The Ringer NFL Show - Underrated Tannehill, Overrated Hurts, and Week 15 Fantasy Mailbag

Episode Date: December 16, 2020

We lead the show by discussing Ryan Tannehill’s under-the-radar greatness before opening up our playoff mailbag for Week 15. We cover the possibility that people are overrating Jalen Hurts, rank the rookie RBs for this week, and answer some difficult QB and WR start-sit questions. We finish the show with a dramatic bad beat, some pretty terrible best man speeches, and much more. Ryan Tannehill, Titans (5:25) QB Sit-Start (11:20) RB Sit-Start (19:50) WR Sit-Start (24:43) Bad Beat (28:54) DEF Sit-Start (37:35) Best Man Speeches (39:05) Email us! [e-mail]. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's episode of the ringer fantasy football show, we go through the week 15 playoff mailbag, where we talk about the underrated Ryan Tannahill, the possibly now overrated Jalen Hertz, and which rookie running backs can you trust for the playoffs? Also, a lot of people are terrible at best man speeches. We go through that too. Stick around.

Welcome to the ringer fantasy football show. My name is Danny Heifitz, and I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Coralbeck. Are you guys ready for a fun fact? Yes. Yeah. Okay, this is from Nick. Nick.

When lightning strikes, it flows from the cloud to the ground, but the part that we see is actually the charge going from the ground back up into the cloud. I knew that. Really? Whoa. Yes. I don't know when. I must have learned that in school.

But yeah, I always knew that the lightning we saw was it going back up. Well, this blew my mind. D.K., did this blow your mind? I've heard this before, but I still don't understand it. I don't get how it works. Glad you asked, because I have NOAA.gov and up the National Severe Storms Lab. And it says, the cloud to ground lightning comes from the sky down, but the part you see comes from the ground up. A typical cloud to ground flash lowers a path of negative electricity that we cannot see.

I don't know what that means. Towards the ground and a series of spurts. I love the word spurts on a government website. Objects on the ground generally have a positive charge under a typical thumbstorm, and basically it just shoots up because opposites attract. I don't really know what that means, but that blew my doors off. Interesting. So it's not, you know, lightning in the first half, nothing great. A half comes alive on the way back.

They had us in the first time. half. They had us in the first half. Have you guys seen that? Yeah. Yes. Okay. Well, oh great. We have a thunderous mailbag episode for you today. Oh, boy. All right. Going to catch light in a bottle.

I was wondering how you're going to transition. It's not exactly germane to the mailbag, but it is an adjective that connects. It wasn't my finest. Before we get into the sit starts and everything about our mailbag, can we just talk about the Lamar Jackson poop incident? Yeah. Do you guys think that he pooped his pants or that he was cramping? I actually believe he was cramping.

Yeah, I think it's funnier the idea that he went in to take a dump though. Oh, it's great. It's great for, as Darren Ravelle would say, terrible for the country, great for country. But if you guys have played high school sports,

college sports, whatever, I mean, it is rare that you have to take a number two in the middle of playing sports. Like, your body usually just doesn't allow it. Like, something's really got to be going wrong. It's rare, but it's not like impossible. The fighter flight thing takes over.

Yeah, no, That's true. You get all stopped up. That's like evolution at work. Right. Yeah. Like you don't have to go. Like if you have to go the bathroom and then a burglar breaks into your house, like you don't have to go the bathroom anymore. I feel like the pregame, the nerves though, can have. It can make things happen in your body. Yeah. The pregame number two is are abundant. That's really how they should evaluate quarterbacks. They should just kind of like deal with like the pregame rituals and just kind of observe. And then I think that that is really how you can test their metal, right? Because that's what you. see what they're made of. I always find it interesting

when you hear about celebrities that get nervous before going on stage. Bill Hader used to throw up before going on SNL every week. Sounds lovely. Isn't that weird? Yeah.

That's crazy. I mean, that sounds like it, like that sounds like a huge problem. But the thing is, you see him on stage. He looks incredibly comfortable. He's so talented. It's very bizarre.

Kristen Whig has like a major stage fright. She hates speaking in front of crowds. That's so bizarre. What, okay, this actually just reminds me of something from my high school days. And believe me, I'm not like saying back in the day

when I was so good at sports But tell us about back in the day when you were good in sports. My first varsity game in high school of basketball, it was against the crosstown rivals, and it was like this crazy pack gym, like thousands of people in there. And I got so nervous that I completely forgot the plays. Like I could not remember our plays, even though we've practiced them like a thousand times, got on the court. And they're like, they're calling the plays.

And I was like, I don't know where to go. I literally forgot what I was doing. And I got yanked after like 30 seconds in the game. It was bad. I remembered eventually, like, in that game. It was just, like, the first, the very early game jitters, I completely, like, lost my memory.

What was your game akin to? Who were you? Yeah, who's your doppelganger? Oh, I don't even know. I was a three, like a wing, spot-up shooter, slasher. Oh, slasher and a shooter. Like, I was like the type of a player

that doesn't have a mid-range shot is either a three or a lay-up. So I was ahead, I was, like, basically. You were ahead of your time? I was ahead of my time, pretty much. You're like a little Robert Covington or something? Okay. Sure.

Wow. D.K. Roco. Holy cow. Wow. Well, D.K., you're still ahead of your time. And speaking ahead of time, we're going to get ahead of time. We're going to ahead of people's lineups this week.

