Fantasy Footballers - Fantasy Football Podcast - The TRUTH: Top 10 Fantasy QBs + Most Surprising Teams - Fantasy Football Podcast for 1/18

Episode Date: January 18, 2024

Can you handle the TRUTH? On today’s fantasy football podcast, a closer look at the top quarterback finishers of the 2023 season! Consistency rankings and tons more! Get the TRUTH about how these players actually impacted fantasy football teams. Manage your redraft, keeper, and dynasty fantasy football teams with the #1 fantasy football podcast. -- Fantasy Football Podcast for January 18th, 2024. Connect with the show: Subscribe on YouTube Visit us on the Web Support the Show Follow on Twitter Follow on Instagram Join our Discord Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by McDonald's. Monopoly is back at McDonald's, everybody. This is an alert. It's time to get back to Mickey D's. Monopoly Double Play is back at McDonald's, and it's easy to get into the win. First, you peel on pack, and then again in the app. There are millions of prizes to be won,

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Welcome in. Thursday, January 18th, the Fantasy Footballers Podcast. Mike Wright, Jason Moore, Andy Holloway. Back with you. You know who won't be back? Pittsburgh? Pittsburgh. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's fair. That's fair, just as Jason prophesied. I mean, it was tough to predict, but sometimes we get some things right. So we begin today with our first truth episode of the offseason, which is always a very anticipated set of episodes. We are going to take a deep dive into the performance of the quarterback position this year.

And the truth can be hard to hear sometimes. You're not going to like the truth today. You may not like it. I will say this. Going through, preparing all these docs, looking at how we score these truth metrics, I did not like it. I was like, this is... No, you were in physical discomfort. I was super upset. I'm like, no, this is wrong. Lie to me.

Yeah, exactly. This can't be the truth? Yeah, but we'll get into it here in a couple minutes, but it's a little unsettling. Let me ask you this, and you can just tease it because we will. We'll break it all down. Did anything you discovered in your journeys that we're going to share change how you'll draft the quarterback position next year?

I think it did, yeah. Okay. But I'm not saying yet. Yeah, he thinks it did. We'll find out. Yeah. But I'm not saying yet. Yeah. He thinks it did. We'll find out. A couple things at the top. Welcome in.

We want to thank everybody that's been supporting the show by heading over to footclanvote.com. There's some award. There's a new one. Mike is. No, there's a new one. This is important stuff. This one is actually important. Well, they're all important. No, they're not.

They're all important because I love to win anything it sustains my my life meter and gotta get some wins in there so there is the the sports podcast or so that that fan vote is still going but the the fsga which is essentially one of the two like large fantasy sports associations. They do a best social media award that has never not been won by the fantasy footballers.

And we don't want to start losing now. So you must go to footclan vote.com and click on that vote now. Continue the FSGA. The dynasty? Yeah, but look, the Foot Clan's undefeated. You guys want, you're listening. You want to be a loser? Yeah, yeah, put it on them.

You don't want to be a loser. Go win. Nothing better than shaming your fans. No, I'm saying they, you guys are undefeated. Stay undefeated. This is my pep talk. And where do they go, Jason? FootClanVote.com.

All right. All right. Quick question of the day. It's a good one. I'm curious your answer. Which NFL team this year ended up being the most different from how you envisioned them before the 2023 season? And I think it's a good question. I personally tried to go away from the, you know,

From Jason's answer? The surprise team because, you know, I view, I mean, that's fine. A surprise team fits the bill for that, for sure. I wanted to pick a team that was, that we had kind of forecasted the way that they would operate and a team that kind of flipped that on its head. And it still ended up doing a lot of things for fantasy managers, but in a different way. And for me, that was the Dallas Cowboys because a lot of the offseason was dominated by the transition from a high-flying Kellen Moore.

Why would you get rid of this guy offense? Right? A lot of negative things were said about Mike McCarthy and what we expect the offense to be. Because he was telling us some things. He was like the quote of, we got to keep the offense out there or whatever it was like. We're scoring too fast.

We're scoring too fast, so we're making our defense tired and kind of letting on that. No, we're going to be a high T, run the ball as many times as we possibly can. Well, yeah, I mean, a high T. They brought in Brian Cornelius Schottenheimer as the – Is that the middle name for it? No. All right.

That's a Kyle special right there. Thank you, Kyle. And, I mean, he's a run the ball guy. He's a Tony Pollard system. So all the bullets on the outline of the Dallas Cowboys in the offseason said, you know, Tony Pollard Dallas Cowboys in the off season said, you know, is Tony Pollard would be given every opportunity. I think we were a little surprised that they didn't bring in a,

you know, another bigger back to compliment and do the Zeke role when he departed. But there was a lot of concern about Dax potential production and CD lambs involvement in the passing offense and whether Brandon cooks made any sense because they wouldn't throw the ball as much. And, and it, you know, real really was the opposite. I mean, Pollard was one of the biggest busts. I mean, I think if our footy award didn't go to Eckler, it was going to Pollard in terms of early draft capital invested in a running back. And then if you had the Dak CeeDee stack from the middle of the season on,

you were probably in your title game and you likely won it. So from a passing success standpoint, it was much better. It consolidated to what Dak could do and CeeDee could do in the offense. And to me, that was different than we envisioned. It was definitely different. I'm now remembering the way that the McCarthy Dallas Cowboys era started, it started on the foundation of a lie. Do you guys remember this? Where he, like his first press conference. Oh, yes, I remember.

When he's watching all the film. Yeah, he told Jerry Jones he had broke down all the film, and he signs on the line, gets all the cash secured, and then his first media appearance, he's like, oh, I didn't watch the film at all. Yeah, he goes, I have to- Oh, you're a dirty liar. I have to tell the truth.

I lied about that. Yeah, that was- So we should have known at that point. McCarthy, known liar. Yeah. So real quick, before you give me your team, then just to follow up there with McCarthy, do you want him to stay? Yes.

Like as a fantasy manager, we do that. We want that, right? For fantasy, yeah, I think I do. Yeah, I mean. Big McCarthy fans over there. You too. You've got to give credit. I'm hesitant, but yeah.

