877: Pre-Draft Rookie Rankings

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Speaker 1: This is the Label Podcast with your host JJ Zacherthis JJ zacherth what's up everyone, It's JJ Zacharyesen in this episode eight hundred and seventy seven of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by Underdog Fantasy. Thanks for tuning in. I'm not the biggest rankings guy in the world. I know people want them, I know I have to do them, but I think fantasy football is far more than just a set of rankings. There's so much detail that gets missed with rankings. I always tear mine up to give them a little bit more context. But even still, rankings aren't explaining range of outcomes. They're not explaining the type of player that you're analyzing. They're not really explaining strategy and roster construction. As long as we're on the same page with that, with that stuff, then I'm down to talk about rankings because they can give you a general idea of where my head's at or where another analyst heads AT's nothing wrong with that. Now, as all of you know, the NFL Draft kicks off on Thursday, and as I do each year, I'm gonna talk through my pre draft rookie rankings, at least through the first round of non superflex rookie drafts. This is sort of a primer for the higher end players in the class, so you know how I'm feeling about them before we officially learn draft capital and landing spots. I'll then do an episode with my post draft top twelve, and then I'll happen a couple of weeks after the draft. Now, I know you might want my rankings before that point in time, and you can get them in a couple of places. I'll have them post to them the Late Round Fantasy Football Patreon soon after the draft, and they'll be in the updated Prospect Guide too. The guide's updates will be released Saturday night after the draft is over, so you'll have information ready to go for your rookie drafts. You can check out the guide over on lateround dot com before get into the rankings. Florida residents, I've got some exciting news for you. Underdog Fantasy went live with Champions Mode and you definitely should check it out. Just pick higher or lower on your favorite players, climb the leaderboard and went up to one hundred x in a single night. Check it all out at Underdog Fantasy dot com or download the Underdog app, and when you sign up, make sure to use promo code Late Round for a deposit matchup to one hundred dollars. Again, that's promo code Late Round. I'll be separating things out by tier today just so everyone's on the same page. This is the first tier of my first round. My one on one in non superflex leagues is Marvin Harrison Junior. I think you can make the argument for him in superflex formats too, but I do have Caleb Williams ahead of him there. I'll be it in the same tier. That's mostly because of how the market acts towards quarterbacks and how quarterbacks retain value from year one to year two. That's something I talked about in episode eight hundred and seventy two. Not to be clear, I don't think Harrison is at risk of losing a ton of value from year one to year two though. Either the market loves him and for good reason. He's got some of the best marks that you're gonna find in the ZAP model, which is my prospect model, and it's the thing that I'm going to be referencing a lot on today's show. One of the key production metrics at wide receiver in the ZAP model is what I call breakout score. It looks at different thresholds within yards per team pass attempt, which is a pretty predictive metric at wide receiver, and it associates a player's age when hitting a ton of different thresholds. Now, I don't love thresholds, but mostly when we're talking about things in a binary way, this is a metric that has a lot of them, so it's capturing more of that gray area. It's really just a way of looking at age adjusted production in the form of yards per team pass attempt, and it's adjusted for a player's strength to program too, So someone playing at Alabama or LSU gets more love than someone playing at like Central Michigan. Predictably, Marvin Harrison Junior has a really good breakout score. It's ninety seven point one. That's the second best mark in the class, behind only Malik Neighbors. Now, Neighbors admittedly has a slightly higher projected ZAP score than Marvin Harrison does. I say projected because we don't have official draft capital right now, but his score is slightly and I mean slightly better. The reason I'm subjectively putting Harrison ahead of Neighbors is because we've seen him do it for multiple seasons with multiple quarterbacks. Neighbors has the best individual campaign of any wide out in this class. That happened last year, but Harrison's probably the safer bet. Just don't mistake that for Neighbors being unsafe. He's in this same tier as Marvin Harrison Junior. He's got a little bit better of a breakout scorer. They both have a great teammates scorer, and Neighbors has the better yards after the catch profile. You can