Purple Insider - a Minnesota Vikings and NFL podcast - Will Justin Jefferson's production be impacted by new QBs?

Episode Date: August 8, 2024

Purple Insider now has a fantasy football show featuring Mike Schopp of WGR550 and The Deep End podcast. Matthew and Mike discuss whether Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison's production will stay strong with Sam Darnold and JJ McCarthy and look at players joining new teams Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Purple Insider. Matt McColler here. And to start the show, we announced something very fun and new. A weekly show with myself and Mike Shope, WGR 550, and the best fantasy player that I know. And the show is going to be presented by Underdog Fantasy. And each week we are going to talk believe it or not fantasy football and this is something mike that i have not had as a part of the show and i'm going to be honest with you for why one we haven't had a fantasy sponsor before so welcome to underdog appreciate you being part of the team the other thing is i i've always been bad at it it's always been a struggle for me so you are here and we're going to call it the

purple insider fantasy show get it show show uh with you and i we've got topics to discuss that i want to get into but now that i'm in and now that i'm going to try at this and i'm going to play on underdog and do my best and we're going to have a couple segments a week what can you tell me what do i need to do to not be so bad at this well it is it is kind of interesting to me say 10 years ago and i wasn't playing very much fantasy i did when i was much younger but i feel like i always thought you almost can't have a draft that you don't like at the end. I mean, really, what is there to know? You've also got all these resources at your disposal. Everybody's got an app, everybody's got a magazine, whatever. And so you kind of just sort of pick off the list and I mean, easy game, but winning and I, I'm not the best player, I think, but I know a lot more than I did then. And it's about structure. It's about, you know, kind of being able to anticipate what's coming later in a draft, almost sort of reverse

engineer it. You can't control everything like that, but, you know, to be able to stack players with teammates or, you know, through divisions in these big tournaments like Underdog has, we've talked about previously, you really do need to know who's playing whom in the fantasy playoff weeks, 15, 16, and 17. That's all the difference when it comes to winning those top prizes. So those are a few ways where, you know, a casual player can learn how to get better.

And maybe you and I will help people through, you know, our communications here. Yeah, absolutely. I'm, I'm hoping that people enjoy the football talk and also fantasy players maybe get a little bit of advice from you more than me. But that's going to be my job is to set you up to tell me what I should be thinking from the fantasy perspective. But I do love the idea of projecting players players I think one issue that I've always had and I'm sure many people do is leaning on what the previous data says about a player when trying to project them for the following season which is going to lead us into our first topic that for some wide receivers for example they've undergone big changes with who their quarterback

is so why don't we begin with the Minnesota Vikings? Because if you look back at Jordan Addison and Justin Jefferson and their previous production, you would say these two guys are two that you want, especially, of course, Justin Jefferson at the very top. But we have a very, very different quarterback situation. And I think that Kirk Cousins has helped a lot of people who drafted Kirk Cousins wide receivers win fantasy championships because he would pump the ball to the number one receiver, whether it was going back to Deshaun Jackson or whether it was Diggs Thielen or then adjusted Jefferson for his first few seasons. How in your mind does it change things

up to have Sam Darnold and or J.J. McCarthy throwing to Jefferson and Addison? I think the most important piece of information with Minnesota is Kevin O'Connell. And I think while Cousins was sort of a common thread, so too is O'Connell. I just can't imagine Minnesota, you know, cutting back significantly on how often they throw the ball. And if you have a team that struggles defensively, which they might, you know, you have a division where there's a lot of talent. There's just every reason, I think, to expect higher scoring games or higher pass volume games, at least from Minnesota. Of course, the point about the defense is if you're losing,

you're going to throw the ball more. And you have Jefferson, who, as you correctly predicted early in the offseason, got his money. So there's just every reason to think Jefferson is fine. Last year, it wasn't always Cousins either. And there were big games. I know Jefferson missed, what, six, seven games in the middle of the season, came back, and was huge in the fantasy playoffs, which was very, very key. So the only receiver I like this year more than Jefferson is C.D. Lamb. And it's not by a lot. Lamb also doesn't have much obvious competition. Jefferson has Addison, who may miss time. We don't know for sure yet.

And Hawkinson is out probably to start the season, too. So I like the season too. So I like the setup there. And you probably noticed I haven't mentioned Darnold at all or McCarthy in sort of the reasoning there because I just don't think that the quarterback has to be great. We've seen that with Minnesota. He's good, Cousins, but didn't have to be great for Jefferson to be really the number one pick in fantasy football last year.

