559: Mailbag 10/8/21

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Speaker 1: This is the Label Podcast with your host JJ Zachersa Jay Jake zacher reson What's up everyone. It's JJ Zachareson, the editor in chief at FANDEL and at number fire dot com and this episode five hundred and fifty nine of the Late Round podcast, the many shows that are part of the FanDuel podcast Network. Thanks for tuning in. We've got another FanDuel Podcast Network Listener League this week. Check out FanDuel dot com Slash League slash Listener League to join. It's a rake free contest that costs five dollars to enter and has fifteen hundred dollars in prizes. You can enter up the three lineups to the contest. Again. That's FanDuel dot Com Slash League Slash Listener League. To join, eligibility restrictions apply. Go to fandel dot com or download the fandel app for more details. The first question this week is from at Real Underscore House. What are the implications for Bears pass catchers rest of season? With Justin Fields now starting? Can we trust a rob as a wide receiver too? Or do we continue to fade everyone because Matt Nagy is trash? This was one of the most popular questions this week, So, as Lucio would say, let's break it down. I know that reference only hit with like a handful of you, but it was worth it. The problem with the Bears passing attack so far this year is that it's not doing what you want passing attacks to do. In fantasy football. You need two things for an effective passing attack for wide receivers. Number one, you need volume. Chicago ring's thirtieth and overall pass rate this year, and they're thirty first in neutral script pass rate, and I highly doubt this dramatically changes with justin fields, we should see more negative game scripts from Chicago in the coming weeks because the schedule's not easy. They get Vegas this weekend than Green Bay, than Tampa Bay, so it would expect a little bit more passing volume because of gamescript, but they clearly want to be a run heavy team, even without David Montgomery for a month. The other piece to this is efficiency. So far, Chicago hasn't had that either. A good passing attack allows teams to extend their drives and it allows them to just generally score points. Chicago has one passing touchdown this season, and they're tied for thirty first in total touchdowns. This is where Justin Fields can help. As he develops, the offense should become more efficient, and like I mentioned on yesterday's Sleeper Show, Fields will push the ball down the field at least more than Andy Dalton. He had over a thirty five percent deep aall rate in Week four. Now volume trump's efficiency in fantasy football. This is a big reason that rookie quarterbacks generally aren't good news for pass catchers in fantasy football. That's what episode five and eighteen over the offseason was all about. Teams with rookie quarterbacks generally aren't throwing that much, and that lack of volume impacts the pass catchers in those rookies offenses. Like I said before, though, this move to Fields is still a net win for Darnel Mooney and yes, Alan Robinson two because Andy Dalton was that bad for them from a fantasy perspective. He wasn't throwing the ball down the field and he just doesn't bring the upset or the potential that Justin Fields brings. I sort of feel the exact same way that I felt a couple of weeks ago when I talked about all this. It's an upgrade for the pass catchers, but I think there's a chance that fantasy managers sort of overstate what this could mean for Robinson and Mooney, Like, yeah, Mooney is a good deep ball guy, and Fields is a good deep ball thrower. The match is clearly there, but volume is still necessary. I would be pretty surprised if Mooney ends up being like a top twenty wide receiver in fantasy football, and the same goes for Alan Robinson. I doubt we see Robinson continue to be this bad for fantasy, but I don't know how we'd view him as anything better than a low end wide receiver three. At this point, it's just not a great passing offense for fantasy football. At least now we have some hope, though we have more upside. This asks questions from at R Kilmer twenty three, what is going on with the Baltimore backfield? Tyson looks so explosive and good on his touches. Yeah, your guess is as good as mine. According to Next Gen Stats, Tyson Williams is second in the NFL in rushing yards over expected per attempt. Only Tony Pollard is better. That's among fifty three running backs with twenty or more rushes. Of those fifty three, Latavius Murray is forty fourth. According to number five is expected points model, forty four percent of Tyson Williams runs have been deemed successful, and his per rush expected points at it is point two to eight. Latavius Murray has a slightly better success rate, but he's lost point zero nine points per rush. I can't sit here and pretend to know exactly what's going on with the Ravens backfield, because I agree Tyson has easily looked the most explosive of any