Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Is Jalen Nailor suddenly a fantasy football sleeper?

Episode Date: August 22, 2024

Matthew Coller and Mike Schopp of The Deep End podcast and WGR550 talk about Jalen Nailor's big opportunity and boom-or-bust players for 2024 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of the Purple Insider Fantasy Podcast show with Mike Shope of the Deep End Fantasy Podcast and my old teammate at WGR 550 in Buffalo. And our show here, our weekly fantasy analysis, is presented by our friends at Underdog Fantasy. Super happy to have them along board. And Underdog Fantasy, the easiest place to play fantasy sports. Also the fastest growing fantasy app in the industry. So you want to sign up over at Underdog

Fantasy with the promo code PURPLE to claim your special pick and your first time deposit offer up to $250 in bonus cash. And if you can't remember the promo code, it's just purple, but we'll leave a link below in the description as well. Mike, what is going on? How are we doing, man? Well, I feel like we should talk about my helmets. I meant to bring this up last week. I

moved them around a little bit, but as you're starting today with me, I'm realizing I've got a Packers helmet and I could, could I do worse for your show? Look at your penance. So strategically placed with the Vikings over your left shoulder and the bills over your right. Like the two teams I actually see are the Vikings and the bills. I doubt that's a coincidence. And I have a collection of Superbowl MVP signed minis. And, you know, I do have a Bills helmet down here, even though I think they've never won one. But for my birthday one year, my kids bought me this because they knew I collected mini helmets. I do not have a Vikings one.

Maybe I should have a Vikings one. Maybe I just shouldn't display the Packers. Yeah, I mean, the Packers being right there visibly is a little bit of a of a swipe although the thing about vikings fans is they totally get it there's a lot of packers fans who live in minnesota and everybody completely gets it they win all the time they always have great quarterbacks they're kind of just right over there uh across the state line so I don't think that they're that offended. It is a little bit different because there are rivalries

that have some true rage behind them. And then there's let's eat our brats together and then go into the stadium and cheer for our respective teams. If you go to Philadelphia, they may assault you if you wear purple. But you walk through Lambeau and that parking you if you wear purple but you go you walk through lambo and that parking lot you got vikings fans packers fans everybody gets it it's kind of a it's a very midwest type of thing yes and we love that so i just know i'm i'm new on the team here your current team i don't want to offend and that was just a random thing but i do not have a vikings

helmet we'll try to get some different teams you know you look a little bit this way we've got pittsburgh they're just hanging on little knobs on a cabinet um trying to trying to impress well if you were collecting superbowl helmets and that was the goal everyone understands that you wouldn't have a vikings no but maybe you can get a fran tarkington signed mini helmet or something. I love the Vikings helmet too. I mean, it's one of the great helmets. No stripe. We learned from Dean many years ago. If you have a stripe on your helmet, you don't get it.

Like the best helmets, the Chiefs, the Vikings, do not have a stripe, the Eagles. And I set out to collect all the Super Bowl MVPs. This was 20 years ago when I started, but then I realized, plus they were super expensive. I really didn't want Tom Brady or, you know, Aaron Rogers. I didn't want those guys. So I decided to cut the collection off at 30. We've got everybody one through 30, which I'm very excited about and proud of.

But yeah, no Vikings. A lot of teams are missing. Unfortunately, maybe someday that you'll get the Bills one signed by the MVP or the Vikings one signed by the MVP. But until then, we'll talk about fantasy football instead. And hey, maybe the driving force. I wanted to start out because I always want to start out with the Vikings topic here and then we'll dive into stuff. And then I have another underdog fantasy best ball draft for you to assault me about like you did last week. Sorry, but you asked everybody, every fantasy show that I go on.

So you've probably, you've heard me on the XM fantasy shows that I'll go on as a guest and they're always asking me, how's Jefferson going to do? How's the quarterback going to do? And that's, of course, I'm happy to answer that. But the answer for Jefferson is always pretty good. And the quarterback now is I'm happy to answer that. But the answer for Jefferson is always pretty good. And the quarterback now is, I'm not sure. But I wanted to bring to the table two fantasy sleepers just for you that I think could get off to a good start with the Minnesota Vikings this year.

And those are Jalen Naylor and Johnny Munt. Are you familiar with these players in any way, shape, or form? Johnny Munt, the eighth-year tight end out of Oregon who played with Justin Herbert. I think I am. Naylor is new to me this year. You know, these are sleepers with a capital S-L-E-E-P. I mean, these are sleeper sleepers.

In underdog drafts, you rarely, I don't think I've ever seen either name this year. And in homedog drafts you rarely i don't think i've ever seen either name uh this year and in home league drafts which i think maybe more of your viewership is sort of in in tune with uh you definitely won't you won't see either of these players drafted i think nailer is a little bit interesting right now in fantasy we're trying to figure out who are the guys we've been ignoring that might be relevant. One seemingly such player is Ray-Ray McLeod in Atlanta. So Atlanta has everybody excited with cousins. They're going to play a modern offense, Zach Robinson.