So for me, he's about third overall. I like picking him over Tyreek Hill because of age and even Jamar Chase. Addison, who goes in round eight. Sometimes I think players are still a little bit worried about whether he'll be suspended. But, you know, just sort of like a poor man's version of Jefferson when it comes to fantasy football, at least. All the same points can be made because, you know, they're on the same team about Minnesota's setup and what I expect there, but just not on the same level. So I don't have a ton of Addison, but again, with the

Hawkinson injury and the Vikings being who they've been, I think he can be a fine pick too. So Addison, I would be slightly more concerned about just from the statistical perspective, because I was looking back at some wide receiver ones, some superstar receivers of the past and how they performed when they had mediocre or bad quarterbacks, wide receiver ones still seem to do really well i mean it would be john skelton throwing to larry fitzgerald or even davante adams had a heck of a lot of catches last year with aiden o'connell pumping in the football or jimmy garoppolo throwing it five miles over his head and yet still if you drafted him you were disappointed but it wasn't like your season was ruined because you drafted him wide receiver twos and threes.

This is where I feel like maybe this is a product of worst quarterbacks. We'll stick with the same guy, stay on the same read. I mean, even DJ Moore had a good season with Justin Fields, but nobody else did. And DJ Moore, when he was with Sam Darnold, I think the next best receiver had 30 catches or something like that. And DJ Moore had 97. And that would be the slight concern here. But I also think that they drafted Addison in the first round and Kevin O'Connell's entire thing is if you're going to give all the attention to Jefferson, we've got a different guy in order to go to. So I agree with you that I think at the end of the day you're still going to have 4 500 yards passing somehow and in some order and how many interceptions get

thrown or how many points you score I'm not sure but there will be that yardage that gets thrown for right and that's all we care about right so you have Addison in a range where it's it's other guys who are maybe like a Cortland Sutton, who kind of seems a little bit boring, probably wide receiver one on his team, though. You know, Palmer with the Chargers, a little bit boring, maybe wide receiver one. So I like your point. It holds up. And if you, the fantasy player, were more concerned with that, you can draft someone very comparable in terms of projections to Addison by looking at those other situations.

But Addison is probably, I mean, certainly compared with Palmer, I would say the better player. And you also have the stacking point in these tournaments where you're trying to figure out how do I get to Minnesota's quarterback if I'm drafting especially both of them? It's Green Bay in Week 17. what can I do with the Packers they're a fun one where you can build out Green Bay or Green Bay Minnesota stacks in the middle rounds with Dobbs or you know not Gene Reed goes a little higher you've got options with the Packers and then you know depending on how well off you are in terms

of your total roster you can get to Darnoldold or even McCarthy toward the very end of the draft. So Minnesota is an exciting team to play with in fantasy. Doesn't Dontavian Wicks sound like a guy who fantasy players tell stories 20 years later of the 10 reception game he had in week 17? Like, yeah, you know, he didn't, he wasn't that great, but that one game, there's another team that has changed in a different way. So the Vikings have now worse, presumably quarterback play. Atlanta is supposed to be taking a huge step forward.

And after watching Desmond Ritter and Taylor Heineke, I'm buying that Kirk Cous cousins can be better than those guys but i also tend to see okay this is the year kyle pitts takes this huge step forward like drake london like everybody's going to be wildly better how do we figure out how much better they're going to be with kirk cousins than they were in the previous iteration? It's a big question this year. For me, I'm really into Atlanta and those guys you mentioned and Bijan Robinson, of course, most of all, even though we're talking about a running back, because the space that they have to come up from last year,

from Arthur Smith to, you know, who knows if Raheem Morris and the Falcons will be like the most pass happy team in the league. Probably not. They're probably going to, you know, your draft capital point from before. Robinson is such a high pick himself. They could be more toward the balance side, but that's still so much better for their receiving options than what it was. So you have Drake London goes in the second round. Once in a while, an underdog, you'll see him in the late first.

Even Pitts, the camp so far has been a little bit kind of shaky again about him talking about whether he's in shape and just sort of questions about coming off an injury that was kind of kept from us, the significance of it anyway, for much of last season. He was, again, kind of a puzzle. I just think there's so much room for Atlanta to spike this year in production and in volume for those guys on offense.

This also, however, could be a team that is winning a lot in a weaker division, and if they're good, then you might not see those pass totals that we're used to from Cousins come up. There's just so much room. There's no way they go the other way. So even though it's a new everything in Atlanta with coaching and quarterback, and maybe just sort of your instinct would be to slow play that. Historically, we've had at wide receiver players struggle when going to new teams, but I can't bring myself to fade the Falcons.

