The Ringer NFL Show - 5 Lessons You Can’t Forget From 2021

Episode Date: July 19, 2022

We leave every fantasy football season with many lessons learned, but after a long offseason, we often fail to recall those crucial former takeaways as we gear up for our next fantasy draft. Luckily, we knew this would happen and have seen the movie ‘Memento’. We run through the past lessons we learned by deciphering the fantasy tattoos we left on ourselves after the 2021 season. (1:42) - News (11:45) - 5 Lessons (57:15) - Listener Emails Check out The Ringer’s Fantasy Football Draft Guide! Email us! [e-mail]. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Producer: Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, everybody? Are you tuning in to the Challenge USA on CBS? Well, tune in to me, Tyson Apostle, as I break down each and every episode with my co-host, Amelia Weddemeier. I'm also a contestant on the show, which gives you all the insider scoop. Amelia, how stoked are you to do this? Tyson, I'm freaking excited. I cannot wait to sit my butt down every single week to watch the show, then come here and recap it with you on The Ringer Reality TV podcast. Your fantasy football show My name is Danny Hypertz

And I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Coralbeck Today we are doing the lessons We learned from last season And then immediately forgot Once the season ended But luckily we tattooed those lessons On our bodies

Like Memento and made ourselves A human to do list So we wouldn't forget So we're gonna go through our tattoos I don't know We'll explain it later It's the lesson Here's the deal

It's easy to forget Like the biggest pitfalls That you made last season It's easy to just get Right back on your bullshit Essentially every year in every draft. Exactly.

We're trying to remind ourselves. Since we're having amnesia, we constantly have amnesia, we're trying to remind ourselves. Like, here's the things. Just don't do it. If we really committed to the bit, we would play this podcast backwards.

We would record it from the end to the start. Could we? It sounds like a lot of work for you. Yeah. Maybe one day. Once we get a little more people on the ringer fantasy football show staff, maybe we can get that going.

Okay. Well, until then, we're going to do memento, but first, news. We can do the news out of order. Not really. That seems so, it's hard to follow. I'm doing a Westworld pod too.

It's enough. I have enough of that. Too many timelines. Too many timelines. Okay. Actual timeline. It's funny that this happened in our real timeline. Ian Rappaport NFL network reports that Ravens running back J.K. Dobbins may not be ready for week one.

Because J.K. Dobbins towards ACL last August. So Rappaport says the recovery not going maybe might not play week one, J.K. Dobbins. J.K. Dobbins then quote tweets, Ian Rappaport. Love it said, and I quote, quote, I'm tired of being quiet. Come to me for your source at Rapsheet. I might not even go on the physically unable to perform list because that's how good my rehab is going

and I'm damn sure going to be ready for week one. And then he kind of went on a rant like Lamar did last week. I will not read all the tweets, but the one that was my favorite was Jake Y Dobbins saying this. I would post videos, I assume he means of him working out. I would post videos,

but I want all you fake-ass doctors and people who have never spoken a word to me to see what me and Jesus been up to on the biggest stage. I like this. Hell yeah. Ultimate duo, JK and Jesus. Chip on shoulder.

I want to like attend a Ravens press conference this summer so I can say, hey, JK, Danny Hydefitz, I'm a fake-ass doctor. I was wondering what you and Jesus have been up to on the biggest stage.

He'll tell you, specifically. I'm such a fan of this. You know what, JK, I will come to you for injury updates. I hope all players to allow this. I'd love to be able to just text K-makers and be like,

what's up with your Achilles? Fake-ass doctors is a great term. I know that it comes with the money and the fame and stuff, but it must be really weird to be, like, a person and, like, random people are just talking about your knees. I just love speculation of running back injuries. It's like July 15th, and it's like, J.K. Dobbins might not be ready for week one.

That's in, like, two months. And I love that. He's just like, I'm sick of this. Also, in Rappaport, the reporter was on Pat McAfee's show live when J.K. Dobbins tweeted this. So Pat McAfee, like, read the tweets back. And he rap report was just. just like deer in the headlights.

Well, if you listen to what Rapsheet actually said, he was sort of just generalizing. When I listened to the quote, I was like, he doesn't really say anything like conclusive. He was like, yeah, there's a chance that had not be ready for week one. It's like the most generic thing. And it's true, there is a chance.

You might not be ready for a week one. What's the point of saying that, though? That's such a limp report. What is the point of that? Buddy, have you seen some of the reports out there? They got to create content. I guess. Well, the irony of this is if Jake Godab,

misses week one. Now he can't. No, now he's painted himself into a corner. This is tough. It's like when RG3 did the all-in for week one and like March after he tore his ACL. Let's not do this. Bottom line, though, are you guys moving J.K. Dobbins down? You keeping him where you had him originally?

What are you thinking? I'm so glad you asked, D.K., because if J.K. Dombins were to miss time, the obvious person who's behind Jackie Dobbins in Baltimore is Gus Edwards, except Gus Edwards also tore his ACL, like right after Jake I know exactly where this is going. So he's not like the week one. So I'm just saying if, in theory, perhaps if Jakey Dobbins nor Gus Edwards are ready for week one, I'm just saying the starting running back for the Ravens in week one would

be none other than Mr. Mike Davis. Boo. The crowd jeers at you. This is tough, Hyphitz. I feel like if I tweeted that Mike Davis could quote tweet me and be like, yeah, Danny Hyphitz a real ass doctor. Highfitz, is Mike Davis on your top 200 rankings? Well, that's an interesting question.

I kind of feel like he has to be now like with the Jacob. If Jacob Adams isn't ready and then Gus Edwards is also recovering from an ACL, I feel like we have to put him in the Mike Davis in the top 200 now, right? Probably. They also have Tyler Beatty a rookie. Not that he's necessarily going to get the job, but you know,

I don't know if even if both of those guys are out, you're still drafting him very late. Yeah, I'm not actually recommending take Mike Davis. It's mostly for the bit. It's just we have to look, like all these stories we're to go through, it's just, these are things we will be keeping tabs on in training camp. And obviously, you know, J.K. Dobbins, when he sees some real-ass doctors, we will see.

Other news, Leonard Fournett, Buck's running back, even heavier than we thought. He showed, I'm not going to lie, I thought this was overblown. He showed up to training camp, and there was, like, one photo that went viral, and D.K. thought it was so funny that he looked fat. His jersey was very tight. I was mostly mad at the equipment manager who didn't get him a bit. bigger jersey because that's just asking for these types of new stories. Yeah, you know, everybody knows this. When you buy a new shirt, you can't dry it, it'll shrink.

Do you see those ads for like the t-shirts that are supposed to make like dad bod guys look good in T-shirts? Oh yeah, I do see those. Yeah, no, I don't get any of those in my Instagram fee. They should start making dad-bod jerseys. I have no idea. That's me awesome. I personally have never gotten one of those ads for those t-shirts in my Instagram all the time. I don't even know what you're cut real loose around the the midsection, but tight on the arms. So it looks like you're fit. Yeah.

In real life, you look like Chris Pratt from Parks and Rec, but the shirt makes you look like Chris Pratt from Guardians of the Action. From the terminal list. Have you seen that, by the way? No. It's kind of, yeah. Okay. I wouldn't know.

I've never got, I've never seen those ads. No idea what you're talking about. Okay. So it turns out that Lenny was in fact fat and you were right, D.K. Because I didn't even know if we wanted to talk about it. But you were correct. Rick Strad from the Tampa Bay Times was one of his podcast this week and said, The last time we saw Leonard Fronet, he was a donut shy of 260,

which is notable because Lenny's, that's like 30 pounds over Lenny's like playing weight. That's a lot. So a donut shy, I can't decide if it's mean or not because I feel like body shaming and anything other than like athletes before camp is kind of out. Although, wait, so I think the interesting thing is Rick Stroud said, who's a good reporter for the Tampa Bay Times, coaches were not happy. That's an understatement when Lenny didn't participate in the OTAs. But then he shows up a mandatory minicap weighing damn near 260.

