Late-Round Perspectives: Shawn Siegele

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Sean Siegel is a rotoviz dot com owner, and he's best known as the original author of the zero RB strategy that so many implement in fantasy football today. He's a high stakes winner, a deep thinker, and he's smarter than all of us because he's not on social media. These are his late round perspectives. I feel like, you know, it's one of those things like, I mean, we play in like just so people know, like we play in I don't know, probably ten leagues together. It feels like, I mean, we played a lot of leagues together, and we have played in a lot of leagues together for years. You know, there's like probably five or so dynasty leagues, and then we're always in like green draft leagues together.

00:00:44
Speaker 2: And you were one of the first people.

00:00:46
Speaker 1: That I thought of to bring on late round perspectives because you know, there are a few people in the space and few other analysts where I just am so interested to see what they do in drafts. You know, I just want to see like where your brain is going with some of these things. And one of the you know, one of the perfect examples is the Apex draft that that we're in right now, right where or that we finished. I guess the Apex League that we've been doing for I think this is like your nine or something like that. I mean, it's been around for a while. So Apex leagues. They host this Writers League Draft that that Sean and I are part of, and we've been doing it for a really long time. And it's one of those leagues where you play an opponent every week and then you play the league median every week. And they were really one of the first to like really introduce it, this idea to the masses that you can play you know, a median.

00:01:35
Speaker 2: Right.

00:01:36
Speaker 1: So in the draft this year, everyone this season going wide receiver heavy, right, We're all people are pumped to finally go with this like wide receiver, wide receiver, wide receiver start and then you Sean sitting in the one spot, you pull the one oh one and you get Justin Jefferson. Okay, chock, everything makes sense there. And then you get five wye or sorry, five running backs with your six picks. You did get Jackson Smith and Jigba in there.

00:02:04
Speaker 2: Obviously. He then this is this is pre JSN hurting his wrist.

00:02:08
Speaker 1: But I just want to hear from you because you were we were going through this draft, and I'm like, I'm thinking to myself, you know, I went with a pretty typical build for me, But we're going through this draft and I'm like, this is fascinating right now, and I want to just sit down and talk to Sean about what he was doing in this draft. So Sean, tell me what was going through your mind as that draft was unfolding.

00:02:31
Speaker 3: Well, you mentioned that we're in a lot of leagues together, and it's always interesting the way that it works because you and I don't draft identically, but there are a lot of overlaps. And this isn't a criticism of any other experts that I draft with, but I am always very impressed by what you do and I like the teams that you come up with, and so from that perspective, you know, I feel like there is this you.

00:03:00
Speaker 4: Know, sort of synergy or what have you.

00:03:02
Speaker 3: But yeah, you look at this Apex draft and one of the other cool elements of it is that it has trading. And so eighteen rounds you get a kicker in a defense, you have sixteen roster spots. There are going to be like occasional players on the waiver wire. Although I mean analysts tend to really vacuum running backs and wide receivers, so there's a little bit less of that than there might be, you know, in a more normal APEX league. But so one of the interesting things about twenty twenty three is that the edges can both be awesome and they can be really tricky. And they can certainly be really tricky in specific environments, and you do see these expert leagues end up with even more massive cascades or avalanches than you might see elsewhere. I definitely wasn't surprised when all of the receivers that I have is draftable in that kind of first couple of round range were gone.

00:03:55
Speaker 4: So as soon as t.

00:03:57
Speaker 3: Higgins is gone at the two nine, like, this is probably going to be running backs. But Keenan Allen, somebody I have a pretty high grade on. Do you want to kind of go in that direction, give yourself a little protection, or take a couple of running backs and then see who comes back. You know, are we going to hit another tier brake. One of the things that I really emphasize and force myself to do is to never draft scared and to always take the points. And certainly one of the things and we'll talk about this probably in a minute, but zero RB was never supposed to be dogmatic. It's supposed to be about how you win your league and what is going to give you the most points. And so if we're sitting on the clock and very straightforwardly the most points are going to come from running back, then we want to take that.

00:04:51
Speaker 4: So I do that.

00:04:51
Speaker 3: At the two three turn, it comes back in the wide receiver I really wanted to make it to me, goes four eleven. If Chris got one gets back one more spot, then I think I'm more or less set because Chris God when a wide receiver thirty is flagrantly absurd, right, So I'm thinking if it makes it there, I'm okay. But he doesn't, and then you have ETN And it's funny, I got one wide receiver plus a receiver who's injured with JSN.

00:05:17
Speaker 1: There through the first through the I mean, and ended up being the first eleven rounds of the draft. It was you going justin Jefferson as you're like, I mean, I mean, it's the obvious pick there, uh, And then you know it was, of course the other receiver that you get in the first again eleven rounds was with JSN, who then gets hurt like a week later.

00:05:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, and when I take ETN, I'm thinking, you know, you got the three running backs. That's you can start the three running backs. When we come back at six seven, again, you're not gonna draft scared. Maybe you get the guys, but perhaps not surprisingly, although I was entertained and maybe a tiny bit surprised that we didn't get this kind of turn to the running backs. This flip there, and so ijould More Quintin Johnston really the last two guys again that I have in a tier at the six seven they go a couple picks ahead of me, and I'm sitting there looking at JK. Dobbins and Javonte Williams and there's just no way I'm going to pass on those guys for far inferior wide receivers. And I even got a little message from Pat later saying he couldn't believe that I took JK.

00:06:23
Speaker 4: Dobbins.

00:06:24
Speaker 3: He was sort of betting on that as he passed in there with the Dallas Goddard selection. But you end up with the five. And one of the things that's very important that people think through when you're in the league. Is it a two three one so two running back, three, wide receiver, one flex, which is what this is. Is very different than a two to two to two, which ill what the FFPC is.

00:06:44
Speaker 4: For example, the.

00:06:45
Speaker 3: Draft that I have here would actually not be very problematic in the FFPC. It is very tricky for me now in this format, which is one of the reasons why all those wide receivers went too to be clear, the two three one, and yet I still want to take the points even if they weren't a draft with trading, I want to take the points. One of the things about having that many running backs is that you've now increased your chances to hit on land mines dramatically, but we also arguably have the depth to overcome it. If three of those five guys hit, the running back one, running back two and the flex spot are going to be so high scoring. If I think there's any way to address wide receiver late and I had some guys that I did like and did pick, I think you have to go after the points. But it also does illustrate that you know, if you get on the edge in an avalanche draft, regardless of what position is avalanching, I mean you can get.

00:07:37
Speaker 4: In some trouble.

00:07:38
Speaker 1: So do you think, let me ask you this, do you have any regrets as to how things went? Because as you're talking through this, you know, I look at the JK. Dobbins Javonte Williams turn that you had in the sixth round. So again, just to recap Sean's in the one spot, he goes Justin Jefferson, then is Brisaw Remandre and then Travis ETN, then JSN and then his JK Dobbins and Javonte Williams. And after the JK Dobbins Javonte Williams turn, we literally didn't get a single wide receiver in that seventh round drafted. So I think that in hindsight that one was there was a very clear tear drop, you know, where you were taking Dobbins and Javante there. But I do think in the I'm curious if in that previous turn with ETN and JSN, I know that you mentioned that Godwin was sort of like the end of that tier, would you today, looking back, maybe have gone wide receiver instead of ETN or are you okay with the way that things unfolded there?

