February 23, 2024 • 51 mins
Brian and Charch look at the biggest names in free agency and find the best possible landing spot to maximize their fantasy value.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Fantasy Football Weekly, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Time now for Fantasy Football Weekly from iHeartRadio, your weekly
source for the nation's best fantasy football advice, speculation, and
whatever stupid stuff they decide to drop into the show. Now,
here's your host, Paul Chargony.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Everybody, it is Fantasy Football Weekly and off season free
Agent edition of Fantasy Football Weekly. My co host today,
like two weeks ago, Brian Johnson, Hey, buddy.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
What's going on, charg Yeah, We're we're in full on
off season, full on depression, no games on Sunday mode.
But our first, our first milestone we have to look
forward to is free agency. There's a well, actually the
combine coming.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Yeah, Combine coming up is a biggie, right, So that's
a couple of weeks from now, and then you know,
we're only three and a half weeks away from free
agency starting. It's it's all coming. Over the course of
the show, we'll talk through the key free agents, not
all of them, just too many, the guys that you
care most about at quarterback, running back, wide receiver, tight end.
We'll talk about what kind of landing space they might find,
(01:16):
you know, is it going to be a hot market.
Is it going to be a cold market? You know?
Where do we want them to go? And we'll break
down all of those guys. Also, I'll mention this, Brian,
We're recording this a couple of days before people are
going to hear it because I'm going to be a
whiskey weekend. I can't wait. If you're a bourbon drinker
and you want to follow along with our fourth this
(01:38):
our fifteenth year, I think of our our blind March
Madness style whiskey bracket double elimination. Follow me on Twitter
at Paul charci In very excited for that.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
I threw you a recommendation as you tweeted it out
as you do every year, because we don't you don't
get too into into your bit, but you got to
bring a new bottle every year essentially, And yeah, I
had a somewhat out of the box recommendation. I'll be
curious to see if you actually took it. We can't.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
We can't can't because it's all it's all blind. That's
part of the beauty of this format is at the
top of every hour you get we have one guy
who administers it, and so he knows all the secrets.
He knows what bottles what we don't know when we're
drinking it. All you know is you get about a
half shot glass of one that's marked A and one
that's marked B. So there's no marketing. You don't the bottle.
(02:29):
You don't have. All you have to go on is taste.
That's it. You don't know what you're drinking. And so
a lot of the times you think you love this
particular bourbon, and then when it comes up, it might
turn out you like a different one better, and maybe
you're even lukewarm on the one that you brought. And
that's what has happened a lot. We had. One year,
(02:50):
my good friend Brian other Brian, not You've not you
friend Brian brought a two hundred dollar bottle of Middleton
and he I previously described it as angels tears in
a bottle, which I can understand. And then the first
time it came up, he voted against it. Second time
(03:11):
it came came up, voted against it again and knocked
He knocked his own bottle out of our competition.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
That's like the sixteen seed knocking out the one seed
in the n c DOAA tournament, which happened recently. I
believe it was Virginia.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, was it just last year?
Speaker 3 (03:26):
No, it was a a few years ago. And then
they went on to win the national championship the next year, Virginia.
I remember that because that was the final four in Minneapolis, Virginia.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
A few years ago.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
Yeah. Yeah, but they they were the first team to
lose as the number one seed, and then the next
year they came back and won the national championship. Pretty
impressive rebound from the most embarrassing, yeah, accomplishment in college basketball.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Right, So that's either going to galvanize you into a
great team or it's going to go the opposite direction
and it's going to spiral you down. In Virginia, obviously,
you know they rebounded from it. An impressive job for them.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Look at us breaking down and c doub play best.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Yeah, that's well barely, it's about all that.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Let's talk football.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
Now, let's talk football. Let's begin at the quarterback position.
We have two notable unrestricted free agents there more Obviously,
we don't think Gardner Minshew and Ryan Tannehill deserve a
lot of time and we're not going to turn this
into a like hour long session here, but let's start
with Baker Mayfield coming off by I think, in most regards,
the best year of his career when he was just
(04:33):
sort of an afterthought when Tampa signed him and he
turned out to be fantasy relevant for much of the season.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
Yeah, I mean he was. He wasn't guaranteed to start
for the Bucks. Last year was basically came down to
the last preseason game between Baker and Kyle Trask, and
we know how that ended. Baker won the job and
he never gave it back. Let's look back at his
stats real quick from last year. Ninth in passing yards,
Baker was. His twenty nine passing touchdowns were the sixth most.
(05:04):
And of the six quarterbacks who threw more touchdown passes
than Baker, only one of them through fewer interceptions than
Baker Mayfield. Wow, and that was Dak Prescott. And back
to those six quarterbacks who threw more touchdowns in Baker Mayfield,
Patrick Mahomes was not one of them.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yeah, did not expect that going into the season that
you get more touchdowns out of Baker Mayfield than Patrick
Mahomes And they both played full seasons yep.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
And Baker had less picks than Mahomes he had more
rushing touchdowns in Mahomes wown to zero. I was like, well,
he must have had more fantasy points in Mahomes.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
He didn't.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Mahomes beat him out on rushing yards. Essentially, he had
like two hundred more rushing yards and that's how he
beat out Patrick. I'm sorry how Patrick Mahomes beat out
Baker Mayfield in terms of fantasy points. So he is
a hot commodity, Like you said, he's a lot hotter
commodity than he was last year. Basically, he was just
a free you know, Tampa grabbed him off the street
for free. But now we're looking at a return to
(06:04):
Tampa Bay, which honestly isn't as appealing because Mike Evans
might be gone.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
We'll talk about that.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Yeah, So we're looking at like the Patriots, the Falcons, Raiders, Broncos, Steelers.
Of all those, to me, the Falcons and the Raiders
stand out most for the most appealing landing spot. So
I'm hoping he ends up there. But I just feel
like Tampa Bay is going to resign Baker, but without
Mike Evans. I don't like his prospects as much. Assumably
(06:30):
presumably without Mike Evans, So.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Ye kind of with you on that Atlanta would be interesting,
Raiders to be interesting. I don't think the Patriots are
in because they're ridiculous if they don't take a quarterback
at pick three. So we'll find out, but I don't
think I think they'll use that pick on a quarterback.
Let's talk Kirk Cousins, who was on an MVP pace
when he blew out his achilles, leading the league in yards,
tied for the lead league in touchdowns, and if you
(06:57):
were to convert the Vikings, if you think Kirks was
good for one extra touchdown a game over the Josh
Dobbs and you know Nick Bullins, then he would have
put the Vikings in a position where they would have
been soundly in the playoffs. And I think Kirk Cousins
would have been a very, very legit contender for MVP
(07:18):
in a season in which Lamar Jackson won the MVP
with twenty four passing touchdowns and I think five rushing touchdowns.
That's it.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
And before Kirk quent down in what week eight nine,
he was five fantasy quarterback just speaking fantasy.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
As a matter of fact, Yeah, I'm glad you brought
that up, so let's talk about that. So when he
went down, he was quarterback five in fantasy for a
non rushing, like zero rushing quarterback. That's pretty good. He's
still only playing half a season. He still finished his
quarterback twenty four. Just pretty impressive year. Prior, Kirk Cousins
was quarterback six before that, quarterback nine. So you know,
(07:56):
he had been a solidly top ten quarterback for three
straight seasons. Now you have to give a little bit
of caution because of the Achilles, but never a mobile
guy anyway, and doesn't to me. I'm not terribly worried
about him coming back off that injury, especially with all
the time they'll have to rehab from it. We just
saw him dance three weeks ago, right, so I think
(08:20):
he's doing okay. You already hit on some of the
landing places for Cousins, Denver, Pittsburgh, Tampa if they don't go,
Baker Mayfield, Atlanta. But the best fit is just to
stay with Minnesota. With what we know that he's got here,
Kirk Kirk and Kevin O'Connell really were hitting their stride
in a big way. Presumably the team resigns Justin Jefferson
(08:41):
they've got Jordan Addison and at some point they get TJ.
Hockkinson back off of his knee injury.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
Well, yeah, isn't that a focal point to keeping Justin Jefferson? Apparently,
is that they signs. I mean, Jefferson's almost given them
an ultimatum at this point, like either sign Kirk, signed Kirk,
or you're gonna lose us both.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
So what we know from Jefferson is super Bowl Week
when he at Radio Row, he was pounding the table
for Kirk Cousins at every stop, and he had been
doing that since the latter part of the season and
saying pretty much outright, you know, look at what we're
struggling with with the other guys when we don't have
Kirk and then Justin Jefferson. Recently, a report came media
(09:24):
report came out and said that Jefferson says that if
he's going to resign, the team has to have a
solution in place at quarterback. Totally. I don't blame him,
and obviously Kirk would qualify for that. Let's go to
the running backs, Brian, you can go as it me
or you first. I think it's I think it is
you first. Let's take. Let's take a look at your
(09:45):
first running.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Back off the I'll go first because I got the King.
Derek Henry. Yeah, yeah, Dereck Henry. Future Hall of Famer.
He should be in the Hall of Fame already based
on his career numbers. We'll sort of dive into those
in a minute, but he turned thirty last month, going
into his ninth season in twenty twenty four. So of course,
the age old question for running backs is he have
(10:08):
enough tread on the tires. Last year, two hundred and
eighty carries. That's still like belcow usage, especially in this
day and age, And despite averaging a career low four
point two yards per carry, Henry finished with nearly twelve
hundred rushing yards twelve rushing touchdowns that gave him six
straight seasons with double digit rushing scores. Twenty eight catches
(10:32):
last year thirty three and twenty twenty two. Now those
aren't huge numbers, but those are the two highest season
catch totals in his career for the last two years,
so he's still he's more versatile than ever, you can
put it that way. So I mean two hundred and
eighty carries, he was down from about like three hundred
and thirty carries last year, so he's not gonna be
his three hundred plus carry seasons likely over. But I'm
(10:56):
in on Derrick Henry. Wherever he ends up. He's already
got the hype video up on Twitter. You know, he's
doing bench presses with a car on his stomach and
he's like chewing through metal chord.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
He's a beast. And you know, places where he could
end up would be really intriguing, like Baltimore, how about Dallas, Minnesota.
I think Minnesota could use a guy like Derrick Henry
in the backfield. Chargers. I mean, there's a lot of
teams looking at running backs Philadelphia. So wherever he ends up,
(11:30):
I'm in on Derrick Henry. And right now I believe
he's like, it's of course way too really best ball
adp but he's going like fourth round, fifth round.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Tyja Spears is going before him. Spears is going end
of third, beginning of fourth. And on the presumption that
Derrick Henry is gonna be gone.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
But I mean, what if he ends up on Baltimore Dallas.
It's a clear lead back. We're talking it's late second
round at latest. I think with Henry.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
So I don't be interesting to see if Henry ends
up in a more of a time share a little
bit like he had with Taja Spears. All the Spears
was more like, you know, he was getting like six
seven touches a game. But what if he what if
he what if they compliment him with somebody who's more
of a pure pass catching back That might be really
interesting to see if you know how that backfield could
(12:19):
work and what that would mean for Derrick Henry if
he's not, you know, going to be an eighteen to
twenty carry a game guy.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Yeah, I think that the eighteen to twenty is gone,
but I think that the fifteen carries not to twelve
to fifteen per game. A couple catches and yeah, and
a with the like he's the queer thunder of any
kind of thunder and lightning backfield for.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Sure, the ultimate thunder right there, Derrick Henry, and he'll
get all the goal line work in almost any scenario
where he falls. Let's talk say Kwon Barkley. You know,
when we look back at his whole career, never as
good as he was as a rookie. Tragically, when he
was unbelievable. That season one rookie of the year put
up two thousand yards, fifteen ten touchdowns in five yards
(13:01):
per carry as a rookie and then never hit any
of those metrics again in any season after that. And
then last year just in a really tough position. You know,
Daniel Jones goes down. The quarterbacking was somewhere between awful
and subpar for most of the year, really all of
the year, and teams just played to stop Saquon Barkley largely.
