764: Insights From Building Projections

00:00:02
Speaker 1: This is the last with your host JJ Zachera, J J. Zacherson, what's up everyone, It's JJ Zacharyeson in this episode seven hundred and sixty four of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel. Thanks for tuning in. I touched on this last week on the Mailbag episode. But the projections building process is not some automated thing where you click a button and everything's magically built. There's definitely that idea out there. There are things that you've got to do manually with your projections.

00:00:37
Speaker 2: A lot of things. Now.

00:00:38
Speaker 1: Everyone's going to build projections in a different way. Some people do all of it manually, some of them just eyeball things. That's not really my approach though. For me, like I said last week, I have some formulas that I use to help me get team level numbers. So I started the team level first. Those include pass and rush attempts that are based on projected pass rates. And then once the team level numbers are set, I go to quarterbacks and I start to project their stat lines. And then once that's finished, we've got even more high level numbers that we can divvy up between running back, wide receiver, and tight end.

00:01:13
Speaker 2: For those skill position players.

00:01:14
Speaker 1: My projections are based on target share and rush share, meaning some team is projected for some number of pass attempts and rush attempts. Those pass attempts get converted into targeted attempts, and those targeted attempts are handed out to players based on their projected target share, and then the rush attempts are divided up and they're given to players based on those players projected rush share. The volume aspect is so important to projection building because fantasy football is built on volume. So once we have those volume numbers, we can do a little regression analysis, some historical analysis and find efficiency numbers for every single player that's going to drive their total yards, and that can help us then figure out how many touchdowns of player are going to score. Now, there are inputs in there that I obviously didn't just talk about, but that's the gist of how my projections are built. If you want like a one minute rundown, and those projections are currently built for the twenty twenty three Fantasy season. Now I do this episode each year, but I like to take notes when I'm building these projections because when you sit down and you start to look at depth charts in more detail, you can uncover some things that you might not have otherwise uncovered. Not to be clear, I don't draft strictly off of my projections, but I think the process of building projections can be really, really helpful in seeing the range of outcomes for a particular player. So today I'm gonna go over some of the most important items that I noted when building projections this year. Now, before I get into those things, I just want to send another reminder and check out the Late Round Prospect Guide and the Late Round Draft Guide over on lateround dot com. The Prospect Guide is all finished and it's ready to help you win your rookie drafts. The Draft Guide is in pre order mode. That Draft guide, which is for your season long leagues, will be sent out on June thirtieth. You can read more about it over on late dot com. I think one of the biggest stories of this fantasy football season is going to be on a topic that's near and dear to my heart, and that's the early round quarterbacks. I promise you this offseason I'm gonna get into the game theory aspect of things with quarterbacks. It'll be in the draft guide I'll likely do an episode on it, don't worry, But I do want to touch on Jalen Hurts, Patrick Mahomes, and Josh Allen. I'm not sure people realize how rare twenty twenty two was. When you look at all quarterbacks since twenty eleven who played at least eight games, twenty twenty two featured three of the top ten quarterback seasons and points per game that we've seen. Hurts, Mahomes, and Allen all had top ten scorers over the last twelve seasons. Meanwhile, and this is arbitrary, but it helps illustrate the point. But all the while, the QB six last year at mid range QB one to twelve team league, that QB six scored nineteen point eight points per game. That was the fifth best QB six average since twenty eleven, so it was a little bit above average. When you go down and look at the QB twelve, that QB twelve last year scored a little over seventeen points per game, and that was the seventh best marked by a QB twelve since twenty eleven, meaning they had a below average score. So at a high level, what that tells us is that the Big three quarterbacks, Patrick Mahomes, Jalen Hurts, and Josh Allen. They were all giving you a really big advantage. They were all high end quarterbacks. During the last twelve years they had top ten numbers in points per game, but then the rest of the position was basically average at best. Some parts of it were below average. These numbers naturally tend to regress. When a player scores a whole lot of Fantasy points, it's usually because something went right for him during that season, and that's what we've seen historically. Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts, and Patrick Mahomes each scored over twenty four Fantasy points per game last year. Among quarterbacks with eight or more games played. That's only occurred eight other times since twenty eleven. Of those eight other instances, every single one of them saw their points per game drop the following year by at least a point. Seven of the eight saw drop by at least two point nine points, and the average drop in points per game was four point six. Now, this is not how my projections are built. This is just an example of natural regression. It's hard to maintain greatness. I'm bringing this all up because projections show this regression. That's part of the reason they can be useful. And my projections currently see none of those quarterbacks getting over twenty four points per game this season, and if and when that drop occurs, as long as the baseline players stay the same, then those three quarterbacks become less valuable than they were a season ago. Now, the drop in projected fantasy points doesn't mean that they're bound to score fewer points. I think it's likely that they do, but it's not a guarantee. These are projections. But also it doesn't mean that you should fade them at ADP necessarily. Like I said, I'll do more analysis on this topic during the offseason. What it does mean is that if you're assuming the edge is going to be the same as last year, I think that's being a little bit too hopeful. I still have those three quarterbacks as the top three in fantasy football, and they're still giving people an advantage. And as I've brought up on this show, over the last handful of years, the quarterback position is also becoming more predictable than it used to be, So you can feel good about those players being the guys who are giving you an edge back in like twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen, that was not the case at all. That was like peak late round quarterbacking. But the important takeaway here is that we can't assume the same edge is going to occur here in twenty twenty three. We should probably bet against that. Now, that was more of a macro view on things. Let's take into something more specific. Let's look at the Atlanta Falcons offense. One thing that does fluctuate year over year is pass rate. It generally regresses, and the Falcons had a bottom five pass rate since twenty eleven.