running back there. My guess is that this has to do more with the non production related things like pass protection, but even still, you should want explosive players active on Sundays. So I don't totally get it. This a's questions from at D Stenz Underscore eight. Hey, JJ, awesome show. Thanks. How do we feel about Michael Pittman's c'son in long value? He has the largest target share on the Colts at the moment and is due for some touchdowns. But how much do you think he will be impacted by t Y Hilton's return in a few weeks? So I got another question about Pittman This week, where the person asking the question noted that I haven't talked about Pittman much this year, but I feel like I have. I feel like I've talked about Pittman a lot. He was featured in last week's fifteen Transactions as a bye, and I still think that he's a good get. I'm not worried about an age t Y Hilton coming in and taking away a ton of volume from Michael Pittman. Pittman is good. He was a good prospect. He's got alpha potential, and through four games he has a twenty six percent target chair in the season, while seeing at least a twenty five percent target chair in each of his last three. Pittman has a really high expected points total too. Pro Football Focus is expected points model has Michael Pittman above Mike Williams and just a little bit lower than Justin Jefferson. My colleague Brandon Godola at number fire. He has an expected points model as well that I reference, and he's got Pittman at thirteen half PPR points per game when he actually has ten. He just hasn't scored any touchdowns, so his fantasy point total isn't as high as it could be. Or should be, so he remains a bye. This next question is from at top three to three. Kareem Hunt was a cell for you this week, But Baker Mayfield is struggling so badly that I have to imagine Cleveland will continue to lean on the run game With that team in defense, why couldn't they support two RB one slash an RB one and an upside RB two. Does quarterback performance factor in for you at all? Yeah, of course quarterback performance is a factor for me. But let's not overstate Baker Mayfield's play here. Mayfield was bad in Week four, there's no doubt, but from weeks one through three, Mayfield was fifth in the NFL and completion percentage over expected he was better than Aaron Rodgers, justin, Herbert kirk Cousins and Patrick Mahomes, just to name a few. His expected points added per dropback was above average. Two, it was better than Lamar Jackson, Josh Allen, and Aaron Rodgers before Week four his game. Now, it was report on Thursday that Mayfield has a partially torn labram in his left shoulder. Maybe that's partially why he played how he played last week, and maybe it has to do with the decline in play from weeks one to two to week three, but he also faced Kansas City and Houston in weeks one and two. He had Chicago in Week three, and he was fine against Chicago, and then he had this bad game last week against Minnesota. So let's just chill a little bit before we say that Baker is struggling so badly, and just because he only has two passing touchdowns doesn't mean that he's playing poorly. In fact, that's a huge point with the transaction from earlier this week with Kareem Hunt. The Browns now have eleven offensive touchdowns that's slightly higher than the league average. Only two of them have been passing touchdowns. That point two to two passed to rush touchdown ratio will not continue, or at least we should bet on it not continuing. And the other point to make here too is that if you ever view a quarterback of a team not playing well, that's shouldn't be translated into being a good thing for running backs. You should want your running backs and your fantasy assets in general, to be in good offensive situations. You don't want the New York Jets. Teams that run the ball a lot, don't automatically have good fantasy running backs. I would be incredibly surprised if both Kareem Hunt and Nick Chubb that they both finish as RB ones this year. I mean, we're barely seeing that through four weeks, and that's four weeks where the Browns have seen their touchdowns really really skew towards the rush. I'm not sitting here trying to say that Chubb and Hunt are doomed or that they won't be usable in fantasy. There's a gray area here. There's an area where we recognize that how teams score touchdowns that's important and that should affect the two running backs moving forward. There's an area where we recognize that Chubb and Hunt are both running backs you'd want a roster and start, but we shouldn't have these expectations that they're both gonna finish as RB ones. The reason I called out Hunt specifically on that show was to say that it'll likely impact him more because he's the one who's playing more over his head. According to the expected fantasy point models that I like to reference, Hunt's played between three and three and a half points per game above expectation this year, which means he should be more in line with last