It's Wednesday. We're going to do some start sits. And including just general mailbag questions, which it's really changed the name of this. It's an inbox. I don't know who has a mailbag anymore. It's a nostalgia. Yeah, I guess, yeah. I guess we got to throw back to something here.

But we're going to go through. So let's just start with quarterbacks because we got a lot of questions about people with quarterback issues. Specifically... It's a tough one this week. It's tough. We got an email. Let's start with this one.

Hi, this is Jack. I just wanted to say I love all y'all. Y'all are hilarious. I've never listened to the show, but I assume... Did you tweet this out? Jack on the show. This is hilarious. Never listened to the show.

Well, he better, or else he's not going to hear the answer to this because we're not tweeting at him. He says, I have been riding Pat Mahomes like a 25 cent horse ride. on the outside of a Kroger to a playoff berth in my league. I got a very strong visual on that. I know exactly what he's talking about. I'm just wondering what week, if at all,

should I bench Pat Mahomes? I have Ryan Tannahill on my bench and he's warming up on the sideline ready to rock. What week do I make the switch? And then we also got another email from a guy named John asking do he play Lamar Jackson and Ryan Tannel this week? So, D.K., is this absolutely insane? I mean, it's not insane,

but I'm not going to advocate for you to sit Patrick Mahomes. I think you start Patrick Mahomes, especially if you've been riding them like a 25 cent horse ride on the outside of Kroger. Yeah, no, I would say don't get cute. This is kind of that situation. I love Tanna Hill, and actually I want to get into Tanna Hill a little bit here.

But, no, I would not say, based on the matchup or anything like that. Mahomes has basically been matchup proof the last two seasons. He's just so good. That offense is so good. And personally, just for me, I'm not going to be, I'm not the type of person that would be like, oh, there's, he's supposed to get like 21 points versus Tannahill's supposed to get 22. Like, no, I'm just going to stick with Mahomes, who's the best football player on the planet. Feel good about it.

What if you have Tannahill, but you don't have Mahomes, but TANHill's playing him? Like, how good is Tanna Hill? That's the point. No one seems to be able to figure this out. Right. Tanna Hill is pretty high on my rankings. I'd have, you know, I'm actually, based on what we saw from Lamar in this last game, I would have Lamar of him. I would have, I think, Josh Allen.

And I still probably have Kyler Murray above him. Russ. Where I start to get, where I start to waver is like Russell Wilson range. Wow. You know, that's kind of the range where I'm like, okay, do I want to start Tannehill? I want to start Wilson. Rogers. No, I'm starting Rogers.

Rogers is bawling out right now. He's out of his mind, good. But I guess the idea, the point I want to talk about it, I want to use this as an opportunity just to talk about how good Tannahill is. Because I've been, Craig right now is doing a dynasty draft for the 2021 season, essentially,

and I talked him into taking Ryan Tannhill. I think, what was it, the third or second round? This is a super flex league. Right, so you can have two QBs. So I took Rust in the first round, D.K. McCuff in the second, and I took Tandahill in the third. And, you know, you look,

him up and he was 32 years old. I think the biggest knock on Tana Hill is that he played for Adam Gason was not good for like four or five years and no one will ever get that out of their head and refuse to believe that he's good. You can't let go with the anchoring that Tannehill is not good and or that he's just like

in this run heavy offense, neither of which are true. He's good, man. And it is a little bit of like a run-centric offense. Obviously their offense is based on Derek Henry and running the ball and all that. But I want to give you guys a little bit of info on TANN. he'll just from a first to form a football perspective then on like a fantasy perspective.

In 2020, his 28 touchdown passes ranked 6. He's thrown just five picks. He has a 6.9% touchdown rate. That's third in the NFL. He's averaging 8.0 yards per attempt. That's 6th. He has 108 pass rating 6, 76.6 QBR, which is 5th. So he's basically a top 6th quarterback in every conceivable rank metric.

He also is first in both fourth quarter comebacks and game winning drives, which to me says he's more than just a guy who can play with, you know, a lead. He's not just like a game manager who can play with a lead. Like he can come in and sling the ball when he needs to, and he has this year. And overall, in 23 starts with the team, this is going back to 2019. He has 50 touchdowns as eighth most. He has 112 pass rating second best is 8.6 yards per attempt is best. It's even better than Mahomes.

His yards per attempt is higher than Mahomes? Yes. For this season or since he became a starter? in 2019 and 2020 combined. Either way. So basically what I'm trying to do is get it out of your head that Tanna Hill is like some game manager guy, like a veteran that they're just plugging in. Like dude is bawling out. He's a legitimately really good quarterback.

Would you rat him like a five cent horse out of, outside of Kroger? Yes. I have a lot. I have maybe more faith in him than most people probably. He's been the QB9 this year. In points per game over the last month, he's been the QB9. Since week seven, he's been the QB9. He's very, like, consistent.

Every week, he's just the QB9. Yeah. You know what's great about Tannenhill is his team is young. He's got two great young receivers. He's got the best running back in the league. He's got a young tight end. He's got a great play caller in Arthur Smith.

Yeah. The future's bright. I don't know what it is. I guess it's the 32 thing that's kind of like holding people back. But actually, I brought this up with Hyphids last night. If you go look at Steve Young's career, it's astounding. Oh, yeah, you showed me this.