(13:24):
Now kind of interesting. Saquon's not old, but he's also
not young anymore. He's twenty seven years old. He's been
hurt a lot. You know, he had the full ACL injury,
high ankle sprains, just a lot of nagging injuries for him.
Last year. He was running back thirteen year before that,
running back six year before that, thirty four year before that,
(13:45):
running back one hundred and twenty because he missed almost
the entire season. So, you know, it feels like Saquon
Barkley could have some bell kow left in him. But
I think the best fit for him, honestly, is in
more of a split bat that backfield, more of a
sixty forty where he can just stay healthy. You know
what happens if Saquon Barkley doesn't have to carry the
(14:06):
ball touch the ball two hundred and twenty five times.
What if he can be one hundred and eighty more
effective times where he can play seventeen games and stay fresher.
I'd love to see him in more of a one
to two punch. What if he goes you know, we
were talking about Tennessee. What if he replaces What if
he's a part of a one two punch with Tad J. Spears.
(14:27):
What if he goes to New England replacing Ezekiel Elliott
and pairing with Remandre Stevenson. You know, that could be
an interesting fit for him as an as a high
end pass catching back.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
What about the Minnesota Vikings. Does that doing anything for you?
Speaker 1 (14:41):
It does? I have a lot of interest in that.
Vikings haven't had a great receiving back in Kevin O'Connell's tenure,
and it would be fascinating to see what Saquon Barkley
could do. If Kevin O'Connell decides he's finally going to
start throwing the running back, something he has not done
in the past, that would be interesting Saquon Bark right there.
Let's go to our next running back and that is
(15:05):
I'll Pollard. Oh, Tony Pollard. What a disappointing season, Brian, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
You can argue he was the biggest you bust in
fantasy football last year, early second round pick, so I'm
taking him in the You know, some people were pegging
him as he was gonna be the RB one because
we saw for years working behind Zeke Elliott pretty much
out producing Zeke Elliott as the secondary back, and we're like,
just give Pollard the bell cow usage and he's gonna
(15:33):
be a top five fantasy running back, right And he
pretty much got that usage last year, but he did
not produce. Let's let's take a quick look back at
his last two years. So in twenty twenty two, Pollard
was third in yards per carry five point two. That
dropped to twenty ninth in twenty twenty three. Four yards
per carry twenty twenty two, Tony Pollard was first in
(15:55):
yards after contact per carry at three point eight last
year year twenty third a two point nine. In twenty
twenty two, Pollard was second and explosive run rate thirty fifth.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Yeah, man, it just because all the highlights we had
two seasons ago. And if I asked you right now
to conjure up in your head a Tony Pollard highlight
from last year, can you do it? No?
Speaker 3 (16:23):
Most of them are him getting stuffed at the one
yard right. There was some bad luck there for sure.
And actually, I mean he did come on stronger towards
the end of the year. We'll give him that. Now.
Pro Football Focus grades and ratings don't necessarily translate to
(16:44):
fantasy points, but he was the highest graded runner by
PFF from from weeks eleven to eighteen. Oh okay last year.
And the usage was what was kind of head scratching,
because in the Zeke days, you know, they use him
in a world read him out more, but they just
ran him up the middle mercilessly. Last year. They kind
(17:05):
of just mixed up the usage where they should have
given Rico Dowdell, who by all means was a would
have been a better draft pick as if he took
Dowdell in the last round over Pollard in the second round.
But long story short, I hope he gets another chance
on a different team. We kind of mentioned the the
sexy landing spots in Baltimore, Tennessee, not really Tennessee with spears,
(17:30):
but Houston. Sorry to say, Damian Pierce charge might not
be the bell cow you wanted, but obviously, but I.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Don't think he's a Pollard's not a bell cow. I
don't want him to go anywhere where he has to
be a bell cow, do you.
Speaker 3 (17:43):
No, not really, but I want him to go somewhere
where he is in more of a split. It just utilized.
His strengths are not between the tackles, that they're outside
of them, and he was just running the A gap
B gaps over and over again by Dallas, which is
not where he found success in the year's past. So
I'd like to see him get a fresh start somewhere else.
He was tagged franchise tagged by the Cowboys in twenty
(18:05):
twenty three, so highly unlikely they use that on an again.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
No chance. I don't think he's back in Dallas either.
I'll mention again another pairing. I'd like Ramandre Stevenson Tony
Pollard and he'd follow Ezekiel Elliott's path to New England.
Wouldn't that That'd be great. Josh Jacobs last year was
the highest scoring running back in fantasy football. Cratered hard
(18:28):
this year, posting half the yards and half the touchdowns
despite only missing four games, and he ran for only
three and a half yards per carry, and Josh Jacobs's replacement,
Samir White, ran for almost a yard more per carry
in obviously the same offense, which could suggest that the
Raiders are not going to use him very much. You know,
(18:50):
Jacobs is relatively young. He's just twenty six years old,
but he's kind of an old twenty six. He's got
one thousand, five hundred touches in his career, and you
get the feeling the last last two seasons where the
Raiders have strong harmed him, strong armed him contractually. We're
just all about taking taking tread off his tires and
(19:10):
then kicking him to the curb and free agency. I
don't think he's going to be a Raider next year,
do you, Brian?
Speaker 3 (19:16):
No, I don't think they got there. They've got their
their money's worth out of them, and then some like
you said, they're kind of used and abused them per se,
which is a kind of you know, we've seen running
backs get that treatment and then they fall off hard
at their new teams, like the Marco Murray is one
of the classic cases, and so yeah, we'll see where
he ends up.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
This is you know what you'll have to decide, listeners,
was Josh Jacob's bad year last year? Was it just
a one off dip or was it the beginning of
the end for a high volume back, Because you know
we've seen, you know, we've seen both of those scenarios
play themselves out. At twenty six, he still could have
some good years left in him, but it could also
just be the end of the road because we've seen
(19:59):
it both ways. I suspect that in a better offense,
Josh Jacobs could still be a good player, and I
don't think he's a change of pace guy. I want
to see him in an offense where Josh Jacobs can
still be the workhorse, where he can catch forty or
fifty passes like he's done before. So Cincinnati, assuming Mixon
moves on, which I encourage them to do, that would
(20:20):
be a fantastic landing spot for Josh Jacobs. Houston, as
you mentioned, Singletary's an unrestricted free agent. The Chargers assuming
Eckler moves on, makes sense. How about Washington They could
use a gritty runner who can actually break a tackle.
They haven't had that in years. Maybe not an ideal
landing spot in terms of the quality of overall offense
(20:40):
in Washington, but that would make sense. Minnesota would make sense.
So there's some nice landing spots for Josh Jacobs out there,
But if I could pick one, Cincinnati would be my
top choice.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
Yeah, that's an ideal landing spot on a landing spot
for another position. We'll get to get too soon, but
we should have prefaced before we go to break. To
preface the running backs, I feel that it's it's a
great year for free the free agent class, and that
it's probably the weakest incoming rookie class of running backs
(21:11):
that I can remember. I mean experts like thor and Eystrom.
I think he would say that I think the third
round might be the earliest we see a running bowl
ye get drafted this year. I might be putting words
in his mouth, but definitely not the first round. That
that's a given. There's not gonna be any running backs
drafted in the first round. And yeah, it's really thin
(21:32):
crop of rookie running backs, so it's a good spot
for a lot of these free agent backs. So I'm
very intrigued to see where these guys end up landing.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Thoro will be on the show next week and we're
gonna start breaking down rookies beginning next week. It's it's
it's time already. Oh he's ready, no doubt, he's ready,
and we're gonna start with quarterbacks. I think we'll find out,
we'll really get to the bottom of where he sees
this first round shaking out and he's he's single handedly
trying to move the needle on JJ Carthy and it
(22:00):
might end up working. We got two more running backs
before we hit our break here, DeAndre Swift, coming off
a season in which he was inexplicably healthy but not
always as productive as we thought he was going to
be at the beginning of the season for the Eagles
and him his productivity drying up was one of the
reasons that we had the big fade from Philadelphia.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Yeah, Swift had that monster game against the Vikings in
like week three on Monday night, and he just looked
like a Grand Slam League winner because he was getting
drafted in the seventh last summer. But after that he
fell off big time. Swift gained just two plus yards
on forty nine percent of his carries regained two plus
(22:45):
yards on just forty nine percent of his carries. That
was the worst clip among qu qualifying running backs two
plus yards after contact. I'm sorry I flubbed that stat.
So he was not efficient and he wasn't efficient near
the goal line because of the Toush push. We all
know that, and Jason Kelcey if he retires. Of course,
(23:06):
everyone knows Jason Kelcey more so for the partying now,
but he was the starting center for the Eagles and
a big part of the Tousch push. If the Toush
push stays intact or if it's band, who knows. But
he wasn't trusted near the goal line, So odds are
he's not back in Philly again. It's the same list
of running backs or landing spots that are out there.
(23:28):
You'd be intriguing in Cincinnati, But Swift was a disappointment
as a pass catcher. Thirty nine catches last year. That
was not a lot he was. We expected a bigger
role from him there. But I still think he's an
able pass catcher, but he's better served as a one
to two punch. What about like a Derek's Derrick Henry
DeAndre Swift both going to the same team. Wow, just
letting those two go at it or Derreck Henry Tony Pollard.
(23:50):
That's the kind of pairing we need, I feel. But
that's where Swift will thrive in a situation like that.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
I think, yeah, not just maybe just not a work
course back. Just that's the you know, that's just the
reality of it for DeAndre Swift.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
It's a dying breed. The bellcoal back. We started saying
this last year and going into last year, it was
like Derek Henry, Saquon Barkley were some of the last remaining.
A year later we're talking about them. How there might
be watched up.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Yep, speaking washed up. Let's go to Austin Eckler. You'll
have to decide for yourself where he stands. But this
is gonna be a tricky one to figure out, coming
off two seasons, the prior two seasons before twenty twenty,
so this would be twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two,
twenty touchdowns and eighteen touchdowns, and then last year, of course,
the productivity just fell off a cliff for him, just
(24:39):
six touchdowns despite playing fourteen games for Austin Eckler and
his six hundred rushing yards for Eckler ranked thirty sixth
Brian in the league. His four hundred and thirty six
receiving yards was only ninth. I mean, we're used to
a guy who was top ten in both. He's like
number one in res yards and you'd be like number
(25:01):
seven in rushing yards, and he had the gaudy touchdown
totals and it all dried up. He's he'll be twenty
nine years old at the start of the season, and
you know, the other side of it is he's kind
of a young twenty five in that he didn't start
getting real workload until he was twenty four years old,
so he's really had like five years of real work
(25:25):
And to me, just clearly for Eckler, he needs to
find himself in a role where he can be James White,
where he can be like the best receiving back in
the league. And I it's not like I wouldn't give
him any carries, but I want to see what he
could do if he were if he remained like a
seventy target running back and only had you know, like
(25:47):
eighty carries on the season. That to me is the
where Austin Eckler is right, now, what do you think?
Speaker 3 (25:53):
Yeah, there were times last year where he almost looked
like a full back running the ball out of the backfield.
He's bettered off as a pass catching specialist. Like you
said at this point, it's it's it sucks when this
happens because he was RB one. He was the top
fantasy player in twenty twenty two. And that's what happens
when when you chase last year's production. I mean, really,
(26:16):
Austin Eckler. The cautionary tales are all in this list.