That's not a good sign for a guy that you just spend a three-year contract on. Does this concern you at all, D.K., about Leonard Fournette? It's a top 20 pick, top 10, 12 running back. I would be lying if I said there's a seed of doubt that's been planted. All I'm saying, like, typically these stories are like non-issues. I think at the end of the day, Fournette's still going to be the starter. He's still going to get a lot of carries, blah, blah, blah. It's still going to be mostly his show.

But, man, losing like 30. pounds, 20, 30 pounds in a matter of like a month and a half, that's, that's kind of like, that's asking for a lot. I don't know if he's going to do it. Like, can you do that? Do you think he's going to be able to do it? Or am I, like, thinking, I don't know, these are professional athletes. Maybe they can do that pretty easily.

Where do we, who said this 260 number, Rick Stroud, Tampa Day Times? Where do you get that number, you think? You think that's accurate? The coaches, maybe, or one of the, I'm not buying it. I imagine he's, I'm going to go out of the limb and say that he probably has, he probably didn't guess. I imagine that you probably spoke to someone on staff. I don't know. When I hear a donut shy

of 260, this doesn't worry me. When is somebody being too fat ever actually affected their career? And they were already like a presumed starter. There's the Eddie Lacey thing. But like, he did fine after he got. You're right. It kind of helped Ben Rothensberger keep another 10 years in his career.

Like when has this ever really been a problem where it was like, man, remember that time that he was just too fat and his career ended? Well, I think I think that the argument is two or threefold in that one, the coaches are mad at you. And you are, you might like lose playing time too. You might literally be winded. Like you might not actually be able to be in as often because you're playing yourself into shape as opposed to like showing up on shape. And then obviously you are probably more likely to get hurt if you're playing yourself into shape and trying to eventually go full speed.

So it's like if Lenny, it's like not a big deal. but if Lenny Furnett like pulls his hamstring in the first week of training camp, you know, we're all going to look around. It's going to be trouble. Oh, yeah, exactly. I think that's actually the most legitimate worry here is that as he's trying to work himself back into shape, this could make him more prone to like pulling out soft tissue or something like that. And then he like has a setback, falls behind on schedule in terms of the losing weight. He can't run. He can't jump.

He can't lift. Blah, blah, blah. And all of a sudden, he heads into the season and he hasn't lost all this weight. So that is, I think, the. legitimate worry. But overall, I'm still, I'm not like moving him down a lot, but I'm like maybe a couple spots in the ranks. I think it's probably fine, if we're being honest. He's a professional running back. He probably knows what it takes to get in shape. I think the practical impact is the bucks will probably keep four running backs and keep Geo Bernard on the roster because they might have

cut him. Fournette tweeted 30 minutes ago. Do you know what he said? What do you say? All fake-ass doctors out here. He said they wouldn't have the same energy in your face, so why entertain them? See y'all September 11th. He's correct on that. No one would call him fat to his face. That's so true. I would not be picking a fight with him. Especially not him now.

All right. So would you rather have Leonard Fornette or Seekwon this year? Sequin. I would also pick Seekoine. But I think they're close. They're pretty close. I've got Fournette slightly higher. I still think in that Tampa Bay offense,

assuming he gets all that volume, my God, he could go absolutely bananas. So yeah, I got Fournette a little bit higher. Yeah, another word, been thrown around this offseason was that Fournet had clairvoyance with Tom Brady and basically that no matter what you want to say, it's like Tom Brady, I mean, there's the rookie Rashad White for the Bucks that have. They have Gishon Vaughn and have Gio Bernard, but realistically, Fornett knows what Brady wants and that's kind of all, that's like the main job qualification. So I think he's still- Is Brady pissed at him? Because that's really what matters.

That's a great question and we should figure that out immediately. Brady, the guy who runs TV 12, I mean, it's realistic he could be mad at him for letting himself go. he probably could all right so we'll check in it's probably nothing but we'll we'll check in and just make sure that lenny's still in on pace to get a lot of work for tampa bay but i'm not concerned about it too much but it's there okay all right you guys want to get into our little tattoo section here yeah do it okay so we're gonna do these are tattoos that we tattooed on ourselves from 2021 because every year there's these lessons you learn and then we forget because we're not smart people and so we tattoo like if you've ever seen memento the guy is amnesia so he

tattoos things on himself to remember. And so we have done the same thing. We have tattooed these reminders on them. We don't really know what they mean, though, because we didn't, like, remember why we got them. We're just going to go through these tattoos we have, and we're going to see if we figure out what they mean and how we should apply them.

Is the plot to Momento, he essentially loses all his memory after sleeping. So every time he wakes up, he has to try and figure out what the fuck's going on. No, no. He has short-term memory loss. So, like, every... Basically, once his mind starts to wane, it snaps out. Yeah. Got it.

So it's not like 50 first dates Quite no he basically like certain sounds like a door shutting will like make him lose his memory It's kind of things like that I think I'm sure there's some like exact medical condition he has but it's some form of like short term amnesia Got it like us we also have a form of short term Every time I hear the the timer on the fantasy draft I lose my memory And I got to figure it out quickly This is the thing it's a real thing just like I wanted Brandon why do I have Why did someone tell me to do Brandon Cooks?

That can't be right. There's no way. I remember that correctly. Not with this clock. Okay. Who do we want to go here first? What's the little vulnerable exercise? We're going to, you know, I don't know if you guys got a tat like I do.

Just right, you know, right across my bare ass. I don't know. Yeah. You know, I popped off my shirt this summer under the summer sun, going to enjoy my day. And I look down. And right across my chest, it just says take Derek Henry. Like old English writing.

And I'm, you know. I wonder when I tattooed this on myself, because it must have been like week six or something like that when he was just tearing the cover off the ball. Because I'm very conflicted right now because what I do every year and what I was planning on doing this year was I was going to predict that this is the year. Derek Henry falls off and then an injury is going to happen. Because it did happen last year, right? I mean, the first eight weeks of the season, he was going insane. He was getting literally almost 30 touches a game and was having, you know, the best year of his career. but now

I don't know what to do, boys. I'm split because I was very excited to be fully on the like Derek Henry has washed bandwagon. He's going to be 29 to the end of this year.

He's got the foot injury. They lost AJ Brown. The Titans are going to be worse. They're going to be losing more. It's all coming together. All of his stats are declining as yards for carry, mistackles, explosive plays,

blah, blah, blah. They're all getting worse. But perhaps the tattoo is what, listen, it worked for Guy Pearce and Memento. Did it? I don't know what to do, boys. You got to follow the tattoo. I think that's like the rule here.

Yes, but the problem is, is I think I tattooed this on myself in the first eight weeks of the season. This Derek Henry injury in week nine really threw a wrench in a lot of like the Derek Henry discussion, the discourse, because it's kind of everything we've always been talking about and it actually finally happened.

But now that it happened so early where he actually came back and played in a playoff game, not very well. But like, because he's already back and healthy, I feel like we're in this weird spot where he's not a, you know, a guy like a J.K. Dobbins, who's like, will he, won't he play week one?

Like, Derek Henry is going to be out there and healthy. There's nobody else in the team. And it's the same situation. But I'm split. I still, to be honest, I think I'm not going to listen to the tattoo. I, I, this is the strangest and most extreme situation I can remember with Derek Henry

McCaffey this year. Derek Henry, I mean, he was on pace for 465 carries last year. Not touches. 465 carries. Like, literally, it was the most carries any player has ever had through eight weeks of football. And I mean, we're in this era where that doesn't even happen anymore. Not only that, he finished, he only played eight games. There's 17 games in a season.

