989: Post-Draft Rookie Rankings

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Speaker 1: This is the Late Podcast with your host JJ zacheris JJ zacher.

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Speaker 2: Reson what's up everyone.

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Speaker 1: It's JJ zachar Esen in this episode nine and eighty nine of the Late Round Fantasy Football Podcast. Thanks for tuning in. It's not too late to purchase the Late Round Prospect Guide. I know a lot of you are in the middle of your rookie drafts. Some of you haven't even started yours yet. The Late Round Prospect Guide is perfect for you. In it, you get one hundred and sixty five pages of information. There's detail on what goes into both my prospect and year two models. There are eighty prospect profiles, tons of year two player profiles, zap model scores for every player, and so much more. People have been loving the enhancements of this year's guide. I think you will too. I put a lot of time and effort into it. You can get your copy right now over on lateround dot com for nineteen ninety nine. And while you're on the site, at the very least, do me a solid subscribe the newsletter. It's absolutely free. That's all over on lateround dot com. Now inside that Prospect Guide, you're gonna find my rankings, and since the final version of that guide was published, the rankings haven't really changed. Sometimes you get small changes here and there, but I feel decent about where things are at today. I'm going to talk through some of those rankings, and unlike the pre draft version of this episode, rather than just going through the first round of single quarterback rookie drafts or the top twelve, I'm gonna talk through my top five tiers of drafts, which this year it actually includes sixteen players. I'll talk about why I ranked the players where I rank them, and I'll give more detail in some of the game theory things that are going on through my head during rookie drafts this year. So without further ado, let's get to that first tier. Ashton Genty started as the one oh one. He's still the one oh one, and he's still in a tier of his own. The ZAP Model absolutely adores Ashin Genty. When it was all said and done this year, gent ended up with the second highest score in the model's history, behind only Christian McCaffrey.

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Speaker 2: And that's at running back.

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Speaker 1: As I talked about a couple of weeks ago on the pre draft ranking show, he pretty much just checks every single box and then some. The only question mark you might have with Ashton Genty is that he's a little bit shorter, but that's not even something that goes into the ZAP model, and Genty landed in a spot for great immediate production the Raiders' offense. Sure there's some question marks, but they address quarterback. With Gino Smith in the backfield, doesn't have any existing running backs that we need to be concerned with, not that we would be anyway with someone like Ashton Genty. Genty came out as the RB five in my early projections. I think he's a clear first round pick in redraft leagues this year. I know some of you are probably rolling your eyes when I said that, because how could you possibly draft a rookie that high.

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Speaker 2: In your redraft league?

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Speaker 1: But rookies with that kind of ADP historically have actually done quite well. We just remember the misses like Clyde Edwards Hilaire, and objectively, Ashton Genty is not Clyde Edwards Laire. Now, after the gent tier in single quarterback leagues, I have three players. The first in this tier is a Marian Hampton. I talked a lot about Hampton leading up to the draft and how he seemed to have an edge over the non genty backs within the ZAP model, and post draft that was also the case. He had a ZAP score of ninety eight point two, which set him above the Ohio State backs. Hampton got first round draft capital, and as I said in the Prospect Guide, history really does favor him. Five of the nine bottom half first round running backs since twenty eleven have given us RB one seasons in the NFL, and that trend continues when you look at the early parts of round two. Prior to this year's draft, just four running backs with top one hundred draft capital had a speed score of one hundred and ten or better and a best season reception share above fifteen percent. DeMarco Murray's one of them, Todd Gurley's another one, and then there's also Saquon Barkley and Jumier Gibbs, a mari and Hampton is now on that list.

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Speaker 2: Now, if you want to look at the.

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Speaker 1: Downside with Hampton, it's probably short term and situation based. Now everyone is rightfully excited about the general fit with the Chargers.

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Speaker 2: Greg Roman loves his powerbacks.

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Speaker 1: That's exactly what he's getting in Amri and Hampton, but the Chargers did sign Naji Harris this offseason, and like I talked about during the free agency period, Greg roman offenses are better for a running backs floor than his ceiling.

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Speaker 2: They'll get a lot of ground.

