Late-Round Perspectives: Derek Brown Returns

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Derek Brown is an NFL and fantasy football analyst at Fantasy Pros who's done work at places like FTN, DraftKings and Fantasy Data. He's a dad, He's got more hair on his chin than the top of his head, and this isn't the first time he's been on late round perspectives. These are his late round perspectives. This episode is sponsored by DraftKings. It might feel like the fantasy football season just ended, but it's actually just getting started. DraftKings is your home for early bestball, no waiver wires, no roster management. It's the easiest way to get it on the action without the weekly grind. Go to DraftKings dot com or download the DraftKings Daily Fantasy app and draft your early bird bestball lineup for a shot out a share one million dollars in prizes. Drafts stay open until the season kicks off, so now's the time to jump in. You draft it. We crowning gambling problem called one hundred Gambler New York Call eight seven seven eight hope n why or text hope en why Connecticut Call eight eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or visit CCPG dot org. Eighteen plus and most states. Restrictions apply. See terms at DraftKings dot com sponsored by drafts. I realized that I haven't done really a show. You know, I usually do the Late Round show with Kitchen every Wednesday. I even said on my Tuesday show that I was going to do it solo this week. And then I got it all. I got my wires crossed, and I realized that this is a week we were taking off because Kitchen was gone this week on vacation. So I haven't gotten any free agent takes out there. This is the this is the first time, and I've gotten to the point where I just don't really fire off many takes on Twitter anymore and on social media very often.

00:01:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've I've pulled back a lot on social media too, just because I maybe it's getting old to get cranky JJ. I don't know, man, maybe we're both getting to the same stage. I'm just not willing to fight with people when they don't come to an art like it's not good faith and it's not right. Let's have a constructive conversation. It's like you're an idiot, you're a clown, you're wrong, blah blah blah.

00:02:13
Speaker 1: And you're like, okay, whatever, I'm just gonna present information. Yeah. My problem is that, like I often will, like on Twitter, especially, I used to like throw out takes or stances on things, not to say definitively this is how I feel, but people will read it as definitively this is how you feel about something, and I don't really I don't want that concrete way of thinking to be out there immediately I want to talk, so instead I go to I mean, one of the greatest blessings for me has been the discord for Late Around Fantasy football. From from that perspective, to be clear, everybody, one of my greatest blessings are my children and my wife and my family, not not the late round discord. So so that people are very clear.

00:02:54
Speaker 2: I love who you have to caveat that or you're gonna get cooked in the comments.

00:02:58
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh I do. I look, I do love the the late rounders out there, and I love our discord, but I do it's crazy. I love my kids more. It's it's it's nuts wild, right, but it's it's been nice to have that community where I can go in there and say, you know, like when Chris Rodriguez signed with Jacksonville, which we'll we'll talk about in a minute, I'm sure. But when Chris Rodriguez signed with with Jacksonville, I was able to fire off a take and then immediately kind of like like I will, I'll fire off the hot stuff in that discord. People will know that it's not to be taken so so seriously, and then a minute or two later, let it sit and then kind of dig into what the ramifications of this particular thing, you know is you just can't do that on Twitter. I can't. I can't do it on social media anymore. So I mean maybe that's a promotion to join the discord perhaps, but regardless, regardless, like it's just a different kind of beast than than it used to be, or it could just be like us getting older audience all that kind of stuff. It's just it's just changing.

00:03:59
Speaker 2: It could be you know, all those things can be true simultaneously, and I don't disagree at all. And that's where I think, specifically, when we get you know, talking about this rookie class later where I'm really kind of torn on a lot of different players, and now, you know, we we were talking about pre show and stuff like ranking guys and stuff where it's like, this is a class where I feel like if we're gonna have the conversation of just tear based stuff where it's like, especially with the wide receivers, it comes down to pick your flavor. You know, we get into a conversation of this version of the NFL versus like ten years ago of the NFL, and how that all kind of sifts out where it's like people will look at on paper rankings and they're like, you.

00:04:43
Speaker 1: Got this guy wide receiver two of the class and it's.

00:04:45
Speaker 2: Like yeah, but draft capital is also going to like factor into that and landing spot and all that kind of stuff. So it's like you get on social media and you're like, oh, well you present early rankings or whatever, and people are like, oh my gosh, Like if you look at it as like this concrete thing and you're like no, no, no, no, no, no, it's these are fluid, like yeah, well.

00:05:06
Speaker 1: You you brought this up and this is like again, So today's structure is we'll talk about free agency just so you guys are aware listening, and then we'll get into the rookie class. Because Deebro does awesome work with prospecting and stuff, and the Prospect Guide will launch on the sixteenth, which is Monday, but technically it'll be out as I do every year, on Sunday night, Sunday evening, so if you guys are pre ordered, I'll keep that pre order price until Monday morning, but that will be out. So I'm basically done with the prospect Guide. I haven't even done my rankings yet. That's the one piece, and I'm just kind of like waiting until i see where the final projected draft capital is all that kind of stuff. But the one thing that you brought up and we're we're kind of going on an order. I'm not going to get into all the prospects yet. I just want to talk at a very high level from a process standpoint, with the prospects. You know, I've talked a lot this offseason about the twelve personnel shift, the heavy personnel usage that we're seeing across the league. The one thing that I'm kind of having a hard time reconciling in a way with prospect work is this idea that like when we're looking at college players like running back, wide receiver, tight end shore, but when we're looking at these guys One of the key reasons that from a data perspective, we're going to look at market share data is because there's such a wide variety of collegiate offenses, right in terms of what they do and how they are styled and all that kind of stuff, just because there's a sheer more number of teams, right, we just have an absurd number of college teams where these guys are coming from. And so one of the things I've been thinking about with the NFL that kind of makes it, to your point, a little bit more difficult to rank right now, is that landing spot probably at least like short term landing spot, you know, because obviously things change in an instant in the NFL. But to me, there's actually becoming a more wide variety of NFL offenses than we've seen over the last you know, like if we were to look at this like seven or eight years ago, like, yes, the trend is shifting towards heavier personnel, you know, more twelve twelve personnel usage thirteen personnel, Yes, that's the trend. But if you get a slot guy who ends up finding a place where the head coach is locked in, and you know, we know that the head coach will be there for the next year too, or you know, two or three years, let's say, and they run a lot of eleven, then all of a sudden, you should probably like that wide receiver a little bit more because as much as we don't want landing spot to dictate things, we know that you know, from the trajectory of these players and from a value standpoint in dynasty, if they get off to a hot start, we want to gain that value, you know immediately with these guys. Is that something that you've kind of that is that all kind of like in your thought process with the ranking stuff and what you're referring to.

00:07:39
Speaker 2: There, Absolutely, and that's one thing that looking at this iteration of the NFL, and you know, it's all been out there, but we've all been talking about it, the shift to more heavy personnel and more twelve personnel, so two wide receiver sets, like it really is it's it's it's coloring the way that I look at a lot of these prospects and on like the short and long term fits for these guys too, because and I you know, we're going to talk about all of them in depth, but for me, it's it, it really drills down to landing spots and as well the profiles too because these slot combined players. And not to get you know, ahead of ourselves, but like Makhaya Lemon, where it's like, dude, I would have loved him a lot more if we would rewind this like ten years ago and the NFL was living in eleven personnel at like eighty five ninety percent or the rams like almost every single snap they're playing, whereas the top end teams are even like last year, if you look at last year, the top ten teams sixty three to sixty nine percent of eleven personnel. So this feels like the Josh Downs conversation where it's like now, or the Jay and Reed conversation where it's like, dude, like if he lands on one of these teams or even the top teams aren't even utilizing this at seventy percent, so like, can he change that math? Sure, But even if he changes that math, that's what seventy So is he still even a full eighty to ninety percent route per dropback player? And if he's not, that's going to change the math of his fantasy value.

00:09:10
Speaker 1: It has to. Yeah, And there's some guys because you know. Again, we'll get into the individual prospects like a Lemonwell, we'll have a good discussion amount. But there are some like pure solock guys like Kevin Coleman, for instance, it's just like like that's that's what he's going to do at the NFL level, you know, or or like you know, there's some smaller guys that that we don't know exactly where they fit and how well they can win on the outside, and therefore we got to pay attention to not just the landing spot from the standpoint of like, yeah, this is a good offense with an opening at wide receiver, and therefore this player can step in and do something. We have to look at it from the standpoint of what what scheme does this offense run? Like schematically, what does this look like for this player to fit in? Now we've done that always. I'm just saying I think that there's more of a of a closer eye to that kind of thing because before, when you had this like widespread eleven personnel usage, you were able to have more wide receivers on the field, which allowed for that more natural opportunity because a lot of guys can move inside out if you're a perimeter guy, maybe a team wants to use you as a big slot, et cetera. But if there are now more limited spots for these wide receivers to go to, we have to be more specific as a result of that.

00:10:20
Speaker 2: I don't disagree at all. And that's what it all comes back to, and really drilling it down to. We always go back to and the and the trope is real as volume is king. Well, that also comes back to snap volume and route volume. And if you're not on the field, I mean it's a Dalton KK conversation. If you're not on the field, you can't score fantasy points, you can't catch passes. So when you're splitting hairs between all of these prospects, I mean, dude, that can make the huge difference between where you're at on a Denzel Boston versus somebody like Makaya Lemon when it's all said and done, because you got to be on the field running routes to get targets and score points.

00:10:54
Speaker 1: All right, we'll get to the prospect stuff. Let's talk free agency. I think this is one of the more fun free agency periods that we've had in a while. So the first one I want to talk about is Kenneth Walker he goes to the Chiefs. I want to just ask you how good of a fit you think this is and how high you think maybe you think he should go slash where you think he might end up going when we're like, just put yourself in August for a second and think about how high people are gonna draft Kenneth Walker now that he's with the Chiefs.

00:11:20
Speaker 2: I mean I just kind of like, and again early before the NFL draft, like reworked my redraft and Best Ball rankings. I put him up at RB ten, Like I think he's an RB one. I think it's about probably where he's going to live in that low end RB one, yeah, territory, and I think it's a really really good fit for both what he does and what the Chiefs need out of him. I mean, if you look at the Casey rushing offense, this rushing offense was horrible, Like, yes, do they look good as far as like rushing success rate and what have you from last year? Yeah, those are all fine because the guys are basically just getting what's blocked and they're not losing yards and from those analytics they'll look fine. But also this rushing offense at the second lowest explosive run rate last year JJ and the lowest miss tackle rate. So those are both things that are firmly in Kenneth Walker's wheelhouse. Where and also the scheme fit like they were tenth best in as far as zone rushing rate Walker last year in zone runs Dude third highest explosive run rate and miss tackle rate. So I like the fit and as well as he's a competent pass catcher. I know that was something we all kind of debated back and forth about when he came out as a prospect.

00:12:28
Speaker 1: But he's proven.

00:12:31
Speaker 2: I mean, unfortunately Chris Collinsworth doesn't agree with us, but he's proven that Kenneth Walker is a good receiver. If you look at, regardless of any analytics that we pull up, the yards per route run in first downs per out run.

00:12:40
Speaker 1: So I love the fit.

00:12:42
Speaker 2: We can all talk about volume and his health and can he hold up to the perceived workload and what that looks like. But I don't know how we don't walk away, like really really high about this.

00:12:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I agree. I sent a tweet out actually that immediately after it happened. I said, when I said, I was in on Kenneth Walker this year. I really next year, you know, I really meant, really meant twenty twenty six. But no, Like the Walker receiving thing is an interesting discussion for me because I was definitely someone from an analytical perspective where I said, this isn't a profile that or someone that profiles to be a high volume pass catcher at the next level. And I the way I'm prospecting and the way that I'm looking at stuff, I'm not necessarily looking at running back receiving ability the way that people would probably think. I'm thinking about it from the stand from from the perspective of how frequently that running back might be used as a pass catcher, which I think are two very very different things because I've used this analogy slash example many many times before. But I think that like there's like, if you think about this from a zero to one hundred, from a percentile standpoint, maybe the top five, you know, ninety fifth to one hundred percentile receiving running backs are special in this league at doing things like lining up out of the slot, maybe you know, going out wide and doing some funky things as pure receivers Christian McCaffrey type players, right, like very special pass catching running backs. And then on the other end, and I always throw him under the bus, no pun intended. But Gus Edwards, you know who just as a zero, like he will never be that guy. And you could argue, like a Chris Rodriguez. We'll get to that in a second now that you know, you know, like like you'll never he'll never be that pass catcher because he's actually he's not that good at it in general. And like there's obviously a skill set in being able to, you know, take a swing pass something that most running backs just generally do, and do that effectively right, and be able to have the right bursten acceleration to make something happen off of a play that you know is something that most running backs can do. But with that being said, I think that the majority of running backs, I'm talking like ninety percent of them live in the middle. They live in this area where if there's a scheme or a situation where a coach comes in and just wants to deploy the running back in that way, like we saw with Kenneth Walker two years ago where he had like a thirteen percent target share then that can happen, like that can work. The unfortunate side with Walker is that you know, three of his four seasons so far, he's been you know, under around that like eight seven eight percent mark and target share because his coaching, the coaching staff is deploying him in a particular way, right, And so like the way I always look at those these types of like running backs and these archetypes is I think coaches view running backs in a way of sort of like subconsciously calculating their collisions and calculating the amount of hits that they would be taking. And if you're a coach, that's coaching Kenneth Walker, I agree. I don't think he's a bad like I remember Collins Worth making that comment in the Super Bowl whenever, yeah, yeah, like saying that he was a bad receiver. I think that's a very far like that, it's way too far, because there's a difference between the ability and the deployment of Right, the deployment of Kenneth Walker has shown not that he's a bad receiver. It's just that he's not seen the volume through the air that other high receiving you know, volume receiving backs would see and So my stance is that, like a coach looks at a player of a Walker archetype and they say to themselves, hey, yes, he's a capable pass catcher, but we want to use him so much on these outside runs that we're going to pound him and use him a lot on there. Like we saw that throughout his time in college, like when he was at Michigan State. Before he was at Michigan State, he carried the ball like three hundred plus, Like he was getting so much work in college that yes, you have to then say there's a there's likely a reason that he wasn't used a little bit more through the air. I just don't know if I mean, I don't think that anyone would sit here and say that Walker is the same kind of receiving back as Christian McCaffrey. But I think he's capable enough. My question with the Chiefs, though, is do you think that that's going to be there for like, like if you were to sit here and just generalize a target share for Kenneth Walker. And this isn't a take that you have to be concrete in, but like, do you think that he's capable of a twelve percent target share? There or do you think we're going to see more of that like eight to ten percent there?

