The Ringer NFL Show - Lamar, the “Raining” MVP. Plus: Diggs vs. Hopkins, Rando RBs, and Week 10 Winners, Waivers, and Burns

Episode Date: November 16, 2020

We lead the show with our continued disappointment with Lamar Jackson before diving into our winners from the week, adding to The Ringer Fantasy Burn Book, and recommending our top waiver adds after Week 10. Headlines: Lamar Jackson (1:50) Winners: DeAndre Hopkins and Stefon Diggs (13:22) Random running backs (19:10) The Buccaneers (25:40) Fantasy Burn Book: Jonathan Taylor, Colts (29:50) Waiver Adds (32:25) 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 Lamar's magic running dry, even though he got really wet. And we run through the stars who scored, like DeAndre Hopkins and Stefan Diggs. But mostly we go through the rando dudes who scored, like Colin Thompson and Pharaoh Brown and Durham Smith, Smyth, Durham Smith?

Who are these people? We will tell you who to pick up and who to leave in obscurity. Stick around. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy. Football Show. I'm Danny Heifitz here with Danny Kelly and Craig Coralbeck. We're coming to you on Sunday night. Yeah, that's right. We just finished watching Sunday Night Football. The Patriots just beat the Ravens in a hurricane, a monsoon. I don't know. There was a lot of water. It was like

an aquarium. I think it was the rainiest game I've ever seen in the NFL. Started pissing. Well, I feel like a couple weeks ago I was talking about you can't see rain on TV, which is kind of weird. And then today you could see the rain on the TV. Especially during that final drive when Lamar was trying to lead the Ravens back on like a, you know, the final minute, whatever, it was just like, there was no way in hell that was ever going to happen. It just, they didn't even get close. There's no, like, well, and Michael's was like, oh, and Chris Collinsworth was like, this is the heaviest, the rains come down all night.

But did you guys have a takeaway from this game other than, like, water-related takes? I think it's Lamar's continued average play. Yeah. I think he might be the most disappointing fantasy player of 2020. other than like, what about the monsoon? The monsoon doesn't change your feelings on this? No, because it's not, I mean, Lamar played better today than he didn't, when there wasn't a monsoon last week. That's a good point.

He was the QB12 going into this week, and he'll probably be like 11 or something after this. But, D.K, people drafted Lamar 17th overall, overall this year. Does he even touch that in the 2021 fantasy circuit? Where does he go in 2021? He might, no, not even close. I mean... Well, I'll give you this. He was drafted outside the top 100 in 2019, which is he closer to, like, second round or 11th round next year.

I bet you he's like a QB six or seven next year. Yeah, yeah. So this is like, I mean, look, honestly, we talked about this before the season, right? We talked about him regressing to the mean and a lot of things, especially touchdown rate. I think it's been much worse than anyone maybe even expected or even could have dreamed it would be. I think it's just, and when we say worse, it's all relative, obviously.

It's not like he's playing terribly, but when you're the reigning MVP, you're the reigning MVP. The reigning. Fantasy football. The rain, R-A-I-N. Oh.

That might have to be the title of this episode. But I mean, and to be where he is now, like honestly, I'm looking at the, the stats right now from fantasy pros in terms of week one through week nine. And Carson Wentz and Lamar Jackson have the same amount of fantasy points, basically. That's not regression. So this week, this week Lamar did better, so he's going to move ahead of him. But like, think about the narratives.

Like, everyone thinks Wentz sucks. Yeah, exactly. He's having a terrible season. All right, here's the thing. This is not regression. Regression was, is like, Lamar Jackson threw a touchdown pass in 2019 on like one. out of every 10 throws. And that is like borderline impossible to repeat

through no fault of his own variance, blah, blah, blah. This is not regression. This is the Ravens. Offense is worse. Their skill players are playing worse. Their play caller is worse. The coaching seems worse.

It's not like just mathematical probabilities, blah, blah, blah, like my eyes glaze over. It's like Greg Roman is out there on fourth and one, the offensive coordinator, and like we're going to go spread set. Mark Ingram will take a shotgun snap

in the pouring rain. Why would you ever do wild? cat when you have Lamar Jackson that quarterback. Right. And that's the point. I think Jason La Canforah pointed out that

like he was just overthinking. I thought that was a perfect example of just the Ravens offense. I don't want to pretend to know why or what exactly is going wrong here. There was certainly, I think it's a combo of defenses are adjusting better to what they did last year.

And Deky, you wrote a whole piece about this in the offseason about how the Ravens have to counterbalance to like you have to get ready for the prepper for the, how teams counter. you, they just don't seem ready at all, whether they're overthinking it or they haven't developed the downfield passing game that was part of what we thought was going to be a huge

thing with Marquise Brown this year. Like, why do the Ravens kind of suck now, D.K.? I mean, I think there's a lot of reasons. I think it's always very difficult, like you said, to live up to the expectations that they set last year. Like, it was like a perfect storm of perfect for them last year. Everything that they did was just so on point. A lot of weather puns today.

Oh, wow. Jeez. And then, so anyways. But like now, that's why it's such a, this is such a perfect example of why it's so difficult to recreate those types of seasons in the NFL. Like, like you said, teams are catching up, I think to, to weigh, they studied him all off season, come up with ways to like mitigate his skill set, mitigate what he does best.

No, but can you elaborate on what that means? Because that's more interesting with Lamar than anyone else in the NFL. What do you mean, like, what are they doing to stop him? Well, I don't, I, you know, I'd have to like dig into the All-22 and stuff. like off the top of my head, you know, it's like... I mean, aren't they just stacking the box and making him... That's the thing. They're just stifling the run, making him throw,

and D.K. just said making him throw to the outside, which he's not as good at. But, like, I think this is really interesting because it's a rare case where Lamar is not a worst player. It's the coaching, right? Isn't it strictly just the coaching is why Lamar is suffering the most this year? It's the play calling? I think that's part of that. Part of that.