This was not. blew my mind. He did not do anything in his career until he was 30 years old in the NFL. That's crazy. And then he went on to have like a Hall of Fame career. So I don't know, man. I just think you got to get some of the preconceived biases or whatever out of your mind and just accept the fact that Tanna Hill is awesome.

So the takeaway here, Ryan Tanna Hill is Steve Young. Lock it in. Ryan Tana Hallfamer. That's the takeaway here? Well, Tase some Hill. Maybe Taseham Hill is Steve Young. There's some parallels there. No.

Okay. That was good. Okay. So I'm glad we did that because we got a lot of emails about Tanna Hill. The other person we got a lot of emails about at the quarterback position, Jalen Hertz, we got quite a few. I think one's fairly representative one. Is someone Rodin's asking Kyler Herbert or Hertz for this week?

And we also got a question of Jalen Hertz, Deshawn Watson or Tom Brady. I think that's probably going a little too far. But, how do you feel about Hertz going into this game and then just the next two weeks? I guess the context is like Watson's been struggling and his weaponry around him has definitely been diluted with all these injuries and suspensions and things. But to me, I still love Watson, even though he's going up against a good defense. So I'm sticking with Watson just by a hair over hurts, even though I do have a lot of faith in hurts. But what about Kyler? Because this is the Oklahoma ball.

This is 2019 Sooners quarterback against 2018 Sooners quarterback. There's no world you should be. I don't think you should be benching Kyler for J. No, I'm going with Kyler. Well, the wrinkle in this is there's a third quarterback in both questions here. There's Kyler, Herbert, or Hertz. So I think we both agree that Hertz is not starting in either of these questions. He's been fun, but like he played one game, he scored 19 points, probably not going to start him.

So the question is really Kyler or Herbert and Brady and Watson. Yeah. How do you feel about that? Kyler. So Kyler over Herbert, what are you doing, Deshaun or Brady? Brady's playing Atlanta. Brady's been kind of good. He's been the QB7 of the last five weeks.

Yeah, it's so tough. I guess Brady. I guess Brady by a hair. Can I ask a real question? Do you think, what are the odds that you think the Texans played like shit against the Bears because that Sports Illustrated story dropped where they just shredded the Houston Texans work environment under Jack Easterby? I don't know if that had anything to do with it.

No. You think morale was just so low they couldn't get up for the game? I mean, it literally opened up with the Houston, Texas. Sports Illustrated, I think Greg Bishop reported out. Literally it started with the Texans players have been following their front office leadership like it's Game of Thrones and they refer to Jack Eustra be who is the interim GM as Littlefinger. This all becomes public and then they lose 36 to 7 like three days later.

I'm just throwing it out there and I'm wondering if maybe they'll... Decent point. I'm just saying maybe like they'll play a little bit better against the cults this week with that past them. That's all. So it's a long way of saying I would take Deshawn over Tom Brady. Yeah. Should we do a name game just real quick with Hertz though?

I'll ask you guys these and so just to be clear. Jalen Hertz playing in Arizona. Would you guys start Jared Goff going up against the Jets over Hertz? Yes. Emphatically so. God, I don't know if I would. I don't trust Goff.

I know it's the Jets. The other thing I want to point out while we're talking about Hertz, I saw this on Twitter, and I apologize I don't have in front of me, but his 18 rush attempts, this last, only, he and Lamar are the only two quarterbacks

in like the last six years with that many rush attempts in a game. so it was rare for a quarterback to run that much. So just keep that in mind. I mean, the rushing floor is absurd with Jalen. I think I would do golf. I'm starting him over. I'm starting Jalen Hertz over golf.

That's what I'm saying. What about Philip Rivers against Houston? Oh, I think I'd start Jalen Hertz there, actually. What about Ben Rothesberger against Cincinnati? Craig, you answer that because you're the Steelers fan. How are we feeling right now about Rathesberger? I agree with what Bill said on his pod I think they're literally trying to keep him up right

until the playoffs and that's why I think they're going to be as weekend at Bernie actually get to the playoffs right now I think he's the slowest player in the NFL he probably is I think I would take Ben I think I'm going hurts

I'm going hurts because watching Ben hurts no I would know what about Derek Carr against Chargers Cara has been going off lately is the only thing that makes me pause here no I would go with Hertz

I would go to Hertz as well I think I would too. Wow. Okay, we'd like hers. Yeah, at some point. We'd like Hertz. I think we're, we're very bullish on Hertz, but not, not ridiculous. Like, we're not benching to show on. If you have a low-end quarterback, you can consider Jillian Hertz. And don't get too cute if you have one of the top eight or nine guys. I think that's what it comes down to.

All right. Another question, we have, this is from Carter. He says, I have Russell Wilson this week and I'm wondering what to do since he hasn't performed too well against strong defenses. Is a waiver ad like Tribiskey or Locke, Drew Locke too risky? Yes. Yes, it's too risky. Why are we even entertaining this question? Why don't we even read this? Is it, though?

What do you mean? I have a real-world situation that I have to decide on. Russell Wilson or Tua this week. Russell Wilson? What are you talking about? I'm going to put Russell Wilson in, but I've actually been thinking about it. That's why I think this is a valid question. It is a valid question.

