The Ringer NFL Show - Power Ranking the Top 12 QBs for the Rest of the Season

Episode Date: October 26, 2022

We each power rank our top fantasy quarterbacks for the rest of the season and debate who should make the final 12. We finish the show by chatting with author Tyler Dunne about his new book ‘The Blood and Guts: How Tight Ends Save Football’ and its roundabout connection to our podcast. Check out our Weekly Fantasy Football Rankings for positional rankings and more! Email us! [e-mail]. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Producer: Craig Horlbeck Additional Production: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, this is Rob Harvilla from 60 Songs That Explain the 90s, the world's greatest loopy and perverse and inaccurately named music nostalgia podcast. We're doing 90 songs now because there's too many songs. Pearl Jam, J-Z, Jewel, YouTube, Cher, Hootie. These are just some of the names people yell at me on the internet because we're back. More great songs, more rad special guests, more loopy perversity. Join us once more on 60 Songs That Explain the 90s every Wednesday on Spotify. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show.

My name is Danny Heifitz. I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Coralbeck. And today it is power hour every Wednesday. We are power ranking something. And today we are power ranking. We're re-ranking the top 12 quarterbacks for the rest of the season. Because we were like, who are the top 12 quarterbacks? We'll get to that.

We also have a guest today, rare for us. We have Tyler Dunn who wrote a book about NFL tight ends. It's called The Blood and Guts. It's about the history of the tight end position. and in a completely unhinged, roundabout way, we inspired his book, kind of. Asterisk on that, you'll hear about it later. We accepted it somewhat.

We incepted the book. We intercepted the book. They're playing TomTom Club on Monday Night Football all the time. Our reach is wide right now. Exactly. You can't measure cultural impact. Thank God, because it would be very low. But we can pretend.

So we're going to get to all that. But first, I want to just talk about the quarterback position writ large, which is kind of like why we wanted to do this episode. We were in person last week. we were in LA and we were talking about quarterbacks. And I don't remember exactly how it germinated, but basically we were talking. It's like, I don't know, five years, 20 years, however you want to count. I feel like his late round quarterback has been a smart thing to do.

Yeah. And just wait on quarterback, wait on quarterback. You can draft a quarter. Who cares what you get? I feel like in my anecdotally in my leagues, everyone is Josh Allen or Jalen Hertz is in first or second. D.K., is late round quarterback as a concept dead. I don't think it's dead. I think this year it's not really working.

I think there's a, like, there's a difference between those two concepts. The idea that it's dead, maybe this year it's dead, but next year, maybe things go back to normal a little bit. Maybe we have better passing. I think the big thing is this year, passing is down for, like, pretty much every quarterback. All quarterbacks are bad now, except for like four or five guys. And so what we're seeing really is the, like before you used to be able to get a really good passer later in the draft, like an older veteran like Aaron Rogers or something.

He'd still be like the QB8. What Matt Ryan used to be, 250 yards, two touchdowns a game. Which would make up for, I guess, the advantage of having a Russian quarterback in the early rounds. Like, instead of reaching on one of those guys, you can just wait and take a passer

who's going to throw for 40 touchdowns or whatever. And it's like kind of, it's a wash, more or less. And that's why you get valued later on. This year, it's like, there's no good quarterbacks in that area. There's no good late round quarterbacks, really. And so I just think everything has kind of changed at least this year.

And maybe we'll see the pendulum swing back next year. But I wouldn't say it's, dead. I just think this year it's not working. Craig, when you look at your teams where you don't have a top six quarterback, do you just regret everything? Well, I'm such a skilled drafter that the rest of my players are good, so it's not really a problem for me. But yeah, I mean, I think

the thing about quarterback, the quarterback position in fantasy football was, like the EK just said, you know, the later on guys were the guys who were just like the clean pocket passers who could get you 18 fantasy points a game, right? They could actually put up 250 yards, two touchdowns every week. Now, the guys who are running are also the guys who most consistently

get you 250 yards or two touchdowns week. So it's just this elite group of people at the top of the Josh Allen's, Lamar, Hertz, Mahomes. All these guys are mobile quarterbacks, but who are also still just as consistent as any other quarterback in the passing game. So right now, the tier drop after the elite guys in fantasy football and fantasy football feels bigger than it's ever been. Yes, the bottom has come out. The bottom has completely dropped. And there's a great stat. Ben Gretsch is a great newsletter. He's a substack. Stealing signals. Stealing signals. And Ben Gretch had this great note in his newsletter this week, which was every single year for the last five years,

there are 11 quarterbacks at least, at least 11, have had 21 points per game, fantasy points. Wow. At least 11 guys have had 21 fantasy points per game. This year it's less than half that. It's like five guys. Like three years ago, it was like 16 quarterbacks were broaching that. So the bottom's falling out at a position that we keep saying to wait on.

And I think big picture, there was really only more or less two reasons we said wait on quarterback. It was one, it was actually kind of hard to predict who would be the number one fantasy quarterback at the end of the year. Like, it wasn't actually that easy. And then two, the gap wasn't that big between the number one quarterback in the 10th or the number two and the 12th. Like, it wasn't that big of a difference. Both those things have changed. It's become much, much easier to predict who the top quarterbacks will be. I don't know if that's because people are better at math. I think it's probably mostly because the rushing quarterbacks are just more consistent. And Josh Allen is getting a fifth of his points on the ground. Jalen Hertz is like almost half his

points are in rushing. And like that's just more consistent of a stat. And then also, as we just said, the gap is just bigger now, or at least it feels that way between number one and 10. So, like, as we were doing this, this exercise of like, we all re-ranked our top 12, really, we ranked top 20 and we took our composite top 12. And I felt this way going in and then when I looked at our rankings, it was true. The top seven is the easiest thing in the world. Like, ranking the top seven fantasy guys for the rest of the season, I thought was more or less really easy. And then everyone after eight, I felt like you could have done eight through 20 and then taking the order flipped it around on 20 through 8

and I would have looked at your rankings but like yeah sure that's fine that makes sense the rest are gut calls it feels like it's a vibes it's a vibes after seven so I so we could go through this again so we're re-ranking the top quarterbacks for the rest of the season going forward

we're doing this power hour style so we're going to go every two minutes and after two minutes you'll hear Kai our assistant producer here will play this sound Tom Tom Club it's a great song It's just a really is great song

And yeah, so we're going to re-rank our top 12. We'll go through one. Go right off the bat here. Kai, you can start the clock. Number one, this was super easy. It's Josh Allen for the bills. This was consensus. The only unanimous pick we all had.

This is the only unanimous? Wow. How are we going to fill two minutes on why Josh Allen's number one? I think we can just sing his praises. It's so obvious that all I had written down here is that Josh Allen leads all quarterbacks and fantasy points, but he was on by last week, which is pretty nuts. He's averaging 29 fantasy points per game. Last year, he was the QB1 with 24 points per game, 2020.

