Late-Round Perspectives: Matt Schauf

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Mattchhoff is a fantasy analyst at Draft Sharks who hosts the award winning Draft Sharks podcast. He's a two time Fantasy pros IDP Accuracy Champion, he's a Main Event.

00:00:10
Speaker 2: League champ, and most importantly, he's a dad.

00:00:14
Speaker 1: These are his Late Round perspectives. This episode is sponsored by Underdog. Underdog is the easiest place to play fantasy sports and they give you a ton of different games and contests to choose from each week. If you think drafting is over because the season started, you'd be wrong. You can draft teams over there each week in literal minutes right now. If you sign up an Underdog with promo code Late Round, you not only get a deposit offer of up to one thousand dollars, but you also get access to my rest of season rankings. Those will be emailed to you once you sign up. But when you sign up, you have to use promo code late Round. Had an Underdog Fantasy dot Com or download the app to do so. Again, that's promo code late Round. Now back to the show. Good to see him, man.

00:01:10
Speaker 2: So you're you're up in uh in like with Rochester area, right.

00:01:14
Speaker 3: You got it, just got our first real snow of the year. And by that, I mean I didn't have to shovel yet, so I guess probably not real by our standards. Yeah, he ever had a snowblower out at least.

00:01:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, it doesn't it doesn't totally count. I'm down.

00:01:24
Speaker 1: I'm down in Charlotte, and we had a dusting yesterday, right, so we we wore or two days ago. We woke up and we had like like an inch inch and a half or so, like it was.

00:01:34
Speaker 3: The school's closed for the week.

00:01:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, Like it took me. It took me like twice the amount of time to get my son to today care and stuff. But he he's turning two in December, so next month, I guess this month, Wow, we're we are in December right now.

00:01:46
Speaker 3: Uh.

00:01:46
Speaker 1: He turns to in like a few weeks. And uh, he had never seen snow before. And because he you know, because he's born here and all that, and uh, he walked outside and he was just like like his reaction was snow, and he was just pointing right every time and then here more and he kept saying more at all the snow that was because he had never like it was just so vast to him. Because it was literally just like everywhere, very adorable thing to see. But yeah, I mean, like it's just different because did you did you grow up in the New York area and stuff?

00:02:15
Speaker 3: I grew up kind of all over. I was actually born in North Carolina, so it probably took me a while to see snow. I don't remember the first time. But then I went lived in Cincinnati for a while, so we got some there South Carolina, Pennsylvania, and then settled in New York from college on.

00:02:31
Speaker 1: Man, you you've been in a lot of the places that I've lived too, because I'm I'm in North Carolina now, lived in Cincinnati for a little while. I was in Pittsburgh is where I was born and raised. Where in Cincinnati did you live?

00:02:41
Speaker 3: So I was too young to really know the areas. I went to pleasant Ridge Elementary School. I went to CBA, which is a bilingual academy, and it was so I guess I was close to Norwood for anybody who's familiar with that area.

00:02:56
Speaker 2: Yeah cool. And then uh, yeah, I was in I was in. I mean I was born and raise Pittsburgh, as most people probably associate me with more than anything, just because especially like back in the day when I started the fantasy stuff, I was a more obnoxious Steelers fan than I am. You know today. That does that mean you're a big Bills guy?

00:03:14
Speaker 3: No, it was Actually I became an Eagles fan, like right around Randall Cunningham time. That was such a fun team. And that was before I moved to Philly. And then I moved to Philly and was there when they hired Andy Reid. So I liked Andy Reid. I remember as a coaching candidate, everybody's like, who's this guy. He's a quarterback coach from Green Bay. I'm like, I don't know. He was at his initial press conference, hadn't even been hired yet, he's got a binder. Let's give him a shot to see what happens. Yeah, it was a pretty fun team to really get in on. And then I mean, as I've gotten older, I don't care nearly as much. I still like when the Eagles win, but my day's not affected by it.

00:03:47
Speaker 2: That's how I am too.

00:03:48
Speaker 1: It's like it's hard to describe because like I still am enjoying, Like I'm really enjoying the Steelers team right, Like it's a incredibly fun team and like the Russell Wilson story is really fun and like Mike Tomman's probably the easiest coach to root for and all of that, right, But it's just a different kind of like when I was a late teenager and into my twenties and stuff like I would like you said, like it would it would either like make or break my week depending on whether or not they won.

00:04:12
Speaker 2: It's crazy.

00:04:13
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I can remember just being angry that the Eagles lost or that North Carolina lost in basketball, and now I'm like, why what that ude to me? It didn't had absolutely no effect.

00:04:24
Speaker 2: But here's the thing I can't. I can't pinpoint if it's what we do for a living that's helping us have that perspective, or if it's just maturity and age and like having a family, you know, Like I mean, it's all that.

00:04:36
Speaker 3: Part of its maturity. But it can't just be that because not everybody, I guess grows all the way up. I can pinpoint it. For me. It was in college. I had History of Sport as part of my Sports Studies minor, and I had a professor named doctor Moser, who you know. I I signed up for this class as a teenager I'm like history of sport, I know all things about sports history. I'm gonna crush this class. And then on the first day I realized, no, it's not history of sports. It's history of sport. And you know, just like the things that we went into with that, I was like, oh, this is about a lot more than whether the blue team beats the white team.

00:05:11
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:05:12
Speaker 3: It just from that point on it just kind of dwindled. And then you know, I had kids, and it's like, if you have kids and your day is ruined or made by what happens on a game on TV, then there's something wrong. Problem.

00:05:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, well you get a lot of I think that you get a ton of perspective too, just on like like even in fantasy right, like I had, Dude, this past week, I had the probably top three worst Fantasy beat of my life because it's going to impact so many things about like the playoff picture and me maybe not making the playoffs in this league despite like here, let me let me just give you a quick summary. I'm my home league that I COMMISSI Okay, this is one where I've been There's like a meme essentially with my buddies where I'm like cursed in this league, and in this league that I commission, we get six playoff spots. The final playoff spot is most points, not in right, so we get you know, if you get bad luck with all that whatever, I might finish second in the league in points four and not make the playoffs. That's how the I and I lost this past week by point one because David and Joku dropped a pass at the end of that game.

00:06:12
Speaker 2: And I've never just you get that like sinking feeling.

00:06:15
Speaker 1: But then again, going back to like the perspective and stuff, it's like it's really hard to like let that sit with you for more than a couple of days at most, you know, because you're just like, okay, like this is we play in a lot of leagues. You and I play in leagues together, Like we're gonna be on the other side of that eventually. It's just that in this instance, I have a dominant team that's probably gonna miss the playoffs, and it's pretty tilting, but we can get over it.

00:06:38
Speaker 3: Yeah. I had two years ago now in a Drafters tournament, I was in position to maybe win it, uh, and then I had Stefan Diggs in my lineup for the infamous Damar Hamlin game that ultimately never happened and we never got points four and I finished fourth, So I had to tell myself that, all right, fourth is still a lot more money than if you didn't fit us up there, even though you know, the funniest part about it is I held off telling my wife that I was close to it because I didn't want her to be like, hey, we might get ten thousand dollars, but we might not. I was waiting, and then the last week I was like, I got to tell her so that she knows why I'm watching it this closely. And yeah, yeah, and that happened.

00:07:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, And especially in like a DFS type game or like a best ball tournament or something like that, you're also like you almost feel like you've earned that money and then you lose that money in a way. But it's like it was technically never in your hands, and you know in the first place, you got to at least you know, like like like have that standpoint and perspective on it. But you know, you mentioned a little bit You're so you got a minor in sport history or something.

00:07:40
Speaker 2: Is that what you said?

00:07:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, sport sport with no s on the end studies sports studies.

00:07:45
Speaker 2: Okay, so what was like what got you into that?

00:07:48
Speaker 1: I want to I want to know your path, your history, and how you got from a sports studies minor to being at Fantasy Sharks and doing the work that you're doing.