There's just too much goodness. Yeah, what I'm curious about for them is there's two ways of handling Kirk Cousins, and we saw it here. There's the Kevin Stefanski way of we're going to create a run first offense and then run play action off that. And Kirk is very, very and then run play action off that. And Kirk is very, very good at running play action. Or there's the lean into the Kirk style, Kevin O'Connell, where you put them in the shotgun and you just live with the downside of that. And because the

upside is a lot of yards passing and Zach Robinson comes from the same tree as Kevin O'Connell, but that tree is also connected to the Shanahan style wide zone play action. I don't know which way they're going to go. And the other thing is with Kirk Cousins, I don't really know about his health and how his body's going to hold up after the Achilles. He also took a beating in 2022, but the fact that they have Michael Penix, since we're talking about this from a wide receiver perspective, Penix is also going to throw the ball a ton that's what they drafted him for because he threw it all the time in washington pitts is the most difficult for me because tight ends have this development thing even with tj hawkinson where hawkinson i think was a little

disappointing in detroit he comes to min, and he's an absolute beast. And I feel like we've seen that with 10 different tight ends over the years where their first team, their first couple of seasons, it's a little disappointing. David Njoku wasn't very good for his first couple years. And then they stuck with him, and it worked out. Is Kyle Pitts going to be a guy who you just have to stick with and then finally give him a better quarterback or is he just not that great and everybody misidentified someone that was supposed

to be Tony Gonzalez when he was actually just kind of a guy he's still young too I mean Pitts I think Pitts is younger than Dalton Kincaid who's going into his second season I mean Pitts has just kind of become known for that sort of disappointing result, despite how pretty the package is, how exciting of a prospect he was. I mean, I still think I want to bet on Atlanta. I mean, Cousins threw more touchdown passes last year than the Falcons, and he played eight games. Bijon had four.

Pitts had three. London had two. I mean, that should double. If Cousins isn't, you know, debilitated from the injury or just shot, I feel like that should double, even with a productive Bijan Robinson and the running game. You know, Zach Robinson, I want to trust that. All of it.

So maybe I'm a little too fired up for for a team that's often just kind of like forgettable but um i'm in even on pits yeah i i mean i'm sort of thinking about last year in their offense and just how miserable it was and how they announced that they weren't going to go after lamar jackson in a trade like once upon a time not that they ever would have gotten him, but it just, that's sort of funny. In like 30 seconds after it was reported that Jackson, you know, was going to look for a trade 30 seconds later,

there were the Falcons media outlets telling you how they would not be interested. One more thought on pits. It'll be worth watching early in the season. I doubt it'll be something that gets revealed in the preseason, just sort of whether he can get match-ups that you'd want from a tight end. At some point early in camp, they talked about using him more as a wide receiver, learning all the positions, the kind of general way coaches tend to talk in July and August. And if he's up against some of the league's top corners, that's not, maybe that's

great for London if he takes that away, but it's not great for Pitt's numbers. If he can get on linebackers or safeties like you'd want from a tight end, then he could probably do some real damage. Yeah. I also think that coaches will talk about that still in a way as if we're supposed to think that that's unusual when every team is doing it every team is putting their tight end in the slot every team is moving their tight end outside just like oh we're doing this thing to make it seem like something is different i don't know that that's that different from last year uh how about this brandon iuk situation it seems to be ready to pop and so by the time i publish the podcast brandon iuk might have a new team so let me ask it this way what would be from his personal production standpoint the best location for

brandon iuk to land and and the worst give me the best and worst well there are i mean a couple of reportedly contenders which which are the steelers and the browns we had new england there for a minute but then they were ruled out i mean the best the best for Ayuk, I think, is going to be San Francisco, if that's how it ends, and he's not traded. But like you said, it does seem more and more likely that he's going to go, which is kind of a shocking thing. I mean, players are often disgruntled in the summer, but they get home. And the 49ers have been so good. What don't we know if he has to go? Just how serious the matter is or whatever the problem is.

So in San Francisco, even though with the Niners, for as many good players as they have, you can't always predict week to week which is going to be the guy that week. You see that with Kittle and with Debo Samuel and also Ayuk. So in a best ball tournament, like we're playing an underdog, you don't have to worry about lineups. It's automatic and you're going to get those huge weeks from those guys. I don't see the Steelers or the Browns being situations that are better for him in terms of fantasy. The Steelers sound to me like the favorite. If he were to be traded there, he would fill in with George Pickens, you know, starting wide receivers. There aren't obvious names there for Pittsburgh that would be competition for him. So he'd go right in. I'm

sure he'd get the big contract that he wants after such a move. But that's Arthur Smith, you know, and I just doubt that Ayuk would be worth more in fantasy playing for Pittsburgh than he is for San Francisco. Cleveland's a trickier one to guess at because would Amari Cooper go the other way in that trade? And that's been speculated, which could open things up. That could be really good for Ayuk if that happens. If it doesn't, then you've got Cooper and Njoku and maybe Judy. And again, I think there's sort of a cap on that. Is there anybody else you think is realistic for Ayuk? 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 U.S. Cellular. Visit uscellular.com slash built for us to get started. Well, you know, I don't see the New England thing seems like it's not happening, but I like them the most for New England. It's a completely rebuilding team. It's a terrible roster.