Yeah, their offense was great until the playoffs. So the team that I went with is a lot of people's team, right? Like, the Houston Texans were a huge surprise. America's team. America's team. That's right. From, uh,

from Texas team in Texas. Yeah. Uh, how does it feel? But the way that it was surprising and the preseason prognostication, really the only player you look at ADP that anyone wanted from the Texans was Damian Pierce. Like that's the only one that's going to do anything.

Whoops. Yeah. It was Damian Pierce and no one else. He was the only one that's going to do anything. Whoops. Yeah, it was Damian Pierce and no one else. He was the only one that didn't do anything. Everyone else was great. I mean, obviously, C.J. Stroud was a revelation, but Nico Collins was great. Tank Dell? Yes, sir.

Noah Brown? Sure. Dalton Schultz? Dalton Schultz, heck yeah. Devin Singletary just not the only player that you drafted in Damian Pierce and and you know the historical data on a rookie quarterback oh since 2004 70% of the time they don't have a single top 36 wide receiver so you kind of avoided these receiving options in in Nico Collins and Tank Dell,

at least in high draft capital situations. It was so the opposite. C.J. Stroud's the first rookie ever to support two top 15 wide receivers in points per game. Tank Dell and Nico Collins were just stars. And I don't know how much of them. CJ Stroud led the NFL in yards per game. Yeah, I mean, he was unbelievable.

As a rookie. Yeah. This is, I mean, for better or for worse, with the rookie season that Justin Herbert had and then the rookie season that CJ Stroud had, like, people are going to take their shots at some of these rookie quarterback situations, which they probably should.

Because the price you paid for Nico Collins or Tank Dell or Dalton Schultz was nothing. Well, the question is just, will you be able to pay that same price and take the shot? Or will this kind of success mean that the consensus will try to take the shot, which means it costs more? What do you think, Mike? Who is the team that was the most different from what you envisioned? So they weren't necessarily the most different, but they exceeded the expectation.

Everything that you thought about the Lions was there were options there. You know, Jameer Gibbs was like a fourth rounder. Montgomery was a guy that we liked all offseason, was going in the seventh or eighth. This is a late round running back that you can get who should be. He'll have some spike weeks. But it was like the skill players on Detroit were incredible. They weren't just good for fantasy football.

They were fantastic. Jameer Gibbs, you know, once the breakout happened, was one of the best running backs in the league. Both him and Montgomery were top 12 running backs in points per game. Amin Ra went from like, oh, he's a Keenan Allen consistent guy. If I'm in a PPR, I'm so stoked to have Amon Ross, my wide receiver, too. He went from that to a true dominant number one wide receiver who was winning weeks. He was nominated for the playoff king. I mean, yet again, I think we should just expect this now

from Amon Ross at the end of the year. But you have that, Sam Laporta, the tight end one as a rookie, that's essentially impossible. We had some really impossible stuff happen between Stroud and Laporta this year. And then Jared Goff was what you expected, but he was actually a bit better, a bit better. There was a few more spike weeks and some really heavy spike weeks that you could foreshadow on a more consistent

basis. So they impressed me. And so since 2000, this is the only team with two top 12 fantasy running backs, a top five wide receiver, and a top five tight end. The Saints back in the day were close, but this was an output that you would hope for, but just exceeded all expectations. And we'll talk more about golf because we'll be talking about quarterback truth today and on our next episode as well. So quick jump into the news.

News and notes from around the league. First episode, since we have the opportunity to talk about the Monday Night Games. Buffalo handled Pittsburgh. Mike Tomlin exited quickly from the press conference. Yeah, so I'll respond to that. So Pittsburgh actually, I thought they did better than I thought they would. Throwing that interception early in the game in the red zone, in the end zone. Yes.

Disrupted their real opportunity to steal that one. We had a 14-point victory for Buffalo, and it was a seven-point game. There was a chance that Pittsburgh could have come back, but Buffalo pulled away. the I've seen the reactions to Mike Tomlin's uh rapid exit from smoke bomb from the uh the post game media conference there which we have part of the news here is that Mike Tomlin has informed the team he will be back for 2024 so those rumblings are gone but I saw a lot of people getting onto uh getting on a Tomlin for leaving with that question, but you're like, he's a human being who just had a devastating playoff loss, and you're like, hey, what are you going to do next year? I get you're a professional, so you need to be able to handle those types of questions,

but stop asking those questions. Those are garbage questions. Those are fine. No, those are garbage. Jason has a different opinion. I'm totally stop asking those questions. Those are garbage questions. Those are fine. No, Jason has a different opinion. I'm totally on the other side. Those are garbage. No, they're doing their job. They're reporting.

They want to know. And it's like that to me is such a just natural question. I would have asked the question. I would have been like, are you back next year? How do you feel? Why is that an off-limits question? To me, whether you think it's dumb or not, it's dumb to not expect it. That's what I would say.

Yes, I can agree with that. Any head coach with a long tenure that knows his own contract should not be surprised at what they receive relationally to that. I mean, Belichick knew he would receive those questions, and I believe he just said something like, yeah, we just got done with this game. And, you know, he just kind of, he played the, he played the game.

That's, that's what was overtly angry. And I, I actually don't know what, what came before. I don't know if that was the third time he got that question or if he got it before the game or whatever. So I give him a pass because whatever, you know, he's, he's Mike Tomlin. Maybe the question didn't hit at the right time, but you've got to be... You can't be shocked at their asking. No, don't be shocked.

But find better questions. That's what I'm saying. Like how Tampa will deal with the weather in Detroit? Oh man, that was so sad. Would you say that that's a good question to ask? I's a great question.

I would say on the foundation, it seemed like a well-researched and well-intended question. There was just one small, just a teeny tiny detail that was missed. If you are not familiar with what we are alluding to, the question was asked to Todd Bowles about how they're going to prepare for the cold weather in Detroit. Who plays in a dome and has played in a dome forever. His answer

was so funny because not only does he kind of roll his eyes at it and be like, you know they're playing a dome, but then when he specifically is like, we'll only be outside for like 30 seconds when we go from the bus to the inside. We'll be okay. I don't think we're going to prepare.

Those are the kind of questions that you... No, I want better questions. Those are the type of questions I would be asking. Oh my God. Oh yeah, whoops. They're not active. How do you survive that question though in your journalism career?

