The Ringer NFL Show - Zeke, Mostert, Fournette, and More Question Marks, Plus Week 15 Bold Predictions

Episode Date: December 18, 2020

For the second week of fantasy playoffs, we discuss all the players with question marks surrounding their availability for the weekend. Then we offer up our gut calls and bold predictions for the Week 15 slate, look back on our Week 14 predictions, build our million-dollar daily fantasy lineup, and rule on a Fantasy Court case. Question Mark Players (2:51) Week 15 Predictions: Jeff Wilson, 49ers (15:38) Leonard Fournette, Bucs (20:29) Irv Smith Jr., Vikings (22:47) Donovan Peoples-Jones, Browns (23:45) Gabriel Davis, Bills (24:58) J.K. Dobbins, Ravens (26:17) D'Andre Swift, Lions (28:07) Michael Pittman Jr, Colts (29:16) Kendrick Bourne, 49ers (29:47) Million-Dollar Lineup (34:58) Fantasy Court (38:23) 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 all the weird, murky-start situations this weekend, like Zeke Elliott and Raheim Mostert. And we also give our gut-gut bowls, our million-dollar lineup, and we invented a German word. Stick around. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. My name is Danny Haifitz, and I'm joined by Craig Holbeck and Danny Kelly.

Are you guys ready for a fun fact? Yeah, sure. All right, fun fact, we have a lot of German listeners. Nice. Because... That's great. We span across the globe. We were talking about German old words and how we need an old German word to describe certain fantasy emotions.

We got a lot of emails from German listeners. So I wanted to read, first of all, thank you to everyone, and everyone was very kind about our terrible pronunciations. But I want to read an email we got from Mel. Mel. Mel writes that German is famous for being very literal with their words, and when a new word is needed, they just jammed together existing words to describe the new word. For instance, the German word, that's great. I love that style. For instance, the German word for ambulance is crocken, Kronken, which literally means sick car.

And then... Oh, okay. Mel writes that the German word, you can invent a German word for the joy and pain you feel when a player's on your team in one league scores in you another league, as Freudus schmerzervenen-legin, which literally means the joy slash pain of too many leagues. Wow. You actually did that pretty well. I'm impressed.

I don't know if you pronounced it correctly, but it sounded like you did to me. There we go. Well, that's all we're going for. Thank you to all of our German listeners. That's lovely. Thank you to Mel. And sorry to everyone feeling the Freudish mirrors of Vien Leagin. I didn't do it as well the second time.

And it's very applicable this week because we've got so many difficult sit-start decisions. I just feel like with the combination of injuries, COVID, guys going on to the COVID list. This is like, it feels like one of the most confusing weeks of the entire season, which is great because it's in the playoffs. Yeah, it's a dark semi-finals of fantasy playoffs. I feel like there's a lot of chaos. Like the German words, there's a lot of pieces. You're not sure how they fit together at first. Ooh.

Yeah. So let's just go through, because as D.K. and Craig just said, it's just like, this is one of the hardest weekends of the year. I feel like in terms of, there's just so much uncertainty about certain players that are on the fence about playing and what to do. So we're just going to roll through a lot of weird situations and just what we make of them. So number one, if you take only one thing from this podcast, there are two games on Saturday. So you have to set your line up from Friday night. Especially if you live on the West Coast.

So confusing. Do not go about your Saturday afternoon and forget there are football games. Yeah, don't start drinking with your friends. No hot toddies at 5 o'clock. What's a hot toddy? It's a hot toddy, the alcoholic drink? What? It's like a hot alcoholic drink.

It's a great winter alcoholic beverage. I've never even heard of it. Oh, it's really good. It's almost like an alcoholic hot spiced cider. Oh, okay. That sounds great. It's really good. Well, don't get up with your hot toddies or whatever.

We'll talk about. about that later. Also, I can't believe they're doing this because Bill's Broncos is during the Clemson Notre Dame game. And then Packers' Panthers is during the Bama, Florida game. So I don't know why they didn't reschedule these games. The NFL doesn't seem to have a problem reschedule. Why do they ever do this on Saturday? I don't understand.

So the answer is the only reason they're not on Saturday is the rest of the season is because literally the law. There's actually a law when the NFL and AFL merged. They actually had to write a law that was like, you can basically only play on Sundays. You can't own the whole weekend. And that's how college football came to be Saturdays because they're legally not allowed to do it until, college is done. But they scheduled it. College football games pushed back to this weekend. So college moved into the window. And then the NFL's like, we're not moving. So now you have two

really Mac games during the best college football game. But so basically the NFL was just like the second we can own Saturday and Sunday we're going to? Yes. The moment we can have the whole, the whole weekend we want. That's that's how it goes. So don't forget to sit your line. It's number one. Number two, the question mark guys, I think we should start with Ezekiel Elliott because they're going against the Niners. He has a calf injury. He didn't he missed practice on Thursday, so he's not practicing. He also seemed to split touch

as a Tony Pollard last week. Admittedly, it was garbage time, but still, what do you guys make of Zeke Elliott? Would you play? So first of all, if he doesn't play, how do you feel about Tony Pollard? And if he does play, would you even play in this week against the Niners? Yes, I would. So I think if he doesn't play, Tony Pollard is actually a really

interesting, like a handcuff type play, a flex spot type play just because he's been really impressive when he's gotten opportunities. He's almost, he's like literally actually almost a borderline flex guy just with the fact that they're splitting reps right now. They don't seem to be

leaning heavily on Zeke. And why would they really honestly like to finish the season? He hasn't looked that great to start with and then they just, what's the point of them feeding him 30 carries a game while they're like not going to make the playoffs, all this stuff? So I think you still got to start

Elliot if he's like if you don't have any realistically better options at this point just because he's still going to get enough volume to be a flex or like an RB2 type guy. I actually think Pollard is pretty interesting regardless of whether he plays or not. So keep an eye on Elliott as we get closer to the games on Sunday.