00:08:34
Speaker 3: Well, I think that things continue to clear up for Dotson and Pickens, Am I clear up. I just mean that that the floor case continues to be solidified and you probably aren't taking that much of a risk there, certainly with Dotson two. You know, if McLaurin either misses time or comes back and is not quite the same in terms of being able to get open for some of those dynamic downfield passes what have you. I mean, Dotson could easily be a guy and that you know, I mentioned that, you know, I don't draft the same way, but.

00:09:09
Speaker 4: We have a lot of these kind of echoes or what have you.

00:09:12
Speaker 3: You took Dotson in round six, and frankly, I I don't understand why he was there for you people.

00:09:20
Speaker 1: Thing is, the crazy thing is if I were drafting today, because I took Markus Brown. You know, I was in the ten spot, so I took him in the round before, uh, and I kind of saw it as like this, like maybe more stability, maybe better floor.

00:09:32
Speaker 2: What have you.

00:09:33
Speaker 1: But but at the same time today, if I were drafting right now, I'd be taking Dotson over Marquise Brown for a lot of different reasons. But I also was just trying to like play the board a little bit and look at who was sort of at the turn thinking that Dotson might fall back to me. But yeah, I mean it just goes back to what you're saying, where we can structurally, I mean, we don't always like draft so completely different, but we can look at things maybe in a slightly different way, but we can then be led to very similar players than Dotson.

00:10:00
Speaker 2: Seems to be like one of those guys.

00:10:02
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I think that Dotson and Pickens are both possibilities there, and certainly after JSN has hurt, it's almost more than I just wish I had one of those two guys than Jasna, because if you're just going to have the two wide receivers, you really need the other guy.

00:10:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, but a broken wrist exactly right, So I really.

00:10:21
Speaker 3: Regret that part more than the Etn part. Etn will be interesting. I have him on all three of the FFPC main events that I've done to this point at different prices. I mean, the falls that he has in some of the leagues are pretty crazy. He does have a somewhat talented backup behind him, But I mean, Travis Etn has a ton of similarities with Jamal Charles. I just I guess I don't think that you can pass on a player like that for it, and I'm I kind of think that I'm the highest guy, or you know, one of the highest people on Dotson and Pickens in the fantasy community. I still don't think you can pass on on atn for players like that that do have still some question marks and some questions they have to answer this season, you know, because the scoring level there could just be so so high. And so that's one of the interesting things about twenty twenty three just you get these very different choices.

00:11:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I feel like that's one of the things that I've learned, something that I've learned from you through the years is really focusing on good players, as simple as that is. If you see a generational talent or someone who you think is that good, don't let him go.

00:11:35
Speaker 4: Right.

00:11:35
Speaker 1: And one of those players this season that I've seen you draft a lot and you took in this league is Breeze Hall. Where I'm with you that from a and I'm assuming I'm with you at least from a talent standpoint, Breeze Hall, if you look at what he did in the limited sample last year, unbelievable numbers, you know, top of the league and yards after contact per attempt. He looked great, and I was on top of already being a stud prospect. Right, So how are you reading this situation now where you probably drafted a lot of bresh Hall pre Dalvin Cook, I would assume, And now Dalvin Cook enters the picture now Breeze's ADP is dropped. Of course, are you still draft I'm assuming you're still drafting him at his new ADP. But how are you sort of viewing what the Jets are thinking that? What could happen to Breece Hall in general?

00:12:23
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's he's such an interesting one. And that was the real dagger for me from last year because he was probably my highest roster player.

00:12:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, me too. It isn't there for me. It sucked.

00:12:37
Speaker 4: It's just.

00:12:39
Speaker 3: For him to look that good, right, because the whole time people are telling you, you know, ignore his production at Iowa State, Ignore what he did at the combine where he looks like this guy who should come out and be Sekwon Barkley, maybe Sakwon Barkley. Plus ignore all that ignores highlights from college. He doesn't quite look right. He's not he doesn't actually.

00:13:04
Speaker 4: Play to that level of athleticism, They're like, I don't know, you've got to be.

00:13:08
Speaker 3: An awfully big skeptic of Freese Hall to not believe like any of the objective evidence about him. And then he goes out and just I mean he looks like Jonathan Taylor plus David Johnson like yeah, pee, and so well, I'm glad I've got that guy. So then the question is, like, you know, how injured is he? The times that he's put up at camp would suggest that the explosiveness in a straight line probably going to be there. That doesn't mean that he'll be able to do everything. And yet at the same time, one of the things that was so interesting from last season is that JK. Dobbins I had a lot of him. It didn't really work out. He had to have that second surgery, he misses some time he's running on these long runs and like he's hobbled, he's waddling down the field. Yeah, you look at JK. Dobbins advanced metrics from last season, and he was one of the best running backs in the NFL at like eighty percent or seventy five percent or maybe fifty percent. Who knows fairly walk the guys who are that separated from a talent perspective really are separated.

00:14:06
Speaker 4: And it's true at running back. And it's one of the things that I.

00:14:08
Speaker 3: Would never want people to think about zero RB is that you don't want to draft running backs. You don't think that there's any talent difference. I mean, there's a big talent difference between the top guys and everybody else, and if you get them at the right prices, you're gonna win your league as a result. So you think through that, obviously he's gonna be or he was good, he's probably gonna be good again. And when we think about the environment there, and this can be a little bit of a trap because we know that how teams will play and the amount of volume that they can create for individual positions can vary quite a bit year to year. But if you look at what the Packers have done at the running back position to create value for two guys, which is what you would expect to have happened here with the Jets, that part is encouraging. And then you think through some of these other situations. It's like, I mean, Tyler Algier is much better than Ezekiel Elliott. So if you have about Remondra Stevenson, you probably should have questions about me, Jean Robinson where he's going. I don't know that you would say that Algier is better than Dalvin Cook. And one of the things I thought was pretty surprising about what the Vikings did is that they're kind of on the way to, you know, maybe being one of these elite teams, and they cut the guy who's a difference maker. They cut the guy who can give you the big plays, which is really almost all you care about at running back. Those other plays don't matter very much. Mean, domind Cook was still good, but is he better than Tyler Raljier? Is he good enough to where you're gonna give a ton of vault into him instead of Breese Haall. I mean, if I still had to pay the original prices on Breese Haall, I'd still be drafting. So it's mostly just a matter of like how inexpensively can you get in and how do you manage your exposures as a result.

00:15:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've gotten to the point too where if you look across the league, you don't have Bell cow backs like true true Bell, Like I'm talking like what we saw ten years ago in the league. And it's not just for these specific backfield it's literally for every backfield. I mean you can go to San Francisco and look at how they split that backfield up and in game scripts with Elijah Mitchell when he was healthy last year. You know, even even the Chargers, not like Austin Eckler, sees crazy, crazy work on the ground. You know, you mentioned Jean Robinson probably you know, Tyler Algeer, even from like a projection standpoint, Tyler Algeer is still seeing one hundred plus touches that in that backfield this season if he were to play seventeen games. You know, Tony Pollard, et cetera, et cetera. And I kind of see it the same way with the Jets and in these situations in general. I mean, you're leaning on your talent evaluation. If the talent evaluation says that Breece Hall is that good, which I think both of us have sort of concluded that independently, then yeah, he seems like he's still someone that you should be looking at. And you know, whether or not this comes a fruition in the way that they split their backfield, if it's gonna be the Dalvin Cook Show, more so in the front half of the season, which, by the way, they don't have the easiest.

00:16:48
Speaker 2: Schedule in the world.

