Becoming a Best Ball Bro: A Full PPR Strategy?

00:00:01
Speaker 1: So rich.

00:00:02
Speaker 2: I watched some some movies with my daughter over the weekend, actually started last week last Thursday. You want to guess what movie we started with and what movie?

00:00:11
Speaker 1: Here?

00:00:11
Speaker 2: I'm gonna ask you a question. What movie has a second and third version of that movie? That was a kid's movie that we probably watched growing up? Do you have any guesses?

00:00:21
Speaker 3: I think I know what direction you're going in, but I don't want to spoil it for the audience.

00:00:25
Speaker 2: What what direction do you think we're going in here?

00:00:27
Speaker 3: I think it's homeward bound.

00:00:29
Speaker 2: It was not homeward bound. It was not homeward bound. Homeward Bound was last year I talked about Homeward Bound. We watched Free Willy, Free Willy. Did you know that Willy had three versions of it?

00:00:40
Speaker 3: I did. Free Willy is the first movie I ever saw in the theaters.

00:00:43
Speaker 2: Oh wow, cool. Uh So, we watched Free Willy and unfortunately we bought we had to rent them. There was like three dollars and fifty cents and uh so we watched the first one, you know, decent flick. We watched the second one, but we didn't finish the second one because we went to a friend's place. At the lake over the weekend and we got back. Turns out that rental was only forty eight hours long, so just to watch the final thirty minutes of Free Willie two to watch to see if Willy dies in an oil fire or not, I had to spend another four dollars when I could have just used that on a Best Ball entry instead. I'm JJ and last year I tried my hardest to become a best ball bro. I drafted over five hundred teams, I talked to some of the most successful best ball players in existence, and I admittedly had mixed results. So this year, I'm going to chase that title once again. My plan is a Max Center DraftKings millionaire maker, and I'm going to document all of it while talking to the brightest best ball minds on the planet. Last year, I didn't quite get there, But this year this is going to be the year where I officially become a best ball bro. This episode is sponsored by DraftKings. There's no better way to lock in your fantasy dominance early than with Best Ball on DraftKings, where you draft once and ride your roster all season long. And right now, Draftings giving all customers a can't miss offer Draft one, Get one and to line up in the fifteen million dollars Best Ball contest for just twenty dollars, and you'll score another Best Ball ticket to play free for a share of that fifteen million, giving you a second shot to win big. It's easy. Just draft your dream team once, no weekly management required, and let your top scorers automatically start each week across the whole season. Every breakout star, every clutch play, every touchdown will count towards your quest for a share of fifteen million dollars. I'm drafting over there all the time. It's an absolute blast. So down with the DraftKings Daily Fantasy app now to draft a twenty dollars best ball lineup to play for a share of fifteen million dollars, and get a second ticket to play free for a share of that fifteen million. That's two chances to win big without ever setting your lineup again. Draft one, Get one only on draftings. The Crown is Yours gambling problem called one hunter Gambler In New York, call eight seven seven eight hope end y, or text hope end why to four six seven three six nine. In Connecticut. Help is available for problem gambling call eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or visit CCPG dot org eighteen plus and most eligible states, but age varies by jurisdiction. Eligibility restrictions apply. Voidware prohibited. One per customer enter the Best Ball fifteen million dollars Headliner contest by nine four to twenty five to get one bonus entry. Twenty dollars. Entry for required reward expires in thirty days. See terms at draftings dot com. Slash NFL dash Best Dashball sponsored by dk Now Back to the show. Welcome into another episode of becoming a Best Ball bro. I'm JJ Zach Reeson and I am joined as always by Rich Ryan Rich. What's going on, Buddy?

00:03:54
Speaker 3: I'm doing fantastic One last soccer reference for the summer, I promise. But whatever the opposite of doom scrolling is is what I've been doing for the past week because, for the first time in forty one years, JJ, my beloved Tottenham Hotspur have lifted a European trophy, beating Manchester United in the Europa League Final in billbal Spain. You cannot wipe the smile off my face.

00:04:17
Speaker 2: Cool man sounds sounds really awesome, sounds sounds great soccer.

00:04:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is this is what it sounded like in my house for the last week. My wife, Jenna, she's from Trinidad and all of her brothers are Chelsea supporters. She obviously knows her football, her proper football, and it's not the top tier, it's not Champions League. So all she's been doing is ribbing me the whole time. She's like, you know, that's not even like that's like a Mickey Mouse trophy, you know, like it's been brutal.

00:04:43
Speaker 2: So so basically, what you're saying is your favorite soccer team won the XFL Championship.

00:04:48
Speaker 3: No, it's it's no, it's and it's not the the n it either. People, all right, stop stop, stop, I'm tired of it.

00:04:58
Speaker 2: So it's not the ACCE. Well sure, sure, okay, we'll believe you, Rich, We'll believe you. All right. So we've been doing the DraftKings thing over the last especially over the last week since we last chatted with all of you guys. But I've been drafting. You know, I'm probably I'm only a few flagship contest lineups in because i want to make those and do those live. And I've been working with the Draft Guide, and obviously Memorial Day happened, so I got to catch up a little bit on that end because I am max entering that tournament, but I am doing slow drafts elsewhere. Rich, have you been digging into the draft and entering the Draftking streets.

00:05:38
Speaker 3: I'll tell you what. The Draftking Streets are, tree lined, white picket fence. The sprinklers are on. Everyone's waving. It's very friendly. If you get my draft over on the Draftking Streets, it's friendly.

00:05:51
Speaker 2: And I like this, so I you know, we have a guest on later on the episode, which we'll do every week. Last week was just me and Rich is sort of an intro, but we do have guests that I that I interview and talk to every week. And my guest that I spoke to talked about how on DraftKings you will often find that average draft positions fluctuate a lot more like people are not afraid to reach and people aren't afraid, whereas other platforms you oftentimes just kind of get in this like robotic. It's the same stuff over and over again, because people don't want to lose value on their on their individual picks. I really appreciate that about the draftings platform.

00:06:27
Speaker 3: Honestly, yeah, I had some guys that, you know, I was building my favorite stack so far from the week seventeen slate based on value and where you can get them is dolphins and bucks. And I was setting up a nice little dolphin stack, and you know, somebody went naked to And that was probably my first tilt session of the summer, one of well, first of the many to come.

00:06:50
Speaker 2: When when people here today's interview, I think that this guest and I'll I guess I can just reveal the guests now. It's Pat Corane who we started last year's Becoming a Bestballer with. But Krarin last year, you know, gave us really good insight on stacking and getting that quarterback and making sure that that quarterback is the one for your individual lineup and that sometimes you have to pass on value in order to make that individual lineup look really good. He also has some really good insight for people today on not getting overly tilted about missing out on that quarterback right on that specific guy that you sort of like set things up for. So I think that that once everyone listens to that, you know, you'll feel a little bit less tilted whenever that inevitably happens to you.

00:07:34
Speaker 3: I definitely needed that because JJ I crashed out and my last two picks of the draft or Harold Fannin and Deshaun Watson. So I need all the help I can.

00:07:41
Speaker 2: Get right now to shock Watson. Wow, look at that. Look at that final too.

00:07:46
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:07:46
Speaker 2: I mean, like, look, I do think the DraftKings, you know, has it's it's you know, all these different platforms have sort of something unique in terms of, you know, obviously what the game style is, but also the demographic that's playing, you know, on these platforms. Like one of the things I've noticed on DraftKings, wide receivers aren't going nearly as early as I thought that they would, just give them the fact that it's a full PPR format. I think the running back thirst is very real. Did you notice that with some of your Draft.

