Hey, it's me, the guy who introduces the show. Listen to my amazing voice. Now, check out the amazing ultimate draft kit. The guys spend all off-season creating this bad boy, and they keep it updated all offseason. It's got their full projections, breakouts, sleepers, bus, over 100 player profile videos. It's even got a mobile app. Has my incredible voice lulled you into a deep sense of trust and commitment? Perfect. Now, check out ultimatedraftkit. Com and get ready to win your league. Now, back to the show. Welcome to the fantasy footballers podcast with your hosts, Andy Holloway, Jason Moore, and Mike Wright.

Welcome in. The fantasy footballers, Mike Wright, Jason Mor, Andy Holloway, back with you, Friday, August ninth. Another episode of The Podcast. Another delicious episode. Nutritious.

Don't get me hungry.

No seed oils on today's episode.

Very nice.

Yeah, trying to keep it healthy.

Oh, yeah, for the gut.

Yeah, I mean, we got to keep it tight, got to keep it right. Season is here. Do you guys Did you guys watch any preseason last night?

I actually did. I watched a decent amount of it. For those who watched it with me, you know why I had to say it's football time in Italian? Because it's back. We're happy. We're ready to get into some actual real stuff.

There wasn't much happening.

No, it was not.

If you just watched pretty much the first quarter of each game, which is where you're going to see some starters, you saw nothing. You saw absolutely nothing from the two teams. I think, to me, looking through the games, watching them, I watched them this morning, and I I mean, there's only two takeaways that I can even glean from both games. All right, what do you got? They were both from the Giants. One, Malik Nabour is obviously not good. No targets.

Yeah, there's just cardio came.

I mean, out there running nothing. So he washed out. Freak out, man. No, but the real only takeaway was Tyrone Tracy does appear to already be established as the guy behind Devin Singletary. I mean, some of these guys, I don't worry too much when when a rookie is further down. Like Jalen Polk, he was not a starter, even though they had two starters out with injury. I don't care. It's the first week of the preseason. The only thing that matters to me is was a guy up? If he's already up, that means he's got the opportunity. Should he stink with it? It can go away, but that's a really good sign. So Tyrone Tracy is my only real takeaway.

Not Eric Gray's 4 for 52 and 2 touch downs in the follow-up?

No, not after the- Because we know those two are competing, and he obviously had a great performance. Yeah. I mean, it's one of those things where it's like, who are you performing against? What time of the game? As far as how I look at preseason.

All right. A couple of headlines before we jump into an interesting Interesting. Quick question. We've got the Running Back top 10 rankings countdown today, but you can head over to ultimatedraftkit. Com right now. I want a point of clarity. Said something on the show that showed up in the support request. Uh-oh. What did you do? I made a big deal of the ADP comparison tool, which is awesome and is available to use if you have the UDK. What I didn't specify or realize in the moment was that it is currently only available on the web version of the UDK, which I learned quickly yesterday. If you want to use the specific average draft position comparison tool that shows Sleeper, and Yahoo, and ESPN, and Underdog, and all of that. It is currently only on the web version. So a little shortcut for you. If you have the Ultimate Draft Kit, if you just go to myudk. Com, that works. That'll take you right to the dashboard. Click on the ADP comparison tool in the research tab, and you can use it there. It is not yet on the app version. However, I bet it will be soon after what happened yesterday.

Thanks, Andy.

So ultimatedraftkit. Com, if you don't have it yet, that's headline number one. You can follow this show. A reminder for the season. First, click Follow on the podcast app. Leave us a review if you are so inclined on Apple podcast. You can follow on Spotify and Apple podcast wherever you're listening. We appreciate that. And you can follow the show also on Twitter, also known as X@theffballers. And you can watch the show on YouTube, youtube. Com/thefantasyfootballers. Subscribe, click the bell. That way, a part of our Sunday Live. We've got a livestream coming up.

A week from today.

We're going to give away a UDK for Life. This is a promotion we do every year. That livestream is coming up as well. If you don't want to miss your opportunity for that, youtube. Com/dfantastyfootballer. Subscribe, click that bell. Am I missing anything? I don't think so. Have I covered all the bases? Al, I'm looking at you.

No, I think you got it.

All right. If we missed anything, it Al's fault from here on out.

Got it? That'll work. Okay.

Quick question of the day, guys. Does the relationship exist between... What is the relationship, essentially, between rookie quarterbacks and the performance of their running backs? We've talked a lot about how rookie quarterbacks cap upside on wide receivers, and the only wide receivers that have ever really had exponential success with rookie quarterbacks have been Steve Smith and Larry Fitzgerald and Reggie Wayne. Kenan. Yeah, prolific Hall of Fame-level wideouts.

And they were usually alone on their team at the time.

But we haven't talked a lot about the runningback position. And so a question came in from Caden talking about DeAndre Swift because he's in that boat. Caleb Williams will be the starter. What does the data say about the upside, the floor of runningbacks with rookie quarterbacks?

The data we looked at was basically every quarterback that started at least 10 games for their team, and then how did that running back, the primary number one fantasy finisher, finish. Essentially, the easiest way to understand this, the big takeaway is they're okay. They've got a safer floor than you might think. They're not going to drop off to the '50s and be a complete bust. But it is very rare for them to be a strong long, high-end fantasy finish. The highest fantasy finish was the Running Back 6, and that'd be awesome. But that was also Austin Eckler, who was already an unbelievable great Running Back- And 108 targets mixed with the unbelievable year of Justin Herbert. So that was a little bit more of the outlier. Yeah, another good one was 100 target season from Leonard Fournet with Garner Minchou in his rookie season. So basically, 59% of the time, the running back was a top 24 running back.

