The Ringer NFL Show - Dying on Taysom Hill, Cowboys Comeback, Rookie RB Resurgence, and Week 11 Winners, Waivers, and Burns

Episode Date: November 24, 2020

We lead the show with the Week 11 Taysom Hill experience and how it affects the other players in New Orleans. Then we get into our winners from the week, adding to The Ringer Fantasy Burn Book, and recommending our top waiver adds after Week 11. Headlines: Taysom Hill, Saints (0:45) Winners: Cowboys (19:30) Justin Herbert, Chargers (21:15) Jonathan Taylor and J.K. Dobbins (25:00) Fantasy Burn Book (32:50) Waiver Adds (36:10) Email us: [e-mail] Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's episode of the ringer fantasy football show, we talk about Taysam Hill, obviously. And then the Cowboys are back. Rookieingbacks are back. And Joe Burrow is not coming back. We also traverse through the running back waiver wire desert and all the other guys to add this week. Stick around.

Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. I'm Danny Hyfitz here with Danny Kelly and Craig Coralbeck. And we all died on the Taysam Hill this weekend. Nice. Wow, good pun right out of the game. That was tough. So we said on the Friday show that it would obviously, obviously, we all knew this for fact, because we're experts who follow this for a living, that James Winston would start and that Taysam Hill would have a larger role. You know, subbing in is like, you know, the quarterback gimmick guy. But James was the clear starter here. And then I'm really happy and proud that we were proven correct on that. So what did you guys think of James's day? James was disappointing. Did he play Ah, Snap? No, zero. Not a one. Like six hours after we released the pod, Adam Schifter was like, by the way, James, not even practicing with the first team.

Not even, nothing. So, yeah, that happened. Do you guys think that if the Saints weren't playing the Falcons who are like, you know, a below average team? Do you think if they were playing the Packers, they would have started Taysome Hill? It didn't matter who they played? Yeah, I don't think it mattered who they played. Yeah, you didn't think they taste, or Sean Payton was like, let's have a little fun here

against the Falcons, see what I can do. No, well, D. D.K.'s been on this all off season. They gave Taysanil $16 million to stick around in 2021, and James Winston's getting $1 million on expired. Well, then why did they sign James Winston? I don't cost a million dollars. What does it care to them?

Here's why they signed him. It's because they wanted to use Taysom Hill as the utility man behind Drew Brees, when Breeze was playing. If you're using your backup quarterback as a utility guy, that raises the risk that's going to get hurt. Therefore, you need a actual game day backup. And that is James Winston. And that's what we saw last week when Breeze got hurt.

They didn't want to alter the entire game plan, I assume. And so they were going to continue to use TASOM as like the utility. guy, the Swiss Army Knife guy. But, and this is like obviously hindsight because we all kind of thought that was how it was going to continue to go. But I mean, if you follow the money, like it makes sense. Like there is a lot of logic that we kind of missed or brushed over in thinking that it was going to be James because like he said, they gave him like a two year, $21 million deal. Peyton has said all along, like he's told us all along that he believes in Taysam Hill. He thinks he's like the next Steve Young, which is obviously sounds like hyperbole. But

Also because Steve Young went to BYU too, right? Yeah, I mean, there's some parallels too. But he was a running quarterback in a time when it wasn't very common to have running quarterbacks and all this stuff. And so bottom line is, I mean, get right to the game. Tastom Hill, I thought was pretty impressive. Obviously, you have to have, you have to view it through the lens of this is a backup quarterback coming in, taking over for a future Hall of Famer.

But in that lens, I thought he was pretty impressive, honestly. And fantasy-wise, he was great. I thought he was fantastic. I mean, he started out really slow. And then I was surprised, I just assumed there'd be a lot more running, to be honest. He had 10 carries for 52 yards. It's kind of cheating because, like, his longest run was 20 yards, but he fumbled. And then he did 10 yards scramble.

But I thought they'd be doing a lot more RPO's, like, option plays, like what the bills do with Josh Allen, what the Cardinals do with Kyler Murray. I just thought there'd be more of that. There wasn't really. It was a lot of play action. Basically, the Saints were like, there's like 45 quarterbacks to meet the minimum threshold. Breeze rakes, like 42nd of 45 people in play action rates. rate. Taysam Hill yesterday would have ranked first in the whole league in play action rate,

like 45% of his throws. So they basically tripled how much they used play action. It was really good on it. But he also got super lucky. Like he threw two balls that should have been picked. Like the deep passing was awful. It was simultaneously the longest any ball has been in the air for the Saints this season. Also 15 yards under thrown.

I don't even know how to describe. Yeah. Emmanuel Sanders caught it like a pun. You know what it's like to throw a ball 15 yards short and catch it? It's like if you go to Thanksgiving dinner in your two hours, late and you show up, they're like, hey, we're running three hours behind on dinner. And you're like, great. Like, you just think that he's in line for disaster coming up? I think we all do know what it's like to throw a football 15 yards short because we're not in the NFL. That's a good point.

Yeah, we actually know exactly what that's like. I was less impressed with him than you guys were. I thought they gimmicked him up a lot. He, of his 30 passing plays, 13 on play action and five were screen passes. 18 of his 30 dropbacks were, we're a little bit aided. He had some crushes. His deep balls were terrible. I thought he had like five plays where he maneuvered in the pocket well and like hit a solid 15-yard pass. But I think if this team gets down 10 and he's got to run a two-minute drill,

I think they're screwed. Yeah, it's kind of like it depends on expectations. Yeah, that's like, what do you expect from a backup quarterback? I don't know. I still think I'd rather just have James. I remember I saw Batman versus Superman on an airplane and I was like, I watched it and I remember thinking, oh, this is the one

everyone says this is the worst movie of all time. Then I watched it. I was like, that was fine. Why is that we're so mad at it? But it's like, when your expectations are so low. Yeah, yeah. The movie, you're like, I'm totally there. Like, everyone thought he'd be a three out of ten. He was like a six and a half or a seven.

Yeah, exactly. But like, yeah, I don't know. I don't think there's any revelation about Taysam Hill. I guess he's now a viable backup. I don't think he should be starting on an NFL team. Well, there's two amazing things about him. One is he hasn't thrown a touchdown pass since he was at BYU in 2016. He's 30 years old.