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Speaker 1: Game work, but his backfields have averaged a target share rank of twenty six point three during his time as offensive coordinator, meaning his backfields they ranked twenty six to twenty seventh in target share on average, and Romans actually never had a team backfield that ranked in the top ten in PPR scoring. No, I don't think that means that you avoid a mari and Hampton or anything. I think he's a near lock to give you an RB two season across his first three years.

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Speaker 2: In the league.

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Speaker 1: I'm just trying to give you both sides of the argument here. For me, though, given his Zapp's go and what we've seen historically from players like this, he's my one ZHO two. But look, I wouldn't fault you if you went with Travis Hunter or Ted McMillan in that spot, two players with top ten draft capital. Travis Hunter ended up having the best score in the ZAT model up wide receiver, largely due to draft capital I've talked about on the show in the past. I won't get too far into the details here, but his collegiate production it was just good, not great. His breakout score was well below average for a first round wide receiver, and his per route run profile that wasn't anything special either. With that being said, I've been open, I've been transparent about being totally fine with kind of throwing some of that out because Hunter is such a unique prospect. He not only played in an offense that featured a whole lot of wide receivers in the field at once, which is naturally going to lower some of these numbers, but he also didn't prepare like a normal wide receiver would.

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Speaker 2: There's reason as to.

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Speaker 1: Why his numbers are lacking a little bit more than any other wide receiver that we've arguably ever seen. The landing spot in Jacksonville, it's really not a bad one in my eyes. I see people saying, but he can't be the team's top wide receiver because they already have Brian Thomas.

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Speaker 2: But projections don't really work that way.

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Speaker 1: It's about target share opportunity, and there's plenty of that for the Jags in the short term. Just look at their depth chart. Not only that, but we see multiple teammates with strong fantasy seasons frequently a wide receiver. Since twenty eleven, we've averaged four to five instances per year where we've had teammate wide receivers ranking the top twenty four in PPR points per game. That's with a minimum eight games played. When looking at top twelve seasons, we get one or two of them per year. To assume that Hunter can't live up to expectation and especially provide spiked weeks, that's a little bit foolish when you consider the type of prospect that we're working with here, And if you're buying into Liam Cohen's offense the way I think you should, then.

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Speaker 2: There's even more reason to be bullish.

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Speaker 1: Now, obviously we don't know exactly how much wide receiver Travis Hunters going to play, but it sounds like the Jags see him primarily as an offensive weapon who can then help on the defensive side of the ball. That's exactly what we needed to hear from a fantasy perspective. And then, like I said, Tedo McMillan, he's also in this tier. If you want to go with Ted over Travis Hunter. I have absolutely zero problem with that. That's why they're in the same tier. But McMillan lands in Carolina where we should feel pretty good about his immediate upside. Xavier Lagett was an overvalued prospect according to the ZAP model. That's not just hindsight bias and his year two score. It's not anything special either. Jalen Coker he had an undervalued rookie season, but he likely wasn't going to be some super high volume earner. And then Adam Thielen he's gonna be thirty five years old in August. McMillan can play all over the formation. He immediately becomes the most talented player in that offense, and to me, it's not really close. So while there may be somewhat of a ramp up period to start the year, I fully expect Tedoro McMillan to be the top target earner Carolina by the time the season ends. Now, with McMillan the player, I've said it all offseason, I don't think he's quite on the same level as like Drake London, and that's a player he often gets comped to. And there is this too. Prior to this year's draft, the only wide outs in the ZAP model who are selected in the top ten with a breakout score below ninety. McMillan's is eighty three, which is kind of average for a first round wide receiver. But those top ten wide receivers were Taevon Austin, Kevin White, Corey Davis, John Ross, and Mike Williams.

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Speaker 2: That's not great.

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Speaker 1: That's not who we want Ted McMillan to be associated with. And I've seen some people take that stat and kind of run with it. That's not the intent though. That's not why I shared it. I think it's important to see all sides of these players analytically. I want to talk about the pros and the cons. Don't look at breakout scorers being more predictive than the player's actual ZAP score. And McMillan's ZAPP scorer is ninety six, which is extremely good. He's in the Elite producer category and players from that category give US wide receiver one in wide receiver two seasons at a very very high rate. I just want people to know that McMillan isn't the kind of lock that I felt with someone like Drake London.

