The Ringer NFL Show - Sleepers 2.0 With Peter Schrager

Episode Date: August 30, 2021

We start with some injury news around the league, including J.K. Dobbins’s recent season-ending injury, and where you should now draft Gus Edwards. Then, NFL Network and Fox NFL Insider Peter Schrager joins the show to help us update our list of sleepers for the 2021 season. Finally, we answer a few listener emails with Peter.  News: RB J.K. Dobbins, Ravens (1:50) WR T.Y. Hilton, Colts (6:58) Sleepers: WR Marquez Valdes-Scantling, Packers (21:30) WR Jaylen Waddle, Dolphins (27:31) WR Russell Gage, Falcons (31:54) WR Darnell Mooney, Bears (38:08) TE Foster Moreau, Raiders (42:42) WR Jakobi Meyers, Patriots (45:52) WR Mike Strachan, Colts (48:43) Listener emails (53:13) Check out The Ringer's 2021 Fantasy Football Draft Guide here. Email us at [e-mail]. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Guest: Peter Schrager Producer: Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The press box is here to catch you up on the latest media stories. Hosted by Brian Curtis and David Shoemaker, these guys have the insight on the biggest stories you care about. Check out the press box on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show on the Rear Podcast Network. My name is Danny Heif. I'm joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Krollbeck. Later, we are going to be joined by NFL Network's Peter Schrager,

also flying coaches, Peter Schrager. Yeah. He's going to give us some sleepers from, you know, actually just knowing everybody in the NFL. which is very helpful this time of year. And also the sleepers, they move up, they down. You've got to kind of reassess about who's actually going where this time of year. So Schrager's going to help us out with that with the inside info.

Also, don't forget, fantasyf football. Dot the Rear.com. It is draft season. The drafts are happening. Check out our top 200. We have our rankings, tiers, draft tracker, so you can actually track who's getting drafted in your league on our site. And you can look at our rankings, but also not, you know,

you don't need the pen and paper if you don't need to. If you want to print out the pen and paper, we have the printable rankings, everything you need, fantasy football. The Rearer.com. I'm personally a fan of printing it out. I like doing that. I like crossing it out by hand.

But, you know, we're in a bit of a predicament here because we obviously want everybody to use our rankings. However, if you want to win your draft, you shouldn't tell any of your friends about our rankings. You should be the only one to use it. So it's kind of a catch-22 here.

I'm not sure what I want to recommend. It's a bad content strategy, Craig, to actively just like people. Tell your friends. Tell your friends. Please tell your friends and lose your leagues. I want, I care about the fan more than I do our numbers. I want you to win.

You have integrity. Okay. Is that the word? Okay. But first, we got to get to a lot of news. A lot of news. Sad news. Ravens running back, J.K. Dobbins, out for the year. He tours ACL over the weekend. His backup is Gus Edwards.

Gus the bus. The Ravens are not currently expected to sign Todd Gurley or a veteran or any of the running back. So, D.K. Dobbins out for the year. Where do you have Gus Edwards ranked now? So we talked about this pretty in depth over the weekend. I put him right around. where James Robinson is in our ranking.

So RB21, RB22 in that area, like in the 50s or 60s, I'd say. I think he's going to have a really big role. He's going to have the lion's share of the work there. But I do think they'll continue, the Ravens will continue to use a, like a rotation, a committee. Tyson Williams is a guy that's had some hype over the last few months. Justice Hill is still around.

And they may end up signing a guy or getting a guy on waivers. Because obviously, there's going to be a lot of teams that cut down from whatever it is, 80 right now to 53 over the next week. There's going to be a lot of running backs on the open market now after that. You know, there's been rumors of the Ravens potentially going on finding you guys. So we'll have to see, by the way, I'm throwing a name out there. Alex Collins, former Raven, who knows their system, knows their run game, and has been really good in the preseason.

The Seahawks were featured him over the weekend. So if he doesn't make the Seahawks team, that could be an option. But regardless, I think, you know, he, he, he, He's not going to catch a ton of passes in theory, and I would have him a little bit lower than Jackie Dombins. But we had this thought, like, you could make the argument he could potentially be even higher than where Dobbins was because he has less competition now.

Well, because he doesn't have to compete with Gus Edwards, because he is Gus Edwards. Right. So I don't know. It's tough. I'm just being a little conservative because I think they're still going to pick up a guy. And I think they could use just a pretty, like, you know, 55, 45, 45, 60, 40 committee.

It's just tough to know. It's tough to think about, this is how I'm trying to think about this. So if they add a guy, let's say they add a guy. Will the guy they add be the new Gus Edwards in terms of if Gus Edwards is now the J.K. Dobbins, he's the lead guy. This new person they add becomes the second guy, the Gus Edwards of last year. Will that person get as many carries and steal as many touches as Gus Edwards did for J.K. Dobbins? If not, and why isn't Gus Edwards just ranked right where J.K. Dobbins is just plop them in right in the same spot? Yeah. Because we had

Dobbins 17th, RB17, before he got injured. It's tough. It's really tough. The answer on why Gus isn't with Dobbins is the uncertainty. Like if Gus does just have Dobbins' role or, you know, volume, maybe not the role, but if his volume, yeah, he would be where that is. It's just we don't know right now. I think the weird part of the Ravens depth chart is so they've got this guy named Tyson Williams, who has basically surpassed Justice Hill for third on the depth chart, which

now is basically second on the depth chart. so even though they like Tyson Williams this is still an extremely inexperienced backfield like Justice Hill is this like very athletic guy that doesn't have a ton of like game experience Tyson Williams doesn't either so I think it would not at all be surprising for them to bring in like that

Alex Collins even if they're saying it won't happen right now I would be a little surprised if Gus Edwards was like the most experienced back for this Ravens team who wants to lead the league in rushing having said that they gave Gus Edwards a contract extent mention like early years like 10 million kind of money that they're like it's not just like oh Gus Edwards is the backup it's like they trust him with the ball and he's averaging over like five yards of carry he's been really good he's like solid he's a really good runner so he's good it's just a matter of price I disagree with you on the James Robinson part just because I have James

Robinson a lot higher than you post these Travis E.TN JK Dobbins injuries I have Robinson really like in that in like the I think the 40s range right around like where jakey Dobbins was for me and some people have them in like the fourth round, fifth, whatever. I think that's where Robinson is because I think he's just a better player who's going to catch more passes.

But again, this is still a Ravens team that could be one of the better offenses in football. And Gus Edwards seems like he's going to get a lot of red zone carries that Lamar, you know, the ones that Lamar doesn't take.

Yeah, it's tough. Because I think Gus still has a lot of the negatives that surrounded Dobbins, passing game usage, Lamar Jackson's stealing, a lot of rushes and a lot of red zone looks, all that stuff. But he's good.

It's going to be good offense. They're going to score a ton of points. I think he's just a really solid R.B.2. Let me ask you this. Would you feel comfortable with him as your RB2 this year? If you get him late, yeah, but realistically, I feel like someone's going to reach for him thinking he's like this sleeper guy that you're probably right.

