this past weekend. Our quick question of the day is, it comes in.

What part of doing a fantasy football podcast is something that most people don't know about? Maybe it's a part of the daily, weekly process. What is something most people don't know about? Let's see. I mean, there's definitely a few things. I guess the one I would say is what has really changed is the the ebbs and flows of the calendar. Like when we weren't in it, fantasy football was still life. You know, I was all in.

When you were in podcast hosting. Yeah, when we were doing the podcast. But like when you hit June, it was like you could really feel it inside of like, Oh, baby. Football's coming back. Football really never leaves for us. Oh, so you miss the... So I find that that I don't get the same... It's Christmas Forever for you type of thing.

Exactly. I don't get the same juice ramp up inside of the natural time. I still... You're always juiced. I love football. Like, I... With the preseason on, it was, you know, is... Oh, thank goodness. Thank goodness this thing is back because it has been too long.

I love football every day. But it's just that that's the natural ebbs and flows of timing that you, you know, your circadian rhythm of sports, we don't really have that. Yeah, like, like the, like a decade ago, the idea of hard knocks coming out. It's like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. I got to throw that on now. It's like, I would consume everything.

I would love, I love watching clips. I don't know if I'm going to sit down because I know I'm going to be sitting down watching film all the time. But I think the thing people might not know about doing a fantasy football podcast is like, we do the show for about an hour a day how much goes into it prior to that the amount of research and reading and Google sheets and work behind the scenes

we try to come on here and sound as relatively dumb as we can but you know we're we are putting in the you'd be shocked how much we prepare to sound this dumb yeah yeah I always think it's funny like we do we do so many shows over the course of the year and how many times we're like doing the dance of like timing recordings so we don't miss news so that we get

like we're trying to thread the needle of like record where like the work we've done pretty well I feel like except for your like Cortland Sutton thing in the middle of the show oh that was the best timing ever I think we made a show moment of the year but but just like when we record and we like know stuff is going to happen we try to dance the recording times around the news which which is kind of fun

but yeah. Speaking of like Christmas year round analogy, Mike, did you see that they're opening a coffee shop down the street? Oh, yeah. That is from us? Yes. It's a Christmas.

It's a Christmas. It's called Christmas Cafe. It's called Christmas Cafe. It's Christmas themed in Christmas music and Christmas. 365. What do you think of that? Is that going to ruin the magic or is that amazing? My initial thought is very optimistic.

It is. I can't wait. If you're telling me at any. point in the year. I could just take off. The Christmas Cafe. I could just... That AC better be... Oh, it's got to be frigged. It's got to be frigid in there. Oh, that's a good point. If it's not like kind of snowing in there, like a little bit falling from...

If I can't wear snugly hoodie... That's not Christmas. That's not going to work. I can walk there from my house. I can't wait. It's that close to you. Yeah. I'm very hopeful. I think they're optimistic. I'm optimistic. I'm optimistic. I'm optimistic. Like, you're pro Christmas Cafe. I think that might be too much. but I'm excited. One way to find out.

You're willing to find out. We'll see if they're opening your app from now. People will decide. Yeah. Let's jump into the news. News and notes from around the league. This is a... Oh man.

The people hate the news today. This time of year is just all. I was going to say this is a breakout show, but the news is going to feel like a breakdown show. We are the message or nothing. We didn't make it happen. The first piece of news, like Mike, you weren't in here. here, but we came on and got to talk about the preseason game Cardinals Raiders and Jeremiah

Love and how good he looked. I mean, it was ridiculous how obvious it was how obvious it was that Jeremiah Love will be a dominator at the NFL. It was almost like they could have known that before they drafted him number three overall in the NFL draft. Well, he ended up. Had to be sure, though, receiving 14 carries for some reason. And the 14th carry resulted in a hip drop ankle sprain, looks like a high ankle sprain. They just weren't sure, you know, that's 13th care. We got to get let's see what happens next. They're still hopeful that he will be ready for week one against the Chargers. That terminology means it's high ankle.

You usually miss three weeks. Come back. And then you lose production. Oftentimes you lose peak production for a couple of weeks. Obviously, if they are bringing him back off of an injury and his first time back is week one, they are not going to take this young future centerpiece of their team and say here's 25 touches in your first week back from injury.

It sucks so much. I mean, and Connor isn't even back to 11 on 11, which means there's a really good chance Tyler Algier is like the starting full-time running back for the Cardinals in week one. By the way, their other top four picks are also hurt. They lost their guard for the year, their second round pick. Carson Beck is hurt. they lost their DT.

In the fourth round, yeah. So there's no, they don't have a draft this year. That's cool, man. Breeze Hall suffered a strange groin at practice. This one is, I mean, I don't know on the groins how often it's due to physical contact or not. But this was, you know, this was just on his own. He's running a route, catches a ball, no defender, and pulls it and goes down. Butterfly stretch.