I think that he's... Since he was in college, the book was he was... not a strong thrower outside the hash. That's still true. Yeah. And I think that it's that skill, it's not that that's an issue, but at the NFL level,

it's not like an above average skill he has. And they didn't really go out and get receivers that are really good at getting it. It's not like they have Devonte Adams on this team. Marquis Brown is not, I mean, I don't know. I mean,

Miles Boykin doesn't seem great. Devin Du Veronaud isn't, like, Willie Sneed is like the second best guy they have after Marquis Brown. Like, who's actually getting open on the boundaries? Or is it just,

I don't know, or am I off the mark here, D.K. No, I think that's part of it. They didn't make big upgrades in terms of the offensive skill players over the off season. In fact, they got rid of Hayden Hearst, not that he was like the key to everything, but like, you know. And then I think the other thing, and we're having this discussion a few weeks back on Twitter, and I apologize. I don't remember the person who chimed in and said this, but someone on Twitter chimed in, I thought it made a lot of sense.

It's like last year, if you remember, on a lot of like the read option stuff that they were doing where either Lamar would hand off and they'd have the running back dive up the middle or Lamar would keep it and go up the middle. Those runs were getting like legitimately eight, nine, ten, eleven, eight, seven, nine, eleven, like just bam, bam, bam, bam, but they were chunk plays, but they were chunk runs the way other teams get chunked passes. And they were, they were creating a ton of explosive plays with the run game. And this year, you know, they lose Marshall Yonda. They lose Ronnie Stanley to an injury. Yonda retired. Stanley got hurt. Hallfamer to be in potentially one day Hall of Famer. So it's like you remove these little pieces of what was

like this finely tuned instrument and all of a sudden things are just not, they don't look the same and I think when they don't have those chunk plays from their running backs, when they don't have as many chunk plays from Lamar as a runner that affects everything.

And so it changes the way that teams are playing them and stuff like that. So I don't know. It's so, it's very complex. We expected it. We expected the Ravens wouldn't be as good. I don't think we expected this this big of a difference, though. It's kind of like the main overarching point. I think that's a good point about the offensive line being worse.

This was the team that set the record for rushing yards in a season in modern history and rushing yards per attempt in a season in modern history. And what? Does it kind of just seem like they've thought we're just going to do that again? So like, yeah, we're just going to the exact same thing. If you asked me to put it down to like what is one sentence, what is going wrong here? It's that the 2019 Ravens targeted their tight ends more than any team in NFL history. got rid of one of those tight ends this offseason

it didn't really add any good pass catchers and now they can't pass well and it's shocking. So you think it's a supporting cast issue mainly? They leaned on their wide receivers last season I mean saying they leaned on their tight ends more is another way of saying they kind of leaned on their wide receivers less than almost any other team ever and then they didn't really add any wide receivers

hope those guys would develop and they kind of didn't and I think that that's a huge reason. From a fantasy perspective I'm no longer afraid of Lamar. When I see his name on the other side of the matchup, I'm not afraid of him anymore. And the thing about Lamar that I do believe is that if shit hits the fan in a game and he's down 15, I don't think Lamar can go 35 for 50 for 412 yards.

That has always been the problem with this Ravens team and it's bizarre because in one hand he's the unanimous MVP is 50 and O and I'm always 50 and O like for votes for last season. And I'm always torn between, well he's 23. Why are we judging him so hard for? And he's 20, what he's He's he 25 and 5 now or whatever I forget what his exact record is. It's absurd. Versus, well, we should hold him a high standard.

He's a unanimous MVP. But he really has no comeback on his record, in part because the Ravens lose so often. And again, this is another example of what are we going to take a monsoon game and put it on his resume as a black mark? That's crazy. But at some point between the Titans' loss where he told Kevin Clark on slow Newsday that they underestimated him, the Chiefs game in Monday and football this season where they looked hapless. I don't really use that word.

Is he the Clayton Kershaw of quarterbacks? The narrative's getting there, Craig. No, because at least Kershaw can do it in the regular season. The narrative is getting there. I will say, I saw the stat from ESPN. He's 23. He's the caveat. He's 0 and 5 in games where the Ravens have trailed by 10 points plus.

I don't have the stats in front of me, but I would guess that a lot of teams lose when they're down by 10 points. Yeah, but I'd love to know the numbers of teams led by MVP quarterback. This is going to be, this is, the point is, this is not fantasy related necessarily, but this is going to be a narrative that follows him around. And he's got to turn it around. Yeah. But let's, let's, let's button this with a very important question. We have to burn somebody for this performance, if only to balance out cosmically all the water. Someone's going in the burn book. It's either John Harbaugh or it's Lamar Jackson or you can make the case of Greg Roman. I will say this about Lamar. He is younger than Joe Burrow, which we legally have to mention. Yeah. I think he's, I think he's. you can't, I think we I'm not putting Lamar in the book. I'm not putting Lamar in the book. Someone's got to go in the book. We just talked about this for like

10 minutes. I'll put John Harbae in. That's fine. I'd give it to Greg Roman. It's like put it, put them both in. Greg Roman is like if Apple just came out with the same iPhone again the year later. There's nothing different. The iPhone 11 again. Except this on Mark Ingramsson shot.

I like that. And no one bought it. Let's put, let's put a ball fit. Also, Jacobins won't play until he drops the ball in the last play. Anyway, okay, there you go. So John Harbo's in the book. Can we have, can we make this a Spotify poll? Can people vote on Spotify?

Which Raven should be in the book? Yeah, Lamar Jackson. John Harbaugh or Roman. Should you're throwing it forth? Baker's Field Brown. Or just the Ravens running backs? Yeah. Yeah.

All right. If you're on Spotify, please vote in that poll. Who should be burned from the Ravens? Okay. Top scores of the week, winners of the week? Yeah, let's do that. All right. Top scores.

QB1 was Tom Brady. QB2 was Kyler Murray. QB3 is Ben Rathsberger. RB1 was Alvin Kamara. RB2 is Josh Jacobs. Rb through is Naheem Hines. Of course, obviously right after. I just unbelievable.

Wide receiver 1 was Cole Beasley. Uncle Cole. Unreal. Love it. Love it. Craig is living his best life right now with Uncle Cole at the Wide Receiver 1. Wide receiver 2 is Keel and Cole.