00:16:55
Speaker 2: I think he's capable of it only because and this also comes down to like what we're seeing schematically defensive wise, and I want to get too deep in the weeds with that, but more too high structures and how teams are combating that. So you're seeing more utilization of and and some of the target share is going more to tight ends and attacking that. Now, what especially with guys with because you have to be in those two high structures to beat that defensive structure. It's like you need guys to be able to create with the ball in their hands underneath and those two high shells. So a lot of that's running backs, but a lot of that target chair is going more to tight ends. But how Andy Reid wants to attack that, I mean, do they've basically been using Rashi Rice in that type of role. So if Rashie Rice takes a hit with those underneath targets going more to Kenneth Walker, I could see it happening.

00:17:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think another by the way, just to give another example of the like archetype I'm speaking to, they're different running backs and they have different styles. But I felt very similarly to Quinnchow Judkins coming out last year. I got another one that too. No no, no, you throw yours out.

00:17:55
Speaker 2: The last year production model and how things changed and what you talked about with walking or taking volume or basically Michigan State taking volume away from the passing game and running him a tunnel on early downs. Aren't we just discussing the final year of college? Frash and gent were his share, Yeah, because his receptions all that stuff dried up, and they were like, you could get the rushing record, We're sarying to feed feed you volume here and take away your pass game stuff. It's not because of anything changed as him as a receiver. It's just how they wanted to deploy him.

00:18:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, because he had a great receiving profile the year before that. You know, it was all there. So yeah, I mean, like, I don't I think that's the I mean, that's a very good example of the nuance that I was speaking to earlier about Twitter, because I had I had sent like like, there is a strong correlation between receiving production in college to receiving production in the NFL. But I think that the thing that I want people to really understand there is that it's not really necessarily I mean, oftentimes it is, but it's not necessarily an ability thing. And I remember whenever I started to adjust you know, receiving yards per team pass attempt at running back, because I realized a couple of years ago that that was a pretty like more important metric than I realized at running back. It is obviously a wide receiver, but it is still a running back. When I adjusted that more for age and strength of schedule and stuff, Kenneth Walker looked better than you know he initially did whenever he was coming out, you know, within the zapp model and stuff. So you know, I don't think like like, I think he's a better I mentioned Quinn John Judkins. I think he's a better pass catcher than Judkins's. But Judkins is sort of in this place where like, this is part of the reason why I wanted a non pass catching back, like a maybe Hampton's a bad example, because I actually think he is a decent pass catcher, but you know, maybe a Judkins is the is the example. Him going to a place like Denver last year would have been really interesting from a ceiling perspective, because all of a sudden, you're gonna get some of these easy looks. You know that they're going to hyper target the running back out of the backfield. So even if that wasn't sort of like part of his repertoire if you will, coming out and part of his arsenal and how people kind of viewed h him, it would just default that way in Denver for him, because that's the way Sean Payton runs his offense is whereas R. J. Harvey had more of a bulkier receiving profile than A Judkins did, and so you know, it was an easier fit to make. But like that to me is when you get that combination because very rarely are you going to get flawless running backs, But when you get that combination of like, okay, I'm deficient here, but this offense allows me to do that thing. So now all of a sudden, I can have that really high end ceiling that I otherwise wouldn't have had.

00:20:30
Speaker 2: Well, and I think we're gonna have, you know, foreshadowing here. I think we're gonna have a very similar conversation when we get to Jendarium Price later.

00:20:37
Speaker 1: Yes, definitely, yes, I.

00:20:39
Speaker 2: Mean it's it's very much a similar conversation that we all had around Kenneth Walker as a prospect, where it's like can he do it? I mean the limited sample and what the how that projects and stuff. I mean, dude, I was out there, like I was out there looking up like Jaendarium Price high school film to sit here and get like some type of feel because like out of Notre Dame, you're like, okay, well, yeah, I can watch all of his targets in like literally two minutes.

00:21:05
Speaker 1: You got anything more? All right, Let's move on to Alec Pierce. He gets the contract with Indianapolis, and then Michael Pittman gets traded to the Steelers. But your overall read with this situation if you look at Price, if you look at Pittman, and you look at these two teams.

00:21:18
Speaker 2: Now, dude, I mean, I just I thought the the Colts contract for Alec Pierce. I'm not going to say that it's absolute insanity, but oooh it's aggressive, man.

00:21:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I mean, good for Peers getting that back. Oh, it's great for Pierce.

00:21:31
Speaker 2: But when we're we're talking about all of a sudden, he's jumped into a stratosphere where right now, you're just looking at average yearly salary. This dude is eleventh in the NFL, right behind Ta Higgins. That's some rarefied era man. So the Colts are putting it on him to be their alpha, like number one pass catcher this year. Now, is he going to get a competition with Tyler Warren? Absolutely, But I mean Pierce looks like on paper he's ready to take that next step, and I know a lot of it last year was the downfield usage. But his splits, no matter how you stack up, his analytics are strong across the board, like one point nine to five yards per route run against man two point four versus his own.

00:22:07
Speaker 1: His foots are.

00:22:08
Speaker 2: Equally strong versus single and too high. So he's got the skills and the athletic upside. Like early right now, I mean I moved him up to wide receiver twenty five. That might be a little bit low considering who's challenging him outside of taller Warren for targets in this passing offense, Like, yeah, jun Josh Downs is there. But we we already kind of had and alluded to the conversation of he's not even a full time player in the offense, maybe that changes.

00:22:35
Speaker 1: But I mean, yeah, do you think do you think that it would be reasonable for a cause I've been I've been chewing on this last twenty four hours for a Dynasty manager to just see if they could really buy low because Josh Downs is still a by I mean like, it's not like he has like a high price tag Theynasty, right. No, obviously there's not competition there with Michael Pittman Gon and and maybe people would see through. But like I guess my question would be, do you think there's any chance that they end up deploying Josh Downs more on the outside. I think it's possible.

00:23:07
Speaker 2: I think it's equally possible that they just go draft another guy in the third or fourth round because we've like, yeah, we've got a lot of guys that fit the archetype in this class that I really like, that are going to fall into that third and fourth round range that are just just toss them into the perimeter and they can they can killd Alec Pierce roll of last year.

00:23:24
Speaker 1: I think not only that, I would argue there's a lot of players in this class that fit this, like Chris Ballard archetype that he loves which is these big bodied, fast outside fast like he did the same he did this, He did it with Alec Pierce, he did it with ad and I Mitchell, like I'm ready for that. And there's a lot of those lots like we could talk.

00:23:43
Speaker 2: I mean, like just Chris Brass will come on right, Ted Hurst, Bryce Lance, like take your pack.

00:23:49
Speaker 1: Even like a Jacobe lane you could throw, you know, like there's there's there's a lot of those like long guy you know, like just just has uh you know, their six three in taller. But like there's a lot of those guys also that are they're questionable. Like there's a lot of high variance prospects in there. So I think from that, like my guess is that they do draft someone to play opposite of like you said, maybe it's around three, maybe early day day three. Maybe I don't know what they're their draft capitals.

00:24:19
Speaker 2: Situation literally right, Yeah, I don't know their picks off the top of my head.

00:24:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I do think that they're going to do have to do something there to just get someone in there. And that's what scares me a little bit with with Josh Downs. But if you can get him relatively cheap, because I think a lot like he's at the point in his career where people just kind of give up, right, Like like dynasty managers are just kind of over it. I mean, Jaden Reid, you could argue the same thing. People are just kind of like, you know, like he flashed, he had his moment early on his career. He's very efficient, but he's just gonna be this guy. I think you could argue the exact same argument for Jane Reid because they just lost Romeo Dobbs and they don't have, you know, as as deep of a wide receiver room at this moment, and Matthew Golden didn't show us much last year, and so uh maybe, you know maybe, but like it's difficult when there's no regime change, you know, when there's no coaching staff change, that really signals, oh, maybe this coaching staff will like this guy more and throw him on the outside. I don't disagree at all.

00:25:13
Speaker 2: And the Colts have their they obviously they gave away their first round pick for Sauce, but they still do have their second, third, and fourth round picks. So I think they're going to take a wide receiver with one of those picks. It just depends on where. But I mean back to your point, I honestly rather would make the bet on Jayden Reid out of the two of those guys only because I mean, you talk about downs in the system and he's probably slock them fine. But the other part about this is he's had a really hard time staying healthy. Like I don't know if we've seen a fully healthy season from Josh and you can say the same thing about Jayden Reid.

00:25:43
Speaker 1: So the thing with pierceon I think is interesting is that even at Cincinnati in college, his target share never got above twenty two percent. And that I think is the big question mark that I have. And you know, you mentioned like they're they're looking at him hypothetically, they're looking at him as as an alpha right now, or at least as they're one. I don't know if that is really going to be part of his range of outcomes. Like I I mean, obviously superfficient, obviously one of the best down the field receivers in the game right now, Like he's one of the rare players where the athleticism like completely translated to the NFL. It took a little bit of time, right Like he's he's gotten better and props to him for getting better, but like a twenty two point eight and a twenty yard a dot the last two years, and then you know, you look at he's maxed out in an eighteen percent target shair in his offense so far throughout his career. He only got to twenty one point six percent in college. You put all that together and you're like, is there an alpha profile here? Like is that really what we're banking on? Like, I give him, Like I don't want to rule him out because he's gotten better. That's that's my that's that's that's my hesitation. But if his price tag gets out of control, out probably end up being out. I don't disagree at all. And I just thought it was so aggressive.

00:26:58
Speaker 2: And again the colts there in the building that they see him practice every day, so they have a better feel about what he can do. But like, I have the same concerns you have because he's never been a high end target earner. And we can all talk about wide receiver skills and stuff, Earning targets is a skill and you either can do it at a high end clip and that was one of the if we be kind of rewind all the way back to the Amaras Saint Brown conversation and the Rashi Rice conversation of previous years where it was like, are these breakouts real? Are these things going to translate? And it's like, dude, you don't just roll out of bed and not every single player that's thrust into one of these situations can earn a twenty five to twenty seven percent Yer, they can't. So can Pierce do that? We shall see. If I was the cold to making the decisions, I would say, look, let's flip this. Let's you want to have signed Daniel Jones to a.

00:27:45
Speaker 1: Contract, Fine, let's sign that.

00:27:46
Speaker 2: Let's make Alec Pierce play on the franchise tag and prove the concept of him operating as our number one. If we're gonna pay him top twelve money, we're gonna pay him top twelve money, whether that's a year down the road or not.

00:28:00
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:28:00
Speaker 2: Well, like I thought, it was kind of crazy that they did this in the flip side of the way that I would have done this.

00:28:05
Speaker 1: Yeah. I also I've never I haven't queried this, but I do wonder how many wide receivers in recent history have not hit a twenty percent target shair during their rookie contract and then hit like a twenty five percent target shair after that, you know, because I'm curious because give given this quarterback situation, they're obviously dimes coming off the Achilles, Like I do think he's gonna Alec Pierce to hit like top twenty wide receiver status will probably need to be in that like twenty four percent higher type target share range. And so I wonder if we've ever even seen this before, you know, I don't know, someone can query that if you if.

00:28:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was like, that's that's a great question. Yeah, Like I don't off the time my head, I don't know who who all of a sudden.

00:28:43
Speaker 1: I mean maybe like the only guy for said like Devonte Parker. Maybe maybe when he ended up blowing up. But yeah, I mean, but even that's a terrible outcome because it's not like it was, you know, long lasting. And then Michael Pittman going to Pittsford. Do you care at all about this? I think it's a better NFL fit than it is fantasy. I mean, you know, we have all the quarterback worries.

00:29:03
Speaker 2: Concerns, don't know who's going to be there is at Aaron Rodgers is it somebody like Kirk Cousins, who the heck knows Man. I mean, right now, I've just got him slotted at wide receiver thirty four. Now I have him ahead of DK Metcalf right now, just because of again target earning and the archetypes of these wide receivers. I think Pittman is a better target earner. I think he is a really good fit for if you're how Pittsburgh constructed this this wide receiver room. Like DK, we know what he does, man Like, he destroys single high, he can get downfield and stuff like that. But he's never going to be and hasn't been a twenty six twenty seven percent target share guy where Pittman. If you match up these two skill sets, Pittman's numbers especially last year, and looking at I mean, this is just a drop in fit of what he was doing last year for the Colts. Like all the Steelers are going to ask him to do is go out and be the guy we go to against two highest structures and single high. We're just gonna go to DK, And honestly, this is probably going to be a really good thing for us when we're looking at trying to figure out where we're ranking these guys based off of the matchups and stuff like that, and people for dfs and all that kind of stuff on a weekly basis, where it was like last year, I just kept telling people with Pierce, I was like, all right, team.

00:30:17
Speaker 1: Runs a lot of single high. It's Alec Pierce week.

00:30:19
Speaker 2: Okay, well, team runs a lot of too high. It's it's Michael Pittman week. And so I think it's a really good fit for more so from an NFL standpoint than it is for us in fantasy because I mean, if it's Aaron Rodgers, how many weapons can he support at this point in his career later?

