The Ringer NFL Show - Week 8 Winners and Losers, and CMC Goes Nuclear

Episode Date: October 31, 2022

We recap Week 8 by giving out awards for the biggest winners and losers of the weekend. We break down Christian McCaffrey’s breakout week and the rest of the RB explosion across the league. Then, we discuss Miami’s ceiling as a fantasy team, re-rank the 2021 QB draft class, and more, before inducting our next player into the 2022 Fantasy Burn Book. Check out our Weekly Fantasy Football Rankings for positional rankings and more! Email us! [e-mail]. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Producer: Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. My name is Danny Hifeitz. I am joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Krollbeck. Sunday of Week A is over. My New York Giants lost to DK. Seattle, Seahawks. But we can get to that later because there's an extraordinarily ugly game. And what was otherwise an awesome week, I feel like I don't want to talk about Richie James, Muffin Punts. I'm curious.

We have been talking about no points being scored. Offense is looking awful. Quarterback sucking. None of that happened today. It's a barn burner. It's a scoring avalanche. Especially the early slate. I feel like the second slater, the afternoon slate, and then the night game was a little

underwhelming, but the early slate was just nonstop action. I think I've decided that my favorite type of football game that doesn't involve my own team is two shitty teams just in an absolute bonkers shootout. Like Carolina, Atlanta, to me, that's the best kind of Sunday morning football you could ask for. I love it. When the Panthers missed, I can't even keep track. But when the Panthers won't scored and then I was like, this is why the NFL makes $16 billion a year. And then the Panthers missed the extra point.

And that's why they're going to make $25 billion. I watched the game with my brother and my brother had Panthers plus three and a half. And they have a roller coaster that he was going through in the final 30 minutes. Yeah. It makes it all worth it. If you know the chart, obviously the Falcons, they're like, you know, artists, like modern art in like how they can lose the game. But that chart looks like a like a like Bitcoin over the last two years. It's just like up and down and up.

It's unbelievable. But the real winner of the day, I just want to start with the only winner I could think of, which is just running backs. Every kind of running back, star running backs. People scoring three touchdowns. Like 10 dudes and three touchdowns today. It was ridiculous the whole day.

So I just want to start with like the superstar running backs, like the old guard that we've kind of wanted to move away from. We were getting obsessed with Breeze Hall and Kenneth Walker's and all these guys. and the dad strength of the old guys. Number one score on the day, Alvin Camara, 38 half-p-R points. He had three touchdowns today, as Craig said. You know how many touchdowns Camara had before?

Zero. He looked like vintage Camara, more importantly, and then the Saints shut out the Raiders, 24-0, which is inexplicable. Christian McCaffrey, 36-half-PPR points. First player with a passing touchdown, a rushing touchdown, and receiving touchdown in 17 years.

Laddani and Tomlinson did that. If you had 30 passing yards under that, so a passing touchdown, a rushing touchdown, receiving touchdown, and 30 passing yards, first person never do that in the Super Bowl era, aside from just looking great in the 49th jersey. Yeah, because LT's touchdowns when he would throw them were like three yards.

They were like on the goal line. McCavry threw a bomb. Derek Henry, 35 fantasy points. The most Derek Henry stat line ever. 32 carries, 219 rushing yards, two touchdowns. Titans had one pass in the second half. They won this game without Ryan Tate Hill. I couldn't believe this.

Derek Henry ties Adrian Peterson and O.J. Simpson, most 200-yard games than NFL history. But more impressively, this sounds impossible. It's his fourth game against the Texans with 200 rushing yards. In a row. Why can't they figure this out? In a row. Fourth 200-yard rushing game against Houston in a row. I had to look that up because I thought that was wrong.

But it's true. So with all that, we've been trying to move on for these young guns. And then it's Camara McCaffrey, Derek Henry, with three of the best games in their entire careers. DK, what is your take? Dad strength. Is that your takeaway from all this? That's what it is. Let's start with Camara, who I said this, I think last week,

but it really rings true. And then Greg Rosentel tweeted this. And I'm like, this is absolutely true. Like, the reason Andy Dalton is the starter for the Saints is because he gets Camara involved. Like, he actually checks it down to him, gets the ball in the hands of their best players. Like, for whatever reason, like James Winston's just like,

allergic to checking it down. This is just not who he is. But I think that a big part of the reason that Andy Dalton is the starter is literally just because he's willing to give the ball to Alvin Camar. Alvin Camar had 10 targets, team high 10 targets today, nine receptions, 96 yards, two touchdowns through the air in addition to his 62 yards and score on the ground. He also looked, Camara looked like happy to be on the team for the first time in a while. And the Saints just looked energized.

Yeah, he was pumped up. like, Camara is usually not a very animated person on the field. And he was like really jazz today and seemed to be like finally happy with his role in the offense. Yeah. He gave a half time speech, or not a half time after the game like a week ago. I think that he's like become kind of more of like a leader on the team. But yeah, no, he just looked like himself.

And since he became healthy too. He's now like a top seven running back in fantasy. The buy. He was like in retrospect, obviously like the biolo running back of the first two weeks. Everyone was like wanted to get out. He had the rib injury. everything, and now he just looks incredible. Okay, Craig, what is your main takeaway from all these star running backs going off?

If McCaffrey's on the Niners next year, is he the most unanimous number one overall pick and fantasy that we've had in like the last 10 years? Ooh. I mean, he has, based on what we saw today, he has the McCaffrey role that he had on the Panthers, but on a team that's actually good that knows how to use him. Right. Well, it's not just those that he use him. It's they're the best at using running backs.

Exactly. That's the thing. It's like, imagine if instead of Jeff Wilson getting all these touches, it was Christian McCaffrey. Yeah. And it's like, I feel like we're moving away from drafting running backs in the first round. But man, McCaffrey on the Niners, it might bring me back. I mean, I think that with Christian McCaffrey, I mean, Bill always said like the Tyson Zone. And it's like, this isn't the Tyson Zone, but it's within the stat.

We need like a box score Tyson Zone. I think you convince me of anything is possible with McCaffrey. Like, he could get 300 total yards in a game. I don't think I'd really blink an eye. Are we going to go through the song and dance, though, with Trey Lance again next year, where it's like, oh, he's not going to check down. We'll get to Trey Lans. That's a good point. We'll get to him later.