33% of the time, the running back for a rookie quarterback was a top 12.

This is the past five years.

Is that what that is, five years? I see since 2011. I see since 2011.

I'm sorry, I was looking at the other running backs.

When you bring it back to DeAndre Swift and you say, Well, how is he going to do? Okay. He should be okay. He's not the type of back that, to me, strikes me as a guy who's going to finish as an Rb1, but he's got a really good chance of being an Rb2. If he even just follows the normal trend, that would be 59% over the last decade. Then if you say, Well, Caleb Williams is better than your average rookie quarterback, we hope, then maybe he's got a better shot than that.

The hardest part for me with the Chicago Bears is just the investments of ADP that are being put into every single player of the offense, and I guess not every, but the three wide receivers and DeAndre Swift. It's just...

And Caleb Williams.

But I'm saying of the pass catchers, of like, there will not be enough to go around to satisfy those four players. It's like someone could come through a big time, but if that happens, that means that there is a huge loser in terms of someone at that ADP. So that's my only concern with the bears. It's just we are very excited for Caleb Williams, and I think people are a little too ahead of the curve for what he can produce.

News and notes from Around the League, presented by USAA Insurance.

If you were watching preseason football, and you were two screening it as many of us do, you're on social media interacting with people, having a good time, and also watching the games, this was the headline. This was the star of last night. Andy's covering his face because it is so unbelievably frustrating. A quote came out from the Cowboys owner, Jerry Jones, was being asked about Cee Lamb and the looming contract extension. And we got the quote, I don't have any urgency to get it done, which was just an absolute haymaker thrown at all of us who believe in City Lamb. I was like, What are we doing in here. And then, Cee Lamb, the source, the actual guy, retweets the caption that's going around of Jerry Jones, I don't have any urgency. And his quote was the caption, I should say, from Seedylam, L-O-L.

And then...

He removed America's team from his bio.

And Micah Parsons joined in and retweeted that. It was a fun time. But also, Jerry. Jerry. If you are listening, let me encourage you in this. Since you don't think you have a sense of urgency to get the deal done with CeeDee Lamb, I think you want to see it happen in your lifetime. So it's pretty urgent because you're about to die. You are. I'm saying he is- I'm saying he is. I'm saying he is. He's older. He's gone. I mean, what does he do? Yeah, he got the lights off. What does he do? That makes sense. It's just one of those like... He's got to be next to death's door. Was that a threat? It was not a threat. It was an encouragement.

He's 81.

Yeah. I mean, look, you've made it past my lineage of family tree. You've had a great life. Maybe step aside or do yourself an even better thing than stepping aside. Get it done so you can see it.

Again, step aside is not a euphemism.

Either one.

Look, here's the deal. It's so annoying. Because he's talking in the same quote all about the amazing players getting made by other players. What an opportunity it's presenting for... I'm being inundated with Zeke runs and Doudle runs and catches by Brandon Cooke.

Incredible negotiation.

This is not working. You know what I mean? We're good without him.

Whatever. Take it or leave it.

I'm going to have to channel... Mike, I know he's on your dynasty team. I'm going to have to just take the mantle here. You're not doing the job needed to get Seedy the deal. I'm going to make a guarantee right now. It's done in the next week. I'm making the guarantee right here, right now. I'm going to call some people. I'm going to straighten Jerry out.

Do you want to know how old Jerry Jones is? He's so old that his actual name is Jeryl. They've stopped naming people Jarl. I mean, that is- That cannot be true. Anyone know a Jarl?

No. I feel like that's it. I know one now.

They've all gone. His name is Jeryl? His name is Jeryl Wayne Jones senior.

It sure is. Born October 13th, 19th.

I was going to guess, but- It's so wild of...

I I mean, I made the same argument for Brandon Ayyuk, of, You did it, man. You were in the middle of the first round, and morons in the draft passed on CeeDee Lamb. Like the Cardinals. They took other wide receivers instead of CeeDee Lamb.

Or Isiah Simmons.

You didn't even need a wide receiver at that time, but you said, This is the best player on the board. We have identified him, and it has worked out better than you could have possibly imagined. You have a truly elite 8 player. This is different than the Brandon Ayuk situation, because this is not a... We can have a debate of, How top tier do you think Brandon Ayuk is as a wide receiver?

There is no debate here.

There's no debate on CeeDee Lamb.

He is him.

Give him the money.

I want you to tell me what happens to this team if he didn't play football.

Oh, brother. We talk about the Cowboys offense as a really good offense. Your argument for Rico Doudle is you want a running back that is part of a top-tier offense. If CeeDee Lamb is not on this team, this is a bad off. I think Dak is good enough to be a middle-of-the-pack offense, not necessarily a bottom five, but he doesn't have the weapons to get that done without Seedy. Seedy Lamb, his utilization... What was he?

He was the receiving game last year.

He's 48% of the receiving targets, 53% of the receiving yards. Of wide receiver. Yes, of wide receiver. It's 44% of the wide receiver touch downs. He's what makes it work.

All right, I'll get it done. Espn's Dan Graziano said the Vikings believe they'll have T. J. Hawkinson back at some point during the first half of the season.

Aka not week one.

Well, that was known.

No, but you would have loved to... When I first saw this news breaking, I was hoping it was going to say that, that he could be back early.

It's good to know this now because you don't want to get closer and closer to the actual drafts and still not be sure if week one is in the cards. I do think T. J. Hawkinson is, if you've got an IR spot- Yes, that's fine. Highlight him as your last pick in the draft because he'll go undrafted in a lot of these places, and then whatever, just throw him on an IR.