You just got to move on. Do you exit immediately? Do you just say, goodbye? You are very thankful that Bowles was kind. Yeah, he was. He could have just destroyed that person. That was a turtle shirt situation. Please hide in your shirt.

All right. Tampa Bay just absolutely wanted it more is what I'm going to say. Philadelphia, the end of the season from a 10-1 team to losing 6-7, they lose 32-9. There was an energy from Green Bay this week against Dallas. There was an energy from Green Bay this week against Dallas there was an energy from Tampa Bay against Philadelphia that those NFC East teams they couldn't match it this week you know Tampa tackled better Tampa you know they fought for the extra yard like I give so much credit to Todd Bowles who talk about like a short stick so to speak when. Sure. When you lose Brady, you've had these years in New York

and just opportunities to win that you couldn't. You didn't have personnel. Their amount of dead cap was astronomical. So it's a huge testament to the coaching staff in Tampa preparing the team to everybody involved. Baker Mayfield, congratulations on kind of a maturation process here. This is not the same guy that we saw a year ago when he looked like what Bryce Young looked like in Carolina.

I mean, he was brought in just to compete with Kyle Trask. He wasn't brought in to be the starter, and he just owned it. He owned this season. He's still playing in to be the starter, and he just owned it. He owned this season. He's still playing in the playoffs. And it's funny because I saw people complaining about the blowouts in the playoffs this week and like, what are you going to do about this NFL? It's like two of these blowouts was the non-favorite teams. What do you mean?

What are you going to do about it? This is great competition. And it's great TV when you're sitting there and you're going, what is happening? I think I tweeted, like, the NFL is great for a lot of reasons. But one of them is that these things can happen any given week. You know, the line between a good team and an underdog, like it just seems like any given week somebody can break through. And these were trouncings.

Yeah, and I'm with Jason. They were, despite the score and knowing the game is over, it was still fascinating. The machine of the Green Bay Packers offense against the Dallas defense, which saw a bunch of the super sharps breaking down personnel and just how badly the Dallas Cowboys defense got outcoached from a personnel standpoint. You're like, why is Aaron Jones just every time he touches the ball,

he's getting at least five yards? And it was, well, Green Bay recognized that Dallas kept staying small against their big guys and just how effective and incredible Green Bay was. And the same for Tampa. It was really fun to watch. And, you know, we'll get into it. We've got a whole off-season of shows. But the Philadelphia situation is going to be one that is tumultuous at best.

They have so many free agents. Jason Kelsey is leaving. That relationship, that departure, the tush push and all of that. Which got stopped. Is that why he's retiring? Oh, it was like once they stop it, I'm out? Yeah. Maybe. It's like, fine, I'm not playing anymore.

Did he walk off the field then and actually turn in the paperwork? I believe Tampa also stopped it. Dear God, they stopped us. I think Tampa stopped it the last time too. It was like week three or whenever they played. So they've got the secret. Apparently the secret is Vita Vea. Have a big, gigantic, awesome nose tackle.

Yeah, the secret to completing it successfully was Jason Kelsey. Yeah, exactly. So he'll be gone. There's a lot of negative energy around the team, and Jalen Hurts had a huge drop-off around the coach gone around the team and jalen hurts had a huge drop off in the back half of the year so it'll be a huge discussion it will not be a i think an automatic assumption that this offense will just get back to form no shane steichen it hurt um played a big role aj brown deletes social media stuff for the Eagles. It will be unsurprising to me in whatever two-months time

if the report comes out, oh, Jalen Hurst was actually way more hurt than we thought. That's true. It's possible. He did not run one for five in that game. Saints fired their offensive coordinator. I've spoken to some Saints fans that I know. They do not feel this is enough.

I don't know yeah I mean no Saints fan I know wants Dennis Allen as the coach nor do any of the offensive players that just usurped him but that's what happened are they going to go full

Lord of the Flies down there just let the kids run it like they fire the coach but they don't hire one? No, I'm saying, no, the coach is there, but just the team takes over. Winston takes over. Jameis is the head coach? Yeah, man. Yeah, I mean, some people just want to watch the world burn.

Jameis, what's the play call? Chuck it. Jameis, it's first and goal on the one chuck it did you hear what i said air it out yeah you see those olave unrealized air yards we're about to double them oh boy all right uh any other news brooks you got anything else for us no sir all right we'll take a quick break we'll come back with the truth Oh, boy. All right. Any other news, Brooks? You got anything else for us? No, sir. All right. We'll take a quick break. We'll come back with the truth.

You know, after that break, I'm not positive Winston would be a great head coach. Not positive. What? I don't. Just an offensive coordinator. I hear him loud and clear. Yeah. All right.

Let's take a look at that quarterback position. You want answers? I think I'm entitled. You want answers? I want the truth. You can't handle the truth. I'm glad to see we did not upgrade the graphic from last year that you were so upset with. I don't see what the problem is.

You know, Brooks did come to me and ask if I wanted it to be fixed. And he's never looked better. And I said, just roll with it. Just do it. Just go with it. Oh, dude, put that on the list of possible shame ideas. Old-timey judge. Yeah, that's good.

What do they call it? Is that a barrister? No, that's like a lawyer in the UK. Is a barrister? Am I right? Am I on to something? Yeah, we looked this up last year and I think had about a five-minute discussion. Every year we have the same discussion.

That's a bear. Thanks, Brooks. All right. Let's get into it. The top 10 quarterbacks in 2023. The truth about the position, about how they affected your fantasy team, about the investment you made in each round on quarterbacks,

and some league-wide passing trends. We always like to start this section with kind of a lay of the land, a survey of what's going on. It was less efficient for passers. The defenses are getting too good. Yeah, I mean, go ahead. You also had a lot of quarterback injuries this year that really played a part of it. This was the lowest touchdown rate since 2011.

Gross. We often look at that individually at quarterbacks that maybe outperformed or underperformed. This was the lowest rate 4.09 since 2011 the lowest fantasy points per pass attempt since 2011 gross and the fantasy points for pass attempts have uh it's dropped for three consecutive seasons uh since 2020 and you know the overarching question is did you feel that for fantasy did you notice that for fantasy yeah i i think that you did but really it came i believe it came on the back of injuries um whether it was injuries to to wide receivers like when mike williams and keenan allen got banged up for for herbert or you know when uh quarterbacks got injured and you lost Kirk Cousins and Herbert.