He played eight, less than half. He still finished 15th in total touches. See, this is where, so. I think so incredible. The Derek Henry thing is a lot of people seem to be focused on this idea that running backs fall off a cliff, the age, the apex or whatever, he's like past the age apex for running backs. And when the cliff comes, like a lot of these guys fall off really quickly. It's like not just a gradual thing. All of a sudden, they're toast, they're washed, whatever.

I think that ignores how much of an outlier Derek Henry is as like a player as an athlete, his size, everything he's done. to this point in his career. The foot injuries is certainly like a concern, but I think there's injuries are a concern with every running back. And I think you have to bet. You have to bet on the upside that Henry can bring. You have to bet on the volume potential

that he can bring. And so while this is a bit of a risk, I'm following this tattoo. Craig, I'm reading your tattoo. It's like, you know, I don't remember. Did you write it backwards so you can like read it in the mirror? Are you like looking down?

Like, how's the writing look to you? I wasn't smart enough to tattoo it backwards. I was like, no. I was in a panic. You know how you can read ambulance in the rearview mirror and it's like, you know, it's written so you can read it in the rear view? Oh, that makes, wow. I know.

Yeah, now I do know that. I didn't know that. I'm actually not 100% sure that's true. Maybe I just made that up. Well, that's a good idea. So bottom line, I'm reading your tattoo and I'm following it because, and I actually moved them up, I believe, in my last rankings update, which will be coming out very soon here. I don't know.

I'm just betting on the volume, especially in an offense here where there's like not a lot of like competition for touches. Like they're going to be feeding him, I think, even stronger than they had in the past. I, I hear what you're saying, D.K., but I just, I just am not, like, intellectually, I understand. It's like, bet against Derek Henry, you're stupid. He's good. What are you doing? The Craig tattoo, it's like he's going to get all these touches.

Why are you overthinking this? The thing I keep coming back to is one, he's the oldest running back really, like, left in the among these elite guys. He's 28. It's been like five years since the 28-year-old guy was even a top five running back. I know Derek Henry's Derek Kennedy, that shouldn't matter as much. But Bill Barnwell wrote a really good column for ESPN earlier this year that basically said, Derek Henry was not really the same runner last year.

Like he, Derek Henry is it like the same as every other running back, right? He's not making people miss in every play. He's getting these two, three, four-yard carries. And then because he kind of runs at a different kind of way than everyone, he just breaks off the 70-80-yard runs. He breaks off these 30, 40-yard chunk plays. Honestly, kind of like what I would say about Sequin, where the three-true outcome guy, it's like 0, 2, 2, 4, 80-yard touchdown.

Yeah. And basically, the big plays for Derek Henry went away. Like, Derek Henry went from having half of the 200-yard games, mostly because he has, like, half of the 50, 60-yard rushes. But then, like, the home runs went away. He does not even the 40 to 50-yarders anymore. Like, that gear, the Derek Henry gear, where he's the biggest player, but then suddenly he's the fastest.

really was even before this foot injury wasn't there as often. I think that's really concerning. And I also think because the only way that his numbers had kept up, even though he lost that gear, was he was getting the biggest workload in NFL history. My concern is the Titans probably aren't going to give him that again. I feel like they might not because it's so obvious. And also, I don't think the flip side is,

I don't think defenses are going to have to really respect Tennessee's passing game with AJ, I mean, with AJ Brown gone, they've got, you know, Trailin-Burks, they got Robert Woods. Like, who's their number one tight end? Like, Austin Hooper? Like, this isn't a very scary group. And so I just feel like they're like, oh, yeah, run Derek Henry into us like three times and then punt. I don't know.

I kind of feel like defenses have already been doing that for like Henry's entire career. Yeah, I just feel like he's not, I feel like the basic of what I'm saying is the amount of carries he got last year masked that on a per carry basis. He really wasn't that guy anymore. And then he broke his foot. And it's stress. injury. Yeah, I think that's a valid concern.

I think the volume thing, it's going to be very interesting because I think at the end of the day, the Titans are going to be in a situation, yeah, where they're going to be like, okay, we're just going to give it to Derek Henry because we like have so much pressure to win. We're in there. Like, they're going to give the ball to like Dantrell Hilliard, like rookie Hassan Haskins, like whoever is these backup guys. Like, they're not going to feel confident about that.

And like the big part of what their offense makes their offense work. is those explosive plays from Henry. It's probably true that he's like slightly regressed in terms of his peak athleticism, peak speed or whatever, but I might chalk that up more to just like variance. Like those big plays, those are a high variance play anyway. Yeah, but I mean, his yards per carry went from like 5.1, then he had 5.4.

Last year it was 4.3. His explosive plays, 14% to 9%. Miss tackles are going down. You know, he's getting older. Like, he's not, like, even if he gets 300 carries, I wonder what those 300 carries look like and if he can get through the season. That I guess is my worry.

I think Vrable is going to pound the rock again. I just don't think they're going to be good carries. This is like a theme of this year. It's the difference between, well, all running backs get hurt versus, yeah, but like, what if this historic workload is going to take a toll on the person

doing the historic workload? And the only thing that would make me feel dumber than betting on Derek Henry or sorry, than not betting on him again and him being Derek Henry again is finally going in on Derek Henry and then him being like, oh yeah, he's just not the same, that's okay, what a legendary career

Hall fame golf clap like Albert Pouls at the home run derby last night. It's like, yeah, you know what I mean? He got to the semis. Oh my God. They rigged that shit. Okay. I love how this exercise,

we just immediately betrayed it. Like my tattoo says take Derek Henry and we're like, oh, we get it. How stupid are we? How stupid are we? It's not actually a rule. Why don't we just list? It's more like guidelines.

Craig, what else did you have written on your body, speaking of? Yeah, so just down my rib cage, I had first round running backs will betray you. Is it a little clearer and sharper and darker than the Take Derek Henry one? Like you got a little later. Yeah, it's definitely thinner, a bit sloppier, a little chicken scratched. Feels like it came around like week 14, 15. This one, you know, I can get behind. You know, I looked at the...

Here are the running backs that were taken in the first round last year and here's some... And I'm going to say how many games they missed after each one. McCaffrey, 10 games. Dalvin Cook, four games.

Derek Henry, nine games. Camara, four games. Zeke, somehow zero. Nick Chubb, three games. Aaron Jones, two games. Jonathan Taylor, zero games. Sequin Barkley. Four games.

Only three of those guys finishing the top ten at the position. Shocker, two of them, were Zeke and just Jonathan Taylor because they missed zero games. and Zeke limped his way through the entire season. Now, if you move to wide receiver and you look at their wide receivers

taken in the first two rounds, here they are, and the games they missed. Devonte Adams won. Tyree Kill, none. Diggs, none. DeAndre Hopkins hurt his knee. He missed seven games. D.K. Metcalfe, Zeroy, Justin Jefferson, zero.

Four of those guys finished in the top seven. The only ones that didn't were DeAndre Hopkins because he got hurt and D.K. McCaffed because Russell Wilson hurt his finger. So I just think running back's really deep this year, weirdly. And just the variance, the injury likelihood of running back first wide receiver is not worth the price to me. And you can make the argument like, well, hey, Craig, the other wide receivers in that top seven group were Cooper Cup, Debo Samuel and Jamar Chase. Those guys are taking like third, fourth round. Why wouldn't you wait?

My argument is take both. Take Justin Jefferson in the first. And then take the guy you think is going to be Jamar Chase this year. We did an episode on that. Take Justin Jefferson as your fifth pick. And then take Michael Pittman or Jalen Wattle or whoever the hell you think it's going to be. because there are a lot of good other running backs in the second and third rounds.

Here are guys going in the 10 to 30 range at running back. You can get Joe Mixin, Nick Chubb, D'Andre Swift, who I like a lot. Aaron Jones with no Devante Adams. You can get Sequins, bounce back, Fournette, David Montgomery. Like, you can get all those guys for way cheaper.