Yeah, but to me, that's it because it's, Okay, first half of season, what person are you? Glass half full? If you are, you're like, Oh, first half. Maybe week three. Or week eight. And then he's re-acclimating with the devastating knee injury. If you have an IR, I'm okay with it.

Yes, but your point is if you don't have an IR, he absolutely cannot be drafted. He cannot be drafted.

And then we'll play the game of which week. Which week is it that you go after Hawkinson off the waiver wire?

I think there's a legitimate case. I'll draft T. J. Hawkinson and throw him on my IR with my last pick. Sure. And there is a very good chance that he won't even retain his IR spot. If week 2 comes along and I've got a player on my roster that's injured, I'll be like, See you later, Hawkinson. I don't want to deal with your slow start. You were just a free hold space. But if I need your spot, yeah, Hawkinson is probably going to come back slow.

All right. The Colts have said that Anthony Richardson and the starters will play a series or two in the preseason game against the Colts.

Against the Colts.

That is what I'm reading. The Colts. I'm Ron Burgundy. Thank Thank you.

I'm going to go out on a limb, and I'm going to say the Colts win this game. If I'm a betting man on a limb, I'm going to bet on the Colts.

Jeremy Fowler of ESPN says, The Chargers, quote, have major plans for Quentin Johnston.

Is he going to be a chef? What's he going to be doing for you?

The word major just implies big.

Yeah.

It's not positive or negative.

We don't know. Major plans. They're hoping to trade him. We see a real draft pick in his future.

Yeah, that was How about starter plans? That would help me. Yeah, if you have major- The plan to start would have been a bigger, more important piece of news than major plans.

Having major plans, is that like- There's like a vacation Coming up. Or he's got major plans. Yeah. He's going to Hawaii for two weeks, bro. Major plans. This is not like a little short stay. Could it be... I mean, he doesn't strike me as a special team's type of player, but like- No. That's like when you have major plans for... But what is major plans for not a starter?

I think Quentin Johnson could still end up starter.

Yes, he should. He was a first-round pick last year, and they really need him.

I feel like the end of this season, we will be saying the chargers had minor plans for Quentin Johnson.

I think that's the odds.

That was today's News & Notes presented by USAA Insurance. Learn more at usaa. Com/insurance. We'll take a break, come back with our Running Back countdown.

Running bags.

One of the things, just to put a bow on the Quentin Johnston stuff and the chargers, if you see Jim Harbaugh being asked questions, did you see him get asked about the progress of Justin Herbert?

Yes, I did.

I don't know.

It was fantastic because it was like 30 seconds of him saying, I'm not even qualified to be qualified to be qualified to talk about whether I'm qualified to say whether he's healthy.

Because of the injury? Okay.

It was just like- But things are positive.

That's how he ended it. That's basically what he said. It was funny. He is a fun press conference.

Did you also see him? Because he got There were some consequences for recruiting violations at Michigan that just went through. Did you see his comments on that?

Oh, did he peak Carroll?

Not my problem.

Well, I mean, he peaked Carroll in the sense that he departed before the consequences. But he came out and he had I mean, you should watch it. It's awesome. I mean, awesome might not be the right word, but he basically just says, I live my life with great accountability for mistakes. If I make a mistake, I come out and say, I'm sorry. And then he just goes, I am not apologizing for this in any way, shape, and form. He's like, I was not aware of anything that happened. I did not do anything.

You're like, It doesn't matter. So we got an I apologize for nothing from Jim Harbaugh?

Yeah. Nice. Hard dog. Hard dog living it up.

It's a fun watch. All right, we're into the top 10 runningbacks, our consensus half PPR rankings. You can see all the rankings. You can import your customized scoring system, get printable cheat sheets, see it all inside the UDK right now. Ultimately, draffkit. Com. This is our top 10 by consensus ranks.

Number 10.

He's still there.

He's a king.

Derrick Henry comes in at number 10. I am the lowest of the three of us on Derrick Henry at 14. Jason has him inside the top 10, Mike at 11. He was the RBA last year in Tennessee. Struggle of a season for that offense. But this is Derrick Henry. He's led the NFL in yards after contact for Four of the last five years, double-digit rushing, touch downs for six straight years.

I think it's going to be seven.

It's going to be seven.

He is the running back equivalent in a lot of ways to Mike Evans in terms of longevity, consistency, and defying the age cliff. Is that a fair comparison?

Yeah. In looking into runningbacks, the age cliff and the season cliff, these are absolutely real things for mere mortals. Just regular human beings. If you're playing running back, 27, 28, things really start to fall apart. But once you're an outlier, you're an outlier. For me, I'm going to run with him until the wheels absolutely fall off.

Keeps himself in incredible shape. The team invested in him. His success has always been very correlative to wins and losses. If you look at his entire career, he averages double the fantasy points and wins, and you're on a team now that you expect to win a lot of ball games. Now, I would not expect Derek Henry to have the volume, total carry counts that he's had in previous years. I don't think that the Ravens will use him in that way. We've had seasons with Baltimore and Harbaugh where the Gusbus owned the fourth quarter of games that they were well in the lead for. There were a lot of times when they had workhorse backs, and then they brought somebody else in to be the efficient closer, but it won't matter, I don't think. I think Derrick Henry's efficiency in three quarters of a win is going to be more valuable than most runningbacks in four quarters.