I have a whole thing. Go through that thing, I think. God, that sucks. Sorry to run on your parade. It wasn't just the great running backs that were great today, though, because it was also the backup running backs to just run through some of these guys. Tony Pollard justified anyone who's had him as a handcuff for the last four years. Yeah. And Zeke finally misses a game.

Tony Pollard gets 15 touches for all. Almost 150 yards, three touchdowns. Tony Pollard has now had two games where he started. And in those two games, he was either the number one running back or top four in fantasy. So that's pretty good. Two games without Zeeke. He's got five touchdowns and almost 300 yards in those games. Deonté Foreman, Panthers running back.

Christian McCaffer gets traded. Chuba Hubbard's out. And we're like, oh, last week. Ah, Deontay Foreman, he can't do that again. Actually, he had exactly 118 rushing yards again. And this time he had three touchdowns. Niners should have traded for four men. It would have been a lot cheaper.

There you go. Probably could have just gave a six. Jamal Williams were like, oh, my God, the lion's offense is worse. Dionne Swift's back. Doesn't matter. Jamal Williams has two touchdowns. He's the top ten running back. Only other lion with multiple rushing touchdowns four times in his season is Barry Sanders.

Just him and Jamal Williams. Antonio Gibson, we're like, oh, my God, what happens when Brian Robinson comes back? Antonio Gibson straight up has been better since Ryan Brian Robinson returned. Like straight up Antonio Gibson is just a better player with better fantasy. Khalil Herbert just out playing David Montgomery, his fewer touches, but 99 yards in a touchdown. All these backup running backs, this was a bonanza today. Like week two, there were 12 running backs of like 12 rushing touchdowns. And then this week, like four people had 10 combined.

So, D.K., all these backup running backs, what's the one that you look at and you're like laser in on as like, what's your main thought here? I mean, Tony Pollard, 100%. Like, this is the AKA we're just an injury away from having a good team award. hyphids, you've talked about this in the past. This was a Lombardiism. I'm going to go crazy. Like, I'm not even a, I don't care whether the Cowboys win or lose. I'm not a Cowboys fan. I can't imagine how mad and frustrated Cowboys fans must be that they're just still

fucking going with Zeke, despite literally 100% of the evidence, like saying that Pollard is better. And after the game, Jerry Jones came out and talked about how it's, they're still not changing their opinion. They're not, they're not going to change anything. their philosophy. Zeke is, they go where Zeke goes. Like, how stupid are you? How did you get so much money? Like, I don't get this.

This drives me insane. They go where Zeke goes. Well, Zieg goes three yards forward and then falls down. Seriously, Zeke's high. This year is 80. He hasn't rushed more than 81 yards this year. Like, ah, God. Like, this is truly the most frustrating thing in football right now is, like,

coaches and teams just absolutely refusing to play their best players for whatever fucking reason. I get that there's the money thing with Zeke. Like, who cares? It's a sunk cost. Just freaking play your best players. It's probably because Jerry Jones was the one who wanted to draft Zeeke in the top five. And his entire life's pursuit now is validating that draft pick.

Yeah, he's just like a fantasy football guy. He just like has this big. The funniest thing about Jerry Jones is every year he gets older and goes to the combine and loses more of a filter and says more and more of what he wants for Super Bowl. He was like, I'd rather have a Super Bowl than another billion dollars. And the next year he went and said other than the health and safety of my family, there's nothing I want more. And then I think this year, last year, he was like,

I would do horrible things for Super Bowl. All he has to do is Bench Ezekiel Elliott. It's like all he has to do. Yeah, dude, just play best players. I like talking to you guys so much about this offline, about how just the whole, like, this myth of that coaches know what's best, and they're always going to, they watch practice, they know more than us, blah, blah, blah. Like, no, not always.

Guess what? Sometimes they're just stupid. They make terrible decisions. Like, this is clearly not good for the Cowboys. not playing Pollard as your starter is bad for the Cowboys. Like, that is objective. There's no, there's no, like, opinion here. It just drives me insane.

It's like when I was a kid and I used to think that everybody who was like over the age of 40 was smart just because they were over 40 years old. Yeah. And then I, when I, I like, you know, once I was in my 20s, I started to interact with people in their 40s and 50s a lot more. I'm like, oh, you know what? There's all, idiots or idiots. It doesn't matter how old you are.

A 55 year old can be just a big of an idiot. It's a 15 year old. Well, this is like, Craig and I talk about this all the time where it's like when you're kid, your parents are like superheroes. And then you go up and you get in your 20s and you're like, oh my God, they were just people. I'm like, my mom was 28 when she had me or something. I'm like, man, I'm

28. Wait, no, what's that Bo Burtum joke? The Bo Burtum joke? When he's like, when my dad was 27, he went to Vietnam. When I turned 27, I built a birdhouse with my mom. Dude, this is like the biggest lesson I learned as I became

a parent. And I became a parent, like old. I was like 37. And I don't like we don't know anything we're making it up as we go along you know what I mean like this is exactly what fucking coaches are doing I like the whole like just assume that coaches are making the best decision thing like that just drives me nuts like obviously we're in the fantasy realm we want to see Pollard go off every week it's we have a vested interest in that but like to me this is not just like some stupid fantasy thing like he is objectively way better than Zique right now I'm like there's no much nothing you could say to me that would ever convince me otherwise like this is just stupid stupid. stupid. I'm so much more hesitant than D.K. to criticize coaches in part because I also don't know anything. So I just defer to the people are there every day. I think I'd go less from like people are stupid to like you can very easily over analyze things when your job is to think about something for 18 hours a day. Kind of like how we never take Travis Kelsey in the drafts, even though we should. It's like we should all stick our advice. Just take good players. But I will say

to your point, D.K., about just it being obvious. Tony Pollard averaged nine yards of carry today and three rushing touchdowns. Dude, he does that every game. Zeeke Elliott's never done either of those things in a game for the Cowboys. He's never had nine yards per carry and he's never had three rushing touchdowns at the game. It wasn't even like he was just,

oh, he's catching passes and therefore he's like doing better. They're using it different. No, he was just running the football. He was like their lead back. Like, God. This is, like there's so many other examples of this that we could get to, like the Justin Fields thing. It's like, oh, a year and a half into his career,

they suddenly realized he's six foot three, 235 pounds. He runs a 4-4. And maybe it would make sense. to have him run around a little. Like, what the fuck took so long? Like, everything about, like, the coaches this year are just, it's just driving me. I feel like I'm thinking crazy, Phil's.