00:08:11
Speaker 3: Evening they don't get hurt anymore? J J. I don't know, if you got them evident they will never get injured ever again where we've made.

00:08:16
Speaker 2: It, yeah, evidently. And then also, and I talk about this a little bit with Karine, but I'm surprised that some of the elite quarterbacks aren't going slightly higher. The one guy that I have talked and I talked to Krane about this. You guys are gonna hear this in a second. But the one guy and I didn't really plan that, Like I put together the general notes for what Rich and I would talk about, and then I talked to Karine. It just so happens there was overlap there. But the one player that I'm shocked by is Jalen Hurts. Jalen Hurts gets drafted after Joe Burrow in terms of ADP on DraftKings, which is bonkers to me. Like, I don't want to sit here right now in May and say that Burrows like a fade candidate number one. I don't think any quarterback and best ball is really a fade because you're building quarterbacks based on the pass catchers you have, You're building stacks and all that kind of stuff. Like even the newsletter I sent out last week that once again found itself on Reddit and people yelled at me on Reddit about Jared Goff being overvalued, that's not really a best ball take, because if you draft Amen ros Saying Brown and Jamison Williams, you can get Jared Goff and he can have spiked weeks, so it's more of a season long take and noting that you know touchdown rates do fluctuate. That's something that I talked about on the Late Round podcast that released yesterday. But Joe Burrow is also low key a regression candidate. Like I do expect Burrow to throw a lot, but he had a career high and attends per game last year, and you had a career high and touchdown rate last year. You can bind those two things. That's a recipe for something that's not very sustainable, right where you have a really high touchdown rate. What's the way to combat touchdown rate regression? That is right, Jared Goff, really high touchdown rate last year. What's the one way to combat that year over year? You just throw more attempts? Throw oh the ball more. But Joe Burrow doesn't necessarily have that to fall back on. Now. I have him ranked as a QB five, as the QB five right now, but that's mostly because there's not other like Superstar Jayden Daniels type players that you would automatically rank right after the Big Four. And I'm just shocked that Burrow is going ahead of Jalen Hurts. I'm assuming it's for stacking purposes. Do you think that that would be like Jamar Chase te Higgins are going there now, now they're getting Arizona, so Trey McBride goes there too, So you're you're game stacking that. And then I'm assuming people just want Joe Burrow and they're forcing it.

00:10:33
Speaker 3: It definitely seems inflationary from both a team stack and a game stack perspective that those players are going so early in the first couple of rounds that naturally Burrow is getting this bump because the people that select those players feel like they want to connect the sack and take Burrow. But just in general, even if you disassociate Jalen Hurts from Joe Burrow and just look at him against the player pool. My first snapchat of ADP was on May twelfth, so two weeks ago when we did our first episode, Hurts has gone back one spot and I know people out there it's like it's one draft spot whatever. The only major piece of news that we've had for the last couple of months is that the Tush push will remain in the NFL. You would think logically that that would have even a small emodicum positive effect on people selecting Jalen Hurts.

00:11:19
Speaker 2: They don't care.

00:11:20
Speaker 3: JJ.

00:11:20
Speaker 2: I don't get it. I don't really get it either. Not only that, but I think Philadelphia is gonna throw the ball more than they did last year. They had, you know, a situation where things were a little bit clean in terms of gamescript stuff like that, and they leaned really heavily on the run. Saquon Barkley was healthy for last season. I mean, what if he's not healthy this year, which we know can happen, and then all of a sudden they're not relying on the run as I mean, there's just there's outs here where Hurtz throws the ball a lot more. Not only that, but like where he goes in drafts, because you can get him into the fifth right, and you can get AJ Brown oftentimes into the late second, and so matching AJ Brown with Jalen Hurts is not even that difficult right now. And it's just it's wild to me. I mean, Jay Hurts has been someone that I've gotten a lot of so far.

00:12:03
Speaker 3: Yeah, and AJ Brown this morning the draft dead this morning, A J Brown fell to me, I don't know. It was late second round which seems a bit crazy for a player of his talents. And then I went ahead and I grabbed Josh Allen in the third because he had fallen way too much, and I was gonna start a little buffalo thing. And then I was so mad because Hurts Hurts fell so Hurts felt a full round passed his ADP and I was just losing my mind because I, again, like Krane discussed, I did not allow. I was like, this falling value is so good, but I just I can't. I can't go to quarterbacks this early in the draft.

00:12:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you wouldn't you You shouldn't have you know, if you get if you get a guy like Josh Allen, but even Alan I think is fine to get. It's weird. I've turned into an early round quarterback disciple after all these years. It's just a wild wild turn event events here, nuts.

00:12:52
Speaker 3: That goes, that goes that you're not you don't have takelock. That's like the number one thing, right, And you've discussed this previously about about younger guys. That break in is they find something and they hold on to it with with diamond hands. But we just we need to be fluid with new we do.

00:13:06
Speaker 2: We do been drafting a lot of different different stacks, though one of them in that same range is the forty nine ers, where George Kittle to me is just unbelievably undervalued at the moment, where like I like getting brock Bauers and trade McBride. That's you know, don't get me wrong, because I think there is that big three. I talked about this on the Projection Show a couple weeks ago. But George Kittle and up from a projection standpoint, is only point one points per game that separates him and Trey McBride in my projections. Not only that, George Kittle's ahead of Trey McBride in those projections. Not not that I'm ranking them that way, but that's how it looks at my projections. He goes well after those those tight ends do. And look I have him ranked as tight end three. But he shouldn't be going, you know, two full rounds the way that he does, you know, after McBride. But then on top of that, the forty nine ers, like this is an offense and a scheme that we should just generally feel good about. They just signed brock Purty. I know they lost Deebo Samuel, but Deebo Samuel was a shell of himself last year anyway, and Christian McCaffrey's back and hopefully healthy. Ricky piersall now you get into year two and you know, hopefully doesn't have the same tumultuous situation that happened, you know, last offseason where he got off to a slow start for very obvious reasons. Juwan Jennings broke out last year. Brendan and Ayuk obviously banged up, but he could come back halfway through the year and be totally fine. I mean, the weapons are still there. In San Francisco's defense is not that strong. I mean a lot of rankings will have them as a bottom ten unit in the league, and so I think that there could be a lot of passing in this offense. And you're getting a lot of these guys at reasonable cost. And then brock Perty goes after pick one hundred, So right now I've been going after forty nine ers kind of aggressively. Maybe it's partially also because I like the Bears, and you know, I'll get Bear and that's a good Week seventeen game in my opinion. But forty nine ers man They've been part of my consideration set pretty strongly so far.

00:14:58
Speaker 3: I love that every week somewhere in the show sheet is the name Romaduinzi.

00:15:02
Speaker 2: You just can't like this, man, Oh my gosh. Yes, look okay, I'm drafting Bears and I am getting I'm getting less dj more more Romadunza. Then if I get a Dounza, I'll often go after Luther Burden as well, especially when he slips. But Caleb Williams, I mean, I said it last week, I'll say it again. Caleb Williams is ranked as a high end QB two. I think he is a a mid to low end QB one, you know, more than that, like QB nine to eleven range than the QB thirteen range where he gets drafted. But then on top of that, like you're you're you're a player like Caleb should be elevated in ADP a little bit because he has stacking outs right, So like it's it's a it's an easy team to generally stack. You know that there's gonna be pass catchers that you're getting early and not late. You know, to stack him, so that's gonna drive up his price a little bit. Like a Jared Goff. Let's say where you know, GoF gets Jamison Williams and Nomen ross A Brown, that can lead to earlier eighty because teams are gonna want to you know, managers are gonna want to draft him earlier. But it's not really happening in my opinion with Kayleb Williams. So I've gotten a lot of that. And again maybe that has to do with the forty nine ers thing and that matchup at me like in the forty nine ers. But then you could also get Roshan Johnson really late. Who Roshan is like an auto click for me right now, because if they don't sign anyone, if they don't add anyone, he's gonna outplay as ADP at this point.