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Speaker 2: He can still hit that ceiling, but I think.

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Speaker 1: There are more flaws to his overall analytical profile. Overall, though, he's a fantastic prospect and he landed in a pretty solid spot in Carolina. Now, to be honest with you guys, when I published my post draft rankings in the Prospect Guide, which I did immediately at the end of the draft, I almost put Trayvon Henderson in his own tier. He was pretty close to Tier two, if not in Tier two. He's a really fun prospect, and admittedly he's the type of player that I usually fall in love with from a fantasy football perspective. Now, clearly I held off on that. I placed him here in Tier three with his Ohio State teammate quin Shawn Judkins, but I do prefer Henderson more than Judkins, and the main obvious reason is pass catching. Now, Henderson to receive the score of ninety four point one in the ZAP model, he was just outside the elite producer category. That's because he had a really strong eighty six point four breakout score. He was able to produce and receiving yards per team pass attempt at an early age, but also at a big program, and that program while This isn't in the model. That program had crazy wide receiver competition, and yet he was still seeing a lot of receiving yards. That's how good Traveon Henderson is. The weird thing, though, is that, according to zapp model, he had a really great breakout score while not having a high reception share. Usually those two are gonna go hand in hand, they're gonna work together. When a player's catching a lot of passes in his offense, you'd expect him to have a high receiving yards per team pass attempt mark.

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Speaker 2: That's what breakout score is based off of.

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Speaker 1: But Henderson his best season reception share was only nine point seven percent. But here's the thing, and this is not archetype commentary, but it's really interesting to me. Since twenty eleven, we've had just five running backs with top fifty draft capital who had a best season reception share below eleven percent but had a breakout score above eighty. One of them was David Wilson, who retired early because of a neck injury, but then there was also Nick Chubb, Josh Jacobs, Jonathan Taylor, and Kenneth Walker. Again, those guys aren't stylistically like Traveon Henderson, maybe aside from David Wilson, but they definitely have been great in fantasy football. I'm also intrigued by Henderson with Josh McDaniels in New England because McDaniels he's no stranger to using running backs as pass catchers. In New England, from twenty twelve to twenty twenty one, the Patriots had an average RNGTH of ninth and running back target share. Now, some of that is obviously going to be personnel driven, but things were above average in Vegas when he was coaching there too. Ramandre Stevenson is likely going to still be involved in some way, but you're drafting Henderson to give you pass catching an explosive play upside. I think, honestly, you could think of someone like James Cook, but more receiving upside than what James Cook has been providing.

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Speaker 2: There's a lot to like now. Quin Shawn Judkins.

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Speaker 1: He fell to a great landing spot in Cleveland where there's potential to see two hundred and twenty.

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Speaker 2: Plus carries right away.

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Speaker 1: The Browns taking Dylan Samson later in the draft, it actually doesn't bother me that much, mostly because it signals that Samson is likely more of a change of pays back given his size and his explosive ability. In my opinion, the better pairing with Judkins would have been someone like Jaden Blue because he has more of that pass catching profile. But Samson kind of makes me feel a little bit better about Judkins because now Judkins might seem more receiving than we initially thought. But I do think the receiving work is still a big question mark. Judkins had below average marks in both reception share and breakout score within the Zapp model. We almost never see running backs with this kind of profile consistently hit double digit percentage target shares at the next level, so I think there's a lot of safety with Judkins. He should see a lot of work on the ground, but he's not the type of back that I usually go all in with because the receiving profile just isn't very strong. Honestly, I've been using Jonathan Taylor as sort of the upside com for Quinchewn Judkins in terms of what his workload might look like. But look at who he's replacing in Cleveland, I could see his ceiling looking more like what we saw on in Nick Chubb. The problem is that Nick Chubb was so good in fantasy football because he was unbelievably efficient, and we can't bank on that with Quincheon Judkins. Judkins, though he had a ZAP score of ninety three point four, given his draft capital, I think he's a good prospect. Don't take any of this the wrong way. I just prefer Traveon Henderson more and I think Judkins is sort of an easier guy to draft and more of a standard league or a points per carry league, not a full PPR one. Now I'm following the ZAP model with this next tier. I'm placing just one guy in this tier. It's a Mechagbuca. This really does feel like another Jackson Smith and Jigba situation. You get a slot player out of Ohio State going in a similar area of the draft. But that slot player, in my opinion, has the talent to be both an inside and outside receiver, but he's going to a team with established veterans that makes his short term outlook a lot cloudier. Now it's clearly worked out for JSN, and I have to throw this caveat out there too. The ZAP model likes JSN a decent bit more than Agbuka. So things working out for JSN, it doesn't mean it's going to automatically work out for a mechag Buka. But Aguka going to Tampa Bay is a little bit awkward. I talked about this last week, but the Bucks don't seem to be a team who cares that much about how a wide out was deployed in college. They took Jalen McMillan last year, who was a slot player in college. They didn't use him there at all in year one, even when Chris Godwin got hurt, and now they're doing the same thing with a mechag Buka. But I do think that Agbuka can play on the outside. His per route run numbers were strong from there. The pick was likely insurance.