It's looking like he's going to play. And that's kind of the main takeaway. It sounds like he's going to play, but if he doesn't play, Pollard becomes this like rocket ship guy. The one thing for Pollard to note is that nine of the 13 touches he got were in garbage time. So I don't love him as the flex

option if Elliott goes and I do think they're probably just kind of keeping it out for the week. I agree though. I actually like Pollard playing more. I like Pollard more of Zeke's out than I like Zeke with both playing. Which is kind of funny to think about. All right. Next one up. The Broncos have a weird situation here. Melvin

Gordon is questionable. He is, Melvin Gordon has a shoulder injury. Philip Lindsay is questionable with a hip injury. He also has like a toe injury too. He's dealing with. So the expectation is Melvin Gordon probably plays. We don't really know about Philip Lindsay. Do you even like any of these guys for this week? I mean, they're going against

the bills whose defense is getting better. I don't love either of these guys. I was going to say, Gordon, it sounds like Gordon's going to play. Fangio said on Wednesday that he expects Gordon to play. But again, this is a situation to monitor. I guess the reason we're doing this is just like a few guys you have to pay attention to as we get closer to

Sunday. It sounds like Gordon's going to play. I think if he does play, he's one of those like a fringe RB2 guy right there on the cusp of sitable, even if he is playing. And so I think we'll get into some of the guys we like more this week, maybe some of these rookie running backs, which I've got kind of outlined, and we can go from there.

But I'd say Gordon is startable as an RB2 if he plays, but it's borderline, and no one's going to blame me if you go a different direction. Yeah, I lean start for Gordon. He's actually been not too bad, and he's one of those guys who I feel like is always playing through injuries. But, I mean, he's had 18, 3, 14, and 10 over his last four games. He's actually been kind of all right. And the bills are pretty average run defense.

The next one I think that's interesting here is Matt Stafford He has a ribs injury They're going against the Titans Which on paper is a good matchup for the lines But realistically If Stafford's hurt This is really this is all really weird

All of a sudden They do have a good backup One of the better ones in the league Well so there's two questions here There's if Stafford plays and if he doesn't What happens to the rest of the skill players But if it's a question of pain tolerance I feel like Stafford's going to play

This dude played games with like a broken back He's a warrior Yeah he is I actually saw this really great quote From the athletics Chris Burke who knows the lions really, really well. He said, I don't know if Matt Stafford's going to play Sunday. I do know that before the Chiefs game last year,

he looked like he could barely walk. He didn't take any snaps in warm-ups because he was so uncomfortable. And then he played and he threw for 291 yards and three touchdowns. That's awesome. Stafford is underrated and underratedly cool. I feel like, I think he'd be a bigger deal if he was in a cooler market.

That's a good point. Matt Ryan, I don't think would be interesting anywhere, but Matt Stafford would be interesting anywhere else. Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree. So if he plays, Marvin Jones, obvious is a start. If he does not play, if Chase Daniels play, Chase Daniel plays, would you start Marvin Jones?

Would you still go with him? I don't think I would. That's just a level of- Just avoid that whole thing. Here's the thing. I actually think this is an interesting spot from Marvin Jones. I think you dock him a little bit because Logan Ryan, the cornerback might be shadowing him,

but still, it's like, I don't, I'm not impressed by the Titans D. I think Marvin Jones has been getting a lot of opportunity. But I'm just not willing to. to lose my fantasy playoffs because Chase Daniel couldn't get Marvin Jones the ball. But here's the thing. Stafford's probably going to play, though. Even if Stafford does play, Marvin Jones has scored more than seven points once in the last four games.

He's not lighten the world on fire. He had one big game, and that's what we're kind of remembering, but he really hasn't done too much. I think he's the opposite of how we usually think of him. I think he's the opposite of what we usually think of him. I think that in the past he's had this steady kind of diet, and I think in this game, he's a boom-buck. He's not the kind of player of like the old

Sean Jackson mold of like 20 points or under five, but that's how I'm thinking him for this week. I think he could blow up or do nothing, but I'm doubting the in-between. Did you guys hear about Frank Ragnow? Oh my God. The center? Fractured. Throat. The lion's center. What is that? I don't mean to laugh because that sounds terrible. No, we should do a segment. Every time we learn of a brand new football injury, we should just

talk about it. Fractured throat. Fractured throat? Gugling injuries. So I don't know you guys. For me, you know, like, there must be physical injuries that freak you out. For me, it's like eye injuries and then spine. Anything spine, anything throat is just like freaks me out. So I looked into this and apparently... It's fair. Part of what's going on here is they called it a contusion, but really he has like a bruised vocal cord.

So they were like, he doesn't have problem eating or breathing, which, you know, those would be huge problems. But he can't really talk because he has bruised vocal. I don't even want to think about what that means. That's tough as a center because I feel like they have to communicate a ton. He's the one supposed to be yelling out coverage. So here's that. I hate to be the person who's like,

what's the football aspect? probably shouldn't be playing football if you have a fractured throat. Let's just make that clear. But if he is going to play and Chase Daniels is in there, it is actually a logistical challenge of a backup quarterback and a center who can't talk. Listen, bruised vocal chord sounds way less serious than fractured throat.

Yeah, that's, I don't know what to make. I'm not a doctor. Did you guys ever in high school? You know, like remember five starring where you hit somebody in the back with your hand and it makes like... Oh, yeah, yeah. So there was another one.

You know, it's like panting, There's all those stupid things at high school. We had, we had what it was. Table topping. We would run over and hit people really, really hard on the shoulders. Like it doesn't do any damage, but every time people are, you just run up behind them and just go, bam! And it was like a thing that we did in our whole class and everyone was like, oh, like, and then everyone would clap. We had this awful one called, I don't know why it was called, I think it was called papaya.

I think you just, I think you just yelled papaya and then you would like karate chop somebody's throat. Oh my God. Okay. That seems that seems meaner. Not like super duper hard, but like just enough to where it kind of choked you up and your Adam's apple kind of hurt. It was the worst thing ever. So I feel.

No fractured throats. I feel for the center. It sounds like the worst thing of all the time. That sounds like you guys took it up a notch from like the shoulder hitting and the back slapping. Dude, I don't know. Five starring sucked. Getting five star is like an awful feeling.

I would rather be five star than throat punched. Oh my God. Okay. Let's move on. Frank Rag now you were thinking. of you. Other weird decisions, this one actually is the easiest one, ironically, is Christian McCaffrey is almost definitely not going to play. You should play Mike Davis if you have. Mike Davis has been great. Mike Davis has been fantastic. Play him. And I would prepare for Christian McCaffrey. If you

somehow win again without McCaffrey, like you have the whole year and you make the finals, I think there's a chance they shut him down for the season. I mean, especially the Falcons, or if the Panthers lose. They're four and nine. They're going to be four in ten. Like, I don't know why they would play him. It doesn't make any sense. So prepare for that. There's another player. Julio Jones is another guy. He might not play this week.

