Late-Round Perspectives: Graham Barfield

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Speaker 1: Graham Barfield is an owner at Fantasy Points who previously worked at Fantasy Guru.

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Speaker 2: And the NFL Network.

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Speaker 1: He also worked with me at Number Fire back in the day. He's the creator of Yards Created. He's an analytics nerd. I think he's the first Jacksonville Jags fan that's been on this show. These are his late round perspectives.

00:00:32
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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a there's a dozen of us. We are. We are very strong in this dozen. All of us have Travis Hunter meetings where we basically just watch his highlights and eat donuts.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, are you did you? Are you from Florida?

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Speaker 3: Right?

00:02:36
Speaker 2: And then you moved out west? Or do you live didn't you live in Florida at one point?

00:02:39
Speaker 3: Yeah? I back in the number of fire days, good memory.

00:02:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I worked with you man. I was twenty thirteen or fourteen, and I was at UNF in Jacksonville, so right. Yeah, I'm a nomad though. I grew up in North Carolina and moved to Florida when I was a kid, went to college there, then moved to Atlanta and moved to LA. I'm in Denver now.

00:03:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, you've been everywhere.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm doing a whole NL West tour for anybody that's a baseball fan. I'm a Dodgers. I got Dodgers Rockies. I just need to knock off the d Backs.

00:03:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, just go to Arizona real quick. What part of North Carolina? I don't think I realize. I will put in North Carolina as you grow up.

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Speaker 3: In yeah, booone. North Carolina up state was like my backyard.

00:03:20
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, yeah you're not You're not far from me at all with me in Charlotte.

00:03:24
Speaker 3: Now, yeah you're Charlotte. Yeah, yeah, dude, I love North Carolina. Like if I moved back to the East Coast, if I ever moved back, that will be, that'd be where we go.

00:03:33
Speaker 1: It's a it's a great place to live, man. It's just it's easy living, good weather. You get the mountains really close, you get the beach real close, Like you can get to either destination within a couple hours.

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Speaker 2: It's nice.

00:03:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, amazing food, Amazing people just like Salt of the Earth people just like yeah, super super kind.

00:03:50
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, man, it's great. You already mentioned the number Fire stuff. I got to bring up the number fire stuff to start to stop. So for those of you who don't know Graham was with me at Number Fire, I guess it was like twenty thirteen is time for like you were one of the early ones to the point where when I would recruit people to write at Number Fire way way back in the day. This is when we were like purely a startup. This is pre Fandel acquisition.

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Speaker 2: All of that.

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Speaker 1: I would call like literally a telephone, like a phone call each analyst, and I would sit and explain expected points to that analyst because we really wanted to push because expected points wasn't nearly as just like everywhere as it is today, and so like number five had net expected points, which was which was the formula that Keith Goldener, the chief analyst, had created, and I would call we really wanted to push it, right, So I would call the analysts who were about to write for number five explain expected points. You were you were one of those calls, right because it was early on so.

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Speaker 3: You hadn't been one of those Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember those calls. I remember all the edits, Like you spent a lot of time with me on the edits and stuff and definitely definitely help. But man, we had an all star group that was Yeah, I mean that was a huge credit to you and like the hiring. But like Reeves was a part of that group, Brandon obviously, Scott Barrett my guy, like that, I mean we had who else?

00:05:12
Speaker 2: Man, Raybon was there for a little while.

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Speaker 3: God, that is right. Raybond was there.

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Speaker 1: I talk about the Raybon things crazy because Raybon, right, I found I found him because I wrote an article on Russell Wilson potentially being the best young quarterback ever because it was like right after they had won their super Bowl, their first that's that's the one where I guess the one that they actually won. And I wrote this article and I got this email back that was like seven paragraphs long, really detailed. There was a bunch of analysis and it was from Raybon, and Raybon's like tearing this this article apart.

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Speaker 2: And my response was like, like some people email and I'm.

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Speaker 1: Like, Okay, you're just being obnoxious about this and you're just doing this because you wanted to like vent about something. But Raybon like had like legit analysis. In My response to him was like, Yo, this is good. You want to write for the site? And so he came on board and he wrote for Number five for a decent amount of time. And then obviously he's gone out and done greater and bigger things. You know, he's more on the sports betting side at this point too. He does some fantasy stuff, but yeah, man, it's just it's crazy. And then you and Barrett are still doing stuff together to this day.

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Speaker 3: Yes, sir, Yeah, Fantasy Points going strong here. Six years. We've got just an incredible amount of content, new product coming out this summer. Super stoked about that. Obviously. Data Suite has been wildly successful. Brett Whitefield charting, Brett Whitefield and his team charting every game. We just yeah, man, we've got our little niche. It's it's cool. It's it's this is I never take it for granted, like it's certainly a blessing to do what I do. This has been. Yeah, It's just like I knew when I was growing up and I took my first ever accounting internship and I got into an office. It was a great place to work, but I was like, man, I don't think I can do an office thing. Like, I got to figure this out and I trust me. I feel super super blessed man to work with not just like my friends like Scott, but just you know, to work in this space. Man. I mean, it's just so cool to do football talk ball talk with people like you every day. Yeah, It's just it's it's one of those things where you know, I still pinch myself honestly, you know, I still speak about those number five days that were you know, ten years ago now, twelve years ago now, but it's crazy.

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Speaker 2: Well, look, I can say at two things that.

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Speaker 1: First off, when you talked about like me editing your your your content and stuff way back in the day and like us having back and forths and like really trying to like you know, figure out how to get the best article out there, you can you can tell Scott this, and I you know, I'm not assuming he would listen to this, but you can tell Scott that you were an easier edit than Scott was for you. For you, it was like always like a gradual you're getting better and better every article, right for Barrett. For Barrett, it was like he was flatlining to start, and it was just over and over again, like like just trying, like like slamming your head well into a wall over and over again. And then it clicked and he talked, you know, he talked about that when he was on Perspectives. When it clicked, then he's you know, he rocket shipped and he you know like figured it out and like you know, became the analyst that he is now. But you can tell Scott that you were you were the easier edit of the of the two of you.

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Speaker 3: I'll hold that over them, trust me.

00:08:16
Speaker 2: There you go, there you go.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, man, I mean I think that the gratitude to be able to do this is really important like to me, and I don't know if you feel the same way, but to me, like I'm always pushing like my my analysis and like wanting to figure out new ways to do things and figure things out because I know that there is someone on my heels that's trying to get this job, you know what I mean.

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Speaker 2: Like it's just a really important piece to for me at least.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not just that, it's not just that this is a highly competitive space. Eyes are wide open, like journalists and everything. It's just been like on the downward trend for a number of years, and now we've got AI coming in to kind of, yeah, give us even more existential threat. So I feel the same way, like I am always trying to I just think of as like keeping my skills sharp, you know, Like I never want to feel like my skills and my ability is like you know, like flatlining or just like dull or whatever. Like I always want to be trying to learn new things. And we've got some amazing analysts like Ryan Heath. Yeah, yeah, he's he would have been a number fire legend back in the day, like.

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Speaker 1: He would him And I like, I I see like the way that the way that he looks at stuff. I'm like, man, it would have been so much fun to like be working alongside you and doing work with you and stuff.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, That's that's the thing, is Like I guess maybe I'm biased towards data driven people because that's the way my brain works. But you know, I think you you people like you Ryan Scott too, Like you've got to have that mix of data driven analysis but also using your gut, you know. Yeah, like you've been playing for so long, like at the end of the day, like right, you kind of have to use and lean on that experience. So I think it's super important to have a bit of both.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Hunter, can I ask, like, you know, with your journey in the space, like now you're doing the fantasy point stuff, talk about like the inception of fantasy points and how that that all came about.