00:07:57
Speaker 2: Now draft Sharks. That's what I meant. Oh sorry, sorry, Draft Sharks. Yes, of course.

00:08:02
Speaker 3: So yeah, I was at Ithaca. I was in the communications school. I went to school planning to be on Sports Center and then quickly realized I didn't really like the TV production stuff that much switched to journalism. So I was a journalism guy with a sports studies minor. And I mean, honestly, what I probably got into it first for was because it was sports studies and I didn't realize the difference between sports and sport, So it was just kind of a natural minor to go with my journalism if I was going to be the sports journalist. But you know, like I said, history of sport was just an example and it would get boring to get into it. But there was stuff like psychology of sport and you know, just all the different angles and things at play around sports that I learned more about through that as opposed to you know, just studying the history of sports. It made everything a lot more interesting. I don't know that that specifically had any impact on me getting too fantasy though. You know, I've just always been a sports fan. Like when my brothers and I were younger, we would read the sports pages. We would trade baseball cards. Baseball was my big sport growing up. I you know, enjoyed football as well, but I loved baseball. There's no more stat dents sport than that. So I've always just kind of been in that and didn't really play fantasy until I was in college. And then, funnily, I the guy who became my advisor in college that I think that's the first actual fantasy league I played in. He was running it. He started up a league, asked me to join, and we would have these advising sessions to set my schedule. We had set my schedule in two minutes because we're like this, you take this, this, this, and this all right. Now, here's what I think about this coming season, and we talk fantasy football, fantasy baseball. I won his league the first year, and then from there I was like, oh, I kind of like this game. I think, well, we'll keep building on this. And that was the beginning of college, so you know there were other steps along the way from there.

00:09:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then and then after college? How did how did this all come about?

00:09:59
Speaker 3: Well, JJ, the years two thousand and two, TikTok was merely a sound that cocks.

00:10:05
Speaker 1: Look, you say that, you say that. But I did have Bob Harris on earlier this offseason and wed up just kidding out, love you love you, Bob.

00:10:12
Speaker 3: He'll understand this next part. I worked at a thing called a newspaper, which I mean your grandparents can tell you about in one Ona, New York, and I had tererned there during college, went back there after college, and the sports editor I was apparently the only guy on staff at that point that played fantasy, which shows you like, it's been twenty two years since then, seems like a long time if you're young. It's really not that long in the evolution of fantasy. But it's gone from me being the only person in a newspaper to play it to now Chris Collinsworth is talking during the game about playing against his son. So I'm there the sports editors like, hey, you're the only one here who plays fantasy. Do you want to do a fantasy column. And I'm like, I don't know if I know enough to do a fantasy column, but all right, I'm arrogant enough to give it a shot. So I did that, enjoyed it, and then I was like, I wonder if there's any more out there. I just kind of searched online. I found the FSWA, which is Fantasy Sports Writers Association. I found they had job postings at that point, and I found Pro Fantasy Sports run by Mike Beacam, who said he needed writers and I didn't know what for. I was like, all right, hey, I'm interested in writing. What do you need And he was like, hey, I need somebody to do an IDP start sit column. And what was funny about that at the time is I had just before that convinced my league, then my only league, to drop IDPs because I didn't it didn't make sense the way we were playing it. And I don't know we could get into that now or in a minute, because I know we're going to talk about IDPs. But I started doing that and I was like, if I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it. Well, like I'm not going to half ass this IDP start Bench, so I dug into it, got to know the guys wrote about him every week, enjoyed that. I was like, hey, there's not that much IDP content out there. Uh, let me see who needs it. I found the Sporting News. I reached out to the Sporting News. I was like, hey, how would you guys like an IDP column, here's some of my stuff. They're like, sure, do IDP com force. And then you know, it was that kind of thing too, where I just found different opportunities. Pro Fantasy Sports got bought by another company which had more work for me. I eventually met Lenny who was the creator of Draft Sharks. Lenny Papano got on with them after I left my previous company. So it's a mix of you know, getting out there finding stuff, obviously doing the work once you're there, but you know, some luck certainly mixed in along the way, Like yeah, Lenny and Draft Sharks are based here in Rochester, where I just happened to land, so that certainly helped us, you know, join up, which is like thirteen fourteen years ago.

00:12:35
Speaker 2: Now, yeah, that's crazy. Is it?

00:12:37
Speaker 1: Is it common that people slip up and actually accidentally say Fantasy instead of draft whenever they refer to draft sharks. I can't believe I said that. Whenever I said that, but it's it's just funny the draft.

00:12:46
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think draft kings happens more often now.

00:12:49
Speaker 2: Actually, that makes sense, Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. All right.

00:12:53
Speaker 1: So so you mentioned that you're you know, you have a backbone if you will, and background with IDP.

00:12:59
Speaker 2: You're an idea guy.

00:13:01
Speaker 1: I don't think i've had an IDP analyst on perspective. This is like episode forty, like late forties at this point, and I haven't had any any IDP discussions. You're shaking your head right now, because yeah, we're used to being treated like that.

00:13:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a common thing for you IDP folks. But look, look I wanna I want to I want to clear the air. I want to open things up to you. I want you to convince folks that are listening as to why they should be playing IDP h and why we're missing out because look, I don't even really play that much IDP either, which is probably a mistake because I'm a fantasy football analyst.

00:13:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, so here's the first question for somebody who's actually interested. If somebody is you know, strongly opposed, and they're like standing their arms fold and say and convinced me don't play it. You're gonna find something you hate about it, and it's going to be a fake reason, so don't play it. My question to anybody who's actually interested is do you like fantasy football? And if the answer is yes, it's the exact same game on the other side, it's just different players and different stack categories. I mean, I don't know about everyone else's experience. I think though, probably most people who play fantasy and who enjoy it, who are actually into it, know a lot more about football right now, even if that's just like paying attention to every team, knowing a lot more players, realizing more of what's going on, realizing who's playing well, who's not, who's hurt who's not. So if you get that from playing fantasy, you're still ignoring half of the game by not playing with the defensive side, because you get the exact same thing if you add in defensive players. Now you're paying attention to those guys. Now you know who's hurt over there. Now you know who's performing well or not. Now you know who's delivering stats or not. I think that one thing the reason I talked to my league out of doing it initially was because we did the thing where we had I believe it was three defensive players at first, and might have even gone down to two that next year. And that's the wrong way to do it. Anybody who plays like that is going to come away with the wrong impression. And that's you know, I know that there are plenty of leagues that do that. See it can do it. It obviously does work. But it's the same as having three offensive positions and having every quarterback, running back, wide receiver and tight end available to throw those three spots. Everybody in your league can get good players there, and every week somebody's not gonna score the way you're expecting him to, and it's gonna make it look like it's completely luck driven. And that's what I get a lot from people, is, oh, it's all luck on defense. I'm like dude, last week, Adam Thielen, Parker Washington, and Nick Westbrook Akeene we top eight fantasy receivers. If you think that there's that big a difference between the offensive a defensive side from a luck standpoint, it's just because you haven't actually played and paid attention to IDP.

00:15:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that makes it. I've been in a lot of leagues.

00:15:41
Speaker 1: I have played in IDP before, to be clear, so I've experienced it. It's just been a minute because it didn't really keep up and I feel like, you know, interest kind of waned a little bit. But there are a lot of leagues that, like you mentioned, where it seems like people just like I don't know if it's the commissioner just being power hungry and thinking that they're getting cute or something like, I don't really understand the logic behind it, but they end up just throwing one or two IDP spots in there. And of course, just think about, like think if you were to do that in the reverse, if you had an IDP, if you had a defensive lineup, and then you just had a random super flex spot or something like literally everyone super flex spot is gonna be really really good, and then you're gonna have like, you know, like these random running backs that are very good, like a Kyron Williams on the Waiver Wire or something like that. And it's like, yeah, this is this is silly, this is stupid. So you're saying that you think people should go and this is this makes a lot of sense, but people should kind of go all in if they're gonna really try out IDP.