25 points per game. So he's even better than ever. Like he's just absolutely going but on bananas. I almost combined bonkers and bananas. 17 touchdowns, four picks, 257 yards and two scores on the ground. He's averaging six rushing fantasy points per game, which is great. It's like built built in little floor there, but he's also one of the best passion in the NFL. I don't like honestly there's not a lot to say about here. And he's consistent. The worst game of the season fantasy wise is 24 points. That is the that is the, his worst game is what the number two quarterback in the league is averaging. Yeah, that's crazy.

And he's super fast. What else do we got? We're running out of steam here. He was definitely the QB1 in 2020. I'm double checking. Yeah, I just sound like it was. Did they ever do this on PTI where they just like both kind of come to a conclusion? There's 20 seconds left.

What do we do here? Is there anybody you would even think about trading? Like, if you have Josh Allen, there's no world where you can even trade him away, it starts to feel like when you have Travis Kelsey. Yeah, his relative value is just too high. unless someone wants to trade you like for Jalen Hertz or something or trade you Jalen Hertz for him plus someone. In that case, I'd maybe consider it. Yeah. You know how like when you live in a major city, sometimes you get like kind of blinded by you get used to like the rent inflation and you get used to how expensive everything is. And then one day you actually move out of the city and you're like, oh my God, this is so much better.

To me, that's like drafting like a top three quarterback in the league for years. All you've been hearing about is how late round QB is the move. My friend Chris did this this year. He finally just said screw it, spent $60 on Josh Allen. And he's like, I got to tell you. It feels phenomenal. I'm never doing this again. Why did people live in cities? I know.

Number two here, Jalen Hertz for the Eagles, which again, he's ahead of Kyler Murray and fantasy points. Jalen Hertz, how to buy last week, still ahead of Kyler Murray. This is the other person that I feel like anecdotally, if you just kind of look around your league. You're like, if you have Jalen Hertz, you're probably doing great. He's just been fantastic. My question here is how come Craig did not rank him number two? This is the only discrepancy here. High Fitz and I had him number two.

Craig had... Craig had Mahomes at three. I mean, it's quibbling. I think the crazy thing about Hertz is, I believe more than 40%, 45% or so of his points are from just straight up rushing, which is nuts. And for some of the later guys, you kind of almost have to use like strength of schedule as tiebreaker. With Jalen Hertz is like, I don't care.

Also, they have that running stat, which is insane. I don't know if it's still going, but they had the most... The amount of points the Eagles have in the second quarter is more than any team has scored in any quarter for the first six weeks of a season, like period. You're obsessed with these quarter stats, I've noticed. You love to, like, figure out how many points someone is scoring within two minutes of the last, you know, half or whatever. I just like, it's just so meaningless to me.

I'm obsessed to stats that have never been done. Jalen Hertz scores as many points rushing alone than Matt Stafford does per game total. Oh, Jesus. The only reason why I have Hertz slightly below as third in Mahomes at second is I'm just doing like I'm, it's a legacy thing. I mean, Mahomes is Mahomes. Mahomes is Mahomes. Also, Mahomes is Mojms is Mojams.

Also, Mahomes is scoring 0.07 less points than Hertz this year. They're essentially tied. And I don't know, do I think, what's more likely that Hertz drops off and collapses or Mahomes drops off and collapses? I think it's more likely that hurts does. So I'm sticking with Mahomes. I think he's a little bit more consistent. That's fair.

Well, on that note, our next guy here, Patrick Mahomes. quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs. I think the only question here. Burden right through Tom Tom. Didn't even do it. How dare you? Disrespecting Tom. There it is.

I kind of just figured we could drop it, but you outed me. One thing I wanted to add on Hertz, second in the NFL in rushing touchdowns among all players, not just quarterbacks. Only Chub has more touchdowns. Okay, go ahead. Hi Fitz. It's not a loss here.

I don't even know. Mahomes? We never disrespected Tom Tom Tom that way. That was just different. I figured once in our life we could be early. I thought it was fine. But we have Mahomes third here. And again, I think the only question is, is Mahomes in this tier with Josh Allen and

Hertz? Is Josh Allen in its own tier? Because Mahomes, I think we were a little worried about the Chiefs offense and then they woke up. And I think that in the big, like, even the first month or so, we were like, no Tyree Kill is the Chief's going to be okay? And then the Chiefs more or less have emphatically proved that they were okay. I mean, they're like arguably better this year than last year.

It's ridiculous. I mean, the first game of the season, we were. like, oh, no Tyree Kill, Mahomes put up 35 fantasy points. So Mahomes is averaging 24 fantasy points a game this year. In 2021, 24 points. In 2020, 24 points. So the Tyreek thing, not a problem. And that's why he's my number two guy. I think this is fair. He has 32 completions of 20 plus yards, NFL best. Like, the Tyree Kill thing, Tyree Kill certainly matters, but they've done such an incredible, incredible Java basically just carrying on without it, but not really losing a step too much. Mahomes has 20 touchdowns this year, which is NFL best. He's number one in the

NFL in passing yards. What else you want? I feel like Tyreek Hill is really good on a mediocre team with a mediocre quarterback. And to me, that's what Miami is, right? Because you can tailor the entire offense around Tyreek. And all you got, and then any quarterback, Atua can hit Tyreek when he's wide open. I think what what, what Mahomes can do without him is so impressive because it allows, it almost unrestricts Mahomes, if you know what I mean? Like, there's now no need to give Tyree Kill 10, 12 targets of games. Mahomes can just do whatever he wants. And we've seen that when he's able to do that,

he's just as good as if he has Tyree Kill. Yeah, I think that sharing the ball between Juju and MvS and Mikul Hardman, we were like, yeah, sure. And then it's actually happened the last three weeks. Like it actually, like, Juju has been getting going, Hardman at the three touchdowns. We're like, okay, they're getting their juice. And also, Andy Reid's just incredible.

Like, this was my big thing coming in the year with Juju and all these guys. Andy Reid's never had a bad offense. He's had like two in 21 years, basically. Like, Andy Reid is insane. Look at that. There we go. Right on the money. Okay.

Next one here, we have Lamar Jackson for the Ravens, who also, this is incredibly obvious. But Lamar is Lamar is, I think the only question here is like, everything with the Ravens feels a little harder. Like the Chiefs, it looks easy. The Eagles, it looks easy for Jalen Hertz. Obviously, the bills of Josh Allen. It looks incredibly, incredibly easy.

Lamar, everything does looks hard. And that's my only complaint, really. But otherwise, he's Lamar. and he feels like I would actually argue the last guy that I'm like very confident on the week to week

we can defer him and where that goes but it's funny you say week to week because he's actually pretty boom bust he hasn't scored more than 15 points

since week three in fantasy 15 points I have him fifth I had Burrow before him but I just I don't love the past catchers he doesn't need to be

great for them to win like it's just they run the ball really well if it's a Gus Edwards day or if it's a J.K. Dobbins day I feel like Lamar needs to have 80 yards in a rushing touchdown to kind of give you an elite fantasy day. And that's the only reason why I had him forth.