Which is just, every time I think about it, I'm just amazed. It's like when two is like, rolls out left. Every time it occurs to me, I'm just like a goldfish. In the 90s or when was that? When was he in college? When was he in college? He was only in college four years ago because he, you know, the mid-aughts. Yeah. Well, he first of like four season-ending injuries in college in five seasons. So the fact that he's still lowering his shoulder is just incredible. We really can't understate how poor, sorry, we can't overstate how crappy that deep ball was. That was the worst deep ball ever. When's the last time you saw a deep ball that bad?

Yeah, if it had gotten intercepted, it would have changed the entire tenor of the game. You're right about that. Like, it's one of those, like, outcome is driving the process. It was his only 20-yard pass. Well, no, he had one taken away by Pounty. He had one touchdown taken away by Poundty. That was underthroat, too. He got lucky on that one.

That was really bad. That was a bad throne. Yeah. He almost kind of has a Philip Rivers deep ball. It seems like his arm motion doesn't work quite as well to throw a deep ball. It's LeBore. Honestly, he had a good. game, the deep pass he threw against the Vikings, too.

Yeah, well, that's the thing. It's like, at least he has a deep ball. It's like, do you want, like, I don't even know. It's like, you want a shitty deep ball or no deep ball? You guys are expecting way too much from it. Okay, bottom line, though. Maybe you're older and wiser or no, not to expect things from life. I think I'm expecting the amount of money he made to translate into performance,

and I just don't think it did. Accountability? Question, though, where do you guys weigh in on the Great Tastom Hill debate, which is, in ESPN, it's like an uproar because he's available at tight end. and they just have a starting quarterback who's like running the ball for two touchdowns like a tight end. Yeah, he like ran zero routes.

How do you guys feel about this? It's like the weekend that was is like whatever. Like it was just sprung on us all Saturday morning that it's this going to happen. But going forward, if you're to league with these eligible tight end, how do you feel about this? I think the eligible tight end thing is BS.

What I think Yahoo and ESPN should do is toggle it. When he's starting, he's a quarterback. And when Breeze is starting, he's a tight end. Wow. Actually, that's kind of interesting. because that is the weird thing is when Breeze comes back and Taseyneville's catching passes again like what the hell do you do? He can't be started

to stay in this. I don't think he's not gonna be. He's not gonna be. They're gonna take away his tight end eligibility this week. I guarantee you. Guarantee. Really? Well, I don't guarantee, but I'm pretty sure they will because, you know, whether it's fair or not that people picked him up to be a tight end because like

you know, I did this in one league where I was like Oh, I played him in a league. There's always the chance that they could start using him down the stretch blah, blah, blah, and he's eligible at tight end, I'm just grabbing him. And then Breeze got hurt, which was like a bonus, obviously, for people that picked him up. But I mean, I don't know. Like, Danny,

you always talk about, like, the parallels to real football and like, blah, blah, all the importance to the value of a team. Like, he's a quarterback. He's not a tight end at all. So there's the thing about it is that, look, if you had a min esp, I had a MN, I played him at SBA and I played him at SBA. I played him a tight end this week. It was glorious.

But the thing about it is, this isn't one of those situations where you're like, hey sports are trending toward positionist positionless teams and players and value it's not that at all it's like some of the platforms cough cough like USBN just were like oh like we're going to call

him a quarterback and a tight end and they were wrong and some people benefited from it but the saints have called him a quarterback the whole time he's listed as a quarterback like it's just you can't take it away from the people from the previous weekend because obviously in a day or two's notice but I do think it's absolutely Also just there's a certain game theory here right

Do you want to piss off the 10% of people Who have Taysam Hill Or the 90% of people who don't Like at a certain point You just have to be like hey sorry You're getting screwed like you're losing your loophole I think ESPN is gonna change it Because so many people were in that uproar about it

It was like actually a pretty big deal on Twitter Yeah like well why do you want to piss off 90% of people When you can piss off 10% I don't think it's as big of a deal at all in Daily Fantasy because it's like, like, Fandel hasn't missed a tight end, but who cares? Everyone can have Tays and meal. It's up to you, but the people who just kind of have him and fell into the situation. But going forward, so Drew Brees is going to return at a minimum.

He can return against the Eagles, I think it's December 13th. And so he's going to miss two more games because he's on injured reserve. It's actually the first time he's been on injured reserve. He's 41. I think that's amazing. That is crazy. So speaking of amazing, well, not in a good way. He's 11 broken ribs, eight on his left side, three on the right side. I had to Google how many ribs you had.

It's 24. Really? So you have 11 broken ribs out of 24. He's got more than half. Well, no. Nice job. He can't do math on the fly either, Craig, apparently. Nice job, Craig.

It's less than half. It's almost half. He has more than half if his ribs are healthy. 11 of 24. 12 is half of 24. Oh, Craig is saying the more than half are healthy. He has 13 healthy ribs. He has 11 hurt ribs.

What the hell are you talking about? Oh, okay. I thought you said more than half are broken. Sorry. So he's got more than half. He's fine. Throw him out there. Well, that's the...

Ben Glicksman, one of our editors would say that it's like the Monty Python sketch. Like, it's a flesh wound. Right. What are you going to do? Bleed on me? Hoping around. But so the thing with this is,

let's just say he comes back on December 13th, which is... So we're getting at least two more games at Tastom Hill. And then, first of all, I don't really get how you can recover from... I mean, a broken rib or two is pretty painful. I don't really understand

that you can play quarterback with 11 broken ribs, even if you can get through the pain. But Tastomil is so much, much value because Brees can kind of just leave the game at any point. Like he's kind of game changing player at Tident. It kind of breaks the game. But let's just say he's as a quarterback. What's his value as a quarterback to people over the next couple weeks and beyond to you guys, especially if you have, if you're a playoff team. I don't know. I think he's a QE1.

Yeah. Because of his rushing upside. It's the cam, it's the cam, it's the cam conversation, you know, they didn't use them as a rush rusher in the first half. I think they're very much trying to ease him in. It's like, you know, give him a few easy throws. Do, dude. bootlegs here, bootlegs there, a lot of play action. Like Craig said, it was very schemed up. But in the second half, he was able to scramble around a little. He had a design run touchdown. He ended up with 50 yards, which I believe led the team and two touchdowns.