year's numbers, which is exactly why I referenced last year's numbers on Tuesday show. So no, I don't think this perception that Baker has been playing poorly should impact how you feel about the running backs in Cleveland at all. If anything, that would make me want them even less. But Baker hasn't been as bad as you think. And for the record, keep in mind that part of the transaction from Tuesday was schedule based. It's not easy for the Browns over the next four weeks, and that doesn't just include Baker Mayfield. That includes the entire offense. This ex question is from at mister Davey Ross. Can you speak a little too bench management? Handcuffing is something you have spoken against during drafts, But as we get deeper into the season, we're seeing the value of running backs and their injuries. Should we be focusing on rostering handcuffs over other upside skill positions? Now, it's true that I'm against drafting handcuffs in most leagues. You could make the argument for deeper leagues or fourteen team leagues and all that, but in the majority of leagues and leagues that most of you guys play in. Handcuffing generally is a losing strategy. Handcuffing in season, not during the draft. That's a little bit different. Now. I've talked about bench management on this show in the past, but I'm gonna give an answer to this that I can reference when anyone has this question in the future. Your fantasy football bench should reflect any issues that your starting lineup has. Like, yes, you want the most valuable players possible on your team and on your bench, but if your starting lineup is loaded at wide receiver and it's not loaded at running back, then your bench should be filled with more running back potential than wide receiver potential. When it comes to handcuffing in season, you have to look at how your team is performing. If you're in a really good spot, then you know that you can look more for safety. You can handcuff your own running backs. In some cases, you can even trade a bench asset for one of your running back handcuffs. If you're in a desperate spot, then that's when you should handcuff other running backs. For example, let's say that you're one in three, your team sucks your second to last in points scored, things look really bad. You need a spark. Sometimes that can be through just trading your players and trying to upgrade things, but it can also come in the form of a running back injury. If you don't have Aaron Jones on that team, on that one in three team, but you have aj Dillon. If Aaron Jones gets hurt, then all of a sudden, you have a big upgrade on your roster. That's how you should be viewing handcuffs. Bad teams should be going after handcuffs of other running backs on other teams more generally, because bad teams need that variance, they need something to go their way in order to be relevant. Good teams can play it a little bit safer. There are reasons that I'm against handcuffing during your fantasy drafts. I've done studies on it. Other people have done studies on it. They're generally bad bets and they're generally dropped early on in the season. But you should always be looking at where your team stands. Always keep track of that, and you can build your bench based on how your team is performing and what your team actually needs. The SASH question is from at Eraser w will positive touchdown regression be coming from Mike Davis and Damian Harris. It has to be right. Let's start with Mike Davis here on the season, he hasn't found the end zone on the ground, but he has through the air. He's slightly overperforming as a receiver in the touchdown column, but definitely underperforming as a rusher. If everything remain the same, yes, Mike Davis would regress favorably in the touchdown column. The problem is, I'm not sure everything will just remain the same. Davis had a fifty percent running back rushher this past week, tying a season long low. To go along with that, he had a five percent target that was this absolute low. Wayne Gallman got in the action this past week, and Cordero Patterson, as we know, he's been very good. So while Davis should regress and regress favorably, we have to watch his overall role as well, so as a result, you can't just automatically consider him a by candidate. And then with Damien Harris, sure maybe he should have two touchdowns instead of one, but he's definitely not someone who would have caught my eye as a player who should regress in a touchdown column. You can like him this week and it's Houston, for sure, but he's more or less performed around expectation. Given where he's seeing his touches and the amount of volume that he's getting. Maybe he's underperformed a little bit. But again, he's not something that I likely would have called out as an obvious regression candidate. That doesn't mean that he's a bad player at a roster that you should mention him this week. I'm just saying that he hasn't performed that far out of the ordinary so far. This beast question is from at bookie Juice