The Ringer NFL Show - A Crash Course on the 2020 Wide Receiver Draft Class | The Dantasy Football Podcast

Episode Date: March 31, 2020

Danny Kelly has been grinding tape on the 2020 NFL draft so you don’t have to, and on this episode he feeds Danny Heifetz and Craig Horlbeck digestible nuggets on the deepest receiver class in years. DK compares receivers to archetypes from the standout 2014 class of Sammy Watkins, Mike Evans, Odell Beckham Jr., and Davante Adams; guesses which receiver might not pan out as a pro; and determines which receiver from 2020 could become the most exciting player in the league. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Liz Kelly, and welcome to The Ringer Podcast Network. We hope The Ringer can provide you entertainment and companionship during this time. So as always, feel free to check out The Ringer.com, where we're still covering the latest in sports, pop culture, tech, and media. And the Ringer's YouTube channel can provide endless amounts of entertainment. You can find that at YouTube.com slash The Ringer. The Fantasy Football Podcast on the Ringer NFL show, on the Ringer Podcast Network. My name is Danny Hypitz, and I am joined, as always, by my co-host. my co-danny, the hero we need

and the analyst we deserve, the Dark D.D.E. Danny Kelly! How are you doing, D.K.? I'm doing pretty well, man. How are you doing? I'm wonderful. You brought the energy right there. Wow. Energy all around. Craig, how are you doing?

Hi, Vince, just because you're in New York and DK's in Seattle doesn't mean you have to yell for him to hear you across the country. How else is he going to hear me? Technology. I was thought your editing was mostly editing out the screaming in between. It's that and a lot more.

I'll have you know. I can see Craig while Danny's screaming in the intro just groaning because he's like, oh, God, I'm going to have to clean this up and post-pro. Now we have video going on in our remote pod so we can all see our faces, which is lovely. There are certain things that we probably shouldn't reveal from behind the curtain that I'm tempted to right now. Like all the mouth sounds that Craig edits out. Oh, yeah.

The mouth sounds. People have no idea. People have no idea. types of things that you remove from podcast and editing. Do a super cut of all the gross mouth sounds that we make. I would if that would take me like hours and hours of work. Yeah. I think that that would just drive him nuts and then we would never hear from Craig ever again.

And probably from our listeners ever again if we pointed that out. So all right. Enough about mouth sounds. More about the draft. The draft is in three weeks, which is crazy to think about. Yeah. It is not being moved. Roger Goodell is keeping it.

April 23rd to the 25th. teams are kind of bummed about it, but they can get over it because everyone is working in weird situations. Yeah. DK has been grinding tape. DK is the tape ground. It's getting there. It's getting there.

The NFL draft guide at the ringer.com is up to 75 players right now. So getting the last 25 going over the next couple of weeks. So we'll have a full 100 up there before the draft starts. I still stand by that we should do a ringer employee combine. and do a draft guide of all of us and it's like our wingspans, our verticals, our 40s. I think that'd be so funny.

Would it be that or would be like editing speed? Like how fast can you edit this podcast? How quickly can you get a blog post up? Yeah, exactly. We give you a story and then you got to get to a thousand words and post up. Oh man, I'd be terrible at that. Danny actually, High fits would be amazing.

He's really good at that. We all have our metrics. We all have. It's about complimentary skill sets, D.K. Yeah, for sure. But right now, I'm thrilled because we're going to lean into one of our nerdy passion. Dynasty League fantasy football.

Yeah. I think we've kind of like danced around but resisted talking about for months. And now we're just going to lean all the way in. Dynasty for those who don't know, it's like regular fantasy football, but you can keep your team. So the only thing you do every offseason is you draft the rookies. So we're going to go through and we're going to talk about which players we like in Dynasty for this year. But even if, first of all, if you don't play Dynasty, highly recommend it. But even if you don't, I think it's actually a pretty good exercise because it kind of cuts to the core of what we want, which is which of these players,

in the draft this year will just be productive pros for a long time. That's really all we're trying to figure out here. And I think that's extremely relevant to the draft and it's extremely relevant for receivers because, DK, deepest draft class for receivers and how long? I mean, it's, it's been a while.

It's been a while. It's been a minute. Yeah. It's been a minute. I think it has the potential to be one of the best all time. It's very frequently compared to the 2014 draft, which is what we're going to talk about today. Yeah, and going back to the dynasty thing,

I just want to make one more point. I love Dynasty because I spend so much of my time doing draft and fantasy football. And Dynasty is like the perfect intersection of those two things because I'm like getting to concentrate on my fantasy football team while I'm working. It's amazing. So anyways, I love Dynasty football. Dynasty is wonderful. I'm excited for this. But I'm also excited compared to the 2014 draft, which is near and dear to my heart.