Thank you, Mike, is what I've been trying to tell everyone, and you are the leader of the charge. Butterflystretch.com. Jason Moore's. Physical therapist. There should not be groin injuries, guys. Butterfly stretch. How are there so many groin injuries? Makes no sense.

Just flap. All right. Let's hypothesize here. Christian McCaffrey has now missed one full week of practice. Originally, it was revealed it was due to, quote, tightness. perhaps the tightness of the wallets of the 49ers? Genuine question because Mike you have a much better memory than anybody alive. This was going on.

It was either last year or the prior year. It was one of the last two years where he's going to be fine. That was the two years ago. That was two years ago. Yeah. Okay. And it kept seeming like totally going to be fine, nothing to see here. And so then two years ago, it was,

and there was something to see there and it was very, very bad. I'm okay. It did time up. Nothing to see here. It timed up with Bejohn and Gibbs getting money. Yeah, there's some, the bushes are whispering.

I think the bushes are just hopeful, man. Yeah, I do too. Josh Downs exited with another injury. Hardfall on his back. Tried to walk it off, was in pain and had to leave for a few snaps. Don't know the severity. Alec Pierce not expected to practice this week.

Go draft. to Ashton Doolin. Yeah, there's like no whiteouts right now in Indianapolis. The good news is if, you know, unlike when Mike Williams would have those terrible tumbles to the ground and injure himself, which is what Josh Downs did, not a lot of weight on

him, fell on him. That's true. Light is a feather. I'm going to hit the button for this one, but Saints head coach Callumor said the team is, quote, still in collection mode regarding Jordan Tyson's hamstring. Leave the red light on me. I mean, this is, this is really,

it's really not good. The range of outcomes here on this injury, for those that don't know, Jordan Tyson, top 10 draft pick from ASU, multiple hamstring injuries while at ASU, had a hamstring injury in the draft process, was just getting some of the best publicity possible with some of these, you know, routes he was running in practice. He looked amazing.

I mean, and this is, this is why he was the number one, scouted wide receiver for us. We watched how twitchy he was at ASU. It was amazing. But this hamstring is now genuinely threatening potentially his entire season. I want people to understand. Surgery is a potential outcome

of the hamstring injury to Jordan Tyson. It doesn't mean it is the outcome, but when you have to say you're still in collection mode, you don't get to, oh, we hope he's back soon. Remember, pay attention to bad news, not good news. You're seeking doctor's opinions because you don't know. You don't like the first few opinions.

You do not usually. I'm just putting this out there. When you see, oh, guy has a hamstring problem, they don't usually go seek like, no. Oh, no, what do I do? It's a hamstring issue. It's like rest it for a couple weeks. You get a great price on a car.

You don't go to five other dealerships. No, this is really bad. And so as of this moment, I'm expecting him to miss the beginning of the season. That's not based on like. No, I think for sure he will. But it's not based on absolute knowledge. That's what I'm saying is just my draft strategy. I am approaching it like I'm not going to have him at the beginning of the season if I'm going to make that selection.

Do these guys ever, this is a, you know, it's kind of funny, but it's a genuine question. When they have an injury like this and they go to the first doc and the doc's like, oh, surgery. No, no, no, I'm saying like everything, you'll be okay. It's a strain, you know, we're just a couple weeks. Are they still like, we need to make sure? No. No. No. If they get good news on the first one, they don't go to a follow-up doctor. Human nature. Yeah. George Kittle, very confident he won't start the season on the Pupp list, has a chance to play week one. What he means by that is he knows he's not going to miss the first four games, in which case he will not be starting on the pup. That's kind of how it was laid out. He's hopeful he's there for week one, but he is very confident. They won't place him on the guaranteed to miss a month worth of game.

That to me says if you're drafting George Kittle, which I don't blame you. Oh, it's easy. Grab another tight end. Are you going to say, Tondres? Yes, I am. See, we had this question. I 100%. I would draft if I'm taking Kittal, if I'm accepting the risk.

And they talked about because they're the Australia game, like they'll know he won't make the trip essentially. So you'll have. Can I make a counter argument for that? Sure. The counter argument isn't that Tongis can't perform well, Kittal, like in a very binary Kittle out, Tanges, in? I think that works out. The problem that I have with that strategy is that there could be a middle period of time where it's limited snaps for Kittal, therefore limited snaps for Tungis.

And because of the players that I like at the back of the draft and Isaiah likely is an option, right? I'd rather have somebody that I might, I might have two good players. Right. If you get Dalton Kincaid late, Isaiah likely late, Dallas Goddard late, all of a sudden come week four, Kittles back and rocking, and you still have someone with value. I don't mind that at all. I'm saying, like, you have a... Joanne Johnson?

I know I can tempt you with Joanne Johnson. Yeah. You're taking him over Tongis, aren't you? With Jordan Tyson's hamstring? The, yeah, probably. You don't you? I would. I do love Jewel Johnson.