Austin Eckler, Tony Pollard, chasing, chasing these those stats doesn't
usually work out. So but I don't think he's totally
washed yet. But yeah, he needs to be in the
right spot where he's gonna get you sixty seventy catches
(26:39):
to be fantasy relevant, because if he doesn't, he's probably
not gonna be relevant at all in fantasy football next year.
For this year, I should say.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
Let me give you some some really intriguing landing spots
for Austin Eckler as a pure receiving back or primary
receiving back Indianapolis with Jonathan Taylor. Okay, how about Jacksonville
with Travis Etn as the lead back?
Speaker 3 (27:04):
I like it.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
How about replacing Jeric McKinnon in Kansas City.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
That's that was the one I was going to lead
off with that, that's the most.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
And how about this one where he wouldn't have to
sell his house. You could go to the rams and
be the receiving option that Kien Williams really isn't. What
do you think of that option?
Speaker 3 (27:25):
You know, I hate that option.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
I know you love ky but the reality is Williams
is not any lead pass catching back. Austin Eckler's still
could be.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Well, the thing is, I liked Karen Williams more as
a pass catcher last year because like they were gonna
use him as a James White, who we just the
afore meentioned James White. So I think you're a little
off on the pass catching for Kyra Willams. Don't.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
They didn't use him that way, you know, for whatever
that indicates, you know, I think Williams ended up. I'm
gonna look it up now, Kyn Williams. I think I
want to say it, like thirty five receptions.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
Take don't forget he missed four games.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
He had thirty two receptions for two hundred yards. And
yes he did miss games. He played in twelve games,
so still that's yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:15):
Well they were throwing the ball. They were throwing it
to Pookin Nakua. That's why. That's that's my story and
I'm sticking to it.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
Sounds good. Let's take a break when we come back.
Wide receivers and tight ends that are headed to free
agency when we come back Fantasy Football Weekly. All right,
welcome back Fantasy Football Weekly. Paul Charchi and Brian Johnson
(28:42):
with us. You can follow us on Twitter at Paul
Charcian at bt XJ, and you might want to follow
Guillotine Leagues as well at gl chop. We are behind
the scenes already hard at work getting all kinds of
improvements in place for Guillotine Leagues twenty twenty four. Very excited.
Can't talk about him yet because they're not done yet,
but we're we got a lot of things in motions.
(29:04):
Can be very exciting year.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
Around the corner, the blade is being sharpened.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
We are sharpening the blade. I like it, off season
blade sharpening. Let's jump into wide receivers, Brian, I'll start
with Mike Evans. Okay, likely a Hall of Fame career
ten straight when thousand yard seasons is ridiculous, Brian, Now,
a thousand yards isn't what it used to be, you know,
because the league is so pass heavy and there's so
(29:30):
many advantages for the passing attack now, but the durability
to just make it through ten seasons unbelievable. He's thirty
years old now, Bucks could move on, but you know,
he's coming off a fourteen hundred yard season, which is
more yards than he had in the two years with
Tom Brady, and he had it with Baker Mayfield. I
(29:51):
don't know if there's going to be a big market
for Mike Evans, a thirty year old guy. Do you
want to sign a thirty year old to a three
year deal?
Speaker 3 (29:58):
Now?
Speaker 1 (29:58):
The Vikings walked on ad feeling at age thirty one
last year, coming off a long, very productive career. What
do you think, What do you think the likelihood is
of What kind of market do you think they'll be
for Mike Evans, including Tampa and others? Do you think
he's gonna be a coveted free agent?
Speaker 3 (30:16):
I think from what I've read, and it makes sense,
like you said, because he's thirty the production likely to
dip could be starting this year, but I don't think
he's going to fall off a clip by any means.
But it's kind of teams that are in win now mode.
And then the two teams that I've the most steam
around are the Chiefs. They need three wide receivers in
(30:39):
Kansas City, where she Rice is the only competent wide
receiver they have in my mind, and the Lions supposedly
will be in the market for a wide receiver. So
outside of Tampa Bay, those are the two spots I
think we could see Evans land, but I think it
makes the most sense just to keep him in Tampa Bay.
I know they obviously love him there between the Lions
on the field, but he's also integral member of the
(31:01):
community and has been for quite some time, so they
love him there and I would be shocked if they
don't retain he and Baker Mayfield. And we mentioned this
earlier for Baker's sake. If he stays in Tampa Bay,
you sure as hell hope that they keep Mike Evans
as well.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
Yeah, the teams get sentimental about Hall of Fame level players, right,
and I do think they'll try to sign him But
here's what's weird, really weird, Brian. Last Monday, the team
chose to absorb a seven million dollar dead cap space hit,
which is something they could have avoided had they gotten
a new deal done with him, but they didn't, And
(31:37):
so you know, they just threw away seven million dollars
a cap space not signing him, and the franchise tag
is not plausible. It's twenty eight million dollars for him,
so there's no chance they're gonna franchise him for him
landing spots. You mentioned Kansas City. Let me give you
another one. What do you think of Buffalo? You know,
Gabe Davis is gonna walk. They're not gonna keep Gabe Davis.
(31:58):
Instead of Gabe Davis, with all of the ups and
downs that he gives you, you get a sure handed
end zone threat in Mike Evans. And you know here
they are Imagine the Bills are the three yard line, Brian.
You think they're gonna push push Josh Allen. But here's
Mike Evans. Great, you know, legendarily effective from close in
(32:19):
the stripe. He's effectively a goal line back wide receiver. Buffalo,
I think would be really interesting as defenses that have
to try to figure out how to defend a Josh
Allen Tush push or a pass to Mike Evans. What
do you think of Buffalo as a landing spot?
Speaker 3 (32:34):
Yeah, that makes sense too, and they certainly fit the
mold of the the win Now teams right.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Yeah, he's not going to rebuilding team, right.
Speaker 3 (32:42):
No, no chance, hopefully not. I hopefully learned his lesson
from from Adam Thiel. And I saw someone mentioned Carolina.
I'm like, no, no more potential Hall of famers going
to Carolina in the twilight of their career. That's that's
kills shot. Yes, Ronnie hope of winning a title.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Not that I think Adam had a nice career, but
not a Hall of Fame career. Jets probably need another
wide receiver opposite Garrett Wilson, and he's Garrett Wilson is
not the same kind of big bodied guide like Mike
Evans is and Aaron Rodgers will be back Baltimore would
be interesting. They re signed Nelson Agilar this week, but
they still need a legit number two wide receiver and
evans physical play is something that none of the wide
(33:20):
receivers in Baltimore have, so those to me are some
of the ideal landing spots for Mike Evans. Let's go
to Michael Pittman, who I think it could be a
franchise tag candidate here. What do you have on Pittman?
Speaker 3 (33:34):
Yeah, he's certainly a candidate to be tagged by the Colts,
And honestly, if they don't, they're they're they're moronic if
they let if they let Pittman walk. Who turns twenty
seven in October. Michael Pittman so pretty much entering the
prime of his career right right now. And in the event,
you don't know what he looks like, six ' four,
(33:55):
two hundred and thirty pounds, absolute monster, kind of another
dying breed in the NFL, but you know, this was
like the prototypical alpha receiver build. You don't see a
lot of him anymore, but he still pulls it off.
And he's been doing a good job, especially last year
fourth in catches with one hundred and nine finished just
(34:16):
over eleven hundred and fifty receiving yards, four touchdowns. Bump
those numbers up a little bit along with one hundred
and nine catches, and he's right in that top tier
of wide receivers. Cdum Justin Jefferson, Jamar Chase, all those guys,
and you know, he's Indy. Is not the best fit
for him fantasy wise in my mind. You know, we
(34:36):
only got to see Anthony Richardson for a game and
a half, but he's a running quarterback. They got a
strong run game with Jonathan Taylor coming back. So I
would like to see him end up somewhere else a
little more exciting.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
But I think.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
Minimal chance that the Colts let him walk. They really
should not.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
You know, related to that, let's let's just go maybe
a few hundred miles away in Cincinnati, Higgins, do you uh,
I don't know that it's a given that they can
afford to keep Higgins. You know, there's talk that they'll
franchise tag him too, but they have so much money
tied up in in Burrow and they've got to go,
(35:15):
and you know, Jamar Chase, that's you know, you wonder
if Higgins is going to be the odd man out
or if Higgins is going to have have an opportunity
to stay in Cincinnati.
Speaker 3 (35:25):
Yeah, initially, you know a few months ago, a couple
of months ago, it seemed like Higgins was all but
guaranteed to be an unrestricted free agent, especially with Jamar.
Chase had a comment somewhere along the lines like, we'll
see if they have enough money to pay him after
they pay me. Basically right, But now now it's leaning
towards they tag Higgins if not, though he certainly right
(35:51):
up there with Pittman and Evans in terms of highlight
names on the market. But I think he's more of
a coin flip than Pittman in my mind at this point,
I think Pittman leaning towards more getting tagged by the Colts.
I don't know if you agree there.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Yeah, I think Pittman is more likely to get tagged
because the Colts just have more space to work with
the Bengals. Right now, looking it up, yeah, I was
I was wrong. Bengals halfs caps cap have do have
cap space. Bengals and Colts are right next to each
other with both effectively fifty nine million dollars in cap space.
So yeah, I think I think there is a much
better chance than I originally thought of T Higgins staying
(36:28):
with his team. Let's go to Calvin Ridley. I picked
this up from somebody on Twitter, and I'm sorry I
didn't jot down who it was. If the Jaguars sign
Calvin Ridley Bryan, they the third rounder they owe the
Falcons for that trade becomes a second rounder because of
(36:48):
because he gets resigned as one of the conditions of
the trade. But if they let him walk, they only
have to give the third rounder to the Falcons and
they likely get third round come pensatory pick compensation, so
they it would probably be a push. They'd lose a
third and they'd get a third and so to some
you know, to some degree, it cost them a second
(37:11):
rounder to re sign Ridley. They could put that second
rounder into a twenty two year old wide receiver. So
I think there's some sneaky there's some sneaky reasons here
why Calvin Ridley will not be back with the Jaguars.
He's a low mileage twenty nine year old because he
was older as a rookie, and then he got suspended
(37:31):
for a season, so he really hasn't played nearly as much.
I mean, he's within a year of Mike Evans by age,
but he's got half as many seasons played as Mike
Evans does. Aside from Gabe Davis, Ridley last year was
the league's biggest boom or bust receiver. Get this, he
(37:51):
had six top ten Fantasy games last year. His other
eleven games, Brian he averaged as wide receiver fifty five
in those weeks, averaging three catches for thirty two yards.
Awful for Calvin Ridley as a boomer bust player. There
(38:13):
are media reports that say Jacksonville try to resign him,
but I don't know here. I mean, ideally, you know,
we don't if we don't care if they give up
the second round or not. I mean, I'd love to
see him stay Jacksonville where he remains the best outside
receiver for sure, and maybe the best overall receiver on
Jacksonville with a good young quarterback. But you know, maybe
because he's older, he doesn't want to go to a
(38:34):
rebuilding team, which would put him on potentially Kansas City
or Buffalo or Baltimore, some of the teams we were
talking about with Mike Evans.
Speaker 3 (38:42):
Yeah. I remember Ridley had really weird splits with Zay
Jones last year because dy Jones was in and now
the lineup with injury, and you'd think, oh, when Zay
Jones was injured, Ridley must have had the big games.
But No, it's when say Jones was playing, is when
Bridley would really go off eared.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
He's not.