And it was bonkers. it's definitely the deepest receiver class that we have for a draft like this decade or I guess last decade now. Just to recap that real quick. In the first round, the bills took Sammy Watkins. The bucks took Mike Evans. The Giants took Adele Beckham. The Saints took Brandon Cooks. And then the second round, the Packers took Devante Adams.

The Jaguars took Alan Robinson and the dolphins took Jarvis Landry. And then Arizona grabbed John Brown and Martavis Bryant went to the Steelers in the next couple rounds. So that is absurd for one position. And also I have to give a shout out to the Eagles, who in the deepest receiver class, we can remember, got two picks for receivers. They left with Jordan Matthews and the legendary Josh Huff, only to be outdone by the Jets who left with Jalen Saunders who left with Jalen Saunders. This is like the bear. This is like the bears coming away from the Mahomes and Watson draft with Trubisky. At least I've heard of Trubisky.

I've never heard of Jalen Saunders. No, not Shaq Evans. Was he the Shack and Tiger King or was that someone else? I think I have somebody else. Oh, was it? Oh, yeah, I was confused Shaq Evans with the guy from Tiger King. So I think the interesting thing is once that happens, we can pretend we're experts and we know what's going to happen and who will be Sammy Watkins and who will be Jalen Saunders. But the reality is that once the real draft is concluded, most people do their rookie drafts.

And we actually, because of the website Fantasy Football Calculator, we can figure out the average draft position of how people were picking those receivers in their dynasty drafts. So basically, how did regular people think those players were going to pan out? Craig, do you have those rankings of once the real NFL draft was done, how people thought they would pan out in fantasy? I do. The first rookie wide receiver taken in that draft was Sammy Watkins went one, Mike Evans went two, so so far not bad. Brandon Cooks at three.

And then it falls off. Jordan Matthews, fourth, Kelvin Benjamin, five. Cody Latimer, remember him six. Then Odell went at seven, Marquise Lee at eight, Defonte Adams at nine, Alan Robinson, 10, Dante Moncrief 11, Paul Richardson 12, Martavis, John Brown, and Jarvis Landry finishing it up. That is incredible. And the larger point there is just nobody knows anything.

I think that's the real point. Yeah. Ultimately, like, this is predicting the future and it's really difficult. And I think at its core, it's, I only beware of people who go about this prospect stuff with a 100% confidence. But this pod is to make that 15 player list five years from now. When they look back on this pod, they're going to be like, damn, they nailed it. Exactly. That's where I'm going is the only person who's actually proven that they can do this stuff with an exact science is Danny Kelly, the dark night. No pressure, D.K.

So, D.K. Well, here's what we're going to do. You know how like player comps are, you know, kind of like a mental shortcut that are not really the most scientific thing, but really fun, but maybe not the best way to do player evaluation? We're going to force you to do player comps today. We're going to take the 2014 draft and we're going to take a bunch of examples from them. and we're going to extrapolate and we're going to force you to compare different players, different awards to the current draft class because this is the only way we can catch up on three weeks notice. However, it's not going to be their characteristics or their skill sets you're going to be comparing, but if it happens to happen,

that's great. You're going to be comparing how they worked out in the NFL and you're going to find guys that compared to these 2014 guys' careers. I like it. I like it. It's fun. I'm thrilled. All right.

First up, this is the most important question. for me, but also in general, but mostly for me. The Odell Beckham Award, the Odell Beckham question. Do any of the receivers in this class have the chance to become the most exciting player in the league? I think so. I mean, simple answer, yes. And actually, there's a few guys in this class that I think have that potential. The first guy that comes in mind is someone that a lot of people actually compare this guy to Odell Beckham in terms of their skill set and their style is Jerry Judy of Alabama.

For me, I'm going with CD Lamb from Oklahoma, though, because I just think, you know, what do you think of when you think of Odell Beckham? You think of that incredible one-handed catch he made by the sideline. You think of him turning a short screen into a 99-yard touchdown or whatever, you know, not 99, but 70-yard touchdown. He takes it to the house. That's kind of the same deal with CD-Lam. I mean, the guy lives above the rim. He's really, really good at the catch point, really good, you know, boxing out, opposing players and going up and getting the ball. He's a stud at that area. He's really ridiculously good after the catch.