The Falcons are terrible. They might shut him down as well. I wanted to ask you guys about this. Shutting down is like a weird part of fantasy football that we haven't talked about. And like the whole reason that there's the fantasy championships are not on week 17 is because there's a lot of guys who get benched. A lot of games don't matter. They're not trying as hard.

So it makes them. People are sitting their starters, yes. Don't you think that the shutdown season really does start around week 15, 16? I know it's shortening the fantasy season. but it is kind of BS that, like, if you draft a guy in a bad team, he might just not play because he's sore in, but on a typical week, he may have actually played because it's important. Like, should the fantasy playoffs be like week 11, 12, and 13 or something?

No. That's actually, I agree with that. I think that would be a good idea. Because, yeah, I mean, think about the stuff we were just talking about as we were prepping for the show. There's so many freaking randos. So full disclosure, we're recording this Thursday afternoon. We were all very glad we don't have to talk about Tyron Johnson from the

from the Chargers because this is a Thursday night game. The podcast comes out Friday morning. We were like, I don't know what to do with this guy. Like I'm starting him in one league, one very deep league. But it's like these kind of decisions suck. And it's because guys are just getting so beat up later as the season goes on. Some teams that are out of it are sitting their star players or not rushing their star players back. I guarantee you Gala Day is not coming back just because he's like going to free agency.

And I'm not trying to get hurt in the last two games of the season. You know what I mean? And so I think there's some validity to that. Doesn't it feel a little bit like the fantasy regular season drags on a little bit? Oh my God. I don't know what about you two makes. Make the playoffs like four weeks long. Something about you two turns me into the crotchety old guy.

But like welcome to the real fucking world guys. The Eagles have played 13 combinations of offensive lines in 14 weeks. These real NFL teams are trotting out randos. If your fantasy team is in any way supposed to mirror what's happening on the field, guess what? The real teams aren't happening. happy about playing Tyrone Johnson either. You get used to it.

It's not supposed to mirror. This is a fake-ass game. Called fantasy football. Why would we want to just have all of our star players? Guess what? Well, it's about blending fantasy in reality. It can't purely be fantasy. It's not like you just have a team of mad at 99s.

Like, if the real guys are all getting hurt, like, you got to play someone. I think you start the fantasy playoffs in week 11, and it's just a four-week royal rumble, and the person who ends up on top wins at all. No, this is just, oh, this is... I don't agree with that. I have such strong opinions about, like, fantasy formats.

It's hilarious to me. I have extremely strong opinions about fantasy formats. Hear me out, playoff starts week one. And if you lose three times, you're out, first one to nine wins, wins the ship. Well, the least climactic, but maybe the best format of all would just be to do it, like, Premier League style.

You should just get points and there's no playoffs. It's called best. That would be really fun because you can't shit talk. There's no, like, side bets. extremely anti-climactic. Okay. You want to go into gut calls, bold predictions? Did we talk about Ronald Jones?

Oh, well, you spoiled it. So yes, that's part of my... God damn it, Craig. Part of my gut call. Peek behind the curtain there for all you at home. He's trying to be real sneaky with the segue there, but no. Let's just, well, let's just get into him now. Because we were going to talk about this, but then I basically realized that I wanted

to talk about Rahima. But it's okay. Well, I'm just going to go into it right now. Sure. My bold prediction this week is I think Jeff Wilson is a top 10 running back. Top 10? I think that that's the crazy thing to say. I feel strongly about him playing this week for a few reasons. Basically, he's getting equal run with Rahim Mostert right now. Mostert. Every time. Every time. Just think of it as like the mostest. He's the mostest. He's the best. Yeah. Okay. I'll totally get it right. Anyway, Rahim now is dealing with an ankle injury. He didn't practice.

on Wednesday. We don't know the status of him practicing on Thursday, but it's the mix of, I think Jeff Wilson actually will get the majority of snaps and carries this week, because they were basically splitting it last week anyway. And the Cowboys defense, I think, is a really juicy matchup. I understand they played really well against the Bengals. I don't care. The Niners are not the Bengals. The Niners have, like, the best designed offense in football, but the Bengals do not. And I think that the Cowboys, even with some defensive shakeups, are not going to be prepared. I think that at a fundamental level, I'm banking on, it's not just, Jeff Wilson. I'm banking on Kyle Shanahan to extremely out-coach Mike McCarthy and the defense by a lot.

And I'm very confident in that. And I just think Wilson is a great mix of he's getting enough carries in a great offense for like scheming him open. And he has the home run ability. And I just think he's a nice mix of like a decent enough floor for a flex with home run ability. Obviously it depends a lot on how healthy mustard is. You know, if they're splitting it. But if moster can't go, I think he's a huge, huge guy. And then even if he can, I think Wilson have a huge day. So I love Wilson as a flex this weekend. You like him as more than a flex, top 10. Well, it's bold. I mean, I'm going out there. I'm not saying he's really good. Like, I don't know for sure. But I would not be surprised if we're doing top scoring leaders on Monday's show and Jeff

Wilson's like second or third. And listen, check your leagues. He's 52% rostered. He's barely, he's being started in like a seventh of leagues. And I think that he pretty easily could be top 20. So I want to read what Kyle Shanahan had to say about most start on Wednesday. This is after practice. He said it.

It's kind of like how. all high ankle sprains are. He zinged it a couple times in this last game, which is going to happen to him a lot. And it just felt a little worse than normal. And I think he's talking about early on in the week when he's not practicing. He said he's not practicing today,

but we feel pretty good that he'll be able to get there at the end of the week. So I think it still hurts a little bit more than usual, but the imaging was positive. So he got an MRI early in the week and whatever, just to check. I think, honestly, this makes me more worried, though, because, like, he's getting zing during the game. I could absolutely see him just, like,

play the first quarter get re-injure it and then just you know take like 12 12 total snaps correct yeah mostard so how do you feel of playing most it this weekend I'm very nervous about it first of all it's a great matchup like he said with the cowboys but the way that they've been rotating it

it just makes me nervous man it's one of those things where he's still coming back from his high ankle sprain there's tons and tons of research on how you know performance really lags coming off of high ankle sprains for more than the time, like a long, longer than the players actually like, you know, actually coming back to the field. So it was before McCaffrey and Michael Thomas has basically just not been themselves since they had those. Exactly. Even Sequin came back from a high ankle spray and he just didn't look that good.