The backups that came in, some of them, like a Jake Browning, was okay. But for the most part, it really crushed fantasy this year. The difficult part with the backups that performed is that nobody bought in in week one. Most people didn't buy in for week two. And then when you could buy into one of them, it was like, is the starter back? It's hard to nail those when it comes to streaming quarterbacks.

There were 67 quarterbacks that started an NFL game this year and 43 different quarterbacks that had a top 12 performance. 67 quarterbacks started. That's just insane. That's too many. That's way too many. So, I mean, we had the whole Tyson, Bilbo, Bajent part of the year. Bailey Zappi got stars. Mitch Trubisky was in there.

Danny DeVito. Even Tommy DeVito. And then Carson Wentz even got a start. That's right. He did. For Jason and his great bet. You must feel so dumb, Mike. Or do you still believe in Matt Ryan?

I feel it's not really dumb. It's just a disappointment that the NFL would allow that to happen. Well, you know, you lost. Jason, you want to give everybody an overview of kind of what, like a general reminder of what we mean by the truth of these players. Yeah, so what we do, you know, a lot of times we use the word consistency, but it's more than just consistency because we do factor in how often they had great games versus good games versus average games versus bust games versus super bust games. So we take a look at basically different thresholds of points for these quarterbacks.

You know, a great game is more than 26 points. A bust game is fewer than 15 points in four-point passing touchdown leagues. Super bust game is fewer than nine points. You're single digits. You're just crushing someone. And we kind of score them individually based upon how it looks historically, what is helpful for fantasy. And it's also worth noting that we don't penalize. So when we're looking at these numbers and these rankings, we don't penalize missed games that you knew the player wasn't going to play like if if the you know if if you couldn't start them in fantasy then even though

obviously them missing the game hurt you you know it was a prepared damage exactly and so this is when these quarterbacks played when they were started and you started them in a fantasy how helpful were they really? And I'm going to jump real quick, just a smidge ahead to give you the best example of quarterbacks as a whole. And what really upset me when I was looking at the truth talk. I'm going to talk about Lamar Jackson. Lamar Jackson finished the season as the quarterback three. And when I was doing this, we do this every year and we look at the, the truth of these quarterbacks.

I couldn't wait to see how bad Lamar Jackson was in the truth score because he was very inconsistent. He had a lot of games that let you down. And in the actual score that we do every single year on the season, he was the, the fourth best quarterback in fantasy. The truth is he was still really, really good for fantasy relative to other options relative to the other options because everyone was inconsistent this

year minus two guys I mean it was a bad year for consistency for quarterbacks that that was the most shocking telling truth to me at the whole quarterback position, which is why we lead off with Josh Allen. Yeah, he makes it easy to have that discussion. I mean, he finished at number one. He was number one in the first half, number one in the second half. He's been number one three or four years. In the one year he wasn't, he was number two.

So from a consistency standpoint, Josh Allen is the truth. I mean, his splits are great. Like if he's facing road top 16, bottom 16. No, he's still giving you, you know, an average of about 26 points per game. Home road. He's not a Jared Goff where you were like, oh, road game. Can't start Josh Allen. Stefan Diggs has a great game.

So did Josh Allen. Stefan Diggs has a terrible game. That did Josh Allen. Stephon Diggs has a terrible game. That's all right. Josh Allen was great. I was going to bring that up because I think without the kind of like back half of the year where Diggs struggled, if Diggs were to depart in this offseason and you hadn't seen that, you would doubt.

But now I think you can have enough confidence to say that like Josh Allen is going to go as the quarterback one next year. 76% of the time it was a good game by our consistency metrics. 24% of the time it was a great game. Only 18% were bust games. And, yeah, he was kind of the pinnacle of consistency at the quarterback position despite a year where, look, he's still playing now.

But I think a lot of people didn't expect that to be the case, and they struggled, you know, stealing the division at the at the very last hour so you know I mean whenever you have an offensive coordinator fired mid-season you right you don't expect that it was a great offensive output but Josh Allen the the truth about the quarterbacks here is that these mobile rushing quarterbacks if they play the whole season, are so valuable. Why? Because Josh Allen had 15 rushing touchdowns, and that is a baseline that is unfair to other guys. C.J. Stroud was awesome this year, but you can't compete with these mobile quarterbacks that, and I don't think Josh Allen gets enough credit for the tush push. They do that.

They do a single back tush push with Josh Allen and so they did that a lot. So like a one cheek? Yeah, just a one cheek push to the left. I couldn't find the rhyme. One cheek squeak? No. No.

We're closer. We're warmer. Workshop it, but keep it to yourself. Alright. I'll be back. Workshop it quick and come back. I'll be warmer. Warmer. Workshop it, but keep it to yourself. All right. But like workshop it quick and come back. I'll be back. Yeah, like 10 minutes. Josh Allen, 15 touchdowns. Jalen Hurts, 15 touchdowns on the ground, both of them. So, yeah, you mentioned it.

Both teams had struggles offensively at different times during the year, but these are your best two quarterbacks. And could have been even better. It was actually his lowest passing yards per game since 2019 at right around 253 yards per game, but he was number one in air yards, number one in 20-plus yard attempts. Sub-30 touchdowns through the air. Had some of those attempts hit more often,

then it could have been even better so i it at this point in january it feels really easy to say alan will be locked in as the number one guy where he goes in the drafts whether you're willing to make the pick because like with all this information we could end up with josh allen just going like second round back of the second round early third round so that'll be I mean the discussion Mahomes went in the second round yeah so Allen probably goes in the second you asked me at the top of the show like that what did I learn that changed how I look going forward and it's that Josh Allen is worth it he was worth it two years in a row and so eventually he'll you know these these mobile quarterbacks we saw it with

cam newton these big body mobile quarterbacks they will fall off earlier they're not going to play till 40 doing the same running style but it hasn't happened yet and i'm going to be fine taking josh allen next year i hated that narrative in the offseason i i was opposed to it from the first mention the idea that josh allen that he would run less. It just didn't make any sense to me. I understand the eventuality, but I thought that that was something that had no chance of happening. You know, Jalen Hurts, Josh Allen, they are two of six picks that I looked at in the top 30 in fantasy as home runs.