go either way with these two players. They're both elite prospects. And when I say elite I'm talking like Jamar Chase level players, players who comfortably deserve to go in the top ten. So that's your top tier, my top tier in single quarterback leagues. I've got one player in this next tier, and it's Roma Dunze. A lot of people are placing a Dunza in. It's here with Marvin Harrison and Malik Neighbors, and I won't fault you if you want to do that. Now. One of the reasons some will be lower on a Doonzay is because of the fact that he didn't declare early for the draft. He played all four seasons at Washington. Historically, that's not been the best news for first round wide receivers that's first round in the real NFL draft. It's gotten better over the last few years, but since twenty eleven, non early declare first round wide receivers have struggled a lot more than early declare ones. Now. I did a study on early declare status a couple of weeks ago in the Late Round Fantasy Football newsletter. You can subscribe to that newsletter for free over on lateround dot com. But in that study, and I might not have doing an episode on it, and I haven't decided yet, but in that study, I bucketed first round wide receivers into four buckets, and these are first round wide receivers since twenty eleven. Those four buckets were early declare windouts and then non early declare wideouts, and then that was separated by players who had breakout scores above eighty or below eighty. So you had early declare wide receivers with breakout scores above eighty, early declare wide receivers with breakout scores below eighty, and the same thing for non early declare wideouts. Now eighties arbitrary, but it's a breakout score that's quite good. What I was really trying to show people with that exercise was that yes, early declare wide receivers have been better than non early declare ones through the years, but it just so happens that the NFL had been taking a lot of non early declare wide receivers in the first round who also had bad breakout scores. The truth is based on the data that I looked at. When you have a non early declare wide receiver who goes in Round one, if he has a breakout score above eighty, he's a better bet in fantasy than an early declare first round wide receiver who had a breakout score below eighty. The guys who don't hit are the non early declare wide receivers who have really crappy age adjusted production, and that's not roma Doonza. He has a breakout score of eighty, which is solid, and he also has an elite teammate scorer because he played alongside Jalen Polk and Jayalen McMillan. He's also not as old as most four year players. He's barely older than Marvin Harrison Junior and he still won't be twenty two until June. Now, I don't have him in the Neighbors and Harrison tier because those two guys just have unbelievable scores in the model. Analytically they're a lot more flawless. But at Dunday would be the clear wide receiver one in most other classes. He's someone that you should feel comfortable getting this season. I've got another tier break after a Duneesay, and we'll kick things off here with Brock Bauers. Spending up at tight end isn't always advisable in rookie drafts, but I do think Bowers could be considered an exception. He's Kyle Pitt's level on the prospect front. In fact, according to the tight End ZAT model, Bowers is the second best prospect at the position since twenty fifteen. That's when the model dates back to, and it's behind only Kyle Pitts. People are gonna say that's on a good thing because Kyle Pitts hasn't lived up the expectation. But Pitts has been stuck in a pretty rough situation. He was hurt last year, and let's not forget that he posted over one thousand receiving yards as a freaking rookie. The downside with Bowers from a model perspective is that he didn't test, so I had to give him a generic speed score, but even with an elite one, he wasn't gonna pass Pits in the model. He's a pretty safe bet though to retain value year over year more than likely. But like any tight end, it's gonna be hard for him to be a top end first round startup pick, especially in a tight end environment that's only getting deeper because last year's class was really really good. Now also in this tier is Brian Thomas. There's definitely some volatility to Brian Thomas's profile. I've said it before on the show, but he was very difficult to find statistical comps for, and even though that doesn't impact his ZAP score, it impacts the way I subjectively view him. When we don't have historical references of the type of player that we're analyzing, it just brings some question marks. Thomas also wasn't very productive until his junior season. His first two years at LSU actually saw him with a sub one point zero yards per team pass attempt rate. That's not good at all and as a result, despite being an early declare, he had a very comparable breakout score to Roma Dunze. They're actually fairly close in age. But Thomas is