And anytime you have that, like, kind of rushing floor, it gives you this really, really high ceiling too, you know, if he can actually start throwing some touchdown passes like he did at BYU. But so to me, like he's a QB, like a low end QB1 probably. He does have Denver next week, which is a very tough defense. We saw what they did last week. But then going forward from there, Atlanta, Philly, Kansas City, which is tough. But then Minnesota and Carolina to finish out the season.

So, I mean, if Breeze is gone or out for, you know, at least three or four weeks, then I think the next few weeks, like, if you picked him up as a tight end, you might still even be able to start him at quarterback if you don't have a better option. Like, I have Rathesburger on one team, and I'm like, should I just start Hill at quarterback? going forward over at Rathusburg, or that's kind of like where my mind is. This dovetails perfectly into what I wanted to ask to you guys, which is I think this is the most important name game of the season. Because if you have Taysam Hill for whatever reason, whether you thought he was like a fun stash on your bench, you had him as a tight end. And now you're in playoff contention and you're really trying to like win these next

two weeks. How bad or good does your quarterback have to be to where you're actually swapping him out for Taysam Hill? So like, you know, going forward, D.K. and Hyphitz here. Would you start Tayson Hill or Tom Brady over the next two weeks? That's a good question. It's how bold do you feel? The Bucks play the Chiefs in Week 12, and the Chiefs defense just made Derek Carr look like an MVP candidate.

So that one's really tough to play like Tom Brady, but I mean, the Saints are playing the Broncos, and that could go either way with the Vic Fangio's defense. But the rushing is so, like, the odds that it Tatea Mood gets a rushing touchdown is just so high that I feel like his floor is like 30. Like, him scoring less than 13 points feels inconceivable. I know it's not, but it feels that way. We're bearing the lead massively here.

Taysam Hill was the QB3 this week. He was a tie-in-one-one-by-far. He was the QB-3. Sorry, this is pending Monday Night Football, but still. And right now, pending Monday Night Football again, he is the overall fifth top. He's the fifth scoring player this week. And he didn't throw a touchdown.

So where does he land here? Is he like in the QB-8 to 10 range? Is he like with Big Big, and Lamar Tannehill. So I think the interesting thing is that I think to say defense is playing so well, you're going to get similar to what happened with Jared Gough this year where it's like they're just not in shootouts like they were in 20

like they were a couple years ago. And I think that will continue. So I don't think there's good. They're going to need them to pass a lot. But I do think they're going to need them to run quite a bit. I mean, they only had six design runs for them. But three of them were on the final drive. They had to kill the clock. That part totally seems reasonable to me to keep happening. So yeah, I mean,

I think it's legit. Like you're going to want to keep playing them. I think unless you've got like one of that like the, you know, Divine 5, that doesn't rhyme, but Kyler, Rust, you know, Josh Allen probably, the, you know, and Rod, like, you know the people who are really good at Mahomes. But unless it's one of those, I mean, you could start them over almost anyone. I mean, you know, Deshaun played doing well. You're going to throw Wentz out there over. Oh, well, no, Wens sucks.

Wens sucks. Matt Ryan, though, Matt Stafford, absolutely. The guys, the, the... How about Lamar Jackson against Pittsburgh? Oh, that's such a good question. It's crazy. It's crazy that it's come to this. Oh my God. That broke my brain.

I'm not going to start taste him over, Lamar. Out of principle. But it's a fall from grace for Lamar. It's a discussion. Holy crap. If you told us that we'd be talking about this in August, I would have thought that we had just sold out and been like, wow, we must have been out of ideas.

You would have been like, that's got to be the weirdest thing that's ever happened in 2020. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Jeez. Wait. Wait, we also have to talk about the other players in the Saints. Michael Thomas had his best game of the season by far. And nine catches 100 yards.

He peppered him. you know, I don't think that, I mean, you're starting Michael Thomas if you have him, and it was kind of a happy accident that that just happened. Yeah. But the flip side is Alvin Camara had the first game of his career without a catch. That's right. Yeah, that's... How worried are we about Kamara here?

Like, I mean, for Kamara managers, like, you can't fucking wait for Brie's to get back. I didn't watch this game this week and think, oh, no, the Saints think that Latavius Murray is a better fit with Tassam Hill. Right. I watched this game and thought, oh, no, the Saints don't think Alvin Camer is 100% healthy because Alvin Kamara played through the end of last season, November, December, with a serious knee injury. And like, that's, I mean, good for him.

Like, he's a tough guy. He plays through injuries. But the flip side is sometimes you don't realize he was hurt till like May of the next year. And I think that might be where we're at where if Alvin Kamara is not playing, I mean, he's playing half of what he usually plays or almost that. That suggests to me that he, the foot injury is kind of serious or at the very least, they're trying to like make sure he's maximized in January and February. So, I mean, what are you going to do about that?

you're not going to bench Alvin Camara. But I do think it's not really fair anymore to expect him to get like the three touchdown be like the Supreme Dalvin Cook level number one, number two guy until he's playing 70 plus of snaps again. The flip side of that is I do think Latavius Murray is a serious flex now because if you're playing even 40% of snaps to the Saints offense, obviously Tase and Hill might bleed some rushing touchdowns. But still, Latavis Murray is known for never fumbling.

They love him near the goal line. It's going to get opportunities. That's really valuable. If you've got Latavis Murray, I think he's a really action. running back right now. So that's kind of the up and down of the backfield. He's been consistent all. I mean, he basically averages like 45 rushing yards a week, with or without

Kamara. That's what it's like literally every it's like 10, 12 carries 45 yards. So now if it ticks up a little bit, yeah, he's a flex. Okay. One other piece of news I wanted to hit up top. Joey Burrow, after the season, torn ACL, torn MCL, other structural damage to his knee. That totally sucks.

Obviously, I mean, gruesome injury to watch. They didn't even show it the replay in CBS, rightfully so. And it's just awful. obviously that sucks. The Bengals as a football team aren't really relevant now. Obviously, like, sucks for fantasy. What do you guys do? And obviously you can cut Joe Burrow now, I'm not sure in like a Dynasty League.

