The Ringer NFL Show - Rams and Lions Stock Watch, Fixing the Fantasy Playoffs, and Bucs-Chiefs Offseason Outlook With Bill Simmons

Episode Date: February 1, 2021

We break down the fantasy winners and losers after the Rams traded Jared Goff for Matthew Stafford, run through what the Chiefs and Bucs offenses could look like next year, and chat with Bill Simmons about his fantasy football format that blends the NFL playoffs with the fantasy playoffs. Rams-Lions Trade (0:50) Chiefs Offseason Outlook (12:44) Bucs Offseason Outlook (19:22) Fixing Fantasy Playoffs (34:48) Email us! [e-mail]! Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Guest: Bill Simmons Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's episode of the Ringer Fantasy Football Show, we talked to Bill Simmons about whether fantasy football should extend through the NFL playoffs. We also look at the Chiefs and Buccaneers offseason outlooks and whether Jared Goff and Blake Griffin should be roommates in Detroit. Maybe we'll see. Stick around. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. My name is Danny Heifitz.

I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Horlebeck. Bill Simmons will be joining us later on the episode. And we will also be going through Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers offseason outlooks for fantasy but first the lions traded Stafford to the Rams for Shark Off that was crazy did you guys see the Rams being the trade target there that was kind of a random weird probably not I don't think anyone had that penciled in I didn't think they had any first round picks left I was I'll be totally honest when I heard they trade of I was like for what like what do they have it's like your friend who's broke and still finds money to buy drugs and you're like where are you even getting this from

finding first round picks and the couch cushions like McVe's pool house he offered up to Dan Campbell. No, it's Cliff Kingsbury's house. Do you think Sean McVeigh lives in Cliff Kingsbury's house? Haven't you seen Sean McVey had a pool house where he's played with his dog? That was when he kept teaching his dog to bounce a ball off his face like he was a seal. And it's like, dude, that probably fucking hurts the dog, man. You guys want to know a weird thing about Jared Goff and Matt Stafford?

Yes. I mean, yeah. Jared Goff has more Pro Bowl appearances than Matt Stafford. That's weird. How fucking weird is that? I don't like that. That's wild. Well, wait, D. you mentioned the picks thing.

I do want to shed out just this thing that blew my mind, which is that the Rams didn't make a first round pick during the Trump administration, and then now they won't have one until like the last year of the Biden administration. And it's just like,

hilarious. You're the draft analyst here, DK. You're the guy who grinds all the tape. Our first round picks overrated. Like, are the Rams on to something here? Are they just absolute psychos? Well, let's keep in mind here that these picks are likely going to be late

in the first round if the Rams are decent. Likely is, yeah. And not 100% sure, but likely like later round. 18 to 25-ish or whatever. But, I mean, they're hoping it's 32, right? And so I think, yeah, they are overrated a little bit. Like, everyone treats first-round picks like they are solid gold,

when in reality, you know, a lot of first-round picks do not pan out. I don't know what the hit rate is necessarily. There's different ways of measuring it. But end of the day, like, flip a coin and this guy might, flip a coin and this guy will be like a long-term, really good starter. for you at best. And like even way, way lower odds, it'll be like a star.

You know what I mean? So them kind of going, zinging while everyone else is zagging, going and using those picks for established guys that you know are going to be good, even if they are more expensive and hurt your cap situation more.

I think there's something too. I think it's very interesting and it's not something that every team does. I don't necessarily know if it's the right move, but I do think, generally speaking, like he said, the first round picks are overrated. Yeah, I think it's interesting that they, Les Need, the GM for the Rams made the RG3 trade, like eight years ago is his first

big trade, and they got all these picks for him. And they did like nothing with it. They got Michael Brockers, a very solid lineman out of it. They got like three or four years of Jonas Jenkins. And that was it for RG3. And then they did the opposite and sold everything to get the first pick to take Jared Gough. Exactly. So I think that it says something that Lesneed, who's not like one of these Wall Street people who took over a team. He's a scout. And there's a scout talent guy who's like, I don't want picks. He's not some game stop shorter like these guys are He's not one of those. He's that edge fun guy.

Oh, my God. Yeah, he's actually deep fucking value. That's less need. Okay, so that's the deal. Let's go through just kind of the fortunes of the players, various players involved here. Not that everyone's thinking about fantasy right now, but I do think fantasy is an interesting gauge here of just generally how this is going to go. Let's sort of the Rams. Stafford, stock up, right?

Stock up. Big winner here. Oh, got to be. A lot. Yeah, for me. I love this fit. Stafford, every stat that I've seen since we saw this trade go down. is like Stafford is really fucking good on play action.

He's really good deep, really good intermediate. Goff sucks at all three of those. Well, not just he does lately anyway, like the last two years. He obviously, Gough was really good for a couple of years there, but he's just completely falling off. I don't know what the deal is. But I think it's a perfect fit in terms of Stafford's skill set, his strengths, with what McVeigh wants to do.

So I'm excited about this. A lot of people were poo-pooing this on Twitter, and I get it, because Stapford has been. I don't know. Stafford's been one of those guys where I think he's a player kind of like in the maybe Andrew Luckvane where expectations were sky high, ridiculously high, coming into the league and maybe he didn't live up to those. But at the same time, I still think he's a really good quarterback. So I think he has a chance in this system to be a really good quarterback in real football and in fantasy. None of the Rams are going to shit talk Jared Gough ever, nor should they.

But you're going to hear a lot of, man, I love playing for Matt Stavis. He's just a special guy, greatly. You know what I mean? It's just like the app, like the positive comments you're going to hear will paint, you know, it's going to be like,

well, what's outside the frame of this picture here? Yeah, it'll illuminate some other things. Read between the lines, I guess. Yeah, exactly. Stafford is going to be the most interesting fantasy discussion come the off season.

There's totally going to be two camps. Like, whatever JJ Zacharison chooses of like, actually, this is going to be fucking incredible. Or like, if you really look at the numbers, like, we actually don't, we're not too excited about this. Like, I kind of have no idea

how people are going to, to see this, but I think there's a chance that he's like the sixth quarterback taken off the board, because people are like, look at that Rams Chiefs game, 2018, like, what if that's Stafford? Like, what if that's Stafford every week now with the Rams? I think the biggest winner here actually is, though, is Cam Acres,

the running back for the Rams, because here's the thing. McVeigh is the youngest head coach in NFL history, but like he's really just a seven-year-old man at heart. Like, I get he's like, you know, he's supposed to be... He's just John Gruden light. Yeah, he's fake sharp. He doesn't have... He doesn't have a...

He just wants to run. life. He just goes and he wants to run the ball. He's like this kind of, he doesn't go for him fourth down. He's not like, he doesn't have the coaching young characteristics you might associate with a young coach. He's kind of conservative and he wants to run. He just is kind of, he's Pete Carroll with a more creative scheme. Exactly. And so I actually think that now that the Rams have a more diverse offense and they'll be able to just, it's not rocket science, do more things that will make the easier for them to run the ball and Cam Acres will, I think he's going to be higher up relatively to other running backs

than Stafford will do quarterbacks. I think Stafford is probably going to be over drafted this next season and Cam Acres. We'll see what happens with the hype, but he'll be underdrafted. I agree. You think Cam Acres will be underdrafted? I think that, well, I don't know exactly where the narrative right now is.

I think Acres has a chance to be like a top five back in 2021. Do you think he'll be that? Do you think he'll be picked like that? I think that fantasy coverage is too, it's ever present now. There's no way. By the time. Yeah, by the time it all rolls around.