I just feel like he's a little boom bust right now. I was listening to the Fantasy Points podcast the other day and they have Greg Kosell on every week to talk, you know, scheme and all that big high-level stuff. And I don't know if I'd ever really had it distilled this simply before this week. But he was talking about how the Ravens, their passing game. And every NFL offense, for the most part, like on the vast, vast majority of play, it says like five eligible receivers, right? The Ravens, almost by default, usually only have four.

They have Patrick Carr, who is their fullback. He plays like 70% of the snaps. And he has eight targets in seven games. So he's basically just, he's taking up space on the field when they're in their passing game. It's a huge detriment to their passing game. It's like... He's like the mountain from Game of Thrones past. trick or card. When I watch the Eagles, I'm like, why don't the Ravens do this stuff? Like,

can you imagine for one moment if Lamar Jackson had five real receivers and, like, was in shotgun? Like, can you imagine if they were spread out, like the way the Cardinals run? You know what I mean? I'm not saying the Cardinals offense is great, but it's always weird to me. Right. Well, yeah, so to me, like, I had the same note, Craig. He's very hot and cold. I think the passing game is still very hit or miss. Obviously, he has that floor. He's, he's averaging nine rushing points per game. So that's, you know, his floor as a, as a quarterback is just really solid. but his ceiling is very volatile. You know what I mean?

And so that's the only reason he's not above these other guys. Obviously, he has the potential to score like 50 points in any given game. But I think the Ravens' offense is just frustrating to watch at times. And I think it's not like Lamar is blameless, but he's certainly missing a guy like Marquis Brown who is having an incredible, incredible year prior to getting hurt. So that would be, yeah, I think I almost put Burrow above him too because I think, you know, Burrow is trending in the right.

direction, whereas Lamar is very sort of, he's just plateauing right now. Yeah, the next year we we had, we had Joe Burrow at 5th for the Bengals. Yeah, it's a good. The first three weeks, we were like, what's going on with the Bengals offense. And then they went back to kind of what Burrow did in college. Like, he's in shock and all the time now and he's just throwing the ball. Like, look way more in sync. So, Craig, you actually had Burrow above Lamar. D.K., it sounds like you almost forget not putting a burrow above Lamar. I still have Lamar above Burrow. I mean, it's just close. You know what I mean? Yeah, it's hard. Tomato. He's just so consistent. I just, I think he's the most, other than

Josh Allen and Mahomes, he's the most consistent passer in the league right now, right? I mean, if you go and look at his line throughout the season, you know, 16 points is his lowest fantasy outing. The last two weeks, he put up 39,

week before that, 32. He has games of 22, 2320. Even when the year started and they went down 02 to Pittsburgh and Dallas, like he's still getting his numbers. He's almost like the old school what D.K. was talking about,

about like the late round guy, the Matt Ryan, you can get where kind of no matter what, he's going to get you 250 and two touchdowns. and that's kind of where Burroughs in right now for me. So after they lost their first two games, and then I think they started to adjust and change their offense.

And like High Fitz mentioned, they basically are now running just a spread offense, right? Like let Burrow do his thing, a bunch of vertical routes, throw it up, let the receivers do their thing. In the last five weeks, in the last five games, he's the QB2, second only to Josh Allen in points per game. So, I mean, he has 12 touchdowns,

one pick plus three rushing touchdowns. I don't know if the rushing touchdown thing is going to last, but I think this passing thing is here to stay, certainly. This passing thing with Burrow, yeah. No, it looked incredible. But I think that that's the thing. We're kind of coming down to the downturn. But again, these are like the easy guys.

And like these are you throw these guys. And these are the guys that if you have, you're feeling very confident about, even though Burrow probably started a little slow. And then as we kind of go to this next group here, I think it's also guys that are in the top seven, but like you're not as excited about them if you have them. So the next guy,

we've got here, Kyler Murray for the Arizona Cardinals, who is clearly in this group, except if you have him, you're not very happy with him. Like, you should, it's kind of like you should appreciate what you have,

but you don't. He's almost in a tier of his own where you kind of have to include him with these guys, the Lamar's and the Burroughs, but he doesn't spiritually feel like he belongs. I'm doing it because obviously he's got the rushing upside.

Yeah. The Cardinals kind of can't be worse. They got DeAndre Hopkins back, and that's not nothing. What's our rule of the season? it could always be worse. It's true, but they just got DeAndre Hopkins back. Cardinals actually are very different with DeAndre.

They've averaged 27 offensive points a game with him, 18 without him. It's pretty big. Nine points a game with DeAndre Hopkins. He immediately made an impact last week. Wait, for Kyler or the Real Life Arizona Cardinals? The real-life Arizona Cardinals score 27 offensive points per game with DeAndre, 18 without him. Wow.

Well, is that because they have like 20 total points of the first half this year as an offense? I'm sure that plays a factor, yes. But, you know, Kyler's kind of one of those things where you don't feel great about it. But it's like, don't watch the game. Just check the stat line. Yeah, that's perfect. He's the QB6 right now in points per game. He has seven touchdowns this year.

Seven passing touchdowns, I should say. He has two rushing touchdowns too. But seven passing touchdowns. That's the same number of passing touchdowns as Davis Mills. Andy Dalton. Marcus Mariotta, who has literally exactly half the number of completions as Kyler Murray does this year. That's even surprising. I would have said he had less than half.

Here's where there's a massive tear drop in vibes. Burrough. Vives are amazing. Arizona, vibes are awful. Terrible. Did you see Kyler's screaming at Cliff? First of all,

since DeKis is I'm obsessed with course. Did we see it? It was like zoomed into like Matt. Like they couldn't have zoomed in any further on. Why are you obsessed? Zoomed in? I want to see. Tyler Veri.

He's short. I get it. You don't have to zoom in like right to his face on every shot. That's all I'm saying. First quarter this year, the Cardinals of. opponents of 48 points and the Cardinals have six. So I don't know what Cliff King's doing.

Yeah, I was going to say he's, Kyler's the garbage time king. And that's actually sometimes kind of nice in fantasy. This is what Jalen Hertz was last year. It's like they have to turn it on in the second half. So they just start passing like all over the place. He has to start running around a bunch, which is great for fantasy, obviously. He had 12 rushes in the first three weeks combined. And he has 33 rushes in the four weeks since.

He's been running a lot more lately. basically only Fields Lamar and Hertz have more rushes over last month than Kyler. So that's a great sign, you know, for fantasy anyway. Next up here and rounding out the tier of the very obvious is Justin Herbert for the charges. We have him seventh. This is the last obvious guy. And honestly, like Kyler, I think he's here somewhat by ceremony and default.

Like he is legitimately been good at fantasy this year, but he wasn't like the prince that was promised. I don't know if he's been legitimately good at fantasy this year. But the best thing, he's in this group. Is he? 17 points per game ranks eighth this year. 12 touchdowns, four picks. Yes, but he's not, I mean, he's really underdelivered.