Like, this is the most obvious thing. We knew this when he was at Ohio State. Sorry, now I'm getting out of fields, but, like, the whole thing is just so absurd. I don't apologize. I love the way he's talking to you, Chip. I love the way of my voice talking to you. Come out, you like a spider monkey. D.K., are there any of these other running back performances?

making my dog nervous. He's pacing around the room because I'm like screaming at this. He's going to throw your war medals off the bridge. Anyways, that's all I got. But the Pollard thing just drove me nuts today. I think it's important to know, like, Deonté Foreman looked really good. That's cool for, I think, a number of reasons. The first one being that he came back from an Achilles injury, which is almost always like a career killer, it feels like.

But that might be changing. That's why Matt Ruhl got fired. He kept playing Christian McCaffrey over Deonté Foreman. Out of these four backup guys who had big days today, Deonti Foreman Jamal Williams, Antonio Gibson, Khalil Herbert. Who are you most confident in moving forward? In fantasy?

Oh, man, that's a really tough one. Probably Khalil Herbert. Honestly, just because they're so run heavy that there's, I feel like there's probably going to be volume for him if he's in the game. Even though he's playing like a split with David Montgomery, you know, he's shown, I think he just fits their scheme better.

He's more explosive. He goes north-south. You know, he's created more explosive plays. I do think David Montgomery is a good player. I don't think it's binary where like David Montgomery's bad and Khalil Herbert's good. But Claire Herbert, I think just as clearly,

it's actually pretty similar to the Pollard thing, except for I just think David Montgomery is better than Zeke. Like, but like they should just, they should lead more on Herbert. Dude, next week, Jamal Williams,

the lines, they're playing the Packers. The Packers gave up 50 yards to Devon Singletar, like the first drive of the game. They can't stop the run at all. My God. All right. The Cooper Cup Award for the player you wish you had drafted more of.

Yeah. players on the Dolphins. I had two a high in my rest of season quarterback rankings and that's starting to pay off quickly. He was the best quarterback today in fantasy and Tyreek and Waddle were both in the top four at wide receiver. Tyree Kill and Jalen Waddle have more total receiving yards

through eight games than any duo in NFL history. This is their second week this year of finishing in the top four, both of them in the top four in a week in fantasy scoring. I got a take for you guys. Ooh. Love when he starts it with that. I think the dolphins use Tyree Kill better than the Chiefs did.

Nice. More yak opportunity or something? Like, what do you mean? And, you know, if I get to bring on somebody who's like a true tape grinder, they could probably help support my claim. But just watching every game, watching the Chiefs games with Tyreek and watching Miami,

the way that they get Tyreek the ball is just more creative. It's smarter. It's almost like because Tew is not very good, they need to scheme ways to get Tyreek Hill open in more creative ways. And with Patrick Mahomes, like it didn't really matter

because Mahomes could get him the ball. But the way they use Tyreek Hill is like, You know, we always joke about how Justin Jefferson is just like whenever, every time he catches the ball, there's nobody within 20 yards of him. I feel the same way about Tyree Kill, except, unfortunately, once again, like I've been saying all season, Tua is underthrowing every ball to Tyree Kill. Yes, he is. Every single time Tyree catches a ball, his back is facing the end zone. Every couch.

He's fielding punts. You know what's so funny, I can't remember, like, a preseason Twitter, like, criticism that ended up being, like, exactly true quite. as much as people being like, too, he's going to underthrow Tyreek. And it's true, Craig. Like, he's not just like back to the end zone. He's like running the wrong direction to catch all these balls. Coming back for it. But not in the design way. But to your point, Craig, I actually think it's a really interesting point. Because what's that the meme with Patrick Mahomes with him chucky and he's like, fuck it, Tyreeks down there somewhere. Yeah. And with Miami, it's a lot more, hey, Tyreeks right here. As we planned wide open, throw him the ball. And it's true, though.

like I think the biggest thing for Miami this year was how good is to it how is he going to develop we almost can like pick up that question and put it to the side because at least when he's healthy and playing and not like out with the concussion everything that's happened in Miami this year the offense with Tyree kill and Jalen wattle with Mike McDaniel designing it is so incredible and just having the fastest player in the NFL and then one of the other four fastest players in the NFL, but like in the Shanahan system, it feels like the, I don't want to be like the future of football, but if, I don't know, it feels revelatory.

It feels like, like certain NBA offenses I've watched. I don't know in a way like watching, I kind of just want to watch the Dolphins and the Bills in a playoff game because it feels like these, these guys are like doing it like on another level the way. It's, it's if you give Tyree a Cushion, you know, he just, you just throw him the bubble screen, but now you're playing.

playing tag and no one can touch Tyree Kill. Yeah, but at the same time, like, this is the two, honestly, this might be the most unique offense in history because you have two of the fastest players in the NFL as, like, their two main receivers. Like, I was talking about this during the last season, like, I'm so fascinated by this because they've accumulated Waddle and Tyree Kill.

Like, there hasn't really been a combination of receivers on any team before like that. I can't remember. And not certainly not in the last recent years. And so it's not like you can just copycat, like, what the, what the dolphins are doing, you know? I think they're either the most fun offense in the league or second behind the bills. I mean, you know how Bill always talks about his favorite league pass teams in the NBA? If I can pick a league pass offense and football, it's the dolphins.

How many times are you watching Red Zone and Siciano or Hansen? Oh, we got to check back into Miami. Something just happened with Jalen Waddle, who, by the way, by far the best end zone dance. I know I've said this before. The Waddle is the best dance, I think, of the past 20 years. Dude, how demoralizing it must be? to give up a touchdown and that everyone's like, oh, I get the taguard, cute little bit.