People won't just have so much smoke blown up Cam Acres' ass. I guarantee you he'll be a top. He'll be what Clyde Edwards-Hillair was this year. The only way to find like an unloved gem in fantasy days is to do what Craig did last year

and just be like, oh, everyone hates David Johnson? Fuck it. I love David Johnson. I'm a David Johnson. You literally literally just have to go like pick against the grain. It's impossible to be contrarian, or it's impossible to find a sleeper without somebody having already said it.

Sleeper is, sleeper's kind of dead. We need a better word for sleeper. We gotta start working on that. Yeah. I kind of think that one of the secret winners of the Rams' 20-21 potential could be whoever their deep threat is, right?

We know Stafford's this great deep-ball throw. Like, Robert Woods and Cooper Cup aren't really that. And so they have Van Jefferson, who's like not a big deep-ball guy, and they have Josh Reynolds. Josh Reynolds is an unrestricted free agent, so who knows if they'll resign him?

He was a good deep-ball guy at Texas A&M. I'm like, I think if they bring in like, I don't know, some Martavis Bryant type, you know, like you go get some like lanky streaker guy. Like he could be a real asset. John Ross. No, oh my God.

I will never want to hear John Ross's name ever again. I hate him so much. But the point is, I knew it would trigger him. Triggering me. But the point is, I think that his speed threat won't be a real player.

Like, it'll be like, who is it? Torrey Smith on the Eagles Super Bowl team. Like, they should go get Henry Ruggs. I know he's like on the Raiders. No, but I think I like this for Robert Woods too. I like this for all the Rams past catches. I don't, I think it just works.

Honestly, it doesn't change their stocks a ton, though. I think that's just fun. The Lions also, I wouldn't even draft Gop this year unless it's a two-quarterback league. He kind of sucks. I think it's, I don't think it's, I don't think it's, I mean, biggest loser here is Gawaday, right? Well, Kenny Golladay is a free agent. Marvin Jones is a free agent.

So the reality is this Gough trade doesn't affect Hawkinson's value of tight end as much as whether Goladay returns or not or whether Marvin Jones Jr. returns or not. That's a bigger deal. I don't think that this changes a ton for the Lions other than their offense was probably worse. Yeah, I think maybe Swift is slightly drops back. Maybe Hawkinson stays the same, to be honest. It depends what happens with Goladay and Jones.

It's really hard to figure out what this means for anyone when we don't know about their top two receivers. I kind of think regardless of who their receivers are, even if Goladay stays or they let him go, that Hawkinson will continue to be the best option on that team from a passing perspective. Did you know guys know that Kenny Gallaudet is 27 years old? It's that old or young?

I feel like I haven't seen him play enough football to be 27 years old already. I believe when he came out he was a little bit older he's an older prospect so yeah I mean that's I don't think you well this if anything

don't you think this probably cements him not becoming or not staying I don't think he comes back I don't think he comes back he's been to her too much it doesn't make sense I doubt he'll be back

he's quietly a pretty nice little option there I know everyone's talking about where's Alan Robinson going to go and stuff like that Golladay would be a nice little pick up if he plays okay

one last thing here worst possible destination regardless of fit for Jared Goff to go is Detroit, right? From L.A. Wow. Are you talking like culture? Just across the board.

Weather culture. I mean, has Jared Goff ever left California? He's from California. He went to Cal and he's played in L.A. So this is the first time he's ever been employed or spent any significant time outside the state of California. Well, they have an indoor stadium, so it's whatever. I know, but like, you know, it's not like he's going to somewhere kind of like cool.

He's not going to Boston. like he's going to fucking Detroit from LA. Sorry, tell the people who... Well, here's the thing to me. I am not going to comment on the character of Detroit as the city. What I will say is what I think is hilarious about this is that Dan Campbell, the coach of the Lions,

comes out and is like, we're going to bite people's kneecaps and shit and all that stuff he said in his press conference, which was both taken out of context and also got exactly as much attention as it deserved. However, the first move they make is get Jared Goff,

who is many things I have never once thought of him as that's a kneecap biter right there. He's not a real world beater of Jared Goff. No, Jared Goff is this rah-rah warrior dude mentality quarterback to lead this group of like tough-minded, hard-nosed, we're going to be the culture of Detroit as a city. We're Motor City. You knock us in her butt.

We get back up. You knock us down again. We get up twice as fast. Meanwhile, Jared Goff gets kicked out of L.A. And he's like, I got, like, there's anonymous sources that say he got railroaded. I'm like, that doesn't sound like he's just getting up. But I don't know. It just literally, it's not the culture that I've heard in that press conference.

Who would be the best fit for this, by the way? If every quarterback was a free agent. some like Rothusberger in a vacuum Josh Allen Josh Allen Yeah no Buffalo in Detroit

I think Josh Allen makes sense You know Jerry Goff and Blake Griffin should start a podcast They both seem like They've both done improv in their lives I bet Jared Goss Well there's just two LA guys

Who got sent off to Detroit Detroit They can be roommates They could buy a house so big They don't have to see each other If they don't want It's a reality show waiting to happen Yeah I would love to see

Blake Griffin just doing improv And like class Like with Jared Goff And Jared Goff is like giving notes And that bustling Detroit Combatting comedy scene. Sorry, I don't know why I'm being so mean to Detroit.

We love Detroit. Yeah, you're being an asshole right now. At least Detroit listeners are just like, what the fuck, Craig? Coastal elite just like rearing your bias. Why don't you go visit the goddamn country, Craig? Oh, I'm so sorry. But anyway. All right, let's move on.

All right, the Chiefs are playing the bucks in the Super Bowl. Why don't we talk about that? Okay. Sure, sure. We'll get to the preview of this game on Friday. We're also going to talk about this later at length of Bill about what we've, with Bill Simmons about what we think about this game. But for right now, we're going to talk just the

off season where we think fantasy wise these guys might land in 2021 how we're feeling so let's start with the chiefs i mean it's just so mohomes is the number one quarterback kelsey's the number one tight end tyree kill is at worst the like at worst the third fifth best receiver and like that's i can't even imagine him being lower than that realistically he's top three do you guys i mean is there any even qualms with any of that it's just more of a question of is kelsey the eighth pick or the 11th, then whether he's tied in one. When I was putting in, I was putting in some numbers with all these guys just to kind of like give some context.

It's like, Mahomes finished as the QB3 this year, which was only six points off of QB1. So he was in, you know, in effect, the QB1-ish. He was a QB8 in 2019, but he was QB3 in points for game. He was a QB1 in 2018. So it's like, this feels like his area. He's living in it, like one through three. There's not a whole lot to talk about here unless he gets hurt. Like he's going to be in that area, I feel like.

He's probably going to be number one. It's just a matter of how high you take them. Like he's not a second rounder, but like, is he a third rounder? Right. Tyree Kill, same deal. I think, like, you know, you can pencil him for a top five receiver. Travis Kelsey's almost certainly going to be the tight end one again. And so there's not a lot to talk about with these guys.

I don't think, honestly, it's just predicting when Kelsey's cliff is going to. Craig, did you want to talk about Kelsey at all? I wanted to just talk about, I think that there's going to be no conversation around Tyreek or Mahomes. I think they're both like 26. They'll be fine. Kelsey, I wanted to see if we could predict the year that the tight end falls off.

Like if it's, you know, can we see? Because Kelsey will be 32 at the start of the season next year. So I just went back and I looked at like all the great tight ends. Tony Gonzalez, Witten, Gromp, Antonio Gates, Jimmy Graham, Greg Olson. Like probably the six best fantasy tight ends in the last decade. Just to see when it ended.