I think this is insane. I would hate to spend the rest of the off-season being like, why the fuck did I start Trubisky? Yeah, you can't. Mitch Trubisky has been the QB8. on points per game. You cannot play Mitchell Trubisky over Russell Wilson in the fantasy playoffs. They're playing the team

that you contend is the best defense in the NFL. I understand, but it's like, but, but I, you don't understand how much I hate Mitchell Trubisky.

I love the idea that Trubisky is playing well enough to earn another season or earn a big contract. He's not. He's not. He's, no,

I will, stop. What is wrong with all of you? It's just interesting. It's interesting. It's all I'm going to say. The Trubisky conversation, is interesting. It's like that Seinfeld clip.

Is it so sane that it just blew your mind? Are you crazy? Am I? Or am I so sane that you just blew your mind? It's impossible. Is it? Or is it so possible that your head is spinning like a top? It can't be. Can't it? Or is your entire world just crashing down all around? Oh, right. That's enough.

Kramer would start Turbisky. No. No. No, although I do want that drop in this episode, though. But this conversation was like a shot of the cheapest rail tequila. I want to chase her right now. So let's, let's, let's, this is an email from Jake. If you had to start an expansion franchise and the mascot had to be a non-sports-related mascot, who are you picking?

This is unbelievable question, first of all. Wait, I'm an idiot. Is this the play or is this to be the mascot? Are they going to play? To be the mascot? The mascot, I thought it was going to have to be to play football. So it's like we're starting the Portland team. What's your mascot?

I would do the Monopoly guy and we're the billionaires. What about that big ass polar bear from icy? That thing's called. You wear shades? Ooh. The Coca-Cola one? Oh, no, the Clydesdills. I want the Clydesdales from Butler.

What about the peacock? Just peacocking it from NBC? You want the NBC peacock? That's the most sell-out corporate answer I've ever heard of my life. What are you talking about? I'm trying to fight. What are you? Okay, like, how about...

Tony the Tiger is... If we have to draft, Tony's Tiger's first pick. Who are you going to have play for you? Of the mascots. Who are going to play football for you? Mr. Clean. I was going to say Mr. Clean. I'm parking Kool-Aid man at D-Tackle.

You know what I just thought of? The Quaker oatmeal guy. A pacifist. He's a Quaker. He doesn't put to play football. Captain Crunch at QB. Tukansam at receiver and slot. Going up the seam.

What's the, what's the, what's the, the doughboy? What about that one? Yeah, Pillsbury, doughboy. Well, you literally, you want to have a soft team? What are you talking about? The Portland doughboys? That's fun. Honestly, Michelin Man at like, tight end is interesting.

Oh, there we go. Oh, you know what is? What's that Shantex, the turkey who stopped smoking? I think I want him. Oh, yeah. It's a quick cold turkey. All right, let's move on. You can have Pac-Man, that'd be fun.

Let's just move on. This is a disaster. Running backs. Brian Schim email. He had, this actually, who said in the, one of a, fun fact. Jonathan Taylor, Clyde Edwards, Alair, Akers, J.K. Dobbins,

Melvin Gordon, Jeff Wilson. Pick three of those dudes. So this guy's got all the rookies. So basically it's rookie running backs. It's just throwing DeAnda Swift here for fun. Like, we basically just ranked the rookies this week because we're talking about how the rookies were very trustable in the beginning of the year. Now we can't trust them. DeAndre Swift is

maybe trustable. Cam Acres is maybe trustable. Which of these guys do you try? I think Jonathan Taylor clearly is number one here. And then the rest, it's like, what do you do with Clyde, Kameakers, J.K. Dobbins, et cetera. You know, J.K. Dobbins against Jacksonville,

I feel like you have to start. He is still getting the most carries. I mean, Mark Engram is basically not on the team anymore. It's basically Gus Edwards, J.K. Dobbins, and Lamar. I think the biggest question going into these final two weeks is if you have Clyde Edwards-Halear. One, they're playing the Saints.

He had a bad week last week-ish. Clyde is so weird because if you look at his stats, like, if you look at his whole season, it's, like, really consistent. Like, it's pretty much 10 to 15 points every single game. But for some reason, I think nobody thinks he's good. Like, he gets 11, 12 points in the worst way. He doesn't have, like, 100 rushing yards.

He has, like, four catches for 38 yards, 15 carries for 40 yards. And he, like, just limps to 12 points. But against the Saints this week, like, D.K., do you think this is finally the week when you should sit Clyde? In a vacuum, no, I don't think you need to sit Clyde. But if I was picking out of this group, My instinct is Taylor, Aker's, and Dobbins, actually, which is kind of surprising because I've been a big C.E.H guy this whole season, but the volume and the production that those three guys have had, like, Acres had 29 carries last week. I don't know if we can 100% trust that he's going to do that again and he's going to get fed or whatever, but, like, you can't ignore that.