Connor. Connor. For somebody like, you know, I don't know, Zeke or Nick Chubb or Camara, not Nick Chub, but like, you know, your Dalvin Cook, you're Derek Henry's. To me, the first round,

running back allure is no longer as sexy to me anymore. I mean, it's hard to argue with that, honestly. And part of me is like, well, you have to just take a risk. You have to just take a gamble and take one of these elite running backs or whatever because that's how you win in fantasy and you just hope you land the right one. My point is that the ceiling of these first-on running backs is almost the same as the seat. Like, I think DeAndre Swift's ceiling is like the same as Austin Ecclars. You know what I mean?

Like, I don't think they're that different. You're in luck. Tristan Cockroff to ESPN is a really good analyst. actually looked into this early this month, and I was reading this piece he wrote, and a couple of the findings were stunning, in part because of how much it matched that gut feeling. I don't know how to explain this stat in a way that isn't confusing,

so bear with me. But basically what he did, well, his overall finding was this. If you, like, the thing where we say is the first round, you can't win your draft, you can lose it. Basically what he's saying, if you want to go for sealing in your first round, you probably want a running back.

You want to go for ceiling. You want to Derek Henry and McCaffee, those guys win. If you want to go for, like, the floor safety, you should really just take a receiver. That was his point. But the numbers he came up with, basically he looked at how many,

the last 10 years, what you just did actually, Craig, how many games the players missed? And he looked at the top five players. And he just added up, how many players, you know,

did the top five last year miss? And then how many in the top 20 missed? And how many, sorry, in 2020, 2019. And then he did that for every rolling group of five, like one to five,

six to 10. And he basically said, okay, over the last 10 years, which group of five, you know, has missed the most games? And it was one to five. The top five players have missed the most games in the first, like, 70 picks. And it's, you know what I mean? Basically saying the running backs you take in the top five are actually the most likely to miss games really in the first six or seven rounds.

Is that because of volume? Well, exactly, right? You think it's common sense, right? Because the guys were taking the top five are running back. who not only do we expect to get near league leading touches with the ball, but have done it enough in the past that we trust them to do it again. And so the guys getting the ball the most are getting hurt. It's not rocket science.

Right. But it was interesting to see it like proven that actually those guys are the most likely to get hurt. It's not a residency thing. It's not just like your gut feeling. So I think it's, I think that the practically for 2020, the question is, are you doubting Jonathan Taylor at number one? Are you thinking about putting Justin Jefferson in a cup number two?

like where do you take receivers, I think then becomes the interesting question. Like, who's worth it and who's not? Yeah, I mean, I think Taylor is still the number one guy. And I think McCaffrey and Najee Harris, if you are probably, in my opinion, like, have the three highest ceilings in the league. But after that, like Justin Jefferson, Cooper Cup, Jamar Chase, dig, C.D. Lamb, Devante Adams, like, I'm fine if you want to get one of those in the first round. I mean, if you look at ADP right now, average draft position, you can get Alvin Camara, Aaron Jones, or Sequin Barclay in the second round.

Like, those are guys that two years ago are just like the fourth pick in the draft. They just, like, got hurt. Like, the talent's not worse. Aaron Jones is in the exact same position. Camara is going to have a way better situation they did last year. And Sequin's arguably in the best position of his career. Like, you can get all those guys in the second round and not spend $78 in your auction draft for Derek Henry.

I agree. And I think that the other part of the draft, the shit is interesting. I know that once you get into who could get hurt, it's like anything happens. But basically, if this group of running backs kind of ages. out. And it's like basically, unless Christian McCaffrey defies the history at the position, he has to defy the history to go from being an elite running back to missing basically, like, the better part of two years to coming back to being elite fantasy running back, really hasn't happened for that long. And Derek Henry kind of having to defy history to take this historic

workload and come back. But if those guys don't defy history and they just kind of age out like all these running backs do when we're always surprised to see it happen, the guys who would replace them are all kind of sitting right behind them. You know what I mean? Like, as you were just like, the Najee Harris, who led the league in touches, but isn't really being anointed

as the next guy. As you said, Craig, like Mixon, Seekwon, Javanti Williams. It's not hard to kind of pick out who would be next year's top five at running back. And you could get those guys later this year.

That was Jonathan Taylor last year. Jonathan Taylor was the second round pick last year. That's why Breece Hall, I think, is a fascinating one. Even though there's not a lot of excitement around him right now and he's on a bad team, blah, blah, blah, all that stuff matters.

But the running back position is just, wow, that was doing my dynasty rankings last night. And I have Breece Hall as the RB6. And I'm like, is this just completely insane for me to be doing this? But then when you look at like how short careers are, you know, his prospect profile, all this stuff, it all kind of adds up. And I think that's right in line with like average draft position right now in terms of dynasty startups.

So man, it's just the position just, it, you know, turns people out. And obviously there's so many injuries and so much turnover at the position. It's just kind of crazy. And at the core of it, I guess it, look, because I think the line I'm trying to draw here is I think Najee Harris could lead the league in touches again. Derek Kenner, if he's healthy, obviously, could, we'll have, would have might have more touches. What I'm saying is that I think I'm trying to bet this year more on the guys who are going

to lead the league in touches, but are like 22 or 23. And like I just fundamentally, you're betting against so much history. and kind of asking guys to defy history for you, it just feels like fantasy hubris to me. I don't have a problem with Austin Echler. It's just he's a smaller dude at a brutal position. And it's something about it messes me up. I'm glad you brought up Naji

because people probably would have been like, oh, what, you're not okay with Derek Henry getting 400 touches, but you are okay with Noggy? That is the difference, I agree. He's been tackled 2,000 fewer times. That's basically, yeah. I'm more in and Craig's second tattoo than the first one. First round running backs will betray you.

I'm kind of into that this year. We can expand on that idea. DK, what tattoos you are? Guys, I woke up, looked down. My arm was like really sore, and I saw on my arms, tell me what this means. Drops are fake news? Was I like, this was during the Trump era, I think,

that I got this tattooed because I don't use the term fake news. But I kind of, I think I get what it's saying. And I think I understand why I tattooed this on myself. and the first person I thought it was Jamar Chase. We were so worried last year about drops, preseason drops. He had three, didn't you have like four drops in a preseason game?

It was like a practice narrative and we were like, don't worry about it. And then he did it in a game. Well, and then he, in that interview, he said that he doesn't like that the NFL ball doesn't have the white stripes on it. It's harder for him to track and everybody lost their fucking minds.

He did say that. So, but I think the lesson here that I was trying to tell myself, old Danny was trying to tell future Danny was just like, Don't worry about drops. Like, that's just such a red herring. That's such a thing that will just kind of like, you're missing the forest for the trees here or whatever.

It's like you can't worry too much about that. In fact, if you look at the number of drops from players last year, obviously drop rate is one thing, but like some of the best players in the NFL, some of the best receivers in the NFL, like, had a lot of drops. D.K. Metcalf has a lot of drops in his career. Tyrook Hill always has drops. Debo Samuel, actually, I think, led the NFL with drops last year.

So it's just something that you have to keep in mind that like it's not the most important thing. When it comes to like a guy like Deontay Johnson, maybe that's like something to start paying attention to because he's actually going to get benched, which did happen. But for the vast majority of instances, like you really shouldn't worry about it because it is something people talk about so much. Like, oh my God, stone hands, he drops the ball, blah, blah, blah. It's something people get really worked up about.

But I think the lesson I learned in particular with Tamar Chase last year was just try not to like get on that wave of emotion where like if a guy makes a bad player too in the preseason like all of a sudden they're going to be a total bust you know what I mean is it about dropsters about like preseason narratives that we clutch on to generally or you specifically saying that I'll never like take put stock in drops again I think it's more the last it's more whatever the the preseason narratives thing that you have to like be careful about getting too attached to one narrative maybe there's one bad report about a I remember last year there was one report that Jamar Chase wasn't separating in practice too. And I like tack that on to the drops issue.