00:07:03
Speaker 2: Last year.

00:07:04
Speaker 1: That's almost definitely gonna rise in twenty twenty three, even if they drafted B Jean Robinson. It's just how this stuff generally goes. With that being said, there's still going to be a run heavy team and that's a real problem for both Kyle Pits and Drake London. Now I love both of those players as talents. I think Drake London is a cornerstone type wide receiver for Dynasty, But for twenty twenty three, I'm not as bolish as you might think. Now, the Falcons don't have a lot of competition for targets, so London and Pits could easily end up seeing fifty percent of the team's targets this year.

00:07:36
Speaker 2: Let's get that out of the way first.

00:07:38
Speaker 1: But one thing we have to remember with London was that last year he had a stretch of games without Kyle Pits. When Pitts played, London had a twenty six and a half percent target share per game, which is fantastic, especially for a rookie. The Falcons were also pretty run heavy during that stretch, and he averaged five point nine targets per game with Kyle Pits. Now, without Kyle Pits, the Falcons aired it out a little bit more. Of course, they went from a forty one percent pass rate to a forty five percent pass rate, and while that was happening, Drake London ended up seeing a nice uptick in target chair because Kyle Pitts was not in that lineup. His target shair went from twenty six and a half percent all the way up to over thirty three percent per game. So that thirty three percent per game rate was on a pass heavier team and that resulted in eight point seven targets per game. So London went from five point nine targets per game with Kyle Pitts to eight point seven without him, that's pretty substantial. The issue is that Kyle Pitts is now healthy again, so London's target share is not going to be thirty three percent. So there's a chance at his overall volume number in this offense for twenty twenty three is not that dramatically different than what we saw from him last year, where he had one hundred and seventeen targets. I've got him for about ten more targets than that. Now here's the good news. People don't seem to be paying for London as if he's going to maintain that thirty three percent. He's a low end wide receiver two in early Best Ball drafts, and that's where my projections have him, and you can make the argument that he's a value there because the Falcons have way more room to grow in terms of being a pass heavier team than a run heavier one. Just be aware that the volume problem, even with regression, has not disappeared for this Falcons offense. And you could say similar things about Chicago. We've seen quarterbacks take big leaps from one year to the next over last handful of seasons, and it's often come after that quarterback gets a new weapon. Josh Allen got Stefan Diggs in twenty twenty, and he became the quarterback he is today. Jalen Hurts got aj Brown last year boom a near MVP season. People naturally think that this could happen with Justin Fields because the Bears added DJ Moore and I like Fields. I was on him last year for a reason. But we really shouldn't make an assumption like this. In twenty nineteen, the year before Josh Allen really broke out, he had a point zero two expected points per drop back rate according to Number five's expected points metric, his success rate was forty two and a half percent.