Right. No, I'm not, yeah, I'm not arguing that, yes. To reiterate, it's a combo of everything because he's been so disappointing, but he has the rib injury. Again, rib injury, they're not, the rib injuries don't heal like that. He's not going to be healthy all season. I think you can see it when he plays. The offensive line, their best offensive line, or really, their best two offensive

linemen have been hurt, and they already had the worst friend tackling football. And they have a slow team. So he can't throw downfield because he can't wait long enough for those. guys to get open. They don't have a quick game. Keenan Allen's been gone. Like, this whole thing has kind of conspired to be bad. And really, it's just like by the grace of God and Austin Echler, like this offense has kind of been fine. But no, Herbert's been incredibly disappointing. And they're trying to treat him like he's Drew Brees. And he's not Drew Brees. He's like bigger and better. I think L.A. fans really hate Lombardi at this point that are OC. But I think this is

another example to me. Yeah, he's hurt. But this is another example to me of like receivers matter. You know what I mean? Like Keenan Allen has been. gone almost the entire season. They don't have much speed on offense. You know, and obviously Mike Williams has been good, but he's hurt now, so I don't know if this is necessarily going to get much better or it might get a lot worse. Are we ranking this too high? Because Mike Williams now was a high ankle spree? Or who are you going to put over him? You know what I mean? That's the thing. I have him eighth and we can get to the next guy or when we get to I put somebody to have Herbert. I don't love anything. I don't see how this gets better.

Since he got hurt, he's the QB 16. Just what is going to get better about Justin Herbert this season? So this is where I think there's a very obvious tier drop, and this is where it gets very controversial quickly. Next guy, we have Tua, Tungo Viloa, for the dolphins. This surprises me. I was obviously much lower on him than you guys were. Deacon, I have him 11th, Craig, has him seventh, but that kind of goes to the disparity.

Craig, you have Tua over Herbert, rest of the season. Yeah. Tua has the two fastest wide receivers in the league, and Justin Herbert probably has the three slowest. I mean, Tua's only played. That's actually probably true. You're right. That's crazy. That's kind of funny.

And as long as Tua can stay on the field, I love what they do offensively. I mean, we've only really seen him play like two and a half full games. And one of them he put up 40 points against Baltimore. I just think this team's going to throw a lot. He has the two fastest for ride receivers in the league. The ceiling seems just so much higher to me as Tua and Mike McDaniel get more comfortable with one another. The offense gets better. Tua stays healthy.

I just think the ceiling is. it's higher than Herbert and I think the floor is the same. Yeah, I mean, I think you're certainly correct that he has a high ceiling with this offense and with these two receivers. To me, I guess the reason I put him a little bit lower is because I am a little bit afraid of the floor. Maybe this is just more, you know, I think just because of the concussion thing that happened, obviously that makes me nervous.

And the fact that they've had multiple quarterbacks get hurt like early in games, like Skylar Thompson got hurt after like two plays. You know, Teddy was forced to leave. the game after a couple, like one series. It's just, I think it's just too fresh in my memory that that has all kind of happened and they've had this, you know, a carousal of different quarterbacks. So maybe that's why I'm worried about this. But I do think your argument about the upside is definitely true that they could score 40 points in a given game. Also, I can't, I couldn't get it out of my head watching this. Remember the four dropped interception that the Steelers should have had on

Sunday football? And I kept thinking about all these series that should have ended. And I agree. I still have two as in this top 12. I just think that that was a really flawed performance. first game back, rust, whatever, whatever. And obviously, who knows what's going on with him right now. But I, I agree with Craig in that too, it just feels like if we were redrafting for the rest of the season, I absolutely would be taking Tua over a lot of the guys that we have behind them, even if they're like insane, the controversial. So the next one we have here, and a guy I think is underrated.

I have Kirk Cousins. And we have them ninth. I actually have him eighth. So the Vikings were on by this week. dude, I think the Vikings offense is fine and it's, they put up points and Kirk, people like to make fun of them, but in such like a mediocre year,

I think Kurt, kind of like what Craig was saying where I was like, oh, Lamar's steady Eddie and you're like, is he streaky. Kirk is like streaky and I kind of just feel like he's going to have like this hot stretch coming up. I feel like the Vikings, especially relatively speaking in like the money weeks of the playoffs.

It's weird now with the 18 week season, what fantasy playoffs now? Generally speaking, I think a lot of people do it three weeks like 15, 16, 16, 17, Vikings actually kind of have a pretty solid schedule for those three weeks. A lot of players actually have a bad one. No one really has a great schedule.

But I just overall think Jefferson Thiel and they coming off the by, like, you could just do so much worse than Kirk Cousins right now. It's not even that he's gotten better. Everyone else has dropped. There's some sort of effect here happening where everybody perpetually, consistently, every single year just underrates Kirk Cousins. I don't know why it is, but it's a thing. It's because he doesn't win you weeks.

You're never like, God, thank God, I started Kirk Cousins this week. He's fine. I don't have him this. I have him lower. I have him 13th. But I don't like, because what I have has just said, like,

you can do worse. When I'm ranking my ninth quarterback for the rest of the season, I don't want to be saying about him you could do worse. I still am going to chase a little bit of like upside. And to me,

Kirk has zero. Yeah, I think that's fair. I hear what you're saying, but I think that the crazy thing I've come to realize is I actually kind of wonder if he's more upside than the guy's behind him.

And that's kind of the nuts thing for him. He's got one game over 20 points this year. Yeah, I mean, he's fine. He's going to get you 17 a week. I don't know if I want that as my ninth guy, but maybe, I guess it's a, it's a choice. His bad games were against good defenses. Like, his week two, he was terrible as the Eagles, and we now see the Eagles as one of the best defenses in the NFL. And he wasn't great against the Saints, but not many people are great against the Saints. Otherwise, he's kind of, he's gone to done really well. So, we'll see. Next one we got here, shout out Tom's on Tom Club. We have Gino Smith for the Seahawks.

Ten. Yeah. My gut based on the season is. this is too low, he should be higher. In reality, I don't know if this is too high. Yeah, D.K., you got him eighth. You could convince me he should be 18th. Like, why'd you put him eighth, DK? Come on.

I'm just saying. I have him 15th, so D.C., we can spar here. That's the thing. Huge discrepancy in Gino. So he is the number seven QB so far. I guess you're assuming that he just falls off a cliff and turns back into a pumpkin. Is that, like, the main argument? No.

They run more with Kenneth Walker. He had one big game against the Lions. Other than that, look at his numbers. I mean, he's a game manager. They're a balanced team. I don't know what his ceiling is. D.K. Metcalf is hurt. He's, I think he's a better real-life quarterback than a fantasy football quarterback.

That's the argument. He had like 35 points against the Lions, as every quarterback does. And after that, he's been pretty whatever. I just think the other guys that you have higher than him are like way worse, though. Like, to me, this is like, I think it is the exact same argument we're having about Kirk Cousins, where Gino Smith, maybe his upside isn't there. but like he's just better, he's playing better than pretty much everybody else on this list right now. And I think the Seahawks offense is really clicking.