What do you guys do? I mean, Joe Mixon's also an injured reserve. They put them on injured reserve, I think shortly before the Bengals game started. So what do you do if you've got Geo Bernard, T. Higgins, Tyler Boyd, A.J. Green. What the hell do you do? The backup is Ryan Finley. Yeah. I don't feel confident starting any of those guys, to be honest.

If we see that Finley can actually run this offense and get those guys involved, you know, and then maybe I'll think about it for week 12, or for week 13, but I am not doing anything until I kind of see what's going on with, with like this offense. And I suspect it's not going to be worthwhile. Yeah. Yeah. Unfortunately, I think he's right.

Yeah, every year there's kind of like a couple offenses by the middle of the year that are like, there's no fantasy value to be had here. And I think the Bengals with Ryan Finley are going to look like the Jets did a month ago. It's not a good situation. So that just sucks. It actually, so it reminds me a little bit of the Cowboys situation over the last few weeks, which I guess we could use to pivot to one of my winners of the week, if you want. Yeah, hit us.

We could use some wins in the year of 2020. The Cowboys' offense. It kind of like had some new life this week against Minnesota, woke up, so to speak, with Andy Dalton back in the lineup after missing a couple of games on the COVID list. He missed a game with a concussion, then he missed a game on the COVID list. And I wouldn't say that Dalton was like anything special or super exciting, but what he did do is get some guys involved. That offense overall just looked better.

They moved Zach Martin to right tackle, which I guess made a big impact on the overall offense, I think, and just their ability to run. Zique all of a sudden is like back in the conversation as a good running back. He went over 100 yards for the first time this year. He had 21 rushes, 103 yards. He added two catches for 11 yards in a touchdown. C.D. Lamb had a touchdown grab.

Um, Amari Cooper was involved. Yeah, our Amari Cooper call was kind of nice. He had a good game. Yeah. And even Tony Pollard got a little bit of action. He had a big touchdown run. So I don't know.

You know, it's not necessarily like I'm going into every game now with this confidence that I used to have for the Cowboys offense. But I do think it makes me more confident to start a guy like Citi. Or, you know, I was never going to bench. That was the best catch of the year. And then Adam Thieland had maybe a better one. That was crazy. The one we flipped over.

like the Matrix? That was the Battle of the Rookie of the Year right there, Justin Jefferson and... No, see you had the good one. I guess Jefferson had the long touchdown. Yeah, but those two, I feel like I think that's the final two now

unless Herbert really starts cranking out wins. I feel like it has to be Herbert. I mean, honestly, Herbert was my winner of the week because Herbert, just the charges for getting Herbert. Like, he's so cool. He had two throws that made me... I don't want to be like jaw drop because they didn't make my jaw drop,

but my eyes agape, my eyebrows went up, whatever that is. Like one was the deep ball that he threw I'm sorry I don't even remember who it was I just remember staring at the ball And he threw it like six Probably 55 yards in the air But it didn't leave the screen

Like the arc was like he threw it 10 yards Yeah it was like a flying drive to center field But with a football Like he just threw it I've never seen a 60 yard pass It was to that guy Tyron Johnson You've never seen a 60 yard pass Stay on the screen before

It was crazy It's so fun that Herbert's good The other one was when he was running backward. If this was Mahomes, like if Mahomes did this, we'd be losing our minds. He was kind of not running backwards, but like running and then turns and flips his hip, squares his shoulders and like ripped a rope to Keenan Allen that was so fast that the defensive back turned around and like tried to, and it was already in Keenan Allen's hands. And Keen Allen legit, I feel like I've never seen this too.

Didn't move. It looked like he didn't move a muscle to catch this ball. Like he just put his hands up and Justin Herbert just threw a 90-8. mile an hour fastball to the space between his thumbs. And the defensive back looked so confused. And I was just was thinking like, this, I thought he was going to, I thought Justin Herbert was going to suck coming out of college. And he's been so quick.

I can't remember being converted in an opinion so quickly as Justin Herbert has in like the half season. And it's like everyone who's, he's a unanimous approval rating. Nobody's watched Justin Herbert this year and been like, I don't like him. If you have him on your fantasy team, you are absolutely starstruck because he's so fun. He delivers every week. The Chargers are lucky. Keenan Allen's been great. D.K., you're also my winner because you had

Keenan Allen as the number two receiver the rest of the year last week, and he was the number two receiver this week. So there you go. Justin Herbert Chargers. No, I think he was... Oh, I guess he fell behind Thielen. Damn it. Yeah, Thieland. But, yeah, charges my winners, you're my winner. I remember hearing Doug Baldwin say

this one time back in the day, how he said something along the lines of, like, most of the time you catch the ball, but then sometimes the ball catches you. And it's like the quarterback just puts it right on your hands before you're even really like looking. You know what I mean? I love that. So that was what that reminded me of.

Dude, I don't think anyone expected what we're seeing from Herbert. Like maybe his parents, but maybe not. Like, you know what I mean? No, even then when they were like at the dinner table when he was gone, they were like, I mean, he's not going to. I want to ask you a question because I think about this literally every fucking week now. You were going to say day and you scale back. Tyrod, if Tyrod hadn't gotten stabbed, do you think that Herbert would even be playing yet?

I feel like he just would be so impressive at practice that he'd have to be by now. Like if he's doing, like, the Mahomes thing, it's like they traded Alex Smith because they're like, we've been watching Patrick Mahomes in practice. I feel like if he was doing this and they were losing his close games.

Yeah, but I think what would have happened is maybe if they were playing really poorly with Tyrod and they were losing and Anthony Lynn wanted to save his job, he switches to Herbert like week eight, week nine, and that gives them like three more weeks. It's just one of those things where I'm like, man, it's crazy. Like, High Fitz, you say it every episode now and I love it. It's like we're one or two injuries away from being a good team.

Like the Chargers aren't a good team, but like they're much better because of Herbert. And to be clear, I feel so bad for Tyrod Taylor. I mean, everywhere he's gone, some weird thing has happened, some weird injury has, I mean, this is business beyond all of them. This is like borderline lawsuit material. But I mean. Borderline? Yeah. He got stabbed right over the border.

But, oh my God. So, Craig, who's your winner of the week? Guys, fellas, boys, we got to talk about the rookie running back carousel has returned to bear luscious fruit for the three of us, for the fantasy community. It's been a freaking roller coaster ride. So we got to talk about if it's going to stay. But I'm talking about Jonathan Taylor, J.K. Dobbins. And I'll, like, toss Clyde Edwards Aller in there. He had a great game, too.

