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Beyond the Box Score: Colts and Browns WRs, Bears Offensive Changes, Ravens Outlook (11/18 Fantasy Football Podcast)
01:03:12
Can we trust the Colts and Browns WRs going forward? What did the Bears do differently this week? Are we concerned about the Ravens offense with a tough remaining schedule?
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- [00:00]
Adam
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- [02:42]
Jacob
No, I can't.
- [02:44]
Adam
It's time to dominate your fantasy.
- [02:46]
Jacob
Off to the races and he stays on his feet.
- [02:49]
Adam
This is gonna go the distance. Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie and Heath. Well, hello everybody. Welcome to the show. It is beyond the box corps here on a Monday afternoon. For those of you watching on YouTube later, start time today. But that means more stats for you, advancier stats than ever before as we will get into. Oh, really? Like a weird Jameis Winston trend that I pick up on. We're gonna talk about the Browns wide receivers, the Colts wide receivers, the Ravens offense, the Giants offense with Tommy DeVito taking over for Daniel Jones and. And more and more. Oh, what was the other topic that we had? Browns receivers, Colts receivers. Oh, the Bears. The Bears offense. What did they do? What did the Bears offense do differently in week 11? They did something at one of the highest rates in the NFL last week or yesterday. Something that they had one of the lowest rates in the NFL going into the week. So that could be an interesting trend. Something that helps us for fantasy. Hey, Jacob. What's going on?
- [03:52]
Jacob
Not much. How do I sound? I'm having some mic issues over. Am I good now?
- [03:56]
Adam
Actually, like, this is as good as you've ever sounded.
- [03:57]
Dan
Yeah, this is. This is the best we've ever sounded. Whatever you did with your mic is now has now been something you should lock in for the rest of time.
- [04:05]
Adam
Got a comment here. Oh, man. Listen, man. Today.
- [04:08]
Dan
Yeah, what is this? I saw this comment too. Are you assuming you're talking about this one?
- [04:11]
Adam
Yeah, I hope so.
- [04:13]
Jacob
What is this?
- [04:13]
Dan
I so hope Omar Fatu says, I so hope Dan and Jacob Lane to Adam for his insane Josh Allen disrespect. I missed this earlier.
- [04:20]
Adam
Well, I didn't miss anything. All I said is that I think Lamar Jackson should be the mvp. But we're going to talk about that later.
- [04:25]
Dan
Okay, that.
- [04:26]
Adam
See that? That's what's so frustrating. I said Lamar Jackson should be the mvp. I laid out the case and all of a sudden that's insane as insane Josh Allen disrespect. Give me a break.
- [04:36]
Dan
Welcome to the Internet, my friend.
- [04:39]
Adam
All right, Chargers 34, Bengals 27. What an awesome game this was. The Bengals had the ball for 34,08, chargers for 25,52. So keep that in mind. The Bengals are running so many plays the last three weeks and it is just unlocking their offense. They've run 71, 75 and 78 plays in their last three games. They're killing it in time of possession. And Joe Burrow has scored 35 or more fantasy points in three straight games against the Raiders, the Ravens and now the Chargers, who had the best defense in football arguably. And honestly, like their defense wasn't that bad. They great for a half or three, two and a half quarters. But anyway, Dan, you want to start? What's your takeaway from the Chargers and the Bengals?
- [05:30]
Dan
Yeah, it's. It's funny for me because I had a chance to before the weekend before this matchup because I was really looking forward to it and it did pay off. Break down all the tape of Justin Herbert and Joe Burrow this week and I put together cut ups that you can find on my Twitter. Just search my name and search their name. They're like five minutes each and they were playing what I thought was the best pure quarterback play of any quarterback this season. I know it sounds ridiculous, but just in the pure quarterback sense. A lot of these quarterbacks offer something else. Lamar Jackson is a playmaker. He makes plays with his feet, but just from standing in the pocket, throwing with anticipation and processing defenses. These guys were locked in going into this week and that's what it looked like watching them both play. Joe Bro throws an insane level of anticipation, specifically in the deep half. We saw that. I agree with you. It was less so bad Chargers defense more so. Who's going to stop this Bengals passing game with T. Higgins healthy? On the flip side, Justin Herbert is playing the best football of his career. Without a doubt, he's seeing the field completely differently in this system. And I don't really even love Roman so much as just like the impact that Harbaugh has had on him. And they finally let him go past first in this game. The whole first half. There's a ton of play action on first down, taking shots, Justin Herbert fitting the ball into tight windows, throwing, throwing with anticipation as well. Just unbelievable arm talent too. They're utilizing the seam with Will Disley. That was a great call by Jacob last week that Disley was going to be a big factor and Disley was probably a weak winner for anyone who added him on waiver wire and put him in your tight end slot. I was one of them because I like the call and that's something Justin Herbert can do that other quarterbacks don't do. Utilize the seam. It's an Area that you need to have anticipation and arm talent to fit it into. So I thought we were watching two of the best quarterbacks in the NFL last night. That was what football should look like, in my opinion. I love watching it when the quarterbacks are that good.
- [07:09]
Adam
Yeah. And I just kept thinking, gosh, imagine if Justin Herbert had Jamar Chase on his.
- [07:13]
Dan
Yeah, well, yeah, he's doing this without.
- [07:14]
Adam
But let.
- [07:15]
Dan
But let's not slander lad McConkie.
- [07:17]
Adam
No. So. So look, I think, you know, it's all systems go for the Bengals, right? It's Chase Brown is an absolute stud. Joe Burrow, you're starting every week. Jamar Chase and T. Higgins are starting every week. And you know, Mike Kosicki, you're not starting unless one of the wide receivers is out. The Bengals are easy. I could get into some of the numbers. You know, I thought Jamar Chase, with T. Higgins on or off the field, he has really like a slightly higher target per route run rate with Higgins off the field, but with him on the field, he is averaging 7 point, 17.5 yards per target. With Higgins off the field, 8.9 yards per target. So probably fluky that it's that big of a gap, but he's almost double his yards per target. It's just wild. Anyway, so, yeah, let's move on to the Chargers and I guess it is McConkey. Let's start with the receivers. Jacob. And like, this is a great game for lad McConkey, obviously, and he's having an encouraging season. You've laid out a lot of the numbers. You really like him. But just from a fantasy perspective, he still now has only two games with more than 67 yards, four games with more than 52 yards. He hasn't really been that great for fantasy. Do you think he will be a starter going forward?
- [08:29]
Jacob
Yeah, I think you with any discussion about the charges, you have to contextualize it with the way that the games have played out. The average over under in their games before this game was 40. 40 is so low. So I'm talking about the Vegas projected combined points between the two teams in each game. The average for the Chargers through 10 weeks was 40 points. In week 11, there was only one game that had a lower projected over under than 40. For reference on how low that is. And over the next month, five weeks, we're going to see a lot of much higher over unders. I think it was 47 or 48 points for the Chargers in this one and we see that pan out with like 60 combined points. Almost between the two teams. And all of a sudden lad McConkey has a ton of volume stats. All of a sudden this per route data that wasn't amounting to much over 23 drop backs. When you extrapolate that over almost 40 drop backs, it's massive because he's really, really good. He's really efficient at producing yardage. And yeah, the role was awesome. It kind of took a while. They were a little bit locked in on Disley early on, but he started locking in on McConkey and it's just like, yeah, there were, there were times. And this is my own bias because I love Makanki where I'm like, he's open, he's wide open. Like, why are we going to QJ? But yeah, he had 32% first retarget rate in this game, which tied Quentin Johnson. A really encouraging game for Johnson. I felt like from a volume standpoint he didn't necessarily convert on some of these contested catches, but they kept going back to him. So those two receivers tied for the highest first three target rate on the team. And in the second half they each had a 41st rate target rate. So it was truly like completely locked in on those two. 80 of Justin Herbert's first three targets in the second half went to QJ or McConkey. So yeah, I think it's like wheels up, sky's the limit for these guys. Like I, I had, I was probably too low on Quinn Johnson. I had McConkey ranked ahead of CD Lamb this week and that's basically where I'm at over the next month. Maybe not so much against the Chiefs, but when they're in these projected shootouts, you're probably looking them as a top 20 receiver almost every single week.