00:16:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, the Bears are a perfect example of the divergence between best ball and redrafts because we don't need to make the decision weekly as to which Bears pass catcher we're going to play. It's just going to decide itself for us. So having those multiple dart throws is actually more beneficial and best ball than in redraft, where it could end up being a headache later in the year.

00:16:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess I already mentioned. This last stack that I've been going after is the Eagles. I mean, it's a really boring three stacks that I'm kind of like going after right now. But it's just based on like one or two of these players, especially the quarterbacks, just being reasonably priced. But I like the Eagles, like you know, I don't think they're gonna have as clean up game scripts. AJ Brown will fall further than he should. I've got more Aj Brown than DeVante Smith. Hurts often goes into round five. Dallas Goddard, you can get him really late. Like Dallas Goddard to me projects as like a low end tight end one or a fringe tight end one. He's tight end sixteen right now by ADP. Like Colston Loveland goes like four tight end spots ahead of Dallas Goddard. When I think that you could argue look nothing against Colston Loveland. I loved him as a prospect. I love him in Dynasty, and I don't even mind him from like a redraft perspective, because I do think there's opportunity for things to kind of like work itself out and him be viable within this panther or within this bears offense. But we have to be realistic that Colston Loveland's like median outcome or sorry, his maybe like eightieth percentile outcome is more so Dallas Goddard's median outcome if we're being you know, realistic about year one tight end performance. You know, I'm the first to tell you that I think that the year one tight end like idea that you fade them in redraft and all that kind of stuff is really overblown because if you look at players who actually get routes run and actually get the opportunity, they perform fine. There's just a lot of mouths to feed in Chicago, Like, I don't think that we can make the assumption that he's going to be a top three, you know, target getter in the offense with Luther Burden there. So I'm I'm preferring Dallas Goddard like, especially given the environment that we're in where I'm getting jail and hurts a lot, and I can get other Bears players, you know, like a like a Dooons and in a Luther Burden. I've been going more like the Dallas Goddard route, like Goddard over Isaiah Likely for instance, and Likely goes ahead of Goddard. I think that you can make the argument that Goddard should go ahead of Tucker Craft, who. You know, that's an offense that spreads the ball around a whole lot, and you know he he definitely over performed a touchdown column last year, which is why I think some people are inflating him a tad. His per route run numbers were fine. They weren't like elites or anything. But yeah, I mean, like I think Dallas Goddard, what I'm saying here is just a little bit undervalue. It just makes this Eagle stack even that more interesting.

00:18:55
Speaker 3: It's almost like people are still valuing him as a player that the Eagles might trade when that's kind of done and dusted with, right, they done, They kicked the can prior to the draft, and then it sounds like during the draft they sat down and had a frank conversation with Goddard and he said that he wanted to stay. And who is competing with him for targets in this offense at tight end? They put Grant Calcatara on the field a ton, but his job is to block and maybe once in a while he'll catch some some random seamer or some Hitch, But like, are we worried about Kylin grantson Harrison Bryant ceiling meaningful targets away from Dallas Goddard. I don't think so.

00:19:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was gonna say, I think that they got Kylon Grants in this offseason, which you know, it's like fine, It's not something that I'm afraid of. You know, from a from a projectable target standpoint, he should be the number three target in that offense. I mean, that's that's the way things are trending. And you know, he's been viable in the past. You know, it's one of those players that I don't think I'm gonna be as into at all in a regular redraft environment because I don't think that his you know, ceiling is like that out of control. But from a best ball perspective, you're just trying to get points, like you're just trying to get and he'll have random spiked weeks. I don't want to have to guess when those spiked weeks are coming. But there's also a contingent upside. If if one of aj Brown or Demonte Smith were to go down, Dallas Goddter would see a higher target here.

00:20:13
Speaker 3: We know that would happen, And just to circle back and put a pin on this segment, the market is telling me that George Kittle and San Laporte are a lot closer than I think they should be. I'm very interested in what's going to happen to the Lions entering the season with the brain drain on both sides of the ball. You talked about Jared Goff this week on the Feed and his touchdown regression that might be coming based on his career outlooks pocket passer trap. So I'm not here to say like the Lions are going to take a step back and not be a top ten offense this year. But if you're putting an elite player who just performs over and over and over again that has no changes to their offense, and if anything, because of the departure of Deebo, Samuel might get a smaller increase in the pie compared to somebody in Laporta that has just there's just question marks on Detroit. We we can't deny that that. I'm taking Kittle in that situation all day.

00:21:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, I didn't even Whenever I think about the Lions too and stacking, I haven't really drafted much Laporta so far, and he doesn't even cross my mind in terms because because Kittle is just such a screaming value where he goes that, to me, it makes no sense to fall back. That's a new tier in my opinion, to go to Laporta. Laporta doesn't look as good in my projections, nearly as good in my projections. You know, I do have him ranked I think as tight end four, but I do think there's a big, big tier break right there after Kittle. So basically, draft George Kittle, draft Jalen Hurts, hopefully hopefully profit But like I said, we have a guest today, Pat Corrane, owner of legendary upside dot com. He's had an insane success as a best ball player in the past. He's he's been become a millionaire through playing best ball. Talked about what to do with the extra rounds over on DraftKings, talked a lot about ross construction, you know, talked a lot about stacking and sort of how he works with the late rounds in these draft in these DraftKings best Ball contest, where you know, is he is he going after players that complete his stack a little bit more, or is he going after players who are just fun and intriguing and have upsides. We had a deep discussion about all of that. Hopefully you guys enjoy. So without further ado, here's the interview with mister Pat Kurat. All right, Pat, we're talking DraftKings. I'm really curious, like, what's your draft strategy when you go from a half PPR platform, which is what a lot of people are playing with in best Ball, to a full PPR one like DraftKings.

00:22:43
Speaker 4: I think maybe you would assume that, you know, if you're going from a half PPR platform to PPR, that you know you'd be prioritizing the wide receivers a bit more, you know, But that's not really what happens, because we're going from a half PPR platform where people love wide receivers and basically draft it like its PPR, to a actual PPR platform. So it doesn't change that much in the world that we live in. When I hop over on DraftKings, honestly, to some extent, I sometimes break ties, like a little bit earlier on to the running backs. On DraftKings, it's a little bit more wild West in terms of where players are going to go. It's less predictable people follow ADP less. There's some big reaches, there's some big fallers, and so I kind of like to be a little bit more balanced. If I'm in a really extreme build and then i get a faller at a position that I'm already super strong at, that's kind of frustrating and not uncommon. So probably the biggest difference is just understanding that ADP environment is going to be a little bit there's gonna be a bigger like standard deviation in terms of the ADP.

00:23:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, alluded to this a little bit, But on draftings, what I've noticed is that people aren't taking running backs any later despite it being full PPR. It seems like it's it's pretty in tune with you know, another platform like a like a UD. But does this make you want to go more zero RB or are you like you just said, like, are you afraid to go with a zero RB approach because there are circumstances that are more unpredictable on a platform like draftings where people might not stop drafting running backs, you know, as they're as they're drafting running backs earlier. Like like basically what I'm saying is like, as I've gotten into two DraftKings in the platform and drafting on there, I've just noticed that I will have like it's very easy to have really strong wide receivers early because running backs are being drafted early. But then at the same time you can get caught with your pants down if you will, where like if you're in the the later rounds and you're going with a more zero RB approach, those running backs aren't a because people just keep keep drafting that position.

