505: Mailbag 5/7/21

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Speaker 1: This is the Lab podcast with your host JJ Zachersa jj zacherreson What's up everyone. It's jj Zachareson, the editor in chief at fandle and at number fire dot com. And this is episode five hundred and five of the Late Round podcast. So many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast network. Thanks for tuning in. Hey, basketball fans, Fandel has partnered with the NBA to provide fans with an exclusive opportunity to win a trip to this year's NBA Playoffs. All you have to do is enter the free qualifying contest on Fandel from May three to sixteenth for a chance to win. Fandel will add together your three highest scoring lineups to get your combined score. The top fifty players at the end of the contest will win bonus prizes on top of qualifying contest payoffs, including a trip for two to the NBA Playoffs, autograph gear from fanatics, and NBA dot com gift cards. So head over to fandle dot com slash NBA Hyphen Road Hyphen two Hyphen Playoffs for more information. Eligibility restrictions apply. Today's Mailbag show, and we've got a lot of questions to go through this week that center around the draft. Let's get to it. The first question this week is from at Dynasty Daydream. HIJJ heard your pre draft mail bag, pot, how are you evaluating the Baltimore situation now? Fade all the wide receivers and buy Lamar? Thanks? Okay, So I don't think my stance was to ever just simply fade wide receivers that go to Baltimore, because whether or not you fade a player doesn't have to do with the player itself all the time. It has to do with the market and rashat Bateman's rookie draft average draft position that's going to take a hit based on this landing spot. My main point with the Ravens landing spot rant from last week is that it doesn't make sense to do absolutely nothing. I've seen people say that Bateman is still their wide receiver too, but that doesn't make much sense to me. They'll claim that landing spot doesn't matter, But like I said on last week's show, if you were to ask them if they'd rather have their favorite wide receiver go to Kansas City versus Baltimore, they would absolutely answer Kansas City. And that's how we know that landing spot does matter in some way. It's just that it doesn't mean everything. I think. When I talk about this, or any other analyst talks about this, our brains go into this mode where it's either you target a guy or you avoid a guy. All I'm really trying to say with the Ravens landing spot take is that it does matter. I think it has to matter when it's at such an extreme, and in this case, we're dealing with an offense that hasn't utilized their wide receivers that much over the last couple of years. That doesn't mean that I'm not projecting the Ravens to be a little bit more pass heavy, or that I'm not expecting some sort of change in efficiency or change in target share to the position now because they invested more into it. Both things can be true. The Ravens can throw a little bit more while still being a bad landing spot. In the end, though, it's about where the market has these players, and I still think Bateman is part of a similar tier that he was part of pre draft. I'll get more into that on next week's show. This next question says, after no major additions in the draft, how do you feel about the Colts receiving group specifically, could both Pittman and Campbell become steady wide receiver twos. I'd be surprised if they become steady wide receiver twos. I think the Colts will be a pretty run heavy team to take pressure off of Carson Wentz's arm, and that'll limit overall volume for teammates to both become steady wide receiver twos. That can't happen. Maybe one of them will, but that means the other one won't be very fantasy relevant. More than likely, I'd bet on Pittman since he profiles more as a true X, but I still don't think it's very likely, and for what it's worth, both look pretty crappy in my projections. There's a lot going on in the Colts offense, starting with the running backs. But even if we assume Pittman takes a jump and leads this wide receiver group, which is what my projection show, he still comes in as a low end wide receiver five in PPR points per game. So they're not players who I see how having super steady production. It's just a really really crowded wide receiver position. This last question says love to hear about how you weigh draft capital versus pre draft prospect profile, looking at guys on both extremes, like with Tony Eskridge, Atwell Palmer versus Marshall Wallace, and Seth Williams. I also got one this week from at Electronics underscore FF that says, how does Tutu look in your model with his draft capital figured in? There's a lot to unpack here, and this is kind of tough to articulate, but I'm gonna try. Let's start with how I look at players pre and post draft. Generally speaking, the players that I like a lot pre draft will go higher in drafts than the players that I don't like, Rashat Bateman, the Bama wideouts, rond Dell Moore, Elijah Moore. It's not like they had bad draft capital. And you mentioned Terris Marshall in this question as someone on the bad extreme, but I don't think that's really the case, considering he got second round draft capital, and I do believe bad medicals were the reason that he fell where he fell. But there's something wrong with round two draft capital. We see round two guys hit all the time. But Tyland Wallace, who I was high on versus Josh Palmer, who I was not. That's where this question really matters, and it's where I lean on my prospect model a little bit more. Tyland Wallace came through with a seventy second percentile score in my model. That doesn't give him a very high chance of hitting. It's not terrible, but it's not great. Anything under eighty is where things get iffy. Josh Palmer's profile was really not