- [10:33]
Dan
And I'll say this about one more thing about this passing game. I, I took flack in the off season, Adam, when we, when I was on a couple of our, our shows before the season and I was a fan of Justin Herbert and Fantasy because my was, yeah, I understand that the volume could be down or they're projected, they're not supposed to throw the ball. But when you have a quarterback this good and you have a coach like Jim Harbaugh, eventually they're going to realize that passing the ball is their best way to score and they're going to be efficient enough just like they were with Colin Kaepernick. And in a lot of ways. I'm sorry, did you have something, Jacob?
- [11:01]
Jacob
I buried the lead. I buried the lead and I just wanted to bring it up because you're hitting on it right now. 10% pass rate over expectation for the Chargers this week. That was the highest of any team in football. We had seen that rate be positive for three straight weeks, weeks seven through nine. And then Gus Edwards came back and it was negative last week, but this week it was much, much higher. So that's based on the circumstances of each individual play. Like how likely were they to pass? They were doing it 10 more than what the expectation would be on those plays. They were passing relative to expectations more than any team in the NFL this week. And it's just like, yeah, look at the team, look at Justin Herbert, look at how well the passing game is working. And that's just really exciting to see them continue to lean into that more.
- [11:39]
Dan
And more efficiency can make up for volume. Justin Herbert, in addition to everything he's done as a passer. And I love, we talked about this a lot with Jamie on the second behind the box court last week. You know, using Quinn Johnson, those railroads, just having Quinn Johnson be that big play threat. And then McConkey with McConkey, it's just a matter of he won on so many routes at Georgia. You can see Carson Beck with McConkey and Bowers and Carson Beck without Bowers to kind of know what kind of impact they had on that offense. But he won on those routes with the separation at the top of routes. As him and Herbert continue to play together, they're going to get that report even better to the point where Herbert, who is clearly an anticipatory thrower, he's put it on tape over his entire career. One of the better ones. The NFL is going to start anticipating that. Oh, that, that separation, getting the ball into space. McConkey is going to do stuff after the catch. We've seen it in at times this season. So I really like both of those guys moving forward. And one more thing, just on this offense and fan, from a fantasy standpoint, when it comes to Herbert, he is finally running the ball. Jacob, you talked about that on Thursday and in this game on his big scramble, he hit 22 miles per hour, which is the fastest entire career. Like he's healthy again with his. They're going to utilize him as the weapon that he is. And it was under. It was always underrated. He was a good runner at Oregon. He was. That was a terrible system for him as a passer, but it was a good system for him as a runner. So if you add that factor in as well, like you, you talk a lot. Adam about that glob of quarterbacks and where like some of these guys fit in. I think he's above the glob. I really do think Herbert in these games that Jacob is talking about with the projected point totals, not the Chiefs game, but in some of these other, in the rest of these games is a locked in QB1 and I would put him in the top eight.
- [13:09]
Adam
Yeah, I.
- [13:11]
Jacob
His scramble ray from the week five by on is higher than Kyler Murray's on a per drop back basis. He's scrambling more than Kyler Murray. Like it's, it's. It's really not just a few here and there. Like he's been doing it pretty consistently. And then we also see the design run of the goal line last week. Yeah, I think there is rushing upside.
- [13:25]
Adam
Yeah, I mean I think he's in the, in the glob, the blob, whatever it is. Because if you look at Herbert's game log, I mean you just. Let's just start at week six. They have a week five by and beginning in week six they decided they were going to throw the ball more. He didn't have more than 27 pass attempts in any of his first four games since then. 34, 39, 32, 27, 18 and 36 pass attempts. So if we just use week six is okay. We're finally going to open up the offense and throw the football. Bad game, you know, average games against Denver and Arizona. 16 points against Denver, 15 points at Arizona, both on the road. Those are his toughest matchups by far in this stretch. New Orleans is horrible. 21, 28 points. Cleveland, they're not a good defense anymore. They just haven't been. 23.5 points. Tennessee, not that good. He only threw 18 passes. He had a rushing touchdown. 21.8 points. Cincinnati, they came into the game giving up the fifth most points to quarterbacks. They can't defend the pass at all. 28.4 points per game. So it doesn't really matter because three of his next four opponents are Baltimore, Atlanta and Tampa Bay. Like he is going to kill those teams.
- [14:27]
Dan
Right.
- [14:27]
Adam
So it's really just semantics. He is a must start going forward because his schedule and his. The way he's playing make him the way he's playing.
- [14:34]
Dan
They're just. He's locked in at a different level than he was week six or whatever.
- [14:38]
Adam
Dobbins, let's talk, let's finish up with Dobbins here because he had the big run at the end of the game and then they, they were using Haskins near the goal line for two straight carries. And they.
- [14:48]
Dan
That's a thing now?
- [14:49]
Adam
Yeah. But then they were like, screw this, let's use Dobbins. Like what we saw with Algeria and Bijan a couple of weeks ago. Right. Dobbins gets one touchdown there and then he gets the long touchdown at the end of the game. And now he has had. So. So going into the game, I said Dobbins had five carries of 20 or more yards, but three of them came in the first two games of the season. So he really hadn't been explosive in a while and it kind of looked the same. And Gus Edwards got the first carry and Dobbins was having kind of a quiet game until that late touchdown run, but it was a 29 yard touchdown run that gives him two carries of 20 or more yards in his last three games. I'm not without concern though for Dobbins because his schedule kind of stinks with Baltimore and Kansas City in two of his next three games. I thought he'd struggle in this game. I won't call it lucky, but they're fortunate, right? Like he was fortunate to have that long run at the end of the game. He only had one catch. I, I see him as less, less than a must start. It's mostly because of Baltimore and Kansas City in the next three weeks. Now, you guys probably, I'm assuming you feel the same way.
- [15:49]
Dan
Yeah, I do. I'm. I'm very nervous about him rest of season. I have a bunch of leagues so it's going to be interesting to see. Maybe the game script will help him in some of these with the, with the higher totals. But I'm curious about the usage of Haskins and that's a former Harbaugh player at Michigan as well.
- [16:04]
Adam
And then this Quentin Johnston dude like 62, started two catches, 48 yards and a touchdown on eight targets. He has six touchdowns on 37 targets. And like I went my watch them and most of his touchdowns are wide open.
- [16:20]
Dan
Yep. Well, that's what I was saying on the, on the podcast last week with Jamie, like that's how the way this offense is set up. He's run on those rail routes where like he's going to get open a lot on those because there's so much attention focus and I don't know if you watch, if you remember this from watching them, Adam, but how many did you watch from the end zone angle or the sideline? If you watch from the end zone angle, a lot of these are not the play side. So it's the back side of play. So Herbert's looking to the play side and he's such a good quarterback at this point that he's able to process and come off to the backside where Johnson's open. He just hits him.
- [16:48]
Jacob
He had a really low. Herbert had a really low first retarget rate this week and I think that just speaks like how well he was processing things like he does.
- [16:55]
Dan
So.