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Speaker 3: Sure, So I worked with Well. I was hired out of college by John Hanson at Fantasy Guru. I was working three part time writing jobs, wrote a World Fantasy Labs. I think I was still doing a little bit number Fire at the time. John hired me with Joe Joe Dolan. So I worked with with Guru and Joe from like seventeen until like well, no, gosh, it was sixteen until nineteen and I took a job at the NFL a couple of years ago. By working at the NFL, John calls me, He's like, hey, man, I got this idea. We meet it at the Combine in Indy in like maybe nineteen, Yeah, and he just pitches me the idea and I'm like, this is brilliant. We need one more person, though, and I have the perfect guy, and it's Scott. And he's like, no kidding, we tried to hire Scott. Scott was apparently like it was he and I in the last two in the interview process at GURU, So John and Joe knew Scott extremely well. And yeah, it was just one of those things where like we all get along really well. We all kind of see the game simoly, but you know, we just, uh, we wanted to have this like full service fantasy site where we have you know, not just you know, good analysts, but entertaining analysts, and uh, it's just kind of morphed. It's not just content now, Like I said, we've got Brett Whitefield, who is a former PFF and you know, trained employee who was working on their sales team, leading and out our charting team of twenty five charters charting every NFL NFL game. You know, we've just we've we've gotten from you know, just a little little fantasy shop talking about you know, Redraft and fastball and Dynasty to an actual, you know, full blown business with you know, tools, and it's just it's super humbling, but it's also super cool, man, Like you know, to form, to have this niche and to have the audience and everything. Like you know, like I said, I started saying this, I just it's kind of got. This is like a full circle thing man, because like you you've absolutely blown up JJ. Like it's just it's been cool to see you and like it's just cool to see all the guys that, like I know, we're putting in the work at Number Fire and all those days and years ago, like still doing it, still balling and kind of doing our own thing and and succeeding in it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you can usually tell, like you know, like you and Scott in particular, just like cared a lot, right, and so you were working hard at what that thing was. And there's some people like no shade to those people, but like they have full time jobs that they're not they're not trying to necessarily make that a career, and I think that that's something that like needs to be Okay. I see a lot of people on like social media when it comes to fantasy football analysis and stuff where they're like, you know, I I don't really you know, this is just a fun thing that I do, and that that's fine. Like you don't have to make this a full time thing. Do whatever your your mind and you know, family and life in general, you know, lead you to do. But you can always tell when there's like that person who just really would love to you know, I think a lot of people would love to do it full time but understand that there are limitations to doing that. But you know, there are people like you or Scott or Rabon where it was just very glaringly obvious that this is what you guys wanted.

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Speaker 2: So it's great to see that you're thriving, though.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, man, I just I eat sleep and literally dream about football, like literally probably about half of my dreams or football or fantasy. It's it's it is so gross. Yes, I'm coming up with like article ideas in my dreams. I was just like, it's one of those things man like, like I said, I don't take it for granted for sure. Yeah, I don't know the space now it's it's it's different, for sure. It's there's obviously more people everybody's kind of trended towards this more data driven analysis. Like it is certainly harder to come up now than it was when I did, or Scott did, or Raybond I did. Yeah, when you did, certainly harder. But I feel like there's just more tools at our disposal now. Yeah, it makes sense one hundred percent.

00:14:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, there's there's there's definitely you know, And I think to your point though about like I really try to not let data just dictate literally everything with my analysis because you need.

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Speaker 2: That gray area thinking.

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Speaker 1: You need to to to not just like be boxed in with that way of thinking. It's kind of weird where we've gotten to the point where, you know, data analysis, like you said, is kind of like the norm for the industry. So like I always think back to like rookie drafts and stuff because I think it's like the easiest way to look at this from you know, just just and compare this. But with rookie drafts, ninety percent of analysts are doing things via production metrics and things that they're you know, in your case, which we'll get to in a second, with like yards created things that these guys are doing in college. You know, that's more film based obviously, but like you know, it's still at least transferring that stuff that you're watching into into digits and stuff. But there's almost competitive advantage to leaning against what you know, some of these like numbers are saying, you know, like you could you could sit there all day long and say, Matthew Golden's you know, production profile and AGUS and production production profile is trash, which you know, the ZA model certainly didn't like love Golden's numbers. But there's also you know, it wasn't as atrocious as being a zero or as atrocious as some other guys that have come out that are more glaringly obvious. It's almost like if you can have some of that nuance to your data analysis, that's really how you're now gaining that edge in the fantasy football space as opposed to just like having a good model and sticking with.

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Speaker 3: That model exactly. Yeah, context is king at the end of the day. I think the golden standard is somebody who can take the data or you know, whatever it is you're looking at receivers, running backs, quarterbacks, whatever, But they also like understand football, you know what I mean, they understand how fantasy points are scored on a real field real quick. You know. With receivers in particular, you know, it's one of those things like running backs and I guess we'll talk about Jayden Blue maybe, but you know, running backs are held back by a number of things and it can be just as simple as the competition in front of them. With receivers, though, man, it's like if you're not earning targets like Matthew Golden, you know, are you going to earn targets? At the NFL level? Like right, that is there is some like level of like data driven analysis where it's like, okay, we can kind of like this is who that player is at the end of the day. Like with receivers in particular, it's very very rare for a receiver to come out and not be you know, a guy who's not targeted in college to come out, and.

00:16:34
Speaker 2: I think a lot of it.

00:16:35
Speaker 1: I've always seen it as puzzle building, right, where like, like a guy like Golden has all of these red flags.

00:16:41
Speaker 2: He does have the draft capital.

00:16:42
Speaker 1: This is just analytic based, right, but he does have the draft capital thing, you know, he did have.

00:16:46
Speaker 2: He is an early declare, which does matter, you know. I think that the early.

00:16:50
Speaker 1: Declared stuff has gotten to the point where people aren't thinking about it properly. They see early declare and they think only in terms of, Okay, he left college early, and therefore he's more talented, which is definitely a huge piece of the early declare thing. But to me, what it actually but what I've come to realize it probably means more of, is a player that's an early declare. Matthew Golden's a perfect example of this. A player that's an early declare doesn't have the benefit of playing that extra twenty five percent of their college career, right, which means their production profile is inherently going to be a little bit lower and worse, you know, hypothetically, unless you're like an elite player that declared early, which happens pretty frequently. But a guy like Matthew Golden, I think that the there's a hypothetical out there where he stays at Texas, right, and this year he has a three point two five, you know, yards per team pass attempt rate, his yards per route run is great, and everything just really comes together for Golden as a senior. And I always what I try to do is envision a scenario of Okay, Golden's first three years are this. We know that because it already happened, right, what would have happened if Golden had a really good year as a senior? How would he How would people be reacting to that player? You know, in the fantasy streets and in rookie drafts, where I think we do a lot of like threshold looking, which I do too, Like I love to bucket these guys and try to see, like, oh, what have we seen historically? It's part of my process as well, and it's in the in the Prospect Guide and all of that. But at the same time, when you're doing that for a player like Golden, he's at an inherent disadvantage, right, a natural disadvantage because he didn't play that extra year.

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Speaker 2: So I do think that, like that's the nuance.

00:18:28
Speaker 1: I really am trying to dig into more with a lot of that analysis, as opposed to like having those thresholds, having those groups, having those buckets and saying, no way can this one thing happen because this has happened in the past.

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Speaker 3: I like that. I like that a lot. And with early declare specifically these guys, I guess with receiver it matters more, in particular with Golden not to keep hitting on the game. It's a great example. Yeah, but he is a great example of this. Like you know, he had significant target competition for all these years, right you know, now you mentioned he's he's got the draft capital, got the landing spot. I think with receiver there's just way more nuance I've discovered in my ten years. I don't know if you agree with this, but I think there's just way more nuance and receiver evaluation than there is with running backs. It's like I can turn on you know, I start charting these guys in March April this year is a little later. I was at a little late this year, but I just think there's way more nuance with receiver production and all that and running back production and within three or four games, I'm telling you, like every year this happens. I already know, like the yards created numbers don't necessarily balance out, because one big play can kind of, you know, it can change it. But within a couple of games you can kind of already get a sense of who a player is where. With receivers, Quinn Eures was terrible, right, right, he was terrible for a long time. We were the same thing. It's the same exact conversation we had, was Zavi Worthy last year. It's like, Okay, the ball tracking is not great, but it's like, was it the ball tracking or was it quin is like not throwing very many catchups targets.