He's not as explosive as Odell Beckham in terms of that home run speed, but what he does have is tackle breaking ability. It's like really weird innate tackle breaking ability. He's not that big. He's not that heavy, but he's just guys slip off of them. They bounce off of them. And if you go on Twitter, you can find cutups and highlight videos of situations that CD Lamb is like surrounded by five defenders and it's like this turned into a touchdown. And there's like multiple of those where he just somehow, you know, pulls a Houdini and manages to break like three tackles on a certain place. So to me, C.D. Lamb is just so exciting, so good, really ridiculously good after the catch,

has that, that, you know, jump ball, catch radius type thing that's really exciting to watch. So that would be the first guy that I vote for as terms of like one of the most must watch players in the draft. To me, that's C.D. Lamb. See, that's awesome to hear because I can, the reason I named it the O'Dell Beckham thing is, it really is so incomparable when the best player in your sport is on your team, whether it's fantasy football or real football. I think Patriots fans know this with when it was Rob Gruncowski at his peak. Ravens fans are feeling it right now with Lamar Jackson and Chiefs fans kind of too with Patrick Mahomes. When the, there's only one or two players at given time that is the must

watch guy. Right. And when that's your guy, there's nothing like in the basketball. It's like Zion when he was on Duke or, I mean, I guess Luca, I guess on the Mavs last year. But that's the best player to have in fantasy football too. Like last year, it was McCaffrey. So if C.D. Lambs, that kind of guy. Like, there's nothing really like that in sports at all. Just like knowing he's on your team. Yeah, man. He's really fun. I cannot wait to see where he lands. I'm a little bit nervous that he's going to land with the Jets. Oh, no. It never seems to, you know, pan out well. Jalen Samuels all over again. Oh, my God. Jalen Saunders. Sonders, sorry. disrespect him.

You're a Steelers fan. You just got Jailen Samuels on the brain. All right. And I got the Giants on the brain. We're on the O'Dell thing. I have another O'Dell. We're pairing the O'Dell on the Jarvis Landry Award here. Yeah.

And this is actually two words of its own. So, O'Dell, Beckham, and Jarvis Landry on the same team at LSU. are there any players in this draft that we're going to look back and be like how the hell did those guys play together in college? Yeah. I wanted to pick like a lesser known, lower key version of this award or whatever you want to call it for this section.

But and two guys came to mind actually from Texas, Devin Duvernay and Colin Johnson, except I don't think either of those guys are going to be super, super stars in the league. Maybe Duvrenay, but Colin Johnson's probably going to be a late. or a round pick or whatever. So I'm going to go with the most obvious and the most high profile, and that's Jerry Judy and Henry Ruggs. And it's actually going to be funny

because like in four or five years, we're going to be talking about these two guys, plus Devante Smith, who probably should have came out in the draft this year, who's another really, really good receiver for them. They have multiple guys that are going to end up being first rounders eventually. So we're going to come back and talk. It's going to be like the, you know,

the Clemson. in guys, DeAndre Hopkins, Sammy Watkins, Martavis, Brian, where all those guys were on the same team together. And it was just like, how the hell did they ever get those guys number one? How the hell they ever lose? So anyways, I think that Jerry, Judy, and Henry Ruggs are going to be that pair of dudes. And it's not like either of these guys come with no risk. I mean, especially Henry Ruggs. I think a lot of dynasty players are very, very leery of Ruggs in terms of his fantasy value. I think a lot of people will recognize that he's going to be an important player on the field for a team because, you know, that field stretching presence is so important

schematically in, you know, getting the defense. They have to play too deep. Real quick. How fast is Ruggs? Like, can you put him in context or second? How fast is Henry Ruggs? There's fast and then there's fast. So I don't, so a lot of people are comparing him with Tyree Kill. I don't think he's, he's got the same type of speed, like the, the turbo boosted explosive speed that Tyreek has, but I do think he's got the take a top off a defense speed that's very, very important for a defense. So I don't know who to compare him to. I guess maybe like John Ross, Sean Brown.

John Ross too, but like I wanted to compare him to a really good player. I mean, I think Ross still has potential certainly, but he hasn't lived up to where he was drafted or whatever. So I would say a guy like, you know, Deshawn Jackson is a perfect example, actually. The type of player that changes the defense. defense. It changes the, and this is sort of turning into a cliche because we mentioned it a lot, but it changes the geometry of the defense, how they have to play. And so those guys are certainly very, very important in real football. But I think a lot of people are pretty worried about

rugs in terms of his fantasy value and especially dynasty players because he's, he's, you just never put up big numbers. He was, let's see here, his numbers, he never topped 800 yards or 50 catches in a season for Alabama. In 2019, 40 catches, 4, 746 yards and 7 touchdowns. The season before that, 46 catches, 741 yards, 11 touchdown. So clearly he's a touchdown making machine. But you can say the same thing for Odell and Jarvis, right? I mean, they combined for 1,200 yards and 99 catches in 2012.