00:16:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, and even within that there are levels I think you should. You need to start with at least five defensive positions, because that's enough to require at least one d lineman at least one defensive back, and then you can do kind of whatever you want with the other three. Like, you don't usually need to require linebackers because in most formats they're at least equal with the other guys, if not, you know, stronger with their scoring and they're you know, are wide scoring very so you know, that differs quite a lot by league. Ideally, I think you get to the point where you're also requiring defensive tackles, specifically cornerbacks specifically, because you know, dB seems like a catch all, but there's a big difference between playing safety and playing cornerback and the kind of numbers you put up and how consistently you get tackle opportunities and all that, and you know, choose whatever level works for you. I think starting with at least five is for the league that's like, yeah, we'll try IDP, but not everybody's ready to jump in yet, and then if you play it and everybody's into it, then you can, you know, ramp it up to the point where there's many defensive starters as there are offense. And you know that's going to sound weird to people who are used to just fantasy being offense, but there are more defensive players available. Like every time you look at the field, five guys on offense are not fantasy viable because they're offensive linemen. On the other side of the ball, every single guy is fantasy viable. Obviously, they're to much different degrees. There are lots of defensive tackles that barely do anything stat wise, but all those guys put up some stats at some point.

00:18:00
Speaker 2: I mean, look in my in my offensive line only league, you know they they are, they are relevant. You know their pancakes that they're that they're able to acquire and accumulate for that league. No sore are you from like your league stamp like like the leagues that you manage? Are you in leagues where it's just wild and crazy with IDP, like like like more IDP than more defensive players than than offensive and such?

00:18:25
Speaker 3: Well, to be clear, I don't commiss any leagues because I had I have enough trouble staying on top of managing my own teams during the season, like making sure I don't forget waivers coming up, especially when they're on different days. So I've definitely played a wide variety, you know, larger lineups, the smaller lineups, the crazy rules defense. Only I really like it when it's balanced, where the defensive guys are as important as offense. I'm certainly not looking forward to get more important, but I think you know, both sides of the ball matter quite a bit in actual football, so I like when they're both affecting each other. In one league, Sigmun blooms one of my league mates there, it's called Goydon Ruyd's But that's got you know, lots of lineup spots on both sides and the kind of scoring that makes everybody important. And it makes the draft the most fun draft that I do all year, because you know, the second round could be half the team's taking quarterbacks, somebody takes a defensive end, somebody takes an edge linebacker, and you don't know if you're doing it right until you get to the end and see what team you have.

00:19:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, That's the thing that I've always thought about with draft strategy, and like I've been you know, obviously i dig into draft strategy a ton and game theory a ton during the off season and stuff, and I'm trying to do studies and see what's optimal and all that kind of stuff. But there's only so many iterations that you can really go with when you're only dealing with four different position groups, right, Like you can you could say, Okay, I'm gonna go early, mid late with any of these positions and kind of mix that up, or I'm gonna you know, like like we've obviously, you know, come up with all these different ideas with like hero RB, zero RB and robust RB and all these different like strategies and stuff.

00:19:57
Speaker 2: But there's really not like there's a line we can actually draw and say, Okay, these are all of the strategies. Like in terms of like like when you're picking these particular positions. Now it's more so like the kind of archetypes that you're that you're taking and the types of players that you're taking and stuff. But I would imagine with IDP, you're able to really just get wild, like you're saying, because there are just so many more positional groups that you can if the scoring evens things out enough, you could you could really go wild with it.

00:20:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's just so much more room for drafting differently. I mean, that's my favorite part of fantasy, is not just the draft, but being ready to adjust during the draft. I feel like that's it might be my top strength in playing fantasy. It's certainly what I enjoy the most is getting into a draft and figuring out what I need to do as I go. You know, obviously we do lots of drafting along the way, so I'm ready with a basic strategy. But I like the adjusting, and I think the more positions you put in there, the more room there is for adjusting and seeing what your adjustments do to other people in your league. Like I like making you know, if I'm like, hey, the league's not dipping into defense early enough, I'm gonna take this top guy here and I'm gonna see if that starts a run and then I'm gonna get you know, this guy on offense later than I should or or whatever it is. But yeah, and anything that you can do to make the draft more interesting, I'm in favor.

00:21:15
Speaker 2: Of yeah, I love.

00:21:16
Speaker 1: I'm more of a fan of like weird roster construction in terms of starting lineup requirements, like we do the Going Deep League, every that Mike Clay put together, and you know, you get the super flex three running backs, six wide receivers, two tight ends.

00:21:29
Speaker 2: It's tight end premium. It's pretty wild like set up in general.

00:21:33
Speaker 1: But it at least like like, I'm not as big of a fan of like massive scoring variations, like like I'd rather just kind of know what we're working with in terms of like how players accumulate points. But I'm more interested in that supply and demand, you know, change and shift, because to me, that's what like the Going Deep League, Like the drafts are always completely unpredictable. I never really know what people are really thinking unless you know Sean Siegels in the draft, which he generally is and you know he's going wide receiver generally. But yeah, you know, it's it's fun to to experience those different iterations and stuff.

00:22:05
Speaker 3: So I agree with that. The other thing about the scoring variations thing is that the more of those there are, the more luck you're building in to the weekly scoring during the season. And that's the part that I like to try to minimize Obviously, we know that there's lots of luck involved anyway, and that's kind of the point, is why introduce more of it by having these crazy scoring things that you know only allows so much prediction.

00:22:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, sometimes you commission leagues too, where you have a spot in the playoffs for most points, not in because of the schedule luck, and you still don't make the playoffs despite having the second most points in that league. Anyway, I'm I'm I'm definitely over it. I promise them over it.

00:22:40
Speaker 3: All.

00:22:40
Speaker 1: Right, let's talk about what's gone on in this twenty twenty four season. To me, it just seems like it's been kind of a weird season. I don't know if like it's been like totally unpredictable or you know, it's not like my teams are like overly strikes. A pretty normal season for me overall, just seems like it's been a little bit weird because unting backs are staying really healthy, they've dominated too a lot of them, you know, a handful of them. Wide receivers haven't been as reliable some of the early earlier round tight ends, all of the tight ends started off really slow. Some of them have finally you know, emerged, but you know a lot of them, you know, whether it's Kyle Pitts or like a Dalton Kincaid, have generally just been bus My question to you is, you know, we know that year over year we generally see an over correction and overreaction to what happened the previous season. What do you think we're gonna be able to take advantage of in next year's drafts?

00:23:33
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, recency bias is always the thing, and it's one of It's one of the things I enjoy about the early drafting now as you start getting early reads on who people are going to be taken too early, and you know, it's certainly different what we can take advantage of best ball wise versus home leagues. Eventually in August, where lots of things change. I think these running backs are probably going to get pushed up more. And you know, you're talking about it being a weird season. The health thing is certainly on the weird side. I wonder if we should have realized that a bit more of the RB centric approach was coming by the league suddenly paying running backs. You know, it's not a lot of them, but the star Ones, Saquon Barkley getting his money, Derek Henry getting his money. I wonder if we should have expected a bit more of that lean on those guys, especially when paired with the number of young wide receivers getting traded. Those are the kinds of things that I'm kind of watching for and figuring out if I need to learn something from it for next year or if it's just a quirky thing about this year. I think as far as the draft stuff goes, probably stud running backs are going to get pushed up the board and people are not going to realize how much luck is involved in staying healthy through a season like Saquon Barkley's having. You know, just look at Christian McCaffrey season last year, and I was wary of him heading into the year because of how difficult it is to get that much work and stay healthy. But you know, when it happens, obviously you end up with a monster Fantasy campaign.

00:24:58
Speaker 2: Do you think that?

