667: Risers and Fallers

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Speaker 1: Hey everyone. In the following episode, you're gonna hear me talk about the Washington Commander's backfield. After recording the episode, it was reported that Commander's running back Brian Robinson was shot multiple times in an attempted robbery. Not much more is known about the situation right now, aside from the fact that it fortunately does not sound life threatening for Robinson, but I wanted to be mindful of the fact that I did talk about him on today's episode. Clearly, this game that we play doesn't really matter all that much when something like this happens. So let's all send love Brian Robinson's way and hope for a speedy recovery. This is the lad Podcast with with your host JJ zacher Retha j J zacher reson. What's up everyone. It's JJ zacher Eason in this episode six hundred and sixty seven of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel. Thanks for tuning in. It's pretty wild, but starting next week, I'll be in my weekly in season routine. For those of you who are new to the show, Each week looks like the following On Tuesday morning, you'll get a fifteen transaction show where I talk about players I'm buying, selling, adding, and dropping in fantasy football. On Wednesday, it's a ten Trends episode where I talk about ten different statistical things happening across the league. Thursday's a sleeper show where I talk through players rostered in very few leagues who you could hypothetically start that week. And then on Friday you get the Mailback episode that's just for the podcast too. For anyone who's part of the Late Round Fantasy Football Patreon, you're also getting weekly rankings Waiver Wire Q and AS, and a Start Sick Q and A each Sunday morning, among other things. But before I start doing these weekly things, I like to do this episode that you're listening to right now. It's on risers and fallers, and I don't just mean players who are rising up or falling down draft boards by ADP. I do this episode to sort of update you guys on any player takes that may have changed over the last month or two for me, because some of you may think that I feel a certain way about a player or situation when I actually don't. My opinions change with new information. Sometimes I get things wrong, and when I learn more about those things, I change my approach. That's how you win in fantasy football. That's how you win in most things. You're open minded, you change your mind with new information. There's no reason to be stubborn when your goal is to win, not just be right about something that you said really early on in the off season. So today I'm going to talk about a handful of players. So I view a little bit differently in fantasy now than I did earlier this offseason. Hopefully it's helpless that we're all on the same page entering the season. Now, before we get into the risers and followers, I want to remind you about the Established the Run Draft kit. Established to Run has rankings for any fantasy format you might be playing in, and they continuously update as news breaks. You also get access to Evan Silva's top one fifty and along with it a change log that you can read to see why players are moving up and down his draft board. It's a great way to make sure you understand why players are ranked where they are, and the goal is to help you make better decisions, not tell you who to pick. And if you're in a best ball draft, their strategy, rankings and insight can help you out a ton with roster construction. Established Run gives you a different perspective on fantasy football than I do. I think the combination of my work in THEIRS can help make this draft season a successful one. So head over to Established Run dot com and purchase their draft kit, and when you do, use promo code JJ for a ten percent discount. That's promo code Jay J. Also, college football fans, the twenty twenty two season is here, and Fandel and Exfinity have teamed up to give you a chance to put your college football knowledge to the test, introducing Exfinity Unbeatable Picks, a free to play contest centered around college football's biggest games. Here's how it works. Head to Fandel dot com, slash Free Slash Contests, slash Exfinity hyphen CFB and make your predictions on which team will win their Week one matchup. If your picks prove to be unbeatable, you'll win a share of twenty thousand dollars in cash prizes courtesy of Exfinity. Exfinity Unbeatable Picks is set to begin on September third at twelve pm Eastern, so make sure to head Tofandle dot com Slash, Free Slash Contests, Slash Exfinity, hyphen CFB, and make your picks today, no purchase necessary. Let's kick things off today with Breeze Hall. I did that episode in June. It was episode six hundred and forty three on beating the running back dead zone. Breeze Hall is a dead zone running back this year, and the episode showed us that rookie running backs, especially, they do a good job at exceeding ADP expectation when they're in the dead zone, at least compared to other players who have emerged from the dead zone. And I think the logic behind that is that these dead zone running backs are dead zone running backs because people force the issue and they're drafting more on volume instead of talent. They see a player like Mike Davis last year, and he was set to see a ton of work, or so people thought, but it was still Mike Davis. I mean, Mike Davis is fine and he seems like a good dude, but he's not a special running back. Breeese Hall had great college production. He can catch passes out of the backfield, He had good draft capital. He looked really good in my prospect model He's not being drafted where someone like Naji Harris got drafted last year is likely because of Michael Carter, and that's pretty valid in my opinion. That's why I'm talking about him today. I was higher on Hall in July than I am today, and my tune has changed a little bit because I think the Jets really are going to use Michael Carter more than I expected. Some people were on that earlier than I was, but I'm adjusting my priors. With that being said, I think Hall is still a good redraft