And all the offense of linemen do it with them. Oh, it's so good. Can we make a category for offenses that are literally, just name it something like every time I look up that category, every time I look up, fucking Tyree Kill or Jalen Wadall is ripping off like a 50-yard play. Because it's like the giants are the opposite. Every time I look up, nothing's changed. The stats haven't changed.

Like, yeah, before we move off Tyree Kill, NFL research, I got this from. Tyree Kill has 961 receiving yards this season, which is the third most in the first eight games of a season in the Super Bowl era. The only people ahead of them are Tori Holt in 2003 in 2003 in Marvin Harrison in 2000. And then to Craig's point, if you take out week three again, which is when the bills were in the 90 degree heat and they had like 100 plays

and they like the Dolphins bear the ball. And he was cramping. Yeah, and Teddy Bridgewater got hurt on like the first drive of the game. if you take out and just look at the six games that Tyree Kill has played in real Dolphins games. He's on pace for 2,500 receiving odds. Wow. Even right now, with the week three,

he's on pace for 2042. It's just, this offense is incredible. Okay. Other players who wish you had drafted more of, D.K. Travis E.T.N. He's turning out to be what all the draft nerds, I think, wanted him to be. Basically, he's not only is he extremely, extremely explosive, utilized in the passing game,

capable of creating like the home run anytime he touches the football, that all that stuff that we talked about as like when he was a prospect. But not only that, now he has just like the three down workload. Like he is the number one back for the jacks. They literally traded away their old starter to just let him have the offense now. Like he is the guy, 24 carries plus three, three catches, 27 touches for a guy like that. Like I was not expecting that. I honestly didn't really expect that to happen in his career.

I thought he was going to be more like a, you know, a complimentary type player. But it's awesome to see. I think he has, he's the maybe the easiest guy in terms of running backs. It's just like the eye test is like this guy's fast as fuck. You know what I mean? Like every time he touches the ball,

he just like looks like he shot out at Canon. So it's very cool to see Travis CTN. And, you know, he was like the big bright spot of that game. The I've made a huge mistake award. I'm just giving it to the entire 2021. quarterback class. This is where Bill would say turn the TikTok camera on or whatever, he says now. But the 2021 quarterback class, we need to have reevaluate the entire 21,

quarterback class. We spent so much time talking about these guys. I mean, all of them might be terrible. I mean, just the day today, this is like the low of this class. Trevor Lawrence through two backbreaking interceptions today in a game they lost by four points. One of those picks, he threw a pick at first and goal at the one yard line, which is the quarterback equivalent of like pissing your pants right as you get to the euro. Mac Jones in this Jets Patriots game, Bill Simmons was tweeted. Bill Simmons is already panicking on Mac Jones. I think the best play Mac Jones made all day was a pick six.

Because at least after he threw the pick six, he took a roughing the passer, which negated the pick six, gave them 15 yards, put him in field go range. Like that was like the best play he made all day. Zach Wilson, I think this sounds fake. Zach Wilson threw three picks in a game that lost by five points. And after those three picks, told reporters after the game that throwing away the ball gets old for him sometimes. I get bored with, I get bored with throwing it away.

Justin Fields, like, might be like a godsend and fantasy football. I have no idea if he's good in real life and the most memorable thing he did today was jump over Michael Parsons to avoid tackling him. So Michael Parsons could return a fumble for a touchdown. And then Trey Lance, who, you know, was gone into the ether. He's like on the House of the Dragon timeline. We get one, one season from him every two years. So I'm just wondering, D.K., like, have we just made a huge mistake?

with this quarterback class? I don't know, man. It's way too early. I know that, like, Simmons has the thing where he's like, you can tell right away. I don't think we can tell right away

that any of these guys are going to be elite. Like, I think that's definitely clear. I'm not ready to give up on several of these guys. I would think, I don't understand why everyone's turned on Mac Jones

so quickly. I know that he hasn't played all that great this year, but he had a very good rookie season. Like, he's been hurt. He's playing on a high ankle sprain. Like, that is very difficult

for any player at any position. Listen, your dog's even crying over the quarterback class. I apologize. He's trying to get out because I'm screaming at you guys this whole time. No, that's actually the set of Mack Jones after the high ankle spring. George, sit down. I got to say, out of all these guys, I feel the best about Justin Fields right now. Yeah.

Which is weird because honestly, like, three or four weeks ago, I was, like, pretty much ready to give up on fields. I was like, he doesn't do anything well. Like, he looks completely lost. He looks shell-shocked. every time he drops back to fast, he's not seeing anything. He's not like, you know, making his reads. He's totally missing wide open guys. And so I was like, this is like several weeks ago,

which is why I'm not quite ready to like completely give up on all these guys if they're having like a few bad games. Obviously, I know that the, you know, evaluation goes back to last year. But yeah, I mean, obviously with with Fields, I think he has the physical talent that none of the other guys have. He's so fast. And he can, and I mean, I've seen, we've seen many like quarterbacks. over the last like 10 years,

earlier in the career, they have to kind of rely on their athleticism. They have to rely on their run game, all that stuff. Like, it kind of gets them into a zone. We saw Russell Wilson do that when he's a rookie. And then you have to develop as a pocket pastor as you go along. I have more faith that he'll do that than any of these other guys.

But I still think Mack Jones could be good. I haven't given up on him. And I still think Lawrence can be good. I do think we probably need to adjust, like, our expectations that he's going to be like the most elite guy that we've ever seen. Like, you know, the expectations that we came when he came into elite,

league were probably way too high. Well, if we had to re-rank these quarterbacks, if we were redrafting this draft, what order would you put them in? Is Trevor Lawrence still first? Yeah, he is. Yes, I think so. Okay. Zach Wilson, in my mind, he would definitely not to fifth.

Yeah. I think he's literally last. Yes. He, to me, has shown the least of any of these guys. The Jets need to move on from him. They need to draft a different quarterback next year. Maybe this is like too forward, but like, you kind of have to be. have to be a little thick to be saying to the media, I'm just getting tired of throwing the ball.