Huge for Coles, huge for Uffs, in the 2018 off season between Cole Beasley and Keeling Cole. Wide receiver 3 was DeAndre Hopkins and wide receiver 4 is Defon Diggs. Heardt. Tide in 1 was Rob Gruncowski. Tide in 2 is Hunter Henry. Tide in through is Cameron Brate, which is hilarious because he's on the same team as Rob Gronkowski.

And then the top defenses, I have to mention are the Jaguars who played the Packers as 14. That's weird. The Saints, the Raiders, and then the fourth base defense was the Rams who were going against the Seahawks. So it's like holy cow. Yeah. So with all of that Michigan got said, D. Who's your winner the week?

I mean, we can't talk about the week that was without Stefan Diggs and DeAndre Hopkins, like back and forth, both putting up game winners, like quote unquote game winners. We all thought Stefan Diggs had pulled it off. You know, I don't even know how much time was left, like a minute left or something like that. Less. I think it was like 38 seconds or something. Yeah. Do you guys remember the shot that Yukon hit at like almost half court to win the NCAA championship?

Remember five seconds before that when Marcus Page hit a three-pointer in the corner to give UNC the lead? Of course you don't, because everyone forgot about Marcus Page's insane shot before the Yukon thing. And that to me is that Stefan Diggs in this game. This was one of the toughest backfires from a shit-talking perspective. Stefan Diggs was like so hyped up. He was like talking all this shit.

Like, all his teammates were like, this is why we brought you here. Like, this is why you're here. And he was like yelling at the camera on the sidelines. He was so hype. I wish without control. It's like Jeremy Shockey, like turns to see what's happening. you know what I'm talking about? But demeanor wise, it was crazy because

it was the Nick Young meme as a football game. But DeAndre Hopkins was the exact opposite. That was like the juxtaposition between the dudes. Diggs is losing it. Like he's just like, yeah. And then Hopkins tweets after the game, never panic and is sitting there just laying with the ball. Like he's hype, but it's not like he just did a hell marry.

Like he's a professional. He had, you know, the press conference is like, yeah, no, the three defenders had really good position. But, you know, I just, you know, they were, I just caught the ball. Maybe he's learning from Larry Fitzgerald, who just scores and hands the ball to the ref, throws the ball of the ref and runs to the sideline and says, thank you, sir, and then walks away.

He just expected to do it. D.K., I think your real winner should be April 17th, 2020, which is the day that Stefan Diggs and DeAndre Hopkins were traded to the Cardinals and the bills. They were traded on March 16th? This is April 17th on Google here. I'm almost, I would bet, like, of so much money was March 16th. Oh, wait, you're right. No, the reason I knew that is because that's the day that, I mean, this is depressing reason,

but that's when pandemic went out of control in America was while everyone was the world is spiraling and everything shutting down, I was writing about the DeAndre Hopkins trade. And that's the fontage stuff as like the world is unravel. So the date is very fresh in my mind. It's crazy that it puts potentially the two best receivers in the way, in the league. Well, they lead the league in receiving yards. I mean, I believe Diggs is one now. and I think Hopkins is too now

and then dig these leading catches by like a pretty healthy amount. So I guess that was like that was kind of the thing I was going to ask is like are these the two best receivers in the NFL currently? Because we talked about D.K. Metcalfe. I think both of those guys proved this week

and other weeks that like they're right on the cusp. They're not quite there. They're not like necessarily the elite of the NFL. I would put Diggs Hopkins. And then I would add DeVant Adams into the elite tier.

And then just below... I think Tyree Kills there, too. Yeah, I was going to say, just below or right there is Tyree Kill. And then below that, probably A-Rob. And I think, like, Julio is still somewhere. Like, my real life, like, I need to win a game. Real life, I need to win a game.

Because the crazy thing about this conversation is, like, obviously Julio's in that tier, except for the fact that he can't score touchdowns, which at some point has to be the merit. Like, he is a universally respected player. He might be the most respected non- quarterback among players in the NFL. But at some point, the Red Zone stuff is like, you have to count it against them, don't you?

Fantasy and really? He's been all right this year. He's got three touchdowns and seven games. It's not terrible. But I'm just saying, he's like a superstar receiver who, like, inside the 10-yard line is not, like, it's not a presence. At some point, that's bizarre. Yeah. The other thing that I think we need to talk about briefly before we move on is those two plays

back-to-back was a great encapsulation of a big. an off-season narrative that we talked about, which was receivers moving teams are very risky in the fantasy world. And like history shows that like if you switch teams, you switch quarterbacks, especially in a year like this, I think the logic was these guys are going to struggle to get, you know, going early on. And Diggs and Hopkins have both just obliterated that narrative. I don't even know if it's going to be a narrative anymore. I mean, look, nobody pushed that narrative harder than me on this podcast or for the whole ringer than I did. to be honest, it was a safe narrative to push.

It was a safe side to back, especially with COVID. Yeah, it's like as a general rule, you look at the history of receivers and new teams, it's not great. They have less practice time than ever. Why is it going to change? But now it's completely different. I'm happy to take that L because you look forward.

Well, if Hopkins and Diggs can do that on this offseason, then why can't people do it in going forward? I think that the key, though, is going to be to remember that when they traded for these guys they, I'm hesitant to say built their offense around Hopkins,

but at least the bills, the bills designed their passing game with Diggs in mind. And I think Arizona, at the very least, Kyler's kind of looking at Hopkins a lot. I think that's important to remember,

but yeah, I mean, I'm kind of ready to pronounce the trepidation over receiver switching teams is kind of dead for me. I don't know how I could stand behind that again. I still can't believe that Diggs was like a fifth round pick.

How the hell of that happened? I will say, just to put a button on it, to put a bow on this. The lesson here is that don't necessarily be afraid about receiver switching teams, but also these are two like the best receivers in the NFL. And we should have known

that they were just going to continue to be awesome. My lesson is I'm not going to be so cavalier about betting against talent in the future. I think that that's my thing. Like, I just, John Hopkins is really good. Okay. Who's your winner?

Dude, Randos, specifically Randow running backs. Holy crap. If you just look at like the scoring, leaders for this week at the running back position. I mean, you can sort it however you want, but the way I, the one I looked at that was nuts is seven of the top 16 running backs this week. I mean, so far, it's Sunday night. Seven of the top 16 were not started in like 85% of ESPN leaks.