The football has stripes, doesn't have stripes on it and pros issue. Like all these things together and everyone was like scared off by Chase even though he was a, you know, generational prospect of receiver. I think there's definitely things that do matter in the preseason. But the idea is you have to kind of like, you know, separate the, you know, the bad news, the fake news from the actual stuff that matters. What if, all right, hypothetically, let's say there was this running back who was like a top 10 guy last year and was in a really great position entering the new year. And then probably showed up to training camp, I don't know, a donut shy of 260 pounds. Yeah. And we were all like, we have nothing to talk about because it's just baseball and Leonard Fournette.

And we're like, oh, oh, but that, you know, what would you hypothetically say about should we downgrade that guy or no or ignore it? Not dramatically. I think ignore is the wrong word, but don't stress out of it. Don't stress out about it. Don't, like, completely take him off your board. Don't move him down a bunch. Because he's going to get, he's still going to get the volume. They did give him that contract.

That contract's not going away. And he still has Tom Brady's trust, which is, like, probably the most important variable of all. So this will be a good litmus test for this year, is what happens with Leonard Forenet. Right now, I'm not going to overreact. That's my, that's like my pledge to you guys. This is the Jamar Chase situation of this preseason.

I'm not going to overreact too much to Leonard for Net. If we get into like preseason week three and he still looks like he's 260 pounds and like the coaches are clearly upset with him and there's been a steady, steady drumbeat of basically like he's not going to get very much playing time. Even Tom Brady's coming out and talking about him. That's where you start to react. But I'm not there yet. It's not happening yet. We almost need like a media like commandments of like like what type of reports should you listen to and what should you not in the off season. I was thinking the same thing because some things are just content. You know what I mean? Like some things are just like there's information

like signal in the noise right? Like roto world blurbs that kind of react to what someone said that doesn't mean you necessarily have to you know like Like anytime you hear a report that says Running Back who normally doesn't catch passes looking to catch more passes this year

Just avoid that. You know what I mean? That's never going to happen. I think the most underrated part of the blurbs. I can't recommend highly enough. And like everyone gets caught. We do too sometimes.

But I can't recommend enough when you can watch the video of a quote. Because like you'll be amazed when you're actually in a scrum and like I know I've done reporting occasionally on the beat. And it's like if you're in a scrum and someone gets asked, hey Tyree, kill, you excited to play with two at Tungo Vailo this season? And he's like, yeah, I'm excited to play with two of this season. And then there were blurb is Tyreek really excited to play with two. And it's like, well, he didn't say that.

He just said, yeah. He was asked if you're excited and he said, yes. What's he supposed to say? No. And then suddenly that's content. And it's just leading the witness. There's a difference between, yeah, leading the witness. That's exactly what it is.

And I think like one third of the things you see in August are kind of leading questions to fill in a prewritten story, which is nothing wrong with that. It's just like, you know, that's not necessarily helping our purposes. Yeah. Or if like a top 20 talent in the league, you read some blurb in like late July and it's like, Keenan Allen having trouble separating in camp. It's like, just throw that in the trash. Just throw it in the trash. The guy's been good for seven years.

Just throw it in the trash. Yeah, we can expand on this later. That's good. We could use a guide, yeah, to reading the news. To take it like one step further to, like the things that I actually do pay attention to in the preseason are, and again, this isn't actually 100%. Nothing is 100%.

Nothing is going to give you like guaranteed results. But like generally speaking, tracking depth charts, who's running with the ones? Who is projected to get into the game? Like, that's the most, that stuff matters. That's essential. That's like, that's the opposite thing, whereas words or talk is cheap. Who is getting the ball in practice?

Like, the number one, it's like life. The number one limited resource in football practice is time. They don't have enough time to practice all the things you want to do. You'd actually be surprised, like they are running a limited number of reps. And so let's just say they only run a make up a number, 100 reps in a day. there was the old joke for the Colts. Like they just gave Peyton Manning all 100 reps. No one else got to do it.

Because the whole dumb running joke was if Peyton Manning goes down, then we're fucked anyway, so who cares? We don't practice fucked. Yeah, we don't practice fucked. We don't practice not having Peyton Manning. And so like, that's the actual quote. It's hilarious. But I think that when you're in running backs,

it's like they're not just ticking around. Oh, we're going to give this practice squad running back some reps with Tom Bray today because we liked how it. That's not how it works. They give the ball to the people they think going to play. And as you see through the course of August 1st to August 31st, who

has gotten the ball more and more practice time with the starters and who gets it less is a very, really the biggest tell we have. It's very important. So with the Jamar Chase stuff, what we probably should have been like, well, did he get downgraded to the second team because of the drops? No,

he did not. And we should have stopped. Yeah, we really overanalyzed it. It's like he was always going to be in the games, you know? He's always going to get a ton of targets. I think that's like where we kind of just like let ourselves down a little bit by kind of letting all these stories get to us. I will say even the depth chart stuff like it doesn't tell you everything because fucking Justin Jefferson was playing behind B.C. Johnson for like three games, his rookie season. And then he went on to have like one of the greatest rookie seasons of all

time. So like even that isn't the most important thing. You know? It's such a good point because it's like you also have to remember there's like there's so much more. It's like an iceberg. There's so much more we don't know than we do know. And then even within the people who know more than us, there's still so much they don't know. Like, again, the Jefferson, it's also like the Justin Herbert thing. It's like, if the charges knew Justin Herbert would be that good, they would have freaking played him, but they didn't know.

It's like the Vikings would have played Justin Jefferson if they knew he was that good, but they didn't know. So the lesson is, to write it all out, like, the steady drumbeat of news, depth chart stuff, things like that are important. It's important, and it can give you, you know, like an idea of who's going to get a lot of playing time, all that stuff. But it's not a science. It's more like an art form.

And so there's no like real one way to do it. It's basically just like trying to synthesize all the news into one, to how you draft. It's very difficult. That's why like you, there's so many misses every year in fantasy. What a perfect segue to guys. I got a tattoo. I woke up this morning and write all capital letters right across my chest. It just says don't trust Shanahan.

this might be tattooed on all of us. I feel like I got to check my body more. I might have this somewhere. I might have it more than one place. I might, so basically. Craig's got the tramp stamp. Don't trust Shannie. Yeah, right on the Shan stamp.

Shany with just like it crossed out. The shant stamp. Oh my God. But, so, I mean, it's just, shana and it's just like an infuriating. Like, we just never know what's up with the Niners. It's like, I mean, a few years ago, like, they drafted Dante Pettis in the second round as a receiver.

he ended up being benched and all this stuff. Last year it was like, you know, they had Brandon Ayuk. He missed time and they played Trent Sherfield. They drafted Trace Serb. Maybe they were running back in the third round. He was a healthy scratch like half of the season. I mean, a healthy scratch on a team where everybody was hurt. You know, and then there's just Shade's general decision making, which sometimes

bewildering. I mean, there was that story where he basically pushed and forced John Lynch to like draft this running back to Joe Williams. Joe Williams never made the team. And then obviously they traded up for the third pick on the draft. Did they want Mack Jones? Did they change their mind? Seems like real life and in fantasy, Kyle Shan,

it's just hard to read with the personnel stuff. Yeah. But now we're ending this thing where is it a bit or not of like, is Shanahan actually unreliable or are we just kind of like forcing ourselves this? I've given this a lot of thought. And I'm at the point where I think I figured it out, guys. Are you ready? Yeah, yeah.