00:20:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I do think that like part of it is that wide receivers. Now I'm going to ask you about yards created too, so that folks can kind of see what you're talking about when you're talking about charting and all that kind of stuff. But like, I do think with wide receivers that people, you know, I think Harmon's done a really good job of explaining this and talking through this obviously with reception perception, but every wide receiver is playing essentially a different position, right, Like there are there are these sub positions within wide receiver at running back.

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Speaker 2: I think, you know, you could make.

00:20:25
Speaker 1: The argument that there is that you know, you have certain specialists that can obviously do different things and lining up across the line of scrimmage, maybe playing the slot.

00:20:32
Speaker 2: A little bit.

00:20:33
Speaker 1: You know, they're they're gonna be better or worse as pass catchers, and they're gonna better or worse as pass blockers. But at the end of the day, like they're they're fitting within a similar mold as a running back, whereas wide outs are just doing all these different things, and there's such there's a bigger discrepancy and even like body types and stuff, and like there's just there's like you're saying, there's just so many more layers to it, whereas there's probably not as many, but there's still you know, and this is what I want to ask you about with like yards Created, like there's still some nuance that you need to look through and dig through with offensive line play, for instance, Right, so I want you to just explain Yards Created, what made you come up with it, and just what it's all about.

00:21:12
Speaker 3: Sure, so Yards Created has been around now for twenty sixteen. It's my charting process for college running backs, and basically, yards after contact is a fine metric, but as we all know, if a running back was contacted behind the line of scrimmage by one guy who you know, the defensive tackle got through because the offensive lineman the guard blew his block, but the rest of the offensive line did their job. You know, that's still yards after contact for the running back. And the inverse of this JJ as we know, I mean, I think running backs should be attributed some yards before contact as well. There's a lot of running backs that let's stick with that example. Let's say a guard on the interior blows his block that that running back jukes him out, but the rest of the line does his job. You know, the running back redirects and gets back to the hole that should be yards blocked, you know what I'm saying. So that was my impetus. Just like watching the games, it's like yards after contact, yards before contact. It does a decent job, but I don't think it tells the full picture. So yards created is simply what the running back gets after the offensive line has done its job or has not done its job. And in college football, especially these days, Man College offensive line play is rough. Like if you think the NFL offensive line play is, Batman College is significantly worse. The other part of yards created that I think is a little different and worth getting into, is I also chart miss tackles forced a little differently, So pff SIS, two main charting companies that you know, chart college games. Every college game. I'm not entirely sure how they do miss tackles force, but I've noticed throughout the years my numbers are sometimes more or less directionally about the same, but they're pretty different at times. So by my definition of mistackle forced, I kind of I am a little more lenient. I think I typically end up charting a few more mistackles force only because I give running backs credit for their speed. So for example, when Ashton Jane t is just breaking angles or base Sill Tutins breaking angles and a defender is at basically in front of him or at equal standing in terms of their position on the field, and Tutans just running past him, that's a mistackle force. Like if that cornerback has no chance simply because you're faster, that should be mistackle. So a little bit of a long winded answer but I'm basically just charting yards and mistackles. And you know, throughout the years there have certainly been some some big hits. There's been some big misses for sure, But I think i've you know, this process has proven to be directionally accurate and in terms of its correlation to future fantasy points. I went back and looked at this in twenty twenty two. Yards created is more predictive of career your fantasy points than any counting metrics. So that's like rushing yards per game, receptions per game, and receiving yards per game. And as you and I both know, athletic testing measures are very very I don't with receivers in particular, and we can get into running backs. I think I think this matters more. But with receivers there's like no correlation. Yeah, don't care at all. I don't even think it's included in your model anymore. No, it's not. Yeah, running backs, I think it matters a little more, like especially weight adjusted forties weight matter. Yeah, but that's that's about it, man. Yeah, athletic testing measures are very noisy, especially at running back, where volume matters more than anything at the end of the day. So yeah, I mean, it's just very hard to find a good efficiency metric in football. It's very hard, especially hard to find one that correlates to success. We're all trying to, you know, work through those very small margins. But yards created as has proven to be a small margin booster.

00:24:58
Speaker 2: Have you been able to too, because like the ZAP model now is so so receiving focused at running back.

00:25:04
Speaker 1: Actually, I don't even have rushing metrics in this iteration of the Zapp model, which.

00:25:08
Speaker 3: Is all I was talking to. I was talking to Reeves and Scott about this, and Reeves brought it up and he was like, dude, he's not even JJ's not even putting rushing yards. And I'm like, that makes sense.

00:25:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, right right, It's just it's it's so inconsistent.

00:25:20
Speaker 1: It's so and like I do think that there's a possibility that next year when I test things, I add something in there as more of like a baseline, like don't get too high, don't get too low on certain players. Right, But I think it's capturing what it needs to capture right now because I've tested it and stuff and like it. It doesn't seem to like the receiving stuff is what seems to matter most just based on like what we're doing and how we're applying this stuff, because I'm not at the end of the day, I'm not trying to solve which running back is actually the best runner or the best like for this scheme. I'm trying to solve which running back is going to give us an advantage in fantasy football. Right, And it seems as though draft capital is not capturing receiving numbers as much as it would be capturing, you know, rushing numbers. If I wasn't using draft capital, I guarantee you I'd be using rushing metrics more. But I think that that's just inherently capturing a lot of that that those numbers.

00:26:13
Speaker 3: Draft capital is absolutely capturing rushing profile. And to that point, I don't even know if rushing production matters when you get drafted. Like, to be honest with you, your bulk rushing production might not even matter anymore. We know when you get draft, especially at running back, if you get drafted early, you're getting the freaking ball. The last three guys that were drafted in the top eight overall, they have three last four guys us four guys that were drafted in top eight. Overall, they had at least three hundred opportunities. All of them did, including Bijon Bijeon I got the three hundred and one opportunities Carrie's plus targets on average, those guys got three hundred and forty opportunities. Zeke, Fournette, Bijean. Now we've got Janet. You look at the hit rates in special on day two. I mean they fall off the board even once you once you get into like the one twenty fives overall on day day three. So there is in terms of directional accuracy. I think draft capital is kind of just specifically for Dynasty, you know rookies like that is that's kind of just and I know it's simple, like we all have our guys. You know, maybe some people love Dylan Sampson and he fell, but hey, like at the end of the day, the rough capitol tells us a whole lot about how these teams are going to use these players.

00:27:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, exactly, And so with that being in it, I just don't care as much about the rushing portion of things. But my question with you doing yards created stuff, like is that naturally helping you as an analyst, like understand their receiving profiles because you're obviously going to naturally like see those plays as well.

00:27:46
Speaker 3: Bacial Tuton's a great example of this. You know, twenty two catches eighty yards is last season. Everybody's like, hey, you know, is he a good receiver? Is he going to be able to have a three down profile? You watch every play of baseial two and you're gonna see what I saw, and it's just a lot of flats, a lot of screen, you know, a lot of just kind of you know, spacing patterns and horrific quarterback play. There were a few targets that should have easily been you know, caught because Touton just got a terrible target. Absolutely it does you know I think with college now, JJ, these these these college offenses, I don't know if you go to high school games. I'm a full on degenerate, so I've I've say, when I lived in Atlanta and there was some great college ball, I take my brother to high school ball. I take my brother to some of the high school games. And you watch high school and you watch college and you're like, this is the same game because it's first down, screen, second and seventh run. You're spacing guys out, there's lots of motion, The reds are extremely condensed. There are just very few offenses in college that even remotely resemble the NFL. So when that comes back to, you know, scouting running backs, it makes some of these evaluations harder for sure. Like Jalen Wright. I know we're talking about the twenty twenty five class here, but Jalen Wright, Dylan Sampson, these guys are good examples of this. These that Tennessee offense is a joke.

00:29:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's a.

00:29:14
Speaker 1: Wide receivers too, right, Like when we like we didn't know how to how to really evaluate Jalen Hyatt coming out, like it's a really tough evaluation because of that.

00:29:23
Speaker 3: Bro Cedric Tillman's like the only guy who's like.

00:29:25
Speaker 2: Good, yeah, yeah, Like we don't even know if he's good.