Somewhere around 60. I think I have it to take Gus in the top 60. I'm kind of just going to pass. That's what's kind of tough about the situation is I think the casual fan when they just see like, J.K. Dobbins hurt. They're like, oh, cool, Gus Edwards will just be Jake. Dobbins and then they'll draft him super high and then your intelligent self can't take him at the correct spot because he'll probably just go a little early now. The whole point is that this is just more

evidence to me that this year it's okay to wait on that second running back spot. You'll be able to fill it somehow, some way with some player and take that running back early, take two if you want, but you can loan up in receivers in the middle rounds. Yeah, I'd still just wait and get Zach Moss, Chase Edmonds, those type of guys, like 30 picks later. Other injury news, T.Y. Hilton has a neck injury cult receiver. So T.Y.Y. Hilton has, it's a disc issue. So quoting Frank Reich, it's a disc issue. So that's a complicated

issue. More meetings, more evaluation to come, more opinions to come. He will miss some games. We don't know exactly how many. We're optimistic. It's not season ending. And quote. So that obviously is bad. T.Y. Hilton is an older player. You know, this is awful. You know, anytime it's a neck injury, that is awful. So Michael Pittman seems like the number one receiver in

Indianapolis right now. D.K., where would you take Pittman now? amid all this like michigoths with indianapolis and injuries. So let's see, I'm just looking where we got him. We have him in half PPR, right in that Mike Williams, Chanel, Brandon Cooks,

Jalen Wattle range. So I'd say like eighth, ninth round. And I think that still sounds right. I'm not necessarily reaching for him, but and honestly, because he hasn't really shown us that he can be the true like quote alpha receiver or whatever. I think it's still some uncertainty there. But I think he's a very interesting

later round guy that has the upside to be, you know, to, like, significantly outplay his ADP. So if he's on the board there with, like, Mike Williams, I might actually lean Pittman just because of the unknown and the upside. I think Mike Williams is sort of locked in as the number two, but Pittman could be the number one in this offense. So does that make sense? I think Pittman is, unless I'm mistaken here,

I'm kind of scrolling through these lists. I think he's the cheapest number one wide receiver in fantasy, which, you know, has some merit on a Frank Reich offense. Someone's got to catch pass. Someone's got to catch passes. I mean, I think we kind of overshot a little bit on this Colts thing. It's like Wentz got hurt. Nelson got hurt.

And we just like fucking dropped everybody 30 ranks. And now it's like, oh, they both might play week one. Yeah, but just a couple other things on the Colts front. So Sam Ellinger, who's going to be one of the backups for the Colts, sprang to his left knee, so he's out five to six weeks. Wentz is now on the COVID list. Yeah, not good. So we'll see whether he has to quarantine for how many days.

Yeah, I'm not going to like pick him to win the Super Bowl. I'm just saying, like, I don't know if he should be the last wide receiver one taken in the league, Michael Pittman.

But, well, the other thing I just want to note about the Colts, their left tackle, Sam Tevey towards A.C. L.

he's out of the season. And Tevi was replacing Eric Fisher, who has an Achilles injuries recovering from from that's coming back middle of the year. So they're on the third left tackle

two weeks out from the season. And then left guard when Nelson is the foot injury. Yeah. So that's, the left side of the line is decimated.

No, maybe not decimated, but tough. Okay. other things, so we like Pitman though. Yeah. Other injury stuff, the Giants are a flat circle. It's the same team.

It's the same. Everything about it's the same, including Evan Ingram just flashes and you're like, wow, why are we too low in Evan Ingram? And then he leaves with an injury. So he has a calf injury. We still don't really know the severity of it. But just the Giants, again, to recap, they signed Kenny Goliday. He has not practiced in almost four weeks. He maybe comes back this week, maybe ready for week one, but he's not practiced in four weeks.

First round pick Cadar's Tony receiver, also hurt, also not practicing. Evan Engram now is the calf injury. Sequin seems set for week one hasn't actually been tackled yet, but suddenly is one of the more healthy players on the Giants. And then Sterling Shepard and Darius Slaten. And Darius Slaten left with an injury too, but he was fine. Are like the only healthy guys in this team. If you're looking for a giant player,

Evan Engram, if he's magically fine, he's probably good. But realistically, Sterling Shepard's the guy in a PPR league that you're probably looking for. Shepard is the quintessential Glansburg, I think. He's like the guy, he's the most boring pick you can make. It's the least sexy pick you can make. But he's also been incredibly consistent when he's been playing, when he's been healthy. It's like you could just bank six targets at least for him every single time he's out there playing. So yeah, he's like in PPR and half PPR especially.

Like he's one of those guys where if you just want someone who's going to be a safe 10 points or whatever in half. PPR and PPR. You know, it doesn't have as much outside as everyone else, but that's fine.

He's just the kind of guy to fill out your flex spot or whatever, your wide receiver three spot. Sterling Shepherd is your guy. He's closer to a bi-week fill in

than an upside bench guy, but, I mean, yeah, he will catch passes. I agree. He's kind of in that like Cole Beasley range.

I mean, he's basically, he's been nicked up the last couple of years, but he is on pace for just about 80 catches every single season. And like, if he's healthy,

I would probably project that again. He's also changed numbers this year. He's number three. He's number three. He's one of those guys. I like it. Other news. DeAndre Swift,

Lions running back has a core injury. He's just continued to be limited in practice. Is this new? Or is this just the same thing he's had? This is just kind of an update. I'm like, he's just still not practicing. And it seems that Dan Campbell's a little concerned,

not just for the core injury when Swift returns, but the conditioning, which I think is an important element to understand that even if Swift is back, I think Jamal Williams is going to play a lot for the Lions. I really like Jamal Williams's late round flyer. If you're looking for running backs, just because I think, I think he's going to play more than people in vision.

If you're doing a salary cap draft, to throw two bucks at Jamal Williams is worth it. Okay. The last thing I want to ask you about, DK, 49ers used a platoon at quarterback, which they have been doing in practice too. Yeah. So preseason Raiders,

first 24 snaps. Garoppola took 14, Tray Lance took 10. What do you make of this, DK? I have no idea. It's one of those things where, on one hand, it could be what they're absolutely planning on doing.

They're just going to do, this running back, or sorry, this quarterback platoon, where basically Trey Lance comes in and does run game stuff where they're doing read option, blah, blah, blah. He's essentially Taysam Hill with a talented, accurate arm kind of deal. You know what I mean? So, like, basically they're swapping out the quarterbacks based on what the situations are.

It looks like this is what they could be doing. However, it could just be Kyle Shanahan trolling in the final preseason game and basically saying to his week one opponent, I'm not sure who that is, but the week one opponent basically has to now prep as if Tray Lance is going to be playing half the snaps at quarterback, and that makes it much more difficult to prep for. It makes it much more complicated. You have to do all this work on read option stuff. So it just makes it much more difficult to prepare for. They might end up just playing Garoppolo. We don't know. I would not necessarily start Tray Lance. Like we've been saying

all summer draft Tray Lance late because once he starts, once he becomes the full-time starter, he has like top 5% potential. But if he's only playing half the snaps, I still. I still think it'd be worth just kind of wait and see and how this goes. I will say in this game against Raiders, he scored a touchdown on a read option. It was awesome. They did like, you know, they had like Jalen Hurd running across the formation. They had a read option play. He kept it.

The defense just totally dived on the running back and left him wide open. This is like what we're going to see all year. It's just going to be really difficult for them to defend this stuff. So, yeah, I don't know. It's kind of like the Taysom thing last year. Too bad. I wish that Trey Lance had tight end eligibility. because that would be like the wrinkle you really want.

But I don't know if he can necessarily start him until he is the full-time starter. Does that make sense? I love the idea of everybody kind of shitting on the Sean Payton Taysam Hilton Hilton for like four straight years. And then Shanahan comes in and does it with Lance. Everyone's like, whoa!

This guy's a genius. The difference is Tate-Hill is the major differences here. Trey Lance was the number three pick overall. He's a good thrower. And number two, Jimmy Carapelo is not Drew Breed. Right. And Drew Bria. I get it.

But you know, it's still there a little bit. No, I totally. People love, people love Shanahan, like, unrepentantly. And so I definitely understand what you're saying. He's like the fucking riddler now. Everyone's like, ooh, what's he doing?

Yeah. I think D.K., everything D.K. said is true in that it's to mess with the opposing defenses. But I also think he will do this in the regular season two. Mm-hmm. Like, I think this is going to happen. What do you, do you think this is like, okay,

regardless of the fantasy thing, do you think this is a good idea? Yes. I just think it's so hard as a quarterback to, like, I guess, I mean, I don't know. I've never played quarterback. back, so I don't have no idea. But like, it'd be hard to get into a rhythm and stuff if you're constantly getting

subbed out and like only being used on some plays. It just feels like it could make both guys worse. I don't know. Like, that's just my worry. I always can make both of them better, honestly. It's kind of like one of those if it's working, like it's, you know, it's great idea. And if it doesn't, it's not. But I think that creatively, like, if Lance has 45% of the playbook down and those

are 45% really good plays, use them. Like, waiting until it's 80 or 90% to put them in. like I get why Shanahan just is like, no, we're going to do all of it right now. It will, I will say like 100% confidence. It makes 49ers a nightmare to defend, put it that way. And a predicted fantasy, which is super fun. Yeah, yeah. All right.