He's been a little up and down since Levi-O. Great game is the number two running back. Yeah, yeah. There you go. Jonathan Taylor had 4.7 points in week 10. This week he had 13.4. He had 22 carries, four catches, over 100 yards, should have had a touchdown. I think had legitimately 50 rushing yards called back from that like insane streak of six back to back.

Oh, my God. That was one of the crazy sequences. He had like a 20-yard touchdown, a 10-yard run. He was like visibly frustrated. He'd get up and be like, fuck. Like, can I let just let me run? I can do it. Yeah.

But, and then flipping it to J.K. Dobbins, who just absolutely dominated all of the Ravens backfield. He had 1.9 points in week 10.

He had 17.5 points this week. He had 15 carries, 70 rushing yards, a touchdown. He looked great. They both played the most snaps of their team.

Jonathan Taylor, really importantly, as we talked about how this didn't happen the week prior, he played crunch time snaps. He was like killing the clock for Indianapolis.

He was in there and like the final minutes of the game. And the biggest question is, One, who do you like more going forward? And two, do you like both of them going forward? Or is one just going to revert right back to being nothing?

I think the answer to this question is a little bit moot because J.K. Dobbins was placed on the COVID-19 list today. And this is Monday afternoon. Going forward the rest of the season. And by place, we don't mean close contact. Like he tested positive. He's out for Thursday in football. We'll get to all that.

Yeah. I think Jonathan Taylor is the answer here, though, because, I mean, honestly, Craig, it played out. I have to go back and listen to our podcast. from on Friday or whatever, but you basically, like, it was like you're a soothsayer. You're like seeing the future.

Am I rap sheet? Am I the new rap sheet? You are, in my mind. Right twice a day or whatever they say. You're like, I could see them, just have it, he could start a little quick, and then they'd just stick with him

because he got the hot hand. I could see it happening, blah, blah, blah. You laid out the scenario. And that's pretty much what happened, I feel like. You know, there was even reports this week that Nahim Hines was going to be

like the lead guy in this backfield. And sure enough, the Colts tricked to everyone again, except for Craig, because Craig was all over it. Does Jonathan Taylor come out of the burn book now? I guess it's the main question. No. This is part of being in the burn book.

Okay. This is no doubt. Absolutely. This is a part of the requirement to be in the burn book. You can't just suck the whole year. You have to tease people. But they played Tennessee next week. Jonathan Taylor should be a fantasy starter next week, right?

This, okay, I want to say something about the rookie class because this has just been such a crazy. It's been such a frustrating year. And in some cases, it hasn't been their fault. Jacob Darwin's going on to the COVID list now after having his breakout game is unfortunate. D'Andre Swift having his breakout game and then having a concussion late in the week, which I don't know if we've gotten how that exactly happened, but just frustrating, obviously, for the fantasy managers that have held on to these guys

in the hopes that they're going to continue to break out. But at least, I guess at least we've seen these guys can do it. And so that gives me some hope that, like, down the stretch, it'll finally come together. and people will be rewarded for holding on to these guys. DK. So you're the draft guru. So going into the NFL draft in 2020, the way you ranked the running backs,

how do they rank now in your minds? Not on situation, just on watching them how they're playing. Who do you think is the best and worst of like the big five? Oh, that's a really good question. Man. Well, to be clear, the big five are Clyde, Edwards, Lear, Jonathan Taylor,

Jakey Dobbins, DeAndre Swift, and... I don't know. I guess we can go with you for. Cammakers. Oh, yeah, or Cammakers who hasn't really played. Yeah, Antonio Gibson.

Gibson counts, I guess, yeah. If you're building a team right now and you only can have one of them, who are you starting your team with? Oh, that's tough. I still think it's Dobbins. And by, like, the slightest hair over Diannjew Swift,

who looked incredible in that game last week. Wow, so Clyde's third, yeah. Clyde's third. I do love Clyde. So Clyde's dead to you. You're saying Clyde's dead to you. That's what you're saying. You hate him.

I would say. I would say after that, it's Clyde and then Jonathan Taylor. Just Jonathan Taylor hasn't really shown anything special to me yet. He's showing he could walk back after holding pounce. He's really frustrated. Yeah, he's already got the Alan Robinson body language down. I think they're all really good players. I think Clyde Edwards-Layor is a really good player.

But I'm talking about, like, the overall skill set, explosiveness, tackle breaking, all that stuff. That's how I'd probably rank it. But, I mean, it's really close. Also, you mentioned we don't know how DeAndre Swift got his concussion, but he was banging his head against the wall waiting for Matt, Patricia, get a fired. Yeah. No, but that's a really interesting point.

Honestly, I would not have thought you would have put Clyde third. You love Swift. He's such a sports guy. And you love Dobbins. It's funny because I don't think I even came into the season loving Swift that much. I just think what he showed the other day was, like, last week and week 10 was incredible. Guys with Wiggle are just more attractive. You know what I mean?

Like, guys who just like make people miss and just like the Lashon-McCoy cell running a... Suddeness. It's so much more appealing than like a fucking bruiser. Clyde Edwards-Lair, to me, is like a, he's a pickup truck. Dandre Swift is like a freaking Maybach or something like that. You know what I mean? Clyde is Maurice Jones Drew. He just like is the same player.

Yeah, yeah. Speaking of implicit bias while we're on the running backs, back to the Herbert thing, do you think that we were just biased against all of his incredible physical traits because he looks like he's 14 and can't drive? Like, you think we just saw his face and we're like, he's not going to be a good corner. back. I also think for some reason it had something to do with him being at Oregon. I think people

discredit Oregon football players and I don't know why. I know D.K. hates them, but no, I don't. Yeah, your weird Washington, Oregon Civil War, which I don't really know why you guys are mad or what it's about. I just know, like, I think people assume they're all smoking mirrors, they're gimmicky, they've got their flashy jerseys. I thought you're just smoking something else. Washington's pretty big on that, too, Hyvitz. I'll be honest. I don't know. I think there's more, there's more pot shops in Washington than Starbucks, I heard. When I visit Washington in 2028 for the first time after everything's

like we can travel again, that'll be great. We'll have a good time. Okay. We didn't get to top scores or high scores, if you will. So let me just go through him. Quarterback, Deshawn Watson was QB1. Herbert was QB2.