00:30:37
Speaker 1: You know, So I think it was I think it was a smart move for Pittsburgh to do. You know, this is this is my yinzer bias aside. I think it was a smart thing for Pittsburgh. My only question with Pittman, who who I think has been like kind of underrated as just a player throughout his career. You know, like he's a solid, solid wide receiver. I fear that what if he doesn't have it anymore? You know, like last year he had an eight three eight point four a dot and he had the worst act of his career on that low of an A dot, and so there's a little bit of that going on. He's had some of these injuries that he's dealt with. I think it was like a back a couple of years ago, which is always scary, but he's to me. I think Pittsburgh also did this because it's an organization that cares so deeply about culture, even though they from a culture perspective, they're so in love with mediocrity. But like from a from a like Michael Pittman is like a for all intents and purposes, From from a teammate perspective, and from like an organization and fan perspective, everyone loves Michael Pittman. I think that's another reason why they ended up making that move. But I agree, I think it's a better real life move than a fantasy move. Let's talk about Malik Willis down in Miami. This is how much does this worry you about devon a Chan and Jalen Wattle. It worries me a lot more for a Chan than it does Waddle. Do I have concerns about Waddle? Yeah?

00:31:51
Speaker 2: I mean, but I kind of feel like we already saw that kind of play out last year, JJ, Like we we've already seen the run heavy Miami offense, Jalen Waddle operating as a one.

00:32:01
Speaker 1: I mean that that was last year, dude.

00:32:04
Speaker 2: Like Week seven through fifteen two, it was only averaging twenty five point three passing attempts. So I mean, okay, fine, Malik Willis is there, We're going to throw him into the same kind of volume conversation. I mean he was wide receiver twenty nine a Fantasy points per game during that stretch, wide receiver thirty three and XFP per game. I mean Jalen Wattle again, going back to it, like we have worries about Alec Pierce earning a twenty three twenty four percent target here, I don't have those concerns about Waddle during that stretch. He earned a twenty three percent target. Heare so with Waddle. I kind of look at this as doesn't this feel like yesteryear DJ Moore conversation? JJ? It's like, can justin field support him? Is he going to be good enough? And then DJ Moore had the talent and the target volume to pay off on all of that handedly So I'm not that worried about Jalen Wattle.

00:32:53
Speaker 1: I am worried about h An.

00:32:54
Speaker 2: I mean, like, dude, I had a hard time ranking him, like right now I have him at like RB ten only because the target volume is gonna go.

00:33:02
Speaker 1: Down like it has to. He was fifth in raw targets amongst running backs last year. Like, he's not sniffing eighty five targets in this offense. He's not gonna sniff a nineteen percent target chare. And you look at the archetype of running back, like you got two hundred and thirty eight rushing attempts last year. We can't project him for that much more. I mean that was fourteenth in the NFL.

00:33:21
Speaker 2: So he feels like a player where it's like, okay, well, now he's got to live with creating his vow, I mean, creating his value in early downs and touchdowns.

00:33:31
Speaker 1: Can he do that? Sure?

00:33:32
Speaker 2: But Malik Wills is gonna also eat into his rushing production and his red zone production, and the target volume is not going to be there. So Chen feels like a guy you're you're drafting probably out or above his ceiling and a lot of aspects where he's gonna fall. I mean I can't see him dropping outside of the top ten running backs and ADP like in the in the summer, can you JJ and at.

00:33:55
Speaker 1: That probably it's like probably not. Yeah, yeah, So it's.

00:33:58
Speaker 2: Like okay, fine, like he's a locked in RB one. But if he doesn't get the pass game stuff and the touchdown what goes sideways? Is he a top fifteen running back? Where you're overdrafting him? Because I don't see top five upside here?

00:34:10
Speaker 1: Am I wrong? I think at the very least people should walk away from what's gone on in Miami this offseason, viewing Devon a Chan as a much much more volatile running back than they did then they viewed him in November, right where you know Mike McDaniel is still there. I mean, like, if you want to just look at this from this from the lens of volatility, I think that's that's fair, right, because you know, completely new coaching staff. Mike McDaniel was a great fit. I remember in the speaking of talking about prospects to fit, I mean like when Devon a Chan went to Miami, I remember being like, you know, is Devon ah Chan big enough? You know, whenever we were prospecting him and stuff, and like just being like, but obviously he has a speed, and he's he had you know, small running backs. You don't always get the kind of production in college that Devon A Chan had. And if you go look at the prospect guide when he landed in Miami, thing mattered anymore for me because that spot was too perfect for Devon Chan. And so you know, we saw that that spot being with Mike McDaniel in this zone heavy scheme that we've seen these incredibly athletic and fast running backs. I mean like we've seen it with like Raheem Moster types you know, throughout his career and stuff. Right, but now you actually have like an uber talented player, not just like a day three running back that the Shanahan system randomly found. That's fast. You had this guy in a Chan that could do everything and then obviously he really grew as a receiver. It's just a new coaching staff. We don't know, we don't know what this is going to look like. And so strictly from that perspective, yeah, and then like you you can never just assume that a player is going to see a twenty percent target shair, you know, a running back that is you know, and so that that's that's frightening Malik Willis. He's Malik Willis has not had a single game in his NFL career with more than twenty five pass attempts, like he hasn't hit that mark in a game throughout his career. And so I love the point of Miami was really past heavy life last year, like or sorry, run heavy last year. Their pass right over expected was minus five point eight percent. And Malik Willis can can throw the deep ball like that. That's that's one thing. That's that's he's been at least so far, you know, a limited sample that he's looked good with and that and that will help Jalen Wattle I think probably be a better and best ball type player more than likely with Waddle. But yeah, A Chan, I'm I'm scared, man, and I am. And that's coming from someone who last two years I've been all over a Chan. I've loved a Chan from a fantasy perspective, and I'm just scared of what this might end up looking like.

00:36:32
Speaker 2: I emphatically agree, and then you know not to belabor the point too. But this is also a team that I think, looking at their current iteration of their depth chart and stuff, where I think they're locked in to take a wide receiver in this draft class, probably in round three, since they had three round three.

00:36:48
Speaker 1: Picks, Travis Etn to New Orleans? Do you think this is bad? And then at the same time, Etn no longer right, I shouldn't say do you think it's bad? How bad do you think it is? Or how good? You know, like what's this looked like for Etn? And then uh, well, beshall Tutan because you know ETM is no longer in his way too.

00:37:03
Speaker 2: Man. I think it's good for Etn and he's going to get a crap ton of volume, and I think we're going to see very similar runout to what happened in Jacksonville last year. Probably the red zone role is all his and just his alone. I think Kamara is out of town now.

00:37:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, is that just an assumption at this point, Like he's kind of one that I'm making.

00:37:22
Speaker 2: Man, I just think like Kamara doesn't want to go anywhere else, like he's talked about it very very openly, like yeah, that he would basically like I'm not going to say pull the gronk and be like fine, you want to trade, I'm going to retire. But like I think they could like legit cut him and I wouldn't be surprised. I hate that for Kamara, but I mean, what else are we supposed to expect, like with ETN getting the big contract. So ETN, like, I'm very high on him holding down like he's going to be Kevin Moore's version of Saquon Barkley and New Orleans in the sense he's going to get all the freaking work. Now, how efficient is he going to be with that work is very fair to question. I mean ETM was not good on a per touch basis, regardless of whatever metric you look at, Like last year was outside the top thirty running backs and explosive run rate, rushing success rate, misstackles yard, like everything everything he was bad. So at this point in his career, does that change?

00:38:20
Speaker 1: Okay? Probably not?

00:38:23
Speaker 2: Maybe, but okay, well then is he just brand new Kyron Williams is the way that I'm kind of looking at with ETN.

00:38:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that's Kyrien Williams and a worse offense. Yeah, that's that's that's the No, it's gonna be priced that way, hopefully, you know, hopefully it's not like they're going back to back, But yeah, I think that's I think that's fair. I mean, the Saints were dead last and PPR points at running back last year. Now you can look at the running backs they had, sure and and you know, like you had these like random bursts were like Devin Neil looked capable enough, you know, as like a solid backup for that like three game stretch. But then they you know, they were running just not very stunthy running backs towards tontgrest demand such and so like we shouldn't expect a lot of production out of that back then, obviously with a rookie quarterback, and then with Spencer Ratler to start the year last year. I do think that, like shucks, development's going to matter a lot here. I'm looking at ETN right now and I'm probably not I would assume I'm not higher or lower. I'm just gonna probably be a round market with him. Let's talk about base Shall Tutin, because this is the great divide right now in America. Is Chris Rodriguez signing with Jacksonville yesterday, right because we're recording this on Thursday, signing with Jacksonville yesterday? But Basehall Tutin was sitting atop the depth chart. Now, what do you look at with his depth chart of la Quinn, Allen, Basehall, Tutin, Chris Rodriguez. How much is Chris Rodriguez matter? You get a lot of people arguing both sides, where are you at? I'm just gonna be on the touton train. I'm totally fine with it.

00:39:47
Speaker 2: Like I feel like Rodriguez landing there like was a glorious thing if you're a Tuton stand because there is going to be this divide and that's going to keep his ADP in check. But honestly, like, doesn't this feel almost like the best case of runout? Like I know a lot of people are not putting it that way, but like if you wanted to make the fever dream for Basil Toot and it's like, well you didn't want to see them, go get another guy in the draft that like is a better pass catcher profiles in that way, or them invest other capital like a second third round pick and another running back. So for me, like, yeah, bring Chris Rodriguez in, Like we know what that skill set is. Is he a very good running back on early downs? Sure you can make that case. He was top twelve A miss tackles, force in yards, utter contact brit Temp last year. But also he's pretty much a sum like net zero in the passing game. And I'm not that worried about leaquent Allen. I wasn't as high on him as a prospect as a lot of other people, but Basil toot and it's like, I'm just gonna bet on the talent, dude, Like on a pertage basis, this guy was amazing last year. He was top twelve a mistackle rate and a rushing success rate. And this is also a coaching staff and a freaking GM that like talked about this player before they even got the job in Jacksonville. So I'm just gonna bet on the talent. Like I I've got Bachel Tuton as the top fifteen running back right now. I think he's got that type of upside and I think he could be an RB one and I'm not gonna worry about because we don't see this happen very much in the NFL just in general, like, oh well, if Baseiel Tuton's not gonna be a bell cow, who the hell in the NFL is a bell cow these days?

00:41:24
Speaker 1: Like playing even even Bejon Robinson wasn't a bellcow, you know, exactly like.

00:41:31
Speaker 2: Baal Is Rodrigue is going to be part of this backfield? Sure, but I look at this as like a sixty to sixty five percent split. Yeah, probably in Basil Tuton's wheelhouse and Rodriguez. It's really comes down to do you think he's going to really eat into the red zone role? Because if he turns into the Tyler al Jier and he's vulturing touchdowns or good lord, if he turns into the the the worst case scenario for this JJ is that this turns into the Seattle backfield and yeahs Rodriguez is zach Sharbona and then we're all crying in her.

00:42:03
Speaker 1: Hands for the whole year. But I don't I don't think that's how this is going to go. Yeah, the empty calorie role that Kenneth Walker played last year, where you know, just a lot of the between the twenties stuff that we just don't care about. Yeah. So look, I was huge on Tutin last year as a prospect. I'm I'm kind of going to take you through this journey because I want to be very clear with where I stand with Tutan. So I was I was high on Tutin as a prospect. He goes to Jacksonville. Obviously, I like, I had Tutin ahead of Camp Scataboo and rookie drafts last year, Like you can go look at rankings and stuff. I think I did too, and you know, like that could be a really bad I mean like in season it looked horrible. You know, Tutin has this season and throughout last year. I'm like, hey, ad base Shall Tutin, Ad base Shall Tutin And that was an l right, And so I think a lot of people are just like And then I had Tutin on my by Candidate's episode as a bye candidate. Then I started writing The Prospect Guy because I do the year two stuff in the Prospect Guide and in Tutin's profile. The one thing that I called out and then I sent a newsletter out about this. It was something along the lines of like, maybe don't buy too aggressively with base Shall Tuton right now, because there are some numbers definitely that scare me at Tad. The main one that scared me with Tutin was that one of the reasons that I liked him so much as a prospect, because I think that he actually fit the Kenneth Walker archetype from a prospect standpoint. And so the one thing that scared me about Tutin and what he did to year one was that he was very explosive coming out like that was why we loved him or part of the reason why we loved him, And then we didn't see that at all his rookie season. He was more of a grinder and bruiser as a rookie right Like, he had a great his success rate was substantially better than Travis Etn's last year. I think Jacksonville saw that, and that's why Etn had twelve goal line rushes Tooton had seven. But like when you look at their overall volume, that's a pretty big discrepancy. Are pretty small discrepancy. Given the amount of volume those two guys were seeing, you would expect Travis Etn to have a lot more. Aka they were using base Shall Tuton at the goal line you know, in those red zone packages relatively frequently for the the amount of volume that he was seeing overall and in general. And so then like after I sent that newsletter, people thought that it meant that that I'm not buying base Shall Tuton. I I'm still buying base Shall Tuton. I'm saying, just pump the brakes for a second, because there are some things that that signal that this could, Like his explosive run rate was was so poor last year that if you look at history and like the ten to fifteen running back since twenty eleven who have kind of been in his bucketed area, I mean, it's it's with after with like it's it's just bad player after bad player, and so that was a concern. I'm calling out a red flag. That's kind of how I approach this stuff, is that I'm looking at it from a pro and con standpoint. But the overall stance was still let's buy bas Shall Tutan because we also knew that traves Etam was likely, you know, not going to resign there. And so now we're sitting here with Chris Rodriguez entering the picture and you have tutan' in Laquinn Allen. To me, la Quinn Allen is more than likely like a da a goombal walle a plus right, like a like that that's likely the kind of he would play. I think he's better than a goomba walle I didn't mind la Quinn Allen as a prospect, but it was very clear when you're a day three back with that kind of receiving profile, you're probably going to play that kind of like third down back type role in the NFL, Like that's where you're gonna be locked into. You could argue that that CAP's bay Sell Tuton's ceiling, but like we're saying, very rarely are you gonna find a Bell cow anyway in the NFL that's playing all three downs like a lot of the It doesn't mean that Tuton's as zero as a pass catcher because la Quinn Allen is on there and third most downs at offensive play that offenses player first and second down. They don't play as many third downs as they do first and second down, which means Bachell Tuton will be on the field a decent bit. You get Chris Rodriguez coming in now, and I would argue that Rodriguez, like from a fit perspective, makes a ton of sense for this offense because in today's game, you're gonna have this rotation of running backs, you're not gonna have these Bell coals, and you're getting a guy in Rodriguez who can get you the tough yards and does something relatively similar as Touton from that perspective, which what we saw from Tutin year one was a really high success rate and a really good grinded out mentality where Jacksonville's EPA was great when Beasehall Tutin was on the field. Chris Rodriguez has been a very underrated probably player in the league from a pure rushing standpoint. But we're playing fantasy football. We're not playing real football GM here, Right, Chris Rodriguez has six career catches and in five collegiate seasons he had twenty receptions.