00:24:59
Speaker 3: So?

00:24:59
Speaker 1: I had this ushi in with with some other folks on the show in the past, but I'm curious on your take of this. So obviously, the these these running backs like a Derek Henry or Saquon Barkley, And I know that like Henry's kind of coled off versus him just scoring a touchdown every single week and just doing his thing. But do you think that people were against drafting running backs this year strictly because of the age factor? Like do you think that that them beating the age cliff, if you will, has played into sort.

00:25:28
Speaker 2: Of what's been going on this year?

00:25:29
Speaker 1: Or do you think that there's a lot of like there's a multitude of factors at play as to why you know Saquon You know, I've seen tweets this week, for instance, being like I can't believe fantasy analysts had us drafting Breeze Hall over Saquon Barkley this year or what have you. And it's like, Okay, very easy to say that in hindsight, you know, of course, but like, why do you think a guy like Barkley or a guy like Henry You know, maybe Kyen Williams to a degree, but even Kiren's.

00:25:54
Speaker 2: Coled off at least a little bit.

00:25:56
Speaker 1: But why do you think like Barkley, we can just focus on him, Like do you think that people were nervous about the health and the age stuff? And maybe his inefficiency or do you think that there were other factors like the situation itself for sake one as to why he wasn't a clear first round pick and more of a second rounder.

00:26:13
Speaker 3: I mean, specifically for him, I think it was primarily people moving away from running backs anyway. You know, Barkley didn't score like Breese Hall did last year, so that's easy. Everybody's gonna draft Breesse Hall ahead of Saquon Barkley because there there wasn't a reason to. And really, going forward, we're gonna keep drafting the twenty three year old dual threat running back over the twenty eight to twenty nine year old dual threat running back. That's always gonna be the case. Granted, there will be some individual spots where we might switch it up, but that's just gonna be the way it is. It hasn't worked out with Breese Hall this year, but that doesn't mean it won't next year. And if next year you're like, yeah, I listen to you, guys, last year it took Breese Hall. I'm not gonna make that mistake again. Yeah you are, just make it in the other direction. Now, I'm gonna get Breese Hall and you're gonna be mad at me again, That's right. So I think that's specific to Saquon Barkley and also just the worry that he wouldn't get enough touchdowns with Jalen Hurts there. I think that's one of the things that we do. We all do, but you know, especially us fantasy folks do too much in digging into the numbers is being like, well, this is how many touchdowns we can't expect, and this is how many Jalen Hurts scores. So either Jalen Hurts is going to get a disappointing number of touchdowns or Saquon Barkley's going to get a disappointing number of touchdowns and we don't do collectively enough of Wait a second, these guys are both awesome. Yea. Their offensive line is awesome. This team has been very effective at scoring rushing touchdowns. What if there is enough to support both of these guys, Maybe not to the optimal level of either one without the other one, but maybe there's enough to make both of these guys really good if they stay healthy. Yeah.

00:27:49
Speaker 1: I mean, look, my biggest mistake with Saqua I wasn't like, like from a positional ranking stadpoint, I had them where most people had them.

00:27:56
Speaker 2: It wasn't anything wrong with that. It's more so, you know, I had him.

00:28:00
Speaker 1: I had some wide receivers over him that I you know, like a Garrett Wilson or whatever. Then obviously, in hindsight, we wouldn't want to do.

00:28:04
Speaker 2: That, but I do.

00:28:06
Speaker 1: The thing that I got mad at myself about from an analysis standpoint is quite literally right before the season. It was in August, I did a mailbag episode and someone asked me about Saquon and I answered the question saying that I thought that people were kind of overstating in the touchdown thing because DeAndre Swift last year was top ten in the.

00:28:22
Speaker 2: League in goal line rushes.

00:28:23
Speaker 1: Like like DeAndre Swift with Philadelphia was getting work at the goal line. It's just that obviously the touchbush was there wasn't an enormous amount of work or as much as it could be if Jalen Hurts weren't involved.

00:28:36
Speaker 2: And then Philadelphia.

00:28:37
Speaker 1: To me, the big thing with Philly this year isn't even necessarily a touchdown scoring. It's just the fact that they've become so run dependent and run heavy, you know, like the defense plays lights out. Kellen Moore steps in, You're thinking to yourself, Okay, they're gonna be a relatively past friendly team just because of his history and his pace history and stuff.

00:28:54
Speaker 2: It just hasn't been that way, and that to me.

00:28:56
Speaker 1: You know, like DeVante Smith went healthy, you know, hopefully he can get things going now that Dallas Goddard is out, But like DeVante Smith when healthy, has not really been doing his thing, even though we know that he's talented and is like his target cheers are okay enough, but they're just not passing enough.

00:29:09
Speaker 2: And so the game scripts in the way the Eagles team.

00:29:13
Speaker 1: Itself kind of came together, it ended up being a perfect storm for Saquon Barkley. And I think it's okay for us to sit here and say that while also recognizing that we probably made some mistakes, Like you said, like draft good players on good teams. Sometimes it's that simple. But then also like, let's not overstate these narratives about what Jalen Hurts is going to be doing in terms of the overall touchdown pile, Like there's still probably enough work there for Saquon Barkley to begin with.

00:29:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think beyond the Barkley situation, you can. It's just another example of thinking about the what if. Like we're concerned about if there are gonna be enough touchdowns for these guys, but kind of ignoring that this team that never pays for running back, yeah, suddenly paid up for one of the best running backs in the league. It's like, what if they're telling us by doing that that they're gonna run a ton They think this guy is special and they're gonna create opportunities for him. Now he has still needed to stay healthy. We couldn't have reasonably predicted him to lead the league and carries to this point, I guess with the quarterback and them both getting all those touchdowns. But you know, it's just considering that what if and like really considering the full range of outcomes, and then also kind of reacting to the way that people are reacting in the draft. I think we do a lot of falling into ADP now because we talk about how how much smarter drafters are and how smart ADP is at this point. Yeah, there's still things that you should adjust to. Like if if Saquon Barkley was going sixth overall in drafts, I'd be like, yeah, I'm not really drafting Saquon Barkley. But if he's going in round two, I'm like, I'm going out ahead and take him there, and if he stays healthy, he's gonna at least be fine.

00:30:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the thing.

00:30:51
Speaker 1: It's like what you're saying is, you know, you know, if he's a one two turn pick right like, which is generally you know, home leagues probably want a little bit higher. Obviously in some best ball leagues. I mean I remember one point during the off season in Best Ball, he was like a two three turn pick. Like, it was crazy how much people were fading him. That's what I was really buying him. And then you know, he rose a little bit as like more of the home leaguers and more casual players stepped in and they ended up being right with the way that they were valuing Saquon. But like, if saque were like the like based on everything that we're saying, and we knew that this was a possibility, or at least we were more open to it and we were just better at recognizing it, he probably still would have been like the one O nine right like, he would have never been like we were.

00:31:34
Speaker 2: We were never gonna rank him above Breeze Hall, you know, like or Bijon or something like. It just didn't make sure.

00:31:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, Like I think I think process wise, like, I'm not really upset about that. I think though, that we can recognize that there's still that gap where you know, five or six or seven spots where he should have probably been a little bit higher than where he was drafted. But then you you have to also just recognize that this has been a really really good run out for him, Like this has been probably like ninety fifth to ninety nine percent tile type outcome for Saquon Barkley this year, which is fine, that's gonna happen for some of these players, and you know, recognize where you were wrong, recognize where you can improve your process, and hope for better results next year.

00:32:11
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, we both know we're gonna miss plenty of things every year. So it's about the main thing is figuring out what you missed that you shouldn't have, Yeah, and then what you missed that's like, that's okay, I can deal with missing that.

00:32:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly exactly. Let's talk about quarterbacks.