- [16:56]
Adam
All right, good stuff. All right. So beyond the box score on today and Thursdays as well, you can hear that and well, you can watch that YouTube.com fantasy football today. If you don't see it live in the Live tab tab, just hit the Videos tab and you can find that. We're going to take a break. When we come back, we'll give you your news and notes. Before we do that though, if you have not signed up for BETMGM yet, use the bonus code Fantasy and you're going to get up to a $1,500 first bet offer. On your first wager with BetMGM, download the BetMGM app and sign up and use the bonus code Fantasy. Deposit at least $10 and place your first wager on any game and you'll receive up to $1,500 in bonus bets if your bet loses. Just make sure you use the bonus code Fantasy when you sign up. We'll be right back on Fantasy Football today. Man, I love finding great new clothes and I love finding a great new clothing company. And that would be Collars and Company. You may have seen Collars and Company getting a $1 million investment on Shark Tank. And if you buy now@collarsandco.com you can get 15% off any purchase of $100 or more with the Code Football. Take advantage of that now. Their clothes are so comfortable. I like dressing up, I really do. But I feel like most of my dress clothes, most of my dress shirts, they're not that comfortable. They get bunched up under my sweaters. It's really frustrating. So you have to check out Collars and Company, makers of the dress collar Polo. These shirts, they're four way stretch buttery soft polos with firm dress collars on them so they give you the dress shirt look but extremely comfortable polo feel. And you can wear these with anything under a sweater with a blazer just by themselves. You can wear them to work, you can wear them to play golf. They're great for a night out. Collars & Co. Also has sweaters, quarter zips, love the long sleeve button downs and they have a women's line too. Check that out. Go to collarsandco.com and just start shopping. If you are looking for a performance dress shirt or polo that looks great all day, check out collarsandco.com use promo code FOOTBALL for 15% off any purchase of $100 or more.
- [19:04]
Heath
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- [19:34]
Adam
Okay, so if you guys are voting today, who's your mvp?
- [19:38]
Jacob
I'll give it to Lamar too. Yeah, I'm with you.
- [19:40]
Dan
Lamar Jackson for me.
- [19:42]
Adam
Oh, okay.
- [19:43]
Dan
Jamie did a poll and with that.
- [19:45]
Adam
Said, with that said, Josh Allen 43% Lamar Jackson 32.6% Jared Goff 19.9%. Go ahead.
- [19:54]
Dan
I said with that said, Josh Allen's win over Casey, albeit at home, which is important, and albeit on a offensive pass interference that was not called, which finally the Chiefs got the bad end of a call, was impressive because they beat the only 90 team. So I'm open to the consideration that it will be Allen. I think Alan is the better quarterback, but I think Lamar has been the better player this year this overall.
- [20:17]
Adam
Well, I think a lot of people are saying that Allen's 9 and 2 and Lamar's 7 and 4 in second place. How can you give him the MVP?
- [20:24]
Dan
Right?
- [20:24]
Adam
I think if you were 4 and 7, okay, maybe, but they're 7 and 4 and it's not like they're bad. I don't care. This I think Heath was saying like you can't give the MVP to a guy in second place. Why?
- [20:36]
Dan
No, I don't agree with that.
- [20:38]
Adam
Why? Like why?
- [20:39]
Dan
I think if you look at the numbers, if you look at the numbers for Lamar Jackson prior to this week he was on histor like the projections over a 17 game sample size season. He was on historic paces from a total yard standpoint, from a touchdown standpoint. So he was doing something a little bit different, I think at least projection wise than Allen. But yep, Allen did beat the 9.0team. So I, I know that. I know both sides of this argument. I've heard this debate a lot.
- [21:03]
Jacob
I love that you brought up the if man. It was like the reversed if. Reversed if. Man, I don't know if you've seen that on Twitter where it's like if Joe Burrow, if the Bengals weren't 4 and 7, he would be MVP. Yeah, well, you are 4 and 7.
- [21:14]
Adam
Ye. Well, this is what I tweeted. They've played the same amount of games and Lamar Jackson has 333 more passing yards, seven more passing touchdowns, two fewer interceptions, 1.5 more yards per attempt, 67% completion rate versus 64%. 268 more rushing yards, but three fewer rushing touchdowns. And then of course, I get the. Whoa. So all about the stats. I know it's not all about stats. Like, I've watched plenty of football this year, too. Lamar Jackson's playing out of his mind, but he did not have a great game against the Steelers. And we are going to talk about that and what was missing there because they actually, I'll just, you know, this is the last thing we're talking about. Our last big topic. You know, Baltimore, if you're worried about them going forward. They averaged 6.1 yards per play against the Steelers. That's the most of any team against Pittsburgh all year. They had a lot of big plays that were there for the taking. And Jackson had some bad throws on deep balls. Flowers had a drop. There was that interception on the slightly under thrown ball to Justice Hill up the sideline. They could have. They could have. And they struggled in the red zone and then they missed the field goals. They actually weren't that bad against Pittsburgh, but in my opinion. But we'll talk about that a little bit later. All right, real quick on the news and notes. Tommy DeVito is going to start for the Giants. And congratulations, Tommy DeVito. You have an amazing schedule. Tampa Bay, Dallas, New Orleans, Baltimore, Atlanta, Indianapolis for the rest of the fantasy season. All right, what do you think this means for Malik neighbors?
- [22:40]
Dan
Dan I don't think this is necessarily a good thing from league neighbors. When DeVito first came in, he did a few things differently than Daniel Jones last year. He would, he would take some shots against cover two, into the hole shots. These are, you know, difficult throws for a lot of quarterbacks. A lot of them don't have the confidence to make it. Jones was one of them. But eventually they took away some of the concepts that DeVito liked. And if you look at the overall, like, stretch of his starts, yeah, he had three wins, but two of those came with a lot of turnover. Luck, the Patriots and Washington. The Giants defense had six turnovers in the Washington game and the Patriots game. I think Mac Jones had like two horrible turnovers. So I don't necessarily know because. Because on offense the Giants were negative EPA in all of those games. So I don't necessarily think this is a good thing for the offense, if I'm going to be honest at all. Really, it's not really a good thing for Neighbors. He's not really a deep shot type quarterback. Drew Locke would have been interesting from that standpoint to unlock Neighbors in the deep half, which is something Jones was never able to do. Overall, I think this is bad for Tracy. I think this is bad for Neighbors. I think this is bad for the entire offense.
- [23:40]
Adam
Didn't you say last year. I'm sorry if I missed it. I was looking at some of the comments about Lamar Jackson that they figured him out and they took away the middle of the. They took away the sidelines because he can't throw to the middle of the field because he's 4 foot 8 or whatever.
- [23:53]
Dan
You know, he's small enough for date. But yeah, that was essentially what what happened. DeVito was using the outside, the outside numbers which something Daniel Jones never did and was fun, exciting to see. But defenses adjusted to that and DeVito, you need a lot anticipation to take advantage of the middle of the field. We'll see if he's changed. Right. Like he was bad at processing last year. He was a rookie. Like there's a chance that he could get better with time. Given a chance. He has a better situation around him than last year for sure though he won't have Andrew Thomas who he had last year. But you know, we'll see what happens with this. I wouldn't. It can't get that much worse for Malik Neighbors, I don't think because he wasn't really getting any good targets in the last few weeks. He was just getting kind of volume. He was used as like a possession receiver. I think they'll still get him a lot of targets. I just think it could hurt Tracy.
- [24:36]
Adam
And last thing I'll say about DeVito, if you're in a super flex league, he did score 17.5 or more fantasy points in six point per passing touchdown leagues. In three of his five starts he never had single digit fantasy points. So you know, compared to a guy like Mac Jones, that's pretty. What he's doing, you know, that's pretty good. And I had forgotten about his rushing ability. Five, he was on pace for 547 rushing yards. So that was, you know, that's interesting at least. Okay. I don't have any major injury updates on offensive players except Darnell Mooney. They don't think it's a serious hamstring injury. So we're hoping, hoping that he's back after their week 12 by there were some defensive injuries and like an offensive. Djuan Jones for Cleveland. I think Dave mentioned this on the broadcast last night. I think he was carted off. He has a broken leg, I believe, and he's out for the season. Alex Anzalone, linebacker for the Lions. He's out for maybe the rest of the regular season. That was a tough one and I'm gonna gonna leave it at that. Let's get into some advanced stats. Jacob, you had an extra hour today. I expect 60 extra advanced stats from you. Go ahead.