So I just, yeah, you know, I think most are his, where he separates himself is like his explosiveness and his ability to hit the home run. And if he's not 100%, like that makes him less attractive or a higher risk. I should say, you know, of just like not being what you want. And so, you know, in my league that I have him, I'm lucky to have a couple extra options. And I'm just not going to start him. But he's the kind of guy who's very borderline for me. He's not a blanket bench because he still has upside against in this good matchup. But if you have, like D.K. said, if you have other options, don't feel dumb benching him.

But don't automatically bench him either. That's my bold. Or we're sticking with murky situations. We usually don't share, but this week it felt different. D.K., who's your bold? This is a similar line And this guy to me is not necessarily I'm not like confidently starting him in leagues

But this is a kind of player that you can Plug in as an RB2 slash flex If you're having major problems with like your lineup right now And the waiver wires bear Lenny Forrenz or guy Leonard Furnett who is basically all but forgotten In this Tampa Bay backfill He was a healthy scratch last week

I mean Fornett for us has even become a Glansberg Our guy Lenny Forns is Stephen Glansberg It's a fall from grace It sucks because for half the year we were like, we literally didn't know who the starter was going to be. And then it kind of Ronald Jones emerged as the guy. And then Leonard Fournett took the backseat completely. But with Ronald Jones, Ronald Jones, number one, had to get surgery on his finger. I think he had a broken finger, had to get a rod inserted or screws inserted or something like that.

There's an unclear turnaround for that injury. And Arians was talking about, like, we don't want to put a guy out there if he can't show that he can hold the ball with one hand, blah, blah, blah. It just makes me really nervous about Ronald Jones. In addition to the fact that he's on the COVID list as we speak, there's a chance he could get off of it in the next few days, but I don't think he's going to play this week. It's not looking like Ronald Jones is going to play. So that opens up the door for Leonard Fernette to be the starter.

Again, it's a little murky. We don't know what the situation is completely. Like maybe LaShawn McCoy is the guy. Maybe even Kishon Vaughn comes in out of nowhere. So it's definitely a risky-ish play going up against Atlanta. But I'm just looking at number one, If Julio doesn't play, Atlanta, I feel like their offense is just going to be punchless and not very good. And so I could see the Tampa Bay Buccaneers go up on them and just kind of like try and control the clock, run the ball a lot, do their thing.

In competitive games, they've been pretty half-heavy, but I could see them getting an early lead and then just kind of like trying to grind it out in the end. So that's what makes me a little bit confident in Fournet versus a pretty good run defense for most of the season in Atlanta. But again, this is a bold call. And I'm just going to, I'm just going to cap it at double digits for now, like, 10. half point PPR. I'm hoping for like a 20-touch day for Fournett and see what happens. But in terms of just like finding a guy

who can get a little bit of volume this week, you know, I think he's a potential, you know, R.B.2. Should I go bold now? I guess, yeah. We just went two bolts. We'll get the bold this week. My bold is that Irv Smith will be a top seven tight end this week.

Ooh. I like this tight end versus the bear's trend. It's worked out. They've actually been pretty bad consistently the entire year. and Kyle Rudolph is hurt. It doesn't look like he's going to play. Irv Smith had a great game last week.

If Chicago can do anything to slow down Justin Jefferson and Thielen, I think Irv Smith could actually be like a legitimately, you'll feel really good about Irv Smith and you'll look smart in your league. I think he's a good start. So I'm saying top seven tight end. I like Smith. He made a couple of really nice crabs. Yeah, I was going to say he's like a, he's athletic.

He's underrated in his ability. He didn't like test really well coming out, but he's very athletic and he moves like. Did he play basketball in college? college? No, I don't think so. Are we played tight end in college? I don't even, I don't know. If you played tight end in college,

like I don't even want to hear about you, honestly. Who are you? Yeah. If any tight end plays tight end in college, I'm out. Yeah, no. I mean, if you're not athletic enough to play basketball as a college athlete,

I don't know what you're doing, to be honest. Okay, I like that one. As long as we're on the boulds, I want to just throw out a couple more. These are not my official bold takes, but I think these are guys that you can throw into your lineups as like a flex option. If you're desperate this week,

if things are not working out with your roster. Donovan Peoples Jones against the Giants. And the reason I think of him is not just that he's had a couple of good games over the last few weeks. He's averaged like 23 yards per per reception. He's been a big play threat for the Brown's offense. This is a guy who he was a six-round pick out of Michigan. But his testing numbers, his athleticism numbers are absolutely bonkers good. Like he had like a 44-inch vert super fast. Like one of the best athletes in this draft coming out. he just didn't have very good numbers at Michigan. Their offense just wasn't very good.

So to me, he's a very interesting play against the Giants who are going to be without James Bradbury, who just got put on the COVID list today. And he's this outside, deep threat type of guy that Bradbury is typically going to kind of shut down. And so he's interesting to me. And I think it matters if Cadaral Hodge play. So keep an eye on that.

I haven't actually seen if Hodge is going to play. but if Hodge is out, I like DPJ as kind of a under the radar flex type option, big play type of guy. The other guy to keep in mind here, which I actually like a little bit more is Gabriel Davis of the bills. John Brown.

I was going to throw him out as a desperation bold. There you go. I also have Gabriel Davis. Are you serious? We all have Gabe Davis. We can all talk about Gabe Davis this week. He's had, I think, touchdowns in like three or four straight games.

Three straight games, yeah. Yeah. And he, you know, another rookie who's come on, because of injury, John Brown has been declared out, I believe, this week. So he kind of maintains his role as the deep threat, the number two guy in this offense behind Steph Diggs. And I don't know, he's just good.

And he has a good rapport with Josh Allen. He's a good deep threat. So he's another type of guy who he's a little bit boom-abust, obviously. But I just like his chances of getting a touchdown this week again. Yeah, I love Gabe Davis this week without John Brown playing. Denver's got like a bazillion defensive backs out. Gabe Davis is good. He's going to, like next year,

keep him on your radar for next year, by the way. I think he's going to be really good next year. All right. Who's up now? We're doing guts? Back to normal, the guts? Yeah. Well, my gut was that Gabe Davis would be a top 30 wide receiver,

so I'm penciling that in here. Okay, there you go. Perfect. Yeah. My good for this week, I'm going to just snipe D.K. Because I feel like D.K. probably has this. I think you should start J.K. Dobbins this week if you have him. He somehow only thinks.