Yeah, go through the list. The list is, it's insane. So you got Nahim Hines on Thursday night football. I mean, I loved all all season I love. He's blown up a couple times, but. Dude, he looks good. He looks legitimately good. He looks like the best running back.

I know I'm absurdly biased here, but anyway, he blew up. Devante Booker, the backup for Josh Jacobs in this game got, he's rostered in like a percent of leagues, barely, got two touchdowns. Rex Burke had scored. Wayne Galman is unbelievable. Malcolm Brown, J.D. McKissick, Salvin Ahmed, for the Dolphins, who I believe made his NFL debut. Yeah. Kalin Balaj and Boston Scott. Boston Scott, even though Miles Sanders returned.

All of those guys ended up being top 20 running backs, top 8, 17, apparently. And so we talked the other day about fantasy entropy, like fantasy points that go to complete waste because they're not in anyone's lineup. This was a crazy week for it. Because not only was it running backs, it was tight ends was even worse. Half of the top 12 tight ends as of Sunday night, half of the top 12 were not started in 1% of ESPN leaks. One percent.

Such a terrible. I'm talking about Cameron Brate, Pharaoh Brown, who I've never heard of, Richard Rogers, Durham Smyth, who I can actually say, I have never heard that name until he caught that touchdown. Colin Thompson, who I believe his first NFL touch was a touchdown, and Dan Arnold, all were top 12 tight ends. Without looking at this doc before we started it, my original thought of, like, what a topic, a headline should be, maybe my winner, was exactly what you did. If it's like, you basically read my mind, like the Randows. I don't know if it's just, we feel this way every year at week 10,

because there's a lot of injuries and there's a lot of, like, change. But this feels kind of egregious how crazy the running back specifically and tight-end landscapes are. And just, like, how much of a crapshoot it is? Like, are they spreading the ball around more? Like, I don't feel like I should spend a draft pick

on anybody except good QBs and good wide receivers at this point. It should be just zero fantasy. Like, instead of zero running back, we should just like zero positions. Just don't draft anyone. Just give me 60 bench dogs. Don't play fantasy.

Go hang out with your family. Just go outside while you can. No, but really, though, D.K., why am I reading about Durham Smyth and, like, Kailen Bollage and Rex Burkett? What's going on? Are coaches learning that, like, players don't matter, and you can interchange them, and you want to keep people healthy, don't overuse anybody? What are we doing here? I have a theory here, but I want to hear D.K. I was just going to say it speaks to the fragility of the running back position, right? Like, they're taking crazy amounts of hits. They're running headlong into people at full speed. You're going to expect guys to get hurt.

the purveyors of the zero R.B strategy I'd probably just loving this right now because you get guys like James Robinson who's just blowing up. He was undrafted. You got J.D. McKissick all of a sudden is getting 15 targets a week. Being 11 and half.

Yeah. We're on the same page today. So anyways, I think this is just like the perfect encapsulation of that and why people would love it. You try to weigh here, like your value when you're drafting and it's like, I could draft James Connor in the third or the fourth or whatever and

like hope that maybe he becomes the next McCaffrey type and then, you know, you get him the year before he's a top three pick in the draft. But you have to spend a third run pick on him. And there's a bunch of guys like that, right? Across the board, your Kenyon Drake, your Miles Sanders, all that crap. Or you just don't do that. You draft a receiver who you know will be solid. And then you just wait and like bounce around and grab these fuckers and get J.D. McKissix to get you 10 PPR points a game because James Connor's not doing it half the time anyway. Speaking of me, McKissick. Can we, can we, we, we, we'll get to James Connor. Okay, speaking to McKissick, we're going to argue about this all offseason.

Let me be very clear. When I say that PPR is bullshit, I'm specifically talking about J.D. McKissick this week. Because I looked up at the, the box score. I saw he 11 points. And I looked at his box score, and he had four carries for negative four yards. And then he had, like, eight catches for, or six catches at the time, I think, for like 38 yards. So in my math, in my head, I did the math. And I was like, okay, so he's got 34 yards and like 11 fantasy points. And a touchdown. The touchdown came after I saw this. This was very important.

The point was at the time, he had 11 points in 34 yards. And I was like, why are we doing it this way? I agree. It doesn't make any sense. Like, we have stretched the boundaries of what is even a little logical. Why are we at the point where we are beholden to J.D. McKissick. catching five checkdowns for no yardage to be worth something. Because we love the zero RV strategy.

It's inflation. And you know what happens to inflation? Eventually everything becomes meaningless. I don't know. I feel like you need to let this. You need to let it go. The PPR is happening. You know what JD McKissick go.

Hyth, it's shitty screens to J.D. McKissick that, like, earn him, like, empty calorie fantasy points is no different to me than just, like, bringing in Gus Edwards for, like, a one-yard punch in touchdown. Like is that really that much harder than catching a touchdown? I don't know. It's like points for his team, which is the goal of organized sporting competitions. Catching a three-yard pass is just as hard as running a one-yard touchdown. I don't know.

It's about what it correlates to the value of the game we're watching. Touchdowns, we all agreed before we went out between the lines that like the touchdowns are worth points and like will contribute to winning the game, which is ostensibly what fantasy football is supposed to mirror, not like catching a ball. that has no intrinsic value. If you're worried about points, why aren't you pro-kickers then? Why shouldn't kickers be on fantasy teams? What are quarterbacks? Punters, fine. Punters, everything. Fine. I don't care.

I'm just saying PPR's out of control. That's all I'm saying. I would like to go on the record and reiterate something that I've said many times on this podcast. I literally couldn't care less. I just could not care less about that. Craig, who's your winner of the week? Honestly, what you, your idea was what I, I had. So I had to kind of go back and look and kind of really think about like, oh, well, you know,

who won the week to me if you just look at the box score going through stuff? It's the buck's offense, right? It scored zero points against the Saints and were awful. This week, they had six guys scored double-digit points, which is pretty crazy. Frickin'Ronald Jones. What the hell? Brady at 31. Jones 24. Mike Evans at 16, Godwin 12, Antonio Brown 10, Gronk 12, Braet 10. Also, wanted to go back and talk about when we went through the top scores and the tight end one was Gronk and a tied-in three was Brayt. Just to show how shitty tight end has been, Gronk had 12 and Kim and Bray had 10.

