The Ringer NFL Show - Last-Second Fantasy Draft Prep, Plus a Surprise Guest!

Episode Date: August 30, 2024

The guys bid farewell to Kadarius Toney’s legendary career with the Kansas City Chiefs (3:33). Next, the guys share some tips and best practices to prepare you for your drafts, including a roundup of injured stars to be aware of, the most advantageous draft strategies to follow this year, the key to auction drafts, and more rules to help you win your fantasy league (7:36). Later, they are joined by Maryland Governor Wes Moore (!) to talk about his love of fantasy football, how he finds time to manage his team, why Maryland is superior to D.C., whether he can still run a sub-five-second 40-yard dash, and much more (46:00). Check out our 2024 Ringer Fantasy Football Rankings here! Email us! [e-mail] The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Guest: Governor Wes Moore Social: Kiera Givens and Jack Sanders Producer: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Tara Palmieri. I'm Puck's senior political correspondent and host of Somebody's Got to Win. Brought to you by The Ringer and Spotify. The 2024 election has been upended with Joe Biden off the ticket and Donald Trump facing a new challenger, Kamala Harris. If you want to hear what the insiders are really saying about the race, join me Tuesdays and Thursdays as I break it all down with lawmakers, journalists and political strategists. We'll go deeper than the headlines to the anxieties at the highest levels of power. And of course, we'll chew over all. the hot political gossip as we head into this historic election. Be sure to follow.

Somebody's got to win at Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, everyone. This is Danny Heifitz. We recorded today's episode before the news came out that Brandon Ayukes signed his contract extension. We will address Ayuk's contract next week. Okay, here's the show. Our fantasy football show. My name is Danny Hyphitz.

I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Horlebeck. And later, we are joined, believe it or not, by the governor of Maryland, West Moore. the episode. Normal thing. Weird. Yeah, he just literally, he played football and he plays fantasy football and he literally just emailed us and was like, can you guys help me with my fantasy football team? And so we have a governor of a state on later, but first, we're going to have, isn't that crazy? But first we're going to have, we're to help the people because it's about the people.

So if you are listening to this episode and you are like, I am a little behind in my fantasy football prep. I have a draft coming up. It's mildly stressing me out. And I just wish someone would just tell me exactly what to do in my fantasy football draft. Just tell me exactly what to do. Then this episode is for you, right, DK, we're just going to help everyone vibe it out. Basically, we're pretending it's like your dad texting you and saying, hey, who should I draft in fantasy this year? And then we could just point him to this pod.

You know how people used to like write the answers on their thigh going into class before a test or like they'd put it on the back of their hand or inside the little calculator thing that slid open and closed? This is like the podcast version of that. If you could somehow bring this into your test, this is the pod to do it for. There we go. Yeah, I feel like they had this problem

where they needed you to do the TIA 84 calculators. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In the thing, but then you could like save formula so people would save. I had like, fucking paragraphs in mine. Yeah. Yeah. It was a full 20,000 words.

Just let them use the internet anyway. I never got to work at the ringer. And they were like, okay, okay, we'd usually answer this problem, but don't use the internet. Don't have any help. You have to only know what I mean? I don't know.

To kids these days? Like, do they just Google every? thing? Is that how it all works now? Like, do they have to read anything? We'll get to that later. All AI. We're going to get to all AI. We're going to get to know your league real quick before that. Two things. First of all, we, if you are a long time listener, if you started listening to

show because the NFL draft show, if this is literally your first episode and you're kind of like, what's up? How did these three idiots get to interview a governor later? Like, whoever it is, I want you to know, reminder, we cover the whole season two. We have Sunday night episodes recapping Sundays. We have Mondays where we help you with waivers and do trivia like it's at a bar. We do power hour rankings on Wednesdays. We have Friday previews. We do everything.

We cover fantasy. We cover the league. We cover everything. Again, my favorite thing. When Russell Wilson's practicing on air, whatever the hell is going on, we're talking about it. And of course, this is the number one podcast in the world for Cadarius Tony related news. So the chiefs have waived Cadarius Tony, receiver, running back, general pain in the side. of anyone who's ever had to root for him.

Not going to lie, I was kind of happy to see it. You remember when J.J. McCarthy, after one of the preseason games, and he threw an interception, and they were like, what did that feel like to throw that interception? And he was like, what an opportunity to learn to better myself. That's how I feel right now. This is just an opportunity. One door is closed, and another will open for Cadarius.

Wasn't right fit in Casey. That's fine. He won them a Super Bowl. He did what he needed to do. He won them a Super Bowl. And now he can go to my Pittsburgh Steelers who need a guy like that in the room. there we go. To help them win a Super Bowl.

Every single time a good player is available via free agency or trade, everyone's like, oh, imagine them on the Chiefs, steam emoji. And now we've Kidaris Tony who literally couldn't work on the Chiefs. Oh, I'm sorry.

Who else almost had two touchdowns in the Super Bowl? Did anyone else on that team? Well, I can't remember one. Interesting. Played five snaps. And scored 1.9 touchdowns. Have you guys ever heard the expression

if you love someone, set them free? The Chiefs just did that with, you know, Andy Reid called him the most talented receiver on the team. So, you know, he wouldn't lie about that kind of thing. I don't think it's a bad sign that Cadarius, Tony, is going to be on his third team. I mean, I'm assuming he's going to be on a team. But that's not a bad sign.

This is just him getting some experience, getting his, you know, feet wet in the NFL. Very bullish on what happens next with this guy. Very, very bullish. Who has the best medical staff? He needs to go there. I don't think there's a, I don't know if the medical stuff's the problem. But yeah, we'll see. Can we guess where is he going to end up?

You're right about the Steelers. The Steelers have like the worst receiving group of the NFL. They do. They're up there with the Chargers. No, it's probably still like New England. I think it's the Chargers and the Patriots, but the Steelers, dude, George Pickens, it's like Calvin Austin. Cordorrell Patterson's going to play.

Van Jefferson. You should go to the commanders. Roman Wilson. Yeah. Yeah. Roman Wilson's hurt. And then, yeah, the Giants. I don't want to talk.

You know the Giants actually, they haven't cut Alan Robinson yet. I don't know what's up with that. Oh, I think I saw that they did. All right. good, thank God. What was, what was up with that? God. You need bodies during training camp to run plays. Catch passes. All right, yeah. That's sad. All right. So, Cadarious Tony, yeah, we just...

We'll meet again. Just the next step in his journey. It's like the Paul. Yeah, like the end of Fast and Furious. We just go the separate ways in the highway. Whoa. Oh. Second best noise someone made in this show after the, the governor makes at the end of this podcast. Just stay tuned for that.

All right. Let's get to just the cheat code. Did you say people wrote in Sharpie on their thigh during a test? How would that help? What? People would write the answers on their fucking thigh. The thigh? How is short?

Oh, wow. Damn. Okay. You've never heard of that? Writing answers on your skin is like the most classic way to cheat on a test. I guess thigh. Yeah. I guess it makes sense.

All right. Anyway, we're just going to roll through these. But again, just... I'm shocked that you are not aware of that. Thigh, all right. Yeah. Where else are you going to put it? I wore caprice, dude.

I wasn't cool. I had cargo shorts. You wore capris? In eighth grade, dude. I don't know what was going on. You were wearing caprize. The only person I've ever seen wearing caprize on purpose was my mom. Yeah.

Well, six grade, you know who's helping me get my clothes? Yeah. All right. It's just ahead of his time. I've never heard a young man say I wore caprice. Well, maybe it was cargo shorts. I don't know the fucking difference, man. It's merils and shit.

It was a tough time. Email us at ring your fantasy football at gmail.com if you have middle school clothing stories. All right. Rule number one. And I know we're going to start with the opposite. I can't get over to the cruise thing. We can't move on.

All right. He's like, hey, I couldn't read the test the test. I couldn't write answers to the test on my thigh because I was wearing caprice. That sentence doesn't make any. Did you have a stroke?

What happened? Oh, my God. Anyway, all right. Any of the answers. Number one. Here are the answers for the fantasy test. Yeah. Know your league rules, which write them on your thigh over into your caprice or whatever.

No your league rules. I know it's dumb and everyone says it. Hit the freaking settings button, the little gear icon. Hit it and read it. I swear to God. Like this happened to me. Like no one's above this. This happened to me.

The ringer had a fantasy football league. Right. And I didn't see the Slack channel. They voted to change Superflex and we're busy. And we're like, oh, well, I'm a fantasy expert. I don't need to know what's going. I'm just going to walk in and win. And like, I got six picks in.

I took a running back. I'm like, oh my God. It's like, all the third pick. I took a running back. Like, it's a Super Flex League. They had voted to change that I never checked. They just waltzed. It doesn't matter how much you do this.

No, the league. So obviously if it's a Superflex league, like quarterbacks, twice as many quarterbacks starting, that means the first backup in a 10-team league with one quarterback. The 11th quarterbacks like Dak Prescott or Jordan Love, the first backup in a 12-team league with two quarterbacks is like Bo Nix. So like you start taking a quarterback the first pick. Maybe that's obvious.