Yeah, Gus Edwards did not crack 200 rushing attempts last year. He had 13 rushing touch downs, and from week seven on, he was the running back 12. So get rid of Gus Edwards and bring in the Yeti on a team that is going to win a lot of games. Their win total is one of the highest in the league. And so if you're telling me this is a team that's going to win games, that means they're going to score points, they're going to score touch downs. And when they get down around the goal line, even though they've got a mobile quarterback in Lamar Jackson, that's not how they have approached the goal line. He isn't a Josh Allen, Jalen Hertz type of guy that's going to push, push his way in. They're going to line up the big boys, and they're going to put the biggest boy behind them, and they're just going to have him easily get in the end zone. So Derrick Henry, to me, there's only pretty much two ways to look at him. Do you believe he's going to be up 12 to 15 shutdowns this season, or do you think he's aged out?

Their offensive line got worse, and you don't want to be the one... I talked about it with Devante Adams. At some point, and this happens to runningbacks, too, you don't want to be the one holding the bag, and then you're just left for dead because it's over for that player. Sean Alexander, who was so, so Good, so, so good, so good, so good, and then a squat.

The bear case for Derek Henry's season is that 25th ranked offensive line, losing the starters, not being efficient on his touches, and then having the occasional non-touchdown game where he's not even giving you the floor you needed. When you're trying to paint the bad picture, do you agree that that would be the case? He's got 13 touches for 40-something yards. He's not going to get in the passing game, is my point. Oh, yeah, of course. Not only does Baltimore not throw the ball to the running backs very often, and it will be Justice Hill if they do, but that's the bad game case.

I don't think there's anything wrong with that bear case. If Derek Henry were 24 years old, he would be ranked as a top three running back this year. There's a reason he's down here at 10. Because things could go wrong, my chips are on the side of having watched him last year. And yeah, he was the running back 8, and he was getting platooned big time by Tajay Spears last year. I think, Kyle, correct me, Spears may have even out snapped-He did.Darryl Henry. It doesn't matter because he's getting those really high-value touches, which are the touch downs. Even if he fails, it would take a catastrophic event to keep him away from 10 rushing touchdance.

He was the running back 4 and the running back eight for a really, really, really bad Tennessee offense the last two years. You transport him to Baltimore, pay him, make him the starter. He's going to be fine.

Transport him to Baltimore makes me feel like it was a big effort on a flatbed.

A hundred %. You know what I mean? This is massive cargo.

Moving free willy.

That's how they take him from game to game. They can't put him in. They're not charter Hiring him on the team jet. That thing can't get off the ground.

This is a precious man. We need to put him in a Pope mobile.

Number nine.

All right, Isiah Pacheco comes in at number nine. This is above average draft position right He's being drafted at Rb12. You two are the two highest in this office. He is definitely the guy in Kansas City. So much confidence in the offense and things working for the Chiefs. I'm right at ADP, so it's not like I am-Yeah, you're not out. I'm not pooh-pooing on Pacheco. I still look at this offense, and when I think of what I love in a running back for my fantasy team. I love it when they're the identity of the offense, like Chubb was and Henry was for years and Barkley. I still am going to look at Mahomes and Kelsey and some weeks, Rashi Rice and some other players before I'm looking at Pacheco. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the identity of this team will be Isiah Pacheco. I'm curious to see how it goes.

The identity of the team will be Mahomes for sure. However, I think you're wrong in the sense that the identity of the team wasn't Kareem Hunt. When Kareem Hunt was the running back for, the identity of the team was the passing game. But their offense was so good that the touch downs flow and Mahomes finds you in the passing game. Andy Reid uses you at the goal line. And Isiah Pacheco, if you watch what they've done as far as what runningbacks were on the roster, what runningbacks they haven't brought back, what they did and didn't do in the draft, he's just the dude. When you to Andy Reid talk about the three-down skillset, how he can run a full route tree, how his hands are great, how his protection is great. Isiah Pacheco is a three-down back for the Kansas City Chiefs who are being underdrafted right now because last year was a down offensive year for them. They brought in more weapons, and I view that as a good thing, not a bad thing for Pacheco, because Pacheco, within the running back core, is going to be the guy. So I just want this offense to click and be awesome.

He'll be out there. They'll be winning games. And he's also a big-bodied back with extreme breakaway speed who isn't 30.

He's a big body back.

Who isn't 30 like Derek Henry. He's 25 years old. He's in his prime. I really, really like the outcome I feel bad for the grass, the way Pacheco runs, but I don't see, outside of him getting injured, I don't see how he is the running back 24.

We've seen players that are probably not Elite talents have elite seasons in Kansas City, with McKinnon being a double-digit, breakdown player late in his career, and some... Clyde has had success despite not looking good. I was interested in this information here, Mike, how do you react to it? Pacheco was 24th out of 35 qualified runningbacks in elusive rating, 27th in evaded tackles, 21st in fantasy points per opportunity, and 26th in yards per touch. So So the efficiency numbers statistically weren't there, but obviously, you're attached to the best offense in football.

Yeah, it's a certain way to look at a running back of more and more with running backs being in tandoms, we need efficient guys because the view of the three-down running back, that is, for the most part, it's all Almost gone from the NFL. So he doesn't have that efficiency part, but he has the volume and the high-powered offense. So I think that that can overpower and combat these efficiency numbers. And it was looking at last year of the snaps. It's an ascending chart of when the year started, it was not full-time, Isiah Pacheco. And he was not... If you remember where he was being drafted, it was actually quite late. The ADP and the crowd was not sure that Isiah Pacheco could retain being a seventh-round pick and still stealing the job from Clyde Edwards-Alaire. And it took over the course of the year for us to really get there, opening at 48 %, 51 % of the snaps, 42. And then by the end, after the buy week, 60, high 70s, and then finishing with a game where he's a 90 % snap guy. I don't think he's 90, but we get him into that 70, maybe low 80s.