It needs players, but we know how fast rosters can turn around. And we saw that in Chicago in two years, we saw it in Detroit in two years and they're going to, after they play Jacoby percent for three weeks, they're going to get exhausted of that. And then Drake may is going to play. I liked that combination of kind of a highly talented,

maybe a little bit wild horse type of quarterback. Who's going to lean on a number one wide receiver all the time, because who else do they have? I've been reading the reports about old friend, KJ Osborne looking pretty good there, which I think I mentioned to you at some point, like, Hey, if you're deep in a fantasy draft, you should take KJ Osborne. Cause he's probably going to catch the ball, but they don't really have too many other guys to get excited about with Pittsburgh. That has, that just has toxic written all over it. Bad quarterbacks, two great wide receivers. I mean, that just could get a guy who wants to run first as the offensive coordinator. I don't know about that. And Cleveland can Deshaun Watson throw it to him,

or is he not good at that anymore because he hasn't been for several seasons so i actually kind of liked new england is the main spot and i don't know as far as other teams it everyone's so set and then you also have to pay all this money so who who is not set and then also would be willing to pay the money is is arizona interested because i feel like they need another receiver to go along with harrison jr but i haven't not set and then also would be willing to pay the money is, is Arizona interested? Because I feel like they need another receiver to go along with Harrison jr, but I haven't heard their name at all. And you wouldn't trade within your division probably either with a player of that caliber. Jacksonville, would they be able to do something? I haven't heard their name at all, but Christian

Kirk is not a wide receiver one to me. So I think actually New England should probably pony up for that. Yeah, and you made the right point with just like it's August 7th. And while it's not the middle of the season, most teams have been planning all summer for who they've got, what they want to be. Only maybe, well, most likely a situation like the Steelers or the Patriots where, you know, it might be just wide open. And those teams are different too. I mean, you talked about New England being in a rebuilding mode here. They drafted two receivers this year in Polk and Baker. So yeah, they could make sense for IUK too. But again, it sounds like not going to happen. The Steeler thing, I talked recently with Will Graves, the AP reporter in Pittsburgh. And when we asked him about this idea, he's like, well, what is Pickens going to think?

And the Steelers could end up just turning, you know, they move the money, make the trade, they move the money to Ayuk. And then Pickens is like, well, you know, I'm not your number one anymore. Just whether you have a problem there. And the whole thing keeps churning. Dynasty wise, though, I mean, he's been around long enough now, but only 26. And I think, you know, he's probably a really good investment wherever he ends up. I'm going to throw out maybe maybe a hot take here.

If the Pittsburgh Steelers trade for Brandon Ayuk, the question I'm going to have is, why did you get rid of Kenny Pickett in favor of two quarterbacks who have been awful the last couple seasons? Because, all right, I understand Kenny Pickett didn't look very good. His offensive coordinator was pretty bad and he, okay, Deontay Johnson, I like maybe more than other people, but Brandon Ayuk is way better than him. I would have just wanted to see that play out with Kenny Pickett to see if he could make progress, take another step.

He found a way to win some games as opposed to Justin Fields, who's played a ton of football and has not been good. Russell Wilson has played a ton of football in recent years. Unless you really believe there's another Justin Fields that exists there. That's why I said, like, maybe it's a dumb take. I don't know. But I might have wanted to see that if you're going to do it rather than, hey, maybe Justin Fields will be something better.

It was it was really interesting how quickly they dumped Pickett. Like you said, I would I would say the same thing. Just how bad was it? You you know personalities or whatever it was you know you have a first round pick with all that spotlight all that attention from having played at pit besides and it can be i don't want to say distract a distraction but it's sort of a continuing story for as long as he's there if he's not playing or he's not playing well whatever it is and I guess I can see why a team would just want to be done with that you know what they have done now with Wilson and then Fields that's more than the more interesting situations in the whole league you know this this year and Wilson has been

injured to start camp. So you've had Justin Fields hype a little bit here in the last couple of weeks. I would love, as a fan and a fantasy player, to see Fields get that opportunity. I mean, for as unproductive passing-wise as he and the Bears were while he was the quarterback, the fantasy points were there anyway because his rushing is so outstanding. You know, with Wilson, I don't see how much upside there can really be for a guy like Pickens or with or without an Iuke trade. I've liked drafting the Pittsburgh running backs this year,

around eight or nine Najee Harris and Jalen Warren, just thinking about Smith, and it sort of fits with the reputation of the Steelers. But if we did get fields, you know, whenever this year that could be really exciting and on underdog, we're thinking more about the end of the season than the beginning. So if Wilson is healthy and starts week one, and it's just, just not going very well, maybe you get fields on the field late in the

season where you'll want him and could uh he could be sort of a little little um g-code kind of player late round pick in underdog drafts yeah i guess it would have made sense for in my mind for the steelers to get fields because maybe there's another gear there that you could try to find chicago was a rebuilding team the wilson part of it, maybe it was with Kenny Pickett. You just couldn't keep him around because he was so deeply unhappy if your team was trading for somebody. But Pickett and Fields and seeing if one of them works out makes so much more sense to me than Russell Wilson there.