Okay, so let's get to sleepers. All right, we are joined by Peter Schrager. You know him from Good Morning Football on NFL Network, but more crucially, you know as the host of Flying Coach Season 2 with Sean McVeigh on the Ringer podcast network. Peter, as Craig was producing that podcast for you, how quickly did like the brotherhood start flowing? It was total bromance. Craig's the man. I wish I could restart my career as Craig. This guy has it all going on. He lives in the West Coast. He's great looking guy. He's hanging out at McVeigh's

house at one point this offseason, which sounds pretty cool to me. I'm stuck here in a Brooklyn apartment just grinding away. Craig is living the life and flying in and out of all these tropical locations. He's got it good. He gets to hang out with you guys. three times a week or often you guys do this. He's living a good life. Yeah, if you define hanging out with Sean McVey as setting up his equipment, then yeah, we hung out. Yeah, so, D.K. and I, Danny Kelly

and I get back. We go on vacation this summer. We come back and Craig has just done a few pods with you and Sean and he's like, guys, I really like Cam Acres this year. I'm like, what do you mean? He's like, well, I just spent half an hour talking with McVeyer after setting up his equipment. And I'm like, oh. Craig knows. It's like, he'll say

something to us because we would do the podcast, which if anyone hasn't listened to, promoted again, flying coach. It was awesome. We had a blast and Craig was fantastic with it. But we would do the podcast, but there would also be like an hour afterwards where we would just bullshit. And he would drop nuggets on us about his team, his roster. And it's hard in the fantasy world not to make a mental note and be like, all right, he sort of likes this first round, you know, whatever it is. So we got to release those tapes. This is like the B sides for this podcast. That's a great segue, Peter, because I wanted to ask you, so you've been in the

same fantasy league since 1997, right? Yeah, the East Coast Dream Team League on CBS Sportsline. That is what we've been doing since 97 when I was in high school. CBS Sportsline, I used to use that high school. That was how we like, we track the games, you know? But I wanted to ask, you're an NFL insider. So are you

in the league with other people who work in the NFL? It's all just people who work all over the world? Do they not like, do they think you're cheating, have inside information that you're not telling them about? Every draft pick you make, are they like, oh, he must know something? Yeah, and it's, here's the truth of it. I have not won this league title. since I've been doing this professionally.

Never. So I come in all barrel-chested, like, oh, I know from Josh McDaniels and Belichick, speaking with them in the summer, that Stephen Ridley is going to have 1,800 yards. Stephen Ridley gets injured in the week, second week, and nothing happened. You know, it's like, I have my guys.

I have my picks. Last year, I think I took Clyde Edwards-Hillair first overall because of all the things that Andy was telling me about how good he was. And then Clyde Edwards-Layer had a fine rookie season, but he wasn't worthy of the first overall pick. If anything, sometimes the insider knowledge in August and July will trip you up in your head because you go too big on it.

But no, I don't think I have any inside knowledge as far as an edge to win. And certainly my friends don't give a shit. Like my friend Ryan is a personal finance guy. My other guy does mortgages. One of them's a cop. Like, they don't give a shit about what I do. They want to just draft their fantasy team and talk shit on the message board. They say that, but when you said a trade proposal, they're like, he knows something.

It's fair. I mean, sometimes I'll try to dump a guy or I'll pick up a guy on waivers, and it's way too odd that, like, I have something. But rarely is it ever like, all right, I'm going to Travis Folgum before he has his big breakout game five days in advance. You know, I usually find out when the rest of you guys find out as to who the guy who's going to have the huge breakout performance is going to be. Well, we're going to get to some big breakouts right now, and we're going to dig deep.

We're going to figure it out right now. Yeah, with all that said, now you're going to give us your sleepers. Yeah, give us the, now that we know you don't have an edge. Here's the truth, though. I will say this. And it includes you guys and it includes all the guys who have done really great work on this. I give you guys so much credit for developing such a voice for fantasy. Because it's a totally different world than what I'm in, where I'm like, you know, this guy's ankle injury, this guy's contract.

And here's the story behind why they drafted this player. But you guys focus and you use numbers on targets. And where I come from is like, I'll talk to the offensive. coordinator and be like, who's looking good this year and what can I expect? Well, here's a name that no one's looking for. So it's kind of at meshes, but I give you guys a lot of credit for looking at it from a numerical thing. Mine's usually anecdotal and just who's getting the positive feedback in camp. I think you got to mesh, mesh both those things, though. I think those are absolutely important. Like playing time equals fantasy like production. So I think I love that.

I actually try and get all the nuggets I can, you know, throughout the preseason stuff. That's why I really appreciate the reporting and stuff that you guys do. You know, the quote, like the people that are not in the fantasy realm or whatever. So I just think, yeah, this stuff is great. I love it. Yeah, fantasy people are just a bunch of pencil pushers, man. We're just like looking at numbers. Desk jockeys.

We don't know what's going on behind. But wait, Craig, when you were talking to McVane, you were listening to all the head coaches, didn't you feel like you had a little insight there that you didn't have beforehand. So that's where I get like, all right, because I was with Schaefter last week. Name drop, big time guy, Adam Schaeffter. We were together and we're at the golf and we're walking around. And he's asking me, like, give me a fantasy guy you got. And it's like there's no one more connected than Adam.

And even he's asking my thoughts because he plays fantasy. And we know that the work that you guys do and I'll say on their side, like Field Yates and Matthew Barry and all those fantasy reporters and like what they do, it's noble stuff. I mean, devoting every day to fantasy and not just big picture football stuff. It's like the jacket sleeve of the book we're going to put noble stuff. that's our noble stuff. That's this pod. So honorable.

Yeah. When we had Arthur Smith on, he was talking about Kyle Pitts and I was like, oh my God. I was like, Kyle Pitts is now going to be a top three tied in for me. And he will be.

But with that said, let's jump in some guys. So Peter, hit us with someone. Again, I think you're right. Like, you want the numbers to point you to somewhere,

but you wanted to overlap with the human knowledge. So like, who's a fantasy sleeper that you're in on this year? Okay, so we can go really deep cut or we can go names that you're hearing. I'm going to go somewhat deep cut

to start. The first name, give you is Marquez Valdez Scantling. Oh, yes. I have this guy on my list. All right. All right. Let me tell you about a guy who transformed himself over the off season, not physically, but this guy is now a route runner, which is something he was not in the past. He would still have those big games, but he can now run the route tree and he has gained the trust of Aaron Rogers. As I say this, I could see the Reddit threads rolling their eyes because I get

caught doing this all the time when I say, I speak to guys in Green Bay, but I speak to guys in Green Bay. and they're like, Valdez Scantling has arrived and is a completely different receiver. And there were some practice habits that Rogers didn't love in the past. Valdez Scantling has worked himself into being a bona fide number two wide receiver and what I think might be the number one offense in the league.

So whereas he might not have been a draftable fantasy player in recent years, I think you could slide him in as your wide receiver three and be very happy or even your wide receiver two. I think Marquez Valdez Scantling is going to have a huge season alongside Devante Adams. I love this. I like that he's transformed himself,

but not best shape of my life guy. He's like a best mind of my life guy. Right? Like the best mental of his life. Yeah, exactly. But Rogers, if you listened to Rogers last week, they asked him about, we call him MVS. They asked him at MVS and he said like,

here's the deal. I could talk about the player all you want. I'm going to talk about the person. And this is someone who's changed himself as a pro. Like, was not ready for the pros when he first came in, but had the body, had the speed. He has made himself a trusted player.

And for Rogers, it's all about trust. If you burn him twice, like he's done with you. That's how it is. That's why he loved Kumero so much because Kumero knew the route tree and Kumero was Raiders. Valdez Scantling is getting that talk. And I know the coach is there. They love what they got this season at him.