00:32:25
Speaker 1: So you know, we we've kind of gone through this journey of back in twenty fifteen twenty sixteen, late round quarterback was like the most obvious strategy on the face of the earth, and then you know, you get into Lamar Jackson in his MVP season, and after that people start to recognize that mobility matters a little bit more and we start to see a little bit more consistency from the top quarterbacks. But this year, you know, we've seen Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Jalen Hurst do their thing, but there's been some you know, relative bus Anthony Richardson c J. Stroud both drafted relatively early. Do you think that people are going to latch onto that and go with more of a late round quarterback strategy again next year?

00:33:04
Speaker 3: I don't because Lamar Jackson still up there. His score currently would have led all of last year's quarterbacks. So I think it's just gonna be him as the first quarterback. It's gonna be Jalen Hurts up there somewhere close. It's gonna be Josh Allen somewhere close to them. It's probably gonna be Jaden Daniels going earlier than we want him to, just like Anthony Richardson was early in drafts last year. If you're I don't know. I don't know if you're like me, but I went into draft season like, oh, it's gonna be fun to take some Anthony Richardson, and then I saw people where people were taking him. I was like, I guess I'm not taking any Anthony Richardson. I think it's gonna be more like that because you know, there are also plenty of bus at the other positions, so people are gonna get to this point where they're like, I could take that wide receiver I don't trust, or I could take Lamar Jackson. I'm gonna take Lamar Jackson, and then I'm gonna do my stacking thing. So I think it's gonna continue with the elites going early. I'll be curious to see if behind that we start to see bigger gaps, because that was maybe more I don't know if detrimental, but that's probably more effective in what happened previously is pushing the other quarterbacks up higher. Like I don't have a problem with the elite ones going early, even if they don't quite score to the level you're expecting. Like even this this year, I thought Patrick Mahomes was going too early. So he's the one among those elites that I'm not taking, but I was fine taking Jalen Hurts. I was fine taking Josh Allen in that range. They haven't let us down. Loved Jayden Daniels because of the upside that he's showing here. So I think we're gonna get a new crop in but I think ultimately people will draft pretty similarly.

00:34:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, I kind of agree.

00:34:35
Speaker 1: My thing is that, like, and I tried to push this a lot over the offseason, when we get pocket passing quarterbacks in those middle rounds and like early to mid rounds, like fringe top six guys, you know, into that like six to nine range, those guys generally don't have very strong hit rates, right, Like CJ. Stroud was one of the most obvious of those of that kind of like archetype of a guy who doesn't have the mobility.

00:34:58
Speaker 2: You really really need an elite passing season from that player.

00:35:02
Speaker 1: And then if you look at like that range this year, right, like Kyler was in that range, but he's obviously mobile, so he's not one of the pocket passer guys.

00:35:09
Speaker 2: But you had CJ.

00:35:10
Speaker 1: Stroud, you had Jordan Love, Dak Prescott was kind of in there, and Joe Burrow was in there, right, and the one guy that's emerged out of that group is Burrow. But you look at what he's doing through the air, and he's playing out of his mind with a ton of passing volume, right, Like you he needed these things to really come together for him to be this consistent fantasy ass and he's still not, you.

00:35:29
Speaker 2: Know, to the degree of like a Lamar or some of the mobile guys.

00:35:32
Speaker 1: And then you know, like, like that's the thing that I think folks should probably walk away with from this season is it's even clearer than it's ever been of that in that like you're gonna have stretches where some of these pocket passers have good games, Like it's inevitable because they're good quarterbacks. That's why they're being drafted where they're being drafted. But if a touchdown just goes on the ground versus through the air, like one or two of those in a given game, that guy's kind of sunk for that week. And they're they're a lot more replaceable with the Sam Arnold types, So you're just gonna throw darts at late in your draft. Then you know, someone like a Jalen Hurts or a Josh Allen or Lamar Jackson. So to your point, like, I think that there's a very real chance that we see, like you know, those three quarterbacks especially go in the first three four rounds as we typically see, and then there not be a quarterback for like three rounds. Maybe Jade and Daniels would be thrown in there too, but there won't be a quarterback from an ADP perspective, like for three or four rounds after that.

00:36:26
Speaker 2: Do you think that's possible.

00:36:27
Speaker 3: I think it's possible. But that's what I'm wondering is if people will allow that or if they'll be pushing up the next force it.

00:36:34
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, And for me, the.

00:36:36
Speaker 3: The what to take advantage of is always a bit more specific like that, Like you brought up c J. Stroud, he and his receivers at their prices were the easiest fades on the board for me. Unfortunately, that included Nico Collins, which did not pay off for me, you know outside of when he was injured. But if I miss on Nico Collins but also hit on CJ. Stroud, Tank Dell and Stefon Diggs, you know, not paying off in all Tlimately, I think I'm winning that and that to me is what I take away more, what I react to more each season, as opposed to the overall positional trends.

00:37:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I like that a lot.

00:37:11
Speaker 1: Let's move on to some player takes so Christ McCaffrey, he's on IR. Everyone had twenty four hours of loving themselves for holding on to Jordan Mason and then he went on IR. So now we get Isaac Grendo stepping in someone who didn't have like the best you know, I prospect mostly through data. I've obviously watched the guys too, but didn't have the best production profile in college, but definitely has a size speed combination. Are you expecting him to step in and just be a workhorse for them or do you think there's a possibility that we see some sort of a split backfield there.

00:37:45
Speaker 3: I'm not expecting him to be a work course, I'm open to the possibility that he is a workhorse. I think that San Francisco would probably prefer that he isn't, but they might not have that many other options. We know Patrick Taylor is a limited player, and I think the thing that I'm most interested in seeing in relation to this is whether and how many carries Deebo Samuel gets yeah, because that I think is going to tell us what Kyle Shanahan thinks of Deebo Samuel right now. If he gets you know, any fewer than four carries in this weekend's game, that says that Kyle Shanahan is worried about Deebo Samuel to me, because when your first two running backs go down and you're left with Isaac Garendo and other dudes, that should be Deebo Samuel running time. He ran eight times. I think it was week one this season to open the air, when they didn't have Christian McCaffrey and we're going with Jordan Mason's the starter. Initially like that's what they do. They're like, all right, we're gonna give Deebo the ball more to make this thing work. So if they don't do that, then I think it's time to worry. I think though, the reason that we should just you know, go feverish after Girenda this week on waivers which has already passed, but you know, we should probably play him higher than we would just about any other guy. You know, a rookie stepping in as a first time starter is just this record of Kyle Shanahan's and I was looking at it just to remind myself how deep it goes. You know, we all know the recent production. We can all probably remember Elijah Mitchell in twenty twenty one. We know that he brought Jeff Wilson Junior where he moster, you know, to the surface in the NFL. But it goes back beyond that. I think probably my favorite example and looking back in it is the one year that Kyle Shannan was the OC in Cleveland. He got sixteen total rushing touchdowns from Isaiah Crowell, Terrence West, and Ben Tate. So if you're running back for Kyle Shanahan, you're scoring.

00:39:27
Speaker 1: That's insane to to those names that haven't heard in so long exactly forgot Isaiah Crowell existed.

00:39:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm I'm I'm with you.

00:39:36
Speaker 1: The other thing with like you know, it's it's like it's like the meme, like the graph meme, like the parabola meme, right wherever, like you have someone who's kind of like an open a mouth breather just saying something, and then you put your glasses on, you really analyze the thing, and then you you come to the realization that the mouth breather is actually right at the end of the day. And I think that's what we're looking at with Isaac Grendo, where it's like fast and right and you know, like he could be a one cut runner and that works in this kind of offense, right like this, that's that's what we that's it, like, we we just need a guy who can run fast, they can get to the outside. I do think they're gonna run a lot more perimeter runs than they have, you know, throughout the season stuff, because he's a different kind of runner than Jordan Mason is. But we've seen this kind of like archetype of a running back to some degree. Usually they're you know, like an Eli Mitchell or like Raheem moster or smaller than a Grendo. But like when you have a an athletic specimen like him in a Shanahan offense, you should probably feel pretty optimistic that things are gonna at least like go semi his way. Like i I'm not you know, I'm not full of I'm not trying to fool anyone to say that like he was a really good prospect, because he really, to me, was not that great of a prospect on paper, he kind of comped to liken An Isaiah Pacheco ish, you know, just a bigger bodied you know, uh, kind of inefficient throughout college and didn't get that like crazy crazy production. Wasn't that much of a receiver, but he had the physical traits to be able to potentially translate. And we've seen him bust out some big runs already this year, Like we know that the big playability is there.