And they made the top three. Wasn't that like the last three tight ends scored double digits? It's embarrassing. Yeah, because Brate had 10.2 and was the third guy. But just in general, across the board, I mean, Brady's probably right around a top five QB now after this week.

And the rest of their season is not bad. They play the Rams next week, which is tough. But then they have Chiefs, Vikings, Falcons, Lions, Falcons. Shout like Jenna Lane, the Bucks reporter at East Bain, who predicted, not the score exactly, but she basically predicted that this would happen. I think she got the amount of touchdowns, right, that the Bucks would score is pretty impressive. The Bucks could quietly go on like a pretty big run and end the season with all of us going,

like, yeah, they might be the most potent, one of the most potent offenses in the league. And all these guys could like, like at the end of this year for fantasy, we could look back on all these players' years and they might not look as big a bus as they did a couple weeks ago. And if that wasn't enough of a roller coaster, Ronald Jones. fumbled, like, very early in this game. And Bruce Ariens is like, you know what? I'm good with this now. I listen to the fantasy show. I don't think I should be that harsh on fumbles.

That Craig guy convinced me. He said I was dumb. It's stupid defense people. I was like, you know what, Craig, you're right. He's like, I wanted to go on flying coach. They didn't let me. Actually, there's, I could see that have happened. Like, I think he and Carol had like a, he and Carol had a good rivalry back when he was in the NFC West.

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or visit 1-800-gambler.net in West Virginia. All right, let's get into the ringer burn book, the Adam Gase Memorial Burnbook. Just to recap, we've got Gase, Daniel Jones, Jack Doyle, A.J. Green, Scotty Miller, Moe Alley Cox, Trey Burton, the entire city of Indianapolis, C.Y Hilton, Michael Gallup, Marquise Brown, a lot of Indianapolis, Baltimore in here.

We just added, well, we'll see who the poll gets for Spotify. Don't forget to vote in the poll. Anyone else you guys want to add to the burn book this week? I'm putting in Jonathan Taylor. More Colts? So more Indianapolis. We're just out on the entire cults offense. He's got to be in it.

He does. He is burning people as bad as anybody has this year. As we get closer and closer to fantasy playoffs, Jonathan Taylor is getting worse and worse. The weirdest thing about him, he's a rookie, right? Usually the way it goes is you get better as the season goes on. Week two this year, Jonathan Taylor had 20, carries for 101 yards in a touchdown.

And last week he had seven carries for 12 yards. He is going backward. He is going backwards. And I think part of being in the burn book, you know, it may sound like the burn book means it's somebody you don't start, but that is not what that means. The reason the burn book exists is because they're the players that you struggle with every week and you start them and they burn you. And so I'm still probably going to start Jonathan Taylor for the

the next couple of weeks. However, he's in the burn book. And it's now on me. It is on you. I just picture you like the Memento guy who just how you just have like Star-Charth and Taylor like tattooed on your chest and you keep forgetting every week that he just hurt so much. Craig,

perfect example of this. AJ Green is in our burn book. Correct. I started A.J. Green in a league this week because I'm a freaking donkey. And then he scored zero points. But we put AJ Green in the burn book or whatever in like week five when he had like no catches one game.

But then like there was like a few weeks span where he kind of researched. and was really good. And, like, this is what people in the burn book do. It doesn't mean they suck because then we would just be like, yeah, Jordan Howard, you're in the burn book. But it's people who go up and down and screw with you. And on a psychological level, they just can't get out of the brain. So the Colts and the Ravens, that's what we've decided, basically.

Or the people do that to us. The Colts and the Ravens have set up a tent in our brains, and we can't get them out. No, they're like the Halloween stores. They rent the space every, like, September and October. But then they're gone for, like, the next eight months. All right. So, there you go. Jonathan Taylor, you're the Bird Book.

And I also am putting James Connor on Burr notice. Shout out Michael Weston. James Connor, we're not going to do it yet. But if James Connor has another bad week, he's officially on Burr notice. I'm putting him on Burrardt. Playing the Jags next week. We'll see.

If they can't do the Jags, he's bird. He's done for me. Okay. Waiver Wire time? Yeah. Some injury stuff. So again, we're doing this on Sunday night. So we don't have like official updates on all the injuries.

So obviously like double, triple, quadruple check all this stuff. But Drew Brees, this was the biggest one of the day, left with a saint. Saints quarterback. He had like a ribs injury. Apparently he told Sean Payton at halftime. He wasn't good to go for the second half. Sean Payton said that hadn't happened in like the 15 years he'd known him.

So whatever the hell's going on there, we don't know the exact extent of it. You know, obviously we'll learn more Monday or Tuesday. James Winston replaced him. You could say he looked worse than Breeze, but the offense looked better. I don't know how you want to characterize that, but that's something to keep an eye on.

The other one's Teddy Bridgewater. He used to be Drew Breese's backup. He's getting an MRI tomorrow for his knee. it looked not great, especially considering his history. And then Matt Stafford for the Lions, so he's getting x-rays on his thumb after the game. Make sure to follow up on that.

And then the other real big injury of, I mean, not even a big injury, but like Jim Michael Hastie broke his collarbone, the Niners. That's kind of it, right? Like, there were people who were in and out of games all day, Devante Adams kind of came in and out. But for the most part,

I think not that bad compared to other weeks. Relatively light on the injuries, other than those three quarterback ones, they're the main ones. I mean, Hasty would have been a bigger deal. I think that most hurts going to come back pretty soon though, so I don't know if there's a lot to worry about there for the 49ers.

With that said, for streams and stashes for let's start with the running backs. By this week is the Niners, the Giants, the Bears, the Bills. So running backs, let's just go in it right now. Yeah. Who do you like it running back to D.K.? So there's quite a few guys on this list, in fact.