I don't think Shanahan is actually that unreliable to depth chart. It's that he's just in love with like fragile running backs. He likes the most fragile ones. The guys always get hurt. Like he's not just really nilly pulling guys. it's his running backs always get hurt. But if you kind of look over the last five years, even by running back standards,

the rate at which the Niners running backs have gotten hurt is so incredible. I either think it's something about the style of running they do or really the profile of running back that the Niners look for. Something about it, because if you just go back, and this isn't reported,

I'm really just trying to make sense of how, really the last four seasons of the 49ers, it's stunning. I mean, last year by week two, five of their six running backs were hurt. Like they had to turn to like, Trent Cannon by week two. December was the same thing.

But like Rahim Moster got hurt for them. Not last year, but over the years, Rahim Moster, Matt Breda. I mean, Jeff Wilson seems always banged up. I mean, Kevin Coleman. There's something really about the style of running back they're looking for it, that it's almost like they're not really concerned if durability isn't a huge issue. And I look at Elijah Mitchell coming into the season. This is a guy who was good when he played, but as a rookie, shoulder issues, knee issues,

concussion and I'm missing one. He also had a rib issue. And I'm like, that was your rookie year. And I'm like, I just kind of can't conceive of taking Elijah Mitchell in the top 50 picks with all this. I don't know. Am I crazy? No.

It's true. And it's actually why I think that Ty Davis Price, their third runner from this year, is such an intriguing sleeper. It's because they've just had so many issues with injuries. And by the way, the whole time you were talking about that, is how everybody on this team got hurt. I was just thinking of myself, like, How the fuck did Trace Sermon not get into more games?

Like, they were, what did, what did he do? Shanahan knew he wouldn't get hurt. And so he's like, I can't play him because then he won't get hurt. I only, he has a type. I want to say he dealt with injuries too. He had a concussion. Yeah, so like. But he also was like a healthy scratch at various points.

I believe his first carry in the league was a concussion. Yeah, I think you're right, Craig. Or first or second. It was like very early on. Yeah, yeah. And it was like at the end of a long run, too. And then Shanahan was like, oh, nice, this guy gets hurt. Okay, cool. Now I'll play him there.

Yeah, I was talking to a couple people about Shanahan recently. It's just like, I think the deal is, obviously, I have made it into like a bit, like, the Shanahan tree of coaching where he just basically, like, if he decides he doesn't like you, you're just not fucking seeing the field. Like, that's kind of a deal. I think in reality, it actually, it's not that he doesn't like him necessarily. It's that he only has, he only wants players that he trusts to do the right thing at the right time. Like, make the right reads.

Go the right direction. It's about control. It's about running this offense that he wants to run. Yeah. The Shannon system, Joe Thomas described it as it turns you in a computer. Everything's a zero or a one and you don't think and you just do what shit, you do any coach doing every single point. But if you're not looking at the offense like a zero one and doing everything that's been

predetermined for you, you are not doing, you're not going to play. Yeah. And specifically when it comes to running back, like I remember watching Alex Gibbs, you know, coaching sessions or whatever clinics from way back in the day. and he's very much like we can turn anybody into a thousand yard rusher if you just take your cues and read the blocking correctly

and do exactly what you're supposed to do based on where the defender is based on like if the blocker in front of you gets his head in front of the whatever like all this technical stuff so if you're not doing that shit they're just not going to play you because they think oh we'll just have someone else

that will actually run where you're supposed to run it's like if they find guys that can do that then they're just happy they can turn that guy into a thousand yard rusher And if you look at the history of like, you know, the Shanahan family, his dad turned all these random guys into a thousand yard rushers. And so, and then like Tom Cape, like all the people that kind of came from that tree and have been running this outside zone thing. Like they can turn all these random like late round picks undrafted guys into big producers simply because they find guys that are like you said. It's like the binary thing.

They're just like, okay, this guy's, you know, overplayed the on defense. So I'm just going to cut it back up field and get five yards. and then just keep doing that like 30, 30 times, 20, 30 times a game. And all of a sudden, you're just, you know, picking up yards after yards after yards. So long story short, is like Shanahan, I like to make fun of it. It's funny. Like, he just hates guys or whatever. But in reality, it's he just wants guys that are going to run, like, be very disciplined in the system that they run.

And so maybe Trace Sermon just is never going to be that guy and he's never going to see the field because he just can't run that offense. The Niners are the only team where I, I think every single running back on the roster might be worth drafting. They have five. Right, right. They have Elijah Mitchell, Jeff Wilson, Jr., Davis Price, Trace Serman, and Jim Michael Hastie. Like, oh, I guess they have one more here. Mason Jordan.

Sorry, Jordan Mason. Yeah, and by the way, he's gotten some hype during training camp. It's like, of course he has. But yeah, it's like keep your free agent auction money ready because the second one of these guys goes down. The second to starter goes down. It's anyone's guess which one is going to step. up and Tyrion Davis-Price could be the Elijah Mitchell of this year.

You know what else is very interesting about the 49ers run game? If you want to get kind of nerdy about it, is now with Trey Lance at quarterback, they're going to be running more of the read option style stuff that we've seen, you know, like obviously RG3 ran it in Shannon's offense a couple years ago. So you're going to say they need a different style of running back? Maybe, maybe like more of a downhill guy, you know, obviously in the read option game, like maybe someone that just has a better feel for that. we don't know for sure if it's going to be Elijah Mitchell or not.

So I just think that... Tieran Davis Price is much bigger than Elijah Mitchell. Yeah. Tieran Davis Price could get all the red zone stuff, like all the goal line stuff. So I think he's very interesting, but overall, like, it's very difficult to parse or what's going to happen with the 49ers run game just because at the end of the day, we're sort of, you know, beholden to the whims of Kyle Shannon. And more accurately, like we're relying on these guys to execute really in a disciplined way,

snap in, snap out, and that's how they're going to get playing time. We know Elijah Mitchell can do that, but pretty injury-prone. So this tattoo needs to be amended, right? It needs to be crossed out, like, be wary of Shanahan? What should it say? Not weary. Wary. Yeah. Don't trust Shannon, asterisk

because while he's an incredibly gifted offensive mind, he has a deep control issue, and that he might just really like injury-prone players, so you should probably just go for the more value-based guys later in your draft. This is like a full-back piece. That's like Ben Affleck's giant back tattoo. Yeah, like Kevin Durant's giant Bible verse in his back where there's a bunch of typos. One of them.

Yeah. Maybe we can just turn it into like the Aaron Rogers tattoo where it's just a bunch of symbols, but you're supposed to interpret it into like a paragraph like you just said, Hi Fitz. Yeah. That would be good. Can we get Tatum to like put together a tattoo that says what you said, but it just in like astrology symbols? What's Kyle Shanhan's Horoscope? Oh, Shandan.

Horoscope. It is, let's see here. Sagittarius. Oh, like Rogers. Everything keeps coming up Sagittarius. Impulsive. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, so Shannon, just stop playing guys with paper bones. Any other tattoos here? Guys, I just have a giant list of players' names that are crossed off.

I'm going to read you the names. All these names are crossed off. Tassum Hill, Tyler Higby, Evan Ingram, Jack Doyle, Tyler Eifford, Irv Smith. As you're going along, it doesn't look like these tattoos were made at the same time. Like I was, I was clearly adding on names. The ink has faded as you go down. So what does this mean? What's the, what's the connective tissue here? What are these guys? Tell me, you tell me. Well, each one of these guys in their own respective seasons kind of seem like the low end, tight end that you loved and thought would break out, but ultimately burned you.

So I'm telling myself, Craig. Why is the Tyler Higbee tattoo clearly been redone? Stop taking shitty tight ends, I think is what I'm trying to tell myself. Stop, no, stop taking late tight ends. It's not your year. You're not the one who figured out which tight end is going to be the next Travis Kelsey. It's just, it's not worth it. But when do you take a tight end then? Right at the top earlier.

