380: Mailbag 6/5/20

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Speaker 1: This is the Late Podcast with your host JJ Zachera JJ zacher reson What's up Everyone. It's JJ Zachares and the editor in chief at fandle and at number five dot com in this episode three hundred and eighty of the Late Round Podcast with many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast Network. Thanks for tuning in. For those of you who have listened to this show for a while, you know my approach at the tight end position is to either spend up or don't spend it all. And generally I'm going to go with more of a late round tight end approach because of the opportunity cost involved in getting a tight end early. But I recognize the benefits of an early round tight end. The positional edge is there. It's not as easy to stream tight end as it is at quarterback, let's say, partially because the position isn't as predictable. There are real mathematical reasons that support going with a tight end early. There are mathematical reasons to go with one late though, too, like the lack of opportunity cost, the fact that we see late round tight ends emerge pretty frequently, and the overall supply and demand of the position you're only starting one of them in your fantasy football lineup each week. To that last point, the question I keep getting relates to that point. It relates to supply and demand. I'm going to read an email that I got this week to kick off the show because I think it's important for fantasy purposes. It's certainly not important for real life purposes, because fantasy football is pretty meaningless, but it's important to fantasy football. But the email says, Hey, JJ first love the show. Thanks, I must listen for any fantasy player. I appreciate that I sent you a response to last week's mailback episode on Twitter about viewing tight end merely as a pass catcher and lumped in with wide receivers. When drafting, you consistently mention if you reach for players at a single play position, you tend to lose value elsewhere. I specifically referenced Travis Kelcey. In terms of twenty nineteen PPR scoring, he was tied with Alan Robinson wide receiver eight and points at wide receivers with two hundred and fifty four. If I lump the two positions into one as a whole, I can view Kelsey as a pass catcher one after, I might start a draft running back running back, considering the large drop in tight end production in comparison to wide receiver twenty nineteen, tight end twelve roughly equaled wide receiver fifty. If I have this view, I secure a higher score at the one position without losing too much at another, and coming closer to achieving what you refer to as the perfect roster All. This is, of course relative considering the demand in roster positions one versus standard two to three a wide receiver. But I would love to hear your take. Thanks again, Cody. Okay, so here's the problem I have with what's being said here. First off, simply adding tight ends to the wide receiver pool isn't so simple. It's a completely different positional slot. Let's just assume a league has no flex spots. You can't flex the tight end position, and you're starting two wide receivers in that league. That means you need twice as many wide receivers as you do tight ends. You should be concerned with how a tight end scores versus how his counterparts score, and how a wide receiver scores versus his Because Travis Kelce scored as many points, as Alan Robinson last year, is kind of irrelevant. I say kind of because there's some relevance when you look at leagues where you can flex players or you can flex the tight end position. But it's not like Travis Kelsey is ever going to not be in your tight end spot. It's more about what it does to the demand of tight ends. They become more valuable when you can flex them because hypothetically more of them can be used. But again, let's think of this more simplistically. You start two wide receivers and you start one tight end. You should be concerned with how Kelsey does versus the rest of his position, not against the wide receiver position. And it's true that Travis Kelcey may give you a larger point advantage versus a baseline player than the top wide receiver or maybe the fourth best wide receiver. That differential is larger, but you also can't ignore that because of supply and demand, because most leagues start just one tight end, more usable tight ends are available late in drafts. What this does is it stretches the advantage that Kelsey has across more rounds, and it increases the opportunity cost then of getting Travis Kelcey. Think of it this way. Let's assume we had perfect information and that we drafted every position perfectly every year. That means when you got Travis Kelcey at thirteenth overall this year, you knew you were getting the tight end one, the tight end one. If you've got Aaron Jones fifteenth overall is the RB nine, you were getting the ninth best running back. The thing is, the baseline player at running back or wide receiver is going to get drafted far before the baseline player at tight end. So that means that the points that you're foregoing when you get a tight end earlier, they're bunched up together more than when you don't. So it's not just that Kelcey versus a baseline player has to outscore a running back or a wide receiver with the same ADP versus theirs. It's that he has to do it even more because of where you're actually drafting those baseline players. And again we're working with perfect information here. Now I get the argument that Kelsey has more bankable production. So now forget the perfect information side of things, we know Travis Kelcey is likely to be the tight end one. But we also see a little less correlation between ADP and final season result at tight end than we do at running back and wide receiver, meaning those late round tight ends are hitting at a higher rate. But I also think this entire question is based on a hypothetical. Hypothetically speaking, if you can go running back running back to start your draft and then get Travis Kelcey in the third round, sure, I'm all for that. That's not where he's being drafted. Though he's currently gotten ADP at the one two