That one I never really got. It sort of felt a little Jets, Neil O'Donnell-y, like kind of desperate for even the quarterback play but he hasn't been good in a long time uh that's not really the the fantasy point uh but maybe there is something there with fields maybe russell wilson never even takes a snap as a pittsburgh stealer i i don't really know how that's going to play out but if i was brandon iuk and there's been some reports that he wants to go there. I just don't really get it. You don't have a single quarterback who can throw you the ball accurately. And you have an offensive coordinator who wants to run just like your head coach out in

San Francisco wants to run and give the ball to McCaffrey. And maybe that's part of the conflict. Um, I know it was with digs here and Delvin cook and so forth. So I found a list of all the players who have joined new teams this year. And we were talking about quarterback situations that have changed. I just want to throw you out. Why don't we just talk about some guys? You want to talk about some guys? Yes, I do. I love talking about some guys.

I didn't come outside to not talk about guys with you. I know. It looks like a beautiful day there. It is a beautiful day to talk about some guys what am i supposed to think about uh saquon barkley because i feel like uh you and i could have gained some yards behind that philadelphia offensive line with jason kelsey there now he's not there anymore but they still got some beasts up front it's a run first offense is this breakout barkley season or is this,

or is Saquon just one of the more overrated players that I feel like we've had? Cause two, two date. If you just looked at a stat page and I didn't tell you that this guy was considered a massive superstar, you'd be like another running back guy who got hurt. Sometimes is, is this, is this breakout Barkley? I think the key to it will be touchdowns. And one reason why I tend to not draft Barkley is because of Hurts

and just how close to automatic he's been near the goal line. It's much like Allen and Buffalo, the tush push stuff. I doubt they put it away. Why would they, you know, go into the season not planning to do more of that, even without Jason Kelsey?

I mean, I think Barkley is fine. I think we can overthink these things. If he's not great, he's been good. You know he can catch the ball if that's something that Philadelphia wants to do with him. It's not really been their offense. A.J. Brown, Devontae Smith, I mean, they've got big players out wide too. Barkley goes mid-second round usually,

and I don't want to be drafting a running back there usually on underdog, but it's not because Barkley or Jonathan Taylor, who's kind of similar in terms of average draft position, you know, couldn't be a home run pick. So we can't overthink it. We can get to a point where we're comparing who Barkley was supposed to be with who he really is. The team made an investment. He's good. There's every reason to think he'll be on the field all the time for the Eagles. Whether you win on that bet will come down to whether he can score.

And that's just not a sure thing when it comes to a hertz team what was going through my mind with him is that jalen hertz could really use a running back who could catch a bunch of check downs because i think the biggest criticism from the smart film analysts last year was when they got to third down or when they got to some situations where receivers were covered they didn't feel like jalen hertz had enough options and that maybe the exit of shane steichen had been problematic for him and nick sirianni didn't have the same feel for some of that now you have a swing pass type of option in saquon barkley that might help there but i have a different saquon barkley follow-up did you in the hard knocks you either watch it or you at least saw some Twitter clips, right?

And in every Twitter clip that I saw, they were talking like, man, I don't know. We just don't want to lose him. It's just really tough. Man, I hope he doesn't go somewhere else. Do you think they were acting for the cameras? Yes. Okay, I thought so too, because I was just like,

I think you guys didn't want to pay saquon barkley yeah and they didn't so um i i have a good amount of respect for joe shane i mean he was a valued piece in buffalo in that front office and day bowl as well i mean he he earned that opportunity um so i think i think that show is fun. It's fun to talk about, but I do also think a lot of it is for the cameras, you know, the owner comes in and they sort of talk these things out, out loud. I can't some, some, some of those conversations did not seem like those were the real ones. And, you know, I guess if it were, if it were, I, I wouldn't just want to be so clear and obvious that we don't want to pay running backs,