00:46:30
Speaker 2: Right.

00:46:31
Speaker 1: I know that he was great in Kentucky with Liam Cohen. I know all this stuff went down.

00:46:36
Speaker 2: Are you aware, J J. Hied Do you know that he knows Liam Cohen?

00:46:39
Speaker 1: Before? How many times do we have to be burned by the non pass catchers in the NFL and fantasy football before we realize that, like, that's not the archetype that we should chase. I'm not saying now when I say that, I'm not saying that Chris Rodriguez can't outscore Basehall Tutan. I'm saying from a game theory standpoint, you should absolutely bet on base Shall Tutan being the higher ceiling running back there because he showed a pass catching profile in college. Chris Rodriguez did not do that. And then last year, yes, you can say Tuton wasn't a pass catcher receiver in that offense. Well, they had Traves Etn and they had LeQuinn Allen. It doesn't mean that they're not look at who he's competing with right now, you know, if this is it for Basehall Tutan, I agree the runout here is very very good because they hypothetically could have gone like a I don't know, more more like all around back in like on like day two, like a Jonah Coleman or something like, you know, like just getting just getting someone who's just like or em Att Johnson. Dude, I was gonna say, Ama Johnson, that's all yeah. They if they went, that would cap his ceiling, like that would scare me hurt. I'm not saying that his ceiling can't be capped, because it could. Chris Rodriguez, what if he is the goal line back right like you're saying, like what if this is a Seattle situation. We have to be open minded about that. But my point is that what if he's not. If he's not, then Tutin is that sixty five seventy percent running back rush are type player who's probably gonna see a ten eleven percent target share in a Jacksonville offense with Liam Cohen. That is a top that's an RB two and potentially RB one if things break the right way. And fantasy football, it's not a given. It's a high variance thing and situation. But that's my thought process and going through all of this is like why, and that's how the story of Bayshall Tutan could could unfold. And if it does, I'm going to chase that ceiling. Of course, I'm going to chase the ceiling. You know. That's that's that's how I play Fantasy.

00:48:35
Speaker 2: Same and the and the other point about all of this too is dude, what if this is just last year's Jacksonville backfield and Touton Tuton is going to inherit what ETM was doing last year and Rodriguez they're just asking him to do what Tuton was doing last year, like, which is very possible that that's equally possible, and it's like, Okay, Tooton in the ETN role where he's getting most of the routes and stuff, and he's splitting fine, he splits the red zone work and stuff. But we know Rodriguez is not gonna work in as a pass catcher. Okay, wheels up. Rodriguez is a flex a touchdown depending flex of Twoton is a top twelve running back.

00:49:07
Speaker 1: Probably, how much do you care about about salary with this, because that's that's an argument that the pro Rodriguez crowd is throwing out there, that that the money is not bad for Rodriguez because what does he get, like a max of twelve mil or something like that, guaranteed six, like a one year six somewhere along those lines. Essentially, it's not that different from like a Rico Dawdle dear deal. Right. And the way I'll say what I see with this is that we are splitting hairs when it comes to this kind of stuff because every team has a different approach to how they spend money. And if you're gonna sit here and say this guy is so much more important than this guy because he's making two million dollars more a season or guaranteed money, that's so irrelevant the grand scheme of things you have to scale this properly, right, Like a running back contract is so low to begin with because of the way the teams view that position, that the delta between one to another is just not significant enough for me to really like care. I'm not saying that we should completely reject and ignore how much money a player is getting. I'm saying that that should not take over the narrative at all, because we should be looking at how the fit and how talented the actual player is.

00:50:18
Speaker 2: I emphatically agree with you, and I thought Ryan Heath shout out to Ryan Heath had a wonderful suite about this and said recent running backs who signed with similar total guarantees to chritis Rodriguez in terms of percentage of the cap and tell me if this is a laundry list of running backs that you would be worried about because they got around the same amount of money JJ Jamal Williams wood New Orleans, Alexander Madison with Minnesota, Dalvin Cook with the Jets, Antonio Gibson with the Patriots, and Naji Harris with the Chargers. Now nag got hurt. We didn't see how that play out. But does the rest of that list really or should really scare anybody, so no people can miss me with the contract. Talk to me, that all comes down to like finding a reason to twist the knife and prove your prior, your narrative is correct. That's all that says to me.

00:51:03
Speaker 1: And look again, there's nuance to this. This isn't a clear I'm what we're doing here, debro is. We're looking at these ranges of outcomes here, and we know that it can go south for Tutin, but we're also recognizing that, like this could this not be a Chase Brown situation where like we don't see the crazy production right away, but the situation is ripe. There's not a great draft class. And then all of a sudden that he's the belcal like he's he's the dude, right, Like, I'm fine with chasing that if we get if we get Tutin as like a fringe Top twenty running back in redraft, like I'm I'm fine chasing that simply because that's not gonna gonna completely slay my team if I miss, you know, and I'd rather chase the upside.

00:51:48
Speaker 2: I emphatically agree, And back to the original point that I was trying to make too, is that, Like, I think because of all the pushback about Rodriguez, we're not going to see a meteoric rise of two and as like RB twelve, RB thirteen and ADP when we flip over the cards like a week before the NFL season.

00:52:07
Speaker 1: I think that's gonna keep his ADP in.

00:52:09
Speaker 2: Check to places where it's like, dude, if you you go wide receiver heavy early, you're taking the swing on a guy. I'm drafting an RB two, but he's an RB one. If everything hits but there's some risk in the profile, then toot in the swing that you probably should take in every single draft because his ADP is going to have probably a hard ceiling with the Rodriguez stuff. Yeah.

00:52:28
Speaker 1: I mean, look, if there's gonna be some some drafts where you're gonna be able to get him at like RB three on your team, if you if you go like RBRB to start or something like that, that is like chef's kiss, Yes, God, you know, like you can get the baby all night. Yeah. Yeah, I mean like that's the perfect kind of high variants, high upside player to go in that situation. Okay, one more, we have Mike Evans and San Francisco do you like the fit? Are you excited you're gonna draft him? Yeah, I'm gonna draft him. Man.

00:52:53
Speaker 2: I think this is just Avonte Adams of last year. This is going to a good team.

00:52:58
Speaker 1: I know that.

00:52:59
Speaker 2: You know, if you look at the one point seven six yards per route run, there's gonna be a lot of people that are like, oh, he's he's slowing down, and the hamstrings and all the emfbs, which I put no stock into any of that. That's who dooo, voodoo medicine, whatever kind of made up crap. I don't worry about that. But Evans I think still has plenty of juice in the tank. Like he's evolved as he's gotten older. He's an amazing route runner, like one hundred and forty six qualifying wide receivers. Last year he was second in separation and route win rate. He's not cooked, man. I would be investing in Mike Evans heavily, just like I did last year. It didn't work out last year, but again, like with all the injury stuff, you probably just get the injury discount this year. Jang.

00:53:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I also think Baker was just not good last year.

00:53:40
Speaker 2: Dude.

00:53:40
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, like I think he wasn't healthy. I think he was a whole gear. Let's not like people should not ignore the fact that he got a decent quarterback upgrade. If you're like you're looking at if you're looking at twenty twenty five Baker, you know, like like whole season Baker, this is a quarterback upgrade. Whether you want to say it's scheme, you know, Kyle Shanahan, whatever situationally it's an upgrade. It's a good spot for Mike Evans to be in.

00:54:02
Speaker 2: And I think it's also like speaking on the as far as the quarterback and stuff, it's also noteworthy to talk about the fact that Rock Party has had a seven percent or higher passing touchdown rate in three of the last four seasons and a forty nine ers offense that like, really we've always kind of equated to being really run heavy, like weeks eleven through eighteen last year, and they were, I mean like they were banged up things like that. This team was also like there were fifty percent like middle of the road sixteenth and passing right inside the ten yard line. And then when we go back to do we see a healthy version of George Kittle this year? So Juwan Jennings is probably not back. So who's Mike Evans competing with? Like he might legitimately lead if he stays healthy. JJ, Mike Evans might legitimately lead the NFL in red zone.

00:54:47
Speaker 1: Targets this year. That's not crazy to say it's in his range of outcomes for sure. I'm excited for it. Any other player that we didn't talk about or do you want to just talk prospects here?

00:54:55
Speaker 2: I mean, I think Isaiah Likely is somebody that I'll mention really quickly. I'm I mean absolutely fantastic landing spot, got the contract and now he's got the clear pathway for targets. So for everybody that we've all like wanted to see that AASAA likely breakout, I think it's coming. Like I've got him as a top ten tight end this year like my early ranks, I've got him at tight end seven because again, who is competing with him for targets? Like yeah, and the difference is draft carnial tape. But if they don't draft him at like four like I mean, excuse me five, then it's wheels up for likely this year.

00:55:30
Speaker 1: Man, Do you think it signals anything about what the Giants might do in the draft, Like do you do you have any read Like do you think that they're gonna go Jeremiah Love? Do you think that they're gonna go off insive line? Like like what's the cause? Because like they have THEO Johnson, who's not terrible, right, but he's I don't know, like my I'm trying to figure out because I say A likely is more of a receiving tight end than anything else, right, Like he's that like like you know archetype wise, more Darren Waller than he is Rob Gronkowski, and so like I'm just trying to think about like what they're envisioning, how much twelve they're trying to run like a Sto Johnson dust And then what what this might signal with what they're going to do in the draft. If anything, it might not be anything. They might just be you know, Harba's like, yeah, I want my guy, you know who I coach for years in Baltimore.

00:56:20
Speaker 2: I think I think there's some a small amount of signal. And I think, you know, we've gotten some of the you know, reading the tea leaves and stuff coming out in the media. I think they're live to take Jeremiah Love. I I'm kind of curious right now if Tennessee doesn't let him get past four. So I think they're alive to take Jeremiah Love. I also think they're live to take Cardinal.

00:56:40
Speaker 1: Tate at five.

00:56:41
Speaker 2: Like I think both of both of those avenues because they I mean the defense, I don't think they're going to take any edge kind of guy. Maybe they go with Caleb Downs or a safety at that pick. They're them bringing back Jermaine Illuminar. I think takes them probably off the board to take an offensive lineman like tackle was the other spot of need they probably had. So I do think that the it's narrowed the window of where they probably go. I think it's probably between Tate and Love right now. So how that shakes out, I think is going to be very interesting. And to your point, the amount of twelve and we kind of talked about this that they run, man, I THEO Johnson's just not somebody again going back to kind of the Rodriguez conversation, but at the tight end position, he's not anybody that's ever wowed me from like, Okay, fine, we can make the case from athleticism, but that athleticism has never translated to NFL field as far as efficiency and other things that we look at outside of touchdown variants where it's like, oh THEO Johnson's really freaking good. It's like, oh, he's athletic, but it's not converting to the NFL field as far as like breaking tackles, yards per route run, doing things like as a receiver especial, really exactly like things are outside of like last year, Yeah, he was a top twelve tight end, but almost all of that was because of the touchdowns.

00:57:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's like a default like, yes, tight end two, like you need to take swings on like you're either going to be elite or you're not going to be that important in fantasy football, you know, unless you're in a two tight end league or something like that. But you know a lot of these guys you just have to take the swing, like you have to just go for that upside. And if you see that with likely, then I think it's the right spot for him. All Right, This is this is a segue because we did just talk about Jeremiah Love. So let's talk about some prospects here this running back class. Do you think that it's only better than the twenty twenty four class because of or is it twenty twenty four or twenty twenty three? I might have put that down wrong, the one that was just bad, the Ray Davis, you know Jonathan Brooks.

00:58:35
Speaker 2: Oh no, it was twenty twenty four, because I pulled up the running backs scause I had to go back in the wayback machine and be like, which class is this?

00:58:41
Speaker 1: I think, Oh my gosh, Marsh four class. Oh dudude, yeah, Marsh. A lot of class yeah, and a.

00:58:46
Speaker 2: Lot of this is just the injuries in that class just crush that class. Trey Benson can't stay healthy, Marshaon Lloyd. I loved him as a prospect, you know, God's sakes, he can't stay healthy. Braylan Allen didn't do anything. So I think this class is better than that class.

00:59:02
Speaker 1: But again.

00:59:04
Speaker 2: That really comes with the caveat of we have to see draft capital, because I mean, dude, RB two through RB five or six of this class, you could paint a picture where one of those guys goes in round two and a few of them going round three. You could paint a picture also of all these guys dropped to round four in the NFL Draft and then it gets crushed. So I think on a talent perspective, it's probably as good, maybe a little bit better. But again we also have the the the we can look back with obvious clarity and say that class didn't hit, but then also injuries crush that class too.