Tony Gonzalez, it never ended. His last season, he had almost 900 yards and eight touchdowns. Jason Whitten... And he was 37. Jason Witten at age 32 was his first beer drop off. Cronk at age 29, he started to get hurt, had a bad season. Antonio Gates, he was 35. He started to get hurt, lose efficiency.

Jimmy Graham was around 31. It was that last year in Seattle. He only had 500 yards, but he had 10 touchdowns, so it kind of didn't seem like he was falling off, but it was really a 400-yard drop from the year before. He was the Mike Evans season that season. He was just like a goal-line guy. He was the tight end fullback that year.

And then Greg Olson was around age. 32, he got hurt and never was the same. So Kelsey is pretty much, if you had to average these out, it's probably around 33. Kelsey might be, I don't know if we think physically he's more of an anomaly than these guys, but. Well, he's certainly in a, he's certainly in a unicorn offense with a unicorn quarterback. He's also healthier and he doesn't have to block, like those guys had to block, which fucking sucks. A lot of these guys are really healthy though. Blocking Limbockers and defensive linemen sucks. He doesn't have to do that. And here's the thing. When a lot of times when players fall off,

you start to show it at the end of a season and no one wants to really say anything because they're a legend. And then you go to the next season and it kind of happens, right? That's not what happening with Kelsey. Kelsey had 13 catches for like 120 yards in the AFC championship game a week ago. Like this guy is like

still, here's the thing. Yeah, he's going to be 32 or whatever next year. He's peaking. This is literally the best season he's ever had. Yeah, I think the bottom line is I am not yet concerned of a cliff coming. No, it's not there yet. The only worry you have to have is perhaps one age older of Travis Kelsey's hamstrings. Like he pulls something and he misses eight games this year. Like that's the thing that would kill you is if he just

gets some nagging injury. Keep those things lubricated. But you're, that's not going to make you not draft him. Yeah. He needs what Will Fuller was taken. Again, I'm just going to say this one more time for the people in the back. Last year, in half PPR leagues, Travis Kelsey had 260 fantasy football points, which was more than double than every single fantasy football tight end, except for like the top five guys. It's a good point, Hyfe. It's like if he puts up some- Doubled everybody except five people.

You're right that like the eye test. Like if he has a fantastic game in the Super Bowl, like what's going to change in six months to where he's going to be that much worse come September? Like he'll be relatively the same guy. Even if he's slightly over the hump, like it's still like you said, so much better than everybody else. Okay, DK, what about Clyde? Everyone thought he'd be good, including us.

Then he sucked. Then he got hurt. He was all relative. So he finished as the RB18, the RB23 in points per game. He was average 12.2 points. I think the big thing, honestly, with his usage, was he had like six rushes inside the,

basically the goal line in week one. And he got stuffed on every single one of them. And then he essentially got banished from goal line situations for the rest of the year. The question is... Like Dark Night Rises, death or exile? Yeah. So that hurt...

That obviously hurt his value a lot of. lot in fantasy. I mean, he got 181 rushes, 803 yards, only four touchdowns. He had 54 targets through the air, 36 catches, 297 yards in the touchdown. I could honestly see those numbers going up as a sophomore in the league, you know, second year in the league. So I think he has a chance to improve. But the big thing is honestly going to be, can he start scoring some more touchdowns? Because, you know, you have these three-down guys that are, you know, the dominant running backs in the league are scoring a lot of touchdowns. And so that's me as a big question. Yeah, is he he going to be the guy that just gets taken off the field every time they get inside the 10-yard line.

Hopefully not, but it's tough to predict that. You know, a rookie season of the, if you, it doesn't look good when you look at it, like what DK just read out, but like his rookie season had 1100 yards and five touchdowns. Yeah, it's not a, he did not suck. I would say it was definitely not what we expected and that was disappointing. Yeah. Okay, fine, he was disappointing. But I think, I think he might end up being underdrafted next year because I do think he's still going to

be in that offense that we love. He's still got a chance to catch more passes than he did this season, and I think his overall volume could go up. And again, I just think the touchdown thing is going to be hard to predict. Classic example of like a post-type sleeper.

Same, I think, Michael Hardman, who was trendy kind of high-upset draft pick didn't really work. I think that Clyde and Michael Hardman are both going to be guys that the shine or the polish is kind of worn off, but could be pretty freaking great. Okay, let's switch to the bucks.

Weird team. The 43-year-old quarterback is like the biggest lock to return on the whole offense, which is weird. The running back situation is odd. Leonard Fernette's a free agent. If you want to come back, I imagine he could. Chris Godwin's a free agent. And then usually you'd say, oh, well, they'll bring them back. But, you know, you never know because, well, actually, the bucks have a lot of cap space.

So if they want them back, they could bring them back, you'd think, or franchise tag, whatever. But either way, this offense won't look quite the same way. So, I mean, let's just start with Brady. 40 touchdown passes this season. He's going to be 44. I don't think we have to pretend anymore that age matters with this dude. He's from a different planet.

So is he a top 10 quarterback again in like 2021? Seems insane to say. I would guess like if you're going to do the over under on top 10, I'd probably guess the over in the sense that he'll be the QB 9, QB 10, QB 9 or whatever. I don't really know if I see him being like a QB3, QB4 type player just because he's so slow. Like he's not going to contribute.

Do you think you guys are faster than Tom Brady? Yeah. I do. You think you're faster than Tom Brady? I thought you were going to say no and Craig was going to say yes. Well, let me rephrase it. I think I'm quicker than Tom Brady. He might be able to like, he might be able to like, you know, stride it out over long distances better than I can.

I bet you I wish I could beat him in like a sprint. Yeah, like tag. Like if you had to play tag with Tom Brady, do you think you could get him more than he got you? I think I could get away from him. Wow. I was trying to escape from Tom Brady. I think I could out. I feel like you've been watching him run from defensive ends for 20 years and it's skewed your thoughts of his athletic.

I'm sure there's, yeah, that is definitely true. Craig, just bursting out the seams here. Talk about how much faster and agile you are than Tom Brady, Craig. I, well, I'm trying to be respectful because I'm trying to be like, am I an idiot? I'm trying to think like, am I an idiot for thinking that I could outrun? Because I don't think I'm particularly a fast person. I think I'm like very average speed. I kind of think I could.

What do you think he would, what's his 40 time right now? Like 5.3? Yeah. I think I could run faster than a 5.3. 5.3 is just stupid. I hate 40-0 dash. I'm rethinking my analysis now.

I'm pretty slow these days. I don't think you could catch Tom Brady at all. Yeah, I think you're probably right. You're probably right. Imagine if you escaped a sack from one NFL defensive end, you'd be thinking about it for years. Tom Brady literally does that all the time. I'm pretty old and creaky at this point.

So, yeah. I think Tom Brady's not going to be. be a sexy draft pick next year because we talked about this at the start of this year. Like when you draft a guy, you know, as like the 10th pick off the board, the 10th quarterback off the board, the whole point is that you hope he can be like the QB3,

which is why people took Josh Allen this year. Brady, I feel like is kind of locked into what he's going to do. Like he's just going to beat like the QB8's probably like his ceiling. So I don't know if it'll be a particularly sexy pick. I could not disagree more with what you just said. Because that's not... Every quarterback this year who's the top six ran. They're all running guys.