00:10:05
Speaker 2: He had a PFF passing grade of sixty one.

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Speaker 1: In twenty twenty one, the year before Jalen hurts big season, his expected points per dropback was point zero eight. His success rate was forty four percent. Those aren't terrible numbers, and he had a sixty nine passing grade on PFF. So Josh Allen and Jalen Hurts had positive expected points per dropback grades. Their success rates were forty two and a half percent and forty four percent. Justin Fields last year had a minus point one seven expected points per dropback rate and a thirty eight percent success rate. PFF gave him a fifty four passing grade. So to put this all another way, we probably shouldn't just generalize here and say that Josh Allen and Jalen Hurts are the same thing as Justin Fields. Unfortunately, Justin Fields has not been the same type of passer. No, we should expect advancement with his passing. Of course, it's not like he's had good weapons in a good situation. But even with that, the Bears are almost definitely gonna be a run heavy team. I mentioned how run heavy Atlanta was last year. Chicago was the absolute most run heavy team since twenty eleven and maybe even beyond. I just went back to twenty eleven. They're gonna throw more this year, but we should still expect him to be a run heavy team. And that combination of questionable passing from a projection standpoint, along with decent enough competition at pass catcher and low passing volume means that DJ Moore looks pretty overrated right now. My projections have him as a wide receiver three in Fantasy. He's currently getting drafted as a top twenty wide receiver. I just can't get there right now. My thing is that if DJ Moore is gonna have this great season and really live up to ADP and far exceed ADP, and it's gonna happen, and what's probably gonna be a bottom half offense and pass rate, just draft Justin Fields. If DJ Moore blows up, they'll still have exposure to that. And if he doesn't, it doesn't mean that Fields has a bad season because we know that his value. Justin Field's value has to do with rushing. I'll be honest, I've got concerns about Jonathan Taylor. Not that I think he's gonna fall off the face of the earth because he's Jonathan Taylor, but the Anthony Richardson thing is not necessarily good for his fantasy production. He definitely has a shot to be more efficient, and that's reflected in his projection, but efficiency only gets you so far in fantasy football.

00:12:24
Speaker 2: The issue with.

00:12:24
Speaker 1: Taylor is that if Richardson is the quarterback, we could see limited use as a pass catcher, and we could see fewer opportunities at the goal line, which is huge. Those are two of the most important things for a running back in Fantasy football. Taylor's now played three years in the league. His max target share per game rate has been ten and a half percent. You could make the argument that the Colts have just been this run heavy team and that's why Taylor's not seen a lot of looks through the air. A ten percent target chair looks a lot better in Kansas City than Indianapolis, and that's true.

00:12:54
Speaker 2: But are we.

00:12:55
Speaker 1: Expecting them to get more pass heavy with a rookie quarterback who's as athletic as Anthony Richardson is. Mobile quarterbacks tend to not dump it off as much to running backs. I did a study on that a few years ago, episode five hundred and ten. But not only that, Richardson will now take up a higher rush share on the ground than previous Colts quarterbacks, and that touchdown equity's gonna be divvied up more too. Now, it's not the end of the world for Jonathan Taylor, but when you're drafting early, when you're in the first round of your fantasy draft, you kind of need to be this.

00:13:23
Speaker 2: Particular with players.

00:13:25
Speaker 1: All of the players that you're choosing from are good and situationally, I think people see Anthony Richardson see that he's probably an upgrade for that Colts offense and just assume that that means great things for Jonathan Taylor, but it doesn't automatically mean that.