While we were researching this, I discovered, I mean, I knew that Odell and Jarvis didn't have a ton, but yeah. Sorry, I completely cut you off, Craig. No, I mean, that's the point. It's just that Jarvis and Odell, basically, their numbers contradicted their skill. And it's like, do you think there's a chance that happens with rugs? Yeah, I think it's certainly possible. If he gets into a high-volume passing game

and he emerges as the number one guy, I think he could buck the trend and turn into a much more productive player. But the odds and the percentages, and that's what a lot of dynasty players are very much just playing the odds. Like that, analytics of it. And if you pick a guy, like, for instance, Henry Ruggs does not have a breakout age. Breakout age is this really important variable that a lot of dynasty players and regular redraft players use for receivers coming out of college where basically it's, it tells you how old a player was

when they broke through the plane of 20% of their teams receiving yards and touchdowns. In other words, they dominated their team's pass catching. So it's hard to be good when you're young and the people who are taking over as the best receiver on their team in college when they're young are the most likely to keep getting better

into the NFL. Yeah. And it's... Is that supported by the numbers in the NFL? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The, you know, there's there's very, very strong correlation between players who end with top 24 finishes, I think,

or top 12 finishes. Like, so much more likely to finish with a top 24 fantasy season if your breakout age is 19 or 20. Like if your breakout age is 21 or you don't have a breakout age, it's like rare for you, for a player to have that elite season. So that's why a lot of people shied away from Hakeem Butler last year. He was an old breakout guy. Actually, Marquis Brown was a late breakout age.

I think he was a 21 year old when he finally broke out. people shy away from that. It's not foolproof. It's not 100%. I know, because some of this does sound ridiculous. You're like, well, he turned 21 in September. And if he would have been 20 in September, then it would have been a whole different story. Yeah. And it's just playing the percentages. And it's playing the probabilities. And so this is, this is, but it is an important thing for, for dynasty drafting. People take it into account for sure. So that's something that I think is holding rugs back in terms of his perceived value in dynasty drafts. Um, he is, is, I think as of March, he was the wide receiver five,

and that put him at 10th overall. So he's going in the back end of first rounds right now. In dynasty drafts. In dynasty rookie drafts. Yeah. So that kind of just tells you people are a little bit leery, even though he's probably going to be one of the top three receivers taken in this class. People are a little bit worried about that lack of overall elite production

and kind of how that translates to the NFL. So I think that's going to be very, very interesting. And then going back to Judy, like, Judy pretty much has, like, has it all in terms of analytical profile. He was the Bolitnikov winner in 2018. Like, he's put up elite production. His breakout age was 19.4, so just 19 and a half years old or so. That's all very, very good. And so, you know, pair that with draft capital, which is another high core.

relation to how you end up producing in fantasy. And I think Judy is going to be a very, very, very highly rated rookie draft player. If not the top receiver, him and CD Lamb, I think are going to be the top two for sure. All right, D.K., so the next award here we have is the surrounding talent guy. And we're giving this to Kelvin Benjamin back in 2014, where he went number 28 overall to Carolina. But he had James at his quarterback in college. He had Devante Freeman as his running back. His whole line went pro. Stevens was good. Are there any guys like that now who's teammates maybe act as a bit of a crutch for them. So, yeah, the guy that I would probably pick for this category is Justin Jefferson from

LSU. And that's not, and that's not even a knock on him because I actually really like him. I took him in a recent rookie draft. So, you know, full disclosure, I like him as a prospect a lot. I think he's going to be a really good pro. But if you look at kind of how he rose this last season, I mean, he had, he broke an LSU record with 111 catches. He finished second nationally with 8.

team touchdowns. He was operating in the slot in a spread scheme run by Joe Brady, who got a job now with the Panthers. Basically what he did in LSU, got him a pro job as an offensive coordinator. He was playing with Godmode Joe Burrow, you know, who had the best passing season of any college quarterback ever, essentially. So like, and, oh, and it doesn't help either that he was playing, you know, on the same offense is Jamar Chase, who might have been the best receiver in the country,

is probably going to be a top 15 pick next season. So overall, like Jefferson definitely, it was like a rising tide raises all ships type thing. Like he, his, his elite, elite numbers were certainly a byproduct of the fact that he was playing in this elite elite offense next to an elite receiver in the slot where he tends to get schemeed open a lot of the time. Now, all that said, I really like Jefferson. He's a very good route.

runner. He kind of reminds me of Doug Baldwin in the way that he kind of breaks people off with his with a really, you know, sharp cuts. He almost has like a basketball style killer crossover type type thing as a route runner where he's he's turning guys around, putting them in a blender. Really ridiculously good contested catch player. Like he goes up above the rim. He's really, really tough over the middle of the field.