I mean, I want to get this quote exactly correct because I just could not believe that I was reading it. But he literally said, it just gets frustrating to just throw the ball away. It's what I've done the last four weeks to put us in a good position to not turn the ball over and for us to win. So I need to be able to keep doing that. It gets old getting out there and not seeing anything there. I do like,

how do you say that? Come on, man. I just can't, I can't believe it. Never, it's insane. At least the seeing ghost thing was in private. That was to a gaggle of reporters. Honestly,

maybe, maybe everybody feels the best about Troy Lance because we really haven't seen them play yet and all these other guys suck when they're on the field. I'm not going to lie, I thought you guys were going to like my house of the dragon joke because he didn't play a college football season. I thought it was good.

In my head, I was like, ooh, that's good. It's true though. It's, Hyphicism, yeah. And then,

so it's Lawrence, is one and then I mean what are we putting mac jones or fields too i'd say field i'd say well yeah probably mac and then fields i don't honestly like going back uh why i was on record saying like i don't really understand why we all just assume that zach wilson should be the number two pick but at the same time like it's not clear cut who any like who would be the number two now even like a year and a half later like i could i could see someone taking mac jones over fields because fields still has not developed very much as a passer. I think that, you know, it's all up in the open.

So, yeah, it's tough. Like, it's really hard to know, like, what any of these guys are going to bring. All that said, though, like, I'm still, you know, I think it's just, we got to take the longer view here. And the teams probably are going to, too. Like, it's probably still, like, a year or two away from any team moving away from any of these quarterbacks. Well, meanwhile, 2021 quarterback class, Eagles, 2020, second rounder, Jalen Hertz, It's just, again, incredible.

Eagles just rock the Steelers. And I want to, on that note, I want to give the Dad Award. Every week we give the Dad Award for being so disappointed. Like, we're not mad. We're just disappointed. This was such a great week for Fantasy. We have to spend this. I'm going to do the Dad Award.

We're so proud of you. So, my God. We're so proud of you for A.J. Brown. A.J. Brown had the best game of his career by halftime. Like straight up. He did. Most receiving yards. in his career, and he had the first three touchdown game of his career, and he did in the first half.

Six catches, 156 yards, three touchdowns. Put this in the category of every time I looked up. Every time I looked up, he was catching a touchdown bomb down the right sideline into the back of the end zone. Steelers are kind of like a rainbow strip right now on defense. They are. To be honest. Ian Hart has noted this. A.J. Brown has more receiving yards this year than the entire Titans receiving core combined.

So. Seems like he would have been useful on that team. He would have been pretty useful. All right, next to word here. Craig mentioned that the Steelers were just an absolute rainbow strip. I think we're just disappointed in the Steelers. Are we now, D.K.?

Well, this is, I'm not mad. I'm not mad at George Pickens. I'm just a little disappointed. Can we not get him one catch? I have to do a shotgun because of this guy. Started him. He was three targets, no catches. He should have had all three of those targets

were like highlight 25-yard catches. One, like his toe was barely out. One they called a bullshit P. Yeah. He was great. You have a league where you have to shock. A shotgun a beer if any of your players, you start getting a zero. If anyone in your starting lineup gets a zero, you have to shotgun a beer, you have to film it and send it to the group.

So anyways, I'm not mad at Pickens because I think he's going to be a great talent throughout the rest of his career. Can we just mix in one catch? I mean, when you're losing by that much, you can't just throw them like a screen or something. What is the over under on how fast you could shotgun a beer? I'm not very good at it. It's like, I don't know, 10 seconds? What's bad? What's like really bad?

I'm not like really bad, but I'm pretty bad. I would say extremely fast is in like the four second, three, four second range. That's like elite status. I would say your average chuggers, you know, six, seven, eight seconds. I would say I'm like slightly below average. Double digits is where it starts to get a little sad. You don't have to be faster than the bear. Just faster than your slowest friends.

I think you shuck at a beer time stops. I couldn't tell you a long. I want to set a line and then have DK record it. We can put it on Twitter. That's good. Oh, man. Anyway, what's the vibe check around the Steelers right now, Craig?

They've been getting just absolutely dominated a couple times this year. They're just getting shit rocked by every team because they're playing like, they're playing like every week they're just playing a playoff team. They've had the hardest schedule

by far to start the season. And the vibes are terrible. Pickett said after the game today, he said, and I quote, guys need to know what they're doing. We need to study more. I don't think we study enough as a group. There's way too many penalties and stuff like that, which we can control.

For that to happen, there's really no excuse for that. Him, the rookie quarterback saying we need to study more, I don't think we study enough, is pretty bad vibes. I'm, like, I'm going to be honest. Did I look up CJ Stroud highlights today? Yeah, I did. Dude, well, here's things. So like I'm cheating on my fiance. I'm in the bathroom with the door locked, like looking at C.J. Stroud highlights. Imagining if we go two and 15, what's possible? Oh, my gosh. Dude, Solac and Stephen are convinced that Kenny Pickett sucks.

And I'm kind of like, you know what? All these, like, incredible almost highlights look like for Deontay and Pickens. They look like Kenny Pickett was not getting enough reps in August. Like, it almost looks as if he was the third string quarterback for three weeks of training camp. To me, he just hasn't gotten to practice with these guys. And then he's playing the toughest defenses like seven in a row. I found peace. I laugh or else I would cry because it's kind of nice that Pickett is either going to,

where he's going to play the rest of the year, and he's either going to be good enough to where I feel confident that he should be the start of next year and we shouldn't draft a quarterback. Or he's going to be terrible. And then hopefully the Steelers will pull a Cardinals and just bury his ass and draft CJ's drought. I'd love that. This should be this segment. We should do this thing called Incognito mode, which is when you just get to ask like, wait, so we could just, we don't need to.

When are you looking at draft prospects and like around? where your team is going to be drafting next year. Yeah. It's hard. Can we just play like the Texans or something? I'd like to see Kenny Pickett play a bad team. I don't know. I'm looking at there.

In Cognito mode, like, should the Giants have just traded Seekwan for the Christian McAfree package and not bought into the six at one start? I don't know. Possibly. I'm actually looking at the Steelers' schedule. They've lost a lot better after the pie.