you know. So, you know, next question, just completely dismissive of the idea of letting a popular, like the best player you've had, arguably, for a few years go. And they did sign Devin Singletary after talking about reasons why not to pay Barkley. They still gave him pretty good money, and he is about the same age or close to it. Weird. Yeah. I do think some of it is kind of play acting as well. Well, I also think that the team gets approval on what gets published on some of those things. So they're not putting anything out there that they wouldn't want. I'm going to give you a handful of receivers with new locations and you tell me who you like the most and who you don't like the most okay old friend of both of ours stefan diggs houston texans now deontay

johnson with the carolina panthers very intrigued myself kelvin ridley with the titans nobody talking about that because titans uh hollywood brown with the chiefs and keenan allen with the bears who do you like most out of that group? Who do you like the least? At price, it would be Deontay Johnson because every one of those other players has real target competition at receiver, whereas Johnson has the least of it. We know what kind of player he is, possession type. And as long as Carolina, this is no guarantee,

but as long as they're at all competent, you know, if Bryce Young takes any step, they've got a coach in there in Canales who has earned a great reputation with Geno Smith and then with Mayfield. Johnson is the cheapest as well of those players. So he's a pretty easy pick for me in the sixth or seventh round, whatever that might be. I do think Keenan Allen is just perennially underappreciated. I mean, he led the NFL last year in ESPN's open score rating. And if the Bears do really pop with Caleb Williams, I think Allen probably will be an important piece there,

even with DJ Moore and Odunze or even Komet. The key is just, you know, his age and whether he can stay on the field. You mentioned Diggs and who else that I didn't talk about here? Diggs, Ridley, and Hollywood Brown. I have not drafted hardly any of Calvin Ridley, but he's a little bit more interesting with Hopkins Hurt. That team should, yes, because Tennessee, but they should look way different with the coaching changes they've made. And they let Derrick Henry go, of course.

So Ridley would have been my, it still is, I would say my least favorite from that list. But now I don't think I would avoid it necessarily entirely because of the Hopkins injury. You know, he might be in a better position and even Traylon Burks on that team possibly gets salvaged here with Hopkins won't be out super long term, I guess. But older, a knee injury is not how you want to start a season. I just don't know what to make of hollywood brown i've just never felt like he was that good uh i didn't think that in baltimore i didn't think that in arizona and i don't think it now he's sort of a one-dimensional wide receiver and with them trying to or at least from all the twitter clips from

training camp it looks like they're trying to get the ball deep to worthy. And you know, he's going to throw to Travis Kelsey underneath like 5,000 times. Where's the target share. And my homes does not ever throw to just one guy outside of his tight end. He's going to look to whoever is open, whoever he can make a play for whoever he just happens to see a flash of when he's scrambling. That does not scream to me.

Hollywood Brown gets 75, 85 receptions. I'm looking at like 45 I I just and he'll get hurt he'll be out for four or five games I I'm just I would be the lowest on him and the highest on Deontay Johnson because I think that what Caroline is going to want to do is get the ball to receivers quick out of Bryce Young's hands and he gets open quick. That's his thing is he's just a very twitchy player. Um, so I probably am the most down on Hollywood Brown. What do you, what do you think of that Kansas city receiving situation? I think the key is what happens with Rashi rice. I mean, I think he is the easiest of the chief receivers to, to draft. draft uh he'll go in between brown and worthy

and i think it's pretty popular but you could just completely push all in on kansas city how many teams are a better bet anyway with kelsey mahomes brown rice worthy like build a team it's the chief's super stack um yeah Brown is tougher. Rice did a great job last year as a rookie, and if he's not suspended for, you know, what, half the season might be the most he'd be suspended for, it sounds more and more like that could get pushed off until next year even. So I think Rice would be my favorite of the Chiefs. And yeah, I mean, Brown bet on himself. It's not a big contract, and he went to the Super Bowl champs. In Buffalo, I liked the idea of him a lot, even with Diggs still here before that trade. I thought Brown was kind of like the perfect free agent idea for the Bills,

but he goes to Kansas City on one of those kind of prove-it deals. Yeah, I'm sort of with you on who he is as a player. There's probably going to be a role for him in Kansas City the way they are. And, you know, he'll have his highlights. But is it going to be big totals that you kind of want from an early fifth round pick on underdog? Maybe not. OK, let's do the same exercise with three running backs who are in new locations. Derek Henry, Joe Mixon, Josh Jacobs. Henry is with Baltimore, which is going to look pretty weird. Joe Mixon in Houston and the stranger decision.