- [25:42]
Jacob
Well, I spent that time arguing with people on Twitter about Christian Watson instead. Yeah, let's talk about Christian Watson. He has one of the highest yard per route run rates on the season of any player. I think he's ready super. 15 in yards right run and like wide receiver, 12 in fantasy points sprout run. And me bringing that up, you know, like, has gotten people in a bit of a tizzy. You have to contextualize it, of course, as you do with any stat. Watson's been on and off the field like he seems to always be. But when Jordan Love has been healthy, when Watson has been healthy, he's had at least a 59 route rate every week. It was 70 this past week. He's clearly playing ahead of Dontevian Wick. So it's not like this is 2 2atwell or something where it's like a player putting up crazy efficiency stats in a bit roll where they come in and do something where the offense is designing them a look and then they go off the field after that. And so their per route data is really inflated after this game. 150 yards for Watson this past week, by the way, kind of flew under the radar after this game. His yard per out run rate is above 2 for his career, which is elite. So this isn't to say that Watson is an elite player or anything like that, but he is an elite efficiency producer or a very close to elite efficiency producer. And it's been that way from the outset since he's entered the NFL. And he continues to get opportunities even though he's continued to be unreliable. Whether that's health or, you know, coming down with 50, 50 plays and all this stuff, he continues to get on the field and get used a lot. He tied Jaden Reed for the team lead in first retarget rate this week. He's clearly an important part of what Green Bay wants to do. And I. We've outlined this as well when we look ahead of the schedules after this Chicago matchup. Green Bay has a string of like four or five straight potential shootouts to close out the season. And so I think Watson is somebody who is really interesting like this this week. The, the passing numbers and just the offensive numbers as a whole were really low because the packers only ran 43 plays. That was the lowest of any team. The Jaguars were the only other team below 50. And so I think it's, it's really just kind of a strange week. And still Watson was really productive and there's, there's a lot of upside left. I would be targeting him and continuing to target Jaden Reed as well going forward.
- [27:58]
Adam
Yeah, he's only Watson's only 52 roster. This is someone we talked about on the beat. The waiver wire show is, look, you got six teams on a buy. This is definitely someone that on any given week can give you a big performance. I just wish the ADOT were a little bit lower, but. Yeah, yeah, right. It's funny because there's two, two indicators for me of it's going to be hard for this player to be really good. And that is eight out of, let's say 15 or higher and slot rate of 70 or higher. Slot rate of 70. 70 or higher. You know who that is? That's Josh Downs, that's Jaden reed and that's lad McConkey. And they're right around 70%. And I, you know, I'm always willing to reevaluate all of my stances.
- [28:43]
Jacob
Yeah, maybe Matt LaFleur is just a caveat for some of these.
- [28:47]
Adam
Maybe. But Reed is frustrating. Right. Like Reid is having kind of a disappointing season. But, but actually there's. There's something else to that. For McConkey and Reed to be in the slot that much. They still get downfield targets. That helps. If you ha. If you are in the slot that much, a lot of the times it means you're not playing all that much because you're. And only on three receiver sets. But if they get downfield targets because like McConkey, if you're thinking of him as just this short area guide and he's not at all. He's kind of got a higher a dot for someone in the slot that much. But anyway, yeah, I thought it was interesting because jaden Reed played 57% of the snaps yesterday. That's his fifth game this season with a snap rate lower than 60%, his third with Jordan Love. Two of those were with Malik Willis. But he's obviously frustrating fantasy managers tough because they only threw 17 passes yesterday.
- [29:34]
Jacob
Yeah, it's just been a really weird season for the packers, contextually, with the quarterback injuries and then just stuff like this. I think there's a chance that it's about to just, like, the dam just breaks in a big way.
- [29:46]
Dan
Yeah.
- [29:46]
Jacob
If we do get some shootouts over.
- [29:47]
Adam
This next month, I think Jordan Love is a great buy low candidate because I don't know how low you guys. Like, he's so good, but he is. Like, I'd rather have him than Herbert.
- [29:59]
Jacob
No, no, he doesn't offer. The rushing is, I guess, the main thing. What's his, like, fantasy playoff schedule? Because it is if, like, Herbert might carry you to the playoffs and then give you, like, nine points in the.
- [30:11]
Adam
Championship at doing problem Seattle at Seattle. Home against New Orleans at Minnesota.
- [30:17]
Jacob
Man, I have that Minnesota game, but, I mean, he had a huge game against Minnesota previously. Like, if that gets into a shootout, Love could still have a huge game, but that is a tough matchup.
- [30:25]
Adam
He scored 22 points on 17 pass attempts against the. He had the most points of any quarterback against the Bears all year.
- [30:32]
Jacob
Yeah. You know, he was pressured on 50 of his drawbacks, too. And they just kind of like, were like, all right, enough of this. We're just gonna run the ball.
- [30:40]
Adam
All right, go ahead, Jacob. Sorry, you only talked about one guy. My bad. Go ahead.
- [30:43]
Jacob
No, it's a. It's a good. There's a lot of interesting context to get into there. Juwan Jennings, we got to just keep bringing him up. We'll do it quickly here. 39 first read target rate last week, that was up to 45 in week 11. Of course, George Kittle missing the game probably influenced that, but it's just like, man, this guy is a monster. He had, I think, seven of, like, 11 first downs for the 49ers in terms of converting passing first downs. Like, he's. You see, like the one where he literally just, like, physicals his way through three people to get a first down. Like, that's the thing. He's just. He's a dude. Like, he's trustworthy, and they're going to keep running things through him. I think when we've seen him be on the field, like, and healthy, he's been the primary option and put up absolutely monster numbers. So, yeah, the peripherals continue to look good for him. Like, his Yard per run rate went up this week. That's crazy because it's been in like all year. We're like it has to go down. The only players who are higher are Justin Jefferson and Nico Collins and A.J. brown. No, he's still there. He's still top four. Yeah.
- [31:42]
Dan
Are we willing to revisit the argument from last week? Is he a must start player?
- [31:47]
Adam
Yeah. Yes.
- [31:48]
Dan
Okay. You'll take the L on that one. Thank you.
- [31:51]
Jacob
Let's just bring up Jameson Williams too while we're here. He's my start, right? We saw it.
- [31:55]
Adam
No, so that's the thing without. Without Laporta. Jameson Williams is must start. I don't know about with Laporta, but. No, I just want to say with Juwan Jennings, I just think it's amazing. Why are the 49ers so good? Brock Purdy to Juan Jennings. That's two seventh round picks. Yeah, two seventh round picks.
- [32:09]
Dan
Really good development by them.
- [32:10]
Adam
But.
- [32:11]
Dan
But with those rates, like with that kind of volume in that kind of offense, there's just very few receivers who are actually going to be better starts weekly than Juwan Jennings, as crazy as that sounds.
- [32:20]
Adam
All right, go ahead. With Jameson Williams, who made the most of his targets for sure. And I think he had. I actually had some notes on him. He had one of his lowest ADA. He had his lowest 8 out of the year in any game with more than one target at 11.7 yard, eight odd. We also had a 64 yard touchdown catch and run against the team that gives up a ton of big plays. So go ahead. You think he's a must start?
- [32:39]
Jacob
I don't actually have anything on jmo. I just wanted to keep. Keep giving.
- [32:43]
Dan
Get another win in for me. Thank you, Jacob.
- [32:44]
Jacob
I appreciate you keep dunking. Let's keep dunking on Adam then. Are you ready to concede? The Niners going to score more than the Ravens going forward. Are we done with that one?
- [32:52]
Adam
They didn't even have that good of a game. They lost, man. They lost What?
- [32:56]
Jacob
They scored 20 more than the Ravens, right?
- [32:59]
Adam
They scored more than The Ravens scored 16. What was the Niners score? Oh, they scored 17. 17 to 16.
- [33:05]
Jacob
They really, really have 17.
- [33:07]
Dan
Yeah. Oh my God. It's so painful watching the Niners when you have Niners players in your fantasy team. Every single play clock for Shanahan goes down to two seconds and he just grinds that clock. But I still think you'll be right on that one, Jacob.