turn over on Bestballtens dot com. Your opportunity cost there is really high. That was my point on the show last week. Right now, according to my rankings, which premium members can get over on number five dot com, I have Kelsey twentieth overall, and I think I can push him up slightly too. I'd have there's no problem taking Kelsey in the middle of the second round, after some of the higher end wide receivers are off the board. I just can't get behind a one two turn pick. That may seem like not a huge difference, but it is. Every selection in the early rounds, every pick from one pick to the next, is significant, So don't get it twisted. I'm not that far off of ADP with early round tight ends. I just want people to really understand the reason that you'd get that tight end early. We shouldn't be merging positions. We should look at the point differential, which is what the basics of value based drafting tells us. But as we do that, we can't lose sight of where other tight ends are getting drafted. That's what opportunity costs is all about. It's getting and understanding the bigger picture, all while asking yourself what am I missing out on when I make this pick. Now, before we get into the other questions this week, I want to let you guys know that UFC two point fifty is coming up on June sixth, and there's no better way to bet the fights than on FanDuel's sportsbook. Right now, users can get an exclusive odds boost when you sign up. Just join fandel Sportsbook and they'll boost Amanda Noon's odds to beat Felicia Spencer from minus six fifty to plus two to fifty. That means you can bet up to twenty dollars on the favorite to win up to fifty dollars to claim your exclusive odds boost just sign up for Fandel's sportsbook and deposit to see the odds. Must be twenty one years or older and president In New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Indiana, West Virginia, and Colorado, first online wager only except in Colorado. Must wager and designated offer market ten dollars minimum first deposit required, fifty dollars max bonus gambling problem called one in hundred gambler and Indiana call one in hundred and nine with it. In West Virginia visit www dot one hundred gambler dot net, and in Colorado call one in hundred five to two two forty seven hundred. The first question this week or I guess? The second question this week says JJ. I've been seeing a lot of people out there recommending to trade back and out of the first round in a dynasty startup. A lot of those same people will also say, in any two for one deal, it's better to be getting the best player in the deal. How can these both be true? Steven, I think there are a couple of reasons for this. First off, you could argue that two for one deals are much more advantageous in redraft leagues because in redraft leagues your waiver wire is deeper, and your depth matters less. Your depth not only matters more in dynasty because you can't rely as much on the waiver wire, but you're using those spots to also hope that players develop into something more meaningful for your fantasy roster. It's a longer term game. People are trading down because they're seeing that Number one, there are some large tiers at the top of dynasty drafts. If you can trade down, you might still be able to get a player from that same tier than where you'd originally be drafting from. But that's the less important piece, in my opinion. The bigger thing is that number two, Dynasty assets are inherently more unpredictable than redraft assets are. In redraft leagues, you're strictly worried about one season. My projection for Ezekiel Elliott in twenty twenty is going to be much better than my projection for Ezekiel Elliott across three or four years. There's just more that can happen to change the landscape over a large period of time, And to this point, it depends on team build. If you're not in win now mode and if you're drafting for maybe a year or two from now, and you're just trying to get assets that appreciate in value, you have less of a need to draft the unicorns in fantasy football. I'm not advocating that you trade out of a spot where you can get Christian McCaffrey. I'm more so saying that if you're at like pick eleven, trading back can realistically net you two players with just as high of a ceiling as what you'd get from pick eleven. At the very least, you can get two players whose value will increase year over year. So that's the logic behind it. This next question is from at Holden Radio. Where to draft zach Ertz? So I talked about Ertz negatively so much on this show in the past. I don't think he's bad, but I think he's been pretty fortunate to see the volume that he's seen over the last couple of years. Given the injuries in that offense, We've seen his target share drop pretty significantly when guys like Golden Tate and now Sean Jeffrey have been healthy. So I'm lower than adp for zach Ertz. I see he's going thirty seventh over on Best Ball drafts, which may skew heavier tight end early, but I've got a more as a fifth rounder. My projections just aren't super bowlish. But if there are injuries like we've seen the last couple of years, he could thrive as he has at times the last couple of seasons, especially two years ago. This question says, hey, JJ, love the show and love your pause game. Thanks. You talk a lot about upside and finding values in players that are too low and avoiding players that are too high. But who are your must have players that you love that are priced just right in redraft this year f City. The first guy who jumped into my head for this question is Calvin Ridley. It feels a lot like the Chris Godwin situation that we had last year, where god was entering a situation where things were really really looking up. The offense favored him, there wasn't that much competition, and he was really good himself. And while Godwin's ADP rose, a lot of people were borderlined sick at that rise. They thought he was just way too expensive. We're going to see Calvin Ridley's ADP go up and up and up with so many fantasy analysts on him. This year, and I'm one of those analysts. Ridley looks great in my projections, so I think that he's properly priced as someone who I would