491: Mailbag 3/19/21

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Speaker 1: This is the Late Podcast with your host JJ zacher Retha, j J zacher Resa, what's up everyone. It's JJ Zacharesen, the editor in chief at fandel and at Number five dot com in this episode four hundred and ninety one of the Late Round Podcast. On many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast Network. Thanks for tuning in. So I know free agency is happening. There are lots of moves to talk about. My plan is to go through all of that on next week's show. This one, this week's mail bag, I'll touch on some situations and I'll talk about some players who change teams, but I'll get into more detail early next week. Just wanted you guys to know now before get into the questions this week. As you know, here at the Late Round Podcast, we live and breathe football, but I think we can all agree that March belongs to basketball. And what better way to get caught up in the tournament action than with a huge new TV from best Buy. Right now, you can find great deals on big screen TVs from brands like Samsung and LG. Best Buy will even bring it to you with fast, free curbside pickup and delivery visit BestBuy dot com today. The first question this week is from at weston Joiner eight. How do you feel about John hu and Hunter Henry now that they're on the same team. So again, I'll talk about this more next week, or at least reiterate what I'm saying here, but the bottom line is that I hate it, at least for fantasy purposes, I hate it. We very rarely see two tight ends from the same team. Give us top twelve tight end one fantasy performances, Mike Clay from ESPN. He tweeted about this earlier in the week. We've only seen a team produce two tight end one seasons twice over the last twelve years. One of them came from Philadelphia in twenty nineteen, the other from New England in twenty eleven. Unsurprisingly, when you look at those seasons, you see two teams that really targeted their tight ends. In twenty nineteen, the Eagles had a tight end target share that was the third highest that we've seen since twenty eleven, and twenty eleven, the Patriots had a tight end target shair that ranked second. They targeted their tight ends a lot. Now, you might be thinking, but JJ New England doesn't have many good wide receivers, so couldn't John news Smith and Hunter Henry command a really high target share two? And the answer to that is yes, they can hypothetically, and I bet that they will. But target share is not everything. The other piece to volume is the offense that these players are in. The twenty nineteen Eagles ranked eighth in the league in pass attempts with six hundred and thirteen. Say, not only were targeting their tight ends a lot, but they were also throwing the ball a lot. The twenty eleven Patriots ranked third in pass attempts. They threw the ball six hundred and twelve times. If you're projecting the Patriots right now, you're not projecting them to come close to those numbers. And twenty twenty New England threw the ball four hundred and forty times. That was the second fewest in the league. So it would take a whole lot for both of these guys is to be super relevant in fantasy. I could see maybe one of them emerging, but not both. And if I had to bet on one, I'd probably bet on John u because of his versatility. But I don't think that I'm going to be aggressively targeting either of these players in this run heavy offense unless things drastically change the quarterback position. And even if something does drastically change the quarterback position, like they get a rookie quarterback, rookies still bring a layer of ambiguity. So overall in twenty twenty one, it's hard to like this tight end situation for fantasy football purposes. This last question is from at two two j Bright. Last week, you made clear that draft capital is king in your model. What's the best way to avoid bad wide receivers who do get high draft capital. I understand it might be a tough one to answer, since every player is different, but is there anything in general to look to find the wide receivers to avoid? Well, First off, I wouldn't necessarily say that draft capital is king in my model, especially a wide receiver. If you have a prospect model, it should be better than draft capital because draft capital is information that you don't need to do anything with. If you just drafted straight off of draft capital, you'd probably be fine enough, but you wouldn't be really gaining an edge over your competition. I want to gain that edge in my model, which incorporates draft capital. With the other factors in the model, it's better than draft capital. That's why I'd argue that draft capital isn't really king. It's the other factors in the model that are making it more predictive than draft capital alone. So my answer to this then is to look at those other factors. That's why I'm always talking about production and the things that go into my model before the draft hits. How you can spot bus is by looking at things like breakout age, whether or not they were early declares, and how strong their production was in college. If they check absolutely none of those boxes, then you should feel less confident in that player versus where they were