And looking at the depth chart, I think that that is in the range of outcomes, where powerful offense getting all the volume. Volume can be the king in fantasy football at the running back position. And he is an absolute smash draft if I'm getting a running back in his area.

Number eight.

27-year-old Saquon Barkley coming in at number eight in our rankings. Jason has him at seven. I got him a nine. Mike at 10. Just got paid. Three years, 37 million, 26 million guaranteed by Philadelphia. That's going to be really painful for Giants fans this year, seeing him run out there in the green. But what is your overarching view? After an off-season of thinking about Saquon in this offense, seeing him have to do everything in New York for so long. I'm curious where you're at now with time.

I have risen on Saquon Barkley since... When it first came, there was a lot of fears for me about goal-line opportunities, touch downs, whether it will be okay for him. Then you look back and you think about DeAndre Swift. Deandre Swift had a really good year. It trailed off a little bit at the end, but the Eagles trailed off a little bit at the end. But Swift was good because of his yards before contact. Swift was number one. I believe the highest percentage of his yards came from yards before contact because their offensive line is great, and he had goal line opportunities. Swift had 14 carries inside the five-yard line last year. With this offensive line, if you give 14 carries to Saquon inside the five-yard line, the push-push will go down for Jalen Hertz because Saquon will actually break the plane of the goal. Saquon only had eight last year. And if you look at running back inside the 10, the New York Giants last year were 30th. The Eagles were fourth. That's not carries. That's running back carries. I do think the opportunity for him to finally be on a good offense is really good.

Did he look bad last year? It's hard to tell when you got 11 defenders. It's hard to tell. You got 11 defenders just trying to tackle you and ignore the other 10 players on offense.

Mike, any thoughts on Saquon?

He is so difficult. I got him in Rb10, and this is one of those... I don't feel great about having them that low. It's more of a matter of I just have-What's the range of outcomes for Saquon then to you?

What's the range of where he gets finished? Can he finish top five?

Yes. The issue of- Can he finish 18? Yes. That's the problem with the range of outcomes for me when I'm looking at the entirety of the situation for Saquon Barkley. Swift was, at least in terms of running back attempts, he was the manual. After the buy week, 80% of the running back attempts, 78%. This is a utilization that if Saquon still has it, top three is in the range of outcomes. We got to make sure we get some of those targets. But he's one of my scariest players of the year because the delta, it's gigantic to me.

All right, moving on. Number seven.

I hit the button in the middle of me talking.

Allow me to interrupt myself.

I assume that had to have Al Borland back there because you're- I know.

Enough, Sake, one.

All right, we're moving on to- Number seven. Number seven. Travis ETN. It was a heck of a year for him last season, especially to start the year. He was the number two running back behind the CMC through the first eight weeks of the year. Those are impactful fantasy weeks. That is a fundamental part of the regular season.

How scared are Because I'm scared. He was in the first half, like you just said, he was the running back three, second half, running back 32. It was so bad, which is the truth.

Yeah, I'm not that scared at all. I got him at seven. He's just too important to this offense. You can't pretend that you have a depth chart behind him. You don't. You just don't have that. You might have a snap here or there with some other players, but Etian is too He's young. He's in that prime age for a running back with an offense that has already been able to lean on him and see great success. I feel pretty confident. I'm not worried about the season, breaking up the way that it did. The offensive line had struggles. Trevor Lawrence had injury issues. But I am leaning on the 340 opportunities to bear itself out this year. That's where I'm at.

Yeah, I totally get it. I've drafted a couple of shares of ETN. Love the 73 targets, the involvement in the past game, the fact that you lose Calvin Ridley, and you're bringing in more unknown commodities and Brian Thomas and Gabe Davis was not a target hog. So you expect them to still be involved in the receiving game and Obviously, he is someone that can score from distance. There's a lot of reasons to like him. However, if I compare him to the offer mentioned Saquan, he's two years younger. I don't know that he's any more explosive than Saquan right now. I expect the Eagles to be a far better offense. It's just a matter of maybe Etienne gets more targets. I would rather have Barkley, and I've been in a couple places there in that second round where this is the decision. They're both still on the board, and you're deciding between Etienne and Barkley. Usually, I go with the younger guy, but this time I'm going to go offense. Where would you be between those two players?

Well, to me, part of it is the the the the injury usage concern that I think exists for Saquon, where he missed three games last year due to injury. Again, we've dealt with that multiple times in his history. I think you're going to have at least 50 more opportunities in the offense for Etienne. Now, whether that translates to more fancy points, I think is in fair debate based on the two offenses.

Etienne is a player that just probably won't find his way onto any of my teams because a lot because of what Jay mentioned of the decision of, Okay, it's Saquon Barkley or ETN. It's Kyron Williams or ETN. It's Devon Echan is going just after Travis ETN. I don't know, man. I get it.

You feel like you're not going to be able to pull the trigger on that name versus those other offenses? Yes.

I get it. I get it. What I'm saying, I understand just how horrifically bad Tank Bigsby was as a rookie. We just mentioned Kenneth Walker. No, I'm not hearing anything about Kenneth Walker in Training Camp buzz. I'm not hearing anything about Zack Charbonne. I'm not hearing any... So it's like, Okay, that's a wash. I'm not hearing anything about Travis ETN, not necessarily the worst thing in the world, but they are pumping up Tank Bigsby again. And so that just-They're pumping him up as far as what we hope we can get from him, not as far as what he's doing.

That's the problem. Tank Bigsby is nothing, guys. That'll be the biggest mistake that you make. I'm not saying you have to take ETN, but thinking about Tank Bigsby at all is a waste of brain cells.