Yeah. There were only six players that were home runs. They were 100% worth the pick and delivered huge, and two of them were quarterbacks. It does say something. Also, something that will cloud how you think about things is

the second round this past year was a disaster. It was real bad. It's just a one year sample, but when you're coming off of a second round, everyone was terrible. Josh Allen continues to be great. You're saying it might drive the cost up?

Well, I'm saying it's going to be difficult for me. I don't want to draft a quarterback in the second round, but remembering how bad each draft went in the second, and you're like, oh, Josh Allen. That feels pretty locked in. Sometimes when you just get a safe superhero, it feels good. And speaking of the superhero body he has, what about one-cheek physique? Does that work? Is that better?

But physique does not imply he's getting pushed from the back. One-cheek peek-a-boo on the other side he's huh did we get there yeah we got there we got there the one cheek peek a boo got it okay you know um we can't all be winners we can figure it out i just need some more names for a singular butt cheek. I'm drawing a... Glute? One glute scoot? Oh! The one glute scoot! We got there! Yes!

Yes, the one glute scoot. Yes, sir. Sometimes it's just important that I'm quiet and let creativity... Right. Yeah, let it happen, man. This is why you're listening. The one glute scoot? The one glute scoot.

Josh Allen. They don't really push him on one butt cheek, do they? Yeah, they really do. He's stronger on one side don't really push him on one butt cheek do they yeah they really do he's stronger on one side he only needs help on one he usually goes to the left and he usually only has one back in there pushing i mean i guess the glute scoot i gotta go one i gotta zoom in and watch i don't i don't know about that um jalen hurts is more of a discussion just because like mike said i mean if it comes out, the injury, maybe you wash away some of the

struggle towards the end of the year. To be honest, the only thing that will really cast a shadow onto Jalen Hurts next year would be a fundamental change to his weapons or they changed the rule. If you...

Josh Allen just had a 52-yard run in this playoff game. Jalen Hurts, do we have the number, Kyle, on how many of the 15 touchdowns came from the one-yard line? Because he had 23 passing touchdowns this year and 15 interceptions, which, by the way, was the exact line that Dak Prescott got criticized for last year. So let's just be fair about that.

So just a quick look, I'm seeing four touchdowns from inside the five for rushing. What? No, that's per game. I'm on pass. Per game? That's not right. 13.

Yeah, 13 of 15. Jay Leonard's longest run this season was 24 yards. Yeah, and he dealt with some injury, knee injury for a big part of the year that could have affected. I think he was around 600-something yards on the ground. The hand was a problem in the playoff game. So the big point is that he didn't end strong. Right.

And so that will, I think, impact the way people view jalen hurts going into fantasy drafts is he guaranteed to be your number two off the board yeah he for me he's guaranteed to be my number two off the board i think he might end up being a better value than josh allen uh those two guys i'm i'm fully fine with investing highly next year they're rushing touchdown baseline and his weapons, I do think he was really, really, really banged up this year. For the most part, he was great. I mean, he's the number two quarterback, the number two in our consistency metric.

He tailed off a little bit at the end, and obviously in the playoffs, he was terrible. Yeah, the end-of-year numbers passing were a struggle, you know, 3,800 yards. 63% of the time, good games, 19% great, 13% bust. I want to give those numbers for each player so you have a lay of the land. And one of the reasons why Mike says, oh, I don't want to draft a quarterback in the second round, but I might. I think by the end of the show, you might.

I think that's the story is that those two guys were very consistent. But let's go to number three. Just a real quick, in case people are thinking it, looking at A.J. Brown's contract, it seems just impossible that they can actually move on from A.J. Brown. Not that they want to, but A.J. Brown with his whole social media temper tantrum.

All those offensive weapons are back. Yeah. Lamar Jackson, number three, number four in consistency, late third-round draft pick, was the number six quarterback in the first half of the year, number two in the second half of the year, had two number one overall finishes in weeks 14 and 17. Jalen Hurts, how many number one finishes did he have on the year on any individual week? Jalen Hurts?

Correct. You're saying number one quarterback of the week. Yes. Probably none? None. None. Yeah. Allen had two, and then Lamar Jackson had two.

You know, his year, 38% of the time he busted. So this, this is the, the Lamar Jackson story that we're used to now since the MVP season, you can always start him and win your week because of him. There aren't a lot of quarterbacks where that is true, but you can also start him and get 18 for 27 for 157 yards in a touchdown that's a thing like for lamar jackson occasionally the gust bus fell into the end zone three times the defense stepped up um you had a really bad run from weeks 8 through 12 where he was quarterback 28 18 16 4 16, 4, and 14. I believe that's the same stretch where the Gus bus had 28,000 rushing touchdowns. I mean, that was part of the storyline this year.

I know we got to the point where Lamar Jackson became a start-sit question because other players were on fire, whether it was Dak who was on fire, some of these other quarterbacks, Brock Purdy. Those started to become discussions partway through the year. But ultimately he ends up at number three. And part of the reason he ends up at number three, number four in our truth metric is his bust rate at 38%, that feels really high for a top tier quarterback. But as we're going through only the top 10 finishing quarterbacks, there's not another one who didn't bust greater than 30% of the time. Like everyone this year busted a lot.

And that's what was so gross and surprising to me. The only two guys that didn't, that had a sub like 20% bust rate, Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts, that's it. And Joe Flacco. Joe Flacco was 100%. Yeah. Lamar was better at home considerably, about five points per game better at home,

something to maybe keep in the back of your mind. That was something that used to factor into Jared Goff, Big Ben. Mark Andrews missed time this year, and he pieced it together with a banged up Rashad Bateman, Isaiah Likely, Zay Flowers, parts of OBJ that still work. So ultimately, we know Lamar's an MVP caliber talent. I mean, we know that about Patrick Mahomes. That statement is still true of Mahomes of, you know, he's a player that if you started him on a given week, he could, he could win you your week. He's capable of it. But this year kind of put to bed some of the red

flags. He had the most starts of his career. He didn't get hurt. He had a high, his highest completion percentage of his career is 67%. His highest yards per attempt of his career with the new offensive coordinator. And so even though the first game of the year threw a lot of doubt into whether Lamar was going to help your fantasy team, the next five weeks kind of erased that. Yep. Number four fantasy quarterback this year, Dak Prescott, ended up tied for eighth in consistency.