drafted. But the key is never thinking in terms of he's a bust or he's not a bust. In my opinion, at least, this whole process, this whole freaking game, is about probability. You're playing the probability game. You can say confidently that Jamar Chase is one of the best prospects that we've seen at wide receiver in a really long time, but don't assume that he's bust proof. And then on the flip side, just because Kadarius Tony doesn't have a great analytical profile doesn't mean that he's bound to not pan out. It's just that by looking at that context, by looking at the non draft capital factors in my model, you can start to determine which players are likely to be over and undervalued since your rookie draft is going to be influenced by draft capital in some way. So, to answer your question more directly, draft capital is not king. I'd argue all the other things that I talk about on this show that go into my model, that's what's king, because those are the things that are actually differentiating players versus their straight up draft capital. This last question is from at C Underscore Matt Underscore Campbell, what do you make of the Hide signing in Jacksonville Robinson outlook for twenty twenty one. So Carlos Hide signed with the Jags, and this is one of those signings where your initial reaction may be a negative one, at least if you're looking at it from James Robinson's perspective. But realistically this is a good thing for James Robinson. It's a plus. You don't want James Robinson's competition to be someone that they take early in the draft. You want James Robinson's competition to be a guy who's been on like five teams over the last two and a half years because he can beat out Carlos Hide easily. Hide to me, is a good move for Jacksonville to get the veteran depth that they desperately need a running back, but it shouldn't really impact James Robinson. What I'd be more concerned about is a rookie, and on top of that, the wild card that we're dealing with when it comes to this new coaching staff and how they may view James Robinson. But I've made my stance on Robinson fairly clear on this show in the past. I'm concerned about the new staff and we have to recognize the regression that's going to hit with James Robinson's volume. Before he got hurt last year, he was pacing to have by far the highest running back rush are that we've seen from a running back dating back to at least twenty eleven. That was not going to be repeated. So my hesitation with him has nothing to do with his being an undrafted free agent. I think we should care about that to some degree, but he's already proven to be an outlier I'm more worried about the things that are out of his control. He's a good player, but he's not as locked into the same type of workload as he saw during his rookie season. Necessarily, my outlook for twenty twenty one is that I may end up being lower than the market on James Robinson, but I got to see where everything lands before I say that definitively. This last questions from at Jared with a whole bunch of d's at the end of his handle, how would you value AJ Dillon moving forward? So you guys might remember a handful of mailbags ago where I talked about AJ Dillon being a bye I still stand by that process. My take was that I did think that Aaron Jones was going to stick around. I thought that he was going to be a green Bay packer. I got receipts, but like anything else in this game, nothing is a guarantee. The fact that there was a decent chance that Jones wouldn't stick around in Green Bay that led me to believe that AJ Dillon was pretty underpriced, at least according to his January ADP. And here's the funny thing about this whole situation. Dylan's likely still going to get some work and maybe be a flex play every once in a while in this offense. But he's got the handcuff upside too. When you look at running backs in his ADP range, at least from a Dynasty standpoint, that's the kind of running back that you're getting anyway. Maybe not where his ADP would have been like a week and a half ago, but at least when we talked about AJ Dillon last on this podcast, you were getting the high upside handcuffs the guys who were flex plays every once in a while, but they really needed that injury to be a true RB one. So I actually think that this could be a low key great time to buy AJ Dillon because people are going to be completely turned off by him after Aaron Jones signed that contract. I'm not pretending like AJ Dillon to some stud RB one, it needs an injury for that to really hit. But if you're in leagues where you've got a deeper starting lineup, I think that Dylan can make sense at times as a flex because the Packers have split that backfield to some degree over the last couple of seasons. I just don't think that people always realize how big of a drop off there is in dynasty in that low end RB two range. I think Dylan's probably more of a high end RB three with upside, But when you get to that point in the draft, there are tons and tons of question marks around other running backs you would be drafting otherwise. The last question from at Brian Kochff. Do you think the hype on Pits is warranted enough to take him in the top half of rookie drafts in a super flex league? No, I do not. I think Pitts