00:25:02
Speaker 1: It's it's it's easy.

00:25:04
Speaker 4: It's much easier to be stronger at wide receiver on DraftKings, like just kind of regardless of what you're doing, if you if you have that as a goal, it's easier to achieve that goal on DraftKings. So I'm kind of trying to think it's almost like more like on f FPC, which just tends to be a pretty running back heavy platform, I'm you know, kind of thinking about the best times to deviate from trying to be strong at receiver and grab the running backs because there are going to be other wide receiver opportunities available later. One pocket for me on DraftKings is like you can be sitting at like, you know, the eleventh round and get a receiver that you like, and that's just kind of a breath of fresh air, you know, that's.

00:25:51
Speaker 1: I'm not used to that.

00:25:52
Speaker 4: But if I know I can get that, If I know I can get wide receivers, I like more in than ninth. If at the like the end of the fifth this morning, I got George Pickens, that's pretty sweet.

00:26:02
Speaker 1: You know.

00:26:02
Speaker 4: I got Marvin Harrison at the end of the third round instead of the beginning of the third round. So there's there's spots where I'm like, okay, if I can sit here at the end of the third, at the end of the fifth, if I can if I can wait for receivers a little bit more later, you know, later on, I'm not like pushing guys up around ahead of where I think they should actually go. So I actually have a wide receiver three or wide receiver four, then I can use that to my advantage by also being strong at running back and and so you know, like I had a build this morning where I took McCaffrey as out of the twelve pall. I took McCaffrey, I took Bresee, I took Trayvon Henderson, and I took DeAndre Swift. So like in every every turn. In the first four you know, first four turns, first four pairs of picks, I took a running back and then and then I didn't take my fifth running back till very late. But I basically kind of built balanced there. But I ended up feeling pretty strong receiver because I also took a receiver with each of my first four pairs of picks as well. So you know, through through eight, I had four running backs and four receivers, feeling pretty good about both positions. And then I filled out the depth at receiver on DraftKings in a way that I basically.

00:27:16
Speaker 1: Don't expect to yeah, if I'm not there.

00:27:19
Speaker 2: So the other thing, you know, this is kind of that point. But when you're drafting, like are you are you more of a fan of doing fast drafts than slow drafts in this kind of environment because you can be more Maybe this is wrong, but this is the way that I after experiencing being becoming a best ball bro last year and now switching over to DraftKings and trying to see what it's like here, like, I've noticed that when I do fast drafts as opposed to slow drafts, I enjoy the fast draft environment more because I have a better pulse on what's going on in that draft. If that makes is that? Is that a proper like? Is that the way that you feel too?

00:27:52
Speaker 4: That's very much the way that I feel. I would even go like a step further and say, I don't trust myself to pay as much attention in my slow drafts, right Like I'll just like fire, Like you get in the mode where you're like firing in picks, yeah, and I've done, you know, when I'm doing slow drafts, I'm like I'll fire and picks and be like, wait, did that team have that guy? Because that was you know, was I supposed to stack there? I'm pretty sure yesterday I was definitely gonna stack. And then I just like fired in a running back pick without thinking. So for me like being dialed in. So I'm paying attention to what's happening in the draft room, but I'm just like also paying more attention to my team when I'm trying what I'm trying to accomplish. I just I feel way more in tune with what's going on, you know, with everyone including me, when I'm in a fast draft.

00:28:41
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:28:42
Speaker 2: I also think that in an environment where it is it does seem like people don't follow ADP as strongly. It's better to do that, to be on top of things, and to do more fast drafts than slow drafts, because then you will be able to react properly and understand, oh, yeah, this guy's slipping in this draft and I can I'll i'll remember this as opposed to like drafting two spots away from the turn and then completely forgetting that that player was someone that you were, you know, targeting on the on the with your next pick and stuff.

00:29:10
Speaker 4: So in this draft that I was doing this morning, I like set up I had Travon Henderson, I was gonna I ended up taking Kyle Williams. I was like, I had Breis Hall setting up like a New England Jet thing, and Drake May goes like way ahead of ADP. So of course you know, I'm a big Drake May guy. I noticed that. I was like, what, but there's there's one of the worst things is if you if you don't see that happen and you're like, oh, I'll just set up Drake May.

00:29:39
Speaker 1: Let me just go to take Drake May. He went around, He's not there.

00:29:42
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, So yeah, I do think it's being paying attention to the draft is a huge edge, and I just I found it easier to do on fast draft.

00:29:50
Speaker 2: What about the fact that there are extra rounds, you know, different platforms you'll look at. We'll have like eighteen draftings as twenty with those extra rounds. How does that sort of shift your approach or does it at all?

00:30:04
Speaker 1: You know?

00:30:04
Speaker 4: One way that it can shift your approach theoretically is that you know you could do more at the at the onesie positions. But on DraftKings, I find that quarterback can get pretty sketchy late in drafts, so I'm usually done at quarterback before those final rounds. But it does allow you to take three quarterbacks more easily because you have, you know, that extra twentieth round pick could be a fifth or sixth running back where you know it might be a four running back build or you know, a five running back build where you don't have a ton of firepower up top if you want to try to add a third quarterback, so the third quarterback, it definitely makes that more comfortable, even though I'm rarely using a nineteenth or twentieth round pick on a quarterback. Yeah, if that makes sense. And then at tight end, I am more willing to just say I'm taking a third tight end in the final round, or even a fourth tight end. I'm more willing to do that on DraftKings. With the two extra rounds to play around with, I think depending on the tournament you're in, you can also kind of take some of these bigger swings. I I was gonna take up Brishard Smith in the nineteenth round of this draft, got sniped. But that's the type of guy where I'm like, I don't know, like pretty wide open backfield. Actually I know it's a seventh round pick, but yeah, converted receiver tested pretty well, so there's like he could be nothing, but he could be something. And in DraftKings Flagship tournament, it's a big final, you're gonna need some really high scoring players. And so getting a guy who could spike out of the twentieth round, even if it means taking on zero risk, is something when you have an extra couple of rounds that I'm more comfortable with.

00:31:49
Speaker 2: So a lot of people listening to this, especially if they're newer to Best Ball, are going to be curious about how many of each position should they draft. And now I know that's a loaded question. I know that's a quotes and that's like not easily answerable, But what's your typical mix look like with quarterback, running back, wide receiver, and tight end, Like if you were you know, we have twenty players in this roster. You know, I know that the mix depends on how you're spending your your capital. You can surely talk about that as well, But what does your general mix look like and what does your lineup construction just generally look like when when things are all said and done.

00:32:25
Speaker 4: Like two to three quarterbacks, five to seven running backs, you know, eight ish receivers fluctuating up and down a bit, probably like two to two to four tight ends, probably two to three most of the time. But at the end of drafts, I'm trying to think about who can spike for me? Who, Like I'm the things I'm interested in are like correlated bets, Like I'm betting on the games I've already bet on, betting on the quarterbacks I've already bet on, So like I will take a two two at well or something that's kind of boring like that if I have a Matthew Stafford and not really if I don't. But there's a lot of guys in that mix where I'll continue to add to a bet. I'll also you know, take a tight like I think some of the tight ends have decent chance of spiking at least at the tight end position in the very final rounds in ways that just if you're thinking about, like who can be a hero for me in one of the single elimination playoff weeks, you know, like I like Harold Fannin, and I appreciate the twentieth round so that I can take some Harold fann you know, like at the end of the season, maybe they're seeing what they have in Harold Fannin, a big slot receiver with tight end eligibility.