I think Tank Bigsby is Benedict Arnold. I really do. He's a traitor to America? He's a traitor to the Jaguar. He was a spy. He was the other team's best player whenever he was on the field. He just constantly gave the ball to the other team.

This is like having a discussion about Amari Demarcato or Michael Carter in Arizona, who both are better players than Tank Bigsby. We cannot live in the past with Tank Bigsby.

I understand that But for a player who's supposed to be as good as Travis Etienne is, and getting all the work that he got last year with the team saying, We have to lessen the workload, and he finishes the year at 3.8 yards per carry, that to me, is You got to figure out how to get that guy off the field to rest a little bit more.

All right. That's the concern. They did say that last year, and they didn't do it. Yeah, because Bigsby was so bad.

Benedict Arnold.

Yeah. That's what made this. This conversation is a repeat of why Travis E. Team was a monster stealing drafts last year. You have to pay more for him this year. Yes, you do. That's the gamble.

Number 6.

Jonathan Taylor. I think we're all ready to regularly talk about Jonathan Taylor again. It's been too long. We have had to deal with injuries, disappointment, lack of quarterback, and we have not settled into the Jonathan Taylor conversation very often. He's going as the Rb5, so people are ready to lace them up and put them in there as their Rb1 in fantasy football. Question marks around Anthony Richardson hindering his ceiling, the red zone opportunities. The team has come out and been very vocal. They're not going to limit Anthony Richardson physically in any way, slowing him down from running the football. Just like the Touche Push and Saquon Barkley, Richardson and Taylor cannot score in the same play on a rushing touch down.

This bears out. Since 2015, there has only been one running back who has scored 15 fantasy points per game alongside a quarterback who scored 100 total rushing fantasy points. You have to assume that if Anthony Richardson plays this season, he's scoring 100 fantasy points on the ground. So that means that the ceiling case, 15 plus, and this is half PPR, so 15 plus fantasy points per game, it's really not in the cards for Jonathan Taylor-Thomas. But context there, if you look at who scored 15 fantasy points per game last season, you had Christian McCaffrey, Raheem Moster, end of list. So it's not that he can't have an awesome season and go out there and score something really healthy.

Can he be the Rb1?

He cannot be the Rb1. No, I don't think so. I don't think he can be a top three running back, but I do think... I mean, I've got him at runningback 6. I think he's going to be a clear, awesome Running Back 1. I'm happy to draft him. We just have to be honest that he can't go out there and score 15 rushing touchstones.

Number 5.

Kyron Williams comes in at number 5. Sean McVay, historically, been a one-back guy. And last offseason, that meant excitement around Kam Akers. That turned into unbelievable production for Kyren Williams. He saw 37% of the team's total opportunities. Comprehend that. Let that sink in. In the 12 games he played, 37% of the team's opportunities were Kyren. Only CMC was higher. It was a wonderful ride And yet there's some doubt. If you graph the Richter scale of fear around Kyren Williams, it's gone up and down and up and down. A little bit of camp injury, then he's fine. He's going to be the guy. But then word comes out that Kyren was a little bit concerned when they drafted Blake Coram. I don't know if you saw that.

I didn't see that one.

Yeah, he said he was initially scared when they drafted Blake Coram, that he's not going to be the focal point. Then the team comes out and reiterates that he's the focal point. Much like Tank Bigsby, and they'd love to give Travis ET an opportunity to be efficient and get a rest, I think they want to do that a little bit. What does that for the the Rams offense, and what does that mean for the Ram's offense, and what does that mean for Kyren's upside?

I guess point of clarification here, that is both helpful for Kyren and the aftermentioned Jonathan Taylor-Thomas. When I said there were only those two guys, Moster and CMC, that scored 15 fantasy points a game. That was looking at the total season ending list because 19.9 points per game was Kyren. He just missed several games, so he wasn't up there. But that's how powerful he was for fantasy football last year. One of my things, we always try to learn lessons year after year after year, not just lessons that we keep forever, but also lessons of change and adaptation and what the current NFL is doing. One of my big lessons last year was if a guy was great on the field, if he I've proved that he is awesome, and the team goes out and invests and brings in-depth and brings in another player and brings in competition, I'm not going to be scared off of awesome. And that was true for Travis ETN last year. That was true for Kenneth Walker last year. I believe it's going to be true of Kyron Williams. Kyron Williams is so good for this system. You look when he came back from the injury.

He was the running back 1, 9, 18, 5, 11, 1, running it at 8.9 a carry, 4.2, 4.6, 5.6, He's just really good. He can catch the ball perfect. He fits this scheme super nice, and he's always been a great back. We love it. It's hard to remember because he basically missed his rookie season after having poor draft capital. But in the NFL draft, when we were preparing for that, Kyron was one of our absolute favorites. He's a really good running back, and the team loves him. Bringing him Blake Coram is a smart football move. It's good for the Rams. It might be good for Kyron Williams, even if it takes another point or two away a game. If he's not 19.9, and instead, he's 17.5.

Points per game. Yeah, but he plays 17 games.

But he plays 17 games? Yeah. Fantastic. I am not scared off of Kyron. I'm fully in.

83% good games, 50% great games by our consistency metric. That's so awesome. We'll take a break and come back with our top four runningbacks. All right, before we jump- Just like the Olympics. Before we jump back into the... Oh, the top four? The top four, baby. Yeah. Before we jump back into the rankings countdown, I think he was trying to say that I cut to the ad at the wrong point, like a three. If I cut it three, then you've got gold, silver, bronze. We're coming back for our top four. Because we always try to correlate with the Olympics is what Jason's saying.

Not always, but maybe while they're happening.