They've lost bad to the bills and to the Eagles. Otherwise, it's not been that bad. No, but every team they've been, I think they've played like six out of the eight teams. They've played her playoff teams. Yeah. It's not good. Okay, next award here, Craig.

This is the Rookie Mistake Award, which is typically our Snickers-sponsored award, but we don't even have their sponsor today. I just wanted to have my own rookie mistake award. We just like Snickers so much we want to talk about it. Sure, shouts out Snickers. My rookie mistake, DJ Moore, who the most exhilarating game of the day

was Atlanta, Carolina, which everybody predicted. Carolina scores a touchdown with like 20 seconds left, a bomb from Phil Walker, our guy, who by the way, threw the ball like 70 yards in the air to DJ Moore. DJ Moore catches a touchdown. He's having the best game of his season, 150 yards in a touchdown for DJ Moore.

I always believed in him. Right. Never, yeah. Nip. Rips off his helmet, gets an unsportsman-like conduct penalty. Now it's a 40-yard extra point. The game is tied.

20 seconds left. Of course, the kicker, Eddie Padero, who looks like an eighth grader, shanks it. He does. It looks like he'd be an extra and super bad. Game goes to overtime. Marriota throws a pick.

They have a 30-yard field goal for Pinero. Shanks it again, they lose. And it was the most devastating bad beat for the Panthers of the season. But also, like, probably good in the long run that they lost. One is the Falcons, like, bad juju over after this and two, should DJ Moore feel better that it feels like any Pinero would have just makes the extra point even without the 50-d-bounty, honestly? Dude, this game, which is, this is very, very, very.

hard to believe, but the winner of this game between, I believe that it was the two and five Carolina Panthers and the three and four Atlanta Falcons, the winner of that game would be the sole leader in the NFC South. The Panthers could have been first in the NFC South if DJ Moore didn't take his helmet off. You know who, uh, who is first the NFC South? Arthur Smith's four and four Atlanta Falcons, first place. Yeah, actually, I don't mind that they won today because guess what? They decided to actually use Kyle Pitts. Like, yeah, they can get points from the forward pass, they realized maybe in this one. Yeah, we don't have to do the three tight ends who outscored Kyle Pitts.

It's really two tight ends who didn't outscore Kyle Pitts or who did outscore Kyle Pitts, which is only two guys. He was the third tied in fantasy this week. 80 yards in a touchdown. Nine targets. They threw the ball. Mariotta threw it like 28 times. Yeah, next week it's going to be 45 rushes and 11 past attempts.

Can I just say, I've been starting Kyle Pitts every single week and this felt great. this is why we said like you had to keep him is because when this happened if you got rid of them and then this happened it's like i just i mean just jump off a bridge that's how i would have felt it's like it's like when you lost an argument like two months ago with a friend and then you finally found out you were right and you like show up one night and you're like hey remember that thing turns out i was right and everyone's like hey dude nobody cares anymore and you're like i was right oh my god now we just got to get drake london some more looks let's not get green that's this whole other thing. Let's just move on.

That's like, really. They're at first place. I already got mad enough at other coaches tonight. I don't want to get mad again. All right. We have a new award here, which is the, the deer antler spray award for, you know, we don't know how you did this. We don't know why, but it was good. This is the, if you don't remember, deer antler spray was the way that Ray Lewis came back from, like, I don't even remember what the injury was. He came back really quickly because he was using, like, regenerative spray from deer antlers or some shit. I don't know. this was early in the PED era.

D.K. Metcalf, speaking of, how the hell did he play in this game? This was also going to be known as the mansplaining of the week. In the past, Hyfitz, has done some mansplains where basically admits to being very wrong about stuff. I was very wrong about this. I basically scolded, not really, but I was like, Highfitz,

why are we ranking DK. Metcalf this week? He's not going to play. He's going to miss like a month. He's got a Pateler tendon injury of some sort. He's not practicing. He's not. expected to practice. And all of a sudden, I think on Saturday he practiced and he was like, okay, I'm going to play. And we're like, oh, and so I created extra work for high fits.

So sorry about that. No, you know what I think the most incredible part of the whole thing is, is he didn't wear a knee brace. He's an alien. I know that that doesn't sound that crazy, but like, that's fucking astonishing that he had this knee injury. And he was like, all right, I'm going to play. I just assumed he's either an step. No knee brace. This is insane. I did a legit double take when I saw him on the field today. Yeah, I thought it was gamesmanship because they were like, oh, Matt Kaff and Lockett, they're going to play. Tyler Larkett hurts his oblique at a practice that's not.

First hope for us ranking people, worst case scenario. There's no possible way to know how healthy someone is if they had heard on a random Thursday. Right, right. And then I'm like, is this gamesmanship? They both play. They both are the difference in the game. They have the two passing touchdowns. And then Metcalfe has to be the first guy that ever be carded off twice in

one season and play the next week both times. Oh, yeah. I mean, we obviously, when he first got injured, we were like, oh, he's done for the year. You know, he was his knee bent inward. It just didn't look good. There was talk of potential MCL, potential ACL, potential ACL. And then, you know, P. Carroll, it's hard to believe what P. Carroll says about anything when it comes to injuries.

So, yeah, I was wrong. High Fitz. I man explained to you that Metcalf, there's no way Metcalf is going to play, but he's an alien. He came back. He played. We're leaving out the obvious here, which is, what if D.K. McK. for the second time this year

just got carded off because he had to take a shit. It's possible. Also, how about Jamar Chase, who was supposed to be out four to six weeks? Now, like, maybe not.

There was Bengals, beat reporters tweeting that, like, internally, team doctors were saying that they just said, like, Jamar's hip will heal faster

than the average human beings. Literally, built different. Like, that's his prognosis. Built different. What does that mean? I, the older I get, the less I know about everything, but especially the human body.

I don't get anything anymore. What's the effect where it's like the more expert you become at something, the more you realize how little you know about? That's an Aristotle quote. Dunning Kruger is, yeah, yeah. But also Aristotle, sure. Yeah, he probably had it first.

