633: Pre-Draft Rookie Rankings

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Speaker 1: This is the Labor Podcast with your host JJ zacheras J J Zacher reson. What's up everyone, It's JJ Zachary said in this episode six hundred and thirty three of the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast sponsored by FanDuel, thanks for tuning in. I can't even explain how excited I am for this NFL draft. We need landing spots for these guys. We need to move on from the speculation. I think we're all ready for it. On today's show, I'll do what I do every year, and that's talked through the top end of my rookie rankings. It's a pretty straightforward show. Keep in mind that things will change once the draft is over. I'll eventually do an episode with my post draft rankings, but if you want to need them very close to after the draft is over, go purchase the Late Round Prospect Guide. It's fourteen ninety nine and I'll be sending out a revised version soon after the draft. I've been asked when that revised version will go out, and I can at least say that my goal is Monday or Tuesday after the draft. I'm gonna working all weekend to get that thing done. So you guys have everything that you need to crush your rookie drafts, So go check that out on Late Round dot com. You'll get way more information on this year's class in that guide than what you're gonna hear on today's show. Now, before we get into things, the twenty twenty two NFL Draft is set to take place on Thursday, April twenty eighth. As we know, and Fandle has a completely free to play contest that allows you to get in on the action, introducing fanduels Mock the Draft Free Play a fantasy contest. It gives you a chance to win a share of ten thousand dollars in cash. All I have to do is try to predict the top ten players chosen in the draft in correct order. Each correct selection will earn you two Fandel points, while each selection within one pick of the correct selection will receive half a Fandel point. Earn the most points, and you could walk away with a two thousand dollars first place prize. For more details, vi is it Fandel dot com or download the Fandle Fantasy app Eligibility Austricians apply. So I'm gonna split today's episode up by tier. The first tier is a player all by himself, and that's Breeze Hall. We'll see what kind of draft capital Hall gets, but he's been rising ever since the combine where he had monster measurables. My prospect model only cares about speed score or wait adjusted forty time, and it only cares about players hitting a threshold. Breeze Hall obviously hit that, but the threshold thing is likely because a lot of athleticism measurables are captured in draft capital, and draft capital is part of my models, so athleticism isn't that much of an input both at running back and at wide receiver. It's not at all at wide receiver, but it likely is shifting players up and down in draft capital. That's why we've seen a lot of speculation of Hall going higher and higher in the draft over the last couple of months. I still don't think that he goes in the first but according to NFL Mock Draft database, Hall has a projected draft slot of thirty six overall, and at thirty six overall, we're looking at a ninety seventh percentile prospect in my model. If you recall I mentioned earlier this offseason that my model didn't have any running back in this class in that nause Harris TRAVESYTN Javonte Williams tier, but it does now Breeze Hall is in that tier. He checks every box. He's got ideal size, he's young, he looks good in the three production metrics that my model looks at. There really isn't any glaring red flag analytically, and he's the only back in this class without an obvious concern. And for the record, the three comps from my prospect guide for Breese Hall Rashad Penny, Ezekiel Elliott, Dalvin Cook. Anything can happen, but he looks like he'll have a very high ceiling in fantasy football and he should be the first overall pick in all formats. Now, after haul, we get into a pretty large tier. At the start of draft season, for me, I was convinced that there was a tier of three really good wide receivers who are bound to go in Round one. But I've expanded that tier to five. Now there are five wide receivers who look like locks to get selected in the first round, and those five wide receivers make up my second tier. I wouldn't be surprised if any of these players ranked at the top after the draft. That's why they're all in the same tier. That's how I work tiers. But let's start with Garrett Wilson, who I technically have is my wide receiver one and the second overall pick in rookie drafts. Of all the wide receivers projected to go on Night one, I think Wilson is the safest bet to be solid in the NFL. He may not have the highest ceiling because he's not the prototypical X receiver that we see with high fantasy ceilings in the NFL. Wilson's one hundred and eighty three pounds and he's gonna go up against corners who are much bigger than him in the NFL. That's a concern, but he's incredibly solid across the board. Analytically, he has a good breakout age around twenty years old. He has a top seven best season receiving yards per team pass attemp rate in this class. That's the most important production metric that my model looks at, and he produced alongside two other first round wide receivers at Ohio State, technically three of them if you want to include Jamison Williams because Wilson got the nod over Williams when they were sophomore together at Ohio State. With projected draft capital in the top ten, Wilson is a ninety eighth percentile wide out in that model. Since twenty eleven, thirty five percent of wide receivers in that range and that ninety five to one hundred percentile range have given us at least one season of eighteen or more PPR points per game across their first three years in the league. For some context, that would have ranked as the wide receiver five last year. So Garrett Wilson is in a very good spot. When I published the Late Round Prospect Guide, though I had trey Lon Burks as my wide receiver two, he's not my wide receiver two