But they have very few skill players anybody can name. Like, it's really just a very short list. They're all top 10 draft picks, but there's just only three. I mean, that's it. You have Algiers, the backup running back. So what happens after London and Pitts? Yikes. Rondale Moore broke his leg, and this is an answer about Jalen Naylor,

but Ray-Ray McLeod seems to be in a starting role. You read the camp blurbs, and okay, he's somebody on a cousin's team. I can justify taking at the end of a draft. You know, you want to be thinking in your home league drafts. A lot of these, some of these players at least are going to be cut. I'm going to have to cut them. I'm going to have an injury to my starting running back. I'm going to need someone else. And these are the players that tend to be the players you cut in those situations. You know, this is also, it's Minnesota. I would defer to you. I feel like Naylor maybe is somewhat similar to McLeod in that they really might have a wide receiver three role on a team that throws it all the time. I mean, almost no team is more that than

Minnesota. Munt, I don't know. You get past eight or nine tight ends, and while there are some interesting names later on, Tyler Conflin, Hunter Henry, Noah Fantz, even Colby Parkinson, they're really all the same. And so I don't think you should really have to take any chances with that. You're going to tell me that Munt is going to start week one and maybe get five or six targets. That's okay.

If he falls into the end zone, then you win on that bet. But I don't think you want to be starting him, right? Starting him might be a little bit of a stretch because you might have Travis Kelsey instead. So you probably want to go that direction. If you are in a deeper league, though, the first five, six weeks might be Johnny Munt as their starting tight end.

As we've gone along, there has been no sign whatsoever that TJ Hawkinson is about to get back on this field. And he is still working out on the side. He's still inside during padded practices. And when you just consider what he went through with the mcl first having to heal and then the acl injury it took even longer so this wasn't like him getting hurt in week i think it was 16 that he actually got hurt this was more like him getting hurt three or four weeks into the off season and then trying to recover and come back

which means he may not be here until midway through the year. Now, of course you'd prefer to have your Kyle pits be your starting tight end all the way through the season, but Sam Darnold keeps throwing the ball to Johnny Munt and he has good hands and he catches, he caught a lot of passes last year when TJ Hawkinson was out for those couple of games.

And the Vikings have this offense where they run receivers downfield a lot and the tight end is are just around open underneath for a lot of plays and we saw that from Hawkinson where he averaged maybe only like nine or ten yards a catch but he got a gazillion catches this is something that Johnny Munt I think could do that one is I'm not as strong on that is a deep, deep, deep sleeper. If he plays six or seven weeks, I mean, you're getting a lot of action there. I think with Jalen Naylor, he is extremely intriguing in part because Jordan Addison suffered a sprained ankle. We don't know for sure if he's going to come back week one, which would put Jalen Naylor as wide

receiver two at this point. And even if he's wide receiver three, there has really been no contest that he's wide receiver three. This team loves 11 personnel. They're going to throw it to him. I think a lot. He's also been someone that they've been super high on for years. It's just that he's been injured and he hasn't had a chance to really shine, but Kevin O'Connell has brought him up a hundred times from the time that he first came into the league until he was here but just two years ago he didn't have an opportunity with kj osborne his wide receiver three there's a lot of chances here and not to mention the potential looming suspension at some point for jordan addison so you've got could be a week or two

at the beginning of the season could be a week or three at the beginning of the season, could be a week or three at the end of the season with a suspension. And the next man up is going to be Jalen Naylor. Well, that's the good stuff right there. I mean, in fantasy football, we're paying as close attention as we can to all the beat reporters, all the people who are close to the inside. You're mentioning how many times O'Connell has said his name is something, even if I didn't know you, I would take interest in because, you know, that's what we're trying to do here is who are the guys we've been sleeping on? These tournaments at underdog have been running for months. Some of them, I mean, the big best ball mania five has been up since, I mean, the spring,

as soon as that NFL draft is over. And there are tournaments that started before that. And an edge, an important edge is finding these guys. I'll give you two names from last year that were these guys that I'm not saying Jalen Naylor will be this, but Puka Nakua and Kyron Williams for the Rams were just nobodies. Williams was a little bit interesting the year before. He got hurt on the opening kickoff of the first game of the season and went away. And Nakua was a rookie. Nobody mentioned their names ever on any show all summer. And then you get closer to the end, and what's happening there?

Kopp is injured. Who takes that spot? Maybe it's 2-2 Atwell. I sort of leaned into that a little bit because there was draft capital with him and he played some, but Nakua was one of the greatest rookie receivers in history and Williams was a league winner. And, you know, speaking of home leagues, nobody ever drafted either guy in any home league draft. There was no reason to.