00:33:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that's the type of where.

00:33:42
Speaker 4: I'm like, you know, I took Harold Fannin at the twenty one in this draft. Xavier or Streppo was the next pick, Like, who's more likely to like have a random spike week to me? You know, it's Fannin and it's at the tight end position. So yeah, I'm kind of at the end of the draft, I'm just kind of like, which guys can I dream on a little bit for the end of the season, whether that's because they're already attached to the stacks that I have, and so that I kind of know that that team's going to be going off for me, right or the team's not very good anyway. So yeah, if that team's going off, pieces of this team are scoring points, let me get a few more pieces of that team. You know, some rookies that that might be interesting bets. And then the position of those rookies isn't so so important unless I'm, like, you know, unless I only have four running backs to that point, I want to tackle on a fifth or something.

00:34:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, do you find yourself like if you were to say what the split is between like, let's say that you're past round fourty y, let's say you're in like round fifteen sixteen, and so you're in like the clear lay parts of your draft where the guys that are available are clearly players that are not projected to score many fantasy points. Are you leaning far more on players that are expanding your existing stacks, or are you leaning more on the Harold fannin non Cleveland brown stacks where you're just trying to get a dude that could hypothetically blow up because of his ambiguity of him being a rookie, like is there You know, you don't have to give a percentage lean or anything like that, but are would you say that you go more towards the stacks than the individual players or the individual individual players more than the stacks.

00:35:19
Speaker 4: Probably more towards the stacks than the individual players. But it sort of depends on the way I've built the team. Like I talked about this team of it this morning that had four running backs and four receivers through eight. One of those receivers was Brandon Ayuk, and then my fifth receiver was Kyle Williams and so on that team. In the fourteenth I grabbed Romeo Dobbs, in the sixteenth, I grabbed Josh Palmer, neither of which were stacked. But and I didn't have and they weren't bringbacks either, but they were. They're guys who I'm just like, yeah, you play receiver, yeah, routes yeah yeah, And they're cheap. I'm paying and not paying a ton for the routes. And I've got a guy coming back off a multi lagament and a rookie, so I would like pretty cheaply, I would say, But I you know, I would like to pay for for some guys who run routes. And then my last receiver on that team was was stacked with Stafford and Pooka to to out well, so and I had Jarco's Hunter there, so I did a RAMS thing. So it's like it depends a little bit on if I feel like the team needs something, for example, if it had a different receiver room, if I had like some veterans kind of in those middle rounds, like if I built it more on like Calvin Ridley's and Cooper or not, well, Cooper Cup's a decent example, Calvin Ridley, like Cooper Cup, Courtland Sutton, like it's kind of veterans, projectable veteran.

00:36:40
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:36:42
Speaker 4: Then like Jalen Nole starts to look unstacked, Jalen Noles starts to look pretty interesting, you know, unstacked Jack Best starts to look pretty interesting. Like, let me, how do I get some like late season upside on this team at wide receiver. So a lot of it's about like what the team I feel like is missing at that point at that position. But if you know, if I have a tie, I'm definitely using stacking to help help break me towards that player.

00:37:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's A really good point though, and one that was stressed a lot on this show last year, was the idea that what you're doing early in your draft needs to dictate what you do later in your draft, right, and that that can go from like, what I think is interesting what you just talked about is that's a player archetype thing that you're referring to, Whereas you know, a lot of people will take it in a more like mundane way and think of it a more like general way of, oh, you went RB times three to start your draft, like, then don't draft you know, maybe get one or two more late as opposed to you know, getting one in like round eight, round nine. That's the obvious way to sort of sort of balance your roster.

00:37:47
Speaker 1: Right.

00:37:47
Speaker 2: But what you're talking about, too is just like the archetype, like if you're getting Chris Godwin and Brandon Ayuk and whomever you know might not be ready to start the season, Giggs, Yeah, Diggs, make sure you're getting a foundation that of players that are not you know, up in the air with what their usage might look like to start the season. Which the two that you named, I think are like quintessential examples of that. With Romeo Dobbs and Josh Palmer where it's like they're gonna be running routes for their roster and for their team, and those are both high powered offense or like good offenses. Yeah, they could easily give you some spiked weeks.

00:38:20
Speaker 4: And I'm doing I'm working on this article that'll be out later this week, my draft plan right now. And you know, like Dobbs is not exciting, but he goes in the fourteenth and like is he what's really the difference between him and Rashad Bateman, you know who goes, Yeah, like the tenth. So these guys were like, I don't want to pay too much for routes if there's you know, Bateman in this draft. This morning, when I had a Luther Burden like, no, thanks, give me lu give me that upside first. Yeah, but this is a tournament where you need massive upside. In week seventeen, you know, you got to beat over a thousand people in the final. So that's the first priority.

00:39:00
Speaker 1: Me.

00:39:00
Speaker 4: Let me make sure I have a team that actually is built to win. But I do have to clear an advance rate, bar right, and that advanced rates fourteen weeks of the season. So I can't ignore that. So finding the guys who can kind of help you do that cheaply is really nice. And I don't mind paying a premium for some of the late season production, especially if I can find that cheaply. I would also I think the archetype stuff is a pretty big edge at this point because because some of the more basic structural drafting stuff has become more ingrained. One thing I would note as well is like, if you have more running back production, like this team, as I mentioned, was pretty strong at running back, and it's got like a Swift and a McCaffrey in a hall. It's like it had Henderson too, but it's not primarily built late season and the running back, Like I expect to score points at running back early. That allows me to take more risks at receives because I think running back's probably hitting my flex.

00:40:02
Speaker 1: A decent amount early in the season.

00:40:04
Speaker 4: Yeah, And so receiver can kind of come online a little bit more as as the season progresses, and I can just like, it's not that Palmer and Dobbs are going to be crushing for me early in the season, but they're just mixing in enough. Yeah, and then and then I have guys who are more back weighted, who are going to be coming on as the season progresses, and running back is helpy is really what's helping me kind of get to that point.

00:40:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, makes a lot of sense. Now we've been talking stacking, and I know there's gonna be people listening to the show that haven't really been super super involved in Best Ball just yet. Hopefully this show changes things and you guys get get more invested and you really like dig what you know is out there. But a stacking is obviously a really big thing because we're looking at sealing outcomes for these players, and we're looking at what they can do in an individual week and spiking that individual week. And so if there's a connection between quarterback and wide receiver and they throw a touchdown, let's say, then you're getting double the points if you will, and you know that they're both hitting your lineup. But my question to you is how important and vital is stacking for you? Like how how much you go out of your way to get that stack going? But then also how deep do your stacks get? And I mean that from you know the number of pass catchers you go usually use. And then also are you using running backs as part of that stack.

00:41:18
Speaker 4: Yeah, I am using running backs as part of the stack. I'm willing to get fairly deep with the stacks. I'm willing to kind of team stacks stuff. I'm willing to stack without the quarterback. I've written a decent amount about this because I think it really keeps you flexible. Like, you know, I mentioned that I did like a brisaw Trevion Henderson, Drake may get sniped.

00:41:37
Speaker 1: What do I do?