pick. Rookie running backs tend to perform better during the second half of the season, and if you believe in the talent, then you believe that he can battle through to get more work. Not only that, but the back half schedule for the Jets is much much better than the front half, and we should put more weight into what happens in the fantasy playoffs, even if it's more unpredictable. In weeks fifteen through seventeen, the Jets get the Lions, the Jags, and the Seahawks. So I'm hoping that Hall's ADP continues to slip a little bit because even though there's likely going to be a committee. I think he's the right kind of second half bet to make. Sometimes you start to realize how you feel about a player when you do a lot of drafting. That's what's going on with me when it comes to Naji Harris. Harris is a good running back who's gonna see a ton of volume this year as he did last year. But I've realized that there's just other running backs that I like a little bit more who often get drafted after him. I think it's fine to put those guys in the same tier, but I've just been underweight with Naji Harris this year. That's forced him down my rankings, something that late round Fantasy football patrons have probably noticed over the last month. It's highly doubtful that we see Harris with as many touches this year as he had last year. He averaged twenty two point four touches per game last year. That was twenty eighth highest of any running back since twenty eleven, and by touches, I'm referring to attempts plus receptions. Now, seventy nine running backs have hit twenty or more touches per game since twenty eleven. Again, Naji Harris had twenty two point four of those seventy nine, sixty one of them have next season data while playing eight or more games. So we're looking at all running backs here since twenty eleven with twenty or more touches per game, and then the qualifiers are that they played a season after they hit that twenty touches per game average and that they also played eight games in that following season. Just forty two point six percent of those running backs were able to hit twenty touches per game again the following year, and only fourteen of the sixty one improved on their average. It's just tough to see that kind of volume year after year, and I'm mostly worried about his receiving volume. Two, Ben Roethlisberger is gone, and the Steelers are almost definitely not going to be the same type of pass heavy team that they've been the last two years with Roethlisberger. Only Tampa Bay has more pass attempts over the last two seasons than Pittsburgh. With a more mobile quarterback, we may see fewer dumpoffs, and Najie Harris led the NFL and targets from behind the line of scrimmage last year. According to Pro Football focus. The offensive line still has question marks, and if Kenny Piickett eventually gets the starting gig, We've seen rookie quarterbacks be bad news for their weapons in fantasy football, so I don't mind Nause. But he seems like more of a floor play than a ceiling one, and when the opportunity costing getting him is a lot of high ceiling running backs, it makes me want to pass on him. But if you want safety, I can understand still going after Nase Harris. The Atlanta Falcons backfield is pretty confusing to me, at least the way that people have reacted to it. I've made note on this show that Cordero Patterson was tough for me to draft just given what we've seen from running backs his age historically. I know that he's a little bit different, but it doesn't mean that the trend is irrelevant. He's an older player, and we don't see older players come out of the middle rounds and exceed expectation by a whole lot of points very often. The Falcons offense might not be very good either, and Patterson himself slowed down last year and has touchdown regression coming his way. With that being said, it turns out my ranking of Patterson is actually one running spot higher than where the consensus has him. Who would have thought, Like I said, I think the market has reacted oddly to this backfield. I still think Tyler Algier is a fine dart throw light in drafts because he's a bigger, bodied guy who can sort of do it all. One of his comps in my model was James Connor, but no one has run away with his job. This isn't like some situation where he came in and just dominated and commanded touches, or it seems like that's the case at least, so I'm surprised that Patterson's ADP hasn't really changed. Yes, history doesn't favor middle round running backs like Melvin Gordon or Kareem Hunt and Corduero Patterson this year because they're past their fifth year in their NFL careers, but they can still be values even if they're not league winners. And that's sort of how I view the trio. I'm not banking on them being a league winning player, but in some builds, like a hero RB roster construction or a zero RB roster construction, they do make some sense. There are a lot of good players who are relevant for fantasy the purposes who suffered bad injuries at the tail end of last year, and the most important one is probably Chris Godwin. At the start of July, I wasn't very into Godwin because there were reports that he might not be fully one hundred percent until like October or even November. But things seem to have progressed well and doctor Edwin pouldofs at Fantasy Points. He shared a lot of data in the past showing us that acl recovery and really recovery in general, it can go a lot better for younger elite players than the alternative, and that's exactly what you have with Godwin. Now. I'm a wide receiver heavy drafter after getting a running back or two in the first two rounds, so Godwin is typically my wide receiver three or my wide receiver four if I get him, which I think is kind of perfect for this situation. So I've gone from not really being into Godwin to being into him at least at cost, because if he was perfectly healthy, he'd be drafted two or three rounds earlier, and that's pretty significant. In those early rounds. It feels like I have to talk about the Washington backfield today, doesn't it. Antonio Gibson wasn't a void for me from the start. I know that sounds like I'm just