He looks extremely, extremely confident. Pretty much every metric that we use for quarterbacks, he's like a top 10, top eight quarterback this year. And the Seahawks, by the way, are relatively past happy this season. So I don't know, that's, that would be my pitch. But like, again, it's a philosophical thing. Like, I have questions about the guys you have ranked above him. Put it that way. I have questions as polite as D.K. is going to get. I have questions about the guys

means he's like, well, you're fucking wrong. That's what D.K. means. I definitely am Gino-pilled, and I think he's been playing really well. But I don't really see how he starts just all of a sudden falling off the cliff. Based on how he's been playing, the offense is really working for him. The Seahawks are pretty balanced. Now they have a really good run game going on with Kenny Walker. And so, I don't know. I just think he's going to continue to do what he's doing. Right now is TV7. Well, the next guy we've got here is Trevor Lawrence for the Jaguars, which I think fits right in this where I think if you, I like Lawrence, I'm actually, I got him ninth because, again, to what Craig said, I actually do think Trevor Lawrence is upside. He also runs more,

like the Jaguars keep he sneaking so much. D.K., you have Gino Smith five spots ahead of Trevor Lawrence, and Craig has Trevor Lawrence four spots out of Gino Smith, which I think kind of sums up this whole exercise, like a net nine spot gap, fight. Yeah, I think, well, with Trevor Lawrence, when you look at how he's done this year, he, to me, is the opposite of Gino Smith. Gino Smith has been game managing properly, winning games. The Seahawks are overperforming their first place, I think, right? In the NFC West. What do you mean game managing?

Because, like, he's making so incredible throws. So, like, I think I bristle a little bit about that term because the throws he's making, the offense he's running is not just like, he's not just game managing. He's like leading this offense. You're right. But, I mean, he's got three games below 200 yards this year. He's not, you know, he's not putting up like these Joe Burroughs inflated passing numbers. He's playing very well.

He's making the right throws. and he's running the offense efficiently. But that's not fully translating to his fantasy stats. What I like about Lawrence, from a fantasy perspective, is that while the Jags are kind of a mess, Lawrence is kind of delivering. He basically had one bad game against the Eagles where he had six points,

which we've now learned the Eagles' defense is elite. And it was raining. And it was like raining and fumbled four times. If you remove that one stinker versus Philadelphia, he's averaging 19 fantasy points per game, which puts them at sixth amongst quarterbacks. And like, he's at half a year without Urban Meyer. I just think he's going to continue to get better

and I like his upside on the ground as well. I agree with that. I agree with Lawrence. I don't know why I haven't rings so low. This is one of those in pod things where I'm like, probably should have had him a little higher. Look, I know it's when you look at his numbers. Like he's kind of hasn't been that bad

outside that one game. He's like the Roar Shock test this year. Some people look at him and think he sucks and I'm like, I think Lawrence is good. Like that last drive against the Giants. Like they almost won that game. It's hard judging Lawrence because he has such high expectations and his draft stock was so high.

So it's like, I almost don't even know which lens to view him. through. Right. Speaking of not knowing what lens. 12th, we have Dak Prescott, who, again, talk about a guy that you could have seventh or 17th, because on one hand, DAC is back. And you're like, all right, first game, back, didn't play that well, whatever. Maybe it was even 100% healthy. He'll get 100% healthy in the Cowboys offense. And I'm kind of like, man, it's just been a while since I was confident in Dak. And I also am just think this is a defensive team.

Actually, wait, I have this quote from Mike McCarthy I want to read, because I, McCarthy said a few weeks ago, this is a defensive first operation talking about the Cowboys. Fucking McCarthy. And I kind of, he's like, that's our strength. We identified that in the spring.

And I'm like, even when Dak's 100% healthy, like, is he going to be slinging it for 400 yards? Feels super, super not going to happen. It's crazy how different Dak feels and the Cowboys offense feels than 2020 before he heard his ankle when he was thrown for like 400 yards a game and they were like setting offensive records.

He had almost. 1,700 yards in four game. He had the most, he had three career highs in a row, and he had the most yards of anybody ever in a four-game span. And now the defense, like, impossible.

Like, Michael Parsons really worked out. And now they're, like, this completely different, they have a completely different identity. And I have, I mean, I have him right here at 12th.

We have him, our composite is 12th, I have him at 12. Like, DAC is a good, competent quarterback. He's probably better in real life than he is in fantasy right now. And maybe he is more of a game manager

the rest of the way, than he maybe needs to be for his talent. D.K., you're much higher on him than Craig and I. Do you think we're wrong? I think it's probably somewhere in the middle. I think I probably should have just flipped him in Lawrence, to be totally honest, if I could just in pod redo my ranks. But I think the reason I had him higher is just the confidence I have in him as a quarterback.

I think he's going to be much better than he has been. I think obviously getting healthy is going to be a big factor. I think the Cowboys' offense in general is kind of sputtered from the start. Like, you know, obviously C.D. Lamb kind of been hit or miss, but his underlying numbers are really strong. I think there's going to be an explosion here pretty soon with him. You know, I think getting Gallup back and healthy is going to be a big deal,

even though he's kind of started slow. I just, I don't know. To me, I think the Cowboys' offense is going to be better in the second half than it was in the first half. And I think I just trust Dak to kind of like get things together. So I think that was maybe just my,

Prescott bias from seeing him do it over the years, I guess, is kind of working here in his favor. So, but I do agree that this is still, like you said, a defensive-minded team, so that probably should have factored a little bit more heavily in my ranking. So that's our top 12. Josh Allen, Jalen Hertz, Patrick Mahomes, Lamar, Joe Burrow, Kyler, Justin Herbert, Tua, Kirk Cousins, Gino Smith, Trevor Lawrence, Dak. No Tom Brady.

For you guys, I had him in there. He's tent for me. Here's the thing with these rankings. So to just kind of keep going here, we have Brady, Daniel Jones, Derek Carr, Stafford, Fields, Aaron Rogers. You could also like flip these rankings and tell me that that's fine too. Like, I mean, the guys that we don't have outside the top 12, I, in theory, we're probably nuts, DK and I for not having Tom Brady high. And yet, the things people are, you just kind of take a step back, you know, like, people are wondering, is Tom Brady going to retire mid-season? How is, like, the Todd Bowles, like, we're in a dark place. And I'm like, would I, if I actually could only draft one quarterback for the rest of

my season, I kind of can't imagine taking Tom Brady right now. All I hear every week is Craig, every week being like, I can't believe I took Tom Brady the year after you're talking. You what I mean? It's like in theory on paper we should be taking. Maybe he's a by-lo, I'm wrong, but I just can't do it. I mean, I hope Craig's right. I just don't have any confidence right now. Like I have this, we, I think Craig and I had the same problem. We both bought into Tom Brady in the whatever 22nd season. The one year he's bad, like, in his entire career. And it's really affected my fantasy teams. I haven't won two leagues. And I'm like, both of them fucking suck. So that's like a part of the reason I like ranked him so low.