Davenz is, if you look at what he did in this last game against the Browns, he was clearly the lead back and snaps and all that touches and everything. And so I think I would lean Taylor Acres, Dobbins, and then CEH would be next. But any combination, really, are those rookie running backs, I feel like pretty strongly that you're in good shape. The Cam Acres thing, Sean McVeigh said, so two weeks ago, Cam Acres had a good game, and Cam Acres told reporters, like, I want, you know, you just, it's easier to get for me when I get in a rhythm. And then this week, he had the 29 carries or whatever. And then he said, and someone asked him about it, and he said, yeah, I guess Sean heard me or whatever. And so while McVeigh kind of denied that he would just feed him like, you know, the featureback, I do think there's a middle ground where it's not quite like the randomness of the hot hand,

but he's also not going to be like Derek Henry. But I would not be surprised if Cam is the lead guy there. And it just becomes a two-thirds, him, one-third everyone else. And it's going up against the Jets again, which is- Yeah, that too, which should be enough, right? Can we do one quick question here? If you had to pick one rookie running back for Dynasty, who is it? Jonathan Taylor.

this was a huge, huge question coming to the season and it basically came down to CEH or Jonathan Taylor. I was in the CEH camp, but I think I probably would go Taylor at this point. It's close, though. I still love Dobbins too, honestly. Oh, no. It's never going to be Dobbins as long as Lamar is, like,

is vulturing running back. I think the dark horse is, one, I mean, Cam Acres is kind of a big dark horse in this. There's a chance Cam Acres is, like, fantastic over the night. What about Antonio Gibson? No, no one's picking him. I mean, he's in there. He's in the conversation.

James Robinson, he's got to be in the conversation. Dude has been awesome. Dondre Swift. He does not have to be in the conversation. Jonathan Taylor is such recency bias. We're picking the guy in the burn book. He's like one good game, dude. Jonathan Taylor.

Jonathan Taylor is the answer for me. Okay. All right. I'm going to stick with Clyde. I'm sticking to Clyde. All right. We got another, I want to read a very interesting email we got. Dear friend, I am in need of your assistance.

my name is Aisha Gaddafi. I am the only biological daughter of late Libyan president, late Colonel Moimar Gaddafi. I have an investment fund worth $27.5 million U.S. dollars and I will authorize you, the ownership of the funds.

I am interested in you for investment project assistance in your country. We can build a business relationship in near future. Did we really get this email? We got this email. What do you, uh, oh, it says,

best regards Mrs. Aisha Gaddafi. Oh, that was nice. What do you guys think? It sounds like quite the opportunity. I hope you sent our credit card information already because this sounds like a great idea. She didn't ask for any credit card. She just wants to help us.

She wants to trust us with the 27.5 million U.S. Trying to get that foot in the door. If she can help us with our million-dollar lineup. That's what I was saying. I don't think we can pass up this opportunity to you guys. Yeah, we'll talk about it on it. But anyway, friend of the pod, Mrs. Ies should get the office. Wow.

Okay. Let's get a couple wide receiver questions. This is a question from West, Weston. He's wondering about Chase Claypool against the Bengals this weekend or C.D. Lamb against the Niners. Stick with the rookie theme here. I cannot trust C.D. Lamb. I cannot trust Ceddy Lamb. And my instinct

here is I understand Chase Claypools had two pretty bad weeks in a row. I would play him against the Bengals and I would not play C.D. Lamb against the Niners. Yeah, at the end of the day, are you going to put your trust in Andy Dalton or Ben? On a good team or a bad team? I don't even think it's that as much as you want to be going against the Bengals or against the Niners. Yeah. I mean, the Niners haven't been

great. They've actually been in the bottom third of the league. They just got shredded by Buffalo. I mean, but I think I'm just Clayle, I like Claypool. I think the Steelers are going to kill him. I agree. Okay. This is the longest rest Pittsburgh's had in like a month before a game, and it's only seven days. Other than the month

between the Thanksgiving game and whenever they play it on a Wednesday or whatever. Okay. Another question from Sam is Amari versus San Francisco or Tyler Lockett versus Washington, which is a great matchup between two perpetually disappointing people. Yeah, you know, I just preach that you should take the quarterback in the team, yet I'm not in the grab. When I take Amari Cooper, your Lockett's been so bad.

We're such Lockett haters. It's crazy. I am a little bit worried about them going up against that defense. The Seahawks's going up against Washington, though. I think I lean Amari in this one too. I would also lean Amari, which is crazy to say. But we're sticking to our word here. It's like if Tyler Lockett didn't do it against the Jets, I'm worried. Yeah. I think this is like going against the green, but I would probably go with Amari. Watch Lockett. Locket guaranteed is just going to go off this week, probably after all this stuff. But yeah. All right.

I think this is a very us podcast question. This is from Nick. He has D.K. Metcalf, Alan Robinson, Robert Woods, and Mike Evans. Four guys. He needs to pick three. Who are you benching? Play D.K. You play Alan Robinson. I think this comes down to Woods versus Evans. Yeah. I would go...

I think the Galaxy Brain plays. You bench Robert Woods. I think you have to bench Bobby Trees. Because they're just going to run the hell out of the ball against the Jets. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. I think you bunch of Bobby Trees. Yeah, wow. But then you're going to feel so dumb when, like,

he has three touchdowns against the Jets, and you're like, well, that's obvious. That'll suck. But yeah, that's, like, my initial thought is, I think we're getting cute with it, but I would sit woods. I think that makes sense. Okay, this is a great question from Eric. If you don't have a great quarterback,

how do you feel about starting the quarterback of your opponent's best receiver as a kind of hedge against the receiver blowing up? I'm in this position right now. I have Tom Brady and Matt Ryan. I think Brady's probably a better play, but my opponent has Julio Jones and Calvin