The one you don't think about is like if there's a two-receiver, if two receivers start, in a 10-team league, that is 20 receivers starting. But if you're in a three-receiver league with 12 teams, that's 36 receivers. And if you throw in a flex or two flexes, that could be a maximum 60 receivers. So you have to track the basic stuff like supply and demand. So if you're in a three-receives, stuff like that, just be aware of that. Also scoring settings. Scoring, yeah, do you get a point per reception, all that stuff?

Yeah, if it's PPR, you want to go after guys who catch more passes, especially running backs. But like you said, what you were trying to say is that like if your team, if you're in a league where you start three wide receivers, maybe even four, you should prioritize drafting wide receivers earlier. Right. Because there's a wider range of talented wide receivers that you want to have the best ones because you don't want to have to have the worst ones. And so I would say first round pick in a three wide receiver league, lean wide receiver.

First round pick in a two wide receiver league, lean running back. And the simplest way to think of it, I'm curious you guys disagree, but I think the simplest way this year is if you have a top five pick, I think you want one of the three top running backs. Bison, or depending you feel of Christian McCaffrey's injury. Some people still have them first by with a bullet. We're a little, Craig and I are a little more nervous. Deacon doesn't care. But get one of the

top three running backs. Or Tyree Kill and Cidy Lynn. Like those are one of your top five picks. And then after that, I think it's okay to take like a receiver in the first round because you got like a Monrod and Garrett Wilson. You have all these guys. But then you probably do want a running back in the second round because there's so much receiver talent later that you kind of want to be targeting

receivers in the middle rounds. And you probably want a running back in the first couple picks or receivers in the middle, because if you take two receivers early, that sounds awesome. But then later, you'd probably end up reaching for running back. So you can. There's no problem with taking two receivers early. But I do think you want a running back at least in the first three rounds. Yeah, it's funny that I would say one running back in the first two rounds. As long as you do that, you're okay. I think people spend so much time thinking about their first round pick. They're so interested in what pick they got in front of the first round, back in the first round, all this stuff. I think in general, the first round pick is the least important pick of the draft.

You can auto draft probably the first round and that's the least important thing. Right. Well, it's the least difficult. Oh, they're all good. They're all great. Yeah. Right. Everyone looks through the first two picks and are like, oh, my team's sick. But to your point, there's a reason there's a saying, like, you can't win your league in your first round, but you can lose it. Yeah. Like, weirdly, if you had to show up 20 minutes late to your draft or leave 20 minutes early, I would rather show up 20 minutes late and lose the first two rounds. Yeah, yeah. Rather than miss. out on the sleepers that I've been spending all off-season studying at the end of the draft. Yeah.

And on that note, you're right, though, people stress about it. I would just plot out, do the mock drafts on whatever platform you're on. Just plot out the worst case scenario. Literally just sit there and be like, like, plot out the most frustrating scenario. Like, oh, I don't know what I would do if this happens and that happens. Like literally, if you have the fifth pick, and so you're going to pick, let's say, fifth and 16th, rank your top 16 players. Take that stress out of your life.

But getting back to other basic stuff, start with the platform you're on. Like we talk about this all the time. ESPN, Yahoo, CBS, wildly different rankings. Sleeper. Like we can go through a few people here, but just to shout out a few examples. Cooper Cup, Rams,

is 24th on Yahoo, 45th on ESPN, two round difference. Rishi Rice is two rounds later on ESPN. Josh Palmer, beloved by Craig. It's like 30 spots later. He's 150th on ESPN, 125 on Yahoo,

100 on sleepers, 50 spots later, depending on the platform. And then flips, like Malik Neighbors is 20 spots higher on ESPN than Yahoo. Michael Pittman is 15 spots higher on ESPN than Yahoo. Kyler-Mur, Kevin Ingram, are like 40 spot gaps depending on ESPN or Yahoo. Just know that going in, like identify like, I mean, we can tweet out a link, but basically, just know that those spots.

Like my favorite example really is Evan Engram being like 60th versus 95th, depending if you're an ESPN or Yahoo sleeper. Yeah, I think the bottom line is when you're in that draft, like, module or whatever you want to call it, the user interface for whatever draft you're doing, I think it's important to like scroll down a little bit and be aware of some of the guys that might be a little bit lower on the list. When you're up on the clock, you know, scroll around and make sure that you're not seeing anybody like down the list that you would probably rank a lot higher. And then keep an eye on that person as you go through to drafts. You can get really good

value on players that you think are really good, but are maybe ranked lower, you know, on whatever platform you're on. So like Rahimoster, it's a great example. you know, he comes in way lower on most things, but I think he's a really good value. And I would take him above, you know, a lot of the running backs that people have, that other platforms would have ranked above him. So just being aware of where those players are

and kind of like look around before you start your draft, I think that's important. Like you can set your cue and like really circle those guys. Yeah, definitely cross-reference the rankings that you want to use, like ours, Fantasyf Football.org.com, with Yahoo, ESPN, whatever platform you're using. I will also add that I think you should use that, You should use a pencil and paper to draft.

I really do believe that. Yeah, even if, so let's say you're drafting online. Let's say you're using Yahoo and you're in their draft software program, whatever it's called. What I like to do is when I'm drafting on my computer, I don't really want to have any other tabs open. I want to be able to look at that draft screen and never go away from it because the second you start searching things, looking things up on other tabs, that's when you lose track of things. You don't see who gets drafted. I like to print out my tiers, which is the next thing we have here on this list.

Tears is super important for drafting. print out your tiers and use a Sharpie, a highlighter, a pen, whatever, and literally cross the names off as they are drafted. And I think that will keep you so much more organized throughout your draft. You'll never have to leave the site on your computer and you can stay more organized than everybody else and also have a different set of rankings that you can reference while you're looking at the Yahoo rankings, which you might not want to use.

I couldn't agree with what Craig just said more. So that is why at Fantasy Football at theHoreMear.com, we have our rankings and we have a draft tracker, You can, if you're thinking like, I mean, look, printers are the only thing that no generation ever mastered. Like using a printer if you don't have one is like kind of a mess. Yeah, go door to door, find somebody with a printer, print out our rankings. We have printable rankings with our tears and bring it to your draft. I feel like it used to be okay to be like knocking some stores.

Like, oh, do you have any sugar? I'm making cookies. Now it's like, do you have a printer? Yeah. I desperately need. Actually, I mean, that's so fucking true. I write now my license expired when I turn 30 and I need to, I'm getting a new one. But in the meantime, I have it.

Yeah, I have a temporary license that they emailed me, but I like don't have a printer. I actually, I don't know. I guess I got to go to FedEx or something, which is insane. Like, I just can't believe that's still where we are. I got to go to a FedEx to print something. I bet half the people listening are like, I can't imagine having a printer around. And I bet you the other half is like, I can't imagine not having a printer. I have a printer.

Not surprising. Fantasyfootball.3.com. We have a draft tracker where if you don't want to do that, you literally can just have all the players. you can hit check if they're on your team X if they're gone. And so we built it so that you can hit positional tiers. And this is, as Craig was saying before, you do tiers. And if you have never done this, if you just have rankings, if you've never like sit there and cross off names.

And again, we have names you can cross off adding the draft tracker at fancy football.org.com hit draft tracker and you hit the positions. If you've never drafted with tears crossing off, you'll figure out why you do it like immediately. Because it's when you actually are on, I know I keep saying this, but when you're on the clock and you look and you're like, oh, there's like six running backs left I like in this tier but like one receiver you're like

I'll take the receiver now see if the running back comes it's so easy to see how the trap because all you're doing is live tracking supply and demand which is too fucking stressful to do while you're doing it so yeah print out stuff if you don't have a printer go to fancyfurtball.com and use different rankings than the ones

everyone's on ours if you want to use ours awesome if you don't doesn't matter like use a different list because no list is perfect so use a different one than everyone else with different tiers. Either make your own tiers if you have time. If you don't have time, then just use our tiers.

That's why we made them. I like the tiers thing because especially after the first couple of rounds, I like to kind of try and plan out two to three rounds in advance or one to two rounds in advance. And so you can look at your tiers like half its exactly said and say, you know, I've got, there's two tight ends left on like the top tier that I really like.

There's six running backs and seven receivers. So I'm going to go tight ends or whatever. Like however you want to plan it. But it just gives you a really good idea so you can plan ahead as it's coming around in the snake draft. Tears are extremely useful in auctions as well just because you don't want to be bidding on the last guy in a tier because generally that guy will get bit up more than he's probably worth. So tiers are extremely useful in any kind of draft. I would say outside of knowing the literal rules of your league, like if it's PPR or standard or how many positions you start, I think tiers is maybe the number one piece of advice I would recommend for people. if you take anything from this episode, it's used tears.