Okay, other deer outler spray, dude, DeAndre Hopkins. Yeah, the deer atler spray hasn't worn off yet, I guess. He still has a little bit left in the bloodstream. Dude, comes back from PED suspension and it's just immediately a top five receiver. Yeah, he's like, you know, he's got 22 catches and two guys.

games like 250 yards. He looks fantastic. Did you see his touchdown catch today? Yeah, sticky hands. This is why it's good to have really good receivers is like the easiest thing that I can take away from this. It's like he caught that thing. It was a laser pass. The back of the end is that he just reached up and snatched her with one hand touchdown.

Like sometimes it's just really nice to have an elite receiver to throw to. Hopkins is incredible. And I was a little worried he lost this step. I do like continue to be radicalized by the Cardinals offense because in one way. Like, it isn't, again, uh, wait, I have to double check here because coming into the season, well, let me see. Yep, they had three points today in the first quarter. So now the Cardinals are up to nine points on the first quarter this season.

Uh, I don't know how that's fucking possible. They continue to have given up the most points in the first quarter and scored the fewest. I don't know what coaching is, if not doing that. The entire, everything that Cliff Kingsbury is supposedly involved with in Arizona doesn't work. The only thing that works for the Arizona Cardinals are when Kyler Murray and DeAnda Hopkins just make shit up. Right. Like MSU, just make shit up. It's the only thing that works for this team.

Well, yeah, reading between the lines is what you're saying is the first quarter, generally speaking, is like the coaches have scripted out the first 10 or 15 plays, whatever it is. And so, you know, hyphids is basically saying, like Cliffs plays suck. And then at the end of the game, it's just like Kyler making up for it and going out and running around. and like making shit happen. So when they actually need to score, Kyler just runs around and does stuff, which it sounds like overly simplistic. I swear to God,

that's exactly what happens every single time. Yeah. Nathan Fielder should do an episode of the rehearsal about Cliff Kingsbury in the first quarter. Dude, it's, why was he wearing sunglasses today?

They were in Minnesota in a dome. Why does he wear sunglasses as a head coach? I think it's literally to make himself look cooler and to hide the fact that he doesn't know what the fuck he's doing. Did you see him last week? He was kind of like bloodshot eyes. He just didn't look that good.

I'm not going to lie. He's inside. Why? I would have made a joke about Cliff Kingsbury looking hungover if I wouldn't like concerned for his health because the nicest thing you can say about Cliff is that he's so concerned for his job. He's just not sleeping. Right.

I am like actually worried for him because he looks like sponge like you know SpongeBob when they run out of water Craig and they get all dried out? Yeah. That's how Cliff looked last week. I won't know that at all. Yeah, obviously. when they're in Sandy's Dome Pinky's up

Yeah, they're in Sandy's Dome Like that's how Cliff looks now That's why he's wearing sunglasses Okay bizarre Like when's the last time you remember Like a head coach Just wearing sunglasses the whole game It's so weird

Now that you say it He's just wearing like Raybans In coaching I don't know what is he doing I mean he looks cool He had like an eye injury It's literally just the Vikings coach Who had wore glasses

Because he had an eye injury And that that's all I can think of I don't know bizarre while we're on it, why do they wear the hats with no top on them, you know, the visors? Why did they run out of like material? Why can't they have the material on the top of their head?

No, that's easy. That's for people who want to wear a hat but have great hair. It's cool. It's less hot. You know, it's cooler. No, it's for people who have great hair but also want a cap. The logo on their face. It doesn't make sense.

Questioning why visors exist. Are you pro visors? DK, that's because you fundamentally look at a hat as a way you hide your bald head. Other people just want like something to block the sun. That's like 50% true. Also, I just think visors look dumb.

Like even if you have great hair. No, if you're like hot and you have great hair, visors look kind of sweet. No. That's a bad thing. It's for hot people. That's the short answer. I mean, visors are dumb, but like people can really pull them off.

Like, if you have a great head of hair, you can do it. But listen, what can't you do with a great head of hair? Exactly. Play quarterback for the head. Jaggs, I guess. You certainly play for the 49ers. Stofer opens a lot of doors for you in life. You know how they say like how many, whatever percent of CEOs are over six feet tall? I wonder what the percent of bald CEOs is.

I mean, probably pretty high. The way that he said bald there is just so vindictive. Bald CEOs. Jesus. No, hate against bald people. I feel like bald isn't the same. I mean, they're talking about 60-year-old white guys. Like a lot of them are bald.

It's just going to be a thing. I mean, yeah. That's how I look at it. I think you're going to ask about what percentage of CEOs are hot. Like Bob Eiger. He's good-looking man. Great-looking guy. Looks fantastic for his age.

He's like 70 years old looks like 55. I don't know what he's doing, what deer antler spray, rich guy shit he's on, but he looks fantastic. Silver, well, actually, he wrote, because he just works out of five in the morning every day. I think it's the answer for all of them. Yeah. He probably just, like, eats well on exercises.

Yeah. Crush his email of five in the morning while he's on a tramp, though. Meanwhile, Cliff Kingsbury is just God knows where at five of the one. I don't know if he's waking up or going to sleep or what. Burn book. Week one, we burn Cam Acres. Week two, we burned Colquette and Darnel Mooney. Week three, we burned Baker Mayfield.

Week four, we burn Carl Pitts. Week five, Alan Robinson. Week six, we burned D.C. Moore and Elijah Moore. And the Dijamore said the best two games of his year since then. Week seven, we burned A.J. D.L. Week eight. Who is the person who has wronged us so thoroughly that we were just burning them, putting him in a burbook.

I struggled this week. Did you guys? I don't, I didn't have anyone at the top of my head. Who do you guys think? I'm so happy. No one wronged me. I still think that we've been circling the Steelers like sharks all season long.

We need to burn a Steeler at some point. And I want to give, every week I think it should be Najee Harris. He's paralyzed any fantasy manager. Nobody knows what to do. He gets you. like eight to ten points every game and that's it and they're like well i don't i'm not gonna sit him i just think he's like the worst no man's land player you have yeah it's like the steelers honestly i'd be almost down to just burn the steelers as a concept because i joked about this on the friday

show but it's true it's like dionte johnson like fourth in targets period like straight up as the fourth most targets in the NFL feels unplayable like he has five catches 35 yards today Target. Like, who cares? He has no touchdowns on the year. It's like, you know what I mean? I would just burn Pittsburgh. Well, no, not the city.