- [33:18]
Jacob
Brock Bowers. So Michael Mayer returned and it was just the first game back but still 85% route rate for Brock Bowers. That was the second highest of any tight week. So that is good because previously when he had been sharing the field with Mary, it was like a 67 route rate. Also. He obviously just had a monster game. He had a 52 of the team's first three targets. He converted 10 first downs. That is crazy. Only five tight ends dating back to 2000 have ever done that in a game. The Most ever is 11 by George Kittle. No one else has done that after that. It's Jason Whitten, Kellen Winslow, Mark Andrews and bowers each had 10. So we're saying Travis Kelsey, Rob Gronkowski, Tony Gonzalez, Antonio Gates, none of those guys ever did in a game. And Brock Bowers did as a 22 year old. And you know, that's, that's an obscure stat, but converting first downs is obviously important for, you know, moving the chains and winning real life football. And he's, he's just a monster. He's everything that people thought he might be as a prospect.
- [34:17]
Adam
Pretty good. I go back to, I remember on Hard Knocks they were saying, I forget who it was. Joe Shane, maybe. He's like, oh no, no, it was Dable. He's like, I called Nick Saban and he said two players in this class gave us problems. Every. We're problems. Brock Bowers and Malik Neighbors. I'll never forget that. That was really cool. All right, go ahead, keep going, sir.
- [34:37]
Jacob
Jackson, Smith and Jigbo. I just want to lay out a timeline here. So week nine, he hit a new career high with 42% first read target rate. Then they have their buy in week 10. Then DK Mecaf comes back. He had a three game absence and that like culminated in the big Week 9 game for JSN in the first half of Week 11, DK is back. They're like funneling everything through him. He had a 51st retarget rate in the first half, DK Metcalf that resulted in 23 yards. He had a drop. It just wasn't really working. JSN only had 12 of the first three targets in the first half. Cut all of them for 38 yards in the second half. We see Seattle change things and really funnel things through Smith and Jigba. He had a 42 first three target rate in the second half. Got all the sketchable targets for 72 yards in the second half. They come back and win. I think, you know, it's just one game and you don't want to get carried away with Just splitting things into halves and everything. But it seems like the momentum just continues to build for JSN and he just kind of keeps checking off things and it's like he might be doing the look at me, look at me, I'm the captain now thing, you know? Like, it seems crazy to say anyone would do that to DK Metcalf, but I mean I think Jason is really good. So this is another encouraging data point. Don't get carried away with it, but we've, we're getting a few of them as the year goes on here. Johnu Smith was the only tight end who did have a higher route rate than Brock Bowers this week. He also led the Dolphins in first downs again on the year. He and Tyreek, you'll have the same number of receiving first downs. Johnny Smith has the highest first down per run rate of any tight end among qualified tight ends. He continues to be a really important part of the offense and really the only part of the offense that's been like working. Devon Hn is, is working, of course, but like defenses are keying in on him so much that it is his like success rate is relatively low. He's often not as efficient as we've seen in the past. Whereas like Jonah Smith has been crazy efficient all year. I, I think this is real. Like it was another matchup where like the, the zone heavy too high safety stuff like suggest that we'll see a lot of Johnny but like we did again and he keeps being productive. He's always been productive when getting given opportunities, honestly.
- [36:47]
Adam
You guys remember when Jalen Waddle was on the Dolphins?
- [36:49]
Jacob
Yeah. Fifth. Jalen Waddle, fifth on the team in first three targets behind Malik Washington, behind Odell Beckham. Pretty cool.
- [36:58]
Dan
Not cool at all.
- [36:59]
Jacob
No, no, it's not Audric estimate. Remember that.
- [37:06]
Adam
What a week that was.
- [37:07]
Jacob
He'll always have week 1021 snap rate, 6 of 23 running back rush attempts. He had three offensive snaps in the first half.
- [37:16]
Dan
Wow.
- [37:17]
Jacob
So I guess, yeah, it's just right back to Javante. I wanted to bring up that Caleb Williams played better. We'll talk about the Bears in more detail, but I just wanted to highlight like Caleb, his catchable target rate I think might have been the highest that it's been all year. It was above league average, which is like a huge accomplishment for him at this point.
- [37:33]
Adam
Caleb.
- [37:34]
Jacob
Yeah, yeah, we have.
- [37:36]
Adam
That's one of our big topics.
- [37:37]
Jacob
Yeah, for sure. Last thing I want to hit on is the Bills. So I brought up pass rate over expectation at the Top. In reference to the Chargers, the Bills through the first six weeks were 23rd in pass rate over expectation, meaning they were running more than expected. Then they trade for Amari Cooper and from that point on, they've had a positive pass rate over expectation in every single game. Their rate during that time is 9.7%. So for reference, the Bengals had the highest proe in the league at 9.7 over the course of the full season. Second place is the Seahawks at 5.8%. So they're lately since making the trade for Cooper passing relative to expectations at like the highest rate in the league, which is just shocking for a Joe Brady offense. And I think it makes some sense, the timing like with the, the Cooper trade. So that's just interesting for Khalil Shakir and maybe Kinkade if he gets back, maybe Cooper. I thought he looked good on some of these outbreaking throws. With Josh Allen, his route rate was still right around 50. So this week it was, it was all Shakir. He had the highest first retarget rate and he was the most important part of the offense. But I think it could be Cooper down the stretch.
- [38:44]
Adam
Okay, I just gotta correct one thing I said earlier. Meant to do it earlier, but whoops. I said that Jamar Chase's yards per target was like double with, with and without Higgins on the field. Like better with Higgins on the field than off field. It is better. But I was comparing his yards per catch to his yards per target, so I made that mistake. His yards per target with Higgins on the field is 12.5. With him off the field, it's 8.9. His yards per catch is 17.5 with Higgins on the field. So my bad. They're still a huge, much more efficient player with Higgins on the field than off the field. All right, just some notes I had here on some snap counts. Adonai Mitchell played only 12 snaps against the Jets. We are going to talk about the Colts wide receivers. Kendrick Bourne, kind of interested. I mean, I don't know, mildly interested. He played 47% of the snaps. He had five catches for 70 yards and a touchdown on five targets. Coming off a game in week nine where he had four for 41 on six targets. So I. It's probably nothing, but I think he's been good.
- [39:43]
Jacob
But yeah, then they like benched him. They like phased them out in week 10. I was like, okay, they're just going to the young guys. But then he was back in this week.
- [39:48]
Adam
I thought he may have been hurt. He wasn't hurt. He just got benched.
- [39:51]
Jacob
I didn't see anything about him getting hurt.
- [39:53]
Adam
Well, he's 2% rostered. I guess that's why I'm interested in him, because there's leagues out there where you might need a Kendrick Bourne Baltimore wide receiver Snap shares Zay Flowers played 84% of the snaps. Bateman 80% Aguilar 39 Deontay Johnson 18% I believe this was the third straight week where Josh Oliver played more snaps than TJ Hawkinson. Hawkinson's been right around 48% of the snaps in all three of his games back. Don't know if that's going to get elevated. It really needs to. I know he was good two weeks or two games ago last week, but we need him to be on the field more and Oliver's hurt, so maybe that will change things. DeAndre Hopkins played less than half the snaps. The Chiefs are almost they're so rarely in three receiver sets. They have the fourth lowest rate of three receiver sets in the NFL. And Cleveland was in three receiver sets, three or more receiver sets on 84.3% of their snaps. They do that all the time. So that's, you know, Cleveland's another team we're going to talk about and what you can expect from their receivers. J.K. dobbins played 73% of the snaps and Brian Thomas Jr. People didn't trust them. I didn't trust him. He had he had a 33 yard catch overturned in the fourth quarter. He would have been over a hundred yards, well over a hundred yards with that catch.
- [41:04]
Jacob
Yes.