So that was something to learn from last year. And players like Naylor, especially considering what you said about Addison and his health and his possibly being suspended, that is the door open on a great offense. You know, that's important too. We've talked about this the last couple of weeks. You want to make sure you're keying on the teams where you feel like you can trust what you know about them. There's been a consistency. That's Kevin O'Connell. And then we also like what it looks like in terms of pass volume for receivers. So I think after all this has having been said that Naylor is somebody to pay attention to. And in these underdog tournaments, I think he's a good idea. If you end up on the Vikings, which is also every team is different for this too, Matt,

with Darnold going so much later than some other quarterbacks, you can end up sort of backdoor stacking Minnesota. Even better if you have Jefferson early and they play Green Bay in week 17. Sorry to mention Green Bay again, but that's good for where the big money is won in these tournaments. You could end up tacking Naylor on in a round 18 final round to a Viking stack. I think that's kind of cool. Yeah, I think with someone like Naylor, if we look at what KJ Osborne did and think about KJ Osborne in 2021 had zero catches. I don't even think he had any targets. I'm not even sure he had any offensive snaps, uh, or what was it? 2020, 20, 2020. And then 2021, he comes out and in the first week he gets like seven catches because through the off season he emerged and became someone that they liked and

that's what we've seen from jaylen nailer he's not taken third team reps or anything i mean he's out there with the first team as their number three receiver over and over again and i think in a team like this where kevin o'connell is always going to lean into passing the ball even if nick mullins or josh jobs is playing then someone like nailer and he's been good i mean he passing the ball even if nick mullins or josh jobs is playing then someone like nailer and he's been good i mean he catches the ball he's good contested catches he's very fast his nickname is speedy i don't know if you knew that but i mean that's enough to draft him right there uh the guy though that i'm not quite coming out of camp as high on as a sleeper that a lot of people ask me about fantasy wise is ty Chandler. It now the health issue with

Aaron Jones is serious when it's an older running back. I think they want Aaron Jones to just play until he drops. I mean, he's just such a terrific all around running back and Ty Chandler is very hit or miss. He's rocket fast, but I'm not sure that he really gets the details in the same way Jones does. And I'm not super sold that and I can't project injuries. I'm just not super sold that it's going to be a duo. It feels like it's going to be about 70 30 to me. Well, yes, we talked last week. You made a point about his failure to pick up a pass block read. And we know how important that we should know how important that is to coaches.

And that's just to bring that back up something that you will not find in stats you know you have to that's where it's especially important to pay attention to what coaches are doing and even sometimes saying the more you trust the coach to tell you the truth uh the better but i know you're coming from a good place when it comes to o'connell And, you know, Madison in Minnesota before Chandler, Chandler now, Jerome Ford in Cleveland, maybe Zamir White in Vegas. There are these next man up running backs that are often, were often really good college players that look like they're just sort of

obvious for the one injury away scenario. And that what happened with Madison behind Dalvin Cook, most people, at least this was my read, Matthew, maybe yours is different, but there was a lot of negativity toward Dalvin Cook in terms of efficiency, one injury away. This is a different coaching staff too, you know, or part of, part of that tenure, but look out if Cook goes down for Alexander Madison, who wasn't good though. Like he wasn't somebody that was any more efficient. And so you had those couple of weeks where the volume was there and that was a good fantasy result, but really like never a good enough player. And so I'm not saying that's true of Chandler.

That's sort of a different point, but the names I mentioned, we kind of all are just sort of champing at the bit for one injury away. This guy that I picked in round 14 is going to be even better than the starter we picked in round five. I don't know. Like there's you coaches don't get, we, we condescend to them. Like, why don't they do this obvious thing that we all think is better, but you know, they know stuff too. So, you know,

I respect what you're saying on Chandler. I will admit after last week's conversation, I was a little bit slower to click on his name this week than last. And, you know, also more eager to click on Jones. I've always liked Jones. I don't know if he's washed or what, but they did pay him and he does catch the ball, which is Minnesota's MO. So I think he could be good value.

He just has to stay on the field like all these guys. Folks, U.S. Cellular noticed that the way we use our phones has gotten ironic. We try to put our phones down for dinner, but the menu is on a QR code. That's ironic. We hit like on social media posts that we don't actually like. Ironic. Which is why U.S. Cellular created UsMode to help us reconnect with each other and use our phones less ironically. A phone company wanting people to use their phones less ironic let's find us again with us mode from us cellular visit us cellular.com slash built for us to get started

yeah i think people are maybe a little too worried about him from an age perspective because it was never quick twitch that made him great. It's seeing the holes, hitting them, toughness, catching the ball. He is really, really bright. I mean, he's one of the smartest football players you're going to come across. So I think he really understands what the goals are for running the football, which is maybe an underrated skill. It's just understanding how the play is supposed to maybe an underrated skill is just understanding how the play is supposed to work and how the defense is operating, how they're lined up, where things are going to present themselves.

And then he's just got great hands. Uh, and I don't, I mean, Chandler catches the ball when you throw it to him too, but I think that Jones is a difference maker with his hands, which means that they could try to use that a lot more. So that's kind of how i'm feeling right now he could get hurt in week one and none of this matters but that's how i feel right now and just quickly on jones i mean a lot of these guys we talk about age model stuff jacobs in green bay or barkley like we're trying to figure trying to guess like what do they have

left aaron jones had back-to-back 100 yard games in last year's playoffs and catches the ball, too. So that's pretty recent. No, it is. And I think that they've managed his workload pretty well here during training camp. Now, I made a list of a few guys that I think are boom or bust. Now, you might tell me that's not a boom or bust guy. What are you talking about? But I like that angle, too.