So I'm just going to kind of roll through them. And then we can decide sort of like where we want to rank these guys. Wayne Galman for the Giants, who is still out there in 50% of Yahoo leagues coming into this week. He scored another two touchdowns on Sunday. Yes, he did. That's giving him five touchdowns in the last four games. Keep in mind, the Giants are going into a buy week this week. So he's not going to help you out this week, clearly. And then at some point, Devante Freeman is going to come back and Galman's value is going to plummet. But we just don't exactly know when that is going to be. So keep him on your list. If you don't need help this

week, but you do want to have like a guy that could maybe plug in down the stretch. He's an option. Nahim Hines with a Colts, 40% owned in Yahoo Leagues. At this point, he feels like a must-ad, just because, you know, if they're going to continue to ride the hot hand approach. The only Colt not to burn somebody. He looks like the best, I mean, watching the game, the team, he's the best running back on the team.

He's explosive. He's dynamic. He's good in the passing game. He's even getting, you know, touches inside the red zone. So, yeah, I mean, he's a must-ad. it's a pain in the ass and a headache to like deal with the Colts running back rotation, but I mean, he's going to get you these big weeks like he did this last week. Savon Ahmed from the Dolphins who kind of came out of nowhere, like relative unknown.

He came in and had 20, he basically took over for Miles Gaskin like full on. 21 carries 85 yards. A touchdown added a catch for five yards. Interestingly enough, these are both Gaskin, Gaskin has missed two weeks in a row now, but Howard was a healthy scratch again. and Ahmed kind of just came out of nowhere and was the guy. So he and Gaskin are both former Udub Husky running backs. So, you know, Chan Galey just loves these guys coming out of Washington.

So who knows why. I just love Husky dogs, but anyway, continue. Yeah. Anyway, Ahmed, he looked good. He legit looked pretty good. He was, like, explosive. He's a rookie. He was undrafted, kind of bounced around a little bit,

landed with the dolphins. Anyways, I think he's definitely worth a touch or worth an ad because he's going to get the touches in that offense. And then we know that Gaskin can't come off the IR for at least one more week. So that's like the key thing here. At least one more week, he's looking like he's going to be the guy in Miami. Kaelin Belage for the Chargers, 19% own for Yahoo. Belage is exactly what I thought Troy Main Pope was going to be this week.

For some reason, they just went back to Belage instead. Was their lead guy 18-carry 68 yards? I had five catches for 34 yards. At this point, it's looking like he's sort of like the lead guy in the rotation right now with, you know, Josh Kelly and maybe Pope getting rotated in. Justin Jackson's hurt. The other guy to kind of keep in mind down the stretch is Cam Acres. He actually led the Rams and carries this week against Seattle with 10.

He only gained 38 yards and Malcolm Brown vulture two touchdowns. But like if you're looking for a stash, this is a stash. I would not necessarily stream this guy. But he got the first carry of the game for the Rams. Yeah. I don't know. Like this is a disaster in terms of like trying to figure out who's going to get the most carries who's going to get the most points because

you know they've got Henderson they've got Acres and they've got Malcolm Brown vulturing all these touchdowns so you just never really know what to do with it but I mean they draft this guy in the second round that's like the only thing that's keeping me interested in it they draft this guy on you have to at some point figure out if he's good no

I think that look Craig always talks about sometimes there's fantasy empty calories and that you want the nutrition and by the go lines I think actually a lot of these three teams actually have something in common the rookies are these rookies that were to discussing or not trusted by the goal line. Cam Acres, I don't think he's getting the ball by the goal line.

The Colts clearly don't trust Jonathan Taylor to not fumble the goal line at the end of the game. The fact that he didn't get the ball late in that Titans game proved that to me that they don't trust them in important situations. And I also don't think the Chargers trust Joshua Kelly. It seems in goal situations, like he has such fluctuating usage that he's clearly an exciting back. But obviously Anthony Lynn, who's a running back's coach by trade,

does not fully trust Josh Kelly with the job that now they've Kalin Belage and Troy Maine Pope are just coming out there and like having great days. If Josh Kelly they trusted him so I think Kalin Belage is a solid ad I don't like Cam Acres for that reason and I like Heinz and I also think it's interesting that the dolphins are kind of the flip side of this

they don't really rotate at the goal line at all they give Miles Gaskin the ball every goal line carry they don't really rotate him out and now that they trust Ahmed he seems to be getting the guy so yeah I think if you're chasing goal line carries I would stay away from Acres.

If you need someone for this week, I think Ahmed is actually kind of like a decent... So how would you rank these? And then the other person I would add is Devante Booker, who's emerged as Josh Jacobs' backup. He's had three touchdowns in the last two games. I don't know if necessarily this is indicative of what he's going to be doing going forward.

He's almost like the garbage time runner that's getting a lot of points. Yeah. So I think if I was going to rank these, and you guys can tell me how you feel about this, I think I would say Heinz 1, Ahmed 2, Balaj 3,

and then Galman, since he's on buy, the only reason I'm not putting Galman hires, because he's going into the buy, and then like from there Booker and Acres. Well, is this your week 11 ranking, or is it your rest of season ranking? I think for both, honestly. I'm worried about Gallman

just because at some point, is it what, Hyphitz, what is it going on with Freeman? So here's the thing. So Wayne Galman, So here's the main point with the Giants is that they're blocking really well now. Like it's important to note that they have it a bad line, but they're playing really well the last few weeks. And it's because they're blocking well and that Wayne Galman's producing in part because DeVante Freeman got hurt. Freeman is not going to come back until at the earliest week 13 against the Seahawks. So at a minimum, and even if it comes back, I'm kind of dubious that, I mean, that's an early time frame.

I'm kind of dubious. He would take the job in one full swoop immediately. So I think at the very least, if you pick up Gallman, what you're going to get is you're going to get a buy week. And then the Giants come off their buy. And they have a pretty decent two weeks because they play the Bengals coming out of that buy. And then they play the Seahawks. They're both on the road, but like whatever. And the Seahawks, I know like they have a better, sorry, worse past defense than run defense.