Underscore. Would you spend sixty percent of your free agent budget just lock someone from Samaj p Rin so they'd be forced to play Michelle or Bolden against you? No, I wouldn't even remotely think to do this. Number one, you're wasting your budget for future transactions. Number two, and more importantly, you're overstating your ability to predict the future. At the time that you would have had to make this choice, you wouldn't even know if Mixing was going to be out this weekend, and you'd also be assuming that Samaj Purin is so substantially better than Sony Michelle and Brandon Bolden. Yes, his projection would be far better without mixing. But running backs can have bad games, especially backup running backs. And then on top of that, you're assuming the manager that you're facing won't or can't do something to improve that running back spot in their lineup, whether it's through a trade or through a last second ad due to an unforeseen injury to a running back. So don't do this kind of thing. And for the record, this was recorded before the Thursday night game, so I don't know how Sony Michelle performs. I'm just letting you know this is a bad idea. The last question this week from at low mess, how do you determine what's a sustainable trend versus a regression? Candidate, to use an example from this week's ten Trends episode, should we be expecting the Titans to continue to pass the ball at the higher clip they have so far this season, or for Derrick Henry to keep his target share. So I originally had a pretty long answer to this question, and then I realized there was a much easier and more concise way to answer it. At the end of the day, when you're deciding what's a sustainable trend versus what's not you're really just asking yourself if there's a reason for something that's going on. Is there a reason Cordero Patterson has half of Atlanta's touchdowns? Is there a reason Tennessee has a higher pass rate this year than other years? When you then dig to uncover those answers, you can start to group things as sustainable or not sustainable. And honestly, guys, this to me is why the best fantasy analysts can't only look at data. Watching games can uncover certain meaning that data can't always uncover. I watch every single game every single weeks that can sit on this show and competently talk about football because a lot of the trends that I uncover they come from the things that I see on Sundays. I see things happen and I wonder why they're happening, And data allows me to build stories around the things that I'm seeing. When that data and story doesn't really make sense, that's when we get possible regression. When it does make sense, then there's a chance that it's more sustainable. Now, I'm not saying that data isn't my number one. To me, you can't ignore data when analyzing fantasy football because it's literally a game about numbers, and I uncover plenty of trends through data that I wouldn't have even thought about had I just watch the games. Data allows your brain to relax and not have to capture every single thing that you see on a football field. The general thing that I want to get across here, though, is that regression is essentially something that's happening that doesn't make logical sense. I mean, if we really want to dumb it down, that's sort of what we're looking at. When things make more sense, when there are answers to the things that are happening, it's easier to buy into something being more sustainable. Like I'll go back to the golf example that I always talk about with regression. I shoot in the low nineties. Usually I'm not a good golfer, but I'm fine enough. If I do nothing to my golf swing and I don't change my approach, and one day I shoot an eighty five, should I expect to shoot an eighty five moving forward? Probably not, because nothing really changed. If I work on my golf swing and I change my approach to putting, and then I shoot that eighty five as a result of that, then yeah, I'm gonna be more inclined to think that this is more sustainable, that regression won't just naturally hit. There's an actual reason for this thing happening. To figure out that doesn't make sense or not question, you've got to look at what the player has done historically, what the team has done historically, what players in general have done historically. There are lots of layers to that. I could find hundreds of things to look for when we figure out the question of does it make sense or not? But that's where you should start. It's it's so simple, but that's how you can separate what's sustainable and what's bound to regress. Ask yourself, does this make sense? That's gonna do it for today's show. Thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribed to the Late Round podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcast can be found. You don't follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks for listening everyone, I really really appreciate the support. Enjoy football this weekend. I'll talk to you next week.