Becoming a Best Ball Bro: An Optimal Lineup?

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Hey, Rich if you played college football twenty five yet.

00:00:03
Speaker 2: You know what JJ, I mean, the mistake of telling myself that I wasn't going to go next to gen until the next GTA game comes out. So unfortunately, I won't be playing until my children have children. What about you.

00:00:14
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a terrible, terrible idea because GTA is not coming out for another fifteen years.

00:00:18
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, I have. I booted it up last night.

00:00:21
Speaker 3: I am playing as the Bowling Green Falcons. They're gonna go to the Promised Land. Terry On stewart Is they're running back and terry On I know you're out there maybe becoming a best ball bro yourself. Let me tell you you're gonna be a Heisman winner this year. I'm JJ, and I've been playing in best ball leagues for years. But there are people out there who play a lot more than I do, and there are people out there who have won a lot.

00:00:46
Speaker 1: More than I have, and I want to learn from them.

00:00:50
Speaker 3: This season, I'll be documenting my journey of max entering Underdog's Best ball Mania contest, and I'll be doing so with guidance from some of the most successful best ball players on the planning This is the year where.

00:01:02
Speaker 1: Things start to change.

00:01:04
Speaker 3: This is the year where I officially become a best ball bro. Welcome into another episode of becoming a Best ball Bro. I'm JJ Zacharieson, joined as always by my co host Rich Ryan Rich.

00:01:23
Speaker 1: What's going on?

00:01:24
Speaker 4: Man, doing good? Man?

00:01:25
Speaker 2: I have a quick, very good NCAA story my freshman year in college. One of my very good friends, my guy Mike Dotson, incredibly good at all video games, especially sports related games. He was also an incredible athlete in Virginia on a state championship football team. He got invited to the high school combine actually, but had never done any lifting before, so he ran in like the low fours, but he didn't do a single bench press zero, didn't get the bar up, so they were like, all right, that's them good. But ironically, he was actually living with elon football team our freshman year, and there were a lot of guys that started chirping him because he thought he was so good at nc DOUBLEA, this, that, and the third. So one of the football players actually challenged him because he thought he was the best. So my buddy Mike Dotson dusted Shane Gillis.

00:02:18
Speaker 1: Oh one night Wow.

00:02:21
Speaker 2: Football Wow, goes on to be one of the biggest experience. We don't keep in touch with him. He left Elon quite early. But yeah, if you're out there, Shane Gillis, Mike Dotson smoked you.

00:02:35
Speaker 3: I had no idea that that Gillis was was an Elon guy. Man, that's crazy. I'm really interested to see with college football twenty five, to see how like the players react to fans, like like, I'm going to become fans of a fan of these random Bowling Green players and maybe one. I have no clue if any of them are like on the prospect radar right, like like Terry and Stewart, I have no idea if he's good or not. He's fun in the game, and I'm using him. You know, of course, I have a ninety percent pass rate so far with my offense.

00:03:11
Speaker 1: You don't. We don't run the ball.

00:03:12
Speaker 3: We're not but out of the backfield as a receiver, he's awesome and that's why I think he might end up, you know, winning the Heisman. But it's gonna be really really interesting to see how all these players are now in the game and we get to know them that way and know of them how sort of that relationship is gonna work with fans and players.

00:03:29
Speaker 2: And underdog always keeping their fingers on the pulse dropping best Bowl Mania today college football, which JJ I will not be partaking. I'm just not good when it comes to unprofessional sports. You know, I've got enough time on my hand.

00:03:46
Speaker 1: Unprofessional.

00:03:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've always called that's always that's always anybody who follows me on Twitter Irish to Ryan, I've always called them unprofessional at the college level, yeah, which is now actually not factual because these guys are getting paid as they should be. But yeah, I just I do not Saturdays are for the family, uh, and then Sundays are for consuming an unhealthy amount of professional football.

00:04:09
Speaker 1: Yeah. That's that's how I've always been.

00:04:11
Speaker 3: Like people ask me, like if I'm gonna do like college football content or like what my sad Saturdays are family days. I you know, it's a choice by me, for sure, But I also think that it's only fair and I'm not gonna like, you know, I wouldn't be fair to my wife with two small children for me to just be sitting on the couch for for both Saturday and Sunday during the fall.

00:04:33
Speaker 1: That's that's just bad. Husbanding.

00:04:36
Speaker 2: Right, it's already it's already bad one day of.

00:04:38
Speaker 5: The right, right, right, right, it's already it's already pretty when you got when you got an almost six year old and a one and a half year old running around like you can't, that's just that's not good fathering and husbanding.

00:04:50
Speaker 3: But yeah, I'm not I'm not gonna I'm not gonna dip my toes in that at all. But I do think that if you're a college football fan, uh, and even if you just want to learn the game a little bit, there's gonna be people across the internet I'm sure, doing lots of content for that, and you should join. I mean, if you're into college football, definitely definitely check that out over on Underdog, because I would imagine there's not gonna be many places that offer what Underdog is going to offer for college football.

00:05:16
Speaker 2: I think the edges will be a little bigger too, in college than an NFL because of the lack of content, like you said, and just in general, when you look at sports betting, larger edges tend to come in I'll say, collegiate sports not unprofessional than they do in professional sports.

00:05:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, there's not going to be a lot of people that have any idea what's going on really, and there's a you know, a lot of it too, is that there's just a wide range of teams and players that you need to understand and get to know, and there's not this like database of oh, yeah, we've seen this guy play for five years and we know exactly you know, unless it's Tyrone Tracy who played in college for eighteen years. You know, you're not going to know, you know, who these players really are because they're either freshmen, we've never seen them college football, or you know, they've only been around for.

00:06:03
Speaker 1: A couple of years.

00:06:04
Speaker 3: So that the people who are studying that stuff definitely are going to happen.

00:06:08
Speaker 4: Edge.

00:06:09
Speaker 2: We had some big wide receiver news today in the NFL. That's right, Quintes Cephas signed with the Houston Texans now out in the Bay Area.

00:06:20
Speaker 4: Yes, that happen.

00:06:22
Speaker 2: Nice shout out to the Stiva's family out in the Bay Area. After weeks of kerfuffles and social media strife and his brother posting things, Brandon Aiyuk has officially requested a trade from the San Francisco forty nine ers. That's according to Mike Garofalo. Now what does this mean? Does this mean that he will get traded? Who are the suitors? There's a lot of speculation going on right now, JJ, And we know we said this repeatedly and we'll keep saying it that uncertainty drives value in the market. So what does this trade request as we enter what is the uncertain period of will he or won't he go? And where will he go? Where will any value be driven out of this? JJ? How will this change the way that you're drafting right now? In bestball?

00:07:09
Speaker 3: I feel like there's probably a five percent chance, maybe even less, that he gets traded. And I think the logic behind that is, you know he's requesting this trade right now, Well why right now? Well camp's about to start. You know, there's an actual tangible thing that's about to happen, and he's trying to use that as leverage. But also look at the state of the forty nine ers, and the state of the forty nine ers is they're one of the most competitive teams in football, you know, looking towards the future right now with one of their most important pieces offensively, who is one of the best wide receivers in the game.

00:07:43
Speaker 1: You know, it wouldn't make.

00:07:44
Speaker 3: That much sense to swap that for draft capital or something like that, which is what you would be doing and getting in a Brandon I you hypothetical trade, right.

00:07:53
Speaker 1: I think this is just a negotiation tactic.

00:07:55
Speaker 3: Just because he requests a trade does not mean the forty nine ers are going to try raid him. We see trade requests all the time, Deebo Samuel I believe requests a trade whenever he was going through his stuff a couple of years ago, and that never came to fruition. He stuck with San Francisco. I could be wrong though, if he did or didn't. But you know, we've been through this before with other players. Now should I should you be open to the idea that he does get dealt?

00:08:19
Speaker 2: Yeah?

00:08:19
Speaker 3: And I think that if you look at the landscape in the NFL, there's probably you know, maybe one or two teams, like maybe a Buffalo or something where if he were to go there. And I'm not even looking at cap or whether this is feasible or not, but there are very few teams out there where this would be a neutral move from a fantasy perspective for Brandon Nyuk or A or a good move for Brandon Nyuk, like San Francisco is a pretty good spot for him, despite the fact that you know they're gonna be run heavy. You know, he might not see like one hundred and forty target type ceiling. The problem is the two teams that he's linked to most are Washington and Pittsburgh, which are two teams that if he goes there, man, I mean we're talking probably like late third round type ADP for Brandon Ayuk. That would be my guess. I mean that's around where you start to get a little bit more ambiguity a wide receiver. You know, maybe we're like Zay Flowers goes another wide out who's in this like you know, a run centric offense who you know, we don't know that much about him. Person like Ayuk is a better player than Zay Flowers, but situationally it would be wor even worse in one of those two spots than what Zay Flowers is seeing. So maybe he'd be above that tier a little bit, right like mid third to late third. Because I do think Ayuk is one of the best wide receivers in football, like top ten to top fifteen, and so maybe maybe top ten. So you know, if he goes to Washington. If he goes to Pittsburgh, that would be bad. But I'm planning for him to stick in San Francisco, and if his ADP falls, I'd be okay with with snagging him. The problem is, I don't know how much it's really gonna fall, because the alternative here, like I said, would be an ADP in like the late third, and that might not be so so big of a risk for people to not draft him there. Like if if he if we were to know that he would go in like round seven or something like that. If he were to be traded, I bet that his ADP would fall pretty dramatically from where it is right now, just based on this news, like just based on like he would go to like the mid third, like maybe early third to mid third. I just don't know if it's going to change that dramatically because he is he is a good player.