- [41:05]
Adam
Maybe he can have a big finish if Trevor Lawrence comes back. And I'm surprised Doug Peterson is still employed. I was expecting to be talking about a new coach, which could happen by tomorrow. We'll see. All right, we're gonna take a break. We got our four big topics, starting with the Colts wide receivers and what to expect with him with them. With Anthony Richardson back, we'll be right back on Fantasy football today. Thursday Night Football is on and it's only on Prime Video. This Thursday, the AFC's oldest rivalry is rekindled as the Pittsburgh Steelers visit the Cleveland Browns join Al Michaels, Kirk Herbstreet and Kaylee Harton for this exciting matchup. Coverage begins at 7pm Eastern with football's best party, TNF Tonight, presented by Verizon live from Cleveland. Not a Prime member? Not a problem. Simply sign up for a 30 day free trial and you can cancel at any time. It's the Steelers and Browns at 7pm Eastern on Thursday Night Football and It's on Prime Video. Restrictions apply. See Amazon.com amazonprime for details. Hey, order up.
- [42:08]
Heath
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- [42:21]
Adam
Colts get a big win on the road at the Jets Anthony. Anthony Richardson had a huge fourth quarter. He's only 44% rostered. First three quarters, Richardson was 12 of 20 for 143 yards. Fourth quarter, 8 of 10 for 129 yards and a touchdown and a rushing touchdown as well. 80% completion rate, a 0% off target rate in the fourth quarter. So he came alive. Dan, what is your take on the Colts wide receivers? Vinnie Knaps on Twitter says the Colts wide receivers now with Anthony Richardson. What. What lies ahead?
- [42:52]
Dan
Well, it was interesting to watch that game back on tape because they did figure out different ways to get Anthony Richardson more comfortable as a thrower. It seemed like earlier this year, Shane Steichen was trying to develop an offense that he envisioned and hoping kind of Richardson fits into that. And then this game, it went back to kind of what we saw last year from the small sample sizes. Richardson, which is like utilizing his skill set, more RPO early, more design, easy reads. And I thought it got him more comfortable and then allowed him to thrive a little bit as a thrower. I don't want to make too much of it because the jets have actually been a much worse defense than we thought they'd be this year. And so it's not necessarily maybe the matchup to, to make your declaration on, but I do feel like moving forward, this offense has a little bit more upside in from the passing game than I expected going into this, you know, second error of Anthony Richardson, they get.
- [43:38]
Adam
Detroit, which they give up a lot of points to wide receivers and not a lot to quarterbacks, which is strange. And they're at New England after that and then a buy. What do you think, Jacob? Can we trust Josh Downs or anyone else?
- [43:52]
Jacob
Yeah, I think you can trust Josh Downs for sure. I just tweeted out the Colts Anthony Richardson produced 213 catchable air yards this week, which is really high. Joe Burrow leads the league with 208 per game. So anybody can have a game where they go above 200, but still it's, it's encouraging. Like, I think that's got to be his highest mark on the year. And then James, I assume when you.
- [44:16]
Dan
Say Joe, Joe, Joe.
- [44:17]
Jacob
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're not including 259, 259 for Jameis Winston in his starts. We're gonna get it. But yeah, two. I think 17 is what I said for Anthony Richardson and that is good. He was pressured a ton. Over 40%. Yeah. Only will Levis and Jordan Love were pressured at a higher rate week 11 and still managed to have a. A good game. We saw the rushing as well, so super encouraging. I haven't watched it yet, but I'm going to.
- [44:44]
Adam
Yeah, I watched it live. Dan watched the tape. Richardson was definitely better and I'm glad you said that because I was watching the game going, oh, wow. They're really, you know, I use the word gimmicky. That sounds bad. But they were designing a lot of things to make it easy on Anthony Richardson and they were doing it creatively and it was working right. Good for them. They were just out scheming the jets, so. So I like that. That's a good point you brought up. And I think he'll be.
- [45:08]
Jacob
I'm seeing not a single scramble for Richardson. Is that possible? Were they all designed runs?
- [45:13]
Adam
I don't remember.
- [45:15]
Dan
The ones I saw were designed. I don't remember if there was a scramble though. Like, interesting. Yeah.
- [45:20]
Adam
Okay, so we'll see. Detroit's a much tougher matchup. They haven't allowed multiple touchdown passes to a quarterback yet, but they have not been great against mobile quarterbacks. So we'll see. I, I think Richardson's going to be one of the prizes on the free agent on the waiver wire at 44 rostered, we'll see how, how people react. All right. Joey Taranto says, do we see any difference in the scheme or the personnel usage with the new Bears offensive coordinator?
- [45:44]
Dan
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [45:46]
Jacob
I've got notes on this. Did you have something.
- [45:48]
Adam
Yeah.
- [45:48]
Jacob
You like teased stat, right?
- [45:49]
Adam
A lot. I mean, they had the third lowest pre snap motion rate in the NFL in weeks one through 10. Sixth highest in the NFL in week 11 so far. And they use motion on almost two thirds of their possession. They had been above 48 in only one other game. They had a higher run rate. They didn't have a single three and out for the first time all season. And they didn't.
- [46:16]
Jacob
You didn't see me tweet these, right?
- [46:18]
Adam
No, I didn't, I didn't. Okay.
- [46:19]
Jacob
We're like coming to all the same stuff.
- [46:20]
Adam
Okay. So we just looked at the same page on True Media. Just like. But no, I mean the pre snap motion, Jacob really stands out. If you look at the teams that lead the NFL and pre step motion, it's the Rams, Packers, Dolphins, Texans, Falcons, Niners, Chargers, Lions, Chiefs and then the Raiders are there as well. So it's, it's weird. I feel like everyone should just do it on almost every play.
- [46:41]
Dan
But yeah, I had two notes before. Before you dive in, Jacob. The two things I noticed from watching was one, they did a better job of moving Caleb Williams out of the pocket to find him some easier spots. Two, they use that pre snap motion in a creative way because I thought it did a good job of giving him kind of two reads to work through and a lot more quick game with that pre snap motion receiver. If he's open you can hit him and sometimes it allowed like underneath crossers. So I thought they did a better job of utilizing quick game against this defense, at least specifically. That was from that standpoint. But from the personnel standpoint, what I thought was interesting was they kind of, they had a very expansive personnel usage under Shane Waldron. This is kind of what happened in Seattle too. Played a lot of players that probably shouldn't have been on the field, if we're going to be honest. And then in this game the Bears got back to just a more. What's the word I'm looking for? Like a funnel look with set. They had 75 offensive snaps. 60 of them had more Alan Adunze and commit on the field. So almost all that's what you want. Like that's the best way to move your offense. You don't need to be mixing in all these tight ends and backs that aren't going to help you on any given snap like those guys could. So I thought that was really important. One final thing I thought was interesting just watching it, the different depth and the different ways they use DJ Moore. I'm a lot more excited about DJ more rest of season than I was prior to this and probably wouldn't have been if Waldron was still the coordinator. So I think that could be a nice thing to look forward to as well there.
- [48:03]
Jacob
87, first retarget rate for Caleb Williams this week was the second highest in the NFL. Going into this week it was at 60.5% which was the third lowest. And so yeah, I think Shane Waldron, like if I had to describe him, it's like galaxy brain, like you watch him and there's just so many plays where it's like, how, how did you think this is going to work? Then there's other plays where it's like, well, that was cool. I've never really seen that in terms of the way they're like moving things around and just kind of giving eye candy to the defense or whatever. But it's like those are just kind of few and far between and there's a lot of stuff that just doesn't work. Whereas this, this game, it felt like way more simple and that is born out in like basically every stat I've seen. So the first retarget rate is huge. For the offense as a whole. And especially as it pertains to fantasy, it's really relevant that the three receiver set rate went way up. It was at 83% during the Shane Waldron era. That was at 69. I think it was only above 81 other time all year. So more three receiver sets means more opportunities for all three of those guys, which is good for fantasy. Of course their success rate was the highest it's ever been. Their priest not motion. We hit on three and outs. We hit on only 21 of their plays. This is definitely a Walter thing. Only 21 of their plays resulted in no gain or negative yardage. Entering week 11 they had the third highest rate at 37%. And so like yeah, it was almost cut in half and it's just like yes, these negative plays. That's why we keep thinking like why is Caleb always trying to play hero ball? And it's like because he freaking has to. Because we keep getting in these disadvantageous situations. Yeah, I, yeah, go ahead.