Ridley and also passing touchdowns are worth six points, which is a good league. Since quarterback is probably my weakest position, I'm leaning towards starting Matt Ryan. What do you guys think? You know, everybody talks about how it doesn't matter, right? Like, you should just play the best players. Has that officially been proven

that, like, it's impossible to separate in your brain the fact that having Tom Brady or starting Matt Ryan will at least mitigate Calvin Ridley and Julio Jones going off. Is there any truth behind that? No, I think you're right. There's a mathematical answer here. I don't know it. I know that emotionally Matt Ryan's a great. It's extremely smart to hedge

because then it just doesn't hurt as much. And really, I don't know if this will help you win, but it will help the pain feel less. And that's really what this is all about. No, yeah. It's fantasy I've come to learn is, it's all about pursuing glory, but it's also understanding that 90% of the people playing will

not win, and it's trying to make that as not painful and minimize the self-hanging. hatred as much as humanly possible. There's really nothing like fantasy football. Like everything out there, there's like a million replicas of it. There are not many things in life that are like fantasy football. It's a very unique experience.

Honestly, this actually gets the bad beat hits on this. I almost want to skip ahead because the bad beat just hits. Let's just skip to it. The bad beat is so funny this week. Wait, did we answer the question? Oh, yeah, right. I think, no, that right. I think that's actually a really good idea.

If, I'll say this, if Julio and Ridley are going, I think it's a better thing than if Julio doesn't play, I would go with Brady though. I agree, because the offense sucks without Julio. Brady is very, very clear. He's very clearly, to me, the better option here, but I like this strategy. I think it's very interesting.

I like it. Yeah, screw it. Okay, I'm just going to read the bad beat because this is, so obviously for bad beat, we got a lot of great emails about the Browns Ravens finish, which was unbelievable. I had a playoff game, almost tilt on that last play.

But this- Man, one of the craziest backdoor covers I've ever seen. I mean, millions of dollars swung in Vegas on that millions of dollars in Draft King Scott Van Pell is just laughing. Yeah, it was just, it was crazy. So we got a lot of emails about this and this was my favorite. This

was from Brad from Birmingham. Brad writes, so Monday was my wife and I's first anniversary. We went to a cabin the weekend before to celebrate but it's still our first anniversary so it's kind of a big deal.

You know what it's also a big deal? my fantasy football playoff game. I was up... Hell yeah. I was up 28 points that had the Ravens D and he had Nick Chubb. Easy win, right?

My wife and I had a quiet night in so I was able to casually check my phone a couple times to see the score. Two first half touchdowns for Chubb had be a little nervous, but I'm still up 12 points to no big deal. It comes time to, quote, go to bed. But I checked the score one last time.

Wait, what is he saying there? Are they going to have sex? Is that what he's implying? Yeah. Intimacy time. weekend at a cabin. What do you think he's talking about? Oh, I don't know. Okay. It's just thinking of sure. Yeah, it's his anniversary weekend at a cabin. They're going to go to bed. No, this, he said he went to the cabin the weekend before. Now he's just at home.

Oh, he's just that home. Oh, that's not as funny. I still think they're having sex, though. It's the bottom line. Our boy Brad's, you're allowed to have sex at home, too. Not just in cabins. Anyway, continue. He had himself a Nick Chub. Oh. Okay. Okay. You're not going to let hyphen. to read the rest of it. It comes time to go to bed, but I checked the score one last time and the Ravens defense

has negative four points. So I'm up only one point with about two minutes to go. And as embarrassed as I am to say it, I turn on the game. Wow. Are we talking mid-quitis here? The court did not request

documentation. Maybe we will. Well, listen, now that Brad is no longer with his partner, he is welcome on this show. I convinced myself yet again that I have the game in the bag when the Ravens score to tie it and the Browns trot out Kareem. No way is Chubb touching the ball while they air it out down the field. What I didn't consider is the Brown scoring and the Ravens D dropping down to minus six points. At this point, my wife is downstairs with me and I am staring into the void as my fantasy season and my wife's respect have both slipped away. I'm a masochist. So before I try and get us back in the mood, good luck there. I checked the score one last time to say goodbye to the season.

There are two seconds left and the Browns have to heave a Hail Mary. I put the game on my phone in bed to watch the last play. And after all the laterals and running around, there's a safety. I got two points and won the freaking game. I went from comfortable win to sweating it out to losing to a playoff win in about five minutes. I've never felt so alive. This has to be by far the best beat of all time. This is what fantasy football does to us.

On our anniversary night, I have my wife asking me to come to bed, but I'm preoccupied with a bunch of dudes playing a football game in Cleveland. Jesus Christ. And don't worry, after playing out the victory from the jaws of defeat, we ended the night amply celebrating both. Yeah, that night, Brad had a good night. That was a little graphic, but I like you. graffin with your Nick Chubb joke.

Wow. Brad touches on a great point, man. It takes over our lives way more than it should. It's invasive. It permeates through our veins. Yeah, I have to say, as we were prepping for fantasy this week, like, usually, you know, we're trying to be

professional about this and, like, help people and, like, research stuff. And this week, once the playoffs started, I was like, I only care about myself. It's me and my problems and my teams. And I'm like, I have to win. And it's just, it's, It's effective.