00:13:40
Speaker 2: Now.

00:13:40
Speaker 1: My projections still have Jonathan Taylor as a top ten running back this year, but he's not in the top three range for me. There are some red flags for him at the moment. You probably won't regret drafting Jonathan Taylor because of who he is, but I just wouldn't force it. Travestn and Kenneth Walker both saw Day two running backs get drafted to their backfield this year, and I think there's reason to not be very bullish on them as a result. Post draft. Kenneth Walker's best ball ADP is in the RB fifteen range, which I do think that you can give him a little bit of a bump because of the best ball format. Not only is he a big play threat, but you have outs to him still being a workhorse back. Maybe Zach Sharbonay just doesn't pan out, maybe he gets hurt, and then Walker would have that top eight or so running back upside. If we assume that Walker maintains that kind of ADP and regular season long leagues though I'm probably gonna be out. My projections have him as a lower end RB two, largely because I'm not sure where the pass catching is gonna come from. He saw a seven and a half percent target share per game rate last year when he took over as starter. This year, now he's got Zach Sharbonay to deal with, and they drafted Jackson Smith and Jigba. As long as everyone's healthy, it's tough to see him getting a lot of looks through the air.

00:14:53
Speaker 2: Since twenty eleven, we've.

00:14:54
Speaker 1: Seen three running backs and half PPR leagues finishes a top ten running back in points per game while hitting a target share per game rate under six percent. That's among all players who played eight or more games. Each of those players scored twelve or more touchdowns on the ground. If there is not an injury, I think it's going to be hard for Walker to hit a high ceiling. Now weekly variants in that weekly upside, that's still going to be there, but on a season long level, it's.

00:15:21
Speaker 2: A tougher sell.

00:15:22
Speaker 1: And then with Travis Etn, I mean you could project Etn for a very similar role as he had last year when he took over that backfield from James Robinson, and he still doesn't look great. He had a seven percent target share per game rate last year without Robinson, his rush share was great, but again, having that target share is important, and now they've got Tank Bigsby. Bigsby is more of a threat to Etn than anyone that they had in that backfield last year, and the team openly talked about adding more pieces to that backfield this offseason, so they went out and they got Tank Bigsby. So, like Walker, my projection still see Etn as more of a lower end R rather than a borderline RB one. In my opinion, you definitely have to do a little bit of projecting for Etn to hit that RB one mark because he didn't have a receiving role last year, it at least wasn't robust, and with more weapons in that offense, I'm not sure that we can lock him into a ten eleven percent target share that's probably necessary for him to be an RB one in fantasy. I know that people are understandably concerned about Tyler Lockett and the Seahawks offense after the team drafted Jackson Smith and Jigbo, but I think specifically in twenty twenty three, Lockett might be a value once again. Now I work with historical ADP data, and that average draft position data helps you generate expected fantasy points. So at a certain point in a draft, a wide receiver or a running back or a tight end, they have some sort of points per game number that they're expected to score, Like the fiftieth overall pick at wide receiver might be expected to score twelve or thirteen PPR points per game as just a random example. You can then look at expected points per game and subtracted from a player's actual points per game to find out how valuable that player ended up being. And there are some instances where trends emerge for individual players. Tyler Lockett is a perfect example. The market almost always hates him, and I know that because.

00:17:18
Speaker 2: He's played below ADP expectation just twice in eight years.

00:17:22
Speaker 1: He actually hasn't been below his points per game expectation since twenty seventeen, and right now, when I compare my projections to what the market is saying a wide receiver, Tyler Lockett once again pops up as one of the best values. Just because Jackson Smith and Jigba is there doesn't mean Tyler Lockett's going to start seeing a fourteen percent target share in that offense. Chances are, especially at the start of the season, Jasen is not gonna be on the field in two wide receiver sets. It was one of the rare places in the first round that he could have landed where that would be the case. Tyler Lockett himself is good at football. Good players get targets because targets are earned. So he's still looking like a pretty firm wide receiver three in my projections when he goes later than that in drafts, and there's upside with a player like Lockett too, because DK Metcalf or JSN could end up getting hurt. Basically, I think my overall point is that the gap between DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett should probably not be as significant as it currently is. That's what my projection show at least.