- [49:47]
Adam
Let's. Let's pour a little cold water here. Right. Just to give the other side. They scored 19 points. Caleb did not throw a touchdown and he was not really so good for the first three quarters. He kind of came alive, made two really good throws to Roma Dunze on the last drive which should have been a game winning drive. It had the field goal block. It's not like they exploded offensively here and they. I feel they think they had the ball for a ton of time. Right.
- [50:12]
Jacob
It just feels like there's hope. It feels like you look at this and it's like okay, this could work maybe. Whereas before it's like this season can't get over fast enough. Like this is unbelievably bad.
- [50:22]
Adam
Yeah. And I have more hope for Odunze too. I mean he had 10 targets and he also had a. There was like an overthrown ball but basically for intended for a dunes they could have had a bigger game for Williams. I always look at the passes of 10 or more areas yards and in the first three quarters he was 1 of 4 for 25 yards in the fourth quarter. He was 4 of 5 for 66 yards. He did a similar thing against Washington where he had a really good fourth quarter and they should have won that game. They lost on the Hail Mary that he had a good fourth quarter and they should have won this game and he didn't follow it up. So I am encouraged. I am encouraged but I'm not like because it's week 12 and there are all these teams on by. You know that's going to make DJ Moore and A. Dunes I think starters for a lot of people. But I. I don't think we saw enough for me to be like yeah, it's. It's all systems go. It's certainly not for.
- [51:10]
Dan
I. I don't know. Yeah I don't think either. None of us think right.
- [51:13]
Adam
No.
- [51:14]
Dan
But just I like that the way Jacob termed it as there's some hope. A couple other things I just like not only how they utilize quick game and that's kind of what led to what you said. Adam. More time of possession but also some design quarterback runs for Caleb Williams. That was something that I wasn't used to seeing. They used him on his own read. His scramble rate must have been up. I don't have the numbers in front of me.
- [51:31]
Jacob
He had five scrambles which was the highest in the league. It was tied with Purdy.
- [51:35]
Dan
So that's something that's going to happen as well and that's good because that kind of goes back to the rich thing. These young quarterbacks, these rookie quarterbacks haven't seen a lot at the NFL level haven't been able to process much or reps to process much. Use their. If they're athletic like that, use them. Get your free yards while you can. And I think that's something we could see tick up to rest of season is rushing.
- [51:52]
Adam
Let me get your take on a couple of things. Someone yesterday said that I look like the kid from ELF and I want.
- [51:57]
Dan
To see the kid from ELF again to know there yeah this guy.
- [52:01]
Jacob
Where did. I saw that on Twitter. Oh man.
- [52:04]
Dan
Sorry.
- [52:06]
Adam
Yeah.
- [52:07]
Jacob
Oh I saw someone saying the Nick Sirianni looks like this guy. Oh yes.
- [52:12]
Adam
Isaac away go. Is the hoodie. Yeah.
- [52:14]
Dan
Then do you look like Nick Siri? Does Adam then look like Nick Sirianni?
- [52:18]
Jacob
No, I don't think so.
- [52:19]
Adam
I don't think.
- [52:19]
Dan
I really think Adam looks like this kid.
- [52:21]
Adam
Yeah but then there's one. Hold on, let me see.
- [52:24]
Dan
I mean they might weigh the same but I don't think he looks like him.
- [52:27]
Adam
Zuhire Says Adam's the kind of guy who locks the door when he's just washing his hands in a public restroom.
- [52:33]
Dan
100. I don't even know if Adam does wash his hands in a public restroom. He has his own, like, set of, like, ways to, like, clean his hands after going to the bathroom. Like, four checks.
- [52:42]
Adam
You know, if I go first, I.
- [52:43]
Dan
Have my own personal washing. Then I have an extra set of hands. Hand sanitizer, you know? You know, yes, if I go into.
- [52:49]
Adam
A bathroom, no, I'll go in and just wash my hands. But obviously, like, this scenario was, I didn't use the bathroom. I just went in to wash my hands. I don't usually lock the door because that's another thing that I have to touch. And my whole goal is to touch as few things as possible. If there are paper towels in the bathroom, I will use the paper towel to turn on the sink lock. I will lock the door, actually, I'll use the paper towel to lock the door. I will use the paper. I will not touch. Put my hand.
- [53:14]
Dan
Wait, you do the paper towel thing? Yeah, on everything.
- [53:18]
Adam
On the sink. On everything. Yeah.
- [53:19]
Dan
Oh, my God.
- [53:20]
Adam
Yeah.
- [53:21]
Dan
I couldn't ever imagine living like that, where I have to hit, cow up things like.
- [53:26]
Adam
Yeah, no, it's not. It's not fun. All right, another one from Vinnie here. He wants to know about the Browns wide receivers, and they're coming off a game where Jameis Winston threw for 395 yards on 46 pass attempts. Tillman had eight targets. Elijah Moore had eight targets. Jerry Judy had 11 targets. Two of those guys were good. Tillman was bad. Jacob, do you have hope for the. And now. And now we've got Steelers, Broncos, Steelers coming up.
- [53:51]
Dan
Up.
- [53:51]
Adam
Do you have hope for the Browns wide receivers going forward?
- [53:55]
Jacob
Not really. Like, because of the matchups, I'm pretty worried that they're going to bench James Winston at some point. We'll see on that. But, like, if they're not winning, if it falls apart, like, I don't know. It's the Browns. They do dumb stuff all the time. Maybe, like, they wanted. It seemed like they wanted to go to DTR originally when Watson went down, but, yeah, as long as Winston's there, I think you. You can just, you know, throw a. Hoping a prayer out there and start these guys because the volume is so high. You know, they're. They're, like, all in the top 10 in air yards every single week. So, like, go. You know, go for it. But, like, you're gonna have weeks like this with Tillman, where it's I think only like a fourth of his air yards were catchable in three games with Winston, he has 207 uncatchable air yards. So, like, Judy's had it better in that regard. Judy's uncatchable area number is 112. Judy has the highest catchable target rate on the team during those starts, other than Joku, who has just such short targets. But yeah, with Winston, it's like unlike anything we are seeing in the NFL in terms of airing it out. And like, honestly, a lot of it is catchable, but on an individual player to player basis, it can be really volatile week to week because like what we just saw with till then.
- [55:09]
Adam
Well, look, we laid it out a couple weeks ago, right? They're in three receiver sets all the time and they throw the ball all the time. The question is, are they going to throw the ball all the time against the Broncos and the Steelers? Those teams, they're both in the top half of the league in terms of past attempts allowed per game. The last three opponents that Jameis Winston has faced rank very high. The first, eighth and fifth in past attempts per game against the next three opponents or just two teams. Pittsburgh's 10th and Denver's 13th in past attempts against. So I do think they are going to throw the ball. They have their number one in pass rate. They are just a throwing, throwing team. They more than any other team in football. So, yeah, I actually find it kind of think these guys are going to be okay. I don't think you have to necessarily run away from them. The weird thing I noticed when I was watching the tape was like, man, James Winston's thrown to the right a lot. Is this a trend? It is. Jameis Winston, in week 11, he had 21 pass attempts to the right, 14 to the left, nine over the middle. In 2023, he had 27 pass attempts to the right. He didn't have throw a lot in 2023. 27 pass attempts to the right, 10 to the left, 10 to the middle for this entire season. 62 to the right, 51 to the left, 30 over the middle. So he just throws right a lot. And Jerry Judy actually lines up on the right more than anyone else. Like, it's like more kind of like 60, 40, he's on the right, Untilman's on the left. So I just thought that was kind of where you want beyond the box score. That's beyond the box score for you. But I think they're going to be okay. I think in the Last three games where he has started, where Winston started, I think two of the receivers have had a good game and one has had a bad game. In like all three games, they just kind of take turns like, yeah, Elijah Moore was garbage last week, Tillman was bad this week, and three games ago, Jerry Judy scored 2.8 fantasy points.