anymore. That's where Drake London is. I think you could argue London as the wide receiver one in this class pretty easily, especially if you're chasing ceiling like Garrett Wilson. London played alongside some NFL caliber players, albeit they weren't as good as the competition that Wilson was likely playing against. I say likely because these guys haven't all been drafted yet. That's what we're projecting, but London played with Michael Pittman and Amenross Saint Brown. He even outproduced Saint Brown in some categories on a per game basis, despite being a year younger. I think it's easy to argue that London might have the best age adjusted production profile in this class, and the biggest red flag in that profile is probably the fact that he got a lot of production on contested catches and we don't know how that's going to translate. There's some fear there because we've seen players like this not translate in recent memory, like Nikhil Harry and jj Arthega Whiteside. Are they a white Side's about to play tight end? Now? That's why London's floor is scarier than someone like Errett Wilson, who's more of a technician. But if you want to chase ceiling, it's there for London. He's six foot four, two hundred and nineteen pounds with comparables in my model to T Higgins and Mike Evans, the elite upside is absolutely there. Now, I do have Trey Loon Burks at wide receiver three, but again he's in this giant tier of five wide receivers. Burks is one of two wide receivers in my model with the best season yards per team pass attempt of three point two in a touchdown share over fifty percent. Overall, the production profile looks fine, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit nervous about how the NFL might view Treylon Burks and how his game might translate to the league. He largely played as a slot receiver in college, so we didn't get that big of a sample size of him against press coverage. PFF actually charted him at just thirty nine snaps against press in twenty twenty one, among the five wide receivers in this tier. As it stands today, he actually has the lowest score in the model, at a ninety fourth percentile score. There's nothing wrong with that. That's a good score, but his dropping projected draft slot is worrisome, as is the fact that he didn't have the beastly combine that a lot of people projected. He could end up playing more of a Juju Smith Schuster role than an aj Brown role in the NFL as a result, and that would limit upside, And that's assuming that he hits. So I like Treylon Burks I recognize the upside, but there are some concerns. Next is Chris A Lava. I'm not digging a Lave a whole lot because of lack of early declared status, mostly because his numbers would have looked similar last year anyway, and because he was still productive this past year in an offense with again a couple of first round picks. Yes, he was more senior to them, but he still was able to produce. I think a Lave is another instance like Garrett Wilson, where he's a safer option than Burke's in London, but he may not flash the same kind of upside from a fantasy football perspective. He does have an issue with the ball in his hands, where he didn't break a whole lot of tackles in college. But he's a great route runner and he can win deep. I know Matt Harmon, who charts these guys for reception perception. He said that Chris Alave was the best route runner in this class. A Lave has almost a ninety seven percentile score in my model with top twenty draft capital. We'll see where he ends up, but if he somehow falls to the twenties and like Green Bay, gets him, or maybe a team like Kansas City trades up. It would not be a surprise if he's the consensus wide receiver one in this class post draft, and I think you can make a similar argument for Jamison Williams. That's why I have both of these guys in this tier. Now, Williams doesn't necessarily have the same type of analytical profile as the other guys in this tier because he didn't do much at all when he was at Ohio State, but he transferred to Alabama and he blew up a couple of mailbag episodes ago, I got a question about Jamis and Williams transfer status and whether or not we should be concerned about that. My answer was that no, we shouldn't be, because really he was losing work at Ohio State to Chris Olave who was older than him, and Garrett Wilson, who's a very good prospect. And it's not like Williams went to Toledo. He transferred to Alabama, and at Alabama he put together a great season. A lot of his numbers in my prospect model actually aligned pretty well to another Alabama wide receiver, Calvin Ridley. Some have Williams as their wide receiver one in this class, Alfredo Brown did. As a lot of you guys heard on the wide receiver episode from just a few weeks ago. I do think there's a chance that he is the top wide receiver selected in this draft because of his ability to separate and his ability to make plays down the field. He fits in today's NFL. He's sort of got like a Jalen Waddle vibe right now. So today, pre draft, he's in Tier two. Is my wide receiver five. Next week he could be my wide receiver one, depending on how the draft goes down. He's a very good wide receiver. Tier three starts with Kenneth Walker. I do think that Walker is a phenomenal runner, and he's got the fifth best best season total yards per team play rate in this class. That's one of the bigger production metrics within the model for running backs. But yeah, you guys know this by now. Walker's downfall is his receiving profile. His best season five point four percent reception share is absolutely a concern. Even if you believe that he can be a pass catcher at the next level, which of course that's in his range of outcomes, it's still a concern. We haven't seen a running back draft in between pick thirty two and one hundred since twenty eleven. Give us a true RB one season in points per game during his first three years in the league with a sub eight percent best season reception share, Kenneth Walker's at five point four per and there were seventeen of those running backs, and that rate jumps dramatically when