00:16:49
Speaker 1: But if it's going to be the the Dalvin Cook Show more so, let's say from a percentage standpoint, to start the season and then the back half of the season, it's more than Breeze Hall Show. I've talked about this in my Mailbag episodes, where uh that just means that bres Hall could spike and peak at the exact moment that we want him to spike and peak. So I'm with you where I think that Breee is still you know, someone that you should be you should be looking at in drafting. Now, you were at the turn in this draft. You were at the one oh one spot. What are sort of some of the things that you're considering when you're at the turn that you're not considering when you're say in the middle of the draft, or even even where I was at the at the one ten where you're sort of close. You're sort of there. You can think about the two teams that are that are after you. But when you're at the turn, you know you have to think ahead a lot more than these other spots.

00:17:35
Speaker 3: You do and you certainly can't ever complain about the opportunity to select a justin Jefferson, And I think if you have the one twelve this year, you can't complain about the opportunity to often go like Garrett Wilson, I'm on Ross Saint Brown, right, I mean, you're getting better value in round two than the people in the front half are going to get. So it's more balanced than it's been.

00:17:55
Speaker 2: But it's a.

00:17:56
Speaker 3: Huge problem that the people who were in one of five, one o six, one oh seven, in a draft as tight as this one, there aren't gonna be the followers. But generally speaking, if you're in the middle, I mean you can pick up a foller, you know, almost every round. If you're on the edge, there will occasionally be followers, but they're.

00:18:12
Speaker 4: Not gonna be two followers.

00:18:13
Speaker 3: They get to you, and so you're almost creating the next wave of followers by having to address some positional concerns. So one of the things that I've always done, and this will be something that's you know, much more just stylistic or conjectural as opposed to believing that it definitely works. But I like to ignore my positional needs. I like to go after the best players. I do like to grab two guys from the same position whenever it makes sense, because I do think that it puts pressure. I mean, you put a very tiny amount of pressure on because whether you're at the edge or you're in the middle, you only get to draft one out of every twelve players, right, But if you can put a tiny bit of pressure on the rest of the league, and if you can really kind of drive home early to the person who gets to pick one spot ahead of you in all of those rounds that you're not going to be pushed into taking a lesser guy, and that you are willing to take players that.

00:19:20
Speaker 4: They think don't make sense.

00:19:22
Speaker 3: They're not going to have some of the same options that they would otherwise have to grab somebody that you need because they think that. Then you know you're under pressure. So again, it probably doesn't make a huge difference, but I mean, I go after the scorers and I want to try to put a little pressure on the rest of the field.

00:19:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think that's a good point though, is that people don't think enough about how they can really dictate the draft when they are at the at the turn like that, and I think this APEX draft that we do each year is really good evidence of that, especially early on when we first started doing this, this league where you know it was it was it's always been very wider heavy versus the market, right this this league has always been one where people are just grabbing, gobbling up as many wide.

00:20:06
Speaker 2: Receivers as possible.

00:20:07
Speaker 1: But I think even early on when zero when you first maybe published zero RB and the stuff on zero RB, and you were going with these wide receiver heavy drafts and it wasn't as I should say, mainstream. We'll get into that in a second, but it wasn't as you know, well known and thought about within the analyst space even at the time. I remember when you would be drafting maybe at the turn or close to the turn, and you would just keep going wide receiver and people were like, what is this guy doing?

00:20:35
Speaker 2: What's going on?

00:20:36
Speaker 1: And obviously you found success in doing so, but it's this, it's this way of dictating the draft because you're throwing people off their game. And to your point too, that the person right next to you, if you are kind of going about things in a relatively unpredictable way. And I don't say that as in like a bad way. I say that isn't from the perspective of like when a players or when a team is drafting, you can generally figure out the kind of position that they're going to attack, right if they go running back, running back, then they're probably not going to take a running back for a really long time throughout their draft, maybe till like round seven or round eight, and so you generally know what to expect that that team's at the turn.

00:21:10
Speaker 2: Let's say, but if you're going.

00:21:12
Speaker 1: At this like best player available type approach where you're just taking the best value if you will, regardless of position, then that's going to throw off the team that's right next to you as well, which is generally what you're saying here, I understand, but you know it's I do think that that's an underrated piece to being at the turn, even though at the end of the day, like you said, it's very very hard to gobble up value at the turn because value is generally dropping, more so in the middle of draft and such, because you can you could be reactive to what's going on. So we'll get to zero RB in a second. Because I know a lot of people will probably want to hear about that this year, you know, we're seeing a little bit of a shift in how wide receiver heavy teams are going. I you know, I looked at a year over year average draft position data from like my fantasy league, you know, more home league, casual league, not necessarily best ball drafts or something. And if you look at that, the main difference really isn't the sheer number of wide receivers being drafted in the first two rounds. It's really just where they're being drafted in terms of it being so wide receiver heavy at the beginning of the first round. That's really the biggest difference year over year. But are you a believer now because people are drafting that way that we could see a running back running back start sort of end up being optimal this year. Do you think the market is sort of overcorrecting or do you think that the market's just finally getting it right.

00:22:30
Speaker 3: I think that the market is getting it right, But I also think that fantasy players individually are arguably getting it wrong a lot, and that if you look at the way wide receivers and running backs are going relative to each other now. And one of the things that you know, I'd love to use to work through this. I mean, I think the projections are amazing, and I think that one of the reasons why you can actually just kind of use ADP and then say, I'm a little bit higher on this guy, I'm going to emphasize him and not have to worry about it as much is that projections are so tight that you can kind of take that as being sort of the value of the player. But I also from the beginning have faded projections a lot, and we have a couple of tools that are really helpful for me in terms of being sort of individual player agnostic and looking at value with our Range of Outcomes tool from Dave Caban and our win the Flex tool from Blair Andrews, two completely different ways of looking at how players are valued. And one of the things that we've always said in the past is that even if ADP is creeping in the direction of wide receivers, it's still pretty crazy, like how much extra value there is a wide receiver. That's not the case this year. It's pretty balanced in so the interesting part, and it kind of goes back to this apex you know, consideration that I had is that there are then some ranges I think in three through six, and again it's going to depend on what your ADP is in the format and the leagues that you play, or running backs actually have an edge and at least they have a very wide range of outcomes. So you still have all of those problems that you've always had with running backs, which is that they get hurt at a very high rate, and then their backups will often give you close to the same thing, and so why would you burn those early picks. But with the guys who hit, there is a ton of upside this year, and so for me, it's not actually running back running back that is very appealing. It's perhaps a more controversial thing, which is to say that a lot of these guys who are young, who have been injured and have you know, just extreme ranges that they are the guys.

00:24:47
Speaker 4: So I think that this.

00:24:48
Speaker 3: Year it almost creates this environment now with wide receivers going up or you have to go wide receiver, wide receiver because you need those guys as your foundation.

00:24:56
Speaker 4: And then rounds three and four at wide receiver are bad. They're bad.

00:25:01
Speaker 3: And so when you're being given guys like a Breisee Hall, like a Travis Etn, even an unproven player like Gibbs, and you work back into the next rounds where you have guys like Dobbins, whom I mentioned in Kenneth Walker. You've got a lot of names there where the wide receivers simply are not very palatable. You think about, you know, what you're trying to do with zero RB, it's to bank these massive points edges and to draft wide receivers that you can get fired up about, and you're.

00:25:28
Speaker 4: Like, my roster is exciting.

00:25:30
Speaker 3: It's like, maybe I need some contingent bets to hit at running back, but if they do, I've got a super roster. If you go wide receiver times four in twenty twenty three, you're kind of looking at it like those wide receivers don't even get me that fired up. So I think that's kind of a moment where you think, you know, maybe I should tweak what I'm doing.