It was a tale of two halves for dac the 15th quarterback in the first half the sixth ranked quarterback in the second half of the year you know part of that story that made it so wonderful is he hit waiver wires oh yeah i mean he was after week five he was on most of them he was terrible through the first five weeks uh and then um i know there was a story the first five weeks. And then I know there was a story about CeeDee Lamb going to, I think it was at the bye week, going to McCarthy and basically demanding the ball more. And it was like, yeah, guess what? That works. Throw it to your best wide receiver because those first five weeks were so, so bad for Dak. Dak is like the fantasy MVP

this year for fantasy football and he's tied for eighth only because those first five weeks. Yeah he would have been significantly higher and you know from week six on in fantasy points per game he was quarterback one. So Mike gave him a pep talk. He came on the show Mike said go get him. I said stop embarrassing me Dak. And he went from 212 passing yards per game to 287 a game.

Went from a touchdown a game to over two and a half. And his quarterback rating, his 17-game pace from week six on, 4,894 passing yards, 44 touchdowns. That's what we're talking about, McCarthy. And this is on a team that has had a, I mean, I know this last game it didn't look like it, but their defense is pretty good. But they still got into these shootout opportunities. Pollard could not.

He was allergic to the end zone. So, you know, Dak was one of the biggest stories in fantasy this season. Yeah, so now the question is, can you trust him going forward to air it out like this? What's his schedule? Nice. 29% great games, 47% good, 29% bust. The question for next year, I think Dak will be looked at like a value opportunity in drafts.

I feel like people are going to really potentially fall into overhype. You think they'll say thank you with an early pick? Yeah, I do. Because he was so, so good. If you take out those first five weeks from week six on, our truth metric, he would have been the number two right behind Josh Allen. We'll see. There are quarterbacks that have played enough years.

Like Big Ben did this a few times, and people just threw him right back in the 12th round. I don't know why, but... I will say this. Mike, you called the second-half sleeper of Dak Prescott. Part of why you called that was because of the schedule. Yes. The schedule was very bad for running backs the rest of the way,

very good for quarterbacks, very good for wide receivers the rest of the way, and he dominated during that time. very bad for running backs the rest of the way, very good for quarterbacks, very good for wide receivers the rest of the way, and he dominated during that time. So I'm not convinced that he's just going to be great week in, week out the way that he was during that stretch that mattered for fantasy. Yeah, I agree, and he'll be, you know, if they have the same head coach, does that change? Because that's a play caller, so that'll make a big difference

in how we view the season. Number five, Jordan Love. Crazy. Undrafted Jordan Love. His consistency rank was tied with Dak at eight. First half, he was the quarterback 14. Second half, quarterback seven. There's a lot of similarities between his and Dak's season. I think people probably got on the I'm willing to start Dak train a lot sooner than Love, but the results were very similar. 12% great game, so he didn't have a lot of those weak winning performances, but 47% good, 24% bust. I mean, it's crazy we're talking about him.

It's crazy, but from week 10 on, so almost the entire second half of the year, you had Dak Prescott as the quarterback one, Josh Allen as the quarterback two, and then it was Jordan Love. I mean, he was super good. Unbelievable. I think Al's probably pretty happy about that. Yeah, he is.

Oh, he's got such a stupid smile. Yeah, he's got a little grin on his face over there. I love being right. You just look stupid. You had no choice. I've got the receipts of me coming to stand it up for him, and you guys all giving me a hard time. That's true.

You also picked them to beat the Cowboys. I did. Which is so impressive if it wasn't for the fact that you will pick them to beat. I assume you're picking them to beat the Niners. I have the Niners taking it in my pool. He likes money more than fandom. Rather win the pool. Wow, that's a betrayal.

Wow. No, no, no. Not a real Packers fan, huh? It's just a bracket, not a pool. I'm sorry. Oh, there's no money on the line. There's no money on the line. Interesting.

And I would prefer the Packers to win, but I did take the Niners. So if we make a bet right now, like a $50 bet, you'll take the Niners and I'll take the Packers? Yeah. Oh, because he'll be happy anyways. Yeah. He'll pay $50 for a win. That's the happiness edge. I. Oh, because he'll be happy anyways. Yeah. He'll pay $50 for a win. That's the happiness edge. I forgot that's the happiness edge.

Never mind. It's too late. No takesie-batches. I guess I just wanted it on record. He bet against his team. I think what is exciting about Jordan Love, and it is the opposite for the wide receivers, is how many good wide receivers are here now.

I talked about it when I think, oh, this was on the Dynasty episode this week. We talked a lot about Jaden Reed and his splits with and without Christian Watson. And I think that it's going to be difficult next year. Like Jaden Reed was very, very good. But if you look when he was good and his splits with and without Christian Watson, they were dramatic. You're talking about an irrelevant player versus a super relevant player. If you've got a healthy wide receiver. Are you talking about Jaden Reed? Yeah.

That doesn't bother me one bit. Sure, but my point is when you've got Christian Watson, if he's healthy and active and Jaden Reed healthy and active and Dobbs and Wicks and all that, it's going to be hard to know necessarily which wide receiver to start, but they all go to Jordan Love. And so going forward, Jordan Love has, I mean, even crafted Musgrave. Like he's got a great skill set of receiving options.

So it gives me confidence in Love going forward. Moving forward. Yeah, no, he makes sense. All those weapons, all those young home runs in the draft. The thing is, it's just, it's kind of messed up is it's kind of messed up. It's kind of messed up. They picked a bunch of good ones for Jordan Love.

And they couldn't I did not push that button. But they couldn't pick them and didn't pick them for Rodgers for years. I don't know man. Jaden Reeves he had Christian Watson he had the road. He had Christian Watson. He had Dobs.

Watson was pretty great. He had injured Watson. And Doc, if you used the word great with Dobs last year, I wouldn't call him great. I'm just saying he had him. He had a lot of this. And he had a chance to make the playoffs in the last game and didn't, and love did. So, look, huge credit. Moving forward, I'd be happy with him in Dynasty.