You snip the hell out of him. of me. I knew it. I knew it. I knew you love Dobbins. I think he's only being started right now in like a third of ESPN Leagues or like a little over a third. This dude is the starter. D.K. has been screaming about play J.K. Dobbins all year. And then lost in the Lamar Jackson, did he poop or not or have cramps game? Is that J.K. Dobbins is the starter. Even coming back from the COVID list, they're giving him. He went from like 40-something percent of snaps. He's in the 60s now. He's, he's clearly at the head of this rotation. And more and more importantly, The Ravens offense is rolling again. This is not a team that looks stuck in the mud anymore. It's they're playing well. And this is a good matchup and the offense is rolling. And he's playing. It's like a perfect storm.

He's underrated. If you have him, I don't know if you have a flex option better than JK Dobbins. So sorry to snipe UDK, but I also did it on purpose. That's perfect. I think he nailed it. The key thing to me is not necessarily even that he's the number one guy in this

offense, but it's turned from a three-headed monster into a two-man crew with him and Gus Edwards. Mark Ingram was essentially out of the picture at this point. He had one carry. I think he had one snap. Or he came in like the first series, had one carry and then was done for the rest of the game last week. So I think, yeah, I like this one.

The game script seems like potentially pretty strong for him in terms of like I could see the Ravens jump out to an early lead. The Jags are just not good. And you could have them just run the ball a lot and find ways to get into the Red Zone, get these guys opportunities to get into the end zone. Also, we forgot to mention the Jagger. the Jaguars who suck. We kind of left that part out. So my, yeah, what did you have for your benchmark? I just said he's top 20 just to be like, he's

play him. Yeah. Top 20 at the position. What's your gut for the weekday? Or that was your gut? J.K. Dobbins. That was my first gut, but I'll just go with my other one. It's sticking with the rookie running back line here. I think Dandre Swift is a, I'm going to put 12 plus half BPR

this week against Tennessee. And I actually like him regardless of whether Stafford plays when I. I can see if Stafford plays, obviously, they're offense has a little bit higher ceiling or a lot higher ceiling. And that could be good for him. But also, if Stafford is out, I could see them kind of funneled the offense through Swift a little bit here. Lots of dump offs, lots of runs.

The Titans have been giving up the seventh most fantasy points per game to opposing running backs this week or this season. So it's a good matchup for Swift and for the Lions. So I don't know. I just like Swift a lot this week. He didn't seem to have any hangups coming back from his extended absence because of the concussion and the illness. He played fewer snaps, or at least a lower snap rate than he did prior to that injury, that big game he had where he was kind of like the breakout game for him.

But I think they're just kind of ramping him back up. It was over 50% in this last week. So he's still the lead guy in that offense. And again, he's just good and it's a good matchup. I like that. Craig, who's your gut for the week? Well, so other than Gabe Davis and then my bold was, um, Irv Smith. My other gut, I kind of have two here. One, I'll be quick. I think you can start Michael Pittman again. I know he didn't pan out last week and we'll get to that in a bit. He had like 40 yards, but he's still seeing a lot of targets. He hasn't seen lower than like a 17% target share over the last like four games or like five games since he became a thing with the Colts, which is pretty good. I still think he's worth it against Houston this week, which is like a terrible defense.

But another gut I have is like if you're struggling at receiver, there's been a lot of receivers recently who have screwed you. Debo Samuel, Julio Jones, you know, Will Fuller a few weeks ago. There's a lot. Kendrick Bourne on the Niners versus Dallas is like, you know, interesting. He's had seven and a half targets a game without Debo in like the last five weeks, which is not bad. He's gone over 80 yards one time. I mean, he's not going to light the world on fire,

but the Niners are throwing it a lot recently. Nick Mullins is averaging like 42 passes of game over the last three games. I think there's a chance that Kendrick Board can provide you with like a safe floor if you like your team and you want like eight points, nine points. I think that's what Kendrick Bourne can get you. I love Kendrick Bourne as a player.

I think he's one of those he has like the biggest gap between his real life value and like he's he's borderline fantasy relevant but like for the Niners he's just the go to guy in third. It's kind of like how Hunter Renfro and the Raiders is just the third down guy

but he's not really, you're not going to play him. Kendrick Bourne was just a tier below I think like Michael Thomas and people and he had like 28 targets on third down last year and like caught like 27 of them. He's insane. So I love any,

I love those kinds of guys getting shine and honestly I just I could see him carving up the Dallas defense because I think he, excels at a lot of things that Cowboys are kind of bad at covering. So I like that one. Kendrick Bourne is to me

this total blind spot because his name keeps coming up and he always has a few good games every year it seems like he did this last year too a little bit but I still absolutely refused to even look into who he is. He straddles the line

between good football players and completely fantasy irrelevant. He's the bridge between the groups. I'm going to be timid. I'm going to say just over eight fantasy points which I consider a startable flex if you're nervous. Better than a goose egg, put it that way. It's desperate times call for desperate players,

like learning who Kendrick Bourne is. Okay. Million dollar lineup time? Let's do it. No, wait, we got to go over last week. Oh, yeah, right, last week. Well, we might as well skip it. Unfortunately.

I feel like Khyphets purposely or maybe subconsciously tries to skip this every single week. It's a ferdinian slip each week. It's a massive part of the dock, like somebody did the work. I don't blame you. We've had all a few. He had a rough patch on these gut-golds. So I said Miles Gass can be a top 20 running back.

He didn't even fucking play because he was on the COVID list on Saturday. So woof. And then Matt Stafford said he'd have a good game. Top 12 quarterback, not even close. He got hurt with the ribs injury. So he didn't come close. I also thought Tyler Lockett would have his game against the Jets. Top 10 receiver.

Not even close. He couldn't even do anything against the Jets. Vaughn into the windup in his first offering. Just a bit outside. He tried the corner and missed. He decided to retire, sad. Yeah. Tough. Tyler Lockett, not even playing football anymore. Unbelievable.