00:25:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's one of the reasons why Christian Watson in particular for me, has been like the target for me and if I'm going wide receiver like in that range, because I can see the upside case so easily with him versus a lot of the other players that just go in there, right, I see a lot of the other wide outs in that area as generally replaceable guys for players who go in the sixth or seventh round. And so if I'm going to reach for a wide receiver, quote unquote, reach because I do think that basically at every position gets very very flat in like the middle of the third round this year, right, And so if I'm going to reach at wide receiver, I'm going to reach for a player because I'm gonna get the top of a tier, right, I'm going to reach for a player who I see having that insane upside. And then in that fifth, sixth round, if I am getting wide receivers, I can at least have some installation there if you will, with some some stability or players who you know can at least balance out if the downside occurs with Watson. You know, it's one of those situations. I'm sure you run into this all the time with just the way that you approach things. But you go on a show or something and you say, draft Christian wattson this year. This is why X, Y, and Z. But a lot of it has to do with team structure too. It's not just simply that individual player. A lot of it is also what can what's going to be happening after I get Christian Watson or what my team builds look like, because uh that that that matters, It matters a lot.

00:27:10
Speaker 2: Uh.

00:27:10
Speaker 1: And so this is actually the like third straight episode where I'm talking about this with Christian Watson. But I just think it's a really really important point to make that you know, whenever you're drafting these players individually, uh, these these low end and high end and and a range of outcome outcomes, it's it's really interesting or it's really important to look at because you know, you're you're then sort of building uh this Frankenstein or this this uh this body at wide receiver together and so instead of that one individual wide receiver. And that's why I'm just shooting for upside in that range because like you said, like I said, it just sort of dies, uh you know in that middle of the third round.

00:27:46
Speaker 2: Uh.

00:27:46
Speaker 1: Let let's talk about the zero RB strategy. Though, because I get frustrated by this. I can't even imagine how you get like like you have to just be out of this. Is probably why you're not on Twitter anymore, is because of the way that people just miss interpret and misrepresent the zero RB strategy so much. I mean I dealt with it a little bit with the late round quarterback strategy back in the day, but not even close to what you are dealing with with the way that people throw out zero RB. I mean, I've seen you know, someone like not draft or running back in the first round and claim that because they did, you know, they'll get a guy in the second and they're like, oh, I went zero RB, like without understanding at all sort of the thesis and the reason why zero RB exists. So, first off, does it bother you that people misrepresented so much? And then what do you think it is that people misunderstand about that strategy and why they just seem to get it wrong when they're explaining it.

00:28:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's so much to you know, potentially unpack there, and I always try and figure out, you know, what are the the fastest ways to say something that's hopefully interesting. It doesn't actually bother me that much now and hasn't bothered me for a long time. In the early going, it did more, which you know, probably only makes sense, And I always liked the arguments that were both friendly and thoughtful. I think it's like anything else where when you put out an idea, even if you're wrong, you would kind of prefer that the opposing arguments not be mean spirit or in bad faith, and you know, unfortunately you get things like that, but I mean.

00:29:24
Speaker 4: That's also life.

00:29:26
Speaker 1: Ah.

00:29:27
Speaker 3: I think that it doesn't necessarily bother me that much because there have been so many people within the community right from the beginning where it resonated for them and not only reached out to me and said that either changed how they were drafting and really opened them up to being able to do things that not only made their teams better but made the experience more fun. And then there were just so many people, many of them associated with Rotoviz, but also many of them from other sites who seem to be more offended than I was, and made such powerful arguments for different elements of it. And I mean, anytime that you see that kind of response, it more than outweighs the negatives.

00:30:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, because I.

00:30:21
Speaker 3: Mean, you realize that number one, there are a lot of amazing people out there. You realize you've got friends, and I mean there's so much research on having friends and having a community is really the only thing that determines the quality of your life, and so that's always a good thing.

00:30:33
Speaker 4: To find out.

00:30:34
Speaker 3: And then and then there were so many good arguments out there by people who were brilliant, and so from that perspective, I think that the give and take was wonderful. I think the only thing that, you know, if I could change the way people look at it, that I would bother to do, because one of the things if you're a competitor and you're still playing the stuff yourself, right, if there are a lot of people misinterpreting it, and certainly if there are a lot of people pushing back.

00:30:58
Speaker 4: And one of the things that.

00:30:59
Speaker 3: Was kind of nice is that the loopholes didn't really close for almost a decade, and so you could draft and dominate, you know, for almost ten years after that came out. It's arguing at little bit less the case now. So it's great if you have people pushing back and pushing a lot of drafters in the wrong direction. The only thing that I would change would be to really try and push home this idea that it was not meant to be restrictive. Then it was not meant to be something where we're throwing a term on something that ends up, you know, being a little bit viral, a little bit marketable, and people grab onto from that perspective. But then, I mean, there's was so much debate, especially for the first you know, six or seven years, like what exactly is it?

00:31:45
Speaker 4: And is it three running backs? Is it four running backs?

00:31:48
Speaker 2: You know?

00:31:48
Speaker 4: Can you then or three or four wide receivers to start?

00:31:51
Speaker 3: Like how long do you have to wait if you take a running back in round four and then don't take another one until round eleven?

00:31:56
Speaker 4: Is that zero running back? Do you have to take a quarterback? Do you have to take an elite tight end? It's like that's the wrong way to think about it, right. The whole idea here is that we.

00:32:06
Speaker 3: Want to be and one of the reasons why that the entire headline for that article.

00:32:12
Speaker 4: I think.

00:32:15
Speaker 3: It is both problematic and also meaningful in that the anti fragile element, and you know, people have pushed back against that term, which is also fine. And then this idea of the myth of value based drafting, which is actually not supposed to be an attack on value based drafting, and you know that part too, you hope, because you don't want to ever put something out that anybody's going to feel like it's an attack on them or their ideas, which are good, right, But it's this idea of how are we thinking through the things that happen in the season.

00:32:48
Speaker 4: One of the terms that we use a lot.

00:32:49
Speaker 3: I think in the next two or three years after that that maybe is even just a better way to think about it, and certainly is applied to a lot of other things now. But you think through contingency based drafting, you think about are based drafting. Again, a lot of those things with dfs and with fastball and different tournaments. People you know, just kind of take as the way things work now. There's nothing remotely controversial about it. But in redraft and across a wide variety of different types of redraft, it's still very important. And so zero RB is meant to free you up and to let you draft in the way that is fun. It gets you a lot of points and build super teams. It's not meant to be something where you feel restricted and you're like, well, do I have to take another wide receiver in order to count this?

00:33:36
Speaker 4: That's going to be a counterproductive way to look at Yeah.