00:10:28
Speaker 2: What about Kittle and Pearsol, Because I would lay two dollars to one that we see Ricky Piersoll's ADP move up half around next time this week and this time next week.

00:10:38
Speaker 3: Excuse me, Yeah, I think it's gonna happen. You know, Kittle maybe might move a little bit. Ks Kittle's ADP seems to fluctuate a good bit from draft draft. You know, like obviously you get an ADP number which is the average. But I wouldn't be surprised if his range is relatively wide in terms of where he gets drafted, because sometimes he'll fall into like the mid seventh, sometime will go with the five six turn. You know, he's kind of everywhere. But yeah, I mean I think that we might see maybe more of those five six turn Kittles. The one problem I would say is that there are a lot of drafts where Kincaid will fall to the late fifth, and so there might be less of a need for a team to kind of go that route and get Kittle. But I think Pierce All is the one that people are going to make the connection with most because it's a wide receiver. He's a young, talented guy. He would be the one stepping up and immediately seeing work. Probably maybe in two wide sets right away, but at least down the stretch he probably would. You know, they also have like a Juwan Jennings who's at least a solid player. I actually think that's not a bad idea either to play off of this is like eighteenth round Juwan Jennings, Right, Like if you're building a forty nine er stack and a lion stack or that week seventeen game, you know, just throwing that dart might not be a bad idea if you want to play against this Brandon Ayuk situation a little bit, because realistically, Jennings isn't the worst art.

00:12:01
Speaker 4: Throw in the world.

00:12:02
Speaker 1: I guess in the eighteenth round in a snack environment, Paul.

00:12:06
Speaker 2: Watchers, No, John Jennings can can you go out there and get it?

00:12:09
Speaker 1: Yeah? And like like they like Jennings.

00:12:11
Speaker 3: I wouldn't be against kind of going that direction and working against the market a little bit, unless the market's like, no, We're going to draft Wan Jennings in the sixteenth round.

00:12:21
Speaker 1: Like that would be a little bit different, but I highly doubt that happens.

00:12:23
Speaker 2: I like that pivot a lot. I like that way more than pearsall sneaking up to like the eleventh round. If you look at current adp so there's this group of receivers Gay Davis, Jalen Polk, John Dottson, Xavier Laguette, and then there's this group of running backs Dowbdell, Lloyd Chubb, Miller, Chandler, and then Pearsaw's after that. So just naturally, I think Pearsall is going to gravitate closer to that group of receivers, and then it's going to be making a decision between those receivers and Pearsall. Who there are going to pepe people out there that sell themselves on the fact that, oh wow, he's going to be the number two receiver and a Kyle Shanhan offense. It's going to happen like I got to click this name.

00:13:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, No, I think it's gonna happen. I think we'll see a rise, but we could we could see a contract get finished up in the next week and things just change immediately.

00:13:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you made great examples earlier, specifically with the debo requests. But then also last year we saw Bosa get his deal done right before the season started. And I mean, Ayuka has been there forever. He already has rapport with Brock Purdy. How much is he how much is he really going to be contributing and learning and improving in preseason? So yeah, I'm with you that I think this as a low, low chance of actually happening. Speaking of camp, we've got all these camps opening up, there's gonna be a wave of information clips of people making one headed catches and being spectacular and all their people being the worst. Ever, So throughout that process, to JJA, how do you go through information and try to discern what is meaningful, what is not? Most importantly, what is predictive and what is not.

00:13:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that one of the things to differentiate is, uh, if a beat writer is speaking about talent, when you can do the talent evaluation yourself, Like, That's that's one thing that I'm not as interested in, say, like if they're talking about a guy who's just like crushing everyone else in practice or something like, just keep in mind that that's a subjective view. It's it doesn't mean that they're always wrong. Like it could be a very valid point, but at least take that with more of a grain of salt. Is if it's like a talent based evaluation about a player, what I'm more interested in is, especially when it comes to backfields, is how they're speaking about the coaching staff liking or not liking a certain player right, or or if they believe a running back is going to see more work than you know what's being projected just by the masses and you know, naturally, like one of the the easiest example of this that I threw out there last year a lot and really, you know, it got me off of Cam Akers, but not on Kyrin Williams unfortunately, you know, pre drect, you know, pre season starting. But was was Jordan Rodrieg from The Athletic who was talking about Kyroen like pretty consistently talking about Kian Williams having a bigger role in that backfield than people realize that Cam Akers was not going to be necessarily a bell cow back, and so I wrote about that in my draft guide, but it was more of a me throwing cam Makers on the avoid list, you know, because he was like a fifth round pick last year, as opposed to me saying, hey, go out there and draft Kien Williams, which you know, the way the season started, I think that was the right advice after like Week one, but then once Week one hit, you know, we were throwing that dart at Kien Williams after his Week one performance, and then camp Makers gets traded and you know, Karen Williams.

00:15:44
Speaker 1: The rest is history.

00:15:45
Speaker 3: But those are the kinds of tidbits that can help is that you're looking at at what these Beat reporters are saying about how a team might deploy a player, like that's very interesting like that, you know, whether it's like, oh, they might like forget about like, oh, they're going to use this running back in the slot a lot like that doesn't we we know historically like that doesn't happen that much.

00:16:04
Speaker 2: But every're like every year, we're gonna we're gonna line them up outside.

00:16:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:16:08
Speaker 3: But if they're like, hey, this wide receiver who traditionally plays perimeter is gonna play more in the slot or vice versa, like that's gonna get me to investigate a little bit further and look at that player in more detail and say, well, can he play that role or not? And then the last thing I'll note about training camp news, if there are negative reports, that's a big deal.

00:16:27
Speaker 2: That's a big make this is it?

00:16:30
Speaker 3: Yeah, negative reports are because because there's gonna be a lot of fluff pieces, there's gonna be a lot of of optimism and positivity from from beats because it's you know, everyone's energetic and excited about the upcoming season. But if there's a negative report about a player that's generally not that great of a thing. Uh you you do want to pay attention to that thing, to that kind of stuff. But again, a lot of this, uh you know, when you look at the and take a step back and look at fantasy football more holistically, as I always say, talent is more. It drives the wide receiver position more than the running back position because wide receivers and I even say this in the interview today with our guests, but wide receivers need to go out, they need to get open. There's more talent involved in playing that position to get volume, which is the volume that we need in fantasy football. With running backs, it's a coaching decision at the end of the day. I mean, of course, we want talent to win out and coaches to you know, get reward talent and give them work. But at the end of the day, a coach can say, I want to split this backfield. I don't want to split this backfield like and if they do or they don't, then that depend that will result in whether that player is good or not in fantasy football. And so because that is a subjective human decision, the coach's decision, I will listen to a beat writer to say how they think a backfield might be split. Now, be wary of the beat writers who like start to project stat lines because they generally don't know what they're doing from that PERSPECTI And I'm not like calling anyone out in particular here, I'm just saying I've seen many stat lines out there from beat writers. They don't know how to build projections, Like they just don't do that right. But if they're saying, hey, this could be a fifty to fifty split between these two running backs, and the market is saying no, it's gonna be a seventy thirty split, pay attention to that, like there's there could be something to that.

00:18:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, And camp usage and formation information becomes even more interesting when they do these inner squad scrimmages, because these teams have kind of punted on the preseason entirely, like they don't take these preseason games very seriously at all. But these inner squad games, I feel like they take those very seriously and they're in a safer environment. The quarterback still has on the red jersey, so you're less likely to have some injuries. So I think that's when a lot of the positional stuff becomes extra interesting. And then yeah, the negative information. You got to think about the job of a beat writer and the economy that they live in. They're basically satellite employees for the team. They may not be employed by the team.

00:18:58
Speaker 1: But yeah, they sure as hell need.

00:19:01
Speaker 2: That team to like them to remain in their orbit, to continue getting sources, to continue to get availability. So when bad stuff comes out, that means a coach or an assistant, likely maybe off the record, fed them that information and is okay with them leaking it out to the public.