No, I'm not disagreeing with that Tom Brady's fast. I'm saying disagreeing with when you take the QB8, it's Tom Brady is in this, is not so, he's not a normal fantasy player. People want Tom Brady on their team. The biggest apprehension about draft. I don't believe that. I think you overvalue that.

Well, you go into regular ass fantasy drafts. There's not always one or three owners that are just like, I just want certain players on my team and Tom Brady just, what? No, I don't live with a bunch of guys from Massachusetts. No one cares that Tom Brady's on their team. It doesn't matter. want to win the fantasy league. They're going to take Matt Stafford over him.

I think Brady, literally more than any player just has a lot of people who are just like, I just want Tom Brady on my team. He's really good. He's still on the board. What are people doing? He's not even that fun to watch. I get it if you're like, oh man, I just want to have Tyree kill on my team. He just like goes deep. But Brady, I don't know. I don't agree with that. He's a popular guy. Maybe you should look into this. Why don't you read his Wikipedia? People get it. I don't know if they're like 44-year-old Brady. I got to have him. I could not disagree more. All right. Maybe we'll do a poll.

We could do a poll. All right. Let's look at the receivers for saying, DK, you think they're going to bring back English? Do you think they're going to bring back Chris Godwin? And if so, what happened? Because he was such a popular sleeper in 2019,

somehow delivered on all of the hype and more. And then like a weird 2020. Yeah, I mean, there was a lot of different things happening in that offense. Obviously, they went from James to Brady. Brady had to get up to speed in that offense. Godwin got hurt. He missed five games.

He did end up finishing. as the wide receiver 20 in points per game. So he's like a low-end wide receiver 2. He wasn't worthless by any means, but he definitely wasn't the top five guy that we saw the year before. Man, I don't really know, honestly, if they're going to bring him back.

That's a tough one. I think they're going to try, but he's going to have the opportunity to get paid because he's young, really explosive, has produced, very versatile type guy. He's going to be,

I think he's going to be really coveted on the open market, so they might not be able to keep him. If they do win a Super Bowl, it probably will help them keep him around just because he can, you know, have a chance to run it back. But at the end of the day, I think, I feel like most players are going to pick the team that pays them the most money. Or maybe go to a team with a good quarterback, obviously. I almost think they might have a better chance if they lose because if you win a Super Bowl with Tom Brady, you're a maid man and you can't go get my money. But if you lose and Brady is running it back, you're like, no, well, fuck it.

Let me win a Super Bowl with Tom Brady. I can't leave yet. That's true. All right. lastly and most importantly more important than Tom Brady more important than everything else going on in America Leonard Fournet

and pending free DK first of all is Leonard Furnett good anymore or was he ever good was it all a dream so I'm writing about Leonard Furnett this week actually heading into the Super Bowl

and I think that you have to go back to like not only was he one of the top recruits coming out of high school, like, in the country? He, by some, according to some places, he was the number one recruit. He was clearly the number one running back recruit that year. Like, he had size, speed, versatility, all that stuff. He was really good in college, LSU.

I don't think he was ever necessarily as good as the hype would say, because, like, you know, they took him fourth overall, and I don't, he wasn't like a change of franchise type player, but very few running backs are these days, right? Right? Like, I would say even like Zeke has not lived up to the fourth overall pick or whatever. What was he fourth or third or whatever it was? I think Zeke was fourth, Fournette was fourth, McCaffrey was like eighth, Sequin was second. None of those guys are worth that draft capital. So when you're using, when you're, I think when you're using that as the barometer, I would say he's been disappointing.

Just from the highly hyped running back point of view, he's, he's been very disappointing relative to some of his peers, like McCaffrey, Sequin, Ezekiel, Elliot, all those guys. Like, he just hasn't been as dynamic or good. So I would say he's not as good as the hype would have indicated. And I don't know if he's a good player. I think he's a solid running back at this point in his career. I do think his late season run where he's taken over as a starter and kind of like given Brady this reliable checkdown option, you know, the passing game, all this stuff.

It's bought him a new lease on his career because I think, halfway through the year, I would have probably thought he might not even be in the league in 2021. But now I think I think he's earned himself a spot on a roster, potentially a pretty, like, highly used spot, you know, on a team next year.

So I do think it's been a pretty big shift for him over the last like, you know, two months or so when he's gone from being a healthy scratch in week 14 to, you know, like the main guy and the Buccaneers backfield in the Super Bowl. Were you really doubting whether he was going to be in the league? I mean, we've seen, so like, number one, it's just cheaper to draft a guy and develop them in a cap-strapped year where the salary cap is shrinking.

Like, no one's going to pay him top dollars, certainly. And then I could have seen a scenario where he just ends up getting cut down. Like, he probably would land with a team, but then, you know, the team just ends up going with like a young guy instead. Like, that, to me, wouldn't have been a wild. Is the Super Bowl more important to London Foreness career? than any other player in this game. I like how... No, I don't think so, but like, it's on the list, certainly.

You know, it's like maybe five or six... Five or six down. I think it's important for him because he can change the narrative, and that's what I'm kind of writing about this week is... He can change the narrative of his career because he went from, you know, like I said, in the course of a few weeks going... He went from basically being like, this guy's pretty much done.

Like, his career is over to... You know, he's buying this new, like, lease. I don't think he's going to be a star ever again, but I think he's got a chance to be like a serviceable, productive, reliable guy. It's also weird that he's thriving as a checkdown guy. Like, it's the most bizarre landing spot for him career-wise.

He's rebranded as... Who does he even compare to? Because he's huge. Like, he's rebranded as like an Austin Eccler type bag. But he's like so much bigger. It's kind of strange. You know what I... You guys ever have like a really big dog

that thinks it's like a little dog and just just like tries to get in your lap? and you're like, your 80 pounds broken off. You know what's funny about Leonard Fournett and Ronald Jones? Ronald Jones is signed for one more year in Tampa Bay. I think Ronald Jones is, like, a lot better than Leonard Fernett at running the football.

I think Ronald Jones is kind of good. Do you guys agree? What does it say that Leonard Frenet and Ronald Jones are of similar talent level? Jones is better right now, even though Ronald Jones has an obvious quad injury that he barely can walk after he breaks off a large run and he's still better than letter to net?

Two 25-yard runs every game. And then lifts off the field. He's just, He's just limping and just like, oh my God, I can't walk. And it's just like, oh, well, that was better than what Fortette would have done right there. Well, that's super considerate. Here's the thing, though. I think, I think Rojo is a better runner, but I, he's terrible in the passing game.

Like, he's, he's completely unreliable in the passing game. Didn't you say he had rocks for hands? Yeah. That's so tough. Yeah. Let's, let's ask this question here, TK. Yeah. Who is the Bucks running back week one, 2021?

Craig Cole. I think it's, I think it's going to be Ronald Jones. I think Ronald Jones is going to be a starter. I do think there's a pretty strong chance they re-signed Fournette to like a one-year. He's on a one-year $2 million deal this season. I could see him coming back on something similar. And then they just do the rotation thing again. Because he's like everything you've heard about him this year is he's matured.

He's been humbled in terms of like he tweeted this like this is a humbling season or something like that like in November. He's been humbled. He's realized like his place, his role in the offense is, to be that, like, he's a role player now. He's gone from being the superstar, like, top four pick, you know, all the way down, like, to when he was in high school. He's just been, like, the guy. And now he's realizing he's got to be a role player.

So I think, you know, just from a personal point of view, like, I think that's a very cool, like, story, like him having that growth and having that realization, like, to, like, be that part of a team, I guess. Like, I think that's kind of cool. But at the same time. I don't think he's going to like rocket, like rocket ship him, propel him into like being a star again at this point.