looking at the alternative when looking at running backs who did catch passes. Now, that's something I've already talked about on this show. I talked about that a couple of Mailbag episodes ago. You can go back to listen to that if you want more detail. I want to be brief here in order to fit in as many players as possible. But the bottom line with Walker is that there's a big piece to his production profile that's missing. It doesn't mean it'll come to fruition and truly matter, but it does mean to me that he's not in the same tier as some of the really good wide receivers who are projected to go in Round one, and I think that's a totally reasonable stance to have. Now, I got three wide receivers in this tier as well, and the first one is George Pickens. There aren't a ton of true X receivers in this class, and that's partially what makes Pickens attractive. We usually see this prototype have higher ceilings in fantasy football. Now. Admittedly, my model doesn't like Pickens as much as I do, and that's largely because Pickens dealt with injury in college and his most productive season came as a freshman as a result. But that also gave him one of the best breakout ages that you can find. He's got plenty of length, and he should have early second round draft capital. He might have first round draft capital. Now. The last time I did a little projecting within my model to make a case for a second round wide receiver with size, it was just a year ago with Terras Marshall. I wrote about this at length in my prospect guide. But I don't think the mistake with Marshall was liking him last year and doing a little projecting. The mistake was then over ranking him versus what the model was saying. They were all in the same tier, but I put Marshall above guys like Rasha Bateman and Elijah Moore. Post draft, I noted that Marshall was an upside play, but that was still a mistake when my model loved Rashat Bateman and Elijah Moore. There's a chance I do bump Pickens into the tier above if he gets the right capital and goes to a spotlight Green Bay this week, but where I rank him will depend on where the other top five wide out settle. If I have to make a big stretch like I did for Terris Marshall last year, who was almost ten percentile spots lower than those two other wide receivers that I talked about in his class, I won't do that. I learned my lesson to rely more on my model. So with Pickens, the bottom line is this, I think his ceiling is there. I wouldn't be surprised at all if he's the best wide receiver in this class. The production as a freshman at Georgia is really impressive. But I'm going to be more reasonable with my approach within my rankings. I want to rely on what objectively looks right now. The next player in this tier is sky Moore, my wide receiver seven. Everyone who listened to this show knows that I love me some sky Moore, but as the draft process has gone on, everyone else seems to love sky More too, so the value isn't necessarily as glaring as it once was. More gets hurt in my model a bit because he's not coming from a big program, But the good news that he's a small school early declare which we don't see very often, and his production profile is fantastic. I'm going to read part of the Sky Moore profile for my prospect guide just to give you guys an idea of how good his profile is. It says, yes, he went to a smaller school, but within this class he ranks fifth and best season receptions per game, fourth and best season yards per team pass attempt, and ninth in best season touchdown chair. He's the only player in this class with top season marks of at least seven receptions per game, a three point four yards per team pass attempt rate, and a forty percent touchdown chair. If you use those filters and look at players since twenty eleven to hit those numbers while being picked in the top seventy, More is currently projected to go sixty first overall, you get quite the list of successes. Cooper Cup, Tyler boyd Amari Cooper, Tyler Lockett, Jordan Matthews, Sammy Watkins, Alan Robinson, Andy Isabella, Devonte Smith, and Elijah Moore. Basically the only miss in that group looks to be Andy Isabella. Even Jordan Matthews had some decent seasons to appreciate in value at the start of his career. My top compare for Sky Moore is DJ Moore. I am very high on him and Moore is a great example of why from a fantasy perspective, this wide receiver draft class does have some depth. I don't think we'll see a ton of hits from players outside the top fifteen at the position per se, but the top ten is really solid. There just isn't this Jamar Chase like prospect to make the class really stand out. And then the last player in this tier is Johan Dotson. He's not in early declare wide out, but he's one of those cases where he still would have looked pretty good of my model had he come out last year. He has top ten numbers in best season receiving yards per team, pass attempt and touchdown share in this class. Those are two production metrics that my model looks at. He's a playmaker. He not only could make splash plays in college, but he was a punt returner for Penn State as well. That doesn't get signal in my model, but it's something a little extra that you love to see from prospects because coaches generally put their biggest playmakers in those positions in college. I think there is some concern over size with Dotson, and one of his comparables in my model ended up being Vincent Brown. That's not great, but he did comp pretty well to t Y Hilton. That's sort of the ceiling that we're working with here, and with him getting mocked pretty frequently to the end of the first round, there's a chance that we see him get a really nice landing spot too. I think that Johann Dotson is a very solid prospect. Now I have a tear break when going from Dotson to Christian Watson. You're probably not that surprised by this if you listen to the Mailbag episode from last week. Watson is not a bad prospect. I just think there are more red flags and concerns with his profile compared to the eight wide receivers that I've already talked about. He's coming from a smaller