964: Mailbag 12/20/24

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Speaker 1: This is the last with your host JJ Zachertha j J zacher reefon what's up everyone. It's JJ zacharyesin in this episode nine hundred and sixty four of the Late Round Fantasy football podcast sponsored by Underdog. Thanks for tuning in before getting the mailback questions this week, I want to make sure you're checking out Underdog. If your fantasy football season's over, or if you just want some more action, head to Underdog right now. You can draft teams for playoff contests and you don't need a huge bankroll to play. There's the Mitten, for instance. You can join that right now for just five dollars an entry. If you haven't played yet at Underdog, make sure you use promo code Late Round when you sign up. That'll get you a nice deposit offer once you get going. That's Underdog Fantasy dot Com promo code Late Round. The firsts this week is an email says hey, JJ, so I took Kyler Murray and Marvin Harrison Junior and many of my fantasy leagues this year. I took my shot on the athletic ability of Marvin Harrison and saw how he could get a majority of target share in that offense, and Kyler Murray when he's healthy, has put up great numbers in the past and had what I thought would be a safe floor due to his rushing ability. I even made the playoffs in all of those leagues despite Kyler and Marv feeling more like an obstacle to overcome. Can you break down from a statistical point of view, what went wrong and why Kyler Murray and Marvin Harrison got me eliminated for my playoffs? Was I wrong to take my shot on these players from the start or is there something that is intangible for why this duo was by all accounts a bust for fantasy football. Hope this ranting email makes sense. Thanks for all the work you do, Eric Now number one, you got eliminated from the playoffs because they had bad games in Week fifteen. Sometimes that happens. A lot of people made the playoffs with Saquon Barkley Derek Henry this past week they got eliminated. That's why by weeks are so important. But look, I talked about Marvin Harrison Junior on the ten Trends episode and how even though he's a rookie and our expectations are lower for rookies based on how good he was as a prospect, his points per game numbers were expected to be higher. Like, forget his ADP, just look at his prospect profile. He should have been better this year. Now, I can't say that he was like a value during draft time. I took him at times, but he wasn't something I was actively targeting this year. I actually wrote a newsletter before the NFL Draft talking about how the difference between Marvin Harrison and Malik Neighbors ADP and early best ball drafts. It didn't make any sense because Neighbors was just as good of a prospect. But to me, I think the bottom line is that they're not getting very creative with Marvin Harrison junior. They don't move him around the formation much at all. You could very, very easily argue that no rookie wide receiver this season has been asked to do more than Marvin Harrison. But I think he's part of the blame too. He hasn't totally looked the part yet, and I stressed the word yet. I still think it's in there. It just isn't in there. During his twenty twenty four campaign. Now, with Kyler, I was actively telling you to draft him this year, and that was an l The statistic I kept going back to was about quarterbacks who average over five points per game with their legs via rushing. Those guys had really really good hit rates historically, like really good. Kyler's right at the cusp of that mark. He's averaging four point nine to six points per game with his legs this year, so he pretty much got there, albeit barely. But that was also the problem that was misleading analysis. I made too many assumptions about what his improvement might look like from twenty twenty three to twenty twenty four on the ground, like last year, coming off a bad knee injury, he averaged five point three points per game via rushing, assuming he'd get there and get beyond. That was clear mistake. And when the player you're analyzing, when his numbers are sort of on the lower bound for some analysis that you're doing, you better hope that the assumption that you're making is correct or else it can go south, which is exactly what happened with Kyler Murray. I then made the assumption that his passing numbers would be better, because you know Marvin Harrison Junior and his yards per attend has actually increased the year over year, but his touchdown rate has not gotten any better. It's just three and a half percent. He hasn't been above the four percent touchdown rate mark since twenty twenty one, and that's a problem for fantasy purposes because touchdowns drive quarterback scoring. Just look at Baker Mayfield. But let me be very clear here, at the quarterback position, we should be striving for high upside, high ceiling players, and I can argue all day long that Kyler was that kind of player. Entering the year, he'd given us rushing points per game numbers in his history that were well above that five mark. I mean, he scored eleven rushing touchdowns in twenty twenty on a points per game basis. Kyler had never finished outside of QB one territory. Add in Marvin Harrison Junior, and there was an obvious ceiling. He just hasn't played well enough. The offense isn't nearly as good as I thought it would be, or at least there was a chance that it was going to be really good. They're below average and total offensive touchdowns scored. They've got almost a fifty percent pass to rush touchdown rate too, So they not only have just underperformed and scoring touchdowns, but when they've scored, it's generally helped someone like James Connor more not the pass catchers and not Kyler Murray. Those little things add up a lot, a slightly better touchdown rate, a couple more rushing touchdowns, and then all of a sudden, we're probably viewing this fantasy season from Kyler Murray a little bit differently. So I don't think the process was necessarily horrible for either guy, especially Kyler Murray. It obviously depends on where you drafted them, but there were reasons to like them with an emphasis on Kyler here. The piece about making assumptions, at least on my end, is one that I can carry over into other seasons though, And by the way, this kind of analysis, I'm gonna be doing it in January when I talk about the things that I got wrong. You can't get better as a player or me as an analyst without holding