On Saturday, we're going to release a bonus episode of this podcast. We're going to rerelease the 10 Things to Remember episode from early in February because we would like to remember them. So there'll be a bonus episode coming out on Saturday, and so stay tuned for that, an extra episode of the show after we finish up with runningbacks here, and then we'll be back into rankings, countdowns next week.

Number 4.

All right, number 4. Jamir Gibbs. Jamir Gibbs coming in at number 4 is ADP. His average draft position is the R-B-4 right Which is I see him going 8, 9, 10, 11, pretty much in every single draft. It seems like if people have to take him earlier than that, they get nervous. But if it's later than that, they feel like they stole. It's always weird to draft a player that you know at 22 years old, can score on any play at any given time, and yet shares a backfield. You are always going into the week saying, I think it's It's not going to work out, but what happens if they just get dragged down on the two-yard line in three straight drives in Montgomery scores?

Yeah, it could absolutely happen. When you're drafting David Montgomery and Jamir Gibbs, each one of them, they both have incredible opportunities, should be good for where they're drafted, but they both have a built-in, not just like, Oh, what if this guy vultures that guy? But they both have the built-in, What if the other guy gets injured? And you want to talk about the Detroit Lion begins rushing attack with that offensive line, that scheme. I mean, that's a league winner. And so you've got, I think, in Jamir Gibbs, if David Montgomery is healthy, you already have someone that is essentially a league winner quality player. Montgomery was fully healthy after the buy week. And after the buy week, you saw Jameer Gibbs already be pretty darn awesome for fantasy football. In those nine games, from Week 7 through 16, he was the running back three, averaging 18.9 fantasy points per game. So you have an incredible upside. He's also, if you think about what I just said, that's from Week 7 to 16 because he got off to a slow start. He was a rookie. He's not a rookie this year. He's coming in as the guy, and David Montgomery is the backup.

You expect him more included, including the receiving game. I mean, you might be hopeful that Jamieson Williams steps up for the first time in his way too long of a career to not have stepped up yet, but Josh Reynolds is gone. And so getting Gibbs more involved in the passing game, he's a really exciting prospect for me. When I look at my rankings, I would still take... Like, Brees and Jamir Gibbs are basically almost identical in the total fantasy points scored. I would rather have Bries than Gibbs, but that's the tier of fantasy points I expect from Gibbs this year.

The confidence in Gibbs can also be helped, like a foundation for it of At the end of the year, both players are healthy, and Jamir Gibbs is still getting carries inside the five. David Montgomery is still absolutely doing his thing. He's getting carries inside the five as well. But it was not a full-time role. The way when Jamal Williams was there, it was just when you got inside the five, Jamal Williams is going to be the finisher. They spread that out. And I think with this offseason, getting more and more integrated into that part of the offense. Jamir Gibbs is a player that, despite being in a timeshare, Jamir Gives, I think, can finish as the R-B-1.

Number three.

Brees Hall comes in at number three. I've got him at two. Mike has him at two. So we both have him as the next guy off the board after CMC. Jason has him at four, which means- He's basically tied with Gibbs in scoring, but I do have Béjan ahead of both of those guys. Elite pass catcher, elite weapon in the Jets offense, and showed that despite being on one of the more putrid to watch offensive teams in the history of the NFL, he could still finish at R before.

Oh, my gosh. Coming off of ACL 10.

Yeah, it's incredible. I don't really know how low Brees Hall can finish without injury.

He's too good. He's too good. The average for the New York Jets last year came from the 25-yard line, away from the opponent's goal. Their offense was so historically bad, and he was the running back four. Now, his Passing volume is going to come down. Yes, it will. Because last year, that offense didn't know what to do.

It was prey and spray.

With the offensive line being so bad, it was just, Hey, run out to the other side of those big guys, and I'll just toss you the ball. That was over and over and over and over and over, which was great for a fantasy That's why he finishes the running back four. But it's also the reason they did that is because just get the ball in his hands and let him go. It's our best chance at having a good offense. Now, if you've got Aaron Rodgers behind a much improved offensive line, you have opportunities to set defenses up for Bries Hall's success. We're at the point now when you talk about Bries and Béjan and CMC, where these guys, there's really not a downside argument.

Yeah, you would not feel like somebody made a mistake if they took their shot on a different name than what we have in this order. Not at all.

And like, Brees Hall, this is why knee injuries are so tricky because you have both Brees and Javante Williams, who were returning last year from devastating knee injuries. One of them, as the season went on, you saw it more and more. Oh, there's Brees Hall. There's the electric player. There's the burst. It's And Javante, you never saw it. By the end of the year, those final three games where the offense was entirely Brees Hall, and he's still running for nearly over five a carry. When the defense knows exactly what's going to happen, that's the type of back. And there's no investment behind him. They took Breyland Allen.

He seems to be lined up to be the number two.

Yeah, an absolute Hulk of a man. But this was a day three pick of, We don't like the back of behind Breese Hall. Let's see if we can find a different one. Breese is the guy.

Number two.

Béjan comes in at number two. Béjan actually has a good player behind him at Running Back. Tyler Aljiri is a good depth Running Back. He has everything that they would have hoped Tink Bigsby could have been or any of these names, what they would love Blank Coram to be. But Bijon actually has that there. But from a From a fertility standpoint, Béjan comes in at number two. He's going to catch passes. He's going to have explosive plays. He's going to have red zone opportunities. We're excited to see what the new offense is going to look like. Last year, they lined up an 11 personnel just 14 20% of the time on first down. They have a new offense. That's low T.

11 personnel is the lowest.

Yeah. I mean, you don't want to embarrass yourself by lining up more than two wideouts. That's not being a man. But when he did have a chance with three wideouts on the field last year, he had almost six to carry.