So as I've been going through and doing these drafts, thinking, i hit this one this guy's going to be great so i've got a couple obvious ones and a couple of a little bit lower on the list the first one i want to start with is anthony richardson because i was a very large anthony richardson enjoyer him with him coming out of college and loved what i saw from him early on with his command of the offense. I think that the throwing though is going to have to make a huge improvement for him to be amazing. Is he a boomer bust guy? And am I on the right side of it by saying I would like him on my fantasy team? Absolutely. I mean, I think the bust with Richardson really is probably only if he gets hurt. You can't overstate the value of running quarterbacks in fantasy football.

So you have a player here that the team is heavily invested in, and there's no question about his potential as a runner. You can question, especially after what happened last year, how much they want to let him run the ball. But so far, it sounds like, you know, you draft this player, you're going to use him for, you're going to play to his strengths. And so I'm not too worried about that. You know, it's right to be a little bit just cognizant of what happened last year, which was he played in four games and he left three with injury, and one was for the season. He'll have to learn. Everybody is saying this. He'll have to learn how to protect himself. So big and so lethal as a runner, you might feel like, what do I have to

worry about? But that did happen last year. So I love my Richardson teams. In underdog tournaments, you always want to have some stack, pair with a receiver or two or even three, because you're almost dead to win the big money without that. You can have the very best player at every position, but if they're not correlated in those playoff weeks, you're going to win your 12-team, 14-week regular season prize and go out in week 15 and double up. And it will have been a great team, but not quite right for the underdog tournaments. So with Richardson, that's a little bit challenging. That's Michael Pittman before

Richardson. You might want to set up for that, and then you have to hope that Richardson makes it to you. That does happen with Pittman going late third and then Richardson late fifth so they're on the same side of the board and then Josh Downs don't forget about him even though he has a high ankle sprain that's going to be a couple weeks into the season probably and then he should be their number two receiver and A.D. Mitchell has had a nice camp it seems so you do have options with the colts um i wouldn't just draft richardson or any quarterback by by themselves if you can avoid it you should avoid it but love the idea of him and i'm definitely in i think the high end is a cam newton type of 10 touchdown rushing 20 touchdown passing type of season for Anthony Richardson. And the Colts could be the

team that is not getting talked about a ton and they end up winning the division or something. I'm always trying to think who don't we expect to win a division or be way better. And that might be one of those teams. The next guy on my list was Malik neighbors. Uh, I really like what I see from Malik neighbors and a little bit of preseason action in college. He was as freakish as anybody that you're ever going to see. And I think he was every bit the prospect of Marvin Harrison. It's just that his quarterback, not so sure that I really trust a Daniel Jones or that I even trust Brian Dable to push down the pass button as much as someone like Kevin

O'Connell with Daniel Jones. I think he likes running quarterback keepers with him and stuff as much as he does throwing the ball downfield. How do you feel about Malik neighbors? But I think the high end of that is that he's just ridiculous right away as a boom or bust. Yeah. What the floor should be is easily, not even close, who would even be second, the number one target earner on his team. And Dable is at least respectable, at least respectable in this area. So, I mean, top 10 pick, they've got to feed Malik Neighbors.

It might surprise you to know where he goes in drafts. Like, you have to decide between Neigh between neighbors and Mike Evans or Devante Smith. I mean, that's the end of the second round. I pick neighbors. If I have CD lamb at one Oh two or even one Oh one, sometimes I'm,

I hope that I can get neighbors and Smith and FC East in the second two, three turn. So he, he goes early. He's drafted like we know he's going to produce big time. And that is a little bit of a guess with the things you said about the Giants. There's just nothing else they should do on offense than get the ball to him. So if you get 10 targets out of the gate per game from neighbors which I don't think is

aggressive and he's good holy cow I mean late second round you haven't killed you haven't drafted Puka if that happens who you picked up on waivers or something it's not that you need a good season from your second round pick but neighbors is certainly capable of it. And I prefer him to Evans Smith. And he, for me are about the same because I liked Devante Smith a lot too. And by the way, the Colts and the giants play week 17. So if you somehow land a team with neighbors and Richardson, and they may be down, you probably can't get Pittman this way, but neighbors Richardson downs or Mitchell.

That could be really good. Cause that's a week 17 matchup and that's where you win the, you know, life-changing money. That's what we're here for. Yeah. What I thought was really interesting is that the draft that we're going to go over in a,

in a couple of minutes that I did recently, neighbors went ahead of Travis Kelsey, ahead of DJ more ahead of Zay flowers. I mean, some guys like Amari Cooper, Michael Pittman that are much more proven than a rookie player. And we can kind of project that DJ more is going to get the football a ton. Uh, Christian Kirk. Also, he went ahead of who there's not that many other people to throw to in Jacksonville, other than Brian Thomas looking better recently. That is is it's a high price i feel like if you're going in on him that you have to compare him to bigger samples that you know about and i think that's one of

the more difficult things to figure out with fantasy is rookies might just be bad like you never really know right uh versus someone like michael pitman who i think is a guarantee to get the football a ton well every everything is a guess and i think you'll find as you dive back more into fantasy football and you can you can read on this i mean this is kind of almost the group think take now you to say the least you cannot be afraid of rookies. And you even probably want to lean into them because you're still playing against people who will make the point about what they have seen before, what's been proven, quote proven.