00:33:39
Speaker 1: I ran into that a lot as well. With the lay around quarterback strategy. It's to a lesser degree though, like I said at the top, where with running backs, you're going to get a lot more pushback and conversation around it because they just matter a lot more to fantasy football, right, And the idea of not just going running back heavy, especially whenever you public that article was just unheard of. It wasn't you know, I wrote the Late Round Quarterback Ebook when it was just one season really where people started to really really hammer quarterbacks early, whereas running backs going early is something that's been part of the fantasy football DNA, and so you writing that is going to naturally get more pushback. But the same kind of things happened with me with the Late Round Quarterback strategy, where the questions weren't so much what is this strategy actually saying, and how is it that I can actually implement this in a strategic way, in a thoughtful way. It was more when should I draft my quarterback? You know, what round should I be drafting this quarterback in? And my go to response was always, you know still is this day. It's not about a game of chicken. It's not about being the last team to take a quarterback. It's about value. That's what the entire strategy was about from the start and with you and with the zero RB strategy, it's not about a game of chicken. It's not about just being the last team to to take a running back per se. It's about understanding this idea of contingent value and understanding how the NFL season actually unfolds as opposed to, you know, going back to value based drafting, which, again without value based drafting and without Joe Bryant publishing that article in the early two thousands, it's the foundation for what everything is sort of built off of, you know, and it's no shade to what he did so long ago. It's more so building off of that and saying, hey, look, yes, it's very important to look at how well players perform against their position and against their peers at their position as opposed to a cross positions.

00:35:39
Speaker 2: But at the same time, as.

00:35:41
Speaker 1: You're writing about with zero RB, you have to be cognizant of the fact that the NFL season isn't as clean as a projection. The NFL season is not nearly as clean as this guy's going to perform X number of points better than this guy, because there's peaks and valleys, there's injuries, there's things that happen, and the running back position is a position where you can really take advantage of that most and I think that's what zero RB really comes down to. It's about really being thoughtful and understanding of how the season goes down, as opposed to just looking at your draft and kind of stopping there and not thinking any deeper about it.

00:36:17
Speaker 3: And definitely back in twenty thirteen as well, there were some really talented backups who.

00:36:22
Speaker 4: Were buried and they would win those jobs straight out by mid season. And that's I think an important note, an important.

00:36:32
Speaker 3: Kind of positive to think about because one of the pushbacks that I tried to address in the original article because I didn't ever want it to be something where it was like we're going to draft these guys and then root for the starters to get hurt, because that's just very very nasty. Yeah, I mean, I would like for everybody to stay healthy. It's not going to happen. But it's important to underline as well that, I mean, you have superstars come from the back of spots and win leagues, win tournaments.

00:37:01
Speaker 4: I don't know that you have you still have that.

00:37:03
Speaker 3: You just don't get as good of values on it because people are very cognizant of the players who could blow up, but we can still you know, draft some of those players today.

00:37:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, we're also in a position, going back to what we were talking about, where there's just so many split backfields now where we kind of get a glimpse of Jalen Warren, we get a glimpse of Tank Bigsby, we get a glimpse of Elijah Mitchell, what have you. And so I think that naturally rises their prices a little bit more than it would have back in twenty thirteen twenty Like Jalen Warren would have never touched the ball in twenty twelve, let's say, and less an injury happened to Agi Harris, and we would have no idea that he was as explosive as he was, and so he wouldn't be being drafted, you know, in the eleventh round or wherever he goes.

00:37:42
Speaker 2: He would be.

00:37:43
Speaker 1: More of that like literal sixteenth round pick that no one really is thinking about. And so if you were good and sharp with your running back analysis in particular, then you were able to really take advantage of that too. So I think that's a good sort of overview and recap of zero orb and why you know, it's not just about, Hey, I got four wide receivers to start my draft, and I got a running back in the fifth round, and then I just got all these running and that's.

00:38:06
Speaker 2: Not how it works.

00:38:06
Speaker 1: It's about being and understanding how the NFL season actually does unfold. Let's move on to the late round quarterback strategy though. Let's talk about me Sean and I'm just kidding. Let's look at this late round quarterback strategy because I've talked about this for years. I talked about this after the Lamar Jackson season happened, where it seemed pretty evident that people were going the market was gonna catch on and realize that this mobility aspect of things was very important at quarterback. Despite what rich Reebar wrote back in twenty thirteen about the Konami Code and the importance of quarterback rushing, it was clear that after Lamar Jackson season, where he was not only this beast, you know as a rusher, but also as a thrower, that we were gonna probably see more of that coming into the NFL. And we have seen that happen now over the last three years, the market's gotten Sharper, It's been a lot harder to st quarterbacks, you know, living the stream my other podcast, we used to stream QB five point per game Frankenstein's and that's not even with the ability to hold on to players. You know, if Deshaun Watson his rookie season, you know, being able to just like hold on to him until he got injured and use him week in and week out. This is literally just looking at guys who are low rostered on the waiver wire. We were able to consistently give you a QB five, QB six, and points per game the last.

00:39:23
Speaker 2: Two years QB eleven, QB twelve.

00:39:26
Speaker 1: It hasn't been nearly as easy, so it hasn't been as effective over the last few seasons the late round quarterback strategy. We haven't seen as many late round quarterbacks really come through and beats every week starters. But at this point, do you think that people have become too high on quarterbacks? Do you think that the Big three, for instance, in Jalen Hurts, Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen are being drafted too high this season? What are your takes on the quarterback position?

00:39:52
Speaker 3: Now?

00:39:53
Speaker 4: The quarterback stuff is going to depend a lot on.

00:39:58
Speaker 3: Your format. I think that if you were in home leagues, and home leagues can cover a very wide range of potential leagues, but then I would want one of the star qbs. And it kind of makes me think back to what you were saying earlier, where I did a little bit of work on this, you know, for a home league strategy piece, and discovered the Christian Watson and Drake London, two guys where I actually have very little exposure, even though their profiles as rookies are their profiles where in year two, yeah, they see them go super nova, right, there are some structural concerns for me with those offenses, so I just don't have very much. But in home leagues, they're like round six, round seven guys, in which case you have to be drafting them. But you also have to be drafting an elite QB because you can put the whole roster together in the starting lineups. If any league is a little bit shallower in terms of the starting lineup, I think you want that quarterback in there.

00:40:59
Speaker 4: Any other I.

00:41:00
Speaker 3: Have a real problem with it, and some of it is just again style and what you like to do. I think that when you and I were on a show a long time ago.

00:41:08
Speaker 4: I mentioned to.

00:41:09
Speaker 3: You that I had a high stakes league. Once I drafted my kicker before my first quarterback.

00:41:17
Speaker 2: I love it.

00:41:18
Speaker 4: I was at the turn and so I intentionally did.

00:41:21
Speaker 2: You had to take the kicker up up the quarterback just for style. I get it. I get it.

00:41:25
Speaker 3: But I've always loved really pushing the QB. And one of the first high stakes leagues I played very heavily was the NFFC Classic, which was a fourteen team format, and that was a format where if you use an early pick at QB, the opportunity cost is just so immensely extreme that it causes problems for you. If you don't go zer RB, it more or less causes problems for you because you don't get the overall roster and the structure that you need most teams, most leagues are not fourteen team leagues. You could think through it from a best ball perspective, where recently we've witnessed the elite qbs generate some good win rates, but we know from a wider range, even stretching back to some of these years where you do have you know that season from Lawn Jackson, you just referenced window QB is still probably the dominant way to play it, although you want to be very sensitive to single season trends that actually show you something new versus things that were just the shape of positional scoring for that one year, based on injuries, based on some other types of things. I think that the way to consistently build super teams is to take the breakout quarterbacks, ideally at the back end of the window. And so you think about, you know, what would be the best way to have played twenty twenty two, even with the monster seasons you get from the elite guys, Really what you would have wanted would be to have Trevor Lawrence to have justin Fields. Now, the Fields thing was very tricky because he actually had such a terrible first month that I had him on high stakes leagues where I cut him, and so you actually don't realize some of the gains from that. And that's one of the reasons that I think twenty twenty three is tricky because there are guys going late this year where I've made an argument to some of my co managers, like, let's stash a bunch of guys because these picks in rounds fifteen to twenty.