But my point is like, if you know Kittle is out, like, Tongis is a free square in your draft. Like some other people might take Isaiah likely in round 10 or something like that. If you want to punt all the way to the end, Tonjus will be waiting for you. And if Kittle is out, this team with... Dot, dot, dot. Exactly. It's like, okay, well, if everything works out, it's great.

It's brand new Mike Evans. It's brand new second round rookie stribling. And Tonjus produces when George Kittle is out. And he's already familiar. I think Tongis would be a very strong start. That's fine. and I would say draft strategy-wise, if you have an IR spot, you don't need to use your draft, just draft Kittle.

No one is going to go and draft Tond just that didn't grab Kittle. In which case, it would be very vindictive if somebody did it. Yeah, but I would just wait until the draft is over, throw Kittle on your IR when that happens before we won. Yeah, and there you go. There's a Tundress plan I like. Tucker Kraft said the team will probably keep him on a snap count until halfway through the season.

He was out there practicing for the first time. Then there was like a quote about the wolves. Yeah, slap him on the butt, send him to the wolves. After the snap count. Yeah, I don't like that. It's going to be like the gray. I've been out with limited snaps. He can.

He absolutely can. He was dominant last year. I have personally been out in the sixth round on a player that I think gets off to a slow start. The fact that he is literally saying I'll probably be limited the first half of the year. Not that he can't just take one pass. You know, he doesn't have to be. out there for every step, but I will counter that by saying, like, look at Dalton Kincaid last year, the best yards per route run of all tight ends in the league. He just didn't play

enough snaps to be very, very valuable. And I don't know if I'm willing to wait half a year for Kraft to, you know, to be that. That's me personally. Kyle Munangai left practice early with an apparent right knee injury, believed to be fine after testing, but it's not been a good offseason for Monongai's health. more it looked like a high uncle sprain was heading his way but according to joe brady he's good to go so that's nice to hear and then this one i am the uh you saw the dj more play the um why oh yes the completely white yes and people were oh man wait you're talking about the one where he catches the ball wide open and he calls the defender to him yeah i'm just saying like he's wide open so he gets

a button and people are like yeah i told you dj more it's like you might be right about dj more but is not the play that that proves your thesis. All right, guys, I don't know. You tell me whether you want the button on this one, but Emeka Abuka underwent more testing and a specialist. Confirmed it was a toe sprain. He's stable. What I don't like is that they asked head coach Todd Bowles about his availability for week one, and he could not confirm right now that Emeka Abuka will be back there for week one, although they are optimistic. Turf toe can linger. Turf toe can really impact players.

It's always, it's silly and stupid because it sounds- Sprain, Jason. Yeah. They're not saying. No, I know, I know. It's not turf toe yet. Right. But if it comes out soon.

If it happens on grass, I don't think you can get turf toe. It has to be the big toe, right? Yeah. Yeah. So we don't know which of the little piggies it is. Not yet. Didn't we say we're going to remove the ring toe? We said we could.

I don't think we have to. In honor of Jaden Daniels, though. Oh. Nice. Nice. Oh, no, that's, you got to get the pinkies. for that one. Either way, you're going down to four. You've got to get down from five. You've got to

respect five. Naji Harris I own the number five. He's getting something. He's got ragrats. I don't remember the timing of this. Was this on the show yet? No, not on the show. This weekend it came out that Jaden Daniels' legal team told LSU that they can't.

Is that his mom? Sounds like it. It's his biggest fan for sure. They told LSU that they can't use his name and image likeness, that type of stuff because they let another quarterback wear number five. How to get everyone to turn on you immediately over stupid bull crap. Yeah, there's got to be some regret.

I want to see. I genuinely want to see. What are you doing? With all the bad pub, this would be the silliest thing. Does his ADP move? Does it move down just like a couple spots? I don't think it'll go there. I don't want to draft.

It won't go there, but you definitely have people who don't like it. Like this, I blame Shadour. Yes. You can't. Do you know how numbers work? There's only so many numbers, right? A jersey fits all the double-digit numbers. If you just because you threw a touchdown pass,

I know, I know, I know, I know he won a Heisman. I know. But like he wasn't even their best He didn't win a national title. I think Burroughs is. Yes, Burrough is out, but. Burrow won a national title. He went undefeated. His numbers were better.

This is for LSU. And they had already promised this recruit, which you should want your team to do well. They promised to recruit this number and the recruit didn't want to give it up. I'm not saying that you don't retire anybody's number ever. It's just it's a slippery slope of like how everybody's going to feel like they had a good career. And if you're Jane Daniels, how are you not like calling them up, be like, dude, make the number five proud. This is Michael Irving.

Michael Irving. Are you saying Irving? No, Michael Irving. Have you not heard Michael Irving? Michael Irvin. Oh, he's got me, Bucky Irving in now. Yeah, you just did it. Irvin.

All right. You're going to get everyone to turn the show off. It was with an I, but it was also with a G. Yeah. Get the. It wasn't. It wasn't. No, I wasn't doing a magic Johnson thing.

This was I with a G. My bat. Yeah. However. It is I. With an in. I know. Okay.