All those things. I love a lot about this player. And I think he's going to be a good player in the NFL. He's going to be a good fantasy player. there. But I would say he certainly benefited from the surrounding talent. So that would be, that would be kind of my guy for this award. All right, D.K. Next up, uh, the Sammy Watkins award. Who is the guy that everyone likes coming into this draft that might just never happen? Yeah. So I would say the guy that kind of stands out here for me is Leviska Chanel from Colorado. And so he's,

he's an interesting prospect. First of all, he's like Debo Samuel and that they, used him in the backfield a lot as sort of like a wildcat guy they used him on jet sweeps screens all that he's very good after the catch very physical very tough he's got some very scintillating intriguing ability to get deep go over the defense so i think that's going to be really really crucial for him as a pro um but i still think he's he's just kind of raw you know he's uh he needs to refine his route running all that i think it's going to be a little bit landing spot dependent for him because I think like Devo Samuel last year, I think it'd be it'd benefit him a lot to find a coach that is like smart at getting him involved in the offense in the

right ways, you know, whether that's on those those jet sweeps or end arounds and then getting him involved on screenplays, taking the shots and play action. Like if he was in a if he was in an offense kind of like Tennessee for instance, I think that would be an interesting fit for him because he's big and physical like AJ Brown, he can get deep on play action, but they also can give him these little short plays where he's using his feet to pick up yards. So anyways, I like him as a player, but I do think he comes with a little bit of risk. In addition to that, injuries have been a big issue for him over the last year. Perfect. And that's the perfect comp for Sammy Watkins, a, a.k.a. Spaghetti Hamsters. I mean, honestly, it's a lot of people are actually comparing

Chanel to Watkins as a style of player. And the injury thing is a very big, I think, similarity as well. And I don't even know if people are using that, you know, to, for the comparison or not, but it works perfectly because Craig's going to get us sued for comparing Leviska-Chanel's hamstrings to spaghetti. My friend and I used to call Sammy Watkins to Hammy Watkins because he always had fucking hamstrings. Yeah. So, and, you know, just perfect example, he had to drop out of the combine because he injured himself during the testing portion of it. He had, I believe it, maybe it was a hamstring injury, in fact. But he's also been dealing with,

he's had a groin injury, groin inflammation that almost kind of kept him out of the combine. He tried to gut it out and it didn't work out for him. He's had multiple injuries over the last few years that have limited his playing time here and there. So the other thing is he's very kind of reckless as a player. Like, he's big physical and fast, but you almost worry about that because he just goes so hard.

You've got to define reckless. It tries to take people on, tries to run through like Leonard Fornett yeah remember him in college he would just seek out people right he'd point to the guy and be like yeah come on let's go still one of the coolest things I've ever seen is him going at a defender

yeah I love that but I mean you love that but at the same time like if he wants to have a long career injury free career it probably would behoove chenault to not do that quite as much so anyways I like the player I think he's exciting as hell to watch play and all that but

just a little bit worried that those injuries are going to be a nagging problem in the NFL. And kind of like Watkins just might not have the number one upside that we all thought he would. Because Watkins went number four overall, I believe, right? Yeah. So, yeah, I don't know. Chanel's probably going to be a second rounder, but I still think the comparison works a little bit. All right. Next we go the Devante Adams Award. This is like the small school guy who falls outside of the first round, maybe for lack of exposure or what have you, who ends up being a top five guy in the league. Yeah. So, So Denzo Mims of Baylor.

Baylor's not a small school necessarily, obviously, but he's also not playing for an SEC powerhouse. He's been a late riser, so his name is certainly on the map, and he could end up going early second round. But I do think he's a type of player who's just, he has all the tools and the skill set to turn into a star. He's, number one, really, really good at a catch point.