00:43:25
Speaker 4: Are essentially worthless. Not completely, I mean, there are hits.

00:43:29
Speaker 3: But one of the things that I do like to do is go back through my high stakes teams, including the ones that finish very high in tournaments. And you're thinking, if I finished very high in a tournament, then I've got multiple hits from rounds eleven through twenty. You go back and find out that you did not, so mostly those players didn't contribute. If you can stash a bunch of quarterbacks late and hit on the right guy, the return again in terms of being able to build a super team and the depth that it gives you at those important positions early.

00:44:00
Speaker 4: Is just so significant.

00:44:03
Speaker 3: The tricky part is that drafters don't get it that wrong that often to where the window qbs actually usually performed quite well. They can be kind of matchup based plays. You get breakouts from that group just like any other position. The year two qbs who are going in the window are really good plays. In twenty twenty three you actually have to reach below that. And so you're saying, are is everybody wrong about Desmond Ritter? Is everybody wrong about Mac Jones, Sam Howe, Rock Purty, Kenny Pickett.

00:44:36
Speaker 4: I guess my argue is maybe they are.

00:44:38
Speaker 3: I mean, those guys could be something, and if they are something, then it's going to be hard for you to compete with a Patrick Mahomes or you even think about last season.

00:44:46
Speaker 4: I mean.

00:44:48
Speaker 3: Pat Kurane and I drafted Justin Herbert one h three in a Dynasty super Flex startup last year, and I think although the pick made sense, it's probably also the pick I regret more than any other selection I made last season. I mean, Justin Herbert is a star, and yet because of his profile, didn't actually do anything for you.

00:45:04
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:45:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, Can you describe what you're looking for in these quarterbacks? Like when you talk about the window, can you explain sort of what it is that you're pinpointing when you're searching for these quarterbacks that the market might not be high enough on.

00:45:19
Speaker 3: Well, we're thinking in terms of the breakout guys. I mean I have a very high tolerance for making extremely risky selections, and so he just works nicely for me. I think that if that is less comfortable for people, I mean, that's why we get the values. That's why Justin Fields goes where he did, It's why Trevor Lawrence, and I have to admit being very nervous about Trevor Lawrence myself to where I mean, I was looking to make some moves in super flex dynasty leagues because I mean there was a chance that he was actually not the generational prospect that people had promised, and especially that if he's not going to run, you do have some problems from just a scoring profile perspective. And yet those guys make the jump, and once they make the jump, they're going to be league winners. I do think too, if you're looking at pure passing guys, if the player can be and kind of thinking redraft here as you might do it, if the player can be perhaps a matchup based play. And the thing that I did then, so our Apex league was so tight that not only did I take those running backs early, but I also didn't feel like there were any viable selections kind of in.

00:46:20
Speaker 4: The next group of picks.

00:46:23
Speaker 3: Quarterback often falls and Denny Well sometimes even not like draft a QB any original draft and just pick one up on free agency. But I went ahead and let the elite guys go, but then did select both Lawrence and Tua because I think that those could be the guys who have that individual season where everything is perfect and a passing a pure passing profile can score enough to help you win, so you get two shots at it. But then also if they end up being kind of matchup based plays, hopefully the schedules work in a way that you can sort of mini stream them. Once we go below that to the back, then you're talking about taking some big risks and looking for some slightly different profiles.

00:47:03
Speaker 4: Maybe.

00:47:04
Speaker 1: You know what's really interesting is I'm not even kidding. This is gonna sound like the most nerdy, uh pathetic thing that people have ever heard me say on this show. Last night, I woke up in the middle of the night to feed my eight month old, and I go back down to bed and I fall asleep. You know, when you're in that like Twilight, you're kind of kind of asleep, kind of not. And I woke up and I had this thought of and I haven't researched this in particular enough, but this is this is the general idea, And this is me just kind of flowing off my dome right here because I haven't really put this together coherently yet. So I'll try my best. But one of the things I thought about was we know that the you know, the elite quarterbacks hypothetically are going to give you an advantage right going into the season. We have a good we have a good feel for those top three, top four guys, maybe even top six guys, and then you get into that like Trevor Lawrence, you know, the range that you're talking about, like Trevor Lawrence to a Deshaun Watson, what have you. Maybe they have top three upside with like a good touchdown rate type season whatever. But one of the things that's pretty evident these days, you know, I say these days basically since the twenty nineteen Lamar Jackson season, is that it's very very difficult to match that high end quarterback performance and they're going earlier now. It's gonna be very very hard to match that kind of performance through streaming through these lower end quarterbacks like a Sam Howe and a Kenny Pickett, and maybe maybe they end up in you know, I've still been drafting both of those guys, especially in like a best ball format, and maybe you're able to platoon those players, But is the play now what you did and what you're talking about to spend an eighth ninth or a ninth and eleventh. What have you pick on two of these sort of mid range guys like a Tua and Trevor Lawrence. They both maybe have again that high ceiling with a crazy touchdown rate season. But what you're doing also is saying, I know that on a weekly basis, these guys have the true ability to have predictable elite outcomes. Right Whereas we can feel okay enough about Sam Hawe Kenny Pickett, but are we gonna feel so supremely confident until maybe the back half of year of this season to plug and play them and say, yeah, they're gonna score twenty five Fantasy points this week, like that's in their range of outcomes, you know, Whereas right away we know that's in the range of outcomes for a guy like two and Trevor Lawrence. And so what I'm basically getting at here is is do you think that there's a possibility that the optimal look, the optimal strategy will end up being and this is more of a managed league thing, not not really a best ball thing, but will it end up being platooning to lower end QB ones, maybe a higher end QB two and me an idiot sitting here saying, yeah, you don't really need to reach for a Dak Prescott or something when you know that you can get replaceable production. But that's only with Dak Prescott. But Dak Prescott plus A to A is going to potentially platoon itself to be able to match a Jalen Hurts type player.

00:50:06
Speaker 3: I think that's completely the case. And one of the things that we're trying to do in every format is figure out where the cost to us really changes. And maybe the number one thing that I try and really make sure that I do in drafts and am aware of as I'm drafting is again this idea of don't try and address positional issues, especially in redraft where you are actually mostly focused on how your starting lineup's going to work and then you have waivers. But figure out where there are these huge tier breaks and where the price considerations are so different, and if there is a way to attack a certain position because.

00:51:01
Speaker 4: Of that, then do it. And so you get some of that at QB.

00:51:05
Speaker 3: And one of the things that I think is interesting, you know, you think about some of the big tournaments, for example, where the elite QB still go early, but then that second tier gets pushed way down. I think it's tempting to think if you get a great price on a QB who's actually still pretty good, that you want to take that and make that the play. But if you get two of the guys there, then like you said, you have this optionality where the matchup based play is a huge benefit. But there's also at least that slight chance when you have two guys, you've got twice the chance that the player breaks out and has this magical season. And sometimes even within the course of the season, it's not that evident that the next game is going to just follow on the previous one, that the scoring is going to keep coming. But sometimes the structural things within the team, maybe what their defense is, how their receivers are clicked, how the coach is calling the plays in that year, before the defenses evolve and catch up to them, it is actually pretty clear you're probably going to continue to get those big games, in which case having the two shots at it is very meaningful.