I'm just like, I just don't want to have to freaking ride this ride anymore. Like, his whole season is, I wish I wasn't wearing this fucking shirt. It is. And like, not only do you, not only do you wish that Brady wasn't on your team, Brady wishes he wasn't on his real life team.

The vibes are insanely atrocious for the bus track. It's so bad. The vibes are bad. They're in a dark place, according to their head coach. But let me throw a couple of things at you. One, Brady's not going to retire midseason. His legacy is on the line. If anything,

I feel confident that Brady being the psycho that he is, is going to turn this around. The team is still extremely talented. With all of the weapons he has, they're still first in the division. I just think if I had to bet on any human being in sports to write the ship, it's Tom Brady. I agree with you.

Here's the problem with Brady for me. They're playing the Ravens next week. Week 14, which is either like the last week, or sorry, week 13, they're playing the Saints who he's basically never had a good game against more or less, playing as a buck. They're playing the 49ers the week after that

who were like maybe the best defense. in football. Who just got destroyed by the chiefs and are super hurt. But yeah. Yes, they're super hurt, admittedly fair. But I'm just saying,

I know it's hard to talk defenses out, but it's like, I'm just looking at this and I'm like, man, I'm torn between every time in my entire life, literally I've doubted Tom Brady had been wrong with, but he retired and didn't want to play on this team. And everyone on the team is openly discussing how bad everything is.

And I just kind of keep coming back to like they can't block. They can't run. They can't do anything. This is where leaders lead. It's time for Tom to step up and end his career on the right note. Well, on that note, Rogers, too. So, I mean, we have Daniel Jones ahead of Derek Carr and Aaron Rogers, which is also, like, pretty insane.

Are we just, like, passionate of the moment? Because that's pretty, like, out there. I mean, is it? What makes you confident in what the Packers are doing in the passing game right now? Unless they make a trade, I see no way out for Rogers. I guess if they get DJ more, I'll feel differently. that ain't happening. I kept looking at this and was like,

am I putting Daniel Jones in fantasy above like Derek Carr? And that seems crazy, but like, is that where we are? I mean, Daniel Jones, he's third in rushing yards per game at quarterback. He has more rushing yards per game than Jalen Hertz, Josh Allen,

Kyle Murray. That's it. That's all it is. I mean, we still don't have him that high, but at least he gives you some type of floor and a competitive edge and he's in every game and he's close to winning

and Dayball's doing well. I just, I like the vibes. And so I guess that's where I'm going big picture to kind of wrap this whole together. It's like the first. seven is like really easy and you can put them in whatever order it's like Josh Allen's obviously first and then more or less you're going to have hurts my homes and Lamar and whatever order borough and then it's like Kyler and Herbert are probably six or seven you could put those top seven guys in whatever

one I don't really care that much and then after it you could convince me if we're talking about upside and rushing and floor that Daniel Jones is ninth and you can convince me he's 19th and I feel that way like for so many guys Brady maybe should be eighth in this list but also if you want to put him 16th I don't care and that's what we're talking about like the all these guys feel so inconsistent on a week-to-week basis. It just feels like a mish-mash. Are we not going to discuss the most controversial ranking

on this board? What do we got here? Craig has Matt Stafford. What is it? Stafford? You have Stafford 9th and we have like... What's going on here?

In the same way... Did you talk to McVeigh? What's going on? In the same way that I think Brady being who he is will write the ship, it has to get better for this Rams team. The Rams just won the Super Bowl.

I know there... I know the offensive line is in Chambles. They just had a buy. They're getting healthier. Their center's coming back. Van Jefferson is coming back. The cornerbacks are coming back. The NFC. West is completely up for grabs right now. I trust McVeigh. They have the fourth easiest skills remaining for quarterbacks. You're telling me Matt Stafford with Cooper Cup, Alan Robinson, and Van Jefferson, and potentially O'Dell, Eldell Beckham, who they're trying to sign. You're telling me he can't be a top 12 quarterback. The guy led the league in touchdowns last year. Yeah, I kind of do feel that way. Because here's

thing. Odell's not coming back. You guys have a 19th? He's averaging 10 points a game. He's like one of the worst quarterbacks in fantasy this year. You just dropped Alan Robinson, Odell like those names have been anything. Alan Robinson more or less clearly seems cooked. And unless he comes out of the by looking like a different NFL player is meaningless. Odell is not playing till December. Like, Odell has already basically put it out there that he's not going to return basically to the fantasy football season's over. And then I guess I look at the Rams and I think if Cooper Cup does it play for whatever reason, I don't. don't think the Rams could get, it feels impossible for the Rams to even get two touchdowns.

You guys have Marcus Marriota over Matt Stafford. That's insane. He just won the fucking Super Bowl. Absolutely not. Dude, we're halfway through the season. He's averaging 10 points a game. I trust McVeigh. They've been atrocious. I trust it. Sean McVeigh's podcast producer believes in Sean McVeigh. Craig, I fucking hope you're right, man, because I have way too much Matt Stafford across all my leagues. So yes, I hope that's true. This team is three and three. and they lost to the fucking bills at the Niners and the Cowboys. I agree. It's just like, I guess put it this way.

I feel like the Rams offense, as we have watched it with McVeigh for like basically five years, more or less, always ebbs and flows to the offensive line. Offensive line is an absolute shambles, and they have less depth at receiver than they've probably ever had. Yes, Van Jefferson's coming back. But again, you're looking at all these quarterbacks. The floor for Stafford's lower than any of them, right? And it looks.

And yes, he could bounce back. But what was his ceiling ever to begin with? Like his ceiling on this team also just feels a lot lower because there is no run after the catch running back to dump it off to. It's like Darrell Henderson who can't break tackles. All these other guys, when they get in a shootout, I actually, yeah, sure, they can get me 30 points. Stafford at this point feels like the least likely.

You could convince me after last night with Justin Fields having more design runs than he's ever had in his career until last night that Justin Fields will be better than Stafford the rest of the season, just based on upside of, you know, Fields actually starts doing 12 carries again. I'm the only one making takes here. You guys are storm chasing. You're just ranking whoever had 280 yards passing last week. This isn't the take purge, man.

We're ranking our top 10 quarterback. This is how I feel. It takes brass balls to rank Matt Stafford in the top 10. He just won the Super Bowl for Christ's sake. Sean McVeigh, Cooper Cup. No, it takes balls to look Sean McVeigh in the eye and tell him I'm not taking your quarterback. You know what? Can we make a bet?

You guys have him 19th, rest of the season. Can we put money that I think he'll be in the top 18 the rest of the season? I'll give you odds. I'll give you two to one odds. Yeah, you better give us odds on that. Why? You ranked him there. That's what you think he's going to do.

I think he's going to outscore Aaron Rogers, Russell Wilson, Justin Fields, Derek Carr, Daniel Jones, all these losers that you have in front of Matt Stafford. What is happening here? I just think this is crazy. They lost the three best teams in the league, and they're on by, and it's a Sean McVeigh offense with Matt Staver to Cooper Cup.