00:15:01
Speaker 2: For the Bucks.

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Speaker 1: They took a valuable position and it gives them good depth and more flexibility for the future because Mike Evans he's going to be a free agent next year, and what if Chris Godwin isn't as healed as they think, what if he's not as ready as they think right now in May. This is just a situation where I don't want to overthink the landing spot too much. Of course, we'd rather have Igbuca get selected to a team with a more wide open depth chart, but there's plenty of time for development. Similar to what we've seen with JSN, things can change fast.

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Speaker 2: I don't want Landing.

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Speaker 1: Spot to dictate so much, because at the end of the day, Agbuka has a zapp score that's pretty close to Tech McMillan's. He's an incredibly good prospect, and incredibly good prospects create their own opportunity more often than not. Now after Igbuka is a tier that I'm calling to choose your own adventure tier because it's sort of conveniently formed and it allows you to kind of take the player that your team needs the most. And usually I'm not drafting based on need, I'm drafting based on value. But I will draft based on need when I have a tier like this. But this tier includes Matthew Golden, then Luther Burden, than Caleb Johnson, and then RJ. Harvey, all in the same tier, interchangeable in rank. The way, I kind of see this as the following. If you want a wide receiver and you're looking for immediate production, I would bet on Matthew Golden over Luther Burden, but if you can be patient, I'd go Burden over Golden because I think Burden is the better player now, similar to running back, if you're looking at immediate production, RJ. Harvey looks like the guy. But if you can be patient, I think it's fine going with Caleb Johnson. You know your league's economy better than I do. Some leagues are going to value that immediate production more than others. Well, let's talk about these players for a second. I talked through Golden last week, mentioning how Green Bay did this because they have a lot of solid but not great wider receivers on that roster, and also Christian Watson. He's gonna miss most of the twenty twenty five season and he's almost done with his rookie deal.

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Speaker 2: Romeo Dubbs he's on the.

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Speaker 1: Last year of his rookie deal too, So to get a wide out who can stretch the field on the perimeter, it's a perfect fit for Matthew Golden. He's definitely got a lot of analytical question marks, but he at least fell to the right spot now with Luther Burden. A lot of people are turned off by the fact that DJ Moore and Romadonze are going to be in Chicago for the immediate future just given their contracts. But I don't think Ben Johnson and company make this selection without some sort of plan. Now, Burton's not Aman Ross Saint Brown, but he did play a lot in the slot in college, and he can do a ton after the catch. My guess is that Ben Johnson had this vision of using Burden there in eleven personnel, and I could see a scenario where production wise, from a production standpoint, we see something with Luther Burden similar to what we've seen.

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Speaker 2: With Jaden Reed in Green Bay.