Tason was QB3. Oh my God. What time is this? The RB1 was Dalvin Cook. RB2 was Clyde. R.B3 is Derek Henry, which, oh my God, that walk-off runs. Cook and Henry are in there every week.

Ridiculous. Honestly, very chalk week, except for quarterback, which is like a different dimension. Wide receiver, was Adam Thielen, wide receiver two is Keenan Allen, wide receiver three is Demir Bird. Okay, not so chalk.

Tighten one was Travis Kelsey or Taysome Hill, depending on what your league is. Darren Waller was tied in two, Mark Andrews was tight in three, and then defense... Super chalk, yeah. Yeah, the Browns against the Eagles, the Panthers against the Lions,

the Steelers against the Jigs. I don't want to quickly shout out the Panthers who had, I think they had gotten like, they had forced like, I think it was like five punts over the last three games, and then they shut the lions, out, like, one of the most random defensive performances.

Yeah, the lions, my God, the lions have hit rock bottom. There was some embarrassing third down stat that, like, the Panthers, like, had given up every third down on, like, the last two games, and then, like, Detroit got zero out of ten third downs. I really think that if the lions weren't playing on Thanksgiving and had a three-day turnaround that they would have thought about firing Patricia, but they can't because it's like you can't fire your coach and then, like, play two days later. Thank you, right.

Okay. Burnbook time? Yeah. This might be a first timer, but I don't know if anyone's in the burn book after this week. So the people we put on burn notice, shout out Michael Weston.

Love that show. You're obsessed. People on burn notice were James Connor, who had 99 total yards. I feel like 100 total yards would definitely munize you from the burn book. 99, close enough. Nah, he's off the burn.

He's not on burn notice. Anyone else? This one I don't even really think counts because he's just been pretty useless this year. But Jarvis Landry, I keep feeling like he's going to break out. And this is going to be the game where he shows up in that passing game

and all that stuff. And so maybe I'm just going to throw Jarvis Landry on there, even though most of the time he's probably not in your lineup at this point. I mean, he's like the wide receiver, like 70 or something right now. But he's got that name value. Yeah, he's got the name value.

And he's like the de facto number one in this offense. so I keep thinking like, oh, this is the week. This is the week for Landry, like, whatever. I'm just going to preempt myself to not think that ever again. So let's throw him in there. But this isn't like necessarily like a big, you know, he's not probably in, he's probably not been in a lot of people's lineups, but regardless.

Can I throw out one one burden of book person who I don't know if he should be in there, but guys throw out dabbo sweetie. Davosweeney? Davoswini, yeah, yeah. Doesn't really fit, but that's not all allow it. No, because Florida State is like, hey, we're not going to play this football game in the middle of, of a global pandemic, as the CDC says,

don't travel to see your loved ones. And dabble Swinney is like, you pussies. What are you guys doing? Scarety cats. I'm just like, what are you doing, bro? You're the bird book for that for me. By the way. You're just tossing them in.

Yeah. I just tossed him in a second I saw that. Forget your cool Disney movie that's coming. By the way, I wanted to add one thing. I feel very validated about putting Marquise Brown in the burn book. Whether it was last week or the week before, I can't remember it. You had a big old goose egg this week.

Zero! So I had a friend text me. He is officially Bakersfield Brown. I had a friend text me this week, weekend. Absolutely stunning question, which was, should I play Marquis Brown or Jacobi Myers, which gobsmacked me? And then I thought about it. I was like, I think you've got to play Jacoby Myers?

And then Markies Brown, goose. It's like, can you just drop the guy? I don't even know. Like, this is crazy. At the end of the year, we should do a thing where it's like, who was the lowest ranked guy to beat out the highest ranked guy? it's James Robinson. It has to be.

Because, I mean, he was the fifth player on the Jaguar's depth chart. And who's the highest guy that he beat out? Non-injury division? Yeah, maybe Zeke. I think it's Juju because Juju's an unequivocal failure.

Juj is the third best player in his own team. Yeah, but Zique was drafted like fourth. Yeah, but you can still play him. Juju's like unplayable. Jiu's behind Claypool and Deonti every week. No, I know. I'm talking about literally like numbers-wise,

like who out scored somebody in a season. Yeah. emotional disappointment. I think the highest played person who's been healthy but still upsetting is juju. Honestly, how was juju not in the burn

book yet? We should burn juju. No, he hasn't been that bad. He's been that bad. He's been awful. It hasn't been that bad. Also, he hurt his little foot

stepping on a flag. Oh my God. I forgot about that. He stepped on the flag. It's a good segue into our waiver wire section, I guess. Okay.

Yeah. He might miss this week. It sounds like Juju. You can see on the video, he's literally just walking to the sideline, and he doesn't see the referee flag in front of him. He steps on it, and I guess he tweaked his foot or something.

He's got a foot in or a toe injury. What's like the lamest way you guys have been hurt? Is there anything? I got hurt playing badminton. I sprang my ankle playing beer pong. I pulled my hammy playing badminton. I threw out my back swinging a golf club. Really? What club was it?

Yeah. I don't know, like a five iron or something? I have to say, my story is pretty bad because it was one of those. You know when the game takes 15 minutes and then it goes at the last cup? that takes another 15 minutes because everyone's just cold. It was that. And then I won. I was really excited and it jumped up. And I landed and my feet were on, like one foot was on the carpet, which is like, you know, a half inch higher. And then the one that was not on the carpet, just rolled.

Just rolled. It's like a kicker who like tears his ACL celebrating. Yeah. So I really enjoy, you know, criticizing the whims of professional athletes every week. I feel extremely qualified. I tweaked my neck really bad, tallying off my head one time. Oh, wow. That wins. That wins. No. Oh, yes. That wasn't even when I was. That wasn't even when I was. That's not even like when I was old. That was when I was young, which is weird. Other injuries, juju, the flag thing's ridiculous.

Joe Burrow, we mentioned he's out for the year. Julio Jones had a hamstring injury. Came back to just catch like a third or fourth downplay and then left again. Honestly, that was fucking cool. Dude, he is a cyborg. That was unreal. This also further, like,

strengthens our argument about how, well, this isn't our argument necessarily, but like the Falcon's offense is fucking worthless without Julio in it. Julio just, I feel like Julio, we might just look back. Most underrated star receiver ever? Yeah. If you were anywhere else, it's just, it's crazy to me, he's not just, he's crazy good.