is a very, very good prospect, but we're not playing a game where we just choose the best players and we go from there. You have to consider opportunity cost and positional value. And yes, having a Travis kelce like player does give you an edge at tight end in fantasy football, we can't say that'smpletely guaranteed with Pits. I think it's fine to value him as a top five dynasty tight end. Right now, the only tight ends that I would take over Kyle Pitts are George Kittle, Travis Kelcey, and Darren Waller. But when opportunity costs is that high in a super flex league, I don't think I could take Pits in the top six because quarterbacks are currency in that format, even if you don't absolutely need a quarterback for your specific team. And then there are a few running backs who could land in great spots. And then there's at least Jamar Chase at wide receiver unless you've got crazy tight end rules that favor that position. I could not take Kyle Pitts in the top half of a super flex rookie draft. The sus questions from at will underscore a underscore bowman. Of the top prospects in the NFL draft with major fantasy implications, where are some of your least favorite landing spots for them? Where do you absolutely not want them to go. I've talked about this before with wide receivers, but I don't want my favorite wide receiver prospects to go to Baltimore. They've been the most run heavy team in football over the last two years, and that aligns perfectly with Lamar Jackson. Get this, Over the last two seasons, they've totaled four hundred wide receiver targets. Not only is that the lowest mark in the league, but it's over fifty targets below the team that's in thirty first. As long as Lamar Jackson's the quarterback, the Ravens are going to be a run heavy team, and that's gonna hurt his wide receivers. That's just basic math and what we look for in fantasy football with running backs, though, it's really just wanting the top three, the big three running backs to fall into a place where they can get immediate bel Coow opportunity. Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Arizona would be a good landing spot. Maybe Miami. So that's generally how I'm viewing things entering the draft. The last question this week is from my friend at Bethany L. Peters. She says, why is there such a big fascination with which players would be the best fit with which teams? I e. Aren't wide receivers in a given tier essentially fungible. If it's Juju versus Baby Try who ends up on Team XYZ? Does it matter? Yeah? I think it can matter a lot. One wide receiver can play a drastically dramatically different position than another wide receiver. Like guess they're both wide receivers. They're both listed as wide receivers. But I actually think that the Juju and Golladay comparison is a good one to run with as an example. Both of those guys win in very different ways. Juju so far in the NFL, he's been a great yards after the catch receiver, and he's played a large number of snaps from the slot. That slot percentage has risen year over years since he entered the league. In this past year, he saw the most targets from that area of the field in the entire NFL. He had one hundred and three slot targets according to Pro Football Focus. Kenny Galladay, meanwhile, has seen fifty eight slot targets throughout his entire NFL career. He's a perimeter wide receiver who's probably the best in the NFL when it comes to contested catches. Let's say that you have Juju or Golladay and your dynasty team. Of course, you want a similar general environment for both players, which goes for any wide receiver on your team. You want good quarterback play, you want a good offensive line, you want a pass friendly offense. That's what you want at a high level. But what you don't want is Jujus Smith Schuster on a team where he's going to be forced to play more on the outside because there's a chance that he doesn't do all that well because he's been much better as a slot guy throughout his career. If he falls to a team with a locked in slot receiver, you run that risk. There's a risk involved with Juju Smith Schuster, and then you want Kenny Galladay to find a home where maybe his quarterback is a little bit more aggressive and doesn't play it safe with his down the field throws. Stafford was a great quarterback for Kenny Galladay because of that, Jared Goff, if Galladay were to stay in Detroit not so much. Goff is worse when the play breaks down, and that scares me a bit when it comes to Kenny Galladay. So I think the bottom line is that one wide receiver, just because he plays wide receiver, is not the same as another wide receiver. They can play drastically different roles, and in an ideal world the teams these players go to there aren't any redundant assets, because when there is a redundant asset, you run the risk that the team isn't gonna use that player in an optimal way. That's gonna do it. For today's show, though, Thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribed to the Late Round podcasts, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found. You never forget to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks everyone, enjoy your weekend, watch as much college basketball as possible, and I'll talk to you next week