Little using tears and don't take a kicker defense till the very end, no matter what. And like, that's honestly half of it. The other thing, so for snake drafts and on that note with the tears thing, what D.K. was saying about like you're able to track stuff, pay attention to like what's going on around your spots. Let's say you have the eighth pick and it's a 10 team league. If you are picking eight, right, so if you're picking like in the middle of whatever round and it's going to go to you and then it goes to the two other guys get to pick twice,

it comes back to you. If both those people have tight ends, you don't need to take a tight end with that first pick. Like, you can wait because they're not going to take a tight end. Or if none of them have a quarterback, you might not get the quarterback you want. So just pay attention to, like, where you are in the grand scheme of what's going on. So, like, if you're, you know what I mean? If there's, you're at the last pick and there's going to be like 20 more picks to you go,

the whole tier could get wiped out. You know, so you just use that, you know, just pay attention to whatever else is doing. Yeah. And just to add to that, like, preparing and having like an idea in your head of like who you want is actually really important. I do a lot of draft. So sometimes I'll just come in and be like, I don't like, I'm just going to wing it.

And usually those teams are not nearly as good. If you prepare and have some ideas of like the real targets that you want to have in five, six, seven, eight, like whatever round it is, um, you know, that's maybe an obvious thing, but it is important. It's true. Like it doesn't matter how good, like we do this all the time, but you do want to walk in being like for this league, this is the worst I'll do. Yeah.

This is who I want, but this, you have to know the lowest you'll accept. Like, you know, if they can't, I, if you don't want to walk out with your number one of running back being David Montgomery, then don't. let that happen. But also boring players are good, right, correct? I know. Yeah. Specifically with Snake, I do think one of the most important principles of drafting a good team in fantasy football is to not be afraid of the dudes that are falling in drafts for no reason. And there's all, they're usually guys who are established dudes on boring teams who are kind of boring names who are always kind of consistent, but might be getting up there in age a little bit. And there is just so much sex appeal for other

names out there that people are ignoring these really rock solid fantasy players. I think this year, and we've seen this anecdotally already, guys like Rahim Mostert, Mike Evans, Joe Mixon, Devonte Adams. These guys are boring. No one is going to talk about them when you draft them. No one is going to ooh and awe. We just did it ourselves. We did a ringer fantasy draft a few weeks ago. And Joe Mixon, for no reason, fell literally four rounds. Nobody wanted Joe Mixon. Yeah. And so, you know, make sure these guys aren't heard or there's, you know, no outstanding issues with them. but in general, I think there is a lot of these guys who are really good values

and it kind of becomes a snowball effect where if they go, if they go one round too late, then everybody starts to get nervous. Why isn't anybody taking Joe Mixon? I don't want to be the idiot who takes Joe Mixon. There's almost like peer pressure. It's weird. Absolutely. It really is a snowball.

And then four rounds later, some guys like, all right, fuck it. I'll take Rahim Mostert. Yeah. And he ends up being like the best pick in the draft. So I know it's not sexy. It's super boring. But if Devante Adams or Rahim Mostert or Mike Evans

falls like a round or two, just draft them. It's worth it. I know it sucks. It's not fun, but just do it. Sometimes your team, yeah, your team won't look that great, but it's going to just, it's going to put up points. It's not going to be exciting. After you finish your draft, when you sit down on the couch and you pull up your team on Yahoo and you're like, fuck, my team is so cool. You roster bait, as the kids say. Even week one, you're going to be like, yeah, I guess I'm starting Mike Evans. And then you know what? He's going to have 100 yards in two touchdowns,

and you're going to be like, wow, I love having Mike Evans. If tears are the best advice on the show, that's probably the next best, which is if a player is falling a lot, just take them honestly. Like, like at the most part, like the rankings broadly speaking

are usually, you know, like just take. I literally, I did a league. Jackie, my fiance has a league

with a bunch of her friends. Flex. She was a bunch of league with her friends and it was, it was 14 people. And I would say 10 of the 14

didn't really follow football. I know, right? Yeah. Flex. Popular. It's like they didn't really follow football

in any capacity. Do you hire someone? The person who refused to participate in the draft, they came to the draft. and we're like, this is too much, I'm going to let it auto draft. That person won.

They actually did that. They just were like, they literally just were like, it'll do it for me? Why would I do it? That's hilarious. It'll do it for me. And that person won,

because they just kept taking all the people known else. The wisdom of crowds. Yes. Those rankings do matter. The one thing to know when people are falling is injuries. I think it's one of the hardest things to kind of figure out,

especially if you're just kind of diving in and, you know, 32 teams with practicing every day. How are you going to keep track of injuries? So let's just run through a bunch of injuries that you should know about. Okay. I can start it off.

Chris McCaffrey, the first overall pick for a lot of people, has a calf injury. The indications are that he'll be ready to roll at the beginning of the season. The Niners are pretty optimistic about that, but calf injuries are a little bit worrisome because sometimes they reoccur, sometimes they can lead to other injuries. And so obviously there's a little bit of risk with Christian McCaffrey. I still haven't ranked number one. You guys are a little bit more worried about it. But that's just something to be in something to have in the front of your mind is he is currently injured, which is always a little bit scary.

Just something to be aware of because a lot of these guys are going to have that little medical logo next to their name and so we want to you to know whether you have a little cross we just want you to realize what that actually means

if it's serious or not. You have permission to take McCaffrey first you have permission to take him to not take him in the top five. Another guy, Pukukua who's supposed to be a guy who's going to go in the second round of your drafts

receiver on the Rams. He heard his knee like a month ago and he basically hasn't really been practicing. He has been back recently doing individual drills. they think he's going to be ready for week one. Something to keep in mind. It's Bursusack.

Yeah, Bursusack, baby. Mark Andrews is the tight end for the Ravens. He's in a car accident. They said there wasn't a scratch with him and he was totally fine and that he didn't practice for a few days. We still don't really know what happened. I think he's fine.

The Harbaas don't tell us anything. It'd be weird if he had a lot of internal damage and they're like, not a scratch on him. Yeah. Oh my God. Like the arrested development doctor. His kidney burst and they're like, not a scratch on him. You have permission to be skeptical of Mark,

injuries because he's still not practicing. And again, it's car accident. Anything could happen. Like, we have no idea. So it's like they said, yeah. So anyway, I think I'm officially a little skeptical of this. So we literally have no idea what's going on there. So take that as you will.

Another guy that has been nursing a hamstring injury, Jemir Gibbs from the Lions. It sounds like this wasn't a serious accident or a serious injury. They just wanted him to, you know, rest and get ready for the season. He reportedly practiced on Sunday. So he's back at practice. That's a good sign. But again, hamstring injuries are scary. because they are at a higher risk for re-injury during the season.

This is a speed guy, an explosive guy. So that makes me a little bit nervous. I'm not necessarily pushing Gibbs down a lot, but it is something where I'm like, if there's a tiebreaker between two players, I might go with the other guy. DeAndre Hopkins, the wide receiver on the Titans, he's out four to six weeks for the knee injury.

He heard it a little while ago, so he's definitely going to miss week one, not sure exactly when he's going to be back. These guys are ones to be to be interested in drafts, to be honest, because he's going to have the little medical tag next to him. he's going to drop super far in drafts, and he might miss like two weeks

and come back and be a great value. So that is another tip I would say is the Mike Evans, Joe Mixing types, who fall because they're boring. There's also the injury guys who fall that actually aren't going to miss as much time as people think. So again, not going to be the sexiest pick in the world,

but by like week three or four, DeAndre Hopkins might be one of the best picture on your team. Speaking of that, Marquise Brown for the Chiefs, his ADP has plummeted the last few weeks because he broke his collarbone. He's probably not going to play in week one. But after that, he should be okay.

He should be good to go. High Fitz has made the point, which is very salient and true, that it was like on the first play of the preseason, which is just terrible vibes. But he comes in an extreme discount now. So I actually kind of like scooping up Marquis Brown on the last round or whenever it is very late in the draft. I got him for $1 in auction league the other day.

It's like, you know, he could end up being, he could end up emerging as like a big time target in this offense. But no one wants him right now because he's not playing right now. Mike Williams, your guy, Craig, now on the Jets, formerly of the Chargers,

coming off a torn ACL, and he just started practicing again on one hand, it was kind of an early tear, so that's sometimes better for cover the next year, but also just getting back to full contact right now in August. Nick Chubb is starting the season on PUP

is going to miss at least four weeks. Physically unable to perform, which is one of those acronyms where it would be putt P. It's kind of like how the Texans, you see they have swarm, but it's, it's like swirm.

They spell it swarm with an A, but it's like, there's no A, it's an E. It's kind of like that. So Jerome Ford is looking likely to be the starter. Their other guy, Naim Hines, their other running back in the league is also starting the season on the Pup list.

So keep in mind that Jerome Ford is going to be a starting running back for at least the first four weeks of the season. He could be a tremendous value. Absolutely. And then another guy, rookie Jonathan Brooks on the Panthers, also on Pup,

is going to miss the first four weeks of the season. If you have an IR slot, another thing to be wary of in your league, if you have an IR slot, you can draft a guy and just stick him there, stash him. Jonathan Brooks is probably the top guy, I would say, this year to do that for. Great example of, like, knowing the rules. It's like, do you want Nick Chub if he takes up a bench spot versus if you can't put

him in IR, then that makes a big difference to me of whether I want to keep someone for a month that won't even play till October. So, yeah, keep those in mind. And again, I really, it makes a difference to me if I have the extra roster part to keep throw him in there immediately. Other guys coming off big injuries, T.J. Hawkinson for the Vikings, he's coming off a torn ACL. he's also going to start, I'm physically unable to perform.