00:29:28
Speaker 3: Right, like exactly, like he's had a two or three game sample where he's like, okay, yeah, yeah. It's just one of those things. Like Tennessee's a great example because it's they stack four receivers on the outside. There's five or six guys in the box on every play. So I've been I haven't changed yards created in terms of the process charting it at all since sixteen, nothing has changed. The only thing that's changed is my access to film. Sixteen seventeen, I was charting off broadcast footage, which was a nightmare.

00:29:56
Speaker 2: Now that I have all two, my gosh, it's awful.

00:30:00
Speaker 3: Dude. It's the end zone. You just have to have the end zone view.

00:30:04
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:30:05
Speaker 3: So that's the only thing that's chance in Yards Creator. But I just noticed anecdotally, man like some of these college oftens. I mean, they're just brutal to watch. Virginia Tech was one of them. Tennessee was again one of them. Ashton Janez. You know, six point one point nine yards Creator per attempt JJ behind the second or now actually the worst offensive line in this class. It was really close between UCF, Virginia Tech, and Boise State. But that's what Yards Creative tries to identify. It's like, Okay, some of these offensive lines are terrible, which running backs are having to work harder to not just generate yards, but you force mis tackles, and those two things have generally, in terms of directional accuracy, have been proven to be pretty predictive.

00:30:48
Speaker 1: So before I ask you about this year's class, I want to talk about historical results. Like I think people like to give context and stuff, and they like the humility and the openness of because you're a transparent analyst as I am, and we're not going to get everything right.

00:31:01
Speaker 2: We're not gonna get everything wrong.

00:31:02
Speaker 1: But I want to hear some of the bigger like hits that you've seen, and then maybe one of the biggest misses that you've that you've seen and if you can look back and even say why and if you saw those things coming.

00:31:14
Speaker 3: Lots of hits, lots of misses, for sure, you do this for nearly ten years. I've charted a one hundred and eleven running backs that's in the database. I've seen more hits than misses. Though in terms of the big hits, Joe Mixon was one. He's still top of the top of the database at six point seventy five yards created per attempt. Saekwon Barkley was kind of I mean, everybody was on him, but I mean yards creator really illuminated how elusive he was. I don't think anybody's ever going to touch his mistackle force number just going down the board though. Alvin Kamara and Kareem Hunt are probably the two that I go back to the most both were you know, day two picks. Ye, both were extremely good and yards created both have had awesome success. Obviously, Kamara is a perennial RB one. Hunt was a terrific value in rookie drafts. Some of the misses, you know, I think one of the biggest ones is definitely Clyde. Clyde Edwards a lair. I certainly overstated the landing spot for him. His yards creative profile was not that great. He had four point five yards creator pretend, but I really kind of I loved his elusiveness and I thought that would carry over into the NFL. He had an I mean really good mistackle forest numbers top I think eighty fifth percentile H was certainly one for me, man, where landing spot absolutely matters, draft capital really matters. But he was I ended up ranking Jonathan Taylor ahead of him. Or excuse me or excuse me, I wrote, I've rankedhead of JT. I was certainly a lesson learned. On the other end of things, Drell Henderson and Anthony McFarlane really popped in yards created. And this is one of those things, man, where big plays matter a ton, And I've I've had a number of discussions with Scott a number of a number of Brett about you know, hey, should I be like adjusting for these big plays. And I've come back to just know, like they happened, you have to chart them the way they are. But Drell Henderson and Anthony McFarland certainly, you know they popped in yards by yards created. If you if you search in the database, you know you're going to see those guys at the top. But it's it's because you know they were big play, you know, merchants. You look at the sustaining type runs. I also in my database, I include this intentionally, you know, the percentage of plays that you create at least five yards, And Henderson and McFarlane we're both pretty poor in both those metrics. So you know, big plays certainly can have an impact on yards created, especially when the samples are small. Henderson and McFarland were both not full time runners, but the in the day, you know, I chart those plays the same way I chart all of them. You know, it's twenty five yards blocked offensive line and if it's a sixty yard touchdown, like I have to give the you know, those thirty five yards to the running back, So that that is the one hole I think in yards created. It's like some of these small sample guys like Henderson, like mcfarlaney had really big plays kind of stand out or shot Penny's another good example, but they didn't have the sustaining type runs you know. On top of that. I think that's that those are the biggest misses for sure. All Right, so let's talk about this class. Is Ashton Genty is he elite? Is he like the elite of the elite? Just just you shouted out his yards created number? Like, where does that place him versus other guys in the past. Yeah, bro, he's he is everything. Obviously, watched a bit of him being out here in the West Coast and then getting into the charting, you pick up on the nuances, the footwork, the vision. Obviously I said the offensive line was really bad. Bottom of the class. Yeah, Ashton Janet ninety eighth percentile in terms of yards created per attempt. He's the truth. Man Like Joe Mixon, Ashon j and t Saquon Barkley are the only three running backs to create over six yards per carry and have at least zero point four miss tackles forced per carry just elite company. Yeah, yeah, I don't think I have a single thing negatively to say about jant Of, Like you're nick picking. Okay, the past protection wasn't that great, but I'm with a prospect like him, like who cares? Yeah, really, who cares? Right?

00:35:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're they're they're they're gonna give him. They're gonna feed them regardless, So it's all good.

00:35:42
Speaker 2: Amri and Hampton.

00:35:43
Speaker 1: He actually he scored a ninety eight in the zapp model, which is there's a pretty big gap when you go from like the ninety nine, which is gent genty was the second best Zapp score, had the second best Zapp score in its history behind CMC. And so you know, you had them in like the nine, you know, high ninety nine, and then you get into like the ninety eight ninety seven range, and those are still very very good running backs, like borderline elite running backs.

00:36:05
Speaker 2: They're just not like the Beijeon types.

00:36:07
Speaker 3: Right.

00:36:07
Speaker 2: But the model really liked Mario.

00:36:08
Speaker 1: And Hampton, So I'm very curious as to where Yards Created had Hampton.

00:36:13
Speaker 3: Yeah. I loved hearing that the production models all loved Hampton. Yards Created also loves Hampton seventy fourth percentile yards created per ten to five point one per carry, also forced zero point four miss tackles force per carry. I said in my article on Fantasy Points that if you gave a bulldozer a Ferrari V twelve engine, like that's Omar and Hampton, the dude is just he's so fast, so big, so strong, fights through contact extremely well, gets those extra yards turning his feet. I think the one thing with him JJ is that he's maybe just a little stiff. Most of his mistackles were through speed and power. But when you force that many mistackles through speed and power alone, like he's just a perfect fit in miss chargers.

00:36:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:36:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the thing, like a downhill man with and some of that will obviously translate. Even if all of it doesn't translate, you know, you're still going to see that that bulldozing mentality, you know, hit the NFL one that I'm really curious with, and I kind of saw a sneak peek. I tried to not dig into your stuff too heavily, knowing that I was going to talk to you, you know about this, But I did see that R. J. Harvey looked pretty decent. He had surprising draft capital to most you know in the draft when the when the Broncos took him, you know, pre draft, I was I was not.

00:37:29
Speaker 2: I was probably more in than out, but I was not one.

00:37:31
Speaker 1: Of the truthers out there, you know with Harvey, where they were just like all about him and stuff because you had the age profile. But one of the comps that I had that the model spit out for him was Chase Brown to give that the like we was seeing the Chase Brown upside con or the the upside hit at this point.

00:37:45
Speaker 2: But where did where did R. J. Harvey stand?

00:37:48
Speaker 3: I loved R J. Harvey. Yards created. Loved R J. Harvey. Five point seven yards created. P attempt is elite. We were talking about Kareem Hunt, Alvin Kamara, two players that Yards created identify that's around the range that those guys were at. Kamarrow was at five to eight, Hunt just a little bit below at five to four. Harvey's awesome man dealt with a horrific offensive line. The interior of UCF's offensive line was so bad, man Like, there were so many plays where he would have to stop his feet behind the line of scrimmage and make somebody miss and he did it all the time. The interior of that line is terrible at mals On. It's a zone running game, so Harvey was constantly having to kind of redirect to find the way the zone was supposed to go. And he has just got some freak physical traits man shows in the arts created numbers, shows in the mistackle force numbers, and now he lands in this like perfect spot, like Sean Payton run game super productive. Yeah, I'm not surprised he didn't pop in your zap model simply because of the production. I did want to talk to you about. We were talking about early declares in age, like how much should we be adjusting for? This seems to be a running theme every year, Marshaun Lloyd Trade Benson last year, these guys tear the racls as freshman all the time. Yeah, like should we be adjusting for that? You know what I mean? Yeah? Yeah, No.