He facilitates touchdowns. He doesn't score touchdowns. Exactly. Yeah, no, really though. Randall Cobb has a toe injury that's actually going to land him an injured reserve. And then Kenny Stills also question with a leg injury for the Texans. Watch that as that develops. But you got Will Fuller there.

So I'm about Will Fuller. is the last healthy man standing, which is hilarious. And then Kicking Kriot, who Bill O'Brien hated, we'll see how that goes, because Bill O'Brien's gone. And then Rex Burkhead

with the Patriots is out in knee injury. That probably opens things up for Damien Harris. It looks pretty serious. Yeah. But Sony Michelle is off injured reserve. Not that him and Rex Burkett do the same things, but who knows with the rotation if anything actually changes.

And then Le Michael Pieran with the Jets is banged up with an ankle injury. I don't know if you actually want a jet. I mean, what are you going to do? Pick up Frank Gore. But let's just go into streaming strash for running backs. The running back situation bleak right now. Well, it was, but here's the thing. J.K. Dobbins and Mark Ingram both test positive for

coronavirus. Ravens play Thanksgiving. Right now, Chris Morton said at ESPN reports that they're going to play this game. We'll put that to the side. Let's just say they're going to play. There's a lot of money. So they're going to play this game on Thursday. You should shell the hell out for Gus Edwards. Craig Horlebeck is saying pay for Gus Edwards. And he hates Gus Edwards with every fiber of his being. Every fiber. So yeah. Gus Edwards is owned in like 7% of leagues. I don't think he's owned in your league. You should probably go get him.

Honestly, he could have a huge day. They're going against the Steelers run day. But amazing chance for a touchdown. If you need to stream someone, obviously go get him. I think the question is, if you can't get Gus Edwards, are you guys at all intrigued by Justice Hill?

Because they're down Ingram and J.K. Dobbins. And Justice Hill is like this very athletic guy who's like the fourth man left out, who suddenly might now be like second in this very good rotation. if Gus Edwards is taken by someone, would you want Justice Hill at least to stash him on your bench in case, or what,

or is that just ridiculous? The way that I would respond to that is, sure. I don't think, you know what I mean? Like, I'm not confident. It would be, a situation would have to be kind of desperate for me to start him. But going out and grabbing him is,

I think, not a terrible idea because we don't, like if they do like a straight up rotation with Gus Edwards and Hill, then yeah, he's valuable. There's also a non-zero chance. Like, look, the way the incubation period works for coronavirus,

it's a non-zero chance that if Dobbins and Mark Engen tested positive, it's not like Gus Edwards can't piss positive Tuesday or Wednesday. It's like, it is, you know, there is a possibility that Justice Hill is starting running back for the Ravens on Thursday. Do you piss positive in COVID tests? What? I thought you said he could piss positive. No, test positive.

I was like, this isn't a steroid quite like. I don't think that's how the Q-Tip thing works, no. Did I even just figure out COVID? is it all in the urine? Yeah. My God. Anyway, so yeah,

I would definitely prioritize Edwards and then you take a flyer on hill if you're, you know. In a deeper league. If you're feeling spicy. Who else? What other guys this week?

If not Gus. I actually saw this tweet from Pat Dordy from Roe World. It's like, this is the worst running back waiver wire spot that he can remember. And I think like we had talked about it.

I feel like everyone's really got everybody on their team. People are hunkering down for the winter. It's cuffing season with your fantasy team. It's not good. So here's a couple of guys to throw out there if you were absolutely desperate to add people. Carlos Hyde of the Seahawks.

Chris Carson is due back for Seattle, but his recovery has been far slower than I think anyone expected, even the Seahawks. Otherwise, they probably would have put him on IR. But he's had a slow recovery with a foot injury. It's unclear how close he is. I think he'll play. But if he doesn't, Carlos Hyde's definitely a starter. Last week he had 14 carries, 79 yards. and a touchdown. Frank Gore, if Michael Pyride misses time, Frank Gore, is at least going to give

you like a three or four or five point floor. I know that sounds terrible, but like you could do worse. And then the other guy I think is actually kind of fun is Tony Pollard, just because if Zeeke got hurt or whatever, you know, like Pollard has that, the talent to be like a really good pick up late in the year. So he's a guy to stash more than to play, but yeah, bottom line, it's pretty bleak in terms of the running back position. I think Gus Edwards is the main guy.

Who do you think retires first? J.K. Dobbins or Frank Gore? Oh, my God. I felt, dude, I started to feel really bad, actually, because there was a story that came out. I can't remember where I saw. Maybe it was the athletic, but it was like Gore was talking about how he's pretty bummed out

that he's stuck on, like, this terrible Jets team in what might be his final career. He just feels so stuck on just the shitty team that's never going to win a game. He doesn't want to be part of this infamous O.N. 16 potential Jets team. And I was like, God damn. Like, you don't really think, I don't really think about that all that much. It's like, this guy just wants to keep playing and whatever. But he clearly wants to win still, which is, I mean, I guess natural. But man, he just, he hates, he's hating life right now, being on the Jets. It's like if D.K. wanted to keep podcasting when he was like 60 and he just like,

popped on some eighth graders NFL pod every week to chime in. And he's still plugging 70-year-old Frank Gore. The radio station kid from Wet Hot American Summer who it's not even plugged in. He's just talking to himself. I'll go on his show. That's like a shutter island of podcasts.

Okay. So Gus Edwards, obviously the pickup everyone else that's more like look in the mirror. Do you really want these people? Wide receivers. Gut check time. Got check time. Okay.