I'll go next. I had JD McKissick 12 points in half PPR. He missed it by a little bit. He had 9.6. Still a decent game. 11 carry 68 yards. Technically incorrect, though. Jameson Crowder, I had over his half pvr point projection of 9.5. I was wrong. I will say there was some extenuating circumstances. Shortly after we recorded the podcast, he suffered a calf entry in practice. Just from listening to the podcast? I think so. He was just. He didn't want me to get it right. It got him so hyped. He was sprinting. He was Josh Jacobsing it. He just didn't want me to have my glory, I guess, or whatever.

He's just fighting with these fantasy football analysts. But he ended up playing, and he played a pretty good amount, but you could tell he was definitely hampered by the injury. I didn't even write down what he got because it was sad to think about. But I think it was like he only had a couple catches. And then my bold take was that Curtis Samuel would have 20 plus points, came up short. He had 12.5. He had a really good second half. He was actually,

I think he had a goose egg going into the half, and I was like, oh, God, this is going to be terrible. K. Montstrong in the second half, had seven catches, 68 yards, two catches for 20, or two rushes for 22 yards. So if you want to spin that, though, DKB, like, Curtis Samuel is averaging 12.5 points in the second half of the last half.

There you go. He came up with a hamstring injury today on Thursday afternoon, so keep that in mind going into this next week, by the way. All right. So mine, equally, is bad. Michael Pittman, 12-half PR points, did not do that. He had five and a half. T.Y. Hilton is

back, I guess. I said Alan Lazard would have double-digit points. He did not. He had three. What's the tight ends name? Rob Tanyaon. Bobby Tanyan. He's just sniping. Tanyan. No, it rhymes with the onion. He didn't tell anyone until like week six. Right, yeah. Tunian's been good.

Tunion rings. Alan Lazzard's looks like it's going to be MVS, who is a guy who is interesting this week against Carolina. Carolina lets up. a ton of deep pass is like the second most in the league. So MVS is a good dart throw, even though I would never trust him. And then my bold was Mike Williams,

15 and a half points wrong, but he left on the third snap of the game with the back injury, so we have no idea. Oh my God. I stand my picture. Some of these are had extenuating circumstances. The COVID list one especially is like, wow. MVS has a big game,

but we were all watching Clemson, Notre Dame. Does it even happen? Does it even go in the book? I don't know. Oh, man. Okay. This is the week where we do a lot better, though, I feel it. It's all right.

We're going to win a million dollars this week. That's true. Every Friday, we're making a Fandle DFS lineup, playing for a million dollars because, I mean, we've got to be like 700,000 inches here. So, you know, we've got to be a little creative. Trying to make a million dollars a week. The year I turned 26 as the head of my own brokerage firm, I made $49 million, which really pissed me off because it was three shy of a million a week.

Did we win a million in the first week of the fantasy playoffs last week? No. Damn it. No, we did not. Damn, another week. I really thought we were going to get at least one or two million. I mean, we did win once this year, technically. So, like, I think that one out of 17 is not that bad.

Okay. This week's lineup, quarterback. We're going Ryan Tannhill. I feel like Tannhill was the theme of the week for us. We just, just the time to give him the respect he deserves going against the lions. Underrated. Same thing. Derek Henry against the lions.

Same reasons. Lions are terrible. Derek Henry is good. I feel like this is one of the most imbalanced offense defense matchups of the week. Other running bat. Jeff Wilson, for everything I said. I just love Jeff Wilson this week. I feel like he's the perfect.

He's cheap and he's available and could have a huge game. Trying to beat 700,000 people here. Receivers were going Justin Jefferson, Brandon Ayuk, rookie combo. I think they could have both a big weeks. And then Alan Robinson at receiver two. They're going against the Vikings. So a lot of Bears Vikings here. And then Irv Smith, a tight end, taking Craig's word for it.

And if it doesn't work out, he's fired. I love the name Irv, by the way. Irv. Flex? We're going Tony Pollard. Screw it. We're kind of swinging for the fences here. We don't know what happens to Zique, but I feel like this is the real, like, you need to hit a nine-player parlay.

I feel like this is the one where you actually separate. Fuck it. Why not? And then at defense, ideally you could get Rams versus the Jets, but we can't do it. So we're doing Patriots against the Dolphins here because Bill Belichick is, without checking the record basically like 903 against rookie quarterbacks. And as much as we love to it, I just, the thought of the dolphins receivers who are all hurt, poor Linboad and trying to go against Stefan Gilmore and if Parker even plays. And then the offensive line is overmatched. Two is overmatched.

Every aspect of the Dolphins offense is kind of disturbing. Look what the past just did to the Chargers in Herbert. I mean, granted, Anthony Lynn's not as good as coach as Flores, but, you know, it's a good bet. I think that the Patsy is going to be quite the challenge for the Miami offense. So that's our million dollar lineup for the week. I'm excited about it. I'm sad that we didn't get Gabe Davis in there. Gabe Dave Dave.

Gabe Dave is playing on Saturday. Gabe Dave. We love Gabe Dave. We were talking about Gabe Davis off the air. and Craig's just his new nickname is Gabe Dave which reminded me

Winston Bishop from New Girl names his newborn baby Dan Bill which is the fucking funniest thing in the world Dan Bill

we're calling him Dan Bill I don't get it to be honest what is it I'm saying with Gabe Dave if they're both like first names

too very one syllable like a German like an old German word just shoved together just shove together take the first Wow

what a through line unbelievable see that that's how the magic happens right there Fantasy court time. All right.

It's from Patrick from Kentucky. Pat. Pat. Big Pat. Pat Ken. Pat tuckie. Okay. In a league where I made the championship, in large part, thanks to you guys,

we don't have a punishment or anything for next year. And a guy who's in sixth place or something went and picked up Jeff Wilson, wow, on waivers this morning when I put in for him. I guess my question here is, what's the ruling? I talked to the commissioner. Who is my opponent in the championship? And the commissioner's like, we'll add the rule for next year. Classic.

The guy who picked Jeff Wilson up has nothing to play for, not even a draft spot because next year hasn't been discussed. So is the purse, are you allowed to make pickups with no skin in the game during the championship weekend, taking players away from those guys? I think it's no, right? No, you can. Don't do it. They should lock waivers if you're not playing. Yeah. There is, so here's the, I think in leagues where there's last place punishments or anything involving seating or anything.