Like, he dominated at the senior bowl. He was winning all his reps. He was just making cornerbacks. backs look silly basically the entire week he was the star of the senior bowl goes into the combine runs like a four three something four three four whatever it was just absolutely blows the door off uh indianapolis he ran like a six a sub seven three cone like the best three cone by a mile at the receiver position so he's very agile very very fast um long you know huge catch radius like all the tools you want i think he's probably going to be like i said he's probably going to be like

either very late first round or early second, but he has the talent to end up being one of the best receivers in this class. And it's such a deep class. I don't know if people are really talking about him. Most people, most like mainstream draft analysts, I don't think have him as like a top three or four receiver, but he could end up being that guy. And then the other one that's like way, way down the line.

And actually this might work better for this category is Michael Pittman from USC, who I compared him in my scouting report to, to Tim Duncan. He's just a little bit boring to watch, but he just does everything well. He's fast down the field. He can get down the field. He can track the football.

He's got an insane catch radius. He wins the catch point. He's good after the catch. He's very, very strong. Never drops the ball. Has maybe the best hands in the entire class. And he's just kind of this big, his dad was an NFL running back.

Like he's just like this big physical pass catcher who's kind of flying under the radar. but a lot of people, you know, I think NFL teams in particular think this guy is going to be a total stud. So he kind of actually reminds me a little bit of Devante Adams style-wise, too, just not necessarily the flashiest dude, but like just strong physical, gets a job done type player. Okay, DK. Next up, John Brown Award. Who's the guy under six feet? Got to be under six feet tall. Who's a speed guy who could be an all-around wide receiver one? I think this award goes pretty easily to Jalen Rager of a TCU.

I mean, the dude is absolutely explosive, explosive athlete. Incredible, like, rare strength, like freakish strength for a dude his size. So he measured in at, let me see here, he measured it at 511,

206 pounds. According to Bruce Feldman's preseason freaks list from the athletic.com, which is a must read every year, he had a 620 pound squat. He can do a 620 pound squat, which is legitimately in the Saquan Barkley stratosphere of squatting. And so, yeah, the dude is just absolutely freak athlete, very, very fast, very good on all three levels of the field.

He's a good sort of taking just a screen pass and turning it into a big play. He's got deep speed to get behind a defense down the sideline. He can play on the outside and play on the slot. Stylistically, he kind of reminds me a little bit of Tyler Lockett, but I think in the right system, a high volume system. He could be very, very big producer, like a Stefan Diggs type guy, Percy Harvin

type player. So yeah, he, he's to me is one of the most exciting players in this class. I love this dude. Percy Harvin and Seekwan in the same. Those are two those are two names to invoke. Oh my goodness. He's kind of, he's got the, he's got the Percy Harvin body type, like really

like sort of compact, muscular dude who can just fly. I think he's more, he has potential to be a little more polished as like a deep threat. Harvin was not necessarily a great deep threat in the NFL. But I think he has the ability to be that kind of deep threat and get downfield. Track the ball. He attacks the ball when it's high up in the air.

You know, it goes up and gets passes. So I think he's really, really good. He's underrated because his offense was, this is sort of the inverse of the Justin Jefferson Award. Like his offense was terrible. They had problems with their quarterback.

They switched up their quarterback a couple times during the season. Just their pass. in game was awful. So his numbers really suffered from it, but he's got, I think he does have sort of elite potential. He's just that good. He's a talented, talented player. I like watching him a lot. So he, to me, is pretty easy winner in this one.

Okay, the flip side. Who's the slot god from this class? So the clear answer here would be Justin Jefferson, since he did so much damage from the slot for LSU, but since we already talked about him, I'm going to go with KJ. Hamler from Penn State. That's such a slot guy name. Yeah, KJ. Hamler. He is

legit jitterbug fast like he has incredible quickness um breaks guys off with routes like his two-way routes so you know you know how slot receivers kind of run like these option routes over the middle of the field where they can either go left or right based on the the leverage of the defender he just absolutely destroys people on these kind of routes um it'd be really fun to see him actually land on the buccaneers because i feel like brady would feed the hell out of him but he's He's just the kind of guy who can get open underneath, incredible speed, explosive cuts. He has some run after the catchability. He's not a super good deep threat, but he can run like a good slot fade, get over the top of a defense.

He's the kind of player every team wants these days just because he has that explosive quickness and speed. So I think he's going to be the guy to watch who's sort of like a, I think he's only a slot type player in the NFL. We'll see, but that's kind of like where he projects. I have a question. What is a jitterbug? Like the bug? I don't know, actually. What is it?

Jitter. Do we know what? I just heard this term for like years, decades, and it just occurred to me. I have no idea what a jitterbug is. Craig, the tech guy, is figuring it out right now. So the first thing that pops out when you type in jitterbug is a phone. And then I said the jitterbug bug, and it still is the phone.