But it's like whatever. They're going to be scoring. They're going to have goal goal. And he's a touchdown guy. Doesn't Coleman have, what did you say to me earlier the day? You gave me like a stroke. you said that Wayne Goulman's the running back three over the last three weeks only behind

Dalvin Cook and Camara. I saw that I saw that stat from Ryan McDowell who posted that he's like over the last month Galman is the RB3 Yeah we're kind of burying the lead here Like obviously if that's true Wayne Galman is the person to pick up Like if you think he's gonna keep getting

one or two touchdowns every game that was the question Well he had five in the last four games Like he's the how much better you're gonna get Than like Camara Dalvin Cook Wayne Galman Like obviously pick him up If you don't need someone for this week he's on by so he's not going to help you this week. But the Bengals and the Seahawks are two really good opportunities to get a touchdown.

Yeah, at a certain point, it's the Aaron Jones theory. It's like, oh, well, he's got five touchdowns in five weeks. Is that going to continue? It's like, well, after week three, you would have said that and he did it for two more. Like, at a certain point, he scores touchdowns. You might want them. All right, so let's put these in order then. Let's do an official podcast order.

If you need someone for this week, it's not Gaulman. But if I'm picking, like, I need to make the playoffs and I need to win, then it's Gaulman for me is number one. So Heinz for this week, the 1A, Gallman for the rest of season 1B, and then for me it would be Belage, or Belaj and Ahmed. Yes.

Belage and Ahmed are like the Band-Aids weekly fill, and I need someone for this week because, I mean, well, honestly, with the teams on by this week, I don't really know who you would need because you don't, you're not filling in, if you have David and Montgomery or Devin Singletary, you probably aren't even playing them anyway

because they suck. If you have the, if you have like the space on your roster and you can wait a little bit, any nineers running back that's hurt that you would add would you add to heaven Coleman now that hasty's out for a while like would you do any of that or no is it only is most dirt the only guy or I wouldn't yeah I wouldn't no okay

Coleman's usage is sneakly as strange as like any NFL player over the last three or four years it is inexplicit like the more you learn about it the more confusing it gets Shanahan loves him for some reason yes but I'm just it is it is inexplicable how that man is used in a football field it's just so sure if you want to

it's like how James Jones was on every LeBron James team for like nine years what happened with James he never plays why is he getting traded with LeBron eventually Tevin Coleman will be like be a GM and just like trade Kyle Shannon someone useful like hey dude I'm gonna do you a solid man all right let me

you want me to roll through the receivers real fast here yeah all right if Corey Davis is still out there go get him he had a goose egg last week but came back had a good good week this week he's just getting the volume. Like he's a big part of this passing offense. I think he's worth, you've got to have him on your team at this point.

Marcus Valde Scantling for the Packers. He's only rostered in 17% of leagues. I had a very big week this week. Six targets, four catches, 149 yards, and a touchdown. I don't know if he's necessarily trustworthy. We'll get into the rankings here. I'm still a little dubious about this guy,

but you can't really argue with the production last two weeks. He had 18.3 points last week. He's a big play threat. always could kind of like has the chance to take it to the house. Michael Pittman and the Colts, who I know that we just got done talking about how every single one of the freaking Colts players is in the burn book, except for naive minds.

I think Pittman has a chance to be pretty good down the stretch here. Yeah, sure. He's the guy we're going to get tricked on next. It's like how Regina George was like thought those protein bars she was eating we're going to help her. Oh my God. No, it's like for the rest of Elm, he's like, no, I mean, these people delude themselves into thinking that they can be the ones

figure it out. and get back together and get along. And then, you know, I'm talking about Tobias Funke. And then his wife is like, do you think we can do that? He goes, I think we might, but I think we just might have what it takes. Anyways, I butcher that. But Michael Pittman from the Colts, seven targets in two plus games, seven plus targets. He looked pretty good.

Seven catches 101 yards on Thursday night. Football. Jalen Rager for the Eagles, who has now led the team in Target. last two weeks at receiver position. You know, the Eagles passing offense is pretty hit or miss, obviously. But, you know, Rigger's a guy that has a lot of talent, was their first round pick, leading the team. He had seven targets with team high at receiver.

Or it was a team high period. He also led the receivers and catches, yards and snaps. So he had four catches and 47 yards. So that kind of gives you the idea. Yeah, there's a little bit of mimsiness going on right now. When you lead the league and receive, when you lead your team in receiving yards a game, but you have less than 50, that's called the Denzel Mims.

But, I mean, at the same time, look at what Travis Fulgum did last month. Any pub is good pub for Mims. Look at what Fulgum did last month. Would you be that shocked if, like, a month from now we're talking about Rager, like doing what Fulgum just did? No, I wouldn't be shocked. I mean, by definition, it's impossible. Is it?

Yes, because I've heard of Jalen Rager before you go. Never heard of Travis Fulgum as of August. All right, moving down the line, Jacoby Myers for the Patriots. rostered in 48% of Yahoo Leagues. He's had an absolutely absurd target rate in the last few weeks, last month or so. He had five catches, 59 yards last night, or tonight, I should say, against the Ravens. You know, going back to last week, 14 targets, 12 catches under 69 yards. He's like the number one receiver in this offense right now, and maybe the only receiver.

That barely, yeah, that doesn't scratch the surface. Tonight, like, he's the only receiver who got a target. Like, they didn't throw the, like, he didn't, no one else caught the ball. It's just running backs and like the last tight end they have left. Cam Blum. He's the only wide receiver. Before this, before tonight's game, he had the six most targets in the NFL over the past three weeks.

He's the Wayne Gallman of receivers, except it doesn't score touchdowns. Yeah, and I think that's going to continue. Like, I think he's going to continue to get the vast majority of the targets for the receiver. So I like him a lot, actually. A few more just throw in, Cole Beasley, obviously, but we've been telling you to pick up Cole Beasley for months now for years. Jakeem Grant for the Dolphins.

With Preston Williams on IR, he picked up some playing time, picked up some targets, five targets, four catches, 43 yards in a touchdown. He had five targets last week, too. KJ. Hamler now has 10 targets in two consecutive weeks for the Broncos. I think he's running most of his routes out of the slot. He's kind of like that inside guy. He's got a lot of speed. Drew Locke seems to really trust him. He's looking to him a lot.