There can be injuries, though, that tilt that the other way. Neighbors, I mean, Harrison goes at the end of the first round sometimes underdog players are not afraid to place their bets on these guys odunze is a little bit you know less expensive he's like round six and then you have worthy and worthy as pastor now with all the chiefs hype but um i mean you i will say conservatively, you don't want to be afraid of the rookies. And the way I play, I want all of them. I want all the rookie running backs in the last four or five rounds, whoever I can afford, you know, the Ray Davises, Braylon Allen, Corum in LA, these guys, I want those guys on my team because they're all in situations where the starter gets hurt. isn't chandler

or jerome ford or players who've been in the league and not been able rico dowdle in dallas not been able to sort of emerge these are rookies where you never know and the more rookies uh on my teams the more i like them rico dowdle sounds totally fake that's that is not a real person that's you don't think so no that's completely made up uh george pickens is the next guy on my list you know what matthew what maybe once a week starting next week i will make up a name and we'll see if i catch it that's a good idea yeah that's a good idea just you'd be like oh you know uh and uh james babelson he's uh you know i think in line to be the third tight end for Miami. And he's going to be pretty good there.

You know, he had that great Oregon State career. Yeah, just go. Just keep going until I'm on the radar. That guy's real. George Pickett's, though, next on my list because I am not quite sure who's throwing to him. And one thing I know about Justin Fields is that if he ends up playing a lot, he might just not throw it at all. He might end up with 2,200 passing yards. And I know DJ Moore had a decent season last year as the number one wide receiver there, but they're going to run the ball.

Fields is going to run himself because he doesn't see the field and he's going to scramble. George Pickens might throw a helmet and get suspended after two weeks or something because he's not getting passes. I just don't like that whole situation with the way the quarterback thing is playing out. Yeah, I have to really think hard on this because I just watched a preseason game, Buffalo-Pittsburgh, and the Steelers looked like they could be the worst offense in the league. And I know every year there's a lot of pessimism toward the Steelers. Like this is the year they're bad and then they never are. But I'm so betting on that

to finally happen this year, like five wins. I mean, come on. So, you know, that's my take on the team. What happens with George Pickens if I'm right. You know, that could go either way. If they're behind all the time and Russell Wilson finds his moon balls again, that could be huge for Pickens. I mean, late last season, he had huge weeks. And I don't know, who was it, Rudolph or Trubisky, whoever it was. Like, that's in the range of outcomes for him. But so is the blow up.

And I don't know. Like, he's a tough click click when you get to pick 40 or about where he goes obviously you don't have the Steelers quarterback yet you don't have any Steelers yet and you have to you know decide if you want to try to build that and I usually don't I'd rather pick Amari Cooper in that range they They're very close in ADP. So are the elite quarterbacks. Allen Hurts, Mahomes are all in that same range. The elite tight ends are all in that same range. So my perfect draft, I'll have drafted two receivers early, maybe even three.

And then when it comes to pick about where George Pickens goes, I'm not in. Because there's some other idea I like more. It's certainly to be respected that he might be great. There is tons of talent with him. There's just a little bit too much of the combination of wildcard kind of personality stuff and Arthur Smith. I mean, that team could just be really bad. And my prediction is that they will be.

I didn't like anything they did at that position this offseason in the offensive coordinator or at the quarterback spot. Get two guys. I mean, Russell Wilson is washed, washed. I mean, it's all sorts of over. There was a minute there where they won some games, including against the Vikings on a last second. And sometimes you go, did you watch the game? Russell Wilson was horrible for three and a half quarters, launched a ball fluttering to the end zone

that a guy reached up and grabbed to win the game. And it was- What a game. Russell, it was an entertaining contest. And, but I mean, that wasn't proof that russell wilson was suddenly back oh sean payton he's getting the most out of wilson now are you serious that was a horrendous game that he played from the quarterback position and they got a couple wins but then that quickly went away at the end of the year and justin fields i got an up close view on for his entire career so far, and he just cannot throw the ball.

And it's not that he can't throw it when he actually lets it go. I mean, he don't throw it. He just gets sacked over and over. It's like Rob Johnson where, yeah, I know you've got the talent to throw the ball. Could you please do that?

And he just gets sacked. So I just can't see. And with Arthur Smith, he's going to hand off 87 of the time that's going that's just going nowhere i don't like that at all for pickens but then there's some other world where he's the only guy you throw to and even on bad teams if you're the only guy you throw to you still end up racking up eight catches in a game the quarterback completes 12 and you got eight of them that does uh end up happening what do you think of uh travis

etn oh he is right at that exact same spot on the board like pick 40 um that's really more of a i'll answer this in two parts drafting wise that's really more of a build decision uh do you want etn as your number one running back? You probably wouldn't pick another one for a couple of rounds. I wouldn't if I do that. I don't hate it. The other part of it, so, you know, that depends on your roster construction. And I would never draft him as a running back, too.

But if you've started with two receivers or even three, that happens a lot, where ETN is a reasonable pick in the early fourth. And, you know, OK. The rest of it. So last year, they knew what they were doing. At the end of the year, they called it a mistake. They just ran him into the ground. I mean, he's not the biggest guy.