00:39:12
Speaker 1: If I had a database of all that stuff, I would I would easily look into it and like and like try to see you know, like when people ask questions like that, you know, because I get questions like that often, It's like my response is always like, if I had the data of course I would.

00:39:25
Speaker 2: I would look into it.

00:39:26
Speaker 1: You know, it's just it's not something that's been high on the priority list to go and sift because that's so much data.

00:39:31
Speaker 2: Entry type stuff you would then have to do.

00:39:33
Speaker 1: But that's the thing, This is what I was talking about at the top with nuance with data.

00:39:37
Speaker 3: R J.

00:39:38
Speaker 1: Harvey is a great example of that where if you look at his journey, so obviously he's over what he's over twenty four. You know, he's an older back, played a lot in college. But if you look at his journey, he started as a quarterback, right, and then he switches to running back, and then he tears his acl right and so like he's already two or three years behind just based on that alone, And so it's not that surprising that late career production happened with Harvey versus you know, some other running back that and it was similar like last year, I really liked Tyrone Tracy.

00:40:08
Speaker 2: Tyrone Tracy was an older.

00:40:09
Speaker 1: Prospect as well, but he played wide receiver, so he you know, he he obviously played a lot more in common. And there was also the pandemic stuff that that threw things off. It's finally not throwing things off as much as it did that in that like two year period with guys coming out, but like even that added an extra year to a lot of these guys' profiles. I'll say overall, like generally speaking, age matters, Like generally speaking, you want younger running backs versus older running backs. But it's not everything, right and if you have a story to tell, which is why I love doing the profiles and the prospect guid every year because I can break down and really like dig into each of these guys and like see why certain things were happening, and like you know why they transferred or you know if they played another position beforehand, Like all that stuff is important to put that puzzle together.

00:40:55
Speaker 3: Right.

00:40:55
Speaker 1: So with Harvey, the model, part of the reason that the model isn't it doesn't hate them, but it did.

00:41:00
Speaker 2: It did group him as a higher risk player. It wasn't so much the age per se.

00:41:04
Speaker 1: It was also there is signal between NFL mock draft data and where the guy actually gets drafted at running back. I merged the two so ninety percent of their draft capital score goes to their actual draft capital and ten percent of it goes to where they were projected to get drafted, right, because that's a whole other set of people that are putting their eyes on. And then at wide receiver, it's more so I'm worried about the reaches only like the guys who you know, ended up ended up going like a you know, Isaac Tesla or something like that person that came to mind, you know, the guys who like those guys have not like they get dinged in the model. Doesn't mean I'm I'm gonna fade them, because Pat Bryant was one that I'm actually not fading.

00:41:43
Speaker 2: And he you know, was projected to go.

00:41:45
Speaker 1: Late and he still, you know again like the model gives him a ding and says, hey, red flag, like this isn't a good thing. But you have to compare all that to cost all the time, right, even Isaac Tesla, he's like a fourth round rookie pick. I don't care if anyone drafts Isaac Tesla because at day two wide receiver, who's going late in your rookie drafts.

00:42:02
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna say the difference would.

00:42:04
Speaker 1: Be if a guy like Tesla or Bryant were like one two turn guys, you know, like that's when we adjust our stance and we say, hey, this is a really really big red flag, and I'd be shouting from the rooftops, you know, don't draft these guys. But when it comes to the age stuff at running back, like, I'm more open than I think people would imagine based on the fact that it's an input in the model. You know, it is an input in the model. We haven't seen really like Tyrone Tracy since twenty eleven is the only running back that has given us anything of substance that's been that then entered the league like post twenty four years old, like after his twenty fourth birthday. And so you know, I'm not saying that it can't happen for Harvey. I'm drafting Harvey, you know, and I love him in every format. But I do think that like you know, you can you can just kind of pile all of these different aspects up and create the story and see where it all lands at the.

00:42:50
Speaker 3: End of the day. Yeah, you know, Harvey is going to be an outlier for sure for a number of reasons, mainly because of his age. I do. I do think it's interesting though, like this debate of like okay, he was twenty three years old and balling out against nineteen year olds last year, Like that certainly has a little staying power to me. But do we really ding that against him, like you say, you know, he tears his acl he was a converted quarterback. He has two years. We have two years on him and the two years that we have you know this is senior and out whatever red shirts senior year. If those are your first two years ever playing running back after being a converted quarterback, it's impressive, dude, not just impressive like insane, like really freaking great. Yeah, offensive line like yeah, yeah, he's an outlier. Yeah, age matters for sure, But like at running back draft capital and give me the ball, and I mean, dude, heart like we're really concerned about Audric estimate, Like I like the estimate a little bit in the last year's week class, but these guys.

00:43:46
Speaker 2: Are on different planes as the thing that met with Harvey that gets me excited. And this is where I've really come around from.

00:43:54
Speaker 1: So like I rank my I do my rookie ranks literally the night the draft ends, then I send out the prospect guy, right, so my ranks don't change, like like they're my immediate reaction. I'm not looking out what the markets doing or anything like that, And my stance was kind of like, I like, I didn't you know, the model didn't mind Caleb Johnson, And I could see the vision of twenty twenty six with Caleb Johnson if he does have a decent season in twenty twenty five. We know that this team historically has actually used belcows, and I know that they haven't in recent years. But Jalen Warren could be gone next year, and if Caleb Johnson has a good year this year, that's the long term play. But if you want the immediate production, it was Harvey. So I just grouped them in the same tier, right. But the more that the sort of like the month has gone on since the draft, the more I've I've sort of swapped, and I now have Harvey ahead of Johnson in my dynasty rank is same tier still, but like ahead of Johnson. I flip flopped that mostly because I see the vision for this year one going very very favorably for him versus Johnson. There might be more growing pains, so like, long term, I can still see Johnson being the better like producer, what have you. But I'm also playing the market a bit and I'm also playing this idea of like, I care deeply about how well these guys get off in their careers.

00:45:09
Speaker 2: And with r J.

00:45:10
Speaker 1: Harvey, and I want to ask you this. With him, his receiving profile was fine. It wasn't elite, it wasn't bad. It was fine. And when you look at this backfield, though adrec est May we know is not a pass catcher. He didn't he didn't catch past that Notre Dame. He didn't catch passes last year, like five targets last year. Julia McLoughlin is I think typecasted as that guy. But he's only seen like a seven to eight percent target share max in his first two seasons. You know, with Denver and so who is going to catch passes in that backfield this year? Maybe maybe they really are are playing this, playing a game with us all, and they're gonna use like Blake Watson or something like that, and they're gonna or Tyler Badet is just gonna who I actually.

00:45:50
Speaker 2: Did like coming out. I like both of those guys coming up.

00:45:53
Speaker 1: But you know, maybe they use those guys in that role. But it just seems obvious that R. J. Harvey is gonna catch a lot of passes.

00:45:59
Speaker 2: And so doing that analysis more, thinking through it more, I become way more pro RJ. Harvey than I expected to be.

00:46:08
Speaker 3: Just think about the Sean Payton offense and what it's crazy, dude, It's a it's a West Coast offense design reads, lots of screens, nicks. Obviously, at the end of last season in particular, he really started stretching the field a lot better. You saw the deep throws start, you know, kind of coming into this offense, it will be it will be a lot of checkdowns and a lot of screens. And when I think of these guys, like, Okay, maybe RJ Harvey isn't Christian McCaffrey out there just chopping you know, ankles and half on angle routes and underneath routes. However, can he explode in the open field? Can he forced you know, mistackles in tight spaces and off of screens? Absolutely yes. And yeah, you know, the the Malason offense that he was just in at UCF, it's I mean, it's it's a mouse fund offense, you know what I mean. Like, it's a lot of inside zone, a lot of play action. There's just a not a whole lot of like you know, downfield routes for Harvey. So that being said, like maybe, you know, we really shouldn't be holding some of the college receiving production against some of these guys when they simply weren't asked to do it, you know what I mean.