Also, Locke sucks, so he has to check down quite a bit. The garbage time narrative didn't really pan out today, unfortunately, for Locke. But yeah, and then a few other options, I guess you could throw on here. Keeling Cole for the Jaguars had pretty good game. Josh Reynolds for the Rams. There's a lot of receivers on the wire this week, I think that you could go for. If you could only put in like three bids, who would you want to actually have on your team? And let's not count Corey Davis.

Yeah, we're assuming Corey Davis is not available in your league. I would say, shoot, I would say Cole Beasley since John Brown looks like he might miss time. Let me put my top three would be Beasley Myers. So Marquez Valdez Scanling is Fool's Gold. You would not chase Fool's cheese. You would not chase his big day. Craig, your guy is... Especially with Lazzard coming back.

Myers is the... If those guys don't make it... If everyone you just said is out, then I think Myers and Hamler are the interesting ones to me. I'm not chasing Joaquin Grant. I'm a little afraid of Joaquin Grant. Burning me. Should we talk about tight end, or should we just like hold a moment of silence

for the position of tight end? I was trying to put together the... I was trying to put together a list of guys to stream at tight end for next week. And I was just like, what are we doing here? We're not pretending. We're not going to pretend to know. Like, we're not going to pretend.

There were two people in the top 10 who, like, caught their first freaking pass for a touchdown. I mean, you're looking at, like, legitimately, guys that get, like, four or five targets, like three or four targets are, like, the top options. You're right. Like, that's a sweet deal now. If it's like, you can guarantee four targets for your time in.

No offense. T.J. Hawkinson, Jared Cook, and Evan Angram combined. for like nine and a half points today. Wow, I was trying to think of other guys to add, besides the two we have, which is Logan Thomas and Tyler Higby. And I was like, oh, you know, let's see what Brate's done this year. Let's look at his numbers. Like, I can't recommend him to people.

Like, he's had one game over 40 yards. He's pretty, he's had one catch in three of his last six games. Like, it's pretty bleak. There's not many people to recommend. I guess you could give a shot. We would literally be lying if we said we had a recommendation beyond Tyler Higbee and Logan Thomas. we would be making shit up. Here's the one thing I'm going to say,

and it fills me with self-loathing to say this. But Taysome Hill is a tight end and yes-in. Oh, my. Oh, God. You guys, if Drew Breeze is out, if Drew Breeze is out and you can play him at that tight end. All right, yeah, that's actually, yeah, this is what you've been waiting for, isn't it?

Okay, it's not the worst. No, I told you. I'm filled with self-hatred right now. That's actually, if Breeze is time, you're actually not wrong. D.K. hired the Chargers doctor to stab Drew Breeze in the rig. The other one I want to throw out there, actually. Since you're a COXVINDK, the person who like, I don't think anyone gets their name set on a broadcast more without being relevant at all is Greg Olson.

Greg Olson has so many like red zone targets or near targets that don't get caught that eventually he's going to have a two touchdown game and we'll be like, oh, there it is. So if you're going to throw a dart, I would actually pick Greg Olson solely because eventually it'll happen. That's where we are. You had four targets, two catches for 33 yards this week. Honestly, he's old and like... Oh my God. A month ago, we were like, don't play Tase him Hill and now we're like, honestly, like, fuck it. Like, we don't know.

It's screw it. I mean, you can't do much worse. Let's be honest. Quarterback, quarterback's not a big streaming week because, I mean, the buy weeks are like Niners, Giants, Bears, Bills. You're only playing Josh Allen out of those. But if you need a streamer for Allen or, you know, your guy got hurt, honestly, Derek Carr, the Raiders are playing the Chiefs and Sunday in at football.

I feel like that could be a shootout. And then Cam Newton at Houston, purely looking at, like, bad defenses, Cam Newton at Houston, Kirk Cousins versus Dallas. And I would throw in Tua Tungaviloa at Denver, even though Denver's defense is probably the best of that group. But I think Tua looked really sharp today. And, you know, just has the potential to be pretty good for the rest of the season. So those are the three that I'd throw out. But I think, yeah, Carr is another good one. James Winston, if he hasn't enough getting the start, why not?

Winston was the QB3 last year. People forget. absolutely James Winston because it's fun first of all let's do like let's be honest we play fantasy football for fun also maybe for money but James Winston is the fun

like the most fun quarterback to have on your team James I mean James might not give Drew Brees the job back if they play so I'm just like to tell you do we I love where we're all out right now do you think that do you think that Breeze is going to play next week it didn't really see like it Sunday night he just got hurt let's get the armor I

come back. I'm not a doctor. I'll say this. We've two more episodes till then. You're right. There's a long time, but I saw this from the long time Saints Bee reporter, Jeff Duncan on Twitter. He said, I've read Drew Breeze's body language and speech inflection for 15 years, and I don't recall him ever sounding like this. The concern was evident in his tone and demeanor. It speaks to his leadership and professionalism that he took the time to address the media after being injured. That sounds like he's retiring. Like, that sounds like he's done forever.

grab the bucks to win the NFC South right now if you can no you want to wait till the saints odds crater and then buy the Saints because everyone's going to forget that the Saints will be better with James Winston oh interesting anyway yeah there's yeah there's some advice probably don't follow that but you can do it on a Vandal sports book okay let's get the hell yeah anyone you guys want people to cut or should we get out of here I think you should come just gonna be quick I think it's time to cut rugs I know he's like a sexy guy to have your bench yeah he's just not doing it for the Raiders. He's never had more than three catches in a game this year. They just don't

throw to him. Get him off your bench. I don't think it's worth it. Maybe he'll have like one. He'll probably have a 50-yard touchdown next week because I said this, but I don't think he's worth having. I'd rather have Michael Pittman or Jalen Rager or Jacobi Myers than him. I think you should stream Henry Ruggs this week just because Craig's

like guaranteed that he'll not be wrong about this. Okay. Let's get the hell out of here. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, D.K. whatever the opposite is of thank you to like the city of Indianapolis just I don't know

what we did to you but my God awful. Thank you Lauren Lauren for listening we'll see you guys on Wednesday