00:59:44
Speaker 1: I think Jack's Falcone who I had on the on the show a couple weeks ago, Scott he made the point of because I asked him the same question about having a clear RB two and it sounds like you don't have a clear RB two or you just kind of see yeah, And so he made the point He's like, I don't have a clear RB two and I can tell you almost emphatically, or he did tell me emphatically that he will not take a non Jeremiah Love running back in the first round of rookie drafts this year. Like that, that's how, That's how he stood firm, just because he didn't see that profile, you know, in this class, and wide receiver's deepish enough, I would say there's still a chance that I would only because I don't think wide receiver is like like phenomenal, like this is probably one of the weaker rookie drafts that we're gonna have in some time. In my opinion, partially I'm thinking super flex too, because you're not getting the depth of quarterback and whatnot. But with Jeremiah Love, like, is he to you you know, same tier as Ash and Gent like that good? Or is he you know? Is he better?

01:00:42
Speaker 2: Like?

01:00:42
Speaker 1: Where are you at with with Love?

01:00:44
Speaker 2: I blame you for this, like when you pose this question in the show sheet, dude, Like I had to go back in the last five years, and I actually just because but all of these guys like in the last few years are exceptional, the top end running backs. I had to go back and stack them up and look at this from just a pure number standpoint about how good a prospects they were. I think Gent stands out by himself on a numbers perspective, Like I think he is probably one of the best running back prospects we've had in the last five years. So for me, I think it kind of goes Genty's one. It's for his prospects prospect status. Yes, yes, genty is one based off the numbers, and I think Love is right there with Gibbs at number two. And you can make that case of Bjon and stuff like that. But I think I think gent stands alone by himself as far as like being the best running back prospect that we've seen in the last five years. And I think Love is right there with Gibbs at number two. And this is not to say Jon is great, but Bijon on a numbers perspective wasn't. He was amazing, but you could poke holes like very slight, but you could poke holes in his profile when he came out.

01:01:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, early on in this process, I thought that Love wasn't going to because I categorized all these prospects via their zapp score and I created a legendary performer category this year, so it's like the highest of you know, it's only the best of the best. Like the hit rates are absurd when players fall into that category, and Jeremiah Love was right below that. He was like a little bit above from a score perspective, like an Amari and Hampton at the time, right, And so the model really likes Amaron Hampton. So that's that's part of the reason for that. But as the draft process has gone on, the steam is out of control with Jeremiah Love for good reason, Like he's a good prospect, but he's he's firmly going to be a legendary performer at this point. I agree, because, you know, because the draft capital is going to be there. If you look at top half first round running backs over the last fifteen years, absurd. You know, the only guy who didn't hit was Trent Richardson, and he still gave you a seventeen PPR point per game season as a rookie. You know, like you still gain that value, you know, or at least maintained it, you know, after his rookie season, and recent history is just absurd with with how good those running backs have been. So I think, like, like when it comes to Super Flex, are you taking anyone over Jeremiah Love like a Mendoza, You're just You're just going You're just going. Love Love is the is the one oh one.

01:03:11
Speaker 2: And this is not a shade against Mendoza and stuff like that, but like, even in the best cases circumstances, what do you hope and out of Mendoza, considering he's not going to run a tough like what a C. J.

01:03:22
Speaker 1: Stroud type of way he's heared Jared Goff trajectory.

01:03:26
Speaker 2: Type like he's gonna have to run hot on passing touchdowns in the passing volume and all that kind of stuff where it's like Jeremiah Love, like you're getting a player where automatically out the gate if you were to put him on the block, and you're like draft him and put him on the block in your dynasty league, like you should be expecting, like people should be offering you like two firsts maybe in some leagues, two first and like a little bit of change. And it's like, is anybody gonna offer you that much for freaking Mendoza?

01:03:53
Speaker 1: Zero chance? Yeah, zero chance. It's got to be it's got to be Love first, and then I mean I'll probably end up having Mendoza like in tier with some of those wide receivers. But let's talk about these running backs, so you don't have a clear RB two. We talked about Jenarium price for a second earlier. I'm having a hard time with price for obvious reasons, right because I approached this very analytically and via the Zapp model. Now, the model itself can account for teammate production to a degree. You know, like the higher Jeremiah Love goes in the draft, the more the model will like Jendarium price and we don't, you know, if I'm being completely honest and objective, we don't really have a sample of player. If Price goes day two of a day two back with a teammate that was drafted that high in Jeremiah Love, like hypothetically if he goes, you know, top eight or whatever, top ten. So I have a hard time with Price simply because you're doing so much projecting with him. Do you agree with that? And can you give me and others any confidence in Price versus what the number naturally going to say? Give him that he shared a back through with Jeremiah Love.

01:05:03
Speaker 2: I think we're having kind of like the Dollar Store Kenneth Walker conversation, where it's like a similar profile, but he didn't get fed the volume and he wasn't the lead back, and there's a lot of projecting we're having to do. I mean, we're all projecting like draft capital for him. Like everybody thinks he's going to go in the second round, but what if he dropped to the third round?

01:05:23
Speaker 1: Like what if?

01:05:24
Speaker 2: Because the NFL double Like I don't care what anybody says, the NFL does double count speed. We see this year over year every year, every year with a wide receivers and stuff like that. What if Mike Washington Junior gets drafted ahead of him because he's a mutint alien, like he tests it out of the damn out of the gym, and it's like, we can't rule that out now, Like do I think, like in my mind's eye of like playing range of outcomes that probably happens. Probably not, But right now I've got fluidity to it because I like Price the player. But there's a lot of projecting. You we're projecting what could his pass game role?

01:05:57
Speaker 1: Is he captain?

01:05:57
Speaker 2: That not even talking about like him as a pass protector, which woof on a limited basis was rough like it is an adventure for Jeddarium Price, So outside of all these different factors, it's a projection because of he didn't get the volume. I would have loved Jendarium Price if he freaking stayed in school and came out after a monster year of production, and we would have felt the whole heck of a lot better and just had the Kenneth Walker conversation as of the projector the Kenneth Walker conversation, but a lot more projecting because we don't have the pass game role and what if he's not a good enough pass protector outside of being a good enough receiver for a team to deploy him in that way. What if he can't pass protect and he's just an early down only guy. I mean from a rushing perspective. I like him as a prospect, and yes it right now, he is my RB two because the numbers are also very good on a per touch basis, like thirty first third and breakaway rate. He was fit twenty fifth and fifth in yards of to contact for attempt over the last two years. But again to your point, there's a whole lot of volatility that comes with projecting jendarium price and I'm not going to be over the moon, and why there is fluidity in that RB two spot, Like I can make you a really good case of Mike Washington Junior being the more complete back, like he's the more athletic back, like he was really freaking good last year as far as like he's a home run hitter. He's got the size that teams will will covet and that athleticism and he's honestly like a really underrated pass catcher. Now, is he gonna pop from yards per route run?

01:07:25
Speaker 1: No?

01:07:26
Speaker 2: But on the film. He's a competent pass catcher. He's done plenty of things in the process and put up more film, whether it's the Senior Bowl or limited opportunities in college as a pass catcher where you can utilize him on wheel routes and things out of the backfield. Now, does he have the hip fluidity to ever be like a true pass game weapon. No, but can you do some things in the passing game where maybe I'm projecting that ceiling to be a little bit higher and that floor to be a little bit higher in the NFL than maybe some are.

01:07:54
Speaker 1: Why do you think Mike Washington is not getting more love than he I mean, like, like, I know he's getting some like the Fantasy Space obviously is giving him that love, but I mean more from like a you know, his draft capital is rising, It's just not to the same area as like a price at this moment.

01:08:10
Speaker 2: You know.

01:08:11
Speaker 1: There when I when I look at his profile analytically, he he wasn't necessarily like if you look at his time and you know, he played with Seth McGowan at one point, and you know, so like there's there's some teammates stuff going on, but he never was like a true, true, true true Bell cow in college, right, never like, is that a projection thing that people were having a hard time with because he has the size, he has the speed. You know, the receiving profile isn't that bad. It's not fantastic, but it's it's it's at least like good enough. Like his his top comp in the that model was Latavious Murray and and and I don't think that's a bad thing when you're taking median outcome and like being able to be usable. And this is what we're kind of working with with this running back class too. Now, Jenarian Price, his top comp was Ronald Jones, just so that people are of that, yeah, so so like, which I think is actually kind of interesting because Jones had very similar red flag callouts of like having to project a little bit from a receiving perspective. And and you know, with Price, you're talking about the past pro stuff like. So I have two questions I want to ask you. Do you think Mike Washington ends up rising via the regular draft people to a point where like, like like it seems like that you think there's a possibility that Mike Washington's the RB two drafted in this class and then with the other piece with with generium price, do you can you like if he gets the draft capital, I'm not worried about the rushing production because draft capital generally is indicative of that side and that's relatively replaceable in the like, yes, you're gonna get the extremes, but it's a more replaceable aspect from a player perspective in the NFL. But my thing with Price is can we project that receiving side like that? Is that where your hesitation lies? Like? Are you I think that sometimes with Price where people are viewing him almost from a real NFL lens and not a fantasy lens.

01:10:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's a lot to chew on there. Do I have concerns about Getarian prices receiving role in production? Yes, I have a lot of concerns because if he can't get the pass pro stuff down, then the glaring holes on his production profile and the lack of receiving work becomes even worse because he's not going to play passing downs. And then if he doesn't get round two capital and he gets round three capital, but him and Mike Washington boco within Mike picks or maybe Washington gets drafted before him in the round. Then it's like and then we then we play the landing spot game. So I have a lot of concerns about Jerian Price and Mike Washington. I don't think he's going to get the hype from the media conglomerate that because for a few different reasons, like you just see, like with the general NFL Draft media consortium, there's certain guys they'll talk about some of this is helmet scouting, some of this is call it collegiate program and all that kind of stuff, and the other thing about it is not me and people were expecting Mike like he wasn't talked about because the hyper h the thing is the narrative around this running back class we've already kind of talked about.

01:11:16
Speaker 1: It JJ is that it's horrible.

01:11:18
Speaker 2: So if the narrative around this class was this class is really good or it's solid, then I think you would seem maybe more people gravitate to it because the echo chamber is not going to like smack it down, you know. So some of this is just straight vibes. What I will say is I think Mike Washington could get drafted higher than what anybody is going to kind of talk about because of what he did at the combine, because of the size, because of there is a lot to like in his profile to where he doesn't get the hype in the process. But when the NFL draft and the picks are flying, I think that he could go higher than people are expecting. And that's the point where everybody goes, oh okay, well I didn't see that coming, and he went before Jeneeri and Price where everybody's like, you know, blown out of their chairs, and where it's like some of us are like.

01:12:10
Speaker 1: Oh okay, should have kind of seen that. Maybe, yeah, right now. The model actually does have Price RB two and it's it's pretty draft capital driven and teammates score driven and stuff like that. But I've said all along, like from the start, I just have a hard time like being overly confident in a guy like Price in his profile. But two guys that the ZAP model seems to like a good bit versus consensus. I stress versus consensus because I don't think they're flawless. But Emmitt Johnson and Nick Singleton or two that are popping a lot in the model. Talk about both of them because I'm very curious about where you stand.

01:12:45
Speaker 2: I like Himma Johnson a lot. Man, I just worry about where his draft capital goes. And I feel like because of how he I wasn't surprised, and I'll be very clear about this, I wasn't shocked about how he tested at all. I actually where a lot of people like, ahh, he gotta yeah.

01:13:01
Speaker 3: Expected yeah, Like I mean, I expected that from the very beginning, if you want, like I because when I'm when I'm writing these profile by the way, Emma Johnson's actually the RB two in the model, I forgot that.

01:13:10
Speaker 1: But when I'm writing these profiles and stuff, I'm watching on one monitors just so that I'm like, you know, not sounding like a moron whenever I talk about them. I didn't see like crazy long speed with him. No, he doesn't have that.

01:13:21
Speaker 2: So like I was hoping that he ran a four five, the fact that he ran a four to four wasn't shocking. If anything, I was happy about that because that's not where Emma Johnson wins. That's not his secret sauce Like okay, fine, we can we can ding in for the three cane and stuff like that, I'm like, and that that's dragging down his rask or he's the only one who did that exactly, and he shouldn't have done it. Like the other thing about it is like we talk about all these guys are not running and testing and stuff like that. His agent should have like tapped him on the shoulder and said, Okay, you're sitting this out, but there's another time good.

01:13:55
Speaker 1: There's a clear bias. I am wondering though, And I heard, uh Dane Brugler kind of talk about this at one point. But and obviously Dane is very very tapped into what's going on with the league, and you know, one of the best of not the best out there. But Dane was mentioning that there are some teams out there that actually give players a little bit more love when they do go out and test because it shows that they got that dog right, Yeah, and so that's great from from now. He didn't test, He was like, what a twenty fifth percentile three cone guy or something like that. Like it wasn't very strong. The rest and stuff was fine, right right, And then but like the interesting thing that Dane brought up was that like Makay Lemon sits there at the podium and says he's got this you know, he's got all this this dog in them, and then he'll compete against anyone, and then he doesn't go out and compete in all of the drills, and it's like, how do you how do you kind of match what they're saying versus what they're doing. So I want to at least give em At Johnson credit for doing it and for doing the three when literally no other running back did. He was the only one who did it, and so for us to knock him on that seems a little bit on, but it is where what kind of like what kind of like comps are you seeing with with Emma Johnson, Like what kind of running back do you think he can be at the next level? So also to your point, just before we move off of this, yeah.