- [57:05]
Jacob
They're basically like Calvin Ridley, but there's three of them on the same team and it's just like, yeah, I don't know, you're just playing roulette.
- [57:13]
Dan
Yeah. There could be worse situations though with all those air yards like that. Some of these offenses don't throw the ball, so it's at least you're getting the chance for I again, these like back end flex plays. I'd rather get the chance in an offense that's going to throw the ball up.
- [57:26]
Jacob
And I think Jameis is playing better than Will Levis.
- [57:29]
Dan
Yeah.
- [57:30]
Jacob
On the Ridley thing.
- [57:31]
Dan
Yes.
- [57:31]
Adam
All right, last one is from A.J. johnson. Are we worried about the Ravens offense with their remaining schedule? Except for the Giants, who they play in Week 15, they have the Chargers on the road, then the Eagles defense, so good, then a buy, then the Giants, then the Steelers again, and then they're at Houston. So are we worried about the Ravens offense with a difficult schedule coming up?
- [57:56]
Dan
Depending on your expectations? Yes. Like, I don't think they're going to play at the level they had played at where essentially like Lamar Jackson and Derek Henry were fantasy. The only people that mattered for winning a fantasy matchup for a lot of weeks. Having those guys on your team. I don't think that's going to be the case rest of the season. These are difficult matchups, but ultimately I still think they're going to be able to score point. I don't think it's like we're worried about benching them, right?
- [58:19]
Jacob
No, but you could maybe like trade them. You know, like if. If Lamar still has this like massive cheat code perception, you know, where it's like he has outscored the next highest quarterback by 50 points or whatever. You could turn that into. If you can turn that into that kind of value, that might make sense. Because I don't think that's necessarily what you can expect rest of season, especially when there's a week 14 buy. So, like, if you need to feel good about winning week 14 and heading into your buy or heading into the playoffs and all that, like, I would definitely be interested in like a deal where you move from him to. To Allen or something or I don't know if that People probably don't do like parallel swaps like that very often, but like him to down to Jordan Love and then also get back a really good flex option or something.
- [59:03]
Adam
Yeah. But I, you know, to make the case for Jackson. Scored 27 points at the Chiefs. They have a good defense. Scored 27.6 fantasy points against the Bills. They have a good defense. Scored 29.6 fantasy points on 19 pass attempts against the Denver Broncos. He.
- [59:21]
Jacob
He's Lamar freaking Jackson.
- [59:23]
Adam
Steelers own. The Steelers own him. I mean, what. I thought this would be different, but they get him every time. Pretty much like he just cannot play well against the Steelers. And he does have the Steelers one more time and it's in your fantasy semifinals. But he's. He's been great against every other team. Like I mentioned, the Ravens moved the ball really well against the Steelers. They had the most yards per play of any opponent against the Steelers all year. The problem in this game, in my opinion, was Lamar Jackson was just off down the field. He was 3:12, 3 of 12 for 77 yards. One touchdown, one interception on pass attempts of 15 or more area.
- [59:58]
Dan
One really bad drop by Zay Flowers.
- [60:00]
Adam
Too terrible drop by Flowers. He had a kind of a near touchdown with Deontay Johnson early in the game up the sideline, but it wasn't a great throw. Slightly under threw that ball to Justice Hill. It ended up being an interception. 50% off target rate on throws of 15 or more air yards was by far his. His worst mark of the season. So I just think he had an off game. If he had had a normal game, they probably would have put up a lot of points against the Raven events, the Steelers. And I personally think it was more on Lamar Jackson than. Than the Steelers. I can't give you a stat to say that I agree. I'm right. Just that's my interpretation. He had some plays to make and he didn't make them.
- [60:34]
Jacob
But what about Derek Henry? Derek Henry or Chase Brown rest of season.
- [60:39]
Adam
I'm still gonna go Henry with the bot. Oh yeah. Because Bengals have a buy this week.
- [60:46]
Jacob
Oh, okay. Nice.
- [60:48]
Adam
Yeah. No. Henry has scored fewer than 15 fantasy points in PPR in four of his last five games.
- [60:54]
Dan
I came into this day, side note, knowing I was having a bad hair day, boys. But yes, you know how you know it for sure? It's bad. Oh, it's bad. I see it. But you know you know for sure when you see one commenter say stands something about this. Is it painted on?
- [61:12]
Jacob
Izzy Carlos Boozer in here.
- [61:15]
Adam
You look fine there You. When you. When you put. When you ran it back.
- [61:19]
Dan
No, no, I need to. I need a haircut again. It's coming to that point again.
- [61:23]
Jacob
What a comment.
- [61:25]
Dan
It was a great comment. Good job.
- [61:27]
Adam
I am crediting the defense, Raj. You know, Raj, I am credit. Why don't you listen to the words I say? I am crediting the defense. I said the Steelers own him. What is with you Internet trolls? Like you just live for this stuff. And congratulations, you got under my skin. I went 55 minutes ignoring this guy. Yes, I'm crediting the d. They did a great job. But it go. You go. Well, you go watch the tape, bud. Look at his.
- [61:51]
Dan
No one get. Nobody gets under Adam's skin quite like Rod.
- [61:54]
Adam
Well, he's a jerk.
- [61:55]
Dan
The guy is really good at it.
- [61:56]
Adam
Just every day. He just. He just. He just gets on. He is. He knows he's a jerk. He's not. I'm not telling him anything he doesn't know. But listen, go watch. I invite anyone. Go watch much if you can filter it out. I don't know if you can. 15/air yard past temps for Lamar Jackson. He really struggled. He just. He was just way off for. On a lot of them. And then there was the zay flowers drop. But the plays were there to be made in. I said in my opinion that was more on Lamar Jackson than Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh still did obviously a very good job because I said 6.1 yards per play for the Ravens. That's the most against Pittsburgh, but that's also well under the stay average 7 yards per play for the season, which is the most in football. So obviously Pittsburgh did a very good job. A little bit of context there. You it troll. All right, we are out of here.
- [62:46]
Jacob
The jerk store called Raj.
- [62:48]
Adam
They are.
- [62:48]
Jacob
They're running out of you.
- [62:50]
Dan
Yeah, there we go.
- [62:51]
Adam
I agree. They are. Okay. So anyway, we're done for the day than. Thank you all for listening and watching and we will talk to you tomorrow with the waiver wire. It should be actually a pretty interesting waiver wire show. Yeah, you're going to need a lot of help. Hopefully you got ahead of the game. For Jacob and Dan and Thomas, I'm Adam, Kid from hell. We will talk to you. Listen, I don't care if your fantasy teams won. If your favorite team beat its arch rival, your football Sunday isn't going to be good enough if you don't nail the. The food aspect of it. If you're not using Hellman's real mayonnaise. What are you doing? Come on. Hellman's Real Mayonnaise is a rich, creamy mayonnaise made with real simple ingredients. Hellman's can be used to bring out the best rich, creamy, delicious flavor in a variety of dishes, dips, sandwiches, deviled eggs, sauces, salads and more. Look, if you're having people over to watch the game or you just want to have good food by yourself, consider this little tip from me. My wife makes the best Buffalo chicken dip. The key ingredient? Hellman's Mayonnaise. It brings it to another level. It's probably my favorite snack on game day. So let me finish by imploring you to step up your mayonnaise game with a series of puns. Mayo game day be delicious, Mayo dip be creamy and your fantasy team be dreamy. And how about this for a fantasy team name Drake Mayo. You get the point. You can purchase Hellman's at your local Walmart, Kroger or grocery store and use it to add extra deliciousness and creamy flavor to your game day dishes. This football season.