And there's a question that says, is a jitterbug or real bug? And it says jitterbug larva. This is the larval form of the rascal, the jitterbug. This isn't helping. I don't know. I don't think they're real bugs. Jittery? Jittery means they're like quick, I guess.

I don't know. I'm not sure where they came from, but. Oh, it's because of the dance, the jitterbug. Oh, there we go. There we go. So all this time we thought it was like quick, like he's like a bug. He's got bug, like reflexes. Like you can go instantly.

At 1930s dance. That's what it is. A little before my time. That's cool. Wow. That's okay. I'm glad we, I'm glad we established something in this podcast. Okay, well, our next award, just like this last segment, was the biggest flop. So who's going to be the biggest flop to Jalen Saunders or the Shaq Evans of this year, you think? I know you're not going to want to pick a guy.

All right, that's a little, I admittedly, I think that's more of a joke at the Jets than anything. Because Jailen Saunders or Shaq Evans are like late rounders. Really, this is just like every year there's guys that bust that people thought were going to be good. So they can be a little better than Jalen Saunders or Jack Evans. I don't want to shade them too much. I was trying to shed the jazz. We're putting a metaphorical gun to your head here, D.K., you got to pick some money. Oh, I have to pick the guy who I think is going to bust.

Yes, you do. What if I don't think anyone else is wrong and you are right? You think every single one of these guys is going to be a top 20 guy in the league. Okay, no, that's definitely not going to happen. Let's see here. Well, if I got to go with one player, I'm going to say Ruggs, just because he has so much hype right now. and I could see a world where a guy with his frame, he's like 511, 190 something pounds.

Like he's very thin. I could see a world where he just struggles versus like really big physical corners. And if we're talking bust, but like fantasy-wise, I could certainly see him not living up to fantasy expectations just because he's playing that very specific role. But, you know, historically, looking back, guys get overdrafted because of their speech.

teams over draft guys because of their lead speed. I do think Ruggs has a good skill set, but he could end up getting overdrafted and not having as big of an impact as people are thinking. So I think if I had to pick a guy, that's probably where I would go. The next John Ross, Henry Ruggs. I mean, yeah, like honestly,

there's some similarities too there in the skill set. Like, Ross was really, really good in college because he had, like, no one was playing up on him. They were all giving him a huge cook. he was able to take little screen passes and spread offense type looks and go and take it to the house he's had injuries at the NFL part of that might be due to the fact they has a small frame you know like these are all the things that you worry about with players of that ilk so i mean i don't think ross is necessarily done in the NFL but he certainly hasn't lived up to the top 10 pick no he was

good for the small person wasn't hurt last year yeah and dek to close us out i want to kind of go big picture on you for a second yeah um obviously so much so much much of like what we're doing with the draft is about there's measurables and you know there's a tape and you're you're a tape grinder but there's also the measurables like how fast the guys how big he is aren't like the wingspan all that stuff and i have a dumb question sure does size matter yeah i think it does i don't think it matters maybe as much as it used to in terms of the the way that the NFL is going but i mean i do think you i think you have to have the frame to absorb big hits in the NFL.

I think if you look at some of the top, quote, number one receivers in the NFL, a lot of them are big physical, like beat up on opposing corner type guys. Even the guys that are starting to become those players, take a look at like Cortland Sutton, for instance, just dominated last year. I think his trajectory is going up really, really high.

Like, he's a big, fast guy. I think there's certainly, yeah, AJ Brown, another one, D.K. Metcalfe, another one. Like, there are certainly, players that lack size that are really, really good in the NFL. I mean, like Antonio Brown, one of the best receivers all time, you know, was not a big guy. So I don't think there's any hard line rule, but I think it certainly helps to have that size. That said, it does, like, if you can't separate when you're that big, though, like, it, basically it's moot. That's what I was

going to say is because there's this idea that, oh, you know, jump ball cat, like jump ball guy or like, like Josh Doxton in 2016. Like, there's all, there's, there's, many examples of receivers where, or how many times is like your dad or your uncle or someone's, but like, we need a big receiver. We need a big end zone target. Yeah. And in reality, it's like, oh, that makes sense on the surface where it's like, oh, yeah, you want a big person to throw it.

You want the tall guy. In reality, you know who's like, who's easier to throw to the 510 guy who's open or the 6.5 guy who's covered? Like, the idea isn't to be catching contested passes. The idea is to get open and catch uncontested passes. So, yeah, I think what we've learned is, is it's not. the size that matters. It's how you use it. God.