someone, as you've heard me and others say on the show over the last month, he's someone who at the very least will be able to play a really strong vertical role in some offense. But he's a potential true X receiver with some of the best physical tools in this class. Now, draft capital is more than likely going to favor him, and the ZAP model likely will too. Just know that there is some volatility to this profile. I'm putting another tier Breake after Thomas, and I'm gonna play Xavier Worthy next. There's some chance that Worthy ends up with a better ZAP score than Brian Thomas when it's all said and done, but it sounds like Thomas is more likely going to go in the first round than Xavier Worthy at the moment. Only Marvin Harrison Junior and Malik Neighbors, though, have better breakout scores than Xavier Worthy. This isn't just a dude who runs a fast forty. He's got a pretty complete profile, and it started when he was a freshman and posted a two point eight to eight yards per team pass attempt rate at Texas, which is bonkers, and it's what's driving his really good breakout score. Now a fear that I do have with Worthy, it's not really his small frame per se, it's at his production profile, at least from a yards per team pass attempt standpoint. It got worse as the years went on. He went from a two point eight eight rate to a one point eight eight to one to a two point one to three to one during his three years at Texas, and that was while they were adding a little bit more competition to the mix, including ad and I Mitchell this past year. Now, with that being said, I'd still categorize Worthy's production profile as very good. And while they were asked to do different things, he he did have twenty more catches and one hundred and seventy more receiving yards than eighty Mitchell did last year. Now, the size thing doesn't bother me a ton Yes, Worthy skinny. If you saw him at the combine, you saw that smaller frame, but he also makes up for that with his speed. And just look at history since twenty eleven, only four wide receivers who weighed under one hundred and seventy pounds have had top one hundred draft capital, and Xavier Worthy will go in the top one hundred two to Outwell was one of them. I think most people saw him as an overdrafted prospect. We were all shocked when two two Outwell was drafted to the Rams, But then there was Marquise Brown, DeVante Smith, and Tank Dell. There's nothing wrong with that group of players. I think Worthy is pretty legit. And then this is also where I'm gonna have Caleb Williams. Single quarterback. Drafts will be dependent on how your league just generally values quarterbacks, and this is the case for this whole list, But make sure you understand lineup requirements before blindly following rankings. It's so so important. But Williams looks the part of being a really strong prospect who can bring a little mobility, and he's walking into a situation with Chicago where he'll be thrown to DJ Moore, Keenan Allen, cole Comet, and maybe even another rookie wide receiver. It's one of the better situations that you could ask for with a rookie quarterback. Now, after the tier of Worthy and Williams. You can go in so many different directions. In my opinion, this is the final tier of my top twelve, so it's a big one, and honestly, this tier might become even bigger when the draft ends if someone like Worthy doesn't get the draft capital that we want him to get. As it stands with projected draft capital, the ZAP model says that Troy Franklin should be the next wide receiver to call out here because of the fact that we currently don't know landing spots for running backs and because there aren't obvious stud running backs in this class. I think pre draft we're still thinking wide receiver here, and Franklin I'll be a better looks like that guy. Franklin does have a really strong analytical profile. He came in a little bit thinner than most expected at the combine. He didn't really have that greade of a showing at the event, but he had almost a ninety breakout score at organ and he had a Fantasy point score of eighty five. Fantasy point score it's essentially the same thing as breakout score, but it's from the perspective of PPR fantasy points. The reason the model doesn't like Franklin. Moore is because a lot of these early Round wide receivers, a lot of the guys projected to go in Round one, they've got teammates scores that are helping them out. To think about that another way, hypothetically, those players would have better numbers than Franklin, or at least comparable numbers to him, had they played with more inferior teammates. More subjectively, I also think there's some worry that Franklin just ends up as more of a deep threat in the NFL. He comps relatively well to Jamison Williams in the ZAP model, and we haven't seen it come together for Williams. Franklin's someone who's more wiry frame does seem to impact his play. My friend Matt Harmon of reception perception you guys heard last week on the