that good, and despite having better draft capital, he ranks in the seventy first percentile. So technically my model gives Tyland Wallace the edge. However, this is where landing spots subjectivity can come into play. Both of these players are super close as prospects now that draft capital is inputed, so it's mostly a wash, and I'm more willing to associate my wide receiver and the Chargers offense with their stud young quarterback than the Ravens with theirs for reasons I've already gone over. Holmer then gets the edge over Tyland Wallace. That's how things usually go down, Like I'm basing my rankings off of things that matter from college to the pros. A player's early declare status, his production, within key production metrics, where he played college, his size to some degree. All of those things are working together pre draft to formulate some sort of ranking post draft. A lot of those things haven't changed. The only thing that's changed is draft capital, and that draft capital piece may move one player ahead of another in my prospect model, but that change isn't likely to be significant. Kadarius Tony is a head of Terras Marshall in my prospect model, but there's an obvious reason Marshall's production metrics don't look as strong as they could, which is that he opted out after seven games last year. And the edge that Tony has on Marshall in my model is two percentage points, and that's with drastically different draft capital. So I'm not gonna let that small difference drastically change my views. Now, you asked about at Well and Eskridge. Admittedly, those are two guys my model didn't mind pre draft, and obviously since they got draft capital, the model likes them post draft. They're actually close to that terrast Marshall range. I'm fine with stepping in and saying, okay, I have to pay more attention to these players based on their draft capital, but I'm doing that while simultaneously inserting my own subjective thoughts two too at Well, size could end up being a very very real concern because he weighs about as much as I did when I was a middle schooler. Eskridge is already twenty four years old. So with draft capital inputted, those guys look pretty good in my model. They're not like must haves, but they look decent. So they're going to move up in my rankings. You'll hear about that next week. They just need to be significantly better for me to change my pre draft thoughts. Like Tylan Wallace dropped a lot because he didn't have the draft capital, so he's gonna drop a lot in my rankings. So I hope that all makes sense. Like I said, it's a tough thing to articulate. This is a really good example though of how I let my model not be the end all for me. It's just a guide for me. This us questions from at Campbell Running where do you fall on early breakout age for wide receivers? Essentially, should escriage be marked down versus someone who is successful at a younger breakout age? Breakout age matters. It's part of my model. My plan next offseason actually is to go through and refine the way that I work with breakout age, and I want to tie it more to yards per team attempt. But a player being productive at a young age absolutely matters objectively. There's a lot of evidence for it, and it makes sense. If a player produces at a young age, it probably means that he's good. He's dominating competition that has more experience than he has. That's why it matters. This US questions from at fred Zinki. MLB would enjoy hearing you break down the New York Jets running back situation. Yeah. So I was nervous about Michael Carter as a prospect since he was undersized and wasn't very fast at Pro Day, and I think Draft Capital reflected that. I don't think my take was wrong, but Carter always had pass catching upside. My comp for him pre draft was Giovanni Bernard. Now he falls to a spot where the one thing I was worried about not happening, which is him seeing early down work that can actually happen. Carter is likely the most talented running back on that team. Immediately you have Michael p Ryan, who actually had worse draft capital than Carter had this year. You've got Ty Johnson, who's probably the dark horse there, but still not someone that you can bank on, given he's had opportunity the last couple of seasons, he never came through as a true workhorse. And then there's Tevin Coleman. He's twenty eight years old. He's passed his prime. From a production standpoint, Michael Carter's profile is really good, especially when you give it the context that it needs, and that he split his backfield with Javonte Williams. He just didn't test as well as I would like athletically for a smaller back, but given that competition in New York, he now has one hundred and fifty to two hundred carry upside in that offense right away, and considering his pass catching ability has never been in question, I think Carter could end up being a pretty decent redraft pick. This year. I went from being worried about him to being far more willing to throw that dart because of landing spot combined with the cost of acquisition, And to be honest with you, guys, I already drafted Michael Carter in a rookie draft this tessquars Is from at fut Bumbles. Javonte got the draft capital that we needed, but a proven and paid Melvin Gordon may be harder to displace than say, an undrafted free agent like James Robinson. Basically, I'm just asking you to please tell me Javante wasn't drafted to be Lindsay two point zero. My sweet Prince deserves more than inside handoffs between the twenties. He was not drafted to be Philip Lindsay two point zero. Melvin Gordon is a lock to be gone next season because he's a free agent, and maybe the Broncos get rid of him even before that. But Denver doesn't trade up in the draft to keep Melvin Gordon around in the long run, and even if they did, they'd still feed Javonte Williams eventually. I'm probably still going to