00:41:37
Speaker 4: I take Kyle Williams and I take Hunter Henry Like, I have a stack of a team of two teams to play each other in Week seventeen. I'm hoping that game goes nuts. But I have Brock Purdy, Dak Prescott, and Matthew Stafford. If I don't have Drake May, Like, that's fine whatever. Like I have have Dak stacked up with Pickens, you know I've got I've got Purdy stacked up with McCaffrey and Ayuk Stafford stacked up with with Puka. To to Jarcos Hunter, Like, the one of these quarterbacks is going off for me because they have to, because they're bringing along Like first two picks of the draft are paired with the same on the same team with the quarterback. So I need those dudes. I need Puka, I need McCaffrey. So the quarterback of one of the teams is probably coming along, and if not, I even have a third option of a of a guy who's also stacked that can hit my lineup in a big way. But then I also am going to need in addition to that stack going off an enormous amount of points like just a bunch. So let me let me capture several more scores, all hitting my lineup together by being right about a game that goes off and when I'm looking at that game, like if I'm looking at the Jets in the Patriots, or if I'm you know, looking at any other game, I'm not usually entering a draft being like, man, I really like the the Bengals and the Cardinals to go nuts in Week seven. Team, let me let me take that game, or let me look at the Dome games and try to target those. I'm doing that less than I'm saying like, let me look at who I drafted and yeah, yeah, I drafted them, and what I need, what this team needs to happen for it to win. Uh, you know, a final that's got over a thousand people in it. Yeah, you know, this team needs Puka to go off, it needs McCaffrey go off. Like those, those become pretty interesting games to stack. So these these early picks that I've made, I'm more likely to try to tackle on correlation and see if I can get the quarterback involved in that. But if I don't, kind of good almost, because my goal is to have all my quarterbacks stacked. And additional stacking elements yeah as well, because I'm not gonna I'm not gonna be right about all of it. I'm not even gonna have to utilize all of it.

00:43:50
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:43:50
Speaker 2: Something that really resonated with me actually happened a few years ago whenever I was doing some research on like stacking and season long, and I got a question about stacking in Season long and fortune only our friend Mike Leoni had established a run had done an article one of like the very first articles on just like research behind stacking as opposed to like, you know, we all know that stacking inherently makes sense, but there was more like data backing it and stuff like that. And one of the things that Leoni wrote about that I've been kind of touching on and talking to people about. I'm curious if this is top of mind for you while you're drafting, But it's the idea that when you are getting those other stacks also, like you know, you didn't get the Drake maypick, but you have this New England stack. The other piece that's really important there is that if New England happens to be the offense that really exceeds expectation, yeah in twenty twenty five, then all of a sudden you have pieces of that offen because like like when I do ADP analysis across the board, if that if a player is in a good offense, he will generally exceed expectation. And it's definitely when a player is in a bad offense, the opposite's happening, right, And so if you have Kyle Williams and Traveon Henderson and New England happens to be the offense that scores forty five touchdowns this year protected at thirty five touchdowns, then all of a sudden, those players are naturally going to be elevated. And so that's part of the you know, equation for stacking for you as well.

00:45:08
Speaker 4: I'm assuming absolutely, yeah, you kind of can win in multiple ways. You can win with those guys being huge hits for the season. You can win in them spiking in one of the playoff weeks. They can spike in multiple of the playoff weeks. They can be great in the regular season and spike in the playoffs. And yeah, I mean that's why I am interested in stacking, you know, with the running backs, because that's.

00:45:31
Speaker 1: Where you you just like, this team is good.

00:45:34
Speaker 2: Yes, you know, like they're undervalued.

00:45:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're undervalued.

00:45:37
Speaker 4: The Texans a couple of years ago, Stroud was a rookie, like you just like Texans were good. Texans would have been even better if you know, Tank Dell hadn't gotten hurt. So like it looked at one point like you're going to basically need to have bet on the Texans to win these tournaments. So I think that, especially like late, you can you can build some interesting stuff. I do take cam Ward was a prospect I really struggled to.

00:45:58
Speaker 1: Get on board with for a while.

00:45:59
Speaker 4: Aultimately end up feeling like, yeah, he has the ceiling to kind of be worth taking on some of the bust risks that I do think he has. But I like him in Bestball because if he if he hits, he's gonna elevate a bunch of fairly cheap players, you know, like the Titans are not priced like they're gonna be good. You can tackle on some of the rookie dart throws. You know, you get it underpriced Pollard, you know, Pollard might be not underpriced, might be overpriced if Ward stinks. But if Ward's really good, then then Pollard spears ridley like all these guys, like even a conquo, like you can kind of win with multiple pieces of your lineup by just making one like pretty plausible bet the number one overall pick is is good.

00:46:46
Speaker 1: You know.

00:46:48
Speaker 4: So yeah, being able to like be right about one thing and then having that affect both your regular season and your playoffs in a really crucial way. Is you know that That's part of the why stacking is enticing.

00:47:02
Speaker 2: The one question I do want to ask too, because I got in I think this this kind of hurt me last year when I was when I was playing a lot more was that I fell in love with offenses that I probably shouldn't have fallen in love with, and I was too, Like, for instance, I really liked Tennessee's offense and putting in placing bets on Tennessee's offense, when in hindsight, I was clearly too bullish on like the the the or I wasn't I wasn't factoring in enough the obvious will Levis being a potato and just you know, not being able to take the next step, which was the probable outcome if we're being honest, right, yeah, apparently apparently, but like like it was, you know, I really liked getting both Spears and Pollard, and obviously Pollard worked out, but like Tennessee was an offense that I invested in, thinking, oh, if this is the offense that blows up this year and it takes the next step, because you know Brian Callahan as coming as head coach and what he did in Cincinnati, and it really just came down to, if will Levis hits, then this is going to be great for you know, where I'm drafting these players right now, and now I know that I can make the exact same argument for like Tampa Bay last year, Right, I wasn't high enough on Tampa Bay. But like if you were high on Tampa Bay and you drafted Tampa Bay players, then you obviously you know, came out on top. But my question to you is, more so are you singling out those teams? Because the more I've thought about this, and this is me kind of work shopping this on the fly, but the more that I've thought about this, there's only going to be maybe one or two of those teams that really pop in a given year, that come out of nowhere that you know, seem that like most of the teams that do well offensively, and I'm talking like league winning well were projected to do well in the first place, right, And so my question is are you seeking those teams out and then just drafting them or are you just kind of letting the draft flow and then you'll see which teams you end up kind of being higher on naturally and more organically.

00:49:01
Speaker 4: I think it's probably a better process to let the draft flow and then you have your guys, like if you're taking players that you like, you know, like I have rankings, and I use those rankings to figure out which players to take, and so I'm going to end up being a little bit more overweight on the teams I'm more excited about. But there's something to be said for just like building coherent teams like, you're not going to win these tournaments with a portfolio. The best portfolio does not win. A single team wins, So a team that is built around what you already did is more likely to win than like jamming in your favorite guys every time when it doesn't really make sense on that particular team.

00:49:46
Speaker 1: I was.

00:49:46
Speaker 4: My version of the Titans last year was the Patriots, where they were just too bad to take advantage of the fact that Drake Mate is actually really good, which was my whole bet. I was like, this guy's going to be really good.

00:49:58
Speaker 2: You got that right, you got that piece right.

00:50:00
Speaker 1: I know it still didn't matter.

00:50:02
Speaker 4: It was so bad it didn't matter, but like he you know, the way I had it ranked. Jayden Daniels was also a target. I did a truth serum take for Pete Overzet's channel where I was basically like, I'm screwing.

00:50:15
Speaker 1: This up by not taking enough Jadon Daniels. It's it's it's a big mistake.

