615: Mailbag 2/18/22

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Speaker 1: This is the Labor Podcast with your host JJ Zachera JJ zacher reson. What's up everyone. It's JJ zachar Esen and this is episode six hundred and fifteen of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel. Hey, thanks for tuning in, Hey, sports fans, There's no better time than today to sign up for FanDuel Fantasy. For users who have yet to make a deposit on FanDuel Fantasy, they can deposit today and receive two free entries. All you have to do is deposit a minimum of ten dollars into your fandel DFS account and you will be instantly rewarded with two free vouchers. This is a limited time offer, so be sure to deposit now and play for free. Head over to fandle dot com or download the Fandle Fantasy app today. Eligibility restrictions apply. Go to fandle dot com or download the fandal app for more details. It's a mailbag show, Let's get to it. The first question is from the Late Round Fantasy Football Patreon. It's from Tony P. Says, Hey, JJ, big fan of the show. Thanks, seems like low hanging fruit, but what do we do? With cam Makers. First he was an RB one Dynasty Darling, then completely fell off boards, then right back to where he started with his lackluster playoff performance paired with his high usage, paired with his injury history. How are you valuing him? So I won't lie. I think people are giving cam Makers way too hard of a time across social media right now. Like, obviously we can cut him some sort of break considering he's coming off a torn achilles. But he also wasn't as bad in the playoffs as people think. Throughout the playoffs, he had sixty seven carries. According to number fires Expected Points model, his success rate on those carries was just twenty eight point four percent. That's pretty bad. But guess what, Sony Michelle had twenty six carries. Sony Michelle's success rate was nineteen percent. Now, I mean, Sony Michelle isn't really what we want from our fantasy football running backs. But this was and is very clearly an offensive line problem, or it was during the playoffs. Combine that with the fact that they faced two top six rush defenses in San Francisco and Tampa Bay. So let's just chill for a second. I know that I don't see him chill right now, But let's chill. If you want to be off of Acres, I think that's totally reasonable. I just wouldn't use his playoffs as the reason. The reason, to me would be that he's never been a workhorse across an entire season in the league, and our sample size on him is small, so if you're going to pay a premium, you may not want to. That's totally reasonable. But Acres was a very good prospect, at least to me and my model, and it's clear the rams at least think that he's capable of carrying a big workload. I think a big part of the reason that we saw him see a decline in touches in that NFC Championship game, in particular, was because of the fumbles that he had against Tampa Bay the week before. In a contest where maybe not as much as on the line like in the regular season. When fantasy football is happening, we may see more cam Akers than what we did against the forty nine ers. If there are league managers willing to sell at a slight discount because of the playoffs, I would buy, but I'm mostly at ADP in dynasty with Akers I do have a feeling that I'm gonna like him more in redraft though this year, depending on where he lands. This next one is also from Patreon, is from Robert and says, hey, JJ, curious which players you believe will have the largest jump positive or negative in ADP between now and prime redraft season, And of course why you believe that without an injury occurring. So for an answer like this, it has to be either players who are about to see a scenery change to a free agent, or players who are about to see a much different situation, and that's either via free agency or via the draft, like a player coming in and torpedoing an existing player situation. Basically, I don't think someone's just naturally going to rise dramatically in ADP because of hype. I mean, some players will, There's one player who I do have in mind that actually might, but most won't. But I do think that Travis etn could see that happen. But it's a lot easier to see a drastic change with a change in situation. And there are a ton of scenarios where players can and will rise in ADP. Just look at free agency. Just look at the free agency list. Mike Williams leaves the Chargers, people are gonna want Josh Palmer a lot more. That's one example. Leonard Fournette might not re sign in Tampa Bay if that doesn't happen. It's only natural to think that, at least in the short term before the draft, that Kishan Vaughn would see an increase in value. And Fortnite's probably the biggest running back free agent where we're not making a strong assumption about his existing backfield. No one wants Keishan Vaughn. But with someone like Melvin Gordon, we're