program. That's a flag. His receiving yards per team pass attempt rate is good, but it's not so over the top amazing given where he went to school. He had a best season touch on tare of thirty five percent, a mark hit by fifteen other wide receivers in this class. There's nothing special there. Again, he's not bad. He has great size, you can get really creative with him schematically, and he's a freak athlete. The latter point is what I think is driving up his potential costs in the draft. And I'll just reiterate what I said on Friday Show. Athleticism does not matter to me a wide receiver in my model, likely because, like I said earlier, it's fully captured in draft capital, So I don't want to double count that he does compare favorably to DJ Chark. But I also think there's a chance that this is another Denzel Mims situation. Watson has a really wide range of outcomes. I could see him hitting like a Chase Claypole did. But let's not pretend that we haven't seen these uber athletic wide receivers bust in the past. That's why I have him here and not ahead of someone like Dotson, because Dotson, to me, is a much safer prospect now after Watson, I've got Isaiah Spiller, and I'll be honest with you, guys, running back is really hard to figure out. After Kenneth Walker, Spiller went from fantasy darling to someone a lot of people are fading after he displayed very little athleticism in the last couple of months. His pro day forty ended up being a four to six four, and depending on how you adjust that, that could make his speed score just under ninety, and ninety is the threshold that I look for in running backs before they get severely hurt in my model. Technically, Spiller doesn't look as good in my model because of that, but he still has a shot to be the RB three in this class outright if draft capital is in his favor, and I think it will be. He does have decent marks and reception share in total yards per team play, and he's got the right size to be a featured back. We can't discount those things. One of his comps in my model is actually Joe Mixon. But how I feel about Spiller will depend almost entirely at this point on how the NFL feels about him. I think he's still going to be a mid day two pick. But we'll see now. Right next to Spiller in my rankings, Rashad White. White's someone that I think the fantasy community likes a lot more than the NFL does. And don't get me wrong, I like him a lot. He could end up being one of the most versatile pass catchers at running back in this class. He had almost a twenty one percent reception share last year, and he's sort of a leaner back at six foot two hundred and fourteen pounds, meaning you could maybe line him up at wide receiver. It took a while for him to produce though. He played some juco ball before getting to Arizona State two years ago, and he didn't produce really until last year. I don't think we should lose sight of that. He's intriguing though, with a top comparable in my model of David Johnson, I think he can play a really interesting receiving role in the NFL, and we know that's favorable for fantasy scoring. We just have to see where his draft capital ends up. And then the last player that I want to talk about today, the last player in this tier, David Bell. Bell is falling a lot in rookie drafts, whether it's a real rookie draft before the NFL draft or a mock draft, and it's because he bombed the combine. He's non athletic. You can't sell him as someone who's going to burn by defenders. He lacks explosion. That's definitely a concern, and he may fall a lot in the draft because of that. If he does, I'll be more and more worried about his potential in the NFL. But Bell has a really good production profile in my model, and more importantly, it's a good age adjusted profile. He immediately produces. A freshman at Perdue, he had eighty six catches and over one thousand yards. Bell has projected draft capital in my model of eightieth overall right now, and at eightieth overall he ranks in the eighty fourth to eighty fifth percentile. That's better than Christian Watson as a fortieth overall pick. Just for context. It doesn't mean I'm ranking Bell over Watson, clearly, but it does show you that Math likes Bell probably a lot more than the market does right now. And the nice part about Bell, honestly is that the opportunity cost is not significant anymore. If he was a player who couldn't separate, who you had to grab at the end of the first round of your rookie draft. That's a tough sell, but he's not that anymore. No one is drafting him there, so you can buy into the higher range of outcomes with him a little bit easier. And there are players with a similar profile who've been fine at the NFL level. Davonte Adams comps really favorably to David Bell, actually, though Adams was just a little bit more athletic, and Kwan Bolten's another one of those players who didn't separate but had good body control and he knew how to use his bigger frame. That's where Bell can win. There are a ton of negatives of that kind of profile, don't get me wrong, and a ton of busts with that kind of profile as well, But you shouldn't have to worry about that given his projected rookie cost, unless he gets drafted a lot higher than expected this week and his rookie cost increases. So I like David Bell overall a little bit more than the market right now, but that's it. Those are my pre draft tiers at the top. I know some of you may want more takes, and remember you can get those takes by purchasing the Late Round Prospect Guide over on lateround dot com. I'll have everything updated right after the draft so you can see where I'm ranking these guys and what my model is saying about them. But that's going to do it for today's show. Thanks to all of you for listening. If you've got subscribed to Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by searching for it pretty much anywhere podcast can be found, and don't for to follow me on Twitter at Late Round QB. Thanks everyone. I'm gonna be doing the mailbag episode a day early this week because of the draft, so get your questions in right away. I'll talk to you then. M