Tyler Higby for the Rams, like, don't worry about him. He's also going to miss the first four weeks of the season. Keaton Mitchell for the Ravens, don't worry about these guys. I don't think that they're worth taking. Hockinson in particular,

unless you have an IR spot, I don't think he's going to be quite himself. I think the biggest question is Jalen Warren, the Steelers running back, who probably was better than Najee Harris and probably was going to win out the job and then, or at least like a larger part of time share. Now he's a hamstring injury.

Craig, are you concerned about Jalen Warren? anything's going to be fine. A little bit. I kind of feel like he's pushing himself to play week one when he might not be fully ready. He said recently that he is going to be ready by week one. But I think there is a, you know, there's always a heightened chance of re-injury with this stuff, especially with guys forcing themselves back. They want to start the season.

So yeah, I would probably drop him down a little bit. I used to have him above Najee Harris in my rankings. Now I do have Najee. So I would ding him a little bit. The injury stuff just in general, it's just to Google anyone, if you're really on defense. You know what I mean? Like, there's always an update. Like, we're recording this on Tuesday, August 27th. Or how do you Google a player to see if they're injured or not? Where should they go? Because I actually think in a pinch, it's kind of difficult. It's a good question. I would say

the panic Google is tough. If you have 20 seconds left. Yeah, yeah. Don't let the panic Google happen. It's more like if someone with the little red cross is falling before your turn, Google that person. I would go to fantasy pros has really good blurbs. At fantasy pros, they have good, like updates. Yep. And just make sure that this hasn't happened today. Just to give you a story, Brian Robinson a couple years ago

filled 30 spots in our draft and Jackie took him not knowing he had been shot like that day. Right. Like he'd been shot like three hours before and she didn't know. And it's like, you know, every now and then if someone does fall

like maybe just to toss a quick Google like, but don't like panic Google. That's different. I don't know. I'm going to make this decision right now. The internet magic Google machine will just tell, don't do that. But before you're out in the clock.

Don't let Google Gemini tell you whether or not a player is healthy. Definitely not. Quarterback, we've mentioned this 100 times. Get a running quarterback. Like running, rushing yards are three times more valuable than passing. It's an actual cheat code that Hafeits hates. Well, it's not, no, it's not a cheat code, whatever we can call it.

It's a fucking glitch. It's a loophole. It was literally the rules were made before any fucking quarterbacks ran. Now all the quarterbacks run and we never changed the rules. It's like, oh, don't get me started. Do you guys, if you guys are in a one quarterback league, which I think is still the standard, are you a fan of getting one of the top four or five guys early? or are you okay waiting and getting somebody in the later rounds?

I don't. So I'm actually fine waiting for sort of the bottom of the tiers in terms of the quarterback. Because I really like Jane Daniels and Caleb Williams this year. I know they're both rookies. But, you know, I think it depends on what league you're in, of course. If people are going to be reaching on Jane Daniels, we don't really know. But like the way that they're ranked now, you can get those guys after some of the more established quarterbacks like Trevor Lawrence, Sherry Gough, some of these other guys that, you know,

have bigger name value, but people aren't quite. or people aren't as sure on what Jane Daniels is going to do a rookie. I think you can wait and get those guys and still get the elite league winning type of upside from a quarterback from those types of players, but you can get them at a steep discount compared to the other one. So in a perfect world, I'm like scooping up really elite receivers and running backs and maybe grab a tight end or whatever and then wait and get a quarterback in that. I guess it's like a middle range, you know, maybe not necessarily late,

but that's kind of my way of going about it this year. And again, the ranking sleeper, if you draft a, on the sleeper platform, Jaden Daniels is for Washington's ranked 115th. And on Yahoo, he's like 70-9th. So that's just a thing to know.

So if you're on Yahoo, it's hard to expect to get Jaden late. The thing I would say generally is like four options. Option one, an elite quarterback. I wouldn't be the first to take them. I don't think there's a big enough gap

between Josh Allen and Lamar and Mahomes and Jalen Hertz that I don't want to reach for Hallen and then realize they could have had Lamar around later. So I'd rather get one of the top four elite quarterbacks, but like don't be the first one. Kyler, Anthony Richardson in the middle.

I love Jaden Daniels, but that if I don't get Jaden, I want to be the last one to take a quarterback. I did a draft last night with my friends. The ones who took quarterback last waited until like the 11th round and still got Dak Prescott. Like there's, I think that if you don't get Jaden, Daniels, you want to wait. Yeah.

Is it better? I actually always lean now lately to get one of the elite guys. I do. No, it's great. I understand not wanting to be the first one. But in Snake, there is a fear of, let's say it's the fourth round and you pass up on Josh Allen. No quarterbacks have gone off the board yet.

And you're like, eh, I don't want to be the first one. first guy to take a quarterback. Then the guy after you takes Josh Allen, and then there's a run on quarterbacks, and by the time you're up again, you're left with, you know, Joe Burrow and C.J. Stroud, and although those guys are solid options, like, you've completely missed out on that top tier. And I do like the security blanket of a great quarterback. I do think that going into the week and being like, Josh Allen's going to get me 28 points every single week, I don't have to worry. Having Deck Prescott's fine, but there still might be some stinkers where he's got 13 points in a weird week four matchup against the Browns. That doesn't have

happen with dudes like Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson. And I personally would rather have that than wait and try to get other values. I, if you're listening to the show, you're probably doing more prep than the other people in your league. And so there is something to be said for get an elite quarterback, get an elite tight end too, and then trust us to help you get the running back and receiver meet like later in the drafts where it's like a Cooper Cup, hopefully doesn't gross. Cooper Cup, I'm the Lake Neighbors, Rishi Rice.

You fill that out later and you can get that stuff done. and like, you know, hopefully running back sleepers and stuff. Like, it's worth betting on yourself that you'll figure that stuff out. So I think that's, yeah, that's totally fine. Basically, also quarterback's the hardest thing to figure out because there's rankings. There's always someone who takes my home with the eighth pick, you know, one quarterback league. It's like, so if it's like that, you know, you have to vibe out the room. Sometimes people wait and people don't want quarterbacks if your friends are all into it.

Some people are just like, I want Josh Allen. I'm a Bill's fan. I'm going to take him sixth. And so you have to vibe out what's happening with the draft. Yeah. It's like a psychology thing. Some people are just like, I don't want to have to worry about the quarterback. I just want to have like a really good quarterback.

Yeah. You know? Yeah. That's the thing that you have to kind of keep in or take into account when you're drafting is like what's the psychology of some of your league baits? That's a sick. That's actually such an important point, D.K. Like you have to know thyself. Like if you like love checking waivers, then like, you know what?

Bet on yourself to get a running. Like if you just are obsessed with like finding a running back on waivers or whatever and at it and you're obsessed with waiver claims. That's a different strategy than if you fucking hate waivers and you're listening and you're a dad and you have kids and you like got dragged into a league and you're just kind of figured out, don't bank on just going to be able to fill a position later. You know what I mean? Like you do have to know like what, who you, like, if you're worried all day about a

quarterback, if it stresses you out that you might have to cut your quarterback and find another one, then yeah, get Jalen Hertz. And if you don't care and you're like, yeah, I'll add someone on waivers. That doesn't cause you any stress. That don't do it. I would also say, know your, know your, your league mates. especially in an auction draft, man. If you're in a league with a bunch of dudes from the Bay Area

and they love the Niners, odds are you're going to have to pay a premium on every single Niners player. Throw them out first. Throw them out first. Iuke, Debo, McCaffrey, Purdy, all those dudes. That's a real thing. I have not had a 49er on my team in my high school league for 10 years because all those guys are Niners fans.

So definitely keep that in mind as well. Know everybody's favorite team. And 100%. Also, auction strategy real quick. If you're doing an auction draft, I know we don't talk about it, a ton. Honestly, I mean this. In addition to just the prep, like, do tiers have your list.

80% of an auction draft is can you pay attention for three hours? You have to wait. You know, like, I think it's Captain Phillips. Is that the movie where they have like the snipers waiting and they have to like wait for like four green lights to all at the same time? That sounds right. But it's like you just have to wait. I've heard the story.

I've heard the actual. Yeah, you're waiting for like, yeah, you're waiting for everyone like the computer to tell you all four shots are clear. Right. You're honestly, an auction draft is spending three hours waiting for that magical moment where nine other people all stop paying attention. Yeah, I think my biggest flaw in auction drafting, which is all I do now, I'm in two big leagues and I auction draft both of them.

My biggest flaw is trying to get too cute. And I end up letting a lot of good players go because I'm like, eh, that's a little bit too much. Like $1 too much. Oh, I don't want him even though, oh, Devonte Adams is going for $10. Oh, I don't really like Devonte. I'm going to wait and see if I can get Cooper Cup. And then Cooper Cup goes for 42. And I'm like, that's too expensive.