already pricing in a big workload for Javonte Williams, and Williams is a stud. Don't get me wrong. I'm just saying there are assumptions baked into costs for some players. And then there's someone like Juju Smith Schuster. He could go to a new spot where his opportunity just looks different, where he's not forced into this like low aid dot slot role like we've seen the last couple of seasons in Pittsburgh. So I think he has a chance to be a big riser. And then obviously the quarterback situation across the league that's gonna shift things too. I'm a believer that a lot of the rumors that we're hearing about Russell Wilson or Aaron Rodgers. I really think those quarterbacks are gonna end up in the same place that they've been. The real big question mark is the ripple effect that Deshaun Watson could have, because if he goes to a place like Minnesota, which he's being tied to right now, then all of a sudden, Cousins goes somewhere else and we've got this domino effect. Those players will impact their wide receivers in ADP. If Deshaun Watson goes somewhere like Tampa Bay, let's say, then the wide receivers on Tampa Bay get a boost because we're thinking that Tampa Bay is not gonna have a great quarterback right now. But again, I'm not expecting as big of a change as some might be at the quarterback position. I usually think of things pretty conservatively on that front. Anything's possible, but we usually don't see complete madness. So those are just a few names etn just naturally moving up. Josh Palmer if Mike Williams leaves Juju with the right spot, and Keyshawn Vaughan at least in the short term if Fournette doesn't stick around. Those are some of the risers, at least. As for the followers, I think that when we hear more reports about a split backfield on some teams, we'll see shifts in ADP. Aaron Jones versus AJ Dillon Miles Sanders, was Kenneth Gainwell, Damien Harris versus Ramandre Stevenson, Ezekiel Elliott versus Tony Pollard. At the extreme, David Montgomery versus Khalil Herbert. If reports trickle out that these backfields be more split than expected, the assumed starters will take an ADP hit. That's sort of how I think about this thing. Those are at least some names and situations to watch out for. This last question is from Patreon. From Stevie. It says, hijj congrats on the new venture. Thanks. What's your approach to lottery tickets in the world of Dynasty? Do you approach your bench similar to redraft and stack up at weaker positions or do you stick with your gut and go solely on who you think is the better player. Wishing you the best of luck with late round Fantasy football. And thanks. Yeah, so this is a good question because in redraft, as you noted, I'm typically beefing up my bench with positions that I'm weaker at in my starting lineup. I think it's fine to go with that approach in dynasty, but you also have to keep talent and longevity in mind. A little bit more on the dynasty front. The thing is, in a dynasty league, you've usually got enough bench spots to the point where you have a ton of backups, both at wide receiver and running back. There's a lot of spots for them, so having more of one position versus the other that's not necessary since there's just a lot of both. I'm still leading with players who I think are talented, who I could see appreciating in value. It's all about capturing as much value across your dynasty roster while thinking long term and redraft you don't have to care about that nearly as much. This next one's from Twitter. It's from at Ryan zero eight seven to one six five zero seven to one. How do you feel about valuing top tier wide receivers versus running backs in dynasty? For example, Naji Harris looks like he's in for an elite workload for the next few years, but the running back shelf life isn't as high as wide receivers. Is he worth trading for someone like Justin Jefferson or even Jalen Waddle. So I definitely value wide receivers higher than other fantasy football analysts do in Dynasty because I care about age, longevity and appreciating assets. For someone like Naji Harris, I can at least tell you that he absolutely crushes my year two model. He's in a very very good spot. I think I actually subjectively like him less than my models do. But yeah, I would be fine trading him away for an elite wide receiver and potentially more. On top of that, I have my overall Dynasty rankings over on the Late Round Fantasy Football Patreon page. You can take a look at those for help with questions like this, and to find the Patreon page, just go to late round dot com. The tess questions from that Patreon page from Captain Bifalow Saquon in a dable system and he thoughts if the Giants are halfway decent, does he still truly have upside in the second round? Yeah, So my take on this situation is that I have more hope that the Giants offense is going to be competent. Things have been rough for Saquon the player, there's no doubt, but the