00:18:25
Speaker 2: Now. I just talked about Jackson Smith and Jigba.

00:18:27
Speaker 1: His projection doesn't look as good as it could have looked in a different environment, at least for twenty twenty three. But I want to make a note about him and just in general. On today's episode, Rookie wide receivers have been pretty good investments in redraft leagues over the last handful of years. That was something I talked about at length on episode six hundred and forty seven. The thing with rookie wide receivers, though, and you could argue this for any rookie, is that they don't always look that great with projections. Even last year, players like Chris Alave Garrett Wilson on the projection's front, they were like wide receiver four, wide receiver fives. I mean, that's where people were drafting them too. Christian Watson and George Pickens were even lower than that. But they end up working out at a much higher rate than you would think, or at least some of these guys do, especially if they're middle round picks and redraft largely because they can get off to slower starts and they really come through during the second half of your fantasy season, and that's the most important time of year, so their season long numbers don't necessarily look as good as they actually are how valuable they actually are. Now, we may not see a ton of higher end picks spent on rookie wideouts this year, and I can tell you that a lot of these guys don't project that well, but they'll likely do well. They'll do better than you expect, more than likely. That's what we've seen.

00:19:40
Speaker 2: At least.

00:19:42
Speaker 1: Jordan Adison is the one that my projections like the most, and he's the one who should be drafted first among this group in my opinion. But don't let a crowded situation pull you away entirely from a rookie wide receiver. Injuries happen and talent emerges. We see that happen each and every year.

00:20:02
Speaker 2: Now.

00:20:02
Speaker 1: The last thing I want to bring up on today's show has to do with two running backs who may not be in the best offenses in the world, but they're not set up all that poorly for production here in twenty twenty three. The first is James Connor. The Cardinals really don't have a ton of depth behind Connor. His projection still doesn't look unbelievable because the general offensive situation isn't that great. Kyler Murray's coming off that acl and his projection's pretty in line with what the market is saying about Connor right.

00:20:27
Speaker 2: Now, But there's also room for growth here.

00:20:31
Speaker 1: That projection is under the assumption that Kyler Murray is not fully healthy and that the Cardinals offense is more of a bottom half or a bottom quarter type offense, and Connor himself is still not hitting the rush share ceiling that he might be able to hit within that projection, So he's still a low end RB two, but there is some room for growth there.

00:20:50
Speaker 2: But the player I think who's.

00:20:51
Speaker 1: More intriguing here is cam Akers. It's easy to forget, but cam Akers balled out down the stretch last year. Over his final six games of twenty twenty two, he ranked eighth, twenty, fifth, twentieth, first, fourteenth, and eleventh, and weekly PPR scoring he averaged seventeen point four PPR points per game. And what's most important in promising is that he was actually seeing some work through the air. He had target shares of fifteen percent, seven percent, eleven percent, and thirteen percent over his final four games. That's not something that we'd really seen from him or this Rams offense. And if you look at that Rams offense today, there's not a whole lot going on. Their pass catchers are weak behind Cooper Cup, they're at least unproven, and the backfield is the same exact way. Now, maybe Zach Evans becomes something who knows but he was still a Day three pick. He didn't have a great collegiate profile. He's not a big back, he's not much of a receiver, and not only was he a Day three pick, but Evans was the Rams third pick of the sixth round. My projections are fairly bullish on cam Akers this year. I'm not sure the ceiling is like a top five ceiling, but if he gets drafted it as a high end RB three or a low end RB two, he can definitely beat that ADP. That's gonna do it for today's show, though. Thanks to all of you for listening. If you yet subscribe to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and felt follow me on.

00:22:15
Speaker 2: Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks for listening. Everyone greatly appreciate it. I'll talk to you later in the week.