All right. Well, we're ending on that. No one's going to do that. I mean, hold on. Just one sec, though. If you look at the top players in terms of yards last season, I'm just going to go down the list. Receiving yards. Michael Thomas. Julio Jones. Chris Godwin. Travis Kelsey was a tight end, but he's big. Devonte Parker, Keenan Allen, Kenny Gawley, Amari Cooper, DJ Moore, Jarvis Landry, DeAndre Hopkins, the first The first small guy on the list is Cooper Cup. Mike Evans, Alan Robinson, Robert Woods, Stefan Diggs. All these guys. Do you have the heights for these gentlemen for context?

I'm not talking about height necessarily either. It's like build. You know, a lot of people bring up like BMI, like their build, their strength. That kind of size matters too. So being thick with at least two Cs is more important than the actual height. I don't draft guys with one C. So yeah, I mean, there's certainly a, like a thought that B.M. I certainly matters in the NFL.

Like guys have to have a certain, you know, like you said, thickness to them to succeed in the NFL. I don't think it's a solid rule. But you're saying it's more about durability than it is about catching passes. The size is more important to just take hits than it is to catch. Well, and be physical. But a lot of these guys are tall too. Like Thomas, Julio, Godwin, I believe, is like 6-2 or something like that.

Devante Parker, 6-4. I don't know off the top of my head of how tall these guys are. Kenyon-A-Lennon 6-3. Kenny Galladay, 6-4. Mari Cooper, what is he, 6-1? DJ Moore is, he's not tall, but he's very thick. Same with Landry. Hopkins is tall.

Mike Evans is tall. A lot of these best receivers in football like 6-2, though. And I guess that's kind of my point, is the idea that a 6-5 receiver dominates is there's really not many. To me, the sweet spot right there is like 6'1 to 6'3. Like, you don't have to be 6-5. There's very few 6-5 guys. There's very few Calvin Johnsons in the world.

There's very few Brandon Marshalls. height, you have to sacrifice other physical attributes. Yeah, like quickness, suddenness. Yeah. Yeah. So is there a player in this draft who I think, is there any player in this draft who maybe people might be too into how tall is, for example, or the jump ball aspect? Because I look at J.G.R. Segal White Side, who was beloved as a like a second or third

rounder last year, ended up going ahead of D.K. Matt Caff, speaking of the Eagles, to wrap this whole thing around. They took R. Siegel White side ahead of the Eagles, a set of Metcalf with the Seahawks. And then our single white side doesn't even play for the Eagles in that playoff game, even when the Eagles were like famously the most battered team in like years. Right. Like in recent memory, their receiving core was injured. And our single white side couldn't even get on the field because he couldn't separate.

He was a jump ball guy. So is there anyone in this class that maybe the frame or the size is maybe overriding the fact that they can't get open? Or the flip side, is there anyone who's small, but it's very good at getting open. Yeah. So I think to answer your first question, I think, The first guy that came into my mind is T. Higgins, and that is the big question mark for him going into the NFL. You know, he's not super sudden. He's not explosive in the short area. When he had his pro date, he didn't test very well. Like his vertical wasn't very strong. It was like low 30s, you know, and so he's not running a 4-4.

He's not a type of guy who's going to separate. And he really, a lot of his game is like winning at the catch point. And there's, I think there's a lot of like diminishing returns with your ability to win at the catch point. because if you're really good at that, a lot of times that means you're not getting open. So you have to have both, I think. You have to have the ability to separate. You have to have the ability to run a sharp route, be where you're supposed to be when the quarterback gets the ball to where you're supposed to be type deal. I think T. Higgins is a really good player, but I think that's certainly an issue and a worry

for him going on to the next level is can he create enough, I guess, separation to be this top tier guy. I think you could ask the same question about like a Kenny Goliday coming into the NFL. He's managed to be amazing. So I think Higgins is like his upside or whatever is in that Devante Parker, Kenny Goliday area. Obviously late breakout Devante Parker kind of area. But it's certainly a question mark with him going into the NFL because that wasn't necessarily his game in college. And say actually with C.D. Lamb.

I mean, he's not necessarily like the super sudden explosive separator. he's just a baller. So, yeah, I think there's certainly question marks with those two guys and their ability to separate. Well, there's no question marks with you, DK. You're a baller too. You're just straight ball in air. Thank you.

All right. I think that's all we got. Thank you, D.K. Thank you, Craig. Thank you to everyone for listening. We will be back next week going through running backs for this draft class. Thank you to everyone for listening and stay safe. See you next week.