So big jump for Valdez Scantling from good fantasy player to like reliable fantasy guy. I like this. I had this on my list. And right now, according to the expert consensus rankings, he's 210th. He's the wide receiver 81. You can get him free. You can get him with your last pick of your draft. Sometimes I can pick him up on waivers.

if you already drafted. But I was just looking, so a couple things. Number one, I love, like, the idea that, like, he's become a pro and things like that. Because, like, so many guys, it just takes different guys a different amount of time to turn into that. I keep going back to, like, Golden Tate when he came into Seattle. It took him two full years. Like, he was starting to look a little bit like a bust. He was in the league for two years before he really kind of, I think, matured into the superstar player that he was for the Seahawks Lions.

etc. I just think sometimes it takes guys a little bit longer to kind of like become pros and high fits you probably make fun of me for this but like I said on the past like people can change man people can like get they can change their mindset. Valde Scantling was actually

among receivers second most targets last year among receivers on the Packers he quietly had 63 targets however he only caught 33 of them his catch rate was atrocious and he was always just going deep I feel like that's part of the reason why And I think if they expand his route tree, you know, and Rogers has that trust for him. He shows that trust in the short and intermediate area more.

He's going to get more targets. He's going to get more like third down looks. Instead of just being like this dedicated deep threat, he averaged 20.9 yards per catch last year. So that was basically his role is just go deep. I'm going to hook it up to you. If he has improved as a route runner and earned Aaron Rogers trust, we've been searching for this number two receiver in the Packers' offense, you know? So is Aaron.

So has Aaron, honestly. And like, he found it in Bobby Ton, you know. last year as like the Red Zone guy. But I think there's a thing with sleepers and fantasy. You always want to take that second year breakout player, the KJ Hamlers, the Jerry Judes, the Henry Ruggs, the Brian Edward. Then there's the guys that have been around. And I think it's like a fourth or fifth year guy. And in this case, Valdez Scantling to me is one of those names. I'll tell anybody who'll listen. I go out and, you know, I'm such a celebrity that people stop me in the streets and they want to know fantasy tips. And I'll always tell them Valdezic, that has never happened. But if

someone wants to stop me and be like, who am I taking last in my fantasy draft? I would say, go with Valdez Scantling. I'd feel confident on that. It's never happened unless it's Adam Schaefter in the golf course. That was it. That was the only one. And I'm sure he asked every single person watching the golf before he got to me, but he was asking just, he was looking for my thoughts as well. So one last thing to add on him. And I think this is interesting is, so I think I heard Rich Reber talking about this is basically like, for high draft picks, typically if you don't pan out in the first two to three years, you're not going to pan out. And this is like just, if you're looking at the numbers of all last, of all the. receivers taken in the last like 20 years.

Where you do find later breakout guys, like third, fourth, fifth season is players who were drafted later in the draft and who came from small schools. And I think MVS hits both of those in terms of like it just, he came into the draft. I think he was like a six round pick. North Carolina State and South Florida. So he just kind of took this different route to where he is now. Sometimes these guys that they find later in the draft, that teams find later in the draft, Like they just, it's harder for them to climb the depth chart right away or earn the trust of whoever is like they need to earn the trust of whether it's the OC or the quarterback.

So yeah, I think this is another guy that kind of fits the role of a quote late breakout. I mean, this is his fourth season, but still, I mean, you know, most of the time if you're like a first or second round pick, if you're not doing anything by your fourth season, you're not going to do anything. But I think this is a chance to be like that late career breakout. And we talk about this all the time, like in fantasy. Like, why like boring picks are usually the best picks. like this drafting MVS, no one in your league is going to be like, wow, Craig. You nailed that one. Good one, good one, dude.

But those are the ones that work out. Everybody is going to draft Jalen Waddle, like, or the guys like that this year. But it's like, oh, MVS, the boring veteran guys, the ones who are actually established other ones who are probably going to have the best chance of actually returning the value that you want at like a late round pick.

Yeah, with that in mind, you just gave me a good segue to one of my sleepers, Craig. Oh, is it Jalen Waddle? Jalen Waddle, yeah. Wow. Asshole. So real quick, I don't actually have any like numerical like data to back this up. I just think I'm like a vibes, like vibes for the dolphin, vibes for Tua, vibes for Waddle.

And I was doing a piece on Tua the other day and I went back and watched a bunch of Waddle and I was just like, man, this guy is like faster than I remember. When I was doing all my college scouting and everything, he is just explosive fast. And he looks like he's healthy. he's in an offense I think that especially with Tuo under center like if you go back and watch Alabama when Tua was playing like it's all rhythm

it's like hit your back foot get the ball out hit the back foot get the ball out he's spread the ball around he's launching deep shots it's very rhythmic and like you know just he has to be in the zone type of deal Tua is not that as a rookie

and in preseason this looked like he has had that sort of like he's been able to just drop back you know he's knowing what he's seeing he's getting the ball out I think they're going to design a lot of plays for Waddle underneath where he's just, you know, catching a slant, trying to pick up yards after they catch, doing screens, things like that. They're also going to use them as a deep threat. So I don't know.

I just think Waddle is interesting. I also think Will Fuller and Albert Wilson could be values in your drafts. This Dolphins offense, I think it's just a little bit undervalued right now. Can I get in on Waddle here? Heck yeah. So I talked to a bunch of the coaches and most of them had Jumar Chase ranked above Waddle and Devante Smith. I don't know if Flo would be upset with me saying this public.

now. I said sources at the time, but it was from him, and I think afterwards he might have confirmed it. They had Waddle number one on their wide receiver board over Jamar Chase, over Devante Smith. And one of the reasons was A, the punt and kick return ability, which is insane. But also, this guy Fs up his ankle in a big game and sits out and could have easily never come back and still been a top 10 pick, worked his ass off at Alabama to make sure he could play in that final BCS championship game was 20% of what he. could have been and yet knew it was going to be on tape, knew the scouts would be watching, knew it might not be his best effort, goes out there basically still hobbling and makes plays.

And like, if you're trying to play for the dolphins and what Flores is trying to build, like it's toughness first. It's wanting to be there. It's all about attitude and culture. So, yes, you have all the stuff that you mentioned. But there's also this feeling of like reliability and accountability where it won't be treated like a flashy fast rookie. It'll be treated like, all right, here's my guy.

I trust him. And I know I can go to him. and Tua, of course, has a great relationship as well. Yeah. I'm just excited about it. And right now, you can get him in like the 10th round or later sometimes. And it's just like it's a no-brainer to me because I think he's going to be a featured part of this offense. He's the sixth overall pick, you know, and they trade it up to get to that spot.

So, yeah, I'm just really excited about what this can do, what this offense can do. And I also am just a Tua believer in general. I think that Tua is going to have a big second year. Peter, you went on the Dolphins with the Taurus with the two. with resurgents too. I don't know yet. I got to see it. He's smiling at that comment.

He's like, I don't know. There's a lot of things that would give you hesitation, but there's a way to shoot a hole or poke a hole in every one of those things. One, Chan Galey was the offensive coordinator last year.

He had been with Ryan Fitzpatrick, with the Bills, with the Jets, and then with the Dolphins. And that was an offense that basically was like the Ryan Fitzpatrick offense that he knew and could spit it out. Tua was coming in as a rookie, not only off an injury,

but with no training camp, no preseason, learned everything on Zoom. and an offensive coordinator who probably wanted the veteran instead of him. Now they've got, you know, a co-offensive coordinator, which is really interesting. I don't know how that's going to be either. And I've asked around and there's no real clear explanation of who exactly is calling the plays and how it's going to work.

But it's an old running backs coach who's legendary in Eric Studsville and then George Godsey, who's been around as a quarterback's guy. So they're kind of molding and they're melding it. But like, there's no one behind him. Berset's not going to replace him. Like this is it. Sink or swim for Tua. There's no threat of.

him being yanked for poor play. But I have been hearing the Watson trade rumors before the Watson stuff came up and then after the stuff. And as long as that's in the ether, like I just got to see Tua do it actually. But there's a lot of Tua supporters in that building and a lot of Tua fans outside of that building. I just got to see it first. Yeah.