be taking. The same goes for Miles Sanders. A lot of people are on Sanders. His ADP seems high to a lot of people because of how Doug Peterson has handled that backfield during his time in Philadelphia, But as I mentioned a lot on the show, he's also not had a player like Miles Sanders. Doug Peterson has not had a Miles Sanders like back I don't think it's unreasonable to think that Sanders has the potential to be a top five running back this year, and all the while, maybe you're a little bit worried about his floor projection, but if he's healthy, it's not like he's gonna disappear, or at least it's hard to imagine that. So I think both guys, despite the hype or price, properly and I think that you could add Deontay Johnson to that group as well. I know your question wasn't related to hyped players, but I thought taking it from that angle might be more impactful. This NAXT question is from at you Boy, Nikki G, do you have any insight on any league winning running backs and wide receivers that would mainly go undrafted in standard ten to twelve man leagues. I was just curious after the breakdown in the last episode. Thanks, So our sample of league winners that have gone undrafted is really, really small. Obviously, this depends on how big your league is. Going undrafted in a ten team fifteen round draft is different than going undrafted in a twelve team twenty round draft. More players are drafted in that second league. But the ADP that I worked with went pretty deep, but we still had just two running backs who were league winners who went after pick two hundred and just one wide receiver. We actually only had one wide receiver who went after pick one hundred and seventy, so our sample size isn't very big to draw any real conclusions. You can get winnable weeks from waiver wire guys, of course, but I looked at things from the perspective of who's giving you an elite difference making performance across the entire season, and they're rarely coming from the waiver wire, and even rarely coming from the late rounds. Like I talked about on that episode. This last question says, hello again, JJ, Hello. I was wondering if you look back on previous drafts in leagues to try and glean what made team successful. If so, what do you look for and preparing for the next draft. I won my ten team standard league last year after picking Lamar Jackson in the ninth round, but I think just as important were the four rock solid contributors I picked in rounds one through six? Is it that simple picking all chalky early, getting guys with the highest potential points per game averages in rounds one through six, and then going for the highest ceiling after that hoping one of them hits. Thanks for the thoughtful analysis read in Wisconsin. You have to ask yourself what your process is for doing what you're trying to do here. Like let me reread the final paragraph of this question. It says, is it that simple picking all chok early, getting guys with the highest potential points per game averages and rounds one through six, then going for the highest ceiling after that hoping one of them hits. It's definitely not that simple. It's not simple to just get guys with the highest potential points per game averages and rounds one through six and then going with the highest ceiling players after that. Like, yeah, that's good in theory, that's a good idea. Hypothetically, we all want that, but you have to define what that means. How are you finding the highest potential points per game averages? How are you finding and defining ceiling? Those are the types of questions we need to be asking. That's why the Late Round podcast is laid out and covers what it covers, because fantasy analysis often stops at the player level, when the entire your goal should be to fine processes in order to increase your chances of hitting on those difference making players. That's what strategy is. The idea of I'll just draft the right players is not wrong, but how are you going to get there? It's not sustainable if you're throwing darts each year. You need a process. So yes, I look back and see what I did right and what I did wrong with my teams. But I'm not just looking at the individual players that I drafted. I'm looking at my process and how I got there. This last question is from at JR Underscore Stats. Should Saquon Barkley be the consensus one h two in redraft coming off an injury, and receptions seemed to take a dip once Jones took over last year with a tough opening schedule for the Giants, I see Barkley as a potential by candidate about the month into the season, thoughts, so his target chair per game wasn't as strong last year as it was during his rookie season, but it was likely going to be hard for him to maintain that rookie season target chair to begin with. I don't think that means that Barkley's all of a sudden worthy of the one oh two, and that's where I do have him. He's my RB two. I don't know what else to say, aside from the fact that we have to remember that he was banged up last season and we saw his ceiling down the stretch. He averaged over thirty fantasy points per game over the final three weeks of the season. We know he has just as high as a ceiling as any other player in fantasy football. Now, to your point about opening up with a tough schedule, while I understand that point totally, ask yourself, who's going to trade away Saquon Barkley because of some down performances. I think approaching things that way is a lot easier said than done. Chances are, if you pass on Barkley with the intent to trade for him, you're not gonna have Saquon Barkley this year. Maybe you're in a league with people who are totally reactionary, but I think in most instances, people are going to be fairly rational when it comes to one of the best players in fantasy football. So I would draft Saquon Barkley at the one oh two and I would not bank on trading for him. That's gonna do for today's show, though. Thanks to all of you guys for listening. If you've yet subscribe to the Late Round podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and don't forget to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks everyone, spread love, be empathetic, and I'll talk to you on Monday.