Speaker 3 (39:02):
He's not. He's not a guy like I would like
to see him on another team, Like Michael Pittman, I'd
like to see him on another team. I think Ridley
can find success in Jacksonville, but like you mentioned, when
it comes to the picks, I think, based on the
inconsistencies we saw last year, that retaining Ridley is not
worth losing out on the pick compensation side. So I
(39:24):
think we will see him, see him hit the market
and uh again, all the a lot of interesting landing
spots or I think he could succeed and like at
a win now mode, and you know those mainly being
Kansas City, Buffalo, Yeah, somewhere along those lines, Baltimore, hopefully
not New England. We just don't want anyone to end
(39:45):
up in New England.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
Well, let's spend you know, we're talking mostly about veterans here,
well really entirely about veterans and New England's it's a
hard reboot in New England. So it just doesn't feel
like that's a landing spot for very many of these guys.
Some of the running backs we did like in New England,
but not the receivers. Two years ago, Mark Heath Brown
demanded to be let out, demanded to be traded away
(40:12):
from Baltimore because he wanted to go to an offense
that could show off his skills for exactly this moment,
so we could get through his fifth year rookie deal
and he could go hit free agency and be really
widely paid. But he ends up in Arizona. Kyler Murray's
not even his quarterback for a lot of it. He
gets hurt a bunch, and now he enters free agency
(40:33):
this year as kind of an afterthought in it with
a lot of good receivers in free agency. What do
you think of Markquise Brown and what level of interest
he's going to have.
Speaker 3 (40:45):
Yeah, his stocks certainly not as high as it was
a couple of years ago. You know that essentially gambling
on himself. It paid off initially if he recalled to
start last year, he was healthy. Kyler Murray was healthy.
Speaker 1 (41:00):
Brother yourself weeks uh pre ac, yeah, Todd Kyler, I
mean two years.
Speaker 3 (41:04):
Ago, yeah, twenty twenty two. Yeah, yeah, Brown was the
top ten wide receiver. Then he got hurt. He like
broke his ankle, and uh, then Murray got hurt later
that year. That's when Murray tore his ACL so and
then going into last year, Murray didn't start the season
so that he didn't get a lot of time with
Kyler Murray. Essentially he did thrive when when they were
(41:27):
playing together, primarily in twenty twenty two. So long story short,
kind of a disaster these last two years.
Speaker 2 (41:33):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
In Arizona. Brown turns twenty seven in June. So he's
he's not old by any means, but he's not your
your your alpha wide receiver, your wide receiver, one guy.
I'd like to see him if he stays in Arizona, fine,
but I think he would fare better where he's you know,
a Robin to someone's batman, where he's alongside a Garrett
(41:54):
Wilson on the Jets or alongside Stefan Diggs and Buffet.
So I will be intrigued to where he lands. He's
not a player wrong, and to love him Wherever he lands.
Landing spot will be pivotal on where I'm looking to
draft or if I'm even willing to draft Markue's Hollywood
Brown next year.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Yeah, it's it's got to be just the right spot.
But I do believe there's some real, sneaky upside of
Marquis Brown if he can hit the if he can
hit it just right, with a strong armed quarterback who
can utilize his downfield speed in an offense that is
pass first, and Marquis Brown stays healthy. I mean, if
you can get all that to come together, this would
(42:35):
be pretty interesting for Marquis Brown. But I need all
that to happen. But if it did, I could see
where he could be just an every week wide receiver
two for your fantasy team. But any of those things
falter and you're back into week to week head scratch
mode on Marquis Brown.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
Well, yeah, one team I want to throw out there.
They'll be intriguing for Brown and most of the wide
receivers we mentioned. We didn't mention this is a landing
spot as too. I mean they got Drake London, yeah,
and well of course they have Kyle Pitts at wide
receiver as well, but I won't go there. But Atlanta
intriguing spot for a lot of these wide receivers that
we failed.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
To mention it is they need to figure out their
quarterback position first. But you know, put Kirk cousins there,
and that's exactly the scenario I'm talking about. Strong armed quarterback,
reliable who can get the we know, can send lasers
downfield to his receivers. That would be a great spot
for Marquis Brown. All right, let's go to the tight
end position. We've got a couple of a couple of
(43:30):
tight ends semi notable. I'll do Dalton Schultz. Last offseason,
Schultz was another guy who bet on himself. Free agency
came along, he didn't find the long term contract a
lot of us thought he might, and instead took a
one year deal with Houston, and productivity was basically unchanged
from what he had in Dallas, and it's really not
(43:51):
that compelling, almost identical numbers in targets, receptions, yards, and
touchdowns to the previous year. And at the end of
the year, troublingly for Dalton elt he started losing snaps
to Brevan Jordan, which I think might have been an
indicator that Houston is not going to resign Dalton Schultz.
I'd be surprised if they do. But there are some
decent landing spots there where Dalton Schultz could earn starters minutes.
(44:16):
Brian Denver needs a tight end. The Jets need a
tight end. Chargers need a tight end, especially with Gerald
Everett heading to free agency. Seattle no offense who we're
going to talk about in a minute is it may
not be there. And I think Miami's really interesting. You know,
Miami desperately needs some tight end help. But you've got Hill,
you got Waddle, You've got several good receiving backs, and
(44:38):
Schultz I think would be like a fourth and fifth
option most weeks, and from a fantasy standpoint, would be
very hard to sort of figure out what to expect
for Schltz in Miami, but they certainly have tight end
need there.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
Yeah, Miami, and you're the top of my list for
tight end needy teams. You feel to mention my favorite
who I believe currently don't have any tight ends on
roster and not the Cincinnati Bengals. If we could just
get an elite pass catching option in Cincinnati for once,
let's see what happens.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
I thought Tanner Hudson had showed some real moments and
I wonder if they if Now. I don't think Tanner
Hudson it's not a free agent, is he. I don't
think he.
Speaker 3 (45:16):
Maybe not a rook I thought I read somewhere that
I didn't really dig too deep, but that they basically
have no one on roster.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
I could you know what you could be right? You know,
I just pulled up.
Speaker 3 (45:28):
I'm saying they won't resign Hudson or anything like that.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
By the way, what a bust erv Smith was for
both my Minnesota and then Cincinnati gave him a legit
you know, gave him a legit contract. Yeah, Tanner Hudson
very quiet, twenty nine years old start, he's been with
UH seven teams. Now, yeah, you're right, Cincinnati is absolutely
in play here. That's a great call, Brian.
Speaker 3 (45:53):
And back to the Schultz really quick. It didn't bode
well for him that as soon as he leaves Dallas,
Jake Ferguson steps in and just looks like the prime
Dulphen Schultz, if not better adult Schultz. So he's a
sort of a system tight end, let's put it that way.
I'm honestly, if I'm any team looking for a tight end,
especially the Bengals. To say Bengals, I'm more excited about
(46:15):
Noah Fense. To be honest, I know he's he's been
somewhat of a disappointment, but no, not somewhat.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
I think a total disappointment. He's he's the rare Iowa
tight end that has underproduced at the at the NFL level.
Speaker 3 (46:30):
He has, but he's still wasn't an elite prospect. He's
twenty six. That's kind of around the average breakout range
for a tight end. Very rarely do tight ends breakout
incredibly early, like Sam Laporta, per se TJ. Hockinson, who
is his teammate. But you know Fans was drafted by
the Broncos and either way, oh yeah, first round talent.
(46:52):
His RAZ score Relative Athletic Scorer, which you know it's
very telling of an athlete's athletic profile, especially a football player,
was extremely high coming out of the draft. So he
was a blue chip prospect. Drafted by Denver in the
first round. He was included in the Russell Wilson trade Seattle,
so you know, Seattle absolutely fleeced Denver in that deal.
(47:14):
We don't have to get into it, so I wouldn't
call him a throw and he was a great piece
to add in. But Seattle just always had this platoon
of tight ends and they're there. Never were a pass
heavy offense. So long story short, I'm very intrigued by
Noah Fan right now. If you're doing early best ball drafts,
he's essentially free. But if he lands in a spot
like Cincinnati or Miami or the Chargers where he can
(47:36):
get you know, true starter reps running seventy to eighty
percent of the routes. I'm not ready to give up
on a guy that was a freakish ash athlete, and
not like he was just an athlete. He was an
all around good tight end at Iowa that produces stellar
tight end. So I'm in on Fan. I'm tracking where
he goes. Rather have Fan over Shultz.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
I'm not. I'm not just because I feel like we've
had so many looks at Noah Fan. Right We're talking
to a lot of guy who in his five year
career has played eighty one games and just never showed.
I just think by now, you know if a guy's
got it or not. And I just think, I think,
no offense, just a guy, but you never know. I mean,
(48:17):
right landing spot is half the is half the battle,
and if he does find himself in the right spot,
maybe he could have You could certainly be worth the ADP.
Right now I gotta imagine. You know, you mentioned Noah
draft going on. You know, no a fan going undrafted,
so you know, for what you'd have to pay to
get him, maybe there's a dice roll to be had there.
Speaker 3 (48:33):
Now. I know we're running long on this podcast, but
I'm having fun, and you know I love talking about
tight ends. Let me just stay in this lane really quick,
because I was thinking about adding the Vikings to this list,
you know, to the list of landing spots or some
of these tight ends, because they're not gonna have TJ.
Howkinson until the midway point at best. Right there's a
(48:55):
chance Hockinson doesn't even play next year, and the starting
tight end for Minnesota is a It's an interesting spot,
to say the least when it comes to fantasy football.
So for those doing their early drafts right now, what
I'm getting had to ask you, true insider, Josh Oliver,
could he be the guy?
Speaker 1 (49:13):
No, Josh Oliver is not. He's just not a receiving
back but a receiving tight end. But they gave him
a giant contract. So the Vikings have as much money
tied up in tight ends as any team in the league.
I want to say so I don't if Noahfan is
dirt cheap. Yeah, he could start the season as the
Vikings as the Vikings starting tight end, but it would
(49:35):
have to be that there's just no market for no
Event for the Vikings to put yet more money into
that spot. Otherwise, I don't. I can't believe that that
would that would end up being something that the Vikings
would end up would end up looking at. I'm pulling
up that the the Vikings have the have the second
highest paid tight end in TJ. Hockinson and the eyeballing
(49:58):
this about the fifteenth highest paid tight end in Josh Oliver.
So I just I can't. I can't see him pouring
more money into that position right now.
Speaker 3 (50:08):
Maybe a more reasonable option for the Vikings that would
be interesting to be a Gerald Everett. We're not going
to get too deep into, but he could be a
cheaper guy to come in and certainly make an impact
Week one in that offense.
Speaker 1 (50:22):
So, by the way, Donald k for himself over the
years he has made No Fan has made career earnings
of dude, dude, dude, Looking right now, you want to
guess career earnings for no Offen at age twenty seven, Well.
Speaker 3 (50:39):
First round pick, so he's on his Wow, so he's
on his second condent. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (50:44):
I'ld say.
Speaker 3 (50:46):
Twenty eight million.
Speaker 1 (50:48):
You're not far off. He's already made nineteen. His total
guarantees though, IS puts him up at twenty five, so
I don't know. I don't know. Career earning says nineteen
total guarantees twenty five million.
Speaker 3 (51:00):
Jeez.
Speaker 1 (51:01):
Not bad for a guy who's been a middling producer
so far.
Speaker 3 (51:06):
Not a dead cat yet, No, I don't think, so
give me one more chance. Yeah, I want to. I
want him to get a nice soft landing spot, and
I'm I'm very intrigued by fantom.
Speaker 1 (51:15):
Thanks for listening, everybody. When we talk next, we will.
I believe we'll be talking rookies next week with Thorn Eiserman.