That makes sense. You got another sleeper for us? Yeah. Here's where I'm going. Same thing you guys are talking about. Late round pick takes him a couple years. But here's his moment at wide receiver. I love Russell Gage in Atlanta.

Wow. Wow. This is a late round guy at LSU. He comes in as like a potentially a quarterback. Like he played quarterback in high school. They bring them in and it's just stars at wide receiver. It doesn't really have his moment at LSU. Gets to the Falcons and has been chipping away, chipping away, chipping away.

Obviously, Hulio moves on and everyone immediately says, all right, that's because of Ridley and because of Kyle Pitts. We're great. They love, they love Gage. They love what he can bring. And it's one of these guys that has a huge upside. Again, late in the draft maybe. Maybe he's the third option on that offense,

but he could also end up being their second option because Ridley's the one, he's the two, and then Pitts plays the tight end position and isn't necessarily a wide receiver, like everyone just assumes, and it might take him a little bit. So I love what Gage can bring. He's an athletic player.

He's smart. He has worked his way into the lineup. And I know that Arthur Smith and the offensive coordinator, Dave Rohn, really have strong feelings for him. So those are two guys that I trust, and they both spoke publicly and privately about how high they feel about Russell Gage. See, Peter, this is the type of shit

that's going to make me draft Russell Gage now. He had 100, he had 109 targets last year. Right? The quietest 100 targets in season. He was on your top 10 list on Good Morning Football, right? You did your top 10? Yeah, I saw that too, and I was like, man.

Yeah, I do my top 10 breakout players. He's on it. That's the type of guy, though, that, like, no one would think Russell Gage because he's been around. Like he's been around. Guess what? It's his moment.

Like this is his time and he knows it and they're going to give him a lot. They're going to give him a lot of targets and a lot of workload. I love this too because it's, well, first of all, I just respect that you came on here and I had no idea how deep these sleepers

are going to be. And you're just like, boom. Russell Gage. Yeah, I love it. Perfect. I also just love the being, like betting against the, hey, Kyle Pitts generational talent

who everyone's obsessed with, including us. And you're like, hey, also like, this is other guy at 109 targets there also is on that tape it's not against pits too like right like can't they all just be have a blow up seat like a new offense arthur smith is brilliant and we'd spoke to him on the flying coach but like his reputation is so good around the league for drawing things up that no one's ever seen before and that's yeah the stuff you hear from mcvay and shanahan

and all these guys like arthur smith is respected there's a lot of offensive coordinators in this league who don't get that kind of respect and don't get that kind of pub arthur smith is that guy and now he's the head coach. And I think if he's talking high about Russell Gage, like Russell Gage is going to succeed. That's just the truth of it. Maybe he'll be the Corey Davis, you know, that he was in Tennessee,

kind of the one B. Yeah. I love these two sleepers because the hard thing for us this time of year is some people have drafted and many have not. And it's hard sometimes to help people who've drafted already have more. And like, these guys are available. They probably are. Unless you're a 14 team league.

I don't think Russell Gage is on someone's roster. No. I have a question just generally, Peter, about like the Falcons and Arthur Smith. because, you know, Arthur Smith, he comes from Tennessee where they were very, you know, balanced. It was, it all, the offense runs through Derek Henry, blah, blah, blah. And going into this season, it doesn't really feel like the Falcons have made

running back a huge priority. Obviously, they brought in Mike Davis. And then a bunch of just random dudes, like they had a couple of undrafted free agents come in. It just feels like they're going to pivot away from this, our offense runs who are running back style. have you heard anything about that? Like in terms of like, are they going to be pass-heavy?

Do you think it's going to be a big switch or they're going to just kind of do what they did last year in terms of Arthur Smith calling plays and the style that he brought to Tennessee? Do you have any insight on that? Yeah, look, Arthur Smith made his bones as a tight ends coach originally. Like, that's where he came up with Tennessee and then was offensive line coached

and was obviously working with the offense when LaFleur was there. LaFleur takes the head coach job and then he gets there. So it's not like because they had Derek Henry that his offense was going to be, run the ball, pound the ball. He comes from a very, very interesting background. And a lot of that is the Shanahan offense and the LaFloor offense and what they run. So they're going to find ways to run the ball. Those offenses always do. And they don't always have A1 lead backs like Derek Henry. But they're going to throw the ball quite a bit too. And I wouldn't underestimate what he did for Ryan Tannahill's career.

And everyone says that's on Tannahill and that's variable in Tannahill. Like Tana Hill was a backup quarterback to Mariotta and goes in and then now is without a doubt, consider one of the top 15 quarterbacks in the league. I think Arthur Smith is there's a lot of credit. I think he can rejuvenate if he even needs it. Matt Ryan's career a little bit too. And Ryan's going to be throwing the ball over the yard. Matt Ryan was an MVP in the Shanahan's game. I know. I know. Rejuvenate and MVP. Mike Davis will get rejuvenated. It's going to happen. Hyfitts is just smiling throughout the whole thing because he's like Mike Davis.

Hyfitts loves Mike Davis. The Shannon's theory. We have a theory way here. I don't know if we have a whole thing on the show about names. Let Danny finish. No, Craig, this is important. No, I was just going to say the, like the. The reason why we believe that Mike Davis is underrated, as well as a lot of other guys in the league, is because of their name. We believe in name bias. Like boring name syndrome. Doug Baldwin wasn't the biggest victims of that. And we think if Mike Davis's name was like Flash Gordon, he'd be going 20 spots higher in draft. Flash Gordon. It's fair. It's fair. It's fair. Robert Woods is that's that's problem. Yes, Robert Woods. I'm with you on this. It's fine. Corey Davis, a lot of these guys. The other part of Mike Davis that I haven't explained enough is the Shanahan system has about 30 years of turning running backs you've never heard of into really good. good guys. O'Landis Gary, Mike Anderson. Charles Davis was seventh round pick. Like, you forget all these guys, like Steve

Slayton for one year of Shanahan, like the Texans. That's the season that I think Mike Davis is about to have. There was a kid in Washington before Alfred Morris, or maybe after Alfred Morris that I'd never heard from again that Mike, that Kyle Shanahan got on and just they went bonkers, Dunbar maybe. I don't know. There was some running back, but it's every single time. And it's Jeff Wilson. And it's, it's, Rahim Moster and it's, that's why, like, I don't think they need a Derek Henry in that backfield. I think the scheme is going to be fun. Aaron Foster.

Aaron Foster, seventh round. All right, Craig, you got a sleeper for us, someone who's going to go after the seventh round? Yeah, I want to talk about Darnell Mooney, the wide receiver on the Bears. I'm into Darnell this year. He was a fifth rounder. He was a rookie last year. He played 73% of snaps. But the stats don't really tell the whole story with Darnell.

You could look at him and be like, all right, 600 yards, four touchdowns, not bad. But he didn't become a starter until week eight. and he was playing with Nick Foles and Mitch Trubisky, who could never hit him. 45% of Mooney's passes downfield were deemed uncatchable, or were deemed catchable, which was second worse in the NFL, which isn't surprising with Foles and Chubisky. But, you know, what does Justin Fields do well? He's great to throwing the ball down the field.

And I think the biggest sign, and this is what Peter was alluding to earlier about, like, you know, sometimes these preseason training camp hype can get us a little bit too excited than it doesn't pay off. I like when you don't hear about a guy. I like when things are quiet, and I like when they don't play in the preseason. Darnal Mooney has played six. snaps his preseason. I really like that. It's a good sign.

A guy like Brian Edwards hasn't played in the preseason. Like, I like stuff like that. He played no snaps in week three. So, you know, he was the number three guy in the offense last year. It was Alan Robinson. It was Anthony Miller. And then it was Mooney. Well, they liked Mooney enough to send Anthony Miller off to Houston. And now he's just the number two guy. He's had a great camp. He has a good relationship with Alan Robinson. They're like best friends teaching each other stuff after every route they run in practice. Matt Nagy said he reminds him of Deshawn Jackson.

I was going 13th in the 13th round in Yahoo Drafts. Like the number two receiver on a potentially awesome Justin Fields, or at least exciting Justin Fields' Bears' offense. And even if it's Dalton, I think he will fare much better with Dalton than he would with Foles or Trubisky. All right. So Mooney last year made national headlines. It is a star on Twitter and beloved in Chicago for the double move on Jalen Ramsey.