01:15:10
Speaker 2: I do want to throw it out there that, yes, fine, the three cone is crushing his RADS score. He also in the vert and broad was a seventy first and seventy third percentile athlete, so it's not like he's a total schlub. And yeah, yes, my comp for him at Johnson's brought the entirety of this process. I've thrown it out there. I haven't given it out on social media because I know people are going to take this and run.

01:15:35
Speaker 1: With this ridiculous. That's why I'm sharing it here.

01:15:38
Speaker 2: That's why that's in a safe space, because I know we can have this conversation and get through this. You look at the play style of Emma Johnson, his short area burst, his lateral agility is where he wins this dude in the second level. I mean, I wrote it up in my rookie profile for him. His infectious energy on a per touch basis, It's like this dude's shotgun like eight monsters and packed in like cheeked like four zen's before he takes every carrier, gets every touches, like every touch, and I would I want to be very mindful of how I present this. I want people to not remember what this player turned into, but I want people to remember his story and his line of like how his career progressed from being a UDFA, the archetype of player that this is. He wasn't somebody that tested as an otherworldly athlete. He was a UDFA. He had to climb the depth chart. Now, yes, he eventually became a freaking fantastic RB one in fantasy, and he was awesome. From a play style and skill set perspective, because I think Emma Johnson is really a pass game weapon. Man. Like we talked about this previously, you do not see and that's one of the things before we get in Nick Singleton that I think that people kind of missed the boat on Singleton is that Nick Singleton's not a true pass game weapon. You did not see him deployed at Penn State on wheel routes, angle routes in the slot like Emma Johnson in his final year in college lined up out wider in the slot on eighteen percent of his freaking snaps. So I'm burying the lead very heavy here. Dude, as a prospect and as a play style comp he's Austin Eckler. To me, he's undersized. He's a pass game weapon. You look at all this and again going back to it, how did Austin Eckler enter the NFL as a UDFA. He had to climb the depth chart continually to get to the point.

01:17:28
Speaker 1: Of where he was.

01:17:29
Speaker 2: But as a play style guy, that's who he is. And now, because of the testing and because of the draft capital is it going to make make it harder for Emma Johnson?

01:17:39
Speaker 1: To be that guy.

01:17:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, sure it is. So if he turns out to be that type of player, he's gonna have to Bucky Irving his way up a depth chart or Austin Eckler his way up an NFL depth chart and just continually outplay guys. Now, is that more of a projection and is that more risky? Absolutely, especially if he drops in the NFL draft? But does he have the talent and is it there for him to do so?

01:18:05
Speaker 1: Yes?

01:18:06
Speaker 2: I adamantly agree. I'm like, that's that's where I'm at on him. But what are your thoughts on him?

01:18:10
Speaker 1: The three comps that came out in the zapp model that are in the prospect guid are Michael Carter, kind of gained Well and James White. Okay, so you get three very usable. I mean, look, Michael Carter's had the career that he's had, but I like people forget that he was not looked at unfavorably coming out and he had decent early career production, et cetera, et cetera. You know, Gainwell has been an underrated player. You know he had this this season, he had last year. Then obviously in the right spot, James White dominated in fantasy like he was a great, great pass catcher, and so I like, I am a sucker for this archetype because I also think in this archetype of Emma Johnston is Aaron Jones. Like I think that that is in this kind of like And I loved Aaron Jones as a prospect, that's say around the time that I started prospecting. And I always tell this story, but I was one of his like og followers on Twitter. He followed me back, and so anytime that I say not anything, but there's like an negative stat about Aaron Jones and someone like someone in the past has tagged him in the tweet being like, look at this hater and Aaron Jones. I'm like, dude, you know I'm not a hater. He's like, I know you're not a hater because I've been around, you know, the Aaron Jones train for a while. And then, by the way, congrats to him on sticking around in Minnesota. But I think that that is now Unfortunately, part of this archetype is like Tyler Bidet, right, like that that kind of player as well. But I think he's gonna be able to at least find a spot on a team and play a role on a team Emma Johnson, and how you grow from there could easily just be determined by both scheme coaching and then him just growing and developing as a player, right and how much how much he wants it if you will. The model loves Emma Johnson, and the model is very receiving focused, so it's not surprising that that he is beloved. But you mentioned Nick Singleton. I'm very curious about your thoughts there because he's a hard one analytically to nail down because he obviously broke his foot at the Senior Bowl and then doesn't test. We don't know, like we saw his weight, but you know, we didn't get to see the athleticism. I think he would have tested really well if he were healthy. So I'm curious where you're at with Singleton overall.

01:20:12
Speaker 2: I mean, he's a former Feldman freaklister, so I agree with you. I think that he would have tested very very well. But my problem with Singleton is you see a lot of these guys where the testing doesn't actually translate to the field. Yeah, I think to a lesser extent, this is an Adam Randall conversation where people are going to love him, and I'm like, okay, sure half home with.

01:20:35
Speaker 1: That Randall And for the Randall stuff is really weird to me to your point, like the profile, like you can look at other guys who've come out and transcend, you know, whether you want to look at Jeric McKinnon type who ended up going to running back, or like Tyrone Tracy obviously recently switching from receiver to running back. But like the profiles, we were there for them. The profile, the production profile is not air for Adam Randall. It's like so it's it's really really tough anyway. I didn't mean to to hide. No, no, no, you're good. You're good.

01:21:05
Speaker 2: And and just for you know, for for my two cents, Randall is somebody like I I my conference is Jalen Samuels, Like I just look at him as a tweeny.

01:21:13
Speaker 1: I wrote out. I wrote about that in his in his actual write up that that like we've seen the Jay sam type come out. I'm looking over at my prospect right now, which is why I'm looking at But his his top con from mine was that the three for Adam Randall or Carlos Williams, Kylin Bilage and Quadriolison. Yeah, so it's like but like but like, for instance, like Burchard Smith right comes out last year. He had really good production and and had like a skill set that we could see translate and obviously it hasn't happened and probably won't happen. But like that's a different kind of player than Adam rand Adam Randall's just this beefy, massive dude who really didn't show us much. But I want to talk about Singleton because Singleton is but I think in.

01:21:56
Speaker 2: The same we're talking about this and I kind of went off on the Randall side was because I'm getting back to like, it's a player that where I don't think they athleticism translates to the field consistently because if you look at him on an analytics perspective, and I think this honestly shows up on his film as well, where Nick Singleton to me feels like he's my quin Shawn Judkins of this class, where last year a lot of people were high on Judkins and I was very much not high on Jumpkins at all because I was like the analytics and the tackle breaking stuff didn't line up with what I saw from a high perspective and you know the production was there.

01:22:33
Speaker 1: But the same thing with Singleton, like it's difficult for.

01:22:36
Speaker 2: Me jja like to get excited about a player where I do the film a vow, I'm not loving it, and then I go marry it to the production profile and I'm like, dude, like, so we're going to be hyped about a player that over the last three years in yards are to contact for attempt amongst all FBS running backs with at least one hundred carries, he ranked one hundred and fifty second, fifty six and one hundred and twenty and one hundred and twenty fifth, and from a elusive rating standpoint, he was one hundred and thirty second, one hundred and seventeenth and one hundred and fiftieth, Like what about and not even talking about his breakaway run rates like what on paper outside of like, okay, he's gonna test good, but it doesn't translate to tackle breaking metrics, which also correlate to production, and tackle breaking is one of the things that like it does translate, like where it's like guys that maybe didn't test as other worldly athletes the taller El's years, Bucky irvings of previous years where the tackle breaking metrics were really really good, and we're like, oh, okay, well we kind of crash question the athletic profiles and then they get to the NFL and it's like, oh no, they're actually still good at that skill that they had in college. With Singleton, it's like, I feel like we're doing kind of like the Rashad White thing where it's like he's super athletic, but he's not effishent at all, and there's holes in the profile, but like we're just going to glaze over all of that.

01:23:52
Speaker 1: You know, you're saying all this in One of his comps in the in the guide is CJ Process and that's what comp him. That is my sect comp him. I'm not even kidding. Yeah, that scares me. That scares me. I mean like I objectively, the model objectively likes him. Okay, So I don't. I don't. I probably don't have as strong of a stance as you do on on Singleton, but I do think that there are like if like it's three comps are a Jaii, Buck Allen, and CJ prosize, So like it's it's a lot of it's a lot of not amazing you know, Compson situations. But like when you look at the size and the the raw receiving numbers and stuff, and you put in the stuff that like the ZAD model, you know, the inputs of the ZAB model, generally players of that archetype will outperform more than underperform. Uh. With that being said, I do think you know from what you're saying and what the comps are saying, there's a lot of volatility to the to the profile.

01:24:49
Speaker 2: And I think it's absolutely hilarious because you and I have have very similar to a very very different prospecting, uh yeah, processes and stuff. So when we get this merriment because we didn't talk about any this pre show, so to come down with an exact same comp on him, I think is not only that.

01:25:04
Speaker 1: But a very like a very a very random, like we're pulling this out of the freaking ether. Yeah, Like DJ process is a very very like like out there comp your.

01:25:14
Speaker 2: Star Wars store, David Johnson has about here, you know, like big an athletic but uh just never happened.

01:25:22
Speaker 1: There's a one back who got a David Johnson comp. This is all analytical. The comps based on size, speed, production, was Seth McGowan out of this class he was he was the David Johns and I I thought if anyone would kind of be maybe it would lean more of a Washington just because DJ was so like freakish, right, But Seth McGowan had like a good combine like and he's and he's older, and there's all this and there's weird. I'm not saying that that's I'm just saying that, like it's it was interesting that he at least had like one good outcome out of his many not great comps that were out there. Because his age, he's he's old, Like he's an older prospect. Uh.

01:26:00
Speaker 2: I'm so curious because my comp for him and this is play style but also size athleticism. I'm so curious if he falls, if if the model came down with this, he's my Isaiah Pachecko with his class.

01:26:12
Speaker 1: Seth mcawen. Oh, really like he runs like him.

01:26:15
Speaker 2: He tested similar, Like there's a lot of play style stuff with that, where yeah, he's my Isaiah Pacheco with his class.

01:26:23
Speaker 1: I don't have a Pacheco comp and for anyone, I was actually just searching to make sure I didn't have the one journey. There was a journey comparable for Kyle Manungai was Pacheco, which is funny because they're both Rutgers guys. I had for Seth mcgawan, and it's Dwayne Washington, David Johnson and Keanta Ingram. So it's like literally just oh, there's this random spiked you know, like crazy good athlete that translated for a few years, but generally speaking, it's it's it's you know, rougher Comps. I mean he's old, like, it's it's he had some some of that like off the field stuff too, stuff. Yeah, so it was just a just a different kind of player. All right, let's be on a wide receiver. You have Cardinal Tait right now is a clear wide receiver. One tell me why you feel so strongly? Why do you love Cardial Tit.

01:27:07
Speaker 2: I think he's the most complete wide receiver prospect in this whole freaking class man.

01:27:11
Speaker 1: I love him.

01:27:12
Speaker 2: I think that there's people are going to try to knock him. I don't freaking care about his forty time.

01:27:17
Speaker 1: We've done him there and.

01:27:18
Speaker 2: People are it's an idiotic thing to even bring up like he's not fast enough. There's actually negative correlations to forty time and wide receiver production if people want to go down that roll road. But Cardinal Tate, I love his skill set. Man, the analytics matchup, like, fine, we can go to the counting stats and all that kind of crap, but like he was tenth in yards per route run. He's honestly the best route runner of this class. He can threaten a defense at all three levels. He has the ability like he has that my ball mentality, Like the dude when he I mean, you post a freaking sixty eight point eight percent contested catch rate. Yeah, like that. Cary Well is like he doesn't drop the ball. He gives you verticality. But I think he has the most plete skill set out of all of these guys, because again going back to I don't have any concerns about him getting slot confined. I don't have any concerns about his verticality and his ability to win downfield. And while on paper he's not an amazing yak player, you see it in his film and stuff, like he can't produce jack. He can break some tackles, although that's not also the way that he wins. I went old school with my comp JJ, and this is like going to Yester Year. So a lot of people are gonna have to go pull up some YouTube clips on this player.

01:28:30
Speaker 1: But we're unk. Yeah, yeah, we're We're We definitely are. I don't have any balances on right now, but I can pull them out. I went Keenan McCardell for my Wow.

01:28:41
Speaker 2: I was really old school because I've seen a lot of the stuff with like George Pickens and and I'm like.

01:28:48
Speaker 1: He does analytically, he does analytically match up to a pick and he does.

01:28:52
Speaker 2: He does in style I mean as far as size, but play style he's different than that. Like he does have some albums with press coverage where he lets guys into his body and it can affect it, but it's not a consistent thing and the play strength is there to where I'm not concerned about that. Like, so I didn't go with Pickens because I think him and Pickens are also very different players.

01:29:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, what about what about Calvin Ridley. That's the second one in there. That's a good one.

01:29:18
Speaker 2: No, I kind of wrestled with Calvin Ridley, but then it's like I went back to it. I'm like, I think from a route running perspective and that type of prowess really is very apt about how poblished they are as players. I do think that that Tait has more verticality and more juice and a little more physicality to his game than Ridley did when he came out.

01:29:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let's talk about Jordan Tyson, because the model is just loves Tyson. His age, justin production is ridiculous that one season, the third season that he had was so good, and so people are aware, like we've seen the spike seasons of like a JSN or Luther Burden did it his sophomore year, and it happened junior year for Jordan Tyson, partially largely because the injury obviously, but like he's he's a younger prospect, so I'm age adjusting everything, and so technically that junior season looks more to the model, more like a sophomore season, which is why his breakout score, which breakout score, by the way, if you look at top one hundred wide receivers since twenty eleven, breakout score itself correlates to their production in their first three years almost just as well as draft capital does. So there's a very strong correlation of breakout score being predictive of first three year production, and Jordan Tyson has the best by far breakout score in this class. So the model naturally just really likes Jordan Tyson. But I understand there's obvious concerns about durability. Is that your biggest concern with him or are there more play style concerns that you have?