By the way, if you want the answer, Jaden Reeves has got to play, just so you know. Like when they're all healthy, just play the superstar. I'm not worried about a one iota. He got schemed off the field against the Cowboys. Who has him in our Dynasty? Shut up. Shut the hell up.

Mute his microphone. Walk out of this set. What's your record in the dynasty this year? Number one pick. That's right. Yeah, number one. All right. We're moving on.

Brock Purdy at six. Brock Purdy was essentially undrafted in a lot of leagues, 14th round. Consistency rank of six for Brock Purdy. That says a lot. I mean, if you committed to him, you were in pretty good shape. 50% of the time it was good, 19% great, 31% bust. Some of the busts, they really hurt you week six, week 16. He didn't have all his weapons the entire year.

I think that's important to note. When he did, things were very, very good. This was an MVP candidate part way through the year most of it most of the year yeah week 16 the ravens uh removed him from the competition and uh you know how are you feeling about the brock pretty experience and the experiment moving forward do you need him to be paid before you start recommending him as a dynasty star? No, he is already established. He's fully legit.

He's young. He's a dynasty star. I don't worry whatsoever about it. I mean, they're going to extend him, I believe, this offseason. It is a shame to see him making less than some college kids right now. Let me paint a different picture. The Packers, Al's Packers, blow him out of the water this week. Purdy throws three interceptions.

Based on everything that I've heard from Shanahan, he's their dude. He's their long-term dude. I am fully convinced. The league changes quick, man. It does. Do you have doubts? I don't think that's going to happen this week, but I think whenever you aren't being paid anything

and you have a team with this kind of expectation, odds on favorite to win the Super Bowl, if you flop in a big game and Shanahan said success with a million quarterbacks, there'll be questions this offseason. I mean, the Philadelphia Eagles just wanted to throw popcorn at their coach and tell him he's out of town for one loss. Yeah, that's Philly, though. I mean, we thought Jimmy G would be there.

We thought Trey Lance would be there. We thought a lot of quarterbacks would be consistent longer-term options there. So I'm just bringing it up. I don't like that he's being paid nothing. Who would you rather have in Dynasty between Love and Purdy? Jordan Love. Really? Yes.

Okay. Is that because he's guaranteed to be a first ballot Hall of Famer by the end of his career because of the witchcraft happening in Lambeau? That's correct. The witchcraft. I can't believe they've done it again. They better not have. It's not fair.

I mean, letting your first-round quarterback sit and learn can pay off if you have some patience. Worked for Andy Reid and Mahomes spent that whole year. We've got Brock Purdy weeks 10 through 15, dominated

almost 24 fantasy points a game, 2.8 passing touchdowns. When they have it going on offense, it looks really smooth. When they have it going on offense, it looks really smooth. When they have it going on offense, Purdy's given up snaps to Darnold at the end of the game because they've blown out their opponents. When they had a full allotment of weapons, the points per game that they were averaging was insane. Impressive season by Purdy.

Couple of dud games definitely delivered for fantasy players that got him for free Mahomes finished 7th was drafted first had a consistency rank you ready for this 17th

gross but is very different between the first half and the second half of the year for him. And I think that there is a somewhat clear correlation that is somewhat scary to me. Go on. Travis Kelsey was very good in the beginning of this season. If you remember, he seemed like, man, that was worth that first round pick. And Travis Kelsey, by the end of the season, was a very poor pick.

He was not good the second half of the year, and that correlated to Mahomes not being good the second half of the year. So I'm just saying, if Kelsey has hit that drop-off, not to being a bad player, he's still valuable, he's still good. I mean, Antonio Gates was very good the last three or four years from an nfl standpoint but he was done being the dominant uh you know great fantasy asset the league leader in yards and touchdowns if kelsey has graduated to that stage of his career i don't know if the weapons are good enough for Mahomes to be a superstar.

I feel pretty confident that they're going to address it this year. They had their success two years ago. Technically, they paid MVS a bunch of money, and it didn't work out. It didn't work out for him to be a superstar. It worked out for the Chiefs to win the Super Bowl. They thought, we can just re-roll this. We'll do it again. i think they address it yeah i mean but what will fantasy players do what will be the reaction i mean he was not a player worth starting over the last six seven eight weeks and yet people did it every week because it was how do you impossible

to put them on your bench i mean we had somebody in our league trade, Lamar Jackson, who had to get Mahomes halfway through the year because the expectation was the inverse of this, that Mahomes would kind of keep improving with this group. I mean, Rashi Rice got better over the course of the back half of the year in terms of fantasy production, but there wasn't the Jordan love effect. There wasn't this accumulation of five, six passing options that drove them forward.

And let's be honest, they had a great defense. This was a problem. We said it at the beginning of the year when we started to see it come together. When your defense is that dominant, you become Isaiah Pacheco. Yeah, and it was not just you go to the running game because you can go to it. No, Pacheco was fantastic. And last year it was going to be Clyde, and then Pacheco – and Clyde was inefficient, and then Pacheco steals the job.

And so I think there's a chance that Mahomes is not locked in as elite for fantasy. He will always be capable of a 40 touchdown season. He will, yes. But this year, 6% great, 25% good, 31% bust. Yeah, it wasn't good. They had a bye week in week 10. After that, he was the quarterback 18 in points per game.

He was behind Derek Carr, behind Geno smith behind russell wilson behind jake browning i mean you fantasy managers uh if you want a title with my homes you're a liar no no i know you can i won with this next guy jared goff at eight yeah he was behind jared goff through that stretch as well. Jared Goff was, I mean, he was fine. Yeah. He was 10th in consistency, 7th in the first half, 14th in the second half. Here is Jared Goff in just broken down as a statistical data point. Versus defenses.

Top 16, 18 points a game. Bottom 16, passing defenses, 23, nearly 24 points a game. Home road splits. On the road, 17 points a game. At home, 24 points a game. So there is a sweet spot of when Jared Goff is at home, you feel like you can play him. When Jared Goff is at home, you feel like you can play him. When Jared Goff is at home versus a bad secondary.

Home run. You're very excited to play Jared Goff. Yeah, and he's always been better at home. Yep. He likes that controlled condition. Yeah, he does. I don't blame you, Jared. I don't know.