He's not even a top 18 quarterback now? I don't know. So wait, what's the bet? What's the bet? Hyvitz, are you ducking away? Are you ducking out of this bet? No, I'm trying to look up with, I'm trying to counter you by trying to find out where Stafford even ranks at the position this year, which is...

What, in QBR or something? What are you looking at? EPA? No, fantasy points. Oh, he's like 27th or something, I bet. No, he's 31st. He's below Zach Wilson. He's below Davis Mills.

He's below Matt Ryan, who just got benched. By the way, Matt Ryan got benched. He's below Taylor Heineke and average points per game, one game. I don't hear a reason why you guys aren't going to, you guys should actually be giving me odds then here, right? If he's 31st. I'll give you outside the top 15. Why?

You ranked him 19th. My whole point is that all these guys are interchangeable and I'll admit I should have had him 18th ahead of Mario. So then you should give me top 18. That's what you put him at. But no, because if he comes in 17th and I ranked him 18th, I'm spiritually like, Craig, that's fine. If he finishes top 9, you win the bet.

How about that? Maybe let's middle it then. How's that? Nine or better, you win the bet? No, because I'm the one taking... Oh, you ranked him nine. What are you talking about? I'm taking the risk here.

We're both putting a money online. I'm taking the risk. Because I'm the one making the bold claim. You're not. Let's split it. Let's split it. I said nine, you said 18. Let's go in the middle.

Let's say top 14. Yeah, over under 14 and a half, right? 14 and a half. I will take he will finish better than 14th. Better than 14 and a half. All right, what are we doing here? Points per game we're talking Let's do this

Let's do we'll never I feel like nobody actually Ever follows up on bets How about like you guys have to buy me a jersey Of my choosing and vice versa Or something like that All right Put it in the notes app

So we remember this All right All right There's our quarterback rankings I honestly made that bet Because I just wanted that conversation to end All right we're going to get to Tyler Dunn

Who wrote a book maybe Because we inspired it But first Tackle Millions and Prizes All Football Season Long in Fandall fantasy contest. If you're new to Fantasy, get in on the action right now with a $10 bonus for playing just $1 in Fantasy on Fandall.

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take someone random throw on your MVP. Everyone's going to have like lock it. Put like Will Disley in your MVP. And then all two touchdowns. And then you're going to win. Boom. Just download the Fandall Fantasy app to get your $10 bonus now to start making every moment.

More age and location restrictions apply. Bonus is issued as non-withdrawable site credit that expires after 30 days. All right. Now we are joined for a very special segment. We do not have guests very often, but we are joined now by Tyler Dunn, who wrote a great book about tight ends

it's the blood and guts. And Tyler, we have you here because they're in a very roundabout way, and like the most roundabout way possible. Your book kind of exists because of this podcast a little bit. That's what I've been told. I'm out of the loop myself a little bit. Can we get a cut of the profits? Is that possible?

Can we work that out? Yeah, to be clear, we're having you on a podcast so we can take credit for your extremely awesome book. That's bad here. Absolutely not. You know, Serapino entered the world right around the time that book deal was signed. So I hate to break it to you, fellows.

But paperwork is paperwork. I was going to say every other people that has like guests on their show, they're like, great job. And we're like, wow, pat on the back for us. Like, am I right? No, but so. It's well deserved. So the weird story is.

So Sean, who is part of the publisher who involved in the making of this book, apparently, shout out Sean, listens to our show. The best of the best. Great guy. fantastic. And a year or two ago, I forget when there was this whole argument online about whether five LeBron's would be like five Michael Jordans. And people were like playing that on like 2K. And so we had an argument on the show. If you had to basically clone a player, if you could have 11 of one player to play a football game, who would you pick? And we immediately were like, you have to pick a tight end. Yeah. Because tight ends are like the essence of football. They're like the most football player. They're like D ends mixed with wide receivers. And tackles. So apparently Sean was listening and was like, wow, tight ends are like the essence of football. We should have a tight end book.

And then now you have a tight end book. And I guess that's how the world works. Our stupid conversation of like six minutes. And then you did the year and a half of work. And like so we kind of like have an equal share in this whole thing. I'm not going to deny it. I love it. It's true.

And I think this if you don't believe in a god or at least, you know, the football gods, you do now because, hey, I'm an old soul. I love the tight end. You got to do it all. You got to roll up the sleeves, kick a little ass. And it absolutely is the sport. Like in one position, you have to do literally everything. And it's from Dick and a Kittle.

It's the same guy in many regards. It is a really cool book. So you were kind enough to send me an advanced copy a few months ago. And it's kind of great. You just kind of like go to Mike Dick's golf club and just like he's, I don't know, he's smoking a cigar like 10 in the morning and just telling you stories about like crush. It's just like really cool. kind of go tight end by 10.

So I won't, and you kind of really tell the story of Mike Dick got through Grancowski. So I want to ask you the original question that spawned all this. If you had to win a football game, but you could only have 11 of like the same person, you had to clone a person. Which tight end are you cloning? Like who is the player you want to play football with?

It's got to be Rob Grunkowski, right? It's the dude here in Buffalo, New York, who is just bashing his brothers, since he can remember. And, you know, Chris has just given him a shot into the bathroom. He hits his head on the bathtub. And, you know, they think he just might be dead. They don't know if he's even conscious or not.

And so Kristen's back down. And then here comes Rob, back for more, you know, wailing away. I mean, it's that lifestyle that he has lived his entire life. I mean, you could go 11 Jeremy Shokies because that was Rob's idol. You know, he wanted to live hard, party hard, like Jeremy Shockey. So it might be close between those two. Absolutely. I think you got to go Grog. Not Tassum Hill?

Tim Tebow, is he in the mix? I don't know. Does he count yet? No, he's not in the book. I promise you Tim Tito is not in the book. Don't worry. You did mention in the book, though, that Gronk was talking about the last wave of like getting cool partying in where you could do whatever you wanted and it wouldn't make it to social media. Do you have any stories you want to share about Rob Grunk that totally won't get him in trouble?

You know, he did talk about an epic party that. was called ratio. And he just started giggling like a schoolgirl and said, I'll let you, you know, figure that. I couldn't get teammates to talk about it. I think if you do the math, probably a lot of females, probably more than male. But the one party that I did get a little detail on was after the 2014 AFC championship game, I believe, right? Yeah, when they crushed the Colts and then the flake gate broke out.

Well, they partied their asses off after that game. And James Devlin, the fullback has this funny story of being there with his wife and there's strobe lights, there's a DJ, there's players there, but there's a lot of dudes that he's never seen in his life. He thinks that this was somebody from Buffalo, not a Gronk brother, but somebody just came right up to his wife

and starts doing the Stivo, like the, mm-hmm, and he kind of looks at him like, get the hell out of here, this mean mugs him. That was, I mean,

when Gronk was at his peak, he was, you know, just crushing souls like, like Sergio Brown. I mean, I love their rival. It just spans several years up to the point where he kicks him out of the club.