It's so funny to look at the 11 personnel numbers of the Falcons last year and how good they were when they did that.

Now, they did not correlate to a change in behavior.

Yes, it was like, Drake London was awesome in 11 personnel. Bison was awesome in 11 personnel.

They got to set up to 12.

They ran it 14% of the time.

Yeah, but when I eat healthy, I feel good, but dead. You know what I mean?

Oh, yeah.

It's not going to I always do it. No. I'm the Arthur Smith of Dietary Choices.

Arthur had a plan.

Just in a quick, if you're new to football, what that means, 11 personnel means one tight-end and one running-back, meaning that there's three wide receivers. When you're in something like 12 personnel. It means you have two tight ends, so you have to remove a wide receiver.

Yeah. And a lot of the times, that correlates with spreading the field out, creating more space versus being... If you're in 12 personnel with a couple of tight ends, you're going to hit them in the mouth. Yeah, we're big, tough guys. You're going to run it up the middle. Béjan, if you had to bet on opportunities this season to touch the football, Béjan, Bries, who's the bet on?

I think I would bet on Béjan. It's really close. The only reason I would bet on Béjan is because I think that there's going to be a lot more plays ran by the Falcons, the tempo, the speed, than what I'll see from the Jets. I think if you're talking percentage of backfield touches, it's probably Breese over Béjan because of the competition in that backfield. To me, this question really comes down to, and this is an interesting question, which offense is going to be better? We've got basically two brand new offenses here because you got two brand new quarterbacks for all intents and purposes. You got Aaron Rodgers.

You got two bad Achilles.

The mirror situation of these two teams. They both have top three running backs. They both have the quarterback coming back from the Achilles. They both have a potential superstar wide receiver that we-Drafted in the same year. That we haven't been able to see the fulfillment of that promise.

This is weird. So here we go. This is what my question is for you two, gentlemen and myself, which offense scores more points, the Jets or the Falcons in 2024?

I'm going to say the Falcons score more points, but that is a product of... I think their defense is just far inferior to the Jets.

100%.

I still think Tyler Algier has a bigger impact than anybody behind Breese, which is why I have Breese a little bit higher.

Yeah, I would agree. Mike, which offense do you think scores more points?

Man, I think- The Chiefs. I think it might be the Falcons.

I lean that side as well. I mean, I get it. This is splitting hairs between these two guys. These are two guys the last two years I've been madly in love with coming out of college. So I don't want to make- They are also your two dynasty runningbacks.

Yeah, baby.

Oh, it's so...

Etn, too.

It led you to a title last year, right?

That was a bad joke. The people didn't like that. That was me, Andy. The people did not like that joke, Andy.

All right, I'm going to end the suspense here. Number one. Christian McCaffery comes in at number one. Who was that? At number one in our ranking. I mean, pretty good player.

Yeah. I mean, Christian McCaffery is You don't need to talk about him. He's going to score more fantasy points than almost every running back every single week when he is healthy. So is he healthy? I mean, the problem is right now, he's got the calf injury. He's taken about two weeks off. The reaggravation rate of a calf for running backs is not very high. Just make sure that you give him enough time to heal.

He knows his body.

Oh, he is not like you, Andy. He is not like you.

What's wrong with me?

His dietary choices are... This man is disciplined like an insane person.

He's not doing milkshakes and burgers?

No.

That wasn't just me.

No, I know, but you just... Yes, it was.

Your milkshake was just you. Wait, I was on the milkshake. Listen, hold on. You just talked about it. I did just talk about it. It's not good timing with what happened yesterday in the office. I went a week on no solid food after my dental surgery, and you guys put five guys into the lunch menu, and some things got away from me. You know what I mean? It happens. I'm on some drugs.

It happens. I don't blame you, man. Milkshakes are delicious.

I clicked different buttons. A lot of stuff showed up.

I'm just saying, Christian McCaffrey has not yet had a milkshake in his life. That's got to be a fact.

Right.

No. And so, yeah, he's in tune with his body. I'm going to bet on him as the running back one.

Did you guys realize, like, Christian McCaffrey, of just how far and the way better he was than everybody else. That was his second best year.

Oh, yeah. He had been better than that. Yeah. Last year- This man is a machine. Last year, he had one game, one single game, where he was not a top 15 running back, and he was the 22.

It was a great game. How many games in a row did he score a countdown? Was it like 20? I mean, the streak was like, I think it was around 20. Kyle, do you remember?

I don't.

It was pretty much- That streak spanned two years.

They were trying to get in the record.

Now, Brooks moved to the Midwest. He just let us know that he's lost a little weight since leaving the office.

No, that's great. I found it. Al has siphoned Brooks. Don't worry, people. We want to keep Brooks as a part of this show, so we're siphoning Brooks and adding them to Al. If you want it back, Brooks, I'm happy to give it back.

Everything is balanced. Matter cannot be created or destroyed.

We got to do something about the lighting in Deucers Alley. These guys wearing hats. Their faces are just hidden. I mean, we got to get, I think, a table light that just blast them like an old tiny police room.

You're saying you don't like that? He hides with Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Like they're going to tell a ghost story? Sure, a ghost story, or that they're going to tell the truth. You make them sweat under a hot light.

Well, I think we should probably stop talking now. That is the end of today's episode. A reminder, Sleeper presents the 10th anniversary Megalas show live in Los Angeles. You can come and see our Bold Predictions episode live, Saturday, August 24th at the Palace Theater. Ballerslive. Com for tickets. Come and join That will be a great way to kick off the 2024 season. Like I said, we're going to have a bonus episode tomorrow, so check the feed, and you will find a little treat.

Goodbye.

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