That'll be super fun. Brian, great job. Thanks for all
your help today. Thanks getting all the way to the
end of our longest offseason pod by a mile, and
we'll talk to you next week. Everybody, Bye bye. Fantasy
Football Weekly is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
(51:37):
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows,
Welcome to Fantasy Football Weekly, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Time now for Fantasy Football Weekly from iHeartRadio, your weekly
source for the nation's best fantasy football advice, speculation, and
whatever stupid stuff they decide to drop into the show. Now,
here's your host, Paul Chargony.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
Everybody, it is Fantasy Football Weekly and off season free
Agent edition of Fantasy Football Weekly. My co host today,
like two weeks ago, Brian Johnson, Hey, buddy.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
What's going on, charg Yeah, We're we're in full on
off season, full on depression, no games on Sunday mode.
But our first, our first milestone we have to look
forward to is free agency. There's a well, actually the
combine coming.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Yeah, Combine coming up is a biggie, right, So that's
a couple of weeks from now, and then you know,
we're only three and a half weeks away from free
agency starting. It's it's all coming. Over the course of
the show, we'll talk through the key free agents, not
all of them, just too many, the guys that you
care most about at quarterback, running back, wide receiver, tight end.
We'll talk about what kind of landing space they might find,
(01:16):
you know, is it going to be a hot market.
Is it going to be a cold market? You know?
Where do we want them to go? And we'll break
down all of those guys. Also, I'll mention this, Brian,
We're recording this a couple of days before people are
going to hear it because I'm going to be a
whiskey weekend. I can't wait. If you're a bourbon drinker
and you want to follow along with our fourth this
(01:38):
our fifteenth year, I think of our our blind March
Madness style whiskey bracket double elimination. Follow me on Twitter
at Paul charci In very excited for that.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
I threw you a recommendation as you tweeted it out
as you do every year, because we don't you don't
get too into into your bit, but you got to
bring a new bottle every year essentially, And yeah, I
had a somewhat out of the box recommendation. I'll be
curious to see if you actually took it. We can't.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
We can't can't because it's all it's all blind. That's
part of the beauty of this format is at the
top of every hour you get we have one guy
who administers it, and so he knows all the secrets.
He knows what bottles what we don't know when we're
drinking it. All you know is you get about a
half shot glass of one that's marked A and one
that's marked B. So there's no marketing. You don't the bottle.
(02:29):
You don't have. All you have to go on is taste.
That's it. You don't know what you're drinking. And so
a lot of the times you think you love this
particular bourbon, and then when it comes up, it might
turn out you like a different one better, and maybe
you're even lukewarm on the one that you brought. And
that's what has happened a lot. We had. One year,
(02:50):
my good friend Brian other Brian, not You've not you
friend Brian brought a two hundred dollar bottle of Middleton
and he I previously described it as angels tears in
a bottle, which I can understand. And then the first
time it came up, he voted against it. Second time
(03:11):
it came came up, voted against it again and knocked
He knocked his own bottle out of our competition.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
That's like the sixteen seed knocking out the one seed
in the n c DOAA tournament, which happened recently. I
believe it was Virginia.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, was it just last year?
Speaker 3 (03:26):
No, it was a a few years ago. And then
they went on to win the national championship the next year, Virginia.
I remember that because that was the final four in Minneapolis, Virginia.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
A few years ago.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
Yeah. Yeah, but they they were the first team to
lose as the number one seed, and then the next
year they came back and won the national championship. Pretty
impressive rebound from the most embarrassing, yeah, accomplishment in college basketball.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Right, So that's either going to galvanize you into a
great team or it's going to go the opposite direction
and it's going to spiral you down. In Virginia, obviously,
you know they rebounded from it. An impressive job for them.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Look at us breaking down and c doub play best.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Yeah, that's well barely, it's about all that.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Let's talk football.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
Now, let's talk football. Let's begin at the quarterback position.
We have two notable unrestricted free agents there more Obviously,
we don't think Gardner Minshew and Ryan Tannehill deserve a
lot of time and we're not going to turn this
into a like hour long session here, but let's start
with Baker Mayfield coming off by I think, in most regards,
the best year of his career when he was just
(04:33):
sort of an afterthought when Tampa signed him and he
turned out to be fantasy relevant for much of the season.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
Yeah, I mean he was. He wasn't guaranteed to start
for the Bucks. Last year was basically came down to
the last preseason game between Baker and Kyle Trask, and
we know how that ended. Baker won the job and
he never gave it back. Let's look back at his
stats real quick from last year. Ninth in passing yards,
Baker was. His twenty nine passing touchdowns were the sixth most.
(05:04):
And of the six quarterbacks who threw more touchdown passes
than Baker, only one of them through fewer interceptions than
Baker Mayfield. Wow, and that was Dak Prescott. And back
to those six quarterbacks who threw more touchdowns in Baker Mayfield,
Patrick Mahomes was not one of them.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Yeah, did not expect that going into the season that
you get more touchdowns out of Baker Mayfield than Patrick
Mahomes And they both played full seasons yep.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
And Baker had less picks than Mahomes he had more
rushing touchdowns in Mahomes wown to zero. I was like, well,
he must have had more fantasy points in Mahomes.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
He didn't.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Mahomes beat him out on rushing yards. Essentially, he had
like two hundred more rushing yards and that's how he
beat out Patrick. I'm sorry how Patrick Mahomes beat out
Baker Mayfield in terms of fantasy points. So he is
a hot commodity, Like you said, he's a lot hotter
commodity than he was last year. Basically, he was just
a free you know, Tampa grabbed him off the street
for free. But now we're looking at a return to
(06:04):
Tampa Bay, which honestly isn't as appealing because Mike Evans
might be gone.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
We'll talk about that.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Yeah, So we're looking at like the Patriots, the Falcons, Raiders, Broncos, Steelers.
Of all those, to me, the Falcons and the Raiders
stand out most for the most appealing landing spot. So
I'm hoping he ends up there. But I just feel
like Tampa Bay is going to resign Baker, but without
Mike Evans. I don't like his prospects as much. Assumably
(06:30):
presumably without Mike Evans, So.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Ye kind of with you on that Atlanta would be interesting,
Raiders to be interesting. I don't think the Patriots are
in because they're ridiculous if they don't take a quarterback
at pick three. So we'll find out, but I don't
think I think they'll use that pick on a quarterback.
Let's talk Kirk Cousins, who was on an MVP pace
when he blew out his achilles, leading the league in yards,
tied for the lead league in touchdowns, and if you
(06:57):
were to convert the Vikings, if you think Kirks was
good for one extra touchdown a game over the Josh
Dobbs and you know Nick Bullins, then he would have
put the Vikings in a position where they would have
been soundly in the playoffs. And I think Kirk Cousins
would have been a very, very legit contender for MVP
(07:18):
in a season in which Lamar Jackson won the MVP
with twenty four passing touchdowns and I think five rushing touchdowns.
That's it.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
And before Kirk quent down in what week eight nine,
he was five fantasy quarterback just speaking fantasy.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
As a matter of fact, Yeah, I'm glad you brought
that up, so let's talk about that. So when he
went down, he was quarterback five in fantasy for a
non rushing, like zero rushing quarterback. That's pretty good. He's
still only playing half a season. He still finished his
quarterback twenty four. Just pretty impressive year. Prior, Kirk Cousins
was quarterback six before that, quarterback nine. So you know,
(07:56):
he had been a solidly top ten quarterback for three
straight seasons. Now you have to give a little bit
of caution because of the Achilles, but never a mobile
guy anyway, and doesn't to me. I'm not terribly worried
about him coming back off that injury, especially with all
the time they'll have to rehab from it. We just
saw him dance three weeks ago, right, so I think
(08:20):
he's doing okay. You already hit on some of the
landing places for Cousins, Denver, Pittsburgh, Tampa if they don't go,
Baker Mayfield, Atlanta. But the best fit is just to
stay with Minnesota. With what we know that he's got here,
Kirk Kirk and Kevin O'Connell really were hitting their stride
in a big way. Presumably the team resigns Justin Jefferson
(08:41):
they've got Jordan Addison and at some point they get TJ.
Hockkinson back off of his knee injury.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
Well, yeah, isn't that a focal point to keeping Justin Jefferson? Apparently,
is that they signs. I mean, Jefferson's almost given them
an ultimatum at this point, like either sign Kirk, signed Kirk,
or you're gonna lose us both.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
So what we know from Jefferson is super Bowl Week
when he at Radio Row, he was pounding the table
for Kirk Cousins at every stop, and he had been
doing that since the latter part of the season and
saying pretty much outright, you know, look at what we're
struggling with with the other guys when we don't have
Kirk and then Justin Jefferson. Recently, a report came media
(09:24):
report came out and said that Jefferson says that if
he's going to resign, the team has to have a
solution in place at quarterback. Totally. I don't blame him,
and obviously Kirk would qualify for that. Let's go to
the running backs, Brian, you can go as it me
or you first. I think it's I think it is
you first. Let's take. Let's take a look at your
(09:45):
first running.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Back off the I'll go first because I got the King.
Derek Henry. Yeah, yeah, Dereck Henry. Future Hall of Famer.
He should be in the Hall of Fame already based
on his career numbers. We'll sort of dive into those
in a minute, but he turned thirty last month, going
into his ninth season in twenty twenty four. So of course,
the age old question for running backs is he have
(10:08):
enough tread on the tires. Last year, two hundred and
eighty carries. That's still like belcow usage, especially in this
day and age, And despite averaging a career low four
point two yards per carry, Henry finished with nearly twelve
hundred rushing yards twelve rushing touchdowns that gave him six
straight seasons with double digit rushing scores. Twenty eight catches
(10:32):
last year thirty three and twenty twenty two. Now those
aren't huge numbers, but those are the two highest season
catch totals in his career for the last two years,
so he's still he's more versatile than ever, you can
put it that way. So I mean two hundred and
eighty carries, he was down from about like three hundred
and thirty carries last year, so he's not gonna be
his three hundred plus carry seasons likely over. But I'm
(10:56):
in on Derrick Henry. Wherever he ends up. He's already
got the hype video up on Twitter. You know, he's
doing bench presses with a car on his stomach and
he's like chewing through metal chord.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
He's a beast. And you know, places where he could
end up would be really intriguing, like Baltimore, how about Dallas, Minnesota.
I think Minnesota could use a guy like Derrick Henry
in the backfield. Chargers. I mean, there's a lot of
teams looking at running backs Philadelphia. So wherever he ends up,
(11:30):
I'm in on Derrick Henry. And right now I believe
he's like, it's of course way too really best ball
adp but he's going like fourth round, fifth round.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Tyja Spears is going before him. Spears is going end
of third, beginning of fourth. And on the presumption that
Derrick Henry is gonna be gone.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
But I mean, what if he ends up on Baltimore Dallas.
It's a clear lead back. We're talking it's late second
round at latest. I think with Henry.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
So I don't be interesting to see if Henry ends
up in a more of a time share a little
bit like he had with Taja Spears. All the Spears
was more like, you know, he was getting like six
seven touches a game. But what if he what if
he what if they compliment him with somebody who's more
of a pure pass catching back That might be really
interesting to see if you know how that backfield could
(12:19):
work and what that would mean for Derrick Henry if
he's not, you know, going to be an eighteen to
twenty carry a game guy.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Yeah, I think that the eighteen to twenty is gone,
but I think that the fifteen carries not to twelve
to fifteen per game. A couple catches and yeah, and
a with the like he's the queer thunder of any
kind of thunder and lightning backfield for.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Sure, the ultimate thunder right there, Derrick Henry, and he'll
get all the goal line work in almost any scenario
where he falls. Let's talk say Kwon Barkley. You know,
when we look back at his whole career, never as
good as he was as a rookie. Tragically, when he
was unbelievable. That season one rookie of the year put
up two thousand yards, fifteen ten touchdowns in five yards
(13:01):
per carry as a rookie and then never hit any
of those metrics again in any season after that. And
then last year just in a really tough position. You know,
Daniel Jones goes down. The quarterbacking was somewhere between awful
and subpar for most of the year, really all of
the year, and teams just played to stop Saquon Barkley largely.