Gotcha. I'm just, I wasn't, I wasn't all the way to E and G. Anyways, he comes out and he's like, he was 88. His number should be retired. He's the best. Instead, he creates this. Oh, it's so smart. incredible legacy for 88 with the Cowboys and then Des Bryant and then C.D. Lamb.

This is like, welcome to the club of greats. Well, and he talks about it. He's like, you know what they do? They talk about it. When, when Des Bryant has a great thing, like, oh, shades of the great Michael Irving. Stop it. No. I will walk off of the set. Did you hear his Charlie Colar crap he was doing? It's Collar.

Collar and Irving. Is this how you felt when we were doing it? doing the, what was this stupid nickname? Darnell Anderson? Yeah, now I'm with you. Years later, I'm with you. That's a slippery slope. That was the best nickname ever.

My goodness. There you go. Naji Harris visiting with the Giants. I don't think we need to talk much about it until he signs there. Do you think that's just because Tyrone Tracy whiffed so hard on the blog? I would tell Tracy to not come back to work. Right into the blue tent. All right.

We'll take a break. We'll get into breakouts. Let's do it. Breakouts Joe Montana Montana Montana all right

we have all of our consensus breakout picks inside of the ultimate draft kit this is a great show opportunity for us to talk about individual breakout picks

that we are convicted about that we have faith in that we believe could help your team at a discount in fantasy drafts since we just talked about them multiple times

might as well I guess I'll start it off. My breakout pick is Isaiah likely. Okay. Isaiah likely. I can see why you wouldn't draft Jake Tongis. Yeah, there you go. I mean, you're going to get a 10th, 11th, 12th round value on Isaiah likely.

He's one of the highest paid tight ends per year on average. And I think we're suffering from unmet, unfulfilled promises with Isaiah likely in days gone by. The truth of the matter is he's one of the most gifted athletic tight ends. They went out and spent the money to bring him into New York. And while I have my concerns about this offense and Matt

Nagy and the offense clicking and dart behind center, I think likely is one of the most obvious, clear like discounts and values in fantasy football. We've seen great moments from him. We've seen him

dominate in zone threat and every single bit of news about this team and what they're saying is he's going he's been the number one target without neighbors on the field and I think the capability is is there I think likely is the most obvious late round pick that's going to I believe be in every week easy start you know when John Harbaal was talking about his confidence on Isaiah likely they asked him specifically about high volume in this offense and he said look the numbers that you're talking about the stats that you're talking about, that wasn't part of the thing in Baltimore because of the supporting cast. He said it's going to be a big year. And I know he said positive things about

likely before, but the truth of the matter was he had to share a lot of opportunities with Mark Andrews and the rest of this offense. To me, likely is going to be a breakout sans injury in year one in New York. It's been the theme of spring and summer. I'm excited about it. And we've seen a lot of tight ends be the late bloomer type of situations where you know you had guys like Greg Olson not really blossom until he switched teams going to Carolina you saw darren waller his first fantasy season was at 27 years old Kelsey at 27 years old you didn't get in a joku delivering big performance until his seventh season so right place right time to me it's a home run. The reason he's on this show is because he just narrowly missed being a my guy for me.

So that's the level of conviction I have around Isaiah Eichly. The drum beat for him, I think it's been there. It hasn't been loud in your face like some of the other players that are just really getting buzz. I mean, Jake Ferguson's going ahead of him, Mike. No, the ADP is fine. I'm saying I'm, I like it. I think of a late round tight end that could really make a jump, a team that, you know, unless Malik Neighbors is ready to go 100% in week one, you don't know who the top target earner on the team is going to be. Could easily be Isaiah Likely. And what I can say underneath, there really has been buzz about him.

It's just not loud, you know, including the, we, Jason and I interviewed Dart. Isaiah likely was kind of the only player he talked about when we asked him about targets. And then there's been little blurbs here and there that I'm surprised haven't elevated his ADP. So he's sitting at a point where I think he is a very low risk, high upside guy. I don't know if I'm convinced it will happen, but in the market, in range of outcomes, there is definitely one where Isaiah likely ends up as the guy who jumps into the top five. What about the fact that Matt Nagy, while we hate him most places, he does involve tight ends more than we usually like.

Sure. He loves getting Jono Smith the ball. Yeah, I mean, I just think that it's going to be a pretty, like Mike, Mike put it best, this is a chance for high upside late in your draft. Yeah. Where it, you know, it's not that, you know, we love Colston Loveland. I love Ty Warren. The crafting is tough.