00:19:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's important. And the formation stuff, like you said, is really important too. Like if we you know, with with your jets, if we see that like Malachi Corley isn't playing with starters in the slot, like he isn't their primary slot guy and it's Xavier Gibson, then we should be paying attention to that because that means that Corley might not be getting early season production.

00:19:40
Speaker 1: And we got to wait a little bit.

00:19:41
Speaker 3: Do you want him to wait on your bench or do you want him to wait on your waiver wire and you just pounce on him instead of using that roster spot. Like those kinds of of things and Nuggets are very very important.

00:19:51
Speaker 2: By the way, I think I think Corley is a Scott Fishbold dart throw by the way, I think I think he could be because they're a deemon in their attend game. But that's just my Jets bias creeping in. Yeah, speaking of running back, you've been drafting running backs in the fourth round, specifically a Super Bowl champion and a man that you propped up as a seventh rounder, Isaiah p Checko keep chopping Rutgers.

00:20:16
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've needed so this is one of my focuses this week, If not the only focus, I think it is the only focus.

00:20:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, fourth round running back.

00:20:26
Speaker 3: So like Traves etn Isaiah Pachecko, Pachecko's the one that scares me most. And I say scares me because I have not been drafting these guys nearly enough. And the reason for that is team structure and team builds in roster construction. I often in the fourth round am panicking a little bit and saying, oh, I got a running back in the first three.

00:20:49
Speaker 1: I can't go non running. I can't get another running back here.

00:20:52
Speaker 3: That's gonna be a little bit scary, or you know, I end up going with a tight end or a quarterback, and I'm looking for like one of those stacks with like Lamar and Mark Andrews or what have you. And the problem is that, like you know, we've said this before, but if there's a position that's gonna fall in drafts, it's it's usually running back, right, Like running back is the one that quarterback two whenever they're not stacked and such. But you know, running backs will fall and drafts pretty frequently. And so in the back of my mind, I'm like, oh, I don't need to get Etn or Pacheco here at ADP because you know, I'll have other drafts where they fall, right, But it's not happening as much as I'd like it to happen. So moving forward and even like today a little bit, I'm trying to draft a little bit more Pacheco.

00:21:35
Speaker 1: The problem is that Pacheco's ADP is rising.

00:21:38
Speaker 3: Right, So this is this was a failure on me trying to become a best ball bro and my read on Isaiah Pacheco in general, because you know, it's kind of going the opposite direction of what I would want in order to get more exposure. And I think that as more casual drafters come in, we're gonna see. You know, whenever I say casual draft, I'm not saying that in like a derogatory way, like I genuinely mean it as like you are just playing this more casually than I am.

00:22:07
Speaker 1: Let's say, right, and when when.

00:22:09
Speaker 3: People who aren't playing as many lineups and and you know, entering as many contests and stuff, when they join, I think they're going to be shocked by the ADP and they'll probably influence that a little bit by drafting these running backs a little bit earlier.

00:22:21
Speaker 1: And so I wouldn't be.

00:22:23
Speaker 3: Surprised if, like Pachecko is a three four turned guy by the end of July, and that scares me a little bit. So I'm still probably gonna force it at least a little bit, you know, over the next couple of weeks.

00:22:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, last two weeks he's gone from forty seven to forty five to forty three. Now, that doesn't seem like a lot, but in these upper rounds, you know, two spots here, three spots here is massive, you know. And you I mean, you made the point previously about the delta, the team where Pacheco is going to go in your home league, and where he's going in best ball was massive at one point, and that gap is starting to narrow, so your opportunity to get them are slipping away.

00:23:01
Speaker 4: JJ.

00:23:02
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know, I gotta I gotta just force the issue a little bit. I don't need to be like ten percent with Pacheco, but I'd like to be at like the six to eight percent range.

00:23:09
Speaker 1: I think.

00:23:10
Speaker 2: All right, let's talk about some specific players. Then another running back which was discussed last week on this show. The Eagles own Saquon Barkley.

00:23:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's following a little bit in ADP where I'm getting him at the two three turn. I've I've paired him with CMC. If I see him in the twenty three overall spot after getting CD Lamb, I'm immediately stacking CD Lamb with Saquon Barkley for that week seventeen correlation, and so I'm getting some.

00:23:39
Speaker 1: I'm getting some Saquon. Now, I know that others are not as.

00:23:43
Speaker 3: Into Saquon in the in the space, Like I was on ADP Chasing yesterday with Sam Sherman, Davis Mattock, and Pac Karine, and it sounded like Davis and Karine were not very high on Saquon, and part of the reason was because they're very high on Devon a Chan, which I'm with them. I like eight Chan more than Saquon. My thing is I'm getting safe. I'm getting eight Chan at times still, you know, in the end of the third round, right whereas Saquon, I don't think it's gonna necessarily jump you know, I don't think he's gonna jump Saquon at any point. And so, like I said, when more casual drafters jump in, I would bet that Saquon's adp rises a little bit because they're gonna be so weirded out by the fact that you know, we're drafting freaking Jalen Waddle over over Saquon Barkley, which which I've been doing all summer for the record, But they're gonna be freaked out by that. And yeah, I mean, like I think that with Barkley, and we've talked about this a little bit last week. We have to be open minded about how this this season could go down for Philadelphia. There's a lot of moving parts, Like there are more moving parts, Like I think Saquon and Jonathan Taylor are pretty similar, uh backs from how they're gonna score slash.

00:24:49
Speaker 1: The kind of environments they're in.

00:24:51
Speaker 3: You get these mobile quarterbacks, good weapons around them, you know, hypothetically a good offensive situations, but they might some of the goal line work. Maybe their target chairs aren't gonna be that that high. But I would say I think Saquon's target shair still has the potential to get into that like twelve percent range and maybe even thirteen percent range. Like it's possible. They have a new offensive coordinator there. That's not something that's happening in Indianapolis. Like we know how Indianapolis is generally going to operate, whereas things could change, and there's variants in Philadelphia with Kellen Moore there, and they could be more pass heavy, and that's not a bad thing for Saquon in my opinion, because if they are more pass heavy, there could be more volume through the air going his way. And that's been something that you know, I know, his efficiency metrics might not show it, but he's a good he's a good receiver out of the backfield. Like he's been playing in a really, really crappy environment for the last few years of his career. So you know, this is also a running back that they haven't had you know, and with Jalen Hurts like about how the.

00:25:50
Speaker 2: DeAndre Swift is like dollar Storeuon Barkley, all right.

00:25:54
Speaker 3: Right, like say what you want about DeAndre Swift in their usage of Swift, It's like, Okay, that's not Saquon Barkley, Like they're not the same, that's not the same kind of running back, and it's not He's not nearly as talented. So I am intrigued by Bavarians involved with Saquan to the point where now that he's at the tail end of the second round.

00:26:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've been, I've been clicking his name.

00:26:14
Speaker 2: Let's talk about another player who switched teams this off season, and that's Jerry Judy, who is now with the Cleveland Browns. And you were interested in not just Judy but the entire Brownie offense right now.

00:26:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, look, so we've we've said enough about Jerome Ford. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna talk down more on Ford. Like he's not someone that I'm like super super actively going after.

00:26:36
Speaker 1: But I do think the receivers are interesting. I've gotten plenty of Amari Cooper, you know, this year.

00:26:40
Speaker 3: Obviously he shout off the ceiling last year on a weekly basis. He had that monster monster outing last year. But also you know, you're looking at uh Deshaun Watson, who I think is undervalued as a fantasy asset. If you look at how he actually performed in games where he was healthy last year, not that bad. His his point per game for production was really not that bad at all. And you're getting at least a little bit of mobility and a little bit of rushing upside with him too. But I think the Browns are pretty strong offensively. You look at their weapons, you look at their line, you look at what they could do. They might be a little bit more pass heavy this year. I think they will be more pass heavy this year with the offensive changes that they made. And then you know there are times in your draft where you want multiple outs for stacking right, Like earlier today, I did a Best ball Mania draft where I had a Bill Stack. I actually had Josh Allen who slipped like seven spots passes ADP, so I drafted him, and then I got Dalton Kincaid at ADP with my next pick, and then James Cook fell into the like well into the sixth and I was able to get James Cook as well. So I had this locked in Buffalo Bills stack and I started and I also had DK metcalf earlier. So I drafted Jackson Smith and Jigba in the seventh and I was like, okay, I'm gonna be going after Geno Smith more than likely. But as the draft went on, I wanted more outs with that lineup, just in case. And so in that lineup, I had Jamar Chase, who they do Cincinnati gets Cleveland in Week sixteen, So I had Jamar Chase in that lineup, and I said to myself, Okay, well, I all these have like week sixteen correlation if I draft Jerry Judy. But also I'm getting this out of getting another stackable quarterback potentially if someone annoys the you know what out of me and drafts Gino Smith a round and a half ahead of ADP. So Judy's just one of those guys where I think that he's probably properly valued, Like I don't think that he's like this screaming value, but he's had some marketing, some marks throughout his career that are pretty favorable. And you know, he obviously was a really, really good prospect. Maybe he just needed this change of scenery like you can. You can tell yourself a story as to why Judy could have a decent season, and then you layer on top of the game theory component.