If you Google it right now, you can find it. It's the first and only time ever seen Jalen Ramsey just fall out of his shoes based on player. Now, it was an incomplete pass because a lot of passes in Chicago the last few years have been so. But the views and the angles that the Sunday night cameras got of Mooney just shaking Jalen Ramsey, gives everyone these tantalizing things. They love him there. They love him there.

And he's a number two for sure. The question is the quarterback. If you're going up against an Aaron Rogers quarterback situation or you're going up against Amal Holmes and you're looking at, all right, who's getting him the ball. Mooney could be great, but I just don't know who the quarterback is. and even if it is Fields, if Fields is going to be able to be consistent enough to get him the amount of action

where you're going to start him in your fantasy league week to week. One thing was Chicago was that Kevin Jenkins, the left tackle, just having back surgery. So now they got Jason Peters, who I believe is 39.

Yeah. No offense to any people in here, but 39's pretty old for left tax. It's fine for NFL media. Hey. I mean... Fine for NFL media. The Bears are locking.

It's fine for NFL media. It's fine. Prime. It's prime for NFL media. But 309 is pretty tough for a left media. tackle in the NFL, especially when that guy had injury issues, like five years ago. So I'm a little concerned the expected improvement of Andy Dalton, considering we just saw

what happens to Andy Dalton when he's like a third string left tackle. And then if fields come in, I think the concern we have with rookies is how many fantasy players can you actually support? It's like Alan Robinson will be fine. It's like the second tier drop off. But I think to Craig's point about Mooney is that he's so cheap that you take the flyer on it. Like you're not really spending anything with getting Mooney, so it's fine. I like him.

13th pick. I mean, it's all upside. These are all darkers at the end of the draft, and I think he's the highest upside. He's a legit good route runner. So Matt Harmon does reception, where he tracks guys, success rates against different coverages and on different routes, and he's had a really strong profile. If you remember last year, he was being used around the line of scrimmage, too, as like a screen guy, and, like, would they just get it to him in space and let him do his thing. So he's more than just a down-the-field deep threat, and I think he can win in the short and

intermediate area too. So yeah, I'm definitely excited about him. You know, they also, they get Tariq Cohen back, who opens things up a little bit. And then they got big game, Dame. My man, Damien Williams from the Chiefs, who should have been Super Bowl MVP. He's now their number two running back with Montgomery. Like, their offense got better this offseason. That helps, and that opens things up.

So Mooney might have those one-on-ones where he could just burn someone or do a double move like he did on Ramsey. Like, I like the Mooney pick. I do. I like him as a player. I'm not sure. where on that pecking order he is. And that's solely because of the quarterback play,

I think, could be very inconsistent this year in Chicago. Okay, so more tepid. So you love every number two receiver except Craig's pick. That's what I'm hearing. More or less. That's all right. You heard them. They love Darnell Mooney.

They did. Can I give you another sleeper? Please. Yes. You will never, never hear this sleeper on any other podcast, see it on any other list. Ooh. This comes from multiple horses,

his mouths down in Las Vegas. You're going to take Darren Waller, and you're going to be happy with that, and he's going to be great. Oh, don't do it. But if you've got the 9th or 10th or 11th tight end sitting there, my man, Foster Moreau, the second tight end on the Raiders is going to get a lot of looks. They are running an offense this year where, yes, they've got rugs and Edwards on the outside, and Hunter Renfro is going to do a little something over the middle.

but they have a two tight end scheme and Gruden raves about this guy now a lot of it's because he can block in the run game and they love what he does and he's great and he's going to be a head coach somewhere in the NFL when he's done playing because he's apparently the smartest guy ever Foster Moreau

number two tight end in Las Vegas fantasy worthy draftable player I'm putting it out there. Foster really sounds like someone who was friends with like Henry David Throw and was by the Walden Pond or something just was in Walden Pond just existentialism just to the nine.

D.K. So I was, my mouth was agape, as you said, Foster Morrow, and DK's just vigorously nodding. Yeah, nodding. You like him? So, Dynasty Brain Strikes again. He's a, he's a popular sort of, if you're going to have a handcuff or a tight end, Foster Morrow is the guy because he's really talented, he's really athletic.

He had a 36-inch 466 and the 40. Wait, Peter, you have to know. We have a soft ban on the word athletic on the spot to describe tight ends because every tight end, like, it's part of the job to be an athletic. You have that. Yeah, me. It's because it's meaningless. Tell me when the tight end's not athletic. I'm sorry, continue about...

Jack Doyle. Jack Doyle. That's the only guy. He made some plays. I think as a rookie, he was kind of quiet last year, but he showed the body control. He got a major injury last year.

So, yeah, he came back from it. So I think he had five touchdowns his rookie year. There you go. Yeah, he had like body control, go up and catch it in the air. I like this one a lot. I don't know a ton about him past that.

Generally speaking, like in fantasy, you don't want a number of two tight end. Generally speaking. If they're running a lot of two tight end sets, you never know. Listen, if you're in a 30 round draft, you could still get Foster Moreau on waivers. Make your jokes. I'm telling you, I think Foster Monroe, when it's all set and done, finish his top 12 tight ends. And if that's the case, he's worthy of drafting. Absolutely.

I like this. I'm not going to say anything because Deky already humbled me when I plugged Adam Troutman like six weeks ago. And Dek was like, I think Juan Johnson's going to win that job. We were like, well, the undrafted phrase, he was switched positions. And he was like, yeah. And I was like, oh, okay. And then it happens.

So all those saints guys are so, it's so hitter. You could throw a dart at the board right now. Anyone who tells you they know, like Calloway had those two catches, that's great. But I know that Trey Kwan Smith's like their guy when he's healthy. And they love Tony Jones at running back. Like, there are so many names that I had never really heard of before this year that Sean Payton is whispering about to people who know. And I would not touch any of them because I have no idea what they're going to roll out.

pull for uh brashad parraman to reconnect with james down there in new orleans just got cut crazy all right one other i'm gonna throw one other sleeper here uh this one's pretty simple it's just it's jacobby meyers for the patriots who is a number one receiver cosplaying as a number four because he's going in the same range yeah don't put any images as people said but as Craig like he's going the same range as all these other receivers like the mv like the marcus valde scantlings of the world guys you can get like the second last round but here's the thing jacobby Myers had, I believe, 11 points five times in the final 11 weeks of last season, which is when he was playing.

He doesn't have any touchdowns in his career, so he's like totally under the radar. But realistically, this is a guy who was productive last year when he started playing. Then Julian Edelman retires so that there's way more opportunity for him in that offense. Then Mack Jones is going to take over the quarterback at some point. So the offense will get better. So you're left with this number one receiver with a bigger role and a better offense and just a better player than really, it's like these three overlapping underrated

things that are making him fall. But in reality, if you can throw your, talk about darts to throw, you can get him with your last pick. And I think by the middle of the season, you'll trust them to be able to play in your flex spot. He had from, whenever he started playing, because basically the Patriots sort of had him on the bench the

first few weeks of the season randomly and weirdly. I think they wanted to feature Nickeel Harry or whatever when he was healthy. But when he started, from when he started playing in the offense, he had a 29% target rate, which was second most in the NFL. Like, he was getting peppered with targets. He's getting open.

He plays the slot, obviously. So that's, like, going to be those easy PPR points for you. And in the preseason, he's been, I think, you know, based on what we've seen, their best receiver. I think he's, like, their number one receiver. Now, he is playing in the slot. So that might, like, affect his usage a little bit, depending on what they do if they run a lot of two tight-end sets, which I'm assuming they're going to.