yourself accountable and seeing if what you did wrong was actually bad process. I'll surely be talking about Kyler Murray again on that show, but I just wanted to let you know this is just the tip of the Iceberg. This asked questions from Patreon and it's from Phil. It says, hey, JJ, to say I love the show is an understatement, thank you. I targeted backs and split backfields in all of my drafts, and I'm now in the semi finals in four of my five leagues. Earlier in the season it looked ineffective, and I remember thinking that this year may be a down year for that strategy, but it really around in the middle of the season for Chase Brown, Rico Dadell, and JK. Dobbins being strong plays. Do you anticipate split backfields being higher in average draft position next season as a result of the success this year? So I'm sure anyone listening to this right now already knows. But the idea of targeting ambiguous backfields has been the one that I've talked about for nearly a decade now, at least eight or so years, and the idea behind it, and this is back by math, but it's that we often find the best middle and late round running back values from running backs who are in projected split backfields, meaning entering the year, we don't know who the guy is gonna be in that backfield. To see the most touches. Now. There are a lot of iterations and things to look for when targeting these backfields, and I'll continue to talk about it in next year's draft guide. But the short answer to your question is no, I don't think this year will change anything. One of the keys with ambiguous backfields is patience. I talked about that a lot with Chase Brown earlier this season, because one of two things need to happen in order for one of the running backs and one of these backfields to break out. Either an injury needs to occur to that other running back or the one player just needs to perform better needs to be the obvious choice. In Chase Brown's case, both of those things happened, and fantasy football managers hate uncertainty. The common theme for finding value in your drafts every single year is uncertainty. Managers hate rookies, They hate the unknown. They'd rather draft a known commodity a running back in the middle rounds than an unknown one, which is why we actually see better hit rates from middle round running backs who don't have that much of a history versus middle round running backs who do. Because of a middle round running back like an RB three in fantasy football. If he has some long history in the NFL, you have to ask yourself, why is this guy being drafted as the RB thirty five right now? It's probably because he has improved going to be good enough to be an RB one or an RB two, Whereas if the player is a first year a second year guy, it's a little bit different. Now, every season is going to be different, and they're going to be all sorts of different backfields being drafted in the middle in late rounds. But year in and year out, average draft position always shows us that when there's uncertainty, there's value because fantasy football managers would rather take the player who's sitting alone in a backfield, a player who's projected and forecasted to be his team's RB one, over a player who's not. They'd rather take Zamir White or Ramandre Stevenson over a Bengals running back or one of the Titans running backs. But the running backs from those backfields usually have more upside. Now, look, the running back position this year was way different than most years. I'll be breaking that down on episodes hopefully in January. So this isn't me getting into that right now. This is me, just speaking on years of experience analyzing this stuff. Because fantasy managers dis uncertainty, we're probably gonna keep attacking this ambiguous backfield strategy. The best questions from Twitter is from at Seabold Dan five three six 't eighty one. It says I'm running into a juggernaut in the playoffs. What is the best way to introduce volatility into my lineup to give myself a chance? I was considering stacking Anthony Richardson and Josh Downs in case they hit on a big play. Yeah, I mean that's the right idea. Honestly, for those of you who have played DFS or still played DFS, it's the same attitude in those contests that you should carry into season long leagues. Some DFS contests have thousands of lineups, so you need more variance in volatility in order to stand out and hit a high score. And ways of doing that are team stacking and game stacking, specifically stacking a quarterback with one of his pass catchers. And there may be ways to counteract what your opponent's doing as well, whether it be making sure that you're not using a wide receiver when your opponent has that quarterback because of the wider either a scoring points or has a big game. The quarterback is at least getting some of that. But stacking is the easiest way to increase volatility. The one thing I do want to say about this, though, don't just look at the little win probability numbers that these different platforms give you to determine if you should do something like this, Like very rarely are you going to enter a game with like twenty percent odds to win. If it's sixty forty even sixty five to thirty five, that's not that dramatic of a win probability swing. One bad performance from one of their players is going to get you back to fifty to fifty. So try to be objective with how you're evaluating how much of an underdog you actually are. The sus question is from at second Diego Second. It says, who are some dented can players going into the next season, players whose perception has fallen to a point that they can be huge values in twenty twenty five redraft leagues and dynasty example for me is Tank Dell. So this is really just asking which plays have performed poorly or well below expectation this year? Who are still actually good players. And when I saw this question, there were two wide receivers that just popped into my head, Jalen Waddle and DK Metcalf. I think in both instances, the offenses are just kind of morphed and not played into what they can do best. Neither guy is making enough splash plays, and I think environment is impacting that just as much as the player himself. For Waddle, he's now banged up and that's always been a problem with him. But I have a hard time believing that a player who started his career with a yards per route run rate of one point seventy five than two point five to nine, then two point six y three, I have a hard time believing