(13:24):
Now kind of interesting. Saquon's not old, but he's also
not young anymore. He's twenty seven years old. He's been
hurt a lot. You know, he had the full ACL injury,
high ankle sprains, just a lot of nagging injuries for him.
Last year. He was running back thirteen year before that,
running back six year before that, thirty four year before that,
(13:45):
running back one hundred and twenty because he missed almost
the entire season. So, you know, it feels like Saquon
Barkley could have some bell kow left in him. But
I think the best fit for him, honestly, is in
more of a split bat that backfield, more of a
sixty forty where he can just stay healthy. You know
what happens if Saquon Barkley doesn't have to carry the
(14:06):
ball touch the ball two hundred and twenty five times.
What if he can be one hundred and eighty more
effective times where he can play seventeen games and stay fresher.
I'd love to see him in more of a one
to two punch. What if he goes you know, we
were talking about Tennessee. What if he replaces What if
he's a part of a one two punch with Tad J. Spears.
(14:27):
What if he goes to New England replacing Ezekiel Elliott
and pairing with Remandre Stevenson. You know, that could be
an interesting fit for him as an as a high
end pass catching back.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
What about the Minnesota Vikings. Does that doing anything for you?
Speaker 1 (14:41):
It does? I have a lot of interest in that.
Vikings haven't had a great receiving back in Kevin O'Connell's tenure,
and it would be fascinating to see what Saquon Barkley
could do. If Kevin O'Connell decides he's finally going to
start throwing the running back, something he has not done
in the past, that would be interesting Saquon Bark right there.
Let's go to our next running back and that is
(15:05):
I'll Pollard. Oh, Tony Pollard. What a disappointing season, Brian, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
You can argue he was the biggest you bust in
fantasy football last year, early second round pick, so I'm
taking him in the You know, some people were pegging
him as he was gonna be the RB one because
we saw for years working behind Zeke Elliott pretty much
out producing Zeke Elliott as the secondary back, and we're like,
just give Pollard the bell cow usage and he's gonna
(15:33):
be a top five fantasy running back, right And he
pretty much got that usage last year, but he did
not produce. Let's let's take a quick look back at
his last two years. So in twenty twenty two, Pollard
was third in yards per carry five point two. That
dropped to twenty ninth in twenty twenty three. Four yards
per carry twenty twenty two, Tony Pollard was first in
(15:55):
yards after contact per carry at three point eight last
year year twenty third a two point nine. In twenty
twenty two, Pollard was second and explosive run rate thirty fifth.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Yeah, man, it just because all the highlights we had
two seasons ago. And if I asked you right now
to conjure up in your head a Tony Pollard highlight
from last year, can you do it? No?
Speaker 3 (16:23):
Most of them are him getting stuffed at the one
yard right. There was some bad luck there for sure.
And actually, I mean he did come on stronger towards
the end of the year. We'll give him that. Now.
Pro Football Focus grades and ratings don't necessarily translate to
(16:44):
fantasy points, but he was the highest graded runner by
PFF from from weeks eleven to eighteen. Oh okay last year.
And the usage was what was kind of head scratching,
because in the Zeke days, you know, they use him
in a world read him out more, but they just
ran him up the middle mercilessly. Last year. They kind
(17:05):
of just mixed up the usage where they should have
given Rico Dowdell, who by all means was a would
have been a better draft pick as if he took
Dowdell in the last round over Pollard in the second round.
But long story short, I hope he gets another chance
on a different team. We kind of mentioned the the
sexy landing spots in Baltimore, Tennessee, not really Tennessee with spears,
(17:30):
but Houston. Sorry to say, Damian Pierce charge might not
be the bell cow you wanted, but obviously, but I.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Don't think he's a Pollard's not a bell cow. I
don't want him to go anywhere where he has to
be a bell cow, do you.
Speaker 3 (17:43):
No, not really, but I want him to go somewhere
where he is in more of a split. It just utilized.
His strengths are not between the tackles, that they're outside
of them, and he was just running the A gap
B gaps over and over again by Dallas, which is
not where he found success in the year's past. So
I'd like to see him get a fresh start somewhere else.
He was tagged franchise tagged by the Cowboys in twenty
(18:05):
twenty three, so highly unlikely they use that on an again.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
No chance. I don't think he's back in Dallas either.
I'll mention again another pairing. I'd like Ramandre Stevenson Tony
Pollard and he'd follow Ezekiel Elliott's path to New England.
Wouldn't that That'd be great. Josh Jacobs last year was
the highest scoring running back in fantasy football. Cratered hard
(18:28):
this year, posting half the yards and half the touchdowns
despite only missing four games, and he ran for only
three and a half yards per carry, and Josh Jacobs's replacement,
Samir White, ran for almost a yard more per carry
in obviously the same offense, which could suggest that the
Raiders are not going to use him very much. You know,
(18:50):
Jacobs is relatively young. He's just twenty six years old,
but he's kind of an old twenty six. He's got
one thousand, five hundred touches in his career, and you
get the feeling the last last two seasons where the
Raiders have strong harmed him, strong armed him contractually. We're
just all about taking taking tread off his tires and
(19:10):
then kicking him to the curb and free agency. I
don't think he's going to be a Raider next year,
do you, Brian?
Speaker 3 (19:16):
No, I don't think they got there. They've got their
their money's worth out of them, and then some like
you said, they're kind of used and abused them per se,
which is a kind of you know, we've seen running
backs get that treatment and then they fall off hard
at their new teams, like the Marco Murray is one
of the classic cases, and so yeah, we'll see where
he ends up.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
This is you know what you'll have to decide, listeners,
was Josh Jacob's bad year last year? Was it just
a one off dip or was it the beginning of
the end for a high volume back, Because you know
we've seen, you know, we've seen both of those scenarios
play themselves out. At twenty six, he still could have
some good years left in him, but it could also
just be the end of the road because we've seen
(19:59):
it both ways. I suspect that in a better offense,
Josh Jacobs could still be a good player, and I
don't think he's a change of pace guy. I want
to see him in an offense where Josh Jacobs can
still be the workhorse, where he can catch forty or
fifty passes like he's done before. So Cincinnati, assuming Mixon
moves on, which I encourage them to do, that would
(20:20):
be a fantastic landing spot for Josh Jacobs. Houston, as
you mentioned, Singletary's an unrestricted free agent. The Chargers assuming
Eckler moves on, makes sense. How about Washington They could
use a gritty runner who can actually break a tackle.
They haven't had that in years. Maybe not an ideal
landing spot in terms of the quality of overall offense
(20:40):
in Washington, but that would make sense. Minnesota would make sense.
So there's some nice landing spots for Josh Jacobs out there,
But if I could pick one, Cincinnati would be my
top choice.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
Yeah, that's an ideal landing spot on a landing spot
for another position. We'll get to get too soon, but
we should have prefaced before we go to break. To
preface the running backs, I feel that it's it's a
great year for free the free agent class, and that
it's probably the weakest incoming rookie class of running backs
(21:11):
that I can remember. I mean experts like thor and Eystrom.
I think he would say that I think the third
round might be the earliest we see a running bowl
ye get drafted this year. I might be putting words
in his mouth, but definitely not the first round. That
that's a given. There's not gonna be any running backs
drafted in the first round. And yeah, it's really thin
(21:32):
crop of rookie running backs, so it's a good spot
for a lot of these free agent backs. So I'm
very intrigued to see where these guys end up landing.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Thoro will be on the show next week and we're
gonna start breaking down rookies beginning next week. It's it's
it's time already. Oh he's ready, no doubt, he's ready,
and we're gonna start with quarterbacks. I think we'll find out,
we'll really get to the bottom of where he sees
this first round shaking out and he's he's single handedly
trying to move the needle on JJ Carthy and it
(22:00):
might end up working. We got two more running backs
before we hit our break here, DeAndre Swift, coming off
a season in which he was inexplicably healthy but not
always as productive as we thought he was going to
be at the beginning of the season for the Eagles
and him his productivity drying up was one of the
reasons that we had the big fade from Philadelphia.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Yeah, Swift had that monster game against the Vikings in
like week three on Monday night, and he just looked
like a Grand Slam League winner because he was getting
drafted in the seventh last summer. But after that he
fell off big time. Swift gained just two plus yards
on forty nine percent of his carries regained two plus
(22:45):
yards on just forty nine percent of his carries. That
was the worst clip among qu qualifying running backs two
plus yards after contact. I'm sorry I flubbed that stat.
So he was not efficient and he wasn't efficient near
the goal line because of the Toush push. We all
know that, and Jason Kelcey if he retires. Of course,
(23:06):
everyone knows Jason Kelcey more so for the partying now,
but he was the starting center for the Eagles and
a big part of the Tousch push. If the Toush
push stays intact or if it's band, who knows. But
he wasn't trusted near the goal line, So odds are
he's not back in Philly again. It's the same list
of running backs or landing spots that are out there.
(23:28):
You'd be intriguing in Cincinnati, But Swift was a disappointment
as a pass catcher. Thirty nine catches last year. That
was not a lot he was. We expected a bigger
role from him there. But I still think he's an
able pass catcher, but he's better served as a one
to two punch. What about like a Derek's Derrick Henry
DeAndre Swift both going to the same team. Wow, just
letting those two go at it or Derreck Henry Tony Pollard.
(23:50):
That's the kind of pairing we need, I feel. But
that's where Swift will thrive in a situation like that.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
I think, yeah, not just maybe just not a work
course back. Just that's the you know, that's just the
reality of it for DeAndre Swift.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
It's a dying breed. The bellcoal back. We started saying
this last year and going into last year, it was
like Derek Henry, Saquon Barkley were some of the last remaining.
A year later we're talking about them. How there might
be watched up.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Yep, speaking washed up. Let's go to Austin Eckler. You'll
have to decide for yourself where he stands. But this
is gonna be a tricky one to figure out, coming
off two seasons, the prior two seasons before twenty twenty,
so this would be twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two,
twenty touchdowns and eighteen touchdowns, and then last year, of course,
the productivity just fell off a cliff for him, just
(24:39):
six touchdowns despite playing fourteen games for Austin Eckler and
his six hundred rushing yards for Eckler ranked thirty sixth
Brian in the league. His four hundred and thirty six
receiving yards was only ninth. I mean, we're used to
a guy who was top ten in both. He's like
number one in res yards and you'd be like number
(25:01):
seven in rushing yards, and he had the gaudy touchdown
totals and it all dried up. He's he'll be twenty
nine years old at the start of the season, and
you know, the other side of it is he's kind
of a young twenty five in that he didn't start
getting real workload until he was twenty four years old,
so he's really had like five years of real work
(25:25):
And to me, just clearly for Eckler, he needs to
find himself in a role where he can be James White,
where he can be like the best receiving back in
the league. And I it's not like I wouldn't give
him any carries, but I want to see what he
could do if he were if he remained like a
seventy target running back and only had you know, like
(25:47):
eighty carries on the season. That to me is the
where Austin Eckler is right, now, what do you think?
Speaker 3 (25:53):
Yeah, there were times last year where he almost looked
like a full back running the ball out of the backfield.
He's bettered off as a pass catching specialist. Like you
said at this point, it's it's it sucks when this
happens because he was RB one. He was the top
fantasy player in twenty twenty two. And that's what happens
when when you chase last year's production. I mean, really,
(26:16):
Austin Eckler. The cautionary tales are all in this list.