Just stop fucking around with these late. Stop trying to predict the tight end sleeper that's going to break out because, like, you've got a better chance of doing almost anything in fantasy. I get what you're saying, but Cole Kemet this year. Good Lord. He's the tight end sleeper. So like, but I figured it out for this year. I've already sent the art to my tattoo artist and telling him how to correctly spell

Kmet because I'm guaranteeing I'm going to be adding this fucking tattoo to my body later on because we're going to be very disappointed. It's the thing is like even some of these guys, and I was looking at last year that after the top six picks. So basically, you know, like I would say like the players that I'm actually interested, the tight ends I'm actually interested in drafting this year. Hold on. Let me pull up the list because it's not a very long list. For tight ends? Sorry, did I say tight ends? I want tight ends.

Travis Kelsey, Mark Andrews, Kyle Pitts, Waller, Kittle, Hawkinson. Like, is there anybody else after that? I'm not even sold on Hawkinson. I would stop at five. That's like even pushing it a bit. So I looked at last year, like the 80, for guys that were taken seven through beyond. You got Logan Thomas. He was a six-seventh rounder. he played in five games. Noah Fant. I mean, he was fine. He didn't, like, he's not going to, he didn't win anybody in any leagues.

Noah Fint. Robert Tanya, who scored, I think, like, 10 plus touchdowns a couple years ago, came in. He was an eighth round pick. Disappeared. He averaged six point three games, points per game in eight games. But isn't this an argument to take tight ends later? No, I'm telling you not to do this. These are bad, hyphen.

These are some of the guys that we thought were going to be. You want six points a game at a time? You say eighth rounder, but like all these guys are going later. So I guess what I'm saying? Early tight ends are bad. Middle tight ends are bad. When did you take a tight end? Where do you do this?

I didn't say early tight ends are bad. Early tight ends are good. What the hell are you talking about here? We want to take Travis Kelsey and Mark Andrews and Kyle Pitts. So you're trying to, well, that's what I'm saying. Let's say you don't get Kelsey Andrews. Are you saying you should take Kyle Pitts and like, like, we're going to reach for one of them? He's saying there's a tier, a top tier of five.

And if you don't get one of those, you're screwed because none of the other ones work out, ever. I feel like the mid-round guys also screw you, though. Well, yeah, but I guess do you consider Darren Waller and George Kittle middle-round guys? I don't. Yeah, Darren Waller was the number one guy in his team, and that was Devante Adams, and it's very much not the number one guy in his team. Yeah, but he's firmly the number two guy in his team. I mean, George Kittle, you could argue, is not the number one on his team.

What was that time you took a tight end, like 55th, and we're like, yeah, that was a great idea. I literally can't remember it happening, ever. Yeah, but I do think the tier one of tight ends is weirdly deeper than it's ever. been. Because I think of the emergence of Pits, like it's always kind of been Kelsey, Andrews, Kittl and Waller, right? Like it was four last year. We're just adding one more. So, Highfitz loves Cole Kmetz this year.

This is going to end well. Craig, do you have like a favorite late round tight end that you, you know, obviously if you miss out early on the top five guys, who are you looking at here? It's going to be really tough for me to tattoo Albert O's last name on my body. Yeah. So I might just go with a letter O. And if you want to go even

deeper, I think, you know, Gerald Everett, Cameron Brate, Evan Ingram. I can't draft any of those. Why Evan Ingram? Can you stop saying, is this a bit? If you're a Giants fan. You're not, you have no ability to be unbiased in this.

Here's what happened. You know, we've talked about anchoring for years, right? I drafted Evan Ingram. I think his rookie season, I think he had actually like a decent year. And I watched like three Giants games. And in all those Giants games, he was pretty good.

And he was like super fast-looked athletic. And I've never forgotten about that. Honestly, we need an asterisk for D.K.'s tattoo That says drops don't matter. Asteris, except for Evan Engram. who always drops the ball on third down and the freaking game

where Daniel Jones did the run and fell on his face. They would have won that freaking game if he had caught the ball. I, oh my God. Yeah, and what did I just say? He can't be unbiased on this one. I think the big thing here, to keep in mind,

like to give you something a little more concrete to focus on, the one thing that connects like the best tight ends in fantasy football is there either the first or second option in their offense. Travis Kelsey, by far the number one

option in this offense now with Tyree Kilgon. Mark Andrews, you could argue he's the top pass catcher in this offense now, especially with Marquis Brown gone. Kyle Pitts, best, like he's probably their best player, period. George Kittle, I think there's a little gray area there.

One, A, one B. Debo and Iuke now, like maybe he actually ends up being the number three option, but I think he's I think he's still the number two behind Debo. And then Waller, who is going to be the number two in theory behind Devante Adams, although, again, this is maybe not in concrete, as concrete as it looked in the past.

Cole Comette, catching passes, Justin Fields this office. He's number two in the offense. If I got to hear Irv Smith's name one more time, I've been hearing Irv Smith for the last three years. Just tattoo already. I'm going to get the tattoo tomorrow of Irv Smith. If Cole Kamette does pan out, it is because he is the number two option in this passing game.

So I'll give you that. This is why I'm not excited about a guy like Pat Fryermuth. He's like the fourth option in that offense, maybe. Mike Gaseki, like, he's probably going to be playing like 30% of their snaps. It's just tough to get excited about any of these guys. Even Dallas Goddard now is the clear number three behind A.J. Brown and Devante Smith, right? Yeah, and a team that doesn't even throw the ball that much. Yeah, I don't know.

Like, it's just all of these guys are so depressing to me. I don't know. Yeah, you're right. Don't stream tight ends, but also don't take one early and don't take one in the middle. so. I don't know why you keep saying don't take one early. No one is saying

don't take one early. Where are you getting to that? You're putting words in our mouth. When did we say don't take Mark Andrews? Well, I'm just curious. We're saying explicitly to take one early. What's an early 10 end? The top five,

whenever you have Kelsey ranked, DK. That's what I'm trying to say. Where do you have Kelsey? I think I've got Kelsey in the first round. Let me see. 16 for me. I've got him at 10. Just fucking get it over with.

DK at 10, that works. I don't think Craig's going to get Kelsey at 16. That's kind of what I'm trying to say. say here. Okay, well, I'll take any of the top five. If I can get any of those five, I'll be happy. Okay. Just check it in. Where do you have them ranked? Well, I'm going to move them up at our next round. Okay, I'm probably 13. Ironically, yeah, probably, I think I'm like, we were talking about James Connor the last episode. Real quick, there, pop quiz. James Connor or Travis Kelsey? Kelsey.

Yeah. I've got the top five, I've got all the top five tight ends in the top 50 for me. Kelsey or Leonard Furnett Kelsey Kelsey or Devante Adams I have him right above one spot Kelsey I'm just double checking my ranks here yeah I got Kelsey higher

I think Kelsey's Kelsey's like such a good pick this year I know Craig you've talked about this a million times in the past but like he is the clear cut number one in that offense now he's like the Derek Henry of tight ends where I'm like no no is this the year he finally slows down

I don't think so. I feel the same way about Henry too, by the way. Yeah, because Travis Kelsey gets tackled like, what, six times a game? Derek Henry, 37. It's good stats. Is he getting tackled or is he just running into people? There's a difference. He's the hammer.

We've all this, like, advanced stats, and honestly, the only one I really want for fantasies. How many times were you tackled? Not run into bounds. Not going to catch that. How many tackles? Tackles. Yeah, Travis Kelsey could catch seven balls. Three of them, he scooted out of bounds.

another one's a touchdown. So you've got tackled three times. Well, that's like they track quarterback hits. Like how many times a quarterback gets hit? Right. Imagine the amount of times Henry gets hit because he's also probably taking multiple hits in one run. Average of three years.

He's thinking like 70 hits a game. Amazing. All right. You guys want to do a couple emails? Yeah. Let's do it. Email from Braden. I can't believe you guys almost went through your,

Braden. Braden. Yeah. I can't believe you guys almost went through your entire episode of how to draft boring players without talking about how many of them had boring names. Boringly named players coming out of value is a core tenet of your podcast philosophy. It is. It really is, yeah.