You don't see bell cows so much anymore in the league. Tank Bigsby, his backup was a disaster as a rookie. And so here we were watching Travis Etienne get all the touches. Great. If you're starting them in this first six, seven weeks of the season, underdog, we're trying to win late. And what happened? Maybe for the second year in a row, there was no juice left by the playoff weeks for ETN. The question is, do they want to adjust that? And I think they might, and Bigsby has had a good camp, they say, like sort of back from the dead is Tank Bigsby.

So I think optimally Jacksonville sort of stretches out ETN and makes him worth more later in the season, which could be good for us. But at the same time, that means they're cutting into his workload early. So that takes some of his value away and never the most efficient guy. I've had lots of ETN teams. If you close your eyes and try to picture a Travis Etienne, like in college, he's running wild. But if you picture a Jacksonville play, to me, he's getting the ball at the four and getting stopped at the three. Like I've just seen 20 plays like that from Travis Etienne, I feel. So doesn't feel great. Not afraid to do it if I've started two or three receivers. So I have some

Etienne, but I'm not the most confident that it's a great pick. How's that? Travis ETN is the type of guy who I would make an argument against drafting running backs because you have to play them in a certain role. If you draft the guy and he's not Jonathan Taylor, they'll still play him as if he is jonathan taylor and i just haven't seen etn at any point in his career convince me that he can be one of those guys and i think if he was a fourth round draft pick then he would be a duo type of guy or a running back to another team based on his talent but no no, we drafted him. He's got to be our guy. Also tank Bigsby back from the dead.

Sounds like an eighties movie, right? And that is a real person. That is a real person that also falls into the category of maybe might not be we're starting next week on that. Right. I knew of him, but I thought that, that really does sound like a fake name. I I'm just kind of out on him, but I was curious if I was missing something uh when his name came up high in drafts i thought i don't know i just don't feel like there's a high end there what you can do is try to think about so round four early four early six if i draft etn i might not be able to afford another running back in six so who's the receiver i'm getting early six it might be brian

thomas it might be deontay johnson okay i mean that can work or you end up picking i like amari cooper i mentioned him when we talked about pickens cooper or pickens in four and then in six you're looking at maybe david montgomery uh sometimes even james cook if you believe in camara i just think that's a better play. I'd rather draft the receiver in four and the running back in six than the other way around. And that pretty much freezes me out on ETN. All right.

Before you take a look at this next draft that I did and see if I did better than last week on Underdog, give me one. Give me a boom or bust guy that you love as the boom well i already said like i will draft as many rookies as i as i can get away with um worthy is kind of obvious in that way and i'm just thinking about the rookies thomas is kind of exciting too on that same Jacksonville team. It sounds like he's been putting on a show there. And I think Kirk is good. And they paid Davis.

I think Davis just sort of gets written off too easily. Man, if Thomas has it, that could – I think Lawrence is good. I mean, there's pushback on that now. But I still think Trevor Lawrence is good. So I'm not drafting a lot of Brian Thomas. I'm trying to come up with the perfect answer for you. Oh boy. I mean, boom or bust, that's like sort of the late, by definition, kind of the late rounds, you know, somebody that you're just throwing in at the end and are willing to take a zero from. One guy that I'm thinking about, but it can't be my answer is Marvin Mims because Denver just cannot seem to

bring itself to trust him. Like he's somebody as a rookie, I drafted a lot of like, okay, there's an opening here. Judy's not great. This should be, you know,

this should be there, Sean Payton. And it just wasn't. And this year is starting like it wasn't either. Oh boy. I got to think of the right answer for this you know how I like to be perfect so boomer boss that I just love as a boom I will say on Marvin Mims if a coaching staff doesn't trust the wide receiver just run away because that means the guy can't get the routes right, the depth, reading the defense, he'll never be able to figure that out. I do think sort of the way I'm thinking about this is through the bust.

And sorry, sorry, but I am thinking about this through the bust because somebody that I think there is real upside for, but, you know, again, like zeros are possible. Will you live with this answer? Because I don't want to take all day will you live with drake may as an answer to this question i like that yeah i like that because i mean the boom side though how high can the boom be high well not all the way high because of the surrounding talent right i think new eng England is not going to be prolific at all this year on offense, but I really like the player. I thought he should have been the second pick. And, you know, he flashed a little bit in the second preseason game. They did draft two receivers

as well in Polk and Baker. Douglas is kind of interesting. I don't think it has to be as bad as everybody else sort of sounds about the Patriots, like worst team in the league kind of stuff. Maybe. I think the sooner they put him in, the better. And I kind of think he's not undeniable, but I think the way Brissette has looked in the preseason too, which is not good, they'll get to May earlier than basically how we've been drafting him and that team through the summer. So in a redraft league, in a tournament, what? This could have been McCarthy, actually, had he not been injured. There would have been a possible outcome that he doesn't play like at all. And that's a bust, right, for one season. But I don't think that happens in New England.

I think maybe May. They're still talking about week one being possible for him. The beat reporters seem kind of split on that idea. Yeah, I like drafting him. It's cheap, and all those receivers, Kendrick Bourne, even Tyquan Thornton, are available right at the end. You can sometimes save your draft. It has to happen.