And then before I know it, we're an hour into the draft. I have one player and I have a ton of money. So I think there's a little bit of like, don't be afraid to spend a little bit of cash. Like if you want one of the best 10 players in the league, you're not going to be the guy who gets the bargain. You're going to have to pay up like everybody else and you're going to have to deal with it. If you want, Bejean Robinson, you're going to have to spend 60, 65 bucks on him and you just got to deal with that. You're not going to be special and be the one guy who got a first rounder for 40 bucks. It's not going to happen.

You know what I think is a really funny aspect of auction drafts too is this happens. I just did one main league of mine has auction drafts. And one guy in particular, Jackson, you guys both know, he, like, he refuses to let anybody get a good deal on a player. So he'll like spinning up everybody. They'll just start chirping being like, oh my God, $2 for this guy. And then he'll like get everybody like, oh, I can't let him have that. He's a hype man.

It's like just such a funny aspect of like an auction draft is like not let, maybe you don't want that guy, but I'm not going to let you get him for cheap either. you know what I mean? So it's like there's that aspect too. Because there's nothing. There's nothing worse than me like spending, I don't know, $18 on Christian Watson. And I think I'm all smart and cool. And then like, Devante Smith gets nominated and he's going for like $8.

And I'm like, hey, everybody, what are we doing here? There's like three guys getting pizza. I'm like, no, no. Look, Devonte Smith, eight bucks. You're going to let him go for that cheap. And then everyone's like, well, then why don't you nominate him, Craig? And I'm like, well, because I already have all my wide receivers. I actually came in last place in a league once like six years ago

because I kept trying to bid up all the players I didn't want and I kept getting them all. Like I was trying to be an asshole like bidding up Todd Gurley when we knew his knee was a real risk. And then I bitted him up trying to send him to like my brother. I want my brother to pay $55 to Todd Gurley and this like his knee doesn't work. And then I got him for 54 and I was like oh God. So it's like be kid, don't be that guy. Don't be a dick.

To be honest, I have yet to read an article that accurately gives me advice that I feel is actually relevant and pertinent to how to auction draft successfully. It's an art. It's a, it's fucking jazz, dude. You are out there. Yeah, it is. You just got to feel it out and strike when you feel like the iron's hot and ease off when you feel like it's not the right moment.

But I do not really have advice for you. You have to bid some random, like on random guys too and like change the way that you're bidding like bid early and then come out and then like maybe come in late and bid another guy. So you like don't your your opponents can't figure out your bidding. patterns or whatever. Like there's so many aspects to it. It is definitely fun. The specific advice I have,

do stars and scrubs. It always looks good. Like, because there's always dollar players to go for between one and four dollars that you're like, wow, that's an amazing player. So here's the deal.

I think that there's two things that I would give specific advice for an auction. In the beginning of the auction draft, everyone is afraid. And I mean afraid to blow their wad. Like, everyone is afraid to start by immediately spending 60 bucks.

So here's the deal. The only, rule of auctions is everyone is so fucking tethered to the random goddamn number. If it says it could, the number could be anything. If it says McAfrey's worth $59, everyone's going to bid right up to $59 and then $60s like, oh, I don't know. No one fucking knows. Like everyone's just obsessed with that one number.

And the thing to know is if you get cheap because it's like, well, it's a 60 to 65, you're going to end up spending that $5 to get fucking Deontay Johnson for like $10. You're going to spend, oh, Zeke Elliott for a dollar and you're going to end up spending the five extra to get Zeke Elliott at $6. spend the extra money on the early people because not always but oftentimes what happens is everyone's Tyree kills you know let's say Tyra kills the first player up

and he's worth $60. He goes for 61 because no one wants to do it first and then like three turns later Jefferson goes for like 70 because everyone's afraid and then when you get run out of elite players everyone's like wait I want one of the elite players. Get the elite guys first I know it's scary but if you can spend $130

And fuck, if you spend $180 and you walk out with Brice, Tyree Kill, and C.D. Lamb, and you spend 20 bucks the rest of your roster, that's awesome. Like, don't be afraid to do that. Oh, Steve, you know what? I would love to. I'd never do that. But I kind of want to. Don't be afraid to do it because you're going to look back

and be like, holy shit. Like, someone went from every year, it happens. Like, the fourth best receiver goes for more than the best one. Yeah. The first one nominated. Don't be afraid to do that. And the other one is, to D.K.'s point, there's no value at bidding before you're interested.

Like when you're hitting the bit, like you're almost have to time the buzzer with like doing it. But then you, so you don't want to be bidding up against yourself to you're interested, but then you do have to throw curveballs and guys you're not actually interested in. So no one can track you. You can't only bid when you actually want a player.

Yes. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like you have to kind of like mix in some bids here and there. You need to bluff a little bit. Otherwise, everybody will be on you. And I can't stress this enough. Pay attention.

It sucks. those are long drafts. They're like five hours. Don't drink that much. Coffee over beer. There's a great burn notice episode where he talks about a key aspect of being a spy is learning how to like keep drinking with people without like drinking, like spilling your drink and like like you know what I mean?

And like you have to be a spy. You have to be like a undercover like get everyone else drunk. Don't get that drunk. I've never heard anyone say the words there's a great burn notice episode. Dude, burn notice. Sick. Burn notice is fucking awesome. I've never known anybody to watch that show.

The only, the only relationship I have with burn notice. is that one S&L sketch about what the fuck is Byrne Notice. Dude, burn notice is awesome. Burn Notice is so good. I can't believe you watch that show. I've never heard anybody

who seen that show before. I fucking love Burrness. I never heard of anyone. Email shit ringerfancy football at gmail.com if you watched Burn Notice. That shit was awesome. The premise of burn notice, there's two people,

one with the last name, Byrne and the other notice, or no. No, that was like Isles and Cain? That was like Isles and Rosoli or whatever. Oh, so they're not, their names are not Byrne. There's no guy named Burr. No. Kai just texted me, Burr notice.

Like, Burr notice is Michael, or Jeffrey Donovan is a spy that gets, like, fired by the CIA. And they try to just let some group kill him. And then so he gets away and he just, he lives in Miami. And basically, he's not allowed to live Miami and he's not a lot of a real job. And so the CIA is just tracking him, but he's like, all right, just stay in Miami. So he just, it's like a procedural. But like, instead of suits where they just help random people with legal cases, he just helps people, like, get out of situations that he's a spies. So sometimes it's like, this woman's like, these people stole my car.

And he's like, all right, I'll go at your car back. And he just, but he narrates, so he teaches you how to break into a house. Like the first set scene of burrown notices, he's like, yeah, people break into a house with ski masks. I break into a house, I grab a yogurt and spoon. And someone's like, what are you doing here? I'm like, what are you doing here? Oh, I see.

You play casual. You say, you make it seem like this is your house. Yeah, he's just like, what are you doing here, man? Yeah, you're in a suit. Yeah, he's like, you look confused and they don't call the cops. Like, what the fuck? Yeah, it's sick. Breaking with just a towel on shirtless.

it's actually yeah it's you learn a lot this is like uh the other day i was on a walk and i saw like a 16 year old kid climbing out of a window and i'm like should i call the cops what's happening here no my god you narc let him go krag i did i did just say it like he's climbing out of a window yeah he's trying to go out hanging out with his friend it wasn't like at night it was like still five o'clock he's going to the pregame look to be clear i'm not a nark i just was like i don't know what to do now in this situation what a nark would Is this guy making off with some booty? Who knows?

He's trying to. I was trying to sound old. Yeah. Well, did you, by booty, did you mean a female? Well, no, well, that does work also. He meant pirate. But like pirate, like some, like some loot, if you will. Make off some with some loot.

All right. Other fantasy advice running through this. We mentioned top seven-ish tight end because there's a lot of good ones. You don't have to take the first one because I feel like he's a lot good Titans this year. And if you don't, Evan Angram, David and Joku, you can wait, you can get them early, whatever you want, honestly. Like, don't feel pressure. Yeah, this is like the biggest, I don't really care about tight end year. I can remember in a while because the top seven to nine are legitimately all in range of possibly being the number one guy in fantasy.

So you kind of just like, whichever one in the middle of your draft seems like the best value in the right time, grab them. Yeah, I think you can easily be the most flexible of tight end this year of any year there's ever been. Like, don't stress about it that much. If you're the 10th guy to take a tight end, you get Jake Ferguson or Brock Bowers. eighth tight end you get David and Joku or like first like whatever it is you'll be happy. And then yeah, take a bunch of running back dart throws at the end of your drafts. Like I love J.K. Dobbins, but like, you know, just throw darts at running back. See what happens.

Don't take a defense or kicker to the end. This is something I think you can actually prep for kind of in it. And it is important is have in your mind like three or four guys that you want to get at the very end of the draft. Because once you get to the end of the draft, there's like 150 people on the list. And they're all like approximately the same value or whatever. and so having some specific players that you want to get, you want to come out of this draft with those guys in the last few rounds, I think is actually an important way to do it.

And again, if you want names, fantasy football dot the mirror.com, we have a bunch of sleepers, but in a nutshell, a lot of the people we love, I love, so Craig loves Rico Dowdell, the Cowboys running back who could be a starter, Tide Shailner for the Vikings, who could be very productive.