patting myself on the back, and I guess I kind of am for just saying that. But I'm saying that because even despite that fact, he's still following in my rankings. Brian Robinson was a solid prospect. My model wasn't in love with him or anything. But this is what I concluded about Robinson in this year's Prospect Guide, which was written the day after the NFL Draft. I said, quote, Robinson should be viewed as a handcuff for now, but the potential is there if Washington loses trust in Gibson. There are only a handful of players in this class who profile is a traditional three down back. He's one of them. Washington keeps showing us that they don't really trust Antonio Gibson. They re signed Jad McKissick, they spent a Day two pick on Robinson. Ron Riveraz compared this backfield to the ones that he had in Carolina with Jonathan Stewart and D'Angelo Williams. These split backfields, and then of course there's a special team stuff. I don't think the fact that Gibson could be a returner for them is that big of a deal, but it's still something building into this narrative of Washington just not really liking Antonio Gibson. Now. I fully expect a healthy Gibson to still lead this backfield in touches this year, but I've not drafted him in a single managed season long league so far, and I've gotten Brian Robinson in plenty, so you can tell where I'm leaning from a value standpoint. It's a backfield that's almost definitely going to be a headache. And as much as I've been a fan of Antonio Gibson the player, and as much as I think that he's more explosive than Robinson, we can't deny that Robinson's look good in the preseason, and that this coaching staff has told us time and time again through their actions and through their words, that Gibson is likely not their bellcal George Pickens has arrived. He's moved up my draft board dramatically. Not because I solely judge a player's ability by how he does in camp or how he does in the preseason, but Pickens was a high variance prospect. I said as much as my prospect guide. One of his comps in my model was T. Higgins, and this is what I said about that comp in the guide. I said, quote, Pickens is one of the few pass catchers in this class who can play a traditional X role and produce alpha like numbers in fantasy football. That's where the T. Higgins comparison comes into play. We just can't make the assumption that he gets there given the incomplete profile. Overall, consider Pickens a medium risk, high rewards selection in rookie drafts. We just didn't fully know with Pickens. Injuries sort of derailed his college career, but the instant we saw him flashing, it was easy to start moving him up draft boards because that ceiling, given his frame, given his speed, it's absolutely there. Pickens is going to be a threat immediately. I wouldn't be surprised if he beats out Chase Claypole for working two wide receiver sets right away, and then Claypool works as the main slot man when the Steelers have three wide receivers on the field. It honestly makes sense. Given Claypool's struggles at times last season, the situation could be a lot better for Pickens. Yes, but then is there and when you're getting to the latter parts of those middle rounds and into the late rounds, you should buy into that. Speaking of talent, the last player I want to bring up today is Damian Pierce. Like Pickens, he was someone who didn't have a totally complete production profile in college. But unlike Pickens, it wasn't because of injury. It was because his team didn't give him work. Typically, volume does correlate to NFL success. That is, successful NFL running backs usually had a decent amount of volume in college because good players get the ball. Pierce didn't have that. He saw one hundred and six and one hundred rush attempts during his junior and senior seasons, respectively, and he never hit twenty receptions. I will say though his best season reception share was absolutely fine. It wasn't great, but it was fine. Florida has done some really weird things usage wise with players in the past like good players. So if all the schools for Damian Pierce to go to where he saw few attempts, it's not a surprise that it was Florida. He also did really well per rush, ranking the seventy fifth percentile last year in yards after contact per attempt. Pro Football Focus actually gave him the highest rushing grade in college football. Running Back is more difficult to judge through my model than wide receiver is. And I know this mathematically too, because coaching decisions drive volume, and that drives production. And if a team is a rational like Florida might have been, that can torpedo how a player looks in the model. It doesn't make the model bad, it's just something to understand. But Pierce landed in a spot where he should be able to see the majority of the team's early down work right away. And while Rex burke Head is probably going to be their main receiving back, which is an underrated role on a bad team, Pierce could dig into that work too. His pass catching ability wasn't that much of a question mark in my opinion coming out. I actually had Pierce as a player to target when my draft guide launched on July first. Then I pulled back on that a little bit in mid July and so that he was just a regular value. But then a few weeks ago I made him player to target once again. So I'm into Pierce this season. I've been into Pierce this season. He's the right kind of bet to make. He's a young middle round running back who's the RB one on his team by ADP and he's got a decent enough backbone of a profile to be good at the NFL level. And he's looked awesome so far. That's gonna know for today's show, though. Thanks to all of you for listening. If you've got to subscribed to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcast can be found, and don't forget to follow me on Twitter at LATEROUNDQB. Remember to check out lateround dot com, join the Patreon by the draft guide, and check out the newsletter, which is completely free. Remember that's where the fifteen transactions article is gonna go each week, and the first one drops next week. Thanks everyone, I'll talk to you later in the week.