It's why we called him Mike Funk Davis. We want to spice up the name. David Montgomery is a pretty boring name. James Connor. I did bring it up that several of the guys had two first names, which, by the way, I'm aware I have two first names too. But it's just like kind of boring. It's like Tom Brady is a boring name.

Two first names. Tim Patrick? People have two first names. It just sounds boring. Tim Patrick doesn't roll off the tongue. If Tim Patrick's name was Equanimity of St. Brown. Yeah, Skymore. Yeah.

Tim Patrick's name was Sky Moore. Everyone'd be like that Russell Wilson's Skymore connection. I'd love to like talk to somebody inside the NFL and be like, hey, do you think if Tim Patrick's name was Skymore, people think he'd better? I wonder what they'd say. Oh, 100%. You think you think like a GM would be like, absolutely, I have a name bias. I'll see if I can ask, I'll see if I'll, I'll see if I'll, I'll, I'll see if I'm going to ask some people

at the Broncos this. Yeah, you should. We'll investigate. All right. Another email. This is an amazing email from Billy. Just an absolutely great. Billy.

Long time listener, I can't say for certain you have helped my fantasy team's performance over the years, but you provided great entertainment. Thank you, Billy. It's the kind of endorsement we love. I mean, I'll take it. I cannot believe you have not mentioned that the hit 2021 song, Big Energy by Lotto, samples our anthem Genius of Love

by Tom Tom Club What's more? It was remixed by the frequently mentioned Mariah Carey. This is true And ironically, I have been listening

to Big Energy for like a month It is on my summer playlist. Oh yeah, it's been all over TikTok. It's everywhere. And I did not notice this, but yeah,

I think, well, didn't we choose Tom Tom Club because Tom Tom Club is sampled in fantasy? Yeah. And so, big energy samples fantasy

and then Mariah Carey came on the remix Mariah we're right here you know what we just got to get to Lotto just go one step further Mariah or Lato I don't know is that right do we have a Lato connect might be Lato someone out there has got to know Lato let me hit up Daniel Lack

all right I was just say we work it we should be able to figure this out like the number one music streaming platform in the world speaking of by the way this reminds me someone else emailed, this is a very similar email. They couldn't believe. We were talking the other day about Acchishur. Accresher.

Accrecher Field. And I was asking. Accreisure. I'm not sure. I don't want to know. I wanted Craig to explain to me how advertising works. And then they were like, you idiots, Spotify literally just bought the naming rights to FC for Barcelona.

Like one of the biggest soccer teams in the world. We didn't mention that. Yes. But your point kind of. maybe persist, you were like, only like corporations can use a crazier, accruesure, like, anybody can be like, oh, what's Spotify? Download it, pay the monthly fee. I should get that.

That's like something the everyday fan that's watching a game is going to be like, oh, Spotify. I should go get that. What's like, do you think we could get the naming rights to a field of some kind? Like, I feel like, you know, independently baseball. Our show? The Ring or Fantasy Football show. Yes. Like what is, like what kind of league could we afford?

Like, you know, obviously, AAA baseball, that's too big. Oh, I was going to say, could we buy out like a Little League field? I was literally wondering the same thing. Could we sponsor like Teeley football? Yeah, but those are owned by the city. That's the problem. But we're giving, but we're paying them, aren't we? Yes, you're buying the rights.

You donate, you donate money to get stuff named after you. That's how this world works. Basically, if some local public field is named after a very nice man who worked his entire life to like make that field like a public land and built this whole Little League baseball field, we would like to read. name it after us instead in exchange for money. Yeah, like my high school football field was like named after some guy because I think he donated it, donated a bunch of money to build it, stuff like that. We won't donate anything. I want to go one up on you guys here. Do the Charlie Munger route.

We should donate a bunch of money to a municipal, to a city so we can design a field with no windows. You think we got that kind of capital? Do you guys remember this story? Do you remember the story? Charlie Munger designed a building with no windows? And they're like, what the fuck, man? This building sucks. He's an artist. He was going for something. The least, like, useful field for Little League field in the world.

Yeah, it's just a square base ball field. It's a giant fire hazard. It's funny because his book is one of, like, the most widely cited books among, like, CEOs in the entire world. We'll look into it. So how many windows do we want? in our building, just three. I just think the kids get too much sunlight these days.

The minimum allowed by law. Yeah. The kids get too much sunlight. Yeah, they're always out. All the kids these days are always running around outside. I know. It's unbelievable. I can't get enough of it.

Playing whiffle ball in the streets. Playing hopscotch. When's the last time you think a kid willingly played hopscotch? That, no, that happens. I think marbles. Marbles is done. but Yeah, no one plays marbles

Hopscotch, that happens You think there's like an eight-year-old goes outside with some chalk Does the squares and plays hopscotch? Yeah, like day- Yeah, they could give them

the bucket of chalk because they don't want them on their phone. Yeah, chalk drawing on sidewalks is still a thing. That's still a thing. That's still a thing. Marbles is done though.

Jump rope. Listen, if you're in daycare and they take the phones away from you, but if you're at home on a Saturday with your parents and you got iPads and PS5s inside, I don't know,

any eight-year-old that's doing hopscotch. Maybe they're doing like the Wii hopscotch. Yeah, probably wee hopscotch. I bet by the end of the year, hopscotch will be like a TikTok genre. What was your guys' like elementary middle school

recess game? Like in my day, it was what I called square ball, but a lot of people know it as four square. Oh, yeah. There's another name for it, I think, too. The name has since been canceled. We played wall ball which, I mean, back in the day we called suicide. I have no idea why. We were in fourth

grade. We didn't know what that word meant, but wall ball which was one. You know, I throw it above the line. Yeah, we play both those wallball. Do you guys play butts up? Is that the same thing as wall ball? I don't know what you guys were doing in the 90s. Buts up is if you lose, you have to stand on the wall, like, point your butt at them, and then they can throw the ball at your ass.

Yes. Oh, and they peg. Oh, wow. I have played that. It's actually kind of fun. What is the other name for Foursquare? I know that there's another name for it. I know.

Oh, yeah. I know you're talking about. The Internet's telling me it could also be called Boxball, but I've never heard that. Boxball. No, that's nice. Four Square was great. That was the four square shark at recess. Oh, what about, was it handball?

That's not the name. That's not what I'm thinking of, no. No, handball is a different game, but we used to call four square handball as well, I think. I don't know what was that. It sounds vaguely familiar. Yeah, right, handball. We should play butts up. That sounds fun.

I want to go play butts up. You got to rename this, man. You can't go to kids in 2020 and be like, kids, you want to play butts up? You can't. That's sense. You're liable to get banned from being around kids. Seven-year-olds, though, amongst themselves, I'm sure we get a rise out of the word butts-up.

Oh, yeah, they think it's hilarious. We just can't be there. Yeah. But they can play it amongst us. But we're renaming the field so we can do whatever we want. Butts-up field. Buts-up field. I was still going to do for our podcast key score.

You know, bad SEO. All right, we should probably go. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, D.K. Thank you to anyone who emails is. We're going to finish your football at e-mail. with thoughts on what we should rename a field, a team. We'll do anything.

We're open ideas. Email at ringerfinacy football achievement.com. We also need money. Send money. We're going to need money for this venture. We're going to start selling out and just attaching our Venmos to the pod descriptions like everybody else does in this stupid media work. We're selling Ringer Fantasy Football Show bonds, but we're never going to pay them back.

Sorry. So just give us cash. Don't say that part, TK. Sorry. Goodbye, everyone. Oh, no. Thank you, Lauren. Thank you, Lato.

Yeah, I was going to be so mad if you didn't think. Lotto. Big energy. Big energy on this episode. Pod's got big energy. Big pot energy. All right, goodbye, everything. Correct.