00:41:12
Speaker 2: But I really like your note about Debo.

00:41:14
Speaker 1: And I think we're gonna learn a lot about Debo, like you said, and whether or not he's dust at this point, because he has been rough this season, like one of the low key worst picks that you could have made in fantasy this year. Are you are you expecting the turnaround or are you kind of just in wait and see mode right now?

00:41:32
Speaker 3: I don't think that it's fair to expect the turnaround at this point. I'm in wait and see. And you know, I think you can still play him in wide receiver three range this week while we're waiting to see, because I do think one of the things that could happen is they could give him the ball a good bit on the ground, you know, I said, if he doesn't get it, then we should worry. But if he does get it, then it's like, oh, okay, Deebo's still alive. Things have just not been going his way. And that's kind of the other thing working in Grendo's favor is if everybody was healthy in the passing game, San Francisco could be like, yeah, the rookie's gonna start for us in the backfield, but we're probably gonna throw it a little bit more. We've got Brandon Ayuk, We've got Deebo doing his thing. We've got a fully healthy George Kittle. But you know, they've got brock Perty coming off his shoulder issue, no Ayuk Debo with who knows exactly what's up. So I think that only helps the available touches for Grendo. And yeah, it's I'm not giving up on Deebo, but it's definitely like worry time.

00:42:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.

00:42:23
Speaker 1: And you know, Ricky Piersol just getting cardio every week at this point instead of, you know, actually getting production for us. Let's talk about the Arizona Cardinals. Kyler Murray has had a roller coaster of a season. Should we be opt I talked about him a little bit on the fifteen Transaction Show this week, But I'm curious to hear your thoughts. Should we be more optimistic or pessimistic about Kyler rest of season?

00:42:45
Speaker 3: I think realistic is the way to be on there. I mean, so to me, being optimistic is like, yeah, Kyler's gonna be fine through the playoffs for me, maybe that works out to me. Pessimistic is saying Kyler sucked lately. I'm not gonna use him. I'm gonna take Will Levis for the playoffs. That's probably not going to work out for you. So I think to be realistic with it is to keep Kyler Murray on your roster, to think he might be my quarterback throughout the playoffs and he might help me win my league. But this team is also not scared to go run heavy in a given game. They have been pass heavier in recent weeks, top half of the league in pass right over expected over the past four weeks, so I'm not super worried that the pass volume is going to disappear. But they're not afraid to go run heavy in an individual game if they're feeling it, if they're controlling it. Certainly not afraid to give it to James Connor near the goal line. So I'm realistic. I have I did a Fantasy football playoff strategy article. I have Kyler's schedule in there, which can be very helpful. I list him as somebody who could help you. But it's, you know, with the caveat that I'm not sure exactly what we're getting from because the numbers have been all over the place. Some of the big weeks have relied heavily on not only rushing touchdowns, but long rushing touchdowns. So I'm not comfy just thinking that he's my QB one no matter what the rest of the way.

00:44:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had him as more like, you know, a hold, like like, don't necessarily give up on him or anything like that just because the schedule, like you know, did like they get Seattle, New England, Carolina, La, the Rams, right, So that's overall, on paper, not really that bad of a schedule. But to your point, I think there is still that fear, especially when they get New England and when they face Carolina.

00:44:25
Speaker 2: You know, if some of those touchdowns end up just coming to on.

00:44:29
Speaker 1: The ground or going to James Connor, you know, instead of Kyler through the air. That can that can easily make or break even if they score four or five touchdowns in one of those games, if four of them are on the ground, then he might not have the passing volume to be able to be relevant enough.

00:44:42
Speaker 2: You want some of that more back and forth. But I think, you know, probably still like a low end one, you know, entering the playoffs because of just what the quarterback landscape kind of looks like right now overall.

00:44:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean he's still in QB one range four US this week, even against the matchuphe his team struggled last time.

00:44:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, he to me, I think I had him at like QB seven or eight or something this week, like because it's just the way that things kind of shape up right now. And look, let's talk about Brice Hall.

00:45:08
Speaker 1: So the Jets have, at least with my numbers, I don't know if you're if your numbers show the same thing, but they have I think the best playoff schedule for running backs, you know, in weeks fifteen, sixteen, seventeen. I use median to look at that, so you know, averages might skew it a little bit differently, but they have a great schedule. But he's banged up he's got this knee issue. I don't think you know we're recording this on Thursday. I always have to throw that caveat out there, out there, So we have not watched the Thursday night game. We don't know who's playing at this weekend, but I think he missed practice again today. He's got this knee issue. Are you worried about haul from.

00:45:43
Speaker 2: That perspective and from a deployment.

00:45:46
Speaker 3: Perspective too, Well, First off, JJ, I do fantasy advice for a living, so I am worried about every single player every week very But what I'm specifically worried about here is the knee, and I think that we all didn't pay enough attention to it last week. Because when a player goes no practice Wednesday, limited, Thursday, full Friday, We're like, all right, he's good to go, even if he's got a questionable tag, and especially if he's then active off that questionable tag, We're like, all right, Well, Breese Hall, I'm definitely playing him. Tied to season low with twelve touches. We got almost as many combined pass routes from Braylon Allen and Isaiah Davis as we got from Breese Hall. That's a huge red flag to me. Isaiah Davis played six total snaps before this past weekend, played twelve in that game, caught three passes. That to me tells me that Breese Hall's knee is not right, which is especially worrisome coming off of bye. So we're gonna have to watch him this week. If he did in fact miss Thursday's practice, I think that's a signal that things certainly didn't get any better than last week. He's already outside of RB one range for us for week fourteen, and by the way, we have the same thing best running back schedule from this week through the end of the fantasy season. He's already outside the top twelve though, despite having these six teams on by and taking a lot of running with him, and he might drop even further if you know, the prognosis isn't much better at the end of the week.

00:47:06
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:47:06
Speaker 1: The one frustrating thing too, is that if you've been handcuffing Breshall with Braylan Allen, look, I still think he's the handcuff for sure, Like he's played really well this year, But they used Isaiah Davis so much last week, especially as a as a receiver right, and his routes run number really wasn't that bad.

00:47:23
Speaker 2: And you have to wonder if maybe they would deploy, you.

00:47:27
Speaker 1: Know, a non Breezehall backfield with Braylan Allen being more of like an early down bruiser, and maybe they used Davis more. I like Davis a lot. I like both Brailon Allen and Isaiah Davis a lot of prospects. And it sucked when they both got drafted the same team because on a team with Breece Hall none.

00:47:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's double sucked because it sucks that they were drafted by the Jets. I was like, oh, I guess I can forget about those guys for at least the next three years. Yeah, and then they got drafted the same team, Like good god.

00:47:54
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:47:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was a big Isaia Davis fan. But I like Braylen Allen a lot too, and my model loved him because of his age justine production. But yeah, I mean, like I do have now a little bit of concern at least I want to voice the concern right that if Breese Hall is out, maybe Braylan Allen doesn't have the same like one hundred percent of the backfield share kind of juice that we once thought that he might have, you know, because there's there's other like like, if if Kyrien Williams were to go down knock on Wood, I think we'd feel pretty good about Blake Orum just taking on a Kien Williams like role more than likely, maybe not to the same degree, but pretty close. Whereas Yeah, Whereas now it's like, okay, if they're gonna use Isaiah Davis in this way, if they like Isaiah Davis, then maybe it's not gonna be as butterflies and rainbows as we thought with Braylan Allen.