What do you guys think of receivers this week? Yeah. there's a few out here, I feel like. Craig, were you the one that kind of like categorized these into two different categories, two different areas laid out for me? So there's the one week late guys Where they're likely Have already been picked up It's Curtis Samuel Who somebody probably grabbed him

In the last week or two He's been consistent The second half of the season He had 17 points this week They're using him a lot He's had a big target share The next guy's Michael Pittman Who we recommended last week

Odds are somebody grabbed him He had 66 yards And a touchdown this week I still think the worry with him Is that the Colts just don't throw it enough And he's not going to get a ton of targets I think he could let you down Next week

And he's not like a dependable starter just yet but he's frisky. These next two guys, Demir Bird might not be in this category, but he had a huge week. He's got a big target share for New England. But again, I don't know if that's something you want to trust. And the last guy's Corey Davis,

who I personally really like. I think I would take Corey Davis over Demer Bird. But, again, might be on somebody's team already. And then we have the This Week guys who are probably on the Waverwire. And we got two jets. We got Mims and Perman. Yep.

Hyfitz's favorite. Mims. By the way, Flacco has looked pretty good. Sorry to interrupt. Yeah, Flacco is just absolutely sailing them to min. It's kind of crazy.

Shocking balls to them. I'm sorry. You're talking about Joe Flacco like through his first pass as a pick six and what might have been the worst hash like hash throw I've ever seen.

Okay, yeah, that was a bad pass. I'm not, okay, good is a very relative term. Good like Batman versus Superman. It's not as bad as I was told. Very, very relative terms to the Jets, expectations for the Jets,

expectations for Joe Flacco, late in his career. Jason Hill, put the opposite. I mean, like, honestly, when Flacco comes in, I think I said this before, it's like, he's an energy vampire. It's just like, oh, God. It's like, oh, everyone who sees Flacco coming is like,

oh, this guy again, like, God damn it. But then, like, in the last three games, or whatever, two games, he's been fucking slinging it. I don't know. I don't deny that Denzel Mimses look good. I just deny that he will get yards for the Jets. He's had like 50 yards a game. I mean, like, on it, he's like a,

He is like a flex now. He gets like eight points a game. That's a flex. Maybe I'm just prejudiced against the Jets. I mean, yeah, I get that. I'm saying, like, if you're in desperado mode here, Mims and Paramarment are not the worst thing you could do. It's called the Adam Gase Memorial Burn book.

That's all I'm saying. You're right. You're right. The other two guys are Tim Patrick on the Broncos and Russell Gage and the Falcons. If Julio misses time, you know, usually one guy fills in for Atlanta, whether it's Zakias or Gage.

And it looks like it's Gage. this time around, who knows. Hard to gauge. Oh. And then what? Do you want to get to tight ends here? There's two guys. The big one is Jordan Akins because Kuti, I mean,

excuse me, Kenny Stills and Randall Cobb got hurt and now we got Jordan Akins. He was pretty good the first, I would say, like half of the season, like getting a pretty consistent amount of targets and things like that. Then he got hurt, I believe, and they shook things up in the Texas passing game. But I feel like Watson likes this guy.

Watson kind of trust this guy. And so he's definitely worth it. picking up. And then the other guy I would throw out there is Jordan Reed, the 49ers, who's rostered in 15% of leagues. Two weeks ago, he had five catches for 62 yards. It looks like Kiddles is going to be out for a while. Iuke went back on the COVID list, and I don't know what Devo's status is in terms of his injury and everything. I think he's going to play, but you just never really know. So Jordan Reed could be one of the primary passing options in this offense. I mean, look, this is a tight end position that's just a wasteland, but these are the two guys that

stood out to me this week on the waiver wire. One other tight end of thrown to the mix, we just saw, as we were recording this, that Adam Thielen just tested positive for COVID-19. So the Vikings don't really have, like, a receiver to step up. Obviously, Justin Jefferson's, like, the top receiver there now. But really, the next beneficiary of Adam Thielen being gone would be Irv Smith, Jr., the tight end.

The Vikings run a lot of two tight-end sets. They got Kyle Rudolph there, but he's kind of just old and out to pasture. Irv Smith, Jr., I mean, they took him in the second round, right? D.K., like 40th or something? I mean, he's an athletic guy, went to Alabama. They've been trying to get him more involved. This seems like the opportunity that would give him a lot more reps. And you're probably, I mean, who's the other Vikings receiver?

It's like, Ola B.C. Johnson or Chad Beebe, like, you're not actually putting them in your flex. If you need someone at tight end, I think Irv Smith Jr. is a really good dart throw if Thielen's going to be out. So I would, I would have no problem plug in Irv Smith Jr. If you need some help with tight end. Okay. Other quarterback streamers, there's not really any good quarterback's. and buy, like, there are no buys this week, right? Bies are over. So, like,

you probably don't need to stream anyone. Obviously pick up Tason Hill if he's in your league. Other than that, I feel like Derek Carr is good at football, and I think we have to acknowledge this now. I really didn't want to, to be honest. I wanted to pretend he didn't exist. He was PFF's top-rated, top-graded quarterback this week against a good Chief's defense.

Like, the Chief's defense is quietly pretty good. If any Raiders fans thought that, I don't know, I can't speak for you guys, thought that I was ignoring the Raiders' offense. You were right. I was trying to ignore them and hope that they would get worse, and now I can no longer ignore them. Derrick Carr actually played excellent.

Maybe it was just we were hearing what he was saying, so we had to acknowledge he exists for the first time as he yells Google and various other strange words. Wait, I think I have a burn. Derrickar? No. Henry Ruggs? Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. I mean, you should cut him. Yeah. I would... Yeah, he's in there, I would say. It's just tough. It's like titillating the idea. idea of Henry Ruggs, but the reality is just not happening at this point.

It's like that like interior decorating project you've never gotten around to. It seems like it would change everything, but you're never going to, it's never going to happen. It's a really, yeah, that's a specific thing. Is that because his last name is Rugs? No, actually, that happens to be a coincidence. Okay, let's get the hell out of here because I'm making rug puns without even knowing it. All righty. All right. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, D.K. Thank you, Lord.

D. D. D. D. D. D. D. D. D. D. D. D. Okay. Thank you Kanye. Yeah. 10 year anniversary, check out the Ringer Music Show on Spotify. And also, we will be coming to you guys with an episode. Craig, what's the schedule? You're the producer here. I don't know.

We're coming out with one on Wednesday like we normally do, except it will be the Friday show. We'll do our predictions, some for Thanksgiving, some for the Sunday slate, and there will be no show on Friday. Everybody enjoy Thanksgiving. And email us ringer fantasy football at gmail.com. Send us your bad beats, fantasy courts, various shenanigans. Thank you.