Austin Eckler, Tony Pollard, chasing, chasing these those stats doesn't
usually work out. So but I don't think he's totally
washed yet. But yeah, he needs to be in the
right spot where he's gonna get you sixty seventy catches
(26:39):
to be fantasy relevant, because if he doesn't, he's probably
not gonna be relevant at all in fantasy football next year.
For this year, I should say.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
Let me give you some some really intriguing landing spots
for Austin Eckler as a pure receiving back or primary
receiving back Indianapolis with Jonathan Taylor. Okay, how about Jacksonville
with Travis Etn as the lead back?
Speaker 3 (27:04):
I like it.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
How about replacing Jeric McKinnon in Kansas City.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
That's that was the one I was going to lead
off with that, that's the most.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
And how about this one where he wouldn't have to
sell his house. You could go to the rams and
be the receiving option that Kien Williams really isn't. What
do you think of that option?
Speaker 3 (27:25):
You know, I hate that option.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
I know you love ky but the reality is Williams
is not any lead pass catching back. Austin Eckler's still
could be.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Well, the thing is, I liked Karen Williams more as
a pass catcher last year because like they were gonna
use him as a James White, who we just the
afore meentioned James White. So I think you're a little
off on the pass catching for Kyra Willams. Don't.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
They didn't use him that way, you know, for whatever
that indicates, you know, I think Williams ended up. I'm
gonna look it up now, Kyn Williams. I think I
want to say it, like thirty five receptions.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
Take don't forget he missed four games.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
He had thirty two receptions for two hundred yards. And
yes he did miss games. He played in twelve games,
so still that's yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:15):
Well they were throwing the ball. They were throwing it
to Pookin Nakua. That's why. That's that's my story and
I'm sticking to it.
Speaker 1 (28:21):
Sounds good. Let's take a break when we come back.
Wide receivers and tight ends that are headed to free
agency when we come back Fantasy Football Weekly. All right,
welcome back Fantasy Football Weekly. Paul Charchi and Brian Johnson
(28:42):
with us. You can follow us on Twitter at Paul
Charcian at bt XJ, and you might want to follow
Guillotine Leagues as well at gl chop. We are behind
the scenes already hard at work getting all kinds of
improvements in place for Guillotine Leagues twenty twenty four. Very excited.
Can't talk about him yet because they're not done yet,
but we're we got a lot of things in motions.
(29:04):
Can be very exciting year.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
Around the corner, the blade is being sharpened.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
We are sharpening the blade. I like it, off season
blade sharpening. Let's jump into wide receivers, Brian, I'll start
with Mike Evans. Okay, likely a Hall of Fame career
ten straight when thousand yard seasons is ridiculous, Brian, Now,
a thousand yards isn't what it used to be, you know,
because the league is so pass heavy and there's so
(29:30):
many advantages for the passing attack now, but the durability
to just make it through ten seasons unbelievable. He's thirty
years old now, Bucks could move on, but you know,
he's coming off a fourteen hundred yard season, which is
more yards than he had in the two years with
Tom Brady, and he had it with Baker Mayfield. I
(29:51):
don't know if there's going to be a big market
for Mike Evans, a thirty year old guy. Do you
want to sign a thirty year old to a three
year deal?
Speaker 3 (29:58):
Now?
Speaker 1 (29:58):
The Vikings walked on ad feeling at age thirty one
last year, coming off a long, very productive career. What
do you think, What do you think the likelihood is
of What kind of market do you think they'll be
for Mike Evans, including Tampa and others? Do you think
he's gonna be a coveted free agent?
Speaker 3 (30:16):
I think from what I've read, and it makes sense,
like you said, because he's thirty the production likely to
dip could be starting this year, but I don't think
he's going to fall off a clip by any means.
But it's kind of teams that are in win now mode.
And then the two teams that I've the most steam
around are the Chiefs. They need three wide receivers in
(30:39):
Kansas City, where she Rice is the only competent wide
receiver they have in my mind, and the Lions supposedly
will be in the market for a wide receiver. So
outside of Tampa Bay, those are the two spots I
think we could see Evans land, but I think it
makes the most sense just to keep him in Tampa Bay.
I know they obviously love him there between the Lions
on the field, but he's also integral member of the
(31:01):
community and has been for quite some time, so they
love him there and I would be shocked if they
don't retain he and Baker Mayfield. And we mentioned this
earlier for Baker's sake. If he stays in Tampa Bay,
you sure as hell hope that they keep Mike Evans
as well.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
Yeah, the teams get sentimental about Hall of Fame level players, right,
and I do think they'll try to sign him But
here's what's weird, really weird, Brian. Last Monday, the team
chose to absorb a seven million dollar dead cap space hit,
which is something they could have avoided had they gotten
a new deal done with him, but they didn't, And
(31:37):
so you know, they just threw away seven million dollars
a cap space not signing him, and the franchise tag
is not plausible. It's twenty eight million dollars for him,
so there's no chance they're gonna franchise him for him
landing spots. You mentioned Kansas City. Let me give you
another one. What do you think of Buffalo? You know,
Gabe Davis is gonna walk. They're not gonna keep Gabe Davis.
(31:58):
Instead of Gabe Davis, with all of the ups and
downs that he gives you, you get a sure handed
end zone threat in Mike Evans. And you know here
they are Imagine the Bills are the three yard line, Brian.
You think they're gonna push push Josh Allen. But here's
Mike Evans. Great, you know, legendarily effective from close in
(32:19):
the stripe. He's effectively a goal line back wide receiver. Buffalo,
I think would be really interesting as defenses that have
to try to figure out how to defend a Josh
Allen Tush push or a pass to Mike Evans. What
do you think of Buffalo as a landing spot?
Speaker 3 (32:34):
Yeah, that makes sense too, and they certainly fit the
mold of the the win Now teams right.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Yeah, he's not going to rebuilding team, right.
Speaker 3 (32:42):
No, no chance, hopefully not. I hopefully learned his lesson
from from Adam Thiel. And I saw someone mentioned Carolina.
I'm like, no, no more potential Hall of famers going
to Carolina in the twilight of their career. That's that's
kills shot. Yes, Ronnie hope of winning a title.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Not that I think Adam had a nice career, but
not a Hall of Fame career. Jets probably need another
wide receiver opposite Garrett Wilson, and he's Garrett Wilson is
not the same kind of big bodied guide like Mike
Evans is and Aaron Rodgers will be back Baltimore would
be interesting. They re signed Nelson Agilar this week, but
they still need a legit number two wide receiver and
evans physical play is something that none of the wide
(33:20):
receivers in Baltimore have, so those to me are some
of the ideal landing spots for Mike Evans. Let's go
to Michael Pittman, who I think it could be a
franchise tag candidate here. What do you have on Pittman?
Speaker 3 (33:34):
Yeah, he's certainly a candidate to be tagged by the Colts,
And honestly, if they don't, they're they're they're moronic if
they let if they let Pittman walk. Who turns twenty
seven in October. Michael Pittman so pretty much entering the
prime of his career right right now. And in the event,
you don't know what he looks like, six ' four,
(33:55):
two hundred and thirty pounds, absolute monster, kind of another
dying breed in the NFL, but you know, this was
like the prototypical alpha receiver build. You don't see a
lot of him anymore, but he still pulls it off.
And he's been doing a good job, especially last year
fourth in catches with one hundred and nine finished just
(34:16):
over eleven hundred and fifty receiving yards, four touchdowns. Bump
those numbers up a little bit along with one hundred
and nine catches, and he's right in that top tier
of wide receivers. Cdum Justin Jefferson, Jamar Chase, all those guys,
and you know, he's Indy. Is not the best fit
for him fantasy wise in my mind. You know, we
(34:36):
only got to see Anthony Richardson for a game and
a half, but he's a running quarterback. They got a
strong run game with Jonathan Taylor coming back. So I
would like to see him end up somewhere else a
little more exciting.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
But I think.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
Minimal chance that the Colts let him walk. They really
should not.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
You know, related to that, let's let's just go maybe
a few hundred miles away in Cincinnati, Higgins, do you uh,
I don't know that it's a given that they can
afford to keep Higgins. You know, there's talk that they'll
franchise tag him too, but they have so much money
tied up in in Burrow and they've got to go,
(35:15):
and you know, Jamar Chase, that's you know, you wonder
if Higgins is going to be the odd man out
or if Higgins is going to have have an opportunity
to stay in Cincinnati.
Speaker 3 (35:25):
Yeah, initially, you know a few months ago, a couple
of months ago, it seemed like Higgins was all but
guaranteed to be an unrestricted free agent, especially with Jamar.
Chase had a comment somewhere along the lines like, we'll
see if they have enough money to pay him after
they pay me. Basically right, But now now it's leaning
towards they tag Higgins if not, though he certainly right
(35:51):
up there with Pittman and Evans in terms of highlight
names on the market. But I think he's more of
a coin flip than Pittman in my mind at this point,
I think Pittman leaning towards more getting tagged by the Colts.
I don't know if you agree there.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Yeah, I think Pittman is more likely to get tagged
because the Colts just have more space to work with
the Bengals. Right now, looking it up, yeah, I was
I was wrong. Bengals halfs caps cap have do have
cap space. Bengals and Colts are right next to each
other with both effectively fifty nine million dollars in cap space.
So yeah, I think I think there is a much
better chance than I originally thought of T Higgins staying
(36:28):
with his team. Let's go to Calvin Ridley. I picked
this up from somebody on Twitter, and I'm sorry I
didn't jot down who it was. If the Jaguars sign
Calvin Ridley Bryan, they the third rounder they owe the
Falcons for that trade becomes a second rounder because of
(36:48):
because he gets resigned as one of the conditions of
the trade. But if they let him walk, they only
have to give the third rounder to the Falcons and
they likely get third round come pensatory pick compensation, so
they it would probably be a push. They'd lose a
third and they'd get a third and so to some
you know, to some degree, it cost them a second
(37:11):
rounder to re sign Ridley. They could put that second
rounder into a twenty two year old wide receiver. So
I think there's some sneaky there's some sneaky reasons here
why Calvin Ridley will not be back with the Jaguars.
He's a low mileage twenty nine year old because he
was older as a rookie, and then he got suspended
(37:31):
for a season, so he really hasn't played nearly as much.
I mean, he's within a year of Mike Evans by age,
but he's got half as many seasons played as Mike
Evans does. Aside from Gabe Davis, Ridley last year was
the league's biggest boom or bust receiver. Get this, he
(37:51):
had six top ten Fantasy games last year. His other
eleven games, Brian he averaged as wide receiver fifty five
in those weeks, averaging three catches for thirty two yards.
Awful for Calvin Ridley as a boomer bust player. There
(38:13):
are media reports that say Jacksonville try to resign him,
but I don't know here. I mean, ideally, you know,
we don't if we don't care if they give up
the second round or not. I mean, I'd love to
see him stay Jacksonville where he remains the best outside
receiver for sure, and maybe the best overall receiver on
Jacksonville with a good young quarterback. But you know, maybe
because he's older, he doesn't want to go to a
(38:34):
rebuilding team, which would put him on potentially Kansas City
or Buffalo or Baltimore, some of the teams we were
talking about with Mike Evans.
Speaker 3 (38:42):
Yeah. I remember Ridley had really weird splits with Zay
Jones last year because dy Jones was in and now
the lineup with injury, and you'd think, oh, when Zay
Jones was injured, Ridley must have had the big games.
But No, it's when say Jones was playing, is when
Bridley would really go off eared.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
He's not.