I love him, but if he's limited snaps, that's tough. But like there's a world where like the gap between Isaiah likely's performance. and some of those guys may not be as big as you think, but you do have to sacrifice a lot to pull the trigger on Loveland early. Yes, you do. So it's just something to think about. But there's, I mean, there's other late round tight-end names we've brought up multiple times,

like Goddard is another one that I think will be involved. But I think likely is a really interesting play in this new offense despite the, and I think that there's going to be some growing pains for dart in this offense, but likely is going to be, you know, we saw it. We saw it last year with Theo Johnson, that he built a rapport with this tight-in. in right away. And it's interesting because Hayden Weeks pointed out like when he played,

all the plays that likely came in on were passing downs. He never put his hand in the dirt once. Theo Johnson was in there blocking for the blocking down. So I think he'll be a targeted receiver in this often. And you do, it's just like a little bonus for him of like if Dart continues to get exploded on the field, waiting in the wings, guys, James Winston. Oh, that I mean, I mean, the odds have seen James this year feel very hot. And if James comes in, I will not have any concerns for any of my past catchers. Yeah, we want them routes for the tight ends. I think you'll see a ton of them from likely.

So that's my breakout pick. Jason, Mike, who wants to go next? I'll jump in here. It is a player that I think the three of, like, oh, this guy took the nation by storm last year. and I think as a show, all three of us, we were pretty hesitant because it's a seventh round rookie running back. Everyone's so excited. Bill, Bill, Bill Crosky. He became like the bit of the show. It was a good time.

This one's so interesting to me, Mike, because we are post-hype season of last year. Yes. And you keep coming. I feel like the way it's gone is this offseason. You haven't been like trying to chase JCM. You just keep coming. bat to a place where you bring his name up. I spent most of the offseason of like, hey, they had to Rashad White. Could he end up being the guy? And, you know, just the way I'm reading the situation right now, it sounds like the team really just, they want it to be Bill Kroski-merit.

And the ADP is shocking to me on Sleeper. Bill Kroski is going as the running back 37, which is, in fact, lower than he was last year, around this time. Like that, that is absurd. The people are so mad at Bill. He was... Which, what, Ackler was around last year? Yeah, and Echler was a huge part of why I wasn't sure that Bill could take over as the

seventh runner, but then of course, Echler goes down to the Achilles in week two. But Bill, for what he was able to put on the field, he was very efficient. Over the first five games, you were seeing an average of 6.6 yards per carry. And then honestly, the whole team falls apart. You have Jane Daniels injuries. Things are just, the other guys are getting injured all over the place, like Terry missing time. It just really didn't work out for Washington.

And Bill struggled mightily. But towards the end of the season, you know, the final three games, we had an 18 for 96 with a touchdown. It's against the Giants. That's not great. As in, like, people are beating up on the Giants. But he's taking what's there. The week 17 against Dallas, 11 for 105.

He had, he has the juice. On a high note. And we knew he had the juice. His highlights are, like this is, he's one of the few running backs that at any point could rip off the 40-yard touchdown. He has that ability. He's going lower than last year. It's insane.

Interesting. Washington, Washington should be a, at least middle, you know, to an upper echelon offense. I still believe in Jane Daniels, despite his. thinking he owns the number five. And this is an ambiguous situation. You know what he doesn't own? Oh, you are.

Yeah. We're watching you. I think you're going to get 55. But it's like Chicago, Jacksonville, Minnesota, and Washington. These are the more potent potential offenses. That is, their running backs are going

outside of the top 24. These are the players that can change the balance. Yeah, we want, I want to hit my fourth rounder and all this stuff. I want to find the late round running back that can come in here and really stabilize my team, if not take it to the next level. They've been expressing, we need him to get better with the ball out of his hands and talk of like, we don't want to have pigeonholed running backs. We don't want to when Bill's out there, the defense, oh, they're going to run it. And when White is out there,

they're going to throw. This is something that Washington does not want to happen, which sounds like if Bill takes the job, that's potentially a three-down running back. So that's very, very exciting for going as the running back 37. Crodd is gone, so he doesn't have, you know, that type of competition at the goal line. Seems like he should get that no matter what. So I'm very interested in his ADP, and I'm very interested in what Bill could turn a three. The Crodd point is really interesting because he was very effective down there and got a lot of opportunities. Super effective.

To be fair, that is what Andrew said. I know, but it didn't need to be repeated. You don't need to beat that. I didn't realize how bad what he said was. I just knew he misspoke. And I had to call him out on it. And then I realized that's very bad. Leave this same, but you got to beep him.

That's very, very bad. I take 20%. Fowls are very important. I take 20%. You're telling me, I said it like, Yeah, you did. You did. You did. You did. You guys are nodding like you're right. We all heard it. You're nodding like you're telling the truth. I don't believe you. Yeah. No, I, that's no way to know. There's no way. We'll never be able to tell if you had actually said it that way first or not. All I know is that whatever way Jason said was worse. Yes. I will agree with that because I hit it a little harder. I mean, you, you, you tripped into your own trap. trapped into your trap. Yeah, well.

Is this show still on the air? Do we have to mark this episode differently? We have the technology to push through. Oh my goodness. Never before. I'm 12 years of shows. I'm sorry, everybody. Back to Bill. I just have

a question. Okay. If this is the only, I know you didn't bring this up, and this was basically you've made all the arguments for why Bill's a good breakout pick. He can do it. This office blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. I actually think the only reason that you like him is because your argument for why Bucky Irving was a breakout was just simply because you were betting against Rashad White. You're like, he's not good.