00:28:56
Speaker 1: And that's why I've been going after Judy a little bit more.

00:28:58
Speaker 2: Browns have a massive wide range of outcomes, right, they had it last year as well, and then Deshaun has the shoulder injury and it just it sent the whole offense into s and Joe Flacco had to come in off the couch and save the day. Yeah, and I think that range facomes remains wide entering into this season. We're not far removed from Deshaun Watson being unequivocally the third or fourth best quarterback in football. Now, a lot has happened since that since that occurred, but there could be something in here in there that makes him way closer to league average than he's being drafted right now. He's being drafted right now like he's a trash bag. So yeah, there definitely could be value on Deshaun Watson. And then finally, the RB four or five cluster you want to discuss with Kamani Vadal, Marshawn Lloyd, Jalen Wright, Ray Davis, what you got here, JJ.

00:29:51
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:29:51
Speaker 3: Look, I just really like this rookie cluster, and they all generally go in the same range. You know, Marshawn Lloyd is creeping up a little bit and he'll go earlier than these guys. We talked about him last week, so I don't want to, you know, get into that anymore. But like you get marsh On Lloyd, Kamani Videll, Jalen Wright, Ray Davis, all of them. You know, you got Videll, who's in a situation where he could like be the one a realistically in this offense by the end of the season. I think that he's at least going to be a good tandem partner for like a guy like Gus Edwards. You get Jalen Wright, who has multiple injury outs, with Devon Chan and Raheem Mostert, he's in arguably the best running offense so you can find in football. Given the scheme, I think he's a really good scheme fit. You know, he's he's a bigger bodied guy compared to the other two backs there, and he's got a ton of speed just like the other backs there. But like I said, he's got multiple injury outs, and I also think that Jalen Wright could have some standalone value in like garbage time, right, Like, like what if they he's their RB three, they're up by two touchdowns in the fourth quarter, he might get some usable weeks just based on garbage time as well. So that's another reason why I like right. And then Ray Davis. You know, I don't I know, I said that I drafted James Cook. I'm not drafting James Cook that much. They were more run heavy with Joe Brady, a lot more run heavy last year Buffalo was, And so I do think they're gonna use Ray Davis and James Cook a pretty decent bit on the ground, and Davis could could slip right into that like Latavious Murray role that we saw last year with a little bit more upside, because I thought Davis was a pretty decent prospect, and what if he's just better than what they had out of Latavious Murray, which I don't think will take that much. You know, I don't think Murray's like horrific, but you know, I don't think it's gonna It's not like he's a superstar, right, And so Davis could step in, you know, get some production there I would have drafted him. I already took James Cook into my bill stack, but I've I've gotten Ray Davis in plenty of bill stacks because you get the contingent upside of a James Cook injury. But also I think there's gonna be some standalone value there for him.

00:31:51
Speaker 2: To bring it full circle. I can't wait for Camp reports with regards to Kamani Vedell because I feel like these other players have pretty defined at least right now, whereas videll We're looking at three backs. Who has any idea how the Chargers are going to deploy these three guys, new coaching staff, three new dudes.

00:32:15
Speaker 3: Like I know, and I'll say this about videll Is, I think he might be a Camp superstar because he's that kind of shifty player, Like he's a really dynamic, fun player from that perspective, because he's smaller, like he's only like five seven and a half, Like he's a very short back. He's smaller, but he's he's got a lot of way to him, kind of like a Jalen Warren, you know, size wise and stuff. But he's a great pass protector, a really good receiver, and he's got that acceleration and speed, and so I could see him winning over beat writers in camp, which is why I've loaded up. He's one of my highest rostered running backs so far.

00:32:53
Speaker 2: Are you calling it right now? Is he gonna have the Amir Abdullah run in preseason that plights the world on fire?

00:33:00
Speaker 3: Look, I think y Dell, I'm not gonna be shocked if vy Deell's like eleventh rounder in Best Ball drafts by the end of August. Like, if he rises, you know, maybe we'll see him. Maybe eleventh round is a little bullish given the running back environment on Underdog, but I think that he can definitely jump like or like enter the Jerome Ford area or like the Blake Korum area right of drafts, Like, I think that's definitely feasible. You mean, league winner, league winning Jerome Ford anyway, all right, I did have an interview earlier today with Mark Garcia. It was a really really fun interview. I think it gives you guys a different perspectives on a different perspective on Best Ball. He's another high volume player. He runs the Best Ball product at one week season. He also contributes to Fantasy Points, Rotal World, and Player Profiler lots of game theory talk with Mark. He had an interesting stance on quarterbacks in best Ball that I think a lot of people are gonna sort of think twice about. But it was It's just a really enjoyable conversation, really sharp guy, and I think you guys will enjoy it. So, without further ado, here is my interview with Mark. This episode is sponsored by Underdog Fantasy. If you haven't played over at Underdog yet, now's the perfect time. There are tons of different best Ball leagues that you can join, and there's definitely a league out there that fits what you're looking for, and you can use all the things that I've talked about with guests. I'm becoming a best Ball bro to crush those drafts. But like I said, now's the right time to join up because if you go and you sign up and use promo code Late Round, you not only get a nice deposit offer, but you also get a free Late Round Draft guide that's a twenty five dollars guide email to your inbox after signing up.

00:34:39
Speaker 1: For absolutely free.

00:34:41
Speaker 3: So head to Underdog Fantasy dot com, sign up using promo code late Round and make it a positive. I can confirm it's a really really fun platform to play on.

00:34:51
Speaker 1: Now back to the show.

00:34:53
Speaker 3: All right, Mark, I got a question for you, How solved is best Ball? I know that that's kind of like worded strangely. I had this in the show sheet, and when I sent it over, I was like, like, I hope this makes sense as a question, But how solved is best Ball? Like, do you think that that Drafters right now might be a little bit overconfident and sort of how they're structuring their teams and how they're going about that and draft and draft out.

00:35:17
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think one percent. If you think about the way that we visualize this concept of like the total potential outcomes in a game. We use in game theory something called a game tree, which is a visual representation of like all the potential paths you can take on a game. I mean, we're you will take like the most basic form of game theory in games like rock paper scissors, there's three different moves, and there's three different moves your opponent can throw. So we have this very tight matrix of the game tree where it's like rock on rock or rock on paper, rock on scissors, and so on and so forth. Right, think about best ball where we even if we constrain ourselves to like six picks around a draft pick or extend that to twelve, the game tree is borderline infinite. So like this idea that we have an idea of what is optimal or what is required to win these contests, Like we have things that describe what is one in the past, but we really don't know. We have no idea what the optimal path on this year's game tree is going to be. So it's it's on the order of magnitude. Even if we constrain ourselves to twelve picks around an individual draft spot, say we're at the twelfth pick. If we say we can draft the six players before and the six players after, we're on the order of magnitude of like three point nine to the twelfth power of like the total number of combinations that are in this game. So like, yeah, we have an idea of what will boost ev like roster construction stuff. We know we should be correlating week seventeen because that's the highest contributor to expected value. There's all this stuff that we use, and the reason we use expected value is it removes things like variance. It removes things that we can't control. But even within that, like there's only so much we can control.

00:37:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

00:37:08
Speaker 3: I mean from that perspective, then we do have sort of these builds and these roster constructions that seem to be go to's in a way within within this, especially over on Underdog, where people are going very very wide receiver heavy, so you see a lot of these zero RB teams, which I don't even know how we define zero RB anymore, especially over there. It's it's like like it's just it's such a weird sort of economy and what's going on over there. But then there's like anchor RB and those kinds of teams and such, how has been or what has been your favorite way to differentiate with team structure? And sort of on top of that, do you think that there is this overconfidence in the way that folks are looking at zero RB and saying this is the way to draft based on you know, what we've seen, you know, over the last four years of Best ball Mania, Like do you think do you think that sample size is far too small for us to say this is absolutely how we should do this, or you know, I know that I'm rambling here with this question, so we can take this piece by piece. But you know, like we do have season long fantasy football, which is not super unlike best ball. Obviously best ball is a different beast to some degree, but there are plenty of similarities because it's fantasy football and it's generally playing the same game. Do you think that the you know, we have enough of the concepts from there that they do trickle over that we do.

00:38:23
Speaker 1: Know that beyond just these Best ball Mania contests.

00:38:26
Speaker 3: Uh, you know that going anchor our B for instance, is actually sort of an optimal thing that we've seen through the years. Or do you think that we should just throw it all out and say all of this analysis is really over analysis and there's just way too much variance involved. And the way that we need to draft here is to differentiate two things, whether that be you know, who we're picking in the player analysis side, but also the team structure side. And maybe instead of going with zero RB and here AREB, we go with three running backs to start a draft.