There was a cool story that came out last week, too, because I got to remember where I saw this. So I apologize to whatever reporter dug this up. But basically Devin White, the linebacker for the bucks was, you know, saw,

I think Brady made the pro bowl. He was just upset that I, like, I didn't make the pro ball. He's like, I did this, I did that. And Tom Brady told him like,

man, there's only one bowl I care about. It's not the pro bowl. Yeah. And I do think, think that as much as it's kind of easy to overlook the personal side of it. I think it's huge what you're saying DK of like, it is

crazy to be 17, 18 years old, you're the number one running back in the United States of America. And then you go to college and it's like, you're the number one running back in the United States of America. And then the NFL's like, you're the number one running back in the United States of America. And then you get cut, it's the Jaguars thing happens. Todd Brady's like, yeah, let's just win a Super Bowl, dude.

Like your individual status doesn't matter. Like, I do think it's incredibly influential on Four Nett and the rest of this team. You did a much better job of explaining that situation than I did. a little bit stumbling, but that's like perfect. I think that's just a cool, these are the types of stories that come out during the Super Bowl is like how guys like buy into a team thing. And he, I think Ford had even said something like he's like, I'm not the asshole that

people make me out to be because he got, you know, he got arrested, I believe, on a DUI. You know, there was the whole situation with him sitting on the bench and like, Coughlin got all like huffy puffy about it, you know? And like that was this whole thing. Like he was a diva or something. And so he said that recently, he's like, I'm not the asshole that people thought I was. He says, hopefully whatever was out there on my name, hopefully it will change because I'm not the asshole. They say I was.

I just love football and I love winning. That's about it. And I'm like, man, when I'm reading about this, I'm like, we were already big Lenny Fornes fans. I'm like, man, I love this. I love this guy. I think it's such a cool story, you know, resurgence late in his career when it really looked like he was just pretty much done in the league. He just turned 26. You know what I mean.

You know what I mean. No, yeah. But he looks like he looks 50. Yeah, mentally it's late in his career because he should be peaking right now as a running back. You know bad boys too when the guy comes to pick up Will Smith's daughter? And he's like, how old are he? He's like 17.

He's like, you look 30. Yeah. Like that was for a net when he was going to college. I mean, that, yeah, if you watch the, I was watching some videos of him coming out of high school and going to LSU. And he's like twice as big as all these other people like on the field. So he still has some. of the most fun college tape to watch.

That dude picks out defenders and runs at them. It was so fun. Do you guys hear the snow plow outside my house right now? No. I'm under a first snow. Oh yeah. How is the storm going, by the way? Give us the update.

I was shoveling snow because you don't want to have to do 18 inches all at once. So I did the first foot or whatever. And I looked behind me and as I shot finished the like the side step and it was all covered in snow again, like literally before I finished. So anyway, I hope you enjoyed the fucking beach, Craig. It's coming down. All right. All right, Lenny Fornes, Lenny Dubs, whatever his name is, great.

Lenny Dubs. Lenny Dubs? All right, it's Lenny Dubs now. Let's talk to Bill Simmons. He has this fantasy format where they actually use the NFL playoffs, and I like it. And it goes all the way through the Super Bowl. I kind of think that's how it should be. So let's talk to Bill.

Okay, now we are joined by Podfather himself, Bill Simmons. What's up, Bill? Hi, guys. How are you? Hello. I came here to talk about my fantasy playoff gimmick that we've been doing on our East Coast League forever. That's actually really fun,

and I think everyone should adopt it. How did you come up with it? Like, were you just pissed one year when you lost and couldn't play fantasy anymore? No, this was, we came up with us a long time ago. I think we, you know, rightly so. We looked at fantasy like, ah, it sucks when it ends. You know, and we had this league since 1990,

and it would go through Week 17. So we went through all those hiccups in the early mid-90s where it's like, oh, wait, they're resting everybody. And we're having the finals during a round. where they've just rested my best running back. So all these different iterations. And then finally we came up with this in the early 2000s, and we've had it ever since.

And you basically protect six. We add positions, and then you get to draft from everybody else. Only the top four teams make it. So we add a quarterback. So it's basically two quarterbacks, three running backs, three receivers, a flex, a defense, and a kicker. And this year we added a wild card because of the extra playoff game. So do you have to keep six or can you keep less? You don't. You can keep zero.

Oh. You don't have to, there's no rule on it. So the big things this year were that extra wildcard game and having the two seed in it, I thought made Buffalo more valuable. So I ended up keeping six, and my six were, I finished second. So we should mention it's the top four. It's not a snake draft. So when we're drafting from the other teams, you pick first in every round if you're the first place team. So that's one advantage. The other advantage is when we're drafting before the season, you have playoff guys in mind, right? Mahomes is more valuable in our draft than he would be in a normal draft because you know he's probably going to play in the AFC title game and you have this awesome chip. So, you know, like next year, Mahomes versus Justin Herbert. Now, you take

Mahomes anyway, but Justin Herbert, if like, I don't think he's going to make the playoffs, he's not as valuable in the first couple rounds, right? Russell Wilson is somebody, sorry, Danny. Every year, he is a valuable draft pick because Seattle's always good. And as we know, now Seattle's not going to be good anymore, and they've kind of fallen to the pack. They'll give you a wild card game every year and then. Well, Brady is the perfect example of that. Because Brady's not exactly like a fantasy football asset anymore, but now if he plays next year, like they could go far again in the playoffs.

You never know. Right. Hold on. So when you start, so do you actually finish the league in the regular season, like week 17 or whatever is the championship, then it's an additional championship on top of that? It's 17 weeks.

After 17 weeks, the top four advance to the playoffs. No, so Danny, it's only one championship. Yeah, okay. That's what I was curious about. So this is like extendor season. I like it. Okay. Oh, yeah. So one of the things that happened this year was my homes and Josh Allen were not on any of the four

playoff teams. So I was trying to get the one seed because I really wanted my homes. My team choked in the last week I lost. I dropped down to number two. So my keepers, I kept Ryan Tannehill. I kept Jonathan Taylor. I kept D.K. Metcalfe, Godwins, Evans. And, and Kelsey, who.

who I drafted in the second round, hoping that they would make the playoffs, right? So the team I'm going against, he had Brady as his quarterback, he'd Kamara, he had A.J. Brown, and I think he had Andrews and, like, Valdez, Gantling, something like that. So he took Mahomes first.

So here was the order of the draft. This is, first round was Mahomes. I took Josh Allen. Then there were three receivers. It was Devante Adams, Stefan Diggs, and Tyree Kill. And I was hoping Tyree Kill would fall to me in the second round. Adams goes third pick, Diggs goes fourth pick.

And then the guy who was in first place, he should have taken Tyree Kill. He took Russell Wilson. That's a big, fatal mistake. Big, big, big, fatal mistake. So Tyree Kill falls to me. So now I have Tyree Kill and Kelsey. Oh, she. And my plan was I'm loading up, because I was loading up on Buffalo,

but also I knew I had Hill and Kelsey. So then it goes, second round was Wilson Hill, Lockett, Michael Thomas. Nobody knows he has 17 injuries. Third round, Brown. I don't know which Brown. That was Marquise Brown. Oh, that would make sense.