It has to work. But you can kind of feel like you've saved your draft by stacking two or three Patriots at the end. So I'll go with May. Well, and there is you talk about the end of the season being important. There is a chance with May that he comes along. And even if there's some rocky moments early on if you're doing best ball you've probably got some other quarterback who's outperforming him but when you get to the end

if he's clicking and he's starting to become that top draft pick quarterback he could have huge days and he could be your best quarterback over a couple of weeks if you're making a late round pick because now just with underdog i'm thinking of everything through best ball kind of viewpoint and i think that that does make sense i like the answer so we can move on he can he can be a quarterback too with alan say for instance they they they play weeks 16 and 18 which is weird so there aren't two bills patriots games in your fantasy schedule usually you can sort of like the idea of pairing division opponents but alan your bet is he's going to be qb1 may at the end they do play week 16 which is a fantasy playoff week uh i don't want to draft two quarterbacks that meet in week 17 but 15 16 fine so that kind of works okay on to my draft now this this one, I'm going to screen share this so you can see it. So here is my about one. Justin Jefferson, I went third overall

because Justin Jefferson, and that seems pretty obvious. Am I too quick on Kyron Williams at number 22, which was my second pick? I didn't think so because I really love what I think he's going to do there. I think he's going to be a bell cow, get a ton of touches. I like Sean McVay in the running game

I don't know if that's interesting to you I may have gone tight end a little early with Sam Laporta after that then so so what I would say here is before you scroll down I don't want you to scroll down yet yeah from drafting literally hundreds of underdog teams, I want to see how you ended up at receiver. Because, like, look at Team 1, and we'll see how Team 1 ended up at other positions. And this is not a tournament. Yeah, that's what you tend to see.

Look at Team 6 with four straight. You know, you see a lot of orange in the top. And just from experience, the risk you run not drafting receivers in those rounds is who do you end up with that feels good at all. Kyron Williams, I think, is a fine pick, but I'd rather, and I'm in the tournament space, and this is not a tournament, so I have to make sure I point that out. I don't want to keep saying it, but it does change things things i'd want to see if he comes back to me in three yeah and you know if he doesn't then i keep waiting but there's no problem with wanting

to bet on him i think so that's fine and that's close to where he goes yeah and i did consider someone like debo samuel he's gonna get the ball a lot. And Marvin Harrison. So I went Sam Laporta with my next pick because Detroit just loves the heck out of him. Then Anthony Richardson, our boomer bust guy with 46. I decided to go kind of all in on that. And you asked about the wide receivers. OK, so as I scroll down a little bit here, I got Mixon in the fifth, but then I went Addison, Smith Najigba, Sutton, and Samuel in four straight picks. And those guys aren't the biggest names, but I could also see all of them as either wide receiver twos or their teams only wide receiver one in the case of Courtland Sutton still

racking up a lot of numbers. And so I felt that I got one of the best running backs and one of the best tight ends early in exchange for a lot of wide receivers later. Yeah, really, you might have gotten away with it. Like that's what you had to do, whether you knew it or not. In rounds five through eight, that is what you had to do to catch up at receiver with just Jefferson toerson to that point like jefferson is your only receiver in the first four rounds if i remember right so this is absolutely what you need to do um you don't need to think about stacking so much i'm not sure you did whether darnold is on this team or not you already have two quarterbacks by herbert as i look at it but i like the players smith and jigba fine, fine. Samuel's hurt now, but that could be a short-term injury, fine.

Sutton, we talked about last week, fine. Through eight rounds, I think you're pretty good here, but you needed these receivers or else you were probably dead. What's important is that you can't prove that I didn't do it on purpose. No, well, I mean, I would ask you. I think I could just say that I did. Uh, yeah, Justin Herbert comes up here. There was a little bit of a run on quarterback. So I needed to jump in. Uh, Herbert is not being pumped up a lot from what I understand, but I think he's still going to be really good and put up big numbers. Even if he

doesn't have the receivers, Jim Harbaugh is going to throw the ball with him. That's why Jim Harbaugh showed up there aside from many investigations in college. I got Hunter Henry. I really liked to Mario Douglas, that idea of getting a new England wide receiver. They're going to throw to someone. So I got both of those guys. Tyler Conklin maybe was a stretch here. I also tyler conklin from covering him and feel like he's someone that aaron rogers will come to trust took a swing at roman wilson took a swing at rashad bateman finally having the rashad bateman season miles sanders and carolina is probably a terrible pick uh and then uh sam darnold at the end because why not he's gonna play and he's gonna throw the ball a lot and what i know about sam darnold is sam darnold is capable of having hysterically

amazing games throughout his career there's not a million of them but there's enough to pick him with the dead last pick in the entire draft yeah and, and I'm not so well-schooled in these 12 teamers. So I'm guessing that you're probably right to want to draft three. I don't know that you'll have to do that. Your number one quarterback is Richardson, so your bet is that Richardson's amazing. And I think anybody from Richardson up could be quarterbacks that I would feel okay drafting two or else like if Richardson, you, you could,

you could escape because you drafted three, but you're going to need some of your late round picks to come through. Otherwise you need Richardson to win. Like Richardson is the guy that with that early in investment, it's not early in terms of draft capital. It's just like, that's your team now. So when you're drafting like this, I think you want to sort of process, who am I betting on? And then sort of embrace the risk that comes from that,

which is I'm not going to draft a third quarterback because if Richardson doesn't hit, I'm dead anyway. I'm glad you have Darnold because you have Jefferson and Addison. So that I like. Look at Team 12, just for the fun of it. That's three quarterbacks. McCarthy, when was this draft? This was right before McCarthy got hurt.