You know what? We can even throw Aaron Jones in here with the Minnesota Vikings as well. I thought it was strange that Green Bay went out and spent a bunch of money to get Josh Jacobs and move on from Aaron Jones. Makes me wonder if they were concerned about Jones is just his body and where that's going to go. But all of these guys are going to get huge opportunity with their teams. How do you order that? Well, I love the spot for Mixon. And I think that the fact that he was going to be released, but then Houston swooped in and traded for him and extended him, none of which probably

was necessary. If you can be able to trust the Texans, that's a pretty significant statement you're making about the player, and the offense could be great. And really also, there's no obvious compliment to him. So mixing with, you know, Henry is much more expensive in drafts than Mixon is. I think he's a great pick in round five or so. I mean, it's kind of amazing to me that I've been able to afford a vacation with how much money I've lost not drafting Derrick Henry for the last four years. I mean, I'll just always take the younger guy and he has just, you know, he's ruined you if you've, if you faded him in drafts, it's hard though, maybe I'm not sure I want to switch over because the whole reason for not drafting him was because of his age and the mileage. It's hard, though, not to imagine him as a Raven just being in the end zone all the time.

You know, for as much credit as Lamar Jackson gets deservedly as a runner, he doesn't run at the goal line. Like, he's not Josh Allen or Jalen Hurts for touchdowns. Far from it. And that even makes more sense of the Henry idea. Cause that's exactly what Derrick Henry is. Um, he is also like late second round, um, mid to late second round. I can't do it. The third round. Sure. Uh, if that's where, if you're in a draft where Derrick Henry falls, so mixing would be my answer to that question. Henry's okay. Depends on kind of where you're at, what you want to build with your draft.

Jones and Jacobs are really tough for me to click on. I'd rather be drafting Marshawn Lloyd in Green Bay, even Ty Chandler in Minnesota, Charbonnet in Seattle, Jalen Wright in Miami, rookies, backups, players where they're one injury away, and they might even be better considering the age of a Jacobs or an Aaron Jones. I've always liked Aaron Jones as a player, and he can catch the ball. Minnesota's going to probably use him in that way too.

But I'd rather pass, just like the Henry point, and how did that work out for me? I'd rather pass on older running backs if I can. Mixon is older, but it's just too good of a setup i think yeah and he's they're gonna send uh guys deep and there's gonna be underneath checkdowns and stuff like that to mix in he's pretty good at that uh with jacobs the one thing i think going in his favor well first they paid him which means he's going to get the football but the other thing is is, I think Matt LaFleur understands running the football. I think he's good at it. And Aaron Jones's success probably in part into his later stages had something to do with the fact that he's based in systems that have been really good at running the football, going back to Tennessee, and he's been good at it when he's been in Green Bay.

And that's how they built everything off of those play actions with Jordan love that helped him so much down the stretch. That just makes me think Jacobs is going to get the ball a lot. And they, he probably is going to do better than he did with the Raiders when you could just load the box because they're passing game. Wasn't scary. It may be more factors than just the usual yards per attempt.

Is there, is there anyone else joining a new team that you are intrigued by? I want to add on Jacobs just quickly first. For sure, yeah. They have been a team where they will use more than one running back. That's sort of the difference between the Texans and the Packers is maybe mostly that for fantasy purposes. So we've seen that with A.J. Dillon, who's still there too, by the way,

just not effective. Jacobs was ineffective last year for the Raiders, year before he was about as good as anybody and was a league winner. Who else is on a new team that I'm excited about? Intrigued. I call it intrigued. Yeah.

Who are you intrigued by? I mean, DJ Moore was in Chicago last year. We talked about Keenan Allen already. I'm super curious to see what that is this year. I would say. I'm just trying to look at names. Curtis Samuel. How about him, Matt? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So Buffalo is a puzzle. What are they going to be passing game-wise, receivers? No one really knows for sure whether Coleman can do a lot as a rookie.

Khalil Shakir will take a step. What can Cade's, you know, pass volume will be? Samuel's a player I've always liked. And the offensive coordinator in Buffalo, Joe Brady, had him in Carolina. Everybody wants to kind of use Samuel in sort of the Swiss Army knife stuff, handoffs, reverses, all kinds of things like that. I think that'll be an offense where it's kind of a shorter passing game,

a lot of horizontal stuff because of the change with Diggs leaving, and I think that's kind of what Brady's vision is, and that could be perfect for Samuel. So the Bills are talking like a team that will – you know how it goes. When you have a number one like Diggs, it's all about how great it is, how fortunate you are to have a number one. Then you trade him, and it's all about how it's ideal to have so many different guys. trade him and it's all about how i do how it's ideal to have

so many different guys everybody eats is their slogan this year i mean samuel is not expensive in drafts round nine or so and of those bills receivers he's the one i would i'm most comfortable picking in that range coleman is in there as well so is shir but I like the idea of Samuel so there's a guy on a new team that not expensive at all could uh have some value I do recall a Greg Roman press conference that I attended once where he was bemoaning only having one football you know it's just too bad we only have one football just can't get it to everybody and then the offense ranked 24th I mean just you know that's I don't know it uh everybody. And then the offense ranked 24th. I mean, you know, that's, I don't know. You know that covering the Vikings, I'll never buy into.