00:50:18
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:50:19
Speaker 4: I took a little bit more at the end, but that truth serum take was recorded a pretty late in the summer.

00:50:23
Speaker 1: It was the damage had been done mostly.

00:50:25
Speaker 4: Yeah, bo Nix was a guy that I thought was a really good pick. I didn't have nearly as much as I should have because I was just drafting Drake May instead, so getting I think the willingness to just like let stuff fault you, pushing down that feeling of like I gotta get my I gotta get my guy. I'm not gonna have my guy on this seems so good and it's not gonna have the league winner who I.

00:50:49
Speaker 1: Know for a fact who it is.

00:50:50
Speaker 2: The feeling that right there is the feeling that I feel all the time. And I'm glad that you brought that up because people are going to feel that feeling. And what you're saying is I.

00:50:59
Speaker 1: Think it's a bad feeling.

00:51:01
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that's leading you down the wrong path where what you should be trying to do is figure out what this team needs, Like what is the win condition for this team, like what have you already said is going to happen, and then try to reinforce this team's chances rather than kind of glombing on the same thing you tend to do in every draft. And I mean that's also a good way to mix up your portfolio. So we have this article last year that Sacrilegis wrote about Chicards similarity and how the idea there is like it's not enough to just mix up the players you're drafting. You actually want teams that are distinctly different from one another, so that you have literal multiple paths to having a good season through these teams that are built differently and don't just like overlap like ten eleven players of overlap and then they're different around the edges. Like that's you're making an extremely correlated bet when you do that, instead of creating an actual portfolio of teams that can win in multiple different types of seasons.

00:52:10
Speaker 1: And I know, like.

00:52:11
Speaker 4: I struggle with this myself, but like if you just tackle on you know, Jalen Polk and Drake May and Antonio Gibson.

00:52:20
Speaker 3: You know I was, I was.

00:52:22
Speaker 2: I was there with Gibson, I was there.

00:52:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, Hunter Henry kind of worked.

00:52:26
Speaker 4: But you know, if you do that like on every team, I was like, maare's the part where I draft four Patriots. It's it makes your teams too similar and it boxes you out from other bets. And you know, hey man, you had a Bronco on that team would have been a pretty good team to do that same idea, but actually use the bow Nicks hit, which you didn't have enough on.

00:52:45
Speaker 1: I think that, I mean.

00:52:47
Speaker 2: I think that, I think that A lot of that, though, is also a bias inherently, where you're like, hey, we're in the late rounds. It doesn't matter if I get this wrong, you know, like like it's this idea that you're you're you're in round fifteen to seventeen, and you're like, oh, I'm just gonna go to my my trusty old Patriots because if I get this wrong, you know, sure it's gonna be wrong on a lot of my teams, but surely this isn't gonna sink my team. But but at the end of the day, like you need every spot, no, like that, that's that's an important part of of what best ball is is like the survivorship of your team and making sure that like all of those pieces are still usable into the playoff weeks, right, So like like like is that part of it too, where like you still need to differentiate in the late rounds, whereas in your season long leagues, Right in your season long leagues, you're probably gonna take the same exact favorite sleeper that you love because if he doesn't pan out, Okay, You'll just replace them with someone.

00:53:48
Speaker 4: Else on and like you can swing, you know, you're swinging for the fence to you know, in season loss, like just give me Drake Man, I think is a much higher ceiling, you know, if I get if I'm forgoing, like a good solid hit in bow nicks, like who cares well in basketball, like you care, you really care. Having that guy who's a hit for you in the late rounds, even for a single week at the end of the end of the season, becomes massive, Like these final round picks super due matter. They become one of the easiest ways to get through the single elimination weeks. If you're getting a spike week out of a free player out of a one dollar auction player, right, like, you have no business getting a spike week out of this guy. If you're able to do that, if you're able to get multiple pieces hitting your team because you found a cheap team to stack up, then all of a sudden, you're like, you've really improved your chances of doing something very very difficult, which is getting to the final You have to win two single elimination weeks. It's a really high bar to do that, and so if these late round picks are zero's.

00:55:00
Speaker 1: For you, you're.

00:55:01
Speaker 4: Really playing with one arm tie behind your back. Even though individually they're all kind of like dart throws. The teams that win these tournaments are very likely to have gotten production out of these picks at some point in the playoff weeks and potentially in the final.

00:55:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, something that needs to be said too, because this is something that because you were the first guest, I'm becoming bestball bro last year as well with the series. And one of the things that you said sort of is in line with what you're saying here where it's draft of your team, you know, don't worry about like there's gonna be a value of falling value that you might have to forego because it doesn't fit what your team needs. And one of the very clear examples to me on draftings right now is with Joe Burrow and Jalen Hurts, where there are many times where you start out a draft with you could go with Jamar, Chase t Higgins, Trey McBride to get the week seventeen correlation going, game stat going, and then right now Joe Burrow has higher ADP on DC hey, then Jalen Hurts does, which, yeah, like to me, my projections don't have that, and my my rankings don't have that. But I gotta ask you because people are gonna run into this, and I think it's just a good like hypothetical slash. I mean, it's a real life example, like in that scenario where you have t Higgins and Jamar Chase and Trey McBride, you're drafting Joe Burrow over Jalen Hurts. No, probably not, actually, okay, because I'm curious. That's why I wanted to ask.

00:56:26
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean in this case, like Jalen Hurts can just like soak up the Eagles offensive points himself. He can score all the rushing touchdowns. He's gonna throw for all the touchdowns, so he can have like an individual megaspike week that doesn't even bring other pieces along, and he's going in the fifth round.

00:56:50
Speaker 2: I have so much Jalen Hurts, by the way, because of that ADP.

00:56:53
Speaker 1: He's just an awesome pick.

00:56:55
Speaker 2: It's very hard for me to not draft not only that, but AJ Brown's fall sometimes it's very easy to get that stack, and so it's just yes, yeah, yeah, anyway.

00:57:03
Speaker 4: Yeah, So I mean, I don't know I think to me, I'm the Burrow example, would would go to kind of stacking without the quarterback, like, oh no, I have I have t Higgins and Trey McBride, you know, and you know I get I don't know, you tack on Michael Wilson or something that you get one of the running backs.

00:57:22
Speaker 3: Sure.

00:57:23
Speaker 4: Great, I'm betting on this high scoring game to be high scoring like that, we were all we're all hoping that game is high scoring, expected to be a good game, you know, even though it's months and months away. Great, I if that game is high scoring, I really benefit. At the same time, I have Jalen Hurts as my quarterback, who I paid a fifth round price tag for when other guys are drafting their quarterback in the second round.

00:57:47
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:57:48
Speaker 4: So, I still I think you're you need to score just an insane amount of points, and that means that in some ways you can kind you need to bet on multiple things at once to happen.

00:58:00
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:58:00
Speaker 4: Forcing me to take like Burrow in this draft this morning went in the third round. Yeah no, thanks, that's just like too expensive for a guy who's really a pocket passer. He's a huge spike week upside guy. But he's not one of these dual threat elites, right, let me wait two rounds and get a dual threat elite instead.

00:58:19
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, I it's just a really it's been an interesting dilemma for me and a question that's been top of mind for me. I didn't know which direction to go clearly, but when I was asking the question, but I my direction that I've gone, just in general in that range of quarterback has just been Jalen Hursts because I don't has it been the tush push thing as to why his ADP is where it's at. It's just very confusing to me.

00:58:40
Speaker 1: I don't know.

00:58:41
Speaker 4: I honestly don't know, because on DraftKings, you had the opening ADPs, like in the pre draft contest had Josh Allen in like the early second yeah, and then Jalen Hurts was kind of always at the like four or five turn, so there was the gap is actually shrunk.