01:30:49
Speaker 2: It's it's honestly not the durability stuff because and I think I just think when we talk about the durability stuff, like especially okay, the knee injury specifically, has he already proved cont exactly back from.

01:31:02
Speaker 1: That, so like he literally came back and dominated after that exactly.

01:31:06
Speaker 3: Like why are we going to knock him because he had the knee injury like freaking three or four years ago. Like, to me, that's in the rear view and I don't care. We could talk about length of his of his career if we.

01:31:16
Speaker 2: Want to go that down that road about it, but like for me, it's like I'm not worried about the knee injury because he's already come back in the NFL field and proven that, like the knee is not a problem.

01:31:25
Speaker 1: So that's been that's been an issue with because like if you read again, I have a lot of respect for the people, especially like I think of all of the like buckets of NFL content, Like you're looking at NFL draft you're looking at like regular seasons, whatever the case may be. I think that NFL draft personalities in the big media landscape are the sharpest of all of those people. Like whether you're talking like DJ or Brugler or whoever, Like, I think they're the sharpest people from from like a football standpoint. Then what you get on regular you know, TV, during the regular season of the NFL agreed like they're they're they're good at what they're doing. And so I don't say this to like dig at any of those people, but I do find it interesting that when you look at mock drafts and you see that Jordan Tyson is like, you know, twenty fifth overall or something like that, and some of these are like twentieth overall, and it's like the blurbs are something along the lines of like, he has the whole package, but durability is the only concern. And I'm like, if durability is the only concern, then we should be drafting him a lot higher than twenty fifth overall. You know I emphatically, but if you don't see, if you see more than the durability, I want to hear that, you know, I want to hear what that part is. Yeah.

01:32:33
Speaker 2: So for me with Tyson and the reason why, like I don't have him as my wide receiver to right now with this class, you can make a case for him. And depends on draft capital and landing spot and things like that. The concerns that I have on Tyson, of yes, like the early production is there, the per route production is there. It's it's when I marry some of this to back to the film. It's like when I look at his game versus other players, his ceiling, he could be the wide receiver one.

01:33:00
Speaker 1: Of this class.

01:33:01
Speaker 2: When we look back at this class two to three years from now, he could be the clear wide receiver one if he hits his ceiling. My worry about Jordan Tyson is that, and again splitting hairs between wide receiver two through five of this class is He's not an amazing yact player. He only had five point one yards of the catch per reception in college. His per route production is really good. It's not elite like two point seventy one yards per route run is really good. If not like yeah, it's it's very good. Yeah, but it's also not an elite number. It's not like blow you out of your freaking chair type of number. He had only thirteen miss tackles across his last two season.

01:33:42
Speaker 1: I was in. Yeah, he has one of the worst tackle breaking numbers that I've seen ever in the database. Yeah.

01:33:49
Speaker 2: And going back to like previous classes, this was kind of where I was. And obviously this is hindsight, but like where we went back to the class of elik neighbors versus Barbin Harrison Jr. And I didn't have Marvin Harrison Junior as my wide receiver one of that class. It was elite neighbors and it was handling mid leak neighbors. And my concerns about Harrison Junior at that time where he wasn't an elite yak player. And the other thing about Tyson just getting into his film role fast is his ability and fluidity with changing directions and at the snap at the top of his stem.

01:34:23
Speaker 1: Is just otherworldly.

01:34:25
Speaker 2: There are some route running spots where he needs to clean up, where the route salesmanship has to get better. He has some TikTok footwork, whether it's release packages off the line or at the top of his.

01:34:38
Speaker 1: Stem where there is waste of motion. Now whether it's is there improvement there from twenty four to twenty five, Yes, but is there enough improvement? Where again, I was.

01:34:49
Speaker 2: Poking holes in certain players' games where like last year, everybody was treating Travis Hunter like he was this otherworldly like god mode wide receiver prospect, and I was like, he's not that dude, Like the the film doesn't line up with that, and Tyson I have some of the worries where it's also it's some of the route running, it's some of the refinement and the growth that still needs to happen in that area. And can he live on the vertical plane because he doesn't sack corners routinely you don't see that wasn't how he was utilized. So can he be a three level threat where it's like looking at him versus a Carnel Tait. I don't have any worries about that from a route running perspective or a skill strength perspective, And his play strength shows up en route in the ability to deal with physical corners, but he's not a ball winner at the catch point. And I think that like that play strength, where it shows up in some areas of his game but it doesn't show up in others is a concern because it doesn't show up in YAK, it doesn't show up after the catch, and doesn't show up when he's dealing with muddy catch points and he has to be a ball winner. It doesn't show up there consistently.

01:35:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's great analysis. And for the record, his comps are a lot more difficult analytically than some like right now in the in the model he has Ceedee Lamb, Marvin Harrison Junior, and Corey Davis as as three and and I but I got volatility, yeah, right exactly, which which is why, like again, I approach fantasy from a very much and I'm open about this very much a ceiling perspective. That changed a lot from you know, like twenty twelve to twenty sixteen when I was doing analysis. I've been much more of a of a ceiling type player. And and he and to me, Tyson like just analytically has that for sure. But I do think that some of the stuff you're bringing up is very valid even when you when you know, you know, look look under the hood and and see some of the players that also were as bad as he was. Now look from a Mistackles Force perspective, Chris Alave, DeVante Smithy, they were both poor there. But and they've translated. But how like we haven't seen the insane ceiling from them right, like they've they've been in like they're vote there. I think they're both extremely wide receivers. But I'm talking from a fantasy perspective. And then you also have like Jalen Riger, Johan Dotson and some scary players that also that were drafted in the first round that have those marks. So yeah, it's good to hear the other side of the Jordan Tyson argument. Well, let's talking about Makaya Lemon. We talked about him a little bit earlier. You have slot concerns about him, like do you think that he cause like his his perimeter yards run is actually the best in the class, like, which is which is crazy when you know you you put this this puzzle together with Mkaya Lemon, but do you watch him and you're afraid of landing spot dictating a lot? Allah? I'm and Ross Saint Brown where who knows if I'm ras Saint Brown does what he does if he doesn't land in Detroit, dude.

01:37:46
Speaker 2: And people have framed that like whenever I've brought any when I've had this discussion on the Fantasy BRISONNFL Draft show, the YouTube comments just like they're like, Oh, you're a Makaya Lemon hater. And and again it's like people want absolutes with all this stuff, and it's not like you can't talk the range of outcomes with stuff where it's like I have concerns about Mikayle Lemon. And again, like we talked about like entering this version of the NFL where I don't think that he's amaras Saint Brown.

01:38:12
Speaker 1: I don't like when.

01:38:13
Speaker 2: I look at and again we go back to like you can look at this stuff like based off of his his profile too, JJ Blake, like does he have the yards per route run? Absolutely? Does he have the early career production? Absolutely? Can we also talk about it like he's looked at it as like this otherworldly yak god over the last two years sixtieth and twenty eighth in yak per reception. Okay, that's solid, it's good, it's not otherworldly amazing, And you stack that up against the tape, and his tape in twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five was very very different. To me, I have gotten it through the grapeviond. He did put on a little bit of weight now, whether you're in the weight room and what have you, from twenty four to twenty five. But it shows up in his film where I thought he was a more explosive player in twenty four, more twitchy and things through his routs top of a stem after the catch all that where in twenty five I didn't see that.

01:39:11
Speaker 1: And then when you.

01:39:12
Speaker 2: Put him out on the perimeter, and yes, the analytics are good there, like on the film, he's not as a refined route runner on the perimeter. He plays like a lot of like. The vertical, especially the vertical element to his game is worrisome for me because he's not a great separator on the perimeter and all the bells and whistles that you look at for route runners to win on the perimeter consistently, especially because that's the difference between him and omin A Saint Brown to me is that amarant is more of a technician as a route runner, and that's how he wins on the outside where he can stack corners.

01:39:50
Speaker 1: He is a better route runner. I didn't see that from Lemon.

01:39:54
Speaker 2: Lemon is a guy that plays almost like when he gets on the perimeter, he plays like he thinks he's t higg where a lot of this is back shoulders winning at the catch point, and it's like, can he win that way? Possibly? But again you go back to the size of him. At his size, that is asking a lot more out of him to win in that exact same manner in the NFL, to where that's where I can't get to the Amara Saint Brown comparisons for him, and where my comp for him is if people are gonna hate it, but rewind to production in the NFL and in fantasy. I look at him in my comp for him as Jarvis Landry, and if he turns out to be Jarvis Landry for fantasy'd be great.

01:40:38
Speaker 1: That can't be a bad thing. How is that a bad thing?

01:40:40
Speaker 2: But people are gonna look at that and say that's a horrible thing. But Jarvis Landry the same kind of concerns. Where As a slot confined player, he was amazing in the beginning of his career when he went to Cleveland and they asked him to play inside outside.

01:40:54
Speaker 1: It wasn't the same. JJ. Yeah, I'll read his three comps. The top one is actually pretty rough, really rough. It's Nelson Agalore is his top comp.

01:41:04
Speaker 2: Okay, and again a slot like a player that was his best in the slot and he had. Honestly, I could say Agalore was a better downfill player than he was.

01:41:13
Speaker 1: And then Obj this is the second one, and then and then Jaden Reid is the third one. So you get you get the slot the slot only as the third.

01:41:22
Speaker 2: So your comps are spinning out that there is more volatility than Yeah, there anybody's willing to talk about where everybody if you get on social media, it's like, if you don't have Mikayle Lemon as your wide receiver one or wide receiver two, or he's not top three in this class and right now in my early ranks, he's not top three wide receiver for me, that people are like, oh, you're clown out.

01:41:41
Speaker 1: It's terrible.

01:41:41
Speaker 2: Just throw it all out, you know, It's like, no, man, Like, I.

01:41:46
Speaker 1: I think I think there's I think there's volatility. I think that there To me, I I think there's probably more volatility to his pro no. I will say, as I dug into it analytically more and more, I was like, Man, this is actually looking better and better just because of like the perimeter stuff, et cetera. But I do think that archetype wise has more volatility than what you're going to get from Tyson and Carnel Tate from a projection standpoint, just because I see it more as a landing spot dependent type situation than what I would get from the other two.

01:42:18
Speaker 2: I don't want to jump us too far ahead here, but I think that there's a really interesting conversation that is not.

01:42:24
Speaker 1: Being had right now. Bring in, bring in.

01:42:27
Speaker 2: I think you're looking at similar archetypes, but I think you have way more proof of concept with Omar Cooper being a more versatile wide receiver than Makayle Lemon. If you look at both of these guys in the way that they're discussing, you look at the roles that they played in college. Omar Cooper basically played the Mikayle Lemon role in twenty twenty five, and he did it at the same level. If not, you can make a really good case that he did it at a better level, like he forced more miss tackles. But the other thing at Omar Cooper's bag that you don't have with Makayle Lemon is he's a better route right and he has in his bag two years of playing strictly as a perimeter wide receiver in college and Lemon never had that, and he was similarly productive like yards per route run and other metrics where he was good as a perimeter wide receiver. And it's like, I don't have those concerns about Omar Cooper playing on the outside and being versatile. So it's like, I'm not putting the Alma Rossain and Brown comp on Omar Cooper. But if we want to talk about the parallels of a slot player that can play the outside and stuff, you have more proof of concept of Omar Cooper doing that and being closer to Aman Rossay and Brown in this class than Makaya Lemon is.

01:43:40
Speaker 1: Yeah. So do you think Cooper deserves to be a first round pick like in the real NFL draft?

01:43:46
Speaker 2: I do. Now, I don't have a first round grade on him. I have a high second yeah, only because I think he is a very very strong prospect.

01:43:55
Speaker 1: But again I don't see like.

01:43:58
Speaker 2: Elite where like in my mind's eye, Can I envision where he is a wide receiver one in an NFL offense. In an NFL offense runs that are passing game through him. I don't see that in his range of outcomes. So it's hard for me to put around one grade on a player like that. So I think he's fringy.

01:44:18
Speaker 3: Now.

01:44:18
Speaker 1: You know, if you were to tell me he gets drafted around one.

01:44:22
Speaker 2: And again if he goes into a similar depending on landing spots, and.

01:44:28
Speaker 1: Say him and Lemon.

01:44:29
Speaker 2: Both get drafted around one, and then we play the landing spot game, and now we have similar draft capital. When it's all said and done, I might have Cooper ranked over Lemen Casey Concepcion.

01:44:39
Speaker 1: He right now, he's slipping a little bit on NFL mock draft database. I mean I say a little bit, but like since mid February he's dropped like four or five spots, which isn't nothing when you're talking about first round capital. Where are you at with him?

01:44:51
Speaker 2: I freaking love him. He is my right now in my early ranks. Again, this is gonna shift post NFL draft. He's my wide receiver too of this class JJ And again, like I'm not just trying to spit hot tags here, but like, I think he is a fantastic prospect, and I know that a lot of like a lot of the metrics and the countings, has the production and stuff like that is going to line up well for him because of me.

01:45:16
Speaker 1: To be fair, and this is one of the things that I have kind of gotten annoyed by with the haters, the numbers driven haters that are out there that are like, no one can like Casey Concepcion if you're doing this through numbers, false, false, very because because he's doing it, like go look at his pro you can just go to a college football reference and he's immediately producing when he was at State, when he was at NC State, immediate production. When you get that age adjusted production, that is a huge, huge signal. The model loves Casey Concepcion. I love him, man.

01:45:50
Speaker 2: I just look at his game both from a film and the analytics perspective, Like when you talk about a wide receiver that had a twelve point two to a dot last year and yet Jay he still was twenty sixth in YAK per reception, Like you don't see it when guys are used also down the field and they're still producing yak and after the catch and then when you factor in Marcel Reed is not a good quarterback like he's He's just not. And so we could play that game with a lot of different wide receivers and collegiate production and lining up film versus production and you know, and a lot of those different things.