It really was the crux of the end. The higher argument. Is that what's happening here? It's just like you just have to compete with Rashad White who's not that good. It, I mean, look, if you want three and a half yards, Rashad White's your dude. If you want four and a half yards, he's not. I'm not even listening to the show anymore. What?

All right, Jason, it's time to talk about your breakout. This is one that I think you might stand alone in this studio on because I want it known that I do. I want it known that I do stand alone on this. And I'm looking at you, Mike. I stand alone. You are to the lowest. You have a running back 26. I'm very out.

Yeah, you're out. Shooketh. So, um, what an honest guy, I, I am going this is calling balls and strikes guys. I'm going against the grain. It feels contrarian, which is a little weird, but my breakout. Not 80s wise. Well, a little bit, a little bit in both directions. I'll explain. My breakout is Trayvion Henderson, uh, an absolute. Please be right. Dynamo of a running back. An explosive, you know, anytime he touches the ball, he can house it. He can get a touchdown. He had a, he had a, very weird rookie year, right? The first two months of the season, he was not used. He was basically like he didn't get the, he didn't get nine touches a game. He was kind of a gadgety guy, the rookie being brought along slowly despite the fact that he was almost first round pick.

He was like super high second round pick. The draft capital was there. The explosiveness, we still saw it in those, in those plays, but it took Ramandre going down to an injury before he really got to explode. However, once he was a part of the offense, it was a, clear working strategy. He was dominant. He was very, very good. In fact, during that time from week nine on, he was the running back nine,

averaging 16.7 fantasy points per game. When it happened, he was a monster. Yeah, his rookie season, he... Not to be confused with remonster. Correct. Correct. Not to be confused with a monster. Yeah.

You can hit it. People don't really like that one. but here's the thing he he was good i know i've heard i know i've heard andy say i don't like how he looked between the tackles or whatever but the truth is he was a very good running back he was extremely efficient of 55 qualifying running backs with 80 or more rushing attempts he was number one in yards before contact six and yards per carry 12th and explosive rush rate at 5.6 that was identical to bejean robinson he had four touchdown runs of 50 or more

yards last year, most of the NFL. So this is a guy you want the ball in his hands. And they gave him work inside the 10. He, you know, Romandre had 16 10 zone rush attempts. Trayvion had 21. How good was his rookie year? He had 1100 total yards and 10 rushing touchdown or 10 total touchdowns. He did that on only 215 touches. He's a good running back. He's a good player. He's explosive. The argument against him is, is Ramandre Stevenson. That is the whole argument against him is that he's going to be behind them. And it should be an easy argument to overcome, but I fear that it has become. And totally.

And that's why he's not being drafted in the first or second round. He was a rookie running back who averaged over five yards per carry, had a 50 plus percent rush success and 10 touchdowns. Since the year 2000, which is amazingly over a quarter of a century ago. I don't believe you. Oh, I know. I felt bad when I realized that. The only guys who have done that in their rookie season is Clinton Portis, Zeke, Camara, Jonathan Taylor, and A-chan, and then now Trayvion Henderson.

You say that Henderson is being drafted super high like he's broken out, but he's actually, his ADP is so far beyond what those other guys year two were. Those other guys were all first-round picks or A-chan was a second-round pick the following year. We're talking to 4-11, almost a fifth-round pick here for Trayvion-Hinderson. and I realize he's in a timeshare, but, but Jason, you know, the times share is a big deal. Except the fact that, like, those other guys that I just mentioned, Camara, he was with Mark Ingram, who had 12 rushing touchdowns and was the running back six his rookie year. H.N. was with Moster, who had, he was the running back two with like 20 touchdowns.

Yeah, it's, the point that I am saying is, sorry, let me give you your ex-exam. Is that this is the type of player that you have to take a shot on to truly be a breakout candidate. That's true. You have to call your shot that the backfield just won't stay the same. And that's what we have seen over and over. Nick Chubb was an explosive guy, but he was bare, you know, it was like Carlos Hyde. That was a big problem. Then they traded him away.

Camara with Ingram, James Cook with Devon Singletary. He sounds silly afterwards. But in that year, Gibbs and Monty. It was like, when there is the most. more explosive special player with high draft capital, they're going to end up getting the work. And honestly, we saw it last year. This is the thing that I think what happened in the playoffs when they played these unfathomably great defenses. I mean, their run of playoff to get to the Super Bowl. They played Super D, Super D, Super D. And Ramandre was the guy on the field. I get that.

But when Ramandre came back from injury during Trevo's rookie season from weeks 12 on, they gave Henderson 13.3 rushing attempts per game. And they gave Ramandre 7.8. Like the switch happened. You get to the playoffs. You go, oh, we got to do the trusted. They play defense. They didn't score a lot of points.