I did a couple on the same day yeah well that's good at least um but he probably he or she probably didn't pick a quarterback until bryce young is that correct same uh jayden daniels oh jayden daniels well then you don't need four uh i don't know why you would do that that person went quarterback crazy that went they went a little crazy there at the end. I think it's kind of fun if there isn't a Jaden Daniels on that team, Bryce Young starts. If you get May or McCarthy to start week one pre-injury,

then you're kind of live there. One thing we talked about, and I know we're getting late, but discussing today is what to do with the quote onesie positions. And I think at tight end, I want to have one of the top five or six guys, which you did in this draft with Laporta, you know, pretty much every time, especially on the FFPC where I play over there with one and a half points per reception. But on underdog, too, i want to have one of those top five or six guys quarterback i really don't care like that is one where because you have such an interesting group in the middle with caleb williams and daniels and tua and you

mentioned herbert and goth and you know deshaun watson even potentially i don't need alan hurts my homes i'll i'll do it if i have the the stack but i don't feel like i have to do it and tight end i feel more like i have to do it right yeah the fall off of tight end after the top couple of guys is pretty severe so before we wrap another uh fantasy podcast show here on Purple Insider. Grade me. What do you think? How'd I do? Better. I don't want to go too far, though,

because we'll maybe do another one of these. Whoops. I switched that over to my email. I don't know if I want to be reading your emails. That was the underdog ad read that I have to do, but let me move us back here. I'll give you a solid B on this. Okay. I like it. Yeah. You know, it'll be your secret whether you got to round five and said,

I need to draft wide receiver with the next four picks, no matter what, that's for you to know. And no one else gets to know that, but you did it. And so in your first eight picks, you have five receivers, one of whom is Jefferson. You have Kyron Williams, who's a top six running back selection. You have Laporta, who's one or two. And then you have Richardson, who's top six. So if your receivers get, if Cortland Sutton gets there for you

and Samuel, guys like that, then you can win. Okay. I feel like progress was made. I will have another draft for you to look at next that, then you can win. Okay. I feel, I feel like progress was made. I will have another draft for you to look at next week when we do the show and a reminder to use the promo code purple over at underdog fantasy for your special pick and first time deposit offer up to $250 of bonus cash. And a reminder that you must be 18 or older terms apply concerned with your play call one 800 gambler or older. Terms apply. Concerned with your play?

Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit ncpgambling.org. That's something that you have to do on the show. Can I please say one more thing? Sure, go ahead. Yeah, absolutely. If I were to buy a Vikings mini, who is the player? I do, just so your viewers know, I do tend to lean older, like 70s, 80s, or even 60s. The Vikings were in Super Bowl IV. If there's a Super Bowl connection, I don't know which Vikings player was the best Super Bowl 11 is their last appearance and I'm not sure it would be Tarkington maybe it would be Alan Page I mean that's a guy I have a ton of respect for or Carl Eller who was on my show

once at a Super Bowl but I would be happy to hear suggestions on like who the right Viking is for a signed helmet so if you want to go a little bit off beat and someone sort of goes oh really that guy yeah I remember that guy, Chuck Foreman, the spin doctor for a little time there.

One of the great running backs in history. And another one I would go with, too. And I've been accused of underappreciating this guy in the annals of great wide receivers in Vikings history. Ahmad Rashad would be another good pick. So both players with Buffalo ties. Really? Well, I Ahmad Rashad would be another good pick. So both players with Buffalo ties. Really? Well, I knew Rashad.

I didn't know that. Did Chuck Foreman play there? No, Rashad did. Foreman got hit in the eye with a snowball on a run. It was the final game of the season, maybe 75. And somebody from the crowd hit him with a snowball and i don't know this i've never spoken with him but like that that was bad for him he yeah i don't know what what he did about that but i know that that happened and jay foreman played for the bills

uh you know 20 25 years later but good names yeah two guys that maybe are a little underappreciated in vikings history uh the deep end fantasy podcast is your show make sure you check that out this was really fun again looking forward to doing this every week and i'm kind of counting down the days here till we can go week one games let's look at them cannot wait it's it's only two weeks i mean two weeks from today we'll be be talking about Ravens Chiefs tomorrow night. In the interim, the deep end invitational is, if I may, one of the toughest, best fantasy football tournaments anywhere. My partner and I, Adam Krautwurst on the deep end, went for the very hardest format to use? Because, you know, most of these drafts kind of look the same.

So how do we build it in a way where people have really hard decisions to make? And we have some of the best, most popular names in fantasy football. We're on live. The second of our four drafts is Thursday night, the 22nd. I'm in that draft. And then next week, 28 and 29, both nights we'll have drafts. So if you want to see what that looks like,

join us on the deep end, deep end FF1. The deep end. Check it out. Mike, we'll talk to you next week. Thanks, man. Thanks, Matthew. Thank you. Football.