Giants as a whole have also been very, very rough. They were dead last in the league this past year in total offensive touchdowns. Tampa Bay scored sixty one touchdowns this year. You know how many of the Giants had twenty three and guess where they ranked the year before, second to last. Running Backs cannot throw in that environment, or at least it's harder to. So we can at least forgive Barkley at least a little bit for his poor performances over the last two years. I'd feel bullish about the Giants being better than they were, and I'd feel bullish about Barkley seeing a big workload in that backfield, both as a runner and a receiver. So clearly I think things will get better. We're buying volume in fantasy football. We can't lose sight of that, and there are a few running backs across the league with the type of touch upside that Saquon Barkley has. I think the upside is there because I think the high touch total is there and the Giants will almost definitely be better offensively because it's very, very difficult to be worse, and who knows, maybe they're a lot better. I think people will end up pricing Barkley as if the Giants offense is going to remain relatively similar. But I don't think people truly understand how miserable the Giants offense has been, and there are pieces there. The personnel isn't like horrifically bad, so there's reasons to like bar going into twenty twenty two. I wouldn't be aggressively targeting him in Dynasty at all, but if he slips in redraft, he does make sense because we should be buying volume. The best questions from Twitter from at Romeo Oscar Bravo, What does your rookie and or second year model say about Travis Etn? Should we expect a Miles Sanders like performance in Jacksonville? So my rookie model loved Etn. He had almost a ninety eighth percentile score in that model because he had first round draft capital and he had really good production in college, specifically good receiving production. His year two model score. It sucks because he didn't play at all. Etn is one of those cases where I have to look at things more subjectively because he didn't have any rookie season production. Because of that lack of production, his journey comparables are players who have gone through a similar path from prospect score to year two model score. His journey comparables are players like David Wilson, Rashad Penny, and mark Ing. And again those comparables are not based on style or size or anything. It's just based on his scores. But they're not great. But I'm still pretty bullish on Travis Etn versus the market. People are way too low on him in my opinion, players in his prospectier generally hit at a very high rate, and we can't knock him because he got hurt at least not totally, not dramatically. So I am definitely more by than sell with Travis Etn. The last question this week is another one from twitters from at Doubles Underscore splits, what's the sentiment on Trey Sermon in Dynasty? Did your prospect model like Sermon? I mean the sentiment is that he's dust, and I think there are reasons to believe that he is dust. My model did not like Sermon. I was okay with drafting him in redraft last year, but I had concerns given his lack of production in college, and those concerns obviously came to fruition. He didn't do that much as a rookie. My prospect model had Sermon in the seventy eighth percentile, and players under that eightieth percentile mark have not hit at a very high rate. Only eight percent of players in the seventy five to eighty percentile tier at running back since twenty eleven, eight percent of them have given us a season in years one, two, or three of sixteen or more PPR points per game. Sixty two percent of them failed to give you a single double digit points per game season. Meanwhile, if you move up one tier, that's sixty two percent number drops to twenty seven percent. So Sermon missed that cut, and given his poor rookie season, his year two model score sucks. It's in the sixty third percentile. His journey comparables are Darrynton Evans, Lamar Miller, and everyone's favorite Christine Michael. So I'm not buying Sermon low right now. I think if he was good enough, we would have seen more from him in year one. That's going to do for today's show, though, thanks to all of you for listening. If you get subscribed to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by starting for it pretty much anywhere podcast can be found. Don't forgets follow me on Twitter at LATEROUNDQB, and again everyone, don't forget to check out lateround dot com. You can pre order the Prospect Guide right now for eleven ninety nine. It's gonna be fifteen dollars when it drops on March fourteenth, and become a patron. There's a link to the patreon on lateround dot com. I did a live stream earlier this week for patrons. It was a lot of fun. Definitely join in on that. But thanks for listening. Everyone. Enjoy your weekend and I will talk to you next week.