Sure. I think obviously you need to pick up guys. But in this kind of league where there's not really last place punishment, there's not really reason to come in sixth or eighth or whatever. There is often like this weird gentleman's agreement or like a gentle people's agreement to just not touch and you let the champions kind of go. It's what's that Godzilla thing where it's like, let them fight? Like it's kind of like that. It works the other way around too. We had a guy in my league who's not in the playoffs and he dropped all of his players.

And then everybody was trying to add him. And it's like, no. I don't like this agent of chaos thing that people in the losers bracket do. Like, knock that shit off. This is the etiquette and I think the rules should be that if your team is out of it and there's absolutely no reason for these teams to play anymore, their roster should just get locked. I might offend people who listen to this podcast. And honestly, I don't care.

Because if you're one of those people who loses and then drops all your players and is like, screw it. I want the whole late league to burn. then you have control issues because if you're, that's like if I can't win, nobody can. I don't care.

It's like, that's awful. Don't do that. We live in a society. I love the commissioner saying, we'll add that rule next year. So that's a classic commission thing you say. That's the intrigue here is that the commissioner,

it would be, I also at the same time, though, if there's no rule and it's this unspoken thing, I don't know if you need to undo the ad though. It's a dick moved by the, by the owner who's out of it, the manager who's out of it to be making that change.

but I also don't think it's aggressive enough to take Jeff Wilson off of his roster. That seems aggressive too. Put him back on waivers. Let the waiver system do its magic again. No, but I don't think the commissioner should be doing that. That's just like the guy could be shamed out of it, but I don't think the, if it's not a written down rule, I don't think the commissioner should be interfering with the guy's team. Like, that's extreme. It's just like, it's a dick move, but it's, you can't do anything about it.

That's what the commissioner is for it to interfere when people are being dumbasses. No, that's not what it's commissioners for. Commissioners for like when the rule, no, when the rule was broken or there's a clear lapse of something's gone injustice. This is not an injustice. It's just like, come on, man. But you can't throw a flag for, come on, man. I don't understand the reason that someone would waste any time doing waivers when they're all the way out of it and there's nothing to play for. Well, but the flip side is you can't ask people to be competitive when they're out of it.

And then they're picking up players and you're like, idiot, why are you picking up players, moron? Like, you have to be consistent. Not in this case. This is not a consistency matter. This is just you're out of it. have nothing to play for anymore. Would you feel this way if your opponent was the one who was trying to get Jeff Wilson and they're like, he should be cut from that roster given to me? But me is your opponent. No, you shouldn't be given to anybody. You just put back on waivers and

let the people that are still playing for something do the waiver system. Let that, let that system work. Yeah, like, I guess you have to like have another round of waivers then. Yeah. I think it's just like, It's an unspoken rule, but like, if you break the unspoken rule, like, okay, well, now we just got to talk about it. Talk about the rule. Throw out the guy's head the next pitch or whatever. Look, ball don't lie. It'll figure itself out. Okay.

Yeah. So there go. Pat from Kentucky, you're screwed. Sorry. Best of luck. Maybe Jeff Wilson won't even do good at all of our lineups will do terribly. So maybe you'll win. Yeah.

If there's any God, Jeff Wilson will just suck or whatever, and it'll be fine. if there's any god. And yeah, if there is a god, I'm sure he'll be focusing on fantasy this week. Please, if there is a god, don't focus on anything but fantasy. Focus on reality. It needs your help.

Okay. Maybe there's an old German word for that. Probably. All right, we'll figure that out next week. All right. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, D.K. Thank you to all the German people

who sent in the German words. Thank you to the Germans who came up with those words, especially the, what is it, Grief Bacon? Thank you, Grief Bacon. And thank you, Lorne. Lord.

Thank you, David Hasselhoff. I try to think of a German singer. Are you kidding? He's absolutely a musician. Is he a musician slash actor and actor slash musician? He is massive, massive. David Hasselhoff is a massive singer? I do not know this.

I'm not going to lie. I learned about him from Dodgeball. I think this is maybe like a my generation type piece of trivia. But yeah, he's like this massive singer in German. But he sings on the side? Or is he famous primarily for the singing? Hyvitz, you may agree with me here. No, I think he's famous for being an actor and maybe secondary.

Yeah, at least in America. Yes, correct. He was famous for being in Baywatch or creating Baywatch or whatever it was. But his music, I'm reading this as from his Wikipedia right now. His music career took off in the late 80s, achieved success at the top of the charts, which went triple platinum in Europe. He's a triple platinum singer, Danny. Okay.

I want to dunk on you for being like he would never be the music. musical act on S&L, which is like the whole premise of this bit. But you did think of a German singer, so. It was applicable. Who is the singer who does 99 left balloons or whatever? Oh, yeah. Gold something. Wait, I got a Hasselhoff thing.

Hyfitz, do you agree that all kids born in the like 92 to 967 range were introduced to David Hasselhoff due to SpongeBob in the SpongeBob Square Hipans movie? Oh my God, you're right. Craig and I, we agree on this that the actual, the word millennials and Gen Y and Gen Z are meaningless, the real divide between millennials, where millennials end is SpongeBob.

If you grew up watching SpongeBob, you're not a millennial anymore. It changed. This is exactly why I can't talk to you guys. You always talk about SpongeBob. I've literally never seen it one time. Well, you're not a millennial. You're not invited.

I think I am a millennial. You're not in the Stalky's Batoon. Yeah. You don't even get that. You don't even know what we're talking about. Wait, actually, what am I? I'm not actually sure. Maybe I'm not a millennial.

I don't think I am. Oh, God. What a millennial last question and ask who am I? My God. That's true. We ask that all the time. I'm Gen X.

Oh, wow. Yeah, you're Gen X. I was close to, I think we're close to Gen Z, but we're not. Should we end this podcast? No, I am a, I am a millennial. Is any of this going to make it

or is Craig going to cut all of that out? There's no, there's no actual, like, official ruling on who is what, right? Like it's all just like, well, so the problem with the generations is it's, it's supposed to be for like a large group of people. Like, it's like a 10 or 15 year block to measure how, you know, how mortgage trends over 30 years.

Like you're looking at massive swaths of generational data for wide sweeping sociology reasons. And then we use it in the internet era to talk about like why we hate younger people or older people. But we paint these huge brushes when really it's for like economic data and sense. census data, and then we just completely bastardized the terms for our own, like, pseudo-cultural armchair reasons. Yeah, what he said. According to this thing, millennials are people born between 1981 and 96, which is me.