00:38:55
Speaker 4: That's a very very complex and in depth question. The fact that.

00:39:00
Speaker 3: Was the worst question that an interviewer has ever asked on a podcast.

00:39:04
Speaker 1: I totally get that It's.

00:39:08
Speaker 4: Why I say that is because like the answer is probably just as complex, right from a theoretic perspective. So there's two big things that kind of from a from a theoretical perspective, facilitate this idea of zero RB. It's the fact that we know that volume, or we know that production at the running back position is most heavily tied and correlated to volume. We also know that running back is the most oft injured position. So those two things play nicely to say like, hey, there's a lot of variance at the position, but we know that through that variance we're able to capture production on the back end of it by that position's value being so closely tied to volume. So that kind of leads us into this idea like, oh okay, like I can I can leverage some of that variance in my favor by going zero running back and trying to leverage some variants on the back end to capture bulk scoring in ways that the field is not. So that part is kind of understood, I think by the field at this point. What is kind of being missed, I think is that we have to kind of also incorporate our governing constraint and our governing constraint in these contests is ADP, And historically speaking, ADP at the running back position is going to see the greatest magnitude in fluctuations throughout a draft cycle. And I label a draft cycle as like when the contest opens to when it closes, that's all the time we have to draft. And within that draft cycle, historically speaking, we're going to see the highest magnitude of ADP movements at running back because it's a function of the value at the position being so closely tied to volume, and that is going to change with different news cycles, Like we're coming up on a major change in that news cycle right now with camp about to start. We're going to see shakeups and depth charts. We're gonna see coach speak. We're gonna see who's running with the ones, who's running with the twos, who's not running at all. Injuries news, We're gonna see injuries during camp. We're gonna see updates on injuries in the past, Like how's Breis Hall looking, how's Derek Henry looking with his age? Like all these things are about to like be magnified. So that is going to drive ADP pretty heavily at the running back position. So both of those things kind of combined to like our draft strategy probably shouldn't be static, like it shouldn't be zero running back is the way to go, or Hero or anchor or however we want to label these things. It probably should change with time and information. So that has led me. I've been extremely heavy in best ball up to this point, through about three hundred and fifty drafts. I've been extremely heavy in zero and anchor or hero running back teams, so like zero or one running back through the first seven rounds or so up to this point, trying to leverage all of that that we just talked about. That's probably going to change here as we enter camp this coming week, where we might see like it be more beneficial from an ev perspective. Again, we talk in TV because it's the only thing we can control. It might be more beneficial to shift that to now looking at the fallers that have fallen at the running back position up to this point and going heavy or whatever the case may be. It's a very very convoluted and complex question brings a very complex answer type deal. But to me, up to this point, yeah, I have been extremely zero running back hero anchor, and that's that's going to change here in the next week or so. Now.

00:42:47
Speaker 1: I think that's a really, really good point.

00:42:48
Speaker 3: And I also think to add to that with the training camp news and what's going to go on with hype trains and such. And honestly, some of it is justified at the end of the day, right, Like it's not that like all hype trains crash, Like some of them are totally fine and reasonable. I mean, look at like Isaiah Pacheco a few years ago, like he ended up being you know, he wasn't like an amazing fantasy asset, but down the stretch he was getting more and more points. And that was after you know, he was turning heads in camp, like it was a big moment for him. And we've seen but then on the flip side, we've seen like a Mir Abdullah, you know, go in the opposite direction.

00:43:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, when when his hype train was getting out of control.

00:43:24
Speaker 3: But I do think that what's important, and what you're saying is, you know, with the volume piece is that I've always kind of preached it as the running back position is more of a coaching decision as opposed to what we're gonna get at wide receiver and tight end, because wide receiver and tight end inherently there's just a little bit more talent that needs to be there for those wide receivers and tight ends to get targets, to get open and to be part of that game plan, whereas a running back just needs to be on the field, Like like Matt Laflour can come out and say, I'm not splitting this backfield or I am splitting this backfield, and that's going to dramatically change the way that we view those two running backs in that backfield.

00:44:02
Speaker 1: Whereas if he says.

00:44:03
Speaker 3: We're gonna be a little bit more run heavy this year or we're gonna be a little bit more pass heavy this year, I don't know if that's going to dramatically change the way that we view the wide receivers on that team, you know, because it's not as tangible, right And so I do think that's really really important that as the months go on, knowing the information that we have, you know, at hand at that moment while we're drafting, and how that can change is really important. And obviously, if you go with a zero RB approach and correct me if I'm wrong here, but if you go with a zero RB approach, what you're saying is I'm getting my running backs late, and they also then have an opportunity then to hypothetically rise in value from when I drafted them in June. Like let's say you're getting a lot Kamani Videl right now or something like that, who's you know, thirteenth fourteenth round, and then all of a sudden they come out and they say, he's crushing it in camp. He's gonna be the RB one, and he's an eighth round pick or ninth round pick or something by the end of August. Like that's a lot of equity gained in that pick because of the information that you were you and actually it's because you're you're sort of opposing the information that you had at that time and saying, we don't have enough information on these backfields. So I'm just kind of kind of lean into that and go with later round running backs. Does that kind of play into it as well?

00:45:11
Speaker 4: Yeah, one hundred percent. And there's a layer that kind of goes beyond that as well in that like how we construct our rosters in that period of uncertainty and humans are not like very we're really bad at dealing and handling with uncertainty. We were like creatures of comfort. We like to have our hand in play, like hand in things. We want to feel in control. Right, So this like this time, this period of uncertainty, we're really really hard or we're really bad at at handling that and dealing that and dealing with that. Why I say that is typically when you see zero running back teams built early before camp, you're seeing like say Underdog for example, where we're constrained to eighteen draft picks, you're seeing six seven eight running back rosters built right, Well, you're you're simultaneously saying that I'm going to leverage this variance, but I'm also going to hedge against that, if that makes sense. So the I've been a big proponent this season of saying, like, if we're drafting as if we're right, and that's kind of the buzz phrase over the last year and a half in Best Ball like draft is if you're right right, Yeah, well you're not doing you're not drafting as if you're right. By taking six seven eight running backs on a zero running back build, you're saying I know that the I know I Well, you're kind of just throwing stuff at a wall and seeing what sticks that leaves holes. Theoretically, at your other positions, if you were drafting zero running back as if you were right in June, in May June July timeframe, you would stop at five running backs because that is what we know is the biggest boost to EV in this format. So like other examples you mentioned the Chargers, we have a lot of uncertainty in Tennessee, we have a lot of uncertainty in Cincinnati, and some of these offenses are we expect them to score points this year like they're all like all those offense except the Chargers maybe are projected currently to be in the top ten in points score. So those are probably valuable situations. So if you're if we kind of reverse engineer all that and consider all of that, like all the theoretics that go into that. Now it's this case of if you're taking Zach Moss, act as if he's going to be a top ten back this year. If you're taking Zeke, you're saying by taking him that he's going to return like RB two numbers this year. And if that's the case, you don't need seven eight running backs on that roster, so like it's it's this weird kind of comfort level. We're not good at being uncomfortable.

00:47:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, it's really interesting.

00:47:53
Speaker 3: In my draft guide, and I say this every year, the number one thing is to lean into uncertainty because the market hates on certainty. Like yeah, like like rookie especially in like managed season long leagues and your home leagues and stuff like that. Rookies and second year players where we don't have a lot of information on those guys, they're always massive values in season long leagues because and then what's funny is once you get to the late rounds, that's when people start drafting all these rookies because they're like, oh.

00:48:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a double digit round pick.

00:48:19
Speaker 3: I don't care, I'll but real realistically, you should be leaning into that uncertainty more so throughout your draft. My one question, my one follow up to that is there seems to be though still a balance correct of like looking at what would be optimal, right, which would like like in hindsight optimal? And what I mean by that is, you know you're saying, like, let's say you go with like a A two.

00:48:38
Speaker 1: Five eight three bill, is that? Yeah, that would add up to eighteen.

00:48:42
Speaker 3: Uh, and you go with something you go with something like that, and but but your your five running backs are kind of zero RB type running backs, right, like you don't have an anchor. Your RB one is Zach Moss. Maybe you get like a Taj Spears in there or something like that. In hindsight, definitely would make sense to say this would be the optimal way that you should have drafted this past year because some of those running backs are naturally going to hit.

00:49:08
Speaker 4: Right.