Oh, Marquise. I took Dobbins because I needed a running back. Edwards Hiller, and then this guy, Russ, who's the fourth place team, which is just taking punchers chances at dudes. He takes Baker Mayfield. Oh. He was like, oh, that's interesting.

interesting. So now all of a sudden, we're in the KC game. If Mayfield beats KC and Mayfield can get to third round, yeah, he's like, could win the league. So that's kind of what you have to do is the fourth pick. And then after that, it was, the next round was Antonio Brown. I took the Saints D, I should take into Bucks D, Jujoo, Kareem Hunt. Next round was Connor, Buffalo D, Steelers, D, and then basically everybody filled up their team. So my team heading into the playoffs was Tana Hill and Josh Allen were my QBs. Dobbins, Jonathan Taylor, Zach Moss, who was a great pick who ends up getting hurt. I should have gotten three games out of him.

Metcalf, Godwin Evans, Kelsey, Buffalo D, Tyreek, suck up in Saints D. So everybody's gone now, but I still have, I have Godwin and Evans, I have Kelsey, and I have Tyreek, and more importantly, I have a 60-point lead. You was going to say, is this, so the points just, the points just keep going. Totals. Oh, that's cool. Okay. Totals.

So I have a 60-point lead. And Tyreek and Kelsey. that might catch me. The first place team, he has like Brady Mahomes, Ronald Jones, Antonio Brown, who's hurt,

and Bucker. Oh, it's a rap. It seems like a rap. I'm a prohibitive favorite. But anyway, I was sweating it out. So the two key moments

were Wilson losing in round one, Mayfield not advancing in round two. And then the fact for me that the Bucks ended up making the Super Bowl and I had two of the receivers. I'm a good check. But is this more fun than just Is this more fun than just having fantasy

end after week 16? You got to admit. Danny, what do you think? Which, Danny? That's too. Well, High fit seems the most confused. Well, Danny Kelly's the one who can't do math live on air. But no, I love this.

I mean, I think that there's definitely a clear gap because the fact that fantasy doesn't have a real presence in the playoffs is just a mistake. And I really think that this is just another example. If there's all these issues with fantasy football, from the pre-Internet era that have stuck with it into now that we're 20 years into the internet era.

And this is one of them that was probably a lot harder to conduct another draft or whatever between the regular season and the playoffs. So it just wasn't a thing. You guys made it a thing. But this is one of those things. I don't see a reason that this shouldn't be a standard thing. Like, I think this is just more fun.

It would be way more fun if every league extended to the playoffs. I think the hardest part is convincing your league. Like, Bill, how many people were against you? I'm like, no, I got first place. I don't want to go into the playoffs and, like, potentially lose. you know, I don't remember I remember I was the one I came up with this format

way back when and talked some people into it but it was contentious. Yeah, but I think ultimately You had to whip up like some support from the group. Yeah, yeah, but ultimately we all landed on two things that made it more fun. The first was that it was fun

in the actual draft before the season to try to value real playoff guys. You know, like in our draft, Brady was always valued a couple rounds higher than in a normal draft because you knew you were going to get at least two playoff games out of him. So that part was fun. And you would see like, trying to think like somebody who puts up stats on a shitty team. James Robinson.

I mean like McCaffrey was on the, McCaffrey is on the Panthers. His teams are not going to the playoffs, at least not later. Right. So that becomes the question of how high do I draft McCaffrey, whereas like Clyde Edwards-Hillair was like the seventh pick in our draft because people are thinking, oh, if when they get in the playoffs, he's going to be this incredibly valuable running back in the playoffs. Turns out that was wrong. So I think the valuing

the playoff guys in August is a really fun wrinkle. And then the other thing is that the actual, you know, the way it plays out where basically the top two teams are going to be competing unless you have a situation where one of the other two rolls the dice with the Baker Mayfield situation. I remember there's one year, um, Jake the Lone when he was on the Panthers when they made the Super Bowl. He played four playoff games. And I think he might have won whoever the league that year

because he was putting up QB stats. It was basically you're getting an extra 100 points out of it. So the wrinkle of you kind of have to go into that draft really feeling strongly about certain teams. I did really well in gambling and stuff for this playoff. So I was just,

I really like Buffalo. I really like the Bucks. I want to stay away from Baltimore. I want to stay away from C. There are certain stayaway teams for me, and that worked out. But, you know, you look at, like, that Wilson versus Tyreek Hill decision probably costs my friend Mahadi, who was the first place team, that probably cost them the title. Yeah.

Because Tyreek is, I don't know how many points he's put up, but Wilson was sucked in that round one. You use up a quarterback spot, and that was it. That's going to be the difference. This is great because the other thing I wanted to, that I have started to love a lot more lately is the idea of doing like a, I don't know what it's what you call it, like a battle royale over the last few weeks for the playoffs. Instead of doing like a head-to-head, you know, where one guy, like you have the best team all year and then one guy can get lucky in the last, like you have Alvin Camara scores 60 points and then you're like great team. And this is me speaking from experience.

Like I hate that. And so I love the idea. And I have a couple of leagues that do this where you have the last two weeks or sometimes the last three weeks. it's just total score. And therefore, like, you're kind of guaranteeing the best team wins or the team with the deepest roster, which is a lot of times the best team. So I love that.

I think that's great. Extending it to the playoffs is like this whole new level of, you know, you have to really be thinking ahead. So I love that. Well, yeah, it doesn't make sense that as football gets more serious and important in real life, it gets less important and serious and fantasy. Like, they should be aligned, right?

Like, when football is the most important, fantasy should be a thing. This reminds me of the real playoffs, too, because, Like Bill said, you get the first pick if you're the number one seed. The number one seed getting a buy in the playoffs is this massive advantage, massive advantage. Home field, all that. So I love the idea that, you know, if you're rewarded for your regular season two, you know,

you get the advantages of home field advantage or whatever. How do you do the draft if it's not, like, do you just do it over email? Yeah, we did it. We did it over text. We just bang through it. It's interesting. One of the things that comes up with this is whether it's better to have somebody for three weeks or four.

Because, like, I thought KC was probably going to be Buffalo. But if I really thought Buffalo was going to make the Super Bowl and I could get four Josh Allen games and I had the first pick, it actually might make more sense to take Josh Allen. If I'm convinced they're going to be Kansas City, I wasn't convinced. But if you can get four games out of a quarterback or four games out of some awesome receiver, that's going to swing it. I think the one thing we probably should do that we have never done.

We've always just been the prizes for the title. There should probably be something where it's like 50% for the regular season win and then 50% for the playoffs, something like that. So you are rewarded for being the one seed heading into it. Or maybe even if it was like one third of the pool, we're just, we like doing it, winner takes all. And you're kind of all in on that. It's more fun.

I like the other part of this where you have an instinct for how the playoffs will go and you're rewarded for that. You're probably going to win because you had a feeling. for the Chiefs and you wanted to pair Hill and Kelsey. I feel like that's another part of fantasy that isn't, like Craig said, it's not aligned with real life. I've always been fascinated by the idea of if players only care about their stats when they win, I feel like you should only get stats and fantasy when your players win. I've always wondered if you could do that.

Yeah, Hyattitz always wanted that you don't get any points if the team loses. You get literally zeros and that part of it has to be like, oh, congrats. Christian McAfrica got 200 yards and three touchdowns and they lost by 30. Like, I've always just wanted, like, how much more that, like, it would just be so much more in tune with the value of a player, not just for having Brady in the playoffs, but the Patriots won 13 games, so Brady got you points in 13 weeks.