It was a great strategy. I think as a full season goes on, your most explosive player is going to get the ball more than than remandre. And if that does happen, and that has to happen to pay off at 411. But if Trayvon Henderson ends up at the end of the year with the 60-40 opportunity count over Ramandre, he's going to be a great pick, a top back. So I'm calling him a breakout player now because next year, if he broke out, you just go, oh, I mean, that was a great pick. there's only one of two directions it goes.

I don't think there's a world where he is exactly what you're drafting him as right now. Okay. Personally. Yeah, I think it's a tough situation to see what happened in his rookie year because you had his three first, his first three productive games were when Ramandre missed. And then Ramandre was limited in practices and stuff coming back. And they obviously were kind of, they showed what they wanted to do when they got to the playoffs, in my opinion.

So to me, there is a world where he's the exact same thing. And I worry about his past protection. There's nothing about him to me that says three down back. Just me personally, from what I saw in the field. I think he's a compliment back. I think he's an explosive guy. But the reports in the off season have been really negative about his past protection.

They have. And Ramondre is the thing that nobody wants to say out loud is that he's a really good running back. We were willing to say it when Trevo didn't exist, when he got a contract extension. and we were excited about him then. Now he just represents a thorn in the side of this other sexier guy that we like. But the team said, in my opinion, they said in the playoffs that Ramandre is their number one running back. I think Romandre is a very good running back.

I'm not afraid to say that. This isn't like Rashad White where I'm going, all he's got to do is beat Ramandre and that's so easy. My point is more David Montgomery was a good running back. Mark Ingram was a good running back. these other guys in these really good offenses time shares are good running backs. The more explosive, the better running back can be great for fantasy. And I'm surprised. They have to be the better.

That's the rub. I don't know that he has to be better. He has to duplicate being that explosive and efficient and hitting that many big plays. Yeah. And the thing is, is how do you look at the Patriots offense? Like I know, Andy, you've been very, very bullish on Drake May being legit, being a top quarterback in the league from what he did last year. He was an MVP candidate, got to the Super Bowl. You are a believer that it's real.

If this offense ends up as one of those top five or six offenses in the league, I don't think it takes a complete Belkow total volume going to Henderson to be really successful. However, there is the world where, I mean, Ramandre has missed 10 games in the last three years. He's not been a pillar of health. When he went down last year, you say you don't have evidence of him being able to be a bell cow. Well, in those four games, he was. I didn't say that. You said, I didn't say anything about him having, I said I don't see him as a three down back in the NFL, which is why his, I didn't say, I didn't have evidence of it. I said I don't see that being his

prototypical what you're going to see on a regular basis. Anybody can be forced into that if their leader if the lead back gets hurt. I mean you basically said I didn't say the word evidence. You said we haven't had anything to make us believe it. Let's go to the tape.

I mean we, because you said I can't quote you correctly. You said we haven't seen anything to make us believe as a three down back. But in those four games, in those four games, he was on pace for three hundred and four opportunities. different than you. I can tell you that I don't think that he's a three down back in the NFL and his draft picks as that. You're also allowed to like what you say, stand by what you say and

not change it 10 minutes later. I didn't change it. I didn't say he wasn't. The nice thing is we have a tape. I have evidence. There's no evidence. I said I don't see him as a three down back. And the team doesn't. That's why they don't play him on third down very often sometimes because Ramandre can pass protect. You don't like it that I have a different opinion. And that's okay. nothing to do with what I'm saying is that Ramon, who's the number one running back on the team?

Ramondre. Okay. What is the number one running back mean? Careys? It means the guy that they look to when, when, yeah, I mean, I think carries. I think at the end of the year, Henderson has more carries. Mike Vrabel's a big part of the equation.

They're a successful team that went to the Super Bowl with this recipe. Ramondre Stevenson is a Vrabel type guy. He does the dirty work. They love him. They throw him the football. No, Brable loves dirty work. He was great in the passing game. I like Ramandre.

We've got to have a bet here. And the bet that I think you will easily... The bet that I think you will easily take and easily lose. I'm sorry, I shared a different opinion. That is not what I'm saying. My God. I'm sorry. You are on one.

We will check the tape. Yeah, we will. The bet that I think you will definitely take is when they are both healthy, like if they're both playing in the game, total carries on the season. carries per game, I think Henderson has more than a remandre, which would make him I'm fine with that. I don't really

like the situation right now, but I'll give you that. Waterbet. Injury is notwithstanding, of course. That's what I said, when they're both playing in games played, I think Henderson leads the back to in rushing attacks. It's your pick. You can have them as a breakout. I do. I'm sorry for filling in

the other side. I hope you're right, Jason. Thanks. Mike is also on my side just quietly. on the side that he doesn't have a confidence. He's playing both sides. He's hoping on one and believing on the other. We'll take a break and talk mailbag. Mailbag. Ooh, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to do it.

Yeah, you were voiceless. I'm glad you didn't come in on Friday. That would have been a mucous fest. Did you hear Matt's mailbag? No. You didn't hear what happened? It was really exactly as you expect. No, we don't.