00:47:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, I look at the receiving stuff too as more of like who has like a glaring red flag, Like Phil MafA has a glaring red flag.

00:47:27
Speaker 2: Okay, like like like MafA is someone.

00:47:30
Speaker 1: But then if there's someone who has like an elite receiving profile, I'll also say, oh wow, this guy is very very interesting as a receiver. Maybe he could do even more than what people are projecting. Or you know, like a CMC you know had had has one of those profiles.

00:47:43
Speaker 2: I actually think that, like like in my model at least, like Jayden Blue actually had a really good receiving profile as well.

00:47:49
Speaker 1: And so Harvey's more in that bucket of like fine, and if you're just gonna get some of those simple routes anyway, then that's and that's all we care about in fantasy.

00:47:56
Speaker 2: We're just trying to gobble up receptions at the end of the day, you know, so he can get those.

00:48:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. I mean we don't some of the you know, the very few running backs get legitimate like first red targets like right right, Like it just does not happen so really to me when I look at college, you know, in terms of projecting out college running backs and how they'll produce as receivers, it really kind of does come down to, like her, are you good in the open field? Like are you good at forcing the tackles? Like what part of your game in terms of the forcing those miss tackles? Like does that translate to the NFL? And with RJ. Harvey, it's very clear it will.

00:48:33
Speaker 1: Let's talk about base shall tutan because at the beginning of the off season every year when I start my prospecting works, this is like late January, end of February, I do an episode on running backs and wide receivers who produce like studs in college. And it's just based on some of the metrics that this app model looks at and I just dig through and I say, Okay, these are the guys who hit thresholds that other successful players at their position hit when they were in college. And one of the surprises out of that was that base shall Tutan looked great from a production standpoint, and at the time there wasn't that much Like I didn't even know how to pronounce his name because I hadn't heard anyone really talking about him. And so, you know, I talked about Tooton on that show, and he's kind of been, you know, one of my like go tos at the running back position. And then obviously the combine happens. He blows up there with his like one eighteen speed score. He gets decent enough draft capital.

00:49:21
Speaker 2: I think some people thought that he would even go Day two, where does Yards Created have have Tuton?

00:49:27
Speaker 3: Man? I love base show too. There we go. It is so hard not to five point three yards Created pert tempt third best in this class, Janet Harvey touton are one two three, So he'd beat out Omari and Hampton by Hair Hampton obviously a little more volume. Virginia Tech's offensive line and just the team as a whole, Like they were really bad, man, Like their offensive line was super inconsistent. There'd be plays where you know, he'd have perfect blocking and then run three or four plays where they're just getting destroyed. Virginia Tech was just a bad teamlast year. Too man like game. Game script matters in the NFL. It also matters in the NFL or in college for getting carries, like they were just getting destroyed some games. There were six and seven last year, so that's why we saw Twoton. You know, only have only scare quotes have one hundred and eighty carries last year with tut I think the one thing that I come back to is like a potential red flag just in terms of watching his tape. He is an outside zone runner for sure. I think there are plays where he would drift too far on like that zone blocking wave and he kind of let his eyes get ahead of his feet. If he can slow down some of the processing stuff and clean up the fumbles, I know he fumbled of course on the first day of right I had five fumbles for him last year. Three of them were lost. That is a problem, but you see the clear upside in the yard's created numbers. I love hearing that the Zapp model liked him, especially because he had twenty three receptions. Man he was he was clutch. Yeah, he was clustered from a score perspective. He was with Caleb Johnson and R. J. Harvey in the ZAP model. Okay, Yeah, and it's the same thing, man, Like, same thing we were talking about with Hanson, like just wasn't really asked to run a you know, robust route trees honestly the same things as Harvey, like lots of just lots of flat routes, lots of spacing routes, and those plays just typically don't produce yards. You know, if you've got if you've got a flat route where you're the fourth read in a play and the defender is like already on your ass, Like, yeah, it's just hard. It's extremely hard. Can we talk real quickly about tooting in this draft capitol because sure, okay, So he was the second pick of Day.

00:51:35
Speaker 2: Three, right, one oh four, Yeah.

00:51:38
Speaker 3: Caleb Johnson went fifteen picks ahead of him, right, and yeah, there's a little difference in terms of the hit rate. If you look at that, you like you've been players by that, but it's a fifteen pick difference, you know what I mean. Like, I don't care you really beholding that against him.

00:51:52
Speaker 2: I don't care that much.

00:51:53
Speaker 1: I I so when I when I talk about draft, because I like even have done episodes, I'm like talking about how like you know, Day one day two, Day three backs and kind of grouping them that way. I think people need to understand, and I've said it before on the show, but people need to understand that that's me trying to make it more consumable for people to kind of like conceptually immediately understand in the model itself. Like in my in this app model, it's looking at pure raw draft capital. Well it's look at draft capital and then ten percent you know, the mod draft stuff.

00:52:21
Speaker 2: But it's all and it's not linear.

00:52:23
Speaker 1: It's based on history and stuff like that, but it's not a linear number that it's looking at.

00:52:27
Speaker 2: But you know, I don't want people to think, oh, now.

00:52:29
Speaker 1: It's day three, therefore the first pick on day three is substantially or is the same as the one hundredths pick on day three. It's not like it's it's not the same at all. So like that's part of the reason why.

00:52:40
Speaker 2: Tutin looks still really decent in the model, and I think that you can almost take advantage of that in rookie drafts and in the market in general. Is because people are labeling him a day three pick, which he is. But there's a very big difference between where Tutin got drafted and where Kyle Manungai got drafted. You know, like like people like Tutin is very much more from a draft capital score PERC perspective, closer to Caleb Johnson than he is, you know, a guy who went like the sixth or seventh round. Yeah.

00:53:05
Speaker 3: I just I think it's interesting hearing and seeing some of the market, like on Underdog specifically. You know, Caleb Johnson is going in the seventies, which is a fair price, good price. You know. Tutan's obviously got a little more backfield competition with ETN and Bigsby. I get that, but like in terms of the capital, they're essentially like kind of the same bets. Like yeah, I always yeah, same bit different Yeah. I always say, like late day two and early day three running backs, they're like plus four hundred bets, you know what I mean.

00:53:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, if.

00:53:35
Speaker 3: You're a better you know what I mean, it's like four to one. I just like the odds with Tutin though, I like the four to one odds.

00:53:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, I look, I love them, like I am very much into Tutin. I love just like I mean, the Jacksonville backfield is a perfect ambiguous back for the stuff that I've researched for so long, like this is the this is a I mean Pittsburgh is too, but like, you know, the offense in Jacksonville should be elevated this year. You should be throwing darts. I don't even think it's just throw darts at Tuton. I think Tuton is a good bet, sure, but still throw darts at the other guys too, because especially from a best ball perspective, because you never know what will end up happening.

00:54:10
Speaker 3: I mean, Tank Bigsby outplayed Traves ETM last year on the fifth year of an expiring rookie contract with a new coach, new GM, like Tuton's chances of being He's not gonna be the week one starter, but week eight starter, Like that's when it matters. Yeah.

00:54:24
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And I think I think Tutin pairs really well with Bigsby. If we're thinking leet term two, you know, you get more of that slasher with Tutin. It's like it's like a Kenneth Walker zach Scharbonnet situation where Walker is that like true slasher. Actually Walker was a analytical compor Tutin in the ZAP model. Not to say that they're the same kind of like exact same player, but both of those like they're both It's funny because they're both like home run hitting backs with the same size profile, same speed type profile. Uh, you know, Walker more prolific obviously and better, but like it's it's that kind of archetype that were in my opinion, that we could be looking at with Tutin. And so I see the similarities, you know, with with like what Seattle has done.

00:55:05
Speaker 2: And obviously Walker's been.