That's just a much more realistic assessment of value. Or maybe you just get like a five-point boost if the team wins or something. Maybe that's what it is. Well, there's a couple other fun things. One is, so you can keep three receivers, but you have a flex, and then this year we added the wild card

because of the extra playoff team. So I went into it with three receivers. I had Metcalf, Godwin, and Evans. And I had the second pick. You could argue I should have taken, Yvante Adams there. If I felt like the Packers are 100% of playoff team that is going to go to the Super Bowl, he's the best receiver in the league. I should just take him and grab the points. But I just felt like I wasn't 100% sold on Green Bay. They weren't playing in round one. And I felt like I was going to get three Allen games. Ironically, Allen didn't even do that well in those games. The other fun wrinkle is you have to fill at least two quarterbacks. So, and, and, And then if you want, like, you could be the third quarterback, could be your wild card. We made it so the flex couldn't be a quarterback.

But so the team, the pasta express, the team that, he's Italian, the team that, that had the first seat, he had Brady and Mahomes. He kept Brady, drafted Mahomes first, then drafted Wilson in the second round. So he had three quarterbacks, which historically is a good way to win. Yeah, because quarterbacks in our league, especially the quarterbacks, the points are, you get bonus points for 50-yard touchdown shit like that. But there were two quarterbacks that were not taken. Phil Rivers and Chubisky.

Yeah. But what we've seen in years past, sometimes people need to pad the, they need to get that second quarterback. But sometimes there's only six good quarterbacks in the playoffs. Right. So you end up with my second quarterback is somebody who then gets like a minus six or something. Because in our league, you have to throw for 250 yards passing

just to start to get points. What? Oh, I love that. That's amazing. 249 doesn't get points? No. So Lamar is like worthless in this league? Lamar runs for 100 yards every game, but he doesn't throw for 250.

Lamar is invaluable in our league because you got to get the 75 yards rushing and you have to get the 250 yards passing or your points don't activate. We don't, like, we don't condone the 170 yards passing, 110 yards rushing. Are you scoring this by? How do you, what website it scores this? Well, initially it was by hand. But now, yeah, we used the CBS website. Did you come up with the 250 rule?

The 250 rule is insane. You know what? I have fought to change this. And I actually was out of the draft for a few years because once I was on the West Coast, it became harder. And then I came back a couple years later because they made me feel guilty. But I wish we just were traditional. Because you'll have these weeks where people will score like 200,

10 points because Ty Rico got a 75-year touchdown and it's worth like 30 points because it's like touchdown bonus. All these things are like, oh my God, what happened? I'm thinking about like Lamar Jackson week 1, 2019 throws for like five touchdowns but only a 200 passing yards and the 200 passing yards don't count. None of it counts. Pretty much. Yeah. The passing touchdown counts. That's just unbelievable to me. Bill, you have, all right, you have a lot of opinions on scoring and we've been arguing all also, I mean, D.K here is very pro PPR. I hate it. I know you hate it. I'm curious how you feel if points per first down is a compromise between the two. It's too confusing. Riley McAthee's

big on it, right? Yeah, he can't, that's his baby, I think. The goal of football is to get yards, first downs, and then touchdowns. I don't know why anything else should be valuable. Catches or not, but first downs are better than yards. I don't like it. I don't love PPR, but I think half PPR has been a good kind of compromise. I like half PPR. It kind of sprinkles it on all the sides. That's the math.

I think our goal with football is to make it seem as, I mean, this league that we have certainly is not that realistic. What are your rulebook? Like the tax code? You don't get points till 250 yards. I'm like I'm going to take a class to play in that league.

Exactly. Hey, listen, if you want, if you're QB, earn your points. Get to 250 yards. Okay. It's do your thing. It's a passing league. I think it's ridiculous.

The Keeper League that I started this year, one of the, it always made me mad that pick sixes weren't worth more against the quarterback, so that's minus four in that league. Okay. There's a couple times that that was really good, but I actually really liked that.

I think pick six is, so Lamar had a pick six in the playoffs, and in this league it was only a minus two. I was like, that's the worst playing football if you throw a pick six. How is that only a minus two? It's the same as an interception?

I want to know what James Winston's points were in that game last in 2019. Oh my God. Seriously. So anyway, I think I'm going to win. The only way I, because I have, if Brady does incredibly well, I'm still recovered because I have the two receivers. Yeah. If Bahams does really well, I have Tyreek and Kelsey. So you're going to turn Poth Express, Aldente.

Right. He's, he's really upset. What's your team name? My team name is the hammocks. Do I want to ask why? He used to be the banana hammocks. and now it's been short in the hammocks. Because there was one tight,

you know those shorter underwear things where they're not boxers? They're like the tighter ones, the jockeys. Yeah. Yeah, it's the Friends episode with the Bannan briefs. So I had those on one weekend and somebody saw them and they were like, you wear Bidand Hammicks.

And that just became my team nickname, the Banana Hammicks. What year was this? In the 90s. This is early. He was partying at an Ibitha. And someone saw him in his banana. in a hammock.

Rob Stone is in this league. His name is Plenty Cheese. What? Or, aka the cheese. Because he's, we always used to make fun that he was cheesy. So he's, his,

his thing was, plenty cheese. So yeah. This is a great format. Thank you. We got, we got to do this. Let's do,

let's do, we need to do a league like this next year. I think the, yeah, the playoffs, incorporating the playoffs would work because the, I love this idea. Yeah. I already reached out to my big,

long-term league and was like, we need to, I told them, about Bill's League and I was like, we need to figure something out. I'll send you all the rules. It's really, it's a lot more simple than, uh, than I probably made it seem because basically the top four advance, you just fill in some extra things.

And the fact that there's 14 playoff teams now, I think it adds a little more variability to it, you know, because you get two extra quarterbacks. Like if we think about if we didn't have those two extra teams, somebody probably gets stuck with like Chubisky. Yeah, yeah. You know, and you're just screwed.

The best thing you did was the draft. idea where it's not snake, because then it actually gives the guy in first. That actually is a very good rule. Because I think if I was in first, I wouldn't have agreed to do this playoff thing, but now the way that you guys draft makes me think, I could probably get a pretty stacked team. Well, the other thing is, and this has been an unusual

playoffs, because you would have thought Buffalo would have been like an awesome team to ride because they played three games, but Allen's stats weren't really that great. Diggs was fine, but he wasn't awesome. And Zach Moss got hurt. And in general, like, they didn't really put up big stats. And then on the NFC side,

like, you know, Brady, I guess three TDs, three picks last week, but it's not like Brady was really lightened up either and their running backs were fine, not great. But in general, it's kind of a boring fantasy season for playoffs. Yeah. Yeah, and Devante didn't either. I mean, we've been doing this DFS game

where we, you know, pick players and we do trivia. And it's been a running joke where, you know, someone wins Derek Henry and then the loser has to take Jackie Dobbins and the Dobbins out does Henry. It's like I took Devante Adams and then Valdez Scantling does better. It's just, The stars haven't been producing at the level you've kind of expected, except for Kelsey and Kelsey you have.

Right. And Godwin, honestly, Godwin's been good too. Even with like the 19 drops. Yeah, we, I did a thing on my pot on Sunday. I just think this Kelsey Hill thing is becoming bigger than just one season. Like I think that as a combo, they're starting to move into this historical realm. You know, like the stuff when I was growing up, like Lynn Swan and John Stallworth and just these combos that Ido is here about are like the Washington when they had all the smurfs together

and Taylor and Rice and just these iconic comp Dupor and Clayton. And we haven't had that as much in the last 15 years. And I think Kelsey and Hill are going to be remembered in a whole different way. I think you're right about that. At some point, it just becomes a math problem. It's just Hill's the fastest player in the league. And Kelsey is just the biggest slot receiver. It's like you can call him a tight end, but it's just if the biggest slot receiver,

you know, he's six foot six or whatever. and those two players on the same field and then you have Mahomes it's three stars that all just pull defenders toward them. Honestly, I think it's like basketball and that's the same way, Steph Curry, just by existing on the court has gravity, right? He's pulling defenders toward him.