It's not great to have number one wide receivers. But it is interesting for him because Curtis Samuel has had about the worst quarterback play that anyone could ever start a career with for him. And now to have a real quarterback who's going to throw the ball a ton, that could yield some pretty big results. I'll give you one. Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

It's relative, but I'm a little worried for the Bills. You know, I was listening. One of my favorite analysts to listen to, Patrick Daugherty of Roto World. I think he was even talking about Samuel, but he said at one point, this kind of conversation we're having what the bills are saying how they want to play it's like that's what bad teams sound like yeah when when you don't have somebody you know it it didn't seem to be that much of a problem for buffalo that everybody was keying on stefan diggs the last four years

i mean he still he still was amazingly productive at least for most of it. So the point, and that's kind of Samuel's career, as you said, with Washington and with Carolina. I doubt there's a league-winning kind of season there, but I like the player. And just like with Coleman and Shakir, as I've said, there's an opportunity with Allen to be productive. Yeah. I mean, I think that whole we're going to justify it by saying

we've got a lot of okay. Players is just not all that convincing. Like, I don't know, man, the, uh, the Rams won the super bowl by throwing it to that one guy over and over again. And you know, those, the Falcons were like, darn, we got to throw to Julio Jones again. I wish we had seven average players instead of him. It doesn't, it doesn't stand to reason at all. And it should be concerning because, and you and I were going back forth a little bit when I was on your show the other day about when digs arrived is really when the light went on for Josh Allen statistically. And that makes sense because a lot of his targets were going to one of the best route runners that has been in the league in the last 10 years. Separ separation is such a huge deal. Can Curtis Samuel separate

like digs? Uh, I don't, I don't think so. Uh, I'll give you the stupidest guy I could possibly pick, but I have this in the back of my mind that I'm, I'm going to be genius picking this guy because everyone says he's going to stink Ezekiel Elliott because, because they have no one else. They have no one else. They throw the ball. Great. And they still have a really good offensive line. And even if he's not creating extra yards, because he has no jolt anymore, he's, he's still going to get a bunch of yards and a bunch of carries. And when they get to the goal line, you know, Mike McCarthy is going to be like, all right, let's run the goal line back. So I am idiotically buying Ezekiel Elliott having a good season still.

Yeah, it's so funny. Like Dallas kind of just – not a lot of people will tell you how much they respect the operation, whether it's McCarthy or whether it's Jerry Jones. But they were prolific last year with Prescott and Lamb. And I felt that way about them last year. Like Mike McCarthy, my first coach fired. I mean, just, they're going to go back in time and run the ball. And really they were fine.

Elliot, see, this is like the biggest weakness in my game. I think there I was five minutes ago, rattling off mid-round running backs, rookies, Charbonnet. I mean, who is that though? Zekiel Elliott sitting right here. Dallas brings him back in. I agree. I think, you know, we talked about Barkley earlier and whether he can score touchdowns. If Elliott ends up as their number one running back, which right now he is, he will score touchdowns. And he's just somebody that I have a blind spot for because, you know, older running backs and he hasn't been good in forever. So why would I do that?

And it's important for me and for you and for anybody else to try to not let that happen to you, because it does make sense that he'll be in position to do really well. And what's that? The 12th round. I mean, come on. If you want to draft wide receivers, like everybody, an underdog does from the beginning, then you're going to need guys like that. Although there are a hundred million good receivers now, uh, it is, this may be Buffalo's point might end up turning out to be true. If Coleman becomes good, that they could be like, I don't know, lots of people become good at, you know, at being wide receiver.

This is the Purple Insider Fantasy Show with Mike Shelp. Your fantasy podcast is the deep end. And so people, if they enjoy this, then they should go check that out as well. We're going to be talking about some guys all year long. Every Wednesday is when we'll record i'll publish it shortly after and break it down the week before going into the week uh upcoming and until then until we get there we'll just talk about some guys and what they're going to do and again very pleased to have underdog fantasy as a sponsor of this very show so we welcome them

as well mike this was a lot of fun. Even during vacation, this is how much you love fantasy football. You're like, let's go even on vacation. So thanks so much for doing this, man. You're welcome.

Anybody playing now drafting now on underdog or wherever, when you're on vacation, this can be tougher, but you got to sort of stay in touch with injuries, trade rumors. Like we have with IU. I know Josh Downs went down this morning for Indianapolis. Don't know how bad, but it looked bad, I guess, to people who were there. It's challenging to try to sift through everything this time of year, but it's important to at least make that effort.

Yes, it is. Ignore your family. Make sure you're staying up to date. I think I still hear them they're still around all right thanks mike we will talk fantasy football next week again appreciate it thank you