that that player is just total dust. And fortunately it's not like his per route run numbers have been dramatically worse than Tyreek Hills. The offense just is not generating explosive plays. Miami's third to last in the NFL this year, and passing yards generated on twenty plus air yard throws. Think about that. The only teams who are lower are the Giants who've had absolutely nothing at quarterback. In New England, who have had absolutely nothing at wide receiver. Those are the only two teams with fewer passing yards on twenty plus air yard throws. That's according to PFF data, and Wattle's shorter stuff is just going to Devon a Chan and John new Smith Moore this season when the Dolphins had consistently had really low tight end target shaars under Mike McDaniel. Now, maybe that stays consistent in the future, but I think the team's poorer offensive line is catching up to them a little bit. Now. I don't think Wattle's just blameless here, but when I watch him when he's healthy, I'm not seeing a player who just all of a sudden got bad at the game. The Dolphins went through a whole lot in twenty twenty four, and that impacted the entire offensive efficiency. Wattlesa dot is at a three year low. His target shair took a massive hit with how they're using John new Smith again, maybe that continues, but Wattle's been too talented to think that he's a sixteen percent target share player now with DK metcalf I said it before on the podcast, I think that right now the Seattle offense is just incapable of consistently getting the ball down the field. Their offensive line is probably a bottom three unit right now, and since DK Metcalf returned from injury in Week eleven, so over the last five games, they're just not getting it done down the field. Metcalf has a slightly lower target share, but his a dot has gone from fourteen point four before the injury to twelve point eight after. Pre injury, Metcalf was averaging three point four targets per game that traveled fifteen or more air yards. He scored three times on those throws, and he was averaging forty seven yards per game on those types of throws. Since returning from his injury, so since Week eleven, Metcalf has seen his deep targets per game dropped from three point four to two point zero. He's seen his yards on those plays get cut almost in half, and he hasn't scored a touchdown on one of those throws. The team has relied more on JSN almost out of necessity. Now, JSN is really good, but this situation, the offensive line, the way the offensive line's playing, it's really helped JSN become what he's become in fantasy. The offensive line is not doing their job. So just like Jalen Waddle. I'm not sure DK Metcalf just isn't DK Metcalf anymore. I think there are reasons as to why we're seeing what we're seeing in the stat sheet. He's just not connecting right now, and he's not seeing the types of targets that really make him an attractive fantasy option. Now. I'm sure there are others out there, but I figured i'd talk about the two that popped into my head immediately. I have no idea if I'm going to be high or low on them versus the consensus in both Redraft and Dynasty, but I do think that there will be people out there who unfairly critique them for things that they just can't control. The last question this week is from Twitter's from at Ivancito. It says it's been the season of JJ's this year, Justin Jajefferson, Juwan Jennings, Jerry Judy. Would you say you've been living up to your name as well? How would you rate your performance compared to those three wide receivers. So, with this being the last Mailbag episode of twenty twenty four, I thought I could throw out some thoughts about my season and how I performed just before I let you go. I think this season has been averaged by my standards. I'm not gonna sit here and pretend like every year is really really good, that I'm the best fantasy analyst in the world. That doesn't help me and us get any better. The best way to describe my season was that I was very close to having a great season, but some of my takes on guys were just not quite there. Like I had the right data. I talked about the right information, but how I acted on that information and how I directed that information, it just wasn't quite there all the time. A good example of this is with Saquon Barkley, obviously a huge League winner this year. I wasn't high or low on him versus the consensus. I wasn't someone saying to avoid him, but I also wasn't saying to target him. But I had it becoming a Best Ball bro episode back in July talking up how he was undervalued, And then I remember doing a mailbag episode maybe late July early August, saying how I didn't understand the argument against Saquon's touchdowns this year when DeAndre Swift just a year ago in that same offense was top ten in the league in goal line attempts. Why I didn't lean into that more, I'm not sure. I think I was afraid of what the market was doing, and that was something that happened throughout the season that didn't allow it to be a great season. It was just fine by my standards. Now, Look, there were some good things in there too. Don't get me wrong. I'm proud of how I flipped my Chase Brown analysis with more information during the off season. I'm excited that I was able to call out Tyrone Tracy a couple of weeks before his breakout. That's all good, and really, there just weren't that many big rookie breakouts this year just in general. We had some like Malik Neighbors and Brian Thomas, and I was heavy on both of those guys. I talked them both up a lot, but there weren't a ton of those Day three types and a lot of times that's where some of my biggest hits come from, like Pookinakua last year. But yeah, decent season, not my best, not my worst, and I think that my personal teams reflect that. I can tell you one thing though, I still love this game. I'm still really passionate about researching this game, and I can't wait for the offseason to start because that's where we start to really gain our edge for twenty twenty five. That's it for today's show, though, thanks to all of you for listening. If you had subscribed to the Late Round Fantasy Football podcast, make sure you are by sweating for it pretty much anywhere podcasts can be found, and follow me on Twitter and Blue Sky at Late Round QB. Thanks for listening everyone. I got a Late Round Perspective's episode dropping later this morning. Hope you give that a listen. Otherwise, best of luck in the semi finals. I'll talk to you next week.