The weather's pretty cold in Detroit. Right. um it was a you know i know a lot of you opted into jared goff on different weeks 12 great 35 good 47 bust i mean it's a 50 50 shot when you're throwing them out there if you didn't factor in those variables the home road splits and the opposing defense the math was 50 50 on whether jared goff would show up for you and i feel like the way Mike played his quarterback roulette, it was about a 50-50 on a given week, whether he came in here crying or satisfied with the result. I mean, the snapshot of week 16 on the road against Minnesota, quarterback 23.

Two weeks later at home against Minnesota, the quarterback 6. And that's who Jared Goff is. two weeks later at home against Minnesota, the quarterback six. Yeah. And that's, that's who Jared Goff is. I think he continues to be that, which there is, there is value for fantasy football. You got to be, you can't just plug and play Jared Goff and think that's going to work. I do think that.

Yeah. I think he has, if you had to decide what would he go to the negative side or the positive side moving forward, I lean the positive side with the development of Jameson Williams in that offense, the electricity he brings to it. The development of Laporta. Laporta is

such a key cog. Moving on, Baker Mayfield, which by the way, the final four quarterbacks in the NFC right now are Jordan Love, Baker Mayfield, Jared Goff, and Brock Purdy. Wow, gross. Which is like not a lot of money.

You're saying that Chicago should not draft Caleb Williams. I mean. They should build around Justin Fields. I don't know what I'm saying, Mike. I'm just saying that if you, like the parlay. Now do the AFC. Yeah, the AFC. I think I looked at the guaranteed money.

It's about $70 million of guaranteed money on the NFC side, and it's about $375 million on the AFC side with Lamar, Mahomes, Allen. Goff and Mayfield were the 101. So they were supposed to be doing this. That's true, but it's been a journey, Mike. Yes. This was not a point A to point B. Neither were the 101 for this team. Correct.

Baker Mayfield. I can't believe he's a top 10 finish. I love it. Number 9, but number 21 inconsistency. Oh, he was terrible. For fantasy purposes, he was terrible. You couldn't have played him. I mean, there was one week. That's the truth. The truth is we should not be talking about Baker Mayfield. Correct. The truth is move on.

He wasn't even a good streaming option. He just accumulated a lot of points over the course of the season playing a full season. And congratulations for getting your team to the playoffs. It's great, but for fantasy, you're irrelevant. He also didn't throw a lot of interceptions. 28 to 10 touchdown to interception

ratio helps you out quite a bit. 4,000 passing yards. That was more than Jalen Hurts. 28 passing touchdowns. That was more than Jalen Hurts. He had a great NFL season. Yes. He really did.

But not a great fantasy season. And 35% bust rate, 6% great, 24% good. One game inside the top seven. Or, sorry, inside the top six. So, playing him, he was a backup to qb type of quarterback yeah and uh he also helped out the mike evans managers quite a bit and at number 10 to a tongue of iloa man i mean this was the second straight year miami had this happen but the first half of the year looks like they are innovating they're the most electric offense in the this happen, but the first half of the year, it looks like they are innovating. They're the most

electric offense in the NFL. He was the quarterback four. In the second half, he was the quarterback 30. His consistency rank was 19, despite finishing at number 10. 12% great, 24% good, 53% bust. And he

got you. That's the problem. Mike held me personally like responsible no not for his demise is it's it was my own doing but it was because i traded to him right before that junk right right before the clock struck midnight on two is when i traded for him yeah i mean there was a point you were going into like week nine week ten yes around there where he was locked in as an every week the the matchup doesn't matter. He's been so good, had so many big performances, you have to start him. And that was the problem of what destroyed you the rest of the season because you just

kept rolling with him. He'll bounce back. Ah, the matchup's good. Yeah, he's got Tyreek. It's the second year in a row that that was the mindset for the second half of the year too. Yeah. Fool you once. Tyreek. It's the second year in a row that that was the mindset for the second half of the year too. He is

a slightly more fantasy productive Jared Goff. I would agree because the offensive potential for him with Tyreek and Waddle is so high. The splits are the same. He beats up bad defenses and he wins at home.

Yeah. God forbid you start him when he doesn't have one of the weapons. That's also something that I just hated. When you took Mostert away, or you took Waddle away, or Tyreek was banged up, they couldn't function properly. Obviously, I kind of went on a tangent about their performance against Kansas City. Yeah, you were upset. Honestly, I wanted to see them succeed,

and I was just so disappointed in the level of grit that they brought to the table and the game plan. And now they say they're going to long-term him. I mean, they're going to save money after that performance. Tell you that. The offensive line injuries were a big problem for them. So maybe the season goes better if those things don't happen. Yeah, I don't know if this is going to be one of those players I'm just taking off the board for my fantasy team. That could be stupid because obviously, just like Goff, there are selective

weeks where you'd want to play him. But he's also very painful to have on your team. In drafts, trying to keep this show evergreen for people, but who goes higher in fantasy drafts, Brock Purdy or Tua? Oh, Purdy. Sure? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, for me, Will.

Well, I'm not saying for us. You're saying ADP. I'm saying the general public, when they come back. It's probably Tua. I think it's probably Tua. Does Brock Purdy win a Super Bowl? I don't know. I mean, that probably two of them. And I agree. Does Brock Party win a Super Bowl? I don't know. I mean, that might make a difference.

But, yeah, exactly, Brooks. Yeah, the playoffs can make a difference. Sure. Yeah, they might be very close. But where is that? Is that eighth round? Yeah, I don't know. So those are your top ten quarterbacks.

All the data, all the truth information will be on the website as well, thefantasyfootballers.com in article form and we will be digging in even more at uh the quarterback position against jason's will on our next episode of the show it's actually even more important i mean the the opposite of the fact that yeah draft draft josh allen oralen Hurts the other side of that is or stream the position because everyone busted you want to play the right matchups at the right home field or road game and so we're going to take a look at the quarterbacks that are not necessarily every week plug and play but how do you play them when do you play them why do you play them and mike would like me to remind you yes i

would to go to foot clan vote.com to do your duty thank you everybody goodbye thank you for listening to another episode of the fantasy footballers podcast join our fantasy football community on join the foot.com and follow us on twitter at the ff ballers