Speaker 3 (39:02):
He's not. He's not a guy like I would like
to see him on another team, Like Michael Pittman, I'd
like to see him on another team. I think Ridley
can find success in Jacksonville, but like you mentioned, when
it comes to the picks, I think, based on the
inconsistencies we saw last year, that retaining Ridley is not
worth losing out on the pick compensation side. So I
(39:24):
think we will see him, see him hit the market
and uh again, all the a lot of interesting landing
spots or I think he could succeed and like at
a win now mode, and you know those mainly being
Kansas City, Buffalo, Yeah, somewhere along those lines, Baltimore, hopefully
not New England. We just don't want anyone to end
(39:45):
up in New England.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
Well, let's spend you know, we're talking mostly about veterans here,
well really entirely about veterans and New England's it's a
hard reboot in New England. So it just doesn't feel
like that's a landing spot for very many of these guys.
Some of the running backs we did like in New England,
but not the receivers. Two years ago, Mark Heath Brown
demanded to be let out, demanded to be traded away
(40:12):
from Baltimore because he wanted to go to an offense
that could show off his skills for exactly this moment,
so we could get through his fifth year rookie deal
and he could go hit free agency and be really
widely paid. But he ends up in Arizona. Kyler Murray's
not even his quarterback for a lot of it. He
gets hurt a bunch, and now he enters free agency
(40:33):
this year as kind of an afterthought in it with
a lot of good receivers in free agency. What do
you think of Markquise Brown and what level of interest
he's going to have.
Speaker 3 (40:45):
Yeah, his stocks certainly not as high as it was
a couple of years ago. You know that essentially gambling
on himself. It paid off initially if he recalled to
start last year, he was healthy. Kyler Murray was healthy.
Speaker 1 (41:00):
Brother yourself weeks uh pre ac, yeah, Todd Kyler, I
mean two years.
Speaker 3 (41:04):
Ago, yeah, twenty twenty two. Yeah, yeah, Brown was the
top ten wide receiver. Then he got hurt. He like
broke his ankle, and uh, then Murray got hurt later
that year. That's when Murray tore his ACL so and
then going into last year, Murray didn't start the season
so that he didn't get a lot of time with
Kyler Murray. Essentially he did thrive when when they were
(41:27):
playing together, primarily in twenty twenty two. So long story short,
kind of a disaster these last two years.
Speaker 2 (41:33):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
In Arizona. Brown turns twenty seven in June. So he's
he's not old by any means, but he's not your
your your alpha wide receiver, your wide receiver, one guy.
I'd like to see him if he stays in Arizona, fine,
but I think he would fare better where he's you know,
a Robin to someone's batman, where he's alongside a Garrett
(41:54):
Wilson on the Jets or alongside Stefan Diggs and Buffet.
So I will be intrigued to where he lands. He's
not a player wrong, and to love him Wherever he lands.
Landing spot will be pivotal on where I'm looking to
draft or if I'm even willing to draft Markue's Hollywood
Brown next year.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Yeah, it's it's got to be just the right spot.
But I do believe there's some real, sneaky upside of
Marquis Brown if he can hit the if he can
hit it just right, with a strong armed quarterback who
can utilize his downfield speed in an offense that is
pass first, and Marquis Brown stays healthy. I mean, if
you can get all that to come together, this would
(42:35):
be pretty interesting for Marquis Brown. But I need all
that to happen. But if it did, I could see
where he could be just an every week wide receiver
two for your fantasy team. But any of those things
falter and you're back into week to week head scratch
mode on Marquis Brown.
Speaker 3 (42:51):
Well, yeah, one team I want to throw out there.
They'll be intriguing for Brown and most of the wide
receivers we mentioned. We didn't mention this is a landing
spot as too. I mean they got Drake London, yeah,
and well of course they have Kyle Pitts at wide
receiver as well, but I won't go there. But Atlanta
intriguing spot for a lot of these wide receivers that
we failed.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
To mention it is they need to figure out their
quarterback position first. But you know, put Kirk cousins there,
and that's exactly the scenario I'm talking about. Strong armed quarterback,
reliable who can get the we know, can send lasers
downfield to his receivers. That would be a great spot
for Marquis Brown. All right, let's go to the tight
end position. We've got a couple of a couple of
(43:30):
tight ends semi notable. I'll do Dalton Schultz. Last offseason,
Schultz was another guy who bet on himself. Free agency
came along, he didn't find the long term contract a
lot of us thought he might, and instead took a
one year deal with Houston, and productivity was basically unchanged
from what he had in Dallas, and it's really not
(43:51):
that compelling, almost identical numbers in targets, receptions, yards, and
touchdowns to the previous year. And at the end of
the year, troublingly for Dalton elt he started losing snaps
to Brevan Jordan, which I think might have been an
indicator that Houston is not going to resign Dalton Schultz.
I'd be surprised if they do. But there are some
decent landing spots there where Dalton Schultz could earn starters minutes.
(44:16):
Brian Denver needs a tight end. The Jets need a
tight end. Chargers need a tight end, especially with Gerald
Everett heading to free agency. Seattle no offense who we're
going to talk about in a minute is it may
not be there. And I think Miami's really interesting. You know,
Miami desperately needs some tight end help. But you've got Hill,
you got Waddle, You've got several good receiving backs, and
(44:38):
Schultz I think would be like a fourth and fifth
option most weeks, and from a fantasy standpoint, would be
very hard to sort of figure out what to expect
for Schltz in Miami, but they certainly have tight end
need there.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
Yeah, Miami, and you're the top of my list for
tight end needy teams. You feel to mention my favorite
who I believe currently don't have any tight ends on
roster and not the Cincinnati Bengals. If we could just
get an elite pass catching option in Cincinnati for once,
let's see what happens.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
I thought Tanner Hudson had showed some real moments and
I wonder if they if Now. I don't think Tanner
Hudson it's not a free agent, is he. I don't
think he.
Speaker 3 (45:16):
Maybe not a rook I thought I read somewhere that
I didn't really dig too deep, but that they basically
have no one on roster.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
I could you know what you could be right? You know,
I just pulled up.
Speaker 3 (45:28):
I'm saying they won't resign Hudson or anything like that.
Speaker 1 (45:31):
By the way, what a bust erv Smith was for
both my Minnesota and then Cincinnati gave him a legit
you know, gave him a legit contract. Yeah, Tanner Hudson
very quiet, twenty nine years old start, he's been with
UH seven teams. Now, yeah, you're right, Cincinnati is absolutely
in play here. That's a great call, Brian.
Speaker 3 (45:53):
And back to the Schultz really quick. It didn't bode
well for him that as soon as he leaves Dallas,
Jake Ferguson steps in and just looks like the prime
Dulphen Schultz, if not better adult Schultz. So he's a
sort of a system tight end, let's put it that way.
I'm honestly, if I'm any team looking for a tight end,
especially the Bengals. To say Bengals, I'm more excited about
(46:15):
Noah Fense. To be honest, I know he's he's been
somewhat of a disappointment, but no, not somewhat.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
I think a total disappointment. He's he's the rare Iowa
tight end that has underproduced at the at the NFL level.
Speaker 3 (46:30):
He has, but he's still wasn't an elite prospect. He's
twenty six. That's kind of around the average breakout range
for a tight end. Very rarely do tight ends breakout
incredibly early, like Sam Laporta, per se TJ. Hockinson, who
is his teammate. But you know Fans was drafted by
the Broncos and either way, oh yeah, first round talent.
(46:52):
His RAZ score Relative Athletic Scorer, which you know it's
very telling of an athlete's athletic profile, especially a football player,
was extremely high coming out of the draft. So he
was a blue chip prospect. Drafted by Denver in the
first round. He was included in the Russell Wilson trade Seattle,
so you know, Seattle absolutely fleeced Denver in that deal.
(47:14):
We don't have to get into it, so I wouldn't
call him a throw and he was a great piece
to add in. But Seattle just always had this platoon
of tight ends and they're there. Never were a pass
heavy offense. So long story short, I'm very intrigued by
Noah Fan right now. If you're doing early best ball drafts,
he's essentially free. But if he lands in a spot
like Cincinnati or Miami or the Chargers where he can
(47:36):
get you know, true starter reps running seventy to eighty
percent of the routes. I'm not ready to give up
on a guy that was a freakish ash athlete, and
not like he was just an athlete. He was an
all around good tight end at Iowa that produces stellar
tight end. So I'm in on Fan. I'm tracking where
he goes. Rather have Fan over Shultz.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
I'm not. I'm not just because I feel like we've
had so many looks at Noah Fan. Right We're talking
to a lot of guy who in his five year
career has played eighty one games and just never showed.
I just think by now, you know if a guy's
got it or not. And I just think, I think,
no offense, just a guy, but you never know. I mean,
(48:17):
right landing spot is half the is half the battle,
and if he does find himself in the right spot,
maybe he could have You could certainly be worth the ADP.
Right now I gotta imagine. You know, you mentioned Noah
draft going on. You know, no a fan going undrafted,
so you know, for what you'd have to pay to
get him, maybe there's a dice roll to be had there.
Speaker 3 (48:33):
Now. I know we're running long on this podcast, but
I'm having fun, and you know I love talking about
tight ends. Let me just stay in this lane really quick,
because I was thinking about adding the Vikings to this list,
you know, to the list of landing spots or some
of these tight ends, because they're not gonna have TJ.
Howkinson until the midway point at best. Right there's a
(48:55):
chance Hockinson doesn't even play next year, and the starting
tight end for Minnesota is a It's an interesting spot,
to say the least when it comes to fantasy football.
So for those doing their early drafts right now, what
I'm getting had to ask you, true insider, Josh Oliver,
could he be the guy?
Speaker 1 (49:13):
No, Josh Oliver is not. He's just not a receiving
back but a receiving tight end. But they gave him
a giant contract. So the Vikings have as much money
tied up in tight ends as any team in the league.
I want to say so I don't if Noahfan is
dirt cheap. Yeah, he could start the season as the
Vikings as the Vikings starting tight end, but it would
(49:35):
have to be that there's just no market for no
Event for the Vikings to put yet more money into
that spot. Otherwise, I don't. I can't believe that that
would that would end up being something that the Vikings
would end up would end up looking at. I'm pulling
up that the the Vikings have the have the second
highest paid tight end in TJ. Hockinson and the eyeballing
(49:58):
this about the fifteenth highest paid tight end in Josh Oliver.
So I just I can't. I can't see him pouring
more money into that position right now.
Speaker 3 (50:08):
Maybe a more reasonable option for the Vikings that would
be interesting to be a Gerald Everett. We're not going
to get too deep into, but he could be a
cheaper guy to come in and certainly make an impact
Week one in that offense.
Speaker 1 (50:22):
So, by the way, Donald k for himself over the
years he has made No Fan has made career earnings
of dude, dude, dude, Looking right now, you want to
guess career earnings for no Offen at age twenty seven, Well.
Speaker 3 (50:39):
First round pick, so he's on his Wow, so he's
on his second condent. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (50:44):
I'ld say.
Speaker 3 (50:46):
Twenty eight million.
Speaker 1 (50:48):
You're not far off. He's already made nineteen. His total
guarantees though, IS puts him up at twenty five, so
I don't know. I don't know. Career earning says nineteen
total guarantees twenty five million.
Speaker 3 (51:00):
Jeez.
Speaker 1 (51:01):
Not bad for a guy who's been a middling producer
so far.
Speaker 3 (51:06):
Not a dead cat yet, No, I don't think, so
give me one more chance. Yeah, I want to. I
want him to get a nice soft landing spot, and
I'm I'm very intrigued by fantom.
Speaker 1 (51:15):
Thanks for listening, everybody. When we talk next, we will.
I believe we'll be talking rookies next week with Thorn Eiserman.
That'll be super fun. Brian, great job. Thanks for all
your help today. Thanks getting all the way to the
end of our longest offseason pod by a mile, and
we'll talk to you next week. Everybody, Bye bye. Fantasy
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