00:48:40
Speaker 3: I know we spent all year thinking, oh, at least Braylen Allen is the direct handcuff. I'm gonna grab him now and we'll see what happens. If anything, he's taking too much work from Breese Hall, so we'll see. It's one game. Maybe this week will be different than Isaiah Davis won't play, But yeah, I don't know. That's that's the tough part of this job is when people are asking us for our advice on something like this and it's like, honestly, I don't know. I could fake and give you an answer and make it sound definite, but i'd be lying to you. I don't Maybe that was one game. Maybe they really like Isaiah Davison, it took him this long to get it. Maybe the Jets have no clue what they're doing and every week is a crapshoot, so you know we'll kind of have to see.

00:49:16
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:49:16
Speaker 1: I mean, look, running back I say this all the time, but running back at the end of the day is a coaching decision, right at least with wide receiver, we can really lean in on our talent evaluation and say, Okay, this guy has to get open.

00:49:26
Speaker 2: We know he's going to be deployed in the.

00:49:27
Speaker 1: Although there's sometimes you get a team like the Buccaneers who deploys Jayleen McMillan on the perimeter when he's a clear slot player and he's never going to be able to do the things that we want him to do given the role that they're giving him.

00:49:37
Speaker 2: Right, that happens, But.

00:49:39
Speaker 1: Generally speaking, teams are going to deploy their wide receivers in the way they deploy them, and we know that talent can win out because if they're open, et cetera, et cetera. With running backs, if they're not on the field, they're not on the field.

00:49:48
Speaker 2: Right.

00:49:49
Speaker 1: That's been the hardest thing for me this week, in particular with Sincere McCormick, right where like every data point in my opinion point and look, as the week has gone on, I've gradually become more more okay with like him as a potential thing, you know, I guess, but like every data point, like he only had a nine percent route share this past week. He hasn't been getting run throughout the season. It's not like he like like, I don't necessarily see this, And I've seen the connection of Zamir White from last year, right where Josh Jacobs gets hurt, Zamir White steps in and then he has not necessarily like a full blown league winner stretch, but he was a very very you know, he's a profitable, profitable back in the month of December. I'm having a hard time making that connection just because Sincere McCormick was not the not even the same type of prospect as Zamir White was, and you know, his route share wasn't there this past week. But it's one of those things, man, where you got to at least take a step back and be like, if Antonio Pearson Company want to use Sincere McCormick a lot more, then they might just do that, right, Like that still has to be part of our range of outcomes in the way that we're looking at this stuff. And that's kind of how I feel about like the Jets backfield, Like if they're just like, hey, we want to use Isaiah Davis more, Okay, Well, then I guess that's the decision that they're making at the end of the day. Also, am I wrong about Sincere McCormick, Like, but where are you at with Sincere McCormick.

00:51:09
Speaker 3: If it takes this deep into a season that opened with Zamir White and Alexander Madison leading your backfield to any for anybody to hear about you, then odds are against you making an impact on the rest of our fantasy season. Like people are asking if they should start him this week. His highlight is twelve carries for sixty four yards for the Raiders. I mean cool, but I'm not out.

00:51:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like I'm trying to just play probability at the end of the day, which is what you're doing.

00:51:37
Speaker 2: Like we wreckon.

00:51:38
Speaker 1: We fully recognize that anything can happen. Like I said, coaches can decide oh you know what Sincere McCormick is going to be our bellcow now right.

00:51:47
Speaker 2: But like to me, evidence just doesn't point that way.

00:51:50
Speaker 1: Where you had both Zamir White and Alexander Madison's sideline, which Madison I think he was close last week even to stepping in and playing. But you know, even if they're out, like I still think a Mira Abdulla is gonna play a pass catching role and we still need that, you know, like we still need that part of a player's game more so than even some of the early downwork that these guys are seeing.

00:52:13
Speaker 3: And of course you always have to leave open the possibility that you are wrong. And you know, yeah, maybe Sincere McCormick does get treated as the workhorse this week, But if I don't allow for that possibility and how I use him, what am I really going to miss out on twenty carries for like seventy yards ye maybe finds the end zone. Like sure, he could have a useful week, but I don't think that I'm missing anything special. Whereas if I said all the same things about Isaac Grendo as a brand new rookie starter, I think that I could miss out on something huge.

00:52:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, totally. What about Kenneth Walker. He's been struggling a lot. The Seahawks offensive line has struggled a lot. Do you think it's just an offensive line problem going.

00:52:54
Speaker 2: On with him right now?

00:52:55
Speaker 3: I think it's primarily an offensive line issue. I'm worried about that offense in general, and that the offense makes me worry about Kenneth Walker more than anything Kenneth Walker's doing. Over the first seven weeks, that team averaged three hundred and sixty eight point three yards twenty five point seven points, passed five games two hundred and ninety eight yards eighteen point four points, and the yardage gets a big boost from the Rams game. They scored defensive touchdowns the past two weeks, so it's been even worse than the numbers look like. So I'm worried about that offense. I'm Walker's role has stayed good until this past week, and we were just talking about it with the Jets. Where I want to see if last week was just the Seahawks playing catch up and Zach Charbona got some extra work there, and then if you look at that last scoring drive where sharbon A wound up scoring the go ahead touchdown from eight yards out. It was mostly him on that drive. Kenneth Walker came in for two negative runs, which probably helped sharbon A be the lead running back at the end of that drive. But what I'm a little bit concerned about and waiting to see is if the way that game ended makes the coaches say, all right, let's give Sharps a bit more this week, get him more involved. So I think that adds some risk at the very least to Walker.

00:54:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, I also think now that you're like, now that we're talking about this, I also think with a player like Walker who like he's great, like a very good running back, people are going to be sick of me saying this because I've talked about it a lot on the show over the last couple of years. He's a he's a home run hitting back, like like, he's not the most consistent runner in the world in terms of gaining positive yardage and doing that that that thing. But that also brings a ton more variance when the offensive line is playing poorly, Whereas if you get a guy like Sharbonay who's more of that bruiser I've always comped him to more of like a James Connor type like, if you get that kind of player to kind of just grind out these yards, it it might that might just be more favorable in this individual circumstance, with this the way the line's playing, the way the offense is playing, the coaching staff might give that a little bit more favor than they otherwise would. Not to say that Sharbonne is a better player than Walker. Walker's clearly more dynamic. I'm just saying, you know, if you can't get Walker into space as easily, then that could be the part of the issue here.

00:55:03
Speaker 3: And for what it's worth too, Walker is still leading Charbonay in most categories, mostly efficiency categories. I know that rush yards overexpected leans Charbonay's way, but just about everything else, you know, yards per carry not big leads, but slight leads still in Walker's favor. So it's not like you know, a couple of years ago with Jalen Warren behind Naje Harris, where there's this dynamic number two and ap plotting number one.

00:55:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, if anything, there's a plotting too in a dynamic number one when it comes to Seattle. All right, two more questions for you.

00:55:31
Speaker 1: The first one, are there any lower rostered players that you're stashing right now for the playoffs.

00:55:37
Speaker 3: What I'm focusing on is handcuff running backs. And we've talked about some handcuff situations, but I think people this time of year are not focused enough on stashing the guys who will get the Grendo bump. And you know that's not one that we really could have foreseen because it took two injuries to push him in there. But Blake Korum this morning, Thursday morning, twenty two percent rostered on sleeper. That's way too low this time of year. If Karen Williams goes down, it's probably gonna be Blake Korman at least close to the same role as Kyen Williams. Trey Benson twenty eight percent, Ray Davis twenty four percent, Justice Hill thirty percent, Kenneth Gainwell nine percent. Yeah, Sean Tucker even four percent for deeper leagues who were like, yeah, all those guys are roster in my league. Sean Tucker's got, you know, double handcuff situation. We've seen him produce this year. And Bucky Irving is on the injury report this week with a couple issues. So to me, that's the kind of guy that you're stashing, and then that way, when somebody goes down this Sunday and your whole league is rushing to the waiver wire to see how much they have to bid to get him, you're like, sorry, turkeys, I picked them up Saturday.