Maybe an addiction. Okay. On that note, we got an email from Cameron. Here's my dilemma. I have two spots for three players. Bobby Trees has been doing me right all year, but I think I might bench him for Josh Jacobs and Cam Acres. As much as I want to dance with who brought me,

who would be Josh Jacobs and Robert Woods. I'm excited by the new piece I got, Camakers, and I'm matched up against my wife and my other semifinal. It's her first year doing fantasy football. And under your advice, and under your advice, and she also took Robert Woods. is it worth going with the riskier combo of Josh Jacobs and Cam Acres

just to free up my rooting conscience against Robert Woods. So basically he'd be going against Woods in one of his leagues, having him in one of his other leagues. How do you guys feel about this? The emotional hedge of making a start-sit decision based on knowing you'll be going against one of your own players. This is tough. So his choice is to either put all his eggs in one basket

or it's to have one team not do as well or one team do great, right? Well, in theory. In theory. Yeah. But I think it's really about the bizarre sensation of like when you have one player in your team and they're going against you

and then the player does terribly or well or scores a touchdown or drops a pass and you don't know how to feel. Right. Have we found, have we landed on a word for that emotion yet when like in this scenario, Robert Woods catches a 40-yard pass

and you're happy and sad at the same time? No, we really need that. Well, someone else submitted a word for... Someone else submitted a word about this. We got an email about... Let me get to it. I'll just read it right now. So, Schadenfreude is a common emotion in fantasy football,

which is basically you revel in someone else's despair, right? Isn't it essentially what Schadenfreude is? What's the name for a fantasy football specific opposite? The misery that comes from watching your player on the bench have amazing games, especially when those points would have won your championship. He proposes... proposes, Schottenfreude,

because I feel like this happens to a lot of Seahawk players. Obviously, this is a shout to Brian Schott and hire with the offensive court.

Brian Schadenhoffeyer. That's a good punch. So that's good for when someone's on your bench, but we do need an old German word for when you have player going with you and against you

and they score and you just feel a mix of every emotion and also nothing in emptiness. So we need the Germans. Come out of us. You gave us the vaccine. Give us a word now, please.

There we go. Ring her fantasy. Football at gmail.com. We got another email along the exact same lines, and this is from B. Gers. He says, My favorite German word of all time is fair shimbeserong.

I don't know how I was freaking do it. Fersimbeserong? Fershlimmbeserong. The point is not that you nail the word. I don't think that's the point of that. The definition is an attempted improvement that only makes things worse. I love this.

The German word thing is hilarious. And he says, this jeers says listen to the word as you set your lineups in the playoffs the irony is that's what you were doing as you were pronouncing the word attempted improvements that only made it worse but yeah i would say that the meaning of that word kind of captures when you when you swap out somebody and they'd kill it on your bench like when you try to bench rossil wilson for mitchell trubisky or am i so sane that you just blew your mind hold on we got to go back we got to go back to Cameron who is talking about

the Robert Woods situation. Does he start Robert Woods and deal with the I think he do both and you try to middle it. It's not like the Matt Ryan thing where you're like all right, it's 60% Brady does better, 40% Matt Ryan, but screw it. He is Julio and Calvin really. I'll go Matt Ryan. It's like, I get like the emotional aspect there.

This one, it's like you still want to win. Like unless he has a better option the Robert Woods, if it's like 50-50 and you're on the fence, that's a solid tiebreaker. Well, he's telling you what it is. He's got Josh Jacobs and Cam that he comes. start instead of Woods.

In that case, I actually think that I would do Josh Jacobs from Cam, because I actually think Cam outscores Robert Woods this week, because I think that the Jets suck and that the Rams will probably be running the whole game. So I actually do think Josh Jacobs and Cam for the situation. All right. There we go, Cam. Cameron for Cam Acres. This is Drew and Baltimore writes, I haven't had a defense score more than five points all

here. Oh, my God. That's, geez. I just can't figure it out. I played Houston last week, and that went to shit like Lamar. Oh, nice. That's pretty good. Anyway, I put in waiver claims

for Washington football team, Arizona and San Francisco this week. Any thoughts? Any other good streamers? Of those three, Washington, Arizona and San Francisco, I think it's an interesting question because Washington is the best defense,

but they're playing the Seahawks. I actually think I'd go the Niners, go against Dallas, even though the Niners are kind of banged up. I mean, that's tough, but... You're going up against a backup quarterback? Yeah. It's not like Dalton is really great

at protecting the football. I could see him turning the ball over. I would of those I picked San Francisco but quite frankly the crazy one is the Cleveland is only half rostered in ESPN leagues I mean we talked to this a couple weeks ago they've gone down 40% they're playing the Giants this week Daniel Jones is back

to turning the ball over I would 100% want the Browns I know they're banged up in the secondary I don't care Daniel Jones has as good of an opportunity to give up a pick six as any quarterback in football right now or a fumble six whatever so I like Cleveland if they're available in your league And also the crazy one, I kind of don't mind the dolphins against the Patriots. If you really need some of the dolphins are kind of, they might be out there in your league.

Like, that's just, you could do worse than Miami. His offense right now is just a mess. So, yeah, absolutely. All right. Should we get to the best man speech stories that people sent us? Yeah, so run down just in case people didn't listen to Monday. If you didn't listen to Monday, how did we even get into this? Josh Jacobs post to the running back?

Because Josh Jacobs thought he was being hilarious. And that reminded me of all these idiots who go up and give speeches for, weddings or whatever. The first best man speeches and how terrible they are and how funny they think they are and how terrible and how no one else thinks they're funny. That was basically like the... It's just guys who get up there put their foot in their mouth. So then we asked for emails.