00:49:09
Speaker 3: But in terms of forecasting, is there any wiggle room for us to say, let's get six running backs? You know, if we know that five is optimal, let's get six, maybe not seven or eight. Maybe that's maybe that's like the part where you think it's a little bit overboard. I hope, hopefully I'm making sense here, But you know, like where we recognize that we're trying to be optimal based on the way things end up going down and looking at things in hindsight and all that kind of stuff. But at the same time, we're obviously still forecasting to some degree, and there's not going to be necessarily this powerhouse to the nth degree lineup and a team out there that just hits on literally everything, especially in these contests where playoff, where the playoffs happen, and there's these playoff structures where it adds a little bit of variance because you could you could be squeaking in and then just having these blo up week fifteen to seventeen matchups. So my question to make that even short, to shorten that I know that these questions have been horribly horribly phrased so far today, My question is do you think there is a little bit of wiggle room to say to play the variance game, to say, I know this isn't necessarily exactly how things are gonna go down, while also playing to what you're saying and saying we should be drafting based on you know, these guys actually hitting.

00:50:28
Speaker 4: Yes. And I think it comes down to our understanding and how we define optimal, because I think that this term has been misused for a long time. Optimal is the exact path on that game tree, that massive array, that tree of potential outcomes that maximizes points when they matter in a playoff style contest that is advancement or that is Week seventeen, and then advancement rate and then week sixteen and then week fifteen. That's the contribu contributors to EVY. So this idea of optimal, knowing that there is one optimal path on the game tree this season and that we don't know that, we also have to understand that we don't need optimal in order to win because we're not playing these contests against a supercomputer. We're not playing against a time machine. We're playing against other inherently flawed human beings. Right, So I mean the way that I kind of described this idea of optimal versus what we can do to win is look at like the Millimaker on DraftKings, and we'll use like, we'll just use that contest because there are anywhere between two hundred and fifty to four hundred and seventy thousand entries every single week, right, the optimal roster on a given week, and this is what fourteen years of the Millimaker being in existence, times seventeen to eighteen full slates on a year, there has never been an optimal roster that has won a DFS contest, so or the Million for that matter. So we know that going into this we don't need optimal to win, So that gives us, from a theoretical angle, the lee way to introduce deviations, and a deviation is any departure from optimal theory, and by definition, any deviation from optimal theory is going to incur a subsequent dip in ev We know this, but we also have to also take into account field tendencies because we can turn those deviations into exploits, which is a fancy way of saying, what I'm doing away from optimal is something that the field is not doing enough based on its hit rate. So in DFS we have things like quarterback and tight end pairings because tight end is naturally going to derive a lot of its value from touchdowns, which directly correlates to the quarterback. We also have seen things over the past two years like quarterback plus running back plus pass catcher. The hit rate of that, and I'm basing this again off of the winning roster and the Milli maker, the hit rate of that is like twenty two point two percent over a two year sample. So the fact that now we kind of we take that reasoning and say, is the field utilizing quarterback plus running back plus pass catcher at a twenty two point two percent frequency the answer is probably not. I don't know. We don't have that data right now, but the answer is probably not. And speaking to best ball, we don't have that data. But making the assumption that the field is not drafting these things that have proven hit rates at that frequency gives us the leeway to say, hey, that might be an exploit where the hit rate is greater than the field's utilization. We know it's not optimal. We know that if very rarely you're going to see an optimal roster have quarterback plus running back plus a pass catcher or a quarterback plus a tight end. But we know that the hit rate is greater than the field's utilization, so that those things kind of give us the leeway to make those exploits. And we don't have the math behind currently because we have all of four data points here. We don't have the math to say, like, what's the magnitude of the deviation or what matters most in round fourteen? Is it week seventeen correlation? Is it closing line value versu ADP, Like, we don't have the math to work that out, but we can confidently say there are things that we can do away from optimal theory to give us these exploits. So that is kind of the what the bulk of my work in Best ball over the last three seasons has been, is like, what can we do different than the field to give us boost to ev where the field just kind of isn't paying attention to it.

00:54:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, So basically, you don't need to draft seven running backs in these kind of builds because your running back room doesn't have to be optimal in order for you to win, but it can still be very very good even with those five running backs actually correct, and.

00:55:01
Speaker 4: That's going to change with time and yeah, right, what the field is doing and ADP and all those things and information. So that's kind of like what I mean by, Hey, our our plan of attack or our game plan in these contests should probably change as time is and we give more information.

00:55:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, speaking of time, and speaking of the word optimal, do you find that there is an optimal time? This is kind of a different, different definition of optimal in a way, but an optal time to draft in bestball Mania? Because bestball Mania obviously starts in May, it'll go through most of August, and then how do you choose which time that you're sort of investing the most, or you know, obviously there's a time constraint here where you know, we all have lives. We can't just like say, oh, I'm going to draft all one hundred and fifty teams on July thirtieth and that's it. But have you found that there is a time that you favor a little bit more like are you drafting more teams late in the summer early in the summer. I, personally, my habit pattern is to kind of break them up into thirds, and I break it up into these time pockets of information.

00:56:13
Speaker 4: So I call the draft cycle the we talked about it earlier, the total time that we can draft in a particular contest. I break that draft cycle up into individual draft windows, and I do that based on the amount of information that we have. So draft window one is like from when the contest opens till the start of training camp, which we're about coming up to. It's very very flat the amount of information that we have. You know, we see you'll see stuff from OTA's You'll see it's like, Okay, they're running routes with no pads against nobody, So what information does that give me? So it's kind of a flat information bucket. There. The second information bucket or draft window that I utilize is the opening of camp to the start of the preseason. We get more information, we see things like injuries, we see things like depth chart breakdowns. And then my third draft window or bucket is the end of training camp or the start the startup preseason until the start of the NFL season, So a short three and a half weeks this year now with the with the removal of one of those preseason games. So the reason I do that is because there's different information. If there's different information, again back to this idea that we should probably be more dynamic in our draft strategies. What I've seen is that the field is kind of flat in the way that they are drafting, and it, as we just talked about, so much is changing in those different draft windows. That so too should our draft strategies. So if I'm a casual, if I'm if I've allocated, hey, I'm going to throw twenty five entries into the BBM, I would most likely want to save those entries until I have the most information, so until my draft window three after the startup preseason. If I understand stand that these cycles are different and that my strategy should change. I probably want to be even spread in that in those three draft windows last year, I I maxed the BBM on like June twentieth or something like super early Wow, because I noticed that the field was kind of flat in their draft strategies and they were not embracing enough variants because of all the uncertainty in the early draft window. So by doing that, like I just exponentially increased the variants associated with my portfolio. And yeah, I didn't win anything, Like my advancement rate was super low, but I understood that, like you have to be willing to embrace more variants when we have few less information. So, like, the answer to that question is like it it depends on each person. It depends on how you are comfortable managing variants, how you are comfortable embracing things that the field might not be embracing. If you are like this player that kind of just wants information and then make the best decision with that information, it's probably best to wait until like the second week of August through the start of the NFL season to draft your contest, like your entire portfolio. Yeah, if you have this like understanding that we should be changing how we approach things with fewer or less information more variants, like, yeah, it's totally fine to draft early a big portion of your portfolio. So it all depends on the individual and kind of how your personal understanding of the theoretics behind all this are and kind of how you are your comfort level with embracing variants.

00:59:42
Speaker 1: I would say, yeah, I love that answer.

00:59:44
Speaker 3: I probably should have asked this when we were talking about running back builds, But I've seen you talk about it a little bit, and I think you tweeted about it a little bit as well, And we've seen others sort of embrace this strategy and this tactic in these earlier Best Ball drafts. I guess it's not as early anymore because we're mid jely at this point, but I've seen the three running back builds and basically be done at the position maybe get you know a guy in the sixteenth or seventeenth or something like that. But what are your thoughts on that, Like, do you think that obviously any strategy can quote unquote work, you know, if things break the right way, But do you think that it's plus ev do you think it's optimal? You know, our human optimal if you will, you know, to get those three running backs at the start of your draft.

01:00:29
Speaker 4: I would argue that the optimal path on the game tree probably or has a good chance of being three running backs. It's probably two to three quarterbacks, two to three tight ends, three running backs, and the rest wide receivers. But again there's that discussion of, like, we don't necessarily need optimal to win these things, and we don't know what optimal is on the game tree, and there's one optimal path, so you would have to get like the exact three running backs that they held the entire season. So like, while that is probably optimal, the variance associated with that is off the charts, like you And the other thing I think that we need to understand with this discussion is we talk in EV terms because that's all we can control. It removes variance. But the tertiary piece to that is EV assumes an infinite sample size.

01:01:22
Speaker 1: We don't have that.

01:01:23
Speaker 4: We have the sample size of one, and in the entire existence of best Ball we have a sample size of eight something like that, and in the entire existence of Underdog we have a sample size of four. So like that's not enough to draw these like sweeping conclusions. But people, and this is kind of the typical response I get when I post a three running back build, and I do it for a very specific reason that we need to kind of open our minds to, like we don't really know what optimal true optimal is at this point. But when the responses I get are like nice things for paying the I can never win, It's like, well, if this sample were infinite, this would win at a higher rate than anything else. But we know that, like, yeah, it hasn't won yet. Okay, we have a sample size of four. So there's a very very nuanced discussion to be had there. It is probably optimal to draft three running backs, only the variants associated with that because the injury rates at the position and the fact that we could see a coach mid season. You know, look at Dallas last year is like they entered the season like, we want to be a run first team, and up until their bye week, they tried to do that. Then they got to their bye week and they reassessed. They're like, hey, this isn't working. We're just gonna air it out, and then they like set historical rates for pass rates the rest of the year. So like that can also change. That's part of variance. Like, so there's so much that we can't control that. Yes, from a practical standpoint, the most evy that we can get from a roster is having five running backs. Creation away from that, we have to realize that that is going to incur a hit to ev But can we do things within that to like make up that ev through these exploits, And that's kind of what's fun to explore.