I love a lot. I think we, I love, Jake Dobbins is one of my favorite values of the entire year. I think he's Rahim Mostritt this year. We mentioned Jerome Ford for the Browns earlier. There's a lot of players that we're big on. Brian Thomas Jr. for the Jaguars is very underrated. Ladd-McConkie for the charges.

Craig's obsessed with Josh Palmer. So yeah, just have those guys in mind, see where they rank on the platform. Just probably the last guy. Yeah. Yeah. And then more esoteric. Take risks. Like, this isn't the stock market.

You're not trying to make like a small game. Like I, I, you know, I'm not trying to get sixth place. Well, unless you like have to take a bus to like a destination draft next year or whatever the, like, unless you're going to have last place punishment. It's like you have to sell lemonade on the best place. the side of the road so you make $100 and you don't want to do last. Like, if it's not that bad, try to win. Like Anthony Richardson or Devane A. Chan, Cooper Cup, like, these are risky guys that we think have huge returns. Like, that's what we're trying to do. And the later it gets, the more riskier you should kind of be. Play to win. Play to win. Play to win. Play to win the game.

And lastly, like, have fun. Like, the point of all this is honestly, like, fantasy football, it's kind of dumb. And I think the reason we love it so much is the reality is it's the best way to stay in touch with your friends as you get older and move to different cities and have partners and have kids. And it's just a very structured way for people to keep in touch and like, have fun, talk shit, make fun of people in the group chat, hit up the person you're playing that week. Like, it's fun to keep in touch with people. Like, like, that really is the point. And also obviously, um, kick their teeth in and like dominate their souls. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I disagree. It's not about having fun. It's about stepping on their throats. No mercy. It's about having fun,

Craig. But you know what the most fun thing is? Money. Winning. Fucking winning. Yeah. There's our last second draft prep. We hope that helps you. Please let us know who your teams did. Next up, we have our conversation with Governor of Maryland, Wes Moore, who's a huge fantasy football guy, played football in college, and we just kind of talked about what he should do in his draft and the Ravens and football. And it was a lot of fun. So we're going to get to Governor Westmore of Maryland in a moment. It's still funny to say that. Wes. West. But first, did you guys know, football is back. Yeah, no, yeah, I heard that. There is no better place to get in on the NFL action than Fandle. America's, Craig, what number of sportsbook is Fandle?

I'm only interested in number one, so they better be. Number one sports book in America, Fandle. Because right now all customers can bet $5 and get a three-week free trial of NFL Sunday ticket from YouTube and YouTube TV. Dang, Sunday ticket free trial, more games, more bets, more fun. And you know, Craig, you'll be able to watch every regular season Sunday afternoon out-of-market game. that's kind of the coolest thing I've ever heard in my life. So we can bet on things.

Like there's props, there's player props, there's weekly lines, there's Super Bowl odds, there's MVP odds. What would you put down for Cadarious Tony MVP odds? I'm not sure Fandall has the capability to accept the amount of money I'm willing to put down on Cadarious Tony. Comeback player of year odds. Plus with Fandall, you don't even have to leave the app to access real-time stats and data to help you make even more winning bets.

Just visit fandil.com slash ringer fantasy to download America's number one. sports book must be 21 plus 18 plus in DC and present in select states. Offer ends September 22nd, 2024. After three week free trial, the full price of NFL Sunday ticket will be automatically charged seasonally. Cancel any time. No refunds. Terms, restrictions, and embargo supply.

YouTube TV base plan required to watch YouTube TV. Redemption requires a Google account and current form of payment. Gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler or visit RG-help.com. All right. Now we have a very special moment, an unprecedented moment. in the history of the ringer fantasy football show. We are joined by, and I'm 100% serious when I say this,

we are joined right now by the governor of Maryland, Westmore, Governor, welcome to our silly little show, and I have to ask right off the jump before we do anything else. First, do we call you, Governor? I saw a lot of people call you Gov, West. Like, how do we refer to you? Man, I'll respond to whatever you got from me. I'm good. I'm good.

That dude. That dude. That dude. I like that dude. dude. Him? Him. Yes, right. I am him. He's him. So, Governor, a lot of people were asking me this week, why is the governor of Maryland coming on your show? And I said, I'm also wondering why the government of Maryland wants to come on our fantasy football show. And so I'm wondering,

do you need advice with your fantasy football league, or do you need our advice governing Maryland? Listen, I'll take whatever you can give me. I'll take whatever you can get. I have literally been an elected official for 19 months. You know what I mean? Like I don't come from a political background. I don't come from a political family.

But what I, you know, what I do know is that, A, that Maryland's doing very well. And I'm excited about that. But also, like, I love football. I came up with football. I played college football. You know, I love fantasy. And I'm the biggest Ravens fan you'll ever meet.

And so I'm just, I'm, so this for me, like, for real, like Denny, Denny, Greg, this is an honor for me, man, because I pay attention to what y'all is saying, and you're all going to be all over my fantasy draft board. I heard you got second last year. We got to get you to first. I did. I went nine and five, and I actually, I did pretty good,

even though the person to won just, like, ran away with it. And we're adding a couple teams this year. So this year, we're going to have 14 teams. So it's going to be a little bit more difficult. But our team name was actually the Three Musketeers because I was on the team with my, with my son James and my daughter Mia. So they picked three musketeers.

So that was our team name. So hopefully this year we're going to run it back, but win it this year. See, that leads me to my first question. So you're obviously the governor of Maryland. And I was like, how is this person running a fantasy football team? Day to day. It requires a lot of work.

I mean, you got to watch the games. There's the waiver wire. You're making trades. So I was going to ask you, did you have a shadow manager? But now I know you got the kids involved. Yes, it was my 10-year-old son. Are you delegating like that? actual official, like, decisions then on who to drop, who to pick up?

Well, you know, but the thing about him is that he was, whenever we won, it was because of his genius. And whenever he lost, whenever we lost, he was like, if only would have gave me more decision, man, I'm like, oh, wow, you're developing in that guy already, huh? Who is in your league? Is this a work league? A family league?

This one was all a work league. This was all office. Yeah. So, and we had some people that are on the scale that really knew what they're doing. And some people who just went to the best available and they just drafted that person. And so, you know, so they got, they got lucky twice a day. So when you're on the clock with your kids, who, what kind of, what kind of draft room are you running? Is it kind of like a Jerry Jones, like, you know, the buck stops here? Are you going to like let the kids make a

decision even if you kind of think you could wait a couple rounds and still get things in Montgomery? I listen to their counsel. But, but, but it's very clear. I'm making the final selection. So they, they give good advice, but I'm not one of these parents. It's just like, oh, yeah, I let my kids win or I let my kids to that, I don't, I don't, I don't do that. No. If they tell me that, you know, as much as, as much as I love Justin Tucker, for example, and he is, he's a beast, we're not making the first pick of the draft a kicker, right? So it's that kind of thing.

I'm like, I take your advice, but at the end of the day, I've got to be the one to push go. On that note, your resume, so we were going through it earlier. I think D.K. was particularly gobsmacked by it. Yeah, I don't know if I've ever seen a more impressive resume. you were a wide receiver on the football team at Johns Hopkins, Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, served in Afghanistan, worked on Wall Street, CEO of the Robin Hood Foundation, the governor of Maryland. Truly, like, we don't understand how you find time to play fantasy football day in and day

out. It's incredible. So tell us what is like your big secret, you know, what are the things that you look for in particular, like, weekend and week out during the fantasy season? When you wake up on Monday morning, are you checking your email first or are you checking the waiver wire? The waiver wire. The waiver wires.

You know, I mean, I don't know. I feel like the way my philosophy is, I'm kind of an old school guy with my philosophy. Like, you know, you got to go after running backs first. Because running backs are the ones that are just going to get you more points. I mean, you know, and by the way, I'm also a data guy. So I love data and I love numbers. And I'm always, I never make any decisions without data.

And I'm pretty sure it's like with running backs, there are only like eight running backs who have scored over 200 points. right? And they're like 33 wide receivers. And so what you know by that is go after your running backs first because once those running backs are gone, you've just significantly minimized your ability to be able to go and win games. And so my philosophy is, I mean, I'm going to go look at early at folks like Bijon Robinson. I'm really excited about the fact that Derek Henry is now with the Ravens and not just because he's a Raven, but I think when you have a Lamar Jackson at quarterback and then you have two tight ends, you have Isaiah likely, at once,

side and you have Mark Andrews as your other tight end. And then you still have Zayflowers on the outside. What the Ravens have done is they've opened up the offense. And so you can't clog the box. You can't. And if you do, then you're going to get burned by likely. You get burned by flowers or you get burned by Andrews. And so you have a quarterback who can actually get the ball downfield.

And so what does that mean? It means you have to open up the box. And what does that mean? We have a six foot six, 250 pounds. running back who is going to embarrass anybody who tries to do a single tackle on him. And so one of the first people I'm looking at, and I probably shouldn't say this out loud, because now everyone's going to go pick my man. Like, I'm looking at Derek Henry.