So that's kind of crazy. That's the thing. I don't consider myself a millennial. I think the real generational lines are, at this point, it's about technology. It's how old were you when you were able to talk to everyone you knew at any point of the day? Like, that's really like the real, like, were you an eighth? grade and in puberty when you could talk to anyone at your school or were you in college or were you in elementary school like that's the real dividing line hyphids and i are the last generation where we did we like

i still remember like we had flip phones like we used t9 texting like we didn't have touch screens like throughout middle school you know what i mean right i think that's a different generation like although like we were getting introduced to facebook twitter instagram all that stuff and kind of like middle school high schoolish But like the kids now who have it when they're like four, I think there's a difference between us and them. Oh, absolutely. But the back in the day technology thing, it's like they say that like the music that you consider like the best music is the music you,

you know, that was around when you were like started having sex. And like I think technology is the same thing. Like when you start flirting, no, I'm serious. Like that's the technology you're getting nostalgic about. I should think Jay Sean, Teo Cruz and Acon are the best music of all time. Exactly.

It's not a clue. I don't think that. Please. The Black Eyed Peas Far East movement? No, none of those. Although Flowrida, the most underrated pop artists the last 10 years. That's the take. Literally a Flowrida, man.

Flowrida makes absolute heaters. There's so many good flowrida songs. You know what I think the generational divide is, Danny? I think we talked about this. It's people who watch Saved by the Bell after coming home from school are one generation. The people who watch SpongeBob after coming home from school are a separate generation. I think that's fair. Sure. I've never seen a minute of Saved by the Bell.

And now the next generation is the kids who just did school at home. They never came home from school. They never left for school in the first place. Yeah, now it's like you watch like Jake Paul vlogs. No, now it's just like oh, you just do school at home. If you watch Save by the Bell on TBS at like

345, it started at the it started at a weird time. It wasn't like at turn of the hour, like a half hour. It started at like 3.45 for some reason. You know what? I feel like we did it. Like I would watch like everybody lives Raymond, King of Queens. Oh, I love...

Oh, yeah. TV said that murder row of like, it was everybody loves Raymond, signed for free runners, friends. TV has his best channel of all time. And then... But like kids now, like, do you know an 18 year old? One, do you know an 18 year old?

Two, do you know an 18 year old that watches sitcoms ever? Like, old sitcoms? Like, they just missed all of it. Like, I don't know how 18 year old. You are the youngest person to bitch about young people. Congratulations. I'm really separated. I will say that when I was growing up,

I always felt like old people. were so old and then I would always understand technology and that we would never happen to us. And I realized it's actually happening to us faster. I am more out of touch with people just like five or seven years younger than me than I feel like other like it's like I am just so far removed. I like even people four or five years younger than us, they don't they've never even open to Facebook account. And I'm like, holy shit, we're already old.

Well, also not even that. Like you know how like when your parents try to work some new technology and they get kind of frustrated to get mad at it if they can't figure it out? We're like, no, it's easy. If you told me to make a TikTok video and make it relatively elaborate, I have no idea how to do that. It would probably frustrate me and I'd get angry. One of the most humbling moments in all seriousness of my life was when someone handing me their

Android phone was like, can you just send a text for me? And I couldn't do it. And I was like, oh my God, I don't know how to send a text on a different phone. I'm just like a mental slave to Apple. I have no idea how to use this thing. That's like one of the most used devices in the freaking world. It's just an Android. I couldn't figure it out.

And I was like, wow. This is the longest BS we've ever had. at the end of a show and I'm going to keep. Is any of this going to stay? I think I'm going to keep all of them. We're still at a decent time. Okay, whatever. Let's get out of here.

If anyone made it to the end of this episode, genuinely like from the bottom of my heart, thank you. Because you are just a great person. I have a story. This is, I changed my, changing the subject slightly, but you're talking about how people, are young people not using Facebook now? Is that a thing?

Correct. Oh my God. I myself, D.K., if you consider me a young person, I do not touch Facebook. Good. They all went to Instagram, which is why Facebook. Well, it's not why Facebook bought Instagram, but one of the reasons they bought Instagram is that. And actually a big thing was when they put Instagram by Facebook on the loading screen for Instagram and all the kids were like, holy shit.

Like Facebook owns Instagram. I never really understood that before because Facebook to younger kids is just like the thing your mom is on. And so that's what happens. You flee from the ones your mom and dad are on. And then also and then all the Russia stuff came out around 2016, the combo that like it's just not cool anymore. I think the boiled down answer is it's not cool anymore. This is kind of age me probably, surely. But I remember when I was in college,

my buddy who was going to Stanford at the time was emailing me. People used to communicate through email, you know, with your friends. He was emailing me telling me about this new thing called the Facebook. And it was like this awesome thing at Stanford. And no one had it. We didn't have it at that point. And then like a year later, I think, like our school got it.

It was very much just you had to have a college, email to get into Facebook. That might be another cultural divide. Do you remember when it was the Facebook? Yeah. And then Justin Timberlake said drop the the. Oh, dude, that is, I saw that. Justin Timberlake changed the world.

Anyway, Facebook is weird now. I don't know. I'm off it. Great take. Timely. Facebook's weird now. Danny Kelly in 2020. I think Instagram's leaving too.

Really young people, high schoolers? I don't think they use Instagram as much as maybe people like Snapchat. Watch the social dilemma. How many times have to say it on this podcast. All these things are poison for you. Like family cousins of mine,

like who are in like the 18 year old range, all they do is communicate on Snapchat. There is a reason that like the Silicon Valley engineers who use this, many of them don't have their kids use these devices or these platforms. Hillary Clinton said that on Dak Shepard's podcast. She was like,

I was at some event with all of these like big tech, bigwigs. And they said that they let none of their kids use social media. They're like the guys who invented Instagram and Snapchat. It's like if all the tobacco executives 40 years ago. We're like, yeah,

we don't let our children smoke. Are you kidding me? That's basically what's going on here. Holy shit. Okay, that's it. Thank you to everyone who stuck around. Thank you,

Lauren. Thank you, David Hasselhoff, whatever. We'll see you guys on Monday. Best of luck for the playoffs.