00:52:12
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:52:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I'm glad that I remembered in my hazy brain, you know that I thought that last night, because I do think that it's really obviously pertin into this discussion. But I do think that, you know, maybe next offseason it's something that everyone should be digging into. Is this just notion of two lower end qb ones, because you know, I talk about this all the time, like opportunity cost to me is the number one thing that people should be concerned about in fantasy football. It's more about the players that you don't draft and the players that you do oftentimes, and I don't think the average fantasy manager realizes how bad even like round five picks are or how bad like round six picks are, right, And when you really see that, you start to draft differently. You start to see things in a much different way. And I think that sort of plays into this where, yeah, you know you're holding two roster spots for a quarterback. But if your league, let's just say, has a ton of roster spots like APEX, does you know it's fairly deep, or or a league where the rest of your league mates are holding two quarterbacks, then it's it's gonna be more advantageous to go that route, maybe even then taking on the opportunity cost of an earlier round quarterback. So I think it's definitely something to for folks to think about if they're drafting, even you know this upcoming weekend or you know, just something to research over the offseason. But let's talk about individual quarterbacks really quick, because I sort of see this firewall where Deshaun Watson goes. He's sort of like the last of a tier of players, and I'm gonna feel probably fairly confident in that that could have that top three ceiling. You know that includes you know, Trevor Lawrence in that range, et cetera. So he's like, you know, QB nine usually in drafts. So let's talk QB ten or worse. Who are the quarterbacks you've taken most this year?

00:53:55
Speaker 4: Tua is the guy, and.

00:54:01
Speaker 3: That's in some ways it's nice that the camp has evidently not been great because you don't have his ADP correct Like most of the players who I mean most of the players who are broken in May, June, July, in August, you don't look at those values. I am an individual draft. I was in a draft yesterday where he went in the fifth round, but mostly you're not getting that. And the player that I'm maybe the highest on relative to the community in the first two rounds and in the first two rounds. Everything's very tight, so it's not like people are actually very far off from each other.

00:54:40
Speaker 4: But is Jalen Waddle? And I mean if Jalen Waddle closes the.

00:54:43
Speaker 3: Gap to Tyreek Hill, if they both perform, well, you can say, well, there's still an issue because they don't have these peripheral targets. They're going to find some different ways to get that done. I mean, his scoring is not that different than what you expect from Joe Burrow and Justin Herbert, So why would you not take the five.

00:54:58
Speaker 4: To sixth round discount.

00:55:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, he could obviously get hurt, so you're gonna need to have some other things that you build in as well. The other biggest name and it's both exciting and disappointing. As a head into my most important drafts, far and away my highest exposure is to Sam Howell and his ADP has taken a big jump in the last week.

00:55:18
Speaker 1: It has it has, Yeah, I mean like you get dual threadability though with him. He was that dude at Carolina and I mean, do you do you let the preseason and the way that he's because he's played well in the preseason. Kenny Pickett has too, Do you let that influence you at all?

00:55:33
Speaker 4: Like?

00:55:33
Speaker 1: Does that is that part of your equation? And obviously you're drafting him before the preseason started, but is that is that helping you? It's obviously helping the market, that's why he's going higher than he was before, but is it helping you and your evaluation and feeling more confident in drafting him.

00:55:48
Speaker 3: It makes me feel more comfortable about the massive steak I had, So that part is nice, I guess. I think the biggest thing is that it seems to have really reassured hit the coaching staff, and that was the biggest reason to not take him, or to be cognizant of your exposures or to make sure you're building in other.

00:56:10
Speaker 4: Paths at the same time.

00:56:12
Speaker 3: Is that there was a drum beat that I think made sense suggesting the number one Jacoby Brissett is actually not bad. I mean, it's one of the best backups, which if you're trying to establish yourself as an NFL starter, it's actually not great to have an elite backup behind you, Yeah, because the coaching staff is going to be thinking, Okay, we've got this other way we can go.

00:56:28
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:56:30
Speaker 3: That part of it was a concern. I think that the only thing that preseason shows, and it's kind of the same thing for Jordan Love, which is that it shows that the guy is not completely overmatched and it's not a disaster. Whether or not he can actually score fantasy points for you in the regular season is going to be completely different, right, I mean, defenses are going to be calling the plays, your offense is going to be put together differently. You're going to be facing the actual starters from opposing teams. So I mean, there's still so much to go there. But the thing that we saw in the preseason was the same thing that you saw at North Carolina, which is that the quarterback has plus mobility, He reads defenses extremely well or I don't know, reads the defenses, but the decision making is very good and the arm talent is elite. One of the things that is interesting. And a head coach has so many responsibilities, and I mean I have some very I mean it was very important to me. It's a very kind of different scope kind of thing. I coached some Division two college tennis right as I got out of college, and I mean there are things that as a coach that maybe you don't know about your players that you should have known. There are some surprises, but it's this odd thing where I remember live streaming the draft with Ben Gretch stealing bananas and every pick for rounds and rounds were like, we think that Sam Hollise should go here because he should have gone in the top ten and he's the best player available and every team needs quarterback depth.

00:57:59
Speaker 4: And it never happened.

00:58:01
Speaker 3: And now this guy is out lighting up the preseason and you're like, yes, this is what he is, this is what he has always been. Why was this a revelation to his head coach who was telling people I didn't know he was this good?

00:58:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, But.

00:58:13
Speaker 3: Again, I mean, anytime that you're right, it's easy to say, oh, I was right. All the times you're wrong, you're thinking, well, there were extenuating circumstances. I wasn't really wrong, So you know, there's there's a lot of that. Basically, it's just it's great to see him play well. And I do think he's surrounded with good weapons and that matters. Yeah, these rookie qbs who don't have guys to throw to. We've had so many situations in the last three or four years where a college star will come up from college and play in the NFL with worset wide receivers than he is used to throwing to on his college team, and you can tell that it sets them back.

00:58:47
Speaker 4: What is going on?

00:58:48
Speaker 2: Yeah? Right, justin Field's being the prime example of that.

00:58:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, then with rookie quarterbacks, let's talk about that. Are you enter out on Anthony Richardson? We had, you know, we did another episode together on super Flex on super Flex formats on Establish the Run with Adam Levittan, and we talked about how we're in another dynasty league together, and my partner and I ended up taking Anthony Richardson one oh two in that draft. It is a draft where or a league where you know, uh, lineups are deep and you don't necessarily super flex, but you don't necessarily need to go quarterback in that environment. In that situation, we ended up doing it. I blame my co manager because he's a Gators fan. Uh jokes aside, though, I mean, I still think that Richardson was at least deserving of being in that one oh two spot. But I want to talk to you about Richardson himself, because it sounds like like Are you in?

00:59:43
Speaker 2: Are you out? Are you drafting him this year? Are you worried that he's a player who just isn't very good.

00:59:50
Speaker 3: I've been out, but I also am not telling other people to avoid him. That's definitely not kind of where I want to be positioned. I think that his price is such that if you draft him and you're wrong in redraft, you're probably not that much worse off than someone who just takes a different position and has.

01:00:15
Speaker 4: Some other quarterbacks.

01:00:17
Speaker 3: So I don't know that the downside and redraft is necessarily that significant, since he's in a range where you can cover overrip. One of the things that I've always emphasized and has been part of the zero RB mentality with it's not just about not paying up for these starters, but it's stockpiling all of the elite backups, these guys who have been great college players and are plus athletes.

01:00:39
Speaker 4: So why would you not draft.