01:03:13
Speaker 1: I think, Yeah, yeah, it makes makes a lot of sense.

01:03:15
Speaker 3: I mean, look, if you were to tell me who the best three running backs, you know, in terms of the full season production and playoff production, if you told me who they were, I'd go with the three running back a build using those guys you know all day long, like you said, that would be that would be the path to be able to have that optimal lineup.

01:03:33
Speaker 1: But it's asking a lot and it's also asking a lot, you know.

01:03:37
Speaker 3: I mean, this is this is more of like a subjective human psychology thing, but like, what are the odds that they would all just be first round, second round, third round type?

01:03:45
Speaker 4: You know what I mean?

01:03:46
Speaker 3: Like like just those backs in the way that a lot of people draft in that way there's always going to be like a Zach Moss or some middle round back that ends up being what that dude.

01:03:55
Speaker 1: Would do, would be yeah last year, right, yeah, yeah exactly.

01:03:58
Speaker 4: The other thing is like we're humans are very very bad at predicting the future. Yes, yeah, so like yeah, like Sam laporta eleven twelfth rounder last year all off season, Karen Williams was undrafted and then came into like the sixteenth round Tank Dell. Like the list goes on from last year. We also have to like be honest with the fact that like that was probably a ninety nine percent outcome having five to six players in the last four or five rounds that are every year, every week contributors. That was probably like that might not happen again for next one hundred years, right, So using that data point of last season as like a determining factor in how we base our decisions this year is probably also a mistake. So and like that, that discussion goes on and on and on, like into this this discussion of variants versus optimal But yeah, that's kind of there's there's just so much that we can't control, and we are very very bad at predicting future.

01:05:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, one hundred percent. Let's not quarterback a little bit.

01:05:04
Speaker 3: It feels like the market at quarterback is relatively efficient in terms of how we would project, you know, in terms of the positional ranks, not necessarily like where they go in the draft, but just you know, within the position and where they get drafted. Is there really a way like me personally, and I'm asking this selfishly as someone who's becoming a best ball brow and hopefully will be a best ball brow by the end of the summer. Yeah, I've found that my quarterback portfolio is incredibly flat, right, Like I just I don't have strong takes, and it's really just driven by stacking and the guy like I have a lot of Will Levis, for instance. It's not like I'm sitting here thinking that Will Levis is going to light the world on fire. I just really like where DeAndre Hopkins goes in drafts, right, and so I pair him up and he's a very cheap way of getting a stack. How are you if you are differentiating at quarterback or is it a similar thing for you where you're kind of just getting the guys who work with your running backs and wide receivers and tight ends.

01:06:00
Speaker 4: I think that's that's a very nuanced discussion as well. But I'll kind of try and make it as concise as possible. If we had an infinite sample size, like the theoretical optimal way to draft would be as flat as possible at every position, and we would look for we would just look to leverage variants in our favor. That would also assume that, like our portfolio could also be infinite, So we know we don't have that. We know we have a sample size of one this season. We know that we have a limited amount of entries that we can put in these So at the quarterback position, it is easiest to be flatter or more in line with that optimal theory because we know that the position as a whole is more condensed as far as scoring goes. It is flatter scoring position. So theoretically that is the optimal way to approach that I kind of because the field is kind of taking this approach of being more flat. I mean, you look at like people who are screenshotting exposures like eighty ninety percent frequency, you're going to see like they have everybody between sixteen and six percent. Like that is that's a fairly accurate assumption of the field right at that point, So I actually go the other way with it because the field is so flat. That is one of the exploits that I can introduce is like, let me take stands on the quarterback position, and I do that by not looking at season long rankings, production or projections, because that is going to be again on an infinite sample, very very flat. What I'm doing is I'm looking for weekly range of outcomes because this is a weekly game and the field is generally treating these things through the lens of season long. We I mean, how is ADP first, How is the first iteration of ADP introduced? Well, they take season long projections and they rank them, and then there's your ADP, and then we see human bias and influence those and shift around ADP. But basically, I guess, without going too much further into this rabbit hole, because it's if we could talk for hours and hours JJ is I will take some more exploitative stances personally at the quarterback position because we know it to be flat, and we know that the field kind of understands that, and we're getting into the realm of a theoretical concept called Nash equilibrium, which is this area of game theory where no one player can gain an appreciable edge over another by anything in that certain aspect of the game. So probably the position that is approaching Nash equilibrium, or getting as close as possible to it is at quarterback. Secondary would probably be running back because we understand all the variants and how we gain value. And then like wide receiver and tight end are like way down the road, like trying to play. So if the field is drafting one way at a high frequency at quarterback and running back, that is where theoretically I'm going to take the most of my stances. So for me, I look at weekly range of outcomes at the position, and that'll give me tie breakers between guys like for example, Kyler Murray, Dak Prescott, Joe Burrow. I mean they're all back to back to back in ADP at the quarterback position right Well, Kyler Murray historically is being drafted in season long where he is because he has a dope floor. I mean, he has like four to six points that you can bank on weekly just from rushing. But where do quarterbacks derive their value in fantasy from? And I did a study on this and I found that the highest quarreladive function of production at the quarterback position is total touchdowns, not like rushing production, not yards on the ground, not rushing scores, total touchdowns. And in order, there's a magic number of touchdowns in order to have a chance at the overall QB one in a season. The magic number is forty touchdowns. So there are very few quarterbacks now that have a chance to score forty touchdowns. And I mentioned Joe Burrow and Dak Prescott and Kyler Murray in that discussion because Kyler has almost what sub five percent chance of scoring forty touchdowns this year, whereas like Joe Burrow and Dak Prescott probably have fifty percent chance of scoring forty touchdowns. So from a weekly perspective, it's much more likely that we're going to see more spike weeks. And again this is best ball, So much more spike weeks coming from guys like Joe Burrow and Dak Prescott compared to guys like Kyler Murray. And the way that I kind of drive this this discussion home is look at Anthony Richardson last year. Everybody says, well, he led the league in fantasy points at quarterback per four quarters played. It's like, yes, he did. He also scored seven touchdowns. Like, he scored seven touchdowns and just over like two games worth of play, and that's crazy. That's probably not going to be replicated this season. But like, yeah, a four of those touchdowns came on the ground, like this dude, Yeah, this dude was balling. So that whole discussion kind of comes down to that will kind of be the deciding factor or a major portion of my decision making process. A quarterback is weekly range of outcomes, and in order for a quarterback to have a high weekly ceiling, which is so much more important to us in best Ball, he's got to score touchdowns. So if we could say, if you want to like dumb this down as simple as possible, like draft quarterbacks on offenses that are expected to be in the top ten in the league, that's it.

01:11:51
Speaker 1: Yeah.

01:11:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, And it also leads to the discussion I kind of want to touch on this because I think it's really important. I talk about this in my draft guy, and I've talked about it for a few years now. Is I do think there's a misunderstanding of mobility and quarterback rushing in fantasy football where it is good, it's a very good thing. But like when Rich Reebar wrote about the Konami Code back in twenty thirteen, it was about Tim Tebow and Terrelle Pryor, and it was about this idea that those guys are horrific passers who can still be fantasy relevant because of their rushing. That is a is a floor argument, right, it's not a ceiling argument. Right. The difference now with like Josh Allen or even Lamar because Lamar obviously has this has had these like crazy touchdown rate seasons and stuff as a passer, is that they're good passers too. Like that that's what's really elevating these guys to being elite. And the difference, you know, I think there is a very very big difference here between you can correct me if I'm wrong, between season long and best ball. And this has been a really big thing for me to like kind of switch because I'm obviously I got season long brain and I'm always thinking about it from that perspective. But I think we verse about this a little bit on Twitter the one day, but I think it's really really important for people to recognize that in season long, the mobility the quarterback rushing.

01:13:09
Speaker 1: What's so great about that is the predictability aspect of it.

01:13:12
Speaker 3: We know going into a season and then going into a game, who those quarterbacks are going to be every every year. And that's why the the r squared between ADP and points per game at quarterback has just increased, you know, over the last five years versus the previous five, previous ten. Yeah, but the thing that needs to be uh sort of reconciled with best ball is this idea that that the rushing quarterbacks don't necessarily have a higher weekly ceiling than the than the immobile the pocket passers do. And then on top of that, if the pocket passer, you know, if they if his team scores three touchdowns and all three of those touchdowns are on the ground and that pocket passer sucks that one day, well.