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Speaker 1: There's just the upside with Burden that maybe he develops into something more because the talent is definitely there. Look, at the end of the day, the Zap Model gave Luther Burden a ninety five point two score. That's not a common thing to see from a Day two pick. He's still in the elite producer category because the model is in love with him, probably two in love with him, but the model does love him. There have been five other Day two wide receivers in the Zap Model's history to get elite producer status. Jordan Matthews, Jujus Smith, Schuster Tyler Boyd, Marquise Lee, and Elijah Moore. You might hear those names and think, oh, man, that's not very good company for Luther Burden, But I strongly disagree. When you look at day two wide receiver hit rates compared to that list, that list is much better than the norm. Three of those five players gave fantasy managers at least one wide receiver two season across their first three years in the league. I'm still in on Luther Burden. I actually might like Burden Moore because I think the landing spot is decent while others don't. That's causing him to fall in rookie drafts. Now with the running backs, I honestly would say that I'm like fifty to fifty between Caleb Johnson and RJ.

00:19:10
Speaker 2: Harvey.

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Speaker 1: If you're in a lot of leagues and you have the chance to pick one of these guys, I'd split it in half.

00:19:17
Speaker 2: Let me just lay out.

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Speaker 1: Though, what's going on in my brain right now. Harvey scored worse in the model than Johnson despite having better draft capital, and a portion of that is because of his age. Now, I'm not necessarily as concerned about the age thing as the ZAP model is. But with that being said, we can't lose sight of the fact that there are reasons that age matters in the ZAP model. One of those reasons is, obviously, we want these guys to stick around longer, so younger players get that edge. If a player is twenty one years old versus twenty four years old, we're gonna prefer the twenty one year old player. But the other thing to really keep in mind is that when a player sticks around college and he plays more seasons, he has an opportunity to post better numbers overall. This is something that I talked about with Matthew Golden and his early declare status. His early declare status matters because he wasn't around for that fourth year of college to improve his numbers. How do we know Matthew Golden wouldn't have dominated as a senior. We have no idea, and the same thing kind of works in reverse. One of the inputs in the running back ZAP model is best season reception share.

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Speaker 2: When you look at RJ.

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Speaker 1: Harvey's output in that statistic, his top season happened in twenty twenty four. He reached an eleven point one percent pro rated share in his three seasons prior to that, he was in the eight to nine percent range, and typically that kind of range without a good breakout score, which Harvey's breakout score is nothing special.

00:20:42
Speaker 2: It's a red flag when you have that combination.

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Speaker 1: But he had that extra year and it bumped up his reception share to a more respectable range. So ages being factored in not just because we want players who are generally younger, but because older players should have more robust production profiles and to account for that, age is then factored into the equation. Now, Harvey was something that I didn't really mind during the pre draft process. He comped the Chase Brown in the ZAP model, and he's got the explosiveness to do well in an offense that's very favorable for running backs. Not only is that depth chart easily beatable, but the Broncos offensive line should be one of the better units in the league over the coming seasons. So I'm in on Harvey Situationally, it's awesome and he has amazing big playability and the Broncos clearly wanted him. Where I disagree with some of the Harvey takes or the people will say that age doesn't matter, I still think that it does just from a profile and analytical standpoint, And where I don't agree is where some people are comping him to like Alvin Kamara and Darren Sproles, these pass catching running backs who did well in Sean Payton's offenses. He's not a Sprosy like back and he's not Alvin Kamara either. Kamara and the ZAT model had a ninety two breakout score and a best season pro rated RESCIS option share of almost twenty percent. That's almost double of what we typically saw from RJ. Harvey, and Kamara actually didn't test as this really explosive athlete RJ.

00:22:10
Speaker 2: Harvey did. To me, if you want to comp RJ.

00:22:13
Speaker 1: Harvey to one of those older running backs in the Sean Payton offense, it's probably more Pierre Thomas. But honestly, I think this is a situation where we just throw out those historical comps. This is a brand new situation. There are brand new running backs. We don't need comps for absolutely everything. The Broncos they said, hey, look we like RJ.

00:22:34
Speaker 2: Harvey. We think he's explosive and he can do a lot for our offense.

00:22:38
Speaker 1: And to me, he's clearly the best all around back in that backfield right now. Now, the reason I think Caleb Johnson is still in this conversation is because he checks a lot of boxes as well, and I think his landing spot is perfect for him and his skill set. What's funny is the top two comps in the ZAP model for Caleb Johnson, and these are analytical comps, but they were Le'Veon Bell and James con two other running backs who were drafted by Mike Tomlin Steelers. Now, I'm not as concerned as some are about Johnson and his explosiveness. Yes, he didn't run the type of forty that we would love to see, but at his size, his speed score was still above average and his explosive run rate in college across his career was right in line with quin Shawn Judkins and it wasn't that far off from Amari and Hampton.