01:00:40
Speaker 3: Guys who have demonstrated that they're good. The problem with Anthony Richardson is that he was a bad college player, and bad college players traditionally do not do well when they make the jump. Now the bad college players who do and this is kind of more position independent, but you can certainly see why it would apply to quarterback as well. It's usually a trap to say a guy's an elite athlete, he's gonna do something different than he's done before. And yet the players who do do something different at the NFL level than they've done in college do tend to be the elite athletes. And then you have a guy who didn't have a ton of experience, so maybe he's just not there yet. It's a difficult jump to make as an NFL player, so I think there are some problems with the statistical profile. One of the things that I think you can get in trouble with but is interesting to me, is that the like the true college football guys the Coluin and I would bring on OT would all say, look, the important thing for you to know is not that he's not a good athlete and that he couldn't make some jump, but he's actually a worse player even than the numbers look like.

01:01:49
Speaker 4: So you're having the.

01:01:52
Speaker 3: Guys who follow it really closely say like, this guy's overmatched as a college football player.

01:01:56
Speaker 4: The jump to the NFL is huge.

01:01:59
Speaker 3: Now. I do think that like thirty one other teams, I would be pretty out in this coaching environment. I mean, what you want as a player who gets selected in the NFL is for your coaching staff to know how to use you and to be elite at what they do, and I.

01:02:13
Speaker 4: Think that he has that.

01:02:14
Speaker 3: Yeah, so that part is pretty encouraging. I guess in some ways I'm both more worried and less worried in the dynasty environment that you mentioned, because if he ends up going on to be like a fifteen year top five QB, then in super flex dynasty, that is probably not to have been out on him. But I also think that people don't necessarily understand how the scoring works in a lot of leagues to where running backs and wide receivers are actually more competitive in the super Flex. I wrote this big Dynasty piece on that topic recently. I think for Anthony Richardson to be a really good pick at the one h two, then not only does he have to hit, but also Gibbs and JSN have to miss, And so then you have to have two things where you have to have a guy who wasn't good in college be good in the NFL, and you have to have guys who were superstars not translated that well now again you could still if he hits, you're gonna be fine. You don't really care what happens with those other guys. But if you taken Jsenter, taking Gibbs, I think you're in a pretty good position, you know, unless those guys get hurt, because you can always get hurt.

01:03:16
Speaker 1: I also think with quarterback in super flex, we know it's currency. We know that people will pay for quarterbacks, and they do both in startups and as obviously the league goes, you're in and you're out. I do have this feeling, and I wonder if you agree or not that even if Anthony Richardson is fairly bad, bad this year, but he shows flashes of that athleticism a law justin fields, and they are invested in him the way they're invested in him. Now this went south with Trey Lance, of course, but you know, if the Colts are indeed invested and they give him more than just this year, more than just his rookie season, like he's he's good enough, and I think that, you know, the bar to get a second year as a starter is probably not that high in this environment, given the investment stuff with with with most quarterbacks, most situations because unlike Trey Lance, where the forty nine ers were competitive and needed to win immediately.

01:04:17
Speaker 2: I don't know if the.

01:04:18
Speaker 1: Colts have that mindset and mentality right now, which is why Jonathan Taylor, by the time that this goes out, the show goes out, he may or may not be a Colt.

01:04:25
Speaker 2: I have no idea. We have no idea at this time.

01:04:27
Speaker 1: But which is why there's at least rumors that you know, he's not going to be on the Colts. And so my thought with Anthony Richardson strictly from a value standpoint is that if he doesn't show up in year one, his market value still might maintain relatively well, and you should force the issue to flip him as opposed to, you know, taking that on, taking on that sunk cost, because you know you could go either way.

01:04:52
Speaker 2: I understandably so with like a Justin Fields.

01:04:54
Speaker 1: Right now, depending on how you evaluate him and think that he is as a quarterback. But if you don't see sign you know from Richardson as a passer in year one, he should still score a decent number of Fantasy points because of his legs. I'm not saying that he's gonna be you know, I think that is there's an outcome where he's elite. There's there's certainly that outcome like this part of his range of outcomes. But you know, I'm not saying that he's gonna score even more than seventeen or eighteen Fantasy points per game. But if he gets to that point, chances are the market is still going to be in on him enough. And so that's sort of the cost benefit that I'm looking at. I agree with you from the standpoint of like profile of a Gibbs or JSN and the stability of that profile and the upside of that profile. Yeah, definitely over in Anthony Richardson type. But from a market standpoint, I could still see Richardson maintaining.

01:05:47
Speaker 2: That value year over year.

01:05:48
Speaker 3: Do you agree?

01:05:48
Speaker 2: Do you disagree?

01:05:49
Speaker 1: Because I'm I'm curious because I think that's a big, big element to the Anthony Richardson story.

01:05:53
Speaker 2: From a dynasty perspective, it is.

01:05:55
Speaker 3: And I mean you even mentioned Trey Lance, who is one of the negative out comes. And yet even knowing all of that, I was in a dynasty startup just two weeks ago where Trey Alliance went ahead of Sam Howe, Desmond Ritter, Mac Jones, a guy who is a third string player right right when ahead of clear starters who actually have interesting things about their profiles. So you're going to be able to hold something. And I think that as long as the dynasty manager has the right type of discipline where you know it can be hard because people do want to win at some point, and yet if you can select young players, and certainly if you're in rookie draft, you have to select young players. But when you're thinking about the startup of this ability to select young guys, because even the misses hold enough value to where you have that option of that if they hit, they're going to skyrocket in value. If they miss, they're going to lose a little bit of value, And you actually need to move off of both player a little bit every year and kind of keep that almost perpetual money machine going there for you. So as long as you have the discipline to do it and not sit on these guys who have failed, or not sit on all of them. You may have a few personal favorites where you're like, I just really want to see what Traylon Brooks is going to do, even though we know that generally speaking, that profile needs to do better than what he did as a rookie.

01:07:21
Speaker 2: Exactly right.

01:07:22
Speaker 4: But in general, you've got to be moving these guys.

01:07:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, John, this is awesome. It was great to talk to you. I'm so glad you're able to hop on. We haven't had a show like this in a minute, so it was really great to just kind of talk game theory a little bit, talk about some of your favorite targets. Might as you let everyone know where they can find you because you are not on Twitter, but where can everyone find you?

01:07:43
Speaker 4: Yeah? Thank you. We have lots of fun stuff up at roadaviz.

01:07:48
Speaker 3: Dot com, including in the past week the top fifteen zero RB candidates countdown list. Would love to have everybody over there. Ben Gretch and I do Stealing Banana.

01:08:01
Speaker 4: Every week pretty frequently.

01:08:02
Speaker 3: There have a lot of fun with that. Ben obviously is an amazing column. Kelly and I who wrote it is overtime and column has this amazing Irish voice and brings this unique perspective from across the pond. And then Peter overs At and I draft underdog teams every Wednesday morning as part of the Best Ball Banana stand. Love those three gentlemen. They do an amazing job it's just it's such a privilege to get to do podcasts with them, and the podcasting has really been what has redeemed the decision to not do social media, because I do get so much great interaction that way, and I appreciate you so much bringing me on. I love talking with you just I mean, you may end up cutting this part, but we get a lot of feedback that from people who are stealing bananas and ship chasing fans, where they're like, we love you guys, and then also like we know JJ isn't exactly part of that, but we love JJ too. So you're the other person that gets thrown in constantly there.

01:09:03
Speaker 4: People love you. I love you. This was a blast.

01:09:05
Speaker 1: I appreciate it, man, I really really really appreciate it. You can follow me I am on Twitter at Late Round QB. Definitely check out the Late Round draft guide over on lateround dot com.

01:09:16
Speaker 2: As always, thanks for tuning in.