So that's something we'll have to see. but I think number one, if Mac Jones wins the job at some point, whether it's week one or week three or whatever, I think their passing game is going to be much sharper and much better, and I think Myers is going to be a big part of it. I love Myers. I'm all over this one. This is a guy you absolutely should just grab latent drafts

and just like see how it rolls out. Yeah, they just have so many new faces there that I'm not sure they've unveiled it all. Like when they brought in Agalore and they brought in Kendrick Bourne and they brought in Janu and they brought in Hunter Henry, to me, it's almost like, be patient to say wait and see because it's almost like Jacoby and Nikiel Harry were the guys they had. Well, here's a whole entire new batch of players. Where do these guys fit in? But yes, Jacoby Myers, he earned the trust of a lot of folks last year in this weird

Cam Newton, Jared Stidham, Brian Hoyer, like whatever that offense was. But his first year, he outplayed Nikil Harry in a lot of ways. And I think that there's Josh McDaniels does have trust in what he can do. And he's only getting better. All right, Peter, do you have any sleep left if not. We got some emails to get to. My last sleeper. It's the deepest sleeper you will ever hear. Deeper than Foster Moreau? Do you have a third string tied in from the Raiders?

This is a sleeper so deep that you might not even know the name. I love it. This is the Indianapolis Colts seventh round pick out of the College of Charleston. His name is Michael

Strawn. Is that on anybody's list? Wide receiver. like Strayhan with a C. Spelt Michael Strachan. Is this the Strachan guy? Yeah. His name is Michael Stront. T. Yilton's down.

It's this, oh, it's going to be Pitman's here. Is it? It's going to be Zach Pascal's here. Is it? Strawn has come in and has made three or four eye-popping plays in preseason games. They are going to be a receiver group by committee. One of these guys is going to emerge because they're going to throw the ball in Frank Reich's offense.

And I'm telling you, there is a chance. Probably don't draft him, but keep an eye on him on your radar. For the deepest sleeper to ever be mentioned, put it in the books. I said this in the late August, Michael Strahan. Not Strahan, not Strachan, that's my guy. Deepest sleeper you'll ever hear. Straight Chan. Tough name.

I'm in awe. The main reason I know about this guy is because I was trying to figure out how to pronounce his name. Stront. I got, I got, Peter's the Pro. That's, you know, Peter's the Pro who's been in the game, is connected to Steve. because you can pronounce that name. I said it's... The way that I remember it is

it's like how the word draft is spelled in Europe like draught. That's how I think of Strawn. Strawn. Our man, Strawn, is enormous. He's 6.5-226. Guys, I like this. There's something to this.

He's had... I looked this up the other day, actually. I think he has 16 targets in the preseason that's the most among all Colts players. 11 catches 130 yards. He's been... In every game, he's been impressive. and there's like a lot of buzz coming out of Colts camp about this guy, so I love this one.

I agree. It's maybe not like beginning of the year he's going to be like a star, but like he could work his way into this offense and like end up being a really regular contributor. They don't have anybody else really. One of my favorite catches of all time is Julio Jones on the sideline, undefeated Carolina Panthers. Luke Keakley's covering him and Julio like does the, like catches it like over his head, like just kind of like does this. It's one of the greatest grabs ever. Strawn did that in a preseason game against the Panthers. here.

Strawn just went and got it. And I'm like, okay, there's talent there. Look, there's not a big college of Charleston NFL pipeline. I just love when there's like this random, random, random guy that you could draft. And everyone in your draft looks and says, okay, well, you could have easily taken Randall Cobb or some known, no one would even blink an eye. But if you want to look like a real hot shit at your draft, like you're doing some deep, deep work. And you've got sources. Go with Michael Strong.

in your last round and everyone is going to be like, what? And you're going to feel pretty good if he has a big game in week one. You know, Adam Schaefter asked me to play golf the other day. I'm not going to go. I'm just going to text him. Just Michael Strawn. Let me correct this to Schaefter's story. We weren't playing golf.

We were walking the golf course at one of these PGA events. And I went like any other stooge dressed in like golf clothes. And there I get there. And Schaefter is so dialed in, walking the course, following Spieth around. I'm like, what up, dude? and he was just dialed in. He wanted no fantasy tips. Golf is the only sport

where you dress like the players playing the game. Tennis. Tennis. They do it there also. At the U.S. Open, just in case, like, Djokovic goes down,

some 50-year-old European guy is going to hop into the... Yeah. Got a racket in their backpack. Yep, I'm good. One of my best friends, girlfriends, is getting into baseball

for the first time, and we're watching in 30 seconds and she's like, why is the old manager also wearing a uniform? Great question. And I was like, I have no idea.

I like it. I think it's cool. stick with it. Old man in a baseball uniform? Tony Larissa wearing Southside for the Chicago White Sucks. All right, let's get to the emails and the voicemails.

We don't actually get voicemails here, Peter. We don't have the flying coach budget. We just have emails here. We also never really came up with a name for our email section. No, mailbag. We just call you emails. Mailback.

I don't know what that is. Well, I wanted to call it the inbox, but we realized no one would know what that meant. That's, yeah. So anyway, we're going to do this flying coach style. Craig, take us through the emails, and if you have voicemails, go for it. All right, no voicemails. This is from Josh. Josh. There it is. Josh, he says, I play in a league where every manager is allowed to make one rule change upon

paying their entry fee. So that would be if you have 12 people in your league, that's 12 rule changes every year, as long as they pay. And in parentheses, he says, the pot is then invested in crypto for the duration of the season with the winner getting whatever it's worth at the end, which is hilarious because if it's like, Dogecoin, you could get like fucking $3,000 or like nine, depending on what happens. And the league doesn't matter. He goes, after nearly a decade, the rules have gotten extremely convoluted. A rule change is defined as changing a single value in the ESPN league setting.

So, for example, you could reduce the number of quarterbacks from two to one to zero. And he basically wants to change the entire league to CBS.com, but that doesn't count. He wants us to adjudicate if that's okay to do. But he sent us his actual rules. This is a bunch of lawyers in this league, by the way. which is hysterified. That makes a ton of sense. They always have to do this.

Here's my wrinkle on it. Read the bylaws. Yeah. The bylaws. Let me just run through a couple of rules here. So they are 0.66 PPR. This is pure chaos. You start 24 players and you have one bench spot.

I like that. What? Dude, this is like baseball. I love it. I like this. You have two kickers, one punter. You start two head coaches. I'm not sure how that works.

I love this. If your quarterback gets sacked, you get five points. Two point conversions rushing are worth 20. Stop. Stop. Stop, stop. I must heard you, clearly, or else these lawyers...

Did you say that the quarterback gets five points if they're sacked? Correct. I think these lawyers are so bogged down in their rules. They need to break out. They need some chaos. They need to feel something, and this is the only way they could do it. So two-point conversions rushing, you get 20 points, passing only two. So they really value rushing.

You get six points every missed field goal. You get 22.22 points for a safety. 30 for a blocked punt and negative 12 if a punt is less than 33 yards. It's the most bat-shit league I've ever seen. Peter, we started a segment called League Rescue. It's like Kitchen Nightmare or Kitchen Rescue with that guy Robert Irvine

where he walks into a restaurant that's a mess and just fixes everything. We're doing that for leagues. People send in their weird rules. I don't want to fix this league. This league is perfect. Is this why we have judges because this is what happens

when lawyers just make all the rules? Who the hell is Rob Irvine? Isn't it Taffer? isn't that the guy? Robert Irvine. He's like the big ripped guy and he's like, it's called Mission Kitchen Impossible

or something? That's, that's the light version of Bar Rescue. That's the show I was raised on. There you go. Bar Rescue. John Taffer comes in,

screams at someone spits in his face. All right, here's a couple of things on this league. A, I love it because I also, I'm always like,

why not just mix it up? The head coach's idea is something I presented to my league, probably in 2003. I said, you get 10 points for a win.

That's it. And you get, get five points for a tie. And it could be the difference of your week or it's not, but you have a head coach. And it also adds in this factor of I'm rooting for a team week to week that might not be your home team. And it kind of just throws a wildcard in. Now, as for the crazy points allotment and the big ass roster, I don't know, but the head coach drafting, I like that. You're speaking high fits as language. Stop validating high fits so much. Highvich was 0.6 for PPR. 0.66. PPR is perfect because PPR is a concept is the devil's work. So that's really appropriate.

devil's work. Oh my gosh. I don't even know what to say about this league other than God help these people. Yeah, this is the craziest league I've ever seen. Our legal system is so messed up. A bunch of lawyers investing in crypto and they're fucked up fantasy.