00:55:06
Speaker 1: The guy that's won out, you know, in Seattle, and so maybe Touton could be the guy that wins out in Jacksonville.

00:55:12
Speaker 3: You and I see this the same way. I have the same vision of like this will be Tuton and Bigsby. Bigsby kind of gives them that like in between the tackles. He was good in between the tackles and grinding, Like, yeah, that's what we all thought he could be coming out. He was much better at that last year. Yeah, And you know ETN and Tuton kind of have that like a little bit of similar skill.

00:55:31
Speaker 1: Set them in space kind of guys and let them let them do their thing. Yeah, and like ETM might be fine in twenty twenty five, it's more so I'm thinking more. You know, once he's he's almost definitely gone next year. Having that two headed backfield really makes a lot of sense. All right, Let's talk quinnch On Judkins, because he had a lot of receiving red flags in the ZAP model, he got boosted a little bit by teammate scorer. You know, he actually had okay enough teammates. You know, he played like Zach Evans and stuff before he transferred to Ohio State. But then obviously he plays with Travon last year. But he had some receiving red flags, and that that, you know, has me probably more like in line with ADP, maybe slightly lower in terms of like where people were drafting him. How does yards created see seed Judkins, because this is a player who hypothetically would be boosted in a model like this app model by rushing more than receiving.

00:56:18
Speaker 2: But I'm not looking at the rushing stuff.

00:56:20
Speaker 3: Right Henderson is certainly the better pass catcher and player in the past game right now, But Henderson Judkins is a better running back. Beat them by yards created and misstech miss tackles forced per carry. Judkins is my style of running back, man like I just will always love these types of running backs who are extremely physical and have that really really good like one cut ability. Judkins is just constantly getting you know, turning two yards into four and five yarders, and that's like just stuff we see all the time with starting running backs in the NFL. It's like those unsexy runs that you know, generate the extra couple of yards. Yeah. I could certainly see how Judkins relative, especially relative to Trevion Henderson. His explosiveness, like didn't look as good as a receiver. He's not as good as a past protector as Henderson either. So I have them ranked back to back. I have Judkins at four, Henderson at five, and it's basically like, hey, the big difference here is like, I think Judkins is a slightly better running back right now. Henderson, though, has more upsides simply because of the receiving profile.

00:57:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let's talk about I want to talk about Caleb Johnson because the model definitely likes him. Camped him to Le'Veon and James Connor, which was hilarious because he then goes to Pittsburgh. It's look, at the end of the day, it's the most Pittsburgh Steelers running back of all time. Yeah, and the fit to me seems pretty perfect with Arthur Smith in the scheme that he runs. But are you see are you hesitating at all with Johnson because he seems like a player who is like maybe he's just above average rather than elite or great.

00:57:57
Speaker 3: I'm pretty concerned about Caleb Johnson. I think he's slight overdrafted right now. Four point one yards created per attempt puts him in the twenty third percentile all time since twenty sixteen. Yeah, it places him what ninth in this class. He's slightly behind Jaden Blue and Jarquois Hunter obviously blew way fewer carries Caleb Johnson. I mean, he's like a he's a professional runner in the sense that he always gets what's blocked, Like there were very few plays where he was out of position. But he greatly benefited from Iowa's offensive line. They have an awesome offensive line, especially on the interior. But it's not just that. You know, they were the I think the fourth or fifth most run heavy team in college football last year if you adjust for games script, they were basically number one and run rate, and it was for a reason they were mauling upfront, and they this offense. Man, they just did if you want, like teach tape on how to use receivers in motion and use receivers to deceive a defense. Just flick on Iowa last year. Man like that. They were moving guys off the ball constantly, confusing the defense and it just opened up some humongous lanes for Johnson. And to his credit, he always got to the right spot. But then I look at it, It's like, Okay, he had this great system, he had this great scheme. Okay, his yards blocked numbers are really high. Like IWA was, offensive line opened up two point five yards block per carry. That's second best in the class. It's one of the best scores I've ever had in my database. Okay, is he elusive And the answer is no. Zero point two eight missed tackles forced per carry is very subpar. And it's kind of like the Omar and Hampton corollary, but in the sense of Hampton's just way more, way better at the power speed game than Powerful. Yeah. Yeah, I mean Johnson's mistackled number or in the thirtieth percentile since twenty sixteen. Hampton's and like nearly ninetieth percentile. But I'm with you. I say all of this, the Yard's creative profile is a little concerning. It's just kind of mid. But man, it's a perfect spot. Like Jayleen Wawren is, you know, he's on a one year deal as a restrictive free agent, and you said it's the most dealers pick of all time. It is like he's going to be their early down running back. He's going to get the goal line carries. We don't think this offense is going to be very good, but like that role for fantasy is incredibly valuable, and these guys just form a very nice complimentary duo between Johnson and warn. Yeah.

01:00:24
Speaker 1: I like to do all a lot, And like I said, I think that there's at least that like potential belcow upside, you know, entering year two. Whereas I do think that, you know, going back to like Harvey or something, we know that Sean Payton will still likely split his backfield, but we know that those those touches are just gonna be so much more valuable at the end of the day, you know, from a fantasy perspective. All right, before I let you go, I need to hear about Jarquois Hunter, Jaden Blue, and Cam Skataboo because Jarquois Hunter was my go to day three sleeper when I would go on podcasts and stuff before the draft, and the model loves him Jayden blew the I don't really likes him surprisingly, even though size is an input and he's.

01:01:03
Speaker 2: Obviously on the smaller side.

01:01:04
Speaker 1: And then Camp Scataboo because of his adjusted forty time at pro for it being a pro day, he got dinged a little bit from a speed score perspective, so he's kind of looks neutral in the model at this point.

01:01:17
Speaker 2: But just give your you know, quick take on those three guys, you know, before we end things here.

01:01:22
Speaker 3: Skataboo will probably be a little longer, real quick.

01:01:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, do what you gotta do.

01:01:27
Speaker 3: Three point nine yards created per carry, eighteenth percentile. The mistackle force numbers weren't that great. I just saw a lot of plays where he basically got caught behind, you know, either but from behind or from the side, and those really stood out to me, like he's just going to get tackled very easily at the NFL. I think I'm still betting on Tyrone Tracy. You mentioned early in the show Tracey's yards created numbers and mistackle numbers were just significantly better. You know, Skataboo is he's a pretty good pass cutcher, surehands, very competitive in pass protection. So it's gonna be interesting to see, like if he can kind of I think he actually might form a role in passing downs and not as a runner. The Scoataboo I ranked him tenth in the class Man, like, this is a really good group. I actually ranked him behind Hunter and Jaden Blue. And I love hearing that Jayden Blue pop in the zapp model.

01:02:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, talk to me, talk to me about Blue man.

01:02:23
Speaker 3: I got to hear that. Yeah, yeah, all right. So I went back and look, there's twelve running backs that have averaged at least four yards created and forced at least zero point three miss tackles fir stper carry, and for what it's worth, those are like thirty fifth percentile. Ish, It's like, you're decent. You're not a good prospect, you're decent. So then I bend those guys with the guys that had more than three hundred and fifty receiving yards in their final college season. I got this list. I got Jayden Blue, Omarion Hampton, Zach Moss, Alvin Kamara, Kareem Hunt, Bucky Irving, Najee Harris, ce H Wampom, Dalvin Cook, Joe Mixon, Travis Dedien, and Saquon freaking Bark. Wow, that's it. That's my list. I think he could have potentially not just had like what he had, like three hundred and seventy receiving yards. I think he could have had like four hundred and fifty equent of yours were good, like maybe five hundred. There were a number of plays where Blue would just dude, he would immediately get separation underneath like angle routes, wheel routes, like legitimate, like hey, we're asking you like not only to get on top of this linebacker, but like you got to get open. And he was gaining one, two, three steps of separation on those routes. And then you mix on the fact that he's a pretty good runner and he was behind you know, Bijon, he was behind Roseean, right behind Jonathan Brooks. It's like, okay, like I can tell myself a story here. And then he gets drafted by Ballast and he has decent draft capital. Jen Blue is my RB seven in this class. I have him a head of Caleb Johnson, and that might be bold. It's it's it's a bet on the receiving profile though. Yeah, Jarques Hunter love hearing that you loved him as a sleeper man. I'm this is one of my big bets this year that he beats out Blake Korum.