target Javonte Williams and reed draft as long as he's reasonably priced, because this could be an ambiguous backfield situation. You guys know, I like to target those backfields where a player has a chance to emerge but isn't priced that way. Regardless, though, I wouldn't sweat Melvin Gordon at least as it pertains to Jervonte Williams dynasty value. This next one's an email from Tony that says, jj, I've seen lots of articles on how Miles Gaskin was a winner post draft, as Miami didn't spend any draft capital on running backs. Thinking back to your League winning running Back episode from last year, I can't help but think that a different Miami running back could end up as a quote league winner. There is some relative uncertainty at the position with Malcolm Brown, Gaskin, and Ahmed, and Gaskin is the presumptive starter and appears to be going around round five. Do Malcolm Brown and Savon Achmed have the receiving chops to fit the criteria for league winner? I think throwing darts of this backfield outside of Gaskin is fine, but my fear is more so that Brown and Ahmed are gonna ding Gaskin's workload more than those guys being standalone league winning values. We saw Achmed do fine when Gaskin was out last year, but when Gaskin came back, he was the dude in the backfield once again. Achman's a little bit undersized as well. Malcolm Brown is the guy that I've been bringing up more on this show because I think there's a very real possibility that he sees short yardage work at the very least in this offense. And there was a report this week from the Miami Herald saying that the Dolphins are pretty bullish on Malcolm Brown. So he'd beat the player that I'd probably target first. But the highest probability chance here is that he just hurts Gaskin more than takes over the backfield. This last question is from at Machiavelli two three one three. Hey, JJ, I memorized your intro and say it along with you every episode, except I usually struggle to time the Thanks for tuning in because you're sporadic with it. I heard you say on Monday's episode that you thought Nause was a mid to high RB two in what running backs do you have above him? So when the draft was going on, I was live streaming on Fandal's YouTube channel and I plugged in Naji Harris into my projections when he was drafted by the Steelers, and he came out as the RB eighteen, which I think is pretty fair. I think, in no particular order, these are the players who should be absolutely positively ranked ahead of Naji Harris right now, Christian McCaffrey, Dalvin Cook, Dereck Henry, Saquon Barkley, Ezekiel Elliott, Alvin Kamara, Aaron Jones. Those really can't be debated in my opinion, maybe Aaron Jones because we don't know the Aaron Rodgers situation. But that's seven running backs. But then I think Joe Mixon should also be ahead of him, Nick Chubb, Jonathan Taylor, probably Miles Sanders, probably Cam Akers, Austin Eckler. That gets you thirteen running backs. I can then see the case for Najie Harris, but my projections actually still have Antonio Gibson, DeAndre Swift, Clyde Edwards, Alaerin actually Chris Carson ahead of him. That's why I said he's likely a high end RB two to a mid range one. Because running backs right now look pretty decent. It'll look like an S show and players inevitably get hurt, but we're working in a perfect environment right now where players aren't hurt. The last question this week is from at T Cripe ninety four. Should draft capital inputs start slowly changing in your model with the NFL getting smarter with using their capital, specifically for the running back position. Obviously, not all organizations are as analytical, but some are, so how will that affect your model for the running back position? For example, a forward thinking team will probably never take a running back day one, but only because the value of the position Day two could mean just as much for a smarter organization as day one for a worse run organization. I'm hoping I'm making sense. Yeah, it makes sense, but I don't think there's any evidence of this happening. This year. We only saw two Day two running backs get drafted. That's the fewest that we've seen since at least twenty eleven. That's how far back I went when looking into this. But we also knew going into this draft that the running back class was weak. Maybe this is the start of some trend, but I doubt it because one year ago, back in twenty twenty, we saw ten different running backs going Day two. That was two more than any other draft since twenty eleven. If it was some sort of trend, then things would be trending downward, but it's not. Seven of the last eleven drafts have featured either one or zero running backs in the first round we had two this year. We can say that analytically savvy teams aren't spending first round picks on running backs, but that could have been the case for years. We have no idea, like the Giants took Saquon Barkley's second overall just a few years ago, Dallas took Ezekiel Elliott fourth overall. Jacksonville took Leonard Fournette fourth overall as well. We haven't seen teams do that spend a top five pick on a running back since Saquon Barkley. But number one, each of those teams could be the teams that you're referring to in this question is not being analytical. And number two, there really haven't been running backs with that kind of hype who have come out since then. So no, I don't think we have to just anything at all. Teams obviously aren't drafting like it's nineteen eighty three, but things really have not changed that much in recent history at the position. That's gonna do it for today's show, though, Thanks to all of you for listening. If you've got subscribed to the Late Round podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found in norficot to follow me on Twitter at late Round QB. Thanks for listening everyone, Enjoy your weekend and I will talk to you next week