00:23:25
Speaker 2: We can sit here and say that he's just a Naji.

00:23:27
Speaker 1: Harris replacement and that's all we're gonna get from him, but I would argue that number one, that's actually not a terrible thing. Look at how Naji Harris performed in fantasy football. If we get that from a third round pick, we'll take that all day long, But number two, why can't Caleb Johnson be better? Part of the problem with Naji Harris was that he literally didn't see any explosiveness transferred to the NFL. We can't assume that's gonna happen with Caleb Johnson, and I've seen takes that Johnson's situation isn't gonna be good in Pits because it's Arthur Smith and they don't have a quarterback. Again, I disagree. Arthur Smith is far worse for pass catchers than he has running backs. Pittsburgh was fourteenth and PPR scoring as a backfield last year, and that was on a team that was bottom seven in offensive touchdowns. We've seen that before in Artie smith offenses. Derrick Henry was great in Tennessee with Arthur Smith. They ring seventeenth and tenth and PPR scoring as a backfield during his two years there as offensive coordinator. Then he went to Atlanta that was from twenty twenty one to twenty twenty three and with questionable quarterback play, similar to what we have in Pittsburgh right now. The Falcons backfields were fourteenth, twelfth, and fourth and PPR scoring. I'm not sitting here trying to sell you guys that the Pittsburgh Steelers' offense is going to be great and that this is a better situation than R. J.

00:24:51
Speaker 2: Harvey's in Denver.

00:24:52
Speaker 1: It's not, but the Arthur Smith offense argument is far worse at pass catcher than it is at running back. Johnson is gonna be the be big bodied back in that backfield, and he's gonna split that backfield with Jaalen Warren more than likely in twenty twenty five. But there's obviously injury upside, and if Johnson shows out and he does well, he could be a bell cow as early as twenty twenty six because Jalen Warren is a free agent and I think Johnson has a real shot to get to that point. He was labeled as a low risk profile in the ZAP model, which means the model saw him as undervalued versus where he was actually drafted by the Steelers. Prior to Johnson getting picked up by Pittsburgh, the ZAP model had seen eleven running backs drafted in Round three with a low risk draft capital delta. Ten of those eleven have had the opportunity to play three or more NFL seasons. And of those ten, half of them gave Fantasy managers at least one RB two season, and one of their first three years in the league, four of them were RB ones. Now, that fifty percent hit rate of getting RB two seasons, that's far better than the fifteen percent rate that we get from all other round three backs. There's a lot to like with Caleb Johnson. He's not as flashy as RJ.

00:26:07
Speaker 2: Harvey.