That sounds awful. I would burn the Steelers. Be careful what you say, man. I know. The entire Steelers, you know what's sad? Chase Claypool is point three points away from being the highest scoring Steeler in fantasy football. That's right.

He might get traded too. Oh my gosh. That's a good one. It's a good one, Craig. Thank you. You're not going to believe this. My dog got out of his crate. He's just wandering around now.

He got out of the crate. Like a madman. How did he get out of the crate? Sniffing at my door. I don't know. Did you lock the crate? Did he develop thumbs? Yes.

I don't know how this happens. You did lock the crate? Are you sure you want to go on record as you locked? You're literally being recorded. Are you, you want to go on record that you locked the crate? Not with like a dead bolt. Putting a dog in a crate is a normal thing.

Like, he sleeps in a crate. Crating your dog is not inhumane. It's not like we're leaving in there for 10 hours. That's not what I'm saying at all. What I'm saying is, by going on record that you locked the crate, you're implying that the dog

undid the lock or instead of just like he forgot. I mean, he's out. He's wandering the house currently. The only other living thing that can comment on this is a dog. So I'm going to have to take two cases. He's not talking. Yeah.

I feel like the dog didn't undo the lock in the crate. Should we burn George? Yeah, seriously. Oh, my God. I don't know how. George Pickens. I don't know how much of, the George saga from tonight.

is going to get axed from the podcast. But just so you know, if you're listening now, George has been making a bunch of noise. My seven-month-old puppy's been making much of noise in the background. And he's a menace. He's a menace to podcasting right now. All right. Let's just burn all the Steelers.

George. They're all just holding you back. You should just don't start any of them because the upside is not there. Until they start, you know what? Until they start playing teams that aren't favored to win the Super Bowl, don't start Steelers. And George is on notice. This is like what we did with the Panthers.

We gave him a week. He's probably right now eating toilet paper, if I had to guess. It's like his thing. Is this the crate where like it's all six sides, right? Like it's not like just the four. Well, the one that I put him in just during the podcast, like I keep him, I was hoping you would go to sleep.

It's just a fabric crate where you like has like a zipper in the front. And I think he broke the zipper. Oh, that makes more sense. But we do have like a. metal crate that he sleeps in and he likes it usually but you know he just wants to hang out and then when he does hang out then he just whines because he wants to go like play and stuff he's a he's a seven-month-old puppy all right well we'll let you go deal with that okay and i was yelling i was yelling a lot at coaches and i think that made him nervous i don't blame him well i mean dk maybe i don't know

i should probably just chill is the is the lesson here if i'm scaring george that's what everyone says about dk's you got to chill thank you craig thank you dk uh thank you you, George, I guess we're not really thankful for George. I mean, I love George. I mean, I love George. It's a coaching issue. Yeah. Thank you, Lord. Lord.

Thank you, George Harrison. Speaking of George's. Hmm. Remember when we did the two Beatles of the live for select? He didn't know what he was the Beatles. Ringo? Ringo. Ringo.

Did George Harrison go solo post-Beatles or no? Yeah, he had, I don't know how many albums, but he definitely has some songs I've heard that are just George Harrison. Yeah. yes and that is the extent of my George Harrison knowledge let me check yeah he did he went solo I want to see what's like the biggest George Harrison song wow I didn't realize the flow that George Harrison had see night good head of hair take you and George Harrison yeah good one my sweet my sweet Lord is a famous song and I think it was on the Guardians of the Galaxy

soundtrack which is a very like millennial thing to say yeah that's a great great song. I really want to know you. That song? Yes. Yes. I like that we didn't anger enough people by not knowing the Brian Adams songs right off the top of the head. So now we're like, yeah, we just don't know George Harrison. No, you didn't know who Brian Adams was. There's a difference. He's right. Huge difference. And I'm at fault there. But not knowing George Harrison's songs, not a huge deal, I feel like. Yeah. In my defense, he spells it with the Y. And my brain just doesn't lump in Bryant's with the eye and Bryans with the Y together. You know, I was at a bar a few weeks ago, and I was talking to a friend, and a guy goes, a guy over here is my name.

And he goes, your name's Craig? And I was like, yeah. And he was like, do you spell it with a C or a K? And I was like, a C. And he was like, weird. That you're the first Craig I met who does that. What? I was like, one, who knows multiple Craigs? And two, who knows Craigs who spell her name with a fucking K? Maybe it's like in Europe they spell with a K. Was this guy European? No. Okay. He was aggressively American. What's that mean?

I don't know. He very much was from America. Well, you know, there was a running back on the box named Craig Lumpkin who spelled his name with a K. Yep. I remember that guy. But it was spelled in the most unappealing way you could imagine. It was K-R-E-G-G. His last name is Lumpkin.

Which might be the worst name in NFL history. Craig Lumpkin. And this is in a sport that had Dick Butkus. I would take Dick Buckus any day over Craig Lumpkin. It's like Craig. You just really feel the EGG. And you're, you feel it in your chest, you know. You feel it.

It sounds like a slur in Gaelic. Craig. Craig. Greg. Remember when we had a big, long discussion about how you pronounce your name in other countries? There was a whole episode of Veep where they can't pronounce. announced the name Craig. Remember that?

It seems like such a straightforward name to me. I don't know. I agree. Craig. I've never quite understood the contradiction. But it is alive and well. Craig Lumpkin. Lumpkin.

Lumpkin, Lumpkin is even funny to me than the Craig. It's like celebrities who change their last name. Like, why can't athletes do that? Change your name, Lumpkin. Just go with Craig. Just everyone just put it in French. Olivia Wilde's name is Olivia Cockburn. Did you know that?

Yeah I'm gonna kind of get Yeah I get why Yeah I yeah I Yeah lumpkin Probably a good call Just change Craig Hanson Done

Pick pick a different name That easy We need to normalize changing your name Who cares Do whatever you want Pick something you want Pick something you want Pick something whatever

Pick a name He's from Newton County Georgia Craig Newton Done Alright goodbye everyone