Turns out, a lot of people who listen to this show know about some bad best man speeches. Some of them we can't even name on the show because they're so hard. There were a few that we decided probably better off not reading on the show. Then I'll ask 20 bucks and we'll send you that email. Thank you for that. Anyway, so this one's from redacted. He asked that we do not read the name.

Which is a great way to start the email, by the way. Do not read my name is how I know it's going to be a fun of email. Okay, so I was in a friend of wedding a couple years ago where his brother was the best man. We were pretty sure he was going to pull some stupid shit because he's generally a train wreck and has very little self-awareness. Oh, my God. Sure enough, he delivered. He proceeded to tell us a story about how he introduced the bride to the groom and recounted the details of the night. This went on for about 20 minutes.

The 20 minutes part is the very key context to this story. There was only one problem. None of it was true. None of it was true. The bride and group met in college 500 miles away from the best man with many of us in attendance at the wedding there. At the end of the story, he started to drunkenly giggle and just ended his speech, just kidding, I wasn't there. That was it. That was the speech.

20 minutes? Okay, listen. Listen, if this is a good prompt, like he did a good job, he just went way too long. Like, this would have been funny if it was two and a half minutes, maybe five minutes. 20 is insane. I don't think it would have been funny at any length of time. If you stand up and you're like, I remember when they met. And then you're like, no, I wasn't there.

Like, that's- Yeah, you're probably right. That's a bad joke. Okay. At least it's not embarrassing. You know, the ones where you like call out somebody's pass or when it gets really rough. Yeah, D.K. What are the other ones, D.K., spoke to you.

Okay, so this next one is actually pretty funny. And from James, and in the way that he presented this, and the email was pretty hilarious too, so good job with the storytelling. Okay, so the context is, this is the groom's second marriage. In between marriages, he lived with a roommate. When they got to the speeches, the roommate walked up to the microphone. Now, let's start with the fact that the roommate was not the best man, nor was he even in the wedding party.

He started with, I would just like to say a few words about the groom. It went okay for about a minute where he said he had lived with him in the past few years, and he's been a great friend. Then it broke down badly. Among the highlights. He kept repeat. He said that he loved the groom and he was sad to be losing him to his new wife. He was in absolute tears when he was talking about his love for the groom.

He recanted many of their attempts of picking up women and trying to pick up women while they're roommates, which is exactly what I was talking about. This is not funny at a wedding. Don't do it. If you think it's funny, it's not. In front of the bride's parents. That's a good move. Idiot.

He went into extended diatribes about how he had lost his job a few months ago and was having a hard time finding work, which Danny probably would be cracking up about. He went past the point about his job to offer his painful outlook on the economy, which I just, he's just going off about the economy in the speech in a wedding. It's worth repeating that he'd come back to how much he loved the groom and he didn't want to lose him to the new wife. It's also worth mentioning that this went on for just over 40 minutes. So double the last time.

Oh, my God. He was, and James says he was keeping time. even though the best man and even though the groom tried to politely take the mic and think him, he just kept on it. And then James goes on to say, DK will know this trick, but I had a two-year-old daughter at the time, and I used her restlessness as an excuse to take her outside and get away from this chaos.

I let her run around with a few other kids while talking shit, or talking about the shit show with all the other smart and lucky parents that managed to get outside. After a few minutes, we went back inside. As one of the parents opened up the door, one of the kids turned around and yelled, He's still talking. We tried to make our way quietly back to our chairs, our chairs while everyone was looking at us,

everyone except the roommate who continued on for another five minutes before breaking down and leaving in tears. Wow. That is incredible story. That's worse than I could have even imagined. I just think it's my favorite part by far is when he offered his painful outlook on the economy. On the economy.

What is it? Oh, my God. He's like, well, you know, it's a great time buy a home, interest rates are low, but I don't have a job. Oh my God. Okay, one more, and then it will be done, because I just want to

thank you for sending in some of these because I was like literally crying, reading them. This one's from Andrew Watros. At my wedding, my best friend of seven years was the best man. And actually, in contrast, this one sounds like a really great speech, so just keep that in mind.

We didn't actually discuss the fact that he'd be giving a speech, that he'd be giving a speech, but I assumed he knew proper wedding procedure. My wife's sister just gave a nice speech and the MC calls up my best man who was not prepared at all and was already probably six on the intoxicated scale. So his best man's speech was, wow, I didn't really think about doing this. Riley, you did good. Watchrose. It's a great last name. And that was the speech. Watchrose. Now you, I like it. Watchros. It's a great last name. Watchrose. That's actually a good, that's a good speech compared to that last one. I would take that Yeah, I'll take that any day.

Holy cow. Well, I'm confused, though, because he gave a speech. He didn't even mention about his outlook on the economy. It's like a TED talk. Who is this guy talking about the economy? What the hell is happening? Except the TED talk is shorter. Capped at 20 minutes.

Oh, my God. Okay. I think we should get out of here. Yeah. Yeah. For everyone that actually made it through all this story. Yeah, my God. Thank you.

Thank you to everyone who said of these emails. we were really cry laughing. Thank you to Brad for Birmingham. Yeah, Brad. Happy anniversary to you and your boy. You dog, Brad. Thank you to everyone. Thank you to D.K.

Thank you, Craig. Good luck to everyone in the playoffs. Thank you, Lord. Lord. Thank you, the Dan Band. Ooh, the Dan Band. Wow. We'll see you guys on Friday.