00:26:07
Speaker 1: And again I don't have a strong preference in which direction you go here, just know that I'm pretty high on both players from a dynasty perspective. We'll close out today's show with one more tier. This is where I'm placing the first round tight ends in Colston Lovelin and Tyler Warren. The tight end zat Model likes both Loveland and Warren, placing them in the Elite Producer category. It does prefer Loveland, though, he's just the fifth first round tight end in the model's history, which dates back to twenty fifteen, to have a career yards per route run rate above two. The other players are David and Joku, Kyle Pitts, Dalton Kincaid, and Brock Bauers, and Kinkaid being on that list is kind of an outlier because he was more than two years older than anyone else on that list when he was coming out, So really Loveland's comping closer to the other dudes on that list, not Dalton Kinkaid. Now neither one of these tight ends tests. That's definitely a bummer, But the fact that they still score high in the ZAP model with just average testing inputs, it's a really good sign for their potential. Draft Capital is doing a lot of the heavy lifting. But just consider this. The only other tight end since twenty fifteen to get drafted in the top half of the first round have been TJ. Hockinson, Kyle Pitts, and Brock Bauers. All of them gave us a tight end one performance across their first three years. I know Kyle Pitts has fallen off, but let's not forget that rookie season. My only hesitation in drafting Lovelin and Warren is that Situationally, I'm not sure we see monster numbers in year one, so I think strictly from a game theory perspective, you'll have an ability to buy them in twenty twenty six if need be. But both of them are great prospects. Now, this is also where I have Jaden Higgins and Trey Harris. When I had Matt Harmon on to do the wide Receiver episode pre draft, he mentioned how he saw Jaden Higgins as more of a power slot, not necessarcessarily as a true number one X receiver. And while the Texans did draft Jalen nol around later to play in the slot, maybe not year one, but twin Ley's compete with Christian Kirk. I do think Higgins landing in a spot with an established alpha like Nico Collins is probably the best thing for his fantasy value. The ZA model gave Higgins a score of eighty eight point one, and that's about eight points ahead of Trey Harris. But I think Higgins is a more volatile profile than Harris and a more volatile situation because situationally, I think you have to prefer where Harris landed. He compliments Lad McConkey really well over there in LA. He can take on some of the perimeter stuff and he can basically just step in and replace what they lost in Josh Palmer. And given what we know about Quentin Johnston, he's got a better ceiling than QJ right now. Immediately, Harris is older, and that's a red flag, but his late career production was so good that his breakout score was still eighty three point four, which is really strong.

00:29:02
Speaker 2: There have only been two.

00:29:04
Speaker 1: Round two wide receivers with breakout scores above seventy in the ZAP Model who were twenty three or older when drafted, Sterling Shepherd and Jaden Reid. Neither of them have really flopped at the next level, so that's good to know. So I'm signing with the model here. Overall, I'm putting Jayden Higgins ahead of Trey Harris, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if Trey Harris is better. That's why they're both in this tier. And then I have one more player in this tier, and this is probably the biggest surprise of this entire episode. It's Bashall Tuton. Now, typically I wouldn't elevate a Day three running back into a tier like this, but the ZAP Model just really, really really likes ba Shall Tutan, and I have to be transparent because I literally did an episode on the Truth about Day three picks like a month ago. I'm separating these players by day one, Day two day three to make it more consumable for you. The model itself is not looking at things that way. It's looking at the raw overall pick, and Tuten went one hundred and fourth overall in the draft.

00:30:06
Speaker 2: That's still pretty good draft capital, and it's extremely close to day two. That's why his.

00:30:12
Speaker 1: Score is still a very impressive eighty four point nine. It's basically right in line with Caleb Johnson and RJ.

00:30:19
Speaker 2: Harvey.

00:30:20
Speaker 1: Now, the initial landing spot for Teutin may not seem great, but similar to what I talked about last week, there's a new coaching staff and they made a selection with a relatively high pick in this draft, and this coaching staff has zero ties the existing players on this roster.

00:30:35
Speaker 2: Travis Etn seems very likely to.

00:30:38
Speaker 1: Be gone next year as a free agent, And while Tank Bigsby did have a much better year two, I don't think any of us would sit here and say that he's someone who can't be leapfrogged on a depth chart. Tuten brings an insane amount of speed and explosiveness in that backfield, and honestly, he's not a terrible pairing with Tank Bigsby, who's more of that bruiser type. So not only could Tuton be a handcuff who gets more work as the season goes on this year, but if he flashes, if the ZAP model really shows up, then he could be the one A and a Liam Cohen backfield next year. This is another instance where I'm trying to ground myself with what the ZAP model is saying. Maybe it's inflating Tuton's ability, But if you remember at the very start of this whole entire process, when I talked about running backs who produced like studs in college back at the beginning of February, maybe even late January, who was the surprise name that popped up in that list? Do you guys remember it was Beshaw Tuton. It's fitting to end draft season talking about Tuton because a lot of the data that I work with, it's pointed to him being a good player throughout this entire process, and now he could have a shot to shine in a promising offense. That's it for today's show, though thanks to all of you for listening. If you had subscribed to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by swarching for it pretty much anywhere podcast can be found and follow me on Twitter and on Blue Sky at Late Round QB. Thanks for listening everyone. I've got a Late Round Perspectives episode dropping later this week. Hope you give that a listen. Otherwise, have a great one.