show, he wrote, quote, tight coverage catches are just another area where his lack of physicality shows up. He gets pushed around and loses that confidence in his hands. So I'll keep Franklin here for now. But a lot of people who look at this stuff analytically and who prospect through data, a lot of them love love, love Troy Franklin. I'm not quite there now. The next spot to me really comes down to Lad mcconky versus eighty Mitchell ad Ni Mitchell. Again, this is in a tier with Troy Franklin among others. I'm gonna go mconkie because both he and Mitchell, they both have concerning marks within the ZAP model. Neither player had above average breakout scores. Neither player posted elite production from the model's perspective. But McConkie did post an elite yards per route run rate, which is something that we can't ignore. Yards per route run generally correlates well to yards per team pass attempt on instances, though, we see what we have with Lad McConkie, which is his best season in both metrics not matching at all. It's the biggest discrepancy the model's database has really ever seen when you look at yards per route run versus yards per team pass attempt in their best season. It's because mconkie wasn't running a ton of routes at Georgia, whether it be because of injury or because of game script, and that piece isn't captured the same way in yards per team pass attempt when he was running routes, though he was really impactful. McConkie's top season in yards per route run is six best in this class among combine invites, and that was at Georgia, a program where it's more difficult to reach those high numbers. Make no mistake, though this is still a concern. The fact that his yards per team pass attempt is as poor as it is definitely scares me. But that right now is what's giving him the edge over Mitchell in my pre draft rankings, the fact that his yards per route run is actually elite. And for the record, that's not to say that these two wide receivers are similar wide receivers. They're not. It's just to say that Lad McConkie at least has something analytically that we can latch onto aside from projected draft capital. But yeah, let's talk about eighty Mitchell. He's been getting first round hype and at this point we should expect to hear his name called a night one of the draft. That might happen for mconkie, but it seems way more likely for Adni Mitchell. That alone should push him up your rookie draft boards. Regardless of all the underlying metrics. But yeah, the underlying metrics, they're kind of rough. Mitchell has a breakout score of forty one point eight, which is below average. Here's a list of first round wide receivers since twenty eleven with a breakout score below sixty, which is well above where Mitchell's at. Here's the list Cordero Patterson, Taevon, Austen Kelvin, Benjamin Kevin White, Philip Dorris Sett, Josh Doxon, Henry Ruggs, Jalen Reger, and Kadarius Tony. You can play a similar game with Fantasy points score two. Mitchell's lacking there. And on top of that, Mitchell actually has the worst best season yards per route run rate, not just among all first round wide receivers since twenty eleven, but he has the worst best season yards per rout run rate among all wide receivers who went to the NFL Combine this year. I sent a meme out last week on Twitter basically saying that the Galaxy Brain take with Ady Mitchell is that his metrics are so bad that he actually is just a true outlier. Like, if I'm being honest, that's one of the things that's kind of pulling me in that a player with production metrics this poor, that he's still on the verge of getting first round draft capital, the man's already an outlier. Right. You could argue that Ady Mitchell has the worst analytical production profile of any wide receiver drafted in the first round since twenty eleven. That's no joke. But because they're so bad, you're almost inclined to say this dude's just already an outlier. But of course I want to be as rational as I possibly can about this. Good enough draft capital will get him in the range with a lad McConkey eighty. Mitchell zapp score is probably gonna be comparable to Troy Franklin's. That's why he's still in this tier. And Mitchell has a strong teammate score because he played with Xavier Worthy and then he played with a loaded Georgia team prior to transferring to Texas. And I actually think that this is where early declare stuff can matter. Mitchell's an early declare. He never put it together though in college, but he also only played three years of college ball. Do we know for sure that he wouldn't have improved on his numbers had he stuck around college for another year. Romadunzay did that. Ro Madunze's numbers his final season were way better than his numbers the other three years that he played at Washington. This is why I say all of this stuff always works together. Whether you're looking at draft capital, early declare status, production profiles, everything, it just works together. This is why I