01:13:53
Speaker 1: You have a backup plan.

01:13:54
Speaker 3: You you have another quarterback that could hypothetically step in and give you some production in a two quarter bill because you're not building with one quarterback and you don't have that security blanket when you're playing in your season long league. And so the floor at quarterback actually does matter a little bit more in season long because you're not able to have that security blanket, am I do you? Is that what you've looked at and what you've researched and would you agree with that?

01:14:17
Speaker 4: Yeah, one hundred percent. When we're making lineup decisions, we value floor at a different weight than when we're talking about best ball, where the computer is generating our lineup. It is so much more beneficial to think about the top twenty percent of a player's weekly range of outcomes in best ball because that now contributes. I mean, look a look at last year on Drafters, which is a cumulative scoring format. You look at like the top ten rosters that were in that format, like six of the top ten rosters last year had Devon Chan because he had a fifty one point game.

01:14:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, like that's you.

01:14:55
Speaker 4: It's hard to make the up that Like in a in a season long perspective, you play against Devon a Chan, you lost that week. That's that's overcomeable, Like you can overcome that in a best ball function or a format, Like it's really really hard to overcome a fifty one burger in a in across a seventeen week sample where we're adding up all the points that you score. So yeah, it's it's it's definitely different. And if we want to like put a bow on this discussion of mobility, like Lamar Jackson owns like a the high well, Lamar Jackson and Joe Burrow are the two quarterbacks that own the highest rate of overall QB one performances over the last three seasons. The if you look at Lamar Jackson and just compare like his blow up weeks, he scored four or five touchdowns every time he was the overall quarterback one, So like, yeah, he two of those might have come on the ground in a given week, but like, you have to score touchdowns at quarterback in order to you can reach these higher end outcomes in a range of outcomes. So like I love Will Levis too. I am. He is in my top three in exposure, and like we talked about, like my top three is not sixteen percent, it is thirty percent. The reason why is I project the Tennessee Titans to outperform their current projections. That's a very different discussion than saying, like why are you not drafting Drake May at the same frequency. It's like, yeah, he is mobile. He's set the NCAA record for like rushing score all that stuff. Like, notwithstanding, the New England Patriots have probably a top five defense on paper. They have so many changes on their offensive side of the ball. They have a head coach who is coming from the defensive side his first year as a head coach. They have new coordinator, Like, there's so much going on there that like, we shouldn't expect New England to vastly outperform from an offensive perspective, whereas like Tennessee getting like a Kyle Shanahan coaching tree guy or a by extension, Gary Kubiat coaching tree guy. That can lead to a situation where they're passing more and they're they're in the red zone more and they have an opportunity to score more touchdowns. So yeah, like I view, I just break it all down into weekly range of outcomes and then kind of factor that in I think at a heavier rate than the field is doing.

01:17:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense.

01:17:31
Speaker 3: I'm glad we were able to talk about it because I know we went back and forth a little bit. Now now it's like very clear and the whole time we were agree, which is great.

01:17:38
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's hard to get that, you know, in two hundred and sixty characters or like three a thread of tweets like let's jam about it.

01:17:47
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly.

01:17:48
Speaker 3: Oh may ask us, what do you think is the biggest mistake that you see best ball players make.

01:17:55
Speaker 4: I think it's being too rigid, And we talked about it a little bit earlier, where so much has changed throughout the draft cycle, and then even more is gonna change, like once we get to the season and us as humans like trying to feign this idea of control in a contest that, as we already talked about the game tree borderline infinite potential outcomes and now borderline infinite variance. I mean, like, look at last season, like thirty percent of the quarterbacks across the NFL got injured and we're out for extended periods of time. Yeah, and that's at the position that has the lowest historic injury rates. So like, there's so much we can't control, so thinking that we can control more than we can and being too rigid and saying I'm going to draft every team zero RB or I'm gonna draft every team hero running back. This is the way you win. I think is the biggest mistake because there's just so many variables.

01:18:48
Speaker 1: Yeah.

01:18:48
Speaker 4: Yeah.

01:18:49
Speaker 3: The other thing too, is that when you go with the same team structure over and over again, that means that your player portfolio is going to look more and more like you're not You're not gonna get the expode like you might like. Like one of my flaws right now is the fourth round I haven't just because of team build, like I want more Isaiah Pacheco than I've drafted.

01:19:07
Speaker 1: You know, it's just that, And now.

01:19:09
Speaker 3: Obviously is ADP's rising, so it's becoming you know, more and more difficult, of course, but you know, it's just one of the things where, like you go, you get in a rhythm of doing the same team builds, and then you realize, oh, there's a player that I actually like, you know, independently of everything else, who I'm just kind of forcing out because I'm I'm forcing myself to go with a tight an elite tight end or something in that range. And I think that's really really important. I think it speaks to the rigidity that you're that you're talking to, you know, with that answer, one last thing before I let you go, we haven't done that much in terms of player takes. This has been much much more game theory driven. So I'll just ask you give me a handful of players two, three who you seem to be drafting most right now and that you think you'll have high exposure to this year.

01:19:54
Speaker 4: My highest exposure through those three hundred and fifty drafts Ish and I looked this up before, is Cooper Cup at about sixty percent, which seems crazy. Two weeks ago I was seventy percent. So it's come down a little bit Cooper Cup, John Ou Smith, and Khalif Raymond. And the kind of the the similarities of those three is they're all on top expected offenses and the Rams, the Dolphins and the Lions, and they're all expected to be on the field almost every single play, and they're all depressed in ADP up to this point, I think the gap between Pukuaku and Cooper Cup is way bigger than it should be. I think they should be both treated kind of as like the one A as pass catchers instead of a clear one uh and two. John Ou Smith is like he was sought out by Mike McDaniel. He brought him in for a specific reason. Like yes, up to this the two year sample we have in Miami, Mike McDaniel has utilized, has been highly concentrated, has been like Tyreek Hill and Jalen Waddle and then the running back room. But like, what else did they have? They never had a wide receiver three. They never had a tight end because Mike Kasicki is not him. Sorry, right, And so like now they have a wide receiver three and they've got two They drafted one in Malik Washington, and they have another that they went out and signed in OBJ And they have a tight end that they went out and got for a very specific reason. I think that reason is he is extremely big, he's extremely fast, and he's extremely athletic. Like, okay, Mike McDaniel, go have fun with that. So yeah, I want to kind of be early on that. And then with Khalif Raymond, like it's four players that are being drafted position or skill position players in on the Lions. It's like you have am and Ra, you have Sam Laporta, and then you have the two running backs. It's like Khalif Raymond's probably going to be on the field at an eighty five percent clip, He's probably going to be in a route at a ninety ninety five percent clip. So I just want to buy into that with a last round pick that doesn't mean really much of anything.

01:22:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, I love the Cliff Raymond call out. He's someone that to me, it's like if you need a little bit more exposure to that stack, especially that Week seventeen game, very easy click.

01:22:14
Speaker 1: And then the John new thing.

01:22:15
Speaker 3: I got pushback from my John who love on another show because people were talking about MIKEA. Sicki and saying, you know, it's like, oh, well they had Mikeasiki. Why didn't they use Kasiki more? Because they've been dead last and tight end target shair in each of the last two years. Yeah, I see it totally. Like John WU Smith is not the same tight end as Mikeasicki is. Mikeasicki's a slot receiver essentially, you know, playing tight end.

01:22:37
Speaker 1: John W. New Smith is much more of the traditional type.

01:22:39
Speaker 3: And I think that McDaniel is going after him because of the act ability. Like that's what the whole offense is sort of predicated on, right, and like that's what John whu Smith does. So well, you get Tyreek and Jalen Waddle getting vertical, you get John new Smith underneath a little bit to create that yack. I mean it makes a ton of sense from a fit perspective, and again it's' ackable. It's such a good offense, all that good stuff, and he's going late. So I'm totally with you on all of those players. Mark, this has been awesome. People are gonna love this. Let everyone know where they can find you and all this awesome game theory work that you're doing.

01:23:13
Speaker 4: Yeah, we just launched a well. I primarily work at One Week's Season. It is DFS centric, but last year I headed up the initial launch of our Best Ball Plus product, which Best Ball obviously, and so we're in year two of that. Head on over to One Week's Season. Get signed up for Best Ball Plus if you're looking for some more theoretic stuff. I also work at Player Profiler, roto World and Fantasy Points, so check out my work there as well.

01:23:38
Speaker 3: All over the place, Man, I really really appreciate your time. As always, everyone, you can check out the Late Round Draft Guide over on lateround dot com. Make sure you're taking advantage of the promo code Late Round over on Underdog. You will get a free late Round Draft guide when you do so, and when you sign up with that promo code and make a deposit otherwise, Thank you for tuning in