I think Derek Henry is a fantastic pickup because I just think that the type of Ravens' offense is laid out is really going to open up a lot of things for him. We love Derek on this show. We've been talking about him all offseason. He's one of our favorite guys. And one of the reasons, like you said, when he was on Tennessee the last two years, his yards before contact, as in like how quickly he was hit, was one of the lowest in the league. He had no room to breathe. The Ravens, on the other hand, have the best

yards before contact in the league because defenses are scared of Lamar. They don't know which way to go. It's why guys like J.K. Dobbins and Gus Edwards, they led the league in yards per carry. And now you factor in Derek Henry, who's one of the best running backs in the league, when Gus Edwards and J.K. Dobbins are great players, but I would say they're probably like league average running backs. So now when you bring in Derek Henry and he's going to have the most room to run of his career, I mean, there's probably only a handful of guys you could predict to have 10 or more touchdowns this season, and Derek Henry is easily one of them. easily one of them because especially and listen Craig you hit the nail on the head how do you prepare

for the ravens during the week like who do you have who do you who's your scout team quarterback that prepares you for Lamar Jackson right his speed his accuracy who who's your scout team running back that prepares you do you put a linebacker back defensive end probably yeah you put a defensive end who probably runs like a 4-8 or 4-9 when Derek Henry runs a 4-4 so it's like who how How are you preparing for that during the week? And so I agree with you. I think you, and you look at the RPAs that the Ravens are going to be able to run. The offensive Ravens are going to be able to run.

It's just very difficult to see how Derek Henry does not put up massive points this year, as long as he stays healthy, particularly with the kind of offense that the Ravens have laid out. Totally agree with you on Derek Henry. And shameless plug, you should use our fantasy football rankings, fantasy football dot the ranger. We got a draft tracker there, gov. you can be using them during the rankings. So this is also really good timing because we're doing an episode, how to win your league,

just trying to last second draft prep. And something we didn't get to, but this is perfect timing is what to do in a larger league, how the topography of rankings change from an 18 league to a 14 team league and something D.K has done a good job explaining in the past. But Dika, I'm curious, like in an eight team league, it's more important to hit an elite quarterback or elite tight end. But Dika, how do you think the strategy changes?

You want running back early? You want a bunch of receivers. Dika, how do you think Gov should approach this at like elite tight end or waiting on tight end, an elite quarterback waiting on quarterback in a like a bigger league? I believe Wes requested that dude, not God. So if you could try to get. I want that dude to answer this actually. Yeah.

Tell us what your strategy is going into these big leagues because I don't know. I don't think there's like one specific strategy that you can really take into these. It just makes, you know, obviously depth is going to be the biggest question mark with everybody's team. I mean, the way, I mean, the way I'm trying to approach it. is, first of all, you do try to look for who you think could be the steals, right? And go get the steals early. Like, for example, I think they have Derek Henry, like, I think he's 14th in the mod draft. I think that's a steal, right?

So he's someone like that. You go after those folks who you're just like, I just think that they are being overlooked for whatever reason. And I think particularly when you think about their setup, they're just going to, they're going to overload on points. And so you go for folks like that. The receivers are going to be interesting because, you know, I think you have. have a good, a good variety of receivers, but some of whom are not in good situations.

And so, for example, I think you have some overrated receivers. You know, like, I think last year, back one of the first picks I picked last year was Justin Jefferson, for example. I think Justin Jefferson is a fantastic receiver. I also know his quarterback just went down. So he's not, he's someone who's probably going to be ranked very high because of his points last year, because of how he performed him last year, but I think that he's probably going to be overvalued because he's got a very difficult quarterback situation right now. I'm looking at folks like, I think DJ Moore, who by the way is a Maryland guy, big up DJ Moore.

Oh, yeah. I think he could have a good year. I think he's an interesting quarterback situation. They have a rebuilt offensive line, and I think that's going to be interesting. I think folks like Cooper Cup is someone who is probably ranked pretty high, but I still think Cooper Cup is probably still seen as undervalued. And so I think you just have to understand what is the situation that a lot of these players find themselves in. And then, and then, and this is where you can't kind of like,

it's not a guessing game. It's not like, oh, I like this team because of it's uniforms, colors kind of thing. You actually need to know what you're talking about. Because if you can actually watch things like the injury wires, if you can watch stuff like that, I think that's where you, I think understanding the data is really where you find the value. And so that's, that's the philosophy that I'm trying to take into and going to him. What's the most important meeting that beforehand you were kind of like checking your fantasy team. Are you like about to go on stage at the DNC and you're kind of like to checking like what's going on with, you know, someone's hamstring.

And you're like, oh, Drake made is the starter. This changes everything. It's like I got to, you got to call with the president and say, oh, wait, one second, I got to do something on my fantasy team right quick. A little bit ago, you mentioned, you know, defensive ends running four-eight. You also mentioned, you know, Derek Henry probably can still run four or five. We saw you, you suited up the other day. Yeah.

For the Terps, put some pads on. We have a running bit on our show that I think Craig could run a 4. and sub five seconds? I don't know if I could. I think I'm 30 years old, you know, I consider myself a decent athlete, but sub five, I think is faster than people think? People think I'm insane for saying it.

Do you think you could do it? Can you break five flat? Yeah, West, do you think you're sub five right now 40 time? Oh, definitely. Yeah. Definitely? 100%. I mean, you look like you could go out there and play right now, honestly.

Wait, do you know what was your 40 time back in college? Back in college, I think I was at a four, five? Yeah, he can do it. But still, look, this is almost 20 years later. That's impressive. And I'm telling you, but in college, I averaged over 25 yards of catch, my senior year. Oh, wow.

You're a deep ball guy. Yeah, who's your comp? Which player in the NFL kind of matches your style as a receiver? Hmm. That's a good question. In my greatest imagination of myself, I'm going to go with Metcalf. Oh, yeah. Oh.

Completely humbly, D.K. McCaff. Yeah. Just humbly. Minus the rage. Body of D.K. Metcalf, hands of Odell Beckham, speed of Xavier Worthy. That's right. If I do say so myself. I love that.

D.K. is one of my favorite players, so I'm cool with that. D.K.'s a monster. I was joking a little bit. But it's just he is, he's such a difficult matchup. Right? Because, first of all, he's just, he's massive. The best thing that a defensive bat can do is, is to try to get a receiver off of their route early, right? Because so much of the NFL, people forget, the NFL is all about timing, man. And that's why just the repetitiveness and the nature of the practice is so important

because a quarterback, if you're lucky, you're going to have three seconds to get the ball out of your hands. And so generally by the time the quarterback is whipping the ball, the receiver hasn't even finished their cut yet. And so that's why the timing and having that, you know, having that good relationship with your receivers is so important. So if you're a good cornerback, if I can throw that receiver off the route by a half a second, I've done my job. Yeah, yeah. Right. I've destroyed the route for the quarterback. Metcalf is so difficult to get him off of his route because he's got great footwork and he's just so big.

Yeah. And so that's why he's a matchup nightmare. And then don't get, don't let him get the ball on the outside where it's just him and a him and a cornerback. You know, because by the time the safety can work the way over to him, he's got another 10 yards after the catch. It's too late. Yeah. So Gov, that dude, him, when's your draft? I think we're doing on, I think we're doing like Thursday evening or something like that.

I need double check. Nice. Okay. Yeah. So I guess we were going to offer to run your draft for you. I guess your kids are doing that, but fine, you care about them more than us. I should, I should. I should.

I should. We should. You can ask us questions during your draft. Yeah. We should. People would like, damn, you're good. You have good picks. I was like, yeah, you know.

Exactly. Do you have any questions for us before your draft? I do. So here's here's a few of them. So one question is what defense should I be going with on this one? That's high fits. I mean, the Ravens, because you're the governor of Maryland. But if you don't want to do that, let's be real, the Ravens lost.

Mike McDonald went to DK. Seahawks, lost a lot of defensive pieces. I'm a big believer. If you want to win, because winning's cool, defense, just do it to the last round. If you're on Yahoo, which, you know, that's our platform. Yahoo or Sleeper, you actually don't have to draft a defense for a kicker. ESB and you do. So I would say this. The two teams, I think, because a lot of people take the defenses before,

there are a couple of teams that I think have really easy schedules to start the season. DK's Seahawks, the first, because a lot of times you don't know, you're going to make a bunch of changes. The Seahawks this season, the first two games for Seattle are the Broncos and Bo Nix's first start. Oh, yeah. And the Patriots with Drake May probably in his second start. And the Seahawks, the Patriots we saw, they can't block. So the Patriots in week two, Broncos in week one, I think that's pretty tasty. And again, I think that's a super easy to get defense.

It's, you know, the Jets, all those guys go like rounds and rounds earlier. Don't take the Jets in the 12th round. Wait. And the other one I would throw out there is the Chargers defense. Like, I don't know if they're going to be incredible this year. But the charges start with the Raiders. We're going to have Gardner Minshu. And then week two, the Chargers play the Panthers.

And then week three, they get the Steelers with Russell Wilson. So I think get those two to get your sea legs in September and then you'll find another one. You got to do defense by committee. Yeah, you got to be on the waiver wire all year. It's not worth. it's not worth spending a lot of money or an early draft slot on a defense, in our opinion, because if you draft the Niners defense instead of like, I don't know, the rookie in Chicago, Roma Dunzee.