00:56:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, exactly. Well the thing too with Tucker, because I had Tucker on my fifteen transaction. I called him out on fifteen transactions this week too, because I think that a lot of times when you get a third string running back, people ignore that player because he's in.

00:56:52
Speaker 2: The number three.

00:56:53
Speaker 1: But when it's a split backfield to some degree, I mean, obviously Bucky Irving had a crazy backfield share last week, but when there's a split backfield, you know there's two outs for that player to at least like if one of those two gets hurt, Sean Tucker at least becomes like a flex play, like he's still someone that you might be able to throw in your lineup. A little bit different with Grendo, as you noted, because CMC was a bell cow and then there was someone behind him who we've seen as a, you know, more of a workhorse type earlier this season. So there were a couple of things that needed to happen for Grendo. But I just want people to like think outside the box a little bit more with some of these injuries and how like guys could become relevant, because when there's multiple outs for these players like we have with Sean Tucker, that's a big deal at the end of the day.

00:57:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, the takeaway is not go pick up number three running backs because of Isaac Grendo. It's look for spots where guys could have immediate opportunity and are available for free and go get them.

00:57:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, And then the last one I want to ask you is there is there a lower key player out there that you think might be able to surprise us in the fantasy playoffs.

00:57:51
Speaker 3: I'm not chasing too much outside of those handcuff running backs. I think I know I've gotten myself into trouble before by sam these matchups and these recent trends and this guy I think might outscore this guy that's been a little bit disappointing, he's been okay. So I've found more trouble than help in doing that. I think there's a chance for like Dalton Schultz or Chigakonquo for tight end needy teams there's a chance that Nick Westbrook Akine just continues being Marquez Valdez Scantling the rest of the way. They've got a positive schedule shallow wide receiver corps. So I'm not saying count on him. He's not even inside our top forty this week with six teams on buy, but he's like in a situation that could pop him into the top twenty five at any given time.

00:58:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's one of those things too, And I'm like, I'm guilty of it because I literally just asked you this question. But like I people are always like, now, who should I be stashing for to win a champions Like I would have told you if I you know, like like if I'm not withholding information whenever I'm doing this stuff, like if there's someone that you should be rostering, I will let you know to roster that guy.

00:58:55
Speaker 2: So yeah, I feel you.

00:58:56
Speaker 1: I think that at the end of the day, like for us to project, like I don't think we're gonna have like an Aman Ross Saint Brown. You know, it probably would have already happened at this point, Amen Rossain Brown. Rookie season kind of finished for for any of these players, at least from a predictability.

00:59:09
Speaker 3: Stamp unless it's Sincere McCormick.

00:59:11
Speaker 2: Unless it's Sincere McCormick. Of course, yes, we might, we might see the To me, it's.

00:59:15
Speaker 1: Gonna be like something wild, like like we're just gonna see a crazy run out, in my opinion, a crazy runout that was a little bit hard to predict, right, like maybe like.

00:59:23
Speaker 2: Elijah Moore goes nuts down the stretch or something.

00:59:26
Speaker 1: They have a tougher schedule, but like, you know, just someone random like that that's on a depth chart, like you mentioned Nick Westbrook a Kine, just someone where you know, he's obviously been playing well recently because of the touchdown luck and the touchdown fortune. But I don't know if there's gonna be like a predictable you gotta stash this in this particular guy. I think we'd just be a little bit more reactive to what happens.

00:59:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think in most cases, guys that are freely available right now are freely available for a reason. Yeah, opportunities either not right there or they're not that good. I think we might be in the midst of Jacoby Meyers determining a lot more fantasy leagues than we ever would have guessed heading into the season that is that is.

01:00:00
Speaker 1: The player on my mailbag episode that I said is my like, like, if I were to pick, I picked two guys who might underperform in the playoffs. I picked DeAndre Swift and Naji Harris because they just have tough, like pretty brutal schedules, and then Jacoby Myers was my guy to overperform. And then every week I do my rest of the season rankings, Matt, and I'm like ten to fifteen wide receiver spots ahead with Jacoby Myers because no one seems to realize that the dude has like a thirty percent target chair. Without Devonte Adams, their schedule is cake down the stretch. So I really like, maybe we can just hop on the Jacoby Myers train and just say that that's that's the answer.

01:00:35
Speaker 3: Absolutely. I mean, I enjoy him every year, but he even I wouldn't have been like, yeah, but watch if Devanta Adams gets traded, he might be a wide receiver five even better than Elijah Moore.

01:00:45
Speaker 2: Never this is I don't know.

01:00:48
Speaker 1: Let me let me ask you this though before we before we head out here, because it kind of goes back to the saquon discussion and some of the running back stuff that we talked about earlier. Like Jacoby Myers, I think we would both agree is a good player, right, Like he's never he's never been a better player. But I wasn't heavily exposed to him this year. I haven't been some leagues, but like, I wasn't heavily exposed to him this year for situation purposes. And look, I don't think he'd be doing this if Davante Adams were still there, you know. So do you think that like we should have leaned into Jacoby Meers more or is it still rational for us to have said, you know, the situation is not that great. Davante Adams is there. That's in brock Howers obviously there. That's why I'm gonna not be as heavy on them.

01:01:28
Speaker 3: I think that we, you know, should have leaned more into him at cost. He was like a wide receiver five to six. And that's always the takeaway from these guys, because every year there are some guys, some wide receivers in that range where by this time of year they're in the twenties and you're like, man, how did I miss it? It's because you thought they were a pretty good player. You just didn't think about this upside thing happening, that it was possible. Maybe it didn't even cross your mind even decide whether it was or wasn't possible. It just didn't cross your mind. So that's what I try to do more with myself. It's like, it's the hardest thing to do.

01:02:01
Speaker 1: It's so hard because you also get so enamored with like rookies and like these and that's the problem.

01:02:07
Speaker 2: But I think, I think this is the big turn.

01:02:09
Speaker 1: And look, I preach talent all day long and like how talent creates opportunities and all that, but it's still so hard to actually like embrace that when you're drafting because it's such a boring pick at.

01:02:20
Speaker 2: The end of the day.

01:02:21
Speaker 3: And plus you could lean into Jacoby Myers and Jonathan Brooks at the same time. Then where would you be right now?

01:02:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, exactly exactly, Matt.

01:02:30
Speaker 1: This was great, Always good catching up with you and talking fantasy football with you.

01:02:35
Speaker 2: Let ever know where they can find you at draft Sharks.

01:02:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, draft sharks dot com. You know, we've got all our stuff up there. We've got team Intel page that tells you how to set your lineup every week so you don't have to ask me, although we still get people saying, yeah, I checked Team Mental, I check the rankings, but who should I really start between these two running backs? Like glad you asked, because you have to know the secret knock to find out who I'm starting. But we've got that, you know, we've got all the tools. They are ready to help people manage their teams. I use them every week because I have too many teams for my own good. I miss a waiver run in at least one league every week, so it's helpful to have that kind of assistance. Yeah.

01:03:12
Speaker 1: I mean, you guys do awesome work, and again, it's always great talking to you. A lot of knowledge that you always drop, even even IDP knowledge on this episode.

01:03:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, you guys know a thing. Yeah, yeah, even realized that IDP existed.

01:03:26
Speaker 1: You guys can find all my stuff as usual over on Late Round dot com, follow me on Twitter on blue Sky all that at Late Round QB.

01:03:32
Speaker 2: Otherwise, everyone, thank you for tuning in