01:04:07
Speaker 2: Yeah.

01:04:07
Speaker 3: Hunter's four point four yards created per carry is literally a full yard better than Blake Korum Korm's yards created profile. It was really bad last year, Like, I caught a bunch of hate when I when I produced, when I put out my numbers on Korum, a lot of Michigan bros were pissed. Yeah, but Hunter is just objectively a better running back. And you look at the draft capitol. I mean Hunter went at one seventeen, Korm won at eighty seven. We just have a whole debate about you, Caleb Johnson versus base Shial Twoton, and it's like, you know, it's only thirty picks. Difference doesn't really concern me that much. Hunter man. I mean, he's he's got that sustaining ability to handle volume on the inside and he's got some big play upside. You know, yards created for uh certainly shows.

01:04:51
Speaker 1: That I think Hunter's really, to me, super attractive in this offense because this offense lacks that explosion like you know Kyen Williams has done when he's done unsure, but he's not an explosive back, you know, He's just he's a very solid back.

01:05:03
Speaker 2: You can do a lot, but he's not that explosive of a back.

01:05:05
Speaker 1: And Jarquis Hunter tested really well, you know, to me, looks looks like he could play that role and beat and be that kind of guy. I know that he's gained some steam, but it's like it's logical at the end of the day in my opinion as to why he would be, you know, ranked where he's being ranked.

01:05:20
Speaker 3: That's I'm with you on that. It It passes all of my sniff test, you know. Yeah, the yards created it was was pretty good. And he's better than Quorum and he's cheat man like he like you said, he's coming up in in best Ball. But you know, we were drafting, not me, but everybody was drafting Quorum in the second round of rookie drafts last year. But Jarkis Hunter is a fourth rounder?

01:05:41
Speaker 2: Yeah right, what right?

01:05:43
Speaker 3: Why what are we doing? Like what did Blake Korum do? Last season to you know, keep that job like he you know, he never got on the field. I am concerned JJ though that like Hunter is somebody that we like, he's a sleeper, but like he's not Kiren Williams.

01:05:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, like he's literally they like the sun physically physically, just not Kyen Williams and doesn't have the attitude of Kyroeni. Yeah, all of that one hundred percent.

01:06:07
Speaker 1: Like Kyen being a free agent next year, you know if he doesn't sign a contract. I mean that's where the Hunter stuff is just very very intriguing. Like I'm still expecting year one to be or sorry year one for Hunter, but this year to be a Kien Williams year for the most part, you know.

01:06:23
Speaker 2: Like I think that's at least what the the expectation would be.

01:06:26
Speaker 1: But I do think there's a chance that Kien maybe dips in Rush are by like ten percent, and you know, they mix in these guys a little bit more and like the other thing too. And I say this all the time, but like that McVeigh tree and the Rams in general, they I think they they drafted Blake Korum wanting more of that duplicate of Kien Williams because they like to rotate by drive as opposed to down and distance in those offenses. And so you know, you could do a two drive on one drive off for Kien.

01:06:52
Speaker 2: And mix in Blake Korum.

01:06:53
Speaker 1: But I just don't think that Korum was able to just do that, Like I don't think he was. I don't want to say good enough because we don't know four sure, but maybe that was the case. And then he gets hurt obviously, and that hurt things as well.

01:07:04
Speaker 2: But like, I think they had the same vision with Jarquist Hunter, like they it's another smaller not like totally shouldn't say smaller. He's like to four or something, but he's not you know an Amarion Hampton.

01:07:13
Speaker 1: He's had two fifteen plus, And I think they have this idea with the guy like Hunter where they can mix him in, see what happens, and what if they mix him in.

01:07:20
Speaker 2: And like he's really really good, you know, then then what happens?

01:07:24
Speaker 3: I think I think you're right. I think that was the plan with Kiren last year, as they wanted to do, like you said, the draw, you know, split drives. Mccorm is just he's not good, like I'll say it, like he's not good.

01:07:34
Speaker 2: I'll let you say.

01:07:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, like Jarquis Hunter is a better prospect and he is like the top target for me in the fourth round, like I would if I have a few teams where I'm like dead at running back. Yeah, I've been moving. I've been trying to move up in like the late third round, just to get them, I will say, real quick to put a bow on it. Like you know Klin Williams had some fumble issues last year. Yeah, sure, he's not explosive runner, but like Sean McVay, will give him all the goal line carry as long as he keeps doing it. Yes, And I saw that. I saw a couple of weeks ago from Cam Disilva, one of the Rams beat writers. He was saying that, you know, they're talking about extending Kiren. So we've been talking till we're blue in the faces fantasy analyst about Korum, about Hunter, Why they're going to replace Karen. Dude, it's just gonna be Kiren fourteen, you know, fourteen goal one touchdowns every single year. Yeah.

01:08:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, look but at the very least, you know, Hunter can be the the top handcuff, you know, at the very least.

01:08:26
Speaker 3: I think I think he's significantly underpriced on that alone.

01:08:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, Graham, this was awesome. People are going to really dig it. Let every know where they can find your stuff. What you guys are doing at Fantasy Points, all that good stuff for sure.

01:08:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, all of my articles everything Fantasy points dot com. Yard's created a breakdown has been up for a few weeks. It's free on the site right now. Go check it out. Yeah, man, We've just got a ton of stuff coming this summer. Ryan Heath and I are live every week doing Best Ball Breakdown. We're best Ball bros, just like you. Man. We got to get you on the show.

01:08:58
Speaker 2: Love it.

01:08:58
Speaker 3: We'll get you on the show at some point this I'm you know, Ryan and I are on our YouTube channel every week, you know, talking Best Ball. And then then we've just got it's June. You know, a ton of fantasy articles coming out. Yeah, check out my Twitter feed at Grand bar Field. I tweet out all of my articles still even though Twitter hates it. But yeah, man, this was great, great catching up with you. This is a fun running back class. Yes, just to put a bow on the show, I think so. I originally thought that a few of these guys, like we talked about too, and I thought Caleb Johnson would go a little earlier too. It's not the twenty seventeen class, yeah, but at the top it's it's pretty close. Like it's not as deep as the seventeen class, but those top four that we were talking about are on par with that seventeen class. Yeah, maybe the depth isn't is good, But I'm curious, is what you think?

01:09:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, the seventeen class also got worst draft capital. I think people remember like it wasn't It wasn't like it was an unbel like there were other draft classes depending on how you you know, label draft capital, of course, but like twenty twenty I think it was better draft capital than the twenty seventeen one.

01:10:02
Speaker 2: It's just that so many dudes ended up hitting.

01:10:04
Speaker 1: Like you had, you know, Alvin Kamara in that class, and you had you know, Kareem hunting, like there's just dudes, and then you had multiple Day three hits, which is not you we usually see like one one maybe too, but you had like three of them or so like hit or at least if you want to throw, Like I think James Connor was in that too, but like he was technically Day two, but he was late day two. Yeah, I mean like I see it as well, Like the in the Prospect model, in the zapp model, a lot of guys had what are dubbed low risk profiles, which means the model like them more than where their draft capital was, and and that's that's big. I mean, those are guys that generally hit, you know, at a higher rate.

01:10:40
Speaker 3: Hell yeah, yeah, yeah, I love it. This is definitely one of the best running back classes I've charted, and I'm glad your numbers kind of backed that up too.

01:10:47
Speaker 2: Yeah.

01:10:48
Speaker 1: Man, of course, you guys can check my stuff out over on lateround dot com. Make sure you are purchasing the Prospect Guide, which I've referenced a lot on the show, that's still for sale, and then pre order the Late Round Draft as well. That's my game theory heavy, you know, drafts, a season long guide where I'm digging into a DP trends and all that fun stuff.

01:11:07
Speaker 2: Been working on that a lot over the last few weeks. But that'll be out on July first. Pre order it before the price goes up on July first. Otherwise, everyone, thanks for tuning in.