01:46:24
Speaker 1: But Casey, I just.

01:46:28
Speaker 2: He has the ability to be Like if an NFL team drafts him and they say, we want to put him outside and he's going to be a seventy percent perimeter wide receiver. Again going back to this, a guy that to begin his collegiate profile was eighty two to ninety two percent in the slot and then his final season in college goes and plays perimeters sixty five percent. And it lines up with the film JJ. He can play on the outside, he has the route running chops. He can't produce yak. He is he plays bigger than his size. Like we talked about, Okay, do these guys play it up at the catch point? Can they be ball winners? Can they bring down tough catches? And some of that translate to ceiling and floor because that also gives you the ability to be a red zone weapon and be a player that can get to not where you're living in a DeVante Smith, a Chris a Lave type of phylum of like four to maybe eight touchdowns is your runout and that's capping your ceiling, because can you ever get into double digit touchdowns and be a top twelve, top fifteen wide receiver.

01:47:34
Speaker 1: I love Casey Man. I think his game is incredibly well rounded.

01:47:37
Speaker 2: I feel like he's getting slept onto a certain amount of this process and just overshadowed because people look at the size and it's like, what's the problem with the size?

01:47:45
Speaker 1: He is ninety Yeah, he was one ninety six of the combine and that's.

01:47:49
Speaker 2: Where it comes back my comp for him because of the versatility and all these different types of things.

01:47:53
Speaker 1: He's Lad McConkey to me. Yeah, he's a very interesting prospect. I'm in on him. One guy that I know you're higher than me on and I want to hear the reasoning and the logic behind is Denzel Boston to me, like from an analytical perspective, checks a lot of frightening boxes. Now a comp wise comp wise, it's Jaden Higgins, Courtland Sutton, Mike Williams, So it could be worse. Okay, that's not terrible, but there's a lot of red flag type stuff from a production standpoint, breakout score standpoint. Now, I know he played at Washington when they had the big three wide receivers there, but also another like low key storyline out of that group was that they had Jeremy Bernard there too, and Jeremy Bernard actually outperformed Denzel Boston, now two totally different wide receivers. So like, yes, it could just be like a deployment, you know, archetype type thing, but I thought that was kind of interesting that that Jeremy Bernard was better than Boston from a production standpoint in that one season that they played together with those guys. But tell me about Denzel Boston and why I should be higher on them.

01:48:56
Speaker 2: Well, and I think you're alluding to, you know, all the stuff with when he gets really hairy about early career production in college and this nil world we're living in and teammates and things like that, where you can it's easy to see in your mind's eye of like how the early production didn't happen because of all the talentshill wide receivers that they had there. And my thing about Boston is yeah, like final like this last season forty seventeen yards per route run, he was fifth and contested catch rate amongst all FBS wide receivers least ten contested targets. And it's funny again we fall in the same exact type of comp here. My conference is Courtland Sutton. I think you're looking at Denzel Boston and he is a ready made high end wide receiver two, can operate as a low end wide receiver one and an NFL offense. The thing about Boston that I absolutely love is he's such a refined wide receiver and one of the we're talking about skills that translate to the NFL, and we see this with so many different players is not only is this route running fantastic, but he has all the bells and whistles. He's a catch point winner and his body control is absolutely ridiculous JJ and we see this like how many different guys, And I think Pocinku is the easy guy we could pull out, you know, just the stratosphere and I'm not putting that on him, but like body control with the catch point and the ability to adjust to aarrant throws his quarterback play in college was not.

01:50:25
Speaker 1: No one's been better than that. We talked about him earlier. Mike Evans is a player, yes, great at that.

01:50:32
Speaker 2: Yes, And Boston I just look at and that's why, like when we're splitting hairs of who these players are and who they come down to be, Like I look at the the profile and from a film perspective, I look at Boston as a cleaner prospect than somebody like a Jordan Tyson. Where it's like Denzel Boston, I feel like we know what we're kind of getting with this type of player from a play style and from a skill set standpoint. Where it's like Tyson, I see more of a range of outcomes about who he is currently and who he could grow into be in the NFL. Is the ceiling higher, Yes, the ceiling is higher with Jordan Tyson, absolutely, But can I say the floor is immensely higher and the ceiling might not be that far away considering his landing spot and similar draft capital for Denzel Boston. Where Boston and Tyson are not in the same conversation for a lot of people, and I understand that for me they are because I could see their runouts in the NFL being very very similar, if not, Boston's a cleaner prospect, and I feel like we have a better I have a better idea of what we can get from a fantasy perspective and the NFL is getting from a player like Boston.

01:51:50
Speaker 1: All Right, we talked about a lot of wide receivers. I'm just going to leave this open ended here. Any wide receiver that we haven't talked about that you're eyeing right now? Do you think maybe not getting enough love? Can I give you two here? Yeah?

01:52:04
Speaker 2: Ted Hurst and Bryce Lance. I love both of these guys. I just they tested extremely well. Ted Hurst isn't going to pop for a number of reasons, whether you want to talk about GWe to Georgia State. A number of his analytics aren't amazing. The film is fantastic for ted Hurst. I don't know why he didn't go to a bigger collegiate program. I don't know why he didn't transfer, I don't know why he didn't get recruited all that kind of stuff, But I love his film. There's a few different things, like you can dive into his profile and be very encouraged by the fact of like amongst all fbs and fcs, wide receivers who's twenty fourth and missed tackles last year. He also leaves college with a sixty one point one percent contested catch rate. So as a player that I think he probably goes round three, round four of the NFL draft. If he would have gone to a bigger school, then he would have better draft capital. It's just the nature of it.

01:52:57
Speaker 1: He got a So he's smaller than this player because like, when I'm running comps, it's it's a it's algorithmically and it'll spit out a bunch of comps and you know, it's looking at the distance for certain metrics and stuff whenever it's doing those comps. So like size is getting a lot of weight, but it's not everything. And so whenever I say this comp, this is a number three one, so it's not like the main one. When I say this comp though, it's not like from a from a build standpoint, it's not totally one to one. But Nico Collins was one of them for Ted Hurst, which dude, he that's that's I mean that that's the fever dream of what he could become.

01:53:32
Speaker 2: Right right, is he's smaller, smaller you but see the thing on his film is he plays bigger than his size too. That's again like where a player like you see the physicality show up in his routes and at the catchpoints.

01:53:45
Speaker 1: Sorry, I mean no, no, you're good. The thing to note though with Nico is that he was not a complete prospect coming out, you know, like that. That's the thing that I think is really important is that, like when you see some of these comps, you're like, wow, that's a really but like some of these guys weren't, Like like, for instance, Omar Cooper, one of his comps is Rashi Rice. Right, actually it's his top gup, but Rashe Rice analytically wasn't flawless, right, We're just seeing him in this space and with in this place that he landed, and you know he obviously is hit in the NFL. So like whenever he taught comps like that, I think that's important for me to throw out there, is that, like Nico is a comfort ted Hurst, But that doesn't mean that the model, I mean, the model was kind of neutral with Nico, but doesn't mean that the model was like Nico was gonna do this right, because that's we can't project that well can we Also?

01:54:33
Speaker 2: Going back to a previous conversation, and if anybody's been doing prospecting long enough, you could also say that Nico Collins was the original Alec Pears as a player that came out and he was incredibly athletic, but none of that athleticism translated to his game because he had so many areas of growth that he needed to achieve as a player, and then you saw the player that he grew into. That's basically what the Colts are trying to do with al Pierce, Like they're trying like this is the new.

01:55:01
Speaker 1: Point Collins type of like a good point bottle of.

01:55:04
Speaker 2: Their career trajectory all over. And yes, we could see that again for ted Hurst, but I love ted Hurst and Bryce Lance. Again, it's a small school guy. He tested amazing. I just look at Bryce Lance's This is Christian Watson two point zero and I'm not gonna just this isn't helmet scouting. But if you look at skill set, size, speed, all these types of things and the nuances of his game, I couldn't come away with any other type of comp for Bryce Lance, who he's a ridiculous athlete. And again I like to put these players up against their peers and the FBS, and if you stack him up against all FBS and FCS wide receivers at least fifty targets last year he was eighthen yards per reception and sixthen yards per route run. So to me, when I go back to and it's the same thing I did with Christian Watson, it's like, Okay, fine, if he's coming out of a ridiculously small school, what do we want to see out of this guy? Okay, you want to see him look like he's superhuman and just just absolutely moss everybody. And that's what Lance did in North Dakota State.

01:56:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, my, do you is there a reason why he had such a late breakout like he because he didn't do anything? Yeah? Not that to me is the is the analytical red flag? Is that, Yes, when he was when he got starter reps, he dominated. I mean he's and he's also what six six three two of four, but he's he's something along those lines. Like one of his comps for for like he got like MVS type players. But then Kenny Golladay was one also, which you know, another smaller school guy who ended up uh, you know, being productive, relatively productive in the NFL. But yeah, it was just it's a weird it's a weird profile because rarely do you see the highs that he hit while seeing almost nothing to start his collegiate career. That's why it just makes it a tough a tough read. Overall, it's tough man, and that's that's where you know.

01:56:52
Speaker 2: And I think his draft capital, both in the NFL and in Dynasty, is gonna be.

01:56:57
Speaker 1: There's gonna be a wide range.

01:56:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, like you know, I think draft capital is also going to tell something again, he's in that Ted Hurst kind of Chris Brazzle.

01:57:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, do you think do you think do you think Lance can make him? Could find himself on day two?

01:57:11
Speaker 2: I do. Yeah, I think he goes in round three. I absolutely do. And I think he should go on round three. And I think the fact that again the NFL double counting speed, this is a player they should double count in the sense of put more respect on his name.

01:57:23
Speaker 1: Don't let him fall to round three, four or five, like draft him in round three. All right, we talked about a lot of stuff, so before I let you go here, I know we even had other stuff that we could have talked about. Then we could be here for another hour at least could be. But we have families and lives and you know, et cetera. So before I let you go, I love I love the hot takes at the end of every show, So give me a give me a hot take for this year's NFL draft.

01:57:48
Speaker 2: When it's all said and done and we look back at this class in three years, I think Cole Payton is the runaway QB two and he's right on the heels of Fernanda Mendoza in fantasy circles and what have you. And if Cole Payton would have gone to a big school, I think that the draft, or if we would have been living in yesteryear of the NFL Draft Consortium, where Josh Allen went and round one, Trey Lance went Round one, Carson Wentz came out of a small program, and Rent went and round one, and Cole Payton's not getting any of that type of love. Now his draft capital could be it's variable. Like there's been some hype that some teams have round two grades on him. I think if I was an NFL GM, I would have no issues taking him in Round three of the NFL Draft.

01:58:38
Speaker 1: If somebody just falls in love with him. They want to take him in round two.

01:58:42
Speaker 2: I get it, but he's going to need some luck and some runout and the ability to start and prove it. But I love the skill set man, I mean, he has the rushing upside and the fact that we're it kind of gets lost in the sauce. Is there gimmicky stuff for the North Dakota State offense where he used a lot of RPO, they used a lot of boot action, he didn't have fulfilled reeds see a throw at quarterback.

01:59:02
Speaker 1: Absolutely.

01:59:03
Speaker 2: The other thing about cold freaking Peyton dude, the arm talent that is on film is it's salivating JJ Like, he has a massive arm. He has to touch the ball placement. He can rip forty yard out like deep outs, like it's not just thread the needle man. And he's got the rushing upside to boot man. So like, I feel like if we were living in the NFL draft community of ten years ago or what have you, this is a guy that maybe would be talked about in a very very different light. But because of he's coming out of the small school, because he has only the one year of starting an experience. Although people talk about it, but they have no problem putting first and second round capital on Ty Simpson, same thing. I just think Cole Payton's not getting enough love, and I think we could be living in a world where he turns out to be basically the Jalen Hurts of this class, where he ends up earning a starting job, gets a starting job, and he keeps the starting job.

02:00:04
Speaker 1: Sounds like the perfect last round pick in a super flex rookie draft. Yes, absolutely, yeah, love it, man. I appreciate the time. Obviously, this is a long one. We had a lot to cover. I think people will dig it. Let everyone know where they can find you, what you're working on, all that good stuff.

02:00:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, all the social media is debro Underscore FFB. All my work is at Fantasy Pros Right now, I'm still diving through all the prospect right ups before the sounder goes off for the first round of the NFL Draft. I think I've done this the last three years in a row. I will have my top one hundred out, so that'll be one hundred skill players all written up for Dynasty Rookie and all that kind of stuff. Rankings will be out and you can find all of my rookie takes and stuff. Both at Fantasy Pros obviously, but we've since launched two brand new YouTube channels that we're trying to get the word out on, both the Fantasy Pros Dynasty Channel and the Tailgate, which is nothing, no fantasy, nothing at all. If you just want straight up NFL general content, we're talking ball, We're just talking NFL stuff.

02:01:08
Speaker 1: Head to the Tailgate, sweet sweet. Yeah, And I've definitely encourage people to check out your work because, like you said, our processes are totally different. But I think that's really really important when you're you know, getting analysis from different people who are looking at the draft stuff and prospecting, just to get your own you know, like create your own narrative for these guys, because you should have fun doing this. You shouldn't just blindly follow people just because I mean, I know that some people are, but if you're listening to this show and you've made it two hours, that means that you're a diehard and you're a sicko. So you know, go listen to everybody's work. You can find my stuff obviously over on Lateround dot com. Prospect Guide will be out on Sunday night for you guys. It's pretty much done it's very very close. I'm excited for that, so definitely check that out Lateround dot com. Otherwise, everyone have a great weekend and as always, thanks for tuning in. Dombertected the tab