00:59:02
Speaker 1: I really don't know.

00:59:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just been it's been strange, and I have I've literally not talked to any other analyst or drafter about the Hurts thing in particular. So it's good to hear that take all, Right, Before I'll let you go any specific targets out there that people should be looking at in DraftKings that that you've been drafting a lot.

00:59:17
Speaker 4: I do like I like Luther Burden a lot. He's for for whatever reason, he's been way cheaper on DraftKings the entire way you can like pre draft he was, he was like in the hundreds and now he's he's kind of down further in like the one twenty ish range, going behind other rookie receivers that I like him better than, like Jayden Higgins.

00:59:41
Speaker 1: Trey Harris. Where did Burden?

00:59:43
Speaker 4: I know he's number one in the pre draft model for you, where did he end up finishing?

00:59:47
Speaker 2: He's right, so he's four behind Travis Hunter, tet Egbuka and then him, but he's still in the elite producer category, so he's still he's one of only five wide receivers in the model's database that went day two that's still an elite producer. And the other guys, the other guys were all like like I say the names and people are like, oh, that's not a great but it's like Tyler Boyd and Juju Smith Schuster and like guys who had good early career production and that were really usable and good. So I'm very much in on Burden as the talent, still very much in even though he got second round capital.

01:00:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, he just he just seems way too cheap.

01:00:25
Speaker 4: And then you know, one thing I'll just mention about DraftKings for people that are maybe a little newer to it, is that the ADP does shift quite a bit faster in a way that I think is is often sharp where news gets baked in quicker. Yeah, but at the same time, we don't have that much news right now, and so like he's dealing with a soft tissue injury is enough for people to kind of panic a little bit. So I think this is actually, in my opinion, a good time to buy Burden, or he's falling on now it's risky.

01:00:56
Speaker 1: Maybe there's soft tissue entry line.

01:00:59
Speaker 4: Yeah, but I think on DraftKings you can count on that type of stuff to have been baked into the ADP a little bit more as opposed to just kind of like waiting forever and ever and ever and hoping you get a discount. I think you'll see the discount materialize a little bit more quickly. You will also see guys rise on news much much faster, so that's something to be aware of. But a couple other guys that I really liked this year. Three guys I really like the top three tight ends this year.

01:01:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, me too. Elite tight end.

01:01:28
Speaker 4: Is kind of taken a bit of a hit the last couple of year, although drafting elite tight end two years ago when ended up being pretty good, but not for this for the regular season.

01:01:39
Speaker 1: As a playoff thing, it was kittle thing. Last year.

01:01:42
Speaker 4: We had, you know, a crop that I was into. We had these these veterans that I thought were going to hang on. We had the you know, some of the younger guys coming up, but it didn't. It didn't end up being a good group. The veterans fell off, the younger guys didn't really emerge as much as you're hoping. Except for Trey McBride, we did did emerge and is now going, you know, in the third round when he's a PPR machine. All we really need is touchdown regression and he's going to smash a third round ADP right. And then you have Brock Bowers, who's one of the best tight end prospects ever, has the best tight ends rookie season ever, gets massive upgrades at coaching quarterback, you want to look at like play volume, just efficiency. The offense doesn't have that much target comp to already kind of dealt with Jacoby Myers already was the number one receiver over.

01:02:33
Speaker 1: Myers last year.

01:02:35
Speaker 4: Besh is kind of interesting, but I don't think someone that really should like strike fear in our hearts, as you know, if you're for Bowers. Yeah, and you know this dude, he was third in receptions last year in the NFL. Only only Jamar Chasin Noma Sat Brown had more receptions than this guy. So on a full PPR site, on a site to where I think, like, really, like what because of the bonuses and stuff on DraftKings, having the guys that you need, you know, it's like a best ball expression that's kind of kind of a trope, but like is he the guy you need? But you need the guys you need here? Like he really If Bowers has a crazy spike week at tight end, you're gonna get the bonuses, you're gonnet the full point PPR, you're gonna really want Bowers. And yeah, he he has. I really feel strong that he has that kind of single week ceiling in addition to just maybe being one of the dudes who the season is kind of about.

01:03:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've been shocked at George Kittle's ADP.

01:03:35
Speaker 1: Yeah to another awesome pick him and.

01:03:38
Speaker 2: Like him and Hurts both like I'm like way ahead of the market and I'm getting them in like the fourth and fifth constantly, like when I'm on the end there, Like it's just such an easy kind of turn type pick and even if even if I'm reaching a little bit by ADP like my projections right now, and I don't draft based on projections, I just use it as like a guideline for me to kind of like see where things are at projections have McBride and George Kittle like that like really close like point one point per game like difference between the two. And so I see it similarly where like there's a big three tight end and I'm getting all of them where I can you know when when I'm depending on the spot that I'm in, but of the three, I seem to be falling to George, Like George Kittle is on like an obscene number of my teams so far because there's just a discount there and that you know, I just he's just an easy click the forty nine ers in general are are easier than I expected to stack.

01:04:33
Speaker 4: I agree, I have a lot of forty nine er stacks. I like Jawan Jennings, which is not I can't tell if I'm like like Jawan Jennings. Is either one of these fun kind of late career breakouts that's like a Miles Austin or a Victor Cruz or something like that, or it's like the you know, like the Marcus Callaway thing, or we were.

01:05:00
Speaker 1: Russell Russell Gage was the name I was looking for. He's the he's he's a guy. Now you can definitely draft Russell Gage in the eighth round. It won't burn you.

01:05:10
Speaker 4: And it's like, oh, yeah, this veteran who was like never good and had like a few good games that one year turned out out to be a good receiver after all. Like this was very obvious, you know.

01:05:23
Speaker 2: J Jennings feels like the Parabola meme where it's, uh, you know, the guy there's just like, draft Juwan Jennings. He scored a lot of points last year. And then the middle of it is like all these calculations being like we haven't seen a player like Juwan Jennings before and then like the expert at the end is like draft Juwan Jennings, because yeah, I feel the same way about Jenny.

01:05:40
Speaker 1: I'm on one of the two ends, but I just don't know which.

01:05:43
Speaker 2: You don't know if you're if you're just giving the basic take or what. Yeah. Yeah, but yeah that's a it's it's good insight for sure. Yeah. I really appreciate the time. Man, this was awesome. I think people are definitely gonna get a lot out of it. Let everyone know where they can find you, what you're working on. All that great stuff over at legendary episode.

01:06:00
Speaker 4: Yeah, all my stuff is over at Legendary Upsides. I mentioned I'm gonna have a draft plan article out this week. We've had some really good content on the site by Matt Rby going through some of the regression analysis I was mentioned with with Trey McBride, got underdog rankings, DraftKings rankings when we launch an FFPC rankings, and we also have a dynamic rankings tool called the Sidekick is an overlay that you draft alongside with and helps keep track of some of the stuff we've been talking about, like what you've been betting on in terms of the correlations and the teams and all of that, and have some news on upgrades of that coming out in the next week or so as well, which we'll announce on the Legendary Upside newsletter and on the Legendary Upside YouTube channel.

01:06:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely check it out. Guys. Pat puts out awesome, awesome content all the time, and take a look at his YouTube and the live streams that he's doing. All my stuff can be found on lateround dot com. Make sure you are subscribed to the newsletter and subscribe to this podcast, and you're pre ordering the Draft Guide, and you're checking out the Prospect Guide, all that good stuff over on lateround dot com. Otherwise, everyone, thanks for tuning in.