And Sergio Brown's still pissed about it. He still wishes he went west side Chicago on that mother effort in his words. It didn't just take it to the party lifestyle. And honestly, I don't mean to ramble on and on about Bronx party because we could do it all hour. He insists to this day that the partying helped him as a player. You know, it's not like us. He's not just downing, you know, five, six, IPAs or 12, 13

Bush lattes. He's going vodka water. He's dancing his ass off. He's moving it. His friends told him it looked like he was having a seizure. He thought it looked good. But he's getting a workout and his cardio. He is. And then he feels guilty the next day. So he does P90X

and sanity workouts with his brother. So you kind of have it at both ends. Maybe Kyle Pitts sucks because he's not parting enough. Maybe that's the problem. I just talked to Kyle Pitts last week. I should have asked him that. I think he's going to be good. Don't give up on Kyle Pitts. Did you talk to Ditka at all about Kyle Pitts? Like how, you know, Dick

obviously set the tight end record for receiving yards way, way, way back when. I wonder how he feels about like Kyle Pitts being like the first guy that even got closer. Obviously, like they played a different number of games. So it's just not quite the same. But did you ask him about Kyle Pitts at all? You know, not Kyle Pitts specifically, but we did talk about like athletic tight ends today. Like what's Mike Dicka's take on all these, you know, is dubious ruffians running around, you know, celebrating showboat. He doesn't like it. Surprise, surprise, right?

Mike Dicke doesn't like all these showboaters, but he does like their play style. I mean, he does like the fact that tight ends are just doing ridiculous things down the field that he couldn't even think about doing. And he's unbelievably humble, Dicca, that is. But he did make a point to say, like, nobody was as tough as me, which is absolutely true. I mean, he played an entire season basically with one arm. You know, he separates his shoulder, throws a harness on, and figures out a way to, like, corral the ball with one and a half arms.

And there, it was a different time. I get it the guys trying to tackle Dicka and Mackie. It is kind of funny to look back and see, like, they almost look like they're like shoemakers and they're delivering your milk, you know, during the week. They don't look like professional football players, some of them. But it was a lawless time. I don't want to be ignorant, you know,

and just oblivious to what football was like in the 60s. He's getting clotheslined. I ran itchki. You know, that, that is a tackle. So it was a different era and he, he deserves credit for being that, just that apex predator, right? Just the top of the food chain and just making football football, right when it was passing baseball, it's kind of like the number one sport in America.

Tyler, it is a, that was a different era. And now we're in a new era where we play fantasy football and not to get existential on you, but every week we more or less, like, oh, my God, what freaking awful tight end? Do we have to throw in our fantasy lineup this week? because like it's like you have Travis Kelsey, Mark Andrews, you're set. And if Dallas got it, sure. And then everyone else is like, oh, my God, I have to stream Hayden Hurst, which is awful. And I am curious.

One, we play a game here called two tight ends and a lie. And I was going to ask, do you mind if I read you the name of three tight ends? And one of them is not real. And you have to guess which one is real. I like it. Yeah, two are real. One is not. Parker Hessey.

Jack Stoll Colby Parkinson Jack Stoll is the lie they're all real The trick question Man alive Needless to say

Jack didn't make the book He didn't make the book I just it sounded like Gunner Stahl Like from D2 You know I just I thought you were pulling like a Mighty Ducks character From Iceland or something

I've never heard of Jack Stoll That's not real Tyler do you have thoughts on if we should even keep the fantasy tight end position in fantasy football. Should we just get rid of it and just mold that right into wide receiver? Half these guys don't even look like tight ends anyway. I think you still need that position.

I played fantasy my whole life. So I definitely remember the time when it all was lumped together. And we're getting the USA Today on Monday to add it all up, right? It has evolved. And I think in the best possible ways. I still think like the best tight ends, they are blocking. And like George Kittle, you know, obviously he's the gold standard today. granted, like he's not in line blocking, but the way he describes himself in that offense is he's kind of like this roaming offensive tackle in a way that's diabolically put in these positions by Kyle Shanahan to crush you at this angle where you're blindsided.

You don't see it coming and this lane develops. Like that's to the extreme. I think every team still seeks an element of that. Like you can use a tight end as a weapon as a blocker within a creative offense. So, yeah, I think that obviously all the tight ends of today are athletic freaks. They're not in line grunners that Mike Malarkey would love back in his heyday with the Steelers. But you better have one. Like, you better have that athletic tight end to open up your playbook.

And if you don't, you better be looking for one of you're going to be fired because I still think it's unbelievably valuable. I know the numbers don't bear it out this season. I'm with you. It's kind of weird to see who we're plugging into our fantasy lineups. it strikes me as more as like a the strangeness to the start of this 2022 season then this wide scale like trend of tight ends being minimized of course I did write a book all about tight ends too so I'm a little biased on that front. It sounds like points per block would solve all of this.

Oh pancakes right? Yeah point per PPP and then people can game the system. So there we love it. That'll work. Why can't we figure that out with technology? I think we solved it. All right. That's perfect.

All right. Tyler, where can people find your book? It's the blood and guts. Where can people buy it? I think we all live on Amazon, right? So they just pop on Amazon, hardcover, Kindle, Audible. You'll hear, if you go the audible route, it will be a voice much better than this one. He's got a very blood and gutsy voice, Alan Carson does. But wherever books are sold, it was so much fun. I mean, if you're going to tell me, I'm going to be hanging out at a bar with Jeremy Shockey,

talking about bar fights and, you know, drinking dozens of beers at the Guinness Factory in Ireland. I would have told you you're nuts. So to just kind of travel the country, seek the soul of the sport. It was awesome. It had a lot of work. I'll tell you what, man. It was a lot of fun. I'm super excited to read it, man.

And then when you write the second edition, you can also throw in like, can't believe I got to drink beers to Jeremy Shockey. Can't believe I wrote a book because these like idiots talked about like Taseham Hill on a podcast. What if they were 11, George Kittles? And like, there you go. Look, who would have thought we'd be here now? Look at us.

And I look forward to Jack Stoll being the subject of hearing you know. Jack stole the biography Perfect Tyler, thank you so much for joining us we appreciate it

and that they thank you DK, thank you Craig thank you Tyler thank you Lauren Tyler you want to name a band oh my God I should have been prepared

I love the show how do I don't I have one in the holster harder than it seems I mean hmm how about this how about how about

Boney Bear because that's what I listen to when I wrote this book you know I know it's not ACDC but when I write I just plug in Justin Vernon and that's what gets me

through all this long for him So I like it. Thanks, Boney Bear. Your beard. Your beard has got Bony Bear vibes too. Yeah, it does. I know. Right.

I'm not a wot. I mean, I guess I kind of a wuss. But I do love that music. It's rhythmic. It's soothing. It's calming. So yeah, Boney Bear definitely helped produce the blood and guts, believe it or not. Awesome.

Awesome. Thank you, man. Thank you, guys. Really appreciate it.