Hill and Kelsey pull guys toward them in a way that defenses can't do anything about it. Yeah, and then you got guys like Byron Pringle catching balls. Yeah, because he's wide open. That's what the difference in Kelsey and Granc is because they approach their offense like it's basketball.

And there's just space. You know, like, it's like when the bucks have Janus, their whole goal is to like spread things out. So he has space to try to get to the rim. And Kelsey's the same way. Gronk was always covered by 17 guys and getting interfered with on every player. There was no space because we had no deep threat.

It was all people doing criss crosses. And then they're trying to float gronk, but they always had dudes on him. And Kelsey, it's like, you can't do that. When they put the three dudes together with Tyree, and the odds of Tyreeks squirting through and just running 70 yards down field, then Kelsey can do whatever he wants

on the other side. Yeah, exactly. That's their best formation. Yeah, when Kelsey's alone, they have the trips on the other side. It really is just whatever you want to do. You put two safeties deep. It's like then they can just run the ball

like it against the bills in week six. They're in for like 250 yards or whatever. That was the most in an Andy Reid coached game. But then you want to shade a safety to either side. Hill and Kelsey, neither of them can be covered by one person. It's just, the chiefs have kind of broken the math of football. It's like 11 on 11 doesn't work versus them when they're all healthy.

You play Madden though, right? These were always the Madden formations that worked, right? When you ran the trips and then you send the tight end to the other side into space. And it would always work on third down or you would do like Buffalo was running that Madden thing where they had no receiver and they would spread the running backs wide and the Allen would take a beat and then he would just run. I was like, oh, total Madden play. That was like my third and six play.

I wonder if like Madden is a bit. affecting play calling now in positive ways. It might be. Honestly, a man-to-man, Travis Kelsey Outrout, works in Madden every time and it works in the real NFL every time.

By the way, you guys aren't old enough to remember like Madden in the mid-90s. The tight end, that was like the first play that reliably worked with like Ben Coates or Shannon Sharp,

Tony Gonzalez, where it was just like third and six, send the tight end in space. Travis Kelsey every year leads the... He is number one in fantasy and God damn it. Why didn't I draft him?

Every year I'm like, hey, he's 30. Maybe he'll kind of drop off. He does it and you're just pissed. That's why I did in this playoff league. I took him like 12th in the whole draft. I was like, fuck it. Every year I'm always jealous of whoever had Travis Kelsey because he's twice as good as every other tight end.

Then he's in the playoffs. He's the only valuable tight end. Kelsey had twice as many receiving yards as I think every other tight end except like Darren Waller. Right. He's a joke. Well, that's the thing. You have to cross your fingers.

He's not a tight end. You cross your fingers and you hope you. strike oil with the Darren Waller guy, but how often does that happen? Like once a decade? Yeah. It's not worth it. Is there ever going to be a third chief? Like, I was thinking about this this morning, actually.

Sammy Watkins is one of the highest paid receivers in the NFL. He was like a top 10 pick. And I can't remember any play from him this season. You know what I mean? It's always Kelsey and Hill. They concentrate. They're paying them. They concentrate their offense through those two guys.

I think it's pretty fascinating. it's like we're always searching for oh this guy's on the chiefs now but like does it actually matter because you know it's just going to go to hill and kelsey anyway yeah i'm curious what basketball team the chiefs remind you of bill because i think football is so much like basketball now it's like both sports it was like the paint or the running game was the center of the sport and then they've changed the rules so you can't be physical on defense in either sport and then it becomes about spacing right it's passing or three-pointers and now the chiefs i don't know if it's the warriors or what but they're just they're such a basketball team to me you know i've thought about this

Curry, to me, is Tyrico. Because of the space. Because teams are so scared of him all the time. Anytime he's moving, the whole defense has to react to it. Yeah, he's just as dangerous without the ball as he is with it. Yeah. Exactly. The space he creates just by being him reminds me at Curry.

I would say Kelsey is like the Clay Thompson, right? He's just catching shoot. And it's just like, if this guy, if we get him here, this is three points every time. But you could also say he's like almost like a Janus, like pick and roll, play him off, send of the basket, something like that.

And then Mahomes would be like the LeBron type, you know, like the guy, the queen on the chessboard, where it's like he can... He can run for 10 yards. He can throw a quick out. He can do it. Everything kind of fuels through him.

So it would almost be like if LeBron was playing with Curry and Clay Thompson. I think that's actually... Yeah, that's why it's a fucking all-star game. That's why they're winning. That's a good comparison because I think the Brady Jordan comps to this, sorry, the Tom Brady, Mahomes comps to, it's kind of like if LeBron played Michael Jordan in the finals.

And I think it's legit in part because Mahomes has the LeBron-esque thing of he's not just the most physically gifted. He's also might already be the smartest quarterback or at least can process things. Like it's not just he has this big arm. It's he can look off defenders so quickly in a way that it's just unguardable. It's like the same way LeBron's the fastest player and the strongest player and also the smartest player. It's like, what the hell are you supposed to do?

just a matter of who they're playing with. That's why the Watkins piece of it doesn't matter. The running back piece is the part that, you know, that's almost like having a center, right? It's like having, you know, that year, the Warriors tried to add boogie cousins. It's like, oh, what's this? Now they'll be able to post up and do things.

And that's kind of what they always try to do. But ultimately, it doesn't seem to matter who the running back is. Yeah. You know, like last year it was like, whatever. Williams just did stuff. And it's like, Joel Anthony or who was the heat center? It's just like they're the replaceable cogs. Yeah, it's like when the heat had like Mike Miller.

And he was fine. But on the heat, he was awesome because the one thing he could do is just hit threes and that's it. I got to go because I forgot to have a 1030 meeting that I'm eight minutes late for. Don't miss that. It's good to see you guys, though. You too. Good luck to the hammocks. Thanks.

Well, I'll tell you how it turns out for the hammocks. When you win, you got to put the money at a game stop, Bill. By the way, I wear boxers now, just for the record. Oh, wow, okay. Yeah, yeah. I've been boxers for 20 years. All right, good to see you guys. All right, later, Bill.

All right, that was Bill Simmons. I'm Danny Highfitz. Thank you to everyone. Thank you to Craig. Thank you, D.K., thank you, Bill. Thank you, Devin for listening. Thank you, Lenny. Thank you, Lenny Forns.

Lenny Dubs. Oh, shit. We should have had Bill picked the band. Oh, yeah. He would have done Pearl Jam. Pearl Jam. Or some, it would have been Yacht Rock. Yacht Rock.

Thank you, Yacht Rock Radio. station. All of yacht rock. All of yacht rock. TK., you a yacht rock guy? Not so much. I like yacht rock. Well, like, give me a few examples.

Doobie Brothers. No. No? I mean, I'm not like a big fan. I probably wouldn't turn the channel. All right, never mind. So we're not thanking the Doobie brothers. We're still thinking Warren.

What genre is Michael McDonald? Oh, my God. I just think he's his own genre. See his own genre? Give me a few more yacht rock. examples here. Steely Dan. Okay, that's fine.

Sure. Anyone named Dan can get a thank you on this podcast. Thank you, Steely Dan. Thank you, Lauren.