That's bad. The situation that happened might, just to give you the quick TLDR is that Mike, Jason, I gave Jason the power to choose who does the mailback. Okay. He chose Matt. When Matt was given the chance to do the mailbag, he was dead silent. He didn't say anything.

He was trying to set these guys up to help him, and then he just was quiet to try to sell him down the river. So then I said, I'm not hitting the drop again. You're doing the music and the drop. And he did an effort at that. He did try to do that. Well, I'll have to check it out. All right.

If you have a question for the show, we're here to help. Go to the website, the Fantasy Footballers.com. Click to submit a question button or dial our voicemail outline 302464 TFFB. YouTube question from Josh. Who is usually the first to lock in all three of their my guys? Is there an answer to that? I don't think there is one. I feel like I did use some lock.

I think you are the one that locks someone in the earliest. Like you usually have an offseason like this year. Alex Pierce from the get-go was going to be until recently when he hasn't been able to get healthy. But I think most years, Mike Evans for you one year was super early. Like all off-season you were locked.

Jameson Williams was like an all. You always have one guy that you're like very early and never sway on. I don't know that. I feel like you might have had yours down before anybody this year. Yeah. Or Mike did. I would say most years there isn't really an answer to this

that's universal. It's just. It's not great to lock. I mean, we give that advice to our listeners. Like, you want to stay water. So, like, that was actually one of the things I think we probably brought up in the, you know, maybe not in 10 things to remember, but basically, like, I want to wait a while because you can feel great about a situation in the personnel, the draft, all that stuff happens.

I want to remember. Don't trade George Pickens, my guys, to Jason. Yeah, because he was yours for a long time. Yeah. Because that dude was on the board forever. Eric in Iowa City, Iowa, when considering strength of schedule, why do you put so much emphasis on weeks one through six rather than the entire season? Well, number one, you want hot starts and fantasy football.

It's silly, but this is the human part of the game, the emotion of waiting so long to see a player. And if someone has two awesome weeks, then it, hey, this is probably going to be a successful season. If they have two terrible weeks, they're a bust and there's panic in the streets. also with the changeover of just defense, this is all we have to go on right now. I can't project the entire season of how a defense is going to go. The team that stinks against tight ends, they will reveal themselves to us over the course of the season. It may not be the same people. Yeah, I would also suggest look at the end of the year roster and then look at your draft.

And more than likely it will be surprising like, oh, wow, I only drafted these three guys. You have a lot of changes. The season is long. Trades, you know, swaps on the way or whatever. Getting off to a hot start will allow you to make trades high to grab people who get off to a slow start and do better there. So certainly getting off to a good beginning to the season is very valuable in fantasy. Debra in Jonesboro, Tennessee. When is it a bad idea to reach for a player in your draft?

top five or would you go six rounds i feel like after five right around after that everyone has their warts so you know if there's a player in the who's a dp say is in the seventh but i'm in the fifth and it's like i got a i got a bad feeling in my gut that someone's going to take him i'll just take that player then but right around the five six round is where it starts to break open. The top of drafts in ADP are pretty good. Like, statistically, historically, historically, especially in the last five years, people get things right more than they don't. Obviously, when you get to the later rounds, it's a scatter shot. So when you, when you reach too far in those early rounds, you're usually going to be making a mistake. And the thing is, is, in those early

rounds. ADP is more established towards not just that you're making a mistake and grabbing a worse player over a better. Even if you reach and that guy is correct, you're not getting the value you could get by getting him the next round or, you know, obviously if he falls all the way to his ADP,

you're just not getting the most value you can. Jeff and Madison, Wisconsin, I haven't heard much talk about the Dread and R.B. Dead Zone. Where would you say the Dead Zone falls this year, Mike? So we did just briefly start. talking about it. I had a whole thing that released on Saturday about the running back dead zone

on just the tips. You can go listen to it from this last weekend, but it's back. You know, the thing that we have seen, and we're going to be talking about this on Wednesday as well, is that running backs this year, because of the health of the last couple years, have been pushed up more than it was a couple of years ago. It's always there. It just kind of shifts where it is inside the draft. We'll talk about it in detail here in a couple days. All right. I was going to say, I think it probably starts.

And look, I love Scatibu, but I think right around there is where you start. You have guys where you're either concerned about the team or you're concerned about the timeshare. All right, we have sleepers on tomorrow's episode. Wednesday we'll cover the 10 tips and tricks. We'll have bus and values and a mayhem mock draft with my. back in the building. Yeah. He was just afraid of the mayhem.

Oh, I was. He's terrified. He's very afraid. He's very afraid. All right, don't forget the UDK for Life giveaway. Pick it up. Take my thorough flu away from me. Yeah.

The drafts are here. Ultimate draft kit.com. We'll talk to you tomorrow. Goodbye. Thank you for listening to another episode of the fantasy footballers podcast. Join our fantasy football community on join thefoot.com. And follow us on Twitter. The FFF Ballers.