have a model in the first place. It's so that I don't overemphasize one of these metrics. It so that I weigh the metrics properly, at least in my eyes. But look, at the end of the day, this is one of the more volatile profiles that I can remember. Regardless of landing spot. It's gonna be tough to just go all in on Ady Mitchell, but is athleticism definitely intriguing. Jaden Daniels is in this tier for me too. The Russian component should be there for him, which is something that we're always looking for in a fantasy quarterback. Matt Waldman compt into maybe having an RG three like impact on the ground, and Jim Sonnis's model, which you guys heard about a few weeks ago, loves Jade and Daniels, so there's definitely a lot there, and what I love most about him from a game theory perspective is that I think there's definitely an attitude towards him. He's just a volatile profile. He's got a lot of variants, similar to a Drake May But I would argue that that's similar to pretty much any other quarterback who gets drafted. We very rarely see an obvious one oh one type quarterback. There are even some flaws to Caleb Williams. And like I've been saying, we know that quarterbacks generally appreciate pretty well in value from year one to year two, at least in super flex formats. But Daniel should have a relatively safe floor when he's active in playing because of the rushing, he should be able to post something in the fantasy points column, which means he'll have a higher chance of holding value in all formats year over year. Finally, though, in this tier, I've got to talk about at least one running back, right and honestly, I'm just going to talk about two because I think these two have the highest chance to get good draft capital. Jonathan Brooks Trey Benson. Those are the two running backs. Jonathan Brooks definitely has the more complete production profile. If he had identical draft capital to Trey Benson, he'd probably have a ZAPP score that's five or six points higher because to me, he's the better running back. To the model, he's the better running back. And the more that I've thought about this, I think Brooks probably ends up being my RB one in this class. When it's all said and done, We'll see how the draft goes, but right now now he is probably my RB one. The only reason I'm questioning that is because he's got this ACL injury that he's coming back from, and there's a chance that we don't see him close to one hundred percent for a lot of the twenty twenty four season. That could hurt his overall value. But Brooks is a solid breakout score of seventy three, and that's despite playing behind Bijon Robinson and Roshan Johnson during his time at Texas. His total yards per team play rate was really good before he went down this past year, and his best season in reception share, another metric the running Back Model focuses on, it's strong enough. At eleven percent, Trey Benson has worse marks than both breakout score, which is measured through total yards per team play at running back, and Benson's reception share is worse two. There are a lot of misses from Day two backs with breakout scores as low as Benson's alongside a sub ten percent best season reception share. But Benson has a chance to have draft capital on his side, and he's got a beastly athletic profile. So I can understand going with Benson, but I'll likely be sticking to the model with Jonathan Brooks. There's definitely a chance that this tier is going to have more players in it. You might see both Benson and Brooks in it post draft, maybe even Keon Coleman rookie Piersoll Drake May. But that for now is how my first round looks for single quarterback leagues. It's bound to change, and I'll be getting too those changes. Like I said at the top, I'll be getting too those changes a couple of weeks post draft on the show. If you want the immediate rankings, ones that are deeper span both single quarterback and super flex leagues, you should definitely check out the Late Round Prospect Guide or the Late Round Fantasy Football Patreon. The Prospect Guy will be updated Saturday night for you guys. The Patreon will be updated soon after. Those rookie rankings will be single quarterback and superflex like I said, and it will be much deeper than what I talked about on today's show. That's it for today's show, though, thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribed to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are car by shooting for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found. You know to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Because of the NFL Draft, I've got a different schedule for you guys this week. It's a Late Round Perspectives week, but I want to use that as an opportunity to get you prepared for the draft, So that episode is actually gonna drop on Wednesday. After that, I'm gonna go into my hole for the draft and get my prospect guide finished, and then i'll be back in your ears early next week. I'll talk to you Wednesday