And I'm telling you, this is not like your Jake Brighant's time to kill lawyers. These are like white shoe firms, New York City. These are like the top, these guys are all making several million, their partners, several million. And this is what they're dealing with.

Trust me. I know many of these types. Before we decline to, change the rules, we should probably, let's assume that the head coaches get points for a win. Peter, this is your chance. This guy's going to propose the rule. We can just make it instead of like 10 points for win. We can just make it a thousand. And that way, just the head coach league. Yeah, he is asking us what his rule change should be. I mean, how crazy can you get? Maybe if your coach gets fired, you win the league? Can I tell you a tangent here? But another thing that I've got friends who do,

that sounds awesome, 32 teams in the league, right? You take eight guys or gals, eight owners, and you just do a 32 snake draft with eight teams. You each get four teams each. And at the end of the season, the team with the most total wins wins the league. So you're not betting on, you're not doing players. You're doing teams,

but you have this random combination of four teams and you're rooting for them so hard every week and you're up against seven other groups of four teams. I like these little weird leagues that are not just your standard Yahoo fantasy leagues. Well, so we did it at the ringer and with Bill and I won. And then he owes me lunch. and then there was a pandemic

and I have not gotten the lunch. He ain't getting that lunch. He needs to postmate you a sweet green salad. Okay, this last one here's pretty fun. This from Matt. He says, hey guys, for years I've been trying to decide which is more important for league's success. The draft or waivers, which is a really interesting question.

So a new idea was born. The Castaway League. Rules are simple. Ten team league, normal scoring. Nine bench spots, though, which is a lot. He says nine teams out of the 10 participate in a traditional snake draft. At the immediate conclusion of the draft,

those rosters are set for the entire year. No players can be added from waivers for the remainder of the season. But the 10th guy in the league, who, like Tom Hanks from Cassaway, was left on an island alone unable to participate in the draft. He gets sole access of all of the waivers for the rest of the year. Do you think this player can win the league? I think that's a really interesting idea. Craig, so the first nine picks, but there's no snake?

It's a snake draft, one through nine, but they have a ton of bench spots. They essentially get one backup for every position in case of an injury. but after that your roster is set you cannot use waivers but this 10th guy who did not participate in the draft gets every player on waivers

for the entire year Oh my God I love it but I would only want to be the 10th guy I would only want to be the 10th guy because it's like such a challenge it's not fun to be the first nine guys right I mean if you go back and look at I mean there's a lot like people like

DeMarco Murray who just like took off in the middle of the year Lamar Jackson all these guys no one had them in the draft I think the problem's the nine bench nine bench is too many because that is going to dilute it but even like six or seven

makes it possible Well, he's doing nine bench because he's, you know, one person per injury. You don't get to make ads. Yeah, it's a good point. I love this, though. I think it's so fun as a second league. But I don't know if I'm asked, I'd only be really into it if I'm the 10th guy because that's such a challenge and so fun.

It's like playing like stratomatic baseball or something. That's a reference before your time, guys. But it's one of these deals where you can like completely like manipulate, all right, strategy and go. It's almost like war games. Well, the rest of the night are just playing standard fantasy. Maybe they should make it so the winner of the league each year becomes the waiver guy the next year. That's like your award for winning. I like that. Well, no, I feel like

it's the opposite. It's like the way Bill's Bill's League is like someone gets kicked out. It's I have to draft. It's like, hey, by the way, you're not participating this year. Like, you just have to watch all that prep. Can I, can I weigh in on that too? Because I listened to all that saga last year. Didn't you feel like there was some eerie, like bad blood between Sal and Bill when they were talking about it? Like, that doesn't that leave? Like, there was like genuine bad blood and they were being laughy, laughing about it. But you could tell there was like some really deep, deep hurt that someone was voted out of the league. Who was it?

Was it Bill voted out of league? It was Bill. Oh, he was pissed. Bill has never been voted out of that league. He got voted out and was so upset he started his own league. Yeah. He took his ball. And then he had the greatest thief and hear about it from Sal.

So I feel like that's not a fun thing to do. Like that's like that kind of like ruined friendships. And like it's called a guillotine league, isn't it or something like that? No, no. The guillotine league is fun. Guantene league is different. And we've gotten a lot of emails about it, which is you, it's, I don't know, maybe 10, 16 teams.

you can know how many of you want. If you lose, you're out. Like you're out. Oh, in the season. Or, you know, two losses. But Guantian, I think, is a, you can only get a shot. Oh, you're talking like, it's a Survivor League of Fantasy? Yeah, it's like March Madness.

So you have 16 teams in the league. That sucks. That's a shitty idea. Wait a second. What if you, what if you seated the teams and then, I don't know, there's got to be a cool way to do it. That's fun. So if you lose week one, you just don't play fantasy for the entire year? Cooked.

That sounds terrible. I guess then you go to family. Shouts out Fandall. There you go. Got to go to Fandle. I kind of like the any creative, like, league, though. All right, my last thing with you guys, before I go with a sleeper, I'm hijacking your podcast. The promo to your podcast is that Waffle House story, and it's on every thing.

Now, that made national news when the guy did it and tweeted about it. But in the promo, you guys are acting like, hey, do you hear about this? Will you edit that promo to a new promo? Because I love your podcast, but that story is not unique to your podcast anymore. Okay. Well, maybe we're going to explain. That story, someone, I think either the same league did it the year earlier or someone else did it.

Okay. So we recorded that months before the story was wrong. I was sure that because you definitely wouldn't have acted like no one knew about it. Of course. So now I guess I sound stupid in all these promos. No, not stupid, but I'm like, oh, I remember that thing on Twitter. But you guys have so many other stories. We've got to refresh it.

My friend recently just had to do that 24 hours in a Denny's because he got last. and every grand slam he ate, subtracted four hours off of his time. He just did that a week ago. Do that one now. Not IHop. Do that one. They're not Fawful House,

but Denny's. Yeah, all of our promo should only be just like horrible draft stories. That should be every promo. They're great. Or just Michael Strawn. Strawn.

Strong. Michael Strawn and Foster Moreau. No joke. I'm going to get all three of you Strawn jerseys and you're going to wear them on the podcast. That's awesome. He's got to make the 53 first, but then I'm going to do that.

They can actually. sell his jersey first. We'll make it. So the to do list is we need Michael Strawn jerseys. We need to re-record the trailer for this podcast. I need to make some cuts in Marquez Valde Scantling in some of fantasy leagues. And then I think that's it. Peter, this is why it's great that we have you on.

You know, no deepers, this is like the comatose sleepers with Peter Schroger. We got Foster Moreau. Michael Strawn, this is great. You're not going to find this anywhere else. This is the regarding Henry sleepers. That's a, that, that, This is where we're at here. Regarding, is that a, is that Harrison Ford? Yes, it is.

Yeah. Right. Phil Major Craig right there. That's incredible. We watch it. All right. Thank you, Craig. Thank you,

Jake. Thank you, Peter. Wait, oh, this is important. Trigger. We pretend that we're on S&L. Like, thank you, Lauren. And then we have to do it.

So I'm going to do it. And now you have to think of band. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Holy shit. Yes. Is that the comatose of fans?

He's in my job. generation. So I love that. Deep cuts. God, if Craig Horlbeck listened to walk on the ocean one time, Danny,

he would know exactly what I'm talking about. Toad the Wet Sprocket is the most underrated band of the 90s. Go Google it. This is the hottest take and we've ever heard

on the show. I love it. Toad the Wet Sprocket. Check it out. Also, real quick, wait, is Stan gets more famous than Steely Dan or no?

No. Steely Dan is huge. Enormous. I'm just trying to confirm. That huge. Yes, they are huge. Steely Dan

is as and I'm in New York so I don't know they play the beacon every year for about 10 days when they both were alive one of them's passed

since then but Steeley Dan is massive guys that is yacht rock thank you fuck incredible unbelievable thank you Peter

thank you so much thanks Peter loved it guys thanks