If Roma Dunzee ends up having an incredible rookie season, are you really going to be happy you pick the Niners defense? Defense is largely unpredictable anyway year over year. There's a lot of turnover. There's a lot of bounce back, a lot of regression. So the way we've always thought about it is like you've got to be vigilant, but it sounds like you are on that waiver wire that every week, every two weeks, you are constantly dropping and adding different defenses.

What rookie are you most excited about? Oh, don't get me started. Here we go. I think honestly, like, this is silly, but I'm super excited to see Xavier Worthy and the Chiefs offense, just that speed. Again, it's kind of like the,

we've talked about this all off season. You give the fastest player in the NFL to the Chiefs and Patrick Mahomes, like, who let that happen? Yeah, why did they let that happen? So obviously very excited about that. But, you know, Marvin Harrison, Malik neighbors,

two of the best receiving prospects we've seen in a really long time. So those are the two top, top guys, I'd say. But like you said, Wes, when you were like, oh, man, I only want receivers with good quarterbacks. I am afraid to draft Malik Neighbors on the Giants because of Daniel Jones. Like, I'm just not doing that. I don't want to deal with that. I'm not dying on the Giants this year. I would rather go after even somebody like Brian Thomas Jr. as a rookie on the Jags, he's going much later later on draft class.

He was out of LSU. He was awesome in college. At least he's got Trevor Lawrence and second half of the season, rookies tend to take off. I would rather spend a later run pick on him than like Malik Neighbors. It's going to be, I mean, it's interesting. This is going to be interesting draft class. I really actually am curious. Again, Chicago and Washington also have good quarterbacks.

And so I'm curious if we're going to see if we're going to see how that's going to play out as well and whether or not we have some real options there. Caleb Williams is going to be incredible in Chicago. I love Washington and Jaden Daniels this year. You want a running quarterback and you want, again, rushing yards are three times as valuable as passing yards. I think Jan Daniels is going to run a lot in Washington. I think he's going to, he's my favorite pick in drafts this year is actually Jaden. He could also unlock. Terry McLaren a little bit.

He's got such an incredible deep ball. He just, you know, he just lost it up into the perfect, into a bucket 40 yards down the field. That's just like one of his biggest strengths. So I think Terry McLaren could really benefit from that too. And you have Echler back there too, which also I think helps to open up the offense. And so, so, I mean, there are, there are going to be some, he has some good, he has some good tools and some good weapons. And I do, I love the point. Again, it's so early.

But Daniels has a lot of the raw skills where if he can do what. people are hoping that he can do. He is kind of this next version of, and again, I'm not trying to put him up on the Mount Rushmore yet, but like the Lamar Jackson. Yeah. Right. The person who can sit there and, yes, open up for 100 yards on the ground, but then if you let him have it, but also he'll still be able to throw a flat foot of deep ball for 50 yards on target. So he really has that kind of potential. And by the way, one thing I've heard about him, he's a first dude in the training room every morning. I respect that. Yeah. He's a worker. Who is the coolest NFL player you've ever met, Wes?

Oh, the coolest NFL player ever met? Yeah. You have any good stories? Any great hangs? I've had some great time with Ray Lewis. Oh, yeah. Ray Lewis is a lot of fun, man. I bet.

Can you share any anecdotes on that one? Just kind of leave that at that? That's my man. That's my man. But, you know, but like, honestly, like, and I would say a lot of the players I've had a chance to hang out with, have all been Ravens, Ray Lewis.

Ed Reed is an amazing dude. And I just love spending time with him. I like the NFL players who like cigars. That's what you get the best stories. Oh, okay. And by the way, I will say one more person too. Do you know who is a lot of fun to hang out with, real talk?

He's not a player as a coach, a former player, is Bill Cower. Oh, yeah. I can see that. He is a lot of fun to hang out with. a lot of fun. That's awesome. That's my guy.

Steelers. Love that. Bill Cowher made me re-evaluate coaches because Bill Cowher dropped this line on me once that I couldn't believe. And he was asked about coaching players. He said, I don't coach players. I coach coaches. I was like that.

It's pretty good. I like that. Also, one pseudo-serious question before we have also, and then a dumb question for you if that's okay. Okay. That's our specialty. Yeah, we're the best at that. I live in Washington, D.C.

Why? Why? Well, I was going to say, pitch on. Maryland and then pitch on, should I move to Maryland and pitch on the stadium, the stadium, not the guy, the stadium is sitting just in the middle of the city. Give us the pitch on why the Washington commanders should be in Maryland and not just play at RFK. Well, because I think if you want to have a world class player experience, if you want to

have a world class game experience, if you want to have something that you could have an entire ecosystem, a whole live, work, play ecosystem, take a look at what we're imagining in Maryland. And you're not going to have that in Washington, D. you know, and I understand, and listen, I totally get it. I got family members who are like, listen, just let them go to D.C. Because that's our spiritual home. Like, I get it.

You know what I mean? I get the whole spiritual home thing. But I'm talking about if you really want to have a world-class franchise that can exist in a world-class ecosystem, it only makes sense for it to be inside of Maryland. And I think that's exactly what the ownership group is looking for. They're looking for a place that you can have winners on and off a field. And I think we're the only place that. is not just aligned in it, both in terms of community and local leadership and state leadership

and all that kind of stuff. It's also a place where I think we have the greatest, greatest opportunity to dream a little bit about what that could look like. And what and what, and DC versus Maryland, listen, I mean, it's the easy one, man. Like, do you, do you care about quality of life? Do you care about school? Do you care about restaurants? Like, on every single thing, I would tell you that you're getting a short end of a stick right there. Yeah, not going to lie. You're probably right. And then dumb question for you before you go. So we talk a lot about age in this show because, so DK is 41, Craig is 30, I'm 29.

So we're all technically millennials, but like, come on, DK's a geriatric millennial. Craig and I are basically like zillenials? And so you're 45. So are you a Gen X or are you also a millennial? You know, it's a good question. I don't know. I mean, my kid just called me old. I don't know.

I'm going to ask how old you are. So quick lightning round. Three things. Did you play Tecmo Bowl or Madden? Oh, I started off on Tecmo Bowl. Okay. Okay. Where the players were like, when the players went and they did, they couldn't like

turns like they went like this and then they turned like that. Right. Right angle zone. Like Tetris. All right. Okay. One point for Gen X. Okay.

Another one, which a thing that has been lost to time, do you remember Zima? I, I do not remember Zima. Right answer, correct. Hydez and I didn't know what that was. Yeah, no, we never heard. It's a drink. I don't know if you didn't know. Lost to the sands of time.

All right, that's one point millennia. All right, it's one to one. Most important question of this whole exercise. D.K. told us this, and we did not believe him. And you have to settle this. DK told us that the internet used to come in CDs in the mail. That's not true. Technically correct.

It's not true. Like AOLC. send CDs. Do you remember the AOL CDs that used to come in the mail? Like, I don't know. Like, we used to get one CD like every month and we just have like a huge pile of these from AOL online. And it was like you plug in the AOL

CD and you can like connect to the internet through that. I was just like, I don't know how any of this works. Yeah. All right. So D.K. made that out. The only thing I remember, the only thing I remember was that you used to have to have like a telephone cord. Oh yeah. And then it was like

the, er. 100%. I don't remember the CDs, though. Was that sound when you hopped in here before? That was actually a really good impression. Can we do that one more time? That was really good. You couldn't talk on the phone when you're using the internet.

Like you can't do both at the same time. You couldn't do both. And I was always really interested to say, like, whoever invented all of that, why would you choose that to be the sound? Like, was that an option? He's like, yo, yo, check this out. I got it.

Let's make it the most annoying noise in the world. Seriously. Yeah, it could be beautiful wind chimes. This is a great bit we could do. Yeah, for the entire world. Governor, that guy, him. Thank you so much for hopping on. And then, yeah, if you ever want to replace your kids

in the front office of your fantasy team. If you want to make that leap from silver to gold. Yeah, yeah. We're on standby. Sit by your phone, y'all. Sit by your phone. We got the dial-up. Yeah, we got the dial-up.

Ready. The Ringer Fantasy show is logged on. That's our new intro song, I think. There we go. All right. Thank you, D.K., thank you, Craig. Thank you, Governor. Wait, real quick.

Thank you. We also thank you, Lorne. We do it like us now. You have to pick a band before we go. Yeah, we thank a band at the end of every show. So we need you to thank a band. Any band you want. Any band?

Wutan clan. Oh, wow. Oh, nice. Perfect. What's the best song for people to go look up right now? I would say cream is great because you get a chance to see like hear like the whole group. Triumph is really good too. If you had a big one Wu-Tang song, yeah, I'd probably go cream.

Perfect. I think that's the right answer. Cash rules everything around me. Thank you so much. We appreciate it. Thank you, governor. I'll talk to you soon. Thank you.

Good luck. Thank you. And go Ravens. Must be 21 plus. and present in select states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C.cambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler or visit RG-Haltz.com. Call 1-888-7-9-7-77 or visit CCPGGGG.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit MDGamlyhelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